Wizards of the Coast put out several big campaign adventures for D&D. And a lot of them left some DMs wondering "How the eff do I run that?" This feeling is not confined to WotC products, but those big campaign adventures were likely the most seen.

I am extremely skeptical about most of the rumors swirling around Wizards of the Coast at the moment. They may well be true, but I don't have enough information to judge.

However, I did see the reaction of all the publishers to the OGL 1.0a deauthorization news. The reaction was not "oh, that's a rumour, we'll reach out to Wizards to clarify." Immediately, it was "we're restructuring our businesses".

The basic attack mechanic of RuneQuest is that you make an attack roll, your opponent makes a Dodge or Parry roll, and then damage is absorbed by your weapon, shield, armour or anything else in the way until it reaches your body. You have hit locations, and they don't have many hit points. So it is essential to have as many thing reducing the damage as it comes through. Even better if you take no damage at all, but there you go.

One of the things I discovered while playing Cyberpunk RED: Damage Reduction can be really tedious. So, the way damage works in the current version of the Cyberpunk RPG is you roll dice. Say 3d6 for a heavy pistol and 4d6 for a very heavy pistol.

The heavy pistol gets 2 shots a turn, the vh pistol only 1.

The heavy pistol is better, right?

I have always greatly enjoyed Cyberpunk 2077. But I've been fortunate enough to (a) have a high tolerance for bugs, and (b) did not expect it to be the Greatest Game Ever That Does Everything. I found the story and characters amazing. And the city. And I loved the gameplay and level design.

When I replay missions, I keep finding subtleties I missed the first time. You know how the game suggests a route through missions? There are often other ways to do them!

Of the various non-core Dungeons & Dragons books that have been released by Wizards for 5E, "Xanathar's Guide to Everything" is the one I like the best, despite a couple of poor development choices with the spells. What surprises me is how few other books I consider anywhere near "great". I think Tasha's is a crushing disappointment, especially when compared to the high bar set by Xanathar's.

I was thinking last night why the crafting system works in Cyberpunk 2077 to upgrade weapons when it doesn't in Dungeons & Dragons. (Well, not so I like it).

And I realised that in CP77, you *are* your weapon. Which is to say, weapons in CP77 have levels, which somewhat parallel your character's levels. As you level up, you gain or can craft weapons that match your level. And they do significantly more damage as a result.

People don't want a real economy in Dungeons & Dragons. They just want things to buy.

One of the oddest things about the game is how you end up very wealthy with almost nothing to spend your money on. The trouble is that whenever you *do* provide things to buy in Dungeons & Dragons, they either end up as being overpowered or irrelevant. (3E went with overpowered).

I delight in running all levels of Dungeons & Dragons. There are always interesting challenges you can throw at the party, and they can always surprise you with their solutions. I find nothing better than setting a challenge without knowing how to overcome it, and watch the players invent something in front of my eyes.

The characters have found a nest of Iuz warriors in the middle of the Sea of Dust!

What are they doing there?

Marvel at my incredible map-making skills! Using @newbiedm's fireball template!

I've just been reminded that one of the most significant changes in 3E from what came before was to make it much harder for high-level monsters and characters to resist spells.

We're still living with those effects. In AD&D, a very high-level fighter needed a 6 to save vs a fireball. There was nothing the caster could do to change that number (as I recall).

One of the fun things I'm doing with my new Castle Greyhawk campaign is introducing the idea of the characters being "Weekend Adventurers".

It's a week of downtime (which they spend on activities) between each session. So, the rogue spends the week committing crimes, and then goes for a dungeon adventure on the weekend.

The druid and dwarf spends their weeks gambling, and then goes on an adventure looking for money to replace what they lost.

In the early days of Dungeons & Dragons, the XP tables were designed so that characters went from 1st to 9th level relatively quickly, and then slowed down.

Gygax suggested that it take 40-60 sessions (a year of play) to reach level 9, then a gain of 2-3 levels a year after that Meanwhile, Hit Point acquisition slowed down significantly after "name" level. Magic-Users gained a solitary hit point per level thereafter!

However, the power of magic-users (number of spells, etc.) kept increasing significantly.

Trap silliness: in one of my dungeons, a group of kobolds lived in a room where they’d set up a swinging log to hit anyone entering the chamber. I think it was possible to detect, but my players didn’t, and so triggered it before being swarmed by kobolds. The players survived the experience, and then, because players, painted a smiley face on the end of the log and reset the trap. Then left.

Some traps are designed just for amusement value, though often of the DM not the players. (Though, given the right group, players can find them awesome as well). One of my “favourites” is found in Castle of the Mad Archmage. It’s a stuck door that is actually made of balsa wood, so anyone trying to force it open hurtles through and is impaled on the spikes beyond.

I've lived through several edition changes of Dungeons & Dragons
1E->2E, 2E->3E, 3E->3.5E, 3.5E->4E, 4E->5E.

In each case, I had come to the point where I was very excited to see what came next.

I haven't yet hit that point with 5E. Which is good! But, it must be said, I'd happily revisit most of the earlier editions. Possibly all. I was pretty burnt out on 3.5E and 4E when they ended.

One of the worst arguments I saw recently about a D&D rule included the phrase "It is easy to tell what is magical in D&D."

Which is of course why Jeremy Crawford put a LONG explanation in Sage Advice about what the game considers magical. It's easy for one person to determine if something is magical or not. It is *not* easy for two people to come to the same conclusion. And that's why we have game rules and explanations - so two people have the same understanding of how the game works.

My D&D knowledge spans several editions of the game. Rules bleed from one into another.

Today, I had a combat vs wolves where the players were riding horses. Could they command the horses to approach the wolves? Because there's an edition where the rule *does* exist, that's the rule I remember. (3E: Ride skill needed to control a non-warhorse in battle).

But that rule isn't in 5E.

So, that could have gone better.

A random encounter on the streets of Hardby: the characters noticed a foreign noble abusing a merchant. So they stepped in.

The sorcerer cast Calm Emotions. Unfortunately, the noble saved (as did some of his guards). And he took exception to this.

In the ensuing fight, the characters killed one of his guards.

Although G1: Steading of the Hill Giant Chief is not the very first adventure published for Dungeons & Dragons, it's close enough. :) And it is fascinating. The framing of the adventure is simple: Giants have attacked the lands of men, you must explain to them that such is a bad idea. With as much force as you can.

One of the problems I'm having with the current D&D releases is that I've reached the limit of how many new setting books I can care about.

I mean, I still want a new Greyhawk book, but that's the setting of my primary campaign. But I don't think all do.

https://twitter.com/dmdavidblog/status/1398762927201701891

I'm not a person who starts new campaigns at the drop of a hat. And my new campaigns tend to be in a world that I've already used, so I can explore it further. There are places in the World of Greyhawk I've never visited - and I've been DMing there for over 20 years.