Other D&D Variant Nimble RPG "The Sunless Citadel" recaps

[Nebulous]

I have been converting the 3e Sunless Citadel to the Nimble RPG. I guess it's D&D adjacent? It started as a 5e mod but morphed into its own game. I highly recommend it for anyone who wants a change of pace from 5e. The combat loop is completely different than 5e. I don't know if it is better necessarily, but it IS faster. The "feel" of the game is still heroic though, same as 5e, and the power level seems equivalent. I doubt I would enjoy Nimble by 10th level either, same as D&D, because they become superheroes. But the low level stuff? It works fine. Nimble has an active Discord community and the creator chimes in often. There's tons of free homebrew and more material in the pipeline. Adapting any adventure is not difficult, but the monster and PC statblocks are not 1:1 so they do take some thought. Simplified statblocks was a design goal though, and monsters are generally much easier to run than 5e.

Here are some of the recaps so far. If you have specific questions about the system itself, feel free to ask.



SESSION #0

Sunless Citadel Session #0.pdf | Powered by Box

app.box.com

SESSION #1

Sunless Citadel Session #1 - Oakhurst.pdf | Powered by Box

app.box.com

SESSION #2

Sunless Citadel Session #2 - The Sunless Citadel.pdf | Powered by Box

app.box.com

SESSION #3

Sunless Citadel Session #3 - The Stone Goblin.pdf | Powered by Box

app.box.com

 

[THEMNGMNT]

Apart from Nimble, how do you like the Sunless Citadel as an adventure? It seems to be well regarded...but to me it reads kind of...basic?

 

[Nebulous]

Apart from Nimble, how do you like the Sunless Citadel as an adventure? It seems to be well regarded...but to me it reads kind of...basic?

I like it a good bit, but yeah, it's a tad basic. That's why I am adding substantially to it with multiple subplots that expand it to the Wymrstair, a bandit hideout, Mt. Hotenow and Thundertree, so there's an expansion of the dragon theme in the original. It was already an old dragon cult base, and I took that new directions to make it span more levels. I also changed default D&D dragons to be like the Dragonslayer movie dragon; feral beasts that don't talk. They can breathe fire and/or poison gas, that's all. Would be pretty awful when the dragon spreads invisible carbon monoxide gas over the party when they think they're safe and hiding in cover.

Edit: I changed Belak the Outcast to be a sub-boss trying to get back into the dragon cult and topple the BBEG. The way it is set up, after the PCs clear the Citadel, they can go different places, but these are not scaled to level and could walk into an absolutely deadly situation. I would give them hints they're entering a place over what they can handle.

 

[THEMNGMNT]

I'm considering using Sunless Citadel in a similar way to you, as a jumping off point for a bigger campaign themed around dragons.

I'm planning a sequel to a 5E campaign from a few years back, which was a mashup of Tyranny of Dragons and Storm King's Thunder.

This new campaign will focus on the Cult of the Dragon resurrecting all the dragons the players killed in the previous campaign. So they're crawling through old lairs and churches of Tiamat looking for dragon hoards and dragon skeletons to advance their schemes.

Pondering using Sunless Citadel as the intro adventure. I might flip the orientation, placing the dungeon on a mesa, with the Grove level being the topmost, and the grove itself being a big cavern that was a dragon's lair opening onto the side of the mesa.