Better start preparing for a halfling cleric errybody, I'm just sayin...

Roll20s DnD compendium is ace btw. It gives you At A Glance info about basically everything, and is super useful.

https://roll20.net/compendium/dnd5e/BookIndex

You generally want to work together, yes, but it really depends on the group, the characters and the campaign

Am a yes.

Friar Bungo Berrybottom is packing his bags and saying his prayers in readiness.

Tempy wrote:

You generally want to work together, yes, but it really depends on the group, the characters and the campaign

Based on my previous record, you'll be looking for ways to kill me off by the end of the first session.

So, I said I would try and do an kind of introductory thing for the new players, and here goes - i’ll try and cover the basics and just let people know what they might wanna know before going in. If you’ve played before, you can skip this. But, for new players, I hope this might be useful. I apologise for the length and possibly incoherent nature of this in advance. So, let’s begin…

Wot is Duhr and Duhr?

A lot of “Beginners Guides” for D&D start with character creation but I think it’s actually better to give an example of how D&D plays. A typical exchange between the DM / GM (Dungeon / Game master) and his or her players might go like this:



DM: You enter the stone chamber and it’s dimly lit from a series of small sconces on the East and West walls. The room is long and it’s difficult to make out any details at the far end… [DESCRIPTION CONTINUES]

Player 1: Ok, I wanna walk in a few feet and check for traps as I go.

DM: Ok, can you roll a perception check for me?

Player 2: After he’s done that, i’d like to head into the room behind him and start examining those sconces.

DM: Sure…what did you roll?

Player 1: Uh, let me see…16.

DM: Ok, as you inspect the floor you do notice some raised tiles. A quick examination leads you to believe it’s some sort of pressure plate that might set off a trap.

Player 1: Got it. I wanna try and disarm it.

DM: Do you have thieves tools?

Player 1: Let me check my character sheet…yeah, I do. I have a set of thieves tools.

DM: Ok, go ahead and roll for me.



Now, that’s a super formal and kinda dry example of D&D but it’s an important one. There are a good number of people out there, like myself, who are or were fans of The Adventure Zone, which is a cool D&D podcast. Except, that podcast is incredibly rules-light and all about the role-play. And that’s cool, because it’s supposed to be one-hour quick bursts of story telling. But D&D as it’s commonly played has a bit more combat, a bit more puzzling, a bit more investigation and a whole boatload more choices for the players to make.

A good example of what to expect can be seen from the following video. It’s from the D&D show Critical Role. Now, don’t go into the game expecting to have an experience just like this - these guys are all professional voice actors, as well as huge nerds, and some of them have played D&D for decades, but there’s a sequence to watch here for general play. The example is from Season 2, but there’s not really any spoilers here. Watch from 32:30 to 1hr 15.

During this time:

The DM refreshed the players memories regarding a mission they have accepted from a local official.
The players head down into the sewers and look around.
The players enter combat.

https://youtu.be/R0rx28wgA4E?t=1950

So that’s kind of how it is. You have something to do in your group, and your DM builds the world and creates opportunities for you to play your character in an enjoyable way. Make jokes, have fun, don’t take it too seriously. Ask questions if you need.

But wot if i don’t understand any of that?

That’s ok and that’s normal.

The godlike Matthew Colville puts it best in his Welcome to D&D youtube video:

When I started, if you saw someone playing D&D, you probably had no idea what they were doing, it looks incredibly weird, but they were obviously having fun. If you asked: “What are you all doing?” the canonical answer was “Grab a chair, here’s a character sheet”.

There’s no way to explain or understand everything at once, and that’s cool. When a DM (in this case, Tempy) offers to run a game for a new group, he knows he’s gonna have to walk people through it. If you wanna do something but you don’t know how it works, ask. If your DM asks you to do something and you don’t know what that is, ask. If you don’t understand why a DM has made a certain ruling, ask.

In D&D the DM is god. He or she has the final say of any decision and the DM has the most preparation and work to do out of all the players, but the DM is also on your side. The DM might not follow certain rules to the letter (every table has house rules because some rules are vague, confusing, or dumb) but a good DM is able to explain to players how or why something works that way, and good players respect those choices. But no-one knows all the rules, and people make mistakes. The rule book will be checked a LOT. It’s ok to make mistakes - hold your hand up, don’t hold grudges and remember that everyone is there to have fun.

So, if you don’t understand how any of this works, thats fine - you will. But a few months down the line you’ll still be checking the rule book and cross referencing rolls with your character sheet because there’s a lot to keep on top of. Everyone is in the same boat, so just enjoy it. And remember, however much you have to keep in your head at once, the DM has magnitudes more. Pity the DM. Love the DM.

Cool. I got it. Get quests somehow, go places, tell the DM i wanna do things, roll for things, have fun, right?

Yep, those are the basics. So now, let’s talk your character!

For me, if you’re a completely new player, i’d recommend against making a new character up in your head from scratch. The player’s handbook (PHB) actually has a really cool guide for making new characters. Once you’ve got some experience you might feel more comfortable taking more creative control over your character. But, for now, I just wanna run through some basic and give an example of a quick-to-make and fun to play new character.

Let’s start with races.

There are 9 races in the basic players handbook - Dwarf, Elf, Halfling, Human, Dragonborn, Gnome, Half-Elf, Half-Orc and Tielfing. There are some other races and variations you can play as but we’re just gonna stick with these for now. When it comes to picking a race…just pick one which appeals to you. There are variations between them - different races have different strengths and weaknesses, and can have access to different languages, but really it doesn’t matter, especially in the beginning. Certain races are smaller, which means they can’t run as fast, which sucks, but also gives them other advantages. Basically, if in doubt, pick anything except elf - every try hard dark and broody wannabe picks Elf. Fuck elves.

Look at the art in the PHB and see which one feels right to you and go with that.
So, as my example character, I’m gonna go with a…Halfling. Why? Because fuck elves.

Once you’ve picked your race, you can pick a subrace, which is a specific variety of your race. Halflings have 2 sub races - Lightfoot and Stout. Lightfoot halflings “hide more easily” but Stout halflings just sounds like cool motherfuckers so I’m gonna pick that! “Hardier that average”? Hawt.

Now, what name am i gonna pick? Well, luckily the players handbook also has a section on names, with choices to pick from if you don’t have a good idea. So, i’ll pick a female name (because why wouldn’t i be a beautiful halfling woman?!?!!) and a family name. So, my halflings name is…Cora Tealeaf!

Now, what’s next? Now I have to pick a class.

There are 12 classes in the standard ruleset: Barbarian, Bard, Cleric, Druid, Fighter, Monk, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer, Warlock and Wizard. Don’t worry too much about the ins-and-out, just read the basic description and then read the class page for the ones that appeal. For example, the basic description of barbarian is “A fierce fighter from a primitive background who can enter battle rage” while the description of a Warlock is “A wielder of magic that is derived from a bargain with an extraplanar entity.”. Which ones sounds cool? Pick that one.  

When I think about my Halfling I don’t want her to be a magic user. Maybe I want her in the front line, so she could be a Barbarian, Monk or a Fighter (or maybe a Cleric for some of that sweet healing utility - remember, after the DM your best friend is the Cleric!) or perhaps a more stealthy class like a Rogue or Ranger. Now, a monk or barbarian might seem stupid for a halfling - but that’s not true. Build the character and it will make sense. In terms of pure damage and power, sure…something like a half-orc or human might seem better for barbarian (small races like halflings get disadvantage for wielding large weapons) but you can work around it. Build around your character flaws and don’t try to make the perfect character.

But what about the primitive culture part? Halflings are usually kinda homely and not at all primitive. Again, that doesn’t matter. Maybe my halfling was kicked out of her community and wandered the world without proper schooling. And as for the “rage” part - maybe she always loses her cool and gets into bar fights. The descriptions are just general guides, but they can be adapted to suit the feel and backstory of your character.

So yeah, fuck you mum! Cora Tealeaf is now a Stout Halfling Barbarian. It means i can’t wield heavy weapons effectively, but i’ll adapt and thrive!

I heard there was fucking dice-rolling in this game…

Yeah there is, so now we have to make some stats.

On your character sheet there will be 6 stats: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma. These stats will be used for all kinds of different things in the game. What will happen is that you will roll a dice in the game (usually a D20, or 20-sided dice) and you will add a stat modifier to the roll.

Now, here’s where it can get a bit confusing. Generally speaking, stats go from 1-20, but you won’t be having a stat of 20 at the start - they can go higher but that’s much later. An intelligence of 1 means you can’t actually speak or understand language but, again, you won’t have that stat at the start. What you need to remember is how these work as modifiers.

A stat of 10 is a modifier of 0. For every 2 that a stat increases, the modifier is +1. So a 14 strength is a +2 modifier. So, when you roll and you need to use that stat, you add (or subtract) your modifier to the dice roll. So, if you roll a 13 on a D20 and your modifier is +2, then you get a 15.

Because of this, a lot of players try to make their characters as efficient and optimal as possible, trying their best to avoid negative modifiers. But these modifiers can be fun! Also, thing about how the personality of your character is reflected in these stats? Bad social skills? Maybe that’s low charisma. Always acting before thinking…probably pretty poor wisdom.

Ok I get it, how do I roll the stats!!!!!

There are a few methods and different DMs use different systems. I will detail 2.

One method is to just use set numbers: : 15, 14, 13, 12, 10 and 8. Assign one number to each stat, putting the highest number in the stat you need the most. In this system I’d probably put my highest number in strength, because Barbarian yo!

The other method is to roll 4 D6 for each stat, and remove the lowest number. So if i roll a 6, a 4, another 4 and a 1, i’d remove the 1 and get 14. I’d then do that 6 times until i had 6 numbers and assign them accordingly.

At the end of that, after rolling 6 times and picking stats, i end up with:

Strength: 17 (fuck yas!)
Dexterity: 11
Constitution: 13 (+2)
Intelligence: 9
Wisdom: 9
Charisma: 9

Now, why did I add a (+2) to my constitution? Because different races and subclasses get different bonuses - for stout halflings, thats a boost to constitution.

One final tip, once you have the numbers, you can hold off until you’ve developed your character personality, before deciding where to put the numbers in.

NEXT!

So now we have our character and some stats, it’s time to flesh her out a bit and give her a slightly more rounded personality.

Now, in the PHB choosing name and sex comes at this point, but i usually do that when i pick race. So, we’ve already done that. Next up is some physical characteristics…which are boring, so we’re gonna skip that. After that…ALIGNMENT!

Now, alignment is basically this -  is your character good or evil? Does he or she believe in the law, or does your character believe in more chaotic and random forces? Alignment is…bullshit. Forget alignment. Just build your character and the alignment will come naturally later. Your DM might ask you to pick an alignment at the beginning, which is fine (there are certain rules which use it) - but it’s probably best to go over it with him / her with regards how to pick it and what it means in the DM’s game. So, i’m not gonna do that. That’s for Tempy to handle.

Next up is languages. By consulting the racing section I see “You can speak, read, and write Common and Halfling.”. This is normal - most races can speak their racial language (in my case, halfling) and Common, which is basically the lingua franca of the D&D world. The PHB states “your background might give you access to one or more additional languages of your choice. Note these languages on your character sheet. Choose your languages from the Standard Languages table.… With your DM ’s permission, you can instead choose a language from the Exotic Languages table or a secret language, such as thieves’ cant or the tongue of druids.”

What does this mean? Think about your character. Is he / she the bookish type who studied ancient writing systems in a family library? If so, maybe your character leant an ancient exotic language (for example, Celestial) or has your character had many dealings on the street and had many run ins with thieves? If so, ask your DM if you can take thieves ‘cant. Don’t worry too much about this - if it makes sense and you can justify it to your DM, your DM will probably agree. But, for a simple one-shot it’s probably not gonna be that important anyway. So, just consult the table and think about your character.

As for Cora Tealeaf, the Stout Halfling Barbarian? She’s tough and had run-ins with some seedy types, sure, but she’s no criminal, so I’m just gonna stick with Halfing and Common.

Now I want to flesh out my character and really think about who she is. To do this easily without spending an hour writing a 5-page backstory I can, again, consult the player’s handbook (seriously, the book is awesome!).

There is a section dedicated in the book to Personal Characteristics. What you can do, if you want, is pick a character background (choices are Acolyte, Charlatan, Criminal, Entertainer, Folk Hero, Guild Artisan, Hermit, Noble, Outlander, Sage, Sailor, Soldier, or Urchin). Each of these character background has a section dedicated to it with an example of the type of background that works for this choice. They also have some suggested starting equipment and skills. And finally, in each section, there are 4 REALLY FUCKING COOL things: Personality Traits, Ideals, Bonds and Flaws.

How this works is, you pick 2 traits, plus one ideal, one bond and one flaw. This makes your simple starter character. According to the book:

Personality Traits: Personality traits are small, simple ways to help you set your character apart from every other character. Your personality traits should tell you something interesting and fun about your character.

Ideals: Describe one ideal that drives your character. Your ideals are the things that you believe in most strongly, the fundamental moral and ethical principles that compel you to act as you do.

Bonds: Bonds represent a character’s connections to people, places, and events in the world. They tie you to things from your background.

Flaws: More significant than negative personality traits, a flaw might answer any of these questions: What enrages you? What’s the one person, concept, or event that you are terrified of? What are your vices?

So, how do you pick these things? Well, you have 2 choices.

Pick the things that interest you.
Roll for it. Seriously. It works and it’s awesome.

For brevity’s sake i’m just gonna pick quickly. So, I figure because I’ve already decided my halfling left her community pretty young, I better go with Urchin or Hermit. But maybe that’s not the most important. Maybe that forced her to adapt and become super sociable in all the towns and inns she traveled to…so, entertainer? In the end, I’ll go for…Hermit.

Now, not everything in the hermit section works for the character that i’ve built so far, and that’s ok. You can change, chop and adapt stuff by talking to your DM. The hermit section also has an extra thing to choose from called “Life of Seclusion” which is basically the reason why you became a hermit. So, I just look at the table and choose choice 3 - I was exiled for a Crime I didn’t commit.

Now, that’s cool, huh? It also explains the rage. Poor Cora Tealeaf, she got kicked out of her home after being framed and now she’s PISSED!

So what are my traits gonna be? Well, a lot of those choices are about finding yourself, or learning about the cosmos or herbalist bullshit, which ain’t me. But there’s 2 which could work - I feel tremendous empathy for all who suffer AND I’m oblivious to etiquette and social expectations.

That kinda works. It makes sense that after the injustice that happened to me, I’d also dislike seeing others taken advantage of. But, similarly, the time time i’ve spent without constant companionship probably rendered my social skills pretty shit.

The ideal I pick is Self-Knowledge, and my bond is “I entered seclusion to hide from the ones who might still be hunting me. I must someday confront them”. Finally, a flaw - there’s a lot of cool choice here but ill go with “I let my need to win arguments overshadow friendships and harmony”. It makes sense that someone without great social skills might not be able to bite her tongue.

So what do we have?

Cora Tealeaf

Strength: 17
Dexterity: 11
Constitution: 13 (+2)
Intelligence: 9
Wisdom: 9
Charisma: 9

Stout Halfling Barbarian
Speaks / Reads Common and Halfling
Exiled for a crime she didn’t commit
Empathy for those who suffer
Poor Social skills / Needs to win arguments
In pursuit of self-knowledge
One the run from people who are hunting her

There are some proficiencies (proficiencies give a +2 bonus to related rolls) that go with each background as well as starting equipment. In the case of the hermit…

Skill Proficiencies: Medicine, Religion
Tool Proficiencies: Herbalism kit
Languages: One of your choice
Equipment: A scroll case stuffed full of notes from your studies or prayers, a winter blanket, a set of common clothes, an herbalism kit, and 5 gp

Now medicine makes sense, given that she’d have to be pretty self-sufficient, but religion…no. So that’s no problem, I’d just talk to the DM and ask if I could swap it to something else. As for the extra language? I’d probably just skip that. And i’d probably want to change some of the starting equipment, but i’d definitely keep the herbalism kit (for medicine) as well as the blanket, clothes and money.

Um, this is getting pretty long now.

Yeah, my apologies, we’re nearly there.

Nina asked “is the group you’re playing with always friendly to each other?”. And the answer to that is yes and no. I will answer it in the final section, titled…

How not to play like a Dick!

It’s natural for personalities to rub against each other and conflict can be fun. If it doesn’t make sense for your character to be super happy to do something, then make that clear. But likewise, it can be a problem if it happens all the time.

It’s all about suspension of disbelief. If your character is arguing with these people, and if everyone is lying to each other all the time, why are you travelling with these people? What keeps you together?

People lie and keep secrets, and that’s cool. But, it’s also the players’ responsibility that their super awesome loner character who steals everything and betrays everyone doesn’t become a huge obstacle to every else’s enjoyment of the game.

So, you don’t always have to be friendly, but you should be friendly or useful enough that people wanna keep you around. And if your justification for pissing everyone else off is “well, it’s my character, he’s a nomadic thief who loves stealing magic items and killing allies in their sleep” then don’t be surprised if they eventually decide they don’t want you at the table.

Similarly, don’t be the type of player who believes stats are destiny. “I have the highest charisma stat so i’ll do all the talking” is dumb and boring for everyone else - what makes sense in this situation? If someone with a low charisma score opens their mouth and fails their roll, thats cool - roll with it (no pun intended) and embrace failure.

And failure. Grasp failure. Enjoy failure. D&D is a game of dice which means you will roll badly sometimes. That’s a good thing. An epic moment where you fly through the air, axe in hand, to come down on top of an evil necromancer, only to miss your mark and plant face first into an altar, knocking yourself unconscious? That’s a great moment and is ruined only by people getting angry at dice! Seriously, fuck that and learn that succeeding is as enjoyable as failing.

If you die? You die, but you die gloriously. You then roll a new character and move on.

Best D&D player bar none? This guy…



Travis FUCKING Willingham. The dude does some awesome things. And he fails a lot too. And he never bitches, he makes it awesome. Plus, he’s buff and I want his babies.

You know what else is great about Travis? He doesn’t metagame.

What the fuck is metagaming?

Metagaming is acting on knowledge you know but your character might not know. For example:

METAGAMING:

Player 1 and 2 are in different rooms. Player one is attacked, and Player 2 rushes to help Player 1.

Not METAGAMING:  

Player 1 and 2 are in different rooms. Player one is attacked, and Player 2 asks the DM “Would I be able to hear any of that noise?”. The DM may then ask the player to roll some kind of check and go from there.

Now, different DMs have different rules about metagming, and that’s cool. But, just remember, you can’t be in all places and once so don’t try to control every situation. The metagming examples were simple ones, but you get the point.

Are we done yet?

Yeah, basically. There’s still some more character stuff, like starting equipment and health points, but those can be run over with the DM before the game (yes, Tempy will help you with this I promise!).

I’ll leave you with this vid to help you with some beginner stuff:

Awesome stuff, Cinty.  You're really making me wish I could commit to this.

Edit: Also, Tiefling!  Damn that brings back memories.  Ran a Tiefling bard in a Planescape/Spelljammer campaign back in the AD&D2e days.  She had a glorious crest of flame coloured feathers instead of hair, sang like a bird, and ate raw flesh (DM's idea).  The DM also wrote a backstory for her winged and ravenous demonic ancestors.  Good times.

Agree with that 100% - once you’ve got an idea of class and race, do your reading. Especially if you have the magics. Just that you don’t have to know every single thing before making a choice.

As for inspiration - I think a lot of DMs forget that, and I know a few do it differently.

Cinty with the killer advice. I also totally recommend the player guide if you can stretch to it or aquire it from the high seas, it's a beautiful book, so much detail and amazing art crammed into it.

I found a pdf version of the proper character sheet on Reddit that's been setup as a form so you can fill it in using Adobe reader or other pdf readers, seems super handy, will get it on dropbox once access had been sorted.

Yeah, lots of good information getting shared. The video Cinty posted is good, too. Very non-annoying, which is very difficult to find from YouTube these days.

I'm so very intrigued by all of this.

Edit: I used “very" too many times in this post due to enthusiasm.

We need to set a date and players first. I am leaning towards Either the 5th/6th, or 12th/13th, with 4 players.

Tempy wrote:

I'd probably counter Tin a little by saying... D&D isn't a game where the rules matter much. It's not Pathfinder, or Dungeon World. As a GM my job is to break the game to make it work.

Totally agree.  Ultimately much of it's down to the DM, so I reckon you lot are all in safe hands.  (For what it's worth, the DM we're playing with is great at making sure the game bends when it needs to, despite my harping on before.)

Tempy wrote:

Inspiration isn't super important either, I generally only gave it to my PCs if they made me laugh. 

That's pretty much how we play it.  Hilarity +/- epic singing results in inspiration.

I'm away in from from 4-18 so fucks old reg

There's nothing stopping anyone from making a character btw, it would probably be best if everyone who was interested did. I could run this One Shot more than once, if there is enough interest. 

You've got free reign on your characters background, but a good thing to do is have a nice prompt as for why you're in the capmaign. This one has a fairly traditional but quite good one.
--

You have woken up at a foggy crossroads, in the presence of a group of unfamiliar people. You have some faint memory of an invitation in the recent pass. A dream, a letter or a frenzied beggar requested you come to Barovia, a land you'd only heard of in hushed whispers before.

--