One great advantage that TTRPGs have over most novels, films and video games is the ability to have multiple perspectives. Especially if you're doing a more RP heavy Lovecraftian thing, try giving your PCs different or even conflicting information; one player can clearly see a doorway where another sees only a brick wall, one has a deep sense of dread emanating from a dark hallway, while another hears the voice of a friendly NPC they met previously asking for help. This can really sell the "madness" part of it as players have to try to figure out which information to act on, and creates opportunity for roleplay as their characters may make different choices than the players necessarily would.

If your table is okay with it, body horror. Healing magic that leaves scars, threatens mutation, or requires a sanity check.

One friend brought a jenga, and any rsky action of any PC implied taking a piece of the tower... Pure adrenaline!

All of those interacting mechanics matter quite a bit for a long term campaign. But for a one-shot, DMs should feel a lot more confident hacking the game to their heart's content.

Partially related to the proposed burning inspiration/HD to avoid madness: I don't remember the exact source of the idea, but when I ran Curse of Strahd, I had a bowl of 15 black d6 "Dark Powers Dice" in the middle of the table that my players could use. It worked like Bardic Inspiration, and you could grab any number of them to add to a roll. But after they used them, I gained an equal number of dice to use against them at a time of my choosing. It added a whole new level of tension, choosing to accept failure or give in to temptation and pay consequences later on. Players are much more tempted to indulge when they're not spending valuable resources, but it still gives them the FEELING of things getting more dire because they're giving me more and more opportunities to make things harder at a later time.

Thanks for the reference to Mothership! It is a great system for horror and lots of the experienced third party writers have baked similar advice into their content. However, I contend that player expectations are probably the most important unmentioned thing for this topic. You players really have to want or at least expect horror or they will rebel against it.

A few more tips! 1. If the encounters are Extremely Dangerous, combat may best be avoided. Give players alternative Win/Loss conditions for encounters beyond D&D's typical criteria. If the monster is way beyond boss difficulty, players need goals to strive for that don't involve trading blows in a losing battle. 1a. Consider adding Time Limits on objectives. This encourages players to hurry to objectives, which synergizes well with rushed decision making with high stakes as well as encouraging players to flee from combat as a victory rather than getting bogged down in encounters outside of their league. 1b. Consider using a highly defined map area so that Traveling the map has important ramifications. Especially when paired with Time Limits, the choice to take the road around a dangerous area, or cutting directly through, as well as the choice to race to your destination or to be more cautious, aware of your surroundings, and stealthy, all play into survival horror. When they can't expect to win direct confrontation, you emphasize the other elements of the game they can actually control. 2. Horror is largely an experience of Powerlessness, while D&D is made for Power Fantasy. Sticking to low level PCs will help stay in genre for horror. 3. Set expectations in session 0. Let players know the difficulty of the combat is meant to appeal to genre, not to simulate a fair fight as D&D normally does and that you aren't out to get them even if the monsters very much are. Also, add the disclaimer that Rolling Dice sometimes means a well thought out horror turns into slapstici comedy when the players roll nat 20s and the monster fumbles every roll.

I like your idea of letting the players know that each time they choose to do something that advantages themselves, the boss becomes increasingly more dangerous.

Horror is about disempowerment, D&D (heroic fantasy) is about empowerment. You have to have table buy in.

Great advice! I really like horror D&D and my longest campaign had a lot of horror elements. The encounter design advice in the old Heroes of Horror and Lords of Madness books have always been a big inspiration to me.

Turn Death Saves into the ICRPG Dying timer! Get healed or stabalize in 1d4 rounds (or better yet 1d4 TURNS).

Honestly, 5e is a terrible system for running horror IMO. If you really want a scary experience you should run an RPG built around that like Call of Cthulu, or even Mork Borg. Of course, if you choose to run a system that's actually conducive to horror, BDR's tips about Monstrous Encounters are *chefs kiss*

I really appreciate the work that goes into modifying 5e for genre-bending purposes, but as a Call of Cthulhu forever keeper, I cannot recommend enough just trying CoC if you're looking for a short horror adventure. PC fragility and sanity mechanics are built in, and if you really want a medieval fantasy setting, there are supplements that can help you do that. Not a criticism of the video, modifying 5e can work if your players want to take their characters from a regular campaign into a horror setting for a special Halloween session or something, but CoC is remarkably easy to get the hang of if you're looking for a standalone one-shot or longer horror adventure. (Advice about telegraphing danger and solutions goes for every TTRPG, though!)

Thanks for this video, I am gonna run a survival horror campaign that is basically lord of the rings meets dead space. The set up basically is, you went to Norazkadul the City of a Thousand Forges, a great dwarven settlement half the size of new york. You got locked up in the dungeon for whatever reason so you have to serve your sentence for a couple of days as the guards begin to gossip about a recent cave-in collapse and rumors of screaming coming down from the deepest levels of the mineshaft. Then one day some crazy shit starts happening and a traitorous guard decides to help you escape in the mayhem before you loose him in the darkness. I haven't decided on the monster or the specifics of the event but I don't want to do something stereotypical like the Undead. I was considering maybe goblins and orcs invaded from the surface but I think something else more sinister than raiders is afoot here. Here are some ideas I'd like to playaround with... -Zombie Virus, nah too basic. Lets take a foot note from Dwarf Fortress, a WEREBEAST OUTBREAK! A dwarf got attacked by a wererat deep in the mines and it morphed back into some scared little dwarven child the axedwarves had to put down but now the plague has spreadout across the city and is uncontrollable. - I can't believe it's not xenomorphs! Some Illithid bio-engineering experiment gone horribly wrong, the dwarves dug into the wreckage of an alien superstructure surrounded by dozens of silently humming eggs that begin to hatch parasitic larvae which burst out into full grown wasp humanoid hybrids looking for more prey to feed or breed. - Another idea from Dwarf Fortress, Forgotten Beasts! If you don't know they are basically randomly generated legendary monsters like a green blob that sprays deadly dust or a giant one eyed cardinal that breathes fire, etc. Long in the early days of the world's creation the Gods created many beasts, but like an artist unsatisified with their work they were cast into the trash bin to be forgotten, this bin is the Hollow a prison encased in the hardest rock. However, the greed of the dwarves was underestimated and they cracked the prison and now the Forgotten Things from the Hollow can now take their vengance on this world and wreak havoc. TLDR; Dwarven SCP containment Breach. And to make things more interesting, Invaders from the surface show up at the best time. The Dwarves are too preoccupied, and usually these invaders are of no consequence but now its a different story.

2:50 - I used Edvard Munch's _The Scream_ to describe a monster in the last session I ran. For a more recent reference, I also said it looked like the murderer's mask in the movie _Scream_. I'm not sure if one or both of them was the inspiration for what a bodak looks like, but it works.

There are some tips here im totally using, but for me what i did for death saves is made them completely secret. I roll behind the screen and the players have to guess weather theyre close to deah or not, that and hp. Everyones hp is secret and they can trade dm inspiration to see it or not, making the combat more reliant on narration and alternative explinations to gauge where they are at. We also incorperated the rules of, as a bonus action you can try to gauge your hp by doing a medicine check (dc15) to see the range of your current health. Gives more purpose to the medicine skill and still doesnt make it op, of course these are all new rules for our table and we're testing it. So its not a one solution for everything, feel free to try it if yu think it helps. We as a table all talked if we wanted to add these rules before hand and clearly stated if something isnt fun or doesnt work we can change it at any time :)

Having the Madness DC increase the longer the PCs spend in the horrific location should light a torch under the characters' backsides. I like the new One D&D Exhaustion rules, and they could make a thematic effect for madness/stress too; rolling to resist Exhaustion at each horrific event.

This a brilliant video. Great ideas, Very inspiring for helping me think about how to craft a better adventure. I'm buzzing with ideas.

Great episode! One non-Halloween question: I am enamored with weird, levelless, osr-like spells (case in point; Lost Pages "Marvels & Malisons" and "Hamsterish Hoard of Hexes"). How should I convert them be usable in 5e if wizard wants to copy them into their spellbook?

5e is next to useless for this kind of thing, but I would suggest: 1. no long rests in the "horror environment" (you have to escape the adventure to really rest); 2. reduced death saves as described in the video; 3. every instance of damage from The Creature also inflicts a level of exhaustion. Couple this with it being an "ambush predator" of some kind, and an environmental advantage (it's aquatic and you're in water, it can move through walls, etc.) and you can probably make the players sweat it, even if they're not actually scared.

I recall, from back when I was running a 5e campaign that went to level 20, I had the three following house rules to make the game more lethal/dangerous: 1: Bleeding out instead of death saves, a mechanic I'd lifted from Dungeon Crawl Classics, whereby a PC downed to 0 hp had exactly one round of combat to be healed, before dying. 2: The sanity stat from the DMG, the saving throws for which I'd mainly used in interactions Lovecraft-style aliens, but which you could just as easily use for near-death experiences, encountering corpses, etc. 3: Lastly, I used a mechanic from some earlier edition of DnD (I forget which), that capped player hit dice at 10, with increases stopping at lvl10. I'd also used this for most humanoid enemies, which had the ironic effect of making high-level combat encounters extremely fast.

You're never too old for Trick or Treating!

The video I wished I watched before I ran CoS! It was so very difficult to get the horror feel I wanted. Honestly even considered maybe D&D was just not the nest system for horror. I'll have to try it again with this video in mind.

Didn't really understand the tip on death saves. You'd only save on a 20? Or fail on a one? Or you fail on everything but a 20?... A friend of mine used a houserule for his curse of strahd game where failed death saves only reset on a long rest. That way falling unconscious becomes much more nerve wrecking and death is always on the table if things get out of hand.

I'm hopefully going to run Shadow of the demon lord. It's perfect for fantasy horror. I have ran one session and plan to run the one shot Dead by Dawn.

Don't forget to play up the RP angle .. you are telling scary stories, after all. There is more than one way to make a player feel horror!

"how to make D&D more scary" turn it into Call of cthulhu

you are one of the best: short and full of info.

I used a modified madness for my Halloween one shot. I set up a jenga game and every time a player needed to make a sanity check they moved a block. It worked because they were in it together so it symbolized the party keeping each other in check, and it got harder as the game progressed. After the game I asked my players if it worked for them or was just a gimmick, they said it helped draw them in quite a bit more than rolling a dice. Now I never figured out what I was going to do if it fell over and needed a reset, buuut maybe just go at it for a bit after a player topples it

i plan to have an encounter with an ether spider who is bound to a mirror, the mirror is stored far away from the restr of the auctions comotion in a closed down showcase hall, and i plan to have the players enter and leave the showcase hall only to find the rest of the auction house now in dissarae as they enteres the spiders mirror where itll hunt them for fun and food

Hi love your videos, but I have a recommendation! I always forget the name of your channel (good name but there’s a lot of other channels and content with the word dungeon in it) but I can never forget “Good evening Dungeon Masters I’m baron …” Maybe try to put that line in your bio. Maybe as a hash tag or something. Maybe even add it to the channel name. I doubt I’ll forget again but I wonder if other people have the same issue. Love your videos, you’re my favorite TTRPG creator, keep it up! :))

It might be worth mentioning that player expectations are critical to running a horror game. If you are trying to create the sense of dread like our favorite horror movies, it is important for you as a DM to understand the implications, and for the players to accept that player agency is going to be affected. D&D is often about a high degree of player agency and wish fulfillment to overcome a challenge, while horror is about survival and at least a degree of helplessness. You probably can’t make your players feel like they in danger without taking away some degree of agency.

Watching this to make my Christmas special because why not.

The one time I've seen the madness table used was rage of demons and very quickly WoTC neutered it during that season

A great way to scare players is to throw monsters at them that they don't understand. Players will think twice about taking rests or how to use abilities when they have no idea when or how the monster will strike next. A prime example of this is the movie Predator, in which a group of strong and experienced soldiers are next to helpless against a threat they can barely comprehend.

I made up a Halloween themed spell. It's more suitable for big bad NPCs than it is for player characters but I'm sure creative player characters will think abuses for it. I think it's close to balanced because it has a high risk to reward ratio, but I would appreciate input if you like to offer it. Feel free to use it including republishing it but I would like attribution if you do. DARK SPIRITS BITE ### D&D 5E Version (Updated): 1. **Spell Level and School**: - Level: 2 - School: Necromancy 2. **Casting Time**: - 1 action 3. **Range**: - 120 feet (Area of Effect) 4. **Components**: - Verbal, Somatic 5. **Duration**: - Instantaneous 6. **Mechanics**: - Upon casting, the spellcaster invokes a restless spirit within the specified range. A random creature within the area, which could include the caster, is targeted. As the spell is cast, a discernible dimming of lights occurs within the area of effect, and a sense of evil and impending doom pervades the atmosphere, which all sentient creatures can sense on a successful Perception roll. - The spirit materializes momentarily to make a melee spell attack against the chosen target with a +5 to hit, dealing 3d6 + 5 necrotic damage on a successful hit before vanishing. - Physical barriers, cover, invisibility, or any form of concealment do not affect the spell's targeting or effectiveness. However, the spell does not function in hallowed areas or against targets under the effects of protection from evil and good or similar wards. 7. **Scaling**: - When cast using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, the damage increases by 1d6 and the bonus to hit increases by +1 for each level above 2nd. - For example, when upcast to a 4th-level spell slot, "Dark Spirit's Bite" deals 5d6 + 7 necrotic damage with a +7 bonus to hit. Note that final write up and formatting is done by chatGPT. The prompt for the art was lost because of a glitch in the app. It's basically the description of the spell.

That thing about madness is a great idea

So the tips are basically running 5e like a OSR

Solid advice.

I'm not clear on the remove passing death saves and remove failed death saves advice. Can someone explain an example of how this would be done?

Could you clarifty what you mean by “lose” death saves? Are you saying they do not roll for them?

Darn, holoween is next week! Good timing

I may be daft but I don't quite get the change for the death saving throws. What is being removed/added/modified mechanically?

Me, watching this video in July: spooky season is just around the corner? :):):)

My suggestions: 1 - Death save DC is 12 2 - No CON bonus to HP 3 - Long rest is a week in town, short rest is 8h of resting (optional rule on DMG) 4 - No feats. 5 - PCs level < 7

Wisdom or Charisma? Nah, I'm asking for Intelligence saves Great video baron, I might use this

I’m thinking of DMing a Halloween adventure. The only thing I haven’t decided on is the main monster Here’s what I have so far. The players emerge from a thick fog to find a peaceful, but disturbingly quite village. Most of the builds are boarded up and no one is outside. The fog is still there but thinner. The only lights come from a tavern. Inside they find a dwarf running the bar. He informs them this place had been a happy prosperous town until a falling Star crashed into the nearby woodlands. A group of hunters went to investigate but never returned. The ground appears to be slowly dyeing and people are vanishing/ going murderously mad. Those that leave into the fog are never seen or heard from again. The only main to leave but return had been badly slashed and died a moment after stepping back into the village. This then will prompt the party to venture into the woods. There they will find a crashed skyship. They will uncover that this ship was used to house fiends, undead, and other monster prisoners. So the big bad could be any number of monsters. Or maybe there are separate threats?

Remediated is an appalling word ameliorated or remedied much less awkward.

I must be drawing a blank here. What do you mean by removing all "passing death saves" and all "but one failing death saves". Maybe it's because its early, but for some reason its not making sense to me.

Planning a campaign where the adventurers go into this pit and accidentaly/are deceived to awaken an ancient deity dragon thats worshipped by a death cult that is an evil dragon and massive. I want it to start rampaging and killing people and a cave in from them sounding the dragon horn will cut the team off from it so theyll be safe but idk how to make the dragon scary

Hacking D&D into horror is pretty difficult, but I think you’ve done a good job! Although I’d suggest just using an actual fantasy horror system like Best Left Buried, since it was built from the ground up to do exactly this, instead of trying to hack apart a heroic fantasy game into a horror game. (Not a knock on your video! Just an alternative)

Mothership mentioned ^_^

I’m a big fan of the 5e conversion of the Darkest Dungeon stress system. Enemies made of should not be causing damage to a stress HP pool stresses players. Especially when recovery isn’t as simple as a spell or nap.

hey man , great video , loved a bunch of your ideas ! have you heard of a brazillian TTRPG focused on investigation and horror called "Ordem Paranormal" ? it's amazing , it has a sanity system , a death system that has no failure or saves it's just a three turn timer making it a race against time to heal the PC and a bestiary full of scary paranormal creatures that are extremelly strong

I just wondered if there was a way to make your character motivations count as death saves? The equivalent of your PC digging deep into their resolve to achieve the thing that drives them. But you need to make progress towards achieving those goals otherwise their effects will diminish. Upon achieving your goal/s, if you don't have a new goal or drive they maybe vulnerable or just straight up retire now their motive is fulfilled. When you go to make a death save you ask the other players what their wounded teammates goals/reason/s to live are? I hope you've been role-playing effectively 😈

The "horror" saves need to trigger on more than just supernatural stuff. A pack of wolves would have a higher effective CR than many lower tier undead or aberrations, and certainly have just as strong horror tradition. I'd also suggest that all three mental saves be targeted differently, and that the ultimate solutions require some level of physicalality. That puts the players in a conundrum, of where to place their abilities and skills for best effect. The new d&d one system for exhaustion looks like a great system for failed saves. It retains player agency, unlike some of the madness listings, but imposes a predictable penalty on everything, as they're overcome by horror.

Your description of your proposed deathsave mechanic confused me. Watched it 3 times now and still don't get it.

To be true: This video is about adapting rules to a horror scenario. It's not about creating horror. In my opinion the best rules never cause a feeling (no matter how deadly a potential dangour is). It's the storytelling aspect. And that's a way more difficult... If you or others have advice here, I really would appreciate any hints.

I didn't understand what he meant by removing passing death saves... Can someone explain?

I have absolutely no idea how the death saves part works. Couldn't follow the mechanics at all

Kinda expected the video to be more about setting the tone and stuff. Forgot how much "hacking" needs to be done for 5e players to experience fun stuff lol

hmhmhm i think a lot of these tips are really interesting, but a bit change to the way death saves work for instance are a little hard to implement in a running game. im currently running one thats all necromancy and undead themed (bc i love those spooky stories), but im not certain they would be on board with these changes after having played for a long time already :O i might suggest it of course, maybe theyre on board... ive considered using madness mechanics a lot, but i feel there is a solid danger of messing with player agency, which i really dont want to do... so im still struggling with the horror elements... especially since its a group of players with quite some experience with mental health issues, and madness mechanics tend to feel pretty unrealistic to me sometimes :O perhaps specific madness effects tailored to specific causes might be better suited to avoid these issues.... might have another look. gore appearing and later disappearing is potentially really creepy though, so i think ill use that principle of something weird happening in the background with no obvious explanation.... eerie as hell :D :D

DnD subreddit: "You can't play 5e as horror! You have to play a different game, and make your friends learn all the new rules." Though I do want to try this "Hordes of Darkness". Love your videos! You're probably a really fun GM.

You called out Mothership right in the video. A million $ Kickstarter for a free game - they’re doing something right. Or if sticking to D&D… Bring back level draining undead. Make the PCs cringe at the thought of instantaneously losing hard earned XP and benefits from a mere touch. Or just do a good hidden enemy scenario with a doppelganger or lycanthrope where one of the PCs *might* be the shape shifter. Paranoia for fun and profit.

Never actually looked into the madness mechanic. As for Death Saves, Players get one in all my games. Just don't be reckless.

I don't like the madness table so i mad a simple enough d20 roll for madness

Or play an rpg designed for playing horror, like Call of Cthulhu, Delta Green, Alien, Vaesen, to name just a few....

Why modify a game when you can play a game suited to the theme. IDK...like DREAD?

As a veteran Call of Cthulhu Keeper, here is my number 1 tip for running horror in D&D: Don't.

Sounds like the main advice is not to use D&D, or at least 5e. Pretty ballsy to recommend something besides 5e. This grognard had to do some work to convince his group to try something besides 5e, and now they're enjoying it!

Pathfinder 1e is superior, 5e needs to fade into obscurity.

I find it funny how stupidly mad the "just play a different system!" people in the comments are. Like bruh chill, why are you in a 5e video when you keep saying the system is trash? The more you click on 5e stuff the more KZfaq will recommend it to you, ya know.

Just play Call of Cthulhu. Problem solved. Happy Gaming.

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OR… just play a better game for horror like Call of Cthulhu or World of darkness games.

You're advertising dScryb? in the other video you criticized WotC modules' descriptions as unnecessary, distracting and intimidating!

Sad to see another video advising people to fit round pegs into square holes and leave the extra work to DMs to figure out. That’s how 5e culture is though. Groups, tables, players, please stop doing this! Help your DM by being willing to cooperate and play something they don’t have to spend 20 hours hacking ahead of your holiday games. It is NOT hard to try a new game, and support good game developers in the process. Call of Cthulu is a simple game, with only a few sub systems needed to run it. Monster of the Week is even simpler. Heck, most games oriented toward horror would be simpler than adding tweaks and additions onto the already *existing* hoard of sub systems for 5e! I promise this will be more fun for the group and so much easier on the person willing to Game Master for said group. I hope everyone has a fantastic Halloween game!

Simple: DON’T! Play literally any other game.

I really enjoy watching you as a commentator, but I do have some wishes for your content - 1) Please slow down. You often fly through complex ideas so quickly that it’s hard to grasp what you’re talking about. 2) Give yourself time to explain complex ideas or examples. Your videos often seem like content has been cut to make them ‘tighter’, but I find myself wishing for more screen-time with explanation. 3) Please drop the geo-politics stuff. Watching you pretend to analyze the socio-economics of imaginary places just feels like a waste of your talent. Like I said - I like your style, and I get the feeling that you have a lot to offer. Just please - give your insights time to materialize.

Just play Alien RPG. D&D sucks for horror.

Please, stop pretending that You can play horror DnD. Look for other games!!!

Jump in my homebrew campaign world...got all 32 flavors of horror...for example..fighting in jungle canopy, demons can see you and you dont