“Typical” Alignment

First glimpses of D&D's Wild Beyond the Witchlight offer 5th Edition's latest attempt to grapple with applying alignment to monsters: "typical" alignment.

Mercer’s Exandria Unlimited Character Taps New Best Spellcaster Race

What's going on with Matt Mercer's sorcerer build? Some crazy good tech! Here's how it works.

The Problems with Race Leveling

D&D's 5th Edition race design is trending in a direction with narrative and mechanical issues.

What Am I Counterspelling?

Counterspell is a spell you cast as a reaction to stop another spell: Xanathar's Guide to Everything (XGE) introduced an optional rule for identifying a spell. It also costs a reaction: This creates a tension between identifying a spell and deciding to counter it. You can only spend your reaction on one. The grand implication … Continue reading What Am I Counterspelling? →

There’s More Than One Way to Skin a Class

Examining reasons why creators might tread over an explored design space.

MCDM’s Illrigger Preserves and Pushes 5e Design

Exploring how MCDM's Illrigger class capitalizes on classic 5e design and pushes the envelope with a new spellcasting template.

Prosthetic Attunement

Wizards of the Coast is bringing accessibility improvements to D&D by removing attunement from prosthetic items.

DC 0 Checks

As a matter of adventure design (or when improvising as a DM), you shouldn't lock mission-critical information behind a skill check. Because if the characters fail the check, the plot line is dead. But, the solution isn't to get rid of skill checks. The solution is progressive skill checks, starting at 0.