Level 3 feels significantly more punchy for most classes, which is nice.

Most d&d podcasts and shows get a bunch of free stuff that they feature (dice, minis, dice towers, stuffed animals, drawings of their characters, etc).

I doubt they buy things that someone wants to sell them.

You probably have to choose: do you want to sell it, or do you want to see it featured?

If the latter, then probably send a letter with some pictures, asking if they would feature it if you had it shipped, to whoever you want (most shows and podcasts advertise a PO Box or some such). If they answer such things on their show, chances are they’ll give you a shout out and let you know on an episode. If they say yes, then you ship it to them, and that’s… It.

Look into your local game cafe(s). That’s the type of place that sells board games, dice, minis, but also has gaming tables and often a small food and drink counter. There are likely nights for newbies you might be able to join, to experience it live.

Watch some youtube videos of people live-playing the game you are interested in. You’ll see the character players interacting with the DM, propped up mostly by their shared understanding of the game mechanics, and the individual mechanics of their characters. Keep an eye out for how things are different in combat vs out of combat.

You don’t need minis or dice if you play online. E.g. there is a Discord bot called Avrae, and many small communities come together around use of that bot to play, where it handles most of the crunchy mechanics like dice rolls and modifiers and even maps. Some communities play live sessions over video chat, others play without video chat but with 5 minute turn timers, and others play asynchronously with 24 hour timers in a format called play-by-post (or pbp) where they roll the crunchy math in one channel, and then roleplay their characters’ actions in another. Disboard will let you search communities who are looking for members–filter by whatever tags interest you most.

Finding a live play group to play a campaign with can be… Hard. I recommend you start by educating yourself about a system via free resources, maybe finding a game cafe to experience it in a one-shot, and try some online play, before investing too much. As you learn more, you’re also more likely to encounter people looking to start or grow a group.

I introduced a “small one story structure, its walls no wider than the span of a single door” next to the farmhouse my players were investigating. They didn’t believe the owners who told them what it was for, and went to check it out for themselves, hackles up and weapons drawn.

It’s an outhouse.

Just an outhouse.

Check out Disboard, and search for 5e or avrae (and optionally play by post) to find a discord server to play on.

There are plenty of small Discord servers that use a bot called Avrae to automate the crunchy mechanics of d&d 5e, with things like char sheets, initiative, monsters and combat, and even maps. Some servers are slow paced, where everyone is expected to act once per ~24 hours, so you get a nice asynchronous game going where you have time to learn your character’s abilities, bot commands, etc, all while typing up your roleplay that matches the mechanics of your turn. That format is great for learning and getting the hang of things in the system, IMO, because you have a ton of time to ask questions in a chat channel to have others help you. Other servers will do sync events, where you sign up for an event with a specific star time, hop into a voice channel, and play with ~5 minute turn timers to really crunch through some combat quickly. This is great once you have the basics of Avrae down (and by extension, the mechanica of 5e).

That’s usually a “westmarches” format, where the server has a large number of players who queue up for events, but each event can only accommodate a small number of players from the top of the queue. You get grouped with random others this way (contrast that to “campaign” play where you stay with the same players for many consecutive sessions). IMO westmarches really helps get you acclimated to D&D through broad exposure to lots of classes, monsters, mechanics, RP styles, etc. And it works really well for someone who is casual!

“Would incest be okay if we could guarantee no reinforcement of bad recessives?”

“I want space travel, to live forever, and make an AI human for… Reasons.”

“Get off my lawn, big government!”

That tracks.

RIP Mitch :(

In 5e: Simon the Devious and the Leather Skins (from What We Do In The Shadows) as a Dhampir Hexblade Warlock with Pact of the Chain.

Between the chain familiar (Count Rapula), a zombie from Undying Servitude (Ken the Accountant), Summon Undead (Blagvlad the Exsanguinator, or Desdemona the Shrieker, or Impussa) and an Accursed Specter (Carol), you have a 4-person posse by level 6. It grows situationally or permanently when you gain access to Danse Macabre, Create Undead, and Finger of Death.

Mechanically, you’re done by 13, and can either finish off with Bard (probably Whispers) or Paladin (Oathbreaker). Either way, take Inspiring Leader once you’ve maxed Cha, and then go get yourself that cursed witch’s hat!

If dropping a database scares you, you are either unaware of the disaster recovery process, or there isn’t one. Edumacate yourself, or the org, as appropriate, so as to increase your confidence when dropping databases.

I read this to my wife.

Her response was “Stop.”

“No honey, that would be the red light.”

It is totally fine to kick or knee or headbutt someone for your unarmed strikes when your hands are busy–this is true with or without Tavern Brawler

RE Battlemaps: strongly opposed to allowing them. Lemmy.world already has a battlemaps community. Ttrpg.network is welcome to make such a community too, I suppose. That content works for many more ttrpgs than dnd, so putting it in its own space makes more sense than allowing it in here.

RE artwork, if someone wants to post a hand-drawn scene of their group’s epic win/loss against the bbeg, that’s cool. I think we like seeing dnd success stories from folks, and a picture can be worth a thousand words. But, if that person is open for commissions, I would strongly prefer not to know about it.

IMO advertising needs to be segregated to opt-in communities kept exclusively for that purpose, much like LFG posts get their own space to mot pollute the general discussion.

(Similarly, links out to other sites that have comment sections, like youtube, should IMO be required to have actual supporting text content worthy of discussion, as without it they are just more advertising. That’s outside the scope of the original discussion tho.)

Edit: RE homebrew–IMO it too should be sequestered, as it represents a divergence from everyone else’s frame of reference.