Teleport Item

1st-level conjuration
Casting Time: 1 action
Range: Sight
Components: V
Duration: Instantaneous

You cause one item of gear in your hand(s) to teleport into the hand(s) of another creature you can see.  The target creature must have hand(s) free to receive the item, otherwise the item appears next to them and drops near their feet.  An unwilling target can make a Wisdom saving through to avoid the effect of the spell.  If they succeed, the item drops at their feet instead of appearing in their hand.

Lingering Injuries

Here's my expanded and home brewed Lingering Injury rules.  The intention here is to provide injuries that are somewhat less severe than those in the DMG; injuries that a PC might suffer after a fall, botched exploration, etc.  I'll be using these in conjunction with a list of random wilderness travel hazards that I'm compiling.

Healing

Each Lingering Injury has a Severity DC (Severity).  Each Long Rest, a PC with a Lingering Injury rolls a Constitution Saving Throw.  If the result meets or exceeds the Severity, the injury is healed.  After each failed roll, reduce the Severity by 1 to model the effects of healing over time.  The PC should make this Saving Throw after any Medicine Checks or magical healing is performed.

Medicine Checks

During each Long Rest, a character can attempt a WIS(Medicine) Check on someone with a Lingering Injury.  Another character with Medicine proficiency can Help in this attempt.  These healers can attend to only one injured PC per Long Rest.  While there's a good chance that this ministrations will help, there is also a chance that they could make matters worse.

Medicine Check Result
0-5: Increase the Severity by 1d6.
6-9: No effect.
10-14: Decrease the Severity by 1.
15+: Decrease the Severity by 1d6.

Magical Healing

Every 10 points of magical healing applied to the injury reduces the Severity by 1.

Lingering Injuries (1d12)

1. Fractured Leg - Severity 20 - Gain 1 level of Exhaustion.  Speed halved.  Cannot take Dash action.
2. Fractured Arm - Severity 20 - Gain 1 level of Exhaustion.  Cannot hold anything with two hands, can hold only one object at a time.
3. Internal Injury - Severity 15 - Action in combat = DC15 Constitution Saving Throw.  Failure = lose your action, and cannot take reactions until start of next turn.
4. Broken Ribs - Severity 15 - Action in combat = DC10 Constitution Saving Throw.  Failure = lose your action, and cannot take reactions until start of next turn.
5. Damaged Eyes - Severity 15 - Disadvantage on Wisdom(Perception) Checks that rely on sight, and on ranged attack rolls.
6. Damaged Ears - Severity 15 - Disadvantage on Wisdom(Perception) Checks that rely on hearing.
7. Fractured Hand - Severity 15 - Cannot hold anything with two hands, can hold only one object at a time.
8. Festering Wound - Severity 10 - Gain 1 level of Exhaustion.  Lose 1d6 hp after each Long Rest.
9. Twisted Knee - Severity 10 - Speed halved.  DC10 Dexterity Check after Dash action or fall prone.
10. Sprained Ankle - Severity 10 - Speed reduced by 5.  DC10 Dexterity Check after Dash action or fall prone.
11. Battered Face - Severity 5 - Disadvantage on Charisma(Persuasion) Checks.
12. Open Wound - Severity 5 - Lose 1d6 hp after each Long Rest.

Dragon Dice

The PCs in my campaign love to gamble at the inn.  Here's a simple gambling game I use.  Each round of play represents an abstract period of time gambling at the "dragon dice" tables.


Stakes

You should first decide what the stakes are for the game.  All of the players risk that amount during each round of gambling.

Resolution

Each participant makes an INT check, including all the NPCs.  If a PC has proficiency with the gambling set being used, they add their proficiency bonus.  Compare the results of all of these checks to determine how much each player wins or loses.  To simplify this math-intensive process,  I built a web-based tool to help resolve all this.  You can find it:

DMMuse.com Gambling Helper

Simply input the stakes, and the results of the PCs' INT Checks, and the tool will resolve the results and tell you how much coin each player won or lost.  The tool rounds out the gambling table with NPCs for a total of 10 particpants.

Cheating

Some of my players love to try and cheat when gambling.  To adjudicate cheating, you'll need to flesh out your "dragon dice" dealer slightly, giving them a WIS score.  Here are a few sample dealers to choose from.

Dealer	Personality	WIS
Alinor	Shallow	16 (+3)
Regot	Rhetorical	9 (-1)
Dulge	Thoughtful	14 (+2)

Each player that tries to cheat rolls a DEX(Sleight of Hand) contested by the dealer's WIS.  Since the dealer has so much to concentrate on, they suffer disadvantage on their WIS check.  If the player wins, they gain advantage on the INT check when resolving the round of gambling.  If their result is 10 or more less than the dealer's, they are caught cheating.  Handle this in an appropriate way, such as  having the dealer call over some thugs to escort the player out of the establishment, or worse.

Know when to Stop!

This simple gambling game is good for a few rounds of fun before the party packs up their gear to go off and do some real adventuring.  And don't forget, situations like this are a perfect time to provide rumors or information about the wider world to your players.

I try to knock them out

In D&D 5e, you can declare any damage as non-lethal, knocking an enemy out instead of killing them outright.  While handy, the deterministic nature of this rule is far too boring for my campaign.  To inject a little uncertainty into the proposition, I use this house rule.

• If you "pull your punches" and attack at disadvantage, and knock an enemy to zero hit points, they are knocked unconscious instead of killed outright.
• You can also attempt to knock out a target by making a normal attack roll followed by a DC15 DEX(Medicine) check.  If you are using a bludgeoning weapon you have Advantage on this check.  Success indicates non-lethal damage.

Exploration Turns

As I alluded to in earlier posts, I run dungeon crawls in my 5e campaign using something called Exploration Turns.  My goal is to merge aspects of dungeon crawl board games, like my favorite Warhammer Quest, with good ole' D&D.    I make use of minis and dungeon tiles.  Dungeons are on the compact side, about 3 to 6 main rooms is enough.  The process works like this:



Starting the Delve

When the party is about to enter a dungeon, I place the first dungeon tile down, and have them line up at the edge of the tile in marching order.  I have everyone make note of their encumbrance, and their modified movement rate.

Move and Action

Play then proceeds in Exploration Turns.  The players take turns moving their PC minis, one by one, in whatever order they decide.  Moving diagonally costs 1 movement point the first time, and 2 the second time.  Each PC can also take one action, such as trying to force open a door, pick a lock, disable a trap, etc.  As new areas of the dungeon come into range of the party's light source(s), I lay down the dungeon tiles to represent them.

Unexpected Events

At the end of each Exploration Turn, one of the players rolls 1d6.  If the result is a 1, an Unexpected Event occurs.  For each dungeon I create, I have a 2d12 table of Unexpected Events.  These are most always negative, such as wandering monsters, traps, or bad environmental effects, but there are some beneficial Unexpected Events.  These Events keep the pressure on the PCs to keep moving and accomplish their goal.

Combat

I reveal any monsters at the end of the Exploration Turn, and then have everyone roll Initiative.  Play proceeds in Combat Turns until the enemies are defeated, following Initiative order.  Since the party never knows when monsters will pop up, they need to take care to preserve their desired formation as they explore the dungeon.

Short Rests

It's rare that the party will want to take a Short Rest in the dungeon, but if they really wish to do so, they can.  If they've found a truly secure position, I'll let them take the Short Rest without risk.  If not, they need to make 3 Unexpected Event rolls during the Short Rest and hope nothing bad shows up.

Summary

The Exploration Turn system makes a dungeon crawl in D&D 5e feel more like a tactical board game.  The Unexpected Event rolls keep the tension ratcheted up, and make things like rolling to open a stuck door meaningful.  Encumbrance becomes important, because each 5' of movement is critical.  The beautiful chaos that is injected from the Unexpected Events keeps the experience fresh and interesting.  My players are currently in the middle of completing the first dungeon using this method, when they're finished I'll publish the dungeon as an example.

Identifying Magic Items

In my Overworld campaign dungeon crawls, I use Exploration Turns when the party is exploring.  During one Exploration Turn, PCs can each move, in any order they desire, and perform one action.  After each Exploration Turn, someone rolls 1d6, and if a 1 comes up, there's an Unexpected Event.  This keeps the pressure on the PCs, and makes things, like rolling to open stuck doors, actually important.  These turns are abstract, representing a period of time exploring an area, and not 6 second combat rounds.

When PCs discover potentially magical items, and wish to identify them, they can spend their entire Exploration Turn studying the item.  If they succeed in an INT(Arcana) Check, they can determine what the item is.  The DC of the Check depends on the item's rarity:





Common: DC5
Uncommon: DC10
Rare: DC15
Very Rare: DC20
Legendary: DC25

Wound Yearner

Wound Yearners are the incorporeal, undead manifestations of ancient nobles who've undergone exsanguination as part of their burial process.  They haunt their lavish tomb complexes, endlessly yearning for their lost blood, and gaining power by touching the wounds of other creatures.

They can sense wounds unfailingly, and will always attack previously wounded targets before unwounded ones, even if this subjects them to opportunity attacks or other risks.










Wound Yearner
Medium undead, neutral evil
Armor Class 14
Hit Points 22 (5d8)
Speed 0 ft., fly 50 ft. (hover)
STR 13(+1)  DEX 14(+2)  CON 11(+0)
INT 10(+0)  WIS 10(+0) CHA 11(+0)
Damage Resistances acid, cold, fire, lightning, thunder; bludgeoning, piercing, slashing from non magical weapons
Damage Immunities necrotic, poison
Condition Immunities charmed, exhaustion, grappled, paralyzed, petrified, poisoned, restrained, unconscious
Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 10
Languages Ancient language it knew in life but can't speak
Challenge 1 (200 XP)

Incorporeal Movement.  The Wound Yearner can move through other creatures and objects as if they were difficult terrain.  It takes 1d10 force damage if it ends its turn inside an object.

ACTIONS

Draining Touch.  Melee Spell Attack:  +4, 1d8 necrotic damage.  If the target has less the full hit points, 1 additional necrotic damage, and the Wound Yearner heals this much damage itself.