Tabletop Roleplaying Games (D&D, Pathfinder, CoC, ETC.)

[The Ugly One]

Supposedly minis are a bad road to go down

They're a bad road to go down if you like having money and time, great if you don't care about either of those things.

 

[LovisXVI]

It's one of my pet peeves about the hobby. Hundreds of games, 99% of the get rave reviews, but each group plays only 5e, their house game, and maybe a third for an esoteric setting.

I've never run and only played 5e once (and briefly). I've run or played Shadowrun, Star Wars FFG, Pendragon, Vampire: the Masquerade, Harnmaster, Call of Cthulhu, Delta Green, all Warhammer 40k rpgs, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, Pathfinder, AD&D, UESRPG, and Traveller, in no particular order. Might have missed one or two systems.

 

[p1138]

I started a bunch of games similar to this. Prisoners on a ship that crashes is the start of Treasure Hunt, which is a go-to adventure for me I can run almost from memory.

A game I want to run starts with the PCs as prisoners/slaves who's caravan is attacked by a monster and they escape. People really object to this opening, and I'm not sure why. It's not a woke thing either.

Depending on the specifics and setting(which should be hashed out before people even start writing characters), it can fuck with player agency regarding their character. Why are they a prisoner? Would their character have actually done anything that would get them prison time? Were they framed for a crime off screen? Would their character even have been anywhere that being captured and sold as a slave would be a thing? What if they wanted to be an escaped slave and now they're caught again already?

"a group of adventurers meeting in a tavern" is boring, but it's at least generic enough to work around most things unless you've got someone stating "I'd never walk into a tavern" or something.

Hundreds of games, 99% of the get rave reviews, but each group plays only 5e, their house game, and maybe a third for an esoteric setting.

Ignoring the people who only want to play TTRPGs, and specifically 5e because it's the popular thing to do. A lot of people simply don't want to take the time to learn another system. I've played quite a few systems over the years, but at the same time I don't necessarily want to learn yet another system if there are other systems that everyone at the table already knows and haven't been played to death. That's even more of an issue for systems/settings that are basically duplicating others instead that myself and the group I play with already know. It's not like just because we played a one shot, and another campaign that lasted a year with all of 3 characters combined because one of mine got killed, that I'd suddenly become bored with a game and would rather be doing something else.

 

[Brain Problems]

What are your guys experience with minis?

They rule but are not remotely necessary except (maybe) for PCs/special monsters.

Spoiler

Okay real answers.

As far as acquiring them this is how it worked/works for me: I wanted minis for a long time and gradually acquired a few here and there by setting alerts on CamelCamel for ones that looked half decent on Amazon. Gradually I got a bunch and then went in and got a ton more from the recent Reaper Bones KS. I also had backed another one on Gamefound that went tits up but luckily instead of costing me everything for nothing, another company picked up the slack and as far as I can tell, just going to cost me a bit more than I initially wanted. I recommend getting in on KS mini batches from Reaper or another company with a proven track record/experience so that you don't throw your cash into the furnace. If you're in the states the shipping is negligible and price is super reasonable. Outside of the US all bets are off. But as @The Ugly One says, they aren't cheap overall but if you buy em in bulk you can break down the cost to a pretty reasonable Price Per Mini amount. If you're acquiring them one by one at your hobby shop prepare to have your ass and wallet ravaged.

As far as playing with them, I go two ways on it. PCs always love using their own minis (my PCs typically buy/bring their own even) and it makes my life as a DM easier too. If you've got significant monsters or enemies, being able to throw a mini down to represent it is great and basically a giant target for the PCs to focus on. If you've got a smaller encounter with fewer enemies, using minis for them is great. If you've got a larger encounter it can be kind of a pain to grab a dozen skeletons or zombies or orcs or goblins or whatever (assuming you have that many) but again, I really like using them and the PCs enjoy interacting with them.

(Also, if you're going to get minis, make sure you get a bunch of orcs, goblins, skeletons, zombies, generic soldier men. Terrain is cool but that shit gets costly very quickly and unless you're going all out, I find is totally unnecessary beyond getting things like some furniture, chests, doors, pillars etc.)

My biggest drawback(s) to using them is that unless you've got some autistically curated collection, sometimes you just don't have the right figure for the fight, which most people don't care about as long as it's close-ish or people aren't being total assholes about it. Contra to that though, sometimes you have so many fucking minis that now you've added to your prep time because you have to sift through whatever retarded ad hoc filing system you've created within plastic baggies or boxes to find the right figures. Kind of a First World problem but it will become an issue for you unless you've got some anal-retentive system for your make believe dragon game toys THEY'RE FIGURINES, MARIE.

Another issue is that it can be annoying to track which monster is being attacked and its HP or whatever compared to using tiddlywinks or Sorry tokens that you can easily just write a number on top of with a dry-erase. This problem isn't as big a deal if you're using visually unique/painted minis and can just make a note on your side of which is which but it adds time and complexity to an already lengthy ordeal and gets worse the more enemies you're facing. There is probably a very simple solution for this that I have spent no time researching or looking into but it is something that comes up.

Finally, there's something lost as far as the imagination goes when you use a mini to represent something abstract. This may sound ridiculous but PCs using their mind to conjure up some image of what the plain coloured token represents is actually kinda cool and outside of some technicall/gameplay difference being possible lost in the process, makes me happy to hear oohs and ahhs and worried stammering when you tell them something is something versus show them. Minor issue but something to consider perhaps.

Finally finally, if you want to paint them it takes a long time. Don't aim for perfection, if you've got a bucket full just start practising and letting those happy little mistakes happen. Perfection is the enemy of good. There are a million tutorials online, you don't have to be making award-winning models.

 

[Ghostse]

The above is one of the dumbest tropes I have ever seen. It's lazy, it feels weirdly like it's for people who simply cannot get their head around being a character foreign to their real life and I loathe it.

The Isekai thing is dumb as hell - with exceptions. Stormhollow, an RPG primarily children to get them adjusted to such things, your character is generally expected to be literal you, or another person from our world. The Heroes are called "Poppins" (as in they "Pop in"). But again, this is for literal children so I let that slide.

The "Heroes from a different time" thing I have done and works decently well. Kind of an Exalted sort of thing where the party IS the heroes of old, shit upon by a time-fucking spell by their final great nemesis: It deaged them back to when they started their quest, then froze them as statues in the evil wizard's tower for 200 years.
So now they are unfrozen, but all their cool gear is depowered (or stolen) and the evil wizard isn't there anymore either, with the clear assumption that like the party he's lost all his powers but he's also been on the loose for an indeterminant period of time before the party woke up, and its pretty clear his intent is to regain his powers and get back to casting the world-ending spell that will elevate him to godhood.

This is a really good set up when you are introducing experienced players to a new system.
"Elvathas, this is not the age of the pathfinders, you cannot just stun-lock casters with grapple in this modern age"

I start adventures in taverns because nobody really cares how session 1 happened. I'm not trying to win some award for most creative session 1 in history, and I don't like spending any mental energy on a triviality like "how we met." This isn't a dating game.

Curse of Strahd has a optional intro where you start at a tavern and the Yawning Portal module starts in the tavern part of the inn. (I think Descent into Avernus also begins at a tavern) Sometimes people overthink shit, a tavern is okay as a starting place, sometimes people get so obsessed with trying to subvert expectations they are better off sticking with the traditional routes.

From the gaming clubs I've played with and ran stuff with no one gave a shit about starting at a tavern. The only time I had someone freakout about the starting location is someone who thought they should sneak into the city of Baldur's Gate because he wanted to troll the whole plot of the module being "The guards don't let you into the city but they'll let you in soon if you do a quest for them."

Unless you're doing a "you're all so wet behind the ears this is your very first time drawing your weapons in anger" kind of campaign, starting at a tavern is fine. Those were one of the social centers of medieval life, and adventurers aren't likely to be cooking their own meals while in town. If you're going to be there every day anyway, and everybody knows adventurers are likely to be there, there's no better place to give out quests.

Starting is a Tavern is completely fine. As mentioned, that used to be just where people gathered. A Pub(lic House) would be a place where all types, including foreign travelers, would gather without raising eyebrows or too many questions being asked.

If you want to see a great way of using "you meet in the tavern", the opening of the movie Ronin is great:

No one knows each other, no one is responding to a public job notice, but through various means a bunch of strangers are told to go to a Tavern and meet someone.

They're a bad road to go down if you like having money and time, great if you don't care about either of those things.

You forgot about "space". So damn many.

But if you need a bunch of minis, Frostgrave is really good. I got their gnolls for a gnoll-heavy campaign and they were great.[/media]

 

[Judge Dredd]

Depending on the specifics and setting(which should be hashed out before people even start writing characters), it can fuck with player agency regarding their character. Why are they a prisoner? Would their character have actually done anything that would get them prison time? Were they framed for a crime off screen? Would their character even have been anywhere that being captured and sold as a slave would be a thing? What if they wanted to be an escaped slave and now they're caught again already?

I didn't think of the agency part. It's strange as I never really had that problem before. Usually I make a patron or common denominator for the PCs to band together initially. I played in one campaign where the party were kidnapped by a cult, but escaped mid sacrifice. Im told BG3 has you start with the party being infected by an illathid and you go looking for a cure.

Originally it was up to them. All that mattered was they were prisoners (or slaves) in a wagon being taken somewhere. Their caravan is attacked by a monster, and during the massacre they make their escape. Iirc I even had some suggestions, and one was they were set up by a jealous rival.

track which monster is being attacked and its HP or whatever compared to using tiddlywinks or Sorry tokens that you can easily just write a number on top of with a dry-erase.

That's genius, I never thought of that.

Also, if you're going to get minis, make sure you get a bunch of orcs, goblins, skeletons, zombies, generic soldier men.

Frostgrave is really good. I got their gnolls for a gnoll-heavy campaign and they were great.

Yes. I have a box of Frostgrave Gnolls I got for fun. They're fun to build, but I have no use for them. Cultists I could kind of use for a traitor guard army for 40k.

Undead, orcs, and soldiers/guards/knights I can get cheap (about £1-£2 per figure). Shilled in other threads, but big fan of Northstar and Wargames Atlantic.

They rule but are not remotely necessary except (maybe) for PCs/special monsters.

My plan was the opposite. I can make a few generic fodder. Gnolls, guards, cultists, casters of various flavours. But any special or one off monsters, using basic tokens as usual. Or using a mini as a proxy. "Oh, this red dragon, now it's a blue dragon" or using a rat swarm as a stand in for a scarab swarm. You get the idea.

Maybe using minis creates the expectation you'd do it for all of them?

Oddly enough, PCs might be hardest to do. There's not much is the way of dragonborn or warforged out there without getting into 3D printing. Maybe kitbashing some stormcast could work?

Edit: Forgot to mention. I often see it said that the board game Rune Wars is a great source of DnD figures. Turns out that was a board game that flopped and was being sold off cheap. ie. It was a limited time thing that seems to be repeated over and over. In that spirit, there are other board games that do the same kind of thing. Certain Hero Quest sets, or the recent dungeon crawl board game Maladum.

Edit 2: If I really wanted to penny pinch, Dark Allience does 1/72 scale generic fantasy stuff for real cheap. Again, the issue would be PCs and special characters, but I could use tokens for those.

 

[p1138]

I didn't think of the agency part. It's strange as I never really had that problem before. Usually I make a patron or common denominator for the PCs to band together initially. I played in one campaign where the party were kidnapped by a cult, but escaped mid sacrifice. Im told BG3 has you start with the party being infected by an illathid and you go looking for a cure.

Originally it was up to them. All that mattered was they were prisoners (or slaves) in a wagon being taken somewhere. Their caravan is attacked by a monster, and during the massacre they make their escape. Iirc I even had some suggestions, and one was they were set up by a jealous rival.

Like I said, it depends on the specifics. Having them be captured by a cult or something could be an option which doesn't change anything about what they want to have for the background of their character, but on the surface without details I can see why some people would readily reject it.

On the other hand, thanks to Skyrim waking up as a prisoner in a wagon itself has become a meme that some people just may not want in a narrative.

My plan was the opposite. I can make a few generic fodder. Gnolls, guards, cultists, casters of various flavours. But any special or one off monsters, using basic tokens as usual. Or using a mini as a proxy. "Oh, this red dragon, now it's a blue dragon" or using a rat swarm as a stand in for a scarab swarm. You get the idea.

Maybe using minis creates the expectation you'd do it for all of them?

Oddly enough, PCs might be hardest to do. There's not much is the way of dragonborn or warforged out there without getting into 3D printing. Maybe kitbashing some stormcast could work?

Edit: Forgot to mention. I often see it said that the board game Rune Wars is a great source of DnD figures. Turns out that was a board game that flopped and was being sold off cheap. ie. It was a limited time thing that seems to be repeated over and over. In that spirit, there are other board games that do the same kind of thing. Certain Hero Quest sets, or the recent dungeon crawl board game Maladum.

You could also just use paper standees for the things you don't want to bother making minis for. For the PCs, if it's a campaign that is going to be going on for a while they can make a character in that and I think it's $12 for a 2 sided acrylic standee? Paizo has had their pawns boxes for years, and they're cardboard in little plastic stands and work just fine looking like this


And if you've got a color printer, hell you can use binder clips from an office supply store as bases


It's not perfect, but it gets the job done.

 

[Ghostse]

You could also just use paper standees for the things you don't want to bother making minis for.

Very much this. The plastic standees are really good and you can get whole kits on amazon.

 

[Glory To Arztotska]

Any idea how to intro a campaign where the player characters were captured and put on a hobgoblin slave galley but then bad weather dashed it on the rocks and the party wakes up on a mystery island? I.e. how to handle losing/reacquiring their gear?

 

[Ghostse]

Any idea how to intro a campaign where the player characters were captured and put on a hobgoblin slave galley but then bad weather dashed it on the rocks and the party wakes up on a mystery island? I.e. how to handle losing/reacquiring their gear?

Read Robinson Caruso. (that better be "reread")

Martials just loot the bloated corpses of Hobgoblin guards on the beach. Magic users are utterly buttfucked- they have to make deals with island spirits for magical power, or pray to the God of the Sea or whatever ruined shines of the forgotten diety that got irritated by its Atlantian worshippers, vulcanized them, but forgot that it needed to leave enough alive to worship it or it would lose its connection to the material plane.
Or maybe say they can pick one spell as the one they folded up and tucked up in the ol' prison wallet.

 

[p1138]

Any idea how to intro a campaign where the player characters were captured and put on a hobgoblin slave galley but then bad weather dashed it on the rocks and the party wakes up on a mystery island? I.e. how to handle losing/reacquiring their gear?

If I were to do something like that, and I knew my players were up for it...

Have them make some characters at lvl 2 or in whatever system you're using basically being past character creation and having done something. Maybe even treat it like a prologue but have them get captured in the end but don't tell them it's a one-shot(you don't want someone coming up with a throwaway character idea they wouldn't actually use in a campaign) after doing a simple dungeon or something. Beginning of the next session after they've been captured, have them level up. Narrate their journey stuck being captives and getting sold along with maybe some checks to see how they survive dealing with the slavers to give you an idea of what meager shit they might have found on the ship or possibly any beatings or untreated illness they may have contracted during the voyage, then dash their ship against the rocks in a storm.

By doing that you've already got player buy-in for the characters, and regardless of how tenuous the party members were with eachother after doing some bullshit lvl 1 chores for a village now they're all pissed off at the same shit and will likely follow any narrative thread that could lead them back to getting some revenge on their original captors. Can even throw in another survivor in there as an NPC for them to interact with. The martial classes will have an easier time in combat, the classes with brains should be able to apply their skills to helping outside of combat. Have some shitty natives on the island they can beat up for some basic gear and include a shaman with some basic spellcasting supplies, now they've got to work to get some usable shit. At that point maybe it's not even an island just a big peninsula, and they can explore from there on whatever sort of adventure you're running.

It'll be a rough start, avoids their characters popping into existence in the world in a stupid situation, and can get the group working together with some goals pretty fast.

 

[Judge Dredd]

On the other hand, thanks to Skyrim waking up as a prisoner in a wagon itself has become a meme that some people just may not want in a narrative.

I know, that's why I was surprised to see it suggested as an original, interesting way to start a campaign.

Being a prisoner works because it doesn't effect the background. You could be a noble who was black bagged, thrown into a van carriage and carted off to parts unknown. You could be a law abiding civilian falsely accused. Could be a minor non-offence and you got mixed up with another prisoner. At least, that's how I see it.

Any idea how to intro a campaign where the player characters were captured and put on a hobgoblin slave galley but then bad weather dashed it on the rocks and the party wakes up on a mystery island? I.e. how to handle losing/reacquiring their gear?

(Ninja'd by @Ghostse )
This is the setup for N1 Treasure Hunt, though I wouldn't recommend their way of handling gear. (If curious, you start as level 0, and the first item you touch determines your class. So picking up a knife makes you a thief, that sort of thing.) As just mentioned, I've pitched campaigns like that and got rejected, but I have run Treasure Hunt many times.

When it comes to stripping gear. It's a favourite technique of mine, though I do it sparingly. My advice. Just do it. Yes, monks and innate spellcasters will be OP in this situation for at least an encounter or two. Let them have their fun. Any "essential" gear like a clerics holy symbol or a wizards spellbook, put it somewhere impossible to miss, and teleport it around if necessary. The rational is they're carrying it as a trophy/storing it to sort later. It shouldn't be immediately available, but they should be able to get it before too long, if for no other reason than it's boring to play a wizard with no spells for session after session.

Play it logically. Have some improvised weapon and unarmed combat rules ready. This comes down to the players, their smarts and buy in. Some players will immediately makeshift something. Snapping off a chair leg, grabbing a wine bottle, etc. Others will sneak around until they get equipped. Other just "unarmed attack". It really depends on the person.

Once combat has happened, most will try to steal any clothes or weapons they come across. Again, logic how this works. -1 ac or disadvantage for a bad fit, if the item is of low quality, have it break on a crit or nat 1. It doesn't have to be complex.

 

[AnOminous]

Any idea how to intro a campaign where the player characters were captured and put on a hobgoblin slave galley but then bad weather dashed it on the rocks and the party wakes up on a mystery island? I.e. how to handle losing/reacquiring their gear?

They can obviously just plunder the hobgoblins (also are these total noobs to the point that retards like hobgoblins can enslave them) for basic shit.

Also how many hobgoblins survived? There might need to be an immediate fight. Also did only hobgoblins and PCs survive? There could be surviving NPCs who could either be useful or hostile (or have their own agendas).

If they actually had functional gear, they could have to do some serious scrounging to try to recover the underwater stuff. Maybe they could recover some diving goggles and actually go looking underwater for their real gear.

(It also raises the question, if they had awesome gear well beyond what they could scrounge off the hobgoblin corpses, why were they enslaved in the first place?)

There's some potential for underwater combat if something other than weather caused the wreck. Or encountering some aquatic allies who sunk the ship because it was run by hobgoblins, who might be actually helpful.

And maybe items from the galley, like whatever cargo they were transporting, might also be useful.

 

[Ghostse]

Have them make some characters at lvl 2 or in whatever system you're using basically being past character creation and having done something. Maybe even treat it like a prologue but have them get captured in the end but don't tell them it's a one-shot(you don't want someone coming up with a throwaway character idea they wouldn't actually use in a campaign) after doing a simple dungeon or something. Beginning of the next session after they've been captured, have them level up. Narrate their journey stuck being captives and getting sold along with maybe some checks to see how they survive dealing with the slavers to give you an idea of what meager shit they might have found on the ship or possibly any beatings or untreated illness they may have contracted during the voyage, then dash their ship against the rocks in a storm.

Again, depending on your players:
another thing I might do is give each player a moment in the spotlight, like a half-session or maybe a session where the other players are NPCs in the Spotlighted character's story about how they wound up in chains on the boat... or maybe as guard.


Last time I did a prisoners-turned-castaways session, I also did thing where I handed out playing cards and told the players "anyone with the ace of diamonds is a traitor. We'll connect after session, but your goal will be to derail the party and have them recaptured. Ok hand them back.". The deck was naturally all spades and clubs but the insistence THEY aren't the traitor only mades them look more guilty.

 

[Pentex]

5e grifters (DMs for hire aka OnlyRolls) gonna get that bag in 2026:

https://archive.is/CT7mQ

If I wanted to roll dice with a bunch of unwashed nerds on a college campus, I can do it for a lot less than $3000.

 

[The Ugly One]

But if you need a bunch of minis, Frostgrave is really good. I got their gnolls for a gnoll-heavy campaign and they were great.

Reaper's gnolls are terrible, too big to fit into a 1" square.

 

[Glory To Arztotska]

5e grifters (DMs for hire aka OnlyRolls) gonna get that bag in 2026:

View attachment 7674426
View attachment 7674429
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https://archive.is/CT7mQ

If I wanted to roll dice with a bunch of unwashed nerds on a college campus, I can do it for a lot less than $3000.

Disgraceful. I'm okay with people wanting to offset the costs of running a game, but I'd rather get raped with AIDS than put up with this shit.

 

[AnOminous]

Last time I did a prisoners-turned-castaways session, I also did thing where I handed out playing cards and told the players "anyone with the ace of diamonds is a traitor. We'll connect after session, but your goal will be to derail the party and have them recaptured. Ok hand them back.". The deck was naturally all spades and clubs but the insistence THEY aren't the traitor only mades them look more guilty.

That's wonderful. That's just beautifully evil. Almost Paranoia level mindfuck.

Whenever I did the obvious traitor thing as a PC everyone knew it because that was the only reason I ever dropped in as a PC in someone else's game. "Oh, so it's THIS again."

 

[anti SJW]

How to get people away from 5E

 

[Judge Dredd]

(It also raises the question, if they had awesome gear well beyond what they could scrounge off the hobgoblin corpses, why were they enslaved in the first place?)

It's the whole "a man has a knife to your throat" "I'm a level 5 fighter, that dagger would do d4 damage and I have 100hp." kind of moment.

I run pulp/spy themed games, and the PCs being captured comes up occasionally. Things like drugged food, sleeping gas, and other methods I just narrate. It works even better as a session starter since you don't have to justify or roll for anything.

I also did thing where I handed out playing cards and told the players "anyone with the ace of diamonds is a traitor. We'll connect after session, but your goal will be to derail the party and have them recaptured. Ok hand them back.". The deck was naturally all spades and clubs but the insistence THEY aren't the traitor only mades them look more guilty.

I'm stealing this.