New campaign has started swimmingly (and I do mean swimmingly, we keep getting held up by stormy weather washing out the roads) Half our party is fighters hired by the mages to guard their expedition. Highlights include: -Elf compulsively collecting sticks to sharpen. Not as weapons, not for fire, just... to sharpen -Half-orc using said elf as a whack-a-mole toy for two days -half-orc badly flirting with our half-elf boss ("I'll eat your mushroom" said completely deadpan, with a failed charisma check) -half-orc accidentally terrifying one of the gnomes by botching another charisma roll while chatting ("I haven't even tried to eat you yet!" "Yet???") So she switched night guard shifts with the other gnome -the other gnome who is a pacifist monk, and has decided to spend his watch shifts perched on half-orc's shoulder for Extra Perception -our other wizard boss getting Offended that this "silly little herbalist" is finding all sorts of materials in the woods... and botching his check to look for materials, coming up with something that only helped said herbalist (druid)
At some point I'll post the logs but in the mean time, session 4/5 highlights! - The most challenging enemy of Session 4 (the session that contained a trio of darkmantles that nearly crushed Nothing's head, and a giant spider)? A greasy slope. Nuth is...not good at climbing. - Our gnome druid, who has a thing for throwing darts into enemies' eyes, might just have invented the hottest new pub game in the land. He carved an eye-shape into a tree and was practicing with it and got seen by a drunk dwarf who thought his throwing game looked fun. (He threw his axe into a nearby tree and got admonished by a very indigant Spindleshanks: "That's NOT how you do it! Look! This is the 'eye'. If you get the dart right in the middle you did really good.") He introduced Spindle to the concept of gambling...and the concept of "money"...and in return got absolutely trounced at the newly-coined game of "Darts". - Nuth found a really fancy ring in a cave. Faeleth (@inchwyrm's elf rogue) SUPER wanted it because she can tell it's really fancy. She spent the entire 4th session needling Nothing about how her ring was 'tacky' and 'ugly', successfully leading Nuth to believe Faeleth has suuuuper bad taste. The next time they slept, Faeleth stole the ring right off of her hand. Nothing hasn't even noticed it's gone yet... - We got pelted with high-velocity goblins by an, um, "eccentric" old gnome wizard we had to appease... It turns out he had a very lurid tryst with our Ranger a couple of years ago. Did I mention that she's eight foot tall and he's a gnome? Their history worked very much to our advantage, though, despite having 0 Charisma modifier she smooth-talked him into cooperating. :)c - Aforementioned wizard was ranting and raving about how the (absolute douchebag) leader of the nearby caravan town needed to 'get off of his dick' if we want him to stop throwing goblins at the town and screaming all hours of the day and night. It transpired that it's Dick with a capital D - Dick van Dog, his treasured pet, buried on the hill the leader's tent is situated on top of. (We got his dog bones back. He's chill now.) - In a fight with some goblins (more errands we were running for the douchebag leader of the town because he duped us with an unbreakable arcane deal), our Ranger tried to shoot the boss goblin. It was a critical failure. The DM had her roll a luck die... She got a natural 20. She totally fumbled the arrow, which veered off-course...the Boss Goblin she was intending to shoot used his ability to swap places with the goblin next to him, straight into the path of the arrow, which hit him in the head. Everyone at the table LOST IT. - We met a farmer called Bobby Ross. Ranger complimented the "happy little trees" on his farm. He mentioned that some of them got taken down in a storm. Faeleth's response? "...Sounds like a happy little accident."
So, I've been having a blast with D&D, it's basically the highlight of my week, so I started writing it up on my tumblr. I definitely recommend you read it, it's pretty fun so far. Highlights: Lily: Can I… kill them? Everyone: Lily no, what the fuck Lily: I’m going to stab them Damerion: Please calm down! [Saika is staring at Lily over his drink] Saika: You happened to stab a lot of guys back in the day. Lily: Yeah well, they deserved it though. Saika: That guy had a weed infraction Tom [to rezzed boars]: Who’s my little snuggums, my little terror who can tear a man apart, you are, you are The Cast: Detective R. Saika, the human pugilist Rough around the edges and hardboiled as fuck, this 40 something investigator has made his living looking through violent crimes and bounty hunting adventurers. He’s got an ongoing problem with alcohol and cigarettes, and a raspy voice that proves it, too. Cartographer Tarron Shau, the human wizard/ranger A multi-lingual (and I mean multilingual) man who loves cyphers, he travels around Daelos, marking down landmarks and taking notes on what he encounters. He only sells fine quality maps. He is travelling with his young son, and word from the harelequins is that he’s looking for something relating to his wife and runes… Damerion Shau, the human wizard Gifted, but nervous, Damerion is an awkward teenager stumbling in his voyage into adolescence. Bookish and quiet, he prefers to keep problems far away and his father close. He hasn’t really said anything, but it appears that his mother went missing some time ago. Clara, the firbolg cleric Kind hearted, optimistic, and devoted to Freya, Clara just wants to do what’s best. Despite a childhood of rejection and isolation from her people, she has kept her desire to do good, and has an open heart. So far, she’s already considering her co-workers “friends”. Safrora Wilhorn, the half-elf monk Abandoned as a baby at a church, and then thrown out of the church when it was discovered he was half-elf, Safrora has lived a rough and tumble life. After finding himself in several fights, he learned how to kick ass and earn some money in the taverns. Bounty Hunter Lily Anne, the human eldritch knight fighter Violent and revenge-driven, 19 year old Lily Anne has a short but bloody history. Still looking for those responsible for the pain she has gone through, she’s made her way through life by taking in bounties… without bothering to keep them alive. It’s only recently that she’s seen the damage she wrecks, and is trying to turn a new page and curb her bloodlust.
Am partway through character creation for a 5E game. In my quest to make a dinosaur druid, I somehow ended up with an aarakocra who, for logical mechanical reasons, knows 5 languages at like age 10 because aarakocra reach adulthood at 3. I have been promised bonus XP if I roleplay them screwing up words all the time because they know 5 languages at age 10. :::PPP
but if you're an adult by that time, why wouldn't you have adult-level language abilities? also what's an aarakocra.
They do. But ten years is not a long time to learn to be completely fluent in five different languages, especially when also studying a) to be a druid and b) DINOSAURS. And this is an aarakocra:
When we went to get stuff out of the trailer we found dad's old first edition manuals (3) and monster manuals (2 or 3?), and one second edition manual. Were pretty cool to see though I haven't been able to look them over yet.
(I'm considering making their gender ambiguous just because Aarakocra inflects based on flight status, Druidic terms related to sex and gender are largely designed to describe the mating and reproductive patterns of animals and use different terms for animals that do and don't have breeding cycles and whether they're in or out of it, Dwarvish direct terms for sex and gender are considered incredibly crass and it's usually only implied with euphemisms, and Elvish has sixteen genders, and at this point they just can't remember how gendered language works in Common. :::PPP )
Dinosaur birb update: Friend drew pics for everyone, so now they have a name, face, and Official Bio. "*clenches fist* DINOSAURS." ...Now to go make a list of kinds of dinosaurs that I can map to animals in the Monster Manual so I have options.
There are actual dinosaurs in the 5e Monster Manual. They're not listed in Appendix A with the other animals -- they have their own entry -- but they're beasts, so they're valid candidates for Wild Shape. ^_^ (Assuming your DM lets you turn into things you have only seen dead and not living)
Yeah, dinosaurs are apparently alive and well in D&D land, because... it's cool, I guess? But whatever makes things interesting in your campaign. There's definitely stats for them, though.
Yeah, I know, but most of those are the big ones like T. Rex and Triceratops. If you're a level 2 birb and can only turn into critters with a CR up to 1 despite your big dinosaur-related dreams, none of the ones in the MM are legal until level 6. So I'm pretty much going, "a deinonychus is BASICALLY going to be like a lion if I swap the bite and claw damage, right?"
(It's also worth pointing out that, hilariously, Wild Shape doesn't let you turn into anything with a fly speed until you're level 8. Aarakocra get a fly speed at level 5. I will probably be talking to the DM about that.)
Yeah, exactly. I'm going to propose swapping the level requirements for "critter that has a fly speed" and "critter that has a swim speed," so birb can't turn into a crocodile until late but can turn into a Quetzalcoatlus (with Giant Eagle stats) earlier.
That's why Adventurers League games (the official WotC games run in stores and have a lot of extra game balance rules) don't permit their use in games, and a fair number of GMs don't either. :(
There are a couple of low challenge rating dinos in Volo's Guide as well, got a Hadrosaurus and Velociraptor in here that are both 1/4, if that's helpful at all. (Also Quetzalcoatalus but it's challenge rating 2) Swapping out equivalent regular-beastie stats works too though and would probably be better for variety and challenge ratings above 1/4 ahaha.
Yeah. You could have the equivalent of a 3rd level spell at 5th level, and that'd be Terrible. (I mean. Having flight *all the time* is nice, but it's slower and you give stuff up for it...)
I think the official Elemental Evil statting up of them as a player race just flat-out gave you a fly speed from the start, which is quite a bit more broken than the homebrew I found first when I googled it.
