D&D 5E Descent Into Avernus & Mad Max: Why the adventure ultimately failed (to me!)

[Unwise]

I am curious to know the story behind a vampire who is fiercely loyal to a city with a second sun designed to turn vampires to dust.

For those curious, he is loyal to the previous king, the vampire lord. The upstart theocracy are usurpers, but the city can be saved from them. He was a loyal praetorian guard of the previous ruler, before he got turned into a vampire. Then he followed him into vampirism.

He still has family, kids and grandkids in the city, but he himself was forced to flee when the guardian appeared in the sky. He still keeps in contact with his family.

I can't recall what is cannon and what is just IMC...the vampire lord was never killed, but lurked below the city, awaiting his chance to return. When arriving in Avernus, the PC discovered his old master is alive and was overjoyed. He is helping the vampire retake the city from the devilish incursion. Later on, he will have a point of conflict as the vampire king has no intention of letting the city leave Avernus. In Avernus there is no sun, and the people all turn to him as their saviour. If he goes back to the prime material, that all changes.

 

[pukunui]

For those curious, he is loyal to the previous king, the vampire lord. The upstart theocracy are usurpers, but the city can be saved from them. He was a loyal praetorian guard of the previous ruler, before he got turned into a vampire. Then he followed him into vampirism.

He still has family, kids and grandkids in the city, but he himself was forced to flee when the guardian appeared in the sky. He still keeps in contact with his family.

I can't recall what is cannon and what is just IMC...the vampire lord was never killed, but lurked below the city, awaiting his chance to return. When arriving in Avernus, the PC discovered his old master is alive and was overjoyed. He is helping the vampire retake the city from the devilish incursion. Later on, he will have a point of conflict as the vampire king has no intention of letting the city leave Avernus. In Avernus there is no sun, and the people all turn to him as their saviour. If he goes back to the prime material, that all changes.

Wow! That sounds awesome. Mad props to you and your player for working in the lore so nicely (even if there are non-canonical elements).

Are you letting the PC use the vampire rules from the sidebar in the MM or are they using the dhampyr race? (Or something else?)

 

[Unwise]

Are you letting the PC use the vampire rules from the sidebar in the MM or are they using the dhampyr race? (Or something else?)

That's the really cool thing. They are playing a semi-undead race, Reborn I think. All the rest of the flavour is actually from being a Moon Druid. They are not themed around being a druid at all, that is just the mechanical chassis that gives them their vampire powers.

Their bite/claws are Primal Savegery cantrip. They have charm person, fog, hold person, summon beast, protection from good, wither & bloom, etc. All sorts of appropriate things

They only shapechange into relevant forms. Wolf, Bear (is hybrid werewolf form), rats, bats, I let them turn into swarms of bats/rats too.

The only change I made, is that they use Cha as their main stat, rather than Wisdom. That just helped the character concept a bit. Both a great stats.

 

[pukunui]

Nice! I dig it.

 

[Shardstone]

That's the really cool thing. They are playing a semi-undead race, Reborn I think. All the rest of the flavour is actually from being a Moon Druid. They are not themed around being a druid at all, that is just the mechanical chassis that gives them their vampire powers.

Their bite/claws are Primal Savegery cantrip. They have charm person, fog, hold person, summon beast, protection from good, wither & bloom, etc. All sorts of appropriate things

They only shapechange into relevant forms. Wolf, Bear (is hybrid werewolf form), rats, bats, I let them turn into swarms of bats/rats too.

The only change I made, is that they use Cha as their main stat, rather than Wisdom. That just helped the character concept a bit. Both a great stats.

Kind of confused why they don't use the dhamphir lineage, which has all of these as features haha. Regardless, super cool!

 

[Paul Farquhar]

if you follow the main path

This is a rather disingenuous additional condition. You can't only play the critical path, since you need to do side quests to gain power and levels. And as I already mentioned, it makes those "huge" games very short. Witcher 3, Cyberpunk 2077 and Dragonage: Inquisition in particular are jam packed with sidequests that don't even bother to dress up their fetch quest nature.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Of these games, Witcher and DA: Origins are the highest rated, and BG 3 isn't done so I haven't played it. That being said, most of those games out more than 5 years ago. Witcher 3 came out in 2015, for example. That doesn't qualify as contemporary design, but is instead just modern design.

You can't get much more contemporary than BG3, since it isn't out till next year, and that has it's share of "bring me X" quests. Now you could try to argue that they are "not on the critical path" since it doesn't really have a critical path apart from at a couple of key points. So you never have to do "steel the statue from the druids", "steel the egg from the owlbear", "find the book of evil magic" etc, but you would miss out on much of the game and be under-levelled if you tried to not do any fetch quests.

Not that there is anything wrong with fetch quests. The Holy Grail is a fetch quest. There have always been there and always will be there.

 

[Shardstone]

You can't get much more contemporary than BG3, since it isn't out till next year, and that has it's share of "bring me X" quests. Now you could try to argue that they are "not on the critical path" since it doesn't really have a critical path apart from at a couple of key points. So you never have to do "steel the statue from the druids", "steel the egg from the owlbear", "find the book of evil magic" etc, but you would miss out on much of the game and be under-levelled if you tried to not do any fetch quests.

Not that there is anything wrong with fetch quests. The Holy Grail is a fetch quest. There have always been there and always will be there.

You should reference Ruin Explorer's post. A out of the way optional fetch quest vs mainline composed of fetch quest is completely different. You are basically arguing something completely different to what I am.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

A out of the way optional fetch quest vs mainline composed of fetch quest is completely different.

"Out of the way" is another qualifier. The fetch quests in BG3 are in no way "out of the way". Technically, you could avoid doing them, but in practice you would have to use cheat codes in order to do so.

They are not "out of the way" in Cyberpunk 2077 or Dragon Age: Inquisition either. You are bombarded with hundreds of the things. You can't drive down the street in Cyberpunk without being bombarded with phone calls from fixers wanting you to fetch them something.

 

[Shardstone]

"Out of the way" is another qualifier. The fetch quests in BG3 are in no way "out of the way". Technically, you could avoid doing them, but in practice you would have to use cheat codes in order to do so.

They are not "out of the way" in Cyberpunk 2077 or Dragon Age: Inquisition either. You are bombarded with hundreds of the things. You can't drive down the street in Cyberpunk without being bombarded with phone calls from fixers wanting you to fetch them something.

Cyberpunk 2077 is one of the worst reviewed games in a long time, and a compelte failure. DA: I is an older game outside of contemporary stuff, and also not super well reviewed for its story.

Regardless, using fetch quests is not the problem. Having a main storyline composed of fetchquests is. I don't know how much clearer I can make this. You are discussing side content, I am discussing the main content.