Krenko's Way Recommendations

[Titobaube]

Hi everyone.

I'm planning to run Krenko's Way, Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica introduction adventure, with my girlfriend (27) and her little brother (12). Both first timers to D&D and little to no experience with TTRPGs in general. I too have little experience with 5e, but comprehensive knowledge of 3,5 and Pathfinder and even a little 4e. DMed that same adventure, but for friends who knew the rules, but thats it.

I'll most probably run a DM-PC along with their characters. So far, I plan to let my players play any guilds with the restriction that they must share at least 1 magic color. (ie. Simic and Izzet good, Selesnya and Rakdos not good).
We're only using the 3 core books and the Guide itself.

Any tips to ensure everything goes smoothly?

[Sorinth]

At only 3 players (Including a DM-PC) I'd be tempted to start everyone at level 2 and/or give them some healing potions probably as part of them getting hired.

In terms of running the adventure, new players might get a little lost to start since there's no clear direction on where/how to start. If that happens your DM-PC can help, but you don't want to be making decisions so have them lay out 2-3 options of how to track down Krenko and then let the actual PCs decide which one to do.

[Abracadangit]

I'm gonna say what I tell all people running a game for first-timers (especially TTRPG first-timers):

Make. Characters. FOR them.

I have seen so many people walk away from RPGs because people run a Session Zero for them like they would for anyone else, and it always starts with this lightning-round tutorial for the newcomers that sounds like "See, there's 6 ability scores, and they have these modifiers, which you add to your proficiency..." etc, etc. It makes people's heads spin, and they get lost in logistics and bookkeeping before they even have a chance to get their sea legs with basic RPG visualization. ("You wake up in a room. There is a bed beside you, and a door on the far wall. What would you like to do?") And if they don't have those sea legs yet, they're gonna be trying to figure out how all that works WHILE trying to keep all the rules straight in their head. It's too dang much.

Instead, I'd ask them what basic fantasy trope do they dig (like questing knight, bookish wizard, cunning thief, so on) and help them build a character from there. Let them do all the talking about cosmetics and their name and what they look like, but you handle all the game mechanics decision making. You can even ask questions like "Ok, pick two out of three that describes your thief - stealthy, acrobatic, smooth-talking." And you pick proficiencies for them based on that.

Disclaimer: If they have experience building chars in open-world type RPGs for PC/console, then they might be cooler with all this, albeit with some guidance. All I'm saying is when people first set foot in this game, they seldom care about the advantages of ASIs vs. feats. They don't have any of that yet. To them, all the options in the PHB are just this intimidating wall of features and figures without context. Either make the character for them or just whip up some pregens and have them pick which one they want (like the Character Select screen from a fighting game), and then take it from there. I would also strongly consider running a mini-tutorial adventure for them before starting the actual game, where they can learn what an ability check is, what an attack roll is, how talking to NPCs works step-by-step instead of this tidal wave all at once.

TTRPGs are so interesting in that they're a hobby so many people SHOULD enjoy, but so many people get thrown in the deep end at first and are like "I don't understand how any of this works and sometimes this is a board game and sometimes this is Improv Comedy Hour and sometimes it's Oregon Trail and I think I want to quit." And it all boils down to how it's presented at first.

[Titobaube]

At only 3 players (Including a DM-PC) I'd be tempted to start everyone at level 2 and/or give them some healing potions probably as part of them getting hired.

I'll probably go with the potions, I think starting at level 2 might be intimidating depending on what class they want to play


In terms of running the adventure, new players might get a little lost to start since there's no clear direction on where/how to start. If that happens your DM-PC can help, but you don't want to be making decisions so have them lay out 2-3 options of how to track down Krenko and then let the actual PCs decide which one to do.

Yeah, my DM-PCs are usually quiet unless the players clearly needs a nudge in the right direction. Good catch about the no clear direction, I'll keep that in mind.

[KorvinStarmast]

I'm gonna say what I tell all people running a game for first-timers (especially TTRPG first-timers):

Make. Characters. FOR them.
{snip}
TTRPGs are so interesting in that they're a hobby so many people SHOULD enjoy, but so many people get thrown in the deep end at first and are like "I don't understand how any of this works and sometimes this is a board game and sometimes this is Improv Comedy Hour and sometimes it's Oregon Trail and I think I want to quit." And it all boils down to how it's presented at first. Nice post. :smallsmile:

[Titobaube]

I'm gonna say what I tell all people running a game for first-timers (especially TTRPG first-timers):

Make. Characters. FOR them.

I'll most likely will build the character myself-ish, one of them has played a few session of Starfinder and the other one made a character for it, but ended up not playing. So at the very least they have an idea what the ability scores are. I think the profiency bonus that replaces trained skill and ranks, BAB and saves is going to be a big help in making it easier to grasp the mechanics.

I'll mostly go with you have 12 class choice. Once thats chosen, 2-3 paths (or 8, I'm looking at you Wizard). We will roll the stats and I'll strongly encourage them to follow the class recommendation for how to assign them.

And as for the ASIs/feats, I'm not even giving them the options. Not sure if there are other options (starting gear vs. cash probably), but we'll definitely go with the basics.

[Abracadangit]

Nice post. :smallsmile:

Hey - thanks!


I'll most likely will build the character myself-ish, one of them has played a few session of Starfinder and the other one made a character for it, but ended up not playing. So at the very least they have an idea what the ability scores are. I think the profiency bonus that replaces trained skill and ranks, BAB and saves is going to be a big help in making it easier to grasp the mechanics.

I'll mostly go with you have 12 class choice. Once thats chosen, 2-3 paths (or 8, I'm looking at you Wizard). We will roll the stats and I'll strongly encourage them to follow the class recommendation for how to assign them.

And as for the ASIs/feats, I'm not even giving them the options. Not sure if there are other options (starting gear vs. cash probably), but we'll definitely go with the basics.

See, it already sounds like you know what you're doing. You'll be in awesome shape. And the fact that one of them has played some Starfinder means they already have a general idea about how a lot of this stuff works, which is like light-years ahead of someone who's never played a TTRPG before.

[LordShade]

Hi everyone.

I'm planning to run Krenko's Way, Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica introduction adventure, with my girlfriend (27) and her little brother (12). Both first timers to D&D and little to no experience with TTRPGs in general. I too have little experience with 5e, but comprehensive knowledge of 3,5 and Pathfinder and even a little 4e. DMed that same adventure, but for friends who knew the rules, but thats it.

I'll most probably run a DM-PC along with their characters. So far, I plan to let my players play any guilds with the restriction that they must share at least 1 magic color. (ie. Simic and Izzet good, Selesnya and Rakdos not good).
We're only using the 3 core books and the Guide itself.

Any tips to ensure everything goes smoothly?

Give them a sidekick rather than a DMPC. Ravnica has some excellent stat blocks:

https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?622843-A-Guide-to-Sidekick-Optimization