Very annoyed with the Quest XPs in KotS

So, we started playing KotS before I had read the full DMG. As I'm reading along I find that a normal Quest XP should give 400 XP for a party of 4 characters.

Having foolishly trusted that KotS was somehow balanced in its rewards and would advise me if something wasn't I've already handed my players an index card with the Find the Mentor Quest - for 1,250 XP. The equivalent of a 7th level quest. Which divided among the four of them will give them over 1/3 of the XP to pass to level 2. When the fight needed to finish the quest is just barely enough to count as a kinda hard level 1 fight.

Now of course I should have caught this if I had just thought for a second, but come on, you're using a pre-written adventure, you kind of trust the writers on some things.

Not only that, but now I've set expectations for quests in general, and now every 400-500 XP quest that comes along is going to seem paltry after this one.

So even though I rarely make these kinds of posts, I'd just like to say: BAD going on that one WotC, REALLY BAD GOING

It's actually equivalent to a 5th level quest... remember, KotS assumed 5 PCs. Still, it is more than a little on the high end. Not that I care too much, because I like it when quests have a major impact, and I also like letting my players advance in level quickly. It allows me to wrap up a campaign faster and move on to the other ideas I've been dying to get into play.

They are throw away characters and it allows them to advance faster and expose the players to the new powers faster. In the dragon bones pit, I could have TPK'd my 4 player party and I had only one character survive the Kobold lair and that was after adjusting the kobold lair for the lack of a fifth player.

Harr said:

So, we started playing KotS before I had read the full DMG. As I'm reading along I find that a normal Quest XP should give 400 XP for a party of 4 characters.

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I'm about to start KotS (wanted to wait for the players to be able to make their own characters), and I'd noticed the bloated Quest XPs (based on the DMG guidelines). I've reduced all awards to be appropriate.

I'm nervous about this adventure. I've heard TPK stories and cakewalk stories. Sounds swingy and situational.

-g

godfear said:

I'm nervous about this adventure. I've heard TPK stories and cakewalk stories. Sounds swingy and situational.

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I don't know if it is or not, but if you nerf the xp gain, you're only going to make it worse.

godfear said:

I'm nervous about this adventure. I've heard TPK stories and cakewalk stories. Sounds swingy and situational.

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It's gone very smoothly for my group. Every major fight has some "Uhoh!" points where one or two characters are in real danger of being taken out, but we haven't lost a character, nor tap-danced our way through the encounters.

From what I hear, most of the TPKs come from old 3.5 players not realizing a shift in tactics is necessary.

From what I understand (and I haven't read the whole DMG yet) Quest XP is expected reasonably often. And they come generally in small "encounter typical-sized" chunks. The ones for KotS are the only Quest XP awards you get so I can see why they are bigger (keeping in mind the plot hooks make it so that you're only getting/giving ONE of the Quest XP awards).