new dm, sunless citadel

[Xaryo]

new dm here, first campagn.
i have 3 long time players ( im a good player too) and for my few sessions, i wanted to take it easy and use an already built adventure, hence sunless citadel from yawning portal.
so for now it is not very fluid.

we had one session gettint to the entrance and a second one getting approx just before Calcryx. Problem is, I'M getting bored. i already skipped many traps. too redoundant.

am i better to have them finishing the Calcryx part and forgetting the second level or accelerating the way through the rest of the citadel?

[Louro]

Can't tell you anything about that citadel, but my suggestion would be to take from it whatever you need.
Don't be afraid of skipping stuff to favour a different playing style. Or bend it to accommodate for what you/your players need/want.

[Tolkin]

Tales from the Yawning Portal is basically a bunch of older classic campaigns mashed up into one.

If you wanted to you could skip the Sunless Citadel and play through every campaign on it's own?

If not I would pick up Curse of Strahd, or Storm Kings Thunder instead.

[Man_Over_Game]

Sunless Citadel is generally a fairly balanced dungeon, designed to have most of the content be within the dungeon, with not much room for NPCs or RP.

If that's not something you're interested in, then Tales might not be a good fit. Most of its "modules" are best designed as a group of 4 or so sessions.

The traps are supposed to be a big part of The Sunless Citadel.

The SC is best used as a separate module into an existing world, with the DM substituting certain parts or characters to fit their needs, or a standalone adventure for a group of friends for a few sessions. It's not designed to be its own world or full-length adventure, not by a long shot.

You mention that you're a first time DM. Have you considered what kind of DM you'd like to be? Some are into combat, others into stealth, many are into world building. It might just be that the SC isn't something that you enjoy DMing, so what do you enjoy instead?

[Xaryo]

i have a good idea of where i want to go with my story. SC was to try my hand at DMing without having too much to think about for preparation. but i now know i don't like that style ( at least SC). other modules from TotYP like the third one (the mayan-like one) fit perfectly in my story as it is from the same roots ( Mysterious cities of gold)
i will definatly use the layout.

but for now, i will shorten the sunless citadel

[Louro]

Actually, for your first time... I think it is better to do it by yourself. Being an experienced player you already know what's behind the screen. Build your own adventure, for 2-3 sessions long.

Think about how you want to challenge your players: puzzles? Combats? Combat with puzzle? Riddles & Traps, social navigation, weird encounters....
Now think about it a bit more, you can do better.

Once you have a couple of ideas for some challenges, add the "reward". The hook, something that'll catch some random adventures attention, ranging from a pouch of coins to just survive (most adventurers seem very interested in surviving).

So far we have some ideas for encounters and a bait. What's behind that bait? BBEG planning to take over? Cultits doing cultism? Ancient spirit trapped? Giants sub-faction undermining government?

Connect everything, and you should have something that in hypothetical teorical game could play out as a story.

IMPORTANT NOTE: That's not gonna happen.
But don't worry. Your efforts pay off, and that abomination you are creating can still become a story. It just won't be the story you think.

Now fill in the gaps. Gather that book and take the stuff you need. Shape the encounters and riddles with some grammatical furniture.
Build a bit of world around the area, some interesting NPCs, and make some random encounters ready (both combat and social). You're pretty much ready to go.

Those extra encounters are really helpful when you players go off the road, so you might be improvising but having some material ready allows you to do better.

Challenge: Designed to make your players think. And cry.
Hook: "wanna coins? Come get them."
Story: What's happening?
Behind: Smoke & mirrors. Don't ever tell the players everything.
Furniture: "The gas exhalated by the creature is the most pernicious pestilence you've ever witness" is better than "roll fort save".
Backup stuff: just in case.

[djreynolds]

Its a good adventure that I have run many times.

Are you bored? Or are your players bored?

This game has a bit of everything.

Traps in 5E... suck. What can happen is a player can begin with a 15 in passive perception, at 1st level. They can easily detect them.

But that doesn't mean they can bypass the traps, they only know they are there.

They still have to roll an investigation check to know exactly what they are and how they work, how big of an area, etc

They still have to disarm them if they cannot bypass them, throw in some combat and these traps can be disarmed with disadvantage, this will make trap springing a challenge.