D&D 5E Is Storm King's Thunder a flop . . ? Still early yet but doesn't look that good.

[dagger]

Part of the problem (in my view) is the new strategy to make every product appeal to players and DMs, so they are all sort of hybrid. Thus, we got a book that is average or above average at everything but not awesome at anything.

So we have crunch, we have setting material for FR (tons of it), and an adventure that goes from 5-10.

 

[Jester David]

I liked SKT and there's a lot of good sections, but it has problems.


There's few plot hooks for the adventure and the story doesn't really go anywhere. There actually isn't really a story per se, just a big sandbox to wander through. It's not so much an adventure but a series of set pieces and dungeons that player characters stumble between.


The actual story of the "event" isn't even really resolved or addressed. The adventure just ends and things are assumed to go back to normal somehow behind the scenes. Which is a big friction point for the last third of the adventure, because the module assumes you're going to focus on finding the titular Storm King when really every player will be much more interested in restoring the Ordning, which will stop all the giant misbehaving that's actually a problem. Finding Hekaton doesn't stop the frost giants or save any of the "small folk".


I blame Chris Perkins.


Okay, that's a dick thing to say, but hear me out.
I had some issues with Curse of Strahd and the lack of direction between locales and hooks. But then I watched him run the adventure for Dice, Camera, Action and saw how he took what was in the pages of the book and expanded on them, drawing on the book to tell the story of the Waffle Crew. Some masterful DMing. And seeing that in action, I can totally see him doing something similar for Storm King's Thunder: pulling on the motivations of the giantess princesses and having them scheme in response to the players, or having them show up earlier with machiavellian intentions. Reading between the lines of the adventure and fleshing it out to tell his player's stories, with the actions of the party and events of each session affecting the narrative, and the adventure being a big bag of tricks and scenes that can be drawn from as needed by the story.
That's great for a master DM. For Chris Perkins. Someone who has read the adventure a few times cover to cover and knows which NPCs they can bring in on the fly, and feels comfortable tweaking the adventure. But it's less useful for people who need those rails and set plots, who don't know the adventure front-and-back, who don't feel comfortable adding moments or extrapolating actions of NPCs. It's ill suited to rookie DMs, organized play DMs tailoring things less to the party, people running a published adventure because it's lower prep, etc.
The above also makes it less fun to read. Adventures with a stronger storyline are more fun to just sit down and skim. And the potential reactive story elements are less apparent upon reading, making it less exciting and thus less desirable to play.

 

[Jester David]

Maybe people are just getting sick of AP's and want source books that will help them create their own stories.

If that was true we'd see a gradual decline of review scores (or even reviews) but Strahd reviewed very well and got a lot of attention. But that's sitting at 90%, which is higher than OotA (82%).

It seems much more likely people just don't like SKT...

 

[robus]

Maybe people are just getting sick of AP's and want source books that will help them create their own stories.

Not yet sick of APs but I'm definitely starting to see the fun in creating your own stuff.

 

[Corpsetaker]

I blame Chris Perkins.

(snip)

It's not a dick move because you are 100% correct. If you don't voice your opinion then they go on as if everything is fine. I think people forget that we are consumers and if we aren't happy with a product or the direction it's going then we 100% right to say something. Chris Perkins isn't your friend, he is an employee that helps provide an entertainment service.

 

[Corpsetaker]

If that was true we'd see a gradual decline of review scores (or even reviews) but Strahd reviewed very well and got a lot of attention. But that's sitting at 90%, which is higher than OotA (82%).

It seems much more likely people just don't like SKT...

Don't forget that CoS took the PC's outside of the Realms and introduced an iconic villain. You can be sick of AP's but still enjoy the occasional one that tickles your fancy.

 

[Prakriti]

I really don't understand the excitement about the flow chart. It's not like the plot is particularly complex and, if anything, it emphasizes the redundancy of some of the content.

I love the flow-chart, and I hope it appears in future adventures, but you're right: SKT doesn't get much benefit out of it. That's both because the book is well-organized (the chapter sequence actually coincides with level progression) and because SKT is pretty linear in design.

As for negative reviews -- I wrote one. One month later, I stand by my review. My opinion has not changed. Every time I think about running SKT, I shudder. It's a totally different feeling than what I get when I read most other published adventures. I loved reading Curse of Strahd, for example. I could envision the locations and the characters, I could fit the pieces together in my mind, and I could, most of all, picture my players having fun. Not so with SKT. Reading SKT is like being handed 25% of a rough draft for an adventure and being told to finish it on your own. Good luck with that.

I would love to say that SKT is a great adventure. The Sword Coast is my favorite adventuring location. I love traditional fantasy. SKT's setting and tone are classic D&D. But the adventure itself -- the most important part -- is a jumbled mess.

 

[Morrus]

Remember to comment and rate the product in its actual entry in the database, guys, rather than just here (though both is fine, too). The more comments and ratings there, the more useful the rating becomes. At the moment, it still needs another 4 ratings to become certified, so it's score is only provisional right now.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I think the problem I am seeing overall w/5e published content is that they really cater too much to the rpgers and sandboxers. Those of us that like encounter-encounter flow in a linear format (miniature enthusiasts, gamists, those who liked 3.5 and 4e, power gamers) are just getting hosed.

And yet, when you go back and read the reviews of Tyranny of Dragons, Princes of the Apocalypse, and Out of the Abyss... a major complain of those were that they WERE linear, and NOT catering to the sandboxers. So it was the sandboxers who felt they needed something "different" after the sandbox of Lost Mines. Thus, since then we've gotten two APs that switch things up and are more sandboxy for those that want them. So now we have three more linear stories, and three more open stories for people to choose from.

Isn't that the entire point of releasing two APs every year? So that there's always something new and different getting released around the corner that you might want to run once your current campaign ends? I mean hell... I ran Tyranny as my first campaign, and once it wrapped up I went immediately into Curse. So I haven't even touched LMoP, PotA, OotA or SKT yet. Which means WotC has like at least two more books on top of those four to release before I need to select a new AP to run... and that means I'm going to have a pretty wide variety of adventure types and styles to choose from when it comes time.

No one's going to get their preferred AP type each and every time. But chances are pretty good that if you do find at least one to run... another one or two are going to get released in the next year or so that will be a good next one to jump into. It might not be the direct next one... but you're probably going to have another option sooner rather than later.

 

[flametitan]

I had some issues with Curse of Strahd and the lack of direction between locales and hooks. But then I watched him run the adventure for Dice, Camera, Action and saw how he took what was in the pages of the book and expanded on them, drawing on the book to tell the story of the Waffle Crew. Some masterful DMing. And seeing that in action, I can totally see him doing something similar for Storm King's Thunder: pulling on the motivations of the giantess princesses and having them scheme in response to the players, or having them show up earlier with machiavellian intentions. Reading between the lines of the adventure and fleshing it out to tell his player's stories, with the actions of the party and events of each session affecting the narrative, and the adventure being a big bag of tricks and scenes that can be drawn from as needed by the story.

Honestly I think this is an issue common to the 5e paths, taking the time to think about it more.

The most blatant example of this would be Princes of the Apocalypse, though that may not be Perkins' fault in that case. The set-up talks about how the cults really only barely tolerate each other, and that they'll fight when given the chance. However, as far as I can read, the adventure only plays lip service to this, and seems to expect the DM to add the possibility of the cults trying to get the PCs to clear their rival powers, rather than try to include "Well, here's what the fire cultists plan to do to usurp the water cultists, and the PCs can try to help them, try to stop them, or take advantage of the ensuing chaos to try and eliminate both cults."