D&D 5E First Official Homebrew Campaign Adventure - Need help with ideas!

[monsterworkbench]

So I have 2 suggestions.

1) Use Monsterworkbench.com Great DM tool, Easy to use and Free. (Shameless plug)

2) Have a demon girl or spirit, something very evil chasing them the entire campaign. They can never kill her, but she can hurt them which will cause them to scatter, run into traps, etc. Everything she passes dies/crumbles, vegetation, animals, buildings etc... So they will need to be cautious of who they meet and what town they enter as they bring with them a trail of decay. One of the players has a cursed stone implanted under their skin and if they find it, can dig it out and she will stop following them. Give hints about the stone but don't give it away, let them figure it out. Or for a less morbid option, have one of the adventurers find a magic item that is way too good for their level like +3 but it has the stone in it and cannot be detected by evil or magic.

(This might be too adult, but kids these days have full beards so.)

-Abe

 

[aco175]

I would recommend having the gate close behind them and now they need to descend the interior of the mountain. Now you can add a few more varied monsters for them to encounter. Also, provide a place for them to rest such as a hidden shrine or secret room. Perhaps the interior was once a dwarven home and mines and now goblins control much of it except for the catacombs which undead control.

 

[JovialLichKing]

Really great ideas here. I'm thinking maybe I have the boss villain (see my other thread), who is too hard for them to defeat now, waiting outside the shrine entrance with his minions. Perhaps he wants the artifact they've just retrieved. They will have to retreat from him. This could provide a way to send them back down through a mountain cavern adventure without making them feel to "railroaded" into it.

Thoughts?


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[Kabouter Games]

Really great ideas here. I'm thinking maybe I have the boss villain (see my other thread), who is too hard for them to defeat now, waiting outside the shrine entrance with his minions. Perhaps he wants the artifact they've just retrieved. They will have to retreat from him. This could provide a way to send them back down through a mountain cavern adventure without making them feel to "railroaded" into it.

Thoughts?

I prefer this to simply having the entrance shut. They have a choice: To fight the BBEG or flee. If they fight, they'll die (they should die!) and it'll teach them a valuable lesson about when to run away. If they flee, they run into a prepared sequence of new adventure you've designed for them.

I don't see a downside to that.

What my fellow Ranger said about providing them a place to hole up and take a long rest is important. They'll have blown through most of their resources by now, surely.

Also, his idea about how to restructure the inside of the mountain is a good one. It's one I've used myself. I used duergar instead of goblins, but the principle remains.

Regards,

Bob

www.r-p-davis.com