Are you tired of your players always taking too long to solve a mystery? Or have they never touched a book and don't even know how to do it in a fantasy setting?

Well, your problems are over! I present to you the DMing asset that I like to call "Someone call the university students!"

Based off a popular idiom in my country, all you need for this asset is to introduce an experienced NPC before your playes go on a little treasure hunt. Ranging from a detective to an archmage, they can be anyone!

Mainly they are just there so your players don't get extremely stuck and eventually get bored! So, put that quirky librarian that just knows a little too much about dragons because they decided to major in Draconic Ages in University and just so happens to be nice enough to help the party!

And you wanna know the best part?

They don't need to tell them everything or be entirely correct (C'mon, they are undergraduates, they don't know their own class schedule). So, use it as your heart desires!

As a bonus I will present to you my top 3:

Wizard student that is paid minimun wage at the local library and absolutely loves to read the monster section, fictional and factual, and occasionally mixes up the two (Use it when you are mad at your players)

Old fella that lives close to the crime scene, and has seen some shit, but doesn't like cops so they only talk to the party about it (Use it when they are about to incriminate the wrong person and you don't want them to wreck the game by accidently sending the Grand Minister to prison)

- dream sequences r so fucking good. they r SO fucking good they can lead on plot and make tension and shit its so good please use them have your players roll a d20 no mod and depending on how high/low they roll they either have a good dream or a nightmare. go apeshit

- if your pals enjoy rp, playing dnd on discord over text is super fun! it works really well just use tatsumaki or avrae to roll dice

- if your player rolls a nat 20, that automatically lets them succeed right? on a nat 1, instead of just failing, have something happen that they wouldn’t want to happen, or have something distract them, etc. your player is exploring a desert and looking around to see any water and rolls a nat one? they get sand in their eyes. it’s fun to make up some sort of little reason for them to fail there

- cannot stress enough how fucking fun it is to have character secrets. go wild on the backstory! have some dramatic shit! work with your players to think things out and its even better if their backstories intertwine with the plot

- i cannot stress this enough. have consequences for your players actions. it enhances the rp

- ask your players questions out of game! ask how they would react to things like seeing estranged family members again, what their worst fears are, etc, it helps to get a feel for the character and makes rp better

- this is more of a general dnd tip not a dming tip but like. if you play online? having a google docs character sheet template is super convenient. i personally use this one i made, and i update it every so often with fixes etc, you can feel free to make a copy and use it for your own characters!

i am looking for D&D DM friends! I need someone who I can talk to about D&D, about my campaign's plot and how much I love my NPCs! I would love to do the same for you, as it even might inspire me!

I was a bit annoyed at the choices for forest biome battle maps on Amazon, so my roommate & I decided to make my own. With an 11 dollar sheet of model train "grass" from Michael's (or any basic craft store) you can make about three of what is pictured below. Even a fine tip Sharpie and a ruler will work!

I am DMing for the first time (but none of my party know about this account) and I was just too excited about how it turned out NOT to share :)

Everyone makes fun of just reversing a name to create NPC names. I mean seriously, Xagyg and Yrag aren’t fooling anyone, Gary. Such a cliche.

But you know what? It works.

Below is a side-quest prompt based on a mini-reading. Use this as the start of a small adventure, or for inspiration for your own ideas. 

Ace of Cups Ten of Wands (Reversed) Seven of Pentacles (Reversed) The Star (Reversed)

A young cleric has recently joined a local temple but has become overwhelmed by the workload. As a result, they’ve been slacking off some of their duties. One duty they missed was sanctifying the small graveyard behind the temple, and recently a corpse has risen, unnoticed by the priests, and has disappeared. The priesthood is now looking for an adventuring party to track down the corpse. Unfortunately, the supernatural illness that’s corrupted the corpse is likely to spread if the corpse isn’t found quickly.

Here are some options for the location of the corpse: 1) Let the corpse have wandered into somewhere relevant to the plot (or anywhere else you want the players to go). 2) Drop some random hints about where the corpse has gone and let the players piece together the location (and then let them be right). 3) Pick a few random locations around town and have the corpse move between them, dropping clues for the players. 

Just finished making this map of the my world of Krimuven and super proud of it.

My group is stuck in the wild stone forest at the moment, after their blimp crashing.