Here's how to make Huge and Gargantuan creatures more fun to fight for your players and more fun to run as a DM. As always, I keep these homebrew mechanics super simple so that the whole table can get a grasp on them without too much reading.
After my DM Quest group finished our first campaign a couple months ago, I decided to stop using D&D Beyond and play my next campaign on a paper character sheet. I had always used real dice, but from what I remembered, the paper character sheet from 5.5 was much better than the old one, and I was excited to have a more tactile experience playing D&D.
I was wrong. All the official character sheets are terrible! And the ones other people make are too fancy and still miss what makes a character sheet useful!
As usual, it's up to me to fix the problem.
NOTE: Since these are a lot of work and I'm not sure if I'm super sold on this formula anyway, this will probably be my last class-specific Bastion. I figured since I had already done the classic Fighter, Mage, and Cleric bastions, I might as well round it out with the Rogue one. If you like this system, I hope these serve as useful templates!
You are awarded a Bastion when you reach 5th level. During downtime, you can invest gold into your Bastion to upgrade it with new facilities and services. At the end of a downtime, you can choose a number of available services equal to your proficiency bonus and gain their effects until the end of your next adventure. You can gain multiple uses of the same service unless otherwise stated. See the original post here.
The hideout is a refuge from the law, a place of clandestine deals, and a repository of secrets and treasure. As a criminal, you can use your Hideout to gather information and augment your arsenal with less-than-legal implements.
In my opinion, the most underrated PC game of all time is a 1997 game by Sierra called Lords of Magic. It has a beautifully organized system of factions called "Faiths," spectacular music, fascinating outside-the-box lore, and a unique gameplay style that involves a mix of turn-based exploration and real-time combat.
In my last D&D campaign, we ended up discarding a ton of magic items. Inspired by the Enchanting skill on World of Warcraft, I made this system for players to recycle unwanted magic items and create ones they do want.
It took me what, 8 years? to realize it's easier to do Hourly Comic Day with a printable template so I don't get those ungoshly crooked lines for the frames. Special thanks to Arlee, my daughter, for inspiring me to do this this year. I would've forgotten otherwise. Enjoy a day in my life!