D&D 5E Out of the Abyss in my grubby hands (pic attached)

[Sacrosanct]

Possible spoilers:


First thing of note:the typo with Orcus rolling on the Madness of Juiblex is still there, as expected. The demon art looks fantastic. You can meet Jaraxle (although just an NPC with no stats). There are random tables EVERYWHERE. I think this adventure path is going to require the most reading by the DM to get prepped. Like, I'm gonna have to read it several times Now excuse me while I read stuff like this:

 

[Sacrosanct]

More spoilers!!!


OK, after skimming though a bit more:

* I totally want to create a human barbarian named Thundarr just to get the Sword of Dawnbringer
* some people will HATE this campaign, as you start off as prisoners without gear. I personally really liked module A4 (which this reminds me of), but I've heard a lot of people absolutely hate being railroaded by starting as a prisoner with no choice of their own
* I really, really wish that if you bought the hardback, there was a code to download the maps. More than HotDQ or PotA, having maps is going to be critical just by the nature of how they are used. I.e., a lot of overland style stuff, and having a copy outside of the physical book would help me tremendously.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

I went to buy this and the store didn't have it.

 

[Valus]

Was it a WotC Preferred store? They get them 2 weeks early. If not you'll have to wait until, I think, the 15th.

 

[Sacrosanct]

That sucks. It looks like you can pretty much run into several iconic Salvatore NPCs, including Bruenor. But they all seem to be minor roles relegated to quest givers, essentially. None are statt'd up. I will say this, the first part (escaping from the underdark) is not linear at all. There are many options to choose from. You could theoretically skip 50 pages of text in this book by just going other routes. In fact, following a natural progression, you will end up bypassing big chunks of the area. That means two gaming groups can have wildly different experiences from level 1-8.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

Was it a WotC Preferred store? They get them 2 weeks early. If not you'll have to wait until, I think, the 15th.

They had Rise of Tiamat early but not this one. Found another store with it though.

 

[jodyjohnson]

* some people will HATE this campaign, as you start off as prisoners without gear. I personally really liked module A4 (which this reminds me of), but I've heard a lot of people absolutely hate being railroaded by starting as a prisoner with no choice of their own.

For our AL Encounters group we're running Harried in Hillsfar first to get characters a little fresh air before getting them captured. Part 2 has some hooks that can lead to the Underdark and imprisonment.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

I like it, there isn't a lot of milling about you are dumped straight in. Sounds interesting.

 

[Saplatt]

* some people will HATE this campaign, as you start off as prisoners without gear. I personally really liked module A4 (which this reminds me of), but I've heard a lot of people absolutely hate being railroaded by starting as a prisoner with no choice of their own
...

You would think, though I have to admit that my most successful campaign ever was a homebrew that started exactly that way ...

Question: Can you skip that sort of intro and just introduce them to the adventure at a higher level (possibly after adventuring somewhere else in the region?) And if you do so, how much of the product are you losing?

 

[designbot]

I really, really wish that if you bought the hardback, there was a code to download the maps. More than HotDQ or PotA, having maps is going to be critical just by the nature of how they are used. I.e., a lot of overland style stuff, and having a copy outside of the physical book would help me tremendously.

Who's listed in the credits under cartographers for this adventure?

Mike Schley & Sean MacDonald made the maps for PotA available for sale pretty quickly. (Granted, buying all the maps cost more than the book, but it's a lot better than nothing.)