Learn about D&D organized play options

[Alphastream]

I've updated the first post with information from the brand new wizards D&D site.

Of special interest:

New page on all the Factions.
New Adventurers League page.
Tons of content for new players. Good stuff for the hobby!

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

That's a fair point. If all you wanted was 4-hour one shots with loose connections, then the current program isn't providing that for home play. To be fair, I don't believe that's what most people were trying to do with organized play content (LFR, LG, etc.)

I'm going to disagree. My time as a Triad member and admin in LFR showed me that precisely what everyone was using those campaigns for. A large amount of the adventures were being run in stores purely due to space concerns. However, most of them were being ordered and ran with nearly no notice. I got so many questions about the minimum ordering time in LG as well as witnessed so many people breaking that rule. You were supposed to order 2(?) weeks in advance of the event time. But everyone ordered them less than a week before the time and lied about the time they were going to run on just so they had something to do on Saturday(and could get around the ordering system).

During the year I lived in Australia, the local store had 2 adventures every Saturday but the 30 or so regulars would constantly run adventures at their house on other days of the week.

The same was true of the people back in Winnipeg when I came back here. As well as most of the people I knew in Toronto(and surrounding area).

The entire point of playing LG was that the group of 30 people were all friends and that any 6 of them might be free on any particular day so they could get together and form a party for 5 hours....while simultaneously having their character be part of a larger campaign where the XP, gp and accomplishments you made during that 5 hours mattered in the greater campaign.

 

[Mull Ponders]

Store options

I just don't think funneling a significant portion of this playing content through stores is going to work. I live in Northern Virginia, a very rich environment for RPG and gaming stores in general. There are multiple stores that are no more than 45 minutes from my house, real gaming stores that have table space to play. A lovely DMing group decided to run a 5e event in a local store last Saturday. They got 4 tables lined up, 24 slots were available for players. The entire thing filled up in 12 hours with essentially no publicity. I wasn't checking their website and missed out. I would have really liked to try it, had actually cleared that Saturday from other responsibilities. But I failed to catch the 12 hour window when it kicked off. The group says they are going to do this once a month at various stores around the area. I promise you every event will fill very rapidly. Now, I'm not really upset at missing it, I can find other ways to play. But the number of stores, the availability of tables, the people who are willing to run these kinds of public events are all just too limited. If I can't figure out how to get in on a store event in my very metropolitan area, imagine the lack of access in 90% of the country.

 

[MerricB]

I just don't think funneling a significant portion of this playing content through stores is going to work.

Just a note on that "Significant Content"...

The adventures that will be available through D&D Expeditions make up a surprisingly small amount of the content that will be available for D&D.

D&D Encounters is just the first part of the published adventure "Hoard of the Dragon Queen".

There are currently 14 announced adventures for the D&D Expeditions line, but they are each a single session (3-4 hrs) long.

Meanwhile, "Hoard of the Dragon Queen" and "Rise of Tiamat" covers 14 or 15 levels of play... which is meant to be about 26 sessions worth. Then you have the Starter Set adventure, which is another 4 sessions or thereabouts.

So, you get about 120 hours of play through the published adventures, and in the first six months, only 56 hours of store-only play.

(And then there may be Dungeon magazine, if it ever restarts...)

There may come a time when the Adventurer's League is giving a lot of content... but it isn't looking like it yet.

Honestly, I'm rather worried about the dearth of material, and I'm extremely worried about using the first section of Hoard of the Dragon Queen for D&D Encounters. How many people are we going to lose from Encounters because they're running it at home at a much better pace? Or just want to complete the full adventure?

Cheers!

 

[Alphastream]

I've updated the section "What is Organized Play, a living campaign, and what do some of these terms mean?" with help from Pedr. Thanks!

Please let me know if you see ways to improve it, especially if you are new to organized play.

 

[Tony Vargas]

How many people are we going to lose from Encounters because they're running it at home at a much better pace? Or just want to complete the full adventure?

Maybe not all that many. IMHO, a big part of the appeal of Encounters is the casual aspect, which is ideal for new players or those with little time. It's public, so you can just show up, there's relatively little commitment, it's just a couple hours, you don't have to show up every week. Your character could die and you just lose 4 surges and show up the next time you feel like it, the DM can hand-wave who got a critical item last week when no one has it the table or two players do. That kind of thing.

The new Adventurers' League rules might make it less casual, and /that/ might cost a few players, but it seems reasonable to assume that it's more likely that using the first part of a published adventure in encounters will draw new/casual players /into/ campaigns, than that campaigns will keep out players who would otherwise attend.

 

[qstor]

the new rules have been posted I talked about one of the big new things here:

http://agamerspeaks.blogspot.com/2014/07/chhangesto-organized-play.html


Mike

 

[sidonunspa]

the new rules have been posted I talked about one of the big new things here:

http://agamerspeaks.blogspot.com/2014/07/chhangesto-organized-play.html


Mike

::::grumbles:::::

I wish people would remember the first living campaign to use organizations and intergrate them into campaign play and have them give player motivations within adventures (aka secret missions) was was "Living Arcanis" (not pathfinder)

:::grumbles::::

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

::::grumbles:::::

I wish people would remember the first living campaign to use organizations and intergrate them into campaign play and have them give player motivations within adventures (aka secret missions) was was "Living Arcanis" (not pathfinder)

:::grumbles::::

And on top of that WOTC did the same thing with Mark of Heroes before even Pathfinder did it.

edit: actually it was Xen'drik Expeditions I was thinking of, I believe.

edit 2: And the article says evil characters were not allowed but they were in Xen'drik Expeditions as well.

 

[Raddu]

Regional Coordinators

Want to be a Regional Coordinator for the D&D Adventurers League? Read this article and fill out the accompanying form to start your adventure!

If you've already sent us an email with your interested please fill out this form as well.

http://dndadventurersleague.org/2014/08/regional-coordinators-for-dd-adventurers-league/