Finished Red Hand of Doom (spoilers)

[Cyronax]

I ran it last year and heavily personalized it.

After the fact our group realized that we had eerily mirrored some events from World War 2.

First, the party was one of the main representatives of a distant order of NG-aligned clerics and many other classes. Most of the RHoD took place in an area that was sort of a crossroads region where international groups often pass through.

A third potential spoiler in the RHoD, a rival to the party, but dire enemies of the hobgoblin-draconic hordes, were a group of dwarves that had been duped into following a closet dwarf cleric who followed my world's equivalent of a Hextor-Wee Jas combo deity named Akkadurai. Anyway, in a few cases during the progression of RHoD, the evil-inclined dwarves would sometimes work towards common goals with the party. In the end however, the three blocs - the party and the distant NG order, the Akkaduradians, and the hobgoblins came to resemble the United States/Britain, the Soviet Union, and the Nazis, respectively. I saw this trend emerging before the players did.

By the end of the RHoD, the PC heroes were the decisive victors against the hobgoblins and the dragons, but quite quickly what was a tepid truce-going on alliance between the PC party and their NG-order and the Akkaduradians (who fought a number of early battles with the hobgoblins and dragons that ended in their own defeat) devolved into several situations that really reminded us of the real world Cold War.

The campaign ended a few months after that, but it was an interesting development nonetheless.

C.I.D.

 

[MerricB]

My group fell apart just before the final encounter... as in, Tiamat had appeared, we'd deal with her in the final session... and it never happened.

Oh well.

RHoD had some great moments, but I felt very underwhelmed by the final section. For my group - which I admit were underpowered - it really ended up being the 5-minute adventuring day. Fight powerful monster, retreat. Fight powerful monster, retreat.

Cheers!

 

[Olaf the Stout]

My group fell apart just before the final encounter... as in, Tiamat had appeared, we'd deal with her in the final session... and it never happened.

That's a bit disappointing Merric. Any particular reason? If I was a player in that situation I'd really want to finish it, just to get closure on it more than anything else.

Olaf the Stout

 

[MerricB]

That's a bit disappointing Merric. Any particular reason? If I was a player in that situation I'd really want to finish it, just to get closure on it more than anything else.

A combination of things: one player was suffering depression and just wouldn't show for sessions. Another player crashed his car which made attendance quite difficult (and later went into surgery for something entirely different). Yet another two players suddenly found their work clashed with the time we played (and it was the only time available).

I went from having 6 regular players to 3 players that were irregular in turning up.

I think we were also rather sick of the adventure by the end of it, so the motivation wasn't quite there. Great early parts, not so great late parts.

Cheers!

 

[RangerWickett]

Pah, and Raistlin defeated her all by himself...)i.e. takhsis, one of the aspects of tiamat!) Well, by drawing her out of the portal he did, or was supposed to. Before his brother stopped him.

I realized in the aftermath that my previous PC, a mounted archer, could have, with the aid of a flying potion, taken Tiamat all by himself. She flew slower than my horse would while flying, and I had a pretty good chance of pegging her with my arrows. Plus I had favored enemy dragon. I really think the Aspect of Tiamat should've had some magical powers to let her be a threat beyond 60 ft.

But still, we had a good time. There were lots of times we made fun of the module for being irrational (You've got ghost lions, but you don't use them to break the defensive line? You've got erinyes that can teleport and unholy blight but they stay around as your concubines instead of killing hundreds of people in the city in their sleep? You've got greater barghests that create invisibility sphere at will, but you don't have troops of invisible monsters sneaking into the city to assassinate the leaders?), but overall it was well done.

 

[Lord Zardoz]

Based on the timeline, I think that most of the extraplanar types (erinyes, etc), are simply not available until near the end of the adventure, when the gate starts to get yarded open.

I have a few really dangerous options to play with in my game since I am using Draconians instead of the Dragonspawn in the adventure. Sivaks can take the shape of the last person they killed. Auraks have Disguise Self and Greater Invisiblity, and Suggestion at will, as well as a Dominate Person ability once per day. I am pretty sure I am not going to have many more Auraks, if any show up. While being barely CR appropriate for my group, if I play them as hard as I can, I am pretty sure I can Anihilate my players with just one Aurak. (And spectacular Death Throes make them even meaner).

Anyway, I think the adventure is pretty damn good so far.

END COMMUNICATION

 

[Thurbane]

Cheers!

Hey Merric, drop me a PM or an email sometime, if you are looking for a Melbourne based group, or looking for an extra player in your group.

 

[MerricB]

Hey Merric, drop me a PM or an email sometime, if you are looking for a Melbourne based group, or looking for an extra player in your group.

Hi!

Being 2 hours away from Melbourne does make it a little hard for me to get down there (or for people to get up here, though admittedly it's only 90 minutes to get to Ballarat... I'm just on the wrong side wrt Melbourne).

Thankfully, I've still got two D&D groups going strongly, though both meet fortnightly rather than the weekly sessions of the group that dissolved. My work is probably going to interfere with that group reforming in any case.

Thanks muchly for the offer, though.

Cheers!

 

[Frostmarrow]

We switched four for five, and then I put the dungeon crawl on the back burner for another time. We had had enough fun with four-fifths of the RHoD and were ready to move on to another campaign.

We did that too. I just threw in the BBEG instead of his lieutenant during the siege of Brindol. This way the module fits a low-magic ideal much better.

 

[Creamsteak]

I wasn't just talking about the Silence. (Which was bad enough, although legal.) It was that and the Boss Monster at the end of the adventure that you're supposed to run away from that really would have done it for me. Any so-called Hero who runs away from the ultimate fight at the end, isn't. (This is pure meatgaming, of course, but the whole point of the game is for the palyers [including the GM, of course] to have fun. Therefore, most players will automatically assume that if a monster shows up at the end of an Adventure, they are supposed to defeat it, not run away!)

And yes, that is bad GMing. Anyone who would leave that in an adventure, unless they know that their players are cool with that sort of ending, is a Bad GM (tm). Just because something is in a module doesn't mean it has to be used. (Ok, it also can be the mark of an Inexperienced GM, but that doesn't seem to be the case here.)

Oddly enough, my players REALLY REALLY wanted to run away from it rather than fight it, and I had been expecting them to "go hero" and try to take it down even in their weakened state.