Recent content by James Gasik

Ah, B. Dalton's. My favorite store in the mall back in the day. Now only a memory.

Doesn't Zone of Truth allow for a saving throw at least? Plus, this line of text makes it difficult to employ (at least that's been my experience): An affected creature is aware of the spell and can thus avoid answering questions to which it would normally respond with a lie. Such a creature...

If you have a day to wait, of course. But ok, how about the Basilisk at CR 3? Or the Medusa at CR 6, both of which can be encountered before you have access to greater restoration? As for curses, that depends. It can be fun to roleplay, and it can turn my character into an NPC under the DM's...

Most DM's, in my opinion, are pretty strict about illusions. Their NPC's will use illusion magic rather liberally, and the DM will be irritated that you don't believe in the illusion, but meanwhile, anything you try to do with an illusion gets a lot of pushback. I don't attribute this to any...

Some DM's were world builders early on, creating complex game worlds full of lore and things to explore, but it's true, most of us were just running adventures and seeing what would stick. PC's had a high rate of attrition, and at least in 2e, it took forever for players to level up if you were...

The issue with magic to remove conditions is that it's really the only method the game gives you to actually do it. Sure, you could shove that stuff to higher level, but D&D is a strange beast where you can already run into things at low levels that require higher level magic to undo. A CR 1/2...

It makes more sense with "free to play" games where a Whale can unload some excess cash at the Pay to Win shop and not only annoy people who have invested hard work into the game, but possibly warp some aspects of the game out of shape (PvP content, for example).

Of course, the other problem with 5e lycanthropy is that Remove Curse exists and is only a 3rd level spell. So if being a murder monster becomes too much of a burden, it's fairly easy to undo.

.That having been said, Halflings in many settings live in or near Human communities, so it's quite possible they have coexisted for some time, and perhaps evolved from similar ancestors. Halflings as a Human subrace isn't the worst idea ever. Though given how Halflings worked in AD&D, there...

So while looking at this, while you do gain a potential stat boost, plus the advantages of your other forms, it very clearly states that the DM has the option to take control of your character should your alignment change due to the curse (I'm not sure what "embracing the curse" entails- not...

Until you decide to remove Halflings or Gnomes from the PHB, then the smallfolk players will come out of the woodwork in droves.

I've been brainstorming a lot with regards on how to make downtime more useful- I hope my players actually approve! There's always the chance they might decide to take a month off to pursue downtime activities of course, lol, but Xanathar's came through with a great solution for that- downtime...

So one of the characters in my new game chose the Urchin background. Their feature allows then to quickly navigate from point A to point B in urban settings. At first blush, this seems ok to be used in a wide variety of locations- urban sprawl is fairly universal. But then I got to thinking...

With Session 2 a week away, I'm getting ready for session 2, which will involve a crazy Paladin, a friendly Half-Oger (his spelling, not mine), and, presumably, Jermlaine, Giant Rats, Harpies, Not-Wererats (yeah, I don't want to deal with were-rat-ism, thanks), and Duergar... Unless they make a...