AwkWord D&D Homebrews

Homebrew for D&D 5e and other general ttrpg tomfoolery

[awkwordadventures]

My current D&D homebrews:

Collections:

Champions of Gaia - 6 nature-themed subclasses

Classes/Subclasses:

Old Growth - warlock patron

Rootborn - Sorcerer Bloodline

Witch - Full Class

Spells:

Adderfoot's Twist of Fate

Items:

Items from "Bardians go to Hell"

[awkwordadventures]

So I just started listening to the Magnus Archives ttrpg live play on their hiatus and its bringing back memories of my take on a Magnus Archives campaign I ran in Call of Cthulhu 7e. Should I convert this to run in TMA setting/Cypher? 👀👀

The Aranea Corporation is a private security company that specializes in the containment of material assets. There is no public security element of the organization and instead, it is rumored that they acquire and secure assets for a shortlist of clientele with deep pockets. Not much else is known about the company from the outside, but people in the small town of Webberville, IL nearby see them as just a normal part of town life.

Aranea owns a small apartment community in town and houses all employees who need housing there, so a few employees are known in the town though regularly regarded as outsiders. The corporation building itself is about 15 miles outside of town. Most employees will drive in separately.

You were recently hired at Aranea Corporation as an Investigator in the Artifact Investigation and Retrieval department. After an intense interview with Oscar Burns, Investigation Manager, you were hired for the position. Your job, as it was described to you in your interview, will be to retrieve potentially “active” artifacts for containment within the Aranea facility.

[awkwordadventures]

Oh look im a player again 😃

[awkwordadventures]

So my latest obsession has been daggerheart and I've been working on turning one of my original 5e settings into a campaign frame.

-▪︎-▪︎-▪︎-▪︎-▪︎-▪︎-▪︎-▪︎-▪︎-

MYTHRA CITY

A vibrant, modern cityscape houses a deep-rooted secret; magic is real, and it walks among the mundane. Will you protect this secret, or seek to bring it to light?

Designed by AwkWordAdventures

Complexity Rating: ●●●○

THE PITCH

Along the coast of a powerful, modern nation lies a city that exists like any other. Humans travel from home to work or school, ordinary children play in parks in the day, clubs filled with mortals dance into the night. However, that which appears ordinary on the surface hides a deep secret which permeates every aspect of life in Mythra City. Magic is real, and it controls everything.

Mythra City is an influential and coveted destination for those of mythic bloodlines. Magic courses through leylines that run from the sacred mountains to the east of the city, all the way to the western ocean. But those of mythic blood who live in Mythra are by no means the majority, and their existence, though powerful, is to be kept secret from any Mythless humans that coexist in this place.

You are Mythic, a powerful magicaly touched being that calls Mythra City home. You may not be from here originally, but you now abide by the Façade and live amongst the mortals. This task of existence is no walk in the park, conveniently located in the heart of downtown as it may be. Instead, you have pledged your mandatory allegiance to one of the nine ruling factions of Mythra, and everything you do is monitored for their interests. Will you valiantly uphold your allegiance? Will you fight to keep the workings of Mythra secret? Or will you work to undermine the will of the Council of Nine that holds so precarious a position of power over Mythic and Mythless alike?

TONE & FEEL

Vibrant, Modern, Urban, Lively, Action-Packed, Familiar, Heroic

THEMES

Urban Fantasy, Secrets in Truth, Progress versus Tradition, Magic and Mundane, The Virtue of One’s Birth, Existential Debate

TOUCHSTONES

Lost Girl (TV Series), Mortal Instruments series, The Magicians, Vampire: The Masquerade, Charmed (TV Series)

[gamechangershow]

🚌Presenting the BRAND-NEW season - Dimension 20: On a Bus!

DM'd by Katie Marovitch, and as players: Aabria Iyengar, Brennan Lee Mulligan, Jasmine Bhullar, and Mark Mercer!

Watch the full episode here

[awkwordadventures]

Character Tip:

You only need to answer 3 questions to make a compelling character:

What are they good at

What are they bad at

What do they care about

These don't have to be complicated, they can be very simple. And while this may lead to some flanderization, it has also resulted in some of my most loved NPCs and PCs.

[awkwordadventures]

I'm interested in maybe doing a loose, low-key behavioral project on GM types, but I want to do some preliminary checks to see if I'm in the right ball park.

I want to structure this as a variety of preference spectrums, sort of like MBTI. I have a list of some categories to start working from but wonder if there's other things I should consider. I'll list them below and give what I think are the extremes.

---

Content (High-content vs low-content):

Content preferences are about how much of a foundation you prefer for a story. High-content preference means you prefer a world that is as fully fleshed as possible with as many details as possible. Low content means you prefer having only enough to craft the story and build the rest as part of the experience.

Authorship (Created vs Curated):

Different from content preferences, this is about what level of control you wish to have over the world. High-authorship would be those who prefer entirely homebrewed settings and stories. That compared to low-authorship which prefers to use pre-written content that allows them to focus more on the game.

Player Input (Collaborator vs. Manager)

This about the level of contribution the players have in the setting/story you like to work with. Someone who prefers high-player input likes to have players who write detailed backstories and build settings together. That compared to low-player input which cares more that players are engaged in the story and game and less how much input they have in it. (Reminding that some players don't want to write detailed backstories or come up with settings, they just want to play, and a low-PI gm would be perfect for them!)

Rules (Laws vs. Vibes):

This is about how much you care about written rules, regardless of system. A high-rules GM prefers to treat the rules as an important foundation and enforce them as true as possible. That compared to a low-rules GM who considers them more guidelines and will champion "rule 0." (This is also where a GM might have opinions on how much they want their players to know the rules, but im unsure if that fits here or in player input).

Tools (Miniature Mogul vs. Theatre of the Mind):

This is how many bells and whistles a GM prefers to implement in a game. A high-tools GM prefers stories and systems that allow for maps, minis, props, and all the peripherals whether digital or physical. A low-tools GM prefers stories and systems that thrive on imagination and make-believe.

---

Keeping in mind that this is verrrryyy preliminary what are your thoughts? Also it's important to note that I don't think any of the 10 extremes are bad. In my 11 years in this hobby I have known players who prefer one or the other of all of these styles. This is not about good versus bad but more about self-understanding to make us all better GMs :)

[prokopetz]

I think a lot of folks in indie RPG spaces misunderstand what's going on when people who've only ever played Dungeons & Dragons claim that indie RPGs are categorically "too complicated". Yes, it's sometimes the case that they're making the unjustified assumption that all games are as complicated as Dungeons & Dragons and shying away from the possibility of having to brave a steep learning cure a second time, but that's not the whole picture.

A big part of it is that there's a substantial chunk of the D&D fandom – not a majority by any means, but certainly a very significant minority – who are into D&D because they like its vibes or they enjoy its default setting or whatever, but they have no interest in actually playing the kind of game that D&D is... so they don't.

Oh, they'll show up at your table, and if you're very lucky they might even provide their own character sheet (though whether it adheres to the character creation guidelines is anyone's guess!), but their actual engagement with the process of play consists of dicking around until the GM tells them to roll some dice, then reporting what number they rolled and letting the GM figure out what that means.

Basically, they're putting the GM in the position of acting as their personal assistant, onto whom they can offload any parts of the process of play that they're not interested in – and for some players, that's essentially everything except the physical act of rolling the dice, made possible by the fact most of D&D's mechanics are either GM-facing or amenable to being treated as such.*

Now, let's take this player and present them with a game whose design is informed by a culture of play where mechanics are strongly player facing, often to the extent that the GM doesn't need to familiarise themselves with the players' character sheets and never rolls any dice, and... well, you can see where the wires get crossed, right?

And the worst part is that it's not these players' fault – not really. Heck, it's not even a problem with D&D as a system. The problem is D&D's marketing-decreed position as a universal entry-level game means that neither the text nor the culture of play are ever allowed to admit that it might be a bad fit for any player, so total disengagement from the processes of play has to be framed as a personal preference and not a sign of basic incompatibility between the kind of game a player wants to be playing and the kind of game they're actually playing.

(Of course, from the GM's perspective, having even one player who expects you to do all the work represents a huge increase to the GM's workload, let alone a whole group full of them – but we can't admit that, either, so we're left with a culture of play whose received wisdom holds that it's just normal for GMs to be constantly riding the ragged edge of creative burnout. Fun!)

* Which, to be clear, is not a flaw in itself; a rules-heavy game ideally needs a mechanism for introducing its processes of play gradually.

[prokopetz]

The point is, as a game designer, you are never going to win over the all-indie-games-are-too-complicated crowd by explaining how simple your player-facing rules are and how seamlessly they support the narrative, because their experience of playing Dungeons & Dragons is that they can simply opt out of engaging with any player-facing part of the game they don't care for, up to and including opting out of everything and making the GM do all the work, and they're coming from a culture of play which has a vested interest in treating this as a valid preference. It doesn't matter how light your rules are, you're not going to beat an expected level of engagement of zero!

[nichtschwert]

Wow I never looked at it this way even though I have known quite a few of these coasting players over the years. Hell I've been that player when I realized that my inability to engage with DnD3.5's rules enough meant that any character build I'd come with myself would always be overshadowed by the hardcore power players in the group.

There are definitely a lot of those sorts of players out there who can be reached by simple player-facing mechanics because they want to engage with the rules but can't. I was one of them.

To be clear this is not a rebuttal. OP never said or implied this is not the case. The takeaway is that you shouldn't be surprised to find players out there will never be interested in juggling even nicely streamlined systems for themselves.

[prokopetz]

Oh, absolutely. I'm not saying that D&D players who are unengaged at the table because the rules are too complicated or too GM-facing for their liking and would do better with a system whose mechanics are more streamlined and player-facing don't exist. I'm saying that the Venn diagram of those players and players who regard all indie games as too complicated has very little overlap. If, as a designer, you're trying to appeal to the former by addressing the criticisms of the latter, you have misidentified your target audience.

(The same goes for indie game advocacy in general. "Play another game" is a snappy sound bite, but no advocacy that's rooted in talking about the structure of a game – mechanical, narrative, or otherwise – is going to be persuasive to a player who has no interest in engaging with that structure. To them that's all "GM stuff", and therefore nothing to do with them.)

[ariadne-mouse]

I CAST BOOP AT 9TH LEVEL

[aureliagaming]

idk what dm needs to hear this but you arent getting that done in a single session

[awkwordadventures]

Champions of Gaia - V0.2

Awhile back I posted about how I've been working on some plant/nature themed Subclasses for 5 e. Well a lot has happened this summer and time really got away from me, but I still wanted to share what I've done!

Here are the 6 Subclasses I came up with (3 martial and 3 caster) for use in any setting where nature is queen:

Barbarian - Path of Bramble

Bard - College of Lifesong

Monk - Way of the Tree

Rogue - Forestwalker Archetype

Sorcerer - Rootborne Bloodline

Warlock - Old Growth Patron

I apologize that these are all images. I had planned to officially publish these in the "correct" way using homebrew platforms, but that ended up being more complicated than I think I was ready for.

Still there is a fully designed, 12-page PDF I have with an author's note and everything! Maybe someday I'll do more with it.

Also all the artwork is public domain! I got them from the National Gallery of Art at nga.gov. There is a note of this in the table of contents but I cut that page for space on tumblr

[awkwordadventures]

While life has been a whirlwind recently I got to do a one-shot with some friends where everyone played a different subclass of my homebrewed Witch class!

Oops, All Witches!

Everyone was a level 11 witch and we had one hedge, one star, and two essence witches. This was a 4-encounter one shot over the course of a few in-game hours, so it was somewhat a stress test. The CR of the encounters never went above 11, so none were deadly. It was a ton of fun and gave me some good insight into a few things!

The number of spells, while more limited compared to wizards, feels good. No one felt lacking for spells, but they also felt the pressure of conservation similar to Warlocks. Overall in a nice spot between its two parent classes.

The essence craft witch is a little overtooled for combat. May consider some moderate adjustments, making it more focused on magic defense and less on combat.

Conversely, the hedge craft witch feels undertooled for healing. May give slight buffs and adjustments to the natural remedy ability to make it more smooth.

Star craft worked pretty much as intended. However it was a lot to keep track of with accounting for both how many Astrology dice were gained AND used. May adjust the 10th Level manifestation to simplify.

Will reduce Out of Body manifestation to 15 feet. It's a fun, unique mechanic that's not too strong and I think 15 feet will put it in a sweetspot.

Will nerf Soul-Binding Sigil. It felt like the player who didn't take it fell significantly behind.

Will add a manifestation that boosts hardiness. While this class shouldn't be a tank they should get an option to buff themselves up a bit given limited spell slots and d6 hit die.

Of course, nothing exists in a vacuum, and these are clearly just preliminary observations from seeing each subclass play a bit. The real test would be seeing how one witch does in a balanced party. Because of this, I don't plan on making major changes until I get the chance to do that, but I wanted to post an update since I haven't been able to recently :)

[awkwordadventures]

Plant Themed Martial Subclasses

So I wanted to keep going with the plant themed Subclasses and this time tackle some martial ideas. I'm not going to share the full classes but just an update on my future plans.

First off I think I'm going to make all the Subclasses available as one supplement for free (or PWYW) on DMs Guild. This is mostly because the caster classes need access to spells not in the SRD and DMs Guild is the easiest way to do that. I have never used DMs guild, however, so that's going to take some time to figure out.

That said, I will publish all 6 Subclasses under one document available for download as soon as they are in a place I feel is ready for consumption!

Yes, you read that correctly, six subclasses! The first two subclasses are already available here. The Old Growth Warlock and the Rootborn Sorcerer.

I also already have 2 martial classes almost ready, they are just in the final stages of polishing. Those Subclasses are:

Forestwalker Roguish Archetype: Leap silently from treetop to treetop and use the cover of canopies to mask your every move. When the timing is right and your positioning is perfect, you're ready to get the drop on your enemies, literally!

Way of the Tree Monastic Tradition: Learn the lessons of nature and embody the endurance of the great trees. Taking one of three stances, this adaptable subclass looks to nature as its true master.

For the last 2 subclasses, I'm going to do one more martial and one more caster. I'll leave it at that for now!

And as a bonus, here is the draft of the primary level 3 ability for The Way of the Tree monk!

Form of the Tree

Starting at 3rd level, you can take a stance reminiscent of a part of a tree to grant you benefit in battle. You can spend 1 ki point as a bonus action to take either the Trunk Stance, Branch Stance, or Leaf Stance. Your stance lasts for 1 minute or until you are incapacitated. If you use this feature again to take a stance, your current stance ends.

Trunk Stance

You steel yourself and embody the sturdiness of a tree’s trunk. While you are in Trunk Stance you gain a bonus to your AC equal to half your proficiency bonus (rounded down).

As part of the bonus action used to take this stance, you immediately gain temporary hit points equal to a roll of your Martial Arts die + your wisdom modifier.

Branch Stance

You twist and bend like a supple branch reaching for the light. While you are in Branch Stance you gain a bonus to the attack rolls of your unarmed strikes equal to half your proficiency bonus (rounded down).

As part of the bonus action used to take this stance, you can immediately make one unarmed strike at a target within 5 ft. This attack deals extra damage equal to a roll of your Martial Arts die.

Leaf Stance

You swiftly glide through the battlefield like a leaf blowing in the wind. While you are in Leaf Stance your speed increases by 10 ft.

As part of the bonus action used to take this stance, you may immediately move up to half your speed.

[awkwordadventures]

5e rules syntax question: if you want a specific trigger to depend on falling, but don't want that fall to be the result of flying, how would you write the limiter?

Currently I have "You cannot use this feature if you start your turn in mid air or if you have used a fly speed as part of any movement this turn." Is this sufficient?

[awkwordadventures]

Wild Magic (Revisited)

I was asked on my main blog my thoughts on wild magic sorcerers and it really got me thinking! I wanted to try my hand at reworking the class and coming up with something that really tackles the core issues of the subclass while maintaining simplicity and the WotC style. Here is what I came up with: Wild Magic Sorcerer (Revisited)

Keep reading for my explanation and screen grabs from Homebrewery!

So I've read over a couple reworks of wild magic and they all operate at varying degrees of complexity. It seems like most people go for more wild and more magic, which is super cool! But I wanted to see if I could tackle just editing the base subclass down to solidify it in both mechanic and flavor without changing too much.

With that in mind, I knew I had to boil down some problems with the subclass and address them succinctly. In my experience, here are the main common greivances:

Too much reliance on DM for surges, which is unfriendly to new DMs and new play groups

Too little chance for a surge to happen

The variance of power levels in surges makes it too random, meaning it is hard have a baseline of what to expect

The surges feel too separated from the rest of the subclass mechanics

With all that in mind, I had the goal of making as few changes as possible to the current subclass to address all those issues. Essentially, I wanted to try editing the work so if someone looked at this and compared it to the base it wouldn't be overwhelming or totally overbearing to implement.

I decided to split the table into 2 tables. This allowed me to tackle the problem of surge variance. By separating the more minor effects from the more major effects, it gives players a better idea what to expect from their results before they even roll. This gives it some consistency while still retaining a simple randomization mechanic.

The splitting of the table allowed me to rework the wild magic surge mechanic to more frequently allow for surges. I didn't take away the DM induced surge (even though I wanted to) but instead added some guidelines on when to use it. I also made it "roll on the table" instead of "roll to see if you roll on the table," again, for consistency.

I also was able to tie rolling a surge into the sorcery points mechanic to help this really feel like a Sorcerer subclass. By working in the major surges as a product of using sorcerous powers, it really becomes part of playing a Sorcerer and not just an extra quirky thing.

Last, I modified some of the abilities to play off the double table mechanic in order to represent the slow gain of control as the player levels up.

As one finishing touch, I slightly modified some of the roll results to help balance the power of each table.

Overall, I think the end result is a good balance of chaos and consistency that should feel more satisfying to play without overcomplicating the playstyle.

Let me know if you think I hit my mark!

[awkwordalex]

How do you feel about wild magic sorcerers?

Wild magic is a tricky one but my sentiment is generally positive. The flavor is good and the mechanics beyond the above-table play with the DM are simple yet impactful. This I'd gonna be a long one so I'm gonna "read more" it

I think a lot of the issues with wild magic come from inconsistency. The fact that in order to use your core mechanic (the table) you are heavily reliant on the DM letting you, and the fact that the table itself is a bit too unpredictable both create table tension.

This creates a power dynamic that is different from all other Subclasses between you and the DM and makes it somewhat hard to use in a new party because you don't have a relationship with the DM. You want to use your cool features but don't want to take others out in the process and the DM may not want a unicorn barreling through its first level goblin encounter where they are trying to teach new players.

If I had to rework wild magic to be more "consistent" I would try to tie the wild magic rolling to a tangible action that the player can control, then I would try to make the outcome of that roll a bit more predictable so the DM and the player know what level to expect.

It would probably look something like this:

Wild magic table:

Split this into two tables that are about half the size of the current one. This would be a minor surge and a major surge. Minor surges would range from narrative effects like turning blue to basic 1st and second level spell effects. There would also be a sizable (maybe 60-100) margin where nothing happens. Major surges are your fireball, fly, unicorn, vulnerability to piercing, etc.

Wild magic surge.

I would keep the "DM can" component but add some guidelines as to when to use it. In the same way warlocks discuss their relationship with their patron with the DM there needs to be examples of how the DM can influence wild magic. Is it stress? Is it excitement? Is it random? With this in mind i would remove the roll for the surge and just say the DM can make you roll on the minor surge table. This adds the consistency we were missing but to make sure the DM can't abuse this I would add that they can only do this once per short rest so there is a limiter on the DM as well.

I would also add a secondary effect to this ability that ties in sorcery points (the core mechanic of the sorcerer) to the wold magic. Something like "starting at 2nd level, when you use sorcery points to regain spell slots or affect a spell with metamagic roll a d20, if you roll equal to or less than the number of sorcery points spent roll on the major surge table, otherwise roll on the minor.

Controlled chaos

Instead of rolling 2 and chosing, I would say that you get some control over whether a surge is minor or major. This same level of chaos but feels more impactful because you have direct control over how disruptive your surge will be. I would say that you can chose to make major surges minor but not vice versa. This also fits the flavor of "control" because major surges are especially wild.

Spell bombardment

This feels weak and doesn't fit the flavor at all. I would replace this feature with one that actually plays with the tables and chaos in some way.

Anyway sorry for the long post. Let me know if you'd actually like me to rework the wild magic subclass 😂

[awkwordalex]

A new member joined my Humblewood campaign so I painted her a mini :) meet our new Jerbeen Druid! This player has never played any ttrpg before so I wanted to make sure she felt super welcome!

(Bonus: updated party photo with my obligatory self-insert wizard friend who patrons the party on occassion)