Matthew Hunt

English 91
Informative RD 5
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 rogue 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, a 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 Manual (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
that 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 once you have progressed 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 itself. 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 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 and how
they can improve or hinder each other.
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English 91
Informative RD 5
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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 keep 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 the follow pages listed here. 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 modifiers taken from the stills you have just rolled, 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 phb) will have all the base races that can be played. The class is your
next choice (page 24 to 58 phb): Barbarian, Bard, Cleric, Druid, Fighter, Monk, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue,
Sorcerer, and Wizard, are all of 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 phb). 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 Rogue 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
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English 91
Informative RD 5
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these you need to spend two skill points on any skill. After your skills, you now need to pick your feats all
but Humans they only get one. This is due to how versatile that race is (page 90).
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. This is the allure of the game. Now you can get to the
equipment section (page 115) which will have weapons, armor, gear, and water; everything an adventurer will
need to journey into the word. Always remember that 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 and 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 that only they will know. You want to keep what you can from the other players until your characters
meet and you 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). The required dice can be acquired at most book stores and game stores, like the books. For
example, if you want to see who is coming up on the road some distance away, you roll your D20 then add
your spot check to that roll to see if you can make him out. The DM would already know the difficulty class
(DC) of that check before you rolled the dice 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 one player has 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. For instance, a double move action, full attack, move attack, charge attack, or
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English 91
Informative RD 5
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standard action spell. There are a lot of free action moves as well, the most common being dropping
something and talking.
Once you attack, youll 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 re-rolling any dice that come up a one.
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,
and read them 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 will always want to make sure that you are enjoying yourself. If you
find that the enjoyment has left, stop playing for a while and find different players or a new DM that can keep
you locked into 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 amount of
knowledge. With just the base knowledge, you can go far. With just the core books, your new friends, and a
DM, a Story can keep your night going. Have fun in your own game of Dungeons and Dragons!