Add Flavor To Your D&D Game With Mini-Encounters

Mini-encounters, as I like to call them, are something I've used in my campaigns for years. What are mini-encounters? After I've finished designing any given adventure, I like to throw in between-scene fillers. These are usually meetings with inconsequential NPCs, sightings of worldbuilding that I've created which the players have never before been exposed to, or maybe a monster who runs away before anyone can even roll initiative.

A few years ago, I wrote an article on GeekDad about mini-encounters, and I'd initially intended to just republish it here. But with those few years of intervening DM experience, I'd like to expand on and flesh out what I'd initially written in that article. 

In my campaign, when the PCs do something that affects the world, I spend time between sessions thinking about how that might affect the world. Let’s say the PCs captured some criminals. Did one escape? Does he want revenge? Perhaps the PCs defeated a major bad guy. What kind of power vacuum forms, and who takes advantage of that? Or that rando lady that they saved - maybe she starts a bakery in town. Because of this kind of thinking, what begins as a simple and inconsequential mini-encounter can later become a major plot element. When you're running a game, it's about more than just the DM telling the players a story - it's collaborative storytelling, and when the players hook onto something in one of your mini-encounters, it can turn into something beautiful. 

Let's begin with my favorite example of a mini-encounter which went in a direction I'd never have expected. In the initial adventure, the PCs needed to travel downriver on a boat to reach a site that they’d be scouting to set up a watchtower to warn against hobgoblin raids. En route, I’d planned for them to encounter a group of four men drinking on the riverbank. The men were obviously inebriated and would wave and heckle from the shoreline. This was my mini-encounter, and I'd planned for it to take perhaps one minute of game time, after which the boat would continue on its way. These men had no real way to affect the players, as the boat was 50 yards away from the riverbank, and the players had no real reason to stop for these idiots. In my head, I reasoned that these men had been kicked out of one settlement for poor behavior and were headed to the village the PCs had just left. 

What happened is that before leaving that village, the PCs recovered a few barrels of mead from a kobold lair which turned out to be poisoned. I’d initially been thinking that either the PCs would drink it and have to deal with the poison or they’d sell it to a local tavern and catch the blame for the death of townsfolk. What ended up happening is that the PCs found out about the poison, warned the townsfolk, and left the mead in storage just outside the town’s church, thinking that they’d later use it to poison hobgoblins or something.

In between sessions, I got to thinking. These men hit the town while PCs are out adventuring. What happens when these rowdy men get to town? The next session, when the PCs got back to town, they found the townsfolk burying the bodies of these four men. The drunkards had gotten to town and found the poisoned barrels. Townsfolk warned them it was poisoned, but the rowdy men didn’t believe them. “Oh sure, you just leave poisoned mead sitting in the middle of town. Right.” I'd never planned for this to happen; it was emergent and collaborative storytelling.

Mini-encounters like these generally won’t lead to anything. But when they pan out, they can be beautiful and add a lot of flavor. Here are some others I’ve used.

• A ten-year-old boy in town nagging the fighter with questions. “Do you kill monsters? Can you cut the head off a dragon? Can I hold your sword?”
• The captain of the small ship transporting the PCs is having relationship issues, and he confides in a PC during the voyage.
• During a sea voyage, the party sees a locathah kid surfaced nearby, waving. He’d just come up to fetch some air for his dad.
• Clerics in the city dealing with a sewage issue by casting multiple purify water spells.
• The party passes some wizards experimenting with a water elemental-powered craft that’s supposed to work like a jet ski. It doesn’t work well and crashes.
• PCs asked to escort a town official’s doofus son who fancies himself an adventurer. The guy is insanely accident-prone.
• After a successful adventure, a newly-famous PC is asked to do numerous missions by random townsfolk, but they’re all very menial. Construction workers ask him to help move a huge boulder to make room for a foundation. A woman asks him to clear rats out of the basement, which isn’t even a combat encounter and is far more tedious than exciting. A barfly asks him to beat up someone who owes him money.
• PCs are asked to arrest a cabal of necromancers. Rather than this being an actual adventure, they get to the house in town, and the two immediately surrender. One guy was teaching the other guy a necromantic cantrip.

Another favorite was when I’d planned to have the party find a random farm on the way to their destination. At the farm, a half-orc farmer lived with his wife and two daughters, and they eked out a meager living. At the time, the party included one half-orc fighter whose life goal to this point had been to save up enough money to get a room above a tavern and spend the rest of his life drinking. After encountering this farmer, he had a revelation that life could be more, and the character’s entire arc changed. That single 5-minute mini-encounter transformed one PC from an aspiring drunkard to a man in search of more of his kind, and he began desperately searching for other half-orcs.

Three Low-Level Magic Items Inspired by Baldur's Gate 3

I've been playing through Baldur's Gate 3 the past few months and loving it. As someone who played the first two titles in the series over 20 years ago, I'm loving the similarities, and the way that choices affect the story is something that's never been better done in an RPG. In terms of a strictly D&D perspective, I can see it incorporating many mechanics which are only coming into use with the new 2024 Dungeons & Dragons ruleset, such as weapon-specific special attacks brought by weapon mastery. I've also appreciated the new mechanics such as reverberation, bleeding, and arcane synergy. Of course, adding all that to your D&D game would be a fairly large homebrew.

The thing I've focused most on are the creative magic items available in the game. Many of them have incredibly creative item-specific rules, and it's made me want to branch out with the types of items available in my own games. 

For tier 1 magic items specifically, there seems to be a lot that can be done with magic that has only a single use each day. Baldur's Gate 3 includes lots of items that cast a spell daily or have abilities that recharge at a long rest. 

At first level, many DMs will be reluctant to hand out magic items, and rightfully so. If you want magic items to feel truly special, then handing out even a +1 sword at first level can very much detract from that. And so I bring you the first of today's three magic items, the Lunar Blade. This silver sword will do extra radiant damage, but only once daily. To regain this ability, it must be charged in moonlight, which means no more camping out overnight inside the dungeon. In addition, since the sword is silver, it has some extra utility when battling lycanthropes and other enemies who are vulnerable to silver weapons.

Today's second item has a once-per-day spell which it can cast. It was inspired by Frost Fingers, a spell from the Icewind Dale - Rime of the Frostmaiden campaign I'm currently playing in.

The Winter Gloves will allow a 3d8 cone-shaped ice blast once per day, like a miniature cone of cold. For a group of second or third level adventurers, this should be useful, but not overly powerful. And while at first a party might rely on it, saving its effects for their bigger fights, they'll use it less and less as they level up, and may drop the item entirely once they get short on attunement slots. 

The last item I have to share today is likely the most interesting of the three. The Luminous Spear has an effect which no one would claim is overpowered, as the first level spell it's based on, Faerie Fire, affects multiple targets in an area of effect. Furthermore, a player wielding this weapon doesn't have the choice of holding off on applying the effect - it simply happens the first time each day a target fails to save.

The spear glows as if affected by a light spell until such time as a target fails the save, at which time the glow transfers from the spear to the target. This means that if the spear was the party's only light source, they may be in trouble.

The only advantage the spear's effect has over the Faerie Fire spell is that no concentration is required for its effect to remain in place for a full minute. Advantage in attacking a foe is always useful, so at higher levels if the party has discovered traditional magical weapons, they may choose to throw this spear while approaching an enemy, in hopes that the faerie fire will aid their attack.

That's it for today, but it certainly isn't the last of the items I've thought up after being inspired by the innovative mechanics of Baldur's Gate 3. Soon, I'll be publishing some Tier 2 magical items which have more than just a single use each day.

Three Different Techniques For Doing Character Voices

Character Voices in Dungeons and Dragons

Doing character voices in D&D isn't for everyone. Occasionally, I myself will even plan a voice for a character and then not perform that voice on the night I'm DMing. But I've come across a technique or two for doing character voices that I think works fairly well, and I'd like to share.

Bad Celebrity Impressions

I am no impressionist. If I try to do an impression of some celebrity's voice, you'd probably have no idea whose voice I was trying to do. But for DMing, that can actually work really well. I jot down some celebrity name next to an NPC, and then I try (poorly) to do that voice. Nobody recognizes the celebrity because my impression is so bad. But it's still a voice, and it's one I can repeat. If I play that NPC enough, the voice will become a thing of its own, divorced from the original source character.

A couple examples of voices you might try to imitate:

• Peter Lorre: A fantastic old timey villain from many a 20th-century film
• Ronald Reagan: The 40th US president has a voice that has been often imitated.
• Matthew Mcconaughey: His voice is unique enough to make a good character voice.
• Bruce Lee: He didn't really have much of a Chinese accent at all, but the way he enunciated words was distinctive.
• Christopher Walken: If you're a good impressionist, this one might be too obvious. I, for one, am not.

There are so many more where these come from.

Focus on Your Mouth

Aside from trying to do impressions, I've often just given a character some mannerism that involves doing something unusual with my mouth when I speak. Holding your tongue to your lower lip while speaking results in a odd voice that might come from a non-human character. Speaking with your teeth subtly clenched the entire time results in a voice that makes a character sound grave if not a bit angry. Speaking with lots of saliva in your mouth and perhaps chewing on your tongue a bit might be appropriate for a lizard-man or a locathah, accustomed to being underwater.

You can also do other voices without making it an impression. Speak in a croaky, gravely voice. A stutter is a solid and relatively easy affectation to add to an NPC to make their voice distinct from everyone else's. And a favorite of mine is speaking in the lowest possible falsetto, resulting in an odd and almost creepy voice.

Character Voices

Last up, character voices. There are a lot of impressive voice actors out there. Taking notes from them when doing characters can only up your game.

The first voice I think of is Inosuke from the anime Demon Slayer. He's got a gritty voice that hurts my throat if I imitate it too much. But what a great character voice.

Egg Shen from Big Trouble in Little China also had a fantastic character voice. I'll leave any further rants about that film's greatness aside, but if you watch the linked clip, you can hear him speaking. Kurt Russel's Jack Burton voice is another good voice impression to try with an NPC tough guy.

Phantom Menace was not a great film, but the alien Watoo had a good character voice which I might try to imitate at some point. Given my lack of talent for impressions, it's unlikely that anyone will know what I'm going for.

Ever heard of a show called The Simpsons? It's loaded with great character voices, but the one I'll point out here is Professor Frink, because when trying to do that voice, I've actually had to tone down the impression to make it less silly. Even 20% Frink is sufficient.

There are plenty of voices that can easily be too much, but work if you tone them down. Kermit the Frog, Rain Man, the Count from Sesame Street. Worst case, your players call you on it, but is that really the end of the world?

The Ultimate Wild Magic Surge Table

Wild magic in dungeons and dragons is something I've always enjoyed. The fifth edition wild mage sorcerer gave me one of my favorite characters I've ever played. But after ten years of using the same wild magic table, it's gotten a bit stale.

There are dozens of variant wild magic tables floating around online, but in reading other peoples' tables, it seems generally clear that they're reading through the spell list and adding effects from that. Wild magic results shouldn't simply cast a different spell. Neither should they have an impact so severe that it derails the campaign. They should all be memorable, and they should all be fun, even when they're detrimental. 

I looked through the wild magic table in the Players Handbook, and although it's completely subjective with many of the results as to whether they're technically good or bad, my assessment is that 24 of the results - nearly half - are good, and there are 13 each bad and neutral results. So that's the distribution I'm going for with my chart. 

When looking through some of these wild magic surge tables I'd see online, I'd occasionally see a result and think "That one. That one is cool. I hope I roll that result.". My goal in creating this wild magic table was to have every single result be the one you can't wait to see play out. After completing the original version of this wild surge table, I read and re-read through it and kept removing some of my results because they simply were not cool enough. I'd then replace the results with something I thought was better. I hope that the end result doesn't disappoint.

01-02	Roll again. For the next 24 hours, your chances of getting a wild magic result are quadrupled.
03-04	You summon an illusory man named Myron. He is very polite. Myron is entirely unable to affect the world around him, but will obey any order you give him. Physical attacks pass through Myron, but spells and weapons of +2 or stronger enchantment can affect him. He has 4 hit points, and will leave behind an illusory corpse if killed. Myron disappears in 1d4 hours, and spends a full 60 seconds slowly fading away, loudly bemoaning his "death".
05-06	Eight shadows rise from the ground sixty feet away from you. They sense that the PCs are powerful, and these shadows would rather find easy prey. They dash off in the direction of the nearest settlement. If the sun is out, they hide at the outskirts of the settlement until dusk before attacking. Note that this wild magic surge can lead to the total destruction of a smaller settlement, and the PC would technically be responsible.
07-08	You open a miniscule gate (1 inch wide) to the negative material plane. Anyone touching this tiny black sphere takes 3d10 necrotic damage. Anyone within a 30' radius takes 1d4 necrotic dmg/round. This area shrinks down to 15' radius in 1d100 hours, and disappears entirely in double that time.
09-10	Each round for the next minute, you may cast a cantrip as a bonus action.
11-12	Every nonmagical metallic item you're carrying suddenly rusts to uselessness. Magical items made of metal grow tarnished, requiring significant polishing to regain any sheen.
13-14	A nightmarish 6-foot wasp nest appears 20 feet above your spell target. It falls and bursts, knocking the target prone and filling the surrounding area with angry, stinging wasps out to a 15-foot radius. The area is lightly obscured, and each creature starting their turn in the area must make a CON save DC 12 each turn or take 2d8 piercing damage, 2d8 poison damage, and be understandably frightened until they leave the area. A successful save halves the piercing damage and eliminates the poison damage and the frightened condition. The wasp cloud remains for 1d6+1 rounds.
15-16	You are affected by a super-powered Heal spell, and any lifelong afflictions your character may have, even those not normally affected by a heal spell, are cured. Around you, any plant life within ten feet withers and dies.
17-18	Your spell target must make a CON save at disadvantage against your spell save DC or levitate into the air, rising 10 feet per round. You do not control this levitation. The effect ends after 1d6 rounds, dropping the target if it remains in the air. If the target succeeds the CON saving throw, then you are levitated, rising 10 feet per round for the duration.
19-20	You and all others within 50 feet sink into the ground up to their waists. Escaping requires two successful DC10 athletics checks, each of which requires an action. A character trapped in the ground has its speed reduced to zero and has disadvantage on DEX saving throws.
21-22	A magical portal opens, leading to a DM-determined (ally / enemy / acquaintance) of the PCs who is presently using an outhouse. This person is understandable outraged. The portal remains for 1d4 rounds.
23-24	For one minute, you and everyone within 30 feet are affected by detect thoughts. Those affected are also stricken with the inability to shut out others' surface thoughts. This lasts for 2d6 rounds, during which time any concentration checks for spells are made at disadvantage.
25-26	You feel a searing pain in the center of your back, and your clothing splits as two enormous, feathered wings sprout from your shoulder blades. You gain a fly speed of 50'. Each round, roll 1d20 - on a roll of 1, the wings shrivel and fall off and the effect ends. On a roll of 20, this check does not need to be made for 1d6 rounds.
27-28	You cast Heroes' Feast.
29-30	You cast an improved Blink spell - you vanish to the ethereal plane on a roll of 9 or higher.
31-32	You summon a large school of cod which cover an area for a 15 foot radius around your position, making that area rough terrain. Simultaneously, you are teleported to the middle of the ocean. In 1d4 rounds, the fish vanish, and you return to the space you previously occupied or the nearest unoccupied space if that space is occupied. You are soaking wet, freezing cold, and covered in seaweed.
33-34	The triggering spell functions normally. The next spell you cast within one minute which would normally affect a single target instead affects every target within the spell's range, both friend and enemy, excluding you. Area effect spells are unaffected by this surge.
35-36	Every magic item on your person which has a triggerable effect activates immediately. Single-use items such as potions and scrolls are unaffected, but other items are activated, and their charges are consumed as normal. Items which would normally affect only you, such as a hat of disguise or medallion of thoughts, affect only you. Items which require a target, such as a wand of magic missile or wand of polymorph will target whatever the triggering spell had been targeting. Other items such as a wand of fireballs or circlet of blasting have a 50% chance to activate in a random direction, potentially targeting nothing - otherwise the target is randomly chosen. Items with effects that make no sense in this context such as a rod of resurrection or ring of evasion are not triggered. The DM determines effects such as where a helm of teleportation brings you or what is created by a wand of illusions.
37-38	You summon 3d4 grigs who declare you their king or queen. If a combat is in progress, they spend the first round noticing and worshipping their sovereign, and the second round surprised. The summoning is permanent.
39-40	A five-foot meteor streaks from the sky and directly hits you, vaporizing you. The surrounding area is affected as per a fireball spell. In 1d4 rounds, the meteor hatches like an egg, and you crawl out, affected as though you had just finished a long rest.
41-42	You become an illusion for 1d4 turns. You are unable to affect the physical world or be affected by it. During this time, any spells you cast are only illusory, but do not consume spell slots. A dispel magic will end this condition early. Other spells have no effect on you.
43-44	A random item of clothing you're wearing becomes enchanted to grant its wearer +2 armor class and saving throws. This enchantment has a 25% chance to disappear at each sunset.
45-46	You tap into a font of magical power. For the next hour, any spells you cast can be extended to double duration, cast at up to double range, or force targets to roll their saving throws with a -2 penalty. During this time, you also have advantage on concentration checks.
47-48	A dark portal opens, vomiting forth a vile torrent of brown, rancid slime and 1d6 lemures which all bear your face. The slime acts as a grease spell, and the lemures are hostile to everyone in the area.
49-50	For the next hour, you lose the ability to speak in Common. Any attempts by the PC to speak normally are perceived by all listeners as loud terrified screams. Any other languages your character knows are unaffected, and you are able to speak these normally.
51-52	You have advantage on your saving throw against the next hostile spell cast against only you (not an area of effect). Furthermore, if the save succeeds, the spell has no effect on you and instead targets the caster. This effect vanishes after 24 hours if not used.
53-54	You immediately become intoxicated, suffering -4 DEX and CHA. These penalties are reduced by one each hour as you sober up.
55-56	Thunder sounds immediately, and 1 round later it begins raining very hard in a one-mile radius, lightly obscuring the entire area. The rain lasts for 1d6 hours. If indoors or underground, the rain forms on and falls from the ceiling rather than from outdoors. This may cause problematic flooding if underground.
57-58	For the next hour, you are plagued by a terrible itch. Concentrating on any spell requires a DC 8 concentration check each round.
59-60	The spell you had cast functions as normal, and you can cast the same spell again on the following 1d4 turns without using a spell slot if you use actions to do so.
61-62	For the next 1d12 hours, you may speak only in rhyme. For each two hours of time rolled, you gain one use of d6 bardic inspiration which must be used during this time. The DM should award inspiration for exemplary rhyming.
63-64	You cast Sanctuary on yourself. Attackers must make a DC 16 WIS save to target you. The spell lasts for up to one minute.
65-66	Up to three creatures you choose within 30 feet of you immediately have their hair burst into flame. Bald characters or characters immune to fire are unaffected. These characters must make a DC14 CHA save or take 2d6 fire damage and spend their next turn fleeing.
67-68	Fall asleep for 10 rounds. If anyone wakes you before the time is up, gain 1d4 levels of exhaustion. If no one awakes you, you may treat this as a short rest.
69-70	Over the course of the next 60 seconds, if you're above ground, an oak forest grows around you in a 1000-foot radius. If you're underground, roots sprout around you in a 1000-foot radius, the area acting as if under the effect of a Plant Growth spell. The effect is permanent.
71-72	For the next minute, you turn to living stone. You become resistant to non-magical slashing and piercing damage, but your speed is quartered, and your weight is quadrupled.
73-74	The target of your spell must make a DC16 WIS save or become possessed by the spirit of a temperamental 6-year-old child named Spencer. Spencer refuses to do anything other than sit and pout and complain. He flees if attacked. The possession ends in 1 minute.
75-76	You summon a shadow magic replica of a beholder. You control its actions, speech, and behavior. It has AC 14, 10 hit points, and can use one of its three eyebeam types each round: mage hand, ray of frost (+4 to hit, 1d8 cold damage), and sleep (WIS Save DC 12). The beholder has terrible bad breath but vanishes in 1 minute.
77-78	A Silence spell comes into effect, centered on you. It moves with you and lasts for 10 minutes.
79-80	You grow a long beard made of golden strands. Once shaven off, the gold is worth 250gp.
81-82	A small black bead appears in your hand. As a bonus action, you can throw this bead with perfect aim to any point within 40 feet. Where it lands, a 10 x 10 x 10 foot pit appears. Anyone standing in that area when the pit appears must make a DEX save DC 14 or fall in, taking 1d6 falling damage. The bead disappears in 1 minute if not used, but the pit is permanent.
83-84	Your body begins glowing, shedding bright light out to 30 feet and dim light for an additional 30 feet. Loud whistling flares begin bursting from your body. Each round anyone within 30 feet of you must make a DEX save DC 10 or be struck for 1d10 fire damage. Flammable objects catch fire. This effect lasts for 1d4+1 rounds.
85-86	You gain the effects of Spider Climb and Feather Fall for 24 hours, no concentration required.
87-88	You burst into flames, taking 1d4-1 fire damage each round. Whenever a creature within 5 feet of you hits you with a melee attack, the attacker takes 2d8 fire damage. This effect lasts for 1d4+1 rounds.
89-90	You gain the effects of Tongues and Speak with Animals for 24 hours, no concentration required.
91-92	You cast the spell Telekinesis, which lasts for one minute or until your concentration fails.
93-94	Your lowest ability score becomes 20 for the next minute.
95-96	Each creature within 30' of you must make a DC14 CON save. On a failure, flowers begin growing from the creature's pores. This is extremely painful. For two rounds, the creature has disadvantage on all attack rolls, ability checks, and saving throws, and cannot move more than 10 feet per round. Casting a spell requires a DC14 CON save. If the creature also happens to be allergic to pollen then really it's just even worse.
97-98	The triggering spell functions normally. For the next 24 hours, you are unable to tell a lie.
99-00	The spell functions as intended, but upcast to your highest level spell slot. In addition, you regain all expended spell slots as if you had taken a long rest.

Taking 10, Taking 20: Passive Abilities and Repeating Skill Checks

Dungeons and Dragons has had many editions over many years. If you're new to the game, you may have come across mentions of "taking 10" or "taking 20" on ability checks, and you may not be familiar with the terms.

Consider this post a quick information public service announcement to explain it all.

Back in 3rd Edition D&D, we had these two new rules for dealing with skill checks that would eventually succeed, or skill checks which should be possible without a roll.

What Is Taking 10?

In third edition Dungeons & Dragons, if a character was performing a relatively easy task, and wasn't threatened or distracted, he could "take 10". This meant that the character could act as though he'd rolled a 10 and add his skill modifier. 

At this point, you may be realizing that this has been effectively replaced in 5th edition D&D with the advent of "passive" skill use, which is effectively the same thing. 

Generally, the only skill we think of in terms of passive is "passive perception", which is a character's perception skill plus 10. The intent of passive skills such as this is for the DM to keep track of the values, and then just tell players when their passive checks succeed, without the PC even needing to ask. Is your character's passive perception a 15? Then when that goblin who was sneaking past rolls a 13 on his stealth, the PC hears even though the player didn't declare that she was looking or roll dice.

Passive investigation does infrequently come up, but few others ever do. 

What Is Taking 20?

Back in the eighties when we played first edition D&D, there were times when we'd roll that 20 sider over and over and over again, knowing that we needed a 19 to succeed, even if all the players had to sit for five minutes waiting for someone to do so. Those were different times, and we were 13 years old.

In third edition Dungeons & Dragons, an updated rule called "taking 20" was introduced. This was a long slow process, where the character would try over and over, and be assumed to fail many times before succeeding. It took 20 times longer than the task would originally take, but the end result was a skill check of 20, although in this case it wasn't the auto-success that rolling a nat 20 might be.

In fifth edition D&D, this has been explained under the multiple ability checks section of the rules.

To speed things up, assume that a character spending ten times the normal amount of time needed to complete a task automatically succeeds at that task. However, no amount of repeating the check allows a character to turn an impossible task into a successful one.

So the difference now is that it takes only ten times as long rather than twenty like it did in third, but it's the same general effect - if you can try long enough, you can succeed at a task without needing to roll that die endlessly like we did in first edition.