Pre-gen adventure assistance needed

[Sammael]

My FLGS is celebrating its anniversary on Sunday, and they asked me to run a D&D game. Needless to say, since they want to promote 4E, they handed me a couple of 4E pre-gen adventures and told me to pick one to run. I told them that 1) I am not a fan of 4E; 2) I am not too familiar with the rules; and 3) they would be better off getting someone else to do it. However, they can't get anyone else on such short notice, and they want me to run the adventure for total beginners and not worry about the rules too much anyway. Reluctantly, I agreed, because I think RPGs need more exposure (the FLGS is full of board gamers and wargamers all the time, but role-players are few and far between).

So, despite the fact that I dislike 4E, I will put my edition bias aside and try to run a fun game. I have two problems, however; since I am not that familiar with the rules, I cannot decide which adventure to pick (i.e. which one is the easiest to run) and I cannot make pre-gen PCs.

These are the available adventures:

Escape from Sembia
Living Greyhawk: A Dead Man's Job
Living Greyhawk: Ambition's Folly
Living Greyhawk: Trial by Fire

Whichever adventure I pick (and I hope to get some advice on this from RPGA members who've had the change to play the three Living Greyhawk adventures listed above), I need pre-gens. 5-6 should be sufficient, I guess. I'd really appreciate it if someone could link me to some good pre-gens that are not too difficult to run and adjudicate.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Jack99]

Escape from Sembia is okay, for a short adventure. It gives players some combat and a skill challenge. I haven't seen the others.

I also have the original pregens released by WotC at DDXP, but I do not know where they can be downloaded. Probably somewhere at wizards.com. I could mail them if you wanted. There are 6 characters.

 

[Rel]

I would strongly recommend downloading the Character Generator Beta and just using the "Quick Character" option. You can crank out a character a minute like that pretty easily.

As a bonus the program will make you a set of Power Cards for each character, which I think would be a big benefit for new players (and GM's) to 4e. Those cards will have all the bonuses pre-calculated for you and the players.

 

[Jack99]

I would strongly recommend downloading the Character Generator Beta and just using the "Quick Character" option. You can crank out a character a minute like that pretty easily.

As a bonus the program will make you a set of Power Cards for each character, which I think would be a big benefit for new players (and GM's) to 4e. Those cards will have all the bonuses pre-calculated for you and the players.

**slaps forehead**

Yeah, ignore my post, and do what Rel suggests. Much easier on you and your players.

 

[Filcher]

Given you don't like 4E, I'm betting you don't pay for the DDI.

Wizard pre-gens can be had here:

H1 Character Sheets


EDIT: I might be mistaken. Is the DDI on free trial or something?

 

[Wik]

Given you don't like 4E, I'm betting you don't pay for the DDI.

Wizard pre-gens can be had here:

H1 Character Sheets


EDIT: I might be mistaken. Is the DDI on free trial or something?

I think the Beta is, now.

 

[Rel]

My understanding is that the Character Generator Beta (limited to levels 1-3) is going to continue to be free to download for the foreseeable future.

 

[Jack99]

My understanding is that the Character Generator Beta (limited to levels 1-3) is going to continue to be free to download for the foreseeable future.

actually it seems they will expand it a bit.

Additionally, the free demo version that everyone can download and install will remain available after the launch of the full version. It features all the content from the physical game books as well as material from the online magazine. The demo version includes all of the Heroic tier feats, plus level 1 to level 8 magic items so you can fully equip even demo characters.

 

[Sammael]

Thanks for the tips, I downloaded the demo and it's working nicely.

Any tips for the adventures themselves?

 

[Festivus]

Of the four you listed, isn't only one of those a 4E adventure? At least I am not familiar with the other three, but if they are Living Greyhawk, I thought that was a 3.5 campaign.

Sembia is ok, but deadly (all the previews are). It at least has a skill challenge in it so it's the closest you can get to a real LFR module without actually playing in one. When compared to Scalegloom Hall (the one in the 4E DMG), which is 99% combat encounters.