Posts

Grappling with an Unorthodox Concept

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Grappling is a fun and unique mechanic which people often tailor their characters around. Commonly the Goliath Barbarian or perhaps warrior is a popular choice, for a number of obvious reasons. However due to me liking to raise the bar for a number of ridiculous reasons I would like to put forward my favorite alternative. The Bugbear Sorcerer Grappler. Yes... sounds ridiculous doesn't it? Grappling Refresh Ok so first things first, lets refresh our memories as to the grappling rules. As taken from a terrific post by Ktkenshinx on grappling from Enworld , lets have a look at the basics: Grappling is a "special melee attack". To grapple a target, you must "use the Attack action" to then make your special melee attack (the grapple). From an RAW perspective, the "Multiattack" ability of monsters cannot enable multiple grapples because it is its own action type. If you have multiple attacks for the Attack action, you can replace as many of them

The Scorned Sorcerer

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As far as class thematic's go, Sorcerers have to be some of the most flavorful. Storm, Sea, Shadow, Draconic, Favored Soul, Wild Magic, Stone, and Phoenix, they all just work beautifully with their unique sub class abilities. What falls short unfortunately is the base class itself, with a very restrictive spell list and no ritual spell casting, its hard to justify a sorcerer over a wizard. But I personally have a soft spot for sorcerers, so lets have a look at making the most out of this class. Wizbanga the Kobold Sorcerer, he saved many a life in his day. Charisma, a PC's Best Friend Having a spell casting modifier based of charisma is a huge bonus that grants a sorcerer some reprieve, as having a strong modifier for social skills allows sorcerers to excel in social interactions. Additionally many races have great natural bonuses to charisma, with Tiefling, Aasimar, Half-Elf and Yuan-ti Pureblood all gaining a starting +2, there is plenty of opportunity to start with a

Divining the Perfect Gift this Christmas

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Looking for a fun holiday present to get a fellow gamer, significant other, your overworked DM, or even yourself? Well look no further!! The hobby of tabletop gaming has a large number of resources available from mini's to maps, supplements to subscriptions, books to bags, and even dice to dresses.    In the spirit of honesty, I have no affiliation with any of these products or companies, apart from having purchased almost everything on this list and personally recommending them as great resources which I have enjoyed using.   For Newer Players/DM's To begin with, if you are contemplating jumping into the world of D&D, there's no other gift i could recommend more highly than the 5e Starter Se t. Its where my family and I started and gave us hours of enjoyment for a little over $25aud. The next item newer players will most likely want to invest in would be a 7 piece dice set. Chessex would most likely be the default brand, with a large range of colours an

Humbly Helping...

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Humble Bundle is a great resource for any gaming enthusiast. For Tabletop players, the content on offer is seldom relevant, Currently however as of the 8/12/17, people can pick up a massive batch of content starting from tier 1 for just $1 through to tier 3 at $17. Now I'm in no way associated with Humble Bundle (unfortunately), I  just love a good deal and the idea that my money can build my hobby and help charity. You can follow the following link to find out more: Humble RPG Book Bundle The content comes from 2 of the most well known 3rd party producers for D&D 5e Content, Kobold Press and Frog God Games. This content is not official cannon but is well constructed, edited and has a number of favourable reviews. For the purists out there not interested in homebrew mechanical content, just the adventures alone may be enough to justify the price. I personally enjoy flicking through adventures to get traps, plots, maps, or even BBEG's for my own campaigns. That'

Session Zero Suggestion

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The concept of a session zero is a great idea which allows the party to create characters without potentially stepping on each others toes. In reality however, I often see people just pick the characters they want to play, which could lead to 3 melee tanks and a wizard or 3 charisma based characters and a cleric. Now this isn't wrong in any way, it just means that more people are capable of filling the same niche, which leads to less overall coverage of all the various skills and abilities. This can potentially complicate things further as it means there's more competition to fulfill certain aspects. Hence the 'stepping on each others toes' issue. I think DM's and players at this point have a responsibility to attempt to split the responsibilities evenly between the group to ensure everyone has their own niche and chance to shine. So to counter this issue in my own games I have devised a simple setup to have players "specialise" in a particular field

Sneak Peak: Upcoming Cooking Supplement for 5e

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From Dungeon to Dessert Welcome to Rocco Battlehorn’s complete guide to field dressing and cooking all of the lands most dangerous game and delicious flora. This comprehensive guide covers how to butcher and cook all manner of beast and monstrosity, as well as how to identify and utilise all types of fungi, vegetable and plant life perfect to give yourself and your companions a winning edge. Disclaimer As a standard rule of thumb, Rocco discourages anyone from eating any meat harvested from any being that was capable of speech. This book has been put together with the careful experimentation and trial of all included ingredients. It should be mentioned however that due to Rocco’s dwarven heritage, these meals may not be suitable to those of a more sensitive constitution. Due to the ordinary nature of many common and weak beasts, this guide will begin only with those capable of producing some form of advantage when compared to regular food. Additionally Rocco strongly recommends av

Not in the Mood for Druid

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Looking through FiveThirtyEight's  amazing survey the other day yielded a number of interesting insights to the types of characters people enjoy playing. The most baffling thing to me though is the very poor representation Druids received in the survey. They ended up being the least popular class, which for a class with such utility, diversity and flexibility, really left me surprised.  There's 6 druids in this picture... maybe. Lets Talk Options Druids have to be almost hands down, one of the most flexible and interesting classes to not only play, but also role-play. I think that most must simply view them as forest dwelling hermits who hate everything but trees and things that cannot speak. This however, doesn't have to be the case. Perhaps your druid is an urchin who has gained their powers after spending time with the vermin that frequents a large city. Or maybe, your druid trained as a cleric following the teachings of a nature god but was never blessed with th