I didn't want them to completely solve it, just understand the twist when it happened. The Redbrand mystery: run a mystery investigation collecting clues about what happened to Iarno Albrek. Igniting the forge: the giant forge in area 12 was the Forge of Spells and they needed the flame from area 15 to relight it after activating the billows.Įpilogue: I wrote up a short scene about where the characters were one year later, to really close it out, like the end of a novel.Įxchange reward: rather than 50GP for retrieving the Phandalin Miner's Exchange equipment, award the PCs membership into the Exchange, which entitles them to sell gemstones and loot at full GP value. Wave Echo Cave water puzzle: a puzzle that lets you put a bridge in place to divert the water across area 18 to the channel and start the billows in area 12. This dungeon honestly seems to be designed with arcane eye in mind, and getting some tedious mapping out of the way at the beginning is nice. I think DMs are hesitant about this spell but I think it's great in this case. The real Gundren is hidden somewhere else.Īrcane Eye in Wave Echo Cave: I gave them a single-use arcane eye to use in Wave Echo Cave. It says the Black Spider just left and if they hurry they can catch him, and it tries to escape once they're on the way out. Vyerith the doppelganger disguises itself as Gundren. Happy to go into much more detail if you want. Basically I have them explore for buffs and info to make it so they have a good shot against the dragon. I've turned it into a one-shot that I've run eight times now. Venomfang prep: I made a ton of tweaks to Thundertree. When they returned to Neverwinter I had the commander challenge the cleric to a one-on-one fight at Neverwinter gate. The party wound up stuck in the woods for 7 days.ĭwarf cleric's commander: this seemed like kind of a loose end in the character backstory. I then have a minigame where they have to make Survival checks and you go the wrong way if you fail. Lost in the woods: After visiting Agatha the players get magically lost. Reverdik Tresendar's diary: in the Redbrand hideout you discover a diary that reveals (1) the Black Hawk Aldith Tresendar's son survived the invasion and turned into the nothic and (2) Aldith is an ancestor of the human noble character, thus making them the rightful owner of Tresendar Manor. Leave the poster on the landing page so players see it every session and so they don't forget about him. Gundren's poster: the Phandalin Miner's Exchange hangs a poster with Gundren's picture and a 500 GP reward for his return as soon as they hear he's missing. It seems like many DMs recommend much more involved roleplaying here, but IMHO that's a lot to expect completely new players to do right off the bat. I asked all players to come up with a 5-10 word answer for the question "why does Gundren Rockseeker trust you?" and had them recite it. Begin with a 15-minute scene at Gundren's house in Neverwinter the night before you leave for Phandalin. I completely changed the wizard's and cleric's quests to be (IMHO) more in line with their character. For the folk hero fighter, for instance, I moved the +1 battleaxe elsewhere and in the dragon's loot put a +1 longbow crafted by your father for the wizard in Thundertree. Personal quests: I expanded each personal quest and made sure there was an appropriate magic item for completing them. I tweaked encounters to be harder, but not enough. I liked this because level 5 is fun, but along with the extra magic items, Wave Echo Cave is way too easy for five PCs. Reaching level 5: they were level 3 for Wyvern Tor, Agatha, and Old Owl Well, level 4 for Thundertree and Cragmaw Castle, then level 5 for Wave Echo Cave. I like lots of magic items, and it seems like the rewards favor some characters over others. Maybe it'll give you some ideas, including ideas of what not to do! :) I'm happy to give more detail on what I was trying to achieve with each of these, or why I feel like it worked or it didn't, if it seems like something you'd want to use.Įxtra magic items: Boots of elvenkind, goggles of night, a bunch of +1 arrows, a +1 longbow, wizard's cloak giving +1 to spell attack mod and save DC, and I made Lightbringer a +1 shield. I'm just going to list what I did and whether it worked for me. There's tons of suggestions out there about how you should tweak this module. This was my first DMing experience and overall I think it went well. It took us 21 sessions totaling around 45 hours. I just ran this campaign with 5 strangers from Roll 20 using the pre-generated characters.
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