Recent content by Burnside

For To Slay a Dragon, I sourced a lot of maps but I can't just post them here because mostly they are not free. However, I can tell you what I've used thus far and where I found them: Act 1 For the "On Safari" quest, I used "Forest of Fallen Giants" from Black Scrolls Games, which I purchased...

Thanos pre-dates Dungeons & Dragons itself by 2 years, and pre-dates Vecna’s debut by 3 years. Vecna was also pretty much just a couple of magic items until 1989-90, well after Thanos was an established arch-villain character for Marvel.

A family reunion for Maliboo in Toymaker Hall in Episode 9 of To Slay a Dragon, presented by Cast Party and EN Publishing. Available in the PodCast Party: A D&D Podcast feed, or right here: To Slay a Dragon Part 9: Lost Boy

Demogorgon was featured prominently in Out of the Abyss (2015) which was a full year before Stranger Things season 1. The D&D product reacting to S1 of Stranger Things (2016), featuring a Stranger Things-style "Demogorgon" monster, was the Stranger Things Starter Set (2019).

The adventure actually does provide an explanation for why only the PCs can solve the crisis.

Rather than talking about Vecna in “every” adventure, they have in fact mentioned him in zero adventures. You could make a good case for Asmodeus being the overarching villain in 5E as he does get mentioned or make cameos in many of the adventures, but there has never been a direct...

He has?

The adventurers venture to the outlaw town of Last Chance. There they find an old friend, and a new ally. Episode 7 of PodCast Party: To Slay a Dragon, presented by Cast Party and @enpublishingrpg, now on YouTube:

My concern with the adventure is that it feels like it might be too much inside baseball. Like, targeted at a small subset of really insider-y, hardcore fans. Or like watching Avengers: Endgame as the first Marvel movie you ever saw. For the vast majority of my players, who are casual and not...

Sure. It also doesn't mean "their messaging has been very clear."

I didn't interpret it to mean players can time-travel. I just think they mean that the DM can decide whether this adventure takes place before or after the events of Curse of Strahd. I don't think there is an implied opportunity to meet pre-Darklord Strahd.

I mean, Perkins said "it's the first adventure using the new rules." They muddy the messaging and contradict themselves a lot. Apologists either ignore the mistakes or maintain that anyone who points them out is lying.

It definitely feels more like a victory lap/greatest hits of 2014-2023 5E, especially with re-visiting locations & characters used in 5E adventures.

As written in Curse of Strahd, even if the players kill him, Strahd just returns a few months later courtesy of the Dark Powers, and the status quo is essentially re-set in Barovia. They definitely wrote it that way so that "canonically" Strahd is always there in Barovia.

It does feel like that, but, in fairness, at PAX East Perkins & Crawford did tout the Vecna book as "the first adventure featuring the new rules." I think folks are understandably confused. The messaging has been messy.