A D&D Solo Adventure Story for Mental Health

Mental Health

It’s no secret that I’m a huge supporter of mental health. I believe there should be a greater focus on mental health, especially when it comes to youth and children.

Why?

“An estimated 1.2 million children and youth in Canada are affected by mental illness—yet, less than 20 percent will receive appropriate treatment. By age 25, approximately 20 percent of Canadians will have developed a mental illness. Youth who are engaged in child and adolescent mental health services, and who require continued services, are also often not well supported as they prepare to enter the adult mental health system.” - Youth Mental Health Canada

Child and youth mental health, and adult mental health, is an ever-growing concern in the aftermath of Covid-19. As adults, we are struggling to navigate these difficult waters. We all need support. We all need to de-stress and relax.

To combat this ever-growing threat, I’ve started a Learn Through Play program called Project Rollplay, to help reduce the rate of stress, anxiety, and PTSS among children and youth, lower the rate of school absences and more, all while using D&D as its platform.

Dungeons & Dragons

Dungeons and Dragons (also known as D&D or DnD) is the most popular tabletop roleplaying game in the world. Made even more popular by YouTube shows like Critical Role, Relics and Rarities and CelebriD&D, which even feature celebrities like Joe Manganiello, Deborah Ann Woll, and Vin Diesel.

At the heart and soul of Dungeons & Dragons is roleplay. Driven purely by imagination, D&D is a structured, yet fundamentally open-ended fantasy tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG).

Typically, one player takes on the role of Dungeon Master or DM for short. The DM is in charge of the adventure; facilitates the game; controls and roleplays the villains, monsters and non-player characters; acts as referee; and narrates the story.

It’s fun. It’s immersive. It’s social. And it’s my number one tool for improving my mental health.

What do you enjoy doing for your mental health?

Solo D&D

Solo D&D is when there is only one player and no Dungeon Master at all. It requires a ton of random rolls and generators to act as the substitute Dungeon Master, and most importantly journaling to keep track of what’s occurring.

I’ve started playing around with some Solo D&D recently and found that it can be quite a helpful tool for fantasy writing. It can spark ideas you never imagined for yourself.

I was recently asked by a friend of mine how you play D&D without a Dungeon Master. How can you play alone?

Throughout this series, I will be playing a solo adventure, providing the results of random roles and writing its story. Hopefully, this can be used as a guide for anyone who might be interested in playing a solo D&D adventure.

The Tools

The most important tool that I use for playing solo D&D is The Solo Adventurer’s Toolbox by PAUL BIMLER.

This module provides all the tools you need to play your own solo D&D adventure. But I prefer to have more variety, so, I’ve included many more tools into the mix.

These are the NPC generators I use as the Toolbox only provides you with the ability to roll the type of NPC, race and class, but provides no stats whatsoever. You then have to build the NPC from the results. These will generate their own stats to save you time so you don’t have to create the NPCs yourself.

NPC Generators I like to use:

RPG Tinker
Kassoon NPC Generator

Motive Generator for NPCs:
RanGen Motive Generatorr

The Solo Adventurer’s Toolbox has a quest generator but sometimes I like to roll on the charts below for something different.

Plot Hooks and Side Quests:
D&D Compendium Plot Hooks & Adventures
DND Speak 100 Side Quest Hooks
Dragon Age Tabletop RPG Wiki 100 Adventure Ideas
Boccob’s Blessed Blog 100 D&D Quest Ideas

Monster Generator:
D&D 5e Statblock Generator
Goblinist RPG Tools

Loot Generators:

Loot Generator — This chart will provide individual loot, party loot, dragon hoard loot, etc.
D&D 5e Treasure Hoard Generator — Use this for Dragon Hoards and Pirate Ships, that sort of thing. Big Treasure.

And if you don’t own a Dungeon Master’s guide, I found this for mundane and magical items, and potions, as the loot generators don’t provide any…

TTRPG Blog — Items

And of course, you need a character. For this, I like to use D&D Beyond. With the free account, you can create up to 4 characters. There are subscription options but you can use the free option for what you’ll need.

Building the character

1. Open dndbeyond.com and log in or register.
2. Navigate to the character builder by clicking Collections from the menu, then MY CHARACTERS.
3. Click the CREATE A CHARACTER.
4. For this character, I’m going to select STANDARD.
   Now I’m ready to start building my character.

I’m going to skip the HOME section. Here we add the Character Name, and an image for the character, and select all of the Character Preferences. Since I’m going to be using the standard options for this, there is nothing to change. And there will be another opportunity in a later section to add the Character Name and image.

1. RACE
   3— Dwarf
   4 — Elf
   5 — Halfling
   6 — Human
   7 — Dragonborn
   8 — Gnome
   9 — Half-Elf
   10 — Half-Orc
   11 — Tiefling
   12 — Special

I’ve numbered them from 3 to 11 and added an extra option for 12 so that I can roll 3d4 (3 four-sided dice). There are tons of other racial options from other modules and plenty of homebrew races as well. If I should roll a 12, I will roll on a special chart that I have which includes many more options.

3d4 — Result: 7

Looks like, for this campaign, I will be playing a Dragonborn.

For the Dragonborn, I need to choose a Draconic Ancestry.

1 — Black Acid 5 by 30 ft. line (Dex. save)
2 — Blue Lightning 5 by 30 ft. line (Dex. save)
3 — Brass Fire 5 by 30 ft. line (Dex. save)
4 — Bronze Lightning 5 by 30 ft. line (Dex. save)
5 — Copper Acid 5 by 30 ft. line (Dex. save)
6 — Gold Fire 15 ft. cone (Dex. save)
7 — Green Poison 15 ft. cone (Con. save)
8 — Red Fire 15 ft. cone (Dex. save)
9 — Silver Cold 15 ft. cone (Con. save)
10 — White Cold 15 ft. cone (Con. save)

1d10 — Result: 6

The Gold Draconic Ancestry provides my character with a breath weapon of, and resistance to, Fire.

Gold Dragons are of Good alignment.

2. CLASS
1 — Barbarian
2 — Bard
3 — Cleric
4 — Druid
5 — Fighter
6 — Monk
7 — Paladin
8 — Ranger
9 — Rogue
10 — Sorcerer
11 — Warlock
12 — Wizard

1d12 — Result: 1

The Barbarian class provides my character with a d12 Hit Dice, which means at every level, I will be rolling a 1d12 + my Constitution modifier to determine how many additional Health Points I will gain. At 1st level, however, I start with a maximum of 12 + my Constitution modifier.

I also get to select 2 of the following skill proficiencies:
1 — Animal Handling
2 — Athletics
3 — Intimidation
4 — Nature
5 — Perception
6 — Survival

1d6 — Result: 1
1d6 — Result: 6

The Barbarian class also provides a Rage ability as well as Unarmored Defense.

Was this character raised by wolves?

3. ABILITIES

To determine your character's ability scores, D&D Beyond provides 3 options… Standard Array, Manual/Rolled and Point Buy. Personally, I like to roll my results.

For the Manually/Rolled option, you roll 4d6 and remove the lowest dice and totalling the other 3. This is done 6 times.

1st roll — 5, 4, 2, 2 = 11
2nd roll — 5, 3, 2, 1 = 10
3rd roll — 6, 3, 3, 2 = 12
4th roll — 6, 4, 3, 2 = 13
5th roll — 6, 6, 5, 3 = 17 (Nice!)
6th roll — 6, 4, 4, 3 = 14

Now to determine which stats I will assign each number to. Based on previous selections (Dragonborn, Survival, Animal Handling), I feel that Strength, Consitution and Charisma should be my top 3 abilities.

Strength — 19 (17 + 2 racial bonus)
Dexterity — 12
Constitution — 14
Intelligence — 10
Wisdom — 11
Charisma — 14 (13 + 1 racial bonus)

4. DESCRIPTION

The Players handbook provides a list of options for Dragonborn names. I’ve numbered them 7–23 and added a Gold Dragon name option if I roll a 6 or a 24. This way I can roll 6d4.

6 — Gold Dragon Name
7 — Arjhan
8 — Balasar
9 — Bharash
10 — Donaar
11 — Ghesh
12 — Heskan
13 — Kriv
14 — Medrash
15 — Mehen
16 — Nadarr
17 — Pandjed
18 — Patrin
19 — Rhogar
20 — Shamash
21 — Shedinn
22 — Tarhun
23 — Torinn
24 — Gold Dragon Name

6d4 — Result: 21

Now, rather than choose one of the available clan names in the Player’s Handbook, I am instead opting to use a Gold Dragon name as his clan name.

Using an online Fantasy Name Generator:

1 — Ithad
2 — Lamotork
3 — Povesthor
4 — Athenthegar
5 — Megerk
6 — Ivanigomar
7 — Brightwings
8 — The Warmonger
9 — Rapidripper
10 — Bouldermind

1d10 — Result: 1

Name: Shedinn Ithad

The next step in the DESCRIPTION section is to choose a background. This includes Character Details (Alignment · Faith · Lifestyle), Physical Characteristics (Hair · Skin · Eyes · Height · Weight · Age · Gender), Personal Characteristics (Personality · Ideals · Bonds · Flaws) and Notes (Organizations · Allies · Enemies · Backstory · Other).

Some of these should be determined at 1st level while others should be determined throughout the playthrough.

COMMENT IF YOU HAVE ANY BACKSTORY SUGGESTIONS FOR THIS DRAGONBORN BARBARIAN NATURE LOVER.

5. EQUIPMENT

For this section, I’ve decided to start without any equipment at all but I will take the randomized gold. 2d4 x 10 gp. 40 gold pieces to start.

The Adventure Begins

Since I have no backstory or information yet to start this character’s adventure and very little information to go on, I thought it might be interesting to generate an introduction for the character.

For this, I decided to use ChatGPT and provided the above information. Here is what it gave me:

Shedinn Ithad woke up in the middle of a dense forest, his head throbbing with pain and his body covered in dried blood and dirt. He had no idea how he had gotten there, or where his weapons and armour were. The only thing he knew for sure was that he was a 1st-level gold Dragonborn barbarian, with proficiency in animal handling and survival.

As he sat up and tried to get his bearings, Shedinn couldn’t help but feel a sense of panic and fear wash over him. He was alone and vulnerable, with no way to defend himself. But he was also a Dragonborn, a proud and fierce warrior race known for their strength and resilience. He couldn’t let this setback defeat him.

Shedinn took a deep breath and tried to focus on the task at hand. He needed to find a way to survive and thrive in this unfamiliar environment. He had 40 gold pieces to his name, which he could use to buy supplies and equipment if he found a settlement. He also had his skills in animal handling and survival, which could help him find food and shelter in the wild.

With determination in his heart, Shedinn stood up and set off through the forest, searching for any sign of civilization or allies. He would not let this challenge defeat him. He was a Dragonborn, and he would find a way to emerge victorious.

Hahaha… I love that he KNOWS that he’s a 1st-level Dragonborn. Did I just create the Deadpool of Dungeons & Dragons?

In the next installment, I will add some of your suggested information for Shedinn’s backstory and officially begin the adventure. Follow along as I generate insane scenarios for the character to overcome. Read to find out if he rolls well enough to accomplish his goals or whether he crashes and burns with Natural 1s.

I have no idea where this story is going to go. Using a combination of dice rolls, generators and reader suggestions, it should be very interesting to see how it develops. I certainly am excited!

Continued in…

From https://medium.com/clear-yo-mind/journey-into-fantasy-intro-255aa6675211