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THE AMA IS NOW LIVE

We at /r/DnD are excited to host Mike Shea of SlyFlourish.com! He'll be discussing his upcoming Kickstarter, his vast history as a freelancer in the TTRPG space, and anything else! Save all your questions and join us on Tuesday, July 7!

From Mike:

Hello!

I'm Mike Shea, writer for SlyFlourish.com and author of Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master and other books. A few years back I also released the Lazy GM's Resource Document into the Creative Commons to share what I've learned and gathered from other GMs into the world.

I've been playing RPGs since the mid-80s and writing about RPGs since 2008. I've been freelancing for various RPG companies for the past 15 years or so including Wizards of the Coast, Kobold Press, MCDM, Arcane Library, Pelgrane Press, and many others.

The Kickstarter for my latest book, Rise of the Lazy Gamemaster, is going on now! This is the latest of the Lazy GM books, expanding each of the eight steps of Lazy GM prep and taking a new focus on campaign planning, adventure types, and an expansive lazy GM toolkit. I hope you'll check it out.

I'm excited to be here to talk to you all about RPGs!

I finally made some wolves Miniatures and I use the opportunity to create some riding legs, so i could make some mounted Goblins. With magnets I can switch the legs back to standing ^^

I have to stop with the magnets its a sickness at this point!

So far i went with more regular size wolves and some larger maybe boss type ( like the picture)

The Goblin is modular so i have to create different variation for the others^^

I painted an owlbear the other day and realized this is going to be my new obsession for the next few weeks. So this time I did a myconid!

Let me know if you're interested in seeing more of these watercolors and if you have suggestions for what monster I should paint next. I was kind of thinking displacer beast, but I'm open to suggestions.

If you want to see more of my art, you can find me on Instagram and Tumblr @tomfoolerytotality. I don't usually plug socials, but apparently I have to hit 400 characters to post this and I ran out of other things to say.

I've really enjoyed D&D 5E and 5.5. I started playing with the basic rule set (red book) and eventually had characters that needed the expert rules (blue book). The red book only covered levels 1 to 3, and back in those days, if your character actually survived their first few encounters, you'd get to the mid-levels quickly. In high school, I got into 1st edition, called AD&D back then, the version responsible for the Satanic panic over the picture of a demon on the Dungeon Master's Guide and the statue of a demon on the Player's Handbook.

Life came calling, and I dropped the hobby after high school and moved on with a career and family. As I've written before, I came back to the hobby because my kiddo's after-school Dungeons & Dragons club didn't have enough DMs. I crammed 5th edition over a weekend (I didn't have any of my older books) and started DM'ing for the club the next week.

I went from 1st edition to 5th edition and missed everything in between. I missed a lot. Back then, the official setting was Oerth/Greyhawk. It's been amazing catching up on the lore. I missed most of the Forgotten Realms (I caught snippets of it in related video games), Dragonlance, Planescape (did play the video game - one of my favorites), Darksun, Ravenloft, and even updates to the Greyhawk setting (I was shocked reading about Rary's betrayal).

The rules underwent a lot of changes - most of them good in my opinion. I still sometimes reach for a d6 when rolling for initiative even though it's been a d20 for decades. I'm glad they got rid of the sexist nonsense of having female humans maxing out at 18/50 strength, or some of the weird, convoluted rules around wearing armor when spellcasting (i.e., you can't cast wizard spells while wearing armor, but you could if you were a cleric dual-class. This also ignored the various exceptions with fighter/magic-user elves, etc.) I missed the changes introduced in the 2nd, 3rd, 3.5, and 4th editions. It seems that 3rd edition was a bit of a golden age, with the introduction of the OGL increasing the popularity of D&D and giving official sanction to homebrew/3rd-party developers. I don't think you have the modern tabletop hobby without the OGL saving it.

I like that the modern game blends role-playing and tactical play. Back in the day, roleplay was pretty much limited to the race and class you selected. You really weren't expected to act out your character, but rather fulfill a role in your party. Elves back then were a class and a race, and that was the extent of roleplay. Roleplaying has really opened up the hobby.

I'd say that back in the day, the people who played D&D weren't the popular kids, but the edgy loners and the artistic kids. At least that was my friend group. Now, you see wider representation. I like that the game is an analog to inclusion. The very premise is that a party of diverse characters unite to beat back the forces of evil. I love that it's more mainstream. You're not a weirdo for playing D&D. Even famous people play it.

I'd say the only thing I don't like about 5.5 is how dense the rule set is. The new PHB and DMG are huge. It feels like there is a rule for everything. And if you include the rule sets that come with each supplement, it's overwhelming. I realize the game needs these rules because various gameplay problems have made them necessary. However, it's a huge barrier for prospective players and DMs.

Back in the day, you rolled for surprise, initiative, and then players/monsters reacted in turn. Nowadays, there are bonus actions, actions that can be taken outside a player's turn, reactive actions such as shield spells, and the shenanigans that are counterspell and silvery barbs. The fights I run take a long time to adjudicate, and I'm constantly looking up rules to ensure things occur in the correct order. I'm sure there are some DMs that can handle this quickly, but that's definitely not me.

I kind of miss the looseness of the older rule set and the implicit idea that the DM makes a ruling on the spot if something isn't clear (I sometimes still do this to speed things up or to benefit the party out of a bad spot). But I can see where most players would prefer to have things better spelled out.

Anyways, I just wanted to weigh in because I've seen some posts here where a lot of older players rant about the state of the hobby. I'm not one of those. I love the current game's inclusiveness, most of the rule changes, and the blend of roleplay and tactics.

After a ruthless vengeful betrayal, Fae's people, the Air-elven folk, are suddenly attacked & taken by a cult looking to resurrect a dead God. In a desperate attempt to flee from their attackers, she calls out for help — and a forgotten God answers her call.

As the last one of her own to remain free, she must venture outside of her home for the first time ever, all the while struggling to accept her newfound powers — the Fire God's gift.

As she reluctantly joins her new companions on the road, she struggles with her identity, the fear of loneliness, and what it means to trust after you've been burned by someone you trusted most.

hey guys! I'm a fantasy artist specializing in RPG character commissions, including creatures, monsters, and original (homebrew) character designs.

✨ What I offer:

• Bust, half-body, and full-body illustrations
• Optional add-ons, including Character Concept Sheets
• Simple or detailed backgrounds included with every commission
• Progress updates throughout the entire process (sketch → flat colors → final render)
• Unlimited revisions during the sketch stage

If you're looking for artwork for your D&D, Pathfinder, or other TTRPG characters, feel free to send me a DM! I'd love to hear about your ideas and help bring them to life.

Portfolio & Socials:

https://linktr.ee/leoncoelho.art

It is often said that kenkus only know words that they have heard, and are limited to those words. that of course makes for some very funny scenes where people are only using words they are basically given. However, unless you are a freshly born or transformed kenku, that frankly isn’t what it would act like.

Do you know what other species has this learned mimic vocabulary? Humans. For the vast majority of humankind, we have only known words that have been uttered in our presence. Other than written word, that’s how we learn to speak. Kenkus aren’t unique in the ability to learn new words. That’s literally every species. Their uniqueness comes specifically from their perfect mimicry.

All that to say, you aren’t having fun correctly so I have come to shame you and tell you how to have fun.

Deep in the guts of the dorian academy of invention a secret arcane laboratory was hiding the dungeon of the Chronomancer. A meddler who’d combined the three major sciences, Arcana, Alchemy, and Engineering to invent the world’s first time machine. But the unstable device send itself and everyone delving there into the far future. Pulsing on and off, sending the adventurers trying to stop it back and forth between a time of ruin and the present.

You can subscribe now and get this map by visiting: patreon.com/balatroart