A Fresh Perspective on D&D Combat Strategies for Immersive Gameplay

Send us a text

Ever thought about how grappling could change the outcome of your D&D combat? Or how a spell's somatic and verbal components could drastically affect your gameplay? This episode peels back the layers of the often understated aspects of the 5th Edition combat system, exploring how specific techniques like disarming and descriptive combat can transform your gaming experience. We discuss just how tangible the world of RPG becomes when you integrate character into your spells and actions, making for a truly immersive and cinematic game.

Have you considered how your daring duels and epic battles can shift when you take into account the terrain? Whether you're using a tree root to trip up your enemy or casting a spell to dislodge a branch, we highlight how these environmental factors can alter the way you play. Moreover, we consider how your setting, be it castle or village, can influence the difficulty of a check. In this episode, we also tackle the exciting mechanics of armor maintenance, borrowed from the likes of Baldur's Gate, that give room for dynamic characters and environments to thrive.

As we wind down from the adrenaline of combat, we delve into its consequences and when it should come to an end. We reflect on the often overlooked aspects like the effect on hit points and age, and stress that combat should conclude when the narrative calls for it, rather than just when hit points dictate. Additionally, we discuss creature challenge ratings, dragon variations, and how the 'rule of cool' can amplify your combat encounters. Join us on this journey as we shed light on these intriguing facets of D&D combat, promising a leveled-up game night for novice and seasoned players alike.

Support the show

Thank you for listening to our podcast. If you are interested in seeing more content like this check out our YouTube! We also post weekly game articles on our Patreon and have an active Discord community.

Social Links:
Youtube
Discord
Patreon
X
Instagram

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Alright, we're back for episode two of DM.
You know, it's kind of likewe're here every every week oh
man, but I'd be crazy though.
No, no, that's insane.
Alright, so Kind of the topicthat we have chosen for this
week is actually gonna be combat.
I think combat is one of themost underused and challenging
things for especially new DMs.

(00:20):
To start with, I started D&Doff Wanting to play and having
no friends in high school whoplayed D&D.
No one at my school played it,so I literally started out by
picking up one of each of thecopies of the main books and
then figuring it out, and I knowdefinitely I made a lot of
mistakes in combat, which is whyI'm really excited to talk

(00:42):
about this topic, because Iwould like to think that I've
come a long way from where Istarted.

Speaker 2 (00:48):
That's fair.

Speaker 1 (00:48):
I started way back in the days at 3.5 Ah, so it was
more complicated believe it ornot, I actually went back and I
played 3.5 after learning all offifth edition, and I have such
respect for that format.
It's actually a lot of fun toplay that combat system,
especially if you know what'sgoing on.
But I do think the 5e is alittle bit easier for,

(01:08):
especially for new players.

Speaker 2 (01:10):
5e 100%, super easy, like streamlined.
So the easiest one is like 5e,super like new player friendly
3-5 if you want to like docombat and like Skill and
ability stuff, like out of RP,like not like oh, I'm gonna have
a conversation with this guylike 3-5 was really meaty for
Skills and like combat and youcould like a Personalized stuff

(01:33):
a lot better.

Speaker 1 (01:34):
I really do like how 5e does the combat though,
because it does give a lot ofroom for players to be very
Specific with how they want todo combat and it gives a lot of
freedom, especially to dungeonmasters and players.
There's a lot of really likenuanced parts that kind of get
overseen.
One that I'm gonna mention thatI really think is often

(01:57):
overlooked is like disarming.
Disarming in 5e is superstraightforward in combat and I
really do like that grapplingand like those close
hand-to-hand, but it's superunderutilized.
Like I see it when I watch,like when I listen to the
podcast for not another D&Dpodcast or critical role, that's
when I see that, but at mytables I've almost never

(02:20):
actually had players get intograppling.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
I don't like 5e.
Super nice with it because it'slike straightforward, it's just
an opposed skill check thatdon't matter too much.
And I've seen in 5e have hadone person who I've played with
who did a grappler fighter so hewas a boxer basically who
grappled people and just punchedthem while they were pinned.
But other than that I don'tever see people you really

(02:44):
utilizing it.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
I will say I've seen a monk use it a lot, especially
on like other shows that I watchon YouTube.
That being said, I feel like itadds a lot to monk fighter
barbarian and it's just superunderutilized.
I think it's just.
It really has what like one,two paragraphs maybe in the
player handbook and it's rightat the end in the combat section
.
It's not mentioned at all inthe early of like how to play

(03:06):
the game.
None of those like effects andabilities to fight show up at
all.
They wait until the very end ofthe book.
And unless you're like a madmanlike me, where I read the book
cover to cover, mostly because Ihad people keep abusing things
that I didn't understand,they're like oh, you don't know
every single feat and how theywork.
Let me pick this random featthat you've never heard of and

(03:28):
let me abuse it and break it.
So I had to go back and readevery single page and that's
when I really realized, oh mygod, these skills can be really
strong as long as you're in likesingle target combat.

Speaker 2 (03:40):
Yeah, I think one thing's probably does real nice
is it makes combat more of alike RP piece to of instead of
just being, well, I'm gonna hitthe guy and I'm gonna use this
one thing.
You can put your own likecharacter into what you're doing
and I like.

Speaker 1 (03:57):
So a very interesting thing is like I have mostly
Played spellcasters.
Spellcasters is kind of myspecial, my special like genre
when I comes to Like playingactual characters.
I've played wizards, I'veplayed sorcerers, I've played
clerics.
Those are like my big three.
I will say I Find that peopleoften overlook the somatic, the

(04:22):
verbal, the fiscal components,unless it's incredibly expensive
for casting spells and Forcombat.
That's kind of.
That's kind of saddening to me,because there are spells like
deafen where if you cast deafenon a magic Caster they can't do
anything with a verbal component, it's just gone, so they can't
cast those spells.
But a lot of times playersdon't even bother to look at

(04:44):
those symbols to kind of seewhether or not they can cast it,
especially when there's thosestatus effects.
So that's where, like me as aDM, if I have a monster that
casts silence, that's reallyscary for all of my spell
casters and they're gonna belike oh, I'm gonna cast fireball
and you can't speak within thisdomain, so you can't cast
fireball.

(05:04):
Like that's crippling anddebilitating to spellcasters and
it's something that peopledon't pay attention to.
If you walk into a silent zonewhere you Can't speak, if you
lose your somatic component,you're done, like there's
nothing you can do.

Speaker 2 (05:20):
So like I think that that's one of the real nice
things for at least spellcastersis because they have the
different pieces and All thoseparts are like super small on it
, like it's three letters thatPeople don't read because it
doesn't have like, well, thisisn't what the spell does and
it's in the block of like oh,it's an instant speed spell or

(05:40):
Bonus action, free action orwhatever type of spell it is,
and that's the piece that getsoverlooked.

Speaker 1 (05:45):
But that's also the part that makes it the most
Interest because they allrequire something slightly
different, and what I do like isthat they all require something
slightly different.
So if you have a prepared spelllist, you really should be
looking at those three lettersand making sure that you have a
variety of them that's missingone of each of the components,
because otherwise, if you loseone of those, it's gonna be

(06:06):
rough.
What if somebody takes your?
What if you have a thief stealyour magic focus belt?
Like you don't have any of yourfiscal components anymore and
they may be minor, but that's acouple gold pieces to replace.
And if you're going right intocombat after that, I want you to
know what spells you're gonnabe able to actually cast.

(06:26):
Like if we're in a bar, acrowded bar, and you're getting
Wasted and I have you roll forperception and somebody grabs
that bag, it runs away that'sgonna be pretty hard on you,
especially with People that liketo go into taverns and drink a
lot oftentimes will make thesekind of nuanced Checks that
people don't think about.
They're like well, why are youpunishing me for being drunk in

(06:48):
the bar?
I'm like because I think it D&Dis a lot more interesting when
it's a real story and it's morerealistic.
And if you're that personthat's wasted in the bar every
night, one of these timesSomebody's gonna grab something
from you and it might be prettyimportant.

Speaker 2 (07:03):
Yeah, like cuz you're , especially if you're in
whatever settings, if you're ina bigger city especially,
there's gonna be people andthey're looking for you Not you,
but like looking for that guywho's getting a little too drunk
, a little too far gone, andthen, as soon as they see that
they're going to go for it,gonna act upon it, basically
taking a spellcaster out,especially because what happens

(07:27):
most of the time, as soon assomething's stolen, you turn and
start trying to shoot.
Yep, and you're not gonna beable to you're gonna turn,
you're gonna go cast, cast likefirebolt or whatever and
Whatever piece of it you needed.

Speaker 1 (07:39):
Yeah, absolutely so.
With magic casters, I mean,magic is a common knowledge
thing in the D&D world.
They're gonna know if they grabthat bag that there's nothing
you can do, and especially withcombat.
And how I like to do it is,those components are very, very
important and I actually likedOne of my players.

(08:00):
They asked me hey, I'm playinga ranger.
I know all the jokes aboutranger being one of the worst
classes.
I don't think it's the worst,especially with D&D releasing
their rework and me havingplayed with a couple of
different ideas for it.
But my ranger goes hey, can Ishoot my bow at the goblin mage
in the back?
He's got his focus in his hand.
Can I shoot at that focus?

(08:20):
Now it's a super small space.
So I'm like, yeah, you canshoot at it, but it's gonna be
really hard to hit.
I'm not telling my player, no,but I'm still gonna give them.
I'm like, if you get above a 15, I didn't tell them.
I'm like, if you roll reallywell, I'm gonna let you hit it.
And they rolled a nat 20.
So, like they hit it, itexploded that magic caster.
He's useless now.
He can't do anything.

(08:41):
That requires a focus which isa good 80% of those, those
abilities, and I'm really notopposed to Players going about
doing that.
Now, me as a DM, I'm not gonnahave non intelligent creatures
or low intelligent creatures gofor the orbs, unlike the spell

(09:03):
focuses, but I Think there's alot of nuances added when you
allow them to disarmspellcasters.

Speaker 2 (09:10):
I think that goes kind of into the being able to
be specific with what you'reshooting at or hitting, like if
I'm in a Fight with somebodywho's trying to get away, it's a
lot more interesting if I canlike take out his legs, the
knowing just hitting his AC,just hitting him in general,
like generically, because thenyou can have that nuance in your
combat, as opposed to justBeating someone until their

(09:32):
health bar is zero.
You get to actually like okay,I'm gonna do this strategy piece
.

Speaker 1 (09:37):
as to, oh, my characters, let's say a
swashbuckler, they're going tobe like stabbing Adam and
slapping quick slashes, whereasyour big barbarian might break
their arm with a hit and like,let's say, I have a swashbuckler
in my campaign and we'rerunning combat and they're
fighting a bunch of thieves andone of the thieves tries to run
past them and get across andthey get this opportunity for a

(10:00):
opportunity Attack.
I would much rather my playerbe like I'm gonna go and slash
for the backs of his knees,because for me if you roll
really high now, let's say youget a non-natural 20 I can be
like alright, you turn, you takea full swing.
If you get seven hit points,he's got one hit point left.
You cut right through the backof those tenants in his knees.
He falls to the ground and you,he's now prone.

(10:23):
That's such a easier descriptionfor me as a DM and it makes my
player feel like they're reallypart of this story, because
you're not gonna justwilly-nilly just chuck an axe at
somebody and Pray to God thatit lands and have no idea.
You're gonna be like alright,I'm gonna look, I'm gonna line
up with his head, I'm gonnathrow my axe and if you roll a

(10:44):
nat one, that things goingflying across the room, but if
you roll a nat 20, it's gonnaland right where you wanted it.
It's gonna be devastating andit gives those story elements
where also it's not on me as theDM to build the entire story
from scratch, and it lets theplayers feel more rewarded.

Speaker 2 (11:02):
Also kind of goes with like, though, a lot of
people run with the rule of coolin the tables.
What's?
It's a lot more like cool ifyou throw your axe and you embed
it into their head Versus, justoh, I threw my axe and I hit
them.
Like those two things are suchdifferent Ideas and they carry
such a different weight to themthat it makes the combat more

(11:24):
like Explosive and action feellike a movie.
Like you're not seeing a moviewhere guys just like punching
them at the chest and like Imean, unless you're watching an
old Bruce Lee film, but thosestill.
But then it's.

Speaker 1 (11:34):
You're the art behind the March, like the fight, yeah
, and I definitely like the, theway that a lot of Older DMs do
it, where they really let theirplayers be Descriptive, and
that's definitely something Idid not do at first.
When I was like they're like Iwant to cast Acid splash, I was
like all right, and I justliterally read off the card.

(11:56):
That was not very engaging, androle play was a very hard thing
for me at the beginning becausewe didn't know the rules.
So I had to learn the rules andthen it was just the rules and
it wasn't any really role play.

Speaker 2 (12:08):
Special with spells, like there's so much you can put
of your character into yourspells.
So, like for a campaign, I'mgonna be playing.
A fire drew without like wildfire drew it right, my cure
wounds Isn't gonna be.
I put my hand on a good 20 hitpoints.
What I've like it's going to be.
I'm a fire druid.
I put my hand on him, ignite myhand and cauterize that wound

(12:31):
and that becomes something whereit's like oh, your character is
doing it in this method, likeI've seen artificers who will
like pull out a syringe ofsomething to do with their heel
and it gives that character toyour like spells as opposed to
just Using the generic oh well,I cast your wounds and it's like
there's there's a spell calledinflict wounds in the cleric

(12:56):
Spell list and that that spellsinsane.

Speaker 1 (12:59):
Like just straight up , that spells insane.
But I ran a necromancer clericand my channel divinity for my
death domain was to add damageto it.
And so my DM, when I landedthis critical hit on a wyvern
he's just started describing howmy hand Started glowing purple
and bubbling and as I touchedthe dragon, tripping into it, I

(13:22):
touched it it began to dissolvehalf of the dragon because I
nearly killed the thing in oneshot.
And like I liked that, he Spentthe time to actually go step by
step and describe really whatwas happening to the creature in
Response to my spell.
And it wasn't just oh, a purple, necrotic light show shines and

(13:45):
the creature falls dead.
And that's where I think a lotof those challenges comes from.
The storytelling perspective isit's our responsibility To kind
of guide that story, both as aplayer and as the DM, and you're
kind of just Making it easieron each other, because if your
players are just saying I'mgonna Like, one of the big

(14:07):
things is like finishing.

Speaker 2 (14:09):
So like when you drop someone to zero, a lot of the
teams will be like how do you doit?
It's a lot more interesting.
The players like, oh well, I'mwhatever class, I do this
intricate thing that's fittingfor my character to do, instead
of just well, I stab him, hedies yeah.
I said earlier, but like thoseare two extremely different
vibes based on just how you Justchoose to talk about what's

(14:32):
happening in the situation and Itotally agree with that.

Speaker 1 (14:35):
It's kind of like, eventually, one of these days
I'm gonna sit down, I'm gonnarecord a bunch of audios and
build a soundboard out and I'mgonna have one.
That's just Finish him it's justlike the old, like old, like
style game kind of aesthetic,because I think it adds some.
It gives a moment for Everybodyto laugh, smile.
Your player gets to dosomething really cool.
You get to describe how it kindof comes out and the

(14:58):
ramifications that come fromthose actions.
Because if they're gonna kill acharacter, if they just are
there like I'm gonna go and stabstraight through his chest,
that's gonna be a lot less, forexample, intimidating.
If they're fighting in afighting a group, then I slice
his head off and it goes flying.
You're gonna probably strikesome fear into the other enemies
.

Speaker 2 (15:17):
It's like there's a little bit of a difference
between.
It was like you're fighting ahorde of just random goblins
Versus you're fighting thelieutenant of the bad guy.
Like if I'm fighting thelieutenant of the bad guy, I
don't want him to just die.
I want that death to be anarrative piece to it, and
sometimes that includes how theydie instead of just oh well,
they, they're dead now.

(15:38):
So now the story is different,because the boss's second hand
is gone, but by how you defeatthem, making it be.
This impactful moment of thisbig Explosion happens.
If you cast fireball, hecatches fire and just explodes
out onto in the middle of abattlefield.

Speaker 1 (15:56):
Yeah, and I think what's really cool about those
kind of experiences is Like,let's say, you are fighting a
random horde of goblins, you'repinned against the wall, your
magic casters are out of spells,you're sitting there as the the
lone barbarian finally enragedand you just take a swing at one
of the goblins and you lob hishead clean off from full health.
If you're gonna describe thatsituation to me and I'm gonna

(16:20):
let you do that and you're likeI'm gonna go and swing for his
head I was roll a 20.
I'm doing 25 damage and hishead is coming flying off, I'm
gonna be like, alright, youintimidate the rest of the
goblins, they turn and they runand that could save your party,
and that also, it seems a lotmore fulfilling than me as a DM
Having to try to make a reasonwhy I don't accidentally TPK my

(16:44):
whole party.

Speaker 2 (16:44):
Yeah, it's also it does allow for that, what you're
doing to actually have aneffect on combat, like In the
rule book, if you're just likethere's like some morale checks,
which is, but that's usuallybig army fighting, right,
because like, oh, you beat halfthe rank, the other half is
gonna what's going on?
And runs away and likedisperses.
But especially like when you'reone-on-one type combats, it

(17:08):
makes it a lot more.
It gives the DM excuses to havethings change in the fight.
So, oh, you Killed the leaderof this group.
The rest of them aren't gonnastill be just standing there
like, okay, we're gonna kill younow.
They're probably gonna be like,oh, what just happened?
Our boss is gone now and andtrying to like Find a leader in

(17:32):
themselves, as they're like, andmaybe you just decimate that
leader and this are like oh well, I'm out and run away.

Speaker 1 (17:40):
Yeah, and I think running away isn't a bad thing,
like it's never a cop out foryou to just be like, oh my god,
to my players just they justslaughtered these monsters and
now there's this one that hasthis glorious and triumphant
Battle against the biggest guythere.
If he, you guys, watch thebiggest man fall and you just

(18:01):
lost two of your comrades, youat least half of them are gonna
be like, oh, do I really want tofight these people?
How much do I believe in thatcause?
So it's like, especially withintelligent creatures, I think
that's really important,especially letting the
characters kind of guide thatnarrative of like you were
talking about how in ourcampaign that we're we're

(18:22):
podcasting, you're gonna berunning a flame Druid.
Like if I watch you walk up andCast a spell and my buddy, from
full health, burst into flamesand incinerates, I'm gonna be
like, oh, about that fight.
I think I'm good.

Speaker 2 (18:43):
It's even like, especially in like comments for
like ship to ship to ship combat.
In any situation, especially ifyou have a fire care character,
casting fire or like lightning,things are gonna catch fire and
Unlike water, even like outsideof D&D, in like the real world,
if your boat catch caught onfire, that boat was gone like

(19:05):
you would have to like try toget water from the ocean to dump
onto the fire Before it spreadsto the sails of your ship or to
whatever other piece.

Speaker 1 (19:15):
Yeah, and I I kind of also it's like one of those
things of I I do have a littlemore understanding of like it's.
It's very much a narrativethat's gonna be important
because, like for yours, you'regonna be a wildfire.
Druid, our setting is in space,on boats.

(19:36):
If you do that on the wrongboat at the same time, the whole
boat goes up in flames with youand the crew on it, and I don't
think that's really what wewant to do a lot of the time.
So it also adds that kind of ifyou're letting them describe
the spells, if it goes horriblywrong and you cast a major fire
spell, half the ship lights onfire and now you got to find a

(19:57):
way to get off and with oursetting we're, we're placed
firmly in the astral sky, likethere are ships that aren't made
out of wood.
That being said, if we're on aship that's wood fighting in
ship to ship combat and you gohog wild, I I would want to hear
how you describe it, because ifyou do one of those major aoe
fire attacks and you light forpeople on fire, okay, maybe the

(20:20):
fire is magical and doesn't likethe wood on fire, but the guy
that's running around with hishead cut off, burning.

Speaker 2 (20:26):
He's gonna say something on fire.

Speaker 1 (20:28):
Yeah, and then you're gonna have to, as a crew, kind
of talk about ooh, should wekeep fighting, should we be
running away from this giantburning ship that we're on?
But hey, the druid gets away.

Speaker 2 (20:38):
The druid turns into a burning plasma.

Speaker 1 (20:40):
Exactly, and it's like, especially with the fact
that we're in a spelljammersetting, like we're in space.
There's only so much air aroundthe ship, so it's like and once
that ship goes down, oh, we'rebolting.

Speaker 2 (20:53):
You're running out of air.

Speaker 1 (20:54):
And, like me as a DM, it's kind of almost amusing to
think about that idea, and it'spart of the reason I really
wanted to encourage you to playthat character is it's almost
funny that you're a fire druidin the middle of space.

Speaker 2 (21:07):
Like this is like a small thing with, like how your
characters work, like a fire'scharacter especially.
Fire is such a dichotomy of anitem like element Every element
is, but like fire hits it insuch a bit more visceral way of
fire will literally destroyeverything if left unchecked.
If we're on a ship and I'm like, well, I'm gonna cast fireball,

(21:31):
that ship is probably on fire.
And now, well, the thing thatwas supposed to just protect us
and help us, like when the fight, is now going to be a reason
that we could all die because ofit and we do have like fighters
and stuff like.

Speaker 1 (21:46):
At the same rate, if, like, let's say, we had a
barbarian instead with a greataxe or a fighter with a great
axe, you decide, you come to meand you're or a hammer, we'll
use a hammer, because it's agood example.
I'm coming with a great warhammer, we're on a ship, I want
to take a big overhead swing andI get a nat one and a miss.

(22:07):
And now not only have you takenthis big wind up and lost your
turn, but that big hammer isprobably going through that ship
.

Speaker 2 (22:15):
And with spelljure it's like a lot more specific
because it's such a magical typeof ship.
If you're near your like Ican't remember the exact name is
but like the helm of the ship,you could just lose your actual
ship, like obviously, like onenat, one's not going to be.
Oh, there goes your ship.

Speaker 1 (22:31):
But if you're like, if you're like smacking the ship
and constantly missing andconstantly having them evade,
that's not going to be good forthat ship.
If you're fighting on the helmand if you mess up and you swing
at the guy who's sitting on thehelm with that war hammer and
you get a one, I'm definitelyhaving that thing smashed open
and then you're stuck going in.
Whatever direction you're in,If that's going to collide with

(22:52):
your ship, that's not going tobe pretty.
And I think that's where thefreedom of combat it has such
highs and lows that it reallybrings more interest into the
actual description of the game.

Speaker 2 (23:05):
If you make like combat can be interesting and
fun, as just like a, so not evensociable, like a game right,
like just doing the base.
We have a map, we do fighting,which, something like that,
something super simple, can beenjoyable.
But because for D&D you're notjust trying to run a game,
you're trying to tell a story.
The big piece for combat is howdoes your combat play into your

(23:28):
story?
There's a couple ways you canhave combat play into the story.
Like you can do a combat whereit's about a character growing,
so throughout that combat youcan kind of see this character
changing, like, especially ifit's like for a backstory.
If you're fighting the enemyfrom your backstory, your
character is not going to go inand out of that fight as the
same person.

Speaker 1 (23:46):
Yeah, and I know we've spent a lot of time
already talking about howterrain affects combat, but it's
such an important part, like ifyou're walking into a cave and
you're using a great sword,you're not going to be able to
swing that.
So now you're a fighter that'sspecialized in sword fighting
that's going to have to go up,get in their face and have a
fist fight, and that's notsomething that you ever really

(24:06):
want to experience as a player.
But it also adds anotherelement to the combat that can
be fun and rewarding orpunishing, and I really like
that.

Speaker 2 (24:17):
And with terrain and combat.
A lot of people just have it asa static piece, like, oh well,
you're in a village, so there'ssome houses and there's like
some fields and there's someanimals and pens, but then
that's all, that's there.
But as soon as like combateventually will get boring
especially if it's a big combat,something can change.
Let's say you're in that townwhere there's like a cow pen or

(24:37):
something.
There's this combat goingaround.
All the animals are going to befreaking out.
They might knock over the fenceat some point and then hit the
combat as a new stat, not evenstatic, but like a new force
that's not actually fighting butlike just plowing through.
And now suddenly my combat ofI'm fighting the 20 million

(25:00):
goblins becomes I'm fightinggoblins and there's cows
charging at me.

Speaker 1 (25:05):
And like, for example you said that perfectly like if
these animals get out and startrunning towards you, that's not
going to be good for you.
But, more importantly, animalsare going to try to get away
from the combat.
If they knock over that fenceand get away, who knows, maybe
you're trying to do sneak attackand then it turns into this big
battle.
Now that horse is gallopingthrough the forest screaming any

(25:27):
of their local villages orwhatever If it's goblins.
Now you got hobgoblins comingand that's not going to be as
fun Like, even if you're likeattacking a bandit camp.

Speaker 2 (25:37):
If you're trying to like be not too noisy while like
fighting all the bandits,someone might still be just
taking a nap.
That somebody could be a reallygood spellcaster so that, oh,
the animals are out now could be.
Their horses have started likebraing and making all these
noises and your spellcaster, whowas like taking an epilogue,

(25:58):
was going on, walks out of thetent, sees six people he has
never seen before fightingpeople, his allies, and suddenly
just goes.
Well, I have to do this.

Speaker 1 (26:09):
Well, it's like, for example, it would say, he's
sleeping under a tree and he'sjust chilling out there.
If you're trying to sneak up,you've successfully gotten your
stealth roll.
We're really close, we're allthe way, we're all the way in
their camp.
Basically, and my spellcastergoes, I want to cast a lightning
strike directly on that giantbranch over him.
Okay, if it's like a mediumsized branch, okay, you got to

(26:32):
get a 10.
If it's a big branch like youget a 15, you cut straight
through that branch.
That dops on him.
I mean I'm willing to give you3d 12s for that and that might
just kill him, which would bemassive for combat.
Or he could be like, if you doit in a subtle way as a druid
and just have it break or havelike a chilling touch hand, like

(26:52):
break it or something that's ormage hand, let mage hand do it.
That kind of adds a differentcomponent where it's like he's
like oh my God, that tree wasreally unstable if he does live
and he's already majorly hurt.
So now you kind of have aneasier fight.
I think combat.
A lot of people miss out theopportunity to use the terrain

(27:15):
you're in to your advantage.
What's the terrain?

Speaker 2 (27:19):
One of the big things , like for the druids, and
rangers have to do a lot withthe terrain and what's around
them.
One of the spell like a corespell to druids is their druid
craft spell.
But that doesn't do anything.
As it's written it's just oh,you can make something grow or a
flower bloom and these supersmall things.
But as soon as you bring inthat, like in combat, you can RP

(27:42):
it.
I could make a tree's root movea little bit.
Somebody might trip over it now.
Or if that guy's under the tree, that root might come up and
grab like if I would probably bea check or something it might
wrap around his foot.
So now he wakes up and camp islike I'm stuck on the ground,

(28:02):
which you don't get if you'rejust if you're not including
that extra little piece tocombat.

Speaker 1 (28:08):
And this has been called lazy before, when I when
I admit this.
But for me those kind ofterrain, like effects, like
hitting a door and breaking itdown, hitting a lightning, a
lightning bolt and breaking offa branch, all of those things I
don't write down what DC I putthat at.
I kind of put it based on wherewe're feeling.

(28:29):
If we're sneaking up and youhave time and you're going
slowly and you're planning tobreak that branch or wrap it
around his foot, I'm going togive you a much easier DC check
than okay, we're in a castle,keep, we've got five cobalts
that we're fighting.
We're a level three party.
I want to smash through thedoor so that we can sprint out
with our down teammate.

(28:50):
That's going to be a lot hardercheck because you got people
swinging at you Like that mightbe a 13 or a 14.
And like that doesn't seem likea lot.
But those DC checks that I do,I kind of do it based on the
feeling of the, of theenvironment, rather than keeping
them as static numbers.

Speaker 2 (29:07):
Yes, like, especially with terrain, like part of it
is how can you use your terrainto your advantage in any like
realistically?
If you're trying to be morerealistic, if you're in a fight
and if you're trying to try toambush or something, you're
going to be modifying theterrain, you're going to be
doing something to give yourselfan advantage, like, say, a
car's going across a bridge orsomething, you might be cutting

(29:30):
down a tree in front of it.
How am I going to do that?
If I'm just, if it's just, ohwell, you cut down the tree.
It's kind of like, yeah, thatmakes your mission easier.
But if there's like a check,because oh, the car got here
earlier, then now there's stakesto this modifying of the
terrain, that tree could fall inthe wrong way.

Speaker 1 (29:52):
Yeah, no.
And like I was talking to oneof my friends last night who was
telling me they've never gotteninto D&D because they've had a
couple of rough goes about it.
They're telling me about onecampaign they were doing where
they were playing a dwarffighter and they're in the
middle of combat with a group ofpeople and they're like I
wanted to break down the doorand go into the room.

(30:13):
I'm playing a dwarf fighter.
Doors are known for beingreally stocky and the team just
told me I couldn't do it.
I'm like that just seems to me.
That doesn't.
That doesn't seem how I wouldwant to play my table.
And I was talking to them.
I'm like no, I would still askyou to do a check.
Grant it your dwarf.
You're pretty strong.
You're probably going to gothrough the door.
I'm not saying you're not goingto go through the door, but if

(30:35):
you roll a five and under, youprobably trip smashing through
the door, land on your face andnow you're prone.
So it's like I'm going to stillask you for checks but I'm not
going to just tell you.
You know now, if my players arelike we're going to go and kill
this whole city and we're goingto go fight constantly.
Might you hear unsettlingnoises in the distance of a

(30:57):
giant worm or something likethat.
That's, you're going to want tostay away from this.
Cries of a dragon, the screamsof a people that are being
scourged, yeah, but I'm going touse that descriptive
storytelling to kind of guideyou away.
I'm not going to tell you youcan't do it, but there might be
something there that you don'twant to fight, and anytime
there's like anything where it'slike a piece of a player trying

(31:19):
to do something, it's almostthere's two options there.

Speaker 2 (31:25):
Should, it should never be a hard no, but it could
.
So it's kind of like an actingrule where you never say no and
for improv right, you don't sayno.
You can't do that.
If you say no, it's always a no.
But so if I'm trying to breakdown the like a door, you might
be know that door is made ofiron.
But you see, a little ways awaythere's something else you can

(31:47):
do, and I mean obviously, I grewup as an actor.

Speaker 1 (31:51):
I've been formally trained in Hollywood.
One of the big things we alwaysdid for improv, like you
mentioned, is we weren't allowedto say no.
It was always we had to say yes, and so they would be like I
want to break through this door,yes, and you can do that, but
you might fall.
If you are unbalanced, it'salways a yes, you can do that

(32:13):
and or, but something else mayhappen.
Or yes, and you're going tohave disadvantage.
On like, I'm always going totell you you can do something.
It just might not be what youwant it to be Like, especially
with like D&D.
If you're in like a castle orsomething right, there's
sometimes where no is the answer.
Like, you can't do that.

Speaker 2 (32:28):
Can I break down this random, like four foot wide
support pillar?
No, but then you, instead ofjust being like no, there has to
be something to it, like youmight be able to do something to
Know what you see, there's thisthing over here that might be

(32:49):
able to help you, or those minorlittle for me.

Speaker 1 (32:52):
They're like I'm trying to find the exit.
We don't want to bother goingaround.
I want to try to go throughthis four-foot wall.
Awesome, feel free.
The, the, the dwarf can just go.
I want to go through thisfour-foot thick wall.
Okay, roll me if they are notgetting a 20.
They're hitting that as hard asthey can and they're gonna be

(33:13):
unconscious Like I'm gonna letyou do it, but I'm gonna also
let everybody else laugh at youif you don't succeed
Tremendously and not even in amean way.
It creates a funny encountereven for that player of like oh
my god, that's so stupid.
I just tried to run through afour-foot wall and that's way
more fun than just being like no, I'm not gonna let you walk
through, at least in my opinion.

Speaker 2 (33:34):
So this was like this is what I never thought it was
gonna happen.
I was doing a campaign of thelike this ice tower and it
starts like collapsing back intothe sea.
So the players are at the verytop of it and the point of it
was like, oh, they have to runback down and get down there.
In time they ended up like thewhole bit was like you're gonna
basically make it down no matterwhat, because your ship's at
the bottom.

(33:54):
You need to get back to yourship.
And it was a way excuse to givethem a new ship.
The goal was to like just getrid of their old one and give
them a new, nicer ship.
And they one of them decidedI'm going to shoot.
They had some fire spell likeburning hands or something out
with the back of our sled downthe.
Is that going to really doanything?

(34:16):
No, no but it's a lot more funif it's like, yeah, that makes
sense.
And then it's like I gave him alittle bit like, oh, you go
faster because you're a rocket.
We've held, slid down thistower.
I made them make a checkbecause I was like a circular
tower.

Speaker 1 (34:32):
I love that that's, but that's so much more fun and
like for me.
A big thing for like momentslike that and all of my moments
is I Don't tell my players theDC often.
And the reason I don't tell theDC often is I feel like I can't
.
If my players like, okay, whatwould the DC be to break through

(34:54):
that four foot wall, I'm notgonna say, oh well, you're gonna
have to do a DC of 19 or above.
I'm gonna be like the walllooks like it's pretty well
intact, very sturdy, had lots ofDeep and meaningful masonry
work into it.
You can tell that it's wellcrafted, especially if they're
dwarf.
Won't be like you can see thatit was made by your brother and
or someone is skilled as themlike.

(35:15):
Then that dwarf is gonna belike oh, maybe.
I don't want to ram into thatwall.

Speaker 2 (35:20):
Think for the if, what, like, should, should
players know how, where the DCis.
It kind of goes to the level ofwhat are they trying to do.
If it's like this is somethingno one would, you would never
have even thought of before, no,you have no idea how hard it's
really going to be.
You can kind of be like, well,that's a wall, it's gonna be
difficult, but that's like allyou're going to know.

(35:44):
Versus like if you're a fighterwho was, you know, part of a
local militia and there's a doorand you're like I want to kick
down the door, you probably know, like you know about.
That's probably about like afortune.

Speaker 1 (35:56):
So for me, the reason I don't explain those numbers
is like, let's say that you area militia Character who has
kicked down plenty of walls.
You're probably a characterthat's focused on strength, so
you're already gonna have anadvantage towards it.
And if I describe the wall ofwell, it's a rickety old board
like what you would see.
You would imagine a normalfantasy setting, unlike a pretty
poor house.
It's kind of shavilly builttogether with some rough like

(36:19):
nails in it.
You're gonna know as a fighterwho's part of the militia with a
high strength Alright, I'mgonna be able to kick this down,
no problem, unless I horriblyfail.
Versus if I say it's a strong,thick, mahogany door with the
gorgeous inlays on it and steelbrach, you're gonna be like oh
yeah, I don't.
I don't think I can break thatdown and, granted, what I do

(36:41):
takes a little more time.
But personally, especially whenwe're having like long sessions
, I think it's a lot morerewarding to the players to hear
those descriptions and be likeLook at that solid oak door that
I just snapped in half.

Speaker 2 (36:57):
There's a little bit of both, like I'm not saying
like, oh, if it's a big thickdoor, give them a, oh, it's a 17
, but like it's gonna be, youknow, we'll probably need at
least like To do okay, like givea little bit of like.
This is kind of the area wouldbe in.
I'd be like it.

Speaker 1 (37:15):
It's gonna be pretty hard, but I'm not gonna like
depending.

Speaker 2 (37:18):
It's also like a that how well you know your DM of,
like, some teams.
Oh, it's gonna be difficult.
It's gonna be like 15 to 20,some, it's gonna be difficult,
it's gonna be like 20 to 25.

Speaker 1 (37:28):
Yeah, and for me, like the only DCs I really like
to tell people, I'll tell peopleif they really want to know,
and we've Discussed itbeforehand.
But the only one where I'm likegonna be like okay, this is
going to be Incredibly like, youneed to get a ten or above is
on saving throws.
Like saving throws or like Conchecks for spells, like that's

(37:50):
public knowledge you know thesespells like and really there's
no way that I can hide thosenumbers, unfortunately.
I wish there was a little bitbetter way to do it, roleplay
wise, but especially with thecampaign that we're preparing
for, I Want it to be highlydescriptive.
We have two new players whoaren't super rule heavy and you

(38:13):
and I are kind of we're theother half of that group,
especially with us podcastingand us knowing the book really
well.
I want to give them thoseroleplay opportunities while we
focus much more on the rule.

Speaker 2 (38:26):
Lawyer thing Like we meet, like this, part of the
reason why it's like I'm playingI haven't done many druids, but
like I'm doing a class that Iknow can do whatever I need it
to do is so that they don't haveto worry about Combat or like
any of the mechanical things,because someone can do it.
I'm playing a druid.
I can be a frontline if I needto.

(38:47):
I can heal, I can do damage.
I can do a little bit ofeverything, depending on how we
take my spells that day.

Speaker 1 (38:53):
Yeah, and I think that that's a really important
thing for us and our dichotomyin our like Is dichotomy the
right word but like in our, inour group, in our decisions, is
the fact that we Know as a groupthat we have players that
aren't as experienced and wehave two people who have DM'd
we've played what Way moresessions than we probably want

(39:16):
to admit.
Yeah, so like for us, it's alittle bit more on us, and I
think that's how a lot of newtables are, because there's a
lot of people looking to getinto DND and we mentioned it on
our last podcast.
Boulders gate just opened thatfloodgates for us.

Speaker 2 (39:30):
And like so has, like the critical roles and the
dimension 20s and the notanother DND podcast.
All those, by having these likeprolific people, are Especially
showing the role play aspectbecause they're all
professionally trained intrained improv comedic actor.
So you want to give thosepeople who are trying to get
into it that opportunity.

(39:51):
So it's not, you're not gonna,your DM's not gonna be Matt
Mercer or Brennan Lee Mulligan.

Speaker 1 (39:57):
You're not gonna have somebody at that level whose
only thing is DND to where theycan spend those 40-hour weeks
just building and like even forpeople that are coming, like
Myself, for example, like Istruggle to find DM's who've
DM'd as many campaigns as I have, because it's such a small

(40:17):
group, it's a lot of the time inthe group it's well, sorry,
buddy, it's your turn to be theDM.
No one really steps forward andwants to be that DM character
and I really didn't have achoice because I was the person
that wanted to start convincingmy friends to play.
So you have to be able to runthe game and I've made so many
mistakes and even watching themI'm like wow, that's crazy.

(40:38):
And like I went to an improvschool.
I'm still growing, but like tofind actual good DMs who have
had that experience is really,really challenging and that's
part of why I wanted to do thisis so that we could kind of have
a discussion with multiplepeople I know who have DMed that
I've either played with or I'veplayed under.
That I've really enjoyed andeven meet some new people,

(41:01):
because it is a very smallcommunity of dungeon masters,
and creating those opportunitiesfor new players to kind of
learn how to play and helpingeach other grow.
That's.
That's really where we're atwith boulders gate, because I
know I have the challenge of.
I went to my work the other dayand I was talking about DND and

(41:21):
I had like nine people come upto me and they're like, oh my
God, I want to get into it.
I played boulders gate but Idon't know a DM and I'm sitting
here like myself as some theonly person my work who's ever
been a DM and I'm like I can'ttake all of these people.
I want to, but even just toteach one of them to be a DM
would take me hours and hours.

Speaker 2 (41:41):
One of the like.
This is one of those things ofthey're not great, the modules
are not the best, because themodules are never going to be
what's fun.
Like you're going to have yourmodule and you're going to start
it and you're going to read itand you're going to learn all
the pieces to it, but then aplayer is going to be like but I
want to do this other thing.

Speaker 1 (41:58):
Rolling with the, rolling with the different, like
I almost jokingly will call itlike the abuse of the players,
as it is like the whole purposeof being a DM your players are
going to be like.
So you know that thing that thebook says nothing about?
Yeah, you know that giant worm.
I'm going to put a mind sash onhim so that he becomes
intelligent, communicating,being.

(42:18):
What is a giant purple wormgoing to do when he can think
and reason?
I don't know.
I have to make that up in fiveseconds and that's challenging
because I don't want to just belike, no, it fails, you can't
put it on him.

Speaker 2 (42:30):
That's boring A lot of time for like, especially
because of Baldur's Gate and how.
All you're learning in Baldur'sGate is the like mechanics
You're not learning.
Oh, this is how I play acharacter.
Your character is like in thatgame is literally nobody,
they're just a bodyrealistically, and the only

(42:51):
characters are the NPCs.
And those NPCs have likescripted responses, which is
because it's a game.
They can't have them being AIdynamic.
But so for any new player,they're not going to have that
right now, especially the DMside of figuring this stuff out.

Speaker 1 (43:08):
Yeah, yeah, and it's.
It's going to be challengingbecause Wizards helped make
Baldur.
It's a phenomenal game.
From what I've heard, I haven'tgot the opportunity to play it
yet because I've been preparingfor our campaign, but it is a
very, very challenging.
Rule of like.
I was explaining someone howtabletop works and how being a
DM works who played Baldur's andthey're like well, I want to

(43:29):
lead a campaign for my friends.
That's it's going to be a lotof work to kind of take that
stepping stone into being a DM.
And for me, like description iskey.
Like armor classes being static.
I don't personally like wallshaving static checks.
I don't like that either.

(43:49):
I want it to be like you'relooking at this guy.
If his leather armor istattered and beaten from years
of being worn, that's going togive him maybe an AC boost of
like seven, not 10.
Like it's it's not going to becompletely useless, but it's
also not going to be perfect.

Speaker 2 (44:07):
And for AC is one of the things.
This is a monster type I wantto include, I'm planning to
include on a campaign I'mworking on, but it's an enemy
whose armor actively breaksthroughout the combat because
it's an ancient like goal one.
With this old armor.
That's really thick armor butit's been sitting there for 200
years so you hit it with a bigaxe, a chunks falling off of it

(44:32):
like it took the hit.

Speaker 1 (44:33):
Yeah, I think it's almost kind of dull when you
have like this really veteranwarrior who puts on his armor
after years of not touching itand he walks out with plate mail
that's giving him a plus 13,but it hasn't been touched or
maintained in like 20, 30 years.
That thing's going to be rustyNow like dragon scale, as long

(44:55):
as there's not like pieces thathave fallen off of it and you
don't describe it as like pieceshave fallen off dragon scale,
like give a little more benefitbecause dragon scales don't
decompose.
So like I'm forgiving with someof them.
But like leather armor, platemail, like stuff like that, it's
going to break down over time.

Speaker 2 (45:12):
Especially if you're using it every like as players
like obviously it sucks havingto buy your big heavy armor,
especially if you're a tank.
So I always go with the like.
You can maintain it on your own.
If you have the tools, yeah.
But if you're just, you know, aguy who's a fighter, who's like
whatever, my armor don't matter.
All that matters is magic itemsand swords, and you know you

(45:37):
buy three swords so you can useall three.
Then if you're not payingattention to your armor, your
armor is eventually going togive out on you.
You're getting constantlybattered by goblins and whatever
else.

Speaker 1 (45:51):
Your armor is not going to be just punky dory
sitting there like, yep, I'mstill great and I love in combat
the idea of armor breaking, andI'm never going to be like out
of the blue, all of a suddenyou're hit by an arrow and your
armor shatters.
That's.
That's dull, but definitely ifyou're talking to your players.

(46:13):
It's like you guys have beentraveling for months through
frozen tundra.
You've been traveling in thisbarren desert, sand blasting you
in the face and you're wearingleather armor and then you get
to the next town and somebodyslashes you.
It might go through that armor.
Like we're going to have thatconversation and I think it's a
fun optional rule that can addsome flavor to your combat and

(46:36):
it makes it so your combat isn'tjust well, I bought the best
armor.

Speaker 2 (46:40):
I am golden now, like you're.
If even like historically ifyou look at armors, those armors
aren't cheap and they're notcheap to keep All of that big,
heavy stuff that is going to bethe sort of like if you know
you're 18 and 20s in AC needs tobe taken care of, it needs to

(47:01):
be maintained, or else it's justgoing to fall apart and the the
other thing is, like youmentioned, those bait like
buying that perfect set of armor.

Speaker 1 (47:09):
Once players kind of have that perfect set of armor
it gets really dull, especiallycombat, because basically
nothing can hit you unlessyou're coming against things
that negate armor, and thatfeels unsatisfying to me.
So personally I I know a lot ofDMs and I have been the DM that
adds status effects as a damagetype, like exhaustion, and the

(47:31):
first time a new player is goingto experience a monster that is
giving you exhaustion points,that's going to be scary.

Speaker 2 (47:39):
And it's like you want to let your tanks feel like
tanks.
Right, you don't want yourperson spent 500 gold on their
heavy play armor to be justgetting smacked around Like you
don't want to be that paladinwho has a 20 AC and the DM said
well, I can't hit the paladin.
So I'm going to bumpeverything's bonus Because it's

(48:00):
unsatisfying for the paladin whowants to be your big tank and
it's the most frustratingexperience for everyone else at
that table.
But as soon as you add thoseother damages like, oh well,
this, you're getting beaten up,even if you're not like bleeding
and taking actual damage fromit.

Speaker 1 (48:17):
You're getting tired by it and like I have special
biomes that I use, like one ofmy, one of my friends, who I'm
hoping to get on here at somepoint swamps we don't go and
swamps swamps are absolutelynever.
I'm not stepping foot into thatswamp unless you force me to.
But like one of the ones thatwe talked about is, we did a

(48:38):
campaign in a crimson forest.
We created this whole biomecalled the crimson forest and we
had these crimson dire wolvesDire wolves aren't that scary,
and it was a late game campaign.
Everybody's like ha ha, I'm justgoing to smack on the wolves
because it's going to be reallyhard for them to hit me.
But one of them hit them andwhat they didn't realize was
that every one of these wolveshad venom on its teeth and its

(48:59):
claws and so it just put bleedon them.
So like, yeah, our wizard had arobe that let him teleport to
dodge, and our paladin had thegreatest magical armor that we
could find, and so he had likean AC of like 22,.
But it hit him with a 23.
And he just started gushingblood and then he, for the first

(49:21):
time in a long time of combat,he had to actually be afraid of
something which was not normal,and it wasn't something that was
massive like a giant boss.
It was a mundane, everydaycreature with the normal step
blocks.
It just had this effect, whichgave it that little edge to make
the encounter feel moredevastating, and with like,
especially with like, high ACcharacters, you can do the well.

Speaker 2 (49:43):
I'm going to just throw saving throws, but that
also feels like cheap of well, Icouldn't hit you, so I'm going
to hit you which, yes, thosesaving throws are important.
Like you, it's a good way tolike keep your party balanced,
of well.
Yeah, your paladin has a 20 AC.
He doesn't have a highdexterity though.

Speaker 1 (50:02):
Yeah, no, throw a fireball.
The thing that I actually findkind of funny, though, is like
the monster manual makesmistakes.
I, as a young, as a very youngDM like not having much
experience at all threw fiveshadows at a party, and if I was
like a shadow has a half achallenge rating.

(50:22):
They're super easy.
My party's going to clean themup, no problems asked.
That is not what happened.
They are immune to everything,and I didn't pay attention to
those immunities and I TPK'd alevel five party with literally
a challenge rating of three,which shouldn't happen.

Speaker 2 (50:42):
But it does, Especially with the challenge
rating system.
It's so unlike optimized ofthis is actually accurate.
You have stuff like that whereit's I can't remember exactly
what the card, the creature isit's invisible and it can push
things really well.
So one a trap and I believeit's a pre-made dungeon is just

(51:02):
a hallway with holes on the ends, Full of these creatures and
like it doesn't matter whatlevel your party is, you can't
see them.
They're just going to shove youand they're going to keep
shoving you until you die.

Speaker 1 (51:16):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (51:17):
And I think they're like a CR one.

Speaker 1 (51:19):
Yeah, and like people don't pay attention to the fact
that those things are dangerous.
It's almost why, like for lategame characters, I actually have
brought back a couple of timeslike the first, second and third
edition old rules surroundingundead where, like, if a
skeleton touches you, it can rip60 years from your character.

(51:43):
Like that doesn't matter toelves, but if you have a human
in your campaign, oh my God, Ijust got touched and lost most
of my lifespan.

Speaker 2 (51:52):
This is a piece that was in older editions that
they've cut because it was kindof dumb and no one was a big fan
, which I kind of thought wasreally interesting, because
intellect devourers still do it,but they don't do the full
effect.
It used to be if you hit likezero in a stat, you died.
You have no intelligence, youliterally have no mind, you

(52:12):
can't live.
You have zero strength.
You are able to hold your bodyup and different creatures could
eat at that.
So your 100 HP fighter had 20strength or 20 con.
That zombie is going to hit himand knock off two con.

Speaker 1 (52:32):
And the the one that was really bad was ghosts.
Ghosts could strip awaypermanent hit points.
That was scary, like I walkedout of a session in three five
that I played and, mind you, Iwent back to three five and I
got hit by this ghost and I wentto what the heck?
And I had to play the rest ofthe campaign out with five hit

(52:52):
points because he ripped 30 awayfrom me and that was terrifying
3-5 combat monsters were brutal, though, because they expected
you to optimize.
I'm kind of glad that we're notin that place anymore.
But like when you get level 20characters if you kind of read
through the DM handbook I'mpretty sure it's in they talk
about what each level ofcharacter is supposed to be in

(53:13):
terms of like society.
Like, once you hit level 6,you're like a well-known folk
hero.
By the time you're hitting like18-20, you're revered as a god.
So like, tossing thatoccasional old rule that is
crippling and terrifying back inmakes the fights feel rewarding
.
It makes you feel like you'reactually going to help towards
something.

Speaker 2 (53:34):
Especially in like later levels, after like level
12-13, there's a reason.
All like we're going back toBaldur's Gate again.
It ends at like level 12.
You can't get above level 12because after that you're just
like essentially a god.
You have spells that can justwipe the board of everything.
So it's not interesting to playat that point in standard 5e

(53:57):
with no homeroo, nothing special.
But as soon as you introducethose things that can either
propagate themselves and createmore monsters on the midst of a
battle or can like hit somethingthat nothing else can, it keeps
the players from just beinglike well, I'm level 20, nothing
gets in my way.

Speaker 1 (54:17):
And the thing that's challenging for me is with new
combat, I kind of struggle toget those status effects
explained well because there'sso few of them.
There's like fatigue, there'sexhaustion, there's bleed, but
like describing bleed is justlike the creature bites you, the
wound doesn't close, itcontinues to drip down your face

(54:39):
and it starts to rush fasterand faster.
Like I can describe thatexhaustion.
You all of a sudden, afterhaving the creature grab you and
envelop you into them, youslowly feel the energy leaving
your body as you crumble towardsthe ground, barely able to move
under your own weight.

(55:00):
I can do those descriptionsbecause I have experience having
to do them and having likeimprov practice.
But I kind of miss the old,brutal monsters because like if
a spirit touched you all of asudden, you saw your hands
shrivel, you felt the life beingpulled from you as the cold

(55:21):
depths come towards you andyou're losing yours off your
life.
But they gave us descriptionswhich I really kind of miss and
like the undead were scary,which is why having a cleric was
a great thing, because justbeing able to evaporate undead
was so important in later levelsand that's where those
abilities come from.
But they're not important thesedays.

Speaker 2 (55:44):
Unless you like, especially for like clerics and
stuff who have these abilitiesto counteract it right now in
like 5E, especially turn undeadis just a very specific ability.
It's not a devastating ability,it's just a very specific one
Turn undead used to be like howyou got out of those bad
situations.

(56:04):
You used to need it to survive,but now it's like well, all
clerics have it, but no onereally uses that ability too
often, because the undead aren'tscary when seeing a literal
corpse walking at you, intent onmurdering you.
That should not be a whatever,it's just another.

(56:25):
It's just another wolf.

Speaker 1 (56:26):
And I think honestly part of that is also pop culture
.
We see zombies and stuff likethat and all of these horror
movies, so we're kind ofdesensitized to it.
Versus when D&D was originallycoming out, those things weren't
popularized.
I mean, there was, likeFrankenstein's monster, which is
really old You've got the oldvampire stories.
But a lot of these spirits thatwere made in D&D and made into

(56:49):
monsters.
They were new ideas, like, forexample, one that's very rarely
talked about the bag man.
Where did that thing come?

Speaker 2 (56:57):
from, I think the bag man's more recent though, but,
like D&D, lost that sense oflike these creatures who are
just intimidating no matterwhere you are, like a creature
that no one ever sees.
That I want, I would love to doa campaign with.
It's hard to do.
Once you know about it, though,is the false hydra, where it
sings a song and everything justforgets about whatever it

(57:21):
consumed.
So you walk into a tavern.
There's a picture of the, ofthe barkeeper and his wife and
the bar.
If you ask the barkeeper abouthis wife, he's like I don't have
a wife.
Who are you talking about?
And you, because you're notunder the full effects of it,
because you never were, thereare just left like what's going
on in this town and the falsethe false hydra is one of my

(57:44):
favorite monsters.

Speaker 1 (57:45):
It's a very unique idea because it's not a hydra
either and the hydra is theamount of times I see the actual
like intriguing hydras from 3-5and before mentioned, versus
just a normal hydra as stated inthe base monster manual, not
even the expanded monstermanuals.
I don't even see the base hydraanymore, like false hydras,

(58:09):
fire hydras, like there were somany hydras and those things
were scary and I never see themanymore.
It makes it makes combat alittle more boring when you're
always fighting goblins.

Speaker 2 (58:20):
And I feel like that's part of not necessarily
pop culture.
But like Lord of the Rings andthese, like big names, what do
you see?
People fighting orcs, goblins,maybe zombies sometimes, but
zombies always end up going intothat horror genre where and
with with your players.

(58:41):
like there's only so many timesthat you can kill a kobold and
it be inspiring and creative,and that's why I wanted to lump
this part little talk, I mean,we'll talk more on monsters
later but specifically talkingabout it in combat, like there's
only so much room forcreativity if we're consistently
using the same monsters, andthat's something that we will

(59:02):
we'll touch on another time evenjust mechanically, if you're
looking at it, if you're justfighting the one or two types of
monsters, you're gonna havesuch a boring combat experience,
as opposed to having somethinglike a it's a demi-litch, I
think where it's just a floatingskull that can cast spells, or
like a beholder yeah, like youdon't see beholders, even though

(59:23):
they're like poster child ofD&D, and beholders are such a
devastating enemy on thebattlefield honestly, I want a
campaign where Xanathar goesafter somebody like that would
be so much fun like a beholderis always going to be a one view
party, but that's because ofhow devastating one beholder can
be.
Your magic, your wizards don'tmatter.

(59:43):
They can't cast spells anymore.

Speaker 1 (59:45):
It's looking at you like these, granny can only look
at one of them with that eye ata time.
So, like if you have multiplemagic castors spread out so you
can't be seen by it.
But like there, there's so muchmore thought into these more
explicit monsters and probablyone of the best ways to do it is
I know they sell now they sellthe D&D books on a subscription

(01:00:08):
on D&D Beyond.
I know there's a lot ofcontroversy behind it, so if you
don't want to go that way, thebooks are now sold in bundles so
, like you can get a bunch ofthe monster books and read
through all the differentmonsters.
Even if you're just skimming,you're gonna find something new
and interesting.

Speaker 2 (01:00:24):
It's always more interesting if you look at
something you see.
You see something that lookscool in for a fight, throw it in
there somewhere.

Speaker 1 (01:00:31):
Find a way to loop it in, like the false hide or find
a way to put it in someonefigure out where they live, to
like, don't just like, toss like, for example, don't toss like a
red dragon into an ocean.
That makes no sense.
That being said, in the 80s Ithink it was, there was this
thing called dragon magazinethat was made by, that was made

(01:00:53):
by wizards of the coast and itdescribes the color wheel for
dragons, and so there are purpledragons, are orange dragons,
are yellow dragons, and they'reexplained in this really old
text and there's actuallyyoutubers out there who now have
gone through and updated thoseto fifth edition.
Like they're out there, thematerials out there, and they're
interesting and they're uniquelike dragons.

Speaker 2 (01:01:15):
Yes, dragon, all dragons are gonna be dragons,
but some of those water dragons,especially the ones that can
shoot, water breath and stuffyeah you can make one of those
combat so interesting.
I've seen a camp.
I've.
It was one of my, my brother'scampaign, but they were fighting
a water dragon in a combatwhere they were retrieving

(01:01:35):
something from the bottom of theocean yeah so that dragon
wasn't just like flying at them,it was swimming towards them it
just just like dragon turtles.
Dragon turtles do the same thingand it's such a different
experience with a classicmonster of a dragon, but now
you're underwater against thisdragon who's chasing you and the

(01:01:56):
.

Speaker 1 (01:01:56):
Because you're underwater, all of your stuff
works different and, like Ithink I can't remember if it's
the orange or the yellow dragon,when's the last time you fought
an orange or yellow dragon?
They're a typical sea dragon.
Not often they breathe salt,like that is so cool of the idea
of just this creature flyingoverhead and just spitting salt
on you and crystallizingeverything that's insane.

Speaker 2 (01:02:19):
Non-fire dragons are such a cool.
Like image in the D&D moviethat came out the other, like
last year, there's a earth drag.
It's like a black dragon.
It's not a black dragon, butit's like a brown or something
drag.

Speaker 1 (01:02:31):
So black was acid no, it's a, it's a black.
Black was the there was inshone.
In total there were three.
There was a red dragon, a blackdragon and then there was the
stone dragon avatar which camefrom, I want to say, rise of
Tiamat's book, which it's like aflashback seen into a big
battle.
You see this dragon flying overshooting, or that was actually

(01:02:53):
an asset, that was a black wasthat?

Speaker 2 (01:02:54):
I said that was the earth one yeah, no, that was the
black dragon that imagery oflike something shooting earth
out of its mouth into abattlefield fully changes the
terrain, because it's not likefire which is going to hit and
like disperse, it's going tobuild a wall.
Now there's this new obstaclethat both teams have to face.

Speaker 1 (01:03:13):
Yeah, and the only reason I remember that that was
a drag black dragon specificallyis both the dragons that they
showed and they talked about inthe D&D movie were named dragons
from first edition.
Nobody knows they exist.
I'm a major dragon nerd.
I've been working on a campaignthat is focused around dragons
so I've done research on thenames dragons and nobody talks

(01:03:34):
about them.
They're in like one of them,the white dragon, and rise of
Tiamat is a well known dragon,but they don't.
Who's a more than ancientdragon and in the campaign when
you fight him he doesn't evenhave spells.
In first edition he had a spelllist of 20 like that's so
boring to just toss him againsta normal white dragon and then
use his name.
It's almost disrespectful tothe character.

(01:03:56):
In my mind.

Speaker 2 (01:03:57):
Any ancient dragon give it spells yeah, give it
something to be more than just abigger dragon because what was
cool about that dragon is hehangs in the snow and waits and
he uses tunnel abilities whenyou have a dragon, especially
even if it's like a fullyhomebrewed dragon, like there's
a campaign that I've been payingattention to with the bad guy

(01:04:18):
has a dragon as a pet, but thisdragon is actually the like
child of the real villain, who'sanother bigger dragon.
And but these dragons aren'tjust like attacking with fire,
like even basic elements.
They're doing these weird, likewhen they hit something ages,

(01:04:38):
so like they attack a town andyou swatch a wall crumble to
dust because this dragonbreathed its time breath on it
that's terrifying.

Speaker 1 (01:04:48):
It's just like the time was, or.
I really like the idea that,like HP and like age and these
things can be affected by combatand that they're not these
static effects and you can losehit points permanently.
Because I'm sorry, if you'restabbed to clean through the
chest unless you have actuallike, if if you just go, what is

(01:05:09):
it?
Spare the dying, stabilize themand then take them back to a
hospital, that's not going to besame, the same as a full
restoration from a cleric.
So like you're going to losefive hit points permanently.
I'm sorry.
Now, if you drink a healthpotion and it forces it to heal,
that's fine.
But if we're just stabilizingyou and having you heal normally
, I don't think that your hitpoints would come back

(01:05:31):
permanently.
It's nothing I've triedimplementing yet but I like the
idea.

Speaker 2 (01:05:35):
I like the idea but I think overall just makes it.
It makes it so.
I this is a piece I alwaysthought, for combat is combat
feels to separate, like you gointo combat and you go out of
combat and they're two differentlike worlds of the game.
But let's say we're fightingand I take half my hit points or
more, especially on the highlevel.

(01:05:57):
I'm not gonna be walking out ofthat fight Just as the same as
I walked into it with.
And that's not just gonna be,oh well, I'm blood battered and
bloody.

Speaker 1 (01:06:06):
It's going to be like , oh well, maybe I'm missing
some fingers now for me when Ireally think about these ideas
of how I want to run my combats.
If I am, as an individual,bringing you down to like zero
hit points, there's got to beramifications and An optional

(01:06:27):
rule.
That I've seen on a lot offorms lately has been this idea
that and I've been playing withthe, the idea myself, I haven't
found a good way to implement itwhere if you have major damage
done to you, it doesn't healunless you go and you seek out
Help from a cleric or or areligious figure or a magical

(01:06:47):
potion, and I like that ideathat, like your body's not gonna
naturally hear those or some ofthese wounds, like Long rest
ain't gonna cut it.

Speaker 2 (01:06:55):
I'm sorry, but isn't gonna heal you from getting like
your heart ripped out orgetting stabbed through the
chest.
No one is like Zorro from onepiece, who takes the biggest
sword across the chest andFights the next day.
Perfectly fine, pretty much nowlike you're gonna be not
walking normally for a while.

Speaker 1 (01:07:14):
And I definitely think that that's kind of
important to recognize is thatoptional rule is very
interesting.
I just don't know how toexecute it yet and that's
something that I'm playing withand I'd love to test In a
campaign before I kind ofpublish the rules on it.
My last kind of thing that Iwant to bring up is Combat

(01:07:36):
ending.
When combat ends it's just soboring and that's why I like
that HP rules, because thenCombat has ramifications that
you're going to have to dealwith later outside of combat.
One of the reasons I like thosestatic effects is, let's say,
that you have exhaustion,exhaustion.
Only tips takes away.
Like a point per long rest ortwo points per long rest doesn't

(01:07:59):
fully reset.
So now you're gonna have tocarry and lug your stuff Going
that slow like, or you're gonnasit down and you're gonna
collapse in your chair at thebar, like.

Speaker 2 (01:08:08):
Then it has Impact on the rest of the game combat
almost needs to end, notnecessarily when the hit points
say it ends, but when the storysays it, then so if you're in
combat for 50 turns with youknow whatever horde of enemies
that's gonna get like Eventuallythey're going to get like bored
or likes decided.
This isn't worth it.

(01:08:28):
So at some point it has to end,without necessarily the fight
being over and the it's kind ofa hard line to find because
that's up to the player inplayers and the DM as to when
they feel combat is right and itfeels satisfying, because if
you're fighting, you know ahorde of goblins or something

(01:08:49):
and they just go and screw itand walk away.

Speaker 1 (01:08:51):
That's really dissatisfying.

Speaker 2 (01:08:53):
But if you're, you know, in a big fight and they're
getting battered down and youBoth, group and they end up
being like this isn't worth ourfight, which is a normal thing
like with like Animals in thewild will they'll be fighting
for a while.
The prey usually he's justjumping out of the way and
eventually the predator yeah,I'm not worth it.

(01:09:13):
Yeah, and just is like Screwthis, I'm going home.

Speaker 1 (01:09:17):
Yeah, and I'd love to see a little bit more of that,
and I think that comes back tothe descriptive combat
storytelling that we weretalking about before.
So I think I think we covered alot.
We're definitely gonna do oneon kind of monsters and like
good ways to use them, because Ifeel like there's a lot left To
talk about with that.
If people are interested incontinuing the discussion, check

(01:09:38):
out our website, check out ourdiscord.
There will be groups in therefor you to connect with and yeah
.
I really appreciate everybodyfor listening today and stay
tuned for the next one.
You, you, you, you you.