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Dragon Encounter Design: Make Every Battle Unique
There are ten different dragons in the Monster Manual, five good and five evil, and yet as anyone who has ever met one in a D&D game knows, there might as well be one. The differences between them are so small as to seem just cosmetic. The biggest difference between them is breath weapon… Continue reading
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EARTH ELEMENTAL: Four Unique Ways to Use the Wall Walker
How to Use: The Enemy Inside the Walls The earth elemental’s primary abilities are earth glide and siege monster. As these don’t work very well defensively, the earth elemental is going to have to be used as an attacker/invader. (Technically, it would also make a fantastic sentry. Undetectable until it attacks, and then hitting… Continue reading
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AIR ELEMENTAL: Four Ways to Disrupt the Party with Whirlwind
How to Use: Whirlwind Looking at the air elemental’s stat block, its most potent attack is probably supposed to be whirlwind attack, judging by the fact that it’s on a recharge. However, the whirlwind attack doesn’t seem worth it unless the air elemental can capture at least two PCs in its affect, preferably more, and… Continue reading
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Simple Traps Done Right
For those following this blog, I am proud to announce that I have posted a guest post on Tribality on the subject of traps. Trap Article Traps are a thing that has an incredible amount of potential, but sadly are often used very poorly. The basic way to use them, as described in the DMG,… Continue reading
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DUERGAR: Unexpected Ways to Use Enlarge And Invisibilty
How to Use: D&D’s Grey Dwarves in their Underdark Outposts The duergar (also known as the grey dwarves, which I use in game as a common nickname) work very well as mercenaries. They don’t have the stat blocks needed to be a major faction (unless you’re using Mordenkainen’s), but their abilities and demeanor make… Continue reading
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HEAD VILLAIN: Introducing him, and keeping him alive.
My apologies to everyone for my lack of posting in the last few weeks. I’ve been working on guest posts to try to bring up the blog’s ratings online, and it’s left me a little short of time. With that said, let me introduce the first DragonEncounters post on a different site. Meeting the villains… Continue reading
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DRYAD: Improved Nature Quests and the Green Trap
Discover better nature-themed quest ideas—and learn how to turn dryad encounters into lethal fights with Entangle and stealth tactics. How to Use: Dryad and Nature Quests The obvious purpose for a dryad is as a quest giver, for nature related quests. I don’t normally do quests (I feel enough quest ideas exist online), but most… Continue reading
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DRUID: Moonbeam and Thunderstrike in a Deadly Chase
How to Use: NPC Druid Spellcasting Tactics The most obvious use of a druid NPC is to give help or advice, or to ask them to go on a quest. I am going to wait to discuss nature themed quests in the next article, Dryad. For this article, I will concentrate on giving two druid… Continue reading
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DRACOLICH: How to Use Immortality as an Unfair Cheat
How to Use – Dracolich “Suicide” Tactics Fighting back isn’t the only way a villain can respond to the heroes’ aggression. Another way is to go after a city, or other civilians, forcing the heroes to either risk themselves in order to save the civilians, or to suffer the effects of massive unpopularity. [See below].… Continue reading
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DRIDER: How to Use Darkness and Range in Combat
Three Ways of Running DnD’s Drider: The Temporary Parley Trap, Tactics of the Darkness Spell, and the Drider’s devastating sniper range tactic. How to Use – DnD’s Drider Parley Tactic Advantage of Knowledge of the Drow The drider is the ideal monster with which to set up a drow campaign. As a being who was… Continue reading
About Me
I’ve been a DM since I was about 10 years old. (Not of D&D, admittedly, but still.) After growing bored of fights that were all the same, dungeons heavily populated by one monster type, and a general shortage of ideas, I figured I’d embark on my own trip through the Monster Manual, one monster at a time. Feel free to join the quest.