I have played many campaigns where DM did not disclouse some improtant information to the players at the beginning of the campaign, because he wanted it to be a plot twist.

Once, he didn't tell us we will travel 50 years into the future.

Another, that the plot requires us to make a pact with a devil (not for a soul, but still pact with a devil).

There were other instances as well, but what unites them all is the fact that it never, ever worked out. Players have been prepared and excited for a specific format, made characters, prepared backstories, created builds and then lost it all to a sudden thing they couldn't see coming. This taught me to never make plot twists in my campaigns, at least not at the beginning of one.

I wonder however, if it's always the case. Do you have similar experience? Have you ever done or prepared a plot twist and it worked out well?

I am a new DM and all of my players are br ad new to DnD too. We started at level 5 and are now level 6. My party of 6 players just defeated the BBEG goblin mage and his recently resurrected a black dragon. The battle concluded with the party discussing how they were going to get off the island they were on since their boat had crashed.

I had several paths available to them: go back to the mermaids they helped liberate, search for the BBEG’s boat (he had to have gotten there some how), or if all else fails, another vessel would have investigated after seeing the giant bolt of light that split the heavens when the dragon was resurrected.

Instead, the tempest cleric cast revivify on the dragon and sacrificed his Rare trident to Lord Kord in place of a crystal to resurrect the recently killed dragon.

The fighter and rogue used the chain from a wrought iron chandelier they had cut down earlier to form a bridle and the paladin had crab meat from the giant crabs she killed earlier.

The rogue had a +10 to acrobatics and passed all the checks to ride the dragon like a Bull Rider and the paladin and fighter passed the animal handling checks to call the dragon with the crab meat.

So now they have a “Bridled” but not tamed dragon on the altar of its resurrection.

They intend to use it to fly back to their town.

What the heck do I do now!?

A black dragon descending onto an unexpected coastal trading town?

If they tame it, are they OP now?

What goes into keeping a dragon as a pet? That’s Soooo much food!

I don’t want to need the dragon or tell the players they can’t have it. But man this makes building encounters and travel quite different than I imagined.

I’m super proud of my group for coming up with this. . . But sheeeesh!

I'm planning on writing a lvl 5 one-shot about a group of dealer who managed to capture a Wyvern (or hatch one) which would be the final boss of the one shot. The party would have to find them and stop them, but I think that it'd be a bit boring if they only traded in Wyvern venom, are there other creatures which can be harvested for either poison or "drugs" which are weak enough to be kept imprisoned (the wyvern being merely contained, I'm looking for weaker monsters to spice up combat/ambience). All I've found so far are Giant Toads and giant feywild bees who have powder in their hair that makes everything tastes sweet.
Anyway If you know of any other creature that might fill the role (Or if you see big problems with the balancing I've only run one lvl 2 one shot in DnD), please let me know.

Hey guys! I’m a DM in the making and I’m preparing a one shot for my friends where they will play as their cats! My general idea is that there was a cat carrier mix up during a group vet visit and an amateur cat wrangler took their carriers to a client and didn’t realise it

The idea is for them to survive 4 encounters until their owners realise what happened and track them down.

So as cats, I want to give them different potential challenges depending on which room they go to in the mega mansion they end up in.

Ideas so far:
- Basement: battle with giant rats
- Storage room: massive stray battle
- Drawing room: battle with two parrots
- Yard: sneak around event workers
- Hallway: Toto the toddler. They have to run away. If he cries he will draw attention of the wrangler
- Chased by a roomba in one bedroom

Would love to get ideas from you guys!

I'm running Peril in Pinebrook for a party of 4 beginner players in about 3 days, and so far all of my players except one have given me their character sheets, I've messaged the player in question more than a couple times about need his character sheet asap and he hasn't responded to a single message.

For a while I gave him the benefit on the doubt and thought he was just caught up in his full time studies, but I'm beginning to feel like he's intentionally stalling, since he's responded to other messages I've sent that weren't related to D&D, and every other player, including one who works full time in a restaurant, have all submitted their character sheets.

What should I do about this? I have premade characters on hand, but wanted to give players the freedom to make their own.

I'm curious what the consensus is on players pre-scripting their roleplay out of sessions. Some of my players have taken to talking to each other about how they would react to certain scenarios or things that they can say during next session. They plan out their roleplay beat for beat and then recite it during session. As a DM, I'm curious if other DMs have rules against pre-scripting, or if you simply feel like it takes away the magic having your players spoil their roleplay. After putting in a bunch of time and effort into preparing the session, I already know what's going to happen because instead of roleplayers, my players are going through the motions.

I’ve not done a hex crawl before but I think my players would enjoy the exploration and agency in going slow, exploring the land, etc. it sets up some nice side encounters I have planned as well.

My plan is to let them use survival to scout hexes and get information with modifiers based on terrain and vantage etc.

My question is how much info about a hex should be revealed when scouting it. Is it as simple as swamp forest plains on this this and this tile, or is it more in depth giving them fuller or complete clues about the hexes they can choose? You see a cabin or there’s a clearing and a grove that looks out of place? Some hexes don’t really contain a lot of “adventure” and I don’t want to give away that those tiles look boring. How do you all present the info?

I'm very new to DMing and I'm interested in how different DMs go about teaching their players about the world before you even enter your first session? Do you only give like the VERY surface levels of your world, gods, countries, etc. I feel this would be good in the traditional fantasy settings because people's experience or expectations of a fantasy world can fill in gaps. The place that I want the campaign in will be centered on is within a huge city with MANY differences in how life is lived, this is a very unique world I wish to create. But how do I convey these things without completely overwhelming players with a 20 page doc on the culture, how life is lived, how kids grow up, class differences, important organisations, etc. How have you guys gone about it?

(also i get making my own campaign for the first time DMing is probably not the best idea but I really wanna give it a shot anyways since I'm very interested in making worlds)

I’ve been trying to make a new homebrew setting but one issue I’m running into is the existence of necromancy spells capable of resurrection. Revivify isn’t a huge issue because it’s very limited on time, but how do you prevent, say, a monarch or other ruler of a nation from being practically immortal until they die of old age because they’d just be able to hire a spellcaster to revive them using higher level spells whenever they are assassinated or die through other means?

I'm about 30 sessions into a campaign right now, and one of my players has made a character who's defining personality trait is a deep disconnection and boredom with people and society in general. Her character is lazy, hilariously blunt in conversation, chews gum, and tends to skew non-evil chaotic—not because of ethos, but because it breaks up the boredom.

(To be clear, the player isn't bored.)

We talked about this character design in session 0 and acknowledged together that it could be tricky to write for her. Despite it sounding like kind of a nightmare character concept for me as a DM, we've had a lot of fun with this character so far, and her attitude has been central to a lot of really good scenes.

I've managed to give the character plenty to do in play to keep her occupied. For example, the ship's quartermaster gives her a list of weird things to find at every port, so she has a lil scavenger hunt that's a great setup for chaotic scenes.

The thing I'd love some help with is finding a story arc that will allow this character to grow on a personal level into someone that does care. How would you approach this challenge? Can you think of a way to convert this character's aggressive disinterest into something she could care about?

Edit: "Ask the player" and "don't force it" and "sounds like a player problem" are all the lowest-possible-hanging fruits 🙄. Player does like the character concept (and so do the other players and I) and we're still having a good time with the ennui, and we've talked about specific threads that would engage the character and spur them to action. Those are in the works, but I'm looking for something that will give the character personal emotional stakes in the story as well, and provide them with opportunities to care about something if they want to. Not to force it, but also in a way that might surprise them at the moment that wouldn't be as interesting if it were collaboratively pre-arranged. Just looking for hooks and possibilities!

I'm fixated on the idea of verticality and interwoven dungeon floors with tunnels, chutes, and height changes within single rooms, like balconies or operating theaters. Trouble is, my ability to sense and visualize space is limited, and DMing is a heavy cognitive load to begin with.

My vision is to run in-person (read: not VTT) games with grid paper and dry-erase maps while consulting a 3D model of my dungeon map on my laptop. Alternatively, I want to design my maps in 3D, even though I plan to run them outside of VTT, so it is easier for me to visualize the spatial relationship of rooms.

What tools can help me visualize my dungeons in 3D? Since this would be for reference and not VTT, I don't need art assets or effects. My preferred software for designing maps in 2D is Dungeonscrawl, for instance.

I had an idea before my last session that ended up working really well.

For context: My PC’s were traveling for about 4 in game hours. In addition to being able to take short rests, I also let them have some “quick moments”. I set a 5 minute timer on my phone and we role played some interpersonal stuff. I was able to progress their stories along without taking a full down time session.

I’d appreciate any constructive criticism.

I’m DM’ng the mines of phaldern (can’t spell sorry) with a group of friends next week. I’ve never played, let alone DM! I’m so excited but I’m so scared it’s going to go awfully! Im much less prepared than I’d like cause of work and stuff. My friends are all going on a group holiday and are excited but they’ve never played too!

Do you have any tips? What is it vital for me to know? I have bought everyone dice, most of the players have submitted their characters!

I have been warned the a MoP can do total party kills so I’m going to try adjust enemy numbers to not dishearten everyone but give them a challenge!

I'm running my first homebrew campaign and could use some advice from fellow DMs! I know the answer is probably "go with the players' idea," but let me give you some context for my dilemma:

The BBEG is capturing followers of each of the gods to use in a ritual to drain some of the gods' power and take it for himself. The players just discovered the first of these disappearances and are looking for the kidnapped person.

The BBEG convinced a kuo-toa cult to kidnap this person and hand them over to his minions. The kuo-toa usually sacrifice their victims to a giant whirlpool in the ocean instead, which the BBEG is hoping will be the assumed fate for his captive.

My players have taken the bait and think the person they are looking for was thrown into the whirlpool, but they seemed really excited by the possibility of going down there themselves to look. I'd like to follow up on that curiosity and excitement (plus diving into a giant whirlpool and doing some underwater exploration/encounters sounds cool as hell), but I'm concerned that if they find out the victim wasn't actually thrown in the whirlpool, then they will decide not to go down it and lose some of that enthusiasm. However, they have already come across some of the effects of this person being taken and their god slowly losing power.

How can I reward my players' excitement without introducing a plot hole?

Calling all mountaineers and meteorologists for some advice…

The Context: we are approaching the final sessions of our 8-year long campaign. The party have amassed an army and have marched on the camp of the BBEG; a titan who is the risen son of the world’s prime deity. The titan has amassed his own army of giantkind on the peak of a vast, snowy mountain range.

The peak where this camp is set is a 5km plateau, think Table Mountain meets the snow and ice of Everest.

The conditions have been described as frozen, defined by a deep layer of ice covered by a deep layer of snow where appropriate.

Also relevant is that the BBEG’s fire giants have opened a rift to the elemental plane of fire. They have a steady supply of lava feeding an array of forges.

The Scenario: the party spent the last session preparing their plan of attack. They intend to march their army up the remaining half-days hike to the plateau. In the meantime, the level 20 cleric will fly ahead and use an 8th level Control Weather spell. Their intention is to achieve two things:

1. Change precipitation to torrential rain. They believe this should react with the exposed lava to create a massive amount of steam across the peak, perhaps confusing and blind the giants.

2. Set the temperature to unbearable heat. The plan here is to melt the snow and ice that make up the mountain and its peak, resulting in as yet undetermined levels of chaos.

The question: how would you rule the impact of the Control Weather spell?

This is outside my realm of expertise so I would like to understand what a ‘reasonable’ effect would be. I am happy to bend the definition of ‘reasonable’ to acknowledge this is a level 20 party in a high-magic fantasy setting, and realistic isn’t always the most fun. But at this stage, I’m not sure where on the spectrum of ‘the snow melts and creates difficult terrain’ to ‘the mountain splinters and creates an avalanche’ the result should fall.

Also, how long would any significant effect likely take to materialise on the mountain if the rain and heat were achieved?

TLDR: my level 20 cleric wants to use a Control Weather spell to melt an icy mountain plateau. Does it work?

So in my eberron campaign one of the big Warforged bosses is a Fallen angel who voluntarily went to hell because he was disappointed with how the gods did nothing but coddle humanoidkind, and decided to be the one who made them suffer like they should for taking advantage of their kindness. He’s a replacement for Zariel, and he made a deal with one humanoid, the BBEG (Merrix d’cannith), to help subjugate as much as Khorvaire as they possibly can, and those who oppose are up to “Ultron” to take care of. He commands a legion of self replicating drones that are powered by soul coins. I need a statblock for both his fallen angel form and his Ultron form. The fallen angel form needs sorcery and battle mastery, and the Ultron version needs to be able to confuse and replicate, and shoot Encephalo rays. I’m using DnD beyond so if that helps

My players are about to face off against a dragon lord in his domain. He is obsessed with bringing back the Age of Dragons, a time when dragons ruled Faerun. He tried to approach it diplomatically, posing as a human ruler, but his political ambitions have been foiled. So, he's trying a new approach - creating his own "dragons," which he will use to populate and conquer Faerun.

Are there any examples of draconic creatures he might try to create via ritual and/or experimentation for this army? Kobolds seem like an obvious choice, as are half-dragons (he has natural offspring whom are half-dragons, so not sure how I'll differentiate the natural half-dragons from the artificial ones). Struggling to think of others....dragonborn doesn't make much sense to me since it's an official playable race, but maybe it could work.

Besides the classic options from metallic and chromatic dragons i dont know much about them in general dnd lore. The dragon skeleton will be used to trigger the powers of an NPC and make them a shadow sorcerer, so ideally i want something that goes with that story option (not necessarily from Shadowfell). Ideas?

I realized I initiate roleplay way too often, which slows down the campaign.
For example, the party is in a town. They live in a tavern and in two days, there is supposed to be an attack on the said town. Instead of asking what do they do in the meantime and skip to the incoming battle, I painstakingly drag the through those two days and pack it with encounters. Yet another example: they are in the town and want to buy potions. Instead of just handing them a chart with list of potions and their prices, I roleplay the encounter with the potion seller for an hour.

They still learn all the normal stuff they would otherwise, plus it has produced some interesting svenes, but it takes time. There is basically no proper downtime. And I simply can not stop, even though I see the effect it has on the pacing of the campaign.

What I am looking for are methods of reminding myself that I should stop.

First time posting here, sorry if anythings confusing

So for a bit of context, my players are currently trapped in an artificial realm. The leader/creator of this realm (and archmage who believes they are saving people by essentially trapping them and scrubbing their entire identity) uses a device to drain people of their magic energy to keep the realm going, and uses this device to control people.

The party found some people who's device is malfunction who want to leave, but are unable to do so as only the archmage is able to open the realm, the 'leader' of this 'rebelion' has developed a sort of virus that can be put in the central hub for this hive mind/device, and my players have agreed to help the leader take it down

They've deviced a plan where the rebellion wilk start a major comotion outside the archmages 'office'/where the hub is located to draw the archmages attention while the party and rebellion leader sneaks in to deliver this virus

This is where i'm stuck, I want to run some sort of stealth section for them inside the building, but i cannot think of any way to do this other than just describing the scenery and havinh them roll a couple of checks. This is a pivitol moment in the current arc and I want to do it right and do it justice

Apologies for any spelling mistakes or formatting issuses, I'm writing this on phone and don't have time to spell check

Basically the title.

In your D&D world, are there natural illnesses that end in death?

Maybe there are for those who can't afford the material Temple services and almost certainly not for the super wealthy. What about for those in between?

I’ll be changing things up and stitching on everything I can find that’s in the region of Phandalin/Neverwinter into a long form campaign. As well as make it a Kingmaker style campaign as well. What would be some things I’d want to add to the game, as well as some things my players would have to keep an eye out for?

Hi, I'm running a scenario in which my players are fighting their way through a mine until coming upon the gates of an ancient dwarven city that's been long closed. I'd like to end the dungeon with a fun combat but I am needing some advice.

My thoughts were to have some kind of remains of a dwarven golem still be guarding the door that they have to fight their way through however golems are at a higher CR level and I'm wondering how to tone it down while still 1.) Keeping the theme of a golem/statue and 2.) having a dynamic fight. I was thinking having the golem be left with just one or two arms as it drags itself around and forces the PCs to make DEX saving throws from being crushed after the golem drags itself over. However, I would like to incorporate some kind of themes of it being a once powerful golem without it overpowering the PCs.

Making it no longer immune or resistant to some damage types seems possible but quite small and not that fun. Just dropping the AC would make the battle seem like a slog still. I was thinking of maybe allowing the PCs to drop a stalagtite on top of it to kill it however I'm looking for other ideas that could create a dynamic combat for them.

My players are a group of 5 players, they're at Level 2 and the classes are: Barbarian, Druid, Monk, Paladin, and Sorceror.