D&D Next: Wild Shape & Oaths

This for realsies last last playtest packet updates the druid’s Wild Shape and adds a new paladin oath, the Oath of Vengeance.

Wild Shape
You cannot do this at all until 2nd-level, but you can now do it once between short and long rests. At 8th-level you can use it twice between rests. There are many forms available at the start, including flying critters and a horse. The time limit is one-half your level in hours. Finally, Circle of the Moon grants access to more dangerous animals like dire wolves, tigers, and cave bears (oh my).

I still do not like it.

Shocking, I know.

You cannot change your shape at all until 2nd-level. Why? Wild Shape is a very unique and iconic class feature for the druid, so why make them wait while barbarians can still rage, monks can flurry, and rogues can sneak attack? Would it really unbalance anything to allow players access all of one level sooner?

The forms are also not made equally: unless you have a major need for Speed, owls are better than hawks, and anything weasels can do, cats can do better (at least until they inevitably start adding more animal forms in splatbooks). Why make each animal its own statblock? All you are doing is downplaying certain animals when they are not rendered obsolete. You could just as easily make thematic benefit packages for a druid to choose from, and let them determine what form they take.

EDIT: I am also opposed to the inclusion of animal statblocks with only slight mechanical variation. The time and space could be better devoted than giving us numerous blocks for cats, dogs, birds, and other critters that probably will only end up having differing skill bonuses, maybe a movement mode or special sense.

Again I am voicing my dislike of Druid Circles (and the whole paths thing in general). With the current system if I choose Circle of the Land then I irrevocably cut off access to “battle forms” for the rest of the campaign, even if I want to delve into them later. There is no reason why characters cannot make more choices, opting into certain concepts down the road if it suits them. The current model is just…lazy.

ANOTHER EDIT: The fact that forms do not scale is another problem. What if I want to make a druid of, say, a wolf clan? Right now I have to wait until 2nd-level before I can turn into a dire wolf, and…that is it. There are no other wolf forms beyond 2nd-level. If forms were based on your level you would not only not have to wait until you could become a triceratops, but if you wanted to stick around as a wolf it would still be viable.

Also, it would be cool if druids could pick up form-based “maneuvers”.

Oath of Vengeance
You gain access to a set of oath spells, including the very unpaladin-sounding misty step (short-range teleport). One Channel Divinity option lets you frighten a creature (with a bonus against fiends and undead despite undead being largely immune to fear), while the other lets you gain attack advantage against a creature that hits you or something else.

At higher levels you can move after making an opportunity attack against a creature affected by your oath, make an attack against a creature affected by your oath before they attack (assuming they are in range), and eventually transform into a angel with flight and a fear aura.

The flavor behind the oath of vengeance makes it sound like something that a paladin swears once they hear of something bad going down, and that once they handle said bad thing that they are free to swear another kind of oath. Of course oaths are just another path that you lock in at 3rd-level, so once you pick divine Batman from the list you are stuck with it for no discernible reason except that it is how 3rd Edition handled character advancement.

Being able to swear oaths and gain benefits from them would actually make paladins more interesting and diverse from clerics (or fighter/clerics). Dungeon World lets you do something similar: you gain benefits when undertaking a quest, and once you wrap it up you can gain new ones the next time around. In this instance oaths could be thematic packages to choose from, or the Dungeon Master could assign appropriate bonuses from a list.

Legends & Lore: The Next Phase

Though the mostly-final Next packet was a disappointment, I am still ultimately reserving judgement until I see the finished product in case they end up fixing things, and/or create enough optional rules to provide a more entertaining experience.

At this point it looks like there are two design teams: one will be in charge of finalizing the core game, and the other will handle a number of herculean tasks; the underlying math, optional systems for tactical combat, drama, and character customization (all three of which should really not be optional), and a “campaign system”.

No matter what the tactical combat system sounds like it would improve the game, though I think there is a lack of understanding as to why people liked 4th Edition combat so much. For me it was one part that every character had multiple interesting, thematic, and often unique actions they could try, one part that thanks to “page 42” it was incredibly quick and easy to (probably) fairly and reliably adjudicate off the cuff actions that the characters and monsters tried to attempt.

For me encounters never felt puzzles or player-vs-Dungeon Master (at least, no more than in any other edition). It was more that if a character wanted to shove a monster into a firepit that they had a good idea of what they would have to do (probably Strength or Dexterity vs. Fortitude), what would happen (fire damage plus ongoing fire damage), and a good estimate of their odds of success. On the other hand, if a player wanted to use Charisma to trick them into charging just before diving out of the way, I could just change it to Charisma vs. Will.

Likewise even if done poorly I think that the game would benefit from a dramatic system. After a brief foray into Dresden Files this is something I have been using in my games, having the players help create the world and giving me material to bait them with; I think that when the players put in work laying the foundation that it makes them more invested. It also makes it easier to get everyone together and the game rolling if they have to make it work, instead of largely shouldering the DM with the burden.

Why enabling more character customization is an optional system is beyond me. Not only would the game definitely benefit from this, but it needs it. I do not buy that breaking everything down into individual blocks would go beyond playtest expectations; just find the major players on CharOp, forward them the packet, and watch them go to town. From there you could decide what is legitimately broken, and what breaches Pun-Pun levels of absurdity such that no sane Dungeon Master would ever allow it, anyway.

The campaign system sounds interesting, though if I had to choose this is the one that I would have made optional, since domain management and especially business operations sound like they would be good for the occasional diversion. At any rate hopefully domain management does not have a level requirement.

What I think would be beneficial is allowing groups of players that fit a demographic to keep playtesting and providing feedback for one or more of the proposed systems, instead of keeping it more in-house. For example I never shut up about character customization, and I think that I would be a really good “custometer” as to whether the optional system would do a good job.

D&D Next: The (Almost) Final Packet

Whelp, looks like this is it. Well, except for the part where they mention a packet update for the druid and a paladin oath.

Spoilers: I felt that 4th Edition was a major step forward for Dungeons & Dragons. Aside from a few legacy mechanics like per-day resources they were not afraid to change whatever they wanted to make the game better. With Next Wizards of the Coast is well on their way to making a very…adequate game. Nothing about it seems fresh or innovative, much less even interesting. It looks like a 3rd Edition clone—flaws and cluttered language and all—with some 4th Edition mechanics tacked on, just without actively referring to it whenever possible.

A lot of Next looks like they are sticking with past editions just for the sake of sticking to a past edition. Who knows, maybe down the road they will write some rules modules that will make it easy to work around these issues (or better yet just fix the core game). As I said before I am still going to keep tabs on how the game develops, and hope that they do not take the easy way out and just rehash an older edition. The silver lining is that even if they do I still have 4th Edition (and to a point 13th Age), and I fully expect 4th Edition hacks to crop up that might be improvements over it.

With that here is my breakdown of the actual packet. Really the only thing I do not talk about are spells, partially because as I have said a million times the magic system makes no sense and is boring, partially because I already played 2nd and 3rd Edition, and partially because there are a lot of them. It sucks, and there are plenty of games out there with better magic systems to choose from.

(NOTE: After reading through so many packets it is very possible that I will overlook or confuse something with material from a previous packet. Actually, given the similarities to 3rd Edition it is possible that I might even confuse something in here with that.)

Overall
I hate how things are formatted, namely features and powers. The number of times something can be used in an encounter or per day is buried in one or more paragraphs, making it easier to overlook. This was one strength of 4th Edition, where it was incredibly easy to at a glance determine the frequency, action required, and any other relevant keywords in a power, feature, or what have you. Why go with something so clunky and difficult to sort through (which is a similar issue I have with 13th Age)?

Also if you want to go “mind’s eye” with the game, then why not get rid of explicit speed and range? It would be a lot better to use distances with a slight variation to their range, like in Numenera where an Immediate speed means anywhere within 10 feet, and a Short distance is between 10 and 50 feet. You could also use 13th Age‘s rules for being engaged. All of this has the added benefit that players can still use minis as visual aids.

Races
I dislike that races only get +1 to an ability score, as it means that about half the time the bonus will not do anything, and depending on your class you might never see a benefit from it. Go with 4th Edition and 13th Age‘s +2 bonus so that you are guaranteed to get something out of it. Also, increase the ability score cap at certain levels (like, I do not know, 24 at 10th-level).

Rock gnomes can still for some reason only create up to three clockwork devices that always work for an absolute amount of time. I would think that they would just gain proficiency with a craft skill and/or tools, or have some racial knack that lets them fiddle with devices or fix them, but since this is more restrictive and makes zero sense I guess we are going with it.

Not only are humans, half-elves and half-orcs still boring, but tieflings and warforged join their ranks with their pointless and contradictory uniformity. So much for various infernal heritages and construction materials.

Not only am I very disappointed that certain races are unnecessarily categorized as universally unusual (including to my surprise gnomes, half-elves, and half-orcs), but that the designers are very careful to make sure that—likely certain groups of people—are very aware warforged come from Eberron, and dragonborn have a ridiculous background: they come from un-blessed dragon eggs.

Yep, I am serious. As a consolation to 4th Edition they put in a sentence about how in some worlds they interbreed so much that they take on a uniform appearance. As a member of the 4th Edition crowd I want to say that I prefer the unique look of them, and have said so many times. Also it is not that I want 4th Edition mechanics and flavor for its own sake, but that in a lot of cases I think that both were just plain better.

Classes
The major change to classes is the addition of proficiency bonuses for attacks, saving throws, tools, and skills. This idea sounds good in theory, but it is just a uniform bonus across the board. You do not actually get to choose what to increase, it just goes up when it says it does, even if you pick up a new proficiency down the line. A pretty big missed opportunity for giving characters some variety and choice, as well as attaching benefits for having a proficiency at a certain level.

Classes saw many features adjusted or removed but are still, as I expected, boring and rigidly defined: with few exceptions when you gain a level you just write down what the game says you get based on an arbitrary depiction of a handful of concepts, and at 3rd level you lock in the rest of the features you get.

This means that, for example, every barbarian gets Thick Hide and proficiency in Tools: Mounts (land) at 1st-level. Why do all barbarians automatically know how to ride animals regardless where they came from or what your background is? No idea. Normally I would blame a previous edition, but I do not think that was even the case in 1st Edition, so…huh.

I want to point out, again, that there are very simple games out there that let you make meaningful decisions about your character. Not even just at 1st-level, but at other levels, too. Just saying it is kind of cool to be able to actually customize things and make choices. As someone who has played a lot of 4th Edition, some Dungeon World, and read plenty of 13th Age these seem like the kind of classes you would throw together over the weekend just to have something to show.

Backgrounds & Skills
While it is nice to see skills make a comeback, unfortunately they rely on the universal proficiency bonus I mentioned above in classes. Again this misses out an a major opportunity to let players actually make choices about what skills they want to increase, as well as link special features to skill ranks, and like classes this comes across as a bit lazy.

Feats
Feats can still grant spontaneous mastery in weapons and armor regardless of your prior skill or experience, which contrasts strangely with how magical feats provide incremental benefits over the course of several feats.

Athlete and Loremaster are the only two feats that grant bonuses to Strength and Intelligence respectively. I wonder why it is just those two; it should pretty easy to whip up a feat for each ability score.

Equipment
Everything is still in gold pieces, which I guess I should not be surprised about since there has been no mention of a silver standard in a long time.

Heavy armor is now only nearly pointless since medium armor caps out at 17 with a Dexterity bonus (heavy armor can get you an 18). Still, it would be nice if heavy armor did something more to make it clearly worth your while.

The most interesting thing I noticed, aside from the lifestyle expense (which was in the previous packet) was that the orb focus lets you use your spellcasting proficiency bonus when using magic. A nice 4th Edition idea—among many—that I have missed in Next.

Magic Items
Not all magic items are bad. The +x stuff is pretty boring and I dislike charged items, but a good number have interesting capabilities; efreeti chain lets you walk in molten rock like it was solid ground. That is a lot more interesting than just a list of combat-oriented bonuses.

I think that the tables for magic item details could and should be applied to some mundane stuff; for example a “normal” sword crafted by genies might weigh half as much, while a spear could also be thrown twice as far. Barring an interesting flavor reason ould stand to see per-day powers go away, though.

Bestiary
With few exceptions most of the monsters seem basically like bags of hit points that try to hit you. The lack of an elite/solo status makes it hard to have the players deal with only one or two monsters; in my home campaign the characters were easily able to swarm and take down a “boss” within a few rounds. No tension, no dynamics, just hit him while he stands there and falls over.

Many have per-day spell-like abilities, which does not make any sense and at this point just seems lazy, as if the designers could not come up with anything new. Even Dungeon World sounds better, and it basically just tells you to use whatever, whenever.

Multiclassing
This seems pretty decent this time around. Your proficiency bonus is based on your overall character level, so you do not have to worry about falling behind as in 3rd Edition. Extra attacks seems kind of clunky, and I am not a fan of gaining all the proficiencies of the new class. There is also the issue that if you multiclass too much it can take along time to actually pick up a feat.

Legends & Lore: The Final Countdown

It looks like that September will be the last publicly released playtest packet, marking the end of the initial phase of trying to nail “the feel” of Dungeons & Dragons. The game is not done mind you, and other groups will carry the torch in order to (hopefully) balance math and (also hopefully) remove abusive combinations.

I would say that the playtest has hit a feel that Dungeons & Dragons has evoked before (3rd Edition), it is just not one that I am interested in (also 3rd Edition). Mearls describes Dungeons & Dragons as a tool of creativity. I agree to a point, though I do not think it is a particularly well-designed tool because of its 3rd Edition-isms:

(NOTE: This is based off of what we have seen so far. I am not going to judge the game on merits and/or promises that we have not seen.)

• Classes are severely restricted not only in what they can do, but what you can even choose from. Mechanically this closes off many character concepts, and even the few that are supported end up being very similar to the rest.
• There is a very strong reliance on magical healing, making a cleric or druid essentially mandatory. Yeah, characters have a measure of self-healing, but it takes an hour for it to kick in and at low-levels is severely limited. 
• Many abilities have daily limitations (including the aforementioned healing magic), which can make adventure pacing much more difficult to maintain (and is pretty much the reason for the five-minute workday).
• Save-or-dies, which from my perspective just result in random, anticlimactic deaths. On one hand they seem to give you at least two shots to shake them off, but aside from magic (like bless) I cannot find a way to hedge the odds in your favor.

These factors inhibit creativity on both sides of the screen, and none of them are an issue in 4th Edition. Yes it initially had some problems, most notably early rules and examples for skill challenges and monster math, but most of it was ironed out near the end. Despite even the stuff that was not, like rituals and math-feats, I never felt that it wandered from what I wanted, but showed me what I had been wanting for awhile, like competent characters, classes that could do what they were supposed to, any race with any class, per-encounter resources, three strike save-or-dies, and more.

Now in their defense there are some 4th Edition-like mechanics present, like marking, Hit Dice, and at-will spells, it is just a shame they are not utilizing more of it to make the game run smoother, easier, and give players more control over their characters. I want to point out (and also bold for emphasis) that if we at least see modules that address these issues and it is a relatively simple process to make them work, I will be happy. Speaking of simplicity…

Simplicity can be nice, but not at the sacrifice of flexibility or choice. Dungeon World, 13th Age, and Numenera offer simplicity but still let you make choices. Character creation is quick, but the choices you make can result in at least two clearly different characters. I also feel like I can easily wing each of those games, including 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons thanks to a very tight monster and skill DC formula and how monster stat blocks are formatted.

I do not feel the same about Next: like 3rd Edition the reliance on healing magic, per-day spells, limited hit points, and save-or-dies is going to make it much, much harder for me to plan and run a game, and characters to built a party.

The third bullet point is similar to the first one, and yes I want rules that are easy to work with. Unfortunately (again), per-day resources, magical healing, save-or-dies, and utility magic like knock make things a lot harder to plan and deal with. Maybe this time around we will not have to resort to lead-lined walls, antimagic rooms, and rings of undetectable alignment as “workarounds”.

It would be great for classes to have the potential to contribute in most situations, again something that I have only seen in 4th Edition thanks to how the skills and Difficulty Checks worked. I fine with some classes being better at certain things than others, like rogues and sneaking, I just want other classes to be able to approach a competent level, like fighters that want to be able to open locks. Where I get wary is the line about balance on a campaign-based scale, which I hope is not inferring that we will go back to the days of Linear Fighters/Quadratic Wizards.

At least we will continue to see weekly updates, as it will give me a way to voice my opinion of the current state of the game as we see it.

Epiro: Episode 110

Cast

• Atticus (wood elf druid 5)
• Josh’s Wizard (human wizard 5)
• Iola (wood elf monk 5)
• Perseus (human paladin 5)

We spent a good chunk of the session mulling over the new packet and, well, “transitioning” the characters by filing off skills, feats, and some class features.

The characters finally arrived at Copper Cairns, got paid (a small fortune of 5 gp each), and without missing a beat headed directly into the mountains. A storm picked up that filled Perseus with one part sense of longing, one part anger. He used detect magic, which I declared only allowed him to detect divine-ish magic, which was fine because it was divine-ish in origin. Rather than recognize spell schools, which to me is a silly thing for a paladin to be able to do, it instead registered domains.

Just…no.

He sensed the power of the Stormcaller stirring the skies into a tempest, but they continued their trek into the mountains with little supplies and even less direction. After several thankfully in-game hours and a flock of harpies later, they made camp as best they could on a ledge buffeted by high-speed winds, and when dawn came most had gotten some measure of sleep. The winds had not let down, but at least they could see, and after a few more hours of climbing they found a temple carved into a cliff.

Moving between eroded statues and collapsed columns were a pair of humanoid figures, followed closely by a shuffling pile of rock. It was getting late so they tried shouting and charging, but since they were pretty far away it gave the two figures a chance to dash through a doorway and use presumably some kind of off-the-books earth magic to close it, leaving the party to square off against the earth elemental.

Josh’s wizard pelted it with a few magic missiles, Atticus turned into a ram (reflavored steed), while Perseus rode him into combat. I was surprised that the elemental was able to hit Perseus, and I ruled that it knocked him away, allowing it to flee underground. Unsure how exactly to get passed the door, Iola used the earthstompers to kick the door while triggering its quake ability.

This was an interesting idea, so I rewarded it by allowing her to make a Strength check with advantage. She rolled really high and opened it, but the elemental was waiting and smacked her in the face. It tried to close the door, but Batticus headbutted the door in an effort to try and keep it open. They both rolled really high, so I ruled that neither was gaining ground until Josh’s wizard slammed it with a sound burst.

This knocked it away, and as it tried to reconstitute itself Perseus skewered it with the Boar King’s Tusk, killing it. The session ended it with them in the Stormcaller’s temple, and since I have two weeks to plan I figure I might as well draw out an actual dungeon to give this exploration and random encounter rules a shot.

Behind the Scenes
The harpies were incredibly easy to kill, even though half the party was climbing a cliff as they attacked. I had to flavor in the elemental’s knock back and resistance to being knocked back, because otherwise it is just a pile of hit points that takes half damage from most attacks (which would mean something if anyone used non-magical attacks).

I am really glad that I have some experience playing Dungeon World and FATE: I called for a Strength check to climb, and used their results to determine who was on a cliff ledge, and who was in the middle of climbing when the harpies attacked. The worse the roll, the further away from safety you were (making a fall that much more dangerous).

Beth did not care too much about the paladin changes, probably because she did not actually change anything (we wanted to get in a good hour of play), but partially because she was already the “lawful good” brand did not need much change. Everyone else was unhappy with the loss of some key features that they loved (druid and bear form), skills, and feats. Josh had been playing up his wizard to be a street thug, but now had no mechanical way to convey that. Melissa was happy to get flurry of blows back, even though it cost ki because it is a per-encounter thing instead of per day. On the downside she can no longer fly for short distances.

So, yeah, it is nice and all that classes have more stuff going on, but I do not think that they had to sacrifice conceptual freedom to do so. It does not mean much to me that all the spaces are filled in if you have little to no say as to what is filling them.

D&D Next Packet: No Choice or Skills

And here I was not expecting to see a new packet until sometime around GenCon, on the day of my weekly playtest campaign and release of the backer-only Numenera pdf no less. The general reaction from my group was—aside from a few things here and there—almost entirely negative, especially with the removal of skills, changes to feats, and further homogenization of many classes.

We still had fun mind you, but not because of anything to do with the system, which is disappointing because the Numenera playtest felt much more polished in a much quicker time frame, and it was not designed by a massive company. Anyway, let us take a look at the packet one pdf at a time.

NOTE: Between this, over ten previous packet releases, Numenera (both the core book and player’s guide pdfs), an ongoing campaign, reading up on 13th Age, a new job, and a few projects on the side I am sure I overlooked or mis-remembered something. Feel free to point it out in the comments and I will address it there.

Most of the classes were already pretty boring, because aside from a handful of levels you basically get what the game gives you at a given level. Playing a barbarian? You gain fast movement at 2nd-level, feral instinct at 4th-level, feral reflexes at 7th-level, and so on. No exceptions. Of course they are not the only class to suffer from this: line up a bunch of druids, monks, paladins, rangers, and rogues and you would be hard pressed to find something that sets them apart.

Now? You have to wait until 3rd-level to even begin diverging. Want to play a wolf totem barbarian? Whelp at 3rd-level you can take the Path of the Totem Warrior option from Barbarian Tradition and gain a +5 on Wisdom checks to spot things, and at 6th-level you can detect invisible and hidden creatures that are really close to you while raging. I was actually surprised to see some variety, here, but then I noticed that the level 10th, 14th, and 17th traits are all the same.

The sad thing is that most of the classes function this way: you get to pick from one of two options at 3rd-level, which just funnels in a bunch of other preset class features on top of the presets you already are going to get. Would it really be so bad to let a 1st-level fighter pick from several options, instead of just giving them Second Wind no matter what? Must every wizard gain Scribe Scrolls at 6th-level? How come all paladins have an Aura of Protection, or can summon a mount at 6th-level?

Given the extensive history that Dungeons & Dragons has, and all the other games out there, I am baffled that the classes are still so limited, both in what you can get and when you can get it. Though I admit it might have been a bit much for some people to handle, 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons let you pick from a variety of class features and powers from the start, as well as new powers at almost every level, Dungeon World lets you choose a move when you level up, and 13th Age lets you pick from a list of talents during creation.

That is my general opinion of almost all of the classes, but here are some bulleted specifics:

• The homebrew barbarian I whipped up a long time ago featured spirit boons, so it is nice to see something similar as an option for the barbarian class. I just wish there were more flexible options in the tree, or that picking one tree did not lock you out of the other. Like, I think it is pretty evocative of a concept to have a bear totem and still pick up Terrifying Rage. 
• The cleric domains are pretty interesting, and I kind of like the shift from Warbringer to just War. They still give you a new Channel Divinity option (though I hate that Turn Undead is a default) and spells, but they also give you some other things. Like the barbarian I dislike that you have to get what your domain gives you, instead of being able to pick from a list of talents/features based on your domain. Update: I noticed that at 10th-level clerics out of spells can try to get divine intervention. This is a neat concept, but I feel that it should be a more central function of how cleric “spellcasting” works.
• The druid is a lot worse off, to the point where the druid player basically wanted to rage-quit. You do not start with Wild Shape (why?), but you get it no matter what at 2nd-level (also, why?), it is still limited on a per-day basis, and the specific shapes are based off of level. Druid Circles are a thing, and there are quite a few Circle features spread throughout the progression, but are still just a list of presets. 
• Fighters no longer universally have Expertise Dice, and lose out on Deadly Strike in exchange for multiple attacks, which is not so bad because you can move between them. At 3rd-level you pick a Martial Path, which determines everything else you get that your class did not already. I see the loss of maneuvers as a bad thing, as it was a really nice way to customize your fighter, and do not see a reason why they should commit to a single path. The Path of the Knight seems interesting, especially since in 3rd Edition fighters and Charisma did not synergize well, though I question why you have to wait until 19th level to attract followers, and that they are all 5th-level. 
• The mage is the odd man out in that you get to pick a feature at 2nd-level, but blah blah you get whatever the game gives you blah blah. I would complain that magic still makes no sense, but then nothing about the wizard mage does. I will admit that I like the nod towards 4th Edition focuses, in that you only get your spellcasting bonus if you are wielding an implement of sorts. I would still love to see focus-specific bonuses, though. 
• I like that monks regain ki points after a short rest. Not exactly what I wanted, but at least a step in the right direction from all the pointless per-day resource management. Heck, even the Disciple of the Elements Monastic Tradition adds in some things I wanted, namely a mountain-themed monk being able to stand still and resist damage. Too bad that aside from a couple of these things that I guess all monks train to learn the exact same things. They get an Expertise Die to add to either Dexterity or Wisdom checks (choose at 2nd level). Simple, but why does not every class have this option at some point? Should not mages get a bonus on lore checks, and a barbarian on Strength checks?
• Paladins only have one oath, and of course it is the goody-goody one. Even worse their oath determines almost everything they get. I guess on the plus side like monks they have encounter-based resources. 
• Rangers no longer get spellcasting at the start, but they get it no matter what because that is how it worked in 2nd and 3rd Edition. Like monks they get to add a scaling Expertise Die to either Dexterity or Wisdom checks, so they can choose to be better than average at hiding or detecting things.
• Rogues gain Expertise Dice, but only to Dexterity checks (I could have seen a case for Charisma, but meh). They get Rogue’s Cant at 2nd-level no matter what, and only they can have it because that is how it worked in 2nd Edition, as well as a bunch of 3rd Edition features when the game tells you to because that is how is how it worked in 3rd Edition.

Again, there are a few things that I like about some of the classes: encounter-based resources (despite the short rest taking way too long), wizard focuses, barbarian totem, the fighter’s path of the knight has marking (but only that one), and some aspects of the monk tradition, but these perks are buried in a needlessly rigid and restrictive progression.

Skills are gone. Mostly. I really liked how Next used to let you pick any four skills you wanted as it allowed for more interesting, diverse characters. Now you now pick two fields of lore, which are all Intelligence-based. Some classes gain an Expertise die that they add to specific ability score checks, but I do not see why skills have to be reduced to something so bland and underwhelming. Again, why not give every class at least the option of picking up Expertise dice keyed to certain ability scores? Like Strength for barbarians and fighters, or Intelligence for wizards.

I really do not like most of the feats. Arcane Archer is fine because a wizard learning to put spells in arrows does not seem like a huge magical breakthrough. It is the big feats like Archery Mastery that bug me, because a character could go from having no skill at all with a bow, to suddenly being able to use every bow, shoot at long range and at enemies in cover without much trouble, and even shoot twice. That drastic jump from 0 to 11 breaks the narrative for me. Again, why even have feats at all? Classes effectively determine how many feats they can get, so why not just build more incremental features into the class that players can choose from?

The most interesting change to equipment was cribbing Shadowrun‘s lifestyle expenses. I wish they would borrow more, like the ability to make diverse characters and an interesting magic system. Equipment could still use some work, but it is still a step forward.

The exploration rules have been divided into dungeon adventuring and wilderness adventuring. There are rules on wall and door materials, finding secret doors, adverse weather based on terrain, high altitude, a sidebar on exhaustion, food and water, and so on and so forth. You can also use a set of optional wilderness exploration rules to add more exploration tasks and resolve getting lost. This is one of the few parts of the playtest where I feel they did not end up with a net loss to the overall fun of the game.

Though fields of lore might be able to give you an inkling of what a magic item can do, the most reliable way is still using magic.

On one hand I am glad that this is just the playtest, because I would not play nor recommend this game to anyone, especially with other, more engaging and interesting games out on the market. On the other hand this has been a fairly boring and at times confusing playtest, where I can only wonder what the design goals of Next are, and why they are seemingly afraid to let you actually build a character.

Epiro: Episode 109

Sometimes you can judge a book by its cover. Its terrible, scarred, vicious cover.

Cast 

• Corvus (human ranger 4)
• Iola (wood elf monk 4)
• Perseus (human paladin 4)
• Yllian (high elf wizard 4)
• Josh’s Human Wizard (human wizard 4)

After an almost two-month long hiatus—mostly due to conflicting schedules—we finally managed to get back to Epiro, our D&D Next playtest campaign that admittedly does not always play by the playtest rules.

Picking up where we left off the characters were still heading towards Copper Cairns to get paid for guarding a supply caravan, as well as investigate the combination of an escaped criminal and cryptic message from a stone giant they met at Goathill Quarry. 

No one ever said being an adventurer was easy. Or simple.

They had finally hit the last stretch of the journey when they saw a plume of smoke in the distance. After dealing with wights and manticores they would probably have preferred to ignore it, but it was near the road anyway so what could it hurt? From a distance they could tell that it was a caravan not unlike their own, except for the part where it had been torched. This was bad enough, but when they got closer they could see that the charred elven remains had been partially eaten. Ominous enough, but no one could be sure if they had been cooked before or after whoever was responsible decided to chow down.

As Corvus busied himself peeling some valuables from the remains, he noticed tracks leading away from the wreckage. Gnoll tracks, to be specific, which explained the chew marks. There were quite a few of them, so he would have little trouble finding them…assuming they wanted to. Normally they would not, because gnolls are pretty horrible creatures that like to eat you, but figured that there might be survivors. The rest of the caravan did not want to stop, because on one hand they had already been delayed a couple of times, and on the other hand gnolls, so told them to be careful and catch up later.

“Unless you get eaten. Then please stay dead, or at least  do not come back as a super-powered zombie that  somehow gets powers based on being partially eaten.”

Their destination was a tower in a field a couple miles away. Pretty idyllic, really, except for the numerous corpses mounted on crosses scattered about. From a distance they could see shapes moving about the rooftop, and figured that sneaking would net them better chances. Thanks to the tall grass and my allowing Corvus to make a group Stealth check they were able to sneak up to the keep undetected. At the tower’s base Corvus could hear muffled screams coming from within; hopefully when they found whoever was being tortured there would be enough left to make this rescue worthwhile.

Crovus took point trying to scale the wall, using his climbing kit to make it easier on everyone else, but dislodged some stones about halfway up. A gnoll peeked over, getting an eye-full of arrow, and was dead without the 2d10 + 1d6 damage the combination fall and spikes would have dealt. As Corvus tried to orient himself another leaned over the ledge and took a shot at him. Given that he was dangling from a rope he was a pretty easy target, but at least it missed his eye (and failed to drop him 20 feet onto a cluster of spikes). Iola flew up the side of the tower, and with a well-placed spinning kick pitched him over the edge as well.

By the time more gnolls arrived the party had made it to the top. One of them grazed Yllian with an arrow, and he responded with a salvo of magic missiles. It did not kill them, but came pretty close, and allowed the rest of the party to polish them off with minimal effort. While Corvus stopped to pick up his ball bearings—because Kamon not only purchased but remembered to use them at some point—and the rest of the party fished about for loot, Yllian did not miss a beat, casting light on his sword and charging down the stairs.

The first room he found was a bedroom judging by the piles of furs and the wet-dog stench. The smell was bad enough on its own, but there were also a pair of surprised-yet-armed gnolls waiting for him. As before one landed a hit with a spear, but before he could respond with some more magic missiling Corvus rolled a bunch of bearings down after him. Fortunately they were more effective this time, but unfortunately this increase to efficacy swung both ways, sending everyone toppling to the floor. Yllian got back to his feet first, and with a souped up pair of missiles took them out in a method that Xykon would have approved of (more so because they did not teleport away).

This routine of gnoll-icide continued for a couple more rooms: Yllian would find a room, kick open the door, get hit, and magic missile whatever was inside. The last room was a, uh, room where live captives were “prepared” and stored for later, and Yllian barged in just as a gnoll had finished giving a human the good old Kalima. He took a cleaver to the chest (in retrospect I really should roll for disease), and to add insult to injury (literally) everyone else in the party bum-rushed them before he could decide with spell slot he wanted to use next.

The only survivor was the as-yet-unnamed freshly generated wizard. Elves were pretty rare despite the party composition, but he also recognized Yllian’s family signet and mentioned that he was traveling back to Delos with them as part of a failed diplomatic mission. With no one else to relay the news, Yllian realized that he needed to find his people and explain to them that they would not be getting any help from Epiro against the hobgoblins. With that he said his goodbyes, gathered some supplies, and started making his way back to Sidon so he could catch a caravan to Delos. The new wizard was more than happy to tag along, what with the recent wizard vacancy and all.

As they gave the place a once over before leaving the new wizard on the roster noticed an axe on the ground. It looked like it was made from bone, blackened metal, and a pale, leathery material. Probably human skin, because that is how fiends roll. He cast detect magic on it, revealing a dark, sinister aura, and then picked it up so that he could better examine it, which is generally not a smart move when it comes to things bearing sinister auras. Nothing really seemed out of place to him—even the stuff that should have—and he decided to keep it, because who knows when a hellish axe might come in handy?

Behind The Scenes 

Josh wanted to switch up his wizard from illusions to evocations, which meant that we had to find a way to get his new character in the game. Given that I had planned almost nothing for today’s session this worked out fine, because it gave me something to work towards. Initially I figured that I would kill him in some spectacular/anti-climactic fashion, like falling off of the tower onto the spikes below, but since everyone was expecting something like that I decided to buck the trend and have him survive to maybe come back another day.

This session went really fast and loose, with nary a mini or grid in sight. Iola got to fly, which was nice, but otherwise really just punched things, which was boring. I let Corvus make a group Stealth check so that they would at least have a chance to sneak up on the tower. It took a lot longer, was a bit harder, and probably not too “balanced”, but I had long since gotten tired of the heavy armor guy ruining everyone’s fun the second or third time running my homebrewed version of Keep on the Shadowfell.

As with the last session I let Josh use a combination of detect magic and Recall Lore (magical lore) to try and figure out what a magic item did. I like that Recall Lore gets a shout out in the Magic Items pdf, but think that there should be more reliable methods besides a specific spell. It would be pretty simple to build items so that some properties can be intuited using skill checks, especially if a character spends time examining them during a short or long rest. Specific spells could be useful for an immediate bypass or if the check fails, maybe for certain cases.

Here is an example of what I mean, using the cursed axe from the session (which I just made up on the spot):

The Pincer of Namtar 

This axe was given to a gnoll chieftain by a glabrezu named Namtar, but it was taken when he was betrayed by an up-and-coming member of his pack. It is powered by the blood of sentient creatures, become inert if it goes for more than a day without any. Namtar can communicate through the axe, offering anyone who wields it power, usually in a time of desperate need. He might want your soul, but could just as easily require that you kill someone or destroy something, because as a demon he is not so much about deception or long-term planning. At night the wielder dreams of using the axe to achieve greatness.

Divine Sense: The axe can be detected by divine sense as a fiendish presence.
Detect Magic: The axe is gripped by a dark, sinister aura. It seems to resonate with murderous intent. A Recall Lore (forbidden lore) check reveals that this aura is demonic in origin.
Examination (forbidden lore): Due to the construction of the axe—a combination of bone, flesh, and blackened metal—it is likely that this axe was forged on an infernal plane.
Short Rest (forbidden lore: This axe is definitely otherworldly, specifically wherever demons come from. Blood empowers the axe, especially that of angels and the devout. If it goes more than a day without quenching its thirst it grows dormant.
Extended Rest (forbidden lore): A glabrezu created this axe, which serves as a focus for it in the material world. Anyone who bears the axe can speak with Namtar…and vice versa.

(Particularly high checks might reveal more, such as the demon’s name.)

Curse: With the exception of uneasy memories and nightmares, viewing the axe is harmless. Once you touch it however, you will not willingly remove it, instead making any excuse possible to hang on to it. If you examine the axe with magic and determine that it is demonic or evil, you will not divulge this information, simply stating that it seems strange.

Property: The axe thirsts for blood. When the axe has been fed at least one drop of blood from a living creature, it gains a +1 bonus to the attack and damage rolls for the rest of the day. This bonus can increase depending on the bargains made and how well you serve Namtar.
Property: When you kill a living humanoid creature with this axe, it deals +1d6 damage for the rest of the encounter. If the creature was a good celestial, or otherwise the divine servant of a good deity (or otherwise notably devout), this bonus increases to +1d8. This bonus increases along with the enhancement bonus (so at +2 it deals +1d6 damage, +3 deals +3d6, and so on).

Property (Attuned): You can cast chaos hammer once per day per attuned property you have with the axe (including this one).
Property (Attuned): You can use the axe to carve through magical effects. This functions like a detect magic spell, except you must strike the object with the magical effect in question (so it may not be good to use in all situations). This ability works once per day per attuned property you have with the axe (including this one).
Property (Attuned): Once per day the axe can shout a word in Abyssal, which functions as a power word: stun, except that it does not work on fiends.
Property (Attuned): Once per day Namtar summons demons to assist you. You are representing Namtar in this instance, so if you embarrass him or treat them poorly then you will have to answer to him.

D&D Next: Drafting the Druid

I had a number of complaints regarding the druid just from reading it since its initial release—per day wildshaping and spells, and set-in-stone class features—but I figured that my criticisms would be more accurate and helpful if I saw it in action first. The characters in my Epiro campaign just hit 4th-level, meaning that I have seen the first three levels of the druid and so feel a bit more qualified when I say that I pretty much still dislike the class as a whole.

Since the 2nd Edition druid adhered to a bizarre interpretation of the (True) Neutral alignment (which I swear included an example of the druid changing sides mid-combat), I never bothered to give it a shot, and barely remember anything else about it except that high-level druids had to
fight other high-level druids to level up after a certain point.

3rd Edition’s druid eased up on this a bit by allowing you to be any alignment that had Neutral somewhere in the mix (and as an added plus, Neutral became less silly), but I still only played one once. The animal companion was nice, and usually twice a day you could do something druid-y like summon entangling roots or animals, but since there was no cleric I ended up doling out cure x wounds. Really nothing about the class stood out; when I was not healing I was hitting things with a metal scimitar (and not wearing metal armor or shields).

It was not until higher levels that you got the ability to change your shape, but even then you were limited to per-day uses. Another downside was that the shapes you could assume were limited by size and Hit Dice, which lead to balance issues where a 5th-level druid could turn into a dinosaur capable of making multiple attacks per round (some with poison), while the fighter could still only make one.

4th Edition broke the mold by not only having no restrictions on weapons, armor, or alignment, but also unlimited wildshaping and druidic magic in some form thanks to the at-will/encounter/daily power structure. One thing I found particularly interesting was that unlike other classes, what she could do depended on whether she was in her human or animal form; nature magic required you to be in human form, while “beast” powers required you to be an animal of some sort.

The downside was that while your animal form was unrestricted, no matter what you you turned into you were Medium-sized, and what you could do was limited without access to certain evocations. So you could wildshape into a bird, but you would be Medium-sized and unable to fly. Fish? Medium-sized and no swim speed. Now if you had the daily evocation form of the hunting falcon, you could change into a Small creature with a fly speed, but you could not manipulate objects, even things that you would expect a bird to be able to interact with or carry.

Despite these issues I still find it unfortunate that 5th Edition’s druid strays closer to 3rd Edition’s model. Yeah you can wildshape at 1st-level, but still only a set number of times per day and only into one of two forms (one of which you only get with the right Circle Initiate choice). Spells are a bit more flexible in that you do not have to specify how many of which one you want to prep ahead of time, but for the most part have a per-day cap (like every spellcaster in the current playtest). Oh, and with the exception of your Circle Initiate choice you only get specific class features at specific levels.

In play the druid is not particularly interesting. Randy’s go-to spell is fire seeds, an at-will that lets you throw up to two exploding acorns, pinecorns, or holly berries at a target for all of two fire damage. Compare to 4th Edition’s druid; yeah, you could throw a flame seed, except it was more like an area-effect grenade, but you could also opt to conjure a thorny vine to yank creatures around, unleash swarms of insects, channel bolts of lightning, and more. Otherwise aside from the odd use of fog cloud or entagle he pretty much uses his magic to heal everyone else.

Really the most druid-y thing he regularly does is turn into some kind of animal and maul something to death. Mechanically the shapes are fine, and I am surprised that they do not eclipse the paladin in terms of attack and damage output, but it disappointing that as with every class feature except Circle Initiate you are stuck with whatever they arbitrarily give you at whatever level: hound at 1st, rodent at 2nd, and at 4th you get both steed and fish. Yep, fish.

4th-level druids, one half of a delicious appetizer.

In changing the druid I would take a similar approach as the monk, dividing its class features into categories like seasons, circles, maybe even some terrain-based features (like we got with 4th Edition’s hunter and berserker sub-classes):

• Seasons would determine for the most part kind of magic you could use. For example summer druids would have fire/radiant and healing magic, while winter druids would have cold and “de-buffing” magic. I could see a case for seasons also establishing what animals you can choose from, but that might be more appropriate for terrain.
• Circles are fine conceptually, and would love to see more class features that are limited by the circle you chose. I would also use them for prestige class/paragon path requirements.
• Terrain could give you bonuses on skills, maybe even something like “terrain tricks” (which would tie in nicely to the Exploration pillar), but like Dungeon World could also be used to establish the animals you can choose from.

Building a druid from these categories would go a long way to making them more diverse and interesting right from the start. One druid might be able to conjure freezing winds, draw strength from a dying creature, transform into a wolf, and easily find shelter to fend off the cold, while another might channel fire (perhaps healing an ally at the same time), assume the shape of a bear, and locate sources of food in the forest. Much more diverse than what spells you prepped for the day.

Another problem is how their magic works. According to the playtest packet, they live in harmony with the land and call upon the gods to wield the magic of the moon, sun, storm, forest, and beast. I am not sure if it means gods in the cleric’s sense, or gods as powerful nature spirits. Linking them with nature spirits could let them cannibalize some of the best parts of the shaman while helping to make them distinct from god-gods. At any rate, cleric-gods or no, like the cleric how their magic works does not make any sense at all:

• Why can they only prepare two spells per day at 1st-level? Are they making deals with specific spirits? Does it have something to do with their headspace?
• Why do they need to prepare spells at all? Is it because whoever they are phoning these into when they set them is too busy to take another call?
• Why can they only cast a set number of spells each day? If these are the result of calling on gods, then what happens if they are acting on the behalf of a god? Is the god tired?
• How come they can use a higher-level spell to cast a lower-level spell, but no matter how many lower-level slots they have access to they cannot cast a single spell of a higher level?

Calling upon gods is all well and good, even if it treads on the toes of the cleric, but then like the cleric aside from “this is how it was done before” I do not understand why they have a daily limit, why they have to set miraculous acts ahead of time, and why there is no way for them to beseech their benefactor for aid in a time of need.

I would go with something more like a wizard. They learn their magic from a circle of druids and/or powerful nature spirit/god. Couple this with the proposal for more flexible and varied mechanics from above, and you could make a pretty thematic druid. Their magic is physically demanding, to the point where I could see some spells having a hit point cost. Some spells might require buildup, so instead of entangle dealing damage and requiring a saving throw to avoid getting trapped, it would start out with thick growth that makes it easier to trip creatures up and slow them down, but if they stick around then they risk getting caught taking damage. Maybe you could burn hit points to speed up the process, representing the druid sacrificing her strength to fuel the magic?

As for wildshaping, someone mentioned druids being unable to remain in an animal’s form for too long because they begin to lose themself. While that is not stated, and at least in the latest packet any flavor reasons for the duration is not even hinted at, I think that that is an excellent mechanic idea. Let them transform whenever, but make it so that they start taking penalties to some Intelligence and Charisma checks over time until they return to normal. I would even keep it so that the penalties linger until you are in your human form for awhile, too.

In order to keep animal shapes viable, I would have many aspects of it scale as the druid levels up, but also allow her to choose features/perks/talents that let that form do more things. So that way if a druid really wants to stick with a wolf theme, she can without falling behind the curve. I am not even just referring to combat stuff; you could attack Exploration elements to animal forms, so that a falcon could be good at scouting and keeping watch, while a horse could travel incredibly fast.

Epiro: Episode 108

Cast 

• Atticus (wood elf druid 3)
• Corvus (human ranger 3)
• Iola (wood elf monk 3)
• Perseus (human paladin 3)
• Yllian (high elf wizard 3)

If the dwarf was understandably unwilling to explain his reasons for freeing a specific prisoner, then the characters would have to try and figure it out on there own. Thankfully he left a room filled with seemingly deranged scrawlings, so they started out giving Intelligence a shot. Since it was established before the game even started that Perseus is a demigod, his 20+ result indicated that his mother had told him stories told to her by his father, namely that the world was formed in a cataclysmic battle between the primordials millenia ago.

He was also taught some old words, and between this and Yllian’s knowledge of primordials and forbidden lore, they were able to deduce that the prisoner knew of a method to harness the dormant power of at least two primordials in order to open a gate, or perhaps punch a hole in a barrier. The only problem was where the prisoner had gone. The guards said that he had been interred some thirty years ago by officials from Argos, but that he was irrevocably insane and so no one interacted with him beyond feeding him and cleaning his cell.

Despite this he was important enough for the dwarf to go through a bunch of trouble to rescue him, and he was not talking. They tried to hatch a convoluted plan in which a prisoner would stage an escape and tag along with the dwarf, who would hopefully go to wherever the prisoner had gone, giving them a trail to follow. This might have actually worked, but a stone giant named Skorres arrived, wanting to investigate the cause for the earthquakes he had felt hours ago.

The stone giant was apparently no stranger to the town, who readily offered to help them with repairs in exchange for some goats. He also helpfully pointed out the direction that the elemental had gone after leaving the quarry: the Green Hills. They asked him if anything was in the Green Hills that he knew of, but he said that he never went there because the stones were too noisy. At least they had a direction to go, and the session ended after they made the halfway mark and fended off a mated pair of manticores.

Behind The Scenes
Since Yllian does not have identify, I caved and allowed Josh to use detect magic with a magical lore check to deduce what the magical boots could do. I think it is stupid to require a wizard to both know and have one specific spell prepared. 4th Edition allowed a person trained in Arcana to both detect magic and identify magic items. Some people felt that this was too convenient, but I think it helped keep the game’s pace going and avoiding a bunch of tedium.

I would structure items so that they had capabilities that are revealed by a short rest and/or a magical lore check (or similar knowledge skill), as well as others that are revealed by a long rest. You could make it so that if you analyze a magic item quickly you get a roll, while if you spend a lot of time you get a bonus or advantage. Wizards could have bonuses to identify items with effects linked to schools they can use. This could also be a prolonged task build into the exploration rules, or a downtime task. You could also have capabilities that are not revealed by this, allowing you to conceal features if you want.

One of the manticores died in the second round, even though the first round was a surprise round that only Yllian got to act in, and on the second round Iola missed it and Perseus did not even get a chance to do anything. I decided that despite an Intelligence of 5, the second manticore determined that it would just be a Large flying lamb to a slaughter, and had it just fly away. I really wish that 5th Edition had an elite and solo system, so that maybe paired monsters or “bosses” had more staying power.

I have some in-depth stuff to say about the druid, but it ended up being so much that I am moving it to its own article.

Epiro: Episode 107

Cast

• Atticus, formerly known as the Randy (wood elf druid 3)
• Corvus (human ranger 3)
• Iola (wood elf monk 3)
• Perseus (human paladin 3)
• Yllian (high elf wizard 3)

After the earthquake subsided the characters that were not already outside got up to survey the damage, along with the rest of the town; the streets were filled with people trying to figure out what was going on, with theories ranging from magic, to monsters, to the return of vengeful gods.

It did not take long for word to reach the characters that part of the quarry had collapsed, damaging numerous homes near the top, burying others, and destroying much of the scaffolding and pulley systems used to haul stone. While Perseus was busy getting his armor on—hoping to avoid getting caught with his pants down in case a fight broke out again—Iola and Atticus helped the citizens excavate survivors and clean up the mess.

Yllian, not really one for labor, suspected that the stone boots were in some way responsible, something that he had not shared with his comrades. Though he had not yet been able to ready identify he figured that he could at least give detect magic a shot to see if he could figure anything out. What he saw was a lattice of red-orange energy threaded throughout them. In a few places the threads had snapped, indicating physical trauma, or possibly waning magic.

He also noticed something else.

Waves of evocation magic where flowing past him, through the ground. Due to the limited range of the divination he could not see where, but he theorized that it was somewhere within the quarry. Well, at the least he was able to eliminate the boots as the cause, though earthquake-causing boots would be pretty rad. Ah, well, he might as well try to figure out what was causing it, and started heading down there with Perseus.

That was when another earthquake hit, this time with Iola and Atticus at ground zero. Rocks fell, some people died, plenty were wounded. Another section of the quarry had collapsed, this time crushing about a quarter of the prison that had been constructed at the bottom. By the time they had picked themselves up and were able to take in what had happened, they could hear inmates whooping and hollering, along with a few voices screaming out before being abruptly silenced.

What guards remained at this point, some ten in all, ordered the citizens to retreat. As everyone fell back, Iola and Atticus decided to stick around and play hide and seek with a mob of criminals who, when they were not engaging in arduous, back-breaking labor, spent the time cooped up in sweltering rooms with other sweaty men. In terms of bad ideas, this easily topped their personal chart.

Iola circled around, using her speed and low-light vision to keep her distance and navigate. Atticus took the high road, transforming into a panther to help him scale the walls and slink above unnoticed. Through some bizarre twist of fate (ie, 1 in 400 odds) Atticus did run into one of the criminals, who apparently had the same idea he did by trying to climb his way out of the quarry. He frantically swiped at Atticus with a shiv, who anticlimactically just loped off.

I am not sure what Iola had expected to find, but I am sure that she was not expected to see a lone, cloaked figure slowly walking along the walls of the prison. It held its hand to the wall, pausing periodically to press its head against it, sometimes tapping with some sort of metal implement. She watched him from a distance, waiting for him to do something else to justify a surprise attack. After ten or so feet, he stopped and started etching something into the wall.

That probably would have been enough in her book, but Atticus had made it to the prison rooftop at about the same time. He peered over the edge, and saw that the figure was already staring up at him, as if expecting him to be there. His expression still changed to one of shock, because though expecting something, that something was not a very large, dangerous cat. He slowly backed away and tried to tantalize Atticat with some meat to no avail.

In all fairness he tried a few more times to deter Atticat, but when it was clear that this was going nowhere he knelt to the ground and whispered…something. Despite adding 1d6 + 5 to his listen checks, all Atticus could make out was some kind of grumbling. A pillar of stone erupted out of the prison’s ceiling a moment later, slamming into Atticus’s chest and throwing him back. So, magic words.

Atticus picked himself up, chest throbbing in pain, and reverted back to his elven form. This also surprised the stranger, who expressed his surprise with the statement, “Well, aren’t you full of surprises.” Atticus, using the element of surprise, conjured up a bunch of thick, dried roots to entangle him. This tore up his clothes and pulled his hook back; Atticus guessed that based on his height, stature, beard, and affinity for stone that he was a dwarf.

He strained against the roots, and when he was unable to break free a pair of arms erupted from the ground and effortlessly tore them apart (which, after reading the description of entangle I realized bought him all of one action). An ogre-sized, stony mass emerged after the arms, and began sliding towards Atticus. He picked himself up and began walking towards the prison, confident that the elemental would occupy Atticus long enough for him to complete his task. With his back to her and his attention clearly focused elsewhere, Iola took the opportunity to move in and take him out.

She had barely moved a few steps when the stranger, without even looking, pointed at her and commanded her to stop. He said that he did not want to hurt her, but that he would if she came any closer. She rushed him anyway, getting in a pretty good hit before his skin hardened into rock and another pillar knocked her away. He took this opportunity to make it towards the prison, creating an entrance and ducking inside, with Iola hot on his heels.

At some point Atticus had conjured a flaming sphere to use against the elemental, but when Iola chased the stranger inside the prison it turned its attention to her, attacking from within the walls to conceal its location. He hopped down and rolled the sphere after them, driving it into the dwarf while Iola pummeled him, easily dodging the elemental’s strikes, and the dwarf collapsed after a few rounds of punishment.

All the while that this was going on, Yllian and Perseus had been rallying the soldiers and town militia to handle the escaped prisoners. Though the guard captain had been killed, they did manage to rescue the nobleman, one Valan Ogre’tor, from a trio of thugs who were holding him at sword point (which was pretty easy given their high Charisma scores and training in Persuade). In the end they managed to capture just under half of the escaped criminals, locking them in a makeshift prison until they could rebuild the actual one.

Once everything had settled Yllian and Atticus tried to press the stranger for information, while Perseus went to “press” Valan. They tied him up so that he could not touch the ground, hoping that it would prevent him from using his magic. After giving it their bad cop/worse cop routine, all they found out was that he was indeed somehow connected to Tharizdun. When they went back to the scene of the crime, they found that the walls of one of the cells was covered in strange signs, and had a circular shaped hole in the ceiling.

Behind the Scenes
The stonecaller marked the first time in years that I have sat down to construct a non-4th Edition spellcaster, and was also my debut into using spellcaster types in 5th Edition. Since there are no guidelines for building your own monsters, and none of them have class levels, I stuck with a method somewhere in between 3rd and 4th Edition; ie, eyeballing many of the stats and just kind of giving him cleric spells that would let him do the spell-like effects I wanted him to.

The end result is that due to a combination of limited actions and hit points, he was only able to do like, three things before getting taken out. In 4th Edition he would have had one or two action points to let him do more, and probably lasted another round or two on top of it. Thankfully I planned on giving him an earth elemental flunky ahead of time so that his objective was able to be completed, but I wish monsters had more interesting things going on.