Crit Academy: A Dungeons and Dragons Podcast

Crit Academy is joined by Zac and Katherine, hosts of the Bite-Sized Gaming Podcast. A round table of DM chuckleheads discuss all things gaming. We discuss their recently launched Kickstarter for Captain Hartchild's Guide to Rare Dragons! A 5th Edition supplement contains 10 unique Dragon's, each with their own personalities, lairs, and minions. Check out their free sample Hullifex the Dragontoad...

"I WANT BIG BOSS FIGHTS, DAMMIT!" We know exactly how the Angry GM feels on this topic. Luckily, he has solved this problem for us. Crit Academy covers the Angry GM's Paragon Monsters. Epic Dungeons and Dragons boss battles that can leave your players split in twain. Show Notes: https://www.critacademy.com/post/episode-185

Crit Academy discusses Armaments of Legacy, a new Dungeons and Dragons DMsguild supplement to enhance your 5th Edition Game. Don't outgrow. Evolve! Armaments of Legacy expands well-known magical weapons, armor, and spellcasting items, transforming them into storied relics that evolve and grow alongside your characters. This product provides the following: Every Item Has a Story: Integrate legacy b...

In Dungeons and Dragons and tabletop roleplaying games in general, storytelling is a prime focus. Through the stories being woven by the Game Masters, characters created by the players, and their actions a wonderful collaborative story is created. Crit Academy delves into a collection of core storytelling rules by one of the greatest storytelling business, Pixar. The Disney subsidiary animation st...

Crit Academy discusses the AI Dungeon. A text adventure roleplaying game that builds a story on the fly based on the player's input. The program's Artificial Intelligence system pulls data from all over the internet to build and respond to the user, creating a cooperative story. This is a fun and engaging resource of any Dungeons and Dragons Dungeon Master. Check it out here: https://play.aidungeo...

Crit Academy discuss and share some  samples for their upcoming Memorable Monsters - A 5th Edition Resource to Monsters and NPCs Kickstarter Project. Memorable Monsters is a tome of unforgettable monsters and villains for your stories and campaigns! For when you need more than just stat blocks, our Memorable Monsters book contains unique and memorable creatures complete with backgrounds, complex m...

Crit Academy covers the newest Unearthed Arcana: Feats. Released 7/13/20 this new collection of feats for 5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons offers a way to become better at something or to gain a whole new ability. Many of these new feats include limited to access to class features. Much like the Martial Adept feature in the Player's Handbook. Pick up the full document here: https://dnd.wizards.com...

Crit Academy is joined by special guest Keith Ammann to discuss his newest book. Live to Tell the Tale: An Introduction to Combat Tactics for Dungeons and Dragons Players. A 77-page book that examines combat roles, class features, party composition, positioning, debilitating conditions, attacking combinations, action economy, and the ever-important consideration of the best ways to run away. If yo...

Crit Academy discusses Total Party Kill Games Recovery Dice Options : Introduced in Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition, Recovery Dice, otherwise known as Hit Dice, allows a character to recover hit points without the need for healing potions or cure wounds spells. This serves to extend the adventuring day by delaying the party's need to return to civilization, which in turn allows characters to co...

Crit Academy is excited to talk about our favorite new DMsguild D&D product, Mythic Encounters! First introduced in Mythic Odyssey's of Theros , a Mythic Encounter is an optional rule you can apply to a creature which increases the difficulty. This takes the form of a Mythic Trait, which triggers most often on reducing the creature to 0 hit points. After which, it transforms, musters its strength,...

Crit Academy discusses the new Dungeons and Dragons setting based on the Magic the Gathering plane Theros. The caprice of the gods. The destiny of heroes. Great journeys into monster-infested wilds, and mythic odysseys to the edge of the world and back. These elements of adventure fill the realms of Theros, a new setting for your Dungeons & Dragons campaign to explore. The roots of Theros lie in t...

Crit Academy discusses Warcraft Heroes Handbook! A 5e supplement that lets you bring the world and characters from the world's greatest MMORPG, World of Warcraft, to Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition. This fun and free supplement is brought to you by lead designed Jih on GMbinder. Venture into Azeroth on your next campaign! Armies and factions have always defined the Warcraft world, and two of the...

Elminster Aumar, Chosen of Mystra, invites you to explore the grandest repository of knowledge in the Forgotten Realms: Candlekeep, the Library Fortress! The Sage of Shadowdale has assembled this companion to help seekers of wisdom navigate the Castle of Tomes. Be warned! Elminster requests that you bring a suitable entrance gift, lest you be turned away at the front gates. This book is the defini...

Crit Academy discusses converting old Dungeons & Dragons content to 5th Edition. Many of us have played through multiple iterations of the game, and through all that, we developed some beloved characters, monsters, and worlds. We walk through a guide published by Wizards of the Coast to help transition your old favorites to the newest version of D&D. Show Notes: https://www.critacademy.com/post/co...

Crit Academy discusses a 5th Edition conversion of the greatest RPG games of all time, Final Fantasy 7. The full supplement can be found HERE. Created by Mike Myler. For the uninitiated, this is the game's magic and equipment-kitting system –you get the Fire materia from somewhere and equip it onto a weapon or armor (better the piece → more materia slots), you can cast the Fire spell with it, as y...

Crit Academy is joined by best selling DMsguild author Jeff Stevens. We discuss one of his newest collaborative, "Allies, Enemies & Quests". Expand your D&D game with this collection of 20 unique NPCs of various Challenge Ratings. Each NPC is designed so they can used as an ally, or as an enemy. Included are several quest ideas for each of the NPCs, three of which have detailed mini adventures and...

Weapons are more than just objects that adventurers carry to stab, slice, or break enemies with. In the proper hands of a master, they can be powerful tools to gain the upper hand against an enemy. A weapon perk is a special skill or technique that can be used with a specific weapon. This allows each weapon to feel unique among all of the options the adventurers have, and hopefully give them their...

Crit Academy discusses 5th Edition Team Deathmatch! A team-based, PvP competitive tabletop arena for Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition. This game is an action RPG about strengthening the bonds you already have with the friends in your gaming group, or forming new bonds of friendship, in the face of shared adversity and the greatest challenge. Nothing beats the thrill of coming together to defeat a...

Crit Academy is joined by John Day. Creator and director of "The Game Shoppe". A show about Kevin Smith (not THAT Kevin Smith!) and his gang trying to save their failing game store. they allow a documentary crew film them for a slight chance to save the last place for gaming and nerd culture in their small town. Show Notes: https://www.critacademy.com/post/the-game-shoppe Make sure to check out ou...

We discuss the Legendary Bestiary: Legendary Actions for Low-Level Monsters . Legendary Actions are one of the coolest, most memorable aspects of fifth edition! As a DM, they allow you to make dynamic choices throughout a combat round, not just relying on a single action to make a huge impact. This element of unpredictability keeps the more tactics-minded players guessing as well, which is likely...

Crit Academy discusses locations in Dungeons and Dragons' Forgotten Realms Setting that should be visited in your stories and campaigns! We cover the GameRant Article by Glenn Carreau and add a few of our own thoughts. Support us: Check out our newest release "The Dark Tides of Damodan" An underwater rescue adventure for characters 5th-8th level. https://www.dmsguild.com/product/309958/The-Dark-Ti...

Today Crit Academy covers a Dungeons and Dragons 5e conversion of the original 151 Kanto Pokemon. This conversion comes to us from Timothy Gonzalez of https://www.pirategonzalezgames.com . Are you ready to catch them all? Show Notes: https://www.critacademy.com/post/kanto-pokedex If you have any feedback, unearthed tips and tricks or topics you would like us to discuss, please send them to us. You...

Explorer's Guide to Wildemount provides everything you need to play D&D on the continent of Wildemount (set within the world of Exandria, the setting for the hit show Critical Role)—a land of war, betrayal, and swashbuckling adventure. Comprised of four regions, Wildemount provides endless potential for adventure in a land of brewing conflict and incredible magic. Rising tensions boil over into al...

Crit Academy covers UltraModern5 Redux or U5, a supplement designed to offer classes, backgrounds, feats, skills, rules, equipment, and opponents for settings outside of traditional ones involving dragons and dungeons, though still employing D&D 5th Edition rules. This book is an expansion of the core 5E rules and thus does not reprint material from core books required for play. There are new clas...

Episode 162: 100 Weapon Histories When playing Dungeons and Dragons some players can spend hours upon hours developing their characters backstory. For some, this may just be how long it takes to decide on a concept that can be explained in a few sentences, while others will write out pages and pages of content. In either case, very rarely does the player include lore and history of their equipment...