D&D 5E (2014) Thinking about 5E releases...

[aramis erak]

So everything is either a one-shot or an adventure path? By that standard, almost every adventure ever published is an adventure path, which makes the definition useless. I never heard of anyone playing through e.g. Keep on the Borderlands or Palace of the Silver Princess in a single session, so by your definition they are adventure paths too.

Adventure paths don't have to take you from 1 to 20, but they should be the basis of an entire campaign, starting at low levels and taking you to very high ones. They should have multiple distinct phases. Something like Dragon's Demand is just a regular adventure. I'm personally not happy calling Princes of the Apocalypse an adventure path either, because I do not think it has the required sequentiality to it. It's just a big adventure.

A sequence is two or mor modules where all but the first one are a sequels to a prior one.
A path is a sequence where the intent is to go straight from A to B (to C) etc., without diverting to a non-sequence member.
A path can also be an omnibus where many chunks could be done as standalone modules, but for which the intent is a single super-module.

HotDQ is easily so. GDQ is. ToEE and RttToEE are not - Return is not intended to be a direct follow on. PotA is, even tho it can be taken out of sequence if needs be.

 

[Coredump]

Several play reports disagree with you on this.

Hahaha.... that is absolute BS!!

If you kill *everything* in episode 7, track down every kobold, attack things you don't need to, never negotiate, never bypass an encounter..... there is about 10,500 XP worth of creatures in the entire episode.

To get *1* PC from lvl 6 to lvl 7 takes 9,000 XP. Heck, lets say you give credit for everything regardless if you fight it or not.... and lets even give an unmentioned 50% bonus for.....whatever.... that still isn't enough to get 2 PCs to level... now if you have a party of 4 or 5....???

I challenge any 'play report' to explain that.

 

[Coredump]

"The Giants" is many modules. Shrine was expanded to include more content because the original was a race tournament (and was priced accordingly). I mean go pick up G1 Steading of the Hill Giant Chief, and count the pages. It won't take you long. The answer is 10. TEN pages for that module, including the map and a few half-page images. And it cost the equivalent of $16.16 in today-dollars. Would you pay $16.16 for a 10 page module from WOTC?

When I said 'giants', I really meant any of them.

And I am not talking about price, but content. G1 still had more content than almost any episode in a current AP. You want to compare the 'single' combined module of G1-3 to a current AP? Cost vs Content?

But lets not forget the rest of the modules.....
Descent into the depths
Saltmarsh
Cult Reptile god
Shrine Tamocaon
Bone Hill
Tower Inverness
Oasis White Palm
Forbidden city
Tomb of the lizard King
etc
etc


To even try and compare an episode of a current AP with one of these is a joke. Most of the episodes are closer to an adventure found in Dungeon Magazine, not an actual module.

DOn't get me wrong, I am not against the current APs.... HotDQ is fine. It just should be a level 1-(5 or 6) and not 1-8.

 

[Coredump]

No thank you. I am fine with a he said/ she said type situation. I have learned over decades, that going and doing the work to dig up that sort of information results in an immediate moving target, and it's a thankless effort, particularly when the person demanding the link hasn't done any similar work to offer similar evidence beyond their own opinion.

Sorry, but I thought the 'work' was unnecessary since the reality should have been painfully obvious. But I have since done the work to calculate all of the possible XP from the entire episode. So it is a mathematical impossibility.

Now, if you have found a play report that is some how able to run 10K XP into 35-45K XP... I would be interested in seeing that.

 

[delericho]

For an Adventure Path, milestone-based XP awards is the way to go. Adding extra encounters simply to give the PCs 'enough' XP makes for lousy storytelling, and isn't very good adventure design either.

 

[Coredump]

However, WotC seems aware of this problem and added a good 50+ pages to PotA and released it as a single volume, reducing the price for the storyline. Ditto the Rage of Demons book. It's a bit unforgiving to rail at a problem that has been aknowledged and fixed. I mean, we paid $10+ less for PotA and got enough extra pages for 2 modules.

I think it is also a bit premature to assume the issue has been 'fixed' just because they added some pages. Episode 7 is 10 pages long, and provides 10K XP. Bumping that to 13-14 pages probably isn't going to equate to 40K XP.
And Episode 7 isn't the only episode 'light' on XP.... and from what I hear, RoT is even worse than HotDQ.

Again, I kind of like the approach they have taken in HotDQ..... just don't call it a 1-8 when it isn't.

(I will admit, I have not looked into PotA, so maybe they did 'fix' it.... but I'm not holding my breathe)

 

[Coredump]

For an Adventure Path, milestone-based XP awards is the way to go. Adding extra encounters simply to give the PCs 'enough' XP makes for lousy storytelling, and isn't very good adventure design either.

False dichotomy.

Milestone makes sense to cover things like extra PCs in the party, or if they miss an encounter, or something. If you think they may only get 35K XP and they need 40K.... then Milestone makes sure they are appropriate level. But when they are only getting 10K.... it just means you are artificially inflating the leveling rate to fill a marketing quota of saying "Level 1 through 15" on the cover.

There are plenty of ways to add more encounters without ruining the adventure or story.

If there isn't a way, or if you simply don't want to... that is fine also. Then design the adventure so Episode 7 is for 6th level and Episode 8 is for 6th level.

Without going into too much detail, we got through the entire Episode 7 and only killed 2 creatures. And we could have avoided that if we had been more careful. But we still would have 'earned' the 45K XP because WotC wanted to call the AP "1-8" on the cover.

 

[delericho]

False dichotomy.

False dichotomy or not, the Paizo Adventure Paths frequently suggest that the DM drop in a few extra wandering monsters or other encounters for exactly that purpose. And, yes, it's a bad practice.

Without going into too much detail, we got through the entire Episode 7 and only killed 2 creatures. And we could have avoided that if we had been more careful. But we still would have 'earned' the 45K XP because WotC wanted to call the AP "1-8" on the cover.

It really depends what XP are supposed to be for. If they're a reward for killing things, then that's a problem. If they're for overcoming challenges, well, you did. Congratulations.

Bottom line: I'm no fan of "Tyranny of Dragons" - I thought Hoard was the better of the two adventures and didn't think it was particularly good (see my reviews for more detail). But for all the flaws with the adventures, milestone XP was one of the things they did right. IMO, of course.

 

[Mistwell]

False dichotomy.

Milestone makes sense to cover things like extra PCs in the party, or if they miss an encounter, or something.

According to WOTC surveys, most people have abandoned the individual encounter XP model and turned to session XP anyway. I know we did at some point during the playtest, and we love it and will never go back.

 

[Mistwell]

When I said 'giants', I really meant any of them.

G1 is "any" of them. It's the logical place to start with the Giants series. It's also a good module and fairly representative of the average type of Giants adventure in that series. Giants was also named in the post I was replying too, so let's drill down on that topic rather than drifting to others (that is what I was talking about when I mentioned moving target).

And I am not talking about price, but content. G1 still had more content than almost any episode in a current AP. You want to compare the 'single' combined module of G1-3 to a current AP? Cost vs Content?

Compare the average episode (not cherry picked) to G1. I think you will find G1 does not have more content, by any rationale definition. And it would cost over $16 now, for those 10 pages.

Personally, I would happily take the current AP over four G1-level adventures for the same price. And I absolutely think price plays a crucial role in this discussion - it's what we're mostly talking about here, a shift from small adventures at X price, versus a big adventure at X4 price. G1 was 10 pages for $16. Prices of the Apocalypse is 255 pages at $50. That's $0.20/page versus $1.60 a page. That's relevant to this discussion, even if you don't want to talk about it. The point I was making is that the larger adventures are more cost effective for Wizards to produce.