First time DM Advice

[anewbie]

Hey,
I am pretty new to D&D, having only played on and off for about a year, but one of my groups is switching out DM's and decided I would like to give a shot at writing my own.

I have been linked to this forum several time while doing research so I figured I should just go ahead and ask the question for once, maybe help someone later.

How should travelling through the desert affect my PC's? I know that spells like endure elements exist so I assume there are some effects, but I haven't been able to find them.

That is my base question, down below I will add background to my campaign if you want to read it, but what I wanted to ask is above.

Background: A bard in my group rolled a character whose background makes his motivation to replace Fharlanghn. I happen to play a cleric of Fharlanghn, so I though it would be fun to DM a campaign that furthers his goals while my character is out of the way. The campaign is based on Stan!'s random Fharlanghn encounters, with some additions and flourishes by me. The reason they are in the desert is to locate Journey's End where "The Book of Fharlanghn" is hidden. If anyone is interested in more of the campaign (I'm done outlining almost all of it) for your own use, or to comment on it let me know, and I'll try and write it up in a nice clean document. The campaign is for a party of 4 level 7 PC's and should get them to level 9/10 depending on how generous you are.

Thanks for the help, sorry if my first post is too long, I'm just excited about my first campaign.

[Doc_Maynot]

Desert based campaign? There is a LOT of info you might like in sandstorm. Personally, other than the game breaking potential of shape sand, I LOVE the book when it comes to adventures in good ol' wastelands/deserts.

[anewbie]

Awesome, I'll be sure to check it out. I have some random encounter/storm events laid out on a table, but as far as what is reasonable to expect from a desert I'm a little lost. Thanks for the suggestion!

[Morgarion]

The SRD has information about environmental hazards (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/environment.htm) as well.

Remember too that even though an arid, 'hot' desert can be lethally so during the day, it can also get really cold at night.

[Phelix-Mu]

Sandstorm seconded. It really is your best friend. It has exposure rules, equipment desert pcs should have access to (at least after having been in the area for a while, while those that originate in the desert should have access to it in their WBL), some desert animals, special desert environments (fear the salt flats!), and supernatural desert threats that can add some environmental challenges to even a low-to-mid-level game (where such challenges usually are solved by the casting of single spells or several spells in tandem...:smallmad:).

While not as purely full of win as Frostburn, IMHO, Sandstorm is an excellent book, as splats go. Most of the terrain/climate-based splatbooks had a decent level of quality. Not sure why this is; maybe it's just my Inner DM bias, but cool environmental rules are cool.

[Doc_Maynot]

cool environmental rules are cool.

Maybe that's why you prefer Frostburn. :smallamused:

Sorry, that was terrible... I'll let myself out...

[Tim Proctor]

I would also suggest that you look at some of the dark sun pre-con adventures, they are really good for basing adventures off of when new.

There are two areas that you want to look at for desert conditions (assuming its a hot desert) the conditions regarding movement and such (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/wilderness.htm#desertTerrain) and the conditions regarding heat dangers (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/environment.htm#heatDangers).

If its a hot desert, they get kicked in the face by fate via Sandstorms (there is a good chance they can endure elements on themselves but they often forget the horses) and if the players have to hoof things themselves it can be very dangerous crossing a desert. Once you get slowed down and its hot then you're eventually going to start failing and succumb to the heat.

I would suggest looking at the party sheets and identifying how long you think they could travel through a desert on average and then have the desert 10% shorter than that, that way it is challenging and requires resource usage, and then throw in a combat encounter (this will be fun cause if they are fatigued and not wearing armor it is time for a rogue or someone else to be the combat king).

[anewbie]

I would also suggest that you look at some of the dark sun pre-con adventures, they are really good for basing adventures off of when new.

I would suggest looking at the party sheets and identifying how long you think they could travel through a desert on average and then have the desert 10% shorter than that, that way it is challenging and requires resource usage, and then throw in a combat encounter (this will be fun cause if they are fatigued and not wearing armor it is time for a rogue or someone else to be the combat king).

Yeah, I've looked over a few pre-cons, and like I said, this is based off of pre made random encounters. I want the desert to have consequences, but I don't want it to exhaust them, because the final encounter occurs just before they reach journey's end in the desert, and that is going to be a very challenging fight (a level 11 dragon shaman with a cr 8 blue dragon, the party should be ~ lvl 9). The idea was the guardians of the road, very faithful Fharlanghn's, try to allow only the most faithful access to Journey's end, and so I figured a dragon shaman trying to explore and find dragons could become a worshiper of Fharlanghn. The dragon just wants food.

I appreciate all the advice though, I have a lot to look into now.