Hoard of the Dragonqueen blue dragon save or die DM problem

[Solamnicknight]

I don't know if anybody has had to chance to run the Hoard of the Dragonqueen adventure but I'm a newbie DM facing a conundrum. One of the early missions while the characters are level 1 has a Adult Blue
Dragon potentially blast the characters with its breath weapon. The problem I'm running into is that this is pretty much a make save or die situation for a level one character. Now, I don't want to coddle my players, but I want them to have fun especially this is their introduction to the new edition. Should I even run this encounter? From what I understand the encounter is optional but I think the dragon attacking the castle is really cool and adds tension. Is there a way to run this without instakilling characters the group put quite a bit of work into at such an early stage?

[SaintRidley]

The idea is to blast the NPCs and not blast the PCs unless they take so long in driving it off that it kills all the NPCs. I think it's something like 20 damage from the PCs to drive it off (cinematic like - don't track NPC damage, but assume they're bothering it).

[Chaosvii7]

It only targets player characters if it wipes out the soldiers. Every round, it kills 1d4 soldiers and inures 1d6 others(there's a whole small army for it to deal with while the PCs attack it.) When I ran it for Adventurer's League, the party only had two characters that could deal reliable damage to it from range - the others had to chuck javelins at disadvantage. But they were able to get the job done and actually did about 50 points when the smoke cleared. It's not meant to be a full-on fight with a potential TPK in it. It's just that the things that make the encounter less faceroll-y are hidden in the block of text describing it.

[TheOOB]

The module even specifically says that the the players can't survive a hit, and they should know that from seeing the other soldiers get killed.

[Solamnicknight]

Thanks for the clarification everyone. Any other tips on running this module? So far I've read up to part 6 and it looks really entertaining for the DM and players.

[MustacheFart]

Thanks for the clarification everyone. Any other tips on running this module? So far I've read up to part 6 and it looks really entertaining for the DM and players.

Yeah. 5th ed is looser in many ways. It's open to DM interpretation and modification. If there is something you don't like or that you want to change then feel free to. Have a little fun with it and use the module as mostly a guideline.


For instance, my character spoke Draconic so I talked to the blue dragon you mentioned. I was able to converse with him to the point that I offered him the chance to join us so he could have A LOT more loot. I told him "You could get what they're paying you, which you can only assume is not all the have because why would they give you all they have if their clearly focused on collecting so much from the town OR you could join us, as we defeat them and have a lot more loot plus what they were going to give you." DM had the dragon think about it for a while and ultimately decline but pretty much outright told us "I don't want to be here but I need to make a good show of it." So, I threw a spear, hit him, and my party started in. Because of the conversation I had, he had little to zero reason to attack us. In fact, we basically struck a deal that we would make it look good.

So, have fun with it and advise your party to be smart. This isn't a run in, hack n' slash, steamroll everything module. It will punish stupid actions.