D&D General DMing 5.5 in a week. What changes do I need to keep in mind? Any good houserules? Also, Dragonlance!

[DarkCrisis]

Potions are a bonus action (probably house rule that back). Anything else make 5.5 a little more gritty? Max monster damage?

Anything else from a DM perspective?

Also do I need to keep anything in mind for the Dragonlance Shadow of the Dragon Queen adventure to help it flow?

 

[Shardstone]

Do 75% monster damage instead of average (50%), and free up multiattacks so that bespoke moves (like a breath weapon) can be used alongside normal attacks. Also, incorporate weapon masteries into your stat blocks that use weapons. Those three things will make your monsters feel a lot scarier and combat a lot harder. If you need to go up another notch, giving monsters one-off legendary actions, and giving bosses more legendary actions, will tilt the action economy in your favor and make the game feel more intense.

 

[Shardstone]

Also the power boost doesn't come to Level 5; you can play relatively normally the first 4 levels.

 

[Piperken]

Anything else from a DM perspective?

I'm still very slowly working in 5e2024 rules.

An "attack" now includes drawing/stow a weapon as part of the attack; these used up your free action originally (except when proficient in two weapon fighting).

 

[humble minion]

Also do I need to keep anything in mind for the Dragonlance Shadow of the Dragon Queen adventure to help it flow?

Not specifically 5.5 stuff here, but:

• think about your characterisation of Darrett. In the later parts he really annoys some people because he seems to tell the PCs what to do a lot. I’m playing him as very uncertain and lacking in confidence, especially after Vogler’s fall and the death of Becklin, so he tends to ask the PCs advice or lean on them to make decisions.
• try to think of a way to introduce Kansaldi and the Red Ruin earlier in the campaign, to set them up properly as endgame bad guys. In the campaign as written, they just kinda appear at the end, with no context, and the PCs have no personal beef with them or experience of them. I have no advice here as I turfed probably the last 3/4 of the campaign to run my own plotline instead, so I can’t really offer any specific advice, sorry.
• if you’re using Leedara, give some thought to a) why she is at Ispin’s funeral in the first place, and b) what her motivations were in convincing Soth to abandon his quest. The module does a very poor job of answering these questions, and the PCs will probably ask once they work out who she is.

 

[GMMichael]

Potions are a bonus action (probably house rule that back). Anything else make 5.5 a little more gritty? Max monster damage?

Anything else from a DM perspective?

Just accept that fighter attacks get special features now. Besides that, it's the same game on steroids.