D&D 5E Waterdeep: Dragon Heist Post-Mortem (Spoilers)

[TheSword]

Curse of the Crimson Throne is a decent city adventure. I did consider a mash up of it, Dragon Heist and Dungeon of the Mad Mage.

 

[ZehirDisciple]

Monte Cook's Ptolus has recently been updated to 5e. I used it in 3rd edition, and it was a great setting with a lot of opportunities for adventure. IIRC, there are only a couple pre-written adventures, so the DM will need to augment it with original content.
If your DM doesn't mind conversion, I really enjoyed The Shackled City (from 3.5, the first Adventure Path by Paizo, in Dungeon Magazine and later published as a standalone hardcover).

Thanks! He has a lot of Dungeon mags so I will suggest the Shackled City.

 

[ZehirDisciple]

I really liked the City part at the start of Tomb of Annihilation. It can easily be buffed to do the equivalent of WD-DH (level up to 5), especially if the characters do some forays in the jungle and come back to the city (this requires not putting too much time pressure on the Death Curse).

Same for the Baldur's Gate part of Descent into Avernus, easy to complete and transform into a real city adventure, and get the characters a bit more prepared for Avernus (which I've extended to level 20 anyway).

And the same for the parts in the cities of Odyssey of the Dragonlords, in particular Mytros, had a really good sandbox here that lasted many sessions, freeing minotaurs from slavery, the "olympic" games, etc.

As you can see, we love city adventures and try to get the best of what we have. This is for official adventures, after that, there are probably a few good third party ones, and I'd like to hear about them too. I think Bard's Gate might be good.

I am pretty sure he has all three of those. Thanks for the suggestions!

 

[ZehirDisciple]

As others have noted, Dragon Heist can be made into a great campaign -- but it has to be modified. You can't play it straight out of the book. The Alexandrian Remix (google it) is probably the best online resource for how to modify the adventure. I'm running a remixed Dragon Heist right now and loving it.

I will not! No spoilers for me!

Building on what Retreater said, Ptolus is the king of urban campaign settings. Regarding adventures, there are about 5 or 6 published adventures -- certainly enough to cobble together a campaign. The best of them is The Banewarrens. In the adventure, multiple evil factions discover and explore a lost dungeon that's a vault for evil artifacts -- and the players have to stop them. It's a perfect blend of dungeon crawl and urban adventure. I've been wanting to run the Banewarrens for years -- and now I finally am. We're 13 sessions in. It's going great so far. (Note that Banewarrens was originally designed for 4th - 10th level characters in 3E, but it's easy to convert to 5E and even scale it down to 1st level characters.)

I'll also put in a vote for Shackled City. I've not played it, but it I own the hardcover and it has some great stuff.

Expedition to the Ruins of Greyhawk from 3E has some good stuff for urban campaigns, and could be paired well with the Age of Worms adventure path.

Another vote for Shackled City! I will definitely have to recommend it! Thanks!

 

[TheSword]

I will not! No spoilers for me!

Another vote for Shackled City! I will definitely have to recommend it! Thanks!

Just be aware, that even though it is a city adventure, it is primarily dungeon crawling. The first adventure in particular is two massive dungeons. It’s not bad and some of the higher level adventures move away from that to smaller locations. That’s what put me off running it though. I want something tighter in a city adventure. Though it could be a nice contrast with more city based hijinks. A bit like Undermountain is a foil to waterdeep.

 

[THEMNGMNT]

If I was going to run Shackled City I would definitely take a scalpel to many of the dungeons (and ramp up the city intrigue).

 

[Retreater]

If I was going to run Shackled City I would definitely take a scalpel to many of the dungeons (and ramp up the city intrigue).

True. Most D&D adventures from the 3.x and onward era have way too many encounters. Especially when you have Adventure Paths that have to get X number of battles to level up to continue the story.
For me, I think the concept of milestone XP has been the biggest game-changer since getting rid of THAC0 and descending AC. Pick out the most important/interesting fights, fill out the rest of the sessions with story, intrigue, and world-building. Keep the pace fast enough so groups don't lose interest, forget about their motivations, or stretch believability.

 

[Lyxen]

True. Most D&D adventures from the 3.x and onward era have way too many encounters.

Honestly, that was true before, in almost every module ever published by any company. Just as an example, but the dungeon which is the core of DL1 - Dragons of Despair has about 40 locations, a large part of which are encounters, and most uninteresting with groups of Draconians, most of the same kind.

Especially when you have Adventure Paths that have to get X number of battles to level up to continue the story.

True, even the best AP have huge dungeons on top of their intrigue, to satisfy people who like these on top of the XP need.

For me, I think the concept of milestone XP has been the biggest game-changer since getting rid of THAC0 and descending AC. Pick out the most important/interesting fights, fill out the rest of the sessions with story, intrigue, and world-building. Keep the pace fast enough so groups don't lose interest, forget about their motivations, or stretch believability.

It's a good point, and the way we've been playing AP has always been that way, with the players looking in any case for ways to bypass guard areas and protective complexes, and the DM helping them along the way.

 

[ZehirDisciple]

Just be aware, that even though it is a city adventure, it is primarily dungeon crawling. The first adventure in particular is two massive dungeons. It’s not bad and some of the higher level adventures move away from that to smaller locations. That’s what put me off running it though. I want something tighter in a city adventure. Though it could be a nice contrast with more city based hijinks. A bit like Undermountain is a foil to waterdeep.

Thank you that is good to know! I was definitely looking for a city adventure, not dungeon + city adventure.

 

[Retreater]

Thank you that is good to know! I was definitely looking for a city adventure, not dungeon + city adventure.

Not to try to sound gate-keepey, but most Dungeons and Dragons adventures are going to have dungeon-like structures as a big focus. Have you thought about looking at a different system (Blades in the Dark) to get inspiration? Perhaps you can convert some of that content to D&D? If nothing else, seeing how adventures are constructed in a game focused on urban intrigue might help design future adventures in D&D.