D&D Week: Combat Confusion
Good Evening, Good Morning, Good Day everyone!
Combat. Its either every player’s dream or nightmare. I remember first picking up the game with a rudimentary knowledge of how tabletop role-playing games worked. I’d played a couple of smaller systems previously and so I figured that naturally, the rules would gradually come to me as I learnt from the book. However, like most new players I hadn’t actually invested in the book yet, and on top of that, I had difficulty taking in the absolute tidal wave of knowledge that I could find.
My very first games were in a local game shop under the Adventurer’s League, playing the selected modules which dove headfirst into combat before I even got a grasp of the game we were playing. I looked at my Game Master, completely overwhelmed and knowing I needed to figure out how to attack the bad guys I simply said: “So… what do I need to do to fight?”. Cue a quick minute-long explanation about rolling to attack and speeds and where it says ‘attack roll’ in your character sheet that doesn’t mean the dice you use for rolling to attack.
Still overwhelmed I was handed the player’s handbook and told to just “read the rules, they’ll explain everything.”
Yeah, It wasn’t the most helpful Game Master, but as it was a 7 person table full of over-excited adults, they had to crowd control.
Nowadays I try my best to help any Game Masters I play with by introducing new players to the ruleset without being too much like a rules lawyer, but it’s still difficult to remember just EVERYTHING you can do.
And so that has brought me to today. We made a cheat sheet!
It is a little rudimentary, with only the basic explanations of what you can do, but if you want to learn more about the abilities you can check the official sourcebooks for longer explanations. It’s simply meant to serve as a quick reference guide for any new players or old players looking to keep themselves aware of what they can do. (I keep forgetting that Dodge and Hide are actions I can take!)
And it’s completely free!
You can download it from our store in PDF format straight away and print it front and back on an A5/C5 piece of card (or blow it up to A4/C4 if you fancy)
Let us know what you think in the comments!
In my early games of Dungeons and Dragons I was extremely overwhelmed and confused with what I was actually capable of doing during my turn in combat, and as a Game Master I know it can be difficult to help your players learn the system. So we’ve developed a cheat sheet for you to print and keep alongside your character sheet. Hopefully this can help you out in your game!
Updated 23/11/21
See you next week for Seeking The Sky: Chapter 2!
Poppy & Sammy
