Building a D&D Character Soup to Nuts From Farmer to Folk Hero
Today’s D&D focuses a lot on one shots or West Marches or Adventurers League, and these are fine. However, this can sometimes leave characters with an empty void where once would be story and personality creating a delightful persona. Today I want to borrow some of your time to help you correct this. Let’s focus on bringing a D&D character to life and look at how I recommend building a D&D character. Whether a first-time player or a veteran, I find this method makes a good platform for an evolving character, something that can grow, change and shape itself as you play it.
Blade Dancer – Dexterity Based Barbarian with Gas in the D&D Tank
The gentlemen at Nerdarchy have been pouring over books and crunching the numbers in their effort to find the most effective fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons tank build. Myself, while I appreciate numbers and that search for the best, I’m not really a build kinda guy. I’m a team player though, so I’m going to put forward my hopefully unique dexterity based barbarian character concept that can be used in the spirit of the tank, while still bringing all manner of interesting flair to the combat scene.
Out of the Box D&D Encounters, Series 2, #46 – “Your Deal”
Out of the Box introduction
Player characters have tool proficiencies they never use. That’s a fact. I cannot remember the last time any character used a gaming set at my table, either when I was a player or a Dungeon Master. Outside of bards, I cannot remember another character using a musical instrument. Therefore, let’s create a circumstance where at least the gaming set comes into play.
RPG Crate Unboxing – May 2018
Hello gamer. It is time for another unboxing and I think this one is a darn good one. Presenting from RPG Crate subscription box — 5th Edition Foes. This is their crate from May that sadly had an issue and arrived a little late. But no worries, it got here and I am so glad it did. This is crate number 22 so RPG Crate has been going strong for almost two years. Well done.
Getting the Most out of D&D Elves with Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes
The Nerdarchists continue their dive into Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes, this time pouring over the lore of the ancient and wise Dungeons & Dragons elves. A lot of interesting information within the Tome of Foes in regards to those weedy long ears got me thinking. So while Nerdarchists Dave and Ted delve into the text on what Wizard’s of the Coast has put in place for elven lore, I want to explore what I believe it must mean to be one of the D&D elves and how it effects the world around them.
RPG Character Types and the Sliding Scale of Tactical Characters vs. Heroic Characters
Salutations nerds! Today, I want to talk about RPG character types, in a way that directly lines up with playstyle. See, a lot of the players I know fall into patterns, somewhere between a couple of polls, and now that I’ve noticed I can’t help but find it kind of fascinating. I’m talking, of course, about tactical characters and heroic characters. They’re both awesome.
WizKids D&D Minis Get Raw with Nolzur’s Marvelous Miniatures and Deep Cuts Miniatures
Minis, miniatures — call them what you will, you know Nerdarchist Ted is obsessed with them. We know that most people who use 3-D miniatures at the table are getting them from one of two places. You either have Reaper Miniatures of you have WizKids. (Our our own Nerdarchy store of course!) There are two new lines of WizKids D&D minis. They have unpainted Nolzur’s Marvelous Miniatures and Deep Cuts Miniatures.
Crafting in D&D miscasts my cantrips
There are a lot of odd trends and desires within the tabletop roleplaying game hobby and I think that comes with the territory of imagination and group storytelling. One of these odd trends, and a crazy common request at my table, is the idea of player-controlled crafting rules. Within Dungeons & Dragons, a game with the obvious design intent of exploring dungeons and battling dragons there is an overwhelming cry from thousands of players around the world for more robust crafting rules. I want to explore and generate conversation on why I believe this might be and why I have such a hard stance against crafting in D&D.
Lurking in the Shadows with a D&D spy character
Hello! Nerditor Doug here to introduce a new voice to the Nerdarchy community here on the website. Tyler is a longtime fan of the Nerdarchy YouTube channel who got in touch with us to ask about contributing to the website as part of a high school program he’s a part of. As always we are happy to work with writers in the Nerdarchy community and share their work here. Tyler is sneaking onto the scene with a D&D spy character concept. In keeping with the theme I snuck in a video from the Nerdarchy archives with Nerdarchists Dave and Ted and Nate the Nerdarch taking a crack at their own version of a D&D spy character.
Infusing Horror and Mystery in 5E D&D with Darkvision
Among other topics, darkvision in fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons has been discussed at Nerdarchy HQ. While myself and the other Nerdarchists really don’t agree with the problem, I wanted to offer some helpful tips that I use in my sessions that might work in yours to make 5E D&D darkvision more enjoyable. There are all manner of creatures and tactics that can be used to increase the level of intrigue in your campaigns, making your players less comfortable in the dark.