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Random Creativity in Dungeons & Dragons
When M.T. Black, the DM's Guild best-selling producer, begins to consider adventures he wishes to develop and the titles he wants to use for those adventures, he doesn't sit back in a large leather...
View ArticleLost Monuments of Chult
The eternal buzz of carniverous insects fills the humid air. Each step in the swamp threatens to tear the boot from your foot or expel a blast of poisonous gas. The eyes of beasts seem always upon you...
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The Abstract Battlemap
One of the wonderful things about D&D is how flexible the game is for the different styles of play we bring to our tables. We can see this most clearly in our options for running combat. Some DMs...
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The Story Focus of D&D
There's a change happening in Dungeons & Dragons games. It's something that's been evolving since the release of the fifth edition of D&D and continuing its momentum over the past three years....
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Running Port Nyanzaru in Tomb of Annihilation
Note, this article contains spoilers for the Tomb of Annihilation campaign adventure. Tomb of Annihilation is a campaign adventure filled with jungle explorations, buried mysteries, strange creatures,...
View ArticleDM's Deep Dive: D&D for the Visually Impaired
This month on the DM's Deep Dive, a proud member of the Don't Split the Podcast Network, I was privileged to talk to my friend and lifelong gamer, Sharon Dudley, about her experiences as a visually...
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Going There
Originally published August 2015 The older we get the harder it is for us to fall back into our imaginations and really go there. As children we're free to let our imaginations run wild. A cardboard...
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Exploring Chult
The fantastic hardback adventure, Tomb of Annihilation, includes a large throwback to the hex-crawl. In this mode of play, the characters make their way through the wilderness of Chult as they seek out...
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The Emotional Investment of Dungeon Mastering
A band of powerful adventurers explores the mausoleum of a powerful dracolich. The adventurers enter a large chamber and with sparks of unnatural energy, five slaads appear, three red and two blue....
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Choosing Targets
Today we're going to talk about how we choose targets for our monsters when running our Dungeons & Dragons games. We'll focus on two ways in particular: Choosing targets that make sense for the...
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The Urgency of the Death Curse
Note: This article contains spoilers for the D&D adventure Tomb of Annihilation. The Death Curse is the main driver of the story in the Dungeons & Dragons adventure Tomb of Annihilation. It is...
View ArticleDM's Deep Dive: Grant Ellis on Understanding Streaming D&D
D&D is exploding. 2017 was D&D's best year for sales since Wizards of the Coast bought the brand from TSR back in 1997. The core books had all become best selling books for weeks on end. The...
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Finding and Maintaining a D&D Group
Note: This article is reposed with permission from the original posted to D&D Beyond on March 2018. It is the first on a six-part series of articles focused on helping new D&D DMs put together...
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Scaling the Story to the Level of the Characters
In a recent discussion on Twitter, my friend Teos Abadia (Alphastream on Twitter) and I, along with a few others, talked about one of my #dnd tip tweets I posted. The tweet said: Make sure the scope of...
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Building Lazy Dungeons
We've talked before about making dungeons awesome, building living dungeons, and developing fantastic locations but not yet about how to build lazy dungeons. How do the philosophies of the lazy dungeon...
View ArticleStarting Strong At Your First Dungeons & Dragons Game
Note: This article is reposed with permission from the original posted to D&D Beyond on March 2018. It is the first on a six-part series of articles focused on helping new D&D DMs put together...
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The Lost Temple of the Eshowdow
Note, this article contains spoilers for Tomb of Annihilation. Nearly five thousand years ago many tribes followed the messengers of Ubtao to the lands of Chult. Nearly two thousand years ago a great...
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Tools for New D&D Dungeon Masters
Note: This article is reposed with permission from the original posted to D&D Beyond on March 2018. It is the third in a six-part series of articles focused on helping new D&D DMs put together...
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Making the Most of *Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes*
Wizards of the Coast recently released their third monster-focused sourcebook, Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, for the fifth edition of Dungeons & Dragons. Like Volo's Guide to Monsters,...
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A Dwarven Forge Caverns Deep Kickstarter Guide
The folks over at Dwarven Forge are right in the middle of their sixth Kickstarter for a new set of cavern-focused encounters and pieces called Caverns Deep. The Dwarven Forge folks reached out to me...
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