Housekeeping!

We’ve got some Friday housekeeping bits and bobs as DM Ben looks to shore up some upcoming encounters before game day. Let’s pull back the tarp and take a closer look at his final prep!

DM Ben is basically running the same campaign across two different player groups: an office game and a home game. Consequently, he continually gets an opportunity to re-prep each encounter and improve it.

Some might say it must be dull playing the same sorta campaign twice. Not at all. First, the playstyles among his coworkers and family members are dramatically different. Second, he gets to do everything he inadvertently missed in the first go around. Lastly, the home game doesn’t take nearly the amount of DM prep, which is the only realistic way our DM can run two game groups monthly.

Longtime readers will recall Waterdeep’s finest carpenter and fisherman, Ewan McHook. He’s central to our home-brewed game elements in several ways: his son, Shamus, spots the party secretly exiting the Fissure and then later has to try and rescue that same lad from the clutches of our evil Night Hag.

DM Ben ran out of prep time for this integral part of the story, so he wanted to create a cooler setting for the home game.

The first terrain we grabbed was this nifty Fishing Shack building by Infinite Dimensions Games. We wanted the group to better understand what building that cellar was a part of here. We did a spotlight post on it, but remarkably, we didn’t get it in a game until now (and that’s a travesty).

You’ll also notice this new cobblestone street battle board by Dwarven Forge. This playing surface was from their recently fulfilled Cities Untold Lotown Kickstarter. It’s super handy to set up a gridded street scene quickly. To complete the first half of the scene, we added this 3D-print boat frame by STL Miniatures.

For the second half of the gameboard, DM Ben wanted to focus on the waterfront itself. We once again leaned on Dwarven Forge and their marvelous Terrain Trays.  Then, it was just a matter of 3D-printing these rugged docks by EC3D Designs. Lastly, we had an old boat from a Gen Con gone by to complete the waterfront vibe.

Looking good, right? DM Ben likes this improved overall water scene much better than his original attempt. Amazing what a little extra prep time can do for a dungeon master, right?

Switching encounters, we thought a brief follow-up to our free d20 DnD Great Escape Cavern table would be worthwhile. The table was done across two entries: Part One and Part Two. While we had our miniatures and scatter terrain selected for each row/d20 result, we didn’t have a chance to set the specific gameboard up.

DM Ben keeps it simple with these fab Cavern Passage Packs by Dwarven Forge. We’ve bought several of them as they provide a ton of cavern layout flexibility. The passages are also nice and wide and can handle the placement of a 2×2 d20 square monster (super important). These fit snugly on our magnetic Rough Stone Terrain Tray, also by Dwarven Forge.

The encounter mechanics are nice and simple here. A player rolls a d20, DM Ben grabs the appropriate piece(s), and then places them at the mouth of the passage. The players are in the same passageway as they’re trying to dig out and escape the underground Fissure.

In this instance, the appointed party member rolled a 12 on his d20. Bad news: They found a vicious Otyugh! Yikes. The players will place their miniatures on the board, roll initiative, and (hopefully) defeat this beefy monster. Since they didn’t locate the way out by rolling a 13, they must roll again on the table.

Until next time!