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Returning 35 results for 'dread ideas are build'.
Species
Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse
Shadar-kai are the elves of the Shadowfell, originally drawn to that dread realm by the Raven Queen. Over the centuries, some of them have continued to serve her, while others have ventured into the
by 1, or increase three different scores by 1. Follow this rule regardless of the method you use to determine the scores, such as rolling or point buy. The “Quick Build” section for your
Backgrounds
Ghosts of Saltmarsh
You have sailed into war on the decks of great ships, patching their hulls with soup bowls and prayers. You once helped build a fishing vessel that single-handedly saved a town from starvation. You
point of distraction by shoddy craftsmanship.
3
Though I am an excellent crafter, my work tends to look as though it belongs on a ship.
4
I am so obsessed with sketching my ideas for
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Domains of Delight: A Feywild Accessory
Chapter 1: Feywild Overview Domains of Delight are to the Feywild what Domains of Dread are to the Shadowfell: sequestered realms governed by powerful beings. Whereas a Domain of Dread is ruled by a
accessory helps you create Domains of Delight and the archfey who rule them, building on the information about the Feywild that appears in the Dungeon Master’s Guide. The ideas, tips, and tables in this
Backgrounds
Guildmasters’ Guide to Ravnica
; did I mention focus?
2
I get really excited about my ideas and I can’t wait to talk about them and start putting them into practice and tinkering with them and I want to tell you about how
suspension.
7
Great ideas are fine, but great results are what counts.
8
If you can guess what I’m about to do, that means I’ve run out of imagination.
Ideals
d6
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft
The Dark Powers Unfathomable, hidden forces manipulate life, death, and reality within Ravenloft. These mysterious, deathless beings are the architects of the Domains of Dread, and have secreted
hint at ways to escape the Domains of Dread. Consider the following possibilities when developing your perspective on the Dark Powers: Amoral Guardians. The Dark Powers are a group of powerful beings
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft
rules every time something frightening occurs, but your group might use them as a way to highlight individual fears and build an adventure’s overarching sense of dread. FROM THE MISTS OR BEYOND
atmosphere of the adventure. Don’t consider fear a tactical disadvantage or something to be avoided. As part of playing a frightening game, you’re a participant in building and reinforcing a sense of dread
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft
Notorious Monsters Every monster tells a story. The more you treat monsters as unique individuals and foreshadow their threat, the larger they’ll loom in characters’ minds. Build dread by giving
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Dungeon Master’s Guide
to life, and build on the ideas the players bring to each encounter. Alter these outlines freely to suit your tastes—and those of your players—and your ideas for your campaign. A Starting Campaign
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Dungeon Master’s Guide
whatever your players throw at you, and you can even borrow pieces of various ideas to incorporate into future adventures. Not every adventure needs to build on earlier plots; a good stand-alone
. Adventure Stockpile Besides tracking each session of your campaign, keep a list of adventure ideas. Even if you don’t end up using every adventure idea, having a stockpile will keep you ready for
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Eberron: Rising from the Last War
, this confrontation could begin with a number of small attacks against the adventurer or their friends. Over time, these actions could escalate. In addition, you could build a story around Thora
chapter 1. The House Tarkanan Assignments table provides hooks for adventurers who are working with the organization, and the discussion of crime syndicates in chapter 1 includes additional ideas
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Dungeon Master’s Guide (2014)
Nine Dread Princes reside, with each of these dungeons stocked with enough monsters and hazards to advance the adventurers two or three levels. The adventurers spend their whole careers fighting the
Nine Dread Princes before finally pursuing an epic quest to destroy the princes’ monstrous progenitor. As long as every dungeon is unique and interesting, your players will appreciate the tight focus
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Vecna: Eve of Ruin
) for his lieutenant. This intelligent artifact of pure evil was meant to serve Kas unquestioningly, but the sword soon developed other ideas. Over time, Kas and Vecna began disagreeing about
battle, Kas transformed into a vampire. He became the ruler and prisoner of a Domain of Dread (a mist-bordered realm in the Shadowfell) called Tovag. Eventually, the Dark Powers whispered to Kas that Vecna
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft
this rare service only to group members and their allies. Keeper ravens as a means of correspondence is detailed in “Life in the Domains of Dread” earlier in this chapter. Keeper Adventures The Keeper
Adventures table offers ideas for strange events that can touch off stories involving the Keepers of the Feather. Keeper Adventures d6 Adventure Hook
1 Keepers invite the characters to a
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Candlekeep Mysteries
spells reveal nothing about the Princess of the Shadow Glass, who has magically hidden her history under other names. If the characters learn the names “Nintra Siotta” or “Lady of Dread Omens” later in
the adventure and use those names in their inquiries, such magic returns the hoped-for results.
The legend lore spell returns an especially cryptic result for the princess: “Glass omens, dread
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Eberron: Rising from the Last War
a pattern of picking one adventurer and discussing their dreams each time the group takes a long rest. Consider these ideas for the basic seed of a dream:
Revisit recent events. This can be a useful
opportunity to call attention to a detail the characters overlooked. Clearly, this character’s subconscious registered the detail as important!
Involve a current villain. This can help build the
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide
large, linked metal medallions and enormous sun hats. A traveling priest of Gond offers services to distant villages as a tinker, a carpenter, and a civil engineer rolled into one, ready to help build
a better paddock gate, dig a new well, or mend pots or furniture that might otherwise go to waste. All priests of Gond keep journals in which they record ideas, inventions, and innovations discovered
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Basic Rules (2014)
some violation of the community’s rules. Did you dread leaving, or were you happy to go? Is there something you hope to accomplish outside the monastery? Are you eager to return to your home? As a
result of the structured life of a monastic community and the discipline required to harness ki, monks are almost always lawful in alignment. Quick Build You can make a monk quickly by following these
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragon Queen
various tools and tiny devices she always carries with her. Rookledust talks rapidly and is always formulating new ideas for her next overdesigned contraption. Though many of her creations are
dangerous, she doesn’t build them with violence in mind. She’s particularly interested in devices for long-distance communication and inventions that mechanize the work of farm animals. Personality Trait
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Acquisitions Incorporated
insight to build a detector that can sense portals or planar disturbances. A portalometer, if you will. The research or scrutineering activities can help the characters uncover the necessary information or
even say that any orrery components the characters still possess become attuned to the ritual as Splugoth prepares it, allowing the characters to triangulate the ritual site’s location. For more build
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden
became the new chief after the previous one choked to death on a mountain goat tongue. By then, Yarb-Gnock had already drawn up plans to build a fortress in the mountains. Karkolohk, the Gnomish word
creatures that would kill him if they learned the truth, Chief Yarb-Gnock is running out of ideas to keep the goblins motivated on other tasks and has begun to fear that the goblins are on to him. His
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Dungeon Master’s Guide
, is where heroes begin to explore the wonders of the D&D multiverse and its many planes of existence. Ravenloft Heroes are drawn into the gloomy Domains of Dread—cursed realms ruled by evil lords—and
running list of ideas as you decide on other aspects of your setting. What Factions and Organizations Are Prominent? Nations, temples, guilds, orders, secret societies, and colleges shape the social
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants
. You could build an entire campaign in the shadow of such a conflict, which is basically taking the ideas described under “Clash of Titans” earlier in this chapter and extending them through many
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Mythic Odysseys of Theros
god favors towers and hanging gardens that lift the verdant natural world up toward Nyx in her honor. In the Nessian Wood, Setessans build watchtowers that serve the dual purpose of military defense
Adventures table offers ideas for adventures in such a place. Watchtower Adventures d10 Adventure Goal
1 Guard a watchtower from assault.
2 Assault a watchtower, defeating the guards defending
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants
ideas about giants’ organizations and societies. Chapter 3 presents tools to help Dungeon Masters build encounters, adventures, and whole campaigns around giants. The chapter includes tables you can
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Ghosts of Saltmarsh
beside their mistress. Random Encounters. The Dreadwood Random Encounters table provides ideas for the sort of encounters that can take place here. Check for an encounter once per day by rolling a d20. On
language hear their names being called. Random Encounters. The Drowned Forest Random Encounters table provides ideas for the sorts of encounters that can take place here. Check for an encounter once per
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants
Everything to build appropriately challenging encounters for your party. The guidelines here can help you plan adventures featuring giants for each tier of play:
First Tier (Levels 1–4). Ogres are
common cause, they can alter the nature of worlds.
Encounter Context Each table entry presents a short description of the creatures in an encounter and what they’re doing. Use these ideas as
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Ghosts of Saltmarsh
Shipwright You have sailed into war on the decks of great ships, patching their hulls with soup bowls and prayers. You once helped build a fishing vessel that single-handedly saved a town from
craftsmanship. 3 Though I am an excellent crafter, my work tends to look as though it belongs on a ship. 4 I am so obsessed with sketching my ideas for elaborate inventions that I sometimes forget
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Acquisitions Incorporated
. It’s a place beneath you, sure, but good ideas often trickle upward. It’s surprising how often a suggestion made by an underling turns out to be exactly what you were planning on thinking all along
Personal Magic When you cast a spell, you go all in, channeling that magic through body and soul. Often, leftover magic from a casting manifests as a residual effect that can build up over
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Dungeon Master’s Guide (2014)
major change to the campaign world. You can build one from scratch using ideas from the current campaign or randomly determine a world-shaking event and flesh out the details. Write a list of three or
World-Shaking Events You can use this section for ideas and inspiration to expand on world-shaking events already occurring (or soon to occur) within your world. Alternatively, you can roll on the
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft
Horror Atmosphere Atmosphere is the overall mood of your game. It’s the sense of levity, excitement, or dread that stems from a story’s content and players’ perception of it. Atmosphere can be
challenging to build and easy to disrupt, but any D&D game—particularly scary games—benefit from your work to cultivate an atmosphere consistent with the experience you’re trying to create. Consider the
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Mythic Odysseys of Theros
example, you might build a campaign around the idea that Erebos, Mogis, and Pharika are conspiring to unleash slaughter and plague on the mortal realm. Perhaps heroic champions of Ephara, Heliod
least one member of the adventuring party is a champion of the god in question, these ideas might serve as adventure seeds. Completing a Quest. When a champion undertakes a quest on a god’s behalf, the
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Mythic Odysseys of Theros
connecting the tombs that the priests use in their caretaking duties, so exploring such a complex can be a daunting task. The Graveyard Temple Adventures table offers ideas for adventures that could
removes limbs from corpses to build an congregation of flesh golems he can’t control.
4 A gate to the Underworld releases a bloodthirsty Underworld cerberus (see chapter 6) into the graveyard.
5
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Fizban's Treasury of Dragons
on the ground. Chapters 4 and 5 feature information and maps to help you build encounters in and around a dragon’s lair. Is the dragon alone or accompanied by minions? With their legendary actions
can divert the characters’ attention away from the dragon and make a combat encounter more interesting—as well as more dangerous. See “Followers” earlier in this chapter for ideas about how the
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Dungeon Master’s Guide (2014)
creatures that typically build dungeons. You can choose a creator from the table or roll randomly, or choose some other dungeon builder appropriate for your campaign. Dungeon Creator d20 Creator
, roll one at random, or use your own ideas. Dungeon Purpose d20 Purpose 1 Death trap 2–5 Lair 6 Maze 7–9 Mine 10 Planar gate 11–14 Stronghold 15–17 Temple or shrine 18–19 Tomb 20 Treasure vault
Compendium
- Sources->Dungeons & Dragons->Ghosts of Saltmarsh
lays a hand on it. The ship sits approximately 100 feet below the waves. Random Encounters The Coast Random Encounters table and the Azure Sea Random Encounters table provide ideas for the sort of
rudder is not attached to the ship’s wheel and is instead operated by a team of six vampire spawn, who turn it at the command of its dread captain. Pale Prow doesn’t sail under the sun, and its appearance






