Sometimes you want to change the game up completely, even if it’s just for the night. Maybe you want to have a night of gambling games, a carnival with an archery contest, a little football, or, like DM Dave’s Barovia, a werewolf wrestling match to put the WWE to shame! When you have that urge, how do you make that happen? The 3 Wise DMs call them minigames, and in this episode, they’ll use Dave’s wrestling escapades to break down how to make these sessions fun for everyone.

Thorin, Tony and Dave have talked about homebrew and crazy ideas before, but in this episode, they’re breaking down a fresh game with a look at how it came to be, how it felt to play in, and what you can take away for your own crazy minigame sessions.

1:00 Bringing WrestleMania to Barovia: How to develop a D&D session where you essentially play a different homebrew minigame

3:00 5E’s wrestling isn’t interesting, so to support Hawk Morgan, DM Tony’s wrestling character, DM Dave have to invent a more cinematic wrestling system

8:00 Does a Hulk Hogan clone fit in Curse of Strahd? Here’s how Dave handled it

13:00 Where, when and how to pay off on a 1-on-1 wrestling match for Hawk yet still involve the rest of the party

22:00 The role of humor in horror games

24:00 Building the wrestling system and how it played out (see this week’s website article at 3wisedms.com for the whole system)

34:00 The lumberjack match rules that let the rest of the party get involved, but not too involved

44:00 The party stuck with the wrestling schtick even after they broke the rules and it went full combat

49:00 Did this save a boring werewolf side quest?

55:00 Advice for executing your own “minigame” sessions

64:00 Final thoughts