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Running the Game

Keep Calm and Carry On Playing: Thoughts On The Upcoming Change Of One D&D And How To Best Handle It With Your Game Group

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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. 

What I Like (And Hate) About You – 3 Wise DMs Reflect On A Decade of 5e and Share Tips That Will Make You Have Your Best D&D Game Ever

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On July 3rd of 2024, D&D 5e will turn 10! While it has taken some hits in those ten years, no one can deny the positive effect it has had on our TTRPG hobby, bringing in an entire generation of new players. With this anniversary, we started to reflect on what we have loved, what … Read more

When Good Men Do Nothing: 3 Tips To Help When Your Players Get The Wrong Idea In Your D&D Game

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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?

Go Go Godzilla! 3WD Brainstorms The Best Ways To Bring Unbeatable Monsters Like Godzilla Into Your D&D Campaign

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As we learned from the AD&D release, Deities & Demigods, “If you stat it, players will kill it.” So, what do you do if you want to place an unbeatable Kaiju-type monster, like Godzilla, into your game world? Something way more fearsome than a Tarrasque. A complete force of nature that shapes the entire world and every adventure in it. Something that you can’t just “punch really hard.”

In this episode, Tony, Chris, and Dave respond to a listener’s question, “have you ever put a monster in your campaign that cannot be defeated?” and enter into a real time brainstorming session as we discuss how we’ve used it as DMs as well as played with it as players in our own games.

There Is Only War: 4 Helpful Tips To Enhance Your D&D Combat That DM Chris Learned from Warhammer 40K

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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.

Back in the Saddle Again: Our Best Tips and Tricks for Coming Out of DM Retirement and Running Your First D&D Game in Decades

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We’ve done several episodes and articles about how to best onboard new DMs and GMs to the hobby, including episode 113: Just Do It, with DM Lenny, about running his first game ever. But what about all the Grognards and OG DMs that were playing it out of the White Boxes assembled by Gary Gygax in his own home?

In this episode, Tony, Chris, and Dave sit down with our good friend, Scott Washburn of Paper Terrain, to discuss his recent return to the DM chair with his homebrewed campaign “World of the Five Gods.” True to form, Scott kitbashed together the original White Box D&D with some flair from 5e.
For all the DMs who have thought that “Retirement Sucks,” whether its been 40 days or 40 years, this is the episode for you.

Rewrites: 3 Wise DMs 5 Top Tips To Help Your Players Connect With the Plot Without Rebooting Your D&D Campaign

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Greetings gamers from all systems, places and timelines!

During a campaign, there are dozens of ways the game flow can begin feeling disjointed or muddled. Like if your particular game has a great deal of lore or subplots that have put the players on different pages. This isn’t always a problem, but when a good chunk of the party can’t remember key details of the plot then it definitely has become one. 

If you find yourself in this spot at least you will be in good company, as this has happened to the best of DMs. Especially if you’re running a significant number of campaigns and you’re constantly trying to outdo yourself. Or perhaps you just rolled too many plot drops that your group just isn’t retaining them. This is why we put together a list of five ways that you can help your party reconnect with both your game and story without starting over at square one.

Godspell: Two Simple Changes To Make Clerics In Your Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragon Queen Dungeons & Dragons Game Feel Special

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There has been much discussion about how some of the major features that separate the Dragonlance setting from other settings were left out of the adventure. While this allows DMs and players unfamiliar with the setting to not feel completely lost, it does leave a good deal of work to a DM (like myself) who loves the Krynn setting and wants to have it feel different and special.

With this in mind, here is the way that our friend of the show, and resident Terrain Wrangler, Scott “The Wizard” Washburn, cobbled together a small and simple change to make the return of True Clerics to the world after three centuries feel special – without rewriting all the mechanics of 5e!

Changes – 3 Wise DMs Absolutely Best Tips For The Player That Wants To Change Their D&D Character Class

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What do you do when your player is unhappy with the direction of their class and wants to change over into a new class mid-campaign, but with the same character?

In this episode, Tony, Chris, and Dave answer a listener question about their player that wants to change their character’s class from Paladin to Sorcerer at 5th level. We delve into not just the narrative components of a change like this, but also the mechanical effects that such a change would inevitably bring. Along the way, we offer tips, tricks, and questions you should ask yourself if you’re planning on something like this in your own games.

RPG Mythbusters: The Tavern is the Best Place to Start Your D&D Adventure

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The tavern. It’s the start of 23 different campaigns that DM Tony has been in over the last three decades. It’s a fantasy adventure trope and gets a lot of hate out there for being basic and unimaginative, but is that necessarily a bad thing?

In this episode, Tony, Chris, and Dave return to our RPG Mythbusters series and test the myth, “Is a tavern the best place to start an adventure?” Will it be confirmed, plausible, or busted?