D&D 5E Lost Mine of Phandelver tips n tricks

[Croesus]

1. Change the NPC names to something I can remember. (The only thing I truly disliked in the module were the names.)

2. Add some mystery and motivation to Iarno. In my current game, Iarno was sent to Neverwinter to stand trial and escaped. In tracking him down, they PCs keep hearing from all the people Iarno helped over the years. Now they don't know if he's a bad guy, been replaced by a doppleganger, been possessed and/or corrupted (perhaps by the glassstaff...).

3. Add more background to the Black Spider. I decided Yuan-ti are trying to resurrect their dead god, so if I did it over, I'd have BS be a Yuan-ti.

4. Add more background for the Forge. Along with my changes to Spider, I've decided that the Forge is powered by the essence of the slain god. That also ties in nicely with the area under Tressendar manor.

5. Mostly be prepared to go with what the players are interested in. My players were fascinated by the Nothic, so he's staying around, a somewhat incoherent source of information. The players hired Droop and another goblin from Cragmaw Castle. They bought out the tavern and won an election against Harbin Wester.

 

[Nebulous]

1. Change the NPC names to something I can remember. (The only thing I truly disliked in the module were the names.)

2. Add some mystery and motivation to Iarno. In my current game, Iarno was sent to Neverwinter to stand trial and escaped. In tracking him down, they PCs keep hearing from all the people Iarno helped over the years. Now they don't know if he's a bad guy, been replaced by a doppleganger, been possessed and/or corrupted (perhaps by the glassstaff...).

3. Add more background to the Black Spider. I decided Yuan-ti are trying to resurrect their dead god, so if I did it over, I'd have BS be a Yuan-ti.

4. Add more background for the Forge. Along with my changes to Spider, I've decided that the Forge is powered by the essence of the slain god. That also ties in nicely with the area under Tressendar manor.

5. Mostly be prepared to go with what the players are interested in. My players were fascinated by the Nothic, so he's staying around, a somewhat incoherent source of information. The players hired Droop and another goblin from Cragmaw Castle. They bought out the tavern and won an election against Harbin Wester.

1. The names didn't bother me, they were generic fantasy-stuff.

2. Iarno could definitely use more fleshing out, and that's a good purview of the DM. I couple paragraphs in the text would have been nice as well.

3. The Black Spider definitely needs to have more fluff. I had him engage the PCs early on by sending spiderhead emissaries that talked in his voice, so that let the party meet him several times before they killed him...which they did in one round when they DID meet him. He'd otherwise been a one-note villain. After that, he was turned into a zombie by a beholder and the PCs had to meet him again, and they questioned him using Speak With Dead concerning a curse on the Black Spider that a PC had subsequently been cursed with. So yeah, I got a lot of mileage out of the Black Spider.

4. I had the beholder and his duergar foregsmiths get hold of the Forge and were going to use it to arm humanoids in the region, and this instigated an armed response from Neverwinter to prevent that from happening.

5. And YES, be prepared to do what the players want. Don't force their hand down a certain path, give them options even if it is not what you had planned, and accommodate their ideas even if you feel personally it's not in their best interest and/or illogical. It often leads to the most memorable sessions.

 

[Michael Laramee]

My players having defeated the Orcs at Wyvern Tor for Hamon Kost return to him. Kost feeling gernerous and interested in knowing more about the players invite them for wine. (Kost got some more dangerous ruins to explore and he thinks that he may need more capable hands then his zombies(I wanted to establish this as a early plothook for later) ). For their efforts Kost rewards with a Jeweled Box worth 25gp. The rogue perception checks and notices there should be a ring there. Upon further investigation they see it on his hand. The two rogues thieves cant that they will steal the ring later that night. Our monk asks him to stay the night at old owl well as it is safe. A Nat 20 persuasion causes Kost to allow it on the other side fuetherust away from his tent. The two rogues successhly break into Kosts tent and with some great rolls steal the treasure and the ring of protection off him. They make their escape. My future plan is to have Kost bring an undead army to sack Phandlin possibly with the help of the Black Spider

Other DM thoughts? I am a first time DM and I like getting second opinions!

 

[aco175]

I added a small dungeon at Wyvern Tor with an skeleton wyvern at the top. There was orcs in a cave at the bottom and a hidden door that led to a few old rooms with smaller undead and the top aerie with the skeleton wyvern in it.

Th Conybery chapter could have been better fleshed out with the cultists being more active and the druid played better. There was a fight with the dragon on the tower that went well and the characters were on the verge of dying when the dragon was almost dead and ended up fleeing.

I agree with the final encounter with the mines and forge areas being an encounter that needs more. My players negotiated with the wraith and it still lives in the mines 6 months later. Next time they go back I may have it dead or let the PCs kill it after it tries to kick out the new occupants. I left a hook to sail off in the underground lake, but the players did not take it

 

[orderofthings]

Hmm. This adventure played really, really well for my group. I might do Cragmaw Castle differently, if I were to run it again. It turned into a slug-fest with a couple of failed Stealth checks at the rear of the castle leading to an all-out brawl in one of the back rooms, but the players seemed to love it, so no harm done. I would agree that Wave Echo Cave is a bit...flat, but they haven't quite finished that yet, so I'll reserve judgement.

Overall, I found very little to fault, especially in Phandalin itself, with a variety of interesting people and affiliations to muck around with. The party is regenerating the manor as a base of operations and it seems Phandalin will become their home for the forseeable future. With Gundren likely to return triumphant and promptly put Halia out of business, the adventure hooks practically write themselves in the run-up to Princes of the Apocalypse.

That's what we did and it worked perfectly. The two go hand in hand.

Sent from my SM-N920T using EN World mobile app