D&D General How much does Shattered Obelisk need Phandelver?

[Hussar]

I'll just echo others here.

You do not need Phandelver at all. Heck, you barely need a town to be honest. The adventure spends virtually no time in the town, and, other than essentially fridging the town in order to get the party motivated, the town has no real purpose.

I am very much not a fan of Shattered Obelisk as written. It's extremely linear and really repetitive. You go through about five small dungeons to gather the Macguffins, then go through a slightly larger dungeon and you're done.

Now, to be fair, the small dungeons are well done. They are interesting for the most part. But, yeah, at least for me and my group, it was pretty formulaic. No big surprises. No mystery. No real drama really.

 

[pukunui]

Now, to be fair, the small dungeons are well done. They are interesting for the most part. But, yeah, at least for me and my group, it was pretty formulaic. No big surprises. No mystery. No real drama really.

Except for Zorzula’s Rest. That map has got some serious issues. I made a whole thread about it: D&D 5E - Shattered Obelisk - Zorzula's Rest and other problems

 

[Parmandur]

I'll just echo others here.

You do not need Phandelver at all. Heck, you barely need a town to be honest. The adventure spends virtually no time in the town, and, other than essentially fridging the town in order to get the party motivated, the town has no real purpose.

I am very much not a fan of Shattered Obelisk as written. It's extremely linear and really repetitive. You go through about five small dungeons to gather the Macguffins, then go through a slightly larger dungeon and you're done.

Now, to be fair, the small dungeons are well done. They are interesting for the most part. But, yeah, at least for me and my group, it was pretty formulaic. No big surprises. No mystery. No real drama really.

That's pretty fair: I do think the dungeons, as dungeons, were pretty well made. But as a storyline? Pretty dismal. Which is made worse by the lower level part, Lost Mines of Phandelver, holding together so well.

 

[Parmandur]

Except for Zorzula’s Rest. That map has got some serious issues. I made a whole thread about it: D&D 5E - Shattered Obelisk - Zorzula's Rest and other problems

The editing issues were pretty weird.

 

[pukunui]

The editing issues were pretty weird.

Yeah, really unusually sloppy.

 

[Hussar]

I ran this over Fantasy Grounds, and the secret door leading into the 1st level is in the completely wrong place. A fact I didn't realize until AFTER the PC's had gone through it.

 

[Remathilis]

Honestly, being tacked on and not well integrated is one of the main criticisms of the book (why bother with expanding on Lost Mines of Phandelver, but then not build on Lost Mines of Phandelver???) but for your purposes should probably work.

I remember that was a common complaint, along with the tonal shift from "classic adventuring milieu" to "far realm weirdness" like its a bait-and-switch.

My original thoughts on it (again, without having read anything now but a more detailed summary of the plot) was to run Heart of Stone from Frontiers of Eberron for levels 1-5, replacing Phandalin with Quickstone. Heart of Stone is an adventure about sealing a Daelkyr's lair (Orlassk, Master of Stone) which has sprung a leak of sorts. For Shattered Obelisk, I'd replace the Far Realm with Xoriat becoming Coterminous and the Mindflayers trying to free Dynn (The Overmind). However, that almost feels like it repeating the same plot as Heart of Stone with a different Daelkyr Prince, which feels repetitive.

I've got time to workshop this, but I don't know if it's going to work like I hoped...

 

[Zaukrie]

Hmmm. So as long as I have the players form a bond with some community, it would work?

I mean, is that really am issue? Most of the time my players try to save the world.

It doesn't require Phandalin at all.

 

[Zaukrie]

I remember that was a common complaint, along with the tonal shift from "classic adventuring milieu" to "far realm weirdness" like its a bait-and-switch.

My original thoughts on it (again, without having read anything now but a more detailed summary of the plot) was to run Heart of Stone from Frontiers of Eberron for levels 1-5, replacing Phandalin with Quickstone. Heart of Stone is an adventure about sealing a Daelkyr's lair (Orlassk, Master of Stone) which has sprung a leak of sorts. For Shattered Obelisk, I'd replace the Far Realm with Xoriat becoming Coterminous and the Mindflayers trying to free Dynn (The Overmind). However, that almost feels like it repeating the same plot as Heart of Stone with a different Daelkyr Prince, which feels repetitive.

I've got time to workshop this, but I don't know if it's going to work like I hoped...

Isn't someone always try to free them? I don't know if I see that as an issue. But others might.

 

[Remathilis]

I mean, is that really am issue? Most of the time my players try to save the world.

It doesn't require Phandalin at all.

No. The emphasis was on A community, not THAT specific community