D&D 5E (2014) Princes of the Apocalypse campaign recaps


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I was posting on this thread earlier, but ended up dropping out. My campaign did get to the end, though! We had a TPK in the Air Temple, mainly because the party accepted Windharrow's offer of an audience with Aeresi, and followed him right into the wind node, where she promptly identified them as enemies and attacked. That didn't go well! Afterwards, we had a discussion about what to do.

We were playing at a university student society, and term time was draining away fast. I proposed that we skip some content, creating new level 10 characters, and move straight onto the final Temple, handwaving away the Fire and Air ones (we'd done Water already). Since time was running out, we also did not do any side quests. This was just about enough time, albeit I actually had to move the game to my home in the event anyway and so the time pressures disappeared. The end result was that we did a really intensive burst through the final few levels of the adventure, and without any variation I found it tough to keep excited. The players faced Yan-C-Bin for their final combat, and that was actually a really great fight! We rounded things off with a short sidequest to the Halls of the Hunting Axe, then did character gen for Curse of Strahd.

Thoughts on the module: I think that this is a really solid adventure, with some strong environments (the Keeps were all interesting) and a great theme, but that there are definite issues. The delegation hook turned out to be as weak in practice as many had feared; my players had difficulty remembering it. I also found that the 'sandbox' elements turned out to be a bit thin in practice. Because I didn't use any of the sidequests, the players never actually went more than ten miles from Red Larch, except that one time they went to the Riverguard Keep via Womford. I had this beautiful map of the Dessarin Valley, and used basically none of it!

What I would change: Move the different dungeon levels far apart. We can keep all the of Keeps in the same place, since that way Red Larch makes a solid low-level base. But then, instead of stairways down into the lower levels, I'd have clues to find them in other parts of the valley. Have the river one be accessed by literally swimming down into the river! The Earth temple could be moved up into the Dessarin Hills, near Yartar. The Air temple perhaps into one of the forests, I'm not sure. Fire into an extinct volcano in the mountains? In short, make the players actually travel around the place.

Furthermore, I'd probably either scale the adventure back - have fewer dungeons in total - or add way more side quest action than I used the first time. The dungeons are great, but huge, and you can spend weeks without any real variation if you're not careful. Finally, I'd strip out the Delegation hook, and think hard about how to approach it instead. Perhaps I'd just straight up have the players be members of the Harpers, or just be wandering nearby when they get attacked by some Elemental cultists, a much simpler hook that also helps to remove time pressure. At the same time, I'd maybe remove the world ending element of the finale; that would give it a more leisurely pace, and let the players choose to do other things, rather than feeling compelled to delve ever deeper without leaving.

Thanks all for the commentary throughout! It was really interesting to read about how other groups approached the same situations. :)
 

 

Nebulous's campaign logs:

Session #36 - The Looting of Black Earth Temple

https://app.box.com/s/pdtixjcxy8luims28fdanwdyudwuujul

Session #37 - Haayon the Punisher

https://app.box.com/s/v5qr3ra80dk5z856eot5ckosnkx33s5x

Session #38 - Haayon's Folly

https://app.box.com/s/rojk3ro6dbh01loz65lktgs18ai1q1fr

Session #39 - A Doom of Ice & Fire

https://app.box.com/s/ts8h3twdcfd7y2jv8prqdvz1g573b1q3

Session #40 - At the Halls of the Hunting Axe

https://app.box.com/s/f4j67wubbvdim84m3bz254bwr7joa0a0

Session #41- The Lost Tomb of King Torild, Part 1

https://app.box.com/s/u9o7hcwphzh1c3yosusm5tkq1nzmfbw9

Session #42 - The Lost Tomb of King Torild, Part 2

https://app.box.com/s/ulepw8q9nrlm3kzi82aeep8mqjznl348

Session #43 - Drannin's Trap!

https://app.box.com/s/cleb3ji2pts1ljtdg98auhv1czi5a3rl

Session #44 - Return to the Vale of Dancing Waters

https://app.box.com/s/hbwqtdah390spjcr1o1zoue5ehkfddv4

Session #45 - The Utter Defeat of Rivergard Keep

https://app.box.com/s/hfcn7w4ygntcnn6scdrxjmmtwcatk4k3

Session #46 - Temple of the Crushing Wave

https://app.box.com/s/f6xb7joufsnscfzf4sgbf7dkkt3unsiu
 

Nebulous said:
Im starting to think at 10th level it's near impossible for them to die unless they get strung out on resources without a long rest. I used to be able to ad hoc encounters. I can't anymore, I have to plan challenging ones. I think I might even have them fight Olhydra in the water node just to see what happens.
Click to expand...

I would have agreed with you two weeks ago, then I nearly had a TPK in the water node.

A relatively fresh 11th level 4-person party made it to the water portal and Gar. Gar had been scrying the party and was aware of who they were and their usual tactics. I swapped out tidal wave from his spell list for dispel magic with that in mind.

Gar's first action was to dispel the heavily armored cleric's water walk spell. From that moment on, everything fell apart. The cleric was focused on staying afloat rather than battlefield control or healing. The paladin tank leaped into melee combat with Gar and his water elemental, leaving the cleric vulnerable to the attacks of the crocodiles and putting himself out of the cleric's healing reach. Worried about losing his own water walk, the warlock cast fly on himself and the paladin. The ranger stayed well away from combat raining arrows down on the crocs.

Gar was able to pepper the party with call lightnings while the crocs grappled and restrained the cleric. Gar himself was able to grapple the paladin while he and the elemental attacked the paladin. Before anyone knew what was happening, both the cleric and paladin were unconscious, the ranger was too far away to do anything about it, and the warlock was alone on the island with the elemental and Gar.

Gar killed the dwarf (auto crits vs unconscious character) and kicked his corpse into the pool. All for the glory of Olhydra. The ranger then spent all his actions getting to the cleric and popping a goodberry in his mouth. The cleric was up long enough to heal the ranger (who only took damage because he got too close to the crocs in order to heal the cleric) before going back under. Fortunately, the dwarvern spirit inside the paladin’s axe was able to seize control of the paladin’s body, crawl up out of the pool, kill Gar with several devastating axe blows, and eventually toss Drown into the portal.

Before collapsing, the dwarven spirit asked the party to take his axe and the body of their fallen comrade to his tomb. The ranger made a hasty escape and the warlock grabbed the paladin’s body before dimension dooring out of the portal cavern. The crocs were left to feast on the body of the cleric as the two survivors retreated back to the Fane of the Eye.

The party made several mistakes, including panicking when their normal battle plan fell apart, separating themselves from each other on the large battlefield, and not working cooperatively. Additionally, they spent too much time (and actions) trying to escape the grapples rather than fighting or some other productive activity.

At least they were able to defeat Gar and close the portal. They’re regrouping in a nearby dwarven temple before assaulting the Black Geode.
 

andrew said:
I would have agreed with you two weeks ago, then I nearly had a TPK in the water node.

A relatively fresh 11th level 4-person party made it to the water portal and Gar. Gar had been scrying the party and was aware of who they were and their usual tactics. I swapped out tidal wave from his spell list for dispel magic with that in mind.

Gar's first action was to dispel the heavily armored cleric's water walk spell. From that moment on, everything fell apart. The cleric was focused on staying afloat rather than battlefield control or healing. The paladin tank leaped into melee combat with Gar and his water elemental, leaving the cleric vulnerable to the attacks of the crocodiles and putting himself out of the cleric's healing reach. Worried about losing his own water walk, the warlock cast fly on himself and the paladin. The ranger stayed well away from combat raining arrows down on the crocs.

Gar was able to pepper the party with call lightnings while the crocs grappled and restrained the cleric. Gar himself was able to grapple the paladin while he and the elemental attacked the paladin. Before anyone knew what was happening, both the cleric and paladin were unconscious, the ranger was too far away to do anything about it, and the warlock was alone on the island with the elemental and Gar.

Gar killed the dwarf (auto crits vs unconscious character) and kicked his corpse into the pool. All for the glory of Olhydra. The ranger then spent all his actions getting to the cleric and popping a goodberry in his mouth. The cleric was up long enough to heal the ranger (who only took damage because he got too close to the crocs in order to heal the cleric) before going back under. Fortunately, the dwarvern spirit inside the paladin’s axe was able to seize control of the paladin’s body, crawl up out of the pool, kill Gar with several devastating axe blows, and eventually toss Drown into the portal.

Before collapsing, the dwarven spirit asked the party to take his axe and the body of their fallen comrade to his tomb. The ranger made a hasty escape and the warlock grabbed the paladin’s body before dimension dooring out of the portal cavern. The crocs were left to feast on the body of the cleric as the two survivors retreated back to the Fane of the Eye.

The party made several mistakes, including panicking when their normal battle plan fell apart, separating themselves from each other on the large battlefield, and not working cooperatively. Additionally, they spent too much time (and actions) trying to escape the grapples rather than fighting or some other productive activity.

At least they were able to defeat Gar and close the portal. They’re regrouping in a nearby dwarven temple before assaulting the Black Geode.
Click to expand...

Yeah, Andrew, dispelling the PCs magic is my new number one priority from here to the end of the campaign. I have to. If i don't, they're going to pounce on everything and destroy the baddies. I personally like D&D less high powered than this, and gods I know it gets worse, all the way to 20th! Things just start breaking down in D&D around 12th-13th level. Or sooner. It depends. Already I'm having to constantly create custom encounters just to give a modicum of challenge to the PCs.

If I ran this per the book, they'd already be done with this campaign and killed everyone and stolen all their loot. I still love it though. I LOVE this campaign, I love the maps and the monsters and the general gist of it. But when I'm done with this one I'm done with 5e for a while, so I'm sure I'll miss some really great adventure paths, but I will need another system to tinker with.
 




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