The Rules of 3.5

Dungeons and Dragons 3.5 is a capital C Complex set of rules to enable a limitless number of adventures with friends and family. The most important thing this allows you to do is tell a story. You face a challenge, you prevail or fail, and these rules can make it fair. Nobody is a master of them all, and the most important thing is that you’re having fun. Read the books. Ask questions, you will not know shit and that’s perfectly acceptable. This will try to address the things you want to know, for normal 3.5 and our house-ruled version, 3.6.

Role Playing Games

The first thing to address is how this type of game works. Dungeons and Dragons is a TTRPG, a Table Top Role Playing Game. It is a set of simple arithmetic-based rules to allow you to Play as a Role, which you can define on your own. The standard model runs as follows: A single player is termed the Dungeon/Game Master (DM/GM), which can also be called the referee, the Judge, or a similar term. They design obstacles- villains, puzzles, mysteries, etc. and often provide a world, a bunch of characters not represented by players (NPC) and a set of objectives. Each of the other players makes a Character. This can usually be whoever you want- a noble knight, a devious thief, a pious priest, or a wizened mage. They are a Player Character (PC) and each player Typically gets to control one for the story, until they are replaced (usually by death or retirement). The rules define what the characters can and cannot do, and the players relay to the DM how they interact with the obstacles given. The PCs go on adventures of various sorts, learn, gain power, find treasure, and do whatever their story turns out to be. Each TTRPG has a different set of expectations- Dungeons and Dragons is designed for high fantasy sword and sorcery, dragonslaying and crusades. Something like Lancer is designed for fantastic mech battles in a distant future. Both use a DM, players, and a world of adventures. Few RPGs won’t do that, and those that are the exception make the rule.

The way one should approach a game of D&D, with rare exception, is as a Team Game. The PCs are allies, who want to support each other so they all succeed. The DM is not your foe, but your enabler — they set up the conditions for your adventure, and you define your own success and failure. A good DM allows you to face challenges enough to make success uplifting, and there should be good communication between the two. Different groups have different levels of seriousness- some are goofy, some are super in-character. Some people have a lot of investment, some people only show up for the weekend. A good median is the best way to approach games: enough levity that you love the characters, enough seriousness that you care about the story.

Game Flow and Your Character

The first set of rules to know for 3.5 are the rules that define your character. Your character can have whatever personality you want, and usually whatever appearance, name, backstory, and anything else you desire. However, their Mechanical Abilities will be codified by a triplicate set of features decided when you make your character- Ability Scores, Race, and Class.

Ability Scores

You have 6 scores that define the characteristics of your character, determined at character creation. Usually 3d6 or 4d6, drop lowest is used to determine what these are. The scores each range from 0 up, and 10-11 is the “average human” level. 20 is the uppermost limits of the greatest humans, 30 is outright superhuman, and 40 is godly. You can increase these over time, but they won’t change by much.

STR: Strength. The physical strength of your character; how well they can jump, lift, smash, etc. Someone with high strength is muscular and athletic, someone with low strength is soft and wispy. It is used for a number of skills, picking things up, melee combat (to-hit and damage), grappling, and attempting to break things.

DEX: Dexterity. The agility and coordination of your character; flipping, dodging, and fine manipulation. Someone with high dexterity is graceful and quick, someone with low dexterity is clumsy. It is used for tasks that require finesse, like sneaking and picking pockets, accuracy with ranged attacks, reflex saves, and makes you harder to hit.

CON: Constitution. The physical toughness and durability of your character. Someone with high constitution is tough and usually fairly portly, someone with low constitution is frail and sickly. Constitution gives you a bonus to health at every level and is used for fortitude saves, holding your breath, fatigue, and overall survivability. Characters with low con have a high risk of death.

INT: Intelligence. The knowledgeability and problem-solving ability of your character; how you learn, think, and remember. Someone with high intelligence can remember facts, adapt to new situations, and learn new skills; someone with low intelligence is stubborn and forgetful. Intelligence gives you bonus skill points and is used for learned arcane spells, knowledge checks, and solving puzzles.

WIS: Wisdom. The awareness and sensibility of your character; how you notice, make decisions, and find mental stability. Someone with high wisdom is aware of the world around them and generally mindful, someone with low wisdom is ignorant and foolhardy. Wisdom is used for divine spells, observation checks, and will saves.

CHA: Charisma. The personality and social ability of your character. Someone with high charisma is a smooth talker, and is typically well-liked and/or attractive. Someone with a low charisma is shy, meek, or unpleasant to be around and is usually unattractive. Charisma is used for social checks, and inherent arcane spells. Charisma affects how people interact with your character in non-numeric ways- 18 and 4 CHA will be treated differently, no dice roll needed.

In most every case, things that use your ability scores will use your ability Modifier (or Mod). This is your score-10, divided by 2 and rounded down. A score of 11 has a mod of 0, a score of 16 has a mod of +3, and a score of 7 has a mod of -2.

The Sheet and Dice

Your character’s abilities and stats are recorded on a Character Sheet. Anything not written on there doesn’t exist as far as the game is concerned, although most DMs are lenient. Keep it organized and updated so you can find the accurate information easily! If you can’t remember what your character can do, a well-organized sheet tells you at an easy glance. A poorly organized sheet may leave you high and dry. The slots for character description are self-explanatory. Alignment, level, and xp will be discussed below.

The slot for abilities is permanent, and the one near them allows you to write if they have been temporarily altered by magic or poison.

Saving Throws has a spot for the Base throw, from your class, your relevant Ability mod, any additional modifiers, and your Total. You should be able to find these quickly, you’ll need them. More below.

Initiative: This determines the order of action in combat. Dex mod and any additional mods.

Speed is how fast you can move in one move action, load is how much you can carry. Heavier loads make you move slower.

Hit Points, or HP. Slot for current, and full. This represents the health of your character, and decreases when injured. When you hit zero you are unconscious, and any lower means you are actively dying, losing 1 point per round until you are stabilized or hit -10. Negative ten means you are Dead.

Armor Class: How hard you are to hit. This is a passive score, totaled up from bonuses. More below.

Armor and Protection, Weapons: The armor and weapons you’re carrying, for quick access. Keep their traits and effects. written here so you don’t have to look them up.

Proficiencies: What type of armor and weapons your character knows how to use.

Base Attack Bonus, or BAB: Broad measure of your combat ability. Added to every type of attack roll, as well as grapples. Keep this accurate, you use it on every attack. More below.

Skills: Your character’s ability to do various things. Keep updated. More Below.

Racial Traits: Any traits your race has beyond ability adjustments. This is where you'd put stuff like darkvision, Swim Speed, vulnerabilities, etc.

Class Features & Special abilities: If you get abilities from your class, like Barbarian Rage or Paladin Smite, this is where you put them.

Feats: Where you list your feats. More below

Known Languages: What languages your character knows. You want to be able to talk to your party and to the local people. You get 1 base language and 1 extra language for each point of int mod. You also can get additional languages in 3.6 with 4 skill points, a feat, or traveling with someone who speaks that language for 3 levels.

Character Past, Appearance, and Personality, and Behavior are all pretty self-explanatory. Don't leave them blank.

The two Animal Companion boxes are for any extra dudes you have following you around. You are responsible for knowing your pets/followers stats, not the DM.

Gear: All your stuff. It’s useful to know what you have to use to get out of sticky situations, and a badly organized stuff bin makes it hard to know.

In addition to your sheet, you need to use Dice to determine results of actions with variable chances. There are 7 Main dice that come in a polyhedral set that you will use most often, and they like all dice are referred to as dX, where X is the number of sides they possess. The 7 main dice are d4, d6, d8, d10, d00, d12, and d20; d00 is a d10 that has numbers up to 100 in intervals of 10. The two most important dice are d6, used for most damage, and d20 which is used for the success of most attempts like attack rolls, skill checks, and more. Occasionally you will encounter d2 (coin), d3 (d6/2 or d4-1), and d% (d00+d10).

Most actions with variable chances will use a d20 and a DC, or Difficulty Check, which is the number you have to add up to to succeed. Hit the number, you win. Any less, you fail.

Classes and Levels

The second piece of your character after abilities is their Class. This represents your characters’ “job” in an adventuring context; somebody who just makes wine and has few other talents won’t go fight vampires, but a skilled melee combatant or a spellcasting genius might. There are a number of classes, detailed below, each with strengths and weaknesses. You start with one class, and as you adventure you gain Experience Points, or XP, for accomplishing difficult tasks and overcoming obstacles. This represents you learning and growing as a person. Enough XP and you gain a Level in your class, growing stronger in many ways. The numerical benefits of your class and level are on a table in the book the class comes from, including your BAB, base saves, skill points, and HD. Your BAB and Base Saves increase in a pattern, typically consistent with other classes like yours, that go up every level or every few levels, depending. Each level, you gain a set number of skill points by your class, plus your intelligence mod; you also gain a number of hit points rolled on a Hit Die (what type of dice is determined by class) plus your constitution mod. Your Hit Dice is the number of dice total you’ve rolled, and is a variable for some effects. Each class also comes with class abilities, which are unique (or at least rare) powers or traits given by the class, with descriptions in the class’s entry. Each time you level up, you also gain a feat in 3.6 (only every three in 3.5 and 3.0), and you also have the Option to choose an alternate class in what’s called multiclassing, and gain a level in that class instead of your previous one. In 3.0 and 3.5, this provides a penalty to XP as you’re trying to learn too many different things. Most DM’s, including me, will not apply this unless you are getting absurd with too many classes. You can also additionally take a level in a Prestige Class, which require your character to have certain things before they can take that class and provide unique and often powerful abilities. Usually characters stop at level 20, and anything beyond that is Epic Level, with a few unique rules not covered here as you’ll have to play a bit to get there.

Races

In a fantasy world, there are almost always more options than just humans. Ability scores are balanced assuming a human is the Average: a race of creatures like orcs that is stronger than humans on average will apply a flat increase to whatever you roll for STR, and something like an elf that is more frail might have a flat penalty to CON. Some races get additional things like abilities, extra Hit Dice, skill bonuses, or different dice for certain abilities. Races that are more powerful than humans have a Level Adjustment, which means you have to give up an equal number of levels in your class to play them: LA 3 means that you have to give up 3 levels, so a LA3 character with 2 class levels counts as level 5. Each setting has its own list of races and where they live, so talk to your DM.

Skills and Narrative Play

Your skills determine what your character is talented at at what they’re not very good at. Many tasks can be resolved with a single Skill Check- d20+your Skill Bonus, which equals your ability mod plus your Skill Ranks and whatever additional bonuses there are. Your class has a list of class skills, things your job has you do, which take 1 skill point to gain a rank. All others are cross-class skills, which take 2 points per rank.

You can have up to 4 + (level*4) ranks in a single skill. Don't be an idiot and put all your ranks into one skill. Spot, Search, and Listen are always class skills. Instead of rolling for a skill check, you can take 10 (ten rounds) or 20 (twenty minutes) to automatically get that number as a result, provided you are not under pressure. Skills that do not normally take one round take 20 times as long in order to take 20.

• Alchemy is an INT skill. It governs your ability to create and knowledge of alchemical reactions, including the creation of poisons, drugs, and other unusual substances. This can only be used when trained, and typically takes some time. This skill was absorbed in 3.5 into Craft.
• Animal Empathy is a CHA skill. It governs your ability to understand and communicate, nonverbally, with animals wild and tame. This skill is exclusive to druids and druid-like classes, and was removed from the main sheet in 3.5.
• Appraise is an INT skill. It governs your ability to estimate the value of unknown objects, as well as guess as to their usage.
• Balance is a DEX skill. It governs your ability to maintain your balance while moving on treacherous footing, including narrow footholds, moving platforms, rolling ships, or moving while being pushed by water/wind. You cannot take twenty on Balance.
• Bluff is a CHA skill. It governs your ability to speak convincingly, whether or not you are telling the truth, to convince your target. This skill is typically used for lying, but can also be used to convince somebody if you are telling the truth by appealing to what they want to hear. Bluff is countered by Sense Motive.
• Climb is a STR skill. It governs your ability to climb up steep surfaces or even ceilings, and gets harder the more weight you have. It can also be used for holding onto a rapidly moving object, like a flying monster. You cannot take twenty on Climb.
• Concentration is a CON skill. It governs your ability to maintain focus on a difficult task during difficult conditions. This can be reading a complex spell during a storm, using a device while currently on fire, or other similar challenges. This is used to cast spells after being damaged in a fight, and is crucial for spellcasters. You cannot take twenty on concentration
• Craft is an INT skill. It governs your ability to create something, the type of which is selected. Anything you make can be a craft skill. This takes some time.
• Decipher Script is an INT skill. It governs your ability to decode and understand runes and languages you don’t speak. This can only be used when trained.
• Diplomacy is a CHA skill. It governs your ability to change the attitudes of other people. Diplomacy can turn a Hostile opponent into a neutral one, or even a friendly one. Diplomacy CANNOT make somebody do what you want, just change their attitude.
• Disable Device is an INT skill. It governs your ability to ascertain the function of and stop any machine or device rapidly. This doesn’t grant you a full understanding, just let you break it. This is typically used for disarming traps in a dungeon. This can only be used when trained.
• Disguise is a CHA skill. It governs your ability to pretend you are someone you are not, including mimicking behaviors and changing appearance with props if available. Disguise is countered by Spot.
• Escape Artist is a DEX skill. It governs your ability to get in and out of tight spaces and snares. This is typically used to get out of binds, nets, and the like, but it also can be used to squeeze through tight holes.
• Forgery is an INT skill. It governs your ability to copy handwriting and other unique forms of signature. This takes some time. Forgery is countered by Spot
• Gather Information is a CHA skill. It governs your ability to find information in a public setting, like a bar. This takes some time, and cannot be done without people around.
• Handle Animal is a CHA skill. It governs your ability to get a friendly or tame animal to do what you want it to do. This can only be used when trained, and cannot be used on wild or hostile animals. Or People.
• Heal is a WIS skill. It governs your ability to stabilize the dying, bandage the wounded, and treat diseases. It also serves as your knowledge base for anatomy and physiology.
• Hide is a DEX skill. It governs your ability to avoid being seen, and is more difficult while moving. Hide is countered by Spot
• Innuendo is a WIS/CHA skill. It governs your ability to receive (WIS) and/or convey (CHA) a message without saying any details- perhaps implying “time to run” without giving away the plan to run, or understanding that an ally is suggesting you steal something. This skill was removed from 3.5.
• Intimidate is a CHA skill. It governs your ability to terrify others or convince them to stand down. A scary appearance will aid your intimidate skill, but it’s more about how you talk. Intimidate is countered by a level check.
• Intuit Direction is a WIS skill. It governs your ability to guess the direction you must travel to a destination. This skill was removed from 3.5.
• Jump is a STR skill. It governs your ability to jump up or over gaps. It also can be used to take falls safely, provided the fall is intentional. You cannot take twenty on Jump.
• Knowledge is an INT skill. It governs your character’s knowledge about a particular topic. Without training, your character is assumed to have a knowledge result of 10 about any particular thing. Knowledge is always a free action, although you can take twenty minutes when in a suitable library or other knowledge source to research something. There are a number of knowledge topics, any of which can be used for any given thing: not all will always be useful.
• Listen is a WIS skill. It governs your ability to hear things around you. Listen is always a free action, and is important for observation. Listen is countered by Move Silently.
• Move Silently is a DEX skill. It governs your ability to move around without making noise or attracting attention. This also includes taking non-movement actions quietly. Move Silently is countered by Listen.
• Open Lock is a DEX skill. It governs your ability to pick locks, as well as do other unique tasks that involve careful and precise manipulation of tools. This can only be done when trained. This was absorbed into Sleight of Hand in 3.5.
• Perform is a CHA skill. It governs your ability to create music or performance art. This does not apply to physically created art like paintings.
• Pick Pocket is a DEX skill. It governs your ability to stealthily pilfer things without being noticed, as well as do other unique tasks that require swift misdirection and sleight of hand. This can only be done when trained. This was absorbed into Sleight of Hand in 3.5
• Profession is a WIS skill. It governs your ability to earn money working in a specific job, or execute a specific job well over a period of time. This takes time, and can only be done when trained
• Read Lips is an INT skill. It governs your ability to understand someone’s speech without hearing them, by watching their mouth. This allows someone to communicate silently, or spy on conversations. This was removed in 3.5
• Ride is a DEX skill. It governs your ability to stay on top of, pilot, and control a mount while riding it. Ride requires a willing mount to control, but can be used to hold onto an unwilling mount. It also allows a user to avoid damage dealt to their mount. You cannot take twenty on Ride.
• Scry is an INT skill. It governs your ability to successfully gain information from scrying spells, and detect those scrying on you. This does not give you the ability to scry. This skill was removed from 3.5
• Search is an INT skill. It governs your ability to investigate an area and find something amongst it. Search is very important to locate hidden objects, clues, and secret doors.
• Sense Motive is a WIS skill. It governs your ability to figure out someone’s true objectives: whether they are lying and what about, what they want to get out of a situation. Sense Motive is countered by Bluff.
• Spellcraft is an INT skill. It governs your ability to understand the magical components of an enchantment, spell being cast, or written rune. Spellcraft is required for counterspelling, and important for identifying magic items. This can only be done when trained.
• Spot is a WIS skill. It governs your ability to observe and see the things around you. Spot is always a free action, and is very important for observation. Spot is countered by a few things, mainly Hide.
• Swim is a STR skill. It governs your ability to swim in any liquid without drowning, as well as keep yourself stable enough for combat underwater. Swim will not let you breathe underwater. You cannot take twenty on Swim.
• Tumble is a DEX skill. It governs your ability to cartwheel, flip, roll, and otherwise maneuver your way around obstacles or opponents. Tumble lets you take less damage on falls, as well as move past enemies without getting struck. This can only be done when trained. You cannot take twenty on Tumble.
• Use Magic Device is a CHA skill. It governs your ability to activate a magic item without the required knowledge or ability to use it properly, like activating a wand when not a spellcaster or getting a magic sword to cast without knowing the command word. This can only be done when trained.
• Use Rope is a DEX skill. It governs your ability to tie knots, including binding a foe, tying shut a door, or other uses of rope. Use Rope is countered by Escape Artist.
• Wilderness Lore is a WIS skill. It governs your ability to survive in the wild, including such things as finding food, water, and shelter as well as identifying whether something is safe to eat and simple predictions of weather. This skill was changed to Survival in 3.5

Important Note on skills, from a DM perspective. I have to design a dungeon to be challenging but not impossible. Skill maxing makes this challenging on two fronts.

First, if you don't have literally anything in climb, jump, or balance, I know that certain obstacles will kill you off instantly. This puts a lot of obstacles out of order.

Second, if you have crazy high ranks in something like lockpick, I have to design a difficult puzzle so you can't throw a single skill check and win it. This makes both of our lives harder.

When these two are put together, the answer is simple- dungeons become a lot harder for me to design, and a lot harder for you to survive. And consider this, is it easier for me to design 50 crazy puzzles and the party to solve them because you choked out options: or for me to kill your character and the party to let you die so they don't have to deal with it.

Atop this, I like to make my obstacles unique and changing, so having lots of skills lets me throw weirder stuff at you without worrying that you are going to immediately bite it.

Some important skills for any situation are spot, search, and listen. So many problems are caused by not paying attention to your situation.

In addition, some important skills for survivability are climb, jump, balance, and swim. If you're bad at these, physical obstacles are gonna be rough.

Combat and Adventuring

This is not a complete combat overview. That will be in section 5. This is a basic overview of the rules of combat and how they work. Dungeons and Dragons has two phases, a more loose narrative phase and a structured turn-based danger phase. The focus of the game is the Adventure: you are not only fighting, but you’re going on some sort of quest or expedition with an objective. The standard flow is you figure out what you’re doing, where you need to go to do it, and overcome some challenges to get there, typically with some stakes on the line. For example: you hear of the treasure hoard of the dragon Kleosses and his plans to destroy a city. You need to venture to his Flame Mountain to battle him. You face his minions of Flame Mountain, then battle for your lives against Kleosses for glory and wealth before he can destroy the city. Not all games follow this path but the traveling and learning typically happen during the narrative phase, and the challenges happen during the danger phase. During the combat phase, each actor on the stage takes action in turns, with a limit on how much you can do each turn as each lasts 6 seconds. Put simply, the basic flow of combat in 3.5 goes as follows. You first get close enough to your foe with movement, then you attack. Your attack uses a roll plus whatever bonus is applicable versus the opponents Armor Class, and if you roll higher you can deal the appropriate damage. You may be able to cast a spell instead or as well, or take other actions additionally. This goes for each actor in the order then again at the start, until enough people are dead or surrendered that the fight is over and the danger is passed. Often combat uses a 5 foot x 5 foot grid to show distances.

• Initiative: At the beginning of each round, every actor rolls a d20 plus their initiative modifier. The highest number goes first, and it goes down the list to determine the order. It’s important to go early in combat, so that you can define the battlefield before the opponent can.
• Armor Class or AC: This is how hard you are to hit. When something wants to schmerk you this is what they're going to roll against. Your AC is 10 + Armor + Shield + Dex + Size + Misc. These are not all the same. It's important to know how they are different.
• Dex bonus is bonus AC due to how fast you can move. You dodge stuff with it. If you are Flat-Footed, or surprised, attacks ignore your DEX bonus. This is equal to your Dex modifier,
• Armor bonus is a bonus from wearing armor on you. Shield bonus is bonus AC from using a shield. If they're making a touch attack, the attacker ignores your Armor and Shield Bonus. These are equal to the number provided in the description of the armor and shield unless you have something to modify it.
• Size the adjustment to your defense based on your size. Being a big guy is not helpful for avoiding getting hit, and being small is a pretty good thing. Ask your DM what these are for your character, or refer to the size chart below for 3.6e size statistics.
• Shield Bonus is the defense increase you get from using a shield. You must both possess a shield and be able to defend with it to benefit from this bonus.
• Misc is anything else, like natural armor, spells, or other ambient effects. There are a few types of bonuses these can take, which are important to know:*
  • Enhancement: Improves an existing armor type. These bonuses do not stack with each other, but do stack with the armor they improve. (8 armor+1 enhancement+2 enhancement=9 total, take better enhancement.
  • Natural: Part of your skin. Applies to flat-footed, but not to touch. These bonuses do not stack with each other (3 from race, 5 from spell= 5 total, take better)
  • Deflection: Magically wards you from attacks. Applies to flat footed and touch. These bonuses do not stack with each other. (4 from spell, 5 from item= 5 total, take better)
  • Dodge: Actively attempting to avoid strikes. Essentially an improvement to Dex bonus, and follows the same rules. Applies to touch, but not to flat-footed. These bonuses DO stack with each other.
• Special AC rule: 3.6e introduces a special optional rule where every 2 points of physical armor AC gives you 1 DR/-, physical damage reduction. Thus, a suit of +2 full plate would provide 8 + 2 AC, but only four points of DR. This is not in normal 3.5.
• Speed is the distance that you move in one move action. You can move this speed and still take a standard action, move this twice using a move and a standard action, or move triple this with a full round action called a run that lets you do nothing else. In standard 3.5, this is x4 and only x3 if running in heavy armor.
• Damage Reduction, or DR, is not on your sheet but could be noted next to health for convenience. Damage reduction is a flat reduction to any physical damage you take (not energy). This is applied at the very end of damage calculation, so it would be after the doubling of a crit, for example. DR is written in the format DR X/Y, where X is the number reduced by and Y is the quality required to overcome the DR. For example, DR 5/Silver would take 5 damage off unless you use a silver weapon; DR 5/+3 would take 5 damage off unless you use a +3 weapon; DR 5/good would take 5 damage off unless you use a good-aligned weapon. DR/- is not overcome by anything that does not specifically overcome all DR effects. The same effect applied to energy damage is called energy resist, but that does not have the overcome tag. Fire Resist 30 takes 30 damage off any fire attack, etc.
• Massive Damage is not on your sheet, but could be noted next to health for convenience. If at any point you take damage equal to or greater than half your health, so long as that half is 50 or more, you must make a DC 15 Fortitude save or die immediately from the powerful strike. This allows a rare extremely powerful attack to have the chance of one-shotting even the strongest foes. The save may increase in difficulty as the damage increases, and your DM will tell you if this occurs.
• Base Attack Bonus, or BAB is the bonus to attack rolls you get from your class. At BAB 6 and every 5 points thereafter, you gain another attack that’s 5 points lower. So a level 6 fighter has 6/1, and level 13 Fighter has 13/8/3. You can use these extra attacks when you make a Full Attack, but not otherwise.
  • Melee Attack Bonus is your ability to land hits in melee combat, and is added to melee attack rolls. This is equal to Str Mod + BAB + Size + Miscellaneous bonuses.
  • Ranged Attack Bonus is your ability to land hits at range, and is added to ranged rolls.This is equal to Dex Mod + BAB + Size + Misc bonuses.
• Special Attacks: These will be covered later, but important note: 3.6 uses a different set of modifiers for size in special attacks than 3.5 does. Please refer to the chart below. In addition, one minor special rule change: large size is beneficial for all special attacks EXCEPT for defending trips, in which case it is negative. The main special attacks are:
  • Grapple: Wrestling somebody and holding them down.
  • Bull Rush: Shoving somebody back
  • Trip: Knocking somebody down
  • Disarm: Taking somebody’s weapon out of their hand
  • Overrun: Run over something, usually on a horse but with your feet too.
  • Sunder: Smash an object

Tall , Long	Attack Mod	AC	Hide	Height/length	Space	Reach	Grapple	Defending Trip	Special Attack	Example
Microscopic	16	16	24	below .1 in	0 ft	0	-32	32	-32	Nematode
Fine	8	8	16	.1 to 4 in	.5 ft	0	-16	16	-16	Fly
Diminutive	4	4	12	4 in-1 ft	1 ft	0	-8	8	-12	Mouse
Tiny	2	2	8	1-2 ft	2.5 ft	0	-4	4	-8	Cat
Small	1	1	4	2-4 ft	5 ft	5 ft	-2	2	-4	Child
Medium	0	0	0	4-8 ft	5 ft	5 ft	0	0	0	Man
Large	-1	-1	-4	8-16 ft	8 ft 10 ft	10 ft 5 ft	2	-2 2	4	Ogre Horse
Huge	-2	-2	-8	16-32 ft	12 ft 15 ft	15 ft 10 ft	4	-4 4	8	Giant Elephant
Gargantuan	-4	-4	-12	32-64 ft	18 ft 20 ft	20 ft 15 ft	8	-8 8	12	50 ft Statue Orca
Colossal	-8	-8	-16	64-128 ft	30 ft or approp	30 ft 20 ft	16	-16 16	16	Colossus Blue Whale
Colossal+	-16	-16	-24	128+ ft	appropriate	appropriate	32	-32 32	32	Mechanus Defender Colossus Kaiju

From: Adjusted Size Chart

Feats, Gear, and Advancement

The way your character gets stronger is a threefold path: the advancement of your class, the tricks you learn, and the stuff you get.

Feats

First up are feats, the tricks you learn. Every class gets the opportunity to learn feats: in 3.5 every 3 levels plus whatever bonus your class gives you, in 3.6 every level as over one thousand of them are available. The 3.6e Feats List provides a cursory overview of each feat: you need to look up prerequisites and details. Please talk to your DM if you are confused. Feats come in a lot of varieties; in order to narrow down what feats to pick, think about what your character does and what they need in order to accomplish it. If you want to do close combat, you want feats to buff close combat as well as feats to keep you alive while there. Feats come in five types, and have five Levels of change.

The five types of feats are as follows:

• Utility: Applies to narrative play more often than not.
• Combat: Applies to physical combat
• Magic: Applies to spellcasting
• Item Crafting: Lets you make items
• Metamagic: Directly alters the qualities of a spell, changing the spell level.

There are also a few Narrow categories of feats, like Kata and Necromantic feats that have special rules you should only need to know if you’re going to make a specialized character

Feats also have five levels of change they can apply:

• Improves a bonus: "+2 to jump checks"
• Gives a New type of bonus, like weapon finesse letting you add dex to melee attack bonus
• Give a New ability you couldn't do before: elemental fist lets you apply energy damage to unarmed
• Change a rule that already existed for you: die hard means you don't go unconscious at zero, precise shot means you don't hit allies
• Make a New Rule that hasn't existed yet, like how Void Use gives you a new point system you can use for other abilities

Out of the thousand-odd feats in 3.6e, there are ten that can be considered fundamental to most every character. You don’t need to have all ten on all characters, but having None is bad, and many of them are prerequisites to so many feats you need them to make a certain build.#

• Power Attack. The base to the entire strength-based melee damage tree, Power Attack lets you take a penalty to your BAB and gain that penalty as a bonus to melee damage for a round; if you wield two-handed, it deals double damage.
• Dodge. You get +1 AC against one opponent you pick. Foundation to virtually every defensive feat.
• Mobility: +4 AC versus any AoO for moving. This comes up a LOT, as movement AoOs happen all the time.
• Weapon Focus: +1 to-hit with a specific weapon. Not good on its own, but leads to tons of weapon-specific feats that get absurd
• Run: Changes your run action to x4, and lets you run longer. You’ll regret not having this when you’re running from a dragon.
• Point Blank Shot: +1 to-hit and damage with ranged weapon within 30’ of the target. Foundation to virtually every ranged weapon feat.
• Precise Shot: You ignore the penalty for shooting into melee, and prevents you from hitting your friends. Rest in Peace, several PC’s. Also a foundation for several ranged weapon feats.
• Spell Focus: +1 to the DC of spells from the chosen school. Like weapon focus, not great but leads to ridiculous power.
• Combat Expertise: You can take a penalty up to 5 on attack rolls and gain the same amount to AC. Very solid defensive feat for any refined fighter, and foundation to a lot of more refined combat
• Combat Reflexes: You get more AoO’s: up to your dex bonus. Very important for battlefield control.

Tip from King: "I think it's helpful to run through the list and put feats you're interested in on another, smaller list, so looking back when you level it's not super overwhelming"

Tip from Pavel: “Since the list is on Google Docs the search function is your friend. If you notice you could use improvement in some area or want to specialize a bit there’s nothing wrong with searching for keywords in those topics”

Gear

Gear in 3.5 comes in 4 major categories: Weapons, Worn Gear, Tools, and Treasure. Weapons can be literal weapons used for fighting, as well as items that give you access to attack options like a wand or a staff. Weapons have different qualities, including the material they are made of, the damage type they deal, the range they can be used at, and even the number of enemies they affect. It gets increasingly important the further you progress to have multiple different modes of attack, as enemies gain resistance to certain types and only having one to rely on will leave you stranded. A good rule of thumb is every character should have at LEAST two types of damage, a ranged option and a melee option, and ideally some way to deal with multiple enemies, either AoE or battlefield control. It's also important to be able to overcome DR somehow, as enemies will often take reduced damage except for a certain material or alignment, and many enemies will be difficult or impossible to kill without a strong enough enhancement. Magic weapons will usually have an enhancement bonus (a flat number applied to attacks and damage) and an enchantment (some extra ability or bonus).

Worn Gear is literally worn on the body, and overlaps significantly with armor. Worn gear can offer practically any effect, including protection, mobility, buffs, and even more attacks. Read and balance carefully: it’s not worth having 15 different mobility effects if your AC is 15. Each worn gear takes a Slot and most follow this rule, but occasionally some gear will take extra slots or a race will have extra slots for bonus body parts.

The average humanlike race has:

• 1 “Head” slot: hat or headband. Usually taken by a helmet in armor but can be replaced w/o issue
• 1 “Eye” slot: glasses or goggles, could be used for a mask.
• 1 “Earring” slot
• 1 “Necklace” slot: amulet or choker
• 1 “Body” slot: Shirt or robe, can be worn over/under most armor
• 2 “Bracer” slots: something worn on the forearms, Usually taken by bracers in armor but can be replaced w/o issue
• 2 “Hand” slots: gauntlets or bracers, can be worn with most armor
• 2 “Ring” slots: rings, resize to be worn over armor.
• 1 “Legs” slot: pants or skirt, can be worn under most armor
• 2 “Greaves” slots: something worn on the shins. Usually taken by greaves in armor but can be replaced w/o issue
• 2 “Feet” slots: Shoes or the like. Usually taken by boots in armor but can be replaced w/o issue.
• If the race has a tail, 1 “Tail” slot. This can wear a bracer or possibly a ring, but does not let you wear more than 2 total rings.

Tools are any item that help you overcome non-combat obstacles. Crowbar, ladders, magic wings, etc. The more of these you have, the more likely you’ll be able to solve a problem without brute forcing it.

Treasure is any item whose primary value is, well, value. Adventurers don’t just fight, they can sell, buy, and barter, and it’s worth carrying around a couple valuables to buy off a greedy genie or to trade for a key.

Please keep track of your gear. If all you have is a sword and armor and nothing else, you’ll have a hard time in combat and be functionally worthless elsewhere.

XP and Advancement

XP, or Experience Points, is the primary currency of getting stronger in D&D. Each time you overcome an obstacle, solve a puzzle, or beat a foe your character learns and improves; this is quantified by gaining XP. You earn XP proportionate to the ratio of your level to your enemies’ level. Generally an easy fight will be a few hundred, a standard fight 1-2k, and a real challenge a few thousand. Higher level characters need to fight tougher foes to learn, as beating the same guy over and over doesn’t teach you anything. You actually need to participate in the challenge and be in some way helpful to the cause to earn XP, but you don’t need to land the killing blow. DMs may reward bonus xp for good roleplaying, creative solutions, and for VERY clearly being the MVP of a fight. When your character hits the threshold for a new level, they Level Up, bringing new abilities, improvements to scores, and so on. Every level in 3.6 you gain a feat, you gain skill points, you usually improve your BAB and Base Saves, and every 4 levels you can increase an ability score by 1. Each time you hit this threshold your character needs to rest, representing the time they take to put the new skills into practice. The threshold for XP gain gets higher as you get higher in levels.

An unseen degree to advancement is on the player side rather than the character: learning how to play better. When you are playing a character, new or old, you should always be aware of where you are succeeding and where you are falling behind, what works and what doesn’t, the weaknesses you need to compensate for. No high level character is perfectly strong, but you can learn to compensate for that.

Building a Character

Dungeons and Dragons is a role-playing game, meaning you portray a whole person that is not you. The more different from you the person is, the more interesting and compelling the role you play. You should always attempt to make a character that challenges you in some way: difficult roleplay, an interesting or complicated mechanic, or some other thing that makes them new and exciting. If your character is one-note, and the same as you in most ways, you’ll get bored quickly. When you get bored, you stop trying, and your character gets worse.

How to start

When making your character, the first thing you need to do is obviously pick What you’re going to do. You can do this in forward order: pick how you want to play and then fill it out, or in reverse: pick some idea you like, and move around a mechanic until it fits your idea. There is no secret to this, you just need to pick something. You can randomly generate, figure out what the party needs, steal an idea from a media character you like, have somebody pick for you, whatever. You just need to do it. The functions of roles will be covered later, but in order to choose a class it's typically a good idea to figure out what role and theme you want them to serve; if you want to fight on the front lines, pick something like a paladin. If you want to be sly and murderous, pick something like a rogue. You can pull a similar task with your character’s race, it's all practice.

Beyond the class and race, every character needs a theme. You will get bored very quickly if you are just a generic Elf Ranger. A vengeful elf ranger who hates the humans that burned his forest, or a introverted elf ranger who uses storm-themed tools to keep people away, or any other uniquely themed elf ranger is much more fun, much more evocative, and you will have a much better time making and playing them.

Following your design for a character, you want to build a person. DnD is a Role Playing Game after all, not a Class Playing Game. In order to build a compelling person, you need to consider several aspects of their design and personality.

• Appearance: Having your character Look unique, with distinct features, scars, etc will help you construct a distinct image of them in your brain
• Alignment: What your character values, what are their morals, and how they act. It can be very easy to just assign what fits the party, or a simple CN so you don’t have to worry about it, or whatever your natural inclination is. It can be more compelling to make their alignment distinct and special to them, so you have to consider not just what to do, but what your character would do. Obviously a few classes are locked to a certain alignment, but even within a LG paladin lies much variety.
• Personality: If your character is “fight monsters and do good” with no other nuance, they suck. You will never have a very compelling dilemma, which is the crux of good roleplay and storytelling. Your character should have motivations- why they are away from home risking their life, what they hope to achieve. They should have fears- what they hope to avoid, or things that may turn them craven. They should like certain things, maybe to the point of weakness, and dislike things too: a paladin who Likes Good and Dislikes Evil is boring. A paladin who dislikes boisterous drunks but also has a weakness for liquor, and struggles with that is far more interesting. Finally your character should have some quirks; a stutter, an accent, a speech pattern, etc. I’ll talk about these more later.
• Important note: what your character strengths and weaknesses are shouldn’t be too predetermined, but rather explored as you play them. You may know they are a coward, but exactly how far they push their bravery should be figured out in play.
• Religion and Culture: This roots your character in the world, and should be discussed with the DM in some way. What faith do they hold, what traditions do they have, what is their food and music like, etc. This immerses you in the world, and makes you feel like you are in the characters skin instead of their head.

Once you have a Person, then you can start making them a mechanical build for fighting monsters.

Roles and Build

Classes in 3.5 serve different roles in a party, mainly focused around combat. Fighting dragons isn’t easy, and it requires a team to succeed. Every character will have a strength and a weakness, and their teammates need to fill those blanks for a strong party.

Roles

There are five key roles in 3.5 and 3.6: DPS, Tank, Support, Spell, and Utility. There are tons of classes for each role, and each class can be built in a number of ways, but the purpose of each role remains the same.

• DPS: Abbreviation of Damage Per Second. DPS’ job is to deal damage and kill something as fast as possible. DPS typically do not have a lot of durability, and need to be able to deal damage fast without putting themselves in too much danger. This usually requires mobility or range, but not always. A DPS should focus fire on enemies that need to die before they destroy the party. Some classic DPS are Rogue and Ranger.
• Tank: Surprisingly, a tank’s job is to get hit… and Survive. A tank should draw the dangerous fire: enemies are going to attack, a tank wants to be the one getting hit instead of the squishier members of the party. A tank can use high AC to make attacks miss, DR or high health to make hits less impactful, or ideally both. A tank wants to keep enemy focus long enough for DPS to deal with the enemies. Some classic tanks are Barbarian and Paladin.
• Support: A support provides the necessary aid to keep the party running. This includes buffs to improve the roles of others, and healing to keep them alive. Tanks need to stay alive, DPS want bonuses to damage, etc. Support isn’t flashy and typically isn’t very offensively strong, but it’s the backbone of a party. Some classic supports are Bard and Cleric.
• Spell: A spell character primarily uses spellcasting, and is the most versatile role. They can typically use a few buffs, strong attacks, and most importantly the ability to alter the rules of a combat to suit them: slowing down enemies, reducing visibility, etc. A spell character is almost inherently the most powerful party member, but they have a crippling weakness: low health. If the tank and support can’t keep them from getting hit, they die fast. Some classic spell-users are Wizard and Sorcerer.
• Utility: A utility character handles problems the other party members can’t: finding traps, solving puzzles, social obstacles, etc. Most classes have some utility, but a utility character specialized in it. Some spell classes have the ability to overlap with utility via spells, but the most prominent utility is Rogue and classes like it.

These roles are guidelines, not absolutes. Most classes can follow two of them, and many overlap within a party. Find the best way to support your team’s flaws.

Build

Once you’ve understood your objective, you have to find a way to make a character to serve that objective. A large portion of this will be set up by the class you choose: the DR and d12 HD provided by barbarian will serve you well no matter what you add to it. However, there are many choices you can make to specify How you choose to serve your objective: a tank could focus on being hard to hit, or being able to take large amounts of damage, or on turning incoming damage into counter damage to make hits less likely. You can take nearly any path you can imagine, but figuring out what you want to do is the challenging step you must take. Once you have decided what your planned path is, you need to decide on the following steps.

Multiclassing: Not every build is perfectly suited to a single class. Perhaps your character is not a raging hulk, but a brute with a sly side that uses their appearance for subterfuge; add some levels of rogue to barbarian. In addition, prestige classes usually offer unique abilities that base classes rarely achieve, so adding levels in a prestige class lets you further specialize. It's important to note that by splitting your class amongst roles, you weaken your capabilities in either role specifically. Rogues have a lower HD than barbarian, so by choosing to mix barbarian with rogue you are by necessity reducing your potential HP. Additionally, by doubling up on classes within a role, you often deepen the weaknesses of that role, as they often are countered later in the class’s progression. For example: barbarians have a strong fortitude, but a poor will. By pairing with another class that also has strong fortitude but poor will, your fortitude will be ahead of what it could be, but your will save will be even further behind than if you had just stuck with barbarian. This isn’t fatal automatically, but it is a concern that should be taken into account.

Feats: Feats are the primary way you can customize your build. As previously discussed, feats cover a lot of angles, and often can give you new abilities to take advantage of; feats allowing you new maneuvers, powerful bonuses to the maneuvers you already have, and more. There is no shortcut to pre-build a feat setup, you must find feats you like. You can do this well ahead of time: keep a list of feats that interest you, search for feats for a specific type of build before you make it. Putting it off until the day before session is dumb. There’s just way too many good combos to pick that late, you’ll get decision paralysis.

It’s also important to not hyper-fixate on a specialty when making a build. To paraphrase a long-winded example: a 10th level rogue who dedicates all ten feats to sneak attack damage will on average do worse than a 10th rogue who has access to spring attack, mobility, some survivability feats and a few sneak attack feats. The former will most likely get caught once by an Attack of Opportunity and wiped out, and the second will be able to move safely and survive long enough to actually get off several sneak attacks and live to tell the tale. It’s important to augment most, if not all, aspects of your character as you advance. Leaving a low Will Save low will come back to bite you in the long run.

Equipment: Finally, equip your character with some gear. Every character starts with an amount of WBL, or Wealth by Level. Your first level money will be determined by the DM, and they have the option to change WBL as they see fit. This money can be spent on pretty much anything, and you are encouraged to think outside the box. Every character should have clothes, attack modes (i.e. weapons) of some kind, preferably some protection, food, water, and some means of light. Without those, you are just not equipped period.

• Gear has already been discussed, but here are a few tips for picking equipment:
• A melee character will often want a weapon with a decent enhancement bonus, and a backup- get disarmed, or need another damage type for DR? Got something extra.
• Almost everybody wants a ranged/AoE option or two, and if you don’t have one there should be a reason.
• If your saves are not close to or equal your ECL, you may want a ring/cloak of resistance to help bring them up.
• An item to correct a bad stat, or to further enhance a class-crucial one like gloves of dexterity is also a smart choice.
• It doesn’t hurt to have a self-heal, or a way to cure status conditions: potions and wands are very good for this.
• You should have utility items: you will be in dark areas, deal with vertical mobility, deal with obstacles, deal with locked doors, etc.

Finishing Touches and Rules of Thumb

In order for your character to be complete, they need to feel like a real person. A funky word thrown around by a lot of games is immersion, which is a bunch of hullabaloo that means can it keep your attention. In order for a roleplaying game to hold your attention when it is not actively demanding it, you need to care about the stories it tells. Making a character who feels like a person, who has their own story to tell that isn’t just a copy of you, is a very important part to doing that.

Personality: Your character should have a definable personality to them, which shouldn’t be just the same as yours. The basics were touched upon earlier in the section, but to finish a personality you should include things that are, for lack of a better word, irrelevant to the adventure. Not everything somebody does revolves around their job. They have hobbies, and have odd interests, and weird things they like. For example, you may be a martial artist in a combat scenario, but beyond that you may have a dislike for blueberries, love films, and do leatherworking for fun. None of those would relate directly to your character were they to fight dragons, but real people don’t only exist for a purpose, they just are. By filling out your character with these smaller details of personality, they become much more vivid and real. Imagine if you were getting to know the character over a date. You wouldn’t be satisfied with how they fight and their quest, you’d want to know these little things. If you don’t feel like you’d know enough about them, add more.

Speech: Another phenomenal way to distinguish a character is to customize their way of speech. Especially if their voice sounds different from yours, there will be a separation of self from that character that will make them feel alive. Not every character has to have a wild foreign accent, or a thick russian, or a gravelly lizard hiss. Sometimes something as simple as a lisp, or a more nasally higher pitch, or a weird way of pronouncing otherwise silent H’s. Try to define a “key phrase” for a character; something you can easily remember them saying in their voice, to help you easily return to the voice. Some good examples for me: “It ain’t easy, being green” for Kermit, “N-n-no m-more lies” for Eirik, and “EULAURGH” for Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Appearance and Clothing: This one is fairly simple. Most often, you will have a decent visual image that appears as you build a character. Finish this off with details most people take for granted: What is their haircut? Do they have freckles, blemishes, or scars? What shape is their nose? Do they have hairy arms or legs? Are their fingers stubby, or spindly? What clothes do they wear? What color scheme do they favor? What type of shoes do they wear? Do they tuck their shirt in? How about their socks? All of these things will give you a very detailed mental image of them, which again is more consistent.

Quirks: Finally, a very easy way to immerse yourself in RP is to give your character a distinguishable quirk you yourself can do when playing that character: this could be a twitch, a commonly repeated phrase, a nonverbal tic like clearing their throat, a wracking cough, or something like spinning a coin between the fingers. By doing this when you play the character, you can begin to associate the character with a feeling, a state of mind. This will provide a consistent through-line to their behavior, rather than varying by your mood that day.

Rules of Thumb: Character building is particularly important to the job of the DM. They have to fit them into their worlds, and build a custom story for them. Here’s a few pieces of advice to make your characters more vibrant and the DMs job easier, in order of importance.

• Play a character who feels like a person. Have a history, have a personality. This is critical, because a 2d character not only becomes hard to RP, but is difficult to fit into the world. Many DMs run big worlds and can easily find a place for a complex character. But no matter where it's put, a cardboard cutout will never really feel like part of it.
• As funny as it might seem, playing a joke gets old fast. No matter how much the concept makes you giggle, they just don’t work. Nobody, including you, will really feel torn up when they are in danger, and there’s no point for me to write compelling dialogue that’s countered every time with the same bit. This isn’t to say you can’t play a character that’s absurd, humorous, and/or ostentatious, but if their sole purpose is to be a joke you will not have a great time.
• A gimmick character sucks when they can’t use their gimmick. If you are playing a character who is only interesting when they get wounded in combat, you will be Bored As Hell 90% of the time. If your whole character is based on stealing shit, you get hung out to dry when there’s jack shit to steal. Characters should be able to interact with the whole world, a gimmick is just that.
• Talk to DM about where your character is from, what their background is, etc. The best characters are ones who work with the world, instead of haphazardly forcing themselves upon it.
• Don't just slap a race and class together. It's tempting, and sometimes you just want to try something out. But a character with reasoning, with some work-together, is generally more compelling. Why is this lizard a mercenary? How did this bird learn to be a ninja?
• Another important note on character building is specific to the game- they should have a reason to be there! People with stable jobs and happy lives don’t risk everything to kill dragons unless something happens, and motivation for that is important.
• Versatility is more important than optimization. Your character should have a specialty, but if you sink so far into melee that you can’t do range, you just gotta twiddle your thumbs the instant the foes are out of melee. Make sure you can do more than one thing.
• Power doesn’t really matter. This is a team game, and the difficulty scales to your success. If you make a really strong character, the DM will just give you harder enemies to fight. The difficulty will stay the same. As long as you are supporting the team and having fun, you’ve met the power requirement.

To sum it up, the best way to build a good character is to build a real person, not an archetype or trope.

Roleplay and Alignment

Outside of combat and even inside of it, a lot of time will be spent doing roleplay, interacting with things from the framework of your character. This can be boring, or interesting, depending on how you approach it. If it’s just a time to pass until the next monster, it’ll be bland and a waste of time. If you treat it like it is, which is part of your story and a chance to explore the complex character you’ve created and make them memorable and interesting, to immerse yourself in the world; then it will be very interesting and often fun, or scary, or emotional. These are some tips to be more interesting and complex during RP.

RP types

There are a few scenarios in which RP can take a turn for the more complex and you should apply more than just “what the player wants to get done”. By taking account of these branches, RP becomes more than just the “talk to NPC to continue quest.” First, what does your character do in a situation? Cedric the player may want to treat the scary monster with dignity to avoid getting killed, but would Tarok the mad barbarian behave the same way? This is a fairly simple thing to consider, but it can occasionally throw an interesting wrench into the scenario. Consider how your character’s values would intersect with and differ from yours, and what they want to get out of a situation. You’re here to have fun, and maybe to win, but they have living to consider. Death may literally be on the line.

Next is your character’s interpersonal relationships with others. It’s easy to be friends with the characters of all your friends, and dislike all the enemy NPCs. But realistically, are you friends with everybody you work with? Do you dislike everyone who is marginally angled against your cause? Your character may dislike some party members, or be more than friends with them: romantically intrigued (remember to always be appropriate - don't be weird about it), see them as a role model, or even have a familial relationship with them. Likewise, they may see friendly NPCs in a positive or negative light: appreciate their candor, look up to them, or dislike their tone. They may not even be directly opposed to villains: they could have a personal hatred for them, they may see it as only business and not mind the person, or they may even like the person and are forced to battle them. This can make your interactions with other characters far more compelling and realistic: arguing with a close friend because one person has great distaste for a villain and the other finds him redeemable, perhaps.

Your character may have personal goals that are not directly aligned with the party and the game. Perhaps they want or need money for something, and they need to wrestle with their own needs versus the needs of the party. Perhaps the party’s progress may require them to lose progress, or even drop a goal entirely. How will your character choose, and how will they respond to the dilemma?

It’s very easy to have your character react as you do; after all, reactions are innate. Some of the most compelling and challenging RP is to pause before reacting and take a second thought: would a necromancer be horrified by the things you rankle at, or perhaps does your disconnect shield you from the horror your character faces? Most reactions will be similar: flee pain, approach loot, and so on. Challenge yourself to find the ones that are not.

Every character has their own moral code, and sees certain acts as distasteful, and some as reprehensible. These may not be the same as you in real life; you may be laissez-faire with minor crimes that your paladin finds wrong, or you may be averse to violence whereas your barbarian resorts to it regularly. No matter where you decide to draw the line, find it. Second, consider how your character reacts if someone around them is forced to, or chooses to, cross that line. Does your paladin smite a shoplifter, or just look down on them? How will they react if they are required to cross that line? Will they deny their involvement, feel shame, or seek repentance?

Finally, find what your character is scared of, real or hypothetical. It may be something as simple as the dark, or a crushing fear of being left behind, but a truly fearless character is a little bland. How does your character respond to their fears? Do they react with aggression and tension, or do they fold under the pressure? Have they been steeled by time, or are there cracks in their facade?

Depth of Roleplay

In order to make your RP more compelling, you may want to introduce slightly detrimental behaviors. If everything is easy, things are a little bland. You probably shouldn’t do all of these, but a few make for a much more interesting and dynamic character. Some characters have goals they want to accomplish that are not only not aligned with the party’s interests, but unrelated in general. Perhaps a character is looking for their own secret treasure, or solving their own mystery; this can divert their focus from the main objective, and split their resources somewhat. They may even set back the party somewhat in order to accomplish their own task.

Reactions were discussed above, and these are slightly different: a character reacting to a situation without thinking or consulting, based on an extreme response to the stimulus. This isn’t to say Cedric the Player doesn’t pause to think, but Tarok the Barbarian has such a negative response to a battle turning against his team that he will respond without thinking. There should be a good reason the character doesn’t pause to choose the right option: very strong emotion, positive or negative. Especially if the situation isn’t dire, a character making mistakes that aren’t inherently player mistakes makes them a lot more 3D.

Also previously discussed were your interpersonal relationships, and an interesting sub-dynamic is that of jealousy or desire, targeted at either friends or foes. One way or another, you want what they have. Perhaps your character has struggled for money their whole life, and a party member is naturally loaded; resentment, and perhaps even petty theft could arise. Similarly, you could have some envy towards a foe, or even a neutral NPC, because they have an item you really want, or a job you’ve always dreamed of. This shouldn’t just be loot-goblin behavior, but a more simmering tension that could lead to interesting interactions.

All characters have a backstory, and very often that backstory includes some sort of traumatic or dramatic element that led them on their current path such as a family dying or a town being attacked. While it is all well and good to keep these to the back of your character sheet, these elements could easily play into your characters behavior in several ways: shame over their role in an event, or survivors guilt, or even lingering trauma related to a cause. An excellent example would be Bjorn, who lost family to a house fire and is permanently uncomfortable around flame. This doesn’t have to be directly stated to the party, but rather left unspoken and shown through behavior. Similarly, they may have some sort of secret they’re keeping from the party, and this could be anything from a prophecy to involvement with the villains. Nobody is a perfect liar, and it is an interesting method of RP to “accidentally” reveal pieces of their secrets or memories as the story goes on, painting their whole picture.

On the same track as memories, characters may not only bring a story but a foe as well; perhaps the killer who slew their family is still on the loose, or one of the party members has a connection to the group their community was at war with. If you talk to the DM about integrating something like this for your character, they will almost always find a way to fit it in because they are ultimately interesting and fun elements to a story that make your character from a bit player into a Main Character. Make sure you have control of the element however: the story shouldn’t be “party member killed my family and I’m coming for them” as that is not only irritating to the other player (unless they came up with the idea too) but also ruins the concept of being an Adventuring Party. Something along the lines of “I’ll get you someday but I have to cooperate with you now” works really well, though.

On the same lines as trauma and innate reactions, your character may have something that completely enrages them, causing them to act out in destructive and uncontrolled ways. This should not be an excuse for being a murder hobo, but it can be a very compelling crux for a normally reserved character to lose their shit when they see a young child being endangered, as their own sibling/child was once endangered. This should be reserved for dramatic situations, as somebody losing their shit everytime they see somebody eat is annoying as hell for the other players.

Every person makes mistakes, and every character will too. These could be in their past, or during the game, but either way they should have a reaction to them. If you want a heartless and cruel character, their reaction could be indifference, but almost any good person will feel guilt and desire to fix whatever bad thing they did. A good character who accidentally does a bad thing has many different paths, either trying to fix the problem, compensate the victim, or try to atone by doing other good things in return, but they should never do nothing. This guilt is worth something, and provides character growth over time.

Finally, the biggest crux of character development occurs eventually when a character is forced to prioritize themselves or others. It can be a very satisfying and interesting turn when a morally grey character chooses to sacrifice their desires, or even themselves, in order to save a character who is in trouble. Conversely, it can be a very shocking and dramatic heel turn when a previously decent or trustworthy character, or even an untrustworthy character who has earned trust over time, chooses to let somebody down in order to satisfy their own greed. These turns really only happen once, but they can be absolutely incredible stories for years after if you can pull them off.

Please note that none of these are “Team-killer” or “Steal Everyone’s Shit” or “Make Life Harder for the Party”. Those aren’t really very interesting character dilemmas, they are just the Player being annoying cause they think it’s funny.

Alignment Guide

Alignments are pretty important to DnD. They map real-world values onto a somewhat objective mechanical structure, and so are somewhat flawed. Most real people fall around neutral good, but in a world where demons devour souls and dragons burn villages, you can afford a little more deviation in moral values. This is what alignments mean, how to choose them, and how to play them. This is not a moral condemnation of what you should be doing: there is no "should", you have free will. It’s just defining what the mechanics mean. The first crux is Good and Evil. In DnD, like most fantasy, a major theme is the conflict of good and evil forces, but this is usually not very well done. The difference between good and evil isn’t as simple as light and darkness, or fire and ice. Instead, it’s how you value yourself and others. The simplest and most accurate way to describe good is putting others before yourself. Whether it’s sacrificing yourself to save a princess from a demon or working a day in the field to get food for your family, you put the needs of others first. Conversely, evil is the precise opposite. Putting yourself before others is evil. This can be as wicked as sacrificing a child for power, or stealing money, putting your need for cash before their right to the fruits of their labors. There are greater and lesser evils, and not every CE character is a psychotic mass murderer who drinks blood. Just as easily, they can be a petty thief who likes cats, but makes money from theft from working folk. Conversely, not every good is as good. Not every paladin is crazy righteous, smiting the wicked and perfectly pure of heart. Sometimes they just protect children from abusers by going on walks with them, regretting their past when they hurt someone. Good people often do bad things, usually fairly minor, and evil people can easily do good things. The sum of how you behave determines whether you are overall good or evil: sacrificing your life to save another outweighs littering for example, and no matter how much charity you do you're not good if you got the money by murdering people for their inheritance. Good people are not always pleasant to be around, nor are evil people grating; plenty of people are a bit of a dick, but they spend their life making things better. Just the same, many people are perfectly affable and pleasant but only leave things worse because they are only really concerned about their own needs.

A second major moral structure is the conflict of Order and Chaos. These are difficult, as they are often misrepresented and misunderstood. Let’s start with what they are NOT. Law is not rules over people. Law is not a group over an individual, although it often can result in that. Law is not always clean, always judgemental, always pure. Most importantly, law is not always good nor evil. Chaos is not always breaking the regime. Chaos is not insanity. Chaos is not always messy, always niche, always broken. Most importantly, chaos is not always good, nor evil. Many writers will tinge their law and chaos with these qualities because of their own personal preference: a more free-spirited writer may write law as oppressive and stifling, a more disciplined writer may write chaos as short-sighted and foolhardy. Law is when you prefer a standard over a situation, when you follow a guideline rather than making snap judgments more often than not. This can be for comfort, or because you truly believe your guidelines are right, but the strength of your lawful convictions only changes the severity of your lawfulness. These standards can be your own, your society's, or your mentor's, but the important factor is that they are generally consistent and used often. Conversely, Chaos is when you prefer a situation over a standard, when you judge each situation from what you know about it, rather than a preset guidance. Chaos can be believing you are above the law, or just that laws are flawed. It can follow the laws, but not cultural expectations, for the same reason. The severity of your chaotic nature is by what rules you break or by how carefully you judge differences. Chaos doesn't have to hate rules, it just has some reason not to follow them exclusively. The tipping line between the two isn't so severe- a lawful person can often make personal judgments, but MORE often uses guidelines. They are not always in conflict, simply an either-or. A very important oft-mistaken detail is the mix-up between individual and group: a chaotic person does not act for themselves solely, that is Evil. Just like that, a lawful person does not always act for the good of the many: that is Good. A chaotic neutral person isn’t necessarily just concerned with themselves, that would be Chaotic Evil.

Neutrality is a tough one, and is often marked down to indecisiveness. Neutrality is a middle ground, and can be that for a number of reasons. There are two types of neutrality, between good and evil, and between law and chaos. First, the neutrality between good and evil. This is simply when a person's moral questions aren't resolved north or south of the border. This can be bad acts, for good reasons- stealing from the rich, because they earned it illegally. Or good acts, for bad reasons- feeding the poor, because you know it will aid you in your election. Sometimes it is indecision, when a person simply does not have strong convictions for helping or for harming, they just live. Neutrality between law and chaos generally occurs when a person has a strong conviction for good or evil, but not so much how it occurs. Help with the laws, or around the laws, whichever can help more. Follow a contract when it suits you, or break when it doesn’t. However, it similarly can occur when rules or breaking them really don't matter to a person. True neutral is tough, and should generally be the cause of a dichotomy: strong good beliefs in one direction, and evil beliefs in another. A character obsessed with “balance and harmony” usually is more lawful than true neutral, and also is a really overplayed character trope. A character with no strong beliefs or behaviors in any direction is Boring and you won’t want to play them very long. Neutrality can focus on an alignment, or blur the waters between them.

Lawful Good (LG), the alignment of Justice, is the best alignment because it uses wisely implemented guidelines to keep everyone safe. It is doing all that you can to ensure that everyone receives fair and equal treatment, and fighting for the weak as much as the strong. A lawful good character believes in fairness and harmony, making sure everyone gets a chance and nobody is left behind. A LG character typically has a moral code of some kind that helps them deal with difficult situations. They should almost never take things for themselves without consulting others or make a power play.

Neutral Good (NG), the alignment of Kindness, is the best alignment because it uses all of its tools to make sure that everyone gets the help they need. It is paying attention to everyone's problems, no matter how small, and putting aside your problems to help them be fixed. A neutral good character believes in altruism and charity, giving to others because they need it more than you do. A NG character typically tries to help the people that come to them with problems, rather than leaving them on their own. They should almost never abandon those in need or hoard resources without cause.

Chaotic Good (CG), the alignment of Freedom, is the best alignment because it takes every person at their whole value and ensures they are happy for it. It is seeing everyone, seeing everything, for its good side, and helping everything achieve the possibilities of the future. A chaotic good character believes in forgiveness and free will, allowing everyone to take their own path safely. A CG character typically tries to find a way for everyone to benefit, perhaps even the villains, provided everyone is safe. They should almost never attempt to force somebody to do something they don’t want to, or control somebody’s mind or choices.

Lawful Neutral (LN), the alignment of Order, is the smartest alignment because it gives you concrete and proven rules for any situation without making mistakes. It is understanding the truth, and making rules that use that truth to the best solution, for anybody who uses the rules. A lawful neutral character believes in objectivity and perfection, finding the right answer to a problem and doing it as well as possible. A LN character typically tries to standardize a situation, trying to do the thing with the least cost and most benefit all around. They should almost never “wing it” or leave something completely out of control.

True Neutral (N), the alignment of Balance, is the smartest alignment because it allows for what is needed when it is needed. It is letting yourself help yourself when needed, or to be humble when that is right. It is to make the right choices, and the rules of those choices can change. A true neutral character may believe in any number of things, but will not choose one side over another. A N character typically avoids picking teams or committing to a plan, as things may need to be adjusted. They should almost never take an extreme stance on a situation or leave someone with that type of stance in charge.

Chaotic Neutral (CN), the alignment of Liberty, is the smartest alignment because anything can happen, and you should be able to do anything to solve it. It is making it up as you go, picking whatever works, and cobbling together a solution from a broad selection of choices. A chaotic neutral character believes in personal choice and personal merit, as each person has their own way of dealing with things. A CN character typically tries to allow each person to do their specialty and sticks to their own lane and their own business. They should almost never force a right answer or way of doing things, or try to control another.

Lawful Evil (LE), the alignment of Oppression, is the strongest alignment because you will not allow anything to escape your grasp. It is holding down who would oppose you, using the weak how they can best fit, and giving yourself power that doesn't fade. A lawful evil character believes in control and unquestioning loyalty, and will force out doubt or dissent to keep everything moving smoothly. A LE character typically steps over individual problems to suit the overall purpose and is willing to break a few eggs to make an omelet. They rarely take individual concerns or desires into account, and rarely give second chances.

Neutral Evil (NE), the alignment of Self-interest, is the strongest alignment because you will use anything at your disposal to get yourself the best you can. It is finding out everyone's weaknesses, exploiting them, and never letting yourself be weak. A neutral evil character believes in self-promotion and assertion, and will try to find the easiest way to exploit and take what they need in order to get where they want to be. A NE character typically pushes lesser concerns to the side in pursuit of their individual goal and is not above hurting somebody in their way. They rarely give anything away for free or without a gouging price, and rarely worry about the interests or needs of others.

Chaotic Evil (CE), the alignment of Hatred, is the strongest alignment because nothing and nobody can stop you or tell you no. It is violence to get your way, lying to deceive, giving others pain because it helps you, or just because you enjoy it. A chaotic evil character believes in vengeance and conquest, and will gladly take bad to do worse or skip the first step to speed up the second. A CE character typically is vindictive against those they see as having done them wrong, and will step away from an objective to target them. They rarely forgive offenses, and rarely let an opportunity go squandered.

Certain classes have to run with certain alignments. Monks have to be lawful, as they set a standard of "always improve yourself". This doesn't mean they can't act chaotic in some ways, but their overall view should fit their training. Not all good people deserve respect, and not all evil people deserve hate. You'll encounter neutral villains and evil heroes. Your alignment comes from your behavior and intentions, and your role in the story comes from your path relative to the party and your results. The most important thing is to pick a character that fits, and an alignment that works for them. If you play a drastically evil character, you will face consequences. An obnoxiously chaotic character suffers in society. A stone cold lawful character won't run well with on-the-spot problem solvers. Make a choice that you can be, and that works for you.

Puzzle Solving

While you spend a lot of time fighting monsters, many obstacles in the game cannot be solved directly by stabbing something with a sword or blowing something up. Puzzles come in a few categories:

• Open ended: Where do I go? Lost in a maze, getting a lead, or interrogating a prisoner. You’re not sure what the objective is.
• Closed: How do I go this way? Opening a door, moving over a difficult traversal, putting together a jigsaw puzzle. You know the objective, but not how to get there.
• Interpretive: What is this thing? Identify a magic item, read runes, find the source of a smell or sound. You’re not sure what it means, but you can do what you want to find out.

Almost all puzzles serve as either a lead or a roadblock during a quest, and can and should be solved by using creative thinking. Almost all puzzles can be addressed by a combo of 5 rules of thumb.

1. Use Your Resources: You have an inventory full of adventuring gear from earlier, and often a book full of spells. You won’t always have an instant fix, but you’ll feel like an idiot if you spend 30 minutes trying to get across a chasm if you had a potion of flight the whole time. Plus, many tools are multipurpose! Try to find a new use for old stuff if you don’t have the right tool.
2. Try New Things: Sometimes you’ll try the right thing and roll bad, but more often you’ll try the wrong thing, roll fine, and it won’t work. It’s not a bad idea to give something a second try if you don’t roll your best, but I’ll almost never give you a puzzle that objectively requires your best roll to succeed. If something doesn’t work twice, or on a high roll, don’t do it again. Do something different.
3. Slow Down: In-game, you might have limited time. However, the game doesn’t advance by taking time in real life to think through what you know and plan a way to test before making a decision. Don’t feel pressured to get out of the room filling with water fast, you're not the one holding your breath.
4. Review your Knowledge: Not only is it smart to use notes, but here’s a secret: you can also look at them, and whenever you want! There’s a good chance I’ve foreshadowed a puzzle, and an even better chance that a knowledge check will tell you something. Knowledge is almost always a free action, and it rarely hurts unless you get a natural 1. If there’s time, you could even call a knowledgeable ally to help you out.
5. Cheat! No, seriously. If there’s a locked door, you DON’T have to find the key! You can kick in the door, melt it, teleport past it, or dig through the wall next to it. You can alter the environment, change the rules of the scenario, and do things you’re not “supposed to”. DMs like making puzzles, but it’s also super fun to be surprised by your creativity. If I didn’t want you to use spells and magic items, I wouldn’t give you spells and magic items. This obviously doesn’t mean look up solutions on google, don’t do that: It’s poor form, you’re being lazy, and they’re probably wrong.

Observation

The first step to solving any puzzle is understanding your area and situation. It’s difficult to put a jigsaw together with only half the pieces, and you should always endeavor to find the ones you need. You usually can ask 3 questions, the 3 D’s, that will give you a good idea of where you are, especially if you think you’re missing something. “Describe the area to me”: Get an idea of the room. These are things your character may not notice the instant you walk in, but would see by looking. This can tell you exits, points of interest, areas that are out of sight, and hazards.

“Describe the person to me”: Get an idea of an NPC’s gear, appearance, general aura, and so on. If you miss that somebody has a big ass sword, you may not realize that their objective is to stick you with it.

“Do I sense anything?”: Maybe there’s a repetitive noise, or an odor, or the area is particularly warm or humid. These can give you hints, particularly in the context of the dungeon, of what you need to do.

These questions don’t take long: at worst, you get a little more immersion, and at best you find a clue that makes a puzzle a piece of cake. Especially if you have trouble catching detail the first time I say things, it’ll save you a lot of time staring at a locked door if you forgot I told you there’s a lever.

Spot and Listen are almost always free actions, and search often is very quick. They’re almost always risk-free and only search requires your character to physically do anything. I’ll almost never be bothered by you making extra spot and Listen checks, as the DM will NOT ask you for them every time there’s something worth noting. The only case is repeatedly doing extra spots and listens after several successes have been made already with no indication that something has changed, and I’ll usually let you know before you roll at that point. A character with the scent ability can also use a Wisdom check in order to sniff out faint odors, just like spot. Similarly, most characters can use a wisdom check for other faint senses like magic aura, breeze, or temperature.

Descriptions

Most DMs will try to flesh out everything you see at 5 levels of detail. Direct, Major detail: These are things you are told as soon as you enter the room that are impossible to miss, like a giant statue or a pool of lava, or something assaulting another sense like intense noise, smell, or temperature. If we’re using a map, I draw it on the map. This is the lowest level of description and stopping here is almost always an error.

Direct, Minor detail: This is what you can find out with the 3 d's above. They don't always require a spot check, but you have to look. Does your sibling have any freckles? Moles? How many? Are the walls in your house all the same color, or do some have slightly different shades? You probably don't notice at first, but if you take any time to look you'll find out. This often can be critical information, like noticing a smell or discovering a cloud of gas. The higher your character’s wisdom score, the more of these become Major details to represent your character noticing more things.

Indirect, Major detail: These are things with lots of notifiers, but are unknown just by a look. These require a spot, or a search, and you won't know what they are without discovery. Things like a trap, or a secret door. I will often, but not ALWAYS, prompt a spot or search for some of these things- this is mainly determined by your Wisdom score. You can totally miss details, and be put in danger, by failing.

Indirect, Minor detail: These are tiny trace details, and usually won't mean much without outside information. Something like a footprint, or a scorch mark. They take a careful eye to even note, and a trained eye to understand. Unless a person is trained, I will usually not prompt a spot check for these. These are often clues that will help you on your quest, but are rarely required

The first four are planned, but sometimes you ask questions I didn't plan. The "fifth" level of detail is on the spot. Usually the DM has a complete mental image of the room, and any details asked about that are not planned will be filled in from that.

DMs put a good bit of work into most every room you go into. If you are playing a class like a rogue you should be asking to make spot checks as often as possible. there will usually be something for you.

Obstacle Course

One set of puzzles are physical ones: you need to get over a chasm, or navigate a pool of lava, or swim through a submerged cave, etc. These have an easy first answer, for those who have the ability: Make a jump check, or climb check, or a swim. If you have the ranks in a skill, you can certainly use it. Some obstacles may not be so easily solved by one skill: perhaps you need to climb, then jump, and need to manage both skills. Especially given how many different obstacles you face, it’s wise to have options for different things. Not every character has to solve the puzzle the same way: a nimble character may use acrobatics to move across a gap, whereas a strong one may knock over a tree to solve the same objective. Rather than try to force a large slow character to be acrobatic, use what they are good at to try and get past a problem. If you can’t figure out a way for what they’re good at to apply, see if there’s a way for their strength to take an alternate path. A strong character could try to kick a nearby door down and go that way instead of the acrobatic gap. Be careful with Plan F (set everything on fire/smash everything) as there's a decent chance you can soft-lock yourself, but a DM will typically give you a slap on the wrist and a new way out rather than have the whole party starve to death.

Atop the various ways to solve a puzzle are the magical augmentations that can be added, and these are too many to be counted: you can make a wall of stone and use it to cross the gap, or make one party member a flier who can carry things across. Even spells designed for damage can be used occasionally for an alternate Plan F, but again be careful. Similarly, there are a number of magic items that can be used to augment your ability to move, and it’s almost always wise to have a few laying around.

Riddles and Lies

The second major set of puzzles are mental, which usually are one of 5 things:

1. Murder or other scene: Clues around an area tell you what happened, and you piece together the story for an objective. First you need to fully investigate: if you want to solve a shooting, you need to find the bullet. Once you have all the clues, or what you hope is enough, you need to connect pieces that make sense together. Scratch marks and fur suggest a beast, scratch marks and a scrap of paper don’t say much together. Once you have an idea, try to fit other pieces to the idea until it’s debunked or everything fits. Rarely will this lead to a party confident on completely the wrong solution, and if so the DM will probably drop more clues.
2. Riddle: The party is presented with information that gives hints to a specific word, person, or other similar thing and needs to ascertain which specific thing it is. Might be a password to a door, or a person of interest. Riddles are intentionally designed to have a specific answer, and often have sets of information to provide a set of possible answers and eliminate them. If you can’t figure out which option works, write down the options and cross them out as the relevant information denotes. If you can’t think of a possible answer, a series of knowledge checks will probably give you a set of answers you can narrow down. A good DM will almost never give you a riddle whose answer isn’t something you should know or can easily find out. Check your resources if you’re really stuck.
3. Physical Puzzle: Things need to be moved around, assembled, taken apart, or manipulated for them to work or stop working. First, figure out all the moving parts, literally or metaphorically. If you have no idea how they work, try to manipulate each of the parts in isolation to figure out how they work before combining. Try to hit each piece completely before moving on.
4. Lying NPC: An NPC knows something you want to know, and you need to suss out how to find out. If you can’t convince them to tell you, you can try to catch them in a lie by asking probing questions about details they may mistake. As a DM, I may be a good liar but I still roll bluff checks for my NPCs, and eventually I may flub a roll and you will catch them. If you can’t get it out of them through talking, you have a series of options: steal a diary/letter, read their mind, beat it out of them, get them drunk, ask somebody they’ve told, and more. Get creative!
5. Lore: You need to know something, and knowledge checks don’t work. Usually if there’s something you need to know and knowledge isn’t good enough, you’re going to have a way to find out: perhaps there is a scholarly NPC about, a hint in the dungeon you’re currently in, or a hidden book you can find. You may even be able to find a library of some sort and make an assisted knowledge check using the library’s bonus.

The first three can be, but often may not be solved with an Intelligence check. More often, an Intelligence check can give you hints to the objective or things you missed. The fourth can be solved using a successful charisma check the same way, but more likely that will help but not solve. The fifth vastly varies depending on context.

In almost any secret situation, it pays immense dividends to take notes of things you don’t think you’ll remember, and check back on them. No DM will reasonably expect you to know every detail of their setting, but if you are told something and promptly forget it because you are lazy or don’t care, it’s on you, not them.

Using Resources

A major dilemma players often face is when to use their things: you gather tons of loot, money, and various garbage and then they sit in your bag of holding until your character dies and they get redistributed or thrown out. Your items are tools to keep your character alive and help you succeed, not the other way around. However, there are a few rules of thumb to follow to make good use of your items.

1. Try not to use an item with a specific use for things that will break it, instead try to use an item that’s more multipurpose, hardy, or replaceable. Rather than trying to shank a guard with a lockpick, hit them with a crowbar; the lockpick will break and can’t be used to open a door, but a crowbar will be fine and be used to pry a door open. On the inverse, if you have an item for a specific use, use that for its task first over the multipurpose item. There’s always a chance you mess up a check and break it or lose it, and you’re in less trouble if you break the thing with only one use. If you are opening a locked door, start with a lockpick and if that breaks you still have a crowbar for various things. If the crowbar breaks, the lockpicks are less useful.
2. Fill your pockets with weird shit. You will get a bunch as loot, you start with plenty of money, and nearly every town has a store to buy stuff with all the gold you get. There are thousands of odd magic items and gear that you can use for any sort of scenario. If you only take water, food, and weapons then get trapped in a 10 foot pit, you absolutely deserve it.
3. Don’t be afraid to experiment with your stuff! You can get more stuff if you lose it, but when your character dies that’s a lot harder to replace. If you find a cool machine, use stuff and you might get lucky! A DM almost always loves creative solutions, and will let them fly especially if you’re having fun. Especially if items have more odd effects, there’s a lot of ways you can move things around in the situation, for the better or for the funnier.
4. As hard as it is to let go, don’t hold onto stuff forever. You get potions, wands, alchemical items, and so on in order to deal with situations. If you don’t use them, you usually die and they go with you. Single use items are CHEAP and REPLACEABLE. It’s almost always a better plan to drink a healing potion for a buffer of hp, use a wand when you need to deal some spell damage, and blow a charge for an advantage. Consider the number of times your character has legitimately been dead broke, and the number of times they are running out of options and dying. It’s way easier to solve being broke.

Puzzle Types

DMs generally build three types of puzzles.

• Secret puzzles are usually mental puzzles, and can be solved by anybody: there’s an answer, it doesn’t matter how you get there. The key to these is try the shit you have and what you’ve learned, to examine the area and recall context. As video-game as it might seem, I will rarely make this an answer you won’t be able to figure out. If you’re really stuck, call an ally. Jorren, Dusk, Nallithan, so on. They can offer hints and help.
• Focused puzzles are meant to be solved by a particular team member, or at least a particular set of skills. An athletic and muscular fighter is probably a better pick for a puzzle where you need to lift heavy objects than the gnome. Research is better for the wizard than the barbarian. A locked and trapped door is a job for the rogue. If one player is the party leader and they are forced to do all of them, they will probably not succeed. Consider whether your character has the tools to solve this issue, and if not, step back and let somebody else handle it.
• Teamwork puzzles are essentially a mix of focused puzzles that demand multiple people to solve: One person distracting while another heists, one person lifts while the other solves a puzzle, one reading off commands while the other inputs. For some things, no matter how creative you get, you need a friend.

“I guess that works” solutions are perfectly acceptable. Almost always, the “correct” solution is the one with the lowest cost or the easiest effort mechanically, but that doesn’t mean it’s the only way to get past it. A focused puzzle can be solved by two players working together, more power to you! One person with a really smart solution or great luck could beat a teamwork puzzle. I will never force a single solution, although other DM’s might, but I might put you in a box with limited options to see how you get out.

Combat and Mechanics

This is not a substitute for reading the Player's Handbook. Read that. This is extras, explanation, and tips. There’s a lot of complexity to 3.5, which is much of the mechanical depth of this game. You can learn thousands of different ways to succeed. This isn’t gonna tell you that. Practice and creativity is the way to make this exciting and fun.

Fundamentals

Combat in dungeons and dragons has a couple fundamental considerations: The ability to survive attacks and the ability to select targets are huge amongst them. A character like a wizard, or a druid, or a bard will typically not be able to survive much, and are often called “squishy”. In D&D 3.5, a squishy being next to an enemy is risky because damage can be dealt quickly, and many actions draw Attacks of Opportunity, which are bonus chances to get hit (more later). Almost universally, you want the characters who can take hits to take the hits, and the squishies to avoid it like the plague. If you can prevent anybody from being hit, great! Secondly, characters and foes have different levels of threat: some are very tough but don’t have a lot of damage output, some are kinda flimsy but deal tons of damage, and all in between. As a rule, you want to handle the foes that deal the most damage first, because that extends the time you have to deal with the lower-damage enemies. This also means the party should have the characters that deal the most damage focus on the most relevant targets, not just random foes. If your damage dealers are melee, they need to be able to get close to the relevant foes, not get stuck on the front line. If they are ranged, they need to be able to get a line of attack to the foes, not in danger of being attacked every time they shoot. Remember, moving past enemies is rarely safe, and by blocking safe routes you can keep enemies from getting close to the people you want safe.

Enemies come in a couple varieties that are similar to player roles, and they should be dealt with a little distinctly. First are melee enemies: they close distance and get you. Ranged enemies deal damage from a distance. Melee and ranged enemies can do both. Then there are Special foes, which typically fall into Control, Healing, or Area Debuff/Damage. Each category has a lot of variation, but for player purposes most enemies will follow one of these sets.*

When fighting melee enemies, they should stay pinned down by the tanks so they can’t hit squishies. This way the DPS can eliminate them while the Tank absorbs the damage they put out.

Ranged enemies are harder, because they have more options of where they can attack from. The connecting factor is this: almost every ranged attack provokes an AoO. Not all, but nearly all. If you get next to them, they either need to become a melee enemy or get hit every time they shoot. Ranged enemies also tend to be softer than melee enemies, so they will typically avoid getting hit that much.

Special enemies can do a lot, but realistically it means your plan won’t be convenient. The way to deal with them is simple: kill them first. They’re usually, but not always, squishier than the melee enemies, so focusing fire on them first will help eliminate them before they can alter the fight in their favor.

There are a lot of details to combat. Here are a few tips:

Get informed: A round is 6 seconds in game, but out of game you have plenty of time to think. Spot checks, listens, knowledge checks, and talking to allies are free actions, and you can do them pretty much whenever you want. Looking at if an enemy is armored, if they are carrying weapons, if they are bleeding, if they have magic auras or active spells, and what they are looking at can tell you a lot about their role. If you miss that the guy in full plate with a tower shield can take damage and the guy in robes charging up a fireball is gonna blow up the party you won’t be able to make a smart plan.

Try different things: This is a game, and it’s designed like one. Every monster plays a little differently, and most DM’s enjoy creative challenges. Setting one plan and following it to a T every time won’t work. Even if Fireball is good, something can be immune to fire. If your fire spells aren’t working, stop throwing fire spells. Every enemy has strengths and weaknesses, and if you try to wrestle with every enemy’s strength you are gonna get ground down. Find their weaknesses and be aware of all your options. Also, as a DM I will often punish doing the same thing over and over because you think it’s really strong. If you always make called shot to the head, you’ll start facing stuff with a damn tough helmet or no head in general.

Understand your job and work together: Combat is designed to take the whole party usually, and if you try to do everything yourself or just sit out, you’re failing the party or putting yourself in serious danger. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to adapt, but if you’re a rogue, don't try to bottleneck a door with a tank behind you, you’re gonna get chewed up. A wizard shouldn’t be a flanker in melee, one stray attack will fold you up. If you don’t help your team, you won’t earn xp. If you get yourself killed, you won’t really earn much xp either.

You don’t know everything: You don’t know if something will work. Just because two enemies look alike, or even if I say they’re both the same enemy type, doesn’t mean they have the same stats. Deception happens, disguises are real, and variation abounds. Enemies can change their AC, their save DC’s, and their bonuses mid-fight with feats, spells, and magic items. The arena might alter the rules, interrupting spells or decreasing accuracy. Plus, being cocky is a bit annoying. Assuming you know the solution and pushing everybody out of the way is a bad plan, because there are more often than not elements you are missing. Make sure you consider things carefully.

Think ahead: You have time to discuss actions, and you have downtime before combat. It’s hard to cooperate if nobody knows what you’re planning to do, and people may catch errors you make if you don’t think ahead. It also lets you make cooperative team moves, and will let supports and AoE casters use their spells in a smart way rather than accidentally leaving you out or blowing you up. They might even think of a smart move for you to do that you didn’t think of.

No Retroacting: When you do something, it’s done. You can’t undo an attack later when you realize you had a better option. Additionally, if you forget to add damage, you can’t add it later. This isn’t an anime, things take effect when you do them.

Keep track of your stuff: It’s difficult to make a good plan if you lose things mid-combat, and it’s very frustrating to run out of arrows or potions mid-combat because you didn’t realize you were low.

Rolling Smart: If you have 8 attacks, it takes forever to roll to-hit, determine what lands, roll damage, and repeat for all eight. Try to roll relevant things together (i.e., the to-hit for all eight, then just the damage for what lands), and write things down as you roll them so you don’t have to keep track of a bunch of different numbers. Additionally, doing math beforehand can be helpful: if you know you need to hit a 25 and you know your bonus of 7, rather than adding 7 to everything you roll you can simply figure out that you need to roll an 18 and know whether you succeeded right away.

Roles and Basic Tactics

3.5 Classes have been defined as falling into 5 roles. Most classes are one or two, rarely will they be three. They have specific uses in combat.

• Utility- Not super relevant in combat, but often can be needed to alter the battlefield while others fight like unlocking a door or convincing a prisoner to help. Most utility will fall under another role as well.
• DPS- Deal damage! The key aspect to playing a DPS well is staying safe while you deal damage, and maneuvering around your tank to take out the relevant enemies without being put in danger.
• Tank- Take damage! The key aspect to playing a DPS is blocking off a monster's routes of attack so that the DPS, support, and Spell get hit as rarely as possible. You need to often accept that you aren’t gonna deal the most damage, and communicate your health to the healer.
• Support- Keep everyone alive and help them get there. Providing the DPS with the mobility and safety to get their job done, keeping the tank alive, and keeping the spells and supports in cover is your job. Make sure you know your team’s status and their needs.
• Spell- The key to a dedicated spellcaster is that they can drastically change the battlefield to suit your team. If the enemy has a ton of archers, a Sleet Storm just makes their arrows worthless. If the enemies have a very mobile foe, Hold Person makes them stop moving. They also often get access to some very powerful buffs and attacks. Make sure you are making the best effect for your team, not just the biggest explosion.

Every role has strengths and weaknesses, and you need to make sure you are accounting for them. As a rule, you want Tanks in front, spellcasters and support behind them, and the DPS wherever the main target is (or where they need to be to hit them, at least). In order to do this, a few things need to happen:

• Tanks need to ascertain the ways the enemies are going to approach and get in the way. Typically this is just the straight line between them and enemies, but occasionally the battlefield will define more routes.
• DPS need to coordinate where the enemies are going to be pinned, and find a Different route. This may entail flanking the pinned enemy, or circling around (or over) to get access to the enemy.
• Spellcasters and supports need to find cover. If enemies are melee, this just means distance. If there are ranged enemies, this can be physical cover or just making yourself a less appealing target than the tanks. These party members should also typically be responsible for a lot of the knowledge checks and observation, communicating this to the team, and setting up the party appropriately. If the enemy has AoE’s, you don’t want to be in one cluster where everyone gets hit with one attack. If the enemy has high single-target damage, you want to know where that damage is being dealt and be able to get healing there fast. If the enemy has buffs to dispel or counter, you want to be able to counter them.

Build and Versatility

In 3.5, versatility is better than optimization. It’s awesome to be able to deal tons of damage with one method, but the second you lose access to that method you are dead weight unless you have other options. It is very much better to have more options than just one good one, as you want to be competent at all aspects of your job and excel at a few select things, rather than be legendary at just one. To that end, a hypothetical scenario from the dearly departed:

Let's do an example: two rogues, identical stats, 10 str, 18 dex, 14 con, 16 int, 14 wis, 12 cha, same equipment, a dagger and studded leather armor. Average health rolls, so 33 hp.

Consider Jimmy the Rogue, level 6. Jimmy has put all 6 of his feats into two weapon fighting to get as many sneak attacks as possible in a turn. Arterial Strike and Ambush let him add bleed damage on top of this, with no damage penalty to his sneak attack.

Two Weapon Fighting

Weapon Finesse

Weapon Focus (Dagger)

Arterial Strike

Ambush

Craven

Now consider Timmy the Rogue, also level 6. Timmy has spread out his feats among a lot of solid base feats. He's extremely mobile, and has lots of feat trees open to him. He doesn't have a single feat to directly increase his damage output.

Weapon Finesse

Dodge

Mobility

Spring Attack

Run

Combat Expertise

Now let's compare their damage output when flanking. Jimmy has two attacks, and with all his feats this combines to give him 2d4 + 6d6 + 12 + 2 bleed/round damage per round. This is a lot of damage. Up to a maximum of 58 total in one round.

Timmy has one attack. This attack deals 1d4 + 3d6 damage in one round. Definitely not that impressive. A maximum of 22 damage per round.

Now let's see how this actually plays out. Stevey the Paladin is fighting with a big bad ogre barbarian, with a club with 10ft reach. He's taking hits fine, but he's just not dealing enough damage to win. The Rogue is positioned behind the ogre. If he moved in, he'd be flanking. Time to see who wins.

Jimmy moves in, provoking an AoO from the Ogre. His AC of 17 is in fact, not very effective against the Ogre's +16 to hit. He get bonkled, takes 2d8 + 13 damage and doesn't succeed in moving in, virtually guaranteed. Even on the off chance that he gets in, if someone else already provoked an AoO for an example, he gets just one attack, dealing at most 30 damage, about 1/3 of the Ogre's Health. Then the Ogre, annoyed by the Rogue who just shanked it, uses the weaker of its two attacks to bonkle him for 2d8 +13 damage.

Now let's see what happens with Timmy. Timmy can use Spring attack to move 3 squares in and 3 squares back out, staying out of the Ogre's 10 ft reach and provoking no AoO whatsoever. He gets one attack, hits, and deals at most 22 damage. At the end of this the Ogre's lost about 1/4th of it's health, and Timmy is safely out of reach. The Ogre is forced to either risk an AoO from Stevey or stay dishing out damage to the person built to take it.

As you can see the one that panned out better was the one with a broader, more comprehensive feat set. Jimmy failed at his role as a DPS because he wasn't able to safely get in, or safely get out, even though he could do plenty of damage. Timmy didn't do as much damage, but he succeeded because he could safely and reliably get in and out with no risk to himself, successfully filling the DPS role.

I could make a thousand examples, and Timmy would win out almost every time. Both of them need a flanker, but Jimmy's win condition requires him to have an enemy sit in front of him and do nothing for one round while he gets ready to full attack. Timmy meanwhile really only needs to have a flanking square within 15 ft, a much much easier win condition.

Thanks, dearly departed. This same scenario can be applied to almost any character. As a rule of thumb I like to have about a third and no more than half of a relevant option dedicated to a particular build, and the rest of that category dedicated to general improvement and options. This applies to feats, spells, skills, and even team plans or magic items.

Action Types

A significant chunk of the difficulty in 3.5 is the limited things you can do on your turn. These are represented by Actions. In order from largest, to smallest

• Full- This takes your entire round, and is all you can do. Full attack, a charge, and coup de grace are all examples of full-round action.
• Standard- You get one per round, and can also take a move action. As the name suggests, most single actions are standard: casting most spells, making one attack, or using most abilities.
• Move- You get one or two per round; if you take a move action you can also take a standard or another move. Most move actions involve moving your body: moving your speed, standing up, or drawing a weapon.
• Swift- You only get one per round, but it doesn’t take up any space. Swift actions are quick, but you need to take a moment to do them. This includes some feats, a few quick spells, and the like.
• Immediate- You only get one per round, but it doesn’t take up any space. Immediate actions are nearly interchangeable with swift actions, but you can use them at any time, not just your turn. This includes activating contingent effects, or releasing a readied action.
• Free- Takes no time, and you can do it as often as you want. Talking, thinking, looking. On your turn or others.

Usually you will get a full action or a move and a standard. Occasionally a modifier like a haste spell will give you extra, or a status like nauseated will remove some. Managing the things you need to get done, with the limited time you have to do them, is the crux of strategy.

Damage, Weapons, Rolls, and Crits

Usually you can deal damage 3 ways: physical attacks, magical (i.e. energy) attacks, or environmental hazards. Every time you attack an enemy with a weapon, you roll a to-hit check on a d20 versus their AC. This comes with an array of bonuses and penalties, unique to each scenario.

• Flanking: When two allies are on opposite sides of a foe, that foe needs to pay attention to both in order to effectively engage them. If you flank a foe, you get a +2 to hit them.
• Touch Attacks: When you only need to touch a foe in order to deal damage to them, you can ignore much of their armor. Most touch attacks will be spells.
• Flat-Footed: When a foe isn’t paying attention, you can ignore their dex mod to AC and their dodge bonus.
• Shooting into Melee: Unless you have precise shot, attempting to shoot a target who is engaged in melee combat has a -4 penalty, and if you miss by 4 or more you hit the other person engaged.
• Cover: If you are hiding behind a wall, barrel, or other large thing that can prevent you from being hit, you have cover. Cover normally provides a +4 to AC, +2 to reflex against relevant saves, lets you make a Hide check, and blocks AoO’s. If the cover is Low (half your height), it only provides cover to those close to it and from those farther away. If the cover is a Creature, it doesn’t allow for a hide check or provide the +2 to REF. If you have a sizable majority of your body behind a suitable cover, such as an arrow slit, a shield wall, etc you have Improved cover, which doubles the AC and REF bonuses and gives a +10 to Hide. If you are completely behind a solid obstacle without any way around, you are in Total cover and simply cannot be targeted.
• Vision: If you don’t have a Barrier between you, but something is blocking you from being seen, such as smoke, heavy rain, or darkness, you have Concealment. Concealment provides a 20% chance that any attack against you misses. If you are completely unable to be seen, you have Total Concealment, which is a 50% miss chance and they cannot take an AoO against you. Occasionally concealment will be modified, but rarely.
• High Ground: If you fight a foe who is lower than you in melee, you get a +1
• Squeezing: If you are attempting to squeeze through tight space, all attacks are made at a -4, and your AC is also at a -4 penalty.
• Kneeling/Sitting/Prone: If you are kneeling or sitting you get -2 AC against melee attacks, but +2 against ranged. If you are prone, these double.

Critical Hits

In 3.5, if you roll a natural 20, or lower for certain weapons, you have a Critical Threat; you have struck a vital area, and can deal large amounts of damage.

Whenever you get a critical threat, you roll again to confirm your success against the same AC. If you succeed, your damage is multiplied based on the weapon, usually x2.

In 3.6, you also get a bonus effect based on a d12 for location and d6 for effect, off our crit table. Also in 3.6: if you roll a 20 on both the original roll, and the confirm roll, you get a double crit: the damage is multiplied by the crit mod twice. Aka x2, then x2 again. If you roll 3 20s in a row, the target is instantly killed by the attack.

In 3.5 if you roll a natural 1 on any check you cannot add any bonus and it is a catastrophic failure, typically leading to a setback in the effort. In 3.6 you can also use this table to determine what sort of setback you face if you roll a natural 1 in combat.

To Determine which Body Part is Struck

d12 Result	Body Region
1	Right Lower Leg
2	Left Lower Leg
3	Right Upper Leg
4	Left Upper Leg
5	Left Upper Arm
6	Right Upper Arm
7	Left Lower Arm
8	Right Lower Arm
9	Abdomen
10	Chest
11	Neck
12	Head

To Determine the Effect on the Struck Body Part

Location chosen- d6	Slashing	Piercing	Bludgeoning	Energy
d6 Result-Lower Leg	Can sever foot at 1/5
1	Item in area takes same damage	>	>	>
2	Normal Critical Mod	>	>	>
3	Ankle Damage: Half Speed, 1d4 Dex	>	>	>
4	Achilles: 1/4 Speed	Nailed Down: Immobilized, Bonus Attack	Shinshatter: 1d8 Dex	>
5	Swept Leg: Knock Prone	>	>	>
6	Foot Damage: Half Speed, 1d6 Dex Damage	>	>	>
d6 Result- Upper Leg	Can sever leg at 1/4
1	Item in area takes same damage	>	>	>
2	Normal Critical Mod	>	>	>
3	Knee Damage: Half speed, 1d4 Str	>	>	>
4	Hamstring: 1/4 speed	>	Kneecap: 1d4 Str, 1d4 Dex	>
5	Hammer: 10' knockback	>	>	>
6	Bloody Wound: 2d4 Bleed	>	Shattered Pelvis: 1d6 Dex, 1d4 Con	Nerve Damage: 1d4 Wis, 1d4 Dex
d6 Result-Upper Arm	Can sever arm at 1/4
1	Item in area takes same damage	>	>	>
2	Normal Critical Mod	>	>	>
3	Elbow Damage: 1d6 Str	>	>	>
4	Shatter Bone: 1d6 Str, 1d6 Dex	>	>	>
5	Shoulder Damage: 1d8 Str	>	>	>
6	Cleft Collar: 1d8 Str, Fatigue 1d6 rounds	Rending Stab: 3d8 Bonus Damage	Crush Collar: 1d8 Str, 1d4 Con	Nerve Damage: 1d4 Wis, 1d4 Dex
d6 Result-Lower Arm	Can sever hand at 1/5
1	Item in area takes same damage	>	>	>
2	Normal Critical Mod	>	>	>
3	Finger Damage: 1d4 Dex (1/8 sever)	>	>	>
4	Slash Wrist: 2d4 Bleed	>	Crush Hand: 1d6 Dex	Extreme Pain: Nauseated 1d4 Rounds
5	Elbow Damage: 1d6 Str	>	>	>
6	Slash Away: Disarm	Nailed: Hand Immobilized, Bonus Attack	Shatter Wrist: 1d4 Dex, 1d4 Str	Blow Away: Disarm
d6 Result-Abdomen
1	Item in area takes same damage	>	>	>
2	Normal Critical Mod	>	>	>
3	Eviscerate: 1d3 Con Damage	>	Spine Damage: +1 Crit Mod	Visceral Shock: Nauseated 2d4 Rounds
4	Groin Damage: Stagger 2d6 rounds	>	>	>
5	Disemboweled: 2d4 Bleed	Skewered: Entangled, Bonus Attack	Gut Punch: Nauseated 2d4 Rounds	Organ Burst: 2d4 Bleed Damage
6	Spine Damage: Paralyze 1d6 rounds	>	>	>
d6 Result-Chest
1	Item in area takes same damage	>	>	>
2	Normal Critical Mod	>	>	>
3	Wicked Gash- 1d3 Con Damage	Heart Stab: +1 Crit Mod	Broken Ribs: Fatigued	Heart Stutter: Dazed 1d4 rounds
4	Wedged- Bonus attack to pull out	Punctured Lung: 1d3 Str, Fatigued	Walloped: Knocked Prone	Lung Damage- 1d3 Str, Fatigued
5	Bloody Wound- 1d6 Bleed	>	Broken Collarbone: 1d6 Str	Lingering Energy- 1d6 lingering damage
6	Slit Muscle: 1d6 Str damage	Run Through: Entangled, Bonus attack	Kidneys Bruised: Nauseated 1d6 rounds	Blast Back: 10' knockback
d6 Result-Neck	Full HP can sever
1	Item in area takes same damage	>	>	>
2	Normal Critical Mod	>	>	>
3	Throat Cut: +1 Crit Mod	Impaled- Bonus attack to pull out	Broken Neck- 1d6 Dex Damage	Nerve Damage- 1d6 Dex Damage
4	Bloody Wound- 2d6 Bleed Damage	Bloody Wound- 1d6 Bleed damage	>	>
5	Windpipe Damage- Muted, Suffocation	>	>	>
6	Nerve Damage: 1d4 Wis, 1d4 Dex	>	Crushed Throat: Fatigue 1d6 min	>
d6 Result-Head	Eyes+Ears take 1/8 health to destroy
1	Item in area takes same damage	>	>	>
2	Normal Critical Mod	>	>	>
3	Split Skull- 1d4 Int Damage	Headshot: +1 Crit Mod	Head Crushed: +1 Crit Mod	Ears Burst- Deafened 1d6 rounds
4	Facial Damage- 1d4 Cha Damage	>	>	>
5	Eye Slash- Blinded 1d6 minutes	Eyeshot- Blind 1d6 rounds, +1 Mod	Concussion: 1d4 Int Damage, Confused 1d6 round	Eyes Damaged- Blind 1d6 min
6	Jaw Chop- Muted 1d6 minutes	Lobe Damage- 1d3 Int, Wis Damage	Knocked Loose: Stunned 1d4 rounds	Overwhelmed- 1d6 Wis damage, Dazzled 1d6 rounds

From: Critical Hits and Called Shots

Damage Types

Weapons can usually deal four types of damage:

• Slashing: Uses an edge to cut. Usually most effective against thick foes with tough skin or flab that needs to be split. Not usually effective against extremely hard surfaces. Will occasionally separate into secret categories for specific tasks: Slicing (drags edge along surface, leaving long and relatively shallow cuts) and Hacking (drives edge into surface, leaving deep and splitting cuts). Swords and axes are slashing damage (slicing and hacking, respectively).
• Piercing: Uses a point to stab. Usually most effective against quick moving foes with targetable weak points. Not usually effective against deflecting armor. Will occasionally separate into secret categories for specific tasks: Stabbing (opens a wound with sharp edges and usually comes back out, leaving a mostly closed wound) and Impaling (opens a wound with a wedge and may stay in, leaving a mostly open wound). Spears, arrows, and picks are piercing damage (stabbing and impaling, respectively).
• Bludgeoning: Strikes with a blunt surface or corner. Usually most effective against solid surfaces and armored foes. Not usually effective against soft-bodied or slippery foes. Will occasionally separate into secret categories for specific tasks: Smashing (faster impact on a relatively small surface, denting and damaging a spot) and Crushing (slower impact on a relatively large surface, smashing the entire thing, or something squeezing). Hammers, clubs, and giant rocks are bludgeoning (smashing and crushing respectively).
• Subdual: Concussive strikes from a softer or rounded object. Also called non-lethal damage. No effect against objects or undead. Cannot be reduced below zero HP by subdual damage. Saps and batons are subdual.

Each weapon will deal a specific die of damage, listed in its entry.

Sizes

Weapons usually come in 3 different sizes.

• Light weapons: Small, quick, lightweight. Can be used in a grapple, easier to use in the off-hand, and can be used with Dex for weapon finesse. If in your off-hand you only deal ½ your STR mod on a melee attack. There’s no bonus for two-handing one, as well. Daggers and Rapiers are light weapons.
• One-Handed. Standard size, used in one hand. If you attack with one hand in melee, you add your STR mod to damage. If you use both hands to hold a one-handed weapon, it deals 1 ½ your STR mod. Longswords and Maces are one-handed weapons.
• Two-Handed. Large, requires two hands to maneuver. Usually higher damage, and longer reach. Most ranged weapons are two-handed. In melee, you deal 1 ½ your STR mod. Warhammers and Pikes are two-handed weapons.

Reach and Range

Weapons default to have a reach equal to the person wielding them, aka 5’ for a human (more below). Some weapons have more reach, letting you hit further away but not close to you, like a polearm. Some weapons have reach and let you hit closer, like a chain weapon. Some weapons are Ranged weapons, which let you shoot or throw a projectile at a target. You don’t get any STR mod to this damage normally, and you get a -2 if you are out of your listed range, multiplied by 2 each time further than that. Using a ranged weapon in melee will get you hit, and ranged weapons are not good against objects.

Other Features

• Two-ended: two business ends. Can be used as if dual-wielding, and applies the dual wielding rules if so.
• Trip or Disarm bonus: give an appropriate bonus to tripping or disarming, typically having prongs or barbs for this purpose.

Magical Attacks

Magical attacks can do any number of things, but USUALLY are one of two options:

• Target is automatically hit, and has to make a save or be affected
• Caster needs to roll to hit a target, who is then affected (maybe makes a save)

Magic typically deals damage in one of ten types, and can also deal physical damage occasionally. DR does not apply to energy damage, ER does!

• Fire: Heat or flame to cause burns. This is not unique to magic and can be found in any fire or lava, but is very common in magic attacks. This is a type of Energy Damage. Fire deals half damage to most objects, and can set things on fire for 1d6 damage/round. Fire often beats things that regenerate health, or creatures of darkness.
• Cold: Extremely low temperatures to cause things to freeze. This is not unique to magic and can be found in cold regions, but is very common in magic attacks. This is a type of Energy Damage. Cold deals ¼ damage to most objects, and can occasionally reduce hardness. Cold often affects energy-based creatures.
• Acid: Acids or bases to corrode and eat away. This is not unique to magic, and can be found in natural acids and bases, but is very common in magic attacks. This is a type of Energy Damage. Acid deals normal damage to most objects, and can often ignore hardness. Acid is usually very effective against foes’ items, and can leave lingering damage.
• Electric: High currents to shock flesh and burn. This is not unique to magic and can be found in natural lightning or charged objects, but is very common in magic attacks. This is a type of Energy Damage. Electric deals half damage to most objects. Electric often beats natural creatures.
• Sonic: Loud sound and vibrations to shake apart. This is not unique to magic and can be found in any loud explosion or crash, but is very common in magic attacks. This is a type of Energy Damage. Sonic deals normal damage to objects, and can often ignore hardness. Sonic usually deafens targets, and is rarely guarded against.
• Positive: Life energy, stitching together wounds and charging the soul. Positive energy is life-force, and heals mortals. It destroys undead however. If you are overcharged with life-force to double your normal max, you will disintegrate. This is a type of Energy Damage. This has no effect on objects.
• Negative: Death energy, opening old scars and festering wounds. Negative energy is entropy, and injures mortals. It heals undead however. If you die of negative energy, you often rise as undead. This is a type of Energy Damage. This has no effect on objects.
• Force: Pure kinetic impact imparted to the target, usually by some kind of force attack or sudden deceleration without impacting a solid surface. Force almost never occurs without a magic attack of some kind. Force deals normal damage to objects.
• Psychic: stress and mental strain literally tearing the psyche and brain apart. Psychic damage has no effect on a target without a mind, including many undead, slimes, or objects. Almost nothing has resilience to psychic damage.
• Eldritch: Raw magic energy, warping and damaging. Untyped magic damage, like an eldritch blast or a retributive strike from a staff of the magi, comes as eldritch damage.

Environmental Damage

Environmental damage can come from a number of things, including physical damage from sharp objects, bludgeoning impacts from falling objects, or energy damage from flames or lightning. It has some damage types unique to it, however.

• Fatigue: If a character gets too tired, they take nonlethal damage as their very body starts to give out. Can happen from long travel or magical effects.
• Abrasion: Slow rubbing with grit, grinding away the surface. Can occur from sliding along a rough surface, a sandstorm, or magical effects.
• Exposure: Combination of sunburn, cold, heat, and wind. Can occur from being outside unprotected for too long.
• Suffocation: Slow damage from difficulty breathing. Only occurs if someone needs to breathe. If a character runs out of air fast, they need to make increasingly difficult saves or drop to zero, then -1, then zero. If they slowly run out of air, or are strangled, they will take first nonlethal damage from suffocation, then they fall to the same death as fast suffocation.
• Desiccation: Water being removed from a living being. Only functions against organic water-filled bodies. Can occur from long periods of exposure, severe dryness, or magical effects.
• Bloodloss: Damage over time, each point of “bleed” deals one damage from blood loss each round. This can happen from a jagged weapon, magical effects, or bad injuries.
• Supernatural: Everything else. Time burn from extreme aging, annihilation from antimatter, reality warping, deleting part of your body, etc. Usually magical, hard to account for.

Movement, Reach, and AoOs

Movement: One square on a map is 5’x5’. Your speed is the distance you can cover in a single move action. Actions that move you further, like a run action or a charge will list their movement relative to this value, rather than a flat value. Moving diagonally follows a special rule: moving one counts as 5’, but the next is 10’: two diagonals totals 15, 4 totals 30, etc. Occasionally, certain areas will affect your movement: this is called Difficult Terrain. This can include heavy rubble, a steep incline, slippery ice, or thorny brambles, etc. Usually this doubles movement costs (one square counts as 10’), but it can even triple or quadruple. Some areas will have additional effects, like damage when walking on hot coals, or needing a balance check to not slip on ice. The DM will explain these. You can take both actions in a turn to move in a Hustle, which is double your move, or take a Run action which is full-round and is triple. With the Run feat you can move quadruple on a run, and sustain a running pace for longer. There are rules for traveling, but those are really only useful to know for DM’s.

Some creatures have alternate movement modes. If they have a speed listed in one of these, they can move that speed without any check. A creature without the appropriate speed may have to make a check to move in that method.

• Burrow: Digging through a relatively soft substrate. Most creatures with a burrow speed cannot burrow through solid stone. When burrowing, consider movement in 5x5x5’ cubes instead of squares, for the same rules of distance. A creature without a burrow speed cannot burrow.
• Climb: Scaling and traversing vertical or hanging surfaces. Most creatures with a climb speed require some sort of handhold or grip, but some can do it on smooth surfaces. A creature without a climb speed can make a successful Climb check to move ¼ their speed (difficulty based on surface), and a check 5 higher to move ½ their speed. You lose your Dex bonus to AC when climbing unless you have a climb speed, and attacking is difficult.
• Fly: Travelling through the air. Anything with a fly speed also has a maneuverability class, which determines how fast they can accelerate, decelerate, climb, dive, and turn. A creature without a fly speed cannot fly, but they can attempt to jump…
• Jump: This doesn’t have a move speed listed for any creature. With a running start, you can long jump a distance with an equal DC (10’=DC 10). Faster and slower creatures have an easier and harder time respectively. You can also jump up a distance with a DC 4 times as high (5’=DC 20).
• Swim: Traversing liquid. Swim speeds assume moving through water usually, but most liquids are similar. A creature without a swim speed can make a swim check to move ¼ their speed (difficulty based on water motion), but this is difficult for encumbered creatures and very tiring. Using slashing or bludgeoning weapons underwater is difficult even for things with a swim speed, and using ranged weapons in water is mostly useless. Shooting from land into water gives the target cover, but not the other way around. With a successful swim check, a non-swimming creature can retain their DEX mod and fight fairly effectively with a piercing weapon.

Reach: Normal humans have a reach of 5’, meaning they can hit a creature in a 5’ square adjacent to them. Weapons that have reach can let you hit further: for example, a polearm with 10’ reach lets you hit somebody 10’ away, or two squares away. The reach listed on weapons is relative to something with a 5’ reach; some creatures also have longer reach, like a giant. If something with naturally longer reach uses a reach weapon, subtract 5 from the weapons’ reach and add it to the creature’s in order to find total reach. So an ogre with 10’ reach using a polearm with 10’ reach adds up to 15’ reach total.

Five Foot Step: This is a special action that is very useful to combat. Think of a quick reposition, rather than a full movement. A 5 foot step could be treated as a swift action, but does not take up your swift action. It allows you to move 5 feet and still take the rest of your actions; however you cannot move and 5fs in the same turn. The tactical benefit of a 5fs is that you do not provoke Attacks of Opportunity for doing so (unless something has a specific rare feat) which lets you move into melee against something with reach and then make a full attack. You can 5fs with swim or climb if you have the relevant move speed, and fly if you have a perfect fly speed. You cannot 5fs with burrow or jump, or by crawling. Attacks of Opportunity: These have been discussed a bit earlier, but in-depth; in combat, you are assumed to be en garde, defending yourself in some sense. When you leave yourself wide open on your turn by doing certain things, anybody in melee with you (or rarely at range) can take the chance to attack you with an AoO. These resolve like regular attacks in almost every way, barring special circumstances. Normally you get 1 AoO per combat round, but the feat Combat Reflexes allows you to make a number equal to your DEX mod. In 3.6, an AoO dealing 1/5th of your health stops you from doing whatever you were doing to provoke it: hard to draw a sword when a dragon tail slaps you. A lot of things provoke AoO, and I’ll discuss 5 of them specifically. Other than these, consider if you could block a punch doing the thing and if not, it probably provokes AoO.

• Moving out of a threatened space. A threatened space is any square that a creature could hit with a melee attack. This can include moving from one threatened space to another, or moving from a threatened space to a non-threatened one. Every square you exit provokes an AoO, not just the first. This usually happens three ways: moving close to something with reach, leaving melee, or running past something. There are a few primary ways to avoid this:
  • Taking a 5 foot step: this doesn’t provoke any AoO!
  • The Mobility feat: +4 AC against specifically this type of AoO
  • Tumbling: The Tumble skill lets you move through threatened spaces without being attacked on a success
  • Spring Attack: You don’t provoke movement AoO from your attack target when using a spring attack
  • Move undetected: You cannot be AoO’d if they cannot see you.
• Casting a spell. If you cast a spell in melee, you provoke AoO. If you are hit, you need to make a concentration check to not lose the spell (DC 10+Spell Level+Damage taken+misc mods) You can Cast Defensively to avoid this: a DC 15+Spell Level+misc mods Concentration check, on success you do not provoke AoO.
• Almost any ranged attack. This is very hard to avoid, you either need a specific kind of feat or a 5fs out of melee before making the ranged attack.
• Standing up from prone. This is a move action, and you will get hit unless you have the Nimble Stand feat.
• Drawing a weapon or taking out an item. This is usually a move action unless you have the Quick Draw feat, and you will get hit either way.

AoOs can be a very effective deterrent for certain behavior, but tough or high AC characters can choose to do them anyway and take the hit.

Special Attacks and Called Shots

When you choose to attack, normally you deal damage. However, you have a couple other options, called Special attacks. Each follows their own little set of rules. Almost all special attacks use the Size mod, which I alter slightly in 3.6 for balance: refer to the chart if playing with me.

• Charge: Running right at a foe and smacking them. A full round action: move double your speed in a straight line, and perform a single melee attack at the end. +2 to hit, -2 AC for the round. A good, if risky, way to close distance and confirm a good hit.
• Grapple: Grabbing somebody and attempting to hold them down. Without Improved Grapple, this provokes AoO. After that, you first make a touch attack to grab them, then both players roll a grapple check. The bonus to grapple check is the same as melee attack bonus, plus the special size mod and misc modifiers. You can do a lot of stuff in grapples, but here are the big ones:
  • You advance grapples on your turn, like volleyball rules. If you attempt a grapple check and fail, nothing happens. If the opponent initiates a grapple check and you fail, they succeed.
  • Grappling takes time and limits your options, but once you’ve succeeded the opponent is pinned and has almost no options, which is basically a death sentence.
  • Grappling is better for subduing creatures and preventing them from doing anything, not killing them.
  • Many monsters will attempt to grapple and eat you, so having a decent grapple mod is helpful
  • Unlike attacks, being big is good in a grapple
• Bull Rush: Shoving a foe back. Without Improved Bull Rush, this provokes AoO. After that, you make opposed STR checks plus size mod- big is good in bullrush. If you win, they get pushed back 5 feet, more if you go with them. If you fail, nothing happens. If you shove your target into a square they cannot stand in (has somebody in it, or a wall, etc), they fall over.
• Trip: Attempting to knock a foe down. Without Improved Trip, this provokes AoO. After that, make a touch attack to grab them. If you hit, you and the target roll STR or DEX checks. If you win, they’re knocked prone, but if you fail they can try to trip you. If you use a weapon to trip, you can drop the weapon to avoid it. Big is good when attempting to trip somebody, but little is good when trying to avoid being tripped.
• Disarm: Attempting to knock a foe’s weapon out of their hand. Without Improved Disarm, this provokes AoO. Afterwards, you and the target both make melee attack rolls: bigger weapons and bigger people are good in a disarm check. If you win, they drop their weapon if you’re armed or in your hand if unarmed.
• Overrun: Run right through or over your foe. This always provokes AoO, and without Improved Overrun the target can give up the AoO to just let you pass. This is a standard action you can take in the middle of a move, but doesn't cost anything if they let you go. After the AoO, you make a STR check versus your opponent’s STR or DEX check, if you win they are knocked prone and you keep moving. Big is good for overrun. If you fail they can reverse it and attempt to knock you prone. This can easily be done on a mount.
• Sunder: Attempt to smash their weapon or armor. Without Improved Sunder, this provokes AoO. After, you make an opposed attack roll (if attempting to sunder a weapon) or the AC of the item you’re trying to break. Big is good for sunder. If you succeed, you roll damage as normal. If you are hitting an object that is harder than the thing you strike with, you can damage the thing you’re striking with as well.
• Aid Another: If you are threatening the same foe as an ally, you can roll an attack against AC 10 to give them a +2 to AC or Attack for a turn instead of damage.
• Feint: As a standard action, roll a bluff check vs their sense motive. If you succeed, they lose their dex bonus against Your next attack on this turn or the next. With Improved Feint, this becomes a move action. This is mainly used to allow a melee rogue to get a sneak attack without a flanker. Unintelligent things cannot be fainted against.

Called Shots

If you want, you can specifically target a particular body part with an attack. This has a -4 penalty, and body parts are smaller than the entire body and are thus harder to hit. You can ask what the penalty for a called shot is, but you must declare it before a roll. If you deal enough damage, the targeted body part can be rendered useless (or cut off, with a slashing weapon). In 3.6, dealing this damage triggers the appropriate critical effect, all info is on the crit table. Limbs require ¼ health to destroy (as does head/neck/torso/abdomen for crit effects only, they are only destroyed when the creature dies); hands, feet, wings, and tails are 1/5th. Eyes, ears, fingers, etc are 1/8th. Called Shots and Critical Hits share the same table at Critical Hits and Called Shots

Magic

Magic is the hardest and largest system of DND 3.5. It takes up half the Player's Handbook, it applies to half the classes, and this tutorial spend the least time on it. Why is this, you might ask? The reason magic is difficult is twofold- People don't bother to learn it, and people don't bother to try it. Magic is not hard because the system is impossible to learn, it's just overwhelming for a lot of people. There are a LOT of spells. The thing is, you don’t need to know 90% of them, even if you’re a wizard. This tutorial sums up the mechanics, but you need to do the next part: actually try to play a decent spellcaster. So many people say "magic is confusing", play only martials for two years, then become a wizard who only casts Fireball, never summons, scries, abjures, or plans, then gets shot twice by a goblin and dies. This guide aims to teach you how to create powerful, compelling, and above all versatile spellcasters.

Magic Debrief

First is understanding how spells work. Spellcasters have access to Spell Slots, which are the number of charges they have to burn on spells. There is no mana system in 3.5. Each spell has a Spell Level, and more powerful spells have a higher spell level. Casters get access to a certain number of spells at each level per day. Some spellcasters only know a certain number of spells, some know their whole available list. Most casters are either spontaneous or prepared. Spontaneous casters don’t need to assign their slots, they pick what spell they use in the slot as they cast it. Prepared casters pick which spell goes in which slot ahead of time.

When you cast a spell, it requires a certain action (usually standard), and this will provoke AoO. You usually need to say some magic words and wave your hands around, but not always- the spell will tell you whether it needs verbal, somatic, or material components, or some combination of the three. You might need to make a concentration check, or another check, to succeed. If you succeed, whatever is written in the spell’s description happens. When you cast a spell, you use up its slot. You get this slot back after you long rest. Every spell has its own effect, and that’s completely written down. You just need to read it.

If you want to be a fun spellcaster, you first need to actually think about the spells you take. If you take Fireball because explosion and spam it over and over, you’ll get boring fast. There are an incredible array spells available to you, and they can combine with each other in all sorts of interesting ways- Diversity and versatility is the boon of the caster, and if you use it you can be the strongest party member by far. If not, you will just be a glass cannon.

Second, you need to learn what your spells do, and think about the options they have. Know the range, know what it does, know whether it has a save or needs an SR check. Know if your Lightning Bolt does damage to objects (yes, only half), if it can hit ghosts (yes, half the time), and if it works on golems (nope, except flesh- it charges them up!) Since you’re a spellcaster, you have access to knowledge skills, and you can use them on everything, whenever you want. The more you know, the better.

Third, you should take spells that give you more options, rather than better versions of options you already have. Obviously you shouldn’t only have one attack spell, but if 10 of your 12 spells are AoE you’re falling behind. A good spellcaster should have a wide array of tools, and you can empower weaker spells in a lot of ways.

Every magic class plays differently, and I can't teach you how to play them all. You learn by playing, by getting experience with the class. Plus, you can play a single class any number of different ways by changing your spells.

Magic offers something unique- you can do most of the stuff you can imagine. If you want to make new spells, or flavor text your spells, go for it! I love magic creativity, far more than I enjoy uninvested and mediocre spellcasters. Have fun with magic, and it works fine.

A Few Magic Types

I’m not going to cover all of magic, but I’ll talk about a few things worth knowing.

Spell Schools

All spells fall under one of 9 schools, which are broad categories describing what or how that class of spell behaves.

• Abjuration: The study of magic and its applications in preventative and protective spells. Abjuration can be used in any number of defensive manners, including barriers, antimagic, damaging wards, resistances, blocking other spells, and shields. An important subset is the dispelling and banishing subset, driving away magic, outsiders, or other threats. Some important spells include protection from evil, resist energy, explosive runes, antimagic field, antiplant shell, dispel magic, banishment, and Mordenkainen's disjunction.
• Conjuration: The study of magic's ability to change the position of objects and entities as well as magic ability to construct those objects and entities. Conjuration subschools include the five following. Calling; bringing a being wholly and physically to your location and plane. Creation; assembling an object or creature out of magical and elemental energy. Healing; drawing together and constructing healthy bodies and souls. Summoning; bringing a being partially, through a constructed form or avatar, to your location and plane. Teleportation; moving a being or object from location to location, or plane to plane. Important spells include summon monster, cure, teleport, major creation, wall of iron, resurrection, and gate
• Divination: The ability of magic to reveal knowledge and senses. They can probe time, space, minds, souls, and the very fabric of reality if used properly. The scrying subschool involves any spell that creates a "sensor" that the caster may receive information from, as opposed to changing their view or giving an answer. Some important spells include identify, detect magic, detect thoughts, clairvoyance/clairaudience, and true seeing
• Enchantment: Not to be confused with the enchantments placed to change the nature of weapons or other objects, is the use of magic to influence the complex machine known as the mind. The school of enchantment is smaller than the others, and includes charms, which change views but not actions, and compulsions which change actions. Important spells include charm person and suggestion
• Evocation: The simplest but often most powerful school, which concerns itself with raw expression of energy and power from nothingness. Most evocation spells are dangerous at best, though some have restraint. Some important spells include magic missile, bigby's crushing hand, fireball, lightning bolt, wall of force, sending, and light
• Illusion: The use of deception, in every form. This includes 5 forms: figments which are temporary and general, glamers which change the apparent qualities of a subject, patterns which produce a figment that affects the minds of those who encounter it, phantasms which are unique to the receiver, and shadows which contain some amount of energy and thus can produce real effects. All illusion spells rely on belief, and can be defeated by disbelief. Illusion and enchantment are connected by their ability to affect minds, and are often blurry in areas. Important spells include silent image, invisibility, veil, phantasmal killer, and hypnotic pattern
• Necromancy: The ability of magic to create an unnatural set of things known as undead, and to stifle the life force of living beings. Necromancy, while often creating similar effects to enchantments, conjurations, and evocations, is classified as a separate school for its wholly evil and destructive nature, that is inimical to the safety of living beings. Important spells include cause fear, animate dead, ghoul touch and finger of death
• Transmutation: The most diverse in results. All transmutation spells involve changing the nature, shape, or reality of a subject. There are no true boundaries between subschools of transmutation, as they all involve change and fluidity of reality. Important spells include rope trick, enlarge person, knock, stoneskin, fly, haste, polymorph, telekinesis, time stop, and shapechange
• Universal: Simply reality-altering spells with no real classification, such as arcane mark and wish.

Divine and Arcane

Divine spells are effects created by a powerful divine being, like a god, demon, spirit, or force of nature, that a caster can invoke by calling upon the being. Divine casters do not possess their own ability to make these effects, although they may be empowered by the connection to the being. Important divine casters are Clerics and Druids. Arcane spells are effects created by a mortal, typically a wizard or sorcerer. The caster has their own ability to create these effects, although it may come from study or some sort of power imparted on them. Bards and warlocks are also arcane casters.

Invocations and Spell-Like Abilities

Some spellcasters, such as warlocks, use Invocations instead of spells. These are Spell Like Abilities, which are abilities that for most purposes follow the rules of spells. Many monsters have SLA, such as the ability of demons to teleport. Rather than write the demon a new teleport ability, giving it teleport as an SLA lets it use the existing teleport effect. Warlocks as well as a few other casters use Invocations, which are typically unlimited use SLAs, instead of spells. Shadowcasters and Witches use effects similar to invocations, as well as the homebrew classes Sentinel, Chaplain, and Soulblade.

Chaos Magic

The offcore Chaos Mage class uses a new system, called Chaos Magic. They can build their own spells, using a set of guidelines, to create any effect they imagine. Rather than using spell slots, each spell takes a toll on their health. It requires a lot of creativity, but allows a lot of power.

Caster Level Checks

Certain spells require you to make a Caster Level Check, which is d20+Caster Level. I.e, a 7th level wizard/7th level fighter would have class level 14, but caster level 7. The four main cases that use CLC are:

• Spell Resistance: Some creatures can ignore spells from a weak mage. In order to affect them, you need to beat the value of their SR on a CLC.
• Dispel: Dispelling magic effects takes a strong mage. You need to beat 11+the caster level of the creator of the magic on a CLC +dispel bonuses.
• Teleport: It’s difficult to accurately target teleporting and plane-shifting spells. A high CLC will make the area of arrival more precise.
• Curing Disease or Poison: In 3.5, remove disease and neutralize poison automatically work, but in 3.6 you need to beat their save DC on a CLC. This means strong venoms and diseases demand a strong caster to remove them.

Concentration

In 3.5, you need to make a concentration check to cast a spell based on ongoing damage, disruptive conditions like a storm or rolling ship, or irritating noises. In 3.6, you also need to account for damage taken since your last round, which makes it a little more even for a martial to control a caster rather than the caster just needing to 5fs away and disintegrate them.

Classes

There are a whole bunch of classes used in 3.6. Hundreds, in fact. Rather than list them all here, a comprehensive list of all the classes used in 3.6e can be found on the page for 3.6e Classes.

Saves and Statuses

Savings Throws and Why you Care

When your character is faced with something they proactively deal with, you have a lot of options. However, when you are faced with something that you have no choice on, and must simply endure, you use a Savings Throw. These are used on all sorts of effects, so they are very important. There are three types of saves in 3.5:

• Fortitude Save: Your physical toughness. This is used to endure diseases, poisons, energy drain, and other body damaging-effects. Any effect that would exhaust, nauseate, blind, or deafen would usually provoke a fortitude save. Stun or instant death effects often use a fortitude save as well. This improves based on your Constitution.
• Reflex Save: Your ability to avoid danger. This is primarily used to dodge danger, such as taking cover from a blast, getting out from under a falling object, or avoiding a number of thrown objects. Almost all AoE effects provoke a reflex save for half damage. This improves based on your Dexterity
• Will Save: Your mental toughness. This is used to endure fear, shame, despair, rage, or other emotional effects. Any effect that would control your mind, read your thoughts, confuse you, or damage your thinking would usually provoke a will save. Stun or instant death effects often use a will save as well. This improves based on your Wisdom.

All of your savings throws use a Base Save, determined by your class, use an ability score, and have miscellaneous modifiers. A barbarian will have a good fort save, but probably will lack in Will. A wizard might be the opposite. These can be bolstered with feats and magic items.

With this in mind, why are saves important? You may take full damage from a fireball, but you can just heal that, right? This would be true, were it not for 3.5’s system of Save-disable and Save-or-Die. A Confusion spell gives you a 10% chance of being able to do what you want, for the entire duration. Your whole battle plan is out the window. All you get to stop that, if you can’t prevent it being cast, is a single will save. You fail, your character is functionally out of the fight. At higher levels, a Finger of Death spell kills you. No damage, you just die. Like Confusion, you only get a Fortitude save, and if you fail that save your character is dead. The save has a fair variance (1-20), and all you can do is make sure your bonus is good, and occasionally give yourself a boost with a spell or two. As a rule of thumb, the DC for any save will be around 10+the monster’s level, give or take. A 10th level monster will have effects at around save DC 20. That means if you have no bonus to the save, you have a 5% chance of succeeding. If you’ve got a +9, you’ve got 50-50 odds (11 makes it), and a +10 means you’re just slightly ahead. If you’re fighting monsters appropriate for your level, you want your saves to be around equal to your level to have even odds of survival, and 5-10 higher than that if you want it to be a sure thing. If your saves are 5-10 below your level, you’re almost guaranteed to fail those saves when they come up.

Status Effects

It’s difficult to fight when you’re messed up, and when you’re fighting tentacle monsters and evil wizards you tend to get all sorts of messed up. This is a list of the base status effects, so you know how to defend them, cure them, and use them on your foes. Many feats and spells will do a slightly modified version, and those will be listed in the entry. Default to that.

• Ability Damage and Drain: Lowers ability scores. This is typically from disease or poison but can occur from all kinds of things. Ability Damage recovers on its own, but Ability Drain is permanent and cannot be recovered except via magical means. Generally if one of your scores goes to 0 bad shit happens, so don't let that happen.
• Blindness: Can't see shit. -2 to AC, no dex AC, move at half speed, -4 to search checks and most str and dex skills. Can't do anything that relies on vision. All opponents have total concealment. Can gradually be overcome if it's present for a long time, ask your DM
• Blown Away: Blown away by high winds. A creature blown away is knocked down and rolls 1d4x10 feet and takes 1d4 points of nonlethal damage for each 10ft. A flying creature takes 2d6x10 for distance and 2d6 for each 10
• Checked: Unable to move forward, typically due to wind. Grounded stays in place, flying moves a specified distance.
• Confused: act randomly based on a percentile. A Confused creature automatically attacks anything that attacks it, and can only make AoO against creatures that attack it

0-10	Attack caster/confusing creature
11-20	Act normally
21-50	Do nothing but babble
51-70	Flee from caster/confusing creature
71-100	Attack nearest creature

• Cowering: Frozen in fear and cannot take actions. -2 to AC and no Dex AC
• Dazed: Can't take any actions, but has no AC penalty. Normally lasts 1 round.
• Dazzled: Unable to see well due to overstimulation. -1 on attack rolls, Search, and Spot
• Deafened: Can't hear shit. -4 to initiative, fails Listen, 20% verbal spell failure chance
• Disabled: A character with 0 or negative HP. You can only take one standard or move action, and any standard action or strenuous action makes you lose 1 hit point unless that action increases your hit points
• Dying: Unconscious and near death, you're between -1 and -9 hit points. Each round on your turn, you roll to stabilize. To stabilize, you need to beat (10-current hp) on a d20 to stabilize (in 3.6, in 3.5 it’s just a flat 10% chance). If you fail, you lose 1 hit point. -10 hit points makes you dead.
• Energy Drained: Your soul is drained, which means you gain Negative Levels! These sound scary and complicated but they’re actually pretty straightforward. Negative levels stack and have the following effects: -1 penalty on attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, ability checks; loss of 5 hit points; and -1 to effective level (for determining the power, duration, DC, and other details of spells or special abilities). In addition, a spellcaster loses one spell or spell slot from the highest spell level castable. Sometimes these are permanent (barring magic), sometimes they’re not. If you have as many negative levels as you have hit dice, you die immediately.
• Entangled. Exactly what it says on the can, you’re entangled in something. This does not entirely prevent movement unless you’re tethered to an immobile object or force. Otherwise, you move at half speed, cannot run or charge, take a -2 penalty to attack rolls, and a -4 penalty to dexterity. Casting a spell while entangled has a base Concentration DC of 15.
• Exhausted. An exhausted creature moves at half speed and takes a -6 penalty to strength and dexterity.
• Fascinated. A fascinated creature takes no actions but pays attention to the fascinating effect. It takes a -4 penalty on reactive skill checks like spot or listen. Potential threats like a hostile creature approaching allow a new saving throw. Obvious threats immediately break the effect.
• Fatigued. A fatigued creature can’t run and takes a -2 penalty to strength and dexterity. If you do something that would make you fatigued when fatigued, you become exhausted.
• Flat-Footed. Not ready or surprised. A flat-footed creature loses it’s dex bonus, if any, to AC and can’t make AoO’s
• Frightened. A frightened creature must flee from the source of its fear to the best of its ability, in addition to the effects of Shaken. Really good intimidate checks can inflict frighten instead of shaken.
• Grappling. Has its own rules. A grappling creature doesn’t threaten any squares and loses its dex bonus to AC. NOTE: by taking a -20 penalty on its grapple checks, a creature can continue grappling without these effects.
• Helpless. You’re fucked. You are treated as having 0 dex, and melee attacks get a +4 bonus against you. This usually occurs when you are badly injured, knocked unconscious, sleeping, or paralyzed. The real kicker is a coup de grace. A Coup De Grace is a full round action that automatically hits (hint: power attack), deals critical damage, and, if they even survive, they have to make a fort save (dc=10+damage dealt) or die instantly. Basically, if anything but a flimsy wizard gets a coup de grace off, the target will 100% die. Good news is a coup de grace provokes attacks of opportunity. Obviously if a creature isn’t subject to critical hits it’s not subject to coup de grace
• Incorporeal. Ghostly, doesn’t quite exist in the physical world. Incorporeal creatures are immune to nonmagical attacks. They can only be hurt by Magic Weapons, Spells, Spell-like abilities, supernatural effects, and Incorporeal creatures.
• Invisible. Self-Explanatory. Invisible creatures get a +2 attack bonus against sighted creatures and ignores their dex ac.
• Knocked Down. Severe wind can force grounded creatures Prone and blow flying creatures back 1d6*10 feet.
• Nauseated. Barf. A Nauseated creature can’t cast spells, attack, or do anything requiring attention. They can only take one move action per round.
• Panicked. Even more severe than frightened, a panicked creature drops whatever it's holding and books it from the source of its fear and any other danger, in addition to the effects of Shaken. If it’s cornered the creature Cowers. You’d need an absolutely absurd Intimidate check to reach this point but it could happen.
• Paralyzed. A paralyzed creature effectively has a strength and dexterity of 0. They can’t move or act physically, but can take purely mental actions. Anyone can move through a paralyzed creature's square as Difficult Terrain.
• Petrified. Turned to stone. A Petrified creature is effectively unconscious. If they’re damaged or chipped, they can be turned back without lasting harm as long as the pieces are joined together as they’re turned back. Anything missing as a statue will be missing as a person however.
• Pinned. Immobile, see grapple rules
• Prone. On the ground. Your AC takes a -4 penalty against Melee attacks, but you gain a +4 bonus against Ranged attacks. You can attack with light weapons (daggers, natural attacks, club), but not with heavier weapons. Even light weapons take a -4 penalty on the attack roll. The only ranged weapon you can attack with is a crossbow. Standing up from prone provokes an attack of opportunity, and as with all AoOs this can block your movement in 3.6.
• Shaken. Spooked, scared, heebie jeebies. A shaken creature takes a -2 penalty on attack rolls, damage rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks.
• Stable. A character with negative hit points who has stopped losing hit points is stable. If you were aided by someone else you’re not at risk of losing more hit points and have a 10% chance per hour to become conscious and disabled. If not, and you don’t become conscious, you lose one hit point.
• Staggered. Happens when your subdual damage exactly equals your current hit points. When staggered, you can take only one move or standard action per round.
• Stunned. A stunned creature drops everything held, can take no actions, and takes a -2 penalty to AC in addition to losing its dex bonus to AC.
• Turned. Typically undead, but other creatures can be Turned too. A turned creature flees for 1 minute, then cowers if it can’t. See the cleric class feature for more information.
• Unconscious. Knocked out and helpless. Usually happens from going into negative hit points, lethal or subdual.

Low, Middle and High level Gameplay

While far from comprehensive, this guide aims to give you some tips to evolve your gameplay from very basic levels to moderate levels of tactical thinking. These are all things your Character would realistically figure out how to do with the tools in their world; metagaming and cheating to get advantages are not present on this list whatsoever. This is split into 3 sections: low level at about 1st-7th level, mid level from around 8-14th, and high level from 15th up. This won’t cover epic level, that’s a whole other can of worms that you need to figure out on your own as there is too much complexity to cover in a tutorial. Each level grouping will have tips on narrative gameplay, plus surviving and thriving in combat.

Low Level Narrative

Most narrative objectives at low level involve finding a bad guy or a treasure and getting there, and there are a few ways you can make this easier.

• Observation: The biggest tool of mystery solving at low level is a Search check, followed directly by Spot. Almost always well-designed low-level dungeons will have the answers you need to get through a door, solve a puzzle, or find a secret hidden around the room somewhere. These might need a little thinking to comprehend, like what scratches imply in a bar as opposed to a bear cave, but they will usually give you directions on what to do. When in doubt, look around.
• Gather Information: If you’re not in a dungeon, but rather a social scenario, the counterpart to a search or spot is a Gather Information check. This is not comprehensive, and will typically only give you the rumors and “common sense” answers to a question. If you want a specific answer, find somebody who might know and ask them. If they aren’t receptive, you have four options: trick them, bribe them, convince them, or threaten them. These can be done with bluff, charisma, and intimidate checks. Gather Information can also give you an idea of who to talk to specifically, and where you can find them.
• Maps and Transport: If you ask, most DM’s will draw you a map of the area if they don’t have one already. If you ask nicely, your DM might even draw a map that looks good. If you can’t get a specific map from the DM, you should draw one yourself. Having a concept of the layout of an area can do you a lot of good. There’s a ton of cheap, easy programs that let you get a very basic layout, which can pay immense dividends when planning a trip by foot that may take some time, especially when you’re on a time limit. Understanding how fast you can get somewhere, and what you might need to traverse to get there, is very helpful. You also want to consider alternative methods of travel; if unencumbered and not blocked by an obstacle you can travel about 25 miles in a full day. On a horse, you can do 30-40, and carry more. A wagon is slower, but you can carry far more with you. A ship is way faster, if you have a river or coastline to take.
• Jobs and Support: At low levels, adventurers really have to take whatever job they can find, but that doesn’t mean they may be Good at all of them. If the job you can find is to drive out some bandits or rescue a missing person, the average adventuring party is fine to do it. However, perhaps a party with a barbarian, ranger, wizard, and paladin gets a job that requires them to sneak into a mansion without attracting attention. They may not be able to do it on their own, and that's ok! There is almost certainly a local pickpocket or cutthroat you can kidnap and force (oops, paladin… apprehend and convince?) to help you out. Get in with guardsmen, have a local wizard cure your curse, etc. Don’t solve it all yourself.
• Get Ready: At low levels, you don’t have a huge amount of options at any given moment. That is why it is EXTREMELY important to get set up ahead of time. Sidequesting to get supplies, extra gear, transport, and information is very much worth the time, as it could mean the difference between climbing up a cliff with your rope and pitons or getting stuck at the bottom with your life on the line. Plus, learning more about your foe or finding allies can be super useful. The same is true between fights: don’t wait until you’re in combat to get healing, get your health topped off after a fight is done so you’re ready for the next fight.

Low Level Combat

At low levels, you typically don’t have too many options for disabling or avoiding enemies other than running away and hitting them. Similarly, you don’t have a huge amount of protection or healing, which means you don’t want to be taking many hits. These combine for a straightforward win condition: defeat the enemies before they get a chance to attack you as much as possible.

• Two Weapon Fighting: One of two easy ways to increase damage at low level is two-weapon fighting- using two swords gives you an extra attack on full attack. Normally, this is prohibitively difficult at a -6/-10, but there are two things you can do to make this easier. The Two-Weapon fighting feat reduces this to -4/-4, and using a light weapon in the off hand drops this further to -2/-2. Using a double weapon behaves the same as a light weapon. With this, you can essentially double your damage output, and if you’re a class with sneak attack or have a decent strength modifier those are generally applied to both attacks. There is a large chain of feats to further upgrade Two-weapon fighting, and it remains a viable attack strategy into late-game.
• Two-Handing: When wielding a weapon in two-hands, you lose the ability to use a shield or second weapon. However, it comes with some serious bonuses: you use 1 ½ your STR bonus for melee damage, and you add double the power attack penalty to damage. A 3rd level barbarian with STR 18 and a greataxe can deal 1d12+12 damage every attack at only a -3 penalty, which their +4 from strength still outweighs adding up to at least +4 to hit. 18-19 damage on average every hit is enough to one-hit most CR 1-2 enemies, and nearly take out stuff at CR 3. A good roll or a crit is even better. A big two-handed smash remains a viable attack strategy for a while, but starts to fall off as enemies get more mobile and harder to hit at high level.
• Action Economy: At low level, each round typically consists of a move and attack/spell, or a full attack; you usually don’t have access to a lot of bonus actions. Because of this it’s important to use your actions wisely. If you can’t cover the distance to melee an enemy in one round, running right at them gives them the opportunity to hit you: consider only moving part way and making a ranged attack, so they have to move into your range without getting a chance to attack. Is it worth spending several rounds grinding down a heavy enemy, or is a single move and an attack to take out a weaker caster a better idea? As a caster, you will typically get one spell per round plus a reposition. Make sure you balance defending/supporting your allies and dealing damage to foes, as you can very rapidly be a few spells behind if you ignore the problems building up. You also can only act on your turn, and if your ally needs to set somebody up but they go after you the plan might fall apart. It can be worth delaying until after an ally gives you a bonus, but if that lets an enemy make an attack it probably isn't. You rarely get an option to interrupt an enemy’s action, but there is one way: you can Ready an action to go off on a specific circumstance, like readying to attack a foe as soon as they move through a door. You have to sacrifice the appropriate action on your turn to do so, so be careful, as you don’t get the action back if the readied action doesn’t work out. You also might be able to deny enemies the option to take their actions through status effects or utilizing the environment, which gives you an edge. The action economy is a consideration all the way through the game.
• Bottleneck+Focus Fire: Usually, you won’t be able to kill all your enemies before any of them get a chance to act. Instead, you have to be selective of your targets; you should figure out the enemy that poses the most threat, and focus damage on them to eliminate them fast. Rather than dealing damage to everybody and keeping it a 4v4 battle where all 4 enemies can hit you, eliminate 1 and set yourself at an advantage that will typically stay. In order to do this, you typically need to isolate the target and keep the other enemies from interfering. The term for this is a bottleneck, as that’s the easiest way to do this: force enemies to approach you through a narrow space where few can get past at a time, allowing you to focus your attacks on the one or two in front as the ones in back can’t do much. You can do this a lot of ways, like Wall spells, threatening AoO’s, use of the environment, or baiting them to run to a particularly juicy target while you shoot them from the sides.
• Status and Debuffs: Status conditions can be nasty, and at low levels you usually don’t have the ability to remove them quickly. Firstly, this makes status-inflicting foes top priority, but if you can’t remove them, your enemies usually can’t either. Statuses that eliminate foes’ actions, like nausea, fear, daze, or confusion are extremely valuable, as they mean you get an action economy advantage. Sure, in a 1v1 a Daze just delays a turn, but it isn’t a 1v1. In a 4v4, it makes the advantage 8 actions v 7. If it lasts more than one turn, or affects multiple targets, this advantage only grows. This falls off at higher levels as enemies get more resistant and have more access to removing statuses, but they are still pretty useful.
• Weakness: At low levels, most enemies have an exploitable weakness. The easiest example is something like a swarm: don’t take most conventional damage, but a torch quickly destroys them with little issue. Some enemies take bonus damage from an element, from a certain material, or regenerate damage that’s not finished off with flame. If something is being difficult to put away, figure out its weakness and exploit it.
• Damage Immunity and What to Do: Swarms are weak to fire, but what if you don’t have fire? A scorpion swarm is immune to weapon damage, and you might be stuck with just that. The obvious answer is “don’t just have normal weapons”, but that doesn’t help in the moment. If you know what you need to hit them with, see if you can find it: torch on the wall, or something flammable and a fireplace. If you don’t know or have no option, it’s simple: run. You’re not meant to beat everything. Come back when you have fire.
• Flanking and Cover: At low levels, positioning is everything. Flanking an opponent means every attack the rogue makes is a sneak attack, and every attack the fighter makes gets a boost to hit. Cover means the ranged opponents have a hell of a time hitting you, and you don’t have to worry about AoO’s. If at all possible, get around a corner, or tip a table, or put an enemy between archers and yourself. This is almost useful, but remember cover goes both ways. If you retreat, your enemy can advance to the cover you left.
• Retreat: A lesson every party needs to learn: you aren’t going to win all the time, and it’s ok to run away. Yes, your enemy wins, and gets a chance to regroup. But losing 3 party members for a mid-dungeon encounter isn’t worth it: you gain knowledge, and come back stronger and more prepared. Especially at low levels where raise dead or resurrection isn’t accessible, once a character is dead they’re gone. Light the room on fire, run like hell, and live to fight another day.

Mid Level Narrative

At mid level, objectives get a bit more complicated and have more implications. There’s always a schemer trying to take over a city, or a threatening beast attempting to ravage civilization. It’s not so easy to find, approach, and slay: villains have minions, secrets, and plots. You also get access to more things, which give you more options of approach.

• Scrying: Wizards, although not alone, get access to a number of divination spells that allow you to see targets on the other side of the world, hear the secrets they whisper, and map the way into their fortresses. Even more powerful is the ability to look into secrets using spells like Commune, Divination, or Contact other Plane. You should absolutely make use of these spells as often as you can.
• Knowledge Checks: Although your knowledge skills might not be refined at low levels, by mid-level you should have a specialty you have some ranks put into. Any knowledge check can be made on any subject, as a free action at any time. It’s not usually gonna solve every problem, but it never hurts. At the very least, you get a reminder of what you’re facing. More often than not, you’re going to learn important details or context that will give you clues or outright paths to success.
• HQ: As you gain power, you start accumulating crap. Some wealth will be in gems and gold, or fancy magic swords, but a lot will come in the form of deeds and steeds, land and supplies. You can try to sell this all, but transporting it and still traveling light is a serious pain. Instead, you probably want to set up a home base. This can be as simple as an old house with a shed, or as complex as a front business with a secret storage underneath. This gives you a safe place to retreat to, a place to store your things, and maybe even a passive source of income if you play it right.
• Favors: Each time your party finishes a quest, they have a chance to make a powerful friend. The old wizard you find a cure for will know centuries of lore, and the mayor of the town you saved from werewolves may be willing to put you in contact with his nation’s government. Often the greatest reward you get from a quest will be the friendship of a powerful individual. Keep records of the people you help, and don’t be afraid to return to ask them for help. Usually the options are they say yes and you are better off, or they say no and you’ll be back in the same place. Worst case scenario, you have a fun betrayal plotline! Having a friend help you out is rarely gonna reduce xp, unless you try to make them carry you through.
• Shopping: Your party will earn a fair bit of money, and a lot of loot. It’s important to consider whether the loot you get serves you better than the money you can sell it for. Secondly, having somebody who can up that selling price pays immense dividends, either a good party face or a strong fence. Turning this loot and the money it’s worth into loot that more directly helps you is very smart but it only works if you do it proactively. No good buying an item that buffs your save after you got Disintegrated. Picks that are smart:
  • Items that buff your class focus or weak ability scores, like INT for a wizard or for a dumb barbarian.
  • Items that improve your saves, or give you immunities to certain effects: cloak of resistance, or something to stop death effects.
  • Items that directly assist your role: bonus damage on a DPS, better armor for a tank, etc
  • Mobility items and RANGED OPTIONS! You’re no good if you need melee and can’t close.
  • Potions, wands, and scrolls to help quickly get rid of statuses
  • Items that upgrade a flaw you’ve noted.
• Preparation vs Cure: It’s an old adage, but an ounce of preparation is worth a pound of cure. A single Energy Immunity is worth a lot of Cure Critical Wounds if you fall in lava, and a Death Ward is cheaper than a Resurrection. It’s very important to think ahead about the dangers you may face, and try to set yourself ahead of the game somewhat before the game gets ahead of you.

Mid Level Combat

At mid-level, the gap between the toughness of foes and PC’s starts to widen. Damage dealing stays about the same, but monsters start to have HP and AC’s into the 200s and 40s, and just as much as the PC’s get powerful attacks, so do the foes. They may have the ability to kill you instantly, which means you need to be more careful and more ready. Your win condition updates as follows: avoid your foes’ most powerful attacks while you grind them down or hit them with a proper attack.

• Area of Effect: At low-level, the spellcasters of the party get access to Area of Effect spells that let them damage numerous foes at once. At mid-level, foes start to get these as well. AoE are most dangerous because they can be confirmed damage: even on a successful save, targets still often take half damage. There are a couple main ways to combat AoE:
  • Target Selection: Kill the caster before they get an AoE cast. Pretty simple, lasts from low to high level.
  • Spacing: The dreaded “Fireball Formation” is when the entire party is close enough to get hit with a fireball. Obviously it is helpful to be close enough together to cast touch spells and cover each other’s backs, but if you all get blown up it doesn’t matter. Try to space out enough so the caster has to pick the most dangerous targets, and ideally those most dangerous targets are DPS with evasion breathing down their necks.
  • Counterspelling: A very important ability for defending casters, a caster can ready an action for the opposing caster’s turn. If they succeed, they can use Spellcraft to identify the spell being cast and sacrifice the same spell (if they have it) in order to cancel the spell being cast. This reduces their damage output, but can be major for keeping everybody alive. With improved counterspell, you can use any spell of the same school with equal or greater power. More on this in “Haste Shred and Other Buffs”.
  • Prepare: Learn about the types of AoE your opponent has access to, and prepare for them: fire immunity when fighting a fire-breathing dragon, etc.
• Distance Management: Once you’re more mobile and have more ranged access, you don’t necessarily need to close distance and be in melee with every foes. It’s also important to consider whether they can close distance and attack you on your turn, or only close distance and attack the next turn, giving you a chance to get away. Spring attack is very good for this, especially if you can spring out of the range of one of their movements. Other good uses are magical repositioning, although it’s notable that these are often standard actions for the ones using them and thus prevent attacks. Even if you can’t stop them from making a single attack, preventing a foe from making a full attack is still very valuable. Tie up their actions chasing you around.
• Damage over Time: An extremely valuable resource is Damage Over Time, which allows you to take an action applying it and continues dealing damage, usually lesser than normal attacks, later. Two very easy examples are lighting people on fire, and bleed damage from wounding weapons. While these are not incredibly powerful and won’t kill anybody immediately, they allow you to deal damage without taking actions. This can allow you to spend actions on defense and repositioning while the target continues to lose health.
• Save Or Die + Disability: Along with the AoE’s that foes gain are Save or Die: you need to make a successful savings throw or get killed, or at least knocked out of combat with a debilitating status effect. The obvious counter to this is having save bonuses good enough to avoid getting killed. These were discussed in section 8.1, and at mid level is where this starts becoming a problem. Buffs from support, resistance items, and feats are important to keep your saves good enough. Beyond that, the casters can attempt to counterspell the relevant attacks, and you can try to make the characters with the best saves the most tempting target. These abilities go both ways, and using these save-or-dies to instantly take out foes that might be hard to kill conventionally is a smart play- try to target them with effects that play on their weak sides, like a will save for a stupid target or Reflex for a cumbersome one.
• Backup Plans: Nothing ever goes the way you plan it to. This is a short section, because it’s advice is simple: never go into a fight with one idea of how it goes, as you’ll get caught with your pants down. Make a backup plan, or two, or ten. It will get used more often than you think.
• Haste Shred and Other Buffs: One of the most powerful abilities of a spellcaster is using buff spells to upgrade your allies, to change the rules of the battle in your favor. These are a few examples of how to use these buffs to the best advantage:
  • Haste Shred: Haste provides an extra attack on full attack, which combined with a rogue’s ability to sneak attack on every flanking attack can add up to a lot of sneak attack damage every turn. Add TWF, and a rogue with 2 attacks can get 4 or 5 sneak attacks every turn.
  • Spike Stoneskin: Against a foe with a lot of attacks, any DR effect pays more than its fair share of dividends: taking 10 damage off every attack doesn’t mean as much when the attacks are 60 damage in one hit, but when they are 12 each in 5 it means a ton. Add on some kind of Thorn effect, aka dealing damage to a foe when they hit you, like Fire Shield, and every one of their 5 attacks will deal more damage to them than the intended target. Combining these abilities on the tank means that them taking hits is not just good for the party, but Good for them as well.
  • Bonus Spells: there are a number of abilities that do good for this, including Time Stop, Spell Flower, and more. The gist is that the mage’s main spells can be cast ahead of time, or in bonus actions, allowing them to use their main action for counterspelling Every Turn. This is not only very good for shutting down enemy casters, but also allows you to add extra spells once the enemy spells are no longer a threat.
  • Carried Auras: Many spells can be cast on objects, like Darkness, and more can be cast on a target or self, like Antimagic Field. Carrying these auras around with an ally that benefits from them, or at least isn’t harmed, can let martials act like they are casting spells. Darkness lets a rogue make a number of sneak attacks if they carry it with them, and Antimagic Field is annoying for magic item users and debilitating for mages but perfectly fine for something like a monk or barbarian.
  • Shapechanging: Turning allies into animals may seem like a rude move, but in a lot of ways this can be helpful, especially if they can turn back, or the change can be dispelled. Everybody can see an ogre, but nobody suspects a seagull until it turns into the ogre right above them. If you turn the rogue into a viper, they can still sneak attack but it’s a lot harder to realize that they’re the threatening one. Even better, they can turn into an ant and pickpocket a valuable (if small) item without ever being noticed.
  • Fast and Distance Healing: A lot of healing can only be done through touch, but there are a number of ways this can be surmounted: Contingent healing effects, spells or feats that allow touch spells to be done at range, mass healing spells, or significant concealment so the healer can tag along without being noticed. Once these are done, the healer can get completely out of the way, and do nothing but pump healing into allies without being put in danger whatsoever.
  • Mind Blank: These spells are of a category all of their own, just eliminating the ability for effects good or bad of a type to affect a particular target. Pumping a few of these into a self-sufficient target, like paladin, barbarian, or monk lets them go ham and ignore enemy casters entirely. Mind Blank, Freedom of Movement, Wink, True Seeing, and Protection from Evil (or Holy Aura) all are good examples.
• Ultra Team Combo: This could be an entire tutorial of its own, but I won’t make a huge section. Essentially, every pair of classes has ways they can gestalt and drastically augment each other: Rogue and knight allow for devastating flanking combos, cleric+cleric means everybody is always at full health, monk+ranger means every target gets grappled then attacked 15 times each round. Figure out how each team member can work together well, then consider a third, then a fourth, then the whole team.
• Damage Types: At mid level, many enemies will start getting significant DR and ER against certain damage types, including physical damage and common energy attacks like fire. In order to damage foes, you may need a particular material, a certain energy, or powerful enough enchantments. On the converse, some enemies may be resilient to magic entirely. It’s VERY important to have enough options in the party to cover your bases, so you don’t get completely stonewalled.
• Retreat and Reset: Just like at low levels, you’ll need to retreat at times. However, enemies will now have the ability to top themselves back up, more likely than not. You will too. This means that you probably will need to come back and start over, but you have advantages: you know what attacks they might use, and can buff against them. You have learned what they’re resilient to. You may be able to call in relevant backup. Be smart, don’t just start from square one.

High Level Narrative

At high level, you are no longer just adventurers, but heroes or villains of a world-famous scale. People have heard of you, and the things you face can have intense world-breaking consequences. Your fame and power comes with risks and responsibilities, as well.

• Commune: At this level, you have the ability to converse with incredibly powerful beings, and not just by kneeling and begging for assistance. Clerics can speak with their gods, wizards can summon, bind, and question powerful fiends. These beings almost always have lots of knowledge and vested interests, and you can get missives, secrets, and advice from them if you take the time to ask. You absolutely should, as this information can be critical to success. You should never approach a battle unprepared at this level.
• Allies, Minions, and Capital: You may not rule a country, but you may very well be the strongest being in the country you’re in. This comes with some drawbacks, and some benefits. You will gain the respect and admiration of many people, and the distaste of many more. This manifests in three ways:
  • Allies and Foes: Powerful people, whether physically or influentially, can make a major difference. Knowing a king who can release a certain NPC from prison, or knowing a powerful wizard who can research a topic for you. Similarly, if you make enemies with power, they’re going to pose problems. Turning these enemies into friends, or eliminating them, is pretty crucial.
  • Minions: You will gather a large amount of lower-power people around you, and they may want to serve you or oppose you. At this point, no PC should be undertaking mundane tasks, that’s what these minions are for. Save your time for the things only you can do, and leave the construction of a base or the collection of donations to your minions. Similarly, a large group of opposed people can be a real hindrance, even if they can’t harm you directly. Diplomacy, political influence, or large-scale warfare may be necessary. More in the next section
  • Capital: You may own large tracts of land, buildings, or valuable resources like minerals or food. These should be converted, ideally with the help of minions, into passive income or into bargaining chips with powerful people. You may not have to kill a million soldiers if you can bargain with a king by selling him mithril. Similarly, a large amount of inhabited and protected space can essentially turn into a minion factory.
• War and Politics: If you make enemies with a large enough group of people, they may come for you and the people associated with you. Unfortunately for good characters being a pacifist may not be an option as the armies of enemies will hurt the weaker people around you just for being around you, and you cannot leave those people to die and still be considered good. Similarly, using your immense power to slaughter people indiscriminately will paint you as a monster. These situations need to be navigated carefully, as millions of lives may be on the line. You can attempt to use your influence to politely or aggressively convince enemy leaders to peace, by offering them things they want or personally threatening them. You can attempt to use your fame to convince enemies or third parties to your side, until you’ve got enough strength to win decisively. You can organize your allies, minions, and wealth into a war effort, facing your foes directly and hoping you come out on top. There are any number of ways to handle such conflicts, but they should be handled proactively.
• Money: At this power level, you tend to have more money than you know what to do with. Obviously a good bit of this can and should be used on magic items and buffs, but consider the indirect benefits it can have: purchasing minions and capital as spoken of above, charity to bring favor to you or influence politics, or founding institutions that can provide benefits like libraries or foundries. Money should be used to fund difficult tasks that would take a lot of time to do solo, and to set up passive income or automated provision of needed things. It’s a lot easier to equip the party with mithril weapons if you purchase a mithril foundry than if you try to mine and make it yourself.
• Other Planes: The world is bigger than just the planet you’re on, and the Planes of existence become far more accessible at high levels. Great dangers and rewards exist in the other planes, including easy travels, ancient secrets and knowledge, and incredibly powerful beings that can be foes or allies. The universe is huge, and choosing to not explore it and exploit it is a HUGE handicap. Regardless of your setting, any intelligent high-level PC should be trying to explore and learn about every corner of it.
• Illusions and Wards: Just like the PC’s, enemies will get access to scrying, and will attempt to spy on your institutions and actions if they can. There are a lot of ways to stop this, chief among them being illusions to deceive prying eyes and wards to keep away nosy investigators. Looking at your spell list, many spells need to be used proactively to prevent enemies from gaining valuable knowledge about you. Be proactive and use them, and don’t let enemies gain any advantage they don’t have to bleed for.

High Level Combat

At high levels, combat expands but also bears some similarities to low level. Both you and your foes have tons of high-power deadly options, so many you can’t possibly cover them all. In order to succeed, you need to again return to early plans and stop the enemy from taking as many actions as you can, limiting them to actions you know you can counter and survive. Your win condition is as follows: Learn and stop as many of your foes’ abilities as possible, and kill them before they can adapt.

• Instakill: The most dangerous abilities in 3.5, instakill abilities not only kill a character regardless of health but also do not allow a save. The two biggest culprits are Power Word Kill and an Orb of Annihilation, but some creatures have their own version of things like this. This can also include abilities that do not allow saves, or have prohibitively high saves, or that deal so much confirmed damage as to kill anything instantly. Obviously, the only real way to weather these attacks is to never get hit with them. In order to achieve this, you need to know if your enemy has an attack like that. Often these attacks will be legendary along with the foe, but sometimes they are less well known. Not doing your research and getting caught with your pants down will be fatal. Once you know what the attack is, there’s always a way to stop it: the spell Spell Immunity is good for this, but there will be a way for each ability. You should avoid the foe until you can beat them: more later.
• Off Switch: A huge game changer at high level is Mordenkainen’s Disjunction, which immediately turns off and breaks an entire party’s set of magic items. This isn’t the only ability that has such a huge disabling potential, but it’s certainly one of the most dangerous ones. Essentially, your entire party has their power base turned off in one move. If you don’t have a way to deal with this, or prevent it, a powerful wizard can hit a switch and take you all out in one go. Treat this like instakill, in terms of countering it.
• Time Travel: At high level, the action economy changes up. You still have certain considerations, but things start getting new abilities: they become able to take extra actions outside of the economy, and even change it up. Versions of this like Haste and Slow show up earlier, but at high levels much more powerful effects exist. Examples of this are Time Stop, Widdershins, Simbul’s Spell Matrix, Contingency, and the increasing availability of quickened spells. On top of this, the action cost required for a lot of the same actions decreases for martials with feats and class features. Enemies too will gain some abilities, some being able to manipulate time or just getting extra actions. There’s a lot of complex interactions, but the basic concept is simple: the bigger the difference between the number of actions your team gets and the number of actions the other team gets, the better. If you can get 5 more each round, awesome. If a Time Stop gives you 10 more, now you’re really ahead.
• Swarm: At low levels, you can start summoning things to take hits for you and deal some damage. At high levels, both you and foes can start fielding foes in the hundreds, or even thousands. This can be a concern, as even with AoE you can only take so many actions, and you can easily get overwhelmed and ground down. In order to deal with this, you need to apply some barrier, physical or metaphorical, to isolate yourself from the horde. A Wall of Fire or Blade Barrier works, or you could become ethereal, or just fly above the targets if they can’t shoot you. Once you’ve done this, large AoE or DOT effects can start to whittle them down. Additionally, morale is a huge factor. Many things that can cause fear have no limit on targets, and scaring away the crowd is very effective. A strong ‘thorns’ effect on the martials also can pay immense dividends.
• Unfair is Fair: As mentioned earlier, monstrous enemies are going to start pulling far ahead of the PC’s in terms of damage potential and health pool, and may have some brutal damage effects. In order to keep up, unfair tactics are necessary: ambushes, turning foes against each other, and shock tactics exploiting weaknesses before enemies have a chance to reinforce them. If you attempt to go 1v1 with an enemy close to your level, you probably won’t stack up. Instead, you should always strive to even the odds by exploiting their weaknesses and the environment. Rather than try to sword-fight the dragon, drop the cave on its head. Rather than trade spells with the lich, kill him when he’s preparing spells.
• Avoid Avoid Avoid: Enemies have a ton of dangerous abilities at high level, and may take a large number of resources to defeat. In order to avoid burning all your resources and being put in obscene amounts of danger, you realistically should avoid fighting as many enemies as possible. Sneak past them, charm them, or just go the other way; you should try to avoid combat when it is not necessary. That should always be kept in mind, before you run out of spell slots above 3rd level and you see another dragon ahead of you.
• Retreat, Reset, and Resurrect: At high level, not only do you and the enemies recover after fights, but death may be a bit of a revolving door with access to Resurrection now easily available. However, this also means that defeating an enemy may not be final if you can’t prevent them from coming back. Obviously if they don’t have anybody to rez them, there’s no concern. There’s always the off chance that someone does bring them back, and they’ll be coming back with you none the wiser. You either need to wipe out their support, or stop them from coming back by sending their soul somewhere it can’t come back from or destroying it, the latter of which is fairly evil. Be smart.

Rules for the Table

This section may mention things you do, and if so, this isn’t targeting you. This is true for everybody, and everyone has certainly been guilty at least once. If you feel defensive, think about why: Everybody has the chance to improve. Whether you’re having a bad day, didn’t notice, or were trying to be funny, you’ve played like a jerk. This will be some rules of thumb in no particular order on how to be a good player, not just a good character.

Good Hygiene is Important

The first rule is the simplest one- Don't stink. Take a shower, wear clean clothes, don't fart on people. You're all gathered around a table for hours, don't make it miserable. If you think you're gonna stink, bring deodorant.

Pay Attention

DMs work hard to describe everything, and you have ears to hear everyone else act. A huge part of being an ass at the table is when you don’t pay attention to anything but your turn and your attacks. When you’re playing on your phone on everybody else’s turn, reading SCP’s or looking at gacha games, you won’t know what’s going on when it’s your turn. You’ll miss which enemies are gonna kill you, what the threats are, and how your team is doing. Obviously it’s a friendly gathering, and goofing around is fine. There’s a gap between that and intentionally zoning out when you aren’t directly on the docket, and the latter will really annoy the party as you are Holding them back. Especially if we need to stop everything to catch you up to stuff you were here for. Put your phone away and try. Additionally, some DMs allow for party actions and RP between sessions, called Downtime RP, in some public channel such as IRC or Discord. If your campaign does stuff during downtime and you completely ignore it, or don’t contribute to the selection of quests and destinations, then complain that you don’t know what to do because you don’t know what’s going on, you’re essentially just an NPC that the party has to babysit.

If somebody is asking a question, describing their action, or getting a description from the DM, stop talking for a sec and listen. Often the DM needs to repeat something or have something repeated, because somebody won’t stop talking. Let people talk.

Be Invested

Be invested! Like previously stated, DM’s put a lot of effort into the game. They build worlds, write stories, make ten times as many characters for you, so that everybody can have fun. Plus, the rest of the party puts in work to make good characters and team strategies. If you don’t pay attention to pings, don’t vote, and barely make an effort in games, you’re being pretty disrespectful to the time and effort of the other group members. On top of that, if you don’t put any work into your character, the DM has to pick up the slack if they don’t want the cardboard cutout mucking up the game. If you don’t think you have the time or energy to play, that’s ok. Players sometimes have to take a break, and almost any good DM won’t be offended if you can’t do the game at the time. However, if you commit to playing then barely show up, you’re in the worst of both worlds because you’re still dealing with whatever time or energy issues you’re having and also letting your party down. It’s perfectly acceptable if D&D isn’t your first priority, it is a game. Being honest and forthright about that is owed to your teammates, because if you spend 40 hours on video games a week your whole team knows you’re lying when you say you can’t spend 30 seconds to check a ping. If you don’t want to put in the work, tell everybody so they don’t have to wait on you.

Keep Good Conduct

Don’t be a sore loser! The DM is not your opponent, they are the designer. They make your opponents, but they also make your allies, and the rewards you get, and the success you achieve. The DM builds challenges for you so you can have fun. If you pout, rage, and complain when you roll bad and trip, or get annoyed when the DM rolls a crit, you’re behaving like a child. Children get spoon fed baby obstacles instead of fighting dragons with the big kids. Sometimes you lose, and sometimes that is the DM’s fault because they misbalanced a scenario. They will help you build a new character, and they will learn to do better. Even more so, getting mad because you failed but a different team member helped you is ridiculous.

Focus on Teamwork

You are a TEAM! The adventures, puzzles, and enemies are designed for your whole team, not just you. Sabotaging your team screws you over, and pisses off your team. Jostling can be funny, and can build for good RP. Infighting, leaving people behind, and refusing to help in the name of RP is dumb, and will fumble the quest and get people killed. Share the spotlight! The dungeons are usually designed to highlight different members in different areas, and higher level characters will sometimes overshadow lower level ones. It’s not cool to take charge in every situation, force things to go your way, and try to show off. If you have a niche you’re good at, cover it. Don’t take over the niches of other players out of a need to overcompensate. If you push this and try to be the strongest, you’ll typically die until you aren’t the strongest by a fair margin.

Remain Appropriate

Don't make people uncomfortable! This one is legitimately easy to fix. If you're graphically describing sex, violence, or other mature topics between characters, you make very well make people uncomfortable. Shy away from that, and if somebody asks you to stop, then stop.

Materials: Bring Em and Respect Em

If you're playing D&D, it is realistically mandatory to have a pencil, a sheet, and dice. Even so, if you are using somebody's dice, you treat them with respect. If you are using somebody's minis, you are not bending them. You should come prepared, and if you need a hand ask the DM or other players. They’re usually willing to lend.

Clean up After Yourself

This can often be a problem with any group gathering; don't make a mess leaving popcorn and wrappers on the floor, then leave when the session is over. If somebody's family is gracious enough to host for your smelly self and maybe even feed you, you should give them the respect of leaving the place about as clean as you found it. Plus, you might even find your character sheet you left behind!

Don't Cheat

The first real major offense a player can do is cheat. Fudging rolls, giving yourself items, bonuses, or changing stats, or writing off damage. Regardless of the form, it always has the same intent: lying to your friends to get an edge over them. There’s no other reason. D&D is a game and winning is not that important. DMs will occasionally bend rules for the ‘Rule of Cool’, almost always in the party’s favor. That is their job, not yours. The DM may not always catch you cheating, as they have a lot of concerns. Any good DM that does find out that you’ve been cheating at a make-believe game about elves and magic will kick you out and leave you there.

Min-Maxing

Minmaxing in this context is mathematically optimizing your stats in a nonsensical manner to get a overpowered character build. There’s a lot of ways to do this in any large system, and a google search will find you plenty of people obsessed with being the best person at the table claiming they have the secret to always winning with this offcore book or that homebrew feat. Building a strong character is not minmaxed- a warrior in the world would be interested in being the best warrior they can be, but this doesn’t mean they’d specifically take a level in druid so an offcore spell can give them double crit damage. Minmaxing is shitty for a number of reasons:

• You are showing that you think you are too good for the world. You don’t want to experience the story or the adventure, you want to win. A DM who spends time writing a world for you deserves better.
• You are showing your disinterest in the other players. A minmaxed character is always a gimmick, always boring to play with, and always trying to dominate the conversation. They also force the DM to balance to the gimmick’s power level, which makes life difficult for everybody else.
• You don’t get how the game works! It’s a TEAM GAME, and trying to be objectively the best is the worst thing you can do for a team. You’re missing the point, and wasting everybody’s time.
• The whole point of minmaxing is arrogance, to spit in the DM’s face by breaking their game. The DM isn’t your opponent, but they certainly can be. Minmaxing is an attention complex, competing because you want to prove you’re the best gamer. Luckily, the DM controls the entire world, and can tear down a “perfect” build with enemies designed to do so because you can only break the game if the DM lets you. They can easily remind you your superiority complex isn’t that important, and boot your baby butt from the game and tell everybody they know that you’re an annoying turd who tries to ruin games

Metagaming

Metagaming. This refers to playing your character as if they have access to info you have, but the character does not. Shooting spells blind into a room that the character doesn’t know has an enemy, because you can see the DM has extra miniatures on the table. Trying to buy magic items the character doesn’t know exists, because the player knows they have a bonus to their class. It is the bane of immersion, and ruins everybody’s time. I respond to metagaming simply: you lose all xp you would’ve earned by overcoming an obstacle you metagamed on. If you solve an adventure hook with metagaming, you don’t get any xp from that whole adventure. Metagaming is almost never accidental, but if you’re worried, think about the old “What Would Tarok Do” adage. If the character has no reason to do it, you shouldn’t either really.

"It's what my Character Would Do!"

On that note, what would Tarok do? It’s acceptable and encouraged to have a character with flaws, because these make them more deep and interesting. That said, you are entirely responsible for your character and their personality. If you make something you know is irritating, you don’t get off with the “I’m just doing what my character would do!” card. If you design a shitbag, you deserve the party hating the character, and I won’t defend you when they drop you for building something against the goals and interests of the party. The two biggest offenders are “ostentatiously evil” and “annoyingly quirky”. If you design an edgelord murderhobo, don’t be surprised when the CG heroes don’t want to have anything to do with you. If your character is just a gag to fuk around, the bit gets old fast and nobody will care after 30 minutes.