Having an area where the party must have access to a 3rd level spell to defeat a foe when they are only 3rd or 4th level - just stuff that the writers put in because they thought they were being clever - that's the stuff that gets a party killed (or otherwise leaves the entire group frustrated when they have to retreat and level grind). Frostmaiden does this on several occasions, puts up arbitrary roadblocks.
Yep. challenges where the party isn't going to be high enough level to have the resource to overcome the challenge (like a 4th level party needing a 3rd level spell), or must-win-to-proceed scenarios where the party has have the exact spell prepared and accessible with no hints to the party that they'd need it. I don't mind scenarios you can't win, but do I mind scenarios you can't win but have to in order to proceed with the quest, or have only one very specific way to overcome it that most party's won't be set up for. Especially in 5e, where it was designed to have multiple classes do multiple things, and not require class X with spell Y that only they could cast like in 1e.
ToA was certainly the deadliest 5e campaign I've run. The first time I ran it, we had a total of 8 PCs die. The majority of those were in Omu. Only one was in the eponymous tomb. That said, only one PC has died so far during my second run through.
If you as DM keep track of cold weather exposure rules and track food supplies while travelling, FrostMaiden will kill PCs without needing any monsters or combat.
get hit by a Meteor Swarm trap at level 7, so insta-kill on a failed save on a lot of characters, and even the tough ones will be at least at 0. Didn't kill everyone in ours, but we had to derail everything to get the resurrections done, and it lead to the campaign ending.
Welp, add me to the "things you've been doing wrong in 5E" list as to saving throws.
Haven't run Rime, but in Curse of Strahd, if the DM runs Strahd as the super-genius with centuries of wisdom and a former lifetime of being a general that he is, he should be near-invincible with his "hit, run, and regenerate" strategy on his home turf.
In his castle, there is no reason Strahd would tolerate a stand-up fight against people with artifacts that can hurt him. He can run through walls/floors/ceilings of his castle. Hence, the strategy is run through a wall, risk an attack of opportunity, strafe an enemy PC (preferably a caster), and exit. If he takes damage, he can simply exit and wait until his massive regeneration kicks in. Add in his summons, and he can interrupt any attempt to rest with noise, guerilla attacks, etc. Absent DM fiat, it should be unwinnable. That's why when I ran it I played up his journal and history so much (stuff outside the scope of the module but in the novels and original material) so that players would realize Strahd as a master strategist would only abandon that strategy in a severe moment of rage. This became relevant when the PCs failed to act before history repeated itself (I had Ireena eventually go to him, something from the novel). He made her into a vampire, the PCs invaded the castle, the PCs got their arses spanked, the PCs began thinking WTH can we do, a player thought what would piss Strahd off, PCs ran to the tombs suffering minion attacks, PCs spiked Ireena/Tatyana. Strahd went insane and abandoned his strategy. Bon appetit.
Haven't run Rime, but in Curse of Strahd, if the DM runs Strahd as the super-genius with centuries of wisdom and a former lifetime of being a general that he is, he should be near-invincible with his "hit, run, and regenerate" strategy on his home turf.
But there is the business of the Vistani fortune telling... Except that there is the Tarokka (sp?) card that specifically calls out a room that Strahd won't flee from and will fight to the death there. My group found that area and trapped him in there. Luckily it was a few steps away from his crypt, so it was no challenge to end him before he could regenerate in an hour.
When I mean deadliest, I mean as written, and isn't necessarily due to any one creature, but can also include bad design or environmental hazards.
Also a caveat, I have not ran or played in every 5e campaign, so perhaps Ravenloft is more deadly
(I played that once, but died immediately when my level 1 fighter in a level 1 party got attacked by a shambling mound in the first mansion and it literally tore me in half).
But now that we did pretty much the entire campaign of RotFM, with a TPK at the end, I'm looking back and thinking that it might be the most deadly campaign, including but not limited to the following reasons:
* In the start of the campaign, it is likely you almost immediately run into Sephek, a CR3 opponent who does an average of 24 damage a round (2 attacks at 12 points each). One average attack will kill most level 1 PCs.
there is barbarian cave with a magical flame that makes the barbarians within immune to all damage. They will just keep getting up endlessly. The only way to stop it is to cast dispel magic on the flame or to lead the barbarian(s) out of the cave.
No, you just need to get him outside the cave. Which any party can do by simply running away. there is no requirement to "complete" this side quest. Although my players strung him up by his own meat hooks. I think he decided being unable to die was not an advantage.
the lost city of Ythryn is structured where the PCs really need to explore most of the city, however, there is a 50% chance of a random encounter after each area is searched, and 24 hours after the party enters the city, those encounters happen every 1 to 2 hours. That means you get one long rest on the first day, and then it's pretty much impossible to get any more of them. You have to explore an entire city full of encounters, then a ton of random encounters as you're being hunted, all without any rests. We were 11th level by that time, and you're going up against demi liches and archmages and living swords, and all kinds of things. I don't know how parties are expected to survive that exploration
Players don't need to complete exploration of the city at all. After a couple of days bossmonster turns up and takes down the barriers herself. But my party had no trouble resting using Rope Trick and/or Tiny Hut (which can be cast by an NPC ally if the party don't have it). There is also nothing to stop the party leaving the city and resting outside it. The demilich is pathetically weak. It was embarrassing how quickly he went down.
When you do finally meet Auril, you won't be at full strength for the reasons right above, and she has an ability in second form that freezes you on a DC 21 Charisma failed save. A lot of people from older editions don't realize this, but in 5e, a natural 20 on a saving throw is NOT an automatic success. So any PC who isn't proficient in Charisma saving throws and doesn't have at least a 14 Charisma will always fail. Always. There is no chance of success. Oh, and not only are you frozen, but you take damage each turn. The only way out of that is for your fellow party to destroy a crystal that formed when you got frozen. A crystal that is immune to all damage except fire. So again, the PCs waste turns figuring that out, and if they don't have fire spells, good luck, you're screwed. In our case, me (the rune knight) and the fire druid were both frozen (we both have a 10 CHA so we could never succeed on a save) and there was nothing we could do the entire encounter after that. TPK soon followed.
A single target ability. It's no big deal if one character spends a couple of rounds on the bench. It only took two rounds for the rest of the party to destroy the second form.
Who goes into an adventure called Rime of the Frostmaiden and doesn't prep fire spells? Who can't figure out to use fire to melt ice?
Welp, add me to the "things you've been doing wrong in 5E" list as to saving throws.
Haven't run Rime, but in Curse of Strahd, if the DM runs Strahd as the super-genius with centuries of wisdom and a former lifetime of being a general that he is, he should be near-invincible with his "hit, run, and regenerate" strategy on his home turf.
In his castle, there is no reason Strahd would tolerate a stand-up fight against people with artifacts that can hurt him. He can run through walls/floors/ceilings of his castle. Hence, the strategy is run through a wall, risk an attack of opportunity, strafe an enemy PC (preferably a caster), and exit. If he takes damage, he can simply exit and wait until his massive regeneration kicks in. Add in his summons, and he can interrupt any attempt to rest with noise, guerilla attacks, etc. Absent DM fiat, it should be unwinnable. That's why when I ran it I played up his journal and history so much (stuff outside the scope of the module but in the novels and original material) so that players would realize Strahd as a master strategist would only abandon that strategy in a severe moment of rage. This became relevant when the PCs failed to act before history repeated itself (I had Ireena eventually go to him, something from the novel). He made her into a vampire, the PCs invaded the castle, the PCs got their arses spanked, the PCs began thinking WTH can we do, a player thought what would piss Strahd off, PCs ran to the tombs suffering minion attacks, PCs spiked Ireena/Tatyana. Strahd went insane and abandoned his strategy. Bon appetit.
Strahd doesn't even have to run away. He doesn't take damage for ending his turn inside stone. He can stay inside the walls and floor attacking with disadvantage.
