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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Shardstone" data-source="post: 9252805" data-attributes="member: 6807784">5E modules are trying to tell stories in addition to being adventure games. However, I believe that WotC is a little bit reluctant when it comes to really giving DMs all the tools they need for a very compelling story. A villain doesn't have to be a character, it can be a setting, institution, law, and so on. However, given the nature of D&D, there need to be memorable antagonists for the PCs to fight. What D&D adventures usually fail to do IMO is to create a good Rogue's Gallery and use it. I think Descent Into Avernus is the best example of this.In Descent, there are three three different gangs in Hell (ala Mad Max) with really cool Warlord characters. These characters have almost 0 to do with the adventure and are only used in one small part of it. Instead, most of the adventure has you dealing with one-off devils or demons, and it's only really at the end that you start getting cool evil characters with staying power. But those characters have no impact on the EARLY game; things like the Dragonborn Paladin of Tiamat or Tiamat herself, or how the Demon Princes at the end of the adventure have no echoes in the early part. In this way, the great villains introduced in the adventure aren't just constrained to a tier, they're constrained to single session moments (maybe two or three if you're lucky or play for fewer hours each game). And even then, the main villain of the whole thing -- Zariel -- barely has any screentime at all till the end of the Adventure; and the Baldur's Gate villains, who were really well written, have no impact on anything in Hell (except for one PC).Overall, these problems can be found in differing amounts in all of WotC's adventures. Dragonheist doesn't have as much of a problem (and it's popular IMO for that reason), but many of the adventures past it do. Even the early adventures, like Princes of the Apocalypse, don't make great use of their really cool villains either. By not giving more tools to turn these great character concepts into great campaign villains, WotC ends up sabotaging the "story" aspects of their adventures. Strong DMs don't have this problem, but even then, I think a strong DM would be better served by more robust villain tools then what we get now.</blockquote>

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