Having just defeated the evil warlock Orpheus, Prestige Worldwide sets out to do what they do best – search for loot. In addition to a pouch containing 40 gold worth of Residuum (ritual component dust) and several skeletal finger bones, orpheus is wearing a few magical garments:

Belt of False Life:
Item Slot: Waist
Property: You gain a +1 item bonus to your healing surge value.

+1 Cloak of the Walking Wounded:
Item Slot: Neck
Enhancement: +1 to Fortitude, Reflex, and Will defenses.
Property: If you use your second wind while injured, you can expend two healing surges instead of one (gaining hit points from both).

The potion counter was jostled quite badly during the battle, and as a result many of the bottles have broken. Fortunately, the male fire bug remains alive and safely inside his container. A careful search through the shattered glass reveals four healing potions also survived intact.

Down in the basement is Orpheus’s laboratory as well as living quarters for him and his two former assistants. Orpheus’s laboratory has a small dis-organized desk an operating table with the dissected remains of some poor miner. Sorting through the mess on his desk reveals four ritual books: Endure Elements, Secret Page, Knock, and Eye of Alarm. Resting atop a tray of rusty operating tools are a pair of sinister looking leather gloves:

Blood-letting Gloves:
Item Slot: Hands
Power (Daily): Free Action. Use this power when you hit with a light blade melee attack and have combat advantage against the target. That attack deals an extra ongoing 5 damage (save ends). If the attack already deals ongoing damage of any type, this item’s power has no effect.

The shared living quarters contains the personal property of the three mages. There is little of interest in their dressers, aside from 545 gold and 160 gold worth of Residuum. One of the apprentices also had a rather interesting item stashed between his mattress and bed frame:

+1 Necroburst Longbow:
Enhancement: +1 to attack and damage rolls.
Critical: +1d6 necrotic damage.
Power (Daily ): Free Action. The next ranged basic attack you make with this weapon before the end of your turn becomes a burst 1 centered on the target, attacking all creatures in the burst. Make the attacks against the opponents’ Reflex defense instead of their AC. Instead of normal damage, each target hit takes ongoing 5 necrotic damage (save ends).

—

Your next quest is to seek out the lair of a local young green dragon, and return to Julius with the dragon’s claws so that he may finish purifiying the orb of unrest. The town does not have much gold left. Julius has promised you 200 gold, and as much time as you’d like studying the various ritual and other books in his library.

The Green Dragon, called Muro, lairs in the forest to the west of Redwall. He is vain, as most dragons are, and demands tribute from a local band of hobgoblins. It is likely that he has amassed a fairly impressive hoard.

Quar’othi fire bugs are a volatile breed of insects with a diet based on a phosphorescent mold that is toxic to most other creatures. Occasionally bred for their explosive power, a poorly managed swarm of fire bugs has put a quick and disastrous end to more than one get rich quick scheme.

I’m trying to start a D&D campaign (or at least one solid adventure) with some of the people from work. Only one of them has played D&D before, so this is an introduction to character options for them. If there’s anything any of you want to ask questions about, please don’t be shy.

This is going to be far from a comprehensive guide, just some of the fundamentals.

Mathematically, the core to a character is their six stats: Strength (STR), Constitution (CON), Dexterity (DEX), Intelligence (INT), Wisdom (WIS), and Charisma (CHA). Each stat plugs into various formulas on a character sheet, and you end up with the actual numbers you use to modify the results of dice rolls. Higher numbers are better. The process of what each stat does exactly is much easier to explain in person, but the learning curve really isn’t as bad as it appears.

Anyway, here’s a list of races and classes to choose from for creating your characters:

Available Races:

Here’s the list of races to choose from. Each race (aside from humans) gets a bonus to two ability scores. Each race also gets a special power. Most powers are only useable occasionally (once per encounter), but humans and goblins can use their powers as often as they like. The last three races in the list are under 4 feet tall, and considered small creatures. They can’t use big two-handed weapons, and have to wield some one-handed weapons with both hands.

Available Classes:

And here’s the list of classes to chose from. You can pair any race with any class, but some are better suited than others. The powers of each class are usually driven primarily by one or two ability scores, with certain secondary scores being important as well.

The classes are divided into four combat roles. Generally speaking: leaders have the best healing abilities, strikers do a ton of damage, controllers are good at putting foes at a disadvantage, and defenders are resilient tanks. Ideally you want at least one of each role in the adventuring party, but it’s not a big deal if that doesn’t happen. Leaders are essential though, you need at least one of those.

As you can see in the four posts below, I have the character sheets for the adventure finalized. If you want to check them out in their original word .docs they’re all zipped up right here. The actual physical character sheets are the most readable in my opinion. Each is two pages: the first page has the character’s stats and portraits, and the second page has the each of the character’s three at-will powers. The rest of the powers are printed out on color coded index cards for ease of use at the table.

A massive wall of stats and powers may be comprehensive, but it tends to lack readability. So let me briefly explain the four characters:

The Paladin:

This guy is the team’s best tank in that he has the highest armor class and most hit points. But he is also the team’s spell caster. Both of his big flashy daily spells are ranged spells that bring the pain while he brings the justice. Finally, he is the team’s secondary healer.

The Fighter:

A very different kind of defender than the paladin, this fighter is all about versatility and area containment. He excels at charging into a hostile area and locking down groups of clustered opponents. Depending on the situation he will find himself switching between equipping his shield or wielding his sword with both hands.

The Captain:

Although he is the group’s primary healer, he also excels at positioning his comrades around the battlefield to enable flanking bonuses and sneak attacks. With such a melee heavy team, he’s going to get alot of use out of his movement abilities. Also, he’s the leader of the group. He gets to decide where they go, how to allocate funds, and is diplomatic enough to negotiate hostage situations.

The Rogue:

Stab stab stab. The rogue finds ways to distract his enemies or put them off-balance, and then he stabs them. With such a melee-heavy group, and so many tricks up his sleeve, the rogue should be able to find a way to work that massive damage bonus from sneak attack just about every turn. He’s also good for picking locks and disabling traps.

Gnoll Rogue:
Age:  14
Possible Names: Scout, Fleabiter, The Derg

Vitality:
Maximum hit points: 45
Injured at:  22 or fewer hit points
Healing surge value: 11
Healing surges per day: 10

Defenses:
Armor Class: 18
Fortitude: 15
Reflex: 18
Will: 14

Movement:
Speed: 7
Initiative: +8

Combat:
Attack Bonus (aka AB): +10
Weapon: Daggers (light one-handed)
Weapon Dice (aka [W]): d4
Damage Bonus (aka DB): +4

Skills:
Acrobatics: +11
Athletics: +10
Bluff: +9
Heal: +1
Intimidate: +3
Stealth: +11
Lockpicking: +13

Special Features:
-Sneak Attack: Once per round when you have combat advantage against an opponent and hit them with a light weapon, you do an extra 2d8+3 damage to that opponent.
-Cornered Beast: You gain +2 to all damage rolls while you’re injured.
-Dagger Specialization: +1 to attack rolls made with a dagger (already counted in your attack bonus).

For a complete list of this character’s powers click here:

(more…)

Dragonborn Paladin:
Age:  112
Possible Names: Thanatos, Stormbringer, Drake

Vitality:
Maximum hit points: 57
Injured at:  28 or fewer hit points
Healing surge value: 14
Healing surges per day: 11

Defenses:
Armor Class: 23
Fortitude: 15
Reflex: 15
Will: 17

Movement:
Speed: 5
Initiative: +3

Combat:
Attack Bonus (aka AB): +9
Weapon: Longsword (versatile)
Weapon Dice (aka [W]): d8
Damage Bonus (aka DB): +4

Skills:
Acrobatics: -1
Athletics: +7
Heal: +10
Intimidate: +13
Religion: +10

Special Features:
-Draconic Fury: You gain a +1 bonus to all attack rolls while injured.

For a full list of this character’s powers click here:

(more…)

Warforged Fighter:
Age:  7
Possible Names: Unit 24, Mecha, Iron Bull

Vitality:
Maximum hit points: 55
Injured at:  27 or fewer hit points
Healing Surge value: 13
Healing Surges per day: 12

Defenses:
Armor Class: 19 (or 21 with a shield equipped)
Fortitude: 18
Reflex: 14 (or 16 with a shield equipped)
Will: 14

Movement:
Speed: 6 (or 7 if charging)
Initiative: +8

Combat:
Attack Bonus (aka AB): +9
Weapon: Long sword (versatile)
Weapon Dice (aka [W]): d8
Damage Bonus (aka DB): +4 (or +5 if wielding a weapon with both hands)

Skills:
Acrobatics: +4 (or +2 with a shield equipped)
Athletics: +11 (or +9 with a shield equipped)
Heal: +9
Intimidate: +6

Special Features:
-Combat Superiority: You gain a +2 bonus to attack rolls when making an opportunity attack, and any moving enemy struck by your opportunity attacks is forced to stop moving.

For a full list of this character’s powers click here:

(more…)

Age:  31
Possible Names: Captain Dean Barlow, Sarge, Duke Thaddington

Vitality:
Maximum hit points: 42
Injured at:  21 or fewer hit points
Healing surge value: 10
Healing surges per day: 10

Defenses:
Armor Class: 19 (or 20 with a shield equipped)
Fortitude: 17
Reflex: 17 (or 18 with a shield equipped)
Will: 16

Movement:
Speed: 5
Initiative: +3

Combat:
Attack Bonus (aka AB): +8
Weapon: Long sword (versatile) or Long spear (two-handed reach)
Weapon Dice (aka [W]): d8 or d10
Damage Bonus (aka DB): +3

Skills:
Acrobatics: +4
Athletics: +11
Diplomacy: +11
Heal: +9
Insight: +9
Intimidate: +6

Special Features:
- Tactical Assault: Whenever you or an ally spends an action point to make an extra attack they get +4 to the attack roll.

For a full list of this character’s powers click here: (more…)

Recapping the Fallcrest campaign will have to wait, it looks like I’m going to be running a D&D gaming session for a group of good friends next Friday night. That means I have a number of things to accomplish before then:

• Finish writing the adventure: I can’t run a game night without a finished adventure unless I’m planning to freestyle a few encounters, but in this case I’m not. I’ll get into more detail on the adventure itself in a minute, but as of right now it is only about half-way completed.

• Scheduling: The person running the game usually ends up as figuring out who is playing, when they’re playing, and where. Getting all of your players to agree is sometimes the trickiest part of being a DM.

• Designing character sheets: I’m not a huge fan of the official 4th edition D&D character sheets. They are a useful worksheet for creating a new character or maintaining that character’s stats throughout a campaign, but they’re also very clunky and lack a template for detailing the character’s powers. I intend to have streamlined sheets for my players that leave out all of the unnecessary background math, add easily readable stats and powers, and provide a place for the players to keep track of things like hit points during an encounter.

• Getting my table props ready: Having illustrations to present to your players during the course of the adventure helps to give them a concrete and unified concept of what they’re dealing with. I like to spend the occasional evening scouring a new website I’ve stumbled across for quality fantasy art and filing it away for later use. I also have other print outs to make, like the list items available from the local merchant. Pre-drawing the encounters onto the big graph paper grids I use speeds up transitions between encounters, and having a system of tools and tokens to represent various bits of game state information like status effects and initiative orders makes complex encounters more manageable.

So what is this adventure I’m running? Well I don’t have a title for it yet, but it is a combat-heavy adventure featuring this team of mercenaries drawn by Gabe from Penny-Arcade:

From left to right we have a human captain, dragonborn paladin, warforged fighter, and gnoll rogue. It is a very melee heavy group, and aside from the rogue it’s also a very defensive group. I’ll have further updates throughout the week as I finish up the adventure.

It has been waaaay too long since I last posted on the site. A whole campaign has come and gone, I have worked a lot on utilities to streamline table play, and I have multiple new adventures midway through development.

The one thing I haven’t done is maintain the site, my bad. I mean to change that now and grow this site into what it deserves to be. I gave things a fresh coat of paint today, and am brushing up on all the web technologies I’ve been missing out on.

I have so many places I could start… but I’ll think I’ll begin with an introduction to the Fallcrest campaign that ran earlier this year as my introduction to D&D 4th edition:

I used the town of Fallcrest in the Nentir Vale as the campaign’s backdrop. Both of my primary players were D&D vets (though new to 4th Edition), and we all worked together with the source material offered by the core 4th edition books to craft the character’s abilities and backgrounds.

Both character’s backgrounds involved a recent personal tragedy relating to their clan/tribe which lead to them changing their devotional allegiances from their ancestral dwarven/elven gods to a darker god of balance and death known as The Raven Queen.

The Stonewheel clan of dwarves had recently discovered a dark strain of ore deep within their mountain caves. In the typical dwarven fashion they dug too deep, and indavertantly unleashed a rift of dark energy that surged through the caverns of their clanhold. The rush of energy swept up and out of the mountain killing and corrupting most of the dwarves as it went. Havor Stonewheel the cleric was one of the few uncorrupted survivors, and he left the mountains shortly after the cataclysm in search answers as to what had happened and why he suddenly felt so cut off from the spirit of Moradin.

Aumnibiru the elven ranger had grown up fighting goblins in a perpetual territory war for Harken forest. A huge surge in the goblin population over the last 10 years had all but obliterated the Oaksinger tribe, and the last remaining tribe members were forced to abandon their homes in a pilgrimmage for a new land to sustain them. Unfortunately their path lead them directly through the troll-infested Witchlight Fens. As dusk fell trolls rose out of the marsh and began slaughtering the unaware elves. Aumnibiru managed a narrow escape, but he was the only Oaksinger to make it out alive.

Two days after the massacre Aumnibiru stumbled into Fallcrest seeking refuge just as Havor arrived to the town in search of an estranged ancestor’s tomb.

The characters started at level 2, and over the course of the campaign made it up to level 8. Havor Stonewheel was a dwarven cleric specializing in healing and ranged magical attacks, (using a build commonly referred to as a laser cleric). Meanwhile, Aumnibiru was a dual-wielding elven ranger using bastard swords.

Four to six players are considered the ideal number according to the official books, and we only had 2 regulars. As a result, individual encounter design was a little more limited until I developed an understanding of the use of different monster roles. However, we were all learning the 4th edition system together, so starting with more straightforward and simple encounters probably worked to our favor.

I think that’s probably plenty for now, so I’m going to cut myself off. Hopefully if I actually keep up posting I’ll eventually get good at it, because I don’t think I’m there just yet. But in my next post on the Fallcrest campaign I’ll go into details about the first adventure, the arrival of an arrogant young lord to town, and his search for magical artifacts.