Red Hand of Doom

[Tinydwarfman]

Why do people like it so much? Why do people not like it so much? I've heard wildly varying reviews of it, so I was hoping for a larger selection of reviews to average out the differences.

[Prodan]

Do you like dragons?

[Tinydwarfman]

No strong feelings one way or the other. (also no major spoilers please, in case I do run it.)

[Lhurgyof]

What is this "Red Hand of Doom" of which you speak?

[Powerfamiliar]

It's a simple iconic plot, and lots of fun. As a level 5-12 (I tihnk) adventure/campaign it also covers what many consider to be the most fun levels in 3.5 dnd.

[Mystic Muse]

It's a simple iconic plot, and lots of fun. As a level 5-12 (I tihnk) adventure/campaign it also covers what many consider to be the most fun levels in 3.5 dnd.

That's apparently a misprint and it's intended to be from level 5-10

I find it fun but I get to play a homebrew version of Paladin and have a homebrew dragon mount now so that's probably a factor (Dragons are my favorite mythical creature)

EDIT: Plus, Paladins are my favorite class.

[LordShotGun]

May people like/dislike it due to one unifying fact...It can and possibly will cause TPKs if your party is underoptimised OR it will be a massive cake walk if you have a party of power gamers.

From what I have heard, RHOD is best run using as few splat books as possible since it was a rather early made campaign in DnD's lifecycle and was not made with several quite common powergamer builds that have only been made possible by these later books.

Also, without giving TOO much away...Blaster AoE casters are NOT underpowered, you WILL need energy resistance of many types, and running away is ALWAYS an option unless its not...(if/when you play this campaign you will understand what I mean)

[Lhurgyof]

May people like/dislike it due to one unifying fact...It can and possibly will cause TPKs if your party is underoptimised OR it will be a massive cake walk if you have a party of power gamers.

From what I have heard, RHOD is best run using as few splat books as possible since it was a rather early made campaign in DnD's lifecycle and was not made with several quite common powergamer builds that have only been made possible by these later books.

Also, without giving TOO much away...Blaster AoE casters are NOT underpowered, you WILL need energy resistance of many types, and running away is ALWAYS an option unless its not...(if/when you play this campaign you will understand what I mean)

Sounds like Dark Sun, 'cept that's level 1-60. xP

Sounds kinda fun.

[Mystic Muse]

Oh, one question about the campaign. Spoilered for those here who haven't played it.

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We just killed a red dragon. I don't remember its name but it was in the forest with the people on giant owls and it had a ring of minor cold resistance and we're about to go to "Rest". Anybody know how far into the campaign we are?

[Powerfamiliar]

Oh, one question about the campaign. Spoilered for those here who haven't played it.

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We just killed a red dragon. I don't remember its name but it was in the forest with the people on giant owls and it had a ring of minor cold resistance and we're about to go to "Rest". Anybody know how far into the campaign we are?

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Rhest is not yet halfway through the adventure.
Edit: You might be playing with some modifications though, pretty sure there wasn't supposed to be a Red Dragon near Rhest.

[Mystic Muse]

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Rhest is not yet halfway through the adventure.
Edit: You might be playing with some modifications though, pretty sure there wasn't supposed to be a Red Dragon near Rhest.

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Maybe. It appears that the red dragon was also way too strong for any normal group. We're level 10 and we only had a 20% chance of hitting the thing due to it having 32 AC and us not having a wizard. Although, as a class feature of my favorite Paladin ever I had a touch attack to deal with him

[Malakar]

RHoD presents a unifed compelling theme across some of the widely regarded best levels of 3.5 D&D.

It has the widely regarded strongest monster as one of your main competition, with recommended power ups, and in situations designed very well to favor them.

It also has a host of memorable but incredibly weak and pathetic enemy NPCs.

As such, you play an epic D&D game, filled with tough fights you barely scrape by against powerful opposition, but lots of opportunities to prove how awesome and cool you are too.

The Plot is well done and cohesive, and never leaves you in a random "Damn, what do we do now?" moment, and involves about 1000 times less arbitrary DM fiat rules abuse than most modules.

[KillianHawkeye]

As a DM, I liked RHoD because it was incredibly well-written. It had a lot of things in it that gave the DM options for what to do if the PCs do X, optional encounters, and a campaign timeline with notes on modifications based on the PCs' successes at certain tasks. Also, dragons!

[Malakar]

It had a lot of things in it that gave the DM options for what to do if the PCs do X, optional encounters, and a campaign timeline with notes on modifications based on the PCs' successes at certain tasks.

This too, I think it would be more fun to play with a group good at seperating meta, or to tell your PCs straight up:

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You destroyed the Bridge, and now, the horde is set back X days or Y strength.

Because Red Hand does an excellent job of allowing character actions to really affect things in more than the obvious "X is dead" form, even if it is all DM fiat.

[balistafreak]

Although, as a class feature of my favorite Paladin ever I had a touch attack to deal with him

Don't tell me it was the Dragon Killer.

Shivering Touch for those not in the know.

[Mystic Muse]

Don't tell me it was the Dragon Killer.

Shivering Touch for those not in the know.

Nope. Deals divine damage equal to half my class level + my charisma modifier in D8s so 10d8 worth of damage just for spending a single turn undead attempt.

It still took a while to kill him and the ranger in the group dealt a critical which helped a lot

[PId6]

Running it right now on PbP here. I'm certainly enjoying it so far, and it's fairly well-written. However, the enemies are, by default, kind of a cakewalk for optimized parties, hence why I've been optimizing most of them... quite a bit.

On a separate and completely unrelated note, I just PK'd my first PC this campaign! It just happened at the Vraath Keep encounter.

[Malakar]

On a separate and completely unrelated note, I just PK'd my first PC this campaign! It just happened at the Vraath Keep encounter.

You didn't PK a PC.

PK can either be Party Kill, to indicate that a PC killed another PC, or as 2/3rd of the phrase TPK means Total Party Kill, as in the party is being killed. (Usually meaning, as opposed to TPK, the entire party but one individual.) Since you didn't party kill, and you are the DM, you didn't PK.

[balistafreak]

He could be Penalty Kicking them. In the nads.

[2xMachina]

PK = Player Killing in WoW/MMORPGs IIRC.

Though, usually you're a player yourself...

[PId6]

Meh, terminology difference. I was referring to it in the generic "Player Kill" sense.

[Saintheart]

I think the positive things about it is that it's one of the better-paced and better-written campaign games out there. The fluff isn't utterly interchangeable with other modules, it actually has an impact on the game. It freely admits the rough inferiority of many encounters given the party's intervention in the campaign world is more or less unexpected. It's the antithesis of the "trigger on entering room" dungeon; it builds in intensity. It also offers several different biomes, doesn't ever reduce itself to endless dungeoncrawling, and offers actual interesting skill-based challenges. The ticking time limit is also a plus; it gives a lot more immediacy to the idea that you've only got so long to get stuff done, which does impact on the 'endless time to build stuff' option.

I think it's also reeeeasonably customisable for more optimised parties if you know what you're doing; there's several good campaign journals on this site which give you a blow-by-blow for how to do it. And the climax of the adventure is just Made Of Awesome.

Probably its weak points are that one or two plot hooks are a little thin, but overall the game is somehow very good at making the players actually give a damn about the NPCs that inhabit the campaign universe.

[Satyr]

I think it is pretty meh, compared to actually good adventure modules. It is terribly one-sided (kill this, kill that... as boring as watching bread), the overarching plot is uninspired and the one element which actually could have an impact on the game , the time table for the Evil Horde of Evil progression, has too little impact on the game to really care.

It's playable, but way too one sided and flat to be very interesting in the long run, mostly to the lack of variation in the challenges.

[AslanCross]

May people like/dislike it due to one unifying fact...It can and possibly will cause TPKs if your party is underoptimised OR it will be a massive cake walk if you have a party of power gamers.

From what I have heard, RHOD is best run using as few splat books as possible since it was a rather early made campaign in DnD's lifecycle and was not made with several quite common powergamer builds that have only been made possible by these later books.

Also, without giving TOO much away...Blaster AoE casters are NOT underpowered, you WILL need energy resistance of many types, and running away is ALWAYS an option unless its not...(if/when you play this campaign you will understand what I mean)

My party was not heavily optimized, but it was mostly a cakewalk for the first couple of encounters. Then I started tweaking everything. It turned out to be challenging, epic and memorable for everyone.

I didn't find it to be a flat all-combat hackfest; some of the built-in roleplaying options were dealt with interestingly by my party. The Ghostlord terrified them, and they even found the interactions with the elves quite interesting.

If there's any part that kind of degenerates to hack-and-slash, it's the final dungeon.

[Simba]

I started as a player in 2 RHoD groups here on the forums. One did not even start but was dropped shortly after the characters were accepted, the other one got a few pages before ending. I would finally like to play it to the end for once. I liked what I saw sofar. You can always pimp the little guys if you feel they are too weak.

[FuryOfMetal]

So is this a downloadable module or do i buy it from a shop?

[Eldariel]

Buyable. And the reason it's so well-liked? It's a well-written module. Sure, difficulty needs to be adjusted and there's one horribly written place in it, but the shell and the ways in which it engages the players are excellent. The story is quite compelling and it just works.

There have been a few extremely good Campaign Journals on RHoD here, which certainly increases the stocks. Quick list:
Saph's Red Hand of Doom Campaign Journal
Kjones's Red Hand of Doom Campaign Journal Part I & Part II
AslanCross's Eberron Red Hand of Doom Campaign Journal

[Birstel]

On a separate and completely unrelated note, I just PK'd my first PC this campaign! It just happened at the Vraath Keep encounter.

You're about on my pace then, I've had to increase levels on a few things, since I have 10-13 PCs depending on who shows up, but I've killed 2 PCs so far.

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Bullrushing the stone shaping cleric off the bridge was fun!

[kjones]

Thanks for the shoutout, Eldariel - I can state with confidence that my campaign journal is, in fact, excellent.

I'll sum up my overall thoughts on the strengths of the module by quoting myself:

Unlike many other modules, the Red Hand of Doom module does a good job of not assuming that the players will take the straight-and-narrow path, and to its credit, it provides many provisions for what to do with wandering players, or those who miss a plot token or two along the way. However, the Vale is a big place, and many areas are simply not well fleshed out. I'm thinking specifically of the Hammerfast Holds here, but there are many others. Again, recall that this module should be viewed as a framework, and take the opportunity to flesh out small towns, minor NPCs, and random encounters on your own. Or be good at improvising, and remain consistent. If the party insists on wandering about the Vale, however, relate everything back to the coming of the Red Hand. Sooner or later, they'll get the picture.

[Emmerask]

Why do people like it so much? Why do people not like it so much? I've heard wildly varying reviews of it, so I was hoping for a larger selection of reviews to average out the differences.

Compared to other d&d modules I tried it was quite good compared to what other gaming systems have to offer especially dark eye it is simply lacking both in detail, complexity and variety, its like comparing wheel of time and a song of ice and fire to eragon . sadly most gaming systems with awesome story modules/campaigns have the worst mechanics, wonder why that is?