3e Adventure Path in 5e

[Forever DM]

So I am getting ready to run a new adventure path for my players, to go from level 1 to as high as we can make it.

I was looking at the old 3e Ashardalon Adventure path;

The Sunless Citadel
The Forge of Fury
The Speaker in Dreams
The Standing Stone
Heart of Nightfang Spire
Deep Horizon
Lord of the Iron Fortress
Bastion of Broken Souls

Now we've run Sunless Citadel before so I might swap that out with Hoard of the Dragon Queen (would that work? and then swap out the Tiamat cultist for them serving Ashardalon, dunno).

I know Forge of Fury is a must-run for me on this one, but I've read that only Lord of the Iron Fortress and Bastion of Broken Souls really tie back to the the first two adventures.

Is this accurate?

Would it be better to replace them with Red Hand of Doom? (again subbing Tiamat with Ashardalon)

Are the other adventures that would be better suited to the plot to fill the centre bit?

I seek avail myself to your knowledge.

Cheers!

[Kurt Kurageous]

So I am getting ready to run a new adventure path for my players, to go from level 1 to as high as we can make it.

I was looking at the old 3e Ashardalon Adventure path;

The Sunless Citadel
The Forge of Fury
The Speaker in Dreams
The Standing Stone
Heart of Nightfang Spire
Deep Horizon
Lord of the Iron Fortress
Bastion of Broken Souls

Now we've run Sunless Citadel before so I might swap that out with Hoard of the Dragon Queen (would that work? and then swap out the Tiamat cultist for them serving Ashardalon, dunno).

I know Forge of Fury is a must-run for me on this one, but I've read that only Lord of the Iron Fortress and Bastion of Broken Souls really tie back to the the first two adventures.

Is this accurate?

Would it be better to replace them with Red Hand of Doom? (again subbing Tiamat with Ashardalon)

Are the other adventures that would be better suited to the plot to fill the centre bit?

I seek avail myself to your knowledge.

Cheers!

You do know that Tales of the Yawning portal has both Sunless Citadel and Forge of Fury already ported to 5e? So what if the players have done Sunless, it will be a speed run then, and you can put a ticking clock on that one easily.

[Forever DM]

You do know that Tales of the Yawning portal has both Sunless Citadel and Forge of Fury already ported to 5e? So what if the players have done Sunless, it will be a speed run then, and you can put a ticking clock on that one easily.

LOL yes I have that book and the adventures on Roll20.

We don't play like that; speed run lol we play a very indepth game mixing rp and tactical in a nice mix. Hence the desire to give them something new to look at, and not "same old/same old" to kick off the campaign.

:)

[the_david]

I'm going by memory. I might get a couple of things wrong.

So, there's really 2 plot lines here:
Sunless Citadel - the Standing Stone - Heart of Nightfang Spire - Bastion of Broken Souls
Forge of Fury - Lord of the Iron Fortress

the Standing Stone is just there to provide some background info, Sunless Citadel merely hints at Ashardalon. I'd be tempted to rewrite it, as it just doesn't feel like a citadel to me. I'd think it would work better with an actual city. The kobolds could be living in a temple to Ashardalon, while the goblins would live in something that resembles a keep more than whatever the map we got was supposed to be. The moathouse from the Village of Homlett would be a better choice in my mind. This would give the kobolds and goblins more space to fight there guerilla war.

You could link Deep Horizon to Forge of Fury and Lord of the Iron Fortress by turning the Desmodus into the Khundrukar Dwarves. You might be tempted to add some Baatorian Greensteel weapons, but I think a certain half-dragon needs all of those to reforge a certain blade. It's hard to take things from your players once they've gotten their hands in them.

Here's a cool synopis on the entire octology. (https://scholarsandserpents.wordpress.com/2018/02/21/ashardalon-and-the-vampire-gulthias/)

[Forever DM]

I'm going by memory. I might get a couple of things wrong.

So, there's really 2 plot lines here:
Sunless Citadel - the Standing Stone - Heart of Nightfang Spire - Bastion of Broken Souls
Forge of Fury - Lord of the Iron Fortress

the Standing Stone is just there to provide some background info, Sunless Citadel merely hints at Ashardalon. I'd be tempted to rewrite it, as it just doesn't feel like a citadel to me. I'd think it would work better with an actual city. The kobolds could be living in a temple to Ashardalon, while the goblins would live in something that resembles a keep more than whatever the map we got was supposed to be. The moathouse from the Village of Homlett would be a better choice in my mind. This would give the kobolds and goblins more space to fight there guerilla war.

You could link Deep Horizon to Forge of Fury and Lord of the Iron Fortress by turning the Desmodus into the Khundrukar Dwarves. You might be tempted to add some Baatorian Greensteel weapons, but I think a certain half-dragon needs all of those to reforge a certain blade. It's hard to take things from your players once they've gotten their hands in them.


Thanks for that link... it has given me inspiration... I'll change the story a little bit... maybe minimize the sunless Citadel, and see where it goes, but now I have ideas how to tie it into Tyranny of Dragons!

Wootxo! :)

[Forever DM]

So here's what I am thinking right now...

Start with truncated Hoard of the Dragon Queen. They save Greenest and learn the "cult of the dragon" was looking for a tablet hidden in the sanctuary. That tablet leads them to the sunless citadel, where I collapse everything except the southern part that leads to the fight with the Dragon Priest, and below his tomb leads them down to the second part... skipping the goblin/kobold war which I never cared for anyways... Once they defeat the Tree/etc... They learn of the Forge of Fury which is what this was all about, as that can be used to make Dragonblades that can be used to slay dragons. The Cult want it to use against the Metallic Dragons, we'll see how they do there. From there we go to the awakening of Tiamat, which is thwarted in an 11th hour twist that reveals the Cult of the Dragon has been infiltrated by the Children of Arshadalon who capture Tiamat's 'essence' (do dragons have souls?), which Ashardalon will use to do 2 things... First restore his heart, and second become lord of all chromatic dragons. Once he is purged of the Belor his plan is to destroy or subjugate the metallic dragons.

And he'll have gotten away with it, if it wasn't for those pesky adventurers ;)

I can see this leading to them having to free Tiamat from the heart, and her in a weakened state having to begrudgingly retreat from the Prime Material Plane, or be destroyed by their mcguffin-x or what have you.

Wheels are turning.

Thanks for that info the_david, it really helped me focus what I want to achieve :)

Cheers!