Matthew Hunt

English 91
Informative RD 4
1

A Start
Pushing into the darkness, a burst of light cast into the chill that was forming up their backs; a soft
word of magic warms the group and shows the end of their journey. Finally the blood, the death and horrors
are over, they are at the end. Opening the chest the skillful rouge dismantled a trap saving his friends from a
nasty shock, they have found the magic that will free the goddess Ehlonna. This is just one of the ways a good
Dungeons and Dragons (DnD) campaign can run; getting this game going can be very challenging at times. To
run your own game there are a lot of key components, or the game cannot run smoothly. The necessary
components are the core book, minimum of four players, the Dungeon Master (DM), and a story.
Getting your core books is going to be the first step to get your game started, these book can be bought
at any local book store, gaming store or even online. The first book that is needed is the Players Hand Book
(PHB), this book will help you make your character and learn about how your character lives in their world.
The Monster Manuel (MM), as the name implies, has all the beginning monsters (mobs) that one will fight.
The Dungeon Master Guide (DMG) has the rest of the rules of how the game is to be run. We all know without
the rules there will be no fun. Of course, the DM does have the ability to make house rules that can be used in
his game and take out book rules that are not to be used in his game. With these basic books mastered you can
advance onto the next set of helpful books.
Most players chose to move on to the Epic Level Players Hand Book (EPHB); this book will show
how to continue your class you have chosen past level twenty. Even more will duel class now to expand their
characters abilities by using one of the complete compendiums, there are ten of these for the third editions of
DnD. There is a few that will keep using the core books to expand their characters abilities. Of course for the
extreme players there is the Rules Handbook, DMG II, and the other smaller guides that one can get to just
expand the world its self. No matter what books you do pick up and use you must find the ones that you like
and that can help your adventures grow. Always keep looking for a new book that might be able to give you an
edge over the other players to make a little better of a character that can last longer, hit better, and role play
with more style. If anything the more you play the more you can learn about each class can improve or hinder
each other.
Matthew Hunt
English 91
Informative RD 4
2

Finding a group of friends to play with can and will be difficult. There will be long gaps of time when
you will not find a game to play, or have the right fit of players to get the game going. That might sound a little
strange. How can you not get four or five people together who enjoy playing a game together two or four times
a month? Most of the time, work, family, school and other events keep people busy and it is really hard to find
a time that works with everyone's schedule.
Once you have that magical group you are ready to meet for that first time. The DM is now either
picked or already has been picked. For most games he/she is the one that starts getting everyone together. At
the first meeting the DM sets his/her rules and the DM will part the player so each as a private area to make
who they want to play. The DM will meet with each player to get their stats which is based on the rules that
were set by the DM. Once these are on the Character Sheet (CS) the player will now input the rest of their
race, class, skills, feats, and equipment on to the CS while the DM is now helping the other players.
The players will be using the PHB for all this. Once placing the stats in the right place they will add
the modifiers (mods) found on page 8 to the right place on their character sheet, these mods are placed into
other places. Skills have ability mods as well as reflex, will, and fortitude saves. Now we pick the race of who
you will play; Dwarf, Human, Elf, Gnome, Halfling, Half-Orc, and Half-Elf. These will go in hand with your
class, due to the stats that can reflect on your characters class (page 12 to 20) will have all the base races that
can be played. The class is your next choice (page 24 to 58); Barbarian, Bard, Cleric, Druid, Fighter, Monk,
Paladin, Ranger, Rouge, Sorcerer, and Wizard are all the base choice classes. Each class has its own abilities,
spells, class skills, and feats.
Now you get to spend your skill points. This is based on your classs intelligence modifier and how
many skills they have (page 62). Each skill is then listed in alphabetical order as is the whole book. There are
some classes that need to have skills to do anything; for example, a magic user needs Knowledge Arcane and
Spellcraft to cast their spells, or the Rouge class needing Move Silently and Hide to sneak. There are many
other skills that each class can use and then some that are not part of their class skill. To gain one rank in these
you need to spend two skill points on any skill. After your skills you now need to pick your feats, all but
Humans, only get on. This is due to how versatile that race is (page 90).
Matthew Hunt
English 91
Informative RD 4
3

With all of this on your CS we now have a rather shapely character starting to form in this world to be
played, maybe a Dwarven Fighter, or Gnome wizard. With each party and each player being so different we
can never know what can really happen till that day. Now you can get to the equipment section (page 115) will
have weapons, armor, gear, and water; everything an adventure will need to journey into the word. Always
remember your starting gold is limited but you must get what you need for the journey. Dont worry youll get
more as you travel, quest, and loot bodies.
Now that CS is almost full there a few empty spots like height, eye color, gender, deity, aliment, this is
up to the player. think of how your person has lived their life, what has happened to them, why are they out
doing whatever it is they are now doing? Pushing for powers, trying to save the area from evil, prove their
worth to their self? Now you need to find your characters personality; for example, does he/she drink alcohol,
eat meat, or worship a deity? Once you are done you will show this and tell your background story to the DM
alone so only they will know. You want to keep what you can from the other players until your characters meet
and know how they will interact with each different character in the game.
Once the game is going, the DM will start the story. This will also be covered later on. You will be
asked questions about what your character will do for each scenario. Most of the time you will need to roll a
die; how this works, roll the required sided dice and add the specified modifiers; the most common roll is the
dice twenty (D20). These dice can also be acquired at most book stores and game stores. For an example if you
want to see who is coming up on the road some distance away you roll your D20 then add you spot check to
that roll to see if you can make him out. The DM would already know the difficult class (DC) of that check
before you rolled to know what you can make out.
As for most gamers its all about the fighting, this always starts with the initiative roll to see who the
first responder is. Roll the D20, and then add initiative to that roll. The fight is done in order from highest to
lowest, for ties, higher initiative score is first. If there is still a tie you reroll until there is a higher roll. Within
each round you as the player now have two actions that can be taken. These can be mixed in many ways that
you can think of; as in example; the move-move action, Full attack, move attack, Charge attack, or standard
action spell. And there are a lot of free action moves, the most common being dropping something and talking.
Matthew Hunt
English 91
Informative RD 4
4

Once you attack roll the D20 to try to hit your opponent. You have to meet or break your opponents
armor class (AC), to calculate AC add 10 + dexterity modifier + armor + shield + natural + deflection and
dodge. The DM will let you know if you hit or miss. Each weapon has a critical (crit) chance; if this chance is
rolled, based on DM rules you confirm critical. If you roll a hit again you score the critical damage hit, if you
want to try a triple critical for an auto kill you would roll again; if you do not score a critical it will only be
regular damage. After hitting you will roll damage based on the die your weapon has and add any modifier
available to you. The rounds continue until one side is killed or has fled.
Now that the game is going and you know what is going on you might someday want to be that DM.
That is always a good choice, you can run the players story to see if they can live or die in your world. First
you want to get your rules down; most follow what is in the PHB and DMG. Either by using a point system for
stats or roll four six-sided dice (4d6) dropping the lowest number and rerolling any ones. Each DM has their
own idea on how they want their world to work and what can happen. Now you need your story, as a new DM
you can find some modules or prewritten campaigns. Take your time get a few of them, read them and if you
dont like them, dont run them. Use what you played, read, seen, to build your own story making the game
yours.
In every aspect of this game you always want to make sure you are enjoying yourself. If you find that
the enjoyment has left stop playing for a while, find different players or a new DM that can keep you locked in
to the world a bit more. There is always more that can be done, more that can be learned, and even more of the
world of Dungeons of Dragons that can be scratched at with this small excerpt of knowledge. With just the
base knowledge you can go far with just the core books, your new friends, a DM and a Story can keep your
night going. Have fun in your own game of Dungeons and Dragons.