Six New Magic Items for July
It’s been an incredibly busy month here, with several writing commitments and the fundraiser event for Citadel LARP. I look forward to telling you more about those writ...
2024-07-24 22:29:14 +0000 UTC View Post
William Brandes Stoddard posts
So You Want To Write a Subclass
Let’s get the first thing out of the way: I am not an authority, and I am not the Subclass Design Cops. If you have a design that makes you happy, go with God. This is just a collection of things I’ve either figured out or been taught by peopl...
2024-07-01 20:03:58 +0000 UTC View PostRevised Kagandi Species
My Aurikesh campaign has its own player species – I wrote new mechanics for humans and goblins, and wrote several new species. Only the githyanki PC uses D&D’s official mechanics. One of these new species is kagandi, who are lightly reptil...
2024-06-24 15:39:41 +0000 UTC View PostPlayer Holdings in Aurikesh
My Aurikesh campaign has 149 sessions under its belt at this point. Fourteen of those sessions are in 2024, which is more than we’ve had in some whole years. The highest-level characters are 11th to 13th level. Because my personal “old-school...
2024-06-21 01:22:08 +0000 UTC View PostRevised Divine Trickster Roguish Archetype
In the misty past of… almost exactly nine years ago… I wrote a Divine Trickster roguish archetype for a friend of mine...
2024-05-15 15:59:40 +0000 UTC View PostEight New Magic Items from My Campaigns
I haven’t created a new collection of magic items in a bit, so what if I just share with you a bunch of things I’ve created for my Aurikesh and Dragon Heist (now long post-Heist – we just continued the campaign with them doing their own thin...
2024-05-01 01:48:32 +0000 UTC View PostLARP Design: Puzzles and Their Uses
Thanks to some great questions from a reader, I have a whole series of new LARP design posts to write, which brings me great joy. In this one, I’ll be talking about specific puzzle types and applications of puzzles in campaign-length boffer LARP...
2024-04-09 15:30:42 +0000 UTC View PostSetting Design and Teleportation
In a conversation over on a social media site that shall remain nameless, Hannah Rose suggested giving even fairly low-level PCs limited access to teleportation, just as a way to get them to the adventure site and back to town. I don’t want to a...
2024-04-02 18:41:15 +0000 UTC View PostFour New Were-creature Stat Blocks
In circling back to a long-dormant project, I’m creating a swath of new stat blocks for were-creatures. The general goal is to keep were-creatures in active use at higher tiers of gameplay. The MM lycanthropes are woefully ineffective, unless yo...
2024-03-27 02:47:29 +0000 UTC View PostAlter Self Reworked
Not too long ago, I finally had a reason to pay closer attention to the spell Alter Self. I’m talking about the 2014 version; I have no foreknowledge of whether it’ll see meaningful change in this year's revised Player’s Handboo...
2024-03-05 16:51:11 +0000 UTC View PostTwenty Researchers and Scholars
For another project, I’m working on research mechanics, and I thought it might be interesting and fun to create a stable of researchers and scholars that you can drop into the narrative on short notice. Maybe the PCs need someone to interact wit...
2024-02-27 14:04:49 +0000 UTC View PostSix New Magic Rings
Blog friends! I’ve missed you, and I’ve missed creating collections of magic items to entertain and delight you. Today I bring you rings of power, none of them to be used lightly.
Angelic Ring
Ring...
2024-02-02 16:33:22 +0000 UTC View PostVillain’s Schemes: Mayhem
It’s been one week under a year since my last post in this series, and a big freelance project means I’ve been awfully quietly lately. It’s almost done, though, and I promise a return to form in February and March. This time, I’m talking a...
2024-01-22 16:12:30 +0000 UTC View PostFour Story Hooks for Seas of Vodari
Now that Under the Seas of Vodari is in the hands of (what I hope is) an adoring public, we’re putting together a Patreon for ongo...
2023-12-29 16:06:53 +0000 UTC View PostSummons and the Pact of the Chain
I’ve never been happy with the Warlock’s Pact of the Chain, as I’ve written about before. My premise has always been t...
2023-11-26 20:28:32 +0000 UTC View PostA Thirteenth Year of Blogging
It’s been a busy year, and right now at the end of it is the very most busy, on a copy-editing project for Exalted Funeral. I love and appreciate everyone who reads, comments, and supports my writing.
Games I’m Running 2023-11-19 20:19:36 +0000 UTC View Post
Bastions in the Narrative
I haven’t had a chance to write my UA breakdown article on the Bastions and Cantrips packet for Tribality yet, but today I’m makin’ gravy without the lumps! This is content that should be fun even if you’re not using whatever comes from th...
2023-11-10 00:20:13 +0000 UTC View PostLARP Design: The In-Town Game
Thanks to a long list of complicating factors, I had to miss almost every LARP event of 2023 before September. Since the start of September, I’ve played an Eclipse event, an Altera Awakens event, and two Alliance events (one Atlanta cha...
2023-10-18 15:24:28 +0000 UTC View PostI Am the Very Model of a Modron Major-General
I am the very model of a modron major general
I’ve legend lore on plants, beasts, and every elementical
I know the Queens of Gith-land, and I quote the flights draconical
From Tiamat to Tu’narath, in order lore-canonical
I’m v...
2023-10-04 15:30:01 +0000 UTC View PostRogues and the Short Rest
As the Unearthed Arcana development of 5e.24 continues, the design team’s apparent campaign against the Short Rest has pivoted hard toward everyone getting back something but almost no one getting back everything on a Short Res...
2023-09-18 20:35:37 +0000 UTC View PostMore Spells from Vecna’s Grimoire
Since Glen Terry asked for them in a recent comment, I’m doing more spells themed around Vecna, the Whispered One. I love spell design, and designing weird things you can do with high-level spells is an especially interesting space.
The “Pious” Warlock, Part Six
It’s been right on a year since the last time I touched this series and covered Yugoloth patrons. I feel like I’m right at the edge of having enough material to do gehreleths/demodands, but… today I’m doing the considerably more popular Gr...
2023-08-24 00:16:06 +0000 UTC View PostNew Monster: Bone Harvester
For one of my freelance projects, I submitted a hefty list of new monsters, and the project lead picked a goodly number of them. In this post I’m writing about one that didn’t make the cut, just because I thought it was an interesting idea. It...
2023-08-09 23:09:16 +0000 UTC View PostOne D&D: New Primal Orders
Back in December, I created a collection of new Divine (Holy) Orders for the Cleric class, and pointed out that Holy Orders reallyneed...
2023-07-20 04:49:10 +0000 UTC View PostHammer of Thunderbolts Redesign
The hammer of thunderbolts is an unusual magic item in 5e, in that it doesn’t do much at all until you acquire and attune two other magic items: gauntlets of ogre power and a belt of giant strength. (The traditionalist...
2023-07-17 04:56:07 +0000 UTC View PostD&D 5e: New Metamagic Options
I like it when sorcerer subclasses support theme and a gameplay loop with a new metamagic option. The core metamagic options are usable for a large number of expected spells, though they don’t need to work for allof them to be valid. Fo...
2023-06-27 15:24:18 +0000 UTC View PostLARP Design: A Further Five Field Battles
It has been more than two years since my last post in this series, in part because we spent two years not LARPing. We’re back at it now, and that makes it easier to write. In the first two posts, I talked about ten field battle models I...
2023-06-21 13:47:44 +0000 UTC View PostRuby Talon Deeps: Locations 3
I’m working on a number of different adventure-writing projects for publication right now, so maybe it’s weird that working on yet another one feels like my easy go-to here. I’ve been struggling with a few different ideas lately. Br...
2023-05-31 21:51:31 +0000 UTC View PostTreasure as Arcane Focus
In the new UA packet, the Create Spell spell requires expensive material components that are consumed on use: an arcane focus worth 1000 gp per level of the spell you’re creating.
Six Spells from the 4e Files
My last set of 4e spells converted to 5e was in October of last year, so I figured it was time to get back to that project. Even with the progress I’ve made, there are tons of cool ideas left to play with.