Gunner Scott
Forum Guru
Hi-
so I recently decided a about four months ago to give 5E a go. I had picked up the Starter Kit from WotC and from there spent two months gather up a group of players (People that I could tolerate and would not annoy me). The Starter Kit was a nice intro into 5E but I did not play the adventure within it, by the time I did have a group up and going, both the 5E PHB and HotDQ were out. So with that said, I decided to run HotDQ a 1 to 7th level campaign set in the forgotten realms. The adventure is not bad but very railroad like IE trying to force the players into situations that normally most would not be apt to attempt, so as a DM I felt the adventure needed a bit of loosening up and a bit more leeway for the players and less railroading.
Basically this adventure pits the players against the Dragon Cult, which is looting area's of Greyhwak and to bring that loot to a central area for the main bad guy to summon Tiamat from the 7th plane of Hell and to do this the cult needs to gather as much loot as possible. The players come into the picture by trying stop the ritual and get back the loot for their patrons. Pretty simple and epic feeling adventure but some parts needed serious work I felt to make it more palatable to both players and me the DM.
I did make a few changes in both the module (an adventure path actually, AP's are episodic encounters kind of.) and my campaign. In my campaign I set HotDQ in Greyhawk in the Village of Hommlet. In the module HotDQ, many locations are set in the Forgotten Realms, but the FR just has to much baggage and too many players know FR better then me. So Greyhawk was my alternative choice to FR. Greyhawk is a more open campaign area where you can add or take away what you like or dislike.
As for house rules, I had a just a few, I'm old school D&D, so in my campaign I ruled zero'ed teiflings (a Dominic P.C race in 5e) and Dragonborn (another PC race in 5E), I also ruled that Paladins must be Human and of Lawful alignment, no new age paladins in my campaign. Another thing thast should be kept in mind is that 5E is a low powered system IE no powerful magic and monsters tend to be weaker then previous editions, so perspective DM's will have to bear this in mind when playing 5E. As one person on another message board put it, a 20th level cgaracter in 5E with a +3 sword is considered to be wheedling a relic. Not very epic but will see how this turns out.
The characters in this campaign consist of one rogue, two clerics and one fighter and an NPC ranger named Dolf.
In HotDQ there are some very railroad like encounters and this I did not like, I wanted the players to immerse themselves into the campaign and get to know the NPC's in Hommlet before the proverbial **** **** hit the fan. Ya see in the module the players come upon a raid in progress and are attacked relentlessly by the raiders as they do certain missions with in the town, I did not like that and wanted to build up to a more set piece battle. So I had it where the players arrived 3 days before the battle occurred, giving them time to scout the lay of the land and inter act with their fellow NPC's/ characters.
The players do hear rumors of a vast Raiding army approaching, and get sucked in to helping defend the Village of Hommlet from these raiders which includes a young Blue Dragon. The Attack begins late in the Day on St Crispens day, the village of Hommlet, even though they knew the attack was imminent still celebrated the Feast of St Crispen. Once the attack got under way, the players helped the Druids of the Grove (Cherry, Amber and Misty) defend against various incursions by both Kobolds and Goblins (the players are at 3rd level), The Raiders take a beating and but do manage to loot some areas of Hommlet and then the raiders Retreat back.
The players are then tasked to follow the Raiders to where there camp is and try to get an idea of the raider's and report back to the Lord Mayer Burns so he can dispatch a troop of mounted knights to deal with the Raiding group. The players find that the Raiders have taken refuge in an old abandoned Moat house, they do see the Blue Dragon in the court yard but it is just relaxing and eating any stray kobold or goblin that wonders to near it. They do come across a secret passage in the outlying woods and it leads into the tunnels underneath the Moathouse, of course near the secret entrance in the tunnles are two troll's guarding this access point to the rest of the area underneath the Moat house.
Will post the next part later in the week, but as much as 5E can be a bit weak, its not that bad.
Scott
so I recently decided a about four months ago to give 5E a go. I had picked up the Starter Kit from WotC and from there spent two months gather up a group of players (People that I could tolerate and would not annoy me). The Starter Kit was a nice intro into 5E but I did not play the adventure within it, by the time I did have a group up and going, both the 5E PHB and HotDQ were out. So with that said, I decided to run HotDQ a 1 to 7th level campaign set in the forgotten realms. The adventure is not bad but very railroad like IE trying to force the players into situations that normally most would not be apt to attempt, so as a DM I felt the adventure needed a bit of loosening up and a bit more leeway for the players and less railroading.
Basically this adventure pits the players against the Dragon Cult, which is looting area's of Greyhwak and to bring that loot to a central area for the main bad guy to summon Tiamat from the 7th plane of Hell and to do this the cult needs to gather as much loot as possible. The players come into the picture by trying stop the ritual and get back the loot for their patrons. Pretty simple and epic feeling adventure but some parts needed serious work I felt to make it more palatable to both players and me the DM.
I did make a few changes in both the module (an adventure path actually, AP's are episodic encounters kind of.) and my campaign. In my campaign I set HotDQ in Greyhawk in the Village of Hommlet. In the module HotDQ, many locations are set in the Forgotten Realms, but the FR just has to much baggage and too many players know FR better then me. So Greyhawk was my alternative choice to FR. Greyhawk is a more open campaign area where you can add or take away what you like or dislike.
As for house rules, I had a just a few, I'm old school D&D, so in my campaign I ruled zero'ed teiflings (a Dominic P.C race in 5e) and Dragonborn (another PC race in 5E), I also ruled that Paladins must be Human and of Lawful alignment, no new age paladins in my campaign. Another thing thast should be kept in mind is that 5E is a low powered system IE no powerful magic and monsters tend to be weaker then previous editions, so perspective DM's will have to bear this in mind when playing 5E. As one person on another message board put it, a 20th level cgaracter in 5E with a +3 sword is considered to be wheedling a relic. Not very epic but will see how this turns out.
The characters in this campaign consist of one rogue, two clerics and one fighter and an NPC ranger named Dolf.
In HotDQ there are some very railroad like encounters and this I did not like, I wanted the players to immerse themselves into the campaign and get to know the NPC's in Hommlet before the proverbial **** **** hit the fan. Ya see in the module the players come upon a raid in progress and are attacked relentlessly by the raiders as they do certain missions with in the town, I did not like that and wanted to build up to a more set piece battle. So I had it where the players arrived 3 days before the battle occurred, giving them time to scout the lay of the land and inter act with their fellow NPC's/ characters.
The players do hear rumors of a vast Raiding army approaching, and get sucked in to helping defend the Village of Hommlet from these raiders which includes a young Blue Dragon. The Attack begins late in the Day on St Crispens day, the village of Hommlet, even though they knew the attack was imminent still celebrated the Feast of St Crispen. Once the attack got under way, the players helped the Druids of the Grove (Cherry, Amber and Misty) defend against various incursions by both Kobolds and Goblins (the players are at 3rd level), The Raiders take a beating and but do manage to loot some areas of Hommlet and then the raiders Retreat back.
The players are then tasked to follow the Raiders to where there camp is and try to get an idea of the raider's and report back to the Lord Mayer Burns so he can dispatch a troop of mounted knights to deal with the Raiding group. The players find that the Raiders have taken refuge in an old abandoned Moat house, they do see the Blue Dragon in the court yard but it is just relaxing and eating any stray kobold or goblin that wonders to near it. They do come across a secret passage in the outlying woods and it leads into the tunnels underneath the Moathouse, of course near the secret entrance in the tunnles are two troll's guarding this access point to the rest of the area underneath the Moat house.
Will post the next part later in the week, but as much as 5E can be a bit weak, its not that bad.
Scott