D&D 5E Anyone else feeling "meh" about recent 5e releases?

[Vael]

Fair enough.

It's just that hardcover books are not cheap, especially after the exchange rate (I'm Canadian). I've only bought 4 non-core books: Hoard of the Dragon Queen, The Rise of Tiamat, Xanathar's Guide to Everything and Ghosts of Saltmarsh.

I won't repeat myself, just I found the Tyranny two-parter pretty underwhelming.

Xanathar's is easily my favourite non-core book. There's a lot to like, the expanded player options, the new spells, and even some really good DM resources.

Ghosts of Saltmarsh, I have mixed feelings about. The adventures are okay, I don't mind that they're old adventures redone for 5e, but I'll admit I mainly bought it for the section on nautical adventuring. And while that section is pretty solid, I really felt like it was a little bare bones. I know, it's not fair to compare an appendix to a whole book, but I remember 3.5's Stormwrack, and felt like more could have been done.

While I don't own it, I've played through Curse of Strahd. Definitely an enjoyable adventure.

Of the books that are printed or announced, there are only 2 on my radar. I'll definitely get the Eberron book, it's my favourite campaign setting, and it has been a long time waiting. Someone in my play group has expressed interest in running a Ravnica campaign, I'll get the book if that becomes a thing.

 

[Parmandur]

Fair enough.

It's just that hardcover books are not cheap, especially after the exchange rate (I'm Canadian). I've only bought 4 non-core books: Hoard of the Dragon Queen, The Rise of Tiamat, Xanathar's Guide to Everything and Ghosts of Saltmarsh.

I won't repeat myself, just I found the Tyranny two-parter pretty underwhelming.

Xanathar's is easily my favourite non-core book. There's a lot to like, the expanded player options, the new spells, and even some really good DM resources.

Ghosts of Saltmarsh, I have mixed feelings about. The adventures are okay, I don't mind that they're old adventures redone for 5e, but I'll admit I mainly bought it for the section on nautical adventuring. And while that section is pretty solid, I really felt like it was a little bare bones. I know, it's not fair to compare an appendix to a whole book, but I remember 3.5's Stormwrack, and felt like more could have been done.

While I don't own it, I've played through Curse of Strahd. Definitely an enjoyable adventure.

Of the books that are printed or announced, there are only 2 on my radar. I'll definitely get the Eberron book, it's my favourite campaign setting, and it has been a long time waiting. Someone in my play group has expressed interest in running a Ravnica campaign, I'll get the book if that becomes a thing.

Fair enough: I get the books on discount through my local store, and I do consider them fairly cheap, especially by the hourly entertainment ratio. I paid less for Hoard of the Dragon Queen than I did to take my young brother-in-law to see You Story 4 in the theatre, and got way more quality and quantity of HotDQ.

 

[Mistwell]

Since then we got Dragon Heist (no interest in that); GREAT ADVENTURE

Ravnica (the MtG setting - blah); AGREE

Dungeon of the Mad Mage (ho-hum); LOVE LOVE LOVE THIS.

Stranger Things Starter (no interest); LOOKING FORWARD TO IT

Saltmarsh (reprint - only mildly interested in that); NOT REALLY A REPRINT, REALLY LOOKING FORWARD TO IT

Acquisitions Inc (a parody setting book); NOT WOTC

and another Starter Set NOT REALLY A STARTER SET BTW

Other announced books include Rick & Morty (another comedy book) NOT WOTC

Avernus (edge lord stuff I can't get excited about) LOOKING FORWARD TO IT

Eberron (blah) REALLY LOOKING FORWARD TO IT

 

[Parmandur]

Since then we got Dragon Heist (no interest in that); GREAT ADVENTURE

Ravnica (the MtG setting - blah); AGREE

Dungeon of the Mad Mage (ho-hum); LOVE LOVE LOVE THIS.

Stranger Things Starter (no interest); LOOKING FORWARD TO IT

Saltmarsh (reprint - only mildly interested in that); NOT REALLY A REPRINT, REALLY LOOKING FORWARD TO IT

Acquisitions Inc (a parody setting book); NOT WOTC

and another Starter Set NOT REALLY A STARTER SET BTW

Other announced books include Rick & Morty (another comedy book) NOT WOTC

Avernus (edge lord stuff I can't get excited about) LOOKING FORWARD TO IT

Eberron (blah) REALLY LOOKING FORWARD TO IT

The Rick and Morty box set is WotX, Kate Wlech has been writing part of it.

 

[ccs]

But fine, I haven't read all the 5e adventures, and clearly I'm an outlier, so I'll ask the thread: How would you order the 5e Adventures from best to worst? And how do they compare to other adventures from other systems?

My rankings, best to worst. with commentary.

Lost Mines of Phandelvar - played this, good opening adventure.
Tales From the Yawning Portal - Own it, read it, played some of it here in 5e, played all but 2 of the adventures in previous editions, & will certainly use parts of it as a DM. It's a selection of great adventures from previous editions converted to 5e. It not a linked campaign, just multiple stand alone adventures sandwiched between one set of covers.
Tomb of Annihilation - Great jungle based sandbox, fun dungeon crawl at the end inspired by the original Tomb of Horrors (found in Tales of the Yawning Portal above). Kind of stupid beginning though. Afterall, why would the NPC trust this quest to 1st lvs?
Curse of Strahd - Well done. Though you're entry into Barovia as 1st-3rd lv characters is a bit week. I've put it 4th because: It's mostly a walking tour of Barovia (the lands surrounding Castle Ravenloft) & its horrors when all you really ever want is to get to Castle Ravenloft and fight the vampire....
But as they have to walk you from lv1 - lv10 or so 1st in order to stretch this into a whole campaign instead of just being a lv.? one shot....
How's it compare to the original & other iterations? About the same as the late 3.5 Expedition to Castle Ravenloft. And IMO completely inferior to the original 1e module (I6 Ravenloft) & it's 2e version House of Strahd - because you've got to foot slog about &^* Barovia for ___ lvs 1st. Wich really just wastes weeks - months of real life play time.
Storm Kings Thunder - Better than the classic 1e G series that inspired it (they were mostly just dungeon hacks vs ever larger giants). Stupid opening though. And as written you won't be going through chapters dedicated to each of the giant types. You'll have to pick one giant type to fight.
Out of the Abyss - I like the concept. It's an Underdark sandbox inspired by the 1e Drow series & the 2e Night Below. And it's got demon lords running about giving me a good excuse to use my Gale Force 9 Demogorgan model. The beginning of this one is pretty good too. You've been captured by the Drow & have to escape.
But after that? My players don't seem at all interested in visiting Kuo-Toan town, Duergar city, or a Drow city. They're perfectly fine with letting Demogorgan & pals eat all those factions. And after exploring the Jungles of Chult in ToA for almost a year the underdark survival/hexcrawl exploration aspect is wearing thinner than I'd expected. So I'm having to focus more on them helping the deep gnomes. I have no idea how the 2nd 1/2 is actually going to play.
Oh. And the large scale map for this is atrocious. It's a 1 page hex map with a color overlay of A) underdark locations, B) surface world terrain printed on it. But the hex lines are so faint/obscured that they might as well not be there. There's also places marked on the map that I've yet to find any entries/details for. (but hey, I've got 2 pages of description for underdark fungi!). Likewise for the color coded "depths". No explanation given. Just color blotting out the hex grid. Very annoying.
Hows's rate next to the 1e series & Night Below? I think it breaks about even.
Princes of the Apocalypse - Inspired by Temple of elemental Evil. Read it once but have yet to run it as we'd just finished the original about 6 months prior to it being announced. Overall I like it more than the original, but I'd need to run it for a different group.
Dragon Heist - I like the idea. I can see what they're aiming for. I was considering running this but it's got a terrible opening & is a bit of a mess. I'll revisit this one eventually.
Hoard of the Dragon Queen/Rise of Tiamat - Played this one, read this one. Ugh. And again with the tour of the setting. The openings a bit rough at 1st lv. But at least it's not stupid plot wise. Start in Greenest, go to ___ for reasons, trail the cult all about the swordcoast.... Have high lv NPC foist tasks off to the players.... And it takes two volumes to do this. Inspired by the 3.5 Red Hand of Doom. Comparison? Just go get yourself a copy of RHoD & plug in 5e stats for the monsters.
Dungeon of the Mad Mage - Playing this one. Hey? You know what might be worse than Hoard/Tiamat? An almost endless super dungeon crawl! It's directly inspired (right down exact copies of the lv maps) of the Undermountain set(s) from 2e. And it sucked then too.


Goodman Games Keep on the Borderlands/In Search of Adventure & Isle of Dread.
Excellent - they include both the original versions & 5e versions. I've read them, but as I have (and can even quote) the originals I see no point in spending the $/eating up shelf space for these volumes.

Saltmarsh - own it, haven't read much of it yet. Love the 1e U-series it's based on/inspired by though. So....?

Balders Gate Avernus - Don't know. At a glance I'm not interested atm. Also atm I don't have a need for another AP. But in about a years time I might change my mind. And I'll be adding it to my Amazon Wish list as my cousins always need a few Christmas ideas (and I refuse to give out mundane practical ideas) .

Essentials set - don't know. I'll likely skip it altogether as I don't need starter sets.

*You'll maybe have noticed a theme here. WoTC is often really bad at penning the beginnings of adventures.

 

[S'mon]

*You'll maybe have noticed a theme here. WoTC is often really bad at penning the beginnings of adventures.

Princes of the Apocalypse is weird that way too - the best beginning stuff is in chapter 6, after the end.

I'm enjoying PoTA very much, but I enjoy all Rich Baker's work. I love the sandboxiness of it even though the group I run it for isn't hugely into sandboxing, more casual follow-the-crumbs.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

ave noticed a theme here. WoTC is often really bad at penning the beginnings of adventures.

Maybe that's because this bit, more than any other, is dependent on the back stories/alignment leanings of the PCs, and therefore outside the adventure-writers contol?

 

[S'mon]

Maybe that's because this bit, more than any other, is dependent on the back stories/alignment leanings of the PCs, and therefore outside the adventure-writers contol?

I dunno, I find there are some pretty obvious rules to follow, like "You all meet in a tavern" or "Nick Fury wants to meet with you" works well, whereas "You are ambushed! There is a huge battle! You are running for your lives!" stuff should be kept where it belongs, in films & TV.

I have seen tutorial 'BANG' openings work well in CRPGs, eg in the 2002 Neverwinter Nights, Oblivion & Skyrim, but even there they have been criticised, eg the Mass Effect 3 opening. And in TTRPGs I think they are almost never a good idea.

 

[ccs]

Maybe that's because this bit, more than any other, is dependent on the back stories/alignment leanings of the PCs, and therefore outside the adventure-writers contol?

No, it's really not.

Let's look at Storm Kings.
The town the PCs help in the beginning was attacked by cloud giants. So what happens when the PCs return from dealing with the goblins? 1st they're given some flimsy excuse to travel to another town. (as opposed to go hunt down those giants!) And then? A friendly (but eccentric) cloud giant in his flying tower descends from the sky & wisks the PCs off to wherever they were heading anyways. .....
I'm sorry, WHY should we go with this cloud giant vs simply starting our vengeance right here/right now?
Sure, I get it. It shows that not all giants are the enemy. And it greatly speeds up travel times.
But in-story? It's still just stupid.

How about Dragon Heist?
Volo recruits a group of randos & pays them with a tavern. Um, ok. I know the people I play with. Their reaction would be to check it out & then immediately go looking for a real adventure (like oh say, at The Yawning Portal) as fixing/running a tavern's not what they had in mind when they made characters.
But the actions really supposed to kick off when the PCs ask questions about an even more random gnome who gets fire-balled in the street out side said tavern. Who cares? It's Waterdeep. Not the most violent of D&D cities, but there's violence. There's thieves guilds, mercs, adventurers, monsters on occasion.... Someones getting stabbed/spelled etc on a regular enough basis to have a city watch & a code. BTW? It's the watches job to pursue whoever's crisping gnomes in the street.
No efforts made to personalize this gnome to the characters prior to his death. Again, OK. We experienced DMs roll our eyes & patch the holes. But not everyone is an experienced DM. And it all still reads really poorly, is overly railroady, & essentially relies upon players asking the questions just because that's what was presented. Ugh.

Tomb of Annihilation.
The PCs patron/friend whatever is dying due to the death curse. And they send the PCs out to take care of the problem. To the far off jungles of Chult! Great! This is what heroes/adventures are supposed to do.
Except as written they're sending 1st lv characters to handle this vital task. Works a bit better narratively if you simply start at 3rd. But a lot of groups like to do 1st.

 

[MNblockhead]

Let me get this straight... sea faring campaign, jungle exploring campaign, city campaign, dungeon crawl, and finally a planar adventure all in the last two years...

And people are claiming the campaigns are ‘samey’, bland and too ‘forgotten realms’? ...

I really struggle to take people seriously on here when this is their criticism. Say you don’t like the writing, say you think the encounters are badly written, say the plot has holes or need repairing. Don’t say they are ‘bland’ though these campaigns are anything but bland.

Frankly in my honest opinion they knock the socks off 80% of previous editions adventures.

Further to your point, you can easily play these without worrying about the larger setting. I never owned a forgotten realms setting book until 5e, I've never read any of the Forgotten Realms novels, and really knew nothing about the Realms other than vague recollections of Ed Greenwoods old articles in Dragon about conversations with some wizard named Elminster. I've had no issues running or playing in any of the adventure books I've purchased and further find it pretty easy to take out parts of them to use in my homebrew campaign world.

Personally, I think rather than try to pander to the long tail of settings enthusiasts with the main product line, they should open up all the old settings and allow the community to upgrade old materials to 5e. That could lead to some excellent print on demand books for other settings that will be as good or better than the main line. For example, I bought Heros of Balder's Gate as a POD book from DMs Guild and it is excellent, sitting proudly on my shelf with all my other 5e books. It would be great if you could do the same for books of or based on Planescape, Darksun, Mystara, etc. But I don't think that it is a good idea to dilute their main line with too many new (or renewed) settings.