D&D 5E Tinkering with OotA random encounter tables

CanadienneBacon · Sep 21, 2015

The random encounter tables in chapters 2 and 3 of OotA call for no encounter on a die result of 1-13 on a d20. For those of you who have played a session or three of the adventure, is that working or not working for your group?

I am considering switching up the ratio so it reads:

1-10 No encounter
11-13 Terrain
14-16 Creature
17-20 Terrain + creature

ddaley · Sep 27, 2015

I am only a few chapters into reading OotA, so, we obviously haven't played it yet. But, the sense that I am getting is that you may roll for a few days worth of encounters until you get a "success" (an encounter). Then, describe to the characters that they travel for 3 days through winding caverns, passing areas glowing brightly with colorful, phosphorescent fungi, and pools of stagnant water... on the 3rd day, one of their scouts comes back to report the sighting of giant webbing, stretching across an enormous gorge...

I get the feeling that, with the vast distances that the characters must cover that days may go by at a time without much happening.

If your party wants more frequent combat, then go ahead and change the encounter tables. I think my players would be turned off by constant, random encounters. I think I will "plan" out the random encounters, as others have suggested in other threads.

CanadienneBacon · Sep 27, 2015

Thanks for responding!

I agree constant random encounters aren't fun. The random encounter table in the adventure has 35% odds of an encounter occurring once per day (I'm looking at pp 25 for the once per day tidbit). My thought was that the Underdark is supposed to be dangerous, why not up it to 50% odds? Probably, there are compelling reasons on both sides of the aisle, and I was hoping to unpack both sides a bit more.