D&D (2024) What Adventure Should One D&D Launch With? (+)

[pemerton]

5e is predominantly a game about intricate PC combat builds, and GM-driven adjudication of non-combat action. So the 1st adventure for One D&D should showcase this. Something similar to Dragonlance would therefore be a good fit: a quest which requires a group of unlikely comrades to join together to travel to strange places, where they have to fight to get the thing they're there to get. There should be some NPCs that allow players with social-oriented PCs to do their thing - but the progression of the adventure should be largely independent of how those NPCs end up responding to the PCs.

 

[AnotherGuy]

An adventure on the lines of Murder in Baldurs Gate which has a fair bit of play on all the pillars.
They just require stronger hooks for the PCs to be initially involved.
Otherwise it's a great city adventure with chaos and disorder looming around the next corner as things become progressively worse. Very under appreciated adventure I think.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

An adventure on the lines of Murder in Baldurs Gate which has a fair bit of play on all the pillars.

If they'd just go back to that damn format they used in the first playtest.

Those small adventures in 2 booklets with a soft DM screen doubling as a folder was magnificent.

I still consider Murder in BG and Legacy of the Crystal Shard to be the most usable products WotC published in the last 10 years when it comes to organization and table use.

 

[MockingBird]

Loved that format for Murder in Baldurs Gate and Icewind Dale. I was really hoping that would continue. Hate they didn't print the next two in the Sundering arch.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

5e is predominantly a game about intricate PC combat builds, and GM-driven adjudication of non-combat action.

Insofar as this is true, and it’s a + thread so I won’t start an argument on the point, the playtest thus far indicates that it will be less true in 2024.

So the 1st adventure for One D&D should showcase this. Something similar to Dragonlance would therefore be a good fit: a quest which requires a group of unlikely comrades to join together to travel to strange places, where they have to fight to get the thing they're there to get. There should be some NPCs that allow players with social-oriented PCs to do their thing - but the progression of the adventure should be largely independent of how those NPCs end up responding to the PCs.

I don’t think this quite matches how most people play the game, but I do agree that something like Dragonlance would be a good introduction to D&D and especially to a D&D which is primarily about making and telling stories about your heroic OC in a dangerous fantasy world.

 

[Shiroiken]

If they'd just go back to that damn format they used in the first playtest.

Those small adventures in 2 booklets with a soft DM screen doubling as a folder was magnificent.

I still consider Murder in BG and Legacy of the Crystal Shard to be the most usable products WotC published in the last 10 years when it comes to organization and table use.

I didn't see Legacy of the Crystal Shard, but MiBG was amazing. It was a solid adventure, but the city setting information made it usable long after finishing the adventure. The only thing I've seen that worked almost as well was Ghosts of Saltmarsh, but the size and information of Saltmarsh isn't really enough to keep going for very long afterwards.

 

[Minigiant]

Here's the thing...

None of the old adventures have tieflings, dragonborns, ardlings, good orcs, and goliaths in it.

The Launch Adventure should have all the PHB races species in it as NPCs. Period Full Stop.

At some point D&D has to stop leaning on 20 year or more old content for sales.

 

[pemerton]

None of the old adventures have tieflings, dragonborns, ardlings, good orcs, and goliaths in it.

That's why I said something like DL!

 

[Minigiant]

That's why I said something like DL!

But DL doesn't have orcs.
But I agree. To me the biggest trends in the last 20 years in fantasy are:

• 
  
• Story Arcs
• Crossovers (people from different worlds or cultures coming together)
• Dramatic Relationships
• Big Battles

Dragonlance + MCU + GOT should be the face of One D&D out the gate.

 

[Clint_L]

Here's the thing...

None of the old adventures have tieflings, dragonborns, ardlings, good orcs, and goliaths in it.

Not yet. Easy enough to add them to an updated version. I'm assuming that they will all be part of an updated Greyhawk, for example.