D&D 5E (2014) Enhancing "Rise of Tiamat" (Practical stuff to try at your table!)

[robus]

Prepping for the final battle with Tiamat and a bit surprised to see Tiamat's tail does piercing damage. I was expecting bludgeoning. (And I'm going to make it that).

 

[pukunui]

Prepping for the final battle with Tiamat and a bit surprised to see Tiamat's tail does piercing damage. I was expecting bludgeoning. (And I'm going to make it that).

Her tail has a stinger on it, like a wyvern's.

See?

 

[robus]

A big concern I have about running the final battle is how a large army is supposed to arrive near the Well of Dragons without being detected?

I plan to have various teleportation circles opened on the plains near Waterdeep that allow the assembled armies to march through and be instantaneously transported to locations near the Well but it doesn't seem likely that a large force can assemble undetected? And thus goes the element of surprise I would imagine. So I feel like the plan has to be made in Waterdeep and then the teleportation is step one of the days campaign (i.e. there's no staging, just attack, attack, attack).

I guess I could have one small teleportation circle on the rim of the caldera which has been prepared for the PC team (+ a few helpers). They will teleport there and wait for the main assault to begin in order to gain some cover from the chaos.

So once the final push begins the PCs will make their way across the caldera to the Temple (I'm not going with the underground caverns - that seems far less epic than this grand finale deserves). I want them to witness the clash of dragons in the air above, the cultists panicking and trying to defend the temple from the onslaught. Just general mayhem and the PCs cutting their way through.

Mounted on the temple will be the Draakhorn making its baleful moan which becomes more strident as the ritual proceeds. (assuming they leave it intact).

Beneath the caldera is where the prisoners are kept - they're in a single file being marched up to a platform in front (but to one side) of the temple and being dispatched one by one and their lifeless bodies being tossed into a fiery lava pit.

The doorway leading into the temple stands open below the Draakhorn platform and arcane light can be seen flickering within. The sky above is thick with swirling storm clouds of course - giving the whole seen an eerie half-light.

 

[robus]

Her tail has a stinger on it, like a wyvern's.

See?

I do - though that tail is also powerful enough to bludgeon too Perhaps I'll add tail bludgeoning as a Legendary action option.

 

[pukunui]

You could. But I don't see her bothering to whip someone with her tail. She'd use it more like a wyvern/scorpion to stab.

 

[Sloblock]

A big concern I have about running the final battle is how a large army is supposed to arrive near the Well of Dragons without being detected?

I decided that the combined armies would start a great battle outside of the mountain range. They would be detected and all of that action would happen off screen.

I added a scene with some speeches for the players to get a sense of scale of what would be lost if they failed their mission. And to fill out the session.

I then had 3 strike teams, one being the PCs flown in via dragons. Each had a mission. The PCs one was obviously to stop Tiamat rising, the others were sent to stop the Draakhorn and free the prisoners.

My group doesn’t like huge dungeon crawls so that is why I cut down the final part.

 

[Anthony Winter]

I have a group that played amnesia to get to level 3 and then a homebrew version of the initial HOTDQ involving a camp and looted treasure.
One of the party (a barbarian) is Enclave so am building them more into the Chulth chapter. Essentially in the druid work there are silvanus, chaantea, miekkeli, and Malar. Th malar subfaction of the Enclave have sided with Tiamat and so berserker/feral/wildmen with similar stats to ogres will be the lackeys in the forest module led my old school, sacrifice-on-the-stone Malarite Druids. Just to keep the world from straight up black and white. I may even place a second enclave representative on the council. Someone more bestial and a little less on the ranger side of the faction - someone buddies with the Were-folk

 

[Anthony Winter]

I like the idea of 2 cult attacks. The first to drain spells and a second maybe an hour later once duration spells have worn off.
Even worse if cultists attack:
- Initial throwaway attackers.
- Second wave of summoned creatures or illusory creatures about 30 mins later.
- Then the real attack about 2 hours after that.

In the past when encountering a dragon outdoors I simply had the dragon fly straight at the party giving them about rounds to hide prepare. About 300ft away the dragon peeled away and sat on a hill about 800ft away watching the party waiting for whatever spells they had to wear off. he then did a single flyby with a breath weapon and carried on out of range. he discovered by spell and ranged attacks that they were pretty powerful so when flying by a third time instead of engaging in melee grappled one and flew of with them into the distance.

 

[jayoungr]

I may even place a second enclave representative on the council. Someone more bestial and a little less on the ranger side of the faction - someone buddies with the Were-folk

Sounds like a great idea. If you do this, could you post the NPC here, in case someone else wants to use that character in a game?

 

[MonsterEnvy]

A big concern I have about running the final battle is how a large army is supposed to arrive near the Well of Dragons without being detected?

Why do you think they would not be detected.