I have heard many get the bigger books to steal from. Take part of 1, part of another, and then put it into a homebrew.
It doesn't work. Because chapters in a book link to each other - they don't stand alone.
but that just means there is an overarching theme, the level progression is built in, and the next adventure starts where the previous left off (either in the same location or the travel was initiated at the end of the previous one). They still have self contained locations, villains and goals.
Could you name a few that work that way and don't rely on knowledge found in previous episodes?
Well he doesn’t ignore it he specifically addresses it and says that even the adventure in the beginners box is too long for a starter DM. I suspect he would say just the cragmaw caves would be a suitable length for a starter DM - make it less a “you stumble across some goblins and then roust them from their lair rescuing whoever you find within” and more a “a guy tells you his wagon got ambushed by goblins and his friend got kidnapped and you have a mission to rescue them (so upon rescuing him you have completed the whole scenario successfully)” and I think he would say that’s a good starter adventure.
Note that there's a new starter adventure; Lost Mine hasn't been it for a few years.
T1-4 Temple of Elemental Evil
He is talking about LMoP though not the Stormwrack Isle, which is the current one. I would agree that LMoP isn't necessarily the best for totally new DMs, but WotC has addressed that by making a simpler starter adventure.
You do know that is only two adventures, right, and the second is HUGE?
