[GM Resources] [D&D 4e] A Medieval Tournament

Knights jousting, c.1445-c.1450. The British Library, Public Domain

In the last session of my current roleplaying campaign of D&D 4th Edition, one of the heroes participated in a medieval-style tournament. The competition took place over six rounds, with competitors being eliminated in each round until there were only two left to face off in a climatic final confrontation.

[D&D:ATFF] Character Backgrounds

The last bit of prep I needed to do before my gaming group gets together to make characters for our new campaign was come up with some choices for character backgrounds. Not every published background would suit my campaign, and I had a few ideas for some backgrounds of my own that would help flesh out some parts of the setting. Below are the backgrounds I created or selected for this campaign.

[D&D:ATFF] Playable Classes in My Campaign

Another limit I am putting on player characters in my new RPG campaign is which classes they can play as. The purpose of this is to reinforce my ideas for the setting. Below is a list of playable classes. Each one is listed with its source/version and its combat role, along with a brief note on some of them.

A few of the classes are marked for "multi-class only". These are classes with more magical abilities. I don't mind if player's heroes have a touch of magic about them, but I want to keep this a low-fantasy setting to begin with. So if a player wants to make use of one of those classes, they'll have to choose one of the other classes as a base and then multi-class into one of the "multi-class only" classes by way of the appropriate feats.

Also of note, character options from the "Player's Option" and "Power" series of supplements are fine if they apply to classes on the list below.

[D&D:ATFF] Playable Races in My Campaign

I’ve decided that I want all player characters to be humans in this campaign, to reflect the idea of a world based on medieval Europe. However, for the sake of diversity, I’m allowing players to create characters using a few different D&D races. In this case, these different racial stats and abilities will just be representing different tribes or cultures of humans. Below are the D&D races I’m allowing, and a quick explanation of who they represent in the setting.

[D&D:ATFF] Setting Overview for New Campaign

So, my players have helped me decide on my next RPG campaign. I'll be running the "A Tale of Fae and Foe" campaign that I mentioned in my last post. For this campaign, I'm taking some of the common precepts of the default D&D 4th Edition setting and twisting them a little to create a world that feels more like medieval Europe. Below is a summary of the setting.

Ideas for My Next RPG Campaign

I'm planning on starting another roleplaying game campaign in the next month or so, and right now I'm kicking around four different ideas for what to run. I believe each will pose its own challenges and present its own opportunities for fun and interesting roleplaying. Below are summaries of my ideas.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Tribes: Vyrden

Here is another Design Journal entry for Heroes of Legend, a fantasy RPG I’m currently developing. At this point in developing the game I’m focusing on creating the various tribes that populate the setting. In the last four posts on this topic I’ve discussed four different terith tribes – essentially different variations on humans. Today, I’m breaking away from that to tell you about the vyrden tribe.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Tribes: Juseido Terith

Here is another Design Journal entry for Heroes of Legend, a fantasy RPG I’m currently developing. At this point in developing the game I’m focusing on creating the various tribes that populate the setting. In a previous post I explained what the terith are, and I’ve talked specifically about the hylan, sharadda and kaldari terith tribes. Today I’ll be sharing some information on another terith tribe.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Tribes: Kaldari Terith

Here is another Design Journal entry for Heroes of Legend, a fantasy RPG I’m currently developing. At this point in developing the game I’m focusing on creating the various tribes that populate the setting. Last week I explained what the terith are, and I’ve talked specifically about the hylan and sharadda terith tribes. Today I’ll be sharing some information on another terith tribe.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Tribes: Sharadda Terith

This is yet another Design Journal entry for Heroes of Legend, a fantasy RPG I’m currently developing. At this point in developing the game I’m focusing on creating the various tribes that populate the setting. In my last article I explained what the terith are, and I talked specifically about the hylan terith tribe. Today I’ll be sharing some information on another terith tribe.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Tribes: Hylan Terith

This is my tenth Design Journal entry for Heroes of Legend, and I’ve shared quite a few ideas about the game so far. Over the next few DJ entries I’ll be sharing some specifics of the setting’s tribes, my stand in concept for what are called “species” or “races” in other settings. What makes tribes different in HoL may be some genetics, but the most important differences are often cultural. Today I’ll be talking about the hylan terith tribe.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Tribes of Legend

In the last few Design Journal entries for Heroes of Legend I’ve focused on some more mechanical aspects of the game. Now I would like to talk about developing some more of the setting for a little while. First, I’m going to focus on tribes.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] How High Can You Roll?

In a previous Design Journal entry for Heroes of Legend I talked about a character’s nine core attributes and the basics of how you’ll make an attribute check. Last time, I talked about different actions you’ll take with those core attributes and how many dice you’ll roll depending on the type of action. Now, I’m going to figure out what kind of numbers you should be aiming to get on these rolls.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] 1 Action Point = 1 Die

In my last Design Journal entry for Heroes of Legend I talked about a character’s nine core attributes and the basics of how you’ll make an attribute check. Now I’m going to go into a little more detail about different types of actions and how attribute checks are made. But first, I want to explain a very important design principle regarding the use of action points and rolling dice.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Attributes and Skills

This is another Design Journal entry for Heroes of Legend, a fantasy roleplaying game I’m currently developing. In the last couple of articles I talked about combat. I’m switching gears here and discussing some more general types of actions.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Attacking with Weapons

In my last Design Journal entry for Heroes of Legend I talked about mechanics for combat. I’m going to continue on that train of thought here.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Combat Grid and Action Points

In my previous Design Journal entries for Heroes of Legend I’ve mostly focused on the setting. Now I’m going to share a few thoughts about the way combat will work. Combat is typically one of the most detailed aspects of a tabletop RPG, a trait that extends from the genre’s roots in tabletop war games. As a fantasy adventure game, Heroes of Legend will put a fair amount of emphasis on combat as well.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Science-Fiction and Fantasy

Here are some more random thoughts about the setting of my new game project, a tabletop roleplaying game I’m calling Heroes of Legend for the time being. So far I’ve described this game as having a “fantasy” setting, but I wanted to mention some of my thoughts on fantasy and science-fiction and how that relates to this game.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Dieties, Golden and Otherwise

Here are some more random thoughts about the setting of my new game project, a tabletop roleplaying game I’m calling Heroes of Legend for the time being. I mentioned before that I want this fantasy setting to have an interesting mythology that matters. What I mean by that is: the world’s creation story has an impact on the current state of the world in the setting, and it ties into explanations of other fantasy elements of the setting.

[Design Journal: Heroes of Legend RPG] Initial Thoughts

Hey everyone! I know it has been a while since I posted anything substantial here. For some time I’ve been kicking around an idea for a tabletop roleplaying game, and I’ve decided I’m finally going to do some design work on it. What’s more, I’ve decided that I’m going to do most, if not all, of this design work in public here on my blog. What I mean by that is: all or most of the work that I do on this game will be posted here in Design Journal entries. What you see is what I’ve done. This won’t be another Open Design project, but I will be interested in any thoughts you have on the game as I design it, and your ideas may influence the direction in which I develop this game.