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Dungeons And Dragons Character Sheet 4th Edition

August 23rd, 2010 admin Leave a comment Go to comments

What to buy next for Dungeons & Dragons?

Ok, so recently for my birthday my friend bought me the Dungeons and Dragons 4th edition starter kit. I have a group of 5 of us who are all willing to put time and money down to get into this game. (All of us are new to d&d but have nerd experience) So basically I have some monster and character tokens, 3 sheets of dungeon tiles, 4th edition quick start rules guide, dungeon master’s book, and 6 dice. Now for one thing I definitely would like a guide for making our own characters, because once we get a little more experience and finish the 3 encounters made for us already, I want to start making up our own encounters/pcs. So in your opinion, what would be a few good book buys for me to get? Also, for now I am the dm, but eventually I think it would be fair to everyone if we switched off the position.

Unless one or more of you really wants to create and playtest dungeons from scratch, you should probably invest in some ready-made dungeons you can play with.. These ready-made dungeons have been playtested to work with certain level characters so they won’t be too easy or difficult. You may be able to find such dungeons online as well. If you decide to create your own dungeons, you will need to playtest them with someone before you actually play with them in your own group. I know you want to run your own, but made-from-scratch dungeons are very, very difficult to get right the first time.

If you share the DM job among yourselves, be sure one person is the DM for each dungeon. If you make your own dungeons, the player who created the current dungeon should also be the DM. Much of the fun of running a dungeon is in experiencing the unknown, not knowing what will appear around the next corner. If more than one of you shares the DM job for a single dungeon, whoever is running the dungeon has inside information about the dungeon itself, which makes it far less fun.

If you make your own dungeons, you will need one or more monster manuals, so you will know what kinds of monsters to put in your dungeons, and what stats they should have. Quick reference cards are a must, especially the ones that contain spells and special abilities. Having cards in front of you that show what spells you have left for the day, and what they do, are incredibly helpful, and will save you a lot of time during game play.

If you can find cards that show weapons, armor, items, supplies, etc. as well as what they do, they will make bookkeeping a lot easier. If you can’t find such cards, you can find 3″ x 5″ cards just about anywhere, and create your own. If a DM says, “You found this,” and has to describe the item so you can write it on your character sheet, and you have to make a mark to show whether that item is in use or not, and you have to either cross it off your list when you lose, sell or transfer the item, and … By the time you get through with the item, you have a very messy character record sheet.

However, if a DM can say, “You found this,” and hand you a card, you can then use that card along with the others you have to show what weapon(s) you are holding, what armor you are wearing, etc. If you lose or sell the item, discard the card. Be sure to keep it for the next time someone buys or finds that item. If you give the item to a player, you simply hand him or her the card. Damage can be shown with a Post-It Note (R). And so on. Once you have used this system for a while, you will never go back. – LJS

Behind the Screen episode 2 (Character Creation for D&D)