Hey all! I am starting a “drag and drop” series once a month where I will be making complex traps, side-quests, encounters and more for you to drag and drop into your own D&D or roleplaying games!  My idea is to create a compendium of interesting, fun and free DnD content that you can adapt and use however you like. They will add a bit of fun to your games without you having to do a whole bunch of prep yourself! :D Todays complex trap is suitable for parties of level 7-10 that I like to call the Arcane Conflux. I've included a detailed description of how it works, including ..read more

  For those of you who don’t know me ... Hi! I’m Annabelle. I’m a huge nerd, and Modular Realms is my business! ?   Today is a very unusual blog post - I'm going a bit meta!   Today I want to tell you about Modular Realms, what it means to me, and why I love it so much. Call it a love letter if you will - it is Valentine’s Day after all!     Why I started Modular Realms   I never really intended to start a business. In fact, I had to be persuaded to start selling my magnetic dungeon tiles in the beginning!   Modular Realms began as a crafting ..read more

  For those of you who don’t know me, hi! I’m Annabelle. I’m a huge nerd, and Modular Realms is my business! ?   Today is a very unusual blog post - I'm going a bit meta!   Today I want to tell you about Modular Realms, what it means to me, and why I love it so much. Call it a love letter if you will - it is Valentine’s Day after all!     What I love best about Modular Realms   To begin with, perhaps my favourite thing about Modular Realms is that it really is the sort of business that I would want to support. Ok, sure Annabelle, but what does that mea ..read more

One of the keys to DMing a great Dungeons and Dragons game is tailoring the game to the party navigating it. This is as true for a Dungeon Master journeying through established sourcebooks as it is for one writing a homebrew campaign! A fantastic starting point is to weave the strengths and abilities of each character class into your storytelling and encounters. In this guide I'll give an overview of the 12 core D&D classes, highlighting their unique capabilities and offering tips on showcasing their strengths within your campaign.   Understanding D& ..read more

There are a lot of rules around in Dungeons and Dragons. If you have new players who want to play spellcasters, then they’re going to have even more learning to do! As their Dungeon Master, you’ll probably want to check in regularly with them, and to tailor your DMing to reduce some of the overwhelm that so many players face when first playing a spellcaster. We want our players to feel like epic badasses striding into battle, not unprepared students dragging their feet into an exam! ;)  If you haven't already, I also highly recommend you check out my post explaining how sp ..read more

  We all have tools that help us dungeon master. They might be source-books, loot tables, or monster guides. They help us with our preparation, and often make our work lighter and faster to get through.  One of the newer tools in a DMs arsenal is AI. It’s something I’ve started really investigating this year. Before we begin I just want to put forth a sort of disclaimer, because people can have all sorts of preconceptions when it comes to AI. So, key thing to remember: AI is a tool that can help you do your job, it cannot do your job for you. If you are a DM who is looking ..read more

  Hullo all!  Not all of us have the hours to spend intricately painting terrain so here's a guide for how to make great looking wooden terrain in next to no time at all!   This tutorial is rated easy-peasy. It takes not time and practically no skill - perfect for a lot of us trying their hand at painting for the first time!     Materials Needed:   Modular Realms magnetic dungeon tiles, "Wood" texture - you can get them here! White Primer - I used this one The Army Painter Satchel Brown Speedpaint  Paint brush  Matt varnish - I used this one   I ..read more

Whether you use dungeon tiles or not in your games, I highly recommend bringing 3D elements into combat!   Bringing 3D elements into your scenery makes a huge difference to your battles. Not only does it bring visual clarity, it also makes for more exciting and immersive gameplay.    I also find combat runs quicker and more smoothly when everyone can see what the environment they're in looks like! Another joy of using 3D battle maps is the opportunities it opens up for tactical gameplay. Suddenly your players begin to make more use of higher ground, cover and other obstacles.&n ..read more

  Armor class (AC) is the measure of how hard it is for an attacker to hit you when rolling to attack. The higher your armor class, the harder it is to hit you. AC is really important in Dungeons and Dragons because if an enemy attack misses, you don’t take damage. There are a fair few factors that are used to calculate armor class including natural defense, armor worn, dexterity modifier, shields, spells, magic items and more. Calculating a characters armor class can get a bit confusing so I’ve broken it down into a step by step approach.     Understanding the basics of Armor ..read more

Spell scrolls are one use consumable items in Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition that allow characters to cast the spell contained within the scroll without expending a spell slot.   There are a lot of rules and conditions around using spell scrolls. We’ll take a look at them in this post. Personally I (and many other DMs) find the rules as written around spell scrolls somewhat limiting so I’ll also introduce you to some of the common homebrew rules that have evolved around the use of spell scrolls in D&D games.     What are Spell Scrolls?   In DnD 5e, spell s ..read more