The Learning DM

After a significant break last year, I’m back in the swing of Dungeons & Dragons again. I’m playing on an online campaign through Roll20.net, and DMing two different tabletop campaigns. One group is running Curse of Strahd. In the other, we just finished Expedition to the Barrier Peaks. I’ve wanted to run this module for years now, and finally I did! Here are some things I learned from the experience.

You Can’t Run It All

First of all, there’s just plain too much content in the crashed spaceship to get through in a reasonable time frame. Our group meets roughly once a month, for 3-4 hours each session. I knew I wanted to get through the adventure in three sessions, so I really had to prioritize things.

I read through the module, highlighting cool scenes and encounters as I went. I decided that the vegepygmies, police robots, both medical androids, the telepathic plant, the “wolf in sheep’s clothing” plant, the froghemoth, and the mind flayer were must-run encounters. Everything else would either be ignored totally, found dead, or just described before running away from the party in fear.

But there were so many rooms! How was I to adequately and accurately describe them all? Well, I totally cheated, that’s how. I made copies of the maps for level 1, 3, and 4, and simply gave them to players when the time came. It made sense that there would be maps on the walls in such a big spacecraft, and it really sped things along.

Also, in the interests of expedience, I let the group find a red key card (which works on all locks) by the end of the first session. I realize all the backtracking and finding new cards was part of Gygax’s intentions when he wrote it, but ain’t nobody got time for that. I’d rather see my players do something epic than collect colored keys and backtrack all over the ship.

No Minis? No Problem

The second big take-away from running Expedition to the Barrier Peaks is the lack of miniatures for most foes. I was able to find no official vegepygmy miniatures, so I decided to make some myself. As a backer of the first Reaper Bones Kickstarter, I had tons of unpainted minis available. I’ve got plenty of zombies and skeletons already, so the Bones zombies and skeletons could be repurposed as vegepgymies. It was quite simple and the results were great!

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I layed on a black basecoat, followed by a sloppy drybrush with dark green. Next was a lighter drybrush with a brighter green, followed by a heavy wash in brown ink. I knew I wanted to have some texture to the minis, so they wouldn’t simply appear to be green skeletons. The perfect texture was easy to find; I just opened up a couple of teabags. I also mixed in some green flock I had lying around, but you really wouldn’t need that.

Mixing a few drops of water into some plain old Elmer’s glue, I “painted” each mini liberally with the glue. Then I sprinkled my tea bag mix over each mini, and let it dry completely. I then mixed some more glue up, and applied it to the mini again, as I didn’t want pieces flaking off. Finally, I based them and sprayed them with a heavy coat of matte sealer. Very simple, and they look nice. The minis are great for vegepygmies, but also any plant-like humanoid, twig blight, moss man, whatever.

On to the main event, then: the dread Froghemoth. I knew I wanted this fight to be the closer, and so a suitably epic miniature was needed. An official Froghemoth mini was produced in limited quantities, but I was unable to find one. There were some very expensive alternatives, but I’m cheap. The third Bones Kickstarter offered a Froghemoth as an addon. I backed it (late), and the anticipated delivery was last fall, well within my time frame. However, the delivery has been significantly delayed. As the day of the Froghemoth approached, I had no mini to use. Making one was my only remaining option.

I decided to hew closely to the actual illustration from the module instead of modern reinterpretations. I ordered this frog toy from Amazon, and used the tentacles of this octopus toy. This project would require heavy customizing, more than simple limb/weapon swaps and such I was used to. Prepping the frog was easy: just cut off the frog’s eyes and front feet. I used grey stuff to fill in the eye holes, smoothing out the head.

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Attaching the tentacles was tough. I drilled small holes in the leg stump/midsection and each tentacle, then pegged a small piece of dowel in between. (The process was similar to pinning a smaller miniature.) Multiple applications of grey stuff were required, the first to simply stick the pieces together, the rest to smooth it out. Time was short, so added one twisted eyestalk with eyes looking in every direction rather than three separate eyestalks. A simple mouth and tongue wrapped up the sculpting.

Next up: painting! I primed the creature using the gradient method. A heavy coat of dark gray, then a lesser coat of medium gray, and finally a burst or two of white for highlighting. I went with glazes of thinned paint over the gradient, which ended up looking great and saved me lots of time. The tentacles were tough to paint, with so many bits and bobs everywhere, but a coat of orange followed by a red drybrush ended up looking OK. Next, I washed it all with Nuln Oil, (from Games Workshop, the best wash IMO) and sealed it with matte spray.

Overall, I think the froghemoth turned out fine. If I’d had more time, I’d have used toothpick ends to make some gnarly teeth, and better sculpted the eyestalks and nostril-thingies. Still, my players thought it was pretty awesome when I dropped the froghemoth on the table, resting on a 5 inch square base.

What about that mind flayer? There are plenty of mind flayer minis out there, why not just use one? Well, a couple of reasons. First of all, it’s clear that the mind flayer in this module is not your traditional robe-wearing squidhead. Second, I had a conversation with a player that led me to want to go in a different direction. We were discussing the new Ghost in the Shell movie, and I commented that they added a Robocop element to the story (a forgotten identity). My buddy responds “DUDE we’d better run into Robocop somewhere in this spaceship.” That’s when I decided that this particular mind flayer would be wearing power armor.

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I had a War Machine figure from an old game lying around, but a Heroclix Iron Man or even a 40K Space Marine would work fine. I spent $4 on a two pack of mind flayer minis from the new Nolzur’s Marvelous Miniatures series, and cut off one’s hands and head. Some grey stuff and a paint job later, and the mind flayer was done. When he showed up, my players named him Power-Cthulhu. If you think a mind flayer is tough on its own, add in some spells and power armor. You’ll thank me later.

The Big Finale

I knew I wanted to use the froghemoth as the centerpiece of the big final fight. KNowing how OP my group’s characters already were, before they found power armor and stun grenades, I knew I’d need to really crank up the challenge. I beefed up the froghemoth with Legendary Resistance and actions, similar to those of dragons. The wing attack was replaced by a RIBBIT power that dealt modest damage in an area, knocking foes prone if a save vs. Con was failed. The auto-damage dealt nicely with summon woodlands creatures shenanigans from the druid.

Even with these alterations, I knew the froghemoth would die quickly. So I went with a multi-stage fight where other residents of the spaceship, including Power-Cthulhu, made appearances.

Stage 1: Froghemoth fights alone, the mind flayer simply observes

Stage 2: Froghemoth is joined by charmed vegepygmy minions with 1 hit point (throwback to 4E). These were useful for disrupting concentration and blocking positions. They also burst spores upon death. In this stage, Power-Cthulhu hovers around, taking potshots at the party with the laser blaster in the armor.

Stage 3: Vegepymies all die. Froghemoth is nearly dead, so Power-Cthulhu steps it up, unleashing his spells and stun attack.

It was a tough fight. The rogue got swallowed by the mighty Froghemoth first, then the barbarian. It took all the 10th level party had to fell the beast. This was the closest the group has come to a player death since level 2. The casters had used up nearly all of their spells. And yet they still had a mind flayer arcanist with a laser blaster and 100 hp of power armor left to face.

Good thing for the group that Power-Cthulhu was ready to parlay. The froghemoth was blocking the only way out of the ship, you see. The froghemoth was too much for the kind flayer to handle alone, so he used the heroes to fight the beast for him. Power-Cthulhu offered a way to destroy the ship (to prevent an infestation of alien vegepygmyism) and directions to the exit if the party simply let him flee.

Expedition to the Barrier Peaks was an incredible experience. Sure, it’s over the top, almost Monty Haul with all the technology, and by far the weirdest adventure in the history of D&D. But it’s also a great deal of fun. Focusing on the highlights, making miniatures for key monsters, and tying it all together in a huge set piece finale will make your crawl through a fallen spaceship a memorable one.

Have you read my books yet? Check out more information about them at marcallie.com/books!

Have you been wondering where The Learning DM went? I haven’t been DMing the past few months, but enjoying the D&D experience as a player. I’ve also been busy writing a new book! Don’t Stop the Geekin’ is full of more stories from my childhood in the 80s, growing up in a world that was much less friendly to geeks than it is now. There are some funny moments, some cringey moments, and plenty of pop culture references that 80s kids will appreciate.

Chapter titles include:

• I Was a Second Grade Pencil Thief
• The Summer of Ms. Pac-Man
• A Tale of Two Johns
• Knowing is Half the Battle
• Mad Math: The Slope Warrior (Beyond Polygons)

Don’t Stop the Geekin’ is available now at Amazon’s Kindle Store. Print copies are coming in May 2016. Sign up for my email list for all the latest news on my books! I’d also encourage you to check out my author blog over at marcallie.com if you are interested in more general geeky stuff.

I am a huge, HUGE fan of the whole Lazy DM movement (Thank you Sly Flourish). 5th edition is quite a bit easier for lazy DMs to work with than 4th edition was, which I very much appreciate. However, sometimes, you just want a huge battle map with tons of minis and scenery. My session this past weekend was one of those times. I spent almost all of my prep time not in the Monster Manual, or the Dungeon Master’s Guide, but at my painting/crafting table.

I like to do big, memorable encounters like this at the beginning of a D&D session. I realize that is backwards from what you’d expect, but I’ve had too many Big Bads not get a fair shake since we only had 30 minutes left for the encounter. So far, it has worked out pretty well, and my players don’t seem to mind at all. Using cliffhanger endings seems to keep the momentum going between sessions as well, which is a nice bonus.

A quick bit of story: my players are lost on the Isle of Dread, and had just returned to the village of Tanaroa after retrieving some missing villagers from a lair of lizardfolk. The lizardfolk attacked the huge wall guarding the village, and the players, along with some important NPCs, village warriors, and zombie minions, were set to defend the village.

The first thing I needed was the wall itself. I had picked up a piece of Mage Knight terrain on clearance several months ago, the Castle Gatehouse. That took care of my gate, but now I needed the rest of the wall. I dug through some junk I had accumulated and found the perfect item: craft sticks that were pointed on one end. Regular craft sticks would work fine too, I imagine, but these looked more authentic, like they had been sharpened for defense. Other than these, I only needed a strip of cardboard and some plain ol’ Elmer’s glue.

I glued the sticks down to the cardboard, leaving about three inches uncovered on either side. Next I used a 1″ brush and some cheapo dark brown craft paint to give it a good first coat. After, I used a smaller brush to paint the crevices between the sticks black, then did a light second coat of brown to fix any sloppiness. Finally, an easy drybrush of light brown made the wall pieces look great.

The only problem left was how to make the walls stand. The extra cardboard on the ends was intended for this purpose. Making two folds and taping them down gave plenty of support on either end. I ending up making two wall sections, one for either side of the gate. When stacked next to the Castle Gatehouse piece, they looked pretty good. The Great Wall of Tanaroa was complete.

The next step was to add some huts to the village. I really struggled with a good way to do this without too much effort. (I am lazy, remember?) In the end, I decided to dig out the old Dwarven Forge game tiles from the first Kickstarter, and see what I could do. Making a stone hut was very simple. I decided to leave off the doors, since these are supposed to be primitive huts after all.

But what to do about the roof? I thought perhaps there were some rooftop Dungeon Tiles, but a quick look at DMDavid’s Index showed that there really wasn’t a good option. (His site is great, and you should visit it often, by the way.) I cut some cardboard a bit larger than the roof size, and set it on top. It was plain, and would work, but something was missing, for sure.

I thought back to the paste, scissors, and construction paper art projects I had enjoyed as a kid. Grabbing a green piece of paper and a pair of scissors, I cut a rough rooftop sized piece, then made repeated cuts around the edges, all the way around the roof. I glued this down to the heavier cardboard I had originally planned to use. Turns out, this step was overkill, and if I were doing it again, I would go with the construction paper alone.

By folding the fringed edges of the paper down, I ended up with a reasonable approximation of a palm-leaf roof over a stone hut. I considered doing some cross hatching on the rather plain rooftop but decided it wasn’t worth the effort in the end. I ended up using two huts like this, and during the fight, village archers used the rooftops as vantage points to defend against the invading lizardfolk. That makes me think, would palm leaves be sturdy enough to hold up a human? Hmm…

All that was left for the battlemap was actually drawing it. As you may have guessed from the pictures above, I used Gaming Paper for this map. I like this stuff quite a lot, it flattens nicely even when rolled up for long-term storage. It’s also easy to draw on with a sharpie. I didn’t go too crazy with details here, just showing a central path, some tar pits, which were the second line of defense if the gate was opened, and a graveyard on the opposite end of the map from the wall. This was used to animate some undead defenders by the friendly neighborhood zombie mistress.

I was excited to use some of my Warhammer Fantasy lizardman army for this session. I had picked up a used lot at a fair price, and the showpiece was a lizardman riding a huge dinosaur. In D&D terms, this was a lizardfolk king riding atop a tyrannosaurus. In order to avoid focus fire issues, I gave the king and his mount a shared pool of hit points. This made for some cool scenes, as when the lizard king would have died, I described that long bloody gashes appeared on the tyrannosaurus, and the blood from these wounds oozed over the king, rejuvenating him. This worked well, providing a cool narrative as well as extending the challenge.

The best part of the encounter, though, was an inventive idea the druid had. He let me know that he intended at some point to polymorph the barbarian, played by my son, into a giant ape. My son had an old King Kong toy that was perfect for this. There was even an action feature where you would push a button on Kong’s back and he would bash with his fist. Conveniently, the lizard king mini fit into Kong’s hand. When the party surmised that removing the king from his mount would break the magical bond between them, all it took was an Athletics contest roll, and then the mighty lizard king was used to pummel his own tyrannosaurus mount into oblivion. My son’s day was absolutely made at that point!

The encounter ended up taking a long, LONG time. In addition to their own PCs, the players ran a major NPC each and a couple even were responsible for village warriors and zombie defenders. This freed me to take care of the lizardfolk attackers, their king, the tyrannosaurus, and also some rakasta and human captives that the lizardfolk had used an enraging poison on before setting them loose in the attack. The fight was finally over after just under three hours, but everyone had such a good time, it seemed to fly by. It was among the most epic experiences of the campaign so far, for sure!

Obviously, I won’t have the time or the inclination to go to such lengths every time. Most of the time, theater of the mind and near/medium/far zones on index cards work just fine. Every once in a while, though, you want something more. You can get great results with the most inexpensive materials. If you don’t have the perfect minis lying around, a trip to the toy aisle of a dollar store can be a great source of inspiration, as well. And if at all possible, include a giant ape in your epic battle scenes. Your players will be glad you did!

I am proud to announce that I have written a book! It’s called I Was Geeky When Geeky Wasn’t Cool, and it’s available for at the Amazon Kindle store. This little book is a collection of memories and tales about what it was like for me as a young nerd in the 1980s. The book is humorous and melancholy at times, moving and engaging through all 30,000 words. There is plenty to reminisce about inside, with dozens of references to pop culture from that glorious decade, as well as more geeky fare like sci-fi, comic books, and of course, fantasy.

I devoted an entire chapter to my first time playing Dungeons & Dragons on the playground in fifth grade. A selection from this chapter is included below. Take a look at it, and if you like it, why not purchase a copy of the full book by clicking on the cover image above?

Jason led us on a journey to a dark, mystical land called Barovia. Packs of wolves howled in the distance as we traversed a muddy road shrouded in eerie fog. A creepy fortune teller cackled as she made predictions about the dire fate that awaited us. We made our way through thunder and pouring rain to the gothic towers of Castle Ravenloft. Inside, the treasures of the vampire wizard, Count Strahd von Zarovich, lie ripe for the plunder. The gloomy setting was incredibly evocative to my ten-year-old mind.

Jason would occasionally present choices for us, asking for our responses, and take the story a bit further. He deftly weaved our ideas and input into a compelling, if not campy, adventure story. It was as if all three of us were reading and writing a Choose Your Own Adventure book together at the same time. I loved every minute of it.

Inside the castle, we encountered all sorts of horrific entities, ranging from stone gargoyles to ancient witches and animated suits of armor. All manner of deadly traps had to be overcome, but vast stores of gold coins and ancient, powerful magical artifacts made the risk worthwhile. Anti-paladins and assassins are not exactly renowned for their sense of community and sharing, and thus Marty and I inevitably betrayed one another, but it was all in good fun. All too soon, the recess bell rang, pulling us from the clang of swords and daggers on undead bones back into the real world. Oh, what I’d have given for a longer recess that day, but it was not to be.