D&D 5E Out of the Abyss: more level 10-15 adventures?

[CapnZapp]

Gravenhollow is a great place to beef up with some encounters.

I think encountering TWO Vizerans, one from the past and one from the present is cool. With the Faerzress going all wonky, the past "ghost vestiges" could become real. (Die Surface Scum!).

Yeah, all that exposition really needs some explosions

 

[CapnZapp]

Really there is no reason the campaign needs to run to level 15 other than that seems to be a magic number the authors were trying to hit. Even as written characters are facing nerfed versions of the demon lords so if you just nerf them a bit more they become challenges for a level 10 party.

Nah, defeating demon lords and fixing archmage spell errors sounds much more like stuff you need level 15 heroes for, so I'll stick to the general outline.

Thanks though

 

[CapnZapp]

I had to beef the xp substantially.

I'm awarding levels as I see fit (not tracking xp) so that bit isn't a big problem.

The issue is more: do the encounters that are specified work as advertised, and are there enough specified location-based encounters?

Pure random travelling wandering monsters isn't my thing, so part of my problem is that I'm definitely not going with the months and months of travel time (and the resulting random encounters).

I increased the enemy experience substantially in Mantol-Derith

Thanks for the heads up. Yes, I'll probably have to add more grunt troops and have them be led by various elite duergar (the book does provide several different kinds), making Mantol-Derith be more like a war zone than a inconsequential skirmish.

I can't believe they felt minotaurs, gnoll packs, grell, or even a single behir could challenge 11th level plus characters

I feel a bit surprised myself. Take the Troglodyte encounter for instance.

The writing seems to imply the party interacts with the Trogs in some other way than just obliterating them. But trogs are smelly nasty underdark vermin; why would they even bother about their squabbling when it would be easier and faster to simply wade right through them? Trogs are CR 1/4!

Even if all twenty were Champions as detailed by OotA it would still be a weak encounter, since they do pitiful damage - all those hit points would only make it a slow fight, not a dangerous one.

The later chapters are weakly designed. The high level design is seriously lacking.

At first blush, the first problem is still using too many creatures in the very low CR range and not using enough double-digit CR creatures as rank-and-file troopers.

I know bounded accuracy makes a few promises, but really, there's still a limit to what use a CR 1 humanoid can be in a level 15 fight...

 

[CapnZapp]

What do y'all think about replacing them Troglodytes (page 168) with Fomorians? That should give the party pause, since at CR 8 each an all-out attack would be very painful indeed. Now diplomacy doesn't sound so useless any longer...

 

[CapnZapp]

I'll introduce fomorians by having a fight with a single fomorian, so they'll have some inkling of why an all-out assault might be painful.

I'm thinking one fomorian, one umber hulk, and a dozen CR 3 grimlocks. Let me see if I can't post their stats.

 

[DM_Jeff]

There's a lot of encounter set pieces that are more like mini-adventures in Caves and Cavern by Raging Swan Press. It's stocked with pathfinder monsters but they could be swapped out easily enough.

Caves and Caverns

 

[CapnZapp]

I'll have a heavily modified Spire of the Horned King up soon if you want to check out what I'm doing to boost experience and make the chapter more dangerous.

I'm still a fair way's off, but yes, I'm interested in this. In the book, the Spire is little more than a low-level wandering monster table. The name, however, is awesome