Chris 
Greetings, 3WD-verse! DM Chris here. When I was approached to run DM Tony’s most recent birthday game, I was excited and yet without a clear vision of exactly what we were going to play. Our birthday game one-shots have become a friendly competition, so I went searching for the perfect idea. We’d just played a … Read more
Birthday games, and one-shots in general, are a great place to stretch out and try something new. The best part of any challenge, like having 3 different DMs running a session, is that there are no mistakes. Only lessons and experience you can bring with you to make your other games better.
Greetings, 3WD-verse! DM Chris here. With all of the excitement brewing around our impending Lord of the Rings Roleplaying campaign, there is one thorn in the rosebush to deal with. To quote the sourcebook, “Magic in Middle-Earth is rare.” So rare in fact that initially I was somewhat confused by the exclusion of spellcasting classes, … Read more
Greetings, 3WD-verse! DM Chris here. Along with Curse of Strahd, Tomb of Annihilation occupies a revered status as one of the “must-play” adventures in D&D. It has grown from the original Tomb of Horrors module into a complete setting, with the aforementioned Tomb lurking deep in the dangerous and vast Chultan jungle. Death and glory … Read more
Greetings, 3WD-verse! DM Chis here. In our latest Return to the Further session last Wednesday night, the players valiantly battled a Dragonborn Mummy Lord and his Green Dragon protector to remove the evil taint that had claimed the ancient elven city of Ennama. All that in two hours on a Wednesday night. Mini-session campaigns can … Read more
Greetings, 3WD-verse! DM Chris here. As I begin my preparation for our upcoming Lord of the Rings Roleplaying campaign, I thought it would be a cool exercise to talk about what I’m doing to get it ready. When you are operating from a sourcebook versus a published adventure, there can be the additional stress of … Read more
Greetings, 3WD-verse! DM Chris here. Over the past several months, the folks over at WOTC have been releasing some of the changes being made to our beloved D&D 5th edition, culminating in the release of the 2024 Core Rulebooks. And as one would expect there have been a bunch of reviews published about the updates, both good and bad. People are resistant to change, and anytime you’re going to alter something that has evolved and grown into such a wide-ranging community, you’re going to ruffle some feathers. But for those of us who have seen years and fads pass by, change can be what you make it.
Greetings, 3WD-verse! DM Chris here. In the long hours, weeks, months, and even years of your campaign, there will be portions of your carefully crafted story that will get lost in the flood of plotlines and twists. It’s inevitable. Don’t fret – it happens to writer’s as well. Remember, you spend a lot more time with the details than your players do. Top that off with the power that ideas can have. Once your players have had a “wrong” idea about the story, it can plant itself deep in their understanding and cause issues for you down the road.
We recently experienced this in our current Shadow of the Dragon Queen campaign. DM Dave does a fabulous job delivering lore and secrets, but over the multitude of sessions a “wrong” idea began to grow amongst the party members. I don’t want to spoil the fun for anyone looking to play that adventure, so I’ll be talking about it generally, rather than in specifics. Our party is nearing the epic finale of the story, and one of the key portions had become slightly twisted. We became so focused on this altered version of what we were there to do that finally Dave had to break immersion and course correct us in order for the story to continue. But then that got us talking – is there a better way to get your players back on point?
Greetings, 3WD-verse! DM Chris here. As you’ve no doubt picked up from some of our #MinisMonday posts on social media, me and the boys have recently picked up a mean Warhammer 40K habit. Credit to the Wizard Washburn, as Scott has assisted in our introduction to the wonderfully addictive wargame. Although it can get pricey (I think of it a lot like golf for geeks), the combination of modeling, painting and battling with your army is a rush that tugs at the heart-strings of gamers like us who love minis and combat.
But what does that have to do with D&D, and more specifically how does that help us as Dungeon Masters, Chris? That is a legitimate question. I’ve been wrestling with it myself. As with any of my hobbies, I love to talk about it. But that’s not enough. We pride ourselves on providing advice to DMs with problems. There wasn’t an article there, or at least there wasn’t until Me, Tony, Dave and Scott had fought several battles. Then the article idea appeared to me in a Warhammer-influenced daydream.
I think of it a lot like plyometrics. If you want to jump higher, then exercise by jumping. That is a gross oversimplification, but the essential idea remains. Every game session, D&D or not, is exercise for your gaming, and by proxy DMing, skills. We’re always learning and evolving. The beauty of our game is how easily it lends itself to the little tweaks and homebrews we imagine as we play other games. So herein lies the little nuggets that I’ve pulled from my recent Warhammer experiences and added to my bag.
Greetings, 3WD-verse. DM Chris here! The Bard class in D&D is a fickle thing. Much like being an actual musician, teasing the right notes out of your wandering minstrel can be challenging. As a guitarist myself, I’d often admired the cool eccentricities of the Bard from a distance, but when DM Dave first mentioned the Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragon Queen campaign, I knew it was finally time to pull the trigger. Enter, Rasgueado Vilhuela. Herein lies the top 5 tips and tricks I used (and learned through experience) as we traveled through Krynn to make my Bard truly sing.
