D&D 5E (2014) What is your favorite encounter site or dungeon from an official module?

[Gorg]

People have mentioned a couple specific ones but I think in general the major encounter locations and dungeons of Lost Mines need to be highlighted (Cragmaw Cave, Cragmaw Castle, the Redbrand Hideout, the Phandelver Mine, whatever that ruined town with the Dragon was called). They all were of reasonable digestible sizes, but still had interesting things going on, usually (or, depending on how you played it, always) had some sort of factional dispute players could theoretically exploit, with minor tweaks they had sensible enough ecology, and, a rare thing indeed in dungeons, all of them made more or less made enough sense to exist as locations that it didn't bother me (even if I feel like everyone in town would have figured out the Redbrand hideout). Both Cragmaw sites and the Redbrand hideout also had multiple entrances.

I've run the module 3 and a half times without really getting bored of it. I think a lot of the reason for that, other than bringing in different material from Icespire Peak or my own imagination each time I run it, is that the central locations all lend themselves to enough variety of approaches and resolutions that they remain fun to run for different groups. My only major critique is that since it is intended to be beginner DM friendly they really should have had specific instructions and supports for what happens when an enemy raises an alarm at one of these locations, because literally every group I've run it for has had at least one of these locations turn into a giant them vs. nearly every enemy in the location battle, and trying to figure out what all the enemies are and what they would do on the fly sucks.

So true, on that last point. I had an entire party get wiped- all 4 making death saves- from that cave with the orcs and an ogre.

They tried to snipe the sentry, and couldn't pull it off, they just winged him. So he ran inside and alerted everyone. The PC's then had the bright idea to bottle them up by putting themselves in the cave mouth, which did work- but allowed the orcs to focus all their attacks on the Fighter and Cleric. (and you can only roll so many attack rolls at +5, before you get some decent numbers, and great axes HURT when they hit!)

The players also had some serious bad luck with the dice, which helped not at all.

They killed most of the baddies, but all ran out of hp... The wizard solo'd the ogre- who got stuck behind all the orcs- with ranged spells, and a climactic Burning Hands as he was getting overrun. I followed the module text to the letter, and had the 2 or3 remaining orcs flee, rather than stick around, coup de gras the heroes, and loot them.

All in all, a memorable fight! They stumbled back into town, bloody, bruised and battered- and much the wiser.

As a DM, I learned that these 5E orcs are not the xp pinatas they were in the past, lol. And that's before I got Volo's!

I also agree with whomever mentioned the abandoned town in that same adventure. Same for the Goblin stronghold. Both were exciting adventures/locations in their own right. I did take the liberty of adding to that dragon's hoard.

 

[zakael19]

Mr. Dorey's warehouse from the Styes (Ghosts of Saltmarsh) the whole module is creepy and disturbing in a Lovecraftian way, but fighting skum mutants on a boat attached to a crane over a city street is so surreal and atmospheric it gave my Ravenloft players the creeps.

Oh that's a good one, I folded this into an Eberron campaign and it still worked great.

The Unwelcome Spirits Fort Venture location/encounter site from Explorer's Guide to Wildemount is a really fun and creepy place if run with the "if 3 days pass" version. A tense massacre site, caged survivor with some setting-weirdness going on, signs of various conflict driven horrors, and a strong supernatural tinge. I really enjoyed running it, and looping some themes from it back to later segments of the Betrayer's Rise dungeon when I ran US as a 1-3 adventure prior to the full Netherdeep campaign.