D&D 5E Princes of the Apocalypse as source material

[Savage Wombat]

I liked the looks of PotA as an adventure, and I'd probably buy it IF I were going to run it. But I'm not, at least right now. And since these APs are supposed to be game support as well as campaigns ...

Would you (or have you already) purchase Princes of the Apocalypse if you have no intention of running it?

 

[Mercule]

Nope. Not much there besides adventure material. About 75% of the "support" can be found in the free download.

Only a couple of new magic items that are suitable for other use. Ditto for monsters. You could probably adapt the others, but it still isn't worthwhile.

If you're running in the Realms, in that particular region, there's probably enough info to make it a consideration, but that's a pretty significant corner case and still a very dubious return.

 

[Paraxis]

No. But I would purchase a softcover version of the players guide to the campaign, and you can for 9.99.

http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/145542?src=DTRPGFB

This gets you all the spells, and even more races than what appears in the campaign guide, and now you can have a physical copy not just a pdf.

 

[Mercule]

No. But I would purchase a softcover version of the players guide to the campaign, and you can for 9.99.

That seems quite fair.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Haven't yet but probably will. Stuff like this I will always find a reason to pull stuff out of to use elsewhere if I don't run a game from it as-is.

 

[77IM]

Several dungeons and side-treks can be lifted wholesale and transplanted directly into some other campaign. The haunted keeps in particular; replace some of the cultists' elemental spells with more generic stuff (or necromantic, or whatever) and nobody will even realize that, say, Rivergard Keep or Sacred Stone Monastery are part of Elemental Evil. The Temple levels can also be pulled out and used separately. You can even have them as isolated cults of fire-worshippers or whatever.

 

[DongMaster]

Even though I love PotA, and will run it, I would say no.

 

[jamesjhaeck]

Several dungeons and side-treks can be lifted wholesale and transplanted directly into some other campaign. The haunted keeps in particular; replace some of the cultists' elemental spells with more generic stuff (or necromantic, or whatever) and nobody will even realize that, say, Rivergard Keep or Sacred Stone Monastery are part of Elemental Evil. The Temple levels can also be pulled out and used separately. You can even have them as isolated cults of fire-worshippers or whatever.

Seconding this. A lot of the dungeons (especially the surface-level Haunted Keeps) are evocative enough to be used as a standalone challenge.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

No. Published dungeon crawls aren't worth my time to read--my sandbox diverges too much from the base assumptions. Easier to just invent stuff.

 

[vandaexpress]

It depends on what you're looking for (I know, helpful, right).

I'm running Tyranny right now, and probably will for some time, so I don't get any immediate use out of it. However I bought it for a couple reasons:

1. I enjoy encounter design, so I like seeing what professionally designed encounters they have, and I *really* appreciate the monsters these adventures bring to the table, I use them as benchmarks for my own creations and they sometimes have cool traits or powers that I can repurpose. I like dissecting the encounter budgets and looking at all the underlying math.

2. I like to have stats for major players in the realms - although not technically realms, the elemental princes are big enough baddies that I don't mind having stats for them. This is particularly important to me until Wizards gets around to releasing an official conversion guide for older stats. (BTW... are there any good unofficial guides floating around here that you guys would recommend?) In particular, anything that approaches what used to be called "epic level" I like having stats for. I also enjoy seeing what level the NPCs are given their position or role within the world. For example, how powerful does one need to be to be an elemental prophet in the Realms? I sometimes have a hard time placing big time NPCs at the appropriate power level in 5e, especially when they were in prior editions. Bounded accuracy is throwing me off in that regard.

3. I want to show my support to WotC so that D&D can continue to grow. I'm fortunate to be in a position where I have enough discretionary income to do this, so the old adage "Vote with your money" applies here.

4. Any tidbit of information about the 5e Realms is of great interest to me, given the relative paucity of information about its current state. Any adventure that takes place there in 5e gets points because of this.

Having said that, what others have said is essentially true - unless you're a diehard D&D fan, I'm not sure its worth it strictly as source material unless your interests are along the same lines as mine, in that you enjoy seeing how professional game designers apply the rules to creating monsters, encounters, and skill checks, knowing that these specific interpretation and applications of those concepts has been approved by WotC.

If you don't plan to run it and don't have an interest in that stuff, pick up the player's companion for free and you should be in good shape.