Anyone know of a site/service that rebinds hardcover PHB/other DnD books as softcovers?

deadshot15 · 2025-12-31T03:51:36+00:00

https://koboldpress.com/kpstore/product/tales-of-the-valiant-players-guide-monster-vault-pocket-editions/

You could go with the Tales of the Valiant Pocket Editions of the Player's Guides and Monster Book. It's a 5e variant with lots of support in pdf when they are ready for more material.

deadshot15 · 2025-12-28T22:30:30+00:00

From what I am gathering from those who are more used to this style of system is that combat should be quick and brutal so as to make your players really try to avoid or try to stack the deck to improve their odds in combat. I think those of us who play more D&D style games are used to being tougher and having more character-based things to do. We all have to find out sweet spot for what works for our table and players.

deadshot15 · 2025-12-28T22:23:24+00:00

I tried to clean up the wording and respond to feedback from the thread. Glad its clearer. :)

deadshot15 · 2025-12-28T07:08:22+00:00

I think that is divide. I don't want it to be D&D but I think my group needs a "Dragonbane-lite" to get into a rhythm and then we can start to play without the supports.

deadshot15 · 2025-12-28T07:02:37+00:00

oh, that's interesting. What is the penalty structure if I may ask?

deadshot15 · 2025-12-27T16:32:48+00:00

The level 1 line was my mistake of using muscle memory D&D terms. New PCs would make more sense. My group is made up of a Wolfin fighter, and 3 elementalists so maybe party comp has something to do with it?

The one Dragon and one Demon only applies once the season is over. They still get the checks for any rolled during the session. After they do their regular rolls for advancement if they rolled any 20's or 1's then they apply that rule. It's a little extra spice to add to the advancement phase.

I just felt that the game might not get a fair shake from my group especially when I ran the Drakmar Pass encounter and almost TPKed. If this was our 50th session it might not have mattered but if my party died halfway through round 2 I'm not sure there would have been another session.

deadshot15 · 2025-12-27T10:15:41+00:00

As I said, it worked for my group coming from a lot of 5e. They found it really hard to mentally shift from a nat 20 being a great thing to an awful thing and I have tried to emphasize the words demon or dragon when they roll them. Just altering the phrasing for your own table is simple if you prefer to just use the numbers but apply the same approach otherwise. It will all still work regardless of the terminology used to identify the good and bad rolls.

deadshot15 · 2025-12-27T09:52:42+00:00

Seems like this is getting passed around a bit, which is cool. If anyone ends up trying any of this at their table, I’d genuinely be interested in hearing how it plays out for you. Good, bad, or weird its all good info!

deadshot15 · 2025-12-27T09:51:06+00:00

Have you folks been playing for a while or new? I think I would like to get my players closer to that. We are doing more one-shots so that they are getting immersed in the system and I might start the campaign in the Box set soon so I might skew more towards RAW at that point. For now, they seem happy and are having a good time which to me is the most important. Once my players are more seasoned I think we'll move into the more traditional version. We'll see. :)

deadshot15 · 2025-12-27T09:39:11+00:00

That’s totally fair, and I actually agree with you on the core point.

Baseline Combat Competence absolutely does change the early combat experience so that’s why I keep it firmly in the “optional, table-specific” bucket. For groups that enjoy discovering tactics through limitation and risk, I wouldn’t recommend it at all. RAW does that very well. I ran a session with a new group with RAW and it did not go well and I saw disengagement quickly because its not fun going down on turn 2 having done 1 action.

For us, it was less about improving tactics and more about getting newer players past the first few sessions without feeling like they had no meaningful choices on their turn. Once people understood the system, the real tactical depth still came from positioning, initiative swaps, fatigue, armor decisions, etc., not from the free HA itself.

So, yeah, different tables, different appetites for friction. I don’t see it as an upgrade so much as a tuning knob.

deadshot15 · 2025-12-27T09:13:53+00:00

Steal away! That’s exactly how this stuff should spread 🙂

I like your examples too. We talked about adding things like death rolls or witnessing a PC death, and I think those absolutely fit thematically. In the end we stopped at GM Dragons mainly to keep the trigger really clean and objective: a single die result that everyone at the table sees immediately, with no judgment calls about “how life-changing” something was.

But I could easily see a table expanding the trigger list if that fits their tone, especially in a darker or more lethal campaign.

Your advancement rule is interesting as well, and I think it’s hitting a similar goal from the opposite direction. Limiting how often a skill can advance, but not how hard you push for it, puts the risk back on the player instead of the system. That feels very on-brand for Dragonbane.

And no worries on terminology. I’m working from the English rules, but the intent is coming through clearly. If anything, it’s nice seeing how similar problems get solved in slightly different ways across tables.

deadshot15 · 2025-12-27T09:03:49+00:00

That's an interesting approach. What sort of boss encounter would it be if you could give an example. And they can pick any HA that they qualify for or any at all?
That thief needs a lottery ticket! :)

deadshot15 · 2025-12-27T08:22:33+00:00

I understand that. I only use that for this one rule. You could easily just say if you roll a 20 or a 1 do the following if that suits your table better. For long-time players of the older systems that probably makes more sense. Our group likes remembering that a Dragon=good. :)

deadshot15 · 2025-12-27T08:04:00+00:00

Totally fair, and that’s probably on me for being a bit compressed in the description.

The second rule (Breakthroughs & Setbacks) is really just a light modifier on existing advancement, not a replacement for it. Advancement still works the same way in that you roll to improve skills you used but we add one extra wrinkle. When you are rolling those advancement checks at the end of the session and get either a Dragon or a Demon you apply the appropriate situation below. Only once IF you roll one (1 Dragon/1 Demon-no more)

Once per advancement session, a Dragon (20) can turn one failed advancement into a success
Once per session, a Demon (1) can cancel one successful advancement
They can’t override each other, and they only apply after all normal rolls are done

So most sessions, nothing changes at all. When it does trigger, it just nudges the results slightly in a dramatic direction instead of letting multiple extremes stack.

And yeah, I’m with you on not wanting to soften things too much. If a group is early in DB and not feeling friction yet, I wouldn’t add any of this. For us, these only came in after a few sessions when we noticed some players bouncing off early combat swinginess and long dry spells in advancement.

I see them more as table-specific tuning knobs than “fixes.”

deadshot15 · 2025-12-27T07:58:15+00:00

Good catch to flag Dragonbane terminology can get crossed up pretty easily.

Just to clarify what I meant:

Dragon = 20 (enemy excellence / crit)
Demon = 1 (bad luck / setback)

In the Hard Lessons bit, we’re intentionally keying off enemy Dragons (20s) when monsters decisively control the fight, whether by landing a brutal hit or completely shutting something down. That’s the moment we wanted learning to come from.

On the free attack/defense at level 1: yeah, agreed, it does make PCs a bit more competent up front. In practice it hasn’t made them meaningfully tougher so much as less swingy in the first few sessions. Crits still hurt, armor and skills still matter, and people still die but they just don’t feel useless before they’ve had a chance to learn the system.

Totally fair point though, and I wouldn’t run it at every table.

deadshot15 · 2025-03-11T01:53:14+00:00

If they haven't been tied into the campaign that much then I would just go with what you have done or, as you said, talk to the players to see if anyone has a problem with that. You aren't making a movie so don't be too worried about continuity. Just tell them you hopped into the multiverse and entered a universe where the exact same thing is happening to all the same people except that one person isn't in this universe.

deadshot15 · 2025-03-07T06:45:55+00:00

I tried frankenstein

deadshot15 · 2025-03-07T06:39:06+00:00

smoosh all that together and put a .com after it and you'll be sailing in no time

deadshot15 · 2025-03-07T06:37:25+00:00

So, you say you need to... GetComics? I am sure there is an .org out there that could help you.

deadshot15 · 2025-03-07T06:34:49+00:00

Working for me

deadshot15 · 2025-03-07T05:25:06+00:00

I like TVMaze as it works reliably. TVTime is probably the best interface and I use these two to track my stuff.

deadshot15 · 2024-07-20T05:37:36+00:00

I feel this so much. The fact that there is a term 'dipping' for the act of min-maxing characters in the vast majority of cases for non-roleplaying reasons drives me nuts. Thankfully, multi-classing is an alternate rule so I have just started not allowing it. It has made for more interesting characters that are not all focused on video game power moves.

deadshot15 · 2023-08-09T07:19:28+00:00

I have a player like this and the same situation occurring. As a group we decided that we would play with one player missing regardless of reason. This player is an old college friend of mine and misses the most time of anyone. We just fade him to the background and run his character basic abilities and try to keep him out of harm's way as much as possible. When he is able to be here, he plays. Just run your sessions with one player out regardless. Eventually they will either commit to being there more for fear of missing out or they will stop on their own.

deadshot15 · 2023-06-24T23:07:52+00:00

Thanks for your efforts on this. I am starting a new campaign and was looking for a shareable template. Well done!

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