D&D 5E Do You Tinker with Adventures to Make Them "Winnable"?

[cbwjm]

So I'm running an official 5e campaign adventure, which shall remain unnamed so we don't get into spoiler territory. I'm primarily looking for general advice and the points of view of other GMs and players more than specific fixes to the adventure.

Here are a few recent situations:
1) Party needs to get into room to defeat evil caster who is terrorizing the local village. Caster is safely locked behind a door that (per the adventure) "cannot be damaged, forced open, or opened in any other way besides a knock spell (or a second spell that is fairly obscure)." All the party can do is leave the quest incomplete.
2) Party enters the first room of the dungeon. There's a monster that is resistant to magic and immune to non-magical weapon attacks (and has a boat load of HP). Party doesn't have magic weapons, because none are placed in the adventure. All the party can do is leave the quest incomplete.
3) Party fights their way through a dungeon to get to the BBEG. He cannot be reduced below 1 HP unless the party casts one of two spells in another room that they are too level to be able to cast. (The adventure specifically says that no other actions work.) All the party can do is leave the quest incomplete.

There are more examples in this adventure, and it's certainly not the way I'd design my own games.

Would you tinker with the adventure to give them a fighting chance? Also, when following the milestone XP suggestions, they get nothing for incomplete missions. So they can't level up to be able to complete the other missions, stuck forever at 4th level.

I'd make adjustments for this adventure since it seems terribly designed.

 

[The Green Hermit]

So I'm running an official 5e campaign adventure, which shall remain unnamed so we don't get into spoiler territory. I'm primarily looking for general advice and the points of view of other GMs and players more than specific fixes to the adventure.

Here are a few recent situations:
1) Party needs to get into room to defeat evil caster who is terrorizing the local village. Caster is safely locked behind a door that (per the adventure) "cannot be damaged, forced open, or opened in any other way besides a knock spell (or a second spell that is fairly obscure)." All the party can do is leave the quest incomplete.
2) Party enters the first room of the dungeon. There's a monster that is resistant to magic and immune to non-magical weapon attacks (and has a boat load of HP). Party doesn't have magic weapons, because none are placed in the adventure. All the party can do is leave the quest incomplete.
3) Party fights their way through a dungeon to get to the BBEG. He cannot be reduced below 1 HP unless the party casts one of two spells in another room that they are too level to be able to cast. (The adventure specifically says that no other actions work.) All the party can do is leave the quest incomplete.

There are more examples in this adventure, and it's certainly not the way I'd design my own games.

Would you tinker with the adventure to give them a fighting chance? Also, when following the milestone XP suggestions, they get nothing for incomplete missions. So they can't level up to be able to complete the other missions, stuck forever at 4th level.

XP: I don't follow milestone XP. Characters earn what they earn. If that means adding in a few more sidequests or a higher chance of random encounters to bring levels up, so be it.

Magic items: I use both Xanathar's and Sly Flourish's blog as guides for how many magic items to make available, and when. Sometimes PCs will find it in a hoard, sometimes they will be given an item as a reward.

Your scenarios: As the DM, you can change what needs to be done in order for the quests to be accomplished. You can also arrange for the players to gain access to the needed components (without telling them that they are actually needed later on). Also, depending upon the nature of the quests, you can come back at a later time to finish off the quests. I would still make the players figure out what needs to be done, though. Sometimes they just may not be able to solve the puzzle, and that is okay.

 

[TheSword]

I actually like this adventure because it's the first one that doesn't feel like a railroad. It is a bunch of circumstances, situations and plot hooks -- like any good sandbox should be. The biggest problem is it tries to shoehorn milestone leveling into a sandbox, which makes no sense.

I haven't run into any of the problems the OP has. Not saying that they don't exist, just that I haven't seen them. But my players in that game laser focused on a single plot line/villain group so...

I agree. There are lots of ‘quests’ in the first two chapters that could overcome to level up. If one becomes a dead end because the party fail, trigger one of the other 9 quests.

If someone wants to use milestone levelling - and plenty do - it’s easy enough to add in. They just complete one more quest first.

 

[TheSword]

I think also in the example given there is nothing stopping the players

Spoiler: Spoilers for adventure refenced

coming back when the moon is in a different phase, coming back with an elf or coming back with a knock scroll to open the tomb.

Why does the adventure have to provide instant gratification.

 

[jasper]

Yes why does an adventure have to provide INSTANT gratification?
Why must ALL encounters in adventure paths be WINNABLE?

 

[DammitVictor]

Look, if the door logically and reasonably can't be opened by means the PCs possess... the PCs should go out and get more means. This is problem solving.

If the door can't be opened by any but one specific means, for no reason... I'm not going to modify the adventure to make it winnable, I'm going to modify it to make it more absorbent and put it to more appropriate use.

 

[Retreater]

Yes why does an adventure have to provide INSTANT gratification?
Why must ALL encounters in adventure paths be WINNABLE?

Because you're providing entertainment for a group of players who've taken time out of their schedules to play a game of heroic adventure. The occasional setback is fine, but when it's time and again "you can't complete this mission" you get players who are frustrated, who might begin thinking their hobby time would be better spent playing a video game.
The feel of D&D is to be able to delve into tombs, recover mysterious treasures, vanquish evil. It's not supposed to be a regular occurrence of "let's chalk up the last session or two as a learning experiment and come back in a few levels, spend another couple sessions getting back to this same exact spot and then deal with this low-level threat that has been inexplicably gated off."

 

[Reynard]

I believe players should always have the opportunity to fail.

 

[Retreater]

I believe players should always have the opportunity to fail.

But on the other side of the token, they should have the opportunity to succeed? Just saying that the adventure is explicitly set up to have only a couple of solutions, most of which are of higher level than the party.
So the original question I posed was: is it ok to change those solutions so the party can win?

 

[Reynard]

But on the other side of the token, they should have the opportunity to succeed? Just saying that the adventure is explicitly set up to have only a couple of solutions, most of which are of higher level than the party.
So the original question I posed was: is it ok to change those solutions so the party can win?

I have not yet seen a reference to the exact side quests in which these situations occurred, so i can't judge them in particular. But what I would say in general is this:

In an open world sand box, if the PCs come to a thing that they don't have the resources to tackle, I would NOT change it to allow them to do so. i would expect them to go get those resources -- whether that means finding the right tools, or leveling up soem before coming back. The world should not, in my opinion, conform to the PCs. The PCs should be exploring the world, its situations, its locations, and its particulars.

That said, I understand this is a specific style of play and I don't begrudge anyone whose interests re more aligned with making sure the players feel awesome all the time. You can't play D&D wrong.