Prompts For D&D Adventures

Weekly (or sometimes more often) prompts and ideas for you tabletop games. Feel free to submit any of your own ideas, or stories of how these prompts turned out.

[beapeabear]

A group of enthusiastic, yet dangerously poisonous animals. What adventures they could have. I think.

[titleknown]

@bogleech

[dnd-prompts-blog]

Turns out the island was actually a dragon turtle, and if we wanted to cross, we had to pay tribute. Tribute was about 10 gp a person.

DM: The turtle stops about 15 feet out.

Me: Is this is a pay-to-advance turtle?

Todd: Don't give him ideas!

[dnd-prompts-blog]

DnD Prompts #7

A half-orc hires the party to help him find his orcish father, deep within orc territory.

[dnd-prompts-blog]

DnD Prompts #6

The prince/princess has been kidnapped by a dragon, the dragon promises to return them safely if the kingdom empties its coffers for the Dragons hoard.

[kastep]

Treasure chest. Once again, study inspired by the videos of Alexei Grishin.

Check his awesome channel

[tabletop-rpgs]

[rpgs-are-neat]

Player Character(s) Concept

A Tiefling and a Half Orc who are half brothers and who love and support each other because they both understand what it was like to grow up “different”

[commodorepompadour]

Heeey just finished another D&D commission. c:

This one was an absolute blast since I rarely get couples commissions. :,D

[wilburwhateley]

The Gate Keeper by Les Edwards, frontispiece for Curious Warnings:The Great Ghost Stories of M.R. James

[thydungeongal]

I drew a thing. Feel free to use it in your games!

[hellodarkcollector-deactivated2]

I recommend it be called Sword of Goblin Slaying. Or if it’s a goblin weapon it might deal more damage to dogs / horses if it’s pathfinder themed!

[thydungeongal]

To be honest, I drew this thing while very tired and just thought that +1d8 to goblins with no context sounded fun so I left it intentionally vague.

It could be +1d8 to number encountered when the PCs run into goblins. It could be +1d8 to damage against goblins. It could be +1d8 to all rolls involving goblins. It could be +1d8 damage when wielded by goblins. It could be all of the above. Whatever.

Anyway, it was mostly an excuse for me to share a random doodle I did because I’ve decided to start drawing more.

[vigothebloodprince]

1d8 to ALL THE GOBLINS

[thydungeongal]

This person gets it

[thydungeongal]

The Dungeon Clock

So, here it is.

The Dungeon Clock starts at 0. Every two turns you check for random encounters: roll a d12, and if the result is less than or equal to the number on the Dungeon Clock, a random encounter happens and the clock resets to 0. If the result is higher than the number on the Dungeon Clock, there’s no random encounter and the Dungeon Clock ticks forward by 1.

Here’s the thing: you always check for random encounters before ticking the clock forward. This might feel nonsensical, since the clock starts at 0, but there’s a method to this madness. It means that if the group has just had a random encounter there will be at least a short stretch of time between their last random encounter and the last, so your group has at least some respite between encounters.

Ultimately though it means that at some point the characters are guaranteed to have an encounter, no matter what they do.

Some further thoughts:

You might want to tie the ticking of the clock to the actions taken by the group in some way. Moving around stealthily and not dallying might stop the clock from ticking forward altogether. Making a lot of noise might trigger a check for a random encounter out of turn: in this case, check for random encounters as normal and if no such encounter happens tick the clock forward as normal.

How do preset encounters in the dungeon interact with the Dungeon Clock? You might choose to reset the Dungeon Clock after any encounter, even ones that were not triggered by a random encounter check, or you might not. I’m personally unsure which would be the better approach. Playtesting is needed.

Under this system, in comparison to the normal Basic D&D method, there’s a lesser chance of a random encounter during turns 2 and 4. By turn 6 in the dungeon the chance is just the same as in Basic D&D, after which it will begin to increase in increments of 1/12.

Going back to the idea of tying the clock into actions taken by the players, the clock might be best used in a situation where you want to give the players a feeling of tension, like when they are trying to sneak around undetected. A random encounter does not immediately mean combat: just because monsters are encountered does not mean they immediately notice the characters, meaning they have a last chance at evasion. Since a random encounter was rolled anyway, the clock will reset to 0 if the characters manage to evade the encounter.

You should probably use some physical representation to keep track of the Dungeon Clock. Hey, a d12 has numbers from 1 to 12!

[titleknown]

…Aaaaaaaand now I want to write up the idea of The Dungeon Clock as a monster, probably a species of construct.

[thydungeongal]

Ooh, that’s a great idea! I could see The Dungeon Clock as having time-based abilities of some kind. Alternately it’d have a “clock” which ticks forward by 1 each round and depending on the time on the clock it’d have a different attack pattern!

The one problem I could see with that is that since D&D combats don’t tend to last anywhere close to twelve rounds (for good reason: anything that long starts to feel like a grind) your players probably wouldn’t get to experience the full breadth of its abilities… unless each Dungeon Clock started with a random number on its clock (roll 1d12!) and you made a dungeon inhabited only by Dungeon Clocks. That way your players could learn their patterns through multiple successive encounters!

[strangerdarkerbetter]

Support autistic people who don’t fit the stereotypes

Support autistics who are women

Support autistics who are trans or nonbinary or any other marginalized gender identity

Support autistic people of color

Support autistics who aren’t savants

Support autistic people who fluctuate between verbal and nonverbal

Support autistic people with special interests that aren’t STEM related

Support autistics who can “pass” as neurotypical in public but struggle at home

Support all autistics

We are all unique people with unique combinations of autistic traits.

Whether you fit the stereotypes, break every one, or are somewhere in between, you are valid and deserving of support

[thebatteringram]

Another party of magic-using animal adventurers: Aegeus the mage, Xerafin the wizard and Ursula the shaman team up and use their arcane knowledge and skills to combat any evil force that blights the land!

[dnd-prompts-blog]

DnD Prompts #5

A mysterious blizzard has come to a small desert village.

[ravnicaresin]

Brus Weagyn - A 5e Batman

With this character build, I attempted to make a fantasy version of Batman. There is no “correct” way to make a Batman-like character but I felt this particular one fit him the best. I’ll give a breakdown of my reasoning for each class in the final build and then detail where our “Batman” would be at levels 1, 10, and 20. So, the final build:

Rogue 8 (Arcane Trickster): Batman is a very stealth-based character, so a Rogue seemed obvious. I went with the Arcane Trickster route as a replacement of the comic’s version of gadgets and technology.

Monk 8 (Way of the Shadows): This is another that seemed pretty obvious. We have a fighter who is great with hand-to-hand combat, can wear no bulky armor, and (by way of the shadows) he has a bunch of cool stuff to add to the sneaky-ness. A few other things are slow fall and deflect missiles which is also a very Batman-y thing.

Fighter 4 (Battle Master): Batman has fighting expertise (went a Dex-based fighter) and knows how to read his enemies. Battle Master felt perfect to show how he can pinpoint the weak spots in the enemy and also how good of a tactician he is. While you could go just far enough to get the archetype, you’d be doing yourself a favor to hit the 4 to get the ability bonuses/feats.

Feats: Some feats are just too cool to pass up. I went Observant, Alert, and Athlete.

Level 1: Rogue 1

Story: While he may not be Batman quite yet, this is a young Bruce (or Brus) who is eager to become the champion of Gautheim. This is Brus/Bruce as he leaves Gautheim/Gotham to find himself.

Level: 10

Class: Rogue 2/Fighter (Battle Master) 4/Monk (Way of Shadows) 4

Story: Brus never stayed in one spot for too long. He studied under various masters, learning many different martial arts. Now, he has returned to Gautheim and has taken to the streets, known as the vigilante/urban legend “The Bat”.

Level: 20

Class: Rogue (Arcane Trickster) 8/Fighter (Battle Master) 4/ Monk (Way of Shadows 8

Story: For years, Brus has waged a war against crime, eventually becoming the hero known as “The Dark Knight”. Not much else to say here; this is Batman realized (or at least attempted to be realized) as a fantasy character.

Character Sheets:

Level 1 - Brus Weagyn

Level 10 - The Bat

Level 20 - The Dark Knight

[noblecrumpet-dorkvision]

Pie Fights

Mark breaks down the conflicts that exist within the color wheel and what makes them interesting.

D&D Story and Character Conflicts

Whether or not you play Magic the Gathering, this article is an interesting resource to explain different story conflicts. The conflicts could be between characters, between kingdoms/countries/factions, or even inside one character’s head.

As a Dungeon Master, use these for your Dungeons & Dragons campaigns to create central conflicts and unifying themes in your plot. As a Player Character, use these as driving forces to promote character growth as you make decisions throughout the game.

Summary:

Selfishness vs. Selflessness (black vs. white)

Head vs. Heart (red vs. blue)

Free Will vs. Destiny (black vs. green)

Freedom vs. Security (red vs. white)

Nature vs. Nurture (green vs. blue)

Structure vs. Anarchy (white vs. red/black)

Change vs. Convention (blue vs. green/red)

Power vs. Community (black vs. white/green)

Courage vs. Caution (red vs. blue/white)

Natural Growth vs. Unnatural Change (green vs. blue/black)

[dnd-prompts-blog]

DnD Prompts #4

A mysterious sickness called "Basilisk Fever" is sweeping through the town, making everyone sick and slowly turning them to stone.

[writing-questions-answered]

Guide: Naming a Town or City

There are many things to keep in mind when naming the town or city in your novel:

1) Genre/Theme/Tone

It’s very important to consider the genre and theme of your story when choosing a town name. Take these names for example, each of which indicates the genre or theme of the story: King’s Landing (sounds fantastical) Cloud City (sounds futuristic) Silent Hill (sounds scary) Sweet Valley (sounds happy and upbeat) Bikini Bottom (sounds funny) Radiator Springs (sounds car-related) Halloween Town (sounds Halloween-related) Storybrooke (sounds fairytale-related) 2) Time/Place It’s also important to consider the time and place where your story takes place. For example, you wouldn’t use “Vista Gulch” as a name for a town in Victorian England. You probably wouldn’t use it for a town in modern day North Carolina, either. Vista is a Spanish word and would normally be found in places where Spanish names are common, like Spain, Central and South America, the southwest United States (including southern California), Cuba, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, and Florida. 3) Size/Settlement Type An isolated town of 300 people probably won’t be Valley City, but a sprawling metropolis of 30 million could be called Windyville, because it could have started out as a small town and grew into a large city. 4) Geography Words like gulch, butte,and bayou tend to be regional terms. You probably wouldn’t find Berle’s Bayou in Idaho, or Windy Butte in Rhode Island. Words like mount, cape, and valley are dependent upon terrain. Most of the time, you won’t have a town named “mount” something unless there are hills or mountains nearby. You wouldn’t use “cape” unless the town was on a cape, which requires a large body of water. 5) History Is there a historical person or event that your town might be named after? The Simpsons’ hometown of Springfield is ironically named after its founder, Jebediah Springfield. Chattanooga, Tennessee is named after the Cherokee town that was there first. Nargothrond, in The Lord of the Rings, is an Elvish town with an Elvish name. 6) Combination of Words

person name + geographical term = Smithfield, Smith Creek

group name + geographical term = Pioneer Valley, Settlers’ Ridge

descriptive word + geographical term = Mystic Falls, Smoky Hill

person name + settlement type = Smithton, Claraville

landmark + settlement type = Bridgton, Beaconville

Word Lists: Types of Settlements

Geographical Features

Place Words

Common Suffixes

Other Descriptors

Try a combination of two words from any of these lists. :)