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I have run the same campaign since the release of 4e.  We’ve been able to last together as a unit for this amount of time for a number of reasons, primarily because we all love gaming and as adults nearing the age of 40, playing with kids at the FLGS is not an option.  Also, I think it’s due to the fact that we don’t play too often, our schedules simply don’t allow it.  We manage to survive on a bi-weekly schedule, and for us it works just fine.

But what about those campaigns out there that implode after a few sessions.  This can be either due to lack of DM interest, inter-party bickering that becomes so prevalent that the party can’t be a true team much longer, real life issues keeping players away from the table, or unhappiness with the game system after some sessions.  I am sure there are many other things that can cause a campaign implosion, but these are the ones that come to mind.

"So what do you say we split the pot, call it even, and go our separate ways?"

So about the lack of DM interest, what can you as a DM do to tackle this?  First, you need to ask yourself if you are playing too much and are getting bored.  I know that I’m not sure if I’d be able to play weekly over a long period of time.  Maybe I’d start off excited and gung-ho, but prepping week to week may get old after a bit.  I’m speaking on purely personal terms here, but this may be your case as well.  DM burnout we like to call it ’round these parts.  Walk away for a bit.  Take a break.  Play a PC and have someone else DM.  Play a different game.  I recently picked up a copy of a book called “D&D Rules Cyclopedia”.  It takes all the rules released under the 80’s boxed sets:  Basic, Expert, Companion, Master and Immortal sets and combines them into a hardback rulebook.  I’m really interested in playing this, although I know my players will never go for it.  Back to the topic, take a look at what’s causing your DM burnout and keep it in check to keep your game from imploding.

Inter-party bickering can be a real difficult issue to deal with as a DM.  Basically, you may need your leadership role to go past from behind the screen and into the real world to figure out the causes behind the conflict.  Stop and ask yourself questions also.  Are you placing the characters in situations where you are forcing these issues to crop up?  That’s a real possibility.  Be mindful of causing too much conflict between different character types.  Players take their characters seriously, and you don’t want to instigate trouble as a DM.  Your job is to bring the fun, not the drama.  Help your players navigate the rough patches causing conflict, in order to avoid a campaign implosion.

Real life issues are something that unfortunately, you can’t have too much control over.  At the end of the day, we are sitting around a table pretending to be elves and dwarfs running around with swords.  Real life is more important.  A guy can’t play due to work or school? Then so be it.  The DM has to quit because he needs a second job?  Oh well.  Arguing about real life complications with the people involved isn’t going to help.  If they could, they’d play.  Think about that.

Game system issues are easier to resolve, if the entire party agrees with a change.  I know in my campaign’s case, there are grumblings of  “3.5 does this better”, but we find 4e enjoyable enough that we keep playing.  Nobody has decided to quit based on a dislike of the system.  It’s what we play and for no it suits us fine.  But what if your players are looking for something else?  You need to ask yourself if you are willing to change over to a new system.  This involves money and learning a new rules set. Time and money.  Are you willing to invest this in keeping your gaming group together?  If so, great!  Have fun.  But there will be times when the player’s lack of interest in the system at hand will show, and this does nothing but create friction and lack of enjoyment–two sure-fire ways to cause an implosion if they aren’t addressed and nipped in the bud.

So have you DM’s out there faced a campaign implosion?  What caused it?  Were you able to salvage it?  I look forward to reading your stories.

I’ve been asked how I store my minis and tiles, so rather than write it up, I thought I’d show you.  Check it:

Okay. So here’s a crazy idea.  I want to start offering the DM out there with little or no prep time a place  for downloading ready made 4e encounters for his or her game.  I want to build a library of delves written not just by me, but by the rest of the rpg community.

Say you’re a DM who worked late last night and couldn’t prep for tonight’s game?  No problem, just come here and find a delve by level, download it and play away.

So what do you all think?  I’m sure I can find one or two of you willing to give it a shot and design a few encounters, no?  I want to read your ideas and suggestions for the section of the site, as this is very much in its infancy right now, but i want to get it going sooner rather than later.

There are some legal issues I need to clear up (user created stat blocks using monster builder or other 3rd party programs,  for example) before I officially launch the section, but I want to gauge people’s interest in something like this.

I’m looking forward to reading your suggestions.

One of the things I find that most gives new gaming groups problems are finding and encouraging ways to make role-playing part of the table experience.  4^th Ed, which is designed with a big slant towards combat encounters, seems to also be a source of concern for groups, if what I read on forums, groups, and emails that I’ve received are to be believed.  Of course, there is absolutely no reason why role-playing can’t be part of your game, so I’m going to give you some ideas that have worked well in my game and have led to some good role-playing opportunities.

Morality

I quickly found that moral conundrums led to great player interaction and role-playing.  There is a fine balance you must keep if you are going to do this, because players will often have differing views of what is right vs. what is wrong, and you want to avoid this leading to inter-party conflicts at the table, where it becomes destructive to your game and an all-around bad time for all.

One of the situations I used involved a side-trek I designed around “Keep on the Shadowfell”, back when I was running it.  I had an abnormally large number of missing players that week, so felt that I couldn’t run the 3 players that did show up through the module, so instead I designed a delve that took place in Keegan’s Crypt, a mausoleum where Sir Keegan’s wife and children were buried.  There, they defeated a group of hobgoblins that had taken residence in the crypt, and inside a casket they found a magical dagger that had been buried with Sir Keegan’s wife, in order to protect her in the afterlife.  The party’s rogue immediately wanted the dagger, as it was magical, while the cleric felt it wrong to steal from the tomb.  The role-playing took over for a large amount of time, as both players made their arguments in order to justify their actions.

Another situation that came up in my game involved a minor npc I created as a McGuffin to the storyline.  She was a child that was being hunted by Shadar-Kai, as she had powers that controlled the weather, and they wanted to use her for her abilities.  My PC’s who work for “the man”, were ordered to find the girl and bring her to them.  When the players asked what would happen to the child, “the man” didn’t really give them any clear answers, and this ambiguity created discomfort amongst the party.  Some felt that they needed to follow their orders, as they were told that finding and delivering the child was necessary for the common good, while others were uncomfortable with what was essentially a kidnapping mission, with an uncertain fate for the child.  This issue led to very good role-playing scenes in the game, because it capitalized on player emotions and their views on certain moral issues.

One time I had the party go and attack a group of Ogres that was attacking farms on the edge of a city.  When they arrived at the ogre living area, they found an ogre mother with her children.  Needless to say, it wasn’t as clear cut and dry as to whether or not they would slaughter the ogre children.  Ultimately they did, due to the racism that is so prevalent in fantasy gaming.  Apparently ogres are just monsters there to be killed, children or not.  But the point is that the situation lent itself to role-play moments.

Questioning their honor

Characters, and particularly dragonborn and dwarves, are big on honor.  This is something you can use to your advantage.  Push their buttons, as sometimes the simple insinuation that they are being somehow dishonorable will lead to them defending their actions and their methods.  A dragonborn, as someone out on the blogosphere said (and my apologies for not remembering who), is basically a Klingon dressed like a walking dragon.  If you are at all familiar with the Klingon race you know how much they value honor in battle.  Play that up, have your npc’s ham it up, question the honor of your party members who value it, and encourage the role-playing that will follow.

Investigative work

If you set up situations in your game that lead to investigations, keep it from becoming an exercise in die rolling and checking against a DC.  If a player says “I’m making my streetwise”, ask him exactly what he’s asking or telling the barkeep at the tavern.  Play up the conversation, asking for rolls (that may or may not mean anything, but will keep him guessing) and determine where the conversation will go from there.  I found that pc’s that give off bad attitudes or ask for coin in exchange for info provide great role-playing moments.  People don’t like random strangers asking them random questions out of the blue, so remember that next time the party goes around investigating.

Battle

Finally, role-playing during battle is also a possibility.  Always remember that intelligent creatures are not very keen on death, and at some point, may give up fighting to try to save their hides.  Eight bugbears may be tough when encountered, but when it’s down to one bugbear and his Morningstar, he may have a different view of the situation.  When Sam the bugbear is groveling and begging for his life, he will encourage your players to perhaps stop the combat and begin the role-play.  You may need to nudge your players a bit to take the hint that the bugbear wants to talk, and not fight anymore, but try to do this organically and not be too heavy handed.  Gauge their interests, don’t force a situation either.  An interrogation skill challenge would be a perfect follow up to this situation, but keep in mind about asking your players how and what they are saying as they interrogate the subject.

While these aren’t the only ways you can get your group to role-play more, they are easy situations to introduce in your game.  Don’t be discouraged if you are a new DM with new players, the role-play will come in time.  Also keep in mind that as one of the books somewhere says, this isn’t an exercise in improvisational theatre.  You need to learn to create a fine balance between dropping the dice to role-play, and just killing things and taking their stuff.  Either way, the most important thing is to have a good time, no matter what your group’s play style is.

I’ve never really liked the idea of wish lists, and much less the idea of treasure being included in the Player’s Handbook.  Unfortunately, that’s now the way it is, and as a DM you’ve got to adjust to the fact that your players have full access to a list of treasures that are available in the game, and more importantly you have to deal with the fact that they probably think that certain treasures simply suck.

There really isn’t much you can do, magic items have ceased being mysterious and truly “magical” and have instead just become another plus to the attack or defense modifier, and on top of that have become selectable by the players by their inclusion in the book.

So here’s a solution to avoid the mechanical & immersion breaking (in my opinion) aspects of wish lists:  create random loot tables based on pc’s wishes.  In essence you are having your players create your random tables while filtering away crappy items.  Perhaps by tier, or by every 5 levels, you can ask each party member to give you 10 items they’d wish to have.  You’ll quickly have at least 40 or 50 items from which to create the table, and have passed on the tediousness of picking magical items to them, while still maintaining the illusion of randomly getting a magical item that doesn’t suck.

So you have a percentage based chart that may look like this:

• Weapons 1-7
• Holy Symbols 8-15
• Orbs Rods 16-23
• Staff 24-31
• Wands 32-39
• Arms 40-47
• Feet 48-55
• Hand 56-63
• Head 64-71
• Neck 72-79
• Rings 80-87
• Waist 88-95
• Wondrous 96-100

You then populate it with a wish list that is composed entirely of items they would eventually want or would consider using, effectively filtering the list of items they’d consider crappy.  Let me know what you think about this idea, I threw it out there so other people better than me at math could come up with their own version of it.

Off the top, I know that the percentage of getting a weapon, for example, is small. I’m just not a math person, this is just an example of what a chart may look like. So someone good with numbers please hurry and design a better one.

As a newbie DM, it’s easy to get caught up in the things that seem important right before you start your campaign. Your maps, your minis, and your epic Tolkien-esque storyline all take up your undivided attention right before your first game.  You are so caught up with what’s happening on your side of the screen, that you may be forgetting the most important part of the equation:  the adventuring party on the other side of the screen.  Remember that these guys are all there to be entertained by you, so you can’t neglect them nor go into the game not knowing who they are  or what they are capable of.  You need to study the party, learn what they are capable of, and design challenges that will give them a good run for their money.

My suggestion to you is that if your guys are using the character builder to make their characters, they send you either the character builder file of their pc, or a PDF of the character sheet a night or two before your first session.  Have them download a program called CutePDF, which installs on the pc as a virtual printer, allowing them to “print” directly to PDF.  This way, you have the characters available to you at a glance via email, and you can begin customizing encounters based on their abilities.

If you have a Rogue in your party for example, make sure you provide something in the adventure to make him feel essential. Locks, traps, a pickpocketing skill challenge to find a set of keys, anything made just for him.  Do the same with your arcane characters, who are always going to want to roll their arcana checks everywhere they go, so make sure every now and then that roll actually provides the party with something useful.  Players want to feel like they are contributing to the successes of the group, and its partially your responsibility to provide that feeling.  Don’t be afraid to toss in a few xp points whenever a character conquers a specific challenge you’ve laid out for him, he’ll appreciate the challenge even more and feel good about his character.

It may be a good idea to sit down with each individual player to get a sense of what type of character they want to be.  Does Gentir want to be the typical rogue, sneaking around and opening traps, or is he more of a swashbuckler Han Solo-ish type?  These conversations are good to have because now you know that the “rogue” in your party isn’t all that interested in playing his guy like a thief, at least not flavor-wise.  You can then create situations that’ll fit his character concept better.

And finally, another good thing to keep in mind as you are starting out in the lower levels is to let your players show off their shiny new abilities they’ve earned for themselves as they gain experience.  Players love it when they can use their newest tricks, so make sure you provide a way to get them into the story. Nothing frustrates a player more than to have a particular skill or ability that never comes up in the game.

Remember, D&D is a collaborative game,  and by keeping your players engaged, everyone has fun.

So yesterday I pulled out the minis and tiles for another game with my 4 year old daughter.  One thing immediately stood out:  if you aren’t consistent with the gaming, the rules will be forgotten.

In her defense though, this is only the third time we play (and even I forgot a rule, and I designed the damn thing).  I made some videos so you can see an example of a kid actually playing… that’s her and I playing, with my 2 year old screaming in his booster seat as he plays with some other minis.

The story was a simple one, her party was sent to a Wizard’s lab to recover some papers, but a group of skeletons was waiting for them to arrive… here now is rpgKids in action at the hands of a 4 year old:

And you can download the rules here.

Edit:

So the winners were @richardphipps on twitter, and Patrick from Ontario.  You see Canada?  We like you here at newbiedm.com.  Stop bitching.

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So here we go with another contest, courtesy of Gator Games and myself.  The good thing is that we’ve learned to speak Canadian for this contest, eh, so you canucks up there are now eligible to enter!

We will select two winners for this contest, and each one of you will win a copy of the book.  Entering is easy, leave a comment below, or find @gatorgames and myself on twitter (@newbiedm) and send us a message telling us it’s for the contest.  The kids call that tweeting, you see.

On saturday night, at 11:59pm easter, 8:59pm pacific time the contest will end, and I’ll select the two winners on Sunday.

These contests are only possible because of my wonderful sponsor, Gator Games, who really must not get tired of giving things away.  Sometimes I think Gator Games is secretely owned by the richest person in the world, and that person is a gamer geek who loves spreading gaming joy.

In all seriousness, take a few minutes to sample their site, you never know what you may find.  Good luck, and it’s not a bad book btw, I reviewed it earlier this past week.

About Gator Games:

Gator Games is an FLGS (Friendly Local Gaming Store) operating in San Mateo, CA., and if you are in the area then do yourself a favor and make them your gaming store.  But if you are not, it doesn’t matter, because Gator Games has a website with a great “Used Items” online store that is certain to satisfy all of your hobby needs with some really great deals.

Gator Games also offers German games and an expanded selection of RPG’s, card games, miniatures, dice and boardgames.  Visit Gator Games’ revamped website today at www.gatorgames.com.  You can also find them on Facebook (Gator Games & Hobby) and Myspace.

Gator Games & Hobby
4212 Olympic Ave
San Mateo CA 94403
650-571-PLAY(7529)

Let me get this out of the way quickly.  I’ll start the review with what should really be the last sentence in it:  Underdark may very well be the best 4th Ed. supplement written to date.  It gets right what to me “Plane Below” got all wrong.  It feels like a complete book that doesn’t make you flip to other books.  It gives us DM’s a self contained wealth of material to run an entire campaign with, and enough locales, flavor and monsters to keep your party busy for the entire three tiers of play.  This book feels like a campaign setting, even if it is not sold as such.

Unfortunately, the book suffers from a big minus, in that none of the locations presented are mapped.  It looks like WOTC’s cartographers called in sick during the writing of this book, which is very unfortunate. So now that you know where I stand with the product, let’s get to the “why” of the matter.

Underdark comes in at 159 pages, 6 Chapters, 38 monsters, 16 mapped encounters, and 1 stated god, Torog, who may be the most fleshed out god in 4e’s pantheon to date, and he is one seriously f’ed up dude to boot.  Also, in a move that I’m willing to bet was more planned than not, Drow are kept in the background and are by no means the featured item in the book, satisfying the numerous Mountain Dew and Pizza munching haters of dark elves everywhere.  My fellow DM’s, there is so much story written into this book, that again, it feels like a campaign setting in it of itself.  The amount of ideas, hooks, quests and locations written into these 159 pages make it must-read for 4e dm’s everywhere.  Here is the breakdown chapter by chapter:

Chapter 1:  Into The Depths

We start with a quick look at what the common folk know of the Underdark, the common knowledge most people would be familiar with.  We then move on to the origin story, which involves the downfall of a god, Torog, the King that Crawls.  Figure out how that nickname ties into the creation of the Underdark. This chapter also includes the sections on the geography, the lords of the realm, and some fantastic terrain.  Adventures and campaign arcs are in here as well, with many to pick from to start a campaign from the ground up.  This chapter is also filled with sidebars providing DM’s with tips and ideas on how the Underdark affects PC’s, how they may find shelter, food and water, and that sort of stuff.  Yes, the book is that detailed.

Chapter 2:  The Shallows

In a nutshell, the shallows are the tunnels and entrances to the Underdark nearest to the surface.  This is where PC’s in the heroic tier would make their journey into the darkness, and meet duergars, goblins, troglodytes, and other creatures that make their home here.  What I really like about this chapter is that we get several fully fleshed out (sadly without maps) locations that are part of the Shallows.  Forgehome, for example, is a dwarven community below the surface of the world, and Maelbrathyr, a ruined city dragged down into the Underdark.  This chapter also includes the first of three delves in the book, and new monster themes relevant to citizens of the Underdark.  It’s worth noting that the delves in the book all use Dungeon Tiles that are still available in stores, unlike the Dungeon Delve book which used out of print tiles in its design.

Again, several sidebars add to the flavor and usability of all this material in a campaign.

Chapter 3:  The Deeps

The deepest portions of the Underdark make up the depths, and here, your Paragon and Epic tier pc’s will find many of the emblematic creatures they’ve come to expect:  Drow, Mind Flayers, Aboleths, and such.  Here’s where the Drow lovers will find the juiciest part of the book, as the Drow city Erelhei-Cinlu is detailed, with a nice image of the full city and plenty of fluff.

The city of Erelhei-Cinlu

Noble houses, city locations, architecture, military and ghettos are all detailed.  If you are running a Drow campaign, this section alone is worth the price of admission, as the city can obviously serve as a template for any Drow city you may have been planning on incorporating into your game.  Hmm. Too bad there’s no maps. Figure out how to key that map for yourselves.

We also get an Aboleth realm, a large underground ocean, a lost mind flayer settlement, and tons of other locales for both Paragon and Epic tiers.  A Paragon tiered delve rounds out the chapter.

Chapters 4 & 5:  The Feydark and the Shadowdark

Just like the world has its echoes in the Feywild and the Shadowfell, so does the Underdark.  Here we get what the underground looks like for these two planes, and well, it’s all kind of similar, but with subtle differences.  For example, the Feydark has no Shallows or Deeps, it is all pretty much the same depth.  And instead of pervasive darkness, it is lit with a dim glow a product of spores and luminescent sea creatures. Fomorians and Cyclopses make their home here, along with gnomes from the kingdom of Drochdan.

I think that the Feydark is just different enough, flavor wise, to distinguish it from the Underdark, much more than its Shadowfell counterpart, the Shadowdark.  Trees and plants live down in the Feydark, along with reptiles, rodents, bugs, and other animals.  There is more light down there as well, and  in fact some of the tiles that are used in the delve in this chapter are the “Sinister Woods” ones.

The Shadowdark is a colder, darker, version of the Underdark, filled with undead, dark ones, and a new race called Incunabula, humanoids in the service of Vecna. No. they aren’t made available as a PC race.  Locations in this chapter include Glimmer, the incunabulum City of Secrets, Esarham, the graveyard of Demons, and Lathan, the River of Souls.

If I had to pick the weakest chapters in the book, it would be these two.  I still think we need separate books on the Feywild and Shadowfell, and detailing their respective “underdarks” would have probably fit better in those future books.  These chapters do not have the same level of detail as the others in the book, at least in my opinion.

Chapter 6:  New Monsters

The last chapter in the book gives us new monsters, the biggest, baddest one being Torog, a huge level 34 solo lurker, and his Crawling Blood Swarm, a level 34 minion that reproduces itself when adjacent to bloodied creatures. Pretty cool.  We also get new versions of already existing creatures like grimlocks, kou-toas, and a mind flayer.

So, yeah, I’ve gushed positively about this book.  It is a good book.  It feels complete, unlike “The Plane Below” which I found was an incomplete mess of a book.  Underdark will not have you flipping pages to other books, rather, it’ll have you mining it for ideas in your own campaigns.  It’s making me want to start mine over to take my pc’s into the underground and try one of their campaign arcs.

A negative in the book? Where are the maps?  Sure, delves are mapped with Dungeon Tiles, but we get zero cartography.  There are tons of locations in the book and we get no keyed maps.  That is a big minus.

I wrote recently about Wizard’s incorporating tons more fluff into their books making up for the amount of rules one can find on DDI, and the fact that I think they probably need to protect themselves from people not buying books due to them having a DDI subscription.  Well, this book again solidifies my theory.  It is packed with story bits, good stuff on the locations, creatures and inhabitants.

I can’t recommend it enough.  It’s a fun read. It reeks flavor.  It’s full of great sidebars filled with fluff and advice.  I dare say that it is the best 4e supplement to date for DM’s out there.  It really should be called the Underdark campaign setting, because that’s what it felt like to me.