All in Homebrew

Enhanced Spelljammer Ship and Battle Mechanics

Enhanced Spelljammer Ship and Battle Mechanics

Neptune
Homebrew

My current campaign is on pause because of school as well, but I am running a homebrew Spelljammer campaign. For the uninitiated, Spelljammer is a setting for D&D that takes place in the Astral Sea and, primarily, Wildspace. It’s space piracy, baby, and I was so psyched to dig into the new book for it!

Unfortunately, I was disappointed by the pretty bare-bones mechanics in the book. Nearly everything is automatic. No crew, no real weapon strategy, extremely light boarding mechanics — they leave a lot up to your imagination. I appreciate the flexibility to a degree, but frankly they leave a lot of DMs with very little guidance on what to do. My players and I were looking for something a bit more robust.

Special Traits for Monsters

Special Traits for Monsters

Neptune
Homebrew, Resources

Every monster in Dungeons and Dragons has unique traits that make it what it is. These traits include spellcasting, attacks, Legendary Actions, senses, languages, saves, and skill proficiencies. However, what about those sort of – listed traits that don’t fall into those categories? Well, that’s called a ‘Special Trait’, and they’re on most stat blocks for monsters. Special Traits normally encompass passive abilities, such as auras, particularly special senses, additional damage under certain conditions, certain resistances, and basically any other ability that doesn’t fall under the other categories of the stat block. 

More Supernatural Charms for D&D 5e

More Supernatural Charms for D&D 5e

Neptune
Homebrew

Supernatural charms are small enchantments granted to players either explicitly (as with the Chwinga creature) or implicitly (an ethereal creature gives a player character a gift in gratitude). They’re temporary, useful, and great when you don’t really want to reward gold or magic items for a job well done. Here’s fifty of them for your game!


A Guide to Homebrewing Magic Items

A Guide to Homebrewing Magic Items

Neptune
Homebrew, Advice

There’s a lot of things to look forward to when you create your own world for Dungeons and Dragons. You can make landscapes, entire dimensions, societies, religions, divine beings, terrifying enemies - it’s all at your command. To be honest, though, while every creation I make excites me in some way, the unique element of magical items in D&D is some of the best fun I can have.

Artisan Tools Revisited: Alchemy

Artisan Tools Revisited: Alchemy

Neptune
Homebrew, Revisited

It’s very likely you’ve seen some homebrew for Alchemy in particular. For my guide, I aim for something more meaningful and interactive, but also very easy to drop into your game without it becoming so time-consuming that it takes up a full session to make a potion.

Homebrew Ideas: Elven Nonverbals

Homebrew Ideas: Elven Nonverbals

Neptune
Homebrew

In Elven culture, it’s preferable to solve conflicts with words over violence, if possible. But if words fail, but violence is unneeded, many Elves utilize a special form of sign language to communicate complex feelings.

Homebrew Ideas: Magic Tattoos

Homebrew Ideas: Magic Tattoos

Neptune
Homebrew

Rather than getting the tattoos from particular artists, a player using RAW would instead find a special needle that’s pressed to the skin for the attunement process, then the tattoo would simply appear on the skin. The process of receiving them, in this weaver’s humble opinion, could use more flavor. I believe tattoos should require more than just finding a special needle in a dragon hoard, so I reworked the rules for my version.