“It’s like Conan plus Indiana Jones plus every Humphrey Bogart movie” for Eberron. “It’s like Lord of the Rings meets Dracula,” for Ravenloft. Ravenloft wears its gothic influence on its sleeve, with Strahd standing in for Count Dracula, and other Ravenloft adventures leaning on classic Universal monster movies like Frankenstein, and Hammer horror films.Īll of these cultural touchstones give these genre-focused settings an instant elevator pitch. The original Eberron Campaign Setting for third edition D&D even has a list of movies that were vital to the setting’s creation, including Brotherhood of the Wolf, Casablanca, The Maltese Falcon, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and a handful of others. What’s something that all the popular D&D genre adaptations have in common? Well, I’m sure you can find a lot of commonalities if you break things down to their smallest parts, but there’s one shared trait that stands out to me in particular: all of these settings use immensely popular movies or novels as touchstones. If you think that breaking this rule will help make your game, your setting, or your adventure better, then go for it! These constraints will help you get a good, basic, and fun game-but like all other rules in D&D, these rules are made to be broken. You get to keep the genre tropes of the Sam Spade-style private eye, the Indiana Jones-like archaeologist adventurer, and so forth, but they’ve been flavored by the trappings of D&D, and thus fit smoothly into a D&D game.Īs with all the advice to follow, this rule is a far-reaching generalization. In Eberron, for example, the hardboiled detectives and intrepid explorers that slink through the streets of Sharn or creep through the jungles of Xen’drik don’t carry revolvers-they carry wands of magic missiles. Instead of bending D&D’s tropes to fit the genre, you bend the genre’s tropes to fit D&D. There are hundreds, maybe even thousands, of roleplaying games out there-don’t torture yourself trying to fit a square peg into a D&D-shaped hole.Īdapting a genre into D&D, however, is less involved. But once you start changing dice systems, or integral mechanics like hit points or spell slots to suit the genre of story you want to tell, you’re far better off playing a different roleplaying game. Adding a new rules system on top of D&D’s existing mechanical framework is fairly easy-and stripping one rules system or a handful of mechanical bits (like certain races or classes) is easy enough, too. The game mechanics of D&D suit several very specific moods, feelings, and genres, and trying to change the engine of the game too much for a homebrew campaign is a fool’s errand. Note that I said “adapting other genres into D&D” and not “adapting D&D into other genres.” The distinction here is important. The first trick is the most important one-and it’s a matter of perspective. How can you adapt the post-apocalyptic genre to D&D? Or the western? Or the courtroom drama? How far can you bend D&D before it breaks-and before you would be better off just finding another game system entirely? The line is different for everyone, but here’s how you can start adapting other genres into D&D. If the professionals can do it in their games, so can you. The upcoming Eberron: Rising from the Last War setting book is sure to be filled with lots of new mechanics, items, creatures, and characters that alter basic expectations of D&D to suit its post-war, pulp-fiction, arcane-noir setting. Tomb of Annihilation adds a new game mechanic-the Death Curse-to increase the game’s lethality and grittiness. Curse of Strahd and the Ravenloft setting presents a world of Gothic Horror, and presents new items, creatures, and characters to sell the idea of being in a malevolent world. Many settings actively adapt D&D to other genres. Others still have a single overarching plot that spans a vast swathe of land, throwing you into an epic quest like in Tyranny of Dragons or Storm King’s Thunder.ĭ&D has lots of variation within its niche, but there are nevertheless plenty of stories that don’t work in the fantasy genre of D&D. Some see you exploring a sandbox environment in search of hidden locations or secret artifacts while completing quests and meeting new characters and creatures, like Tomb of Annihilation or Curse of Strahd. Some D&D adventures take place in dungeons like Princes of the Apocalypse. The core rules of D&D support games of epic heroes who slay hideous monsters in the face of overwhelming odds, and claim the loot that they guard as a reward. Monstrous Compendium Vol 3: Minecraft Creaturesĭungeons and Dragons is a game of fantasy roleplaying.
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