D&D 5E A bit of a dilemma

[hawkeyefan]

Thanks for the comments.

Yeah, I noticed after the fact that the reason for going back was a bit underdeveloped. This is my first time running a published adventure (besides Phandelver), so I have been reveling in what little prep I have to do outside of reading ahead and pulling monster tokens. Guess I haven't learned well how to improvise!

They haven't run into the traps yet, having gone right for the guard barraks. That should be fun.

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I just wanted to add...you don't have to stick to the timeframe of the eggs hatching as written in the book. Adjust it as needed to make the encounter work for you.

Also, with a Druid, Ranger, and Barbarian in the party, I would think that a Nature check to determine how far along the eggs seem would be fine. Let them have an idea so that they can decide how to handle things.

 

[Wepwawet]

First thing about running a published adventure: you have to be prepared to change things as you go

I would also have send the players back to the cave after the first sloppy investigation. In this case it's easy, you can have the NPCs connect the dots, as in "so the whole cult left the camp but they still left 4 Dragonclaws guarding the cave? There must still be something important in there, could prove game changing".

About your question, I would definitely make the dragon eggs hatch. The cult has their resources, if the players don't destroy it, they are allowed to develop them and in the future they will be used in their war. You can always lay out the cave in their next visit in a way that the wyrmlings don't fight together. Black dragons are evil creatures, it's reasonable to say that black dragon babies need to be kept separate or they'll kill and eat each other.

Or not. If they felt no reason to investigate you can move forward and erase this off the world...

 

[KahlessNestor]

I believe adventure assumes the DM will also handle xp for several "accomplishments" if milestones are not used, even though it is not spelled out this way. It already gives plenty of examples of such, also pointing out how diplomacy or whatever other tactics should benefit the players as much as or even more than direct assault (just check the ropper...).

Anyhow, I found it funny you felt like your players needed to be headed back. Next time something similar happens, maybe you would consider just adding some interesting encounter on their way forward to possibly make up for the xp, or just award them for efficiency, instead of guiding them backwards. As pointed out already, leaving the cave as they found out the cult next steps could have been the intelligent idea.

As things are now, you can also simply assume the dragons have been moved away already. They were there only provisionally, waiting for hatching, so after that, there may have been no more purpose in leaving them there. The heroes could arrive at the hatchery just to see empty eggshells. You may even use them afterwards (like in the chapter "the cult strikes back" from RoT, or "on the road" in HotDQ).

The only problem with letting them follow or trail the cultists is that by the time you learn they're heading north (which is given to you in the note and maps in Mondath's chambers), you are now a gew tendays out from Elturel. I am not sure you can make it back to Elturel and then to Baldur's Gate in time to get into the caravan.

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[Barolo]

I doesn't really matter, does it? I mean, the cult can progress at any pace you want, and every group of adventurers might find out in different ways and at different moments the whereabouts of the cult. So in the end you either pace the cult progress in a way that matches the players' progress or they miss the adventure. We DMs are constantly adapting the scenario somewhat to fit the players in the adventure, in a sense.

I do not mean that the DM should downplay any oversights on the part of the players, though, they should have an impact on the game or otherwise the players may feel like their actions and decisions aren't meaningful. If they arrive at a destination later than expected because they clearly didn't bother to investigate some site they knew they should (as could be the case here), maybe their late attempt to infiltrate on the caravan will be less smooth, which could lead to tougher interactions with the cultists, or maybe they will need to spend resources to catch up.

Anyhow, as they travelled to meet the NPCs, then needed to go back to recover the remaining clues, hasn't the timeframe already changed? Now all you need to do is evaluate if the dragons are an interesting threat for the players now. If they aren't, there are completely justifiable ways to remove them from the equation, being letting the eggs not be hatched yet (which would potentially reward the players later on, in dealing with the factions in RoT), or they can have hatched already and the dragons been moved before the heroes have returned.

Now, finding the dragons there can also be fun, specially if your players are up to the challenge. It is certainly fun for me, as a DM, to run these kinds of encounters, and certainly looks like fun to my players from where I stand.

 

[jasper]

When I ran this adventure for my group (5 players), I found that the XP rewards were generally insufficient to advance the level of the PCs at the rate the adventure assumes. In the early parts of the adventure this wasn't too much of an issue, but by the middle to end portions I had to start using the milestone award system. There were simply too few encounters within chapters.

So let me reword. The dm will have to create extra encounters using the adventure, mm, and other sources to feed the pc's xp. Or the dm should use milestones instead of xp.

 

[Bradley Hindman]

So let me reword. The dm will have to create extra encounters using the adventure, mm, and other sources to feed the pc's xp. Or the dm should use milestones instead of xp.

Yup. Succinctly put.

 

[Rya.Reisender]

I don't really like using milestone leveling myself.

My thoughts:
- Dungeons in D&D 5e actually seems to be quite doable even when a level below the recommended level (it might just mean the group can't clear the dungeon in one go)
- I give XP for avoided combat as well, like for example if the PCs find a peaceful solution with some enemies, then they get the full XP from those enemies without fighting them, this can actually make up a large portion of the XP received and definitely avoids PCs getting underleveled just because they don't kill everything in sight

 

[Tony Vargas]

here is my dilemma:

The module says the three black dragon eggs will hatch "within a tenday". This is information the players would never really have; just the DM. It's six days to Elturel, and then six days back. So by the book, the eggs should be hatched. So should I be throwing three black dragon wyrmlings (CR 2) at my players in addition to the kobolds and guard drakes (and any wandering monsters) that are supposed to be in the dragon hatchery? Or should I just ignore it and run it as written?

So, either way is OK, the determining factor, IMHO, is the attitude of your players. If they've been well and truly bitten by the D&D bug and are up for it, you can run a consequence like that 'straight' and it's a learning experience for them. They learn that their decisions have consequences, and that conditions them for certain styles of play.

If the group is more casual or if they seem to be catching onto more the RP or 'story' aspect, then fiddling with time-lines and NPC decisions and the like to keep the game flowing and a satisfying story developing is just fine.

Of course, since you're asking, I assume you don't have a strong preference, yourself. If you do, well, it's your game, too.

 

[Bradley Hindman]

I give XP for avoided combat as well, like for example if the PCs find a peaceful solution with some enemies, then they get the full XP from those enemies without fighting them, this can actually make up a large portion of the XP received and definitely avoids PCs getting underleveled just because they don't kill everything in sight

Normally, I use milestone leveling. But, as this was the first campaign that I ran using the 5th edition ruleset, I awarded XP per encounter to get a feel for the new rules. As you suggested in the quoted text, I gave full XP for encounters avoided or circumvented. I also gave goal completion awards which amounted to roughly 20% of the total XP available per chapter. Despite this, there wasn't enough XP available to level the PCs at the expected rate.

When I recognized that there was an XP deficit, I sat down and added up the total XP that the chapters permitted. It was far short of what was needed to actually level the PCs at the suggested rate. My initial thought was to multiple all experience rewards by some factor to compensate. Fortunately, I then realized that this was a slightly silly idea. All it accomplished an increase in math to get the same result that milestone leveling would accomplish. I gave up on XP per encounter at that point.