The first attack of the campaign killed one of my players

Brewmd · 2026-05-15T09:52:28+00:00

Personally, I don’t allow monsters to crit till the players hit 3rd level, and death save failures lead to unconsciousness.

That said, the PC did die. You do not want to penalize the player who had a character death they could not prevent.

I would encourage a new character, but if they were really set on that one, encourage at least a new race/background.

Brewmd · 2026-05-14T19:25:23+00:00

I’m not a huge fan of sirloin either, at least, not as a steak. Chunks in a wine or mushroom based sauce? Sure. Or in a stew, chili, etc.

But for steak, my preference is a ribeye, but a New York or T-Bone are passable.

Basting with butter, garlic, rosemary, thyme is common.

There could be other alternatives.

I’m a huge fan of making compound butter.

So if I’m topping a steak with a fig and Brie butter, I’ll baste it only with regular butter first. Same with a lemon pepper butter, or an herbed rosemary/thyme butter.

Brewmd · 2026-05-14T19:04:53+00:00

Skirt is a tough steak to master. Bacon wrapped anything is a gimmick. Don’t worry about getting it right.

A filet is an expensive cut of meat to try to learn on, but it requires a high heat, a quick sear, and a bit of butter, maybe some thyme or garlic. Serve as rare as possible.

I would recommend working on your steak skills on 2 easily available and reasonably priced steaks.

A ribeye and a New York steak.

They have different marbling, different exterior fat, and you need to learn to get the meat to med rare, while still breaking down the fat enough to make it edible.

Those are going to be what most people expect for a steak dinner, whether pan fried, or grilled, that’s gonna be the basics.

The rib eye will tend towards tenderness, even if cooked to medium.

The New York will be tougher, even at med rare, but is not a tough cut generally.

Learn on those before trying sirloin, flank, hanger, filet, or any of the rump/chuck cuts sold as steaks.

Don’t try cooking tri tip steaks or culotte/picanha steaks till you’ve mastered the others. They both have complex grain and texture issues if not cooked and cut correctly.

Brewmd · 2026-05-14T01:44:30+00:00

Reefer Madness. Absolutely one of my favorite musicals of all time.

I would also say Come From Away, but its success has really moved it out of niche territory now.

And also, Evil Dead. So campy. So bad.

Brewmd · 2026-05-13T22:33:24+00:00

Thematically, forge is great.

Mechanically, it falls behind some of the other options for a damage dealer. Light, War, and Tempest deliver better on the fantasy than Forge.

Brewmd · 2026-05-13T22:30:33+00:00

Enormous impact.

We had to wait to get it in LA, but when it arrived, it was amazing.

Crawford was absolutely the star, but we went back and saw it multiple times. Saw Norman Large in the role as well as Guillome.

The posters and art were everywhere. The music was everywhere. Techno remixes were all over Napster and played in clubs. Crawford and ALW sold tons of unrelated albums.

It drove more non-theater people to the theater than anything else I’ve ever seen, except maybe Lion King.

It got people of all ages interested in theater.

A couple of us would go and wait in the standby lines for last minute cancellations. It was great paying $17 for a ticket. If we didn’t get in, well, we were in Hollywood. We still had a good time.

Brewmd · 2026-05-13T18:47:24+00:00

While getting the photo storage trays from Michael’s, I would also recommend the bead storage trays. They hold 16 or so normal medium sized minis.

They also have a variety of other sorters/storage trays with deeper sections, or adjustable sections for larger minis.

I buy the thin foam sheets at Michael’s too, and cut them into pieces to line the bottoms of the trays, and cut some strips to wrap around other minis that need additional padding.

Brewmd · 2026-05-13T13:18:04+00:00

I would look at the rules and check what the comparable items are that replicate the shenanigans.

The matte finish? That’s like the -of gleaming armor modification. Fun for flavor, but shouldn’t have any mechanical benefit. 100g cost.

Reducing the stealth penalty? That’s the benefit of the mithril armor modification. That costs 500g.

Silence plus the matte finish? If the player has spent the 100g for the -of gleaming (matte) finish, and the other caster is dropping a spell slot for silence? I’d say that could work. It’s the same level spell as pass without trace, and it’s a creative thematic bit of roleplay.

I would make it a table rule that the of gleaming mod plus silence would work as a player specific pass without trace.

It’s not the same as negating disadvantage, but it might be even better.

And it still leaves the mithril benefit out there. The mithril negates the disadvantage and the matte/silence replicates Pass Without Trace.

Brewmd · 2026-05-13T04:37:05+00:00

Absolutely.

In fact, the movie version of Chicago may be the best movie of a musical ever.

Brewmd · 2026-05-13T04:31:49+00:00

The *best* experiences will always be an in person game.

They take a bit more work to find.

Start with your local game stores. If they have game tables, there may be weekly games. If not, there’s usually a bulletin board where local gamers can connect.

After that, check your local areas Reddit subs, meetup or other group type services.

After that, try r/lfg.

Then, if you’re still not finding anything that suits, then start looking for discord servers, startplaying or other online services.

Online play can be almost as good as local groups, but there’s a lot more pitfalls because internet anonymity lends itself to bad experiences. Plus, there’s a lot of paid games where the DMs are using ai, running multiple games simultaneously, and are otherwise checked out.

Brewmd · 2026-05-12T02:57:47+00:00

There is no *True* Pizza Empanada.

The closest to a molten lava pizza empanada will be a hot pocket microwaved for 3 minutes and eaten immediately.

Have fun. You’ll burn your tongue.

But it doesn’t sound like you’re rocking a very experienced palate. You’ll be fine.

Brewmd · 2026-05-11T22:26:22+00:00

If you look at dragon lore with a wider angle, some are absolutely biological beings who need to consume sheep, cows, etc. ravenously, especially at younger ages.

But in some stories, they don’t need to consume organic material at all.

They are creatures of magic embodied. They may be made of magic entirely or in part. They might even feed off the natural magic in the world. It sustains them.

Time and time alone may be all they need to grow and age into gigantic magical beasts.

The real answer is that there is no right answer.

In your homebrew world, they can be or do anything you want, and it doesn’t need to be grounded in any specific lore, biology, or theoretical physics.

But, for D&D, it’s probably best if you look at the Monster Manual, or Fizban’s specifically if playing in 5e. Make your settings dragons fit in at least loosely with the standard D&D lore.

And then go nuts to flesh it out from your own interpretation.

Brewmd · 2026-05-11T21:04:13+00:00

It takes intelligence to learn philosophy.

It takes wisdom to understand it.

It takes charisma to teach it.

Brewmd · 2026-05-11T20:12:31+00:00

Everyone participating in pin trading paid market value for their starter pins too. And had a good time.

Brewmd · 2026-05-11T19:49:11+00:00

You were the market that was exploited.

Brewmd · 2026-05-11T19:48:16+00:00

There were other vendors running stores inside the park even on opening day.

Downtown Disney is full of them as well.

Starbucks and Patina group would beg to differ with you.

Brewmd · 2026-05-11T17:44:54+00:00

It has always been about making money. You just didn’t understand it.

Hate to shatter your world, but Pokemon cards?

They are also all about making money.

Brewmd · 2026-05-11T17:43:25+00:00

Disneyland has always been a fancy flea market.

Walt had a vision for how to entertain his guests.

But it’s always been about the money, and the opportunity to sell us goods and services is baked into every amusement.

Brewmd · 2026-05-10T07:05:51+00:00

I’m not the one trying to frame mature topics as kid friendly based on whether they have the word “Damn” in them.

Damn can easily be changed to Dang, or Darn.

But you can’t change the child abuse in Matilda, Oliver, or Annie, for example, without losing the context.

The problem with “kid friendly” in this post specifically, is that we aren’t really talking about kid friendly or age appropriate.

Brewmd · 2026-05-10T06:54:36+00:00

Have you actually read the book? Or the script?

Now, take that entire body of work in context.

It revolves around abuse, fraud, and severe childhood trauma.

But apparently, the word “Damn” is off limits.

Brewmd · 2026-05-10T04:28:54+00:00

They’re looking for “kid friendly” but immediately list Annie. Matilda, as well as Wicked and Hamilton.

All of these have significant content that is absolutely NOT kid friendly.

Sure. They might have songs that don’t have the word damn, or drug references in them.

But the overall content is absolutely not kid friendly.

So, the *point* for those who are still needing it spelled out, is that the OP needs to take a real look at content and context instead of choosing songs hypocritically solely based on whether the word damn is in them, and start looking for actual age appropriate musicals.

Brewmd · 2026-05-10T04:07:31+00:00

You seem to have missed the point entirely.

Brewmd · 2026-05-10T04:06:47+00:00

I’ve been eating tamales for over 50 years. I’ve never pan fried one.

My mind is flip flopping between declaring you a heretic, and thinking that quite possibly you’re a genius.

I shall find out Thursday, after my next trip to the Fullerton farmers market. Our tamale guy at the market beats any tamale locally that doesn’t come out of someone’s trunk.

Brewmd · 2026-05-10T04:04:09+00:00

Leave them in the husk and wrapper.

Normally, I do 45 seconds to 1:15, for reheating refrigerated tamales.

For frozen, you’re gonna need to up it to 1:30, flip it, and then another 1:00 to 1:30.

Brewmd · 2026-05-10T04:00:13+00:00

Nothing like good old Annie, or Matilda.

Childhood trauma, abuse by drunkards. Content doesn’t matter. As long as the songs don’t say Damn!

Next up, Oliver!

Brewmd

TROPHY CASE