New DM, rough campaign plan

[Vorenus]

Greetings and salutations.

I'm a new DM, and new to D&D 5e. I'm gearing up to run a campaign for a group of five players, who are running the following characters:

1. Aasimar Paladin
2. High Elf Rogue
3. Wood Elf Ranger
4. Half-Orc Barbarian
5. Dwarven Cleric (Life Domain)

My first question is: Will this group be completely screwed because they don't have any Wizards or Sorcerers?

My next question is thinking about the long-term plan for the campaign. My original plan was to create my own campaign from the ground up. I had some sort of epic quest kind of like Dragon Age: Origins in my head, but I don't know enough about the Forgotten Realms world to make it work, so instead I've decided to stick with officially published material for the time being. So I'm starting my group with the Lost Mine of Phandelver, then we're going to do Storm King's Thunder. After that they should be around level 10 or thereabouts. I'm thinking of running the Tyranny of Dragons after SKT, although I can see from the description that the Tyranny of Dragons is designed to take characters from level 1 to 15. So my question is: How difficult would it be to upscale Tyranny of Dragons to go from level 10 to 20, rather than 1 to 15?

Thank you for taking the time to read this post, and I look forward to hearing from you.

Best,

--Vorenus

[Man_Over_Game]

Hiya, noobie! Welcome to the game!

The main thing that Sorcerers and Wizards provide in 5e is AoE battlefield control, buffs, and the occasional arcane utility effect (teleports, hiding stuff, etc). With the amount of skills and tankiness of your party, you don't really need a ton of finesse, though. The problem you'll find with this party is how dull it'll be to run in combat. Without a Wizard running Flame Sphere, or a Druid maneuvering a Moonbeam, the party won't have much to tactically consider. It'll be limited to "Big Guy Hit Thing", "Skinny Guy Shoot Thing", "Light Guy Heal Thing" for 20 levels. So consider making your battles have a lot of tactical diversity. Add a lot of Difficult Terrain, mix up what kind of enemies you use, and add some climbing elements. Make a battlefield with a lot of obstacles, and let your players determine how to use that stuff. You don't necessarily have to have a plan for the chandelier, but put one in anyway and let them come up with the plan.

For the module specific stuff, just skim through Tyranny of Dragons and determine what the players already need to know. You can fit in some clues in the prior sessions (maybe the Big Bads in LMoP and SKT have notes implying that they're receiving orders by a higher power that, when combined, lead up to the truth of them following Tiamat).

[Yora]

My advice to all new GMs: Don't start with trying to run a big epic campaign. At least for the first couple of months, you should focus on making the next two or three sessions fun and everything that comes after that you can deal with when you get there. Though in truth, it should be an "if you get there". When you start out with a group, you have no clue for how long you will be playing. If it turns out you will be playing 8 sessions and get up to level 3, that's all fine. But better to have it be a short adventure completed to its end than the game ending in the frst chapter of a 12 chapter epic.
Running Mines of Phandelver first, and when that is wrapped up going into Storm King's Thunder is a good plan. And when/if you get to the end of that and know that you will be continuing the campaign after that, then it's time to start making plans for what comes next.

I really wouldn't say that combat without a wizard is boring. If fights start to feel a bit unexciting, then making use of more complex terrains is definitely the way to go. For the start, fighting in open clear arenas as completely fine, but fights become much more interesting when you also have pits, chasms, fences, walls, watchtowers, bridges, fire, smoke, and so on. The players can use those to their advantage and so can their enemies.
The party has both a cleric and a paladin. I think they will be completely fine regarding magic.

[Unoriginal]

My first question is: Will this group be completely screwed because they don't have any Wizards or Sorcerers?

No. Wizards or Sorcerers are not special "must have to win" classes.

My next question is thinking about the long-term plan for the campaign. My original plan was to create my own campaign from the ground up. I had some sort of epic quest kind of like Dragon Age: Origins in my head, but I don't know enough about the Forgotten Realms world to make it work

Why do you want to set it in the Forgotten Realms? You could create your own world. Even put Lost Mine of Phandelver in it still.

[Vorenus]

Thank you for the responses. I should clarify something: I am new as a DM, not new as a GM. I've been GMing games for a long time. The distinction is that I am new to D&D 5e. Most of the games I have been running for many years now have been GURPS, Deadlands, Warhammer 40,000 (the various products by Fantasy Flight Games such as Dark Heresy, Deathwatch, Rogue Trader, etc.), Call of Cthulhu, Rifts, Savage Worlds, and probably several other games I'm not thinking about right now. I apologize for creating the misimpression that I am new to running a game. I'm just new to D&D 5e.

As to the longevity of the campaign: I'm actually not worried about that. Most of the games I have run have lasted several years. And I like to plan out the long-term story arc, while leaving a lot of flexibility for the players in how to get there. Like I said, I was originally planning to run a home-brewed epic quest based off of the storyline in Dragon Age: Origins, but I just don't know enough about Forgotten Realms to pull that off yet. So I'm going to shelve that idea until after we get the current characters through their own epic quest using the published adventures, and then the next go-around I will be confident in my mastery of the lore to build a homebrewed epic quest.

Thanks again for the responses, and I apologize for the confusion I caused. If anyone has any suggestions on how to upscale Tyranny of Dragons (Hoard of the Dragon Queen and Rise of Tiamat) to begin at level 10, I'd still love to hear those suggestions.

[Vorenus]

No. Wizards or Sorcerers are not special "must have to win" classes.

Thanks, that's good to know.

Why do you want to set it in the Forgotten Realms? You could create your own world. Even put Lost Mine of Phandelver in it still.

Basically because the published adventures are set in Forgotten Realms, and they already have good maps, and there are novels my players can read that are set in that world, too. I will eventually create my own world as I have done for other systems, but I want to master D&D first, and so the Forgotten Realms setting will work just fine. Until Planescape comes out, then I'm jumping ship to Sigil.

Also: because I work full-time and I am in grad school part-time, so I want to use published adventures to save time--at least until I finish my (current) graduate degree program.

[Unoriginal]

but I just don't know enough about Forgotten Realms to pull that off yet.

Again, why set it up in the Forgotten Realms?

Another tip: I've heard many people say that SKT and Tyranny of Dragons were badly written. Which parts of those modules attracted you?

[Mythcaller]

In accordance with what Man_Over_Game was saying about combat being pretty straightforward, something I was taught when I first started out was not to make every encounter solely about killing all the enemies. Add something extra, on top of having to defeat all of these enemies, add the layer of having to stop any of them from ringing a reinforcements bell, or maybe you have to get to a certain spot in a number of rounds before an NPC is killed, something to make it more than just, as Man_Over_Game put it, "Big Guy Hit Thing", "Skinny Guy Shoot Thing", "Light Guy Heal Thing". Even if there is a limited number of ways for the group as a whole to get the job done, make it a little challenging for them, add some flavour to the battle. Killing everything, while relatively easy, shouldn't be the only way to end an encounter.

[SirGraystone]

First question: No, it's very hard to really "screw" a group no matter which character form it. A DM can create encounter to target any group weakness or counter their strength.

Second question: By the time you have run LMoP and SKT depending of how often you play, you'll probably be at it between 6 and 12 months, that leave you plenty of time to prepare what come next. Starting over with level 1 characters after SKT is also an option, that let players try other options, try new thing, hunt werewolves and vampire in ravenloft maybe.

The main problem with long epic story from 1 to 20 is that its a lot of works to prepare and you never know if your players will follow that story. That can become frustrating if you work for weeks on something and your players ignore it and go be pirates or something.

[Vorenus]

Again, why set it up in the Forgotten Realms?

Another tip: I've heard many people say that SKT and Tyranny of Dragons were badly written. Which parts of those modules attracted you?

The main reason is to save time. I work full-time, and I am in grad school part-time. So I don't have as much time to build my own world right now as I have had in the past. After I finish my (current) graduate program I will have more time for world-building and etc. But for now I'm going to stick to published adventures until I (a) have mastered the rules to D&D 5e, and (b) have finished my (current) graduate program.

As to the other question: I have not read either of those adventures yet. I have read the PHB and the DMG from cover to cover (once each) and re-read certain sections (sometimes more than once), and I have just started reading Lost Mine of Phandelver. I own Storm King's Thunder plus several other books, and I plan to get the Tyranny of Dragons set this weekend at the friendly local game store. I think what appeals to me about Storm King's Thunder is that from my quick skim of the book it seems like there is a lot of meat in there, and also a lot of freedom for the players to go off book and explore as the story unfolds. At least, that's my impression thus far. Also: The book seems to make the giants really scary, which I like. I want the bad guys to be scary. Which is the same reason I was thinking that Tyranny of Dragons would work well as the capstone to the campaign, taking the PCs from levels 10 to 20. Tiamat should be the ultimate bad girl. Without having read the books yet, when I saw that it only went to level 15 I was a little surprised. I read the Dragonlance novels a long time ago, and Tiamat is basically the same as Takhisis, I think, and there's no way that 15th level PCs are going to win in a fight against Takhisis without having some major help from other metallic dragons. Again, I haven't read the book yet, but those are my initial thoughts.

[Vorenus]

Side note: I'm new to this forum. Is there a way to click "Like" on posts that I . . . like? I don't see how to do that. Several of y'all have posted things I want to "Like," if there's a way to do that. The other forum I spend most of my time on is Bolter and Chainsword, which is a WH40K forum, and it's easy to "Like" posts there. (My name is also Vorenus on that forum in case anyone else is on there, too.)

[Man_Over_Game]

Side note: I'm new to this forum. Is there a way to click "Like" on posts that I . . . like? I don't see how to do that. Several of y'all have posted things I want to "Like," if there's a way to do that. The other forum I spend most of my time on is Bolter and Chainsword, which is a WH40K forum, and it's easy to "Like" posts there. (My name is also Vorenus on that forum in case anyone else is on there, too.)

Not on GitP. We're oldschool here, when the only way to know your worth is the number of flaming trolls under your boot. When you got a mob ready to lynch yah, that's Reddit Gold here, Son!

Although you could do it like this:

Some stuff I agree with

I agree with that stuff you said.

[Vorenus]

One other "by the way": I should have mentioned that I tried finding advice on scaling up Tyranny of Dragons to start at level 10 via the good ol' Google and searching this site before I posted my thread, but I didn't find anything particularly useful. Thanks again for your responses.

[Man_Over_Game]

One other "by the way": I should have mentioned that I tried finding advice on scaling up Tyranny of Dragons to start at level 10 via the good ol' Google and searching this site before I posted my thread, but I didn't find anything particularly useful. Thanks again for your responses.

Check out this link: https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questi...nny-of-dragons

It covers a lot of good advice for how to run Tyranny of Dragons at a higher level. Basically, skip over Hoard of the Dragon Queen, jump right in to Rise of Tiamat, make sure that the party knows of a trustworthy and powerful person, and they're in Waterdeep.

Rise of Tiamat will basically start with a council, advising the players of everything they need to know, and skips over the shenanigans of chasing a bunch of cursed gold around the countryside in HotDQ.

[Vorenus]

Check out this link: [redacted due to GitP's rules]

It covers a lot of good advice for how to run Tyranny of Dragons at a higher level. Basically, skip over Hoard of the Dragon Queen, jump right in to Rise of Tiamat, make sure that the party knows of a trustworthy and powerful person, and they're in Waterdeep.

Rise of Tiamat will basically start with a council, advising the players of everything they need to know, and skips over the shenanigans of chasing a bunch of cursed gold around the countryside in HotDQ.

Thanks, I'll check that out.

[2D8HP]

I'm partial to Sunless Citadel (from Yawning Portal), and Tomb of Annihilation among the WotC adventures, but running Lost Mines of Phandelver from levels 1 to 5 and then Storm King's Thunder level 6 and up is a great way to go.

[Zhorn]

Although you could do it like this:
I agree with that stuff you said.

Handy advice, good to know

@Vorenus, you and I are in a similar situation with how we're running our campaigns.
My players are half way through LMoP, and I'll be launching them into other modules afterwards.
The approach I'm going for with mine is looking at the main story beats in the other modules any not sweating the small stuff too much. Each of the 'later' module choices (SKT, HotDQ, RoT, ToA, etc) have a fair chunk of level-up/ choose-your-own-adventure stuff in the middle to get the players up the the right levels for the set pieces. I'll be swapping, combining, and transplanting the set pieces from each a fair bit, to save on scaling and so all the encounters don't feel like the rest of the world is on hold while ONE story plays out. Dragon cultists are becoming more active, giants are acting restless, stories of undead swarming in chult, stuff is happening all over. I'll give hooks and leads in certain key directions and locations, but otherwise when the party is as a level suited for a batch of encounters, put them in the party's path. The giants and dragon stories are all over the sword coast, and even if the players head over to Chult, frost giants have a reason to be there, there's a few dragons in Chilt too, and the dragon cultists would be keen on gathering treasures and riches from that area too. Even going by the cultists usual goal of dracoliches, necromancy in Chult is a good a tie in as any.
Most of the modules "end bosses" can serve at high levels pretty well, just remove some of the extra support the players would get in the books to up the difficulty on the ones you run at later levels.

[Great Dragon]

Man_Over_Game gives some good advice.

Personally, I'd include the Plots from HotDQ (chasing Dragon Cultists, with the gold, around the Sword Coast) as Side Quests - just upscale the main villains of this to be about 2 CR above the Party. Adding other NPCs and intelligent creatures (Beholder!) also gunning for the treasure can be fun!

Plus, since you started with LMoP, you can have Venomfang (assuming there was an encounter and it survived) show up with Plots of Revenge!!

In addition, after you have read the Council Meeting, you can add some social problems and intrigue.
(1) At least one of the Metallic Dragons is being a hindrance, and the Party can put in effort to figure out why.

(2) Boci made an Assassin Rogue/Moon Druid that specializes in getting in where people don't expect. Just make this at least a 9 Assassin/2 Druid.
*Shift to Tiny size to get into the location and locate the target in less than an hour, find a hidden spot nearby and Shift back to Humanoid form and shoot/stab target for 5d6 Sneak Attack and full Assassin benefits, Bonus Action Shift to Tiny size again, and escape in less than an hour. If caught in the act, BA shift to Brown Bear and fight to get out.*

Also, The Chromatic Dragons encountered should all be at least Adults. Ancient Dragons can start poking their heads into the events of the Campaign around 15th level. Each Dragon is trying to get the sole favor of Tiamat, and won't work together. (This gives the Players a better chance of success)

[Nhorianscum]

Greetings and salutations.

I'm a new DM, and new to D&D 5e. I'm gearing up to run a campaign for a group of five players, who are running the following characters:

1. Aasimar Paladin
2. High Elf Rogue
3. Wood Elf Ranger
4. Half-Orc Barbarian
5. Dwarven Cleric (Life Domain)

My first question is: Will this group be completely screwed because they don't have any Wizards or Sorcerers?

My next question is thinking about the long-term plan for the campaign. My original plan was to create my own campaign from the ground up. I had some sort of epic quest kind of like Dragon Age: Origins in my head, but I don't know enough about the Forgotten Realms world to make it work, so instead I've decided to stick with officially published material for the time being. So I'm starting my group with the Lost Mine of Phandelver, then we're going to do Storm King's Thunder. After that they should be around level 10 or thereabouts. I'm thinking of running the Tyranny of Dragons after SKT, although I can see from the description that the Tyranny of Dragons is designed to take characters from level 1 to 15. So my question is: How difficult would it be to upscale Tyranny of Dragons to go from level 10 to 20, rather than 1 to 15?

Thank you for taking the time to read this post, and I look forward to hearing from you.

Best,

--Vorenus

The party can do fine as is. Worst case they run into a need for arcane casting and either hire one at a cost/great deal of effort, or somone dies due to missing out on arcane stuff and the new player rolls one. Or the high elf rouge goes AT.

All things considered scaling modules is a pain. My suggestion would be to run LMoP along with SKT and then (if the game is still going) worry about the next step.

[Great Dragon]

In addition to the Magical Items normally available: Perhaps adding utility magical items that duplicate arcane spells.
Things like:

Ring of Feather Fall. (Uncommon)
Attunement by any class.
As spell, usable 3 times a day.

Amulet of Levitate (Uncommon)
Attunement by any class.
Lasts 10 minutes, usable 3 times/day

Goggles of Night/Detect Magic/See Invisibility. (Uncommon)

Stealing the "Identify Tablet" from 3e.
(Uncommon) Place a magical object on this for 15 minutes, and all the information about the object is written on the tablet. (About equal to a ritual casting, but if a mage actually joins the Party, they still shine)

Stone of Alarm. (Uncommon)

Figurine of Tiny Hut. (Rare)
Usable 1x day, lasts 8 hours.

Figurine of Phantom Steed. (Rare)
Usable 1x day, lasts 8 hours.

Hat of Alterations.
Attunement by any class. (Rare)
Alter Self, lasts 2 hours, usable 3 times/day.

Miniature Secret Chest. (Very Rare)
Attunement by any class.
Saying the key word/phrase activates the item, a permanent Leomund's Secret Chest.

[Unoriginal]

In addition to the Magical Items normally available: Perhaps adding utility magical items that duplicate arcane spells.
Things like:

Ring of Feather Fall. (Uncommon)
Attunement by any class.
As spell, usable 3 times a day.

Amulet of Levitate (Uncommon)
Attunement by any class.
Lasts 10 minutes, usable 3 times/day

Goggles of Night/Detect Magic/See Invisibility. (Uncommon)

Stealing the "Identify Tablet" from 3e.
(Uncommon) Place a magical object on this for 15 minutes, and all the information about the object is written on the tablet. (About equal to a ritual casting, but if a mage actually joins the Party, they still shine)

Stone of Alarm. (Uncommon)

Figurine of Tiny Hut. (Rare)
Usable 1x day, lasts 8 hours.

Figurine of Phantom Steed. (Rare)
Usable 1x day, lasts 8 hours.

Hat of Alterations.
Attunement by any class. (Rare)
Alter Self, lasts 2 hours, usable 3x day.

Miniature Secret Chest. (Very Rare)
Attunement by any class.
Saying the key word/phrase activates the item, a permanent Leomund's Secret Chest.

Why? None of those things are even remotely necessary.

[Great Dragon]

Why? None of those things are even remotely necessary.

Reasons:
1) they can free up the need to either memorize those spells (like Detect Magic), or having to simply do without those arcane spells (Like See Invisibility).

2) Because it's fun.


Edit:
Now, I really don't like the Ring of Invisibility in the DMG being Legendary, but still acting like a normal Invisibility spell.

Rings of Invisibility. Attunement by any class.

Least: as Invisibility spell 1x day. (Uncommon)

Lesser: as Invisibility spell 3x day. (Rare)

Improved: Invisibility as an Action, no limit. (Very Rare)
{Or}
Greater: as Greater Invisibility spell 3x day (Very Rare).

Master: as Supreme Invisibility 3x day (Legendary)

Mandatory LoTR reference: That Ring was an Artifact, with Supreme Invisibility as an Action, no limit. IF limited to just D&D Invisibility spells.

[Vorenus]

Thank you to everyone for your suggestions. You've given me a lot to think about.

[Vorenus]

Hello again, everyone. I thought I would take a minute and check in and let you know that my campaign is going quite well. We have finished 7 sessions now. The players and I are really enjoying it. The characters are on the cusp of achieving level 3. They got their first magical item during the sixth session, which was the sword Talon, when they cleared out the underground lair of the Redbrands beneath Tresendar manor. I did my best to describe it in all its elegance and really play up its unique nature. I made one minor tweak to it and made it an "Elven Longsword," which is really a rapier rather than a longsword but I didn't tell the group that. The point was to make it a Finesse weapon, since the Wood Elf Ranger had been wanting to use a longsword since the campaign began. When the player discovered the "Elven Longsword," and I gave the flavor text of how Talon looks, that it was wielded by the famed hero Hawk Tresendar--it all went really well. The whole group really got into it. The Dwarven Cleric character rolled a naturla 20 on his History check so I gave him the whole backstory of Hawk Tresendar and Talon. I forgot about the whole "atunement" thing so I let the Ranger use the sword and get the +1 bonus right away, but after that session I realized my mistake and explained it at the start of session 7 and we won't make that mistake again. Oh well, in the end that's not a huge deal. Anyway, the point is the characters were really into the flavor text, and they loved the sword. I downloaded some cards that have a picture of the magic items found in Lost Mine of Phandelver on one side with the description and stats on the other side, and when I gave the player the card with Talon on it he really lit up--it was a great gaming moment. I hope I can achieve that with every future magical item (other than potions of healing, and other common stuff like that).

Now the players want to renovate and restore Tresendar manor and turn it into a home base, which I am totally on board with. I'm still working out how much it will cost. I was going to use the base cost of a manor from the DMG, which costs 25,000 gold, but then I figured I would cut it in half since it is generally easier to restore than it is to build from scratch. I couldn't find any official rules covering this, but that seems reasonable. Then on top of that I am having all of the NPCs who live in the town of Phandelver pitch in and provide free labor. The player characters really did an excellent job developing relationships with the townsfolk and have been helping them out in a lot of ways (e.g., the side quests in the adventure book). So I think I am going to settle on a total cost of about 5000 gold pieces, which I know is a HUGE discount, but I think it is thematically appropriate. The townsfolk of Phandelver really like the characters and think of them as heroes. These are the heroes who have freed them from the tyranny of the Redbrands, and they also have begun a war with the Cragmaw clan of goblins, and they also wiped out the Orcs at Wyvern Tor--basically, the town is very, very happy to have the player characters stay in Phandelver and make it a home base. I'm going to let the players design the layout of their new manor. (Side note: They have decided to completely wall off the secret passage into the cellar--they didn't want an enemy to be able to sneak in that way.)

In the next session the group will head to Cragmaw Castle and rescue Gundren Rockseeker. That will be session 8. At the end of that session I plan to have everyone level up to Level 3. After that, the only two big chunks left from the adventure are the ruined town of Thundertree and the climactic dungeon of Wave Echo Cave. When all of that is done we will close the book on the introductory adventure of the Lost Mine of Phandelver, and then jump almost immediately into the combined adventure of Storm King's Thunder and Tyranny of Dragons. I've been reading through those books working on a good way to combine the two and I think I have a really good plan.

Anyway, I just wanted to share this with everyone. Thanks again for your help and answers to my previous questions. If any of you have any suggestions based on anything I have just shared about how our first 7 sessions have gone and where we're going in the next few sessions, or with ideas for combining Storm King's Thunder and Tyranny of Dragons, I would love to hear your ideas. Thanks to everyone.

--Vorenus

[Nhorianscum]

Good update and an enjoyable little read.

+x weapons and armor don't require attunement.

[Great Dragon]

@Vorenus:
First: Welcome to GitP!!

I tend to run my games different from most, and as such sometimes get flack in threads.

Which is fine

My advice for a missing Caster Class is:
Add more Magic Items to Treasure.
Potions or Scrolls, and Wands are great.

Healing and Restoration for missing Clerics.
Wand of (Mass) Healing Word, and Remove Curse.

I tend to use Rings a lot for useful (Arcane) spells.
Like Detect Magic, Darkvision, See Invisibility, Devil's Sight. (Goggles are too easy to notice and take away, where a Ring might be overlooked by searching captors, Especially if they aren't made of shiny precious metals)

I just look at spells and ponder what would make a good usable item.
Using Attunement for some magic items will keep Item Bloat down.

I like a good Debate, so shoot me your Ideas.

*****

I'm also doing a combination of Storm King's Thunder and Tyranny of Dragons, although being a Grognard, I am of course adding things from Older versions of both.

I'm keeping Notes on everything in Google Docs, and I'm spending my personal Downtime (I'm retired) organizing and planning what the Major (Bad) Players are doing during the time the PCs are dealing with a situation. (and especially all PC Downtime)

I do run things where the BBEGs are much too busy dealing (indirectly) with each other, and are using Proxies and Minions to do basic footwork (because both BBEGs are trying to get the other into a situation where they are at a Disadvantage before engaging, and using Trickle Down Logic for Minions). This keeps things on a (mostly) Level Appropriate Challenge basis, backed by In Game Logic.

Since you asked, I can add specific information for Named Individuals (both in the Modules, and Homebrewed) as I have time to access my Tablet (I'm stuck on my phone 75% of the time, so please be patient with me)

Also, just FYI, I'm running three different Groups (on different days) in my Campaign World, and they can each affect what another Group Encounters.

Specific Group antics are found in my Ancient Realms (<-- Link) thread in World Building.

I'm most interested in what you and your Group do in something similar.

Edit: Moved: Here

[Vorenus]

Hello, Adventurers! It’s been a while since I checked in and shared how my campaign is going. Hopefully you’re enjoying reading about it. (If not, then I suppose you won’t read it?)
Last time I checked in I shared that we had completed our 7th session. Real life stuff made us skip a couple of weeks, but we have now finished our 9th session. During the 7th session the PCs made the trek to Conyberry to talk to the Banshee named Agatha on behalf of Sister Garaele (the Harper elf cleric in Phandalin); then they trekked south through the hills to explore Old Owl Well where they met Hamun Khost, a necromancer and Red Wizard of Thay; then they went further south to Wyvern Tor where they wiped out the Orc marauders; and finally they managed to learn the location of Cragmaw Castle by ambushing some Goblin raiders and interrogating them. So I had thought they would head straight to Cragmaw Castle in the 8th session. I planned for them to do everything at Cragmaw Castle in session 8, and then they would level up to level 3 at the end of that session. I’m using the Milestone Leveling system, as I believe I have mentioned before.

Instead, the players went “off script,” and it was simply wonderful. Sessions 8 and 9 have been really good examples of what happens when a group of players are collaborating really well with the DM (in this case, me!) to make the story their own. This is one of the reasons I got into roleplaying in the first place, and I’m always glad when it works out as well as it did.

In session 8, instead of going to Cragmaw Castle as I had anticipated, they instead spent the whole session interacting with the NPCs in the village of Phandalin. In particular they spent a lot of time talking to Sister Garaele, on whose behalf they had visited Agatha to ask about a lost Harper spellbook. The Aasimar Paladin character didn’t trust Sister Garaele, but the High Elf Rogue and the Wood Elf Ranger both did. The Dwarven Cleric and the Half-Orc Barbarian didn’t care one way or the other, they went and did other stuff during that part. The reason the Aasimar Paladin didn’t trust her was because they had been told some really negative things about the Harpers by Hamun Khost, the Red Wizard of Thay necromancer hanging out at Old Owl Well. During their conversation with Khost, he referred to the Harpers as an organization of “criminals and spies who seek to undermine political order and bring anarchy to the Realms.” This is, of course, a twisted interpretation of the Harpers’ own goals. Both the Wood Elf Ranger and the High Elf Rogue have as their bonds and motivations that they strive for freedom. They view themselves as champions of the oppressed, and the enemies of tyrants everywhere. They were very concerned that the Harpers might be the bad guys here. But after talking with Sister Garaele for a long time, they came to the realization that the Red Wizard of Thay was lying to them, and that the Harpers are actually a force for good who oppose oppression throughout the Realms. Sister Garaele did not tell them that she was, herself, a member of the Harpers, but she came really close to telling them. They will both very likely be invited by Sister Garaele to join the Harpers soon. However, the conversation took a really interesting turn when the PCs told Sister Garaele about their encounter with Hamun Khost. They told her about how they encountered the necromancer at Old Owl Well, and then they happened to mention that they told the necromancer about the Banshee living in Conyberry. Sister Garaele immediately reacted quite strongly to this information. I was ad libbing and improvising here, but it came off quite well. Sister Garaele said something like, “You told a necromancer where he could find a Banshee that he will most likely seek to enslave?” She told them she had to set off immediately to warn Agatha. That was basically the end of session 8.

Session 9, the players finally went to Cragmaw Castle. They did a really good job scouting out the location. The three stealthy characters (High Elf Rogue, Wood Elf Ranger, and Half-Orc Barbarian—all have Stealth as a Proficiency and have at least a +5 bonus, and none has armor that imposes disadvantage) infiltrated the castle and got into position so that when the two heavily armored characters (the Dwarven Cleric and Aasimar Paladin) entered through the main gate and drew lots of attention they were able to spring out and attack the Goblins in a flanking maneuver. It was really well executed. One of the highlights was when the Half-Orc Barbarian went into a rage and then ran off on his own, away from the other four PCs. He burst into a tower room that had five Goblins in it. Five rounds of combat later, all five were dead and he was barely hurt at all. Another highlight was when they released the Owlbear and provoked it to rush headlong into another mass of Goblins. They ended up having to kill the Owlbear and the Goblins in a very nasty and chaotic brawl that was quite fun to roleplay. We use tactical maps and miniatures for all combats, and I had printed out the entire map of Cragmaw Castle onto cardstock which I then laminated and taped to the table, revealing each room as they entered it, and the combat was a lot of fun. (The map is zoomed in and takes up 18 sheets of 8.5 x 11" cardstock, making a perfect tactical combat map.) Eventually they fought their way into the throne room and confronted the leader of the Cragmaw Clan, who was accompanied by a Drow—really, it was a Doppleganger, but the PCs didn’t know that. One of the PCs, the High Elf Rogue, remarked on how odd it was that a Drow was hanging out in this castle during the middle of the day, but that’s as far as they got with that particular lead. The Doppleganger actually escaped during the fight while the players were busy fighting King Grol and his two massive Worgs. The PCs killed King Grol and the Worgs, and rescued the unconscious Dundren Rockseeker.
So that’s where we ended for the session.

For session 10, I intend to take them off book again. They are going to get a message from Sister Garaele, using a magical spell or perhaps an animal messenger or something. Sister Garaele is going to tell the PCs she went to warn Agatha, but too late, and now Hamun Khost has captured Agatha and enslaved her. She is going to try and liberate Agatha. This will not go well, and she will also be captured, so the PCs will then get a chance to rescue both Agatha and Sister Garaele.

Then session 11 I plan for them to go to the ruined village of Thundertree to talk to the Druid Reidoth. The adventure as written has the PCs find the map to Wave Echo Cave in Castle Cragmaw, but I decided I really wanted the players to go to Thundertree, so I deleted the map from the Castle. The only way they will be able to locate Wave Echo Cave is by talking to the Druid Reidoth. They don’t know it yet, but the Druid has been taken captive by the Green Dragon Venomfang who has taken up residence in Thundertree. A really important reason for them going to Thundertree is to have their first encounter with the Cult of the Dragon. More on that in a minute.

After Thundertree, I plan for sessions 12-13 to be the Wave Echo Cave, the finale of the Lost Mines of Phandelver module. If you haven’t played through this module, I think it is really well done. It is a great sandbox type adventure. My players and I have really been enjoying it, and I am looking forward to using Phandalin as “home base” for a long time to come. I'm definitely getting a LOT of mileage out of this slim little module! 13+ sessions (9 done, plus 4 more anticipated) from about 60 pages of text and maps is really good value!

After the Wave Echo Cave finale, I’m going to start transitioning the campaign into simultaneously running both Tyranny of Dragons and Storm King’s Thunder spliced together. An idea I had that will really make this much better, I think, is to not have the start of Tyranny of Dragons set in the village of Greenest, but to instead substitute the village of Phandalin. As I’ve already mentioned, the PCs have really bonded with the villagers in Phandalin, and are working on renovating Tresendar Manor to be their long-term base of operations and home. So I’m going to have the blue dragon that attacks Greenest attack Phandalin instead. I think it will make a much more personal connection for the campaign, and provide a lot more motivation to the PCs to do a lot of the stuff they have to do in that module. One of the reasons I want the PCs to go to Thundertree is that I expect them to go BACK to Thundertree around session 16 or so, after the attack on Phandalin and the aftermath thereof. The Druid Reidoth, assuming he survives the clutches of the Green Dragon Venomfang, will come to the PCs and tell them that the Cult of the Dragon has returned to Thundertree, and they will go back to Thundertree to rescue some of the citizens of Phandalin who will be captured during the raid that was supposed to happen at Greenest. I think this is going to make the whole campaign a lot more interesting for everybody.

Long term, the culmination of Storm King’s Thunder is going to play into a massive finale wherein the Storm Giants will help the PCs in their war to free the land from the tyranny of dragons. At least, that’s the plan!

I hope everyone enjoyed reading this, and I’ll keep checking in as time goes on.

[KorvinStarmast]

Hello, Adventurers!

Sound like you all are having a great time.
Hooray, and happy adventuring. :)

[Great Dragon]

@Vorenus:
Thanks for the update !

[DrowPiratRobrts]

Basically because the published adventures are set in Forgotten Realms, and they already have good maps, and there are novels my players can read that are set in that world, too. I will eventually create my own world as I have done for other systems, but I want to master D&D first, and so the Forgotten Realms setting will work just fine. Until Planescape comes out, then I'm jumping ship to Sigil.

Also: because I work full-time and I am in grad school part-time, so I want to use published adventures to save time--at least until I finish my (current) graduate degree program.

Again, why set it up in the Forgotten Realms?

Another tip: I've heard many people say that SKT and Tyranny of Dragons were badly written. Which parts of those modules attracted you?

I've heard the same about those adventures though I haven't looked at them.

I agree with the whole feeling beholden to a FR setting. Even if you think it'll be less work to run FR, at a certain point you also have to make it your own or it will involve way more time in research to strictly follow the world as portrayed officially.

So I'd say go ahead and run a module if you want, but don't stress about the ins and outs of Forgotten Realms, because you're the DM. This is your Forgotten Realms. Do whatever you want if you aren't sure how to answer questions about certain gods or NPCs or social dynamics.