A Short Break
3 Wise DMs is taking off the week of 8/22, but don’t worry, we’ll be back next week with a new podcast episode and articles.
How a Real Archmage Fights: Threshold of Evil and D&D’s Most Underrated Wizard
The life of an adventurer isn’t always about saving the kingdom and having ales. Sometimes, the heroes are faced with failure, and nothing is a greater example of this than a TPK. So. allow me to pay my respects to an old rival of mine as I begrudgingly explain why he deserves to be counted among the ranks of the greatest D&D wizards, such as Elminster and Mordenkainen.Â
Strange Homebrew: Knowing When, Where and How to Make Your RPG Campaign Weird Without Losing Your Players
DMs have some crazy ideas. And deep down, there’s nothing most of us want to do more than unleash those ideas on our unsuspecting players. These strange homebrew ideas can be the coolest and most memorable part of the campaign, but they’re also risky. Will your player throw a fit after their corporeal form is replaced with a pile of insects? The quit risk is high. What makes sense in the story? If you can get the players to go along with that, you can have fun with all sorts of crazy homebrew ideas.
The Richest D&D Adventure of All Time: Greyhawk Ruins, Is It Monty Haul if It’s Canon?
What if the treasure horde was just so over the top that instead of its collection being an awesome moment it was more of a WTF one? Let’s take a look at the module that made my players feel like they both jumped the shark and nuked the fridge, and what was done to keep the campaign going afterward.Â
When DMs Go to War: How to Run Mass Combat in D&D (and similar RPGs) and Not Bore Your Players
Most DMs come to a point in their campaigns where they want to run The Big Battle! A real war: Storming the beaches of a fantasy Normandy, the Siege of Winterfell, the Battle of Pelennor Fields from Lord of the Rings. But when you go to set the battle up, you realize just how clunky mass combat is in D&D and most RPGs. In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave answer that and more as they break down what happens when DMs go to war.
4 Movie Franchises That Make Blockbuster RPG Campaigns
Movies: They fire our imagination as storytellers and DMs. We want to help create the same level of tension, drama, hope, fear, love and hate that our favorite stories do. Here are 4 blockbuster movie franchises that could make epic RPG worlds.
When Your Game Goes Hollywood: How to Adapt Jurassic Park, Jumanji, and Any Other Movie Into an RPG Adventure or Campaign
campaigns, including how it can go wrong, choosing the right system, and understanding the details your players will identify with.
The Hardest D&D Adventure of All Time: Anyone Ever Run Through the Throne of Bloodstone?
The Throne of Bloodstone is the finale of a 4-part series that was published in 1988. What makes this module so unbelievably difficult that it made the #1 spot on my most challenging module list? Grab yourself a coffee and let’s talk about how, back in the day, D&D used to crank the difficulty up to 11.
Surrender Like a Boss: When RPG Monsters and NPCs Should Give Up and How to Get PCs to Accept Their Submission
Sometimes the best stories play out after defeat, but to get to them, bad guys need to occasionally survive the fight. In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave roll out their best tricks for using surrender as a storytelling tool, combat hack, and reminder that actions in their RPG worlds have consequences.
3 Dungeon Magazine Adventures That Changed My DMing Life – Revisiting One of the Greatest Gaming Resources From Back in the Day
If you were a DM from the 80s and 90s, odds are that Dungeon Magazine was an essential part of your gaming tool kit. Personally, Dungeon provided several elements of gaming that have always been near and dear to my heart. Let’s take a look at three unforgettable Dungeon magazine adventures that had such an impact on both my players and me that we can remember them vividly more than 30 years later.Â