Dungeons and Dragons 3.5 Campaigns:

Like a lot of people, I’ve spent the last several months playing the absolute masterpiece that is Larian Studios’ Baldur’s Gate 3 (BG3). It’s an amazing game, so it’s no surprise that we’ve had a long list of think pieces about the lessons it can teach us. What is a bit surprising is how many of those think pieces directly compare BG3 to 5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons (5E), along with other tabletop roleplaying games.*

So in my current campaign my players are currently preparing a city for an onslaught of undead rallied by a lich lord and I’ve been brewing up some more deadly and challenging zombies for them to go against and here’s the result so far! Took some nods from the Sliver stat block I made a while back for this one. Hope you enjoy!

Settlement: Barrowtown

Thriving with one foot in the grave

Once an innocuous village overlooking a particularly foreboding stretch of wilderness,  “Yarrowton” transformed into it’s current macabre state a few decades ago when two great armies hacked each other to bits over a week long series of skirmishes that left the region’s farmers with hundreds of wounded fighters on their doorstep and a sea of bodies gathering flies in the sun. A practical and strong-stomached folk, the people of what would eventually be Barrowtown got to work burying the dead regardless of who’s banner they’d fought under, thereby turning their home into one of the largest graveyards since the grand necropoli of the old empire.

Life in Barrowton isn’t that much different than any other farming community, save for the omnipresent gravemarkers and the fact that every attempt to till the soil still brings up a few stray bones or a rusted old sword. Priests of a number of different faiths have come to minister to the graves, operating temples to Tyr or the Mournful Raven queen while living and working alongside the town’s lay inhabitants. Quite a few of the survivors of the battle also ended up settling in Barrowtown, both as a means of honouring their fallen comrades and a means of starting fresh away from homelands that might no longer want them. These three communities combine to give barrowtown it’s unique atmosphere: rustic, martial, pious, and mournful, a solemn sentinel of the hinterlands.

Hooks:

If you were looking for a great village to start a campaign, Barrowtown is it: a waystation for travellers with a population that can provide fighters or clerics, wide-eyed farm kids or secret delving necromancers. Stop by for a pint of locally brewed beer at the Pale Rider Inn and plan your group’s expedition to a ruined fort out in the plains, or a long abandoned fortress deeper up into the hills.

Every battlefield has its scavengers, and among the dogs and ravens none stand out like Jackal Joe: an enterprising salvager who made his living following behind armies and “reclaiming” weapons, boots, and scraps of armour from the fallen, even if he had to pry them from a grip of dying men. That was until the battle outside Barrowtown gave him enough bloody plunder to retire on, opening up a general store and selling off a little more of his horded trinkets each year. He’s still got some choice ( read: magical) inventory stashed away for customers with a coin to spend, as well as a fancy looking signet ring that’d probably be worth a sizeable reward provided one went to the trouble of buying it off of him and finding the noble family it belongs to.

Link to artist found in the source of this post.

Here is a list of 10 relatively quickly resolved encounters, not necessarily combat, that your group can stumble upon. Some may spawn adventures of their own, others may simply serve as flavor for a particular location in your world.

While walking along an otherwise deserted street, the party spots a hulking wolf. Its muzzle and front paws are covered in blood, and it’s limping slightly. This is a werewolf. She will not attack on sight, as she’s wounded. If the party approaches her, she will try to scare them off. If they can discern her true nature, she will transform into her hybrid form and confess to having just killed someone in a fit of rage. She claims that she’s trying to leave the city before she harms anyone else. The werewolf is clearly trying to suppress the urge to lash out at the party. Will they help her, or slay her? ー　Suggested ability checks: Animal Handling, Insight, Persuasion

One evening in the tavern, citizens complain that the water in the local well has lost its (alleged) healing powers. They speculate that the “gentle soul”, which they believe is a spirit who lives in the well, is unhappy with them. If the party takes a sample of the water, they can discover some impurities, provided they have the right know-how or tools. The well ends in a flooded, subterranean cave. If accessed, the party can discover a water weird living in the cave. It seems friendly, but unhappy. What (or who?) is the cause of the impurities in the water, and why is the water weird so displeased? ー　Suggested ability checks: Alchemist’s tools, Arcana, Brewer’s supplies, Herbalism kit, History, Nature

While shopping, you hear a sudden racket down the street. A very angry merchant is chasing two small children - you hear the jangling of coins as they race past you, around the corner and out of sight. If the party chooses to proceed down the street to find the children, they’ll see a sewer grate that isn’t quite in place. If they enter the sewer, they’ll have to be careful, as noise might attract the gang of bugbears who have their home there. If the players are perceptive, they’ll be able to follow a combined trail of dropped coins and subtle markings in the sewer walls to discover the children’s hideout. Turns out a group of about a dozen kids live down here, stealing to survive. One kid is “the face”, and uses the money the rest of them steal to buy food. They are afraid to come up, because the city guard is likely to punish them, but live in beyond squalid conditions here. How will the party deal with this situation? ー　Suggested ability checks: Investigation, Mason’s tools, Persuasion, Stealth

While exploring the city’s underbelly, the party discovers (whether by accident or not) a secret passageway that has been improperly sealed. Behind it are two nothics, evidently in an argument. If anyone in the party speaks Undercommon, they’ll be able to learn that one is upset with the other for not sharing the secrets of the Lady of Rot and Decay, while the other claims to have no such knowledge. What can the party learn from this conversation, and how will the nothics react if they find out their hiding place as been discovered? Do the nothics keep something interesting in there? ー　Suggested ability checks: Arcana, Calligrapher’s tools, Investigation, Religion

A young mage with grand ambitions for urban improvement contacts our fearless adventurers. They had the bright idea to summon and use magma and steam mephits for luxurious and cheap heating of the city - no more firewood necessary, and the streets will always be free of snow in the winter! Unfortunately, the mephits proved unwilling to be helpful, and immediately escaped to a nearby bath house. The city guard is unwilling to go into the by now extremely hot building, and is more interested in finding the source of the problem. The mage is terrified that the guards won’t understand they had the best of intentions, even more so because they aren’t sure how to banish the mephits again. How will the party handle the mephits, and will they expose the careless mage to the guards? ー　Suggested ability checks: Charisma, Constitution, Deception, Persuasion

A local inn advertises a new, special brew: “A fun night guaranteed, or your money back!” After indulging, the party lose themselves to fits of laughter and don’t remember much of the evening otherwise. However, the next morning they awaken to find that a nilbog followed them to their sleeping spot. Inspired by their chaotic merriment last night (and perhaps the amount of gold they carry around), the nilbog has approached them to ask for help with disposing of a particularly cruel goblin captain, who abuses the goblin tribe that resides in the nearby hills. Will the adventurers trust the nilbog and help the goblins, and what will happen if they do? What happens if they refuse? Is there something more to the drink they had last night? ー　Suggested ability checks: Constitution, Insight, Intimidation

An elderly beggar catches the hem of a party member’s cloak and asks for “a little kindness”. If the party helps them in a satisfactory way (DM’s discretion), the beggar will give them a blunt dagger as thanks, saying only to use it at the uttermost end of need. The dagger seems ordinary. If the party can unveil its secrets, they’ll learn it’s an instrument of a blood-sacrifice happy cult. If two people use the dagger to make a blood pact, they’ll be able to share in the other’s suffering (if character A takes X points of damage, character B can choose to sacrifice themselves and take the damage instead. If this kills them, character A regains an amount of HP. DM’s discretion; go ham!). How did the beggar get the sacrificial dagger, why did they get rid of it, and will the cult want it back? ー　Suggested ability checks: Arcana, History, Religion

The party takes a wrong turn and find themselves in a part of town none of them recognize. The people here seem suspicious of the party and don’t believe they got here by accident. After meandering for a while, an elf with severe facial scarring stops them and offers to show the way out, if they’ll take a little wooden doll with them and give it to someone in town. Will the party accept the deal? How will the elf react if they don’t? Who is the intended recipient of the doll? What happens if they don’t deliver it? And where exactly did the party end up? ー　Suggested ability checks: Insight, Survival, Woodcarver’s tools

The party overhears a shouted exchange between a group of stone masons and their foreman. They’re working on restoring a cathedral, but according to two masons, monstrous statues have appeared overnight. The masons are too spooked to go back to work, but the foreman is dismissive of their “superstitions”. Should the party investigate, they’ll find that three gargoyles have taken up residence in the cathedral, and they’re not exactly planning to leave, as they have nowhere else to go. How will the party deal with the gargoyles? What happens if they stay? Will the foreman believe their story? ー　Suggested ability checks: Mason’s tools, Persuasion

Mini Dungeon: The Desolate Climb

Adventure hooks: 

With a large journey looming, the party will need to make a decision as to whether to take a large detour around a chain of impassable mountains, or utilize a notorious dungeon as a shortcut. The decision to go by way of the dungeon could shave weeks off their travel time, but will involve a brutal gauntlet of climbing and fighting as they ascend the ancient towers hundreds of floors. 

A map has fallen into the party’s possession, claiming to present the location of a fabulous treasure secreted away by a master thief before her capture. The only rub is that this thief was an Aarakocra, and the bird-folk had no need of denoting WHICH of the floors she hid her stash in. 

When attempting to teleport back to a spire or other ancient building, a mishap strands the party half way up the Desolate Climb and scatters them across differing floors. With no way to get their bearings, the heroes will have to regroup and fight their way free. 

Deliverer by Nikita Fedotov

Lots of DMs struggle with this, and for good reason. 

Dungeons are the most mechanically straightforward aspect of the game besides combat, and the immediate shape and contents of them is more pressing to players than the atmosphere. 

But, there are some simple ways to make your dungeons more atmospheric. Here’s my proposed solutions, both a long thinky one and a fast random one:

I think that dungeons should thought about as ‘once functional spaces’. Every place in the world has a purpose for which it was built, even if it’s a weirdo crazy one. Dungeon rooms should almost always be more than just treasure, traps, and monsters. 

For example, temples have cloisters, treasuries, storage rooms, waiting rooms, choirs, sanctuaries, apse, washing rooms, etc. Each of these rooms has specific objects and furniture inside them, as well as different acoustics. They get decorated with frescoes and murals or hanging art or sculptures. They’re cultural places. Think about them as physical spaces that people would use. 

Now imagine something happened in them, long ago. Why is this place a ‘dungeon’ and not still used? What event caused it to be abandoned? A battle? Plague? Was the place cursed? Come up with that and you can seed the rooms with small historical details: evidence of fights, skeletal remains, treasures hidden so they could be reclaimed later (but never were).

Now add the effects of time and nature. Fabric rots, metal rusts, stone erodes and crumbles. Plants and roots push stone tiles aside, and water seeps in and floods deep places. The passage of ages scours away history and purpose. Now, your once functional rooms don’t appear so functional, but their purpose can still be intuited.

Now add some new tenants. Monsters are always the first to reclaim abandoned civilized spaces: goblins make shantytowns out of old human ruins, beasts make warrens in sepulchral tombs, small dragons and basilisks favour places with statuaries and abandoned treasures. No matter the space or its original purpose, monsters move in and call it home. Sometimes multiple species of monsters…and then they fight or argue over sharing space.

So now your dungeon has a vivid look and feel. The important bit now is to think about how that imagined space sounds and smells. 

With every room and hallway, imagine how its history smells. Is it acrid or pungent? Smokey or mouldy? Does it smell surprisingly pleasant? If so, that’s often a worrisome sign, because it means something sentient might already be there. 

Audio can clue players into a space faster than any other description. Wind whistling indicates access to the surface…or a much deeper cave. Dripping denotes water (you hope). Creaking could mean doors…or ghosts. Large spaces echo, and sounds warp and distort the further away they are. There’s even different kinds of silence. There’s an empty, lonely silence that comes with long dead spaces, or the claustrophobic close silence of small spaces. 

Appeal to your players senses besides sight. Describe what rooms smell, sound, and even taste or feel like. This is a surefire way to make your dungeon rooms stand out. For example:

“You enter a 20 by 20 foot square room. It’s a stuffy old parlour. Pushing the door open you immediately smell something caustic and sour, but you don’t see an immediate source. All the furniture is rotted, but some of it looks smashed. You can hear the faintest scraping of something against the wall in the adjacent room”.

If that seems like a lot to write, try something like this: Reveal each bullet point as the players inquire about them, or when they make Perception checks:

Parlour, 20 ft square room.

The room feels uncomfortably thick and stuffy.

All the furniture is rotted out. Some of it is smashed. Evidence of a fight.

Smells caustic and sour. The smell comes from under a tattered rug. It’s beholder puke. 50gp if collected and sold to the right buyer.

Scraping sounds from the cloaker in the next room.

So maybe you already have a pretty basic dungeon and you need to make each room (or block of rooms) less boring. Here’s my handy set of sense tables:

Random Room Sensations:

For each room you want to enhance, roll four dice (a d12, a d10, a d8, and a d6). Your rolls will determine what’s up with this room. Every time you roll a result, cross it out and replace it with a new one you come up with.

Smells (1d12):

Sickly sweet, like rotting fruit or wilting flowers.

Musty, like old people and expired cologne.

Tangy, like body odour and grime.

Dusty, the choking scent of age and ghosts.

Foul, like waste and death; something unholy.

Crisp, like freshly cut grass or unchecked plant life.

Soggy, the lingering smell of still water and flooding.

Pungent, like rot and decay.

Spicy, like herbs and dried ingredients, aged.

Electric, a faint aroma of ozone and metals.

Earthy, like fresh dirt and clay, mixed in with the copper of blood.

Roll again twice, both smells clash together.

Sounds (1d10):

Claustrophobic silence.

Deep, echoing silence.

Low moaning or groaning.

Creaking of wood in the distance.

Faint, maddeningly indistinct whispering.

Faint, maddeningly indistinct whispering in a language you don’t know.

Metal scraping against metal, rhythmically.

Dripping of some kind of liquid onto stone.

Dripping of some kind of liquid into more liquid.

Roll again twice, both sounds are present.

Touch Sensations (1d8):

Dryness on the skin, chapped lips and dry eyes.

Cold dampness, water beads on metal items.

Humidity, clothes become hot and heavy, metal feels colder.

Dry heat, throats become parched, skin itches.

Pressure change, ears pop and noises distort.

Static tingling, hair stands up on end, goosebumps.

Unholy chill, shivers, goosebumps, a sense of unease.

The feeling of being watched, an uncomfortable presence.

Kinds of Darkness, if applicable (1d6):

Grey, distant darkness that yields to lantern light.

Cloying, smothering darkness that seems to draw close to you.

Eerie still darkness that feels like it holds endless monsters.

Calm, still darkness that invites restfulness.

Flickering, shifting darkness where the room seems to be moving.

Impenetrable darkness that makes darkvision endowed races feel at uneasy.

I hope all this helps make your dungeons a little less boring. The dungeon tables in the back of the 5e Dungeon Master’s Guide from @dndwizards is also helpful in this regard. 

The way it works is it breaks down all of Dungeon crawling into four elements: lore, traps, treasure, & encounters.

This idea states that every room of your dungeon should have 3 of these four. That way every player has something to do.

Example:

You enter a simple rectangular chamber. The cold air washes over your skin sending goosebumps down your spine, no less than the sight of the eerie statue of a woman in the center of the room does. Her lifeless eyes stare down at a brazier in her hands, inside of which is a shining pile of gold. As you slowly approach to get a closer you look, you also spy two things. First, several crates in the back of the room, stacked in the corner. Second, the sound of scratching on stone, near yet muffled. What will you do?

In this example I have three elements present that the players don’t know but get a hint of.

I have treasure clearly in display for those who like loot.

The scratching sound implies combat. The fighters are ready and on edge waiting for something to jump them.

The smart players know that the statue isn’t gonna give away the gold for free. Especially after I called it “eerie.” So those who love a good puzzle or trap are now gonna go nuts looking for a trap on that statue.

As for what the trap is, it matters little. The gold could be covering a pressure plate and when removed it would open secret doors behind which would stand some horrid beast. To find it PCs would need some sort of a Investigation check or what not. The point is this situation provides 3 of 4 elements and entertains 3 out of 4 types of players.

And if you’re wondering what was up with the crates, those contain some minor loot. A potion or two, some gold. That’s for the players to not feel cheated out completely of their reward. Or you can make them mimics. PCs love mimics.

What do you guys think?

In both cases the writer is set-designer, camera-operator and director for the movie being projected in the imaginations of readers / player-listeners.

Introducing the Teacher-Gamer Handbook

The Teacher-Gamer Handbook is a resource for educators to lead Role Playing Games (such as Dungeons and Dragons) in the classroom, in homeschool and online. It contains a full semester of robust lesson plans and the pedagogical infrastructure to last years that teach 36 life-skills to players with pre-created adventure suggestions, narrative arcs and prompts.

The main premise is: you can’t learn something unless you notice it. The purpose of the RPG Skillset is to generate multitudes of continuous opportunities to notice things within at least 36 major domains of self-development. The possibilities are endless.

My name is Zach.

Here is a brief history of how the Teacher-Gamer Handbook came to be:

1982 played Dungeons and Dragons for the first time - my character died in the first 10 minutes, it was so fascinating and unlike anything I had ever experienced… I was hooked! I have been playing RPGs for thousands of hours and almost 4 decades. Some would call me an O.G. (Original Gamer).

1990’s adventuring in life, school, work, music production, becoming Canadian and starting a family steered me in new directions.

2002+ raising two boys with my wife Sophie, I was teaching and studying by day, hangin’ with the family and playing RPGs when I could on weekends.

2006 enrolled in an MA program in Education to better understand the “how” of teaching and learning.

2010 finished my Masters in Education focused on authentic learning and life-skills curriculum development.

2012 realized that role-playing games (RPGs) in Schools was an untapped resource. I began working on the Teacher-Gamer as an extension of my Distinct Self well-being program.

2014-2016 brought RPGs in Schools curriculum into the classroom at Green School Bali

2015-present Wild Mind Training workshops blending RPGs in Schools with mindfulness ramps into wilderness trips with Wildlife Conservation Society.

2020 Teacher-Gamer Revolution! - happening offscreen on tabletops everywhere! Let’s get radical about balancing EdTech and AI coming into schools by bringing our teacher’s hobbies into life-skills classes that enrich youth with socio-emotional and literary skills while maintaining the distinctly human teacher-student relationships that cannot be replaced by computers.

What We Need & What You Get

I started this campaign for three main reasons:

It is time to put the Teacher-Gamer Revolution on the timeline, now, globally. It is so important to take what you have inside you and put it into the civic sphere. I urge all educators to make the world a better place by combining their passions with their pedagogical skills and make them available to the public.

Self-publishing the Teacher-Gamer Handbook (TGHB) will launch this new step of my career with all the support of my colleagues, friends and anyone who likes the idea that robust off-screen game-system-learning (engaging face-to-face life-skills development) is a viable initiative to balance the influx of technology into schools.

The TGHB is my calling card, a beacon, an organized methodology that I can put into the hands of people I meet at conferences, conventions and school boards wherever I go.  

I took a calculated risk and have already borrowed the money to:

finish the book

have it typeset in the style of a role-playing game handbook

make videos to explain how teaching RPGs in schools works

build a website with a private interactive forum.

I also plan to use the momentum and connections I make with so many people around the world to take the curriculum to the next level.

My ultimate goal is to hit at least $60,000 so that I can spread the methodology online and hit the road when the world opens up again to safe conferences and in-person education.

Here’s the Teacher-Gamer Revolution plan for the funds raised on IndieGoGo:

Hard Copy prints of the book for everyone!

Hit our stretch goals and produce additional resources for Teacher-Gamers to accompany the Handbook.

Finish the next three handbooks full of additional lesson plans, classroom activities and teaching strategies.

Newsletters with practical activities

Instructional videos

Teacher-gamer website features celebrating educator success around the world  

Weekly Webinars for online outreach and support

Teacher training workshop deployment to implement new full-scale RPGs in the classroom programs.

Head to Conferences and speaking events to grow the community and gain traction.

Continued customization of RPGs in Schools curriculum in community centers, school boards, correctional facilities and homeschools far and wide.

Finish the next three handbooks full of additional lesson plans, classroom activities and teaching strategies.

Benefits for the Educators

help schools transition into more life-skills programs that prepare youth for adulthood

build progressive opportunities for face-to-face off-screen courses in schools

maintain positive attitudes about the future of schools

work to make life-skills more prominent in schools for the subject teacher who is getting pushed out by tech

Strengthen relationships with students through gameplay

The last thing a teacher wants to feel like is “obsolete”. There is some hustle each teacher must do to remain fresh, viable and relevant in their community, but if teachers are trying to battle incoming tech or are being asked to do more tech type roles, they will have to find ways to shift the consciousness of the institutes they work in or be moved around or pushed out.

This is a call to teachers to take their passions- or at least an opportunity to pick up this methodology to teach games- and deploy life-skills into their learning environment.  

The Impact

By contributing to the Teacher-Gamer Handbook, you are doing more than just buying a book or helping it get printed, you help:

establish the printing, distribution and sale of the book

the off-screen Teacher-Gamer Revolution gain traction and take flight

bring viability to the TEACHER-GAMER profession

subject teachers to collaborate with their peers to build robust game systems into learning opportunities

wilderness survival teachers establish classroom simulations of safety and role-playing through authentic learning narratives

bring a whole new piece of curriculum to holistic education

make in-roads for RPGs in Schools to become a discipline unto itself that helps youth process the multiverse of systems, franchises, worlds and cultures that are coming at them at high-speed through the internet and media.

The Story

The Teacher-Gamer Handbook has been over 8 years in the making!

The RPGs in Schools program was originally developed as an extension to a Personal and Social Development Local Programme course cycle in Canadian public school – a well-being curriculum program of life-skills electives at The English Montreal School Board in Quebec. Since then, the RPGs in Schools program has been adapted into the Wild Mind Training resiliency program for youth, 10 years old and older in schools and camps in Indonesia and the UK where I have been working over the last 6 years.

Starting in 2014, Green School Bali was an early adopter of the RPGs in Schools Program where I ran Introduction to Dungeons and Dragons as an English literacy course (creative writing) in high school and as an English literacy course (communication thematic) in middle school.

Every child surveyed in Green School reported that they liked the RPGs class and over half of them considered it their favorite class!

As I went along, I started realizing that all the life skills (21 basic and 15 advanced) that I was teaching could be dialed in to meet various curriculum goals and that if I put learners on a narrative cycle such as the Hero’s Journey, they would begin to recognize so many more thematics, symbols, motifs and literary forms as they relate to so many of the stories, books, films, TV series, mangas and other sagas that they follow.

Re-branded as Wild Mind Training, over the last 4 years. I have been experimenting with more mindfulness, wilderness conservation and improvisational theatre elements. As a home school aggregate on the weekdays and a weekend workshop for day school children, I have ironed out the kinks of three different levels of Introduction to Life-Skills through 3rd edition Dungeons and Dragons courses.

As with any pedagogy delivery system, the context and content (ie. role-playing game being used) can be adjusted into the area of study or subject. What matters most is that the learning system is authentically motivating and delivers opportunity after opportunity to acquire literacy, socio-emotional and life skills.  

Risks & Challenges

Getting the book printed is only the first step. I’m taking a huge financial risk of my own even if the project does not get funded. In order for it to succeed, I have to get out there and hit the road to show people how the methodology really improves the learning experience for the students and teachers.

I’ve got to hit trade shows, book speaking events, and still create workshops to help teacher-gamers really kickstart this program.

Let’s keep it real: this is an alternative learning method that requires adaptation. There may be backlash as conventional school systems are entrenched in “standardization”. I have to keep pushing this body of work as a complement to curricula by expanding the resources for teachers.

Gamification has brought games into education, but have also made the teachers gatekeepers to the computer. The negative result is that kids will be on their best behavior just to be allowed to get on screen. We need to bring value back to the teacher-student relationship, also making the teacher-gamer an exciting part of education - off-screen!

The Teacher-Gamer Revolution is on!

And I am ready. The time is NOW. If not us, then who?

As a network of early adopters it is YOU that will help me carry this forward and YOU that by belief in this project, will help extend the reach of the Teacher-Gamer Revolution.

We have some goals to hit, and time is of the essence. There has been so much learned by going for it and I am so excited to turn this guerilla-style launch of getting the first Handbook off the ground and into teachers hands everywhere.

We will try to get questions answered as soon as possible, just know we are also trying to get the book to print BEFORE the end of the campaign and have a lot going on.

That being said, we are GOING TO PRINT and get your copies to you as SOON as possible. Depending on your location this could take some time as we are a GLOBAL movement with community around the world, but can only afford to print in ONE location at this time.

Print and delivery is scheduled for June 15th and getting copies in your hands by July 1st. But again, your patience is much appreciated and we will update you every step of the way!

Thanks to you for all your patience and getting involved.

Indiegogo campaign ends: 24 April 2020

Hullo, Gentle Readers. As I write these words, my state is in a state of emergency, and, unless you’re someplace incredibly remote, I imagine you’ve been affected by COVID-19 in some way, as well. I’m hoping all of you stay healthy and safe through this rather bleak time.

As I set out on my occasional forays into the world outside my home, I’m struck by how eerie it can be. Traffic is vastly reduced, and I see far fewer people out and about. As I often do, I try to process this odd new environment through the lens of the RPGs I love. This may seem dark, and it is a bit, but stories are what I often turn to as a coping mechanism. So I let my imagination run free, and I try to let the current situation inspire ideas, rather than letting it terrify me.

Many fantasy settings have some kind of apocalyptic event that explains why things are not the same “now” (whenever we’re telling the story) as they were “then” (back in some amazing prior era.) The Forgotten Realms has the Fall of the Netheril Empire, amongst other events. Dragonlance’s Krynn has the Cataclysm. Eberron has the Day of Mourning. I use this idea myself with my own campaign, which has seen the fall of ancient empires leaving devastation in their wake. Often, this gives us an explanation for two things – why people aren’t making magic-items constantly, and why all these dungeons are kicking around, waiting for monsters to inhabit them.

The general conceit is that one of these fallen civilizations was far more advanced in some way (perhaps knowing magics far beyond those that modern peoples have access to – level 10 spells, perhaps). Their ruins are the source of a lot of magic-items and dungeons, and their fall is why these things are lying around, waiting for adventurers to plunder them. You could also use these fallen civilizations to explain some of D&D’s wackier monsters. “Owlbears? Oh, yeah…it’s believed that the Kingdom of Lophrygia used magic to create all manner of hybrid creatures – owlbears, manticores, chimeras…all sorts of things.”

So how can you use this in your own campaign? Well, the first thing to do is to bake one of these kinds of empires into the fabric of your setting’s history. My own campaign’s most prevalent nod in this direction is the concept of “The Old Ones”. The Old Ones were a civilization of strange, six-armed beings who apparently had mastery of magic far beyond that of most modern peoples. They created the Warforged in my setting, for example, as well as the Tarrasque. I recently introduced the idea that one of the last living Old Ones, known as Simic, was experimenting in making adaptable, hybrid entities out of these new-fangled humans (thus giving a place to the Simic Hybrid race from Ravnica in my campaign).

Once you have your civilization, you create a reason for them to not be around any more. The Old Ones, for example, disappeared mysteriously around the time that the Tarrasque appeared for the first time, and it’s believed that they sacrificed their own existence to bring it to life in an act meant to punish the Gods and their creations – humans, elves, dwarves, halflings, etc.  

I recommend that you create some distinctive features of the architecture and art of your lost civilization. The Old Ones, for example, were six-armed, so their architecture often features six-sided columns, hexagonal doorways, and the like. They also used a spiral design in much of their art. As a result, when I begin describing such features in a dungeon, the players quickly catch on that it’s of Old Ones make, which they know means this dungeon could contain almost anything – teleport traps, weird puzzles, powerful magical effects, and esoteric treasures.

As an example of how you could use this, let’s say you’re running an adventure where the PCs are rescuing prisoners from a hobgoblin outpost. Maybe the hobgoblins have built a fort on top of a hill that’s actually an Old Ones complex, buried over time. They dug down into it to build the foundations of their own structure, found a tunnel with a door that was magically sealed, and essentially posted a guard on it, but otherwise ignored it, tunnels elsewhere to dig out dungeons for their prisoners and slaves.

Your players at first will be experiencing a typical hobgoblin lair. They fight, they sneak, they parley, or what have you. Eventually, when they get down into the dungeon area, they rescue the prisoners, but they’ll also encounter the magically sealed door. Your description of this door should be markedly different from other things they’ve discovered Maybe it’s in a partially crumbled tunnel of worked stone, while the hobgoblin dungeons are packed earth reinforced with timbers. Immediately, your players will realize they’re dealing with something different, and, once they breach that door, you can run something entirely new. Undead, construct guardians, and curious treasures should await them.

Take advantage of the lifespans of the characters! There are such drastic differences. Elves typically live 8 times longer than humans and there are so many other different variations of expectancies. Recognize what it means, look at the beauty and macabre aspects it could add to your story.

Have the gnome be an old family friend who’s life of adventuring started with your 3 times great grandfather and he has joined a member of every generation of your family on a quest since then. 

Have your younger half brother look to be decades older than you because your mother was an elf and his was a human.

Have the aging elf be a hero of human folklore stories and myths from the adventures he had while he was in his prime.

Have the 30 year old orc not be able to fathom the concept that the Halfling was nearing 150, because he has had the longest life ever recorded in his clan.

Have the dwarf who helped build a major city over a century ago able to recall his handiwork and seeing how time has changed it.