need some advice on being a DM

Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you:

No adverts like this in the forums anymore.
Times and dates in your local timezone.
Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance.
Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely.
Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net.

If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

**gamefreak**

thanks so far i am going to use both of them, they will be put in around the 10th and 12 level.
one of my friends wanted me to come up with a new class and i want you guys to tell me what you think and give me some suggestions for it after i post it. it will be in about 6 hours before i'm able to get to another computer though

**Arctik_Firangi**

Track down the Players Handbook II - that has new official classes. I also recommend some sort of Technomancer if you'd like your campaign to allow rudimentary steam-powered technology or something.

**gamefreak**

sorry i wasnt able to post it yesterday i had to set up another network last period but today i have a substitute in networking so i can do any thing i want. (except smoke weed)

**gamefreak**

sorry it didnt work i couldnt center it under the headings. i'll try to type it out on word then turn it into a pdf file and put it on here later.

**gamefreak**

ok here is the calss i came up with sorry it took so long i got caught up with a scholorship contest.

so without further delay here it is.

the name isn't very original so any suggestions would be much appreciated. also if you find something that you think should be changed post it here and a reason why and i'll see if you convince me to change it.

**gamefreak**

am i the only one posting here anymore?

if not what do you think of the class?

another question:
should i come up with a map for every building in a town or should i have five or six that i roll a dice to determine which one they enter?

**Lordhat**

I can't comment on the class w/o some playtesting. but right off the top it looks a bit overpowered.

As far as the maps thing goes, I'd go ahead and stick with the 5 or six, and roll for it. No real sense in mapping out every single building in a town; The only ones you realistically might have a need for at random: the Inn, the Bath-house, the Smithy, the Church and the Bar (if it isn't also the Inn). AKA the places your PC's will immediately head once they get back into town. Any other buildings you need to map out (such as a job for a rogue) can be done off the top of your head for the session; The PC(s) will probably never be back to visit that particular place, or won't notice if something's different if they do.

Of course there are the times when you've scripted a new place, feel free to premap that. All in all just remember K.I.S.S. Too many maps and stuff will bog down the game and bore your players while you're shuffling through your parchments looking for the exact page.

EDIT: On further review, that class is WAY too much. Restrict the PC to ONE element of thier choice and then trim the list up. Then make it a Prestige class. That seems much more balanced. I would make it easiest for Monks to progress naturally into the class, followed by Druids, then Rogues, then everybody else. Also note that in 3.5 there is no game difference between a punch, kick, or even a headbutt; They are all unarmed attacks, they deal the same damage.

**gamefreak**

i did the punch and kick separate b/c i had the kick require the ranks in jump and tumble.

ok so i will change it to a prestige class and only let them choose one element b/c i can see where you are coming from, i thought it was overpowered too but i wanted to see what you guys thought b/c i lack jugdement as far as pc power goes.

any thing else?

**Lordhat**

Yes, be sure to trim it down to 10 levels.

**gamefreak**

well i think i am about out of questions right now but i want more feed back from the people who downloaded it but havent posted here since then.

**Lordhat**

Well I'll make an effort to answer your questions, but I might be a little slow, especially over the weekends. So far your campaign is looking like a lot of fun. I hope your players appreciate the amount of effort you're putting in.

**gamefreak**

sorry its upside down i didnt notice this until i uploaded it.

and this one too, i'll see what i can do as far as photoshopping them to add some grids to this one and flipping them both around

here are somethings for my campaign i have in my gallery, i'll make sure i upload some more today and post them here
i'll get the description for the maps up a little later.

**OverbossGhurzubMoga**

Some good resources I use are:

http://www.rdinn.com/armoury.php

http://www.seventhsanctum.com/

**gamefreak**

talk about thread necromancy, but thanks OverbossGhurzubMoga. *no i didn't type your name i copied it, its way too long.*

**Lordhat**

Necromancy schmecknomancy. I've been waiting for more questions from you for, like, ever.

**gamefreak**

ok well i have had qute a long time to think and mostly you guys have been very helpful. umm... any suggestions on what kind of bottles i should use for a riddle? i need seven different ones.

umm... i came upon a speed bump when dming last week... a guy bought a pouch and a 15gp worth of chalk. he crushed up all of it and put it in the pouch. when he came to a stream and they were out of food he dumped half of it in the stream and he said it would choke the fish out of the stream. I'm wanting to keep SOME reality to my campaign, does any one know if that would really happen?

**Lordhat**

I'd just have him roll to see if it works. Use survival, tell him it's to check to see if he picked the right spot in the stream. The DC should be high enough that he has to roll an 11 on the die (if you don't want them to have to worry TOO much about food) or 15 (if you want it to be a bit harder on them). Or, if you don't want them to eat at all due to plot, have it work WONDEROUSLY well, then have a Selkie (or other water type fae creature) attack them for poisoning the river. Regardless of whether or not they win, either the Selkie or a minion will have absconded with all the fish at the end of the fight.

Regardless of whether or not it's realistic, it IS a clever idea, and those should ALWAYS have a chance to work unless they're OBVIOUSLY ludicrous. You WANT your players to be thinkers, especially if you want them to solve riddles and such.

Also what part do the bottles play in the riddle? Are THEY the riddle? Do they contain pieces of the riddle? Are they the answer to the riddle?

**gamefreak**

they are a part of the riddle and two of them are answers to the riddle. one will let them move forward the other will make them go back and not be able to get the treasure.

Danger lies before you while safty lies behind
two of us will help you whichever you would find
one among us seven will let you move ahead
another will transport the drinker back instead
two among our number hold only nettle wine
three of us are killers waiting hidden in line
chose unless you wish to stay here forever more
to help you in your choice we give you these clues four
first however slyly the poison tries to hide
you will always find some on nettle wine's left side
second different are those who stand on either end
but if you would move onward neither is your friend
third as you see clearly all are different size
neither dwarf nor giant holds death in their insides.
fourth the second left and the second on the right
are twins once you taste them though different at first sight

the one to go forward is the smallest bottle
the one to go back is the bottle on the far right

**Gitzbitah**

I highly suggest using graphing paper for your maps. It isn't especially useful for outdoor encounters, but inside of a dungeon it assures uniform scale and no 'woopsie' moments when your chambers cross. As an added bonus, you don't have to write down the dimensions of anything. Just count off the squares and stick to your scale.

**gamefreak**

yes that i have found out. but thank you any way.

do you know how to put a grid on the map above of the cave?

**BlackSpike**

The original Forgotten Realms boxed set came with a map with no grid, and a clear sheet of grid-paper (plastic), so you could pop it over at any angle.
I'm not sure where you'd buy such grid-paper, but a stationers must have some, or know where.

For places that do fit to a grid (Dwarven settlements, Lawful Cities), squared paper is useful, but for more abstract places (natural caves, cities that have matured over time, with no rebuilding, Elven homes), I like to use plain paper, with a ruler and clear grid-paper handy.

**OverbossGhurzubMoga**

gamefreak wrote:they are a part of the riddle and two of them are answers to the riddle. one will let them move forward the other will make them go back and not be able to get the treasure.

Danger lies before you while safty lies behind
two of us will help you whichever you would find
one among us seven will let you move ahead
another will transport the drinker back instead
two among our number hold only nettle wine
three of us are killers waiting hidden in line
chose unless you wish to stay here forever more
to help you in your choice we give you these clues four
first however slyly the poison tries to hide
you will always find some on nettle wine's left side
second different are those who stand on either end
but if you would move onward neither is your friend
third as you see clearly all are different size
neither dwarf nor giant holds death in their insides.
fourth the second left and the second on the right
are twins once you taste them though different at first sight

the one to go forward is the smallest bottle
the one to go back is the bottle on the far right

God I am going to sound like such a damn dork....but...
that sounds a lot like the riddle from the first Harry Potter book.

**gamefreak**

yup... i pulled a lot of my old books from thier shelves and opened their extremely dusty pages and looked through them for some extra stuff. dont think this would infringe on copyrights or any thing so i am still gonna use it. i also got some stuff from my collectors edition LotR books. i gots some from a terry pratchet book and a book from the pendragon series. i used to read all that in middle school. but yes you are right i got it from the first harry potter book and i am going to use the sphinx's riddle from the fourth (i belive thats right)

well my pcs have finally found the deck of many things i have been trying to give them for the past two levels (level 10 now) and the pc who got it got imprisoned on the first draw. mwahahahaha.... he was complaining about how everything was either to easy or too hard so i gave him it and now... well lets just say he committed suicide when he was imprisoned (not literally) and made a new character and started over.

thanks blackspike i'll look around for some

**BlackSpike**

AH ... Deck of Many Things! So much fun! (For the DM, and occasionally players!

)

**Lordhat**

gamefreak wrote:yes that i have found out. but thank you any way.

do you know how to put a grid on the map above of the cave?

Scan it (or just copy it) and print it using graph paper instead of normal paper.

**gamefreak**

good idea didn't think about that.

came up with another riddle:

what is gold?

Spoiler:

what do you think?

**OverbossGhurzubMoga**

Lol. That's unique and hard to figure out. A riddle I once had played on me as a player follows.

Well, first, some back story. In our campaign, there is a diety who calls himself "The Fool." He appears as a monsterous version of the creature from the 'Alien' movies, with a few minor things added. Like, really cartoon-y eyebrows. He also likes to mess around with the group of adventurers and screw things up. Although he has infinite cosmic power, he's too stupid to do anything that could harm us.

His only goal is to be the universes largest imbicile [and he succeeds very well]. There are a lot of quirks but too many to list here.

Anyways, the riddle went like so: "Only a mind of a child's will open this door."

Everyone spent 30 minutes trying to figure it out. So, I grab The Fool, stick his head in the opening of the door, and viola, it opens.

**Cannerus_The_Unbearable**

I'm not going to bother reading any of the rest of the thread, and I'm just going to answer the original post. When I write an adventure I try to give everyone a moment to shine. Never be obvious, make it look like it was all their own creativity that made it happen. This makes you look good, like you can create this awesome world, and makes the players feel good too. When making a "villain" or an opposing group I start with a philosophy or a quote. Now take that quote to the furthest extreme you can. I just googled "quote generator" and this is jsut one that popped up:

"Confound these ancestors.... They've stolen our best ideas!" - Ben Jonson

Time travel? A down-and-out pauper from a town with a strong caste system looking to destroy all the libraries so everyone can be equal and noone can be proven to be royalty? That's just off the top.

To downgrade the human mind is bad theology. - C. K. Chesterton

Someone looking to destroy all temples and elevate earthly beings to their "rightful place?" Or flip it, certain temples are forcing their ways more heavily than others, and it's the players job to stop an inquisition from happening?

"You and I as individuals can, by borrowing, live beyond our means, but only for a limited period of time. Why should we think that collectively, as a nation, we are not bound by that same limitation?" -- Ronald Reagan

A town's faithful guardian dragon has dissapeared due to a foolish leader who refused to throw it a birthday party, because it felt like the dragon owes them for not slaying it.

Those are just a few ideas.

Always have a motivation for the characters. I like to trick my players into agreeing to take the bait, as it feels like they've chosen to roughly follow your path then. Beyond your path, just have a world fleshed out. That way if they start going in the opposite direction (which there is NOTHING wrong with), you have at least some immediate answers.

Always reward creativity, and do not give any extra credit to cheesy power gamer types. Don't harm them purposefully, but know that they have their reward.

Those are the initial thoughts. Damn I'm good

**gamefreak**

sorry about my extended break from the forums.

ok hiding under bones? should it provide a +2 circumstance bonus?

**OverbossGhurzubMoga**

Hiding from sight?
Are there a lot of bones?
If so, then yes. But should make a will-based saving throw to keep from sneezing because of all of the dust. [it's what I would do.]