dungeon mastering princes of the apocalypse for people who have never played before

[BillyN831]

i was browsing with the owner of the hobby store and i picked out of the abyss and princes of the apocalypse since they carry characters 1-15. he recommended out of the abyss is not for starters since you start off in a prison cell. he also recommended to get to level 3 for princes of the apocalypse soon. what's that all about? should i roll for a campaign out of the dungeon master's guide or use the starter set or any free modules online until level 3 and then play the primary campaign? what did he mean you want to get to level 3 soon?

[Toadkiller]

He campaign actually starts at level 3. I'm playing it, so I haven't read the book. But there is apparently some stuff in there for levels 1-3. My DM had started us before he had the book in hand, so he just ran us through a stand alone 1-3 module and then looped us in the troubles in Red Larch.

[NecroDancer]

The adventure is great, I love the dungeons, I love the new creatures, I love the story, I love the magic items, I love the spells, what I don't like is that the adventure is TOO open world, the party may run into an encounter long before their strong enough to deal with it. I'd suggest making the adventure a bit more linear to avoid TPKs.

TLDR: good adventure just badly organized.

[BillyN831]

thanks! i didn't know if started literally at level 3!

[Addaran]

There's a few quests for going from 1 to 3 that aren't very important for the main quest.

Some "go investigate bandits", a necromancer(he's pretty brutal thanks to magic missile) hidding close, something about a ghost, a fake treasure cave, etc.

I aggree that for new players, you're best to railroad them a bit so they do the temples in orders and don't skip a chapter. (Each Keeps at the surface lead to the corresponding element temple, wich is about 4 lvl higher, then there's one big area that will lead to the elemental Node of each element, another good 4-5 levels difference). So it's possible for your lvl 5 characters to just continue down the stairs and enter a lvl 9 dungeon.

The book also state that the prophets will send more enemies thanks to vision if the players try to rest in the dungeons. You might need to done that down or spoil it for the players, or else they'll keep dying.