D&D 5E Horde of the Dragon Queen (what am I doing wrong)spoilers

TaranTheWanderer · Jul 1, 2019

2 TPKs.

I don't get it. Am I playing the enemies too hard/smart?

Greenest: they try to rescue the people from the church. They attack the kobolds and cultists. One of the cultists gets hurt to 1hp so I make him retreat to get help. I give the group 10 rounds before reinforcements come. They rescue the people from the church but the Goliath goes down, no-one is strong enough to move him and they all get dropped defending him.

- should I not have my enemies run to get help? The fight seemed way too hard for a 1st level adventure. Maybe they were 2nd.

I started the next session with them captured at the enemy camp.

Next:

Hatchery: They wipe the whole dungeon, including Cyanwrath and leave Fruluum and the 10 guards/cultists for last. They were all in single digit hps and out of spells and abilities before that fight and they didn't take a long rest. I gave them a second short rest AND let them level to 4th (no new spells but added hps and hit dice, new abilities and spell slots). That felt like the best compromise because taking a long rest after slaughtering everyone didn't seem prudent. Fruluum just wiped the floor with them. It was a drawn out battle and they killed everyone but one cultist and one guard but hardly touched the Boss. She just stood back, surrounded by guards with Spirit Guardian up and Sanctuary. If anyone got close(which only happened once) she smacked them with her Halberd and recast sanctuary. I used mooks to block up the narrow passageways to prevent more than one or two PCs getting into the room at once and to gang up on anyone who got in the room. I never made all the cultists attack. I always made one do the help action (to flank or whatever)and the second attack at advantage.

The adventure just seems so hard. And now what? They all made their death saves so they're unconcious but I find it hard to suspend disbelief by making them prisoners AGAIN....time for new characters? Is the whole module like this? I hate the idea of new characters because the adventure is a bit rail-roady and I'd spent a great deal of time making hooks for the characters.

My idea is to have the one survivor - a player who wasn't at the game last night and is disguised as a guard - to run back and find a new group of adventurers to help him finish off the cult at the hatchery.

Charlaquin · Jul 1, 2019

I can tell you exactly what you’re doing wrong. You’re running Hoard of the Dragon Queen. It’s a terrible module.

TaranTheWanderer · Jul 1, 2019

Charlaquin said:
I can tell you exactly what you’re doing wrong. You’re running Hoard of the Dragon Queen. It’s a terrible module.

Ok, fair enough. One of my players had it and I don't have lots of time to do a homebrew campaign, so I ran it. Are you suggesting I ran things properly?

I've been playing 5e for three or so years and have been finding it to be a less deadly compared to previous editions. It could be that I've had a couple 'story driven' DMs who didn't push combat very hard. Even when I DM one-shots, I've found I've been able to err on the side of more deadly to challenge PCs.

I guess I was just 'trusting' the module for balance but a lot doesn't feel 'right' as I was prepping stuff. I know there's a thread to help 'improve' the module but what's the point of having a module if you have to read a 10-page thread? For me, I run modules to save time and reading piles of threads is just more prep that I don't have time for.

What modules are good? I'm willing to buy a different one. I was thinking of running Storm King's Thunder.

I told them to make new characters. They're all new to D&D so, on the bright side, they've learned the value of retreating and caution.

Morrus · Jul 1, 2019

I definitely found it pitched tough. IIRC (it was a few years back!) we had to tone down a lot of the encounters at the time.

Paul Farquhar · Jul 1, 2019

I think even the good ones benefit from preperation and tweeking to suit your table. I haven't read HotDQ, but I'm aware that it isn't well regarded.

Tales and Chronicles · Jul 1, 2019

The first chapters of HotDQ are incredibly lethal. The numbers of enemies encountered versus the staying power of a 1st level group is ridicule. It requires a lot of Dm work to work adequately, and even then, most of the chapters arent that interesting. The whole caravan trip is really a motivation killer; sooner of later a party member will ask the fatal question: ''why are we even doing this?''

I replaced the first chapters of HotQD with Sunless Citadel, with the party as resident of Oakhurst looking for their friends, and have the party find the red dragon mask in a discarded pile of junk. What a surprise when the cult of dragon shows up just as the party exit the citadel to ask to hand them over the mask! They were taken as slave, separated from their friends from Oakhurst, along a huge (in cinematic) trip until they reached the hatchery not far from the Castle Nerytar. They entered the hatchery, found the password to enter the castle (I used the Forge of Fury instead of the regular castle), then fought their way to the bottom of the castle, found a portal that would take them to the Floating Castle.

This way, the party would fight some dragons (there's just one dragon fight in HotDQ) and have a better motivation to pursue the cult.

Alternatively, all first chapters of HotDQ could be replaced with a refluff for lower levels of Red Hand of Doom, but it will require more work since its a 3ed module.

akr71 · Jul 1, 2019

I had to place a number of healing potions for the characters to find in the first 3 chapters. I also had a few NPCs available for help in certain situations because my group was only 3 people and that felt like certain death at points.

If you don't have time for a lot of prep, I would certainly consider something different. HotDQ & RoT took A LOT of prep and tweaking.

My group is having a lot of fun with Dungeon of the Mad Mage, but they're big into dungeon crawls. A dungeon crawl beneath a big city where they can escape to when they need a break - and I need a DM break - is suiting us just fine.

Sadras · Jul 1, 2019

TaranTheWanderer said:
They're all new to D&D so, on the bright side, they've learned the value of retreating and caution.

Despite the module's difficulty inexperience might also be a factor.

With regards to where to restart from...
I'd say keep the characters, have them rescued by Delaan Winterhound (Rise of Tiamat - Council Member) with his pet Loska, who was investigating rumours of a dragon hatchery in the area. The cult has long since taken off - so the party are a tenday or so behind the Cult.

The characters failed so they should have a setback of some kind besides the fact that they lost their equipment...
Let them select from one or more of the below, no two characters should have the same

(a) Lingering Injury: Festering Wound, Horrible Scar, Lose an Eye/Hand (think Beric Dondarrion or Jaime Lannister)*;

(b) Madness (when in the presence of Frulam again): The character retreats into his or her mind and becomes paralyzed . The effect ends if the character takes any damage, OR the character becomes incapacitated and spends the duration screaming or weeping OR the character becomes frightened and must use his or her action and movement each round to flee from the source of the fear. Only a successful DC 12 will save at the end of the round removes the temporary madness.

(c) Demoralised: Loss of Inspiration until party succeeds in their first combat encounter;

(d) Hardened: Additional character Flaw or negative character trait

* They can have have these repaired at great personal cost to the characters - financial debt, pledge allegiance to a faction, individual which may be used for interesting roleplaying opportunities during the council meetings in Rise of Tiamat OR to offset the negative give such a player a Plot Point.

Also you can build up Frulam as the party's nemesis, maybe Frulam impressed by one of the party members during the combat, woke him/her out of unconsciousness in attempt to recruit him/her to the cult's cause, perhaps mistakenly providing additional information on the cult's further activities, maybe she kissed the character - being physically attracted to them...before knocking them out again for their refusal to join her.

I think this is a great roleplaying opportunity to setup some great future conflict.
Perhaps one of them comes back with a vision/memory from the Wall of the Faithless...did that really happen...

DEFCON 1 · Jul 1, 2019

I don't see you doing anything wrong.

I see your group deciding to "all go down with the ship".

That's not a problem you have to solve, that's their choice.

*****

In the first instance, once the goliath fell unconscious and they discovered they couldn't lift him and get him away, the group could have decided to leave him there and get the villagers to safety. They chose not to and decided to defend him. You rightly made the call to give the enemies 10 rounds before coming back with reinforcements, plenty of time for them to get away if they wanted to. They decided not to and they paid for it with their lives, which is neither your fault nor the fault of the adventure.

In the second case... they knew what their status was prior to that final fight. They could have (if they had decided to) just camped out at the mouth of the hatchery (assuming Fruluum anbd the guards were still inside) to get their long rest, and let the enemies come to them. That would have given them a better position for the fight most likely, if Fruluum and the guards decided to try and get out.

Instead, they chose to forsake a long rest in order to try and "clear the level" in a single go. Again... they didn't have to do that. And the chapter of the book isn't written specifically to allow parties to do that. Now is it possible? Sure. The right plan, getting lucky on rolls, etc. etc. and quite possibly some groups could kill each and every inhabitant of the camp without needing to take a long rest. But the chapter wasn't written under the expectation that every group would be doing that. So again... it's not your fault, and its not the fault of the adventure. Your players made a choice and they were killed because of it.

If this is something neither you nor your players want to have happen... then they either need to change their battle plans going forward, or you need to change how you throw encounters at them so they can easily rest whenever they want.

Does that mean you can't just play HotDQ "as-is"? Quite possibly. But this will be true of any adventures you run... at some point as the DM you have to put a little thought and time into what you run because only you know what your group's inclinations and abilities are. That's the job of the DM... to give their players the experience they are looking for.

jayoungr · Jul 1, 2019

TaranTheWanderer said:
Ok, fair enough. One of my players had it and I don't have lots of time to do a homebrew campaign, so I ran it.

The idea that HotDQ is "a terrible module" is not shared by everyone on this board. My group had a great time with it, and I think it is unfairly maligned.

TaranTheWanderer said:
Are you suggesting I ran things properly?

Hard to say without more information. The fact that your players are inexperienced may be a large factor.

Are they making any effort to be stealthy and avoid encounters that they're not ready for? If so, are you calling for group checks or does everyone in the group have to pass in order for it to work? Do they ever try to talk their way out of combat instead of fighting, and if so, do you let them do that?

How is the lethality happening? For example, you said one of your players is a Goliath; what class is he? Are your spellcasters getting caught in melee? Are you using the flanking rules, and if so, are your players making use of them?

TaranTheWanderer said:
I guess I was just 'trusting' the module for balance but a lot doesn't feel 'right' as I was prepping stuff.

My group didn't have any deaths in the early levels, but they were all experienced players, which may make a difference. It got so that I'd add a couple of extra minions to every fight just to keep them challenged. If you want a quick-and-dirty solution, why not just remove a couple of minions from every fight?

vincegetorix said:
The whole caravan trip is really a motivation killer;

For some groups, maybe. If your group enjoys roleplaying and social interaction, as mine does, it can be the high point of the adventure. That chapter definitely plays better than it reads, in my experience.

vincegetorix said:
sooner of later a party member will ask the fatal question: ''why are we even doing this?''

They're doing it to stay with the treasure and find out where it's going. Pretty simple answer.

vincegetorix said:
(there's just one dragon fight in HotDQ)

Two, technically; there's the blue dragon at the beginning that the PCs help to drive away from Greenest, and the white dragon in the flying castle at the end.