D&D 5E (2024) So what's going on with the October book?

[Parmandur]

That's a good point, I think that's just mismatched expectations. It's called Dragon Heist so players expected to be heisting, not to be going after those who were doing the heist. The back-of-the-book text is ambiguous, so I can see either way:

Exactly. Thung is, people thought "Ocean's Eleven" when it is more like Raiders of the Lost Ark: the NPC antagonists also have the PC extremely outgunned, so going in hot and heavy is unlikely to work, so some sneaking and skill based encounters are going to be the path forward...which is what I also believe Perkins was thinking of with the "heist" imagery.

 

[Nikosandros]

The thing people miss about Dragon Heist is thst the Villains are heisting, and the players are like the Avengers here.

Honestly, I find Dragon Heist both terrible and great. The adventure itself, IMHO, is terrible. Linear, stupid and boring. I would never ran it. The book, however, is fillet to the brim with ideas, characters, locations and maps. Using the remix from The Alexandrian and adding plenty of my own, I ran what I consider one of my best campaigns ever.

 

[Reynard]

Honestly, I find Dragon Heist both terrible and great. The adventure itself, IMHO, is terrible. Linear, stupid and boring. I would never ran it. The book, however, is fillet to the brim with ideas, characters, locations and maps.

QFT

 

[bedir than]

Additionally, Dragon Heist doing the play on words with dragon=money was too cute by half.

 

[Parmandur]

Honestly, I find Dragon Heist both terrible and great. The adventure itself, IMHO, is terrible. Linear, stupid and boring. I would never ran it. The book, however, is fillet to the brim with ideas, characters, locations and maps. Using the remix from The Alexandrian and adding plenty of my own, I ran what I consider one of my best campaigns ever.

I feel like that criticism and praise apply to most campaign books that Chris Perkins worked on, being great smorgasbords of material with mofe or less weak prebaked "plots". Though I think that both the strengthes and weaknesses typical of his style are quite exaggerated in that particular book, indeed.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Honestly, I find Dragon Heist both terrible and great. The adventure itself, IMHO, is terrible. Linear, stupid and boring. I would never ran it. The book, however, is fillet to the brim with ideas, characters, locations and maps. Using the remix from The Alexandrian and adding plenty of my own, I ran what I consider one of my best campaigns ever.

I think that what you describe makes Dragon Heist an excellent adventure. IMO, 95% of published adventures are hot garbage if you expect to run them 100% exactly "as is". DH at least had some great, inspirational bits that made it worth running at all. I ran it twice.

I can understand the disappointment that it wasn't a Heist, if players were hoping for one, but I think the criticism gets overblown. Neverember committed a heist of Waterdhavian Dragons. That's what the name refers to. Expectations could have been mananed better, but the name fits the book, once you understand it. It's not inappropriate, it's just a little too "clever".

There's way, way worse out there.

When it comes to Spelljammer, I didn't find that I disliked the adventure itself, exactly, but I absolutely LOATHED the supposed "ship-to-ship" battle rules. They are so half-baked that I still don't entirely understand how anyone could use them without throwing them out and making it up for themselves. Which I can, and did, do, but then I wonder: What's the point of them existing? They're just terrible.

 

[evilbob]

Um... October... Did no one else think of Halloween? I know it's not entirely an international holiday but it's catching on. That makes me think Horror. Or Ravenloft (similar).

 

[Parmandur]

Um... October... Did no one else think of Halloween? I know it's not entirely an international holiday but it's catching on. That makes me think Horror. Or Ravenloft (similar).

The timing plus Heroes of Horror UA is suggestive.

 

[Remathilis]

Um... October... Did no one else think of Halloween? I know it's not entirely an international holiday but it's catching on. That makes me think Horror. Or Ravenloft (similar).

Ironically enough, WotC has been lousy at releasing spooky stuff at Halloween. Curse of Strahd and Van Richten's Guide both were spring releases. Maybe to give DMs enough time to buy and read the things. Anyway, I'm not not saying it's a possibility, but it doesn't have a lot of presedent.

 

[Parmandur]

Ironically enough, WotC has been lousy at releasing spooky stuff at Halloween. Curse of Strahd and Van Richten's Guide both were spring releases. Maybe to give DMs enough time to buy and read the things. Anyway, I'm not not saying it's a possibility, but it doesn't have a lot of presedent.

Not a lot of precedent, in particular...but it wouldn't be surprising either.

The UA is more suggestive than the date, as is the parallel of Forge of the Artificer.