Kamen Rider Build is a 2017 tokusatsu show by Toei. It’s the story of genius inventor Kiryu Sento, who gets wrapped up in a conflict between three nations, whose strings are secretly pulled by the greatest mastermind villain in the entire franchise.
The series has it all: humor, intrigue, a tight plot, and enough action to fill the DM’s encounter quota. Basically, Kamen Rider Build is a Best Match for a D&D campaign, and DM V from My Wife is the MC has just the homebrew to help you play exactly that!
Kamen Rider Build is my personal all-time favorite among the many, many series DM V introduced ever since we got married. Personally, it’s right up there in his ever-evolving top 5.
In his latest Husband Homebrew video, he shows how DMs can add Kamen Rider Build into your campaign setting and how players can fulfill that character fantasy of being one of the Kamen Riders from the series!
He’ll highlight some of the chapters in this long homebrew document that help D&D tables add Kamen Rider Build into your campaign setting!
For players, he’ll highlight how the Rider System works, as well as showcase some of the best matches that you’ll find in the document. And there are A LOT of them in the document. This includes setting elements like the sky wall disaster, rules for nebula gas, and of course, Evolt.
So… are you comfy at the table? Make sure you shake the like and subscribe fullbottles and let’s… start the experiment!
Setting Elements
One of the strongest elements of Build is its setting. It’s a version of Japan that’s been split into three warring nations due to a supernatural event called the Skywall Disaster, where eldritch walls rose from the ground and divided the country.
In the intervening years, a secret organization has taken advantage of the chaos to conduct human experimentation on the innocent, turning them into dangerous monstrosities using the mysterious Nebula Gas that’s been leaking out from the walls.
Unbeknownst to the powers that be, a brilliant, yet evil alien mastermind is secretly playing all sides and pulling all the strings.
From a Dungeon Master or DM’s perspective, this gives you A LOT of stuff to work with. You have the setting’s backstory, factions, monsters, and a big bad. So to help you DMs along, DM V wrote a very chunky chapter 1 that outlines the various setting elements based on Kamen Rider Build.
It’s no full gazetteer by any stretch, but it should help you get started on writing and designing a campaign or adventure arc themed around the series.
He also wrote these elements to make them more flexible, regardless of whether you’re running a medieval fantasy campaign or if you’re a silly mallard like him who tends to run homebrew contemporary fantasy settings.
But a D&D campaign isn’t engaging without enemies, and this homebrew has several sections dedicated to helping you choose the right monster stat blocks!
Enemies Abound
The Smash from Kamen Rider Build is the result of Nebula Gas experimentation on humans. While they look strikingly mechanical, they may not be the most appropriate to add to your campaign.
So DM V wrote a chapter that has a bunch of guidelines to help you choose the right monster stat block. Said chapter also has a few notes on how to adjust their ability scores to match their monstrous nature as well as some optional adjustments like creature tags.
He’s mentioned a few times that Build’s monsters are the result of Nebula Gas shenanigans, so to stay authentic to the series, he wrote an entire chapter dedicated to Nebula Gas and its effects. It even shows how people can expire from this experimentation process and how victims can often lose their memories, as well as the potential CR levels they can turn into once they mutate into Smash.
But as your campaign goes on, your players will slowly unravel the truth behind these experiments. And by then, you need to have a big bad step up.
Kamen Rider Build is famous for its infamously hands-on big bad: Evolt. This guy caused EVERYTHING, from the Skywall Disaster to terrible-tasting coffee!
And much like your players, he’ll be growing along with them as he progresses through his plans, from a dangerous rogue Kamen Rider… ish warrior, to a full-on existential threat to the planet. He is smart, he is dangerous, he is fairly charismatic—and DMs, he is you.
To help you along, DM V made sure to write down a bunch of stat blocks that DMs can use whenever he pops up to challenge your party. One for each of his evolutions!
While Evolt is pulling the strings, the one key element that all the factions are fighting over is Pandora’s Box. DM V includes a dedicated artifact for it, which basically has built-in systems to help you create the final dungeon, and, if the players are evil, outright destroy the planet.
The homebrew document also has other stuff, like Vernage’s bangle having a dedicated item card for exposition and some slight deus ex machina, should the need arise.
Finally, I gave DMs a small chapter dedicated to narratively integrating Kamen Rider Build into your D&D table. This chapter has a few tips on which characters are important, some story hooks to start off your adventure, and a section on starting gear like rider belts and fullbottles.
Character Options
Now, DM V’s YouTube channel wouldn’t hit a thousand subs if it weren’t for Rider fans wanting to BECOME Kamen Riders. So in keeping with tradition, the Build homebrew has a bunch of options to henshin your way through combat encounters.
First, there’s a new subrace available to all races, which has features related to the Nebula Gas chapter. This section also has a few feats meant to represent the main Kamen Riders of Build. Second, DM V wrote new types of magic items specific to Build’s setting elements. These of course include the transformation devices, and unlike his previous homebrews, rules on how to use them are now in a nice section that applies to ALL henshin devices. This is because there’s more than one, from the crank-powered Build Driver to the steamy Transtream Gun.
The second new magic item type is the fullbottle. They go hand-in-hand with the henshin devices, and these take up a huge chunk of the document.
There are quite a few fullbottle combos that are available in the document. Some of the forms like Hedgehog and Fire Engine grant additional cantrips and spells, a new attack option, and a few attack bonuses. It even adds a new finisher. The classic hawk and gatling on the other hand grants a new ranged weapon and fly speed.
The document has more than SIXTY fullbottles that you can mix and match for your Build OC. Well, maybe not the Christmas and cake forms, but we think everyone can agree that we can leave out some forms. It even has the bottles for Blood Stalk, Night Rogue, and the Sclash drivers with the full version. Sorry Gear Bros, maybe in a future update.
With fullbottles come weapons, and this document has a bunch of them that work in tandem with the henshin devices, like the pirate station bow or the hawk gatling gun. Of course, this wouldn’t be complete without the super forms like Cross-Z Magma or Build Genius items. DM V even included an item for Prime Rogue, since that guy is easily the coolest one in the group.
OK, maybe second-coolest.
Are you Ready to play Kamen Rider Build in D&D?
You can find this jam-packed homebrew document in DM V’s Ko-fi shop!
What’s more, you can get this and any other homebrew document for FREE by becoming a member on Ko-fi or Patreon.
Purchasing it allows DM V to keep the channel afloat, and any support you send is greatly appreciated! There’s also a secret 40% discount code hidden in the video! If you figure it out, don’t spoil it in the comments, but feel free to brag. You deserve it.
And hey, if this is your first time seeing DM V’s work, send him a duck emoji in the comments to let him know we sent you! He does even more homebrew for Kamen Rider, with documents to play Kamen Rider Geats and Kamen Rider W!
