D&D 5E fifth edition release schedule ... cart before the horse?

[mcbobbo]

you only need a story to make an adventure. with that in mind, any module from any edition can be directly (more or less) converted to 5th edition. all you have to do is substitute the 5th edition version of the monster. in the cases where an early edition monster is too strong or not strong enough, this is a brilliant and useful encounter building tool: http://asmor.com/5e/monsters/#/encounter-builder

in some cases you will have a monster that doesnt have a 5E stat block. you can sub in a similar monster to fix this: giant lizards and ambush drakes are almost identical; different spiders can be subbed by Giant Spider (or if youre creative, use that as a template to convert the phase spider, sword spider, or whatever).

long story short, you can easily come up with thousands of hours of playable material with some easy conversion work.

Not only is this true for older D&D to 5e, but I have actually done this successfully with other systems. E.g. Keep on the Borderlands with Savage Worlds. It takes a little finesse, but nothing too intense. Especially if the table is okay with the DM admitting that things got out of hand and doing some retcon - as a worst case scenario.

 

[Mistwell]

[MENTION=2525]Mistwell[/MENTION], a conversion guide for Next, which might just say "increase monster HP 50%" or "use monster stats from MM", would be handy.

D&D Next to 5e Conversion Guide
3.5 to 5e Conversion Guide
2e to 5e Conversion Guide
1e to 5e Conversion Guide

 

[DEFCON 1]

Question for you... if Hoard of the Dragon Queen hadn't gotten lukewarm reviews in your opinion, would you still consider WotC having dropped the ball? What if they had released a third adventure alongside HotDQ and that *also* had gotten lukewarm reviews, would that have been enough for you even if you didn't want to play two of them because you didn't think they were of quality? How many adventures did WotC have to release along with what level of metacritic rating would have been necessary for you to feel they did right by the game?

 

[mcbobbo]

D&D Next to 5e Conversion Guide
3.5 to 5e Conversion Guide
2e to 5e Conversion Guide
1e to 5e Conversion Guide

This is not the direction I would go if you're not comfortable designing your own material. There's some small chance you'll convert into a different power level than the 5e core material would have. It's probably better to go Orc for Orc or Giant Spider for Custom Spider, as needed.

Now something that would be cool is an encounter conversion guide. E.g. "3.5 CRs are typically 1 level higher" or similar. I suspect though that this will only develop with practice.

 

[Wrathamon]

This is not the direction I would go if you're not comfortable designing your own material. There's some small chance you'll convert into a different power level than the 5e core material would have.

is this really a problem?

If you're a DM worried about smashing your players, you still have the power to not smash them. If you convert an encounter that might be too powerful, you can alter the encounter at any moment during the encounter you felt was a bad conversion, just like you can make it harder.

If you have put too many monsters in an encounter, its easy to make some of the monsters are previously hurt, so they have less hps and die easier, or they aren't really into fighting to the death so they take off at half hps, or oh no they start rolling really bad and miss more often or roll crappy damage.

If its just one monster that is too tough, you can not kill the players but capture them and make a story moment out of it as they wake up captured.

I am sure Tolkien was running his platoon with a 5e conversion he did, when they ran into the trolls. He had to toss in his OP NPC that he always does when he designs a bad encounter to save the day! wtg J.R.R! Stick to the publish material you clown.

 

[Mistwell]

Now something that would be cool is an encounter conversion guide. E.g. "3.5 CRs are typically 1 level higher" or similar. I suspect though that this will only develop with practice.

There is some of that in the guides. They are worth reading, and a lot of work went into them.

 

[Selkirk]

[MENTION=6777934]Maldavos[/MENTION] i pretty much consider all 'homebrew' worlds to be inferior (some might be good...most of them definitely are not). but with a new edition i definitely consider all homebrew material to be inferior. the mechanics are new...mearls and company are still answering rules questions (some of them pretty big ones) and the designers are the ones that have a definite feel and knowledge for this edition. not to mention wotc employs professional writers and artists (and playtests modules) to ensure quality and play balance -which is what i find so delightful about mines of phandelver..the balance of the encounters.
[MENTION=98938]DeF[/MENTION]con1 it really wouldn't have mattered if hoard had gotten good reviews. if we assume that i bought phb on august 19th (it is very unlikely then that i would have paid 20 bucks for mines of phandelver in starter set) i would be left with one module of content. for experienced dm's and players fifth edition is just a bunch of mechanics which they can apply to whatever setting. to me as a new (albeit returning d&d) player-i am incredibly interested in the setting. i want more content tied into this pretty cool world...not some random 'world' from a homebrew campaign or some module from the past (which might or might not tie into the present 5e world). what wotc has given us so far is a very thin reed...a few sentences about setting/one module. and some rules. this isn't good enough!

 

[Hannerdyn]

[MENTION=6777934]Maldavos[/MENTION] i pretty much consider all 'homebrew' worlds to be inferior (some might be good...most of them definitely are not). but with a new edition i definitely consider all homebrew material to be inferior. the mechanics are new...mearls and company are still answering rules questions (some of them pretty big ones) and the designers are the ones that have a definite feel and knowledge for this edition. not to mention wotc employs professional writers and artists (and playtests modules) to ensure quality and play balance -which is what i find so delightful about mines of phandelver..the balance of the encounters.

I get that. I won't proselytize here for the beauty that is homebrew except say that the experience tends to be more tailored to you and your group, which for me is a benefit that outweighs the rare chance that I might see a picture from a module I'm playing. Frankly, when my DM starts using a module, things get a little predictable.

Were I you I would simply have your group pick up Hoard. It is the AP for D&D, it will last you at least until the DMG comes out and likely to part II. Most of the issues raised in the 'lukewarm' reviews regarded things like player choice and the deadliness of the encounters, not the professionalism of the writing, art, etc. I don't think you'll miss much in the way of choice as you're accustomed to modules anyway. As for the deadliness.... well there are ways of dealing with that.

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

I do know that anyone who doesn't use published adventures is missing out on all the great stuff that has been published, as adventures

I didn't say 'doesn't use' I said 'sticks to'. There's tons of good stuff in the published modules that can be adapted and used to fill out a home campaign. But slavishly adhering to someone else's story to the point of eschewing homebrew material seems unfun and ignoring the best part of RPGs -- having a GM who can create and modify on the fly in response to your actions. Otherwise, it's little better than a CRPG.

 

[MortalPlague]

[MENTION=6775377]Selkirk[/MENTION] - It sounds like you've been burned on homebrew before, and that's a shame.

The published modules for 5th Edition have been, in my experience, excellent. I haven't played Phandelver or Hoard of the Dragon Queen, but I'm involved in the alpha playtest, and so I've had a chance to see some of the stuff that's coming up. And there's been more of it flooding my inbox than I can handle with my groups.

First off, Scourge of the Sword Coast is a truly excellent adventure that should not suffer at all using the final rules. My group played through a number of the episodes (we didn't have time to do the whole thing), and it was a ton of fun. Very good if you like a little bit of sandbox play, where you can approach a problem from multiple angles.

Secondly, while I can't speak for Hoard, Rise of Tiamat is quite good. It takes a bit of work on the part of the DM to bring things to life, but the scope and scale of this adventure is truly amazing, and as we near the finale, things are definitely hitting an epic note.

Thirdly, there is a series of adventures that are coming out, I'm not sure where. I think it'll be the Expeditions program in stores? If you saw Defiance in Phlan at PAX or Gen-Con, it's associated with that, and it's a pretty beefy set of adventures, all pretty good.

So rest assured, there is more content coming up soon. I can't say when, as I have no idea at all, but keep an eye out.