Waterdeep: Dragon Heist First Impressions

I love heist/caper stories and urban fantasy adventures so the minute the D&D team announced Waterdeep: Dragon Heist, I couldn't wait to get my hands on it. Now that I've got it? I'm still excited.

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My full review will follow after I finish reading the book but a few quick impressions.

1. The choice of four villains to choose from is a nice touch for replay-ability. Each villain is tied to a season. The full reading will reveal why.
2. I like the adventure flowchart and encounter chains.
3. It has a pronunciation guide! That makes a DM's life much easier.
4. Players have three additional factions they can play, one of which is Force Grey. Critical Role fans will love that.
5. Lots of cool NPCs are in the adventure, including well-known ones like Laeral Silverhand, though she may not be the same as the last time you saw her in an official Waterdeep adventure.
6. The building maps are nice and could be reused in other adventures.
7. For background material, it includes a section labeled “Volo's Waterdeep Enchiridion” that should get DMs new to Waterdeep up to speed.

After the freeform aspects of Tomb of Annihilation, the fact that Waterdeep: Dragon Heist has a bit more structure while still a sandbox is a smart choice. Being set in Faerun's most famous city also presents some nice dilemmas for players. Murder hobo tactics are likely to get them killed or imprisoned, so players should have to be more strategic – of course, that's never guaranteed.

While these are just quick takes based on a flip through of Waterdeep: Dragon Heist, they definitely whet my appetite for more. City-based adventures aren't explored enough in D&D, in my opinion, Waterdeep is a rich enough setting to allow for as much variety as any wilderness or dungeon setting.

This article was contributed by Beth Rimmels (brimmels) as part of EN World's Columnist (ENWC) program. We are always on the lookout for freelance columnists! If you have a pitch, please contact us!

 

[Burnside]

Damn dude, you had me at “not as much of a sandbox as previous publications!”

Plot flowcharts? Events organized chronologically? Utilitarian maps? Enough setting material to run your own stuff in Waterdeep?This sounds like the best WotC-published adventure since Phandelver. Maybe even since Murder in Baldur’s Gate!

I'd say in terms of ease-of-use, best since LMoP.

Best overall? It's going to be a matter of taste. People who really like FR will like it more than those who don't. It is NOT going to be easy to put this one in Eberron or a generic setting. It's very much Waterdeep, the FR factions are used more heavily than in recent years, terrible Ed Greenwood names ("Janytar Mistgem" and what have you) are all over it, and so far I have encountered references (not plot-central) to characters and events from Horde of the Dragon Queen and Princes of Apocalypse.

A surprising amount of dice-rolling going on in places where you might expect more story. For an adventure containing intrigue, mystery, and investigating, it's disappointing to see that a lot of the actual investigation and information gathering is resolved by "spend a tenday making three DC 13 Investigation checks per day" rather than actually describing how those investigations might be played, what clues can be found, or who can be spoken to. DMs and players are often left on their own if they want to bring that stuff to life.

It's pretty generous with magic items, and for once they were nice enough to put spells and scrolls for wizards to find. There are a lot of exotic beings and creatures running shops - it's a more magic-heavy setting than the previous Sword Coast stuff has been.

Chapter 1 is a fun, railroaded city quest ending in a fun, challenging starter dungeon.

Chapter 2 includes loads of side quests you could get from factions. They're more sketches than quests really; DMs will have to pick the ones the like and flesh them out.

 

[beholdsa]

That's too bad, I was hoping to run it in Palanthas in Dragonlance.

 

[Demetrios1453]

As I mentioned on the D&D Beyond thread, I very much like what I have read so far, and am very much looking forward to the upcoming Undermountain sequel, so we can at last run a full 1 - 20 5e campaign.

One thing stuck out in particular - the "summer" campaign with the Cassalantars is quite a bit darker than the other campaigns, since whether the characters win or lose, innocents are going to suffer horribly as a result, unless they somehow find a loophole technicality in something that shouldn't possibly have a loophole technicality.

[sblock]The Cassalantars have pledged the souls of their children to Asmodeus to save themselves from ruin previously - their oldest son's soul has already been forfeited and he is now a chain devil, and the souls of their two younger twin children will be forfeit on their rapidly-approaching ninth birthdays. They can redeem the souls for 999,999 gold pieces and sacrificing 99 "unfortunate souls" to Asmodeus all at once before that date. The Casalantars are looking for the treasure to help pay for the gold piece part of the contract and plan on indulging in a mass poisoning at an upcoming party they will hold. So, if the characters "win" and keep the Cassalantars from gaining the treasure, two innocent children will be turned in to lemures. if the party loses, and the Cassalatars gain the treasure, 99 innocent people (or more by accident) will die (if the party stops that, well, then we're back to dooming the children). The only way that things could come out for the best would be to let the Cassalantars gain the treasure, and then trick them into murdering 99 people who somehow deserve it, which somehow seems a pretty tall order for a low-level party. I did think it would be amusing to ensure only cultists of Asmodeus were invited to the party and then subsequently murdered; while suitably ironic, it would be really difficult and the Lord of the Ninth would probably not see the humor in the situation... [/sblock]

 

[Staccat0]

I’m torn. I hate how WOTC handles sandbox content but I don’t have a ton of interest in playing a plot heavy adventure. Not everything is for everyone but I’m curious...

Do players plan the heist? Are they given a lot of approach options?

And if it’s story heavy, is it pretty easy to grab off a shelf and just run from the book?

 

[Tiles]

We played our session O tonight and set off for Waterdeep with our new patron Volo G. I’m really impressed with how broad and flexible the adventure could run and how inovative the adventure structure is. It’s setting and adventure blend is really optimized. I’m excited to play our next game!

 

[FriendBesto]

Overall I'm most excited for an official 1-20 run designed out of book to flow as one. Large urban info dumps have always been my personal biggest issue with running content but I'm optimistic about the quality of organization with this one, alot of the GM that I use aids like flowcharts are included, which makes me really excited for the 6-20 chunk!

 

[gyor]

I'd say in terms of ease-of-use, best since LMoP.

Best overall? It's going to be a matter of taste. People who really like FR will like it more than those who don't. It is NOT going to be easy to put this one in Eberron or a generic setting. It's very much Waterdeep, the FR factions are used more heavily than in recent years, terrible Ed Greenwood names ("Janytar Mistgem" and what have you) are all over it, and so far I have encountered references (not plot-central) to characters and events from Horde of the Dragon Queen and Princes of Apocalypse.

A surprising amount of dice-rolling going on in places where you might expect more story. For an adventure containing intrigue, mystery, and investigating, it's disappointing to see that a lot of the actual investigation and information gathering is resolved by "spend a tenday making three DC 13 Investigation checks per day" rather than actually describing how those investigations might be played, what clues can be found, or who can be spoken to. DMs and players are often left on their own if they want to bring that stuff to life.

It's pretty generous with magic items, and for once they were nice enough to put spells and scrolls for wizards to find. There are a lot of exotic beings and creatures running shops - it's a more magic-heavy setting than the previous Sword Coast stuff has been.

Chapter 1 is a fun, railroaded city quest ending in a fun, challenging starter dungeon.

Chapter 2 includes loads of side quests you could get from factions. They're more sketches than quests really; DMs will have to pick the ones the like and flesh them out.

I think it's a blend of railroaded main plot, with a Sandbox of side quests.

 

[gyor]

Overall I'm most excited for an official 1-20 run designed out of book to flow as one. Large urban info dumps have always been my personal biggest issue with running content but I'm optimistic about the quality of organization with this one, alot of the GM that I use aids like flowcharts are included, which makes me really excited for the 6-20 chunk!

As I understand it, you can also mix in various AL session 8 moduals as well from DMSGUILD, it's flexible enough to allow that.

I would suggest also getting the SCAG for more regional background lore.

 

[dave2008]

(Highlight for spoilers):

You should probably out the spoiler, behind a spoiler tag
[sblock]
The Cassalantars have pledged the souls of their children to Asmodeus to save themselves from ruin previously - their oldest son's soul has already been forfeited and he is now a chain devil, and the souls of their two younger twin children will be forfeit on their rapidly-approaching ninth birthdays. They can redeem the souls for 999,999 gold pieces and sacrificing 99 "unfortunate souls" to Asmodeus all at once before that date. The Casalantars are looking for the treasure to help pay for the gold piece part of the contract and plan on indulging in a mass poisoning at an upcoming party they will hold. So, if the characters "win" and keep the Cassalantars from gaining the treasure, two innocent children will be turned in to lemures. if the party loses, and the Cassalatars gain the treasure, 99 innocent people (or more by accident) will die (if the party stops that, well, then we're back to dooming the children). The only way that things could come out for the best would be to let the Cassalantars gain the treasure, and then trick them into murdering 99 people who somehow deserve it, which somehow seems a pretty tall order for a low-level party. I did think it would be amusing to ensure only cultists of Asmodeus were invited to the party and then subsequently murdered; while suitably ironic, it would be really difficult and the Lord of the Ninth would probably not see the humor in the situation... (End of spoilers)[/sblock]

use:

Spoiler

text to be hidden

, but replace "spoiler" with "sblock"

 

[Burnside]

And if it’s story heavy, is it pretty easy to grab off a shelf and just run from the book?

From what I've read this far:

Chapter 1, yes, most DMs will just be able to read the chapter once and run it.

Chapter 2, no. It's basically "have them do some side quests until they reach level 3. Here's some ideas, you flesh them out."

Chapter 3, pretty much yes. Back on the railroad.

Because of the chronological progression, for the most part DMs only need to focus on one chapter at a time as opposed to something like CoS where ideally you really had to have your head wrapped around the entire book at all times.