WotC Vecna Eve of Ruin: Everything You Need To Know

WotC has posted a 19-minute video telling you 'everything you need to know' about Vecna: Eve Of Ruin.

• Starts at 10th level, goes to 20th.
• Classic villains and setting, famous characters, D&D's legacy.
• Vecna wants to become the supreme being of the multiverse.
• Vecna is a god of secrets and secrets and the power of secrets are a theme throughout the book.
• A mechanical subsystem for using the power of secrets during combat.
• Going back to Ravenloft, the Nine Hells, places where 5th Edition has been in the last 10 years.
• It would be a fun 'meta experience' for players to visit locations they remember lore about.
• Finding pieces of the Rod of Seven Parts, pieces throughout the multiverse.
• Each piece in one of seven distinct planes or settings.
• Allustriel Silverhand has noticed something is wrong, puts call out to Tasha and Mordenkainen, who come to her sanctum in Sigil.
• The (10th level) PCs are fated to confront Vecna.
• Lord Soth and Strahd show up. Tiamat is mentioned but doesn't appear 'on screen'.
• Twists, turns, spoilers.
• It's a 'love letter to D&D'.

 

[Shardstone]

An adventure where Vecna gets betrayed by Lolth at the end...man it was right there

 

[Reynard]

No it hasn’t.

Ever Shrinking the design team and moving farther and farther toward Beyond focus IS enshittification.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

I think they should drop giant walls of text and do more with less -- words, specifically. I know I am a broken record on this, but if your adventures are meant to actually be played you need to write them and lay them out to that effect. Put the walls of prose in the intro and appendix and make the adventure actively functional.

Absolutely. I don't quite get why it always seems that some really important information is always missing, yet there's also always stuff that seems to be repeated.

But what you say is exactly the sort of thing that I mean. Give each part more space (not necessarily more words, though in some cases - such as more alternatives - it might take more words in different places).

 

[Demetrios1453]

Ok, I started reading through the adventure.
How does

Spoiler: Eve of Ruin WTF?

Kas fool Alustriel and Tasha into thinking that he can cast Wish? I know the Crown of Lies makes it so no one can tell you're lying, but... Kas can't cast spells. At all. He has Arcana, wooo, buuut he can't actually cast spells.

Spoiler

You answered your own question there by mentioning the Crown of Lies. Kas says he's helping cast wish, and the artifact makes Alustriel and Tasha 100% believe that he is doing so. No further explanation is necessary. The fact that he isn't actually casting the spell is the reason it malfunctions and summons the PCs.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

Ever Shrinking the design team and moving farther and farther toward Beyond focus IS enshittification.

The Design Team is far bigger than it was at the start of the edition.

Using Beyond is not either. Beyond is pretty much a pure positive for expanding the game. It’s not taking anything away from the print books.

 

[Demetrios1453]

Given that V:EoR begins in Neverwinter and the mini-adventure V:NotEE takes place there as well, this is what I'm currently thinking in creating a 1 - 10 campaign to lead into V:EoR:

Taking Chapter 1 of BG: DiA, which takes place in Baldur's Gate for levels 1 - 4, but moving it to Neverwinter (with appropriate adjustments), making the cultists of the Dead Three the dupes of Vecna cultists instead the dupes of Tiamat cultists, and interpolating V:NotEE while the party is at 3rd level.

Instead of finding links to Tiamat and the moving to Avernus, they find links to Acererak (and through him, Vecna), thus pointing them towards Chult to investigate Acererak's tomb there. After getting to Chult, it can be a pretty quick bee-line to Omu and the Tomb (instead of wandering around Chult long enough to gain like 4 - 5 levels), as Omu is recommended for level 6 and up, and they'll be leaving Neverwinter at levels 4 - 5 or so. Then just do the latter half of ToA, which is an easy lead-in to V:EoR through Acererak after returning to Neverwinter.

 

[Reynard]

The Design Team is far bigger than it was at the start of the edition.

Using Beyond is not either. Beyond is pretty much a pure positive for expanding the game. It’s not taking anything away from the print books.

Some folks who aren't happy about a pa carte purchases might have a different opinion.

 

[Demetrios1453]

Also, for the complaints that the Dragonlance section wasn't "Dragonlance-y" enough, there are some encounters with veterans in that section. As veterans are CR 3, just substitute them out with equivelent CR 3 kapak draconians. Bozak draconians (CR 2) and sivak draconians (CR 4) would work fine as well (and given the party's level, even throwing in a CR 6 aurak draconian probably wouldn't disrupt things much). Other than that, the chapter still has a decent amount of Dragonlance flavor, such as a kender, Lord Soth, and the entire chapter being dependent on Krynn's three moons. The only real issue are the canonically-questionable werewolves, but that sort of thing is something many a Krynn campaign has papered over before..

 

[MonsterEnvy]

Some folks who aren't happy about a pa carte purchases might have a different opinion.

Using Beyond and it expanding the game doesn't really have much to do with the A le carte purchases.

 

[mamba]

Some folks who aren't happy about a pa carte purchases might have a different opinion.

and they still would be wrong, even without that feature