Games of all types influence one another. It’s one of the beautiful things about gaming. Mechanics and features push games into evolving, changing, and growing as players discover new things that they love and want to see more of. The same can happen in your game ofDungeons & Dragons.
As a Dungeon Master (DM), you’re able to implement some of the best parts of video games into your campaign for your players' benefit. Or to make things easier on you, DMing is not always an easy or quick thing to do. So consider adding some of gaming’s best mechanics to your sessions to up the fun and lessen the stress.
8Dynamic Maps
Hit, Hit, BOOM
One way to bring more action and consequences into combat is to have dynamic battle maps. Even if you only use markers and paper or some simple outlines in a digital space, you can still have maps alter as the battle rages on. This is lessSuper Smash Bros.where stages completely shift or change while you keep fighting (though that can be super cool too).
It’s more along the lines that, as the surroundings take damage, they fall apart. Rocks tumbling down, threatening to crush the party and enemies if they don’t dodge them successfully. A tree catching fire from a spell hitting it, creating a whole new problem for the party. Small things like this make the world feel real and might cause the players to hesitate before their next move.
7Collectibles
Gotta Find Them All
This is more for the parties who love lore and uncovering secrets about the world around them. Collectibles have been a major part of gaming for decades. They are a way to expand upon the story without distracting from the narrative. Or they can be used as rewards, treasure, objects to sell,or craftable items.
It makes the party feel like they are making discoveries and being rewarded for searching and even looting instead of just barreling ahead to the next objective. It can also cause them to interact with NPCs more if you create a character the players have to consult with to discover what these items are or what they mean.
6Fast Travel
Who Has Time To Walk There?
Fast Travel is such a good feature in any number of games. It can really cut down on, well, downtime where there isn’t much to do. And that’s not just for video games. In D&D, your party may have to travel back and forth between important locations, complete fetch quests, or may just want to explore the world.
It can be hard to constantly plan encounters, or you could find that the traveling is making it take longer to move the narrative forward. So having fast travel, at least to key locations, can be such a life saver. This can be through teleportation spells or items, sigils that poof people to where they need to go, or even just using a quick travel montage when you don’t plan to have any combat or intrigue.
5Checkpoints Or Safe Rooms
Why Are We Finding So Much Health Here?
Have you ever run a Dungeon that takes the party long periods of time to navigate? Or string together smaller bouts of combat back to back? Having a safe place for the party to hide away, rest, and refresh can be a great way to serve both in-game and above-table purposes.
For in-game reasons, spell casters can be completely out of spell slots, the party can have really low health, or they may have to lie and wait for a bad guy to show up. In real life, it allows the DM to put an easy pause on the action when a session is over or if the party split up and you have to visit what the other players are up to. It’s a useful mechanic to keep in the back pocket.
4Randomized Loot
Ah, A Rock. Thank You.
This isn’t a new feature to D&D.The Player’s Handbook and the Dungeon Master’s Guide (DMG)both have tables that have trinkets and loot where a DM can roll some dice and see what the players get. But some DMs might avoid this or make the loot more tailored to the party.
An argument as to why you should use a randomized loot table? It forces the players to adapt to having interesting tools and items to work with. It can really cause them to think outside the box or use these items in ways you would never have expected. Plus, you could argue, it’s realistic that not all items players come across will be helpful.
If you’re interested in using a random table but are afraid of the party getting items that would break the game, you may always adjust or replace items on it to make it fit your setting or players' level better.
3Boss Rushes
Let The Bodies Hit The Fight Pit
Sometimes, your players want to let off some steam by punching some NPCs or monsters really hard. Or you have a story arc that can really be empowered by making the players face a series of mini bosses or creatures.
Think of an arena setting or an underground fight club. Maybe your players have to impress the leader of a crime syndicate, or they have to fight for their freedom in a battle to the death ordered by a tyrannical ruler. A boss rush can serve so many different purposes while being a fun way to bring some combat into a session.
2Social Links
Who Will You Spend Your Day With?
The DMG has an optional rule for Loyalty, though this is written to talk about an NPC who is a member of the party along with the player characters. Why not tweak the rule a bit and apply it to important NPCs who aren’t in the group of adventurers?
This doesn’t have to be full-blown Persona 5 social links, but your NPCs can have side stories the players can participate in and, depending on their relationship, these non-playable characters can reward the party with additional feats, items, safe places to stay, and any other way you’re able to think of. They can also put themselves in harms' way or give their life for the party.
1Base Building
This Is A Safe Space
Survival games can lend so much to D&D. Depending on how intensive you want the survival mechanics to be, you can borrow resource management, creating and running settlements, even needing to be inside at night or face hordes of creatures and dark foes.
But one mechanic that can be useful even in very casual campaigns is the ability to build or commission a base. This can be as simple as a home the party can return or escape to or can be as grand as a palace filled with staff and guards. This gives the players a safe space to rest and somewhere to store equipment, loot, or keep animals like mounts or livestock.
