D&D Encounters: New season: War of Everlasting Darkness

[Morrus]

This week marked the start of the newest D&D Encounters season, War of Everlasting Darkness, at participating Wizards Play Network stores across the country! Running through December 19, War of Everlasting Darkness is the final D&D Encounters season in the Rise of the Underdark storyline.

Deep in the darkness of the Demonweb Pits, Lolth has been spinning a web of deceit, treachery and ambition, but the time has come to fight back against her Darkening! Her goal – to seize control of arcane magic, a domain that has lain vacant since the death of Mystra a hundred years ago, and turn the surface world into eternal darkness. Under the advantage of her Darkening, Lolth’s servitors hope to help complete her ascendancy to her new role as Goddess of Magic. Can Lolth be stopped?

This season, there are three new features as the finale plays itself out:

• Level Up Each Session! - Characters will be allowed to level up at the conclusion of each weekly session (rather than each chapter), and characters will progress from level 1 to 8.
• Bring Your Own Hero to the Table! - Players will have a more robust array of character options to choose from and will be able to use the following books for character creation, including: Heroes of the Fallen Lands, Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms, Player’s Option: Heroes of Shadow, Player’s Option: Heroes of the Feywild, Player’s Option: Heroes of the Elemental Chaos and Into the Unknown: The Dungeon Survival Handbook.
• New Design! - Each session will be more of a mini-adventure rather than an individual encounter, with a balance of interaction, exploration and combat.

Wizards of the Coast’s D&D Encounters program is an exciting, weekly campaign that plays out one epic encounter at a time. Players defeat enemies, solve puzzles, finish quests and perform heroic deeds to earn Renown Points that can be used to gain exclusive rewards. Each session takes 1-2 hours to play, and each week there’s a new and exciting challenge. Jump in anytime!

 

[Plageman]

That's great but for us who don't live near a game store that offers an opportunity to join the D&D Encounters, I really hope WotC will start offering a digital way to experience these adventures.

 

[avin]

New Design! - Each session will be more of a mini-adventure rather than an individual encounter, with a balance of interaction, exploration and combat.

4E moving to DDN, just like from 3.5 to 4E.

 

[Dire Bare]

4E moving to DDN, just like from 3.5 to 4E.

Because in 4E there are no adventures, only encounters? Your comment makes no sense to me.

 

[Dire Bare]

That's great but for us who don't live near a game store that offers an opportunity to join the D&D Encounters, I really hope WotC will start offering a digital way to experience these adventures.

While I don't begrudge WotC's focus on in-store playing (it makes tons of sense from a marketing and financial perspective) . . . I too would love to see the Encounters and Lair Assault products eventually released digitally, even if it's a year later! Who knows, maybe when they start releasing digital product next year, they'll do just that!

 

[possum]

Interesting new format. I'm just halfway bummed that the materials hadn't arrived for character creation this Wednesday. Halfway bummed because I got to play in the Shadowrun demo that I'd been eyeing for months...

 

[Alphastream]

Interesting new format. I'm just halfway bummed that the materials hadn't arrived for character creation this Wednesday.

If your store ever has problems with getting kits, they should contact their WPN reps. Those reps are usually really good about fixing any problems. Of course, if your store forgot to order the kit then that can be a big problem. Still, it is worth prodding them to contact their rep.

 

[Alphastream]

Also, the thread here in the official forums for Encounters provides pregen characters for levels 1-8. This community effort provides any store with pregens so that if you have a walk-in player you don't need to sit them down to create a character. Because each week this season the PCs level up, having pregens can really help run a smooth event. Please help us get the word out regarding these pregens!

 

[avin]

Because in 4E there are no adventures, only encounters? Your comment makes no sense to me.

New Design! - Each session will be more of a mini-adventure rather than an individual encounter, with a balance of interaction, exploration and combat.

Because 4E is designed around "encounters" and DDN moves back to "adventure".

Because 4E focus heavily on combat and former editions have a far more balanced approach in exploration and RP.

If you are assuming I'm bashing 4E you are flat wrong, I like it, got 10+ books and I'm still playing an online campaign, so I can free of prejudice say that 4E business is combat, everything else it's on a second plane.

What I was trying to say is: everytime there's an edition change, later books (and now Internet stuff) shifts from the old paradigm to the new. That's why Wotc itself is saying "new design!".

 

[Dire Bare]

Because 4E is designed around "encounters" and DDN moves back to "adventure".

Because 4E focus heavily on combat and former editions have a far more balanced approach in exploration and RP.

If you are assuming I'm bashing 4E you are flat wrong, I like it, got 10+ books and I'm still playing an online campaign, so I can free of prejudice say that 4E business is combat, everything else it's on a second plane.

What I was trying to say is: everytime there's an edition change, later books (and now Internet stuff) shifts from the old paradigm to the new. That's why Wotc itself is saying "new design!".

Thanks for the clarification. While I'll agree that the 4E products focused design around combat encounters . . . . I've played full adventures composed of shorter combat encounters alongside a good mix of RP, exploration, and combat in 2E, 3E, and 4E.