D&D 4E Trying to Decide on Module Order for a 4e Campaign

[Jessica]

I have another person interested in joining the 4e game I'm starting soon so we're tentatively starting on the 13th. Since I'm reigning in my tendency of planning big for a campaign, biting off more than I can chew skill and energy wise in the pre-campaign stages, getting anxious and stressed out, and then eventually stopping/cancelling, I decided that I'm going to run modules for AT LEAST all of Heroic Tier. I was wondering what would be the best order/choice for running the adventures? Here is what I have/will have soon:

Dungeon Delve (1-30)
Keep on the Shadowfell(1-3)
Marauders of the Dune Sea (2)
Madness at Gardmore Abbey (6-8)
Orcs of Stonefang Pass (4-5)
Prince of Undeath (27-30)
Pyramid of Shadows (7-10)
Revenge of the Giants (12-17)
Scepter Tower of Spellgard (2-5)
Seekers of the Ashen Crown (2-5)
Slaying Stone (1-2)
Thunderspire Labyrinth (4-6)
Tomb of Horrors (10-22)

From what I understand so far, all of my players will be new to 4e with one who is still relatively new-ish to D&D and one an experienced player of non-4e editions. I can pick up adventures to fill out that list if I can find a good deal on a hard copy(I love having all those maps and tiles and whatnot). What would be a good order to go in? Campaign setting-wise I'm leaning more towards Eberron because I like the concept although I don't know hardly anything about it.

 

[Oathstone]

There is good adventure for beginners in Eberron Campaign Guide, I would go for it, and follow it by Seekers of the Ashen Crown. Khyber's Harvest(free at drivethrurpg) is also set in Eberron.

 

[muppetmuppet]

I wouldn't run eberron useless you know something about it. It is quite an unusual world and unless you are willing to put some work in is hard to make work. It sounds like it would be effort better spent elsewhere.
I suggest running the keep on the shadowfell which actually was the introductory offer from wotc. There used to be a free update/errata version on their site in case you have an original and there are loads of blogs and suggestions.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Ugh! KOTS is just one of those adventures that is hard to recommend. There's very little there that is original or memorable. The main dungeon is a slog, the BBEG only makes an appearance at the very end as a lair boss, and otherwise the plot is pretty much remarkable only for its meaninglessness. There must be some LFR modules or something that are better. ANYTHING is better!

If you have the DMG you can always run Kobold Hall as an intro adventure. It isn't bad. There's nothing super special there, but the tactical situations are decent, and the thing is mercifully short, so it doesn't really have to have a lot of plot going on. It certainly fullfills its role as a basic rules intro and starter adventure. Once you get past that you can run things like Slaying Stone (which you can also start with, its a decent adventure). I'd just generally avoid the whole HPE series, unless you want to do a lot of tweaking. Orcs of Stonefang Pass is supposed to be pretty decent. There was an adventure published in the Essentials DMK that fits in between Slaying Stone and Orcs, that might work for you if you can get hold of it.

 

[Jessica]

I've heard so many good things about Madness at Gardmore Abbey that I really want to run it especially since I probably won't do at least the H part of the HPE adventures. If I did TMoP(Eberron Campaign book adventure) OR Slaying Stone --> Seekers of the Ashen Crown --> Madness at Gardmore Abbey with maybe a dungeon delve to fill in a gap or two level-wise, would that work? With Slaying Stone it seems I would want to make sure to pair up Orcs of Stonefang Pass up with it since people seem to include those two together. What adventure would be good to come after MaGA to bring in paragon tier? Also what are some of the best paragon tier adventure modules if I decide to go that route?

I wouldn't run eberron useless you know something about it. It is quite an unusual world and unless you are willing to put some work in is hard to make work. It sounds like it would be effort better spent elsewhere.
I suggest running the keep on the shadowfell which actually was the introductory offer from wotc. There used to be a free update/errata version on their site in case you have an original and there are loads of blogs and suggestions.

I have roughly 24 hours worth of commute to class between now and then, so I have time to read up ALOT on Eberron. I really like a lot of the concepts in how it's more "modern" in some ways(e.g. deities who aren't active in the world, aftermath of great wars, technology, etc).

 

[darkbard]

AbdulAlharzred is correct in that conventional wisdom will direct you to steer clear of the H1-E3 line, but I'm going to offer a dissenting viewpoint. I've run KotS twice to good success: once upon first release and again, much later in the edition, with foes updated to MM3+ stats and more optimized characters. This latter run through utilized the free updated version of the adventure available through WotC's website, which includes an early appearance (of sorts) by the BBEG to tie things together a little more tightly and make the heroes really hate the villain (particularly if one makes use of the Missing Mentor adventure hook and has the mentor killed by the villains and his corpse discovered in that scene).

While certainly not an amazing adventure, it does a very good job of introducing the game and many of its elements. I would, however, suggest doing some reading at gaming forums on how to rework skill challenges, particularly as they are presented in the first couple of years of 4E. This is an excellent place to start: https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/511098/dm-tips-how-to-run-a-skill-challenge-d-and-d-4e#post-623481

If you really enjoy KotS, Myrdraak has converted all the foes to MM3+ stats and written a revision that ties the story elements together much more closely throughout the entire adventure path, which is available here: http://web.comhem.se/mwester/Shadowfell/Documents/H1-H3_Orcus_Conversion.pdf

That said, my experience of the Heroic tier's high points would steer you to Reavers of Harkenwold (adventure included in the Essentials DM kit, but one can find it elsewhere) and Madness at Gardmore Abbey as the clear standouts. Those adventures take one from 2-4 and 6-8 or 9, respectively. So what I would do is start with elements of KotS but leave the end game unresolved, segue to Reavers, return to KotS and then move the Gardmore Abbey (conveniently set around Winterhaven, as is KotS). This might require a little bit of scaling some encounters and cutting some material from KotS, but, as AbdulAlhazred says above, there are segments that can be cut to reduce some of the grind therein anyway.

Best of luck! Enjoy!

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Oh, the one in the MV was not bad either. I never actually ran it, but it read through OK.

 

[Jessica]

I don't have the Monster Vault, but I realized that having a DDI subscriptions means I now have every single 4e Dungeon issue. Which Dungeon adventures are particularly good to do after MaGA?

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I don't have the Monster Vault, but I realized that having a DDI subscriptions means I now have every single 4e Dungeon issue. Which Dungeon adventures are particularly good to do after MaGA?

The various 'Chaos Scar' adventures are all short adventures of mostly heroic tier that you can drop in. I won't say they are all particularly good (or bad), but they're short and designed around the concept of adventuring in a small region filled with monsters. Its basically a respin of the old Keep on the Borderlands concept, though I don't think there is a real write up of the 'home base'. Its the same sort of idea, just extended with various adventure locations up through level 10 or so.

The only down side to Dungeon is its hard to find a really good index to all the adventures. WotC used to have a searchable one, but it contained EVERY article, not just adventures, and didn't have basic info like level etc, just the names. I'm pretty sure people have done better ones, maybe there's one here on ENWorld, but that would be a good thing to locate. You should really take a look at the LFR adventures too, many of the later ones are well-liked, and they're also fairly short, but can be strung together in story arcs. Of course they do use FR, but my guess is you can adapt many of them to Eberron without too much trouble.

 

[darkbard]

Its basically a respin of the old Keep on the Borderlands concept, though I don't think there is a real write up of the 'home base'.

Actually, they did a write up of the home base; I believe it's called, ugh, Restin Keep or some such ridiculous name. But, to be honest, name aside, the keep and its history/plot hooks are among the highlights of the Chaos Scar material. I don't remember in which issue it can be found, but it's there among the Chaos Scar material, some of which is quite good, delve-style material. A lot of it, though, is uninspiring.