I'm creating my own campaign and I was wondering whether you need to make character sheets for the enemies - e.g. a group of dwarves that ambush the party, or do I just stick to creatures? Any help is appreciated.
Yeah for your dwarves, use npc/monster stat blocks from the back of the monster manual. Take the humanoid ones (say one of your dwarves is a Knight, one is a Druid, and one is a Berserker) and just make the necessary changes if any are needed (give darkvision for one) to make them specifically dwarves.
Another tip, don't be afraid to 'reskin' monster stat blocks. For example, a Drow Assassin could actually be a Dwarf Assassin just remove the Fey Ancestry and Sunlight sensitivity abilities.
It's kinda just a case of browsing through available monsters and picking the stat blocks that you feel fit the best what you need. Reskinning really allows you to have more freedom in designing encounters etc.
just on the off chance you didn't notice it, there's an encounter builder on this site where you can just search up monsters for and toss them into a fight with your campaign characters. way easier to just fish out a pre-made 'monster' from the monster manual or basic rules stuff.
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unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: providefeedback!
I build some of my more important NPCs as PCs - mainly because I'm new to 5e and I don't know spells etc. It helps me explore possibilities and learn the game. For example, an important NPC (for a player's background) turned up in a cool ship and I wanted her to have some wind/storm powers, so I built her as a sorceror... and learnt loads about sorcerors that I didn't know previously. And about loads of spells I hadn't looked at and didn't know. So for me, a bit of work, but helped me get some bits of the game I hadn't got a grasp of.
But, in general, the statblocks are grea,t and it's much quicker to twiddle them for flavour.
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RPGs from '83 - 03. A fair bit of LRP. A big gap. And now DMing again. Froth.
I personally see it as a hassle and just tweak a creature stat block. It's annoying to keep up with the constant creation of a new character, and it takes up space in your character slots if you don't have a D&D Beyond membership.
I build some of my more important NPCs as PCs - mainly because I'm new to 5e and I don't know spells etc. It helps me explore possibilities and learn the game. For example, an important NPC (for a player's background) turned up in a cool ship and I wanted her to have some wind/storm powers, so I built her as a sorceror... and learnt loads about sorcerors that I didn't know previously. And about loads of spells I hadn't looked at and didn't know. So for me, a bit of work, but helped me get some bits of the game I hadn't got a grasp of.
But, in general, the statblocks are grea,t and it's much quicker to twiddle them for flavour.
What I did recently was build a couple of NPCs as characters, then grab appropriate-level monster blocks and reflavor them based on the character's abilities. If there'd been good high-level ranger and bard stat blocks to use as templates, I'd've probably started there instead, but there weren't. (Maybe there are in all the named stat blocks from adventures, but that's way more effort than I wanted to put in.)
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I'm creating my own campaign and I was wondering whether you need to make character sheets for the enemies - e.g. a group of dwarves that ambush the party, or do I just stick to creatures? Any help is appreciated.
Stick to creatures. Character builds are generally more complicated to run, and go down much faster in a fight.
Yeah for your dwarves, use npc/monster stat blocks from the back of the monster manual. Take the humanoid ones (say one of your dwarves is a Knight, one is a Druid, and one is a Berserker) and just make the necessary changes if any are needed (give darkvision for one) to make them specifically dwarves.
Another tip, don't be afraid to 'reskin' monster stat blocks. For example, a Drow Assassin could actually be a Dwarf Assassin just remove the Fey Ancestry and Sunlight sensitivity abilities.
It's kinda just a case of browsing through available monsters and picking the stat blocks that you feel fit the best what you need. Reskinning really allows you to have more freedom in designing encounters etc.
DM session planning template - My version of maps for 'Lost Mine of Phandelver' - Send your party to The Circus - Other DM Resources - Maps, Tokens, Quests - 'Better' Player Character Injury Tables?
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just on the off chance you didn't notice it, there's an encounter builder on this site where you can just search up monsters for and toss them into a fight with your campaign characters. way easier to just fish out a pre-made 'monster' from the monster manual or basic rules stuff.
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: provide feedback!
I build some of my more important NPCs as PCs - mainly because I'm new to 5e and I don't know spells etc. It helps me explore possibilities and learn the game. For example, an important NPC (for a player's background) turned up in a cool ship and I wanted her to have some wind/storm powers, so I built her as a sorceror... and learnt loads about sorcerors that I didn't know previously. And about loads of spells I hadn't looked at and didn't know. So for me, a bit of work, but helped me get some bits of the game I hadn't got a grasp of.
But, in general, the statblocks are grea,t and it's much quicker to twiddle them for flavour.
RPGs from '83 - 03. A fair bit of LRP. A big gap. And now DMing again. Froth.
I personally see it as a hassle and just tweak a creature stat block. It's annoying to keep up with the constant creation of a new character, and it takes up space in your character slots if you don't have a D&D Beyond membership.
What I did recently was build a couple of NPCs as characters, then grab appropriate-level monster blocks and reflavor them based on the character's abilities. If there'd been good high-level ranger and bard stat blocks to use as templates, I'd've probably started there instead, but there weren't. (Maybe there are in all the named stat blocks from adventures, but that's way more effort than I wanted to put in.)