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Submit Your Questions for the February Q&A Livestream! (Patreon)

Published:
2021-02-25 15:55:00
Imported:
2026-06

Content

Our February 2020 Livestream will be a Dungeon Master's Homebrew Workshop! Join us stream on TOMORROW, Feb 26th from 6 PM to 8 PM ET.

Please submit any questions you may have about homebrewing content for your D&D campaigns, such as:

Creating new player options new options (origins, subclasses, spells, feats, ect)

Homebrewing magic items

Building NPCs (both roleplaying traits and game statistics)

Creating factions and organizations for your world

Designing custom monsters and their stat blocks

How to "reflavour" existing monsters and rules to suit a new concept

Homebrewing adventures, pantheons, and worlds

Please leave your questions in the comments below by tomorrow at 4pm. We ask that you submit no more than one question for consideration.

We hope we can answer most submissions, but we may need to narrow our selections occasionally depending on the quantity. We’ll curate the questions to avoid duplicates, and we encourage you to LIKE questions submitted by other patrons which are of interest to you so we can prioritize if necessary. We’ll read out your questions out during the stream, and hopefully take a few extra questions from the live chat as well.

If you miss the live stream, don’t worry — the full recording will be available on YouTube a few days later.

Cheers

Kelly & Monty

Comments

Senrey

How do you avoid DM fatigue and writer's block? I'm currently running my first homebrew and after 3 or so months I just can't get motivated or excited for writing the next week's session.

Angel

Hi DDudes! My first campaign I've ever run is a homebrew campaign. Often times, I find a slight struggle in filling the world with interesting factions. What are some good methods and rules of thumb that you can recommend when it comes to designing interesting and compelling factions? Thanks!

Edward Obarowski

I've been thinking of home-brewing a fighter subclass that is the cleric version of Arcane Knight. I've been told by people that's what a paladin is, but not really in my opinion. This would be a fighter primarily, but have some of the cleric sub abilities as well as casting. I am thinking to keep the spell progression the same as the Arcane Knight, but would like advice on how to implement the other abilities to keep it balanced. Hopefully this does fall into the category for this Q&A, if not, feel free to disregard.

MapleyBacons

Thoughts on the wildfire druid? I noticed it was missing from your druid subclass rankings.

Dan Dredgen

Do you guys have an tips for creating monster-inspired subclasses? I recently home brewed a Sphinx Lord warlock patron and used the creature stat block to create the class features. I love how it came out thematically but am having a hard time balancing the abilities (ie. including damage dealing features or not, as well as increasing damage or effectiveness with level progression) I would love to hear your thoughts on this. Thank you

Baron Haber

Hey there dudes, thanks for all the great content. I’m running an island campaign and I’m thinking of ways to make ocean voyages of about 1-2 days length fun and active. Any tips or systems that you find particularly useful? (Kelly, I know you’ve done some pirate campaigns.)

Samuel Crites

How do you create depth to your world so that it doesn’t feel thin or the players don’t find the one area you haven’t spent enough time thinking through? I am

Samuel Crites

just starting my first home brew campaign so anything helps.

Gregory Lopez

I have a homebrew setting that I've been working on for over 20 years and that has been through multiple editions and game systems. Most of the setting information is in my head, though I have a little written down to give players. How much should I write down & how do I get motivated to do so?

Kurtis Fosdick

They made the video before Tasha's came out

J. Cruelty Catalog

Advice for how to speed things up without railroading the players. The group that I am dungeon mastering has spent literally hours going off the beaten path and slogging through the wilderness in search of (nonexistent) clues while ignoring the main quest... and then they get bored! It takes the fun out of world-building when they never get to experience it.

Jack Fisher (ChumSlinger)

Do you know of a strategy/method/tool for building an NPC Stat block from a player character sheet?

Kurtis Fosdick

What are some hard limits that homebrew material shouldn't edit from DnD's base ruleset? What mechanics/abilities are just too unbalanced to be fun?

Brett Sheridan

Gentlemen! Big fan! I've recently attempted making a class with the help of the Dungeon Dudes Discord channel So thank you for the great community! My question is about testing out adventures or new homebrew content. Before running a "shake-things-up" kind of adventure, I'm curious if you have a method in which you test these kind of things? A Solo played encounter or do you bring others in? Not to mention dealing with players responses to these attempts by the DM to avoid stagnation, can sometimes be extremely awkward... Glory to you! Brett

MapleyBacons

oh! My b. I’ll go hunting, thanks! :)

Alex Moskowitz

If you're homebrewing a magic item that requires players to spend charges, how do you determine how many charges to spend per activation and how many charges to recover on rests?

Joey Johnson

Are there any good guidelines on Magic Item limits such as chance to break, number of charges, time to recharge, use time, or requiring attunement? I find it tough to figure out which tools to use when balancing magic items for PC use.

Troy Middleton

Often times in homebrew campaigns I find the climax to be a large scale battle with multiple different factions participating. Do you have any tips for homebrewing solid war style or city siege based combat? With so many different events happening it can be difficult to make the players feel like they are actually in control of the battle's outcome

Parker Brantley

To add onto this I really wish there was a low level, mid level and high level stat block for every class but never seem to have enough regular humanoid stat blocks in my games. Would you know where to find them in order to fill out my world?

Dan Bono

Any tips on getting a group of powerful (lvl 11) murder hobos (I inherited them from another DM) to interact with NPC's? There are 2 in the party that can cast Speak With Dead so they literally shoot first then ask questions. They are complaining that the current game is basically an overland dungeon crawl (it is). I'm not too keen on creating a village or community just for them to waylay it all (I had a small Lizardfolk village that attempted to parlay, they were all dead in 2 rounds).

Dice&Doggos

For Homebrewing monsters, do you think it's okay to add extra effects on the fly? Such as a black pudding/gelatinous cube would blind all creatures in it's space. Also, what's the best way to slowly introduce homebrew rules without beaking anything.

Alex Chelminski

What are your thoughts on using armor AC penalties to help encourage players to heal earlier and add some realism/penalties to a player dropping and getting back up multiple times in a fight?

Nickolaus Willard

When making a new homebrew world/setting, which content area do you do design and focus on first and why? Related questions/different ways to ask this: Is there an order of operations that you believe is most efficient? How in depth do you dive into each and what sort of timeline might you expect to spend on each? - Physical Geography - Mythology - Cosmology - Lore - Human Geography - Institutions/Factions

Evenus

Have you tried homebrewing cursed items? Any advice on how to make them more interesting than "your character has a new personality" or "you lose x max hit points every 24 hours?

Brian Leet

You have recently mentioned the Wild Magic Surge table and the Delerium related tables you are working on for Drakkenheim. How do you go about building tables like this, and do you have any other sources of fun random effects we could throw into our own campaigns?

Colton Parker

How do you measure the power balancing of homebrews? I'm thinking specifically of player options including class / subclass improvements, new spells, new player specific features. I like giving my players additional options (items, feats, one-off character features) but I am concerned about power balance and the implications of something being unbalanced.

Michael J Piasecki

How do you go about updating or lifting material from previous editions of D&D to create “homebrew” in 5e? I am specifically trying to port from 3.5e, where there is no bounded accuracy, but just general guidelines for porting between any system would be useful.

Roger Bron

re: "Building NPCs (both roleplaying traits and game statistics)" Q: I'm not sure this is what you wanted, but what advice do you have if a party believes it is missing some Class (as in "We don't have a Cleric, no one can use this magic item"), and they want an NPC to join the adventure and fill that role and function, or, setting up a key NPC in town (a sage, some expert) but not making that NPC truly know it all, not turn into "The DM is really talking here, telling players what to do ..."

Robb Van Eck

What are some ideas for re-balancing or tweaking content mid-campaign - sometime homebrew works great... sometimes not so great ... what are some tricks for fixing in game without blowing up the campaign?

Gary Robbins

You are travelling away from your Homebrew notes, all of a sudden an idea for your Campaign hits you. What tools do you carry with you so you can jot them down? I imagine there are several hand written notes written on the back of coffee shop napkins.

McSquishy

I know you guys have covered the differences between DM's and how experience effects how much time you spend prepping or creating your homebrew world. In your opinion, for a newer DM how long would you recommend working on creating your homebrew world, and what steps would you take?

SoraNC

Not sure if this is technically on topic but: As a DM, how do you handle players requesting homebrewed items, homebrewed mechanics, or homebrewed classes/races? (i.e. the Chain of Returning from CR, creating a fishing system and handing it over to you to implement it without asking, wanting to play Unearthed Arcana curated stuff)

Euan Smith

Is Kelly looking forward to the return of the Wilhelm Moustache as much as I am?

GSG Plays116

What is a good way to ensure a semblance of balance to your homebrew creations; whether it be classes, races, items, etc.

Matti Gilmore

One of the best this to do is compare it to other subclass of that class. And it's also good to let your player now is that you may need to change things for balance. Honest the only real way to see how it play out is to play it. And see how it. Fits in your game. Also looking in the dmg I believe they have a screen on that. But it think it basical. Says. Compare it to other subclasses of that class. Homebrewing is more of an art then a science. When ever possible skin(reflavor) honest I don't think damage tips matter that much unless if it's force or psychic. Because for few things we resist/immunity.so watch giving high damage die of them two. Of their. Is something similar to the feature at the that level use it as a good but keep in mind not are glasses are created equal

Noganite

Look up the templar homebrew. Sounds like what you are looking for

Noganite

I often find that i build the world in the bubble around them as they move through it and the events move without them elsewhere. There is always the "i never said the castle wasnt right along your path and now it is" trick i also like the feel of building shops and people that could be in any town so that i always kinda get my creative rocks off. Makes tracking where i put it a bit cumbersome though

Gary Robbins

If you were to create Wilhelms mustache, what Stats would it have?

Noganite

I usually start from one of the humanoid statblocks and work from there. I use the average trap damage tables to get a feel for if im going overboard and add in additional abilities if it fits withing the story and class i intended them to play ( archer reskined as a ranger with the hunters mark and pass without trace) dont put anything you dont plan to use in the first three rounds ( my players always kill them within that time usually)

Noganite

Love the dungeon dudes recent broken item combinations video for this

Gary Robbins

Can you go into detail how your 1d6 random generator works? I understand the importance of the 1 and 6. Do the 2,3,4,5 have any importance?

Noganite

Simply make a city that is too powerful for them to pull that shit in unless they are super sneaky about it. Doesnt matter how powerful they are if there are if they are outnumbered 3 to 1 by similar or higher powered npcs.

Matti Gilmore

I think the dmg. Has something about porting from older systems

Noganite

Can go with the be open approach and ask them, always good if you have to back the rule out later. Saw a video that indicated when to be careful with the rule of cool is if they can easily replicate it again and again with class features only ( no outside prep or environment feature) and it gives a significant power boost over the intended mechanics

Noganite

Seen suggestions with failed death saving throws being more permenant as wounds that are slowly removed with long rests, also heard of levels of exhaustion from going down and coming back up, can always refer to raise dead penalties for coming back (a little steap for falling unconscious)

Noganite

I had a sword i made once that could essentially shock you with part of the damage and cause a shocking grasp effect on you if you were not resistant to lightning damage (essentially a lightning flame tonge variant), Are other damage based curses viable

Matti Gilmore

That really depends on your dm style. I honestly would be more worried about the over all store but with out railroading

Noganite

Magic is often one of the best ways to get versatility in game, what spells, feats or items work well for homebrewing a little more versatility (spell like abilities or inventions) into the classes so it doesnt always feel like me big fighter smack enemy over and over action surge over and over again (not that that is a bad thing) I know fey touched and ritual caster are some that straight up add magic.

Em Radi

When you're creating new character options, how do you go about determining whether or not they are balanced with the published options so as not to overpower the other choices? Just through play testing trial and error, or are there other ways?

Seng Hoong Tan

How to balance power levels of NPCs, especially the BBEG and his / her lieutenants? Started a campaign with PCs L1. Initially planned BBEG approx L8. We place fortnightly and somehow, we have been playing for over 1 year now and the characters are L8. I have introduced henchmen / underlings etc. The BBEG, they have met a few times and just escape with their lives earlier on. Now, they will wreck him without any adjustments.

Joey Johnson

This doesn't address the rest, but for items I make them earn it. I.E. You want this really powerful bow? There's rumors of a High Elf bowyer on top of a mountain...

Euan Smith

Wilhelm's Marvellous Moustache Wax of Twirling - This rare magical item can only be used by a character with a Moustache. This pot of magical moustache wax contains 2d6 doses. Each dose grants the user Advantage on Persuasion and Deception rolls. A dose lasts until the user takes a long rest.

Moses Allen

[Teacher Question] Pre-made modules with included maps are super-cool and all, but I used to homebrew content for middle school history classes with IRL tabletop D&D. I used to be able to boast the mental math that kids learn by rolling dice and quickly adding the variety of modifiers, but much of this is lost with bot rollers that auto-count dice and a great lack of resources for me to create detailed or interactive maps like in the pre-made modules. What advice would you have for bringing homebrew content into digital spaces for online learning (at a level for middle school kids)?

wisdom_hunter

Question... What is your experience or ideas about 2 DMs working together to do an adventure? For example, Like one narrates the story and manages mechanics while the other acts out the NPCs?

megaera

Question : What would you consider a big "no-no" when doing a homebrewed campaign. For exemple, I've noticed that DM who have created their own world tend to be a tad more interested in creating exposition for their world than the actual campaign. So what do you guys consider as the big dangers of homebrewing.

Kadz

Question: Where would you start in building a pantheon?

Matt

Question: I want to have choices in my campaign that give something stronger than a feat, but weaker than a subclass as a reward. How would you go about that? I intend all players to have something like this due to their choices, so there wouldn't be power disparity.

SoraNC

That might work for some items but most of the time I'm against them for various reasons that I can't disclose to the player for spoiler purposes. Being given the homebrewed fishing mechanic system + table was really a "thanks but no thanks" moment for me - especially when they want to be able to "reel in" a dragon turtle. As for the Unearthed Arcana content or his own homebrewed stuff... I'm really hesitant to just say "sure" despite being a laid back DM when its my biggest min-maxer theory crafting all these powerful combinations (that aren't balance tested) and providing spreadsheets of those characters through level 20.

Kate

How many different NPCs are needed to make a village/town/city feel fully populated? Are there any NPC roles that must be filled no matter the size of the settlement (like a shop keep for example)?

Bee Barkhouse

Question: I am homebrewing my own setting that has been in my head for many years, my party enjoys it so far but I fear I may be writing my story too linear. Whenever there is an adventure conclusion, I tend to use the "adventure calls" hook like an old friend or a courier showing up. What is your most useful trick to keep the party going without railroading in a homebrew world? Thank you so much, I adore all your videos! -Bee Barkhouse

Honorable Emu

I'm wondering how to balance my factions. How do I showcase both the positives and negatives of my factions so that my players can choose which to ally with, while still be willing to fight the others. I'm amazed by how Monty was able to balance this in DoD and want to be able to emulate the depth of his factions.

Technicall D&D

Because we know the CR system falls out of use around tier 2, when making Homwbrewed monsters in an XP leveling game how do you decide an adequate rating?

Adam

What is your favorite map making software?

Larry Fetters

I have rolled a Firblog Druid. Would a Druid/bard multi class be good.

HandsomeJay

When homebrewing or tweaking an existing monster, are there guidelines that you follow? For example: saving throws for a 5th level party should be about X. Or an attack roll should max at x% of the lowest HP party member.

Jack Kingsley-Smith

Question 1: Do you have any tips for running an encounter where you want the players to flee? How do you avoid them fighting to the death with a lich at level 2, for example? Some players will naively assume that every combat encounter is meant to be beatable, and making this mistake even once can derail a campaign. Question 2: A DM wants to homebrew a solo boss creature by buffing an existing stat block (like the archmage). Adding Legendary actions and Lair actions seem appropriate but balancing them is important, and the DM does not want to just copy all the LAs from an existing monster. Do you have any advice on the type of actions that make for good or bad custom LAs?

cmac

Question: I have a player who ask me to homebrew a magic item that would turn back time 1 round. I would like to oblige them (they are a great team player) but I don't have enough experience to know if this is an okay idea, a bad idea, or a really bad idea. I think the cost to use the magic item has to be high. Would you advise me to allow this item? If so, what would you advise the cost of using it be?

Fancynonna

Let's say you have an artificer who's really leaning into the inventor archetype, and wants to craft a bunch of homebrewed objects. How do you calculate the time and money it takes to do that for each item? For instance, does it take less if it gives no combat advantage or if they know a suitable spell, etc. Also: do you have any tips on how to reflavor spells for an artificer, in order to improve roleplay during combat? Would you rely on tying the spells to an item? For instance, would it be acceptable to say they have some magical glove that lets them cast mage hand, even though it's not actually in the player's inventory? Finally, some people already asked about monster CRs, and I'm also curious about this. It feels like for low level PCs, even monsters with the right CRs are at risk of killing them pretty easily. How do you evaluate CRs and how do you make sure you don't accidentally cause a TPK, while also avoiding deus ex machinas or having the monsters suddenly flee for no reason?

Jin_1814

Question: How would you homebrew a BBEG for a high level boss battle at the end of a campaign? Which stats, abilities, spells and legendary actions are best to challenge high level players and make the climax of the campaign memorable? I am trying to homebrew a deity and cannot find a good statblock to use as a template.

Michael Epp

Hey Dudes, I'm thinking about homebrewing a politics-oriented subclass, probably for a sorcerer, and wonder what kinds of special abilities you might suggest? For instance, if a sorcerous origin is political, what boosts would a character get at first, sixth, 14th and 18th level? Would they all be persuasion and diplomacy oriented, or is there some other way to approach this? Thanks as always for the good work!

Floppers

Question: I find that magic items are easy and fun to homebrew, but it is more challenging to design fun and engaging items for a campaign with an artificer in the party. I really want to offer the character a reward that doesn't feel like another infusion or class perk. How would the Dungeon Dudes approach this?

Dexstar

Hey Dudes, love your campaign videos! They make me feel like I am at the table as well! My question is: What's a good way to allow players to make their own faction or organization together? What if they want to make a stronghold, house , etc for faction/organization? How can I prepare? What things do I need to keep in mind if I were to allow this? Homebrewing premade organizations are easy because you don't have to go into much detail into how they got started (ex. It took this amount of lumber to build this part of the building) but if the players want to homebrew their own organization or faction, how would I make it work?

Goblin

I like to build my world around my players and their choices. The problem is I find this quickly becomes a soap opera. How do yall make player driven worlds without things going crazy? (if you read any of my posts on Discord about my last campeign...the one with magic nuclear power plant my party had to save from an ancient dragon...you know what I mean)

McSquishy

Yeah I get that, I know people that prep and have a whole homebrew world in 4 months and others who have literally spent a whole year or two. Their campaign did go till level 17, but regardless as a newer DM I don't really know what people do during those time spans and how they know when they are ready.

Adam W.

Do you have advice for homebrewing cursed items that players might actually use?

Charlie Brady

An Arcane Trickster takes the Magic Initiate (Wizard) feat. Please describe the spell selection

Sam Brown

Hey DDudes! I'm considering introducing a community of werecats in my mostly urban homebrew campaign as a means to potentially give my tabaxi PC the choice to join their ranks and gain some cool new abilities, if not some unpredictability. How would you go about writing a clan of hitherto unknown werecats (or any similar creatures) into a place like Waterdeep? Thanks!

Jon Seidenwurm

Hey all! My two questions (if possible as they are somewhat related) I am running a home game with my gf and our roommate. With only three of us the party size is limited to two. To counter this I have been having the hit points of monsters and giving the party a couple of extra powerups, however balancing encounters is still very challenging. Question 1, what are you thoughts on running a two player campaign and do you have any tips for balancing encounters... This brings me to my next question, which regards the new sidekick rules from TCE. I'm thinking of giving them a healer sidekick to add some magic and survivability, what do you guys think about implementing side kicks both generally and as a way of rounding out a party (excuse the long post)

Skullking20

Question- How would you homebrew evil NPCs. I plan on doing a one shot with 3 level 10 players with them facing 3 evil NPCs . I planed on making them into Revenants each being a evil character class( a oath breaker, death domain, and a divine soul sorcerer) but I dont know if I should use all the class features they get or not when facing the PCs I want to make it a challenge but not try to tpk the group.

Dungeon Dudes

Yeah, we'll be covering this one in a future video!

Dungeon Dudes

Write every day if you can. I set a goal of trying to write 500 to 1,000 words before noon. Sometimes I have to force myself to do it, but it's a habit, like going to the gym or eating healthy. - Monty

Dungeon Dudes

Hi Moses! This one is a bit outside our area of expertise, I'm afraid! That said, for map-making, check out DungeonDraft!

Dungeon Dudes

This is a big question, we might tackle this one in a future video

Dungeon Dudes

Hi Kate, this is a big question - we might put this one in line to cover as a future video!

Dungeon Dudes

As an AT, I want Booming Blade, Mage Hand, and Minor Illusion, and Find Familiar. Everything else is gravy.

Christopher Wingert

Question: In a campaign with two player characters in Tier II of play, I want to introduce cooler, stronger monsters and villains but worry about player death or TPKs coming up too easily. Encounters of moderate difficulty or above can turn deadly very quickly if one of the characters is incapacitated in any way. Besides just finding ways to lower the CR of stronger monsters, do you have any suggestions for upping the “cool” factor of creatures without necessarily raising the “danger” level too much?

Kate

Cool! I know at least one of my DMs would really appreciate a discussion of this topic!