D&D 5E Why is Hoard of the Dragon Queen such a bad adventure?

[Derren]

It would almost be like expecting the players to buy into the campaign before the campaign started was such a major stretch.

Good grief, it's a Forgotten Realms adventure - high heroism and badassery is to be expected isn't it? If you have a group of players that are going to completely ignore the adventure in front of them, why on earth are you playing an adventure path?

Good that you agree that the adventure, especially the beginning requires a lot of metagaming to work.

And it is not just buy in. You could completely buy the adventure background, yet charging into a town under dragon attack, let alone attacking said dragon at level 1 remains a suicidal tactic and most players will only do it because of metagame knowledge (The adventure wont throw a dragon at us at 1st level, etc.)

 

[jayoungr]

I disagree. Even with the provided backgrounds it takes a heavy dose of metagaming to charge into a town under dragpn attack or even attacking said dragon which is clearly a much too powerful foe to take down werent it for scripting and plot immunity.

Still a separate point from the one I was making. The complaint I was addressing was "the PCs have no reason to help out the villagers.

That said, a lot depends on the group; some groups are totally up for trying to attack a dragon at first-second level. It's up to the DM to decide how (and whether) to present the dragon.

 

[Jester David]

Editing.
It sounds like large chunks of the adventure were cut out, so much so that several chapters were excluded. So it sounds like the writers either overwrote dramatically, the word count was off, or WotC decided to make the products smaller than intended. Or some combination of the above.

There's also likely some problems that arise from limited monsters and working with a game in flux.

WotC has also never been the best at handling adventures. It's not their thing. They don't have anyone on staff that's an amazing adventure writer. So they outsourced. But that means extra coordination, no one to really handle the outlines and structure, or edit the book to make it shine.

 

[Derren]

Still a separate point from the one I was making. The complaint I was addressing was "the PCs have no reason to help out the villagers.

That said, a lot depends on the group; some groups are totally up for trying to attack a dragon at first-second level. It's up to the DM to decide how (and whether) to present the dragon.

There is a difference between having a reaon to help a village and attacking a clearly superior foe without any form of advantage unless you know you have plot immunity.

 

[Prism]

There is a difference between having a reaon to help a village and attacking a clearly superior foe without any form of advantage unless you know you have plot immunity.

As has been said the dragon encounter is optional so pretty easy to drop. Most modules have an encounter or few in them that I drop

 

[KarinsDad]

Yeah, because expecting heroes to act heroic is such a huge stretch.

The point is different from this.

Expecting all PC heroes to act suicidal is a huge stretch.

I know that at our table, a few of us (about 2 out of 6) tend to get into character and stay there. Something that is opposed to character concept jars at some of us.

I was playing a LG wizard. My PC has an Int of 16. I'm all for helping out the greater good, but Int 16 going into a burning town with raiders and a dragon is just plain suicidal for no observable gain. Just 6 more dead creatures. Maybe we can take out a few raiders, but the dragon just might smoke us before we even set foot in the town. As a player, I know that it is ok, otherwise the DM would not run it. But as a PC, my character does not know this.

I prefer playing the character via character knowledge, not player knowledge. I suspect that the "this is suicide" thought never even entered the minds of many players at many tables. It entered our minds and our PC conversation.


The whole "but you are heroes" argument might not fly. Let's take 911 as an example. Informed decisions are different than uninformed ones. If a structural engineer would have gone to the command post in NYC that day and said "That building is coming down in less than 10 minutes. You've got to get your men out now and get everyone away from these buildings now or hundreds will die.", it's likely that whomever was in charge would have made the right call and saved a lot of rescuers lives. Taking on a dragon is that level of suicidal for first level PCs.

Taking away the metagaming knowledge that "it's ok, it's a module" puts the game into one of suicide for the PCs. If the dragon would have attacked for real, most PCs at most tables would have been killed.

That is what the PCs should expect and that's why the module is subpar. It requires metagaming knowledge to even get the adventure started. At least at some tables.

 

[KarinsDad]

As has been said the dragon encounter is optional so pretty easy to drop. Most modules have an encounter or few in them that I drop

Are you a new DM? This is the showcase adventure of the new edition.

Yes, as an experienced DM, if my players decide to not even go into the town, I describe how they see the dragon flying toward the mountains. At that point, the game is back on track.

But for a new DM, this thought might not even enter his or her mind.

 

[Rhenny]

I think this adventure tries to play over to great a level span which is why it is difficult to allow choice. If we compare to the Red Hand of Doom, it succeeds because it allows the players to some extent to tackle the smaller scenarios in almost any order with only the first and last couple being determined by timings. 6th to 8th level characters can handle a wide variety of encounter difficulty. The Hoard struggles a bit because it chooses to start at 1st level and rapidly progress the PCs up to 8th. As written it would be difficult to create episodes that can be shifted in order until you get to the last two or three.

Having said all that I have found the individual episodes very open in nature. We are in the middle of the castle episode. How do you get in? Entirely up to the group - sneak, fight, climb the walls, disguise, use magic? Go in the night or day? Very good design

We are only in the 3rd Chapter now, but I agree with you. The whole feel of the adventure seems so Urgent and rushed. Immediately our PCs are embroiled in a war and it seems like we have no time to feel out characters. I would like to have a few introductory possibilities prior to the kobold and cultist/dragon attack. More early choices would make it more likely that the PCs could be hooked or embroiled in the conflict.

That said, I'm still enjoying it very much. It has a seriousness that some adventures lack, and it definitely feels gritty enough for me.

 

[KarinsDad]

Btw, I think the thing missing for me is the "Wow factor". Maybe I'm jaded from playing for so long, but "Where's the beef?".

Having said all that I have found the individual episodes very open in nature. We are in the middle of the castle episode. How do you get in? Entirely up to the group - sneak, fight, climb the walls, disguise, use magic? Go in the night or day? Very good design

How is that different than any other adventure? How is it good design to have options that nearly every other castle that PCs have gone into have also had? Is this castle episode better than the Greenest episode because you feel that it is less scripted?


One could say that going to a town being attacked by a dragon IS the wow factor. But the way it was done seems subpar. If the designers had lured the PCs to the town and suddenly, a dragon show up, that would have been more of a wow factor.

PC Fighter: "Oh crap, a dragon just landed on the keep. What are we going to do?"

instead of

PC Fighter: "Wow. A dragon is attacking that town. Sucks to be them. Let's go back the way we came. We can't fight that."


Same final result. Different presentation. And the designers did not have to pick one or the other. They could have said "If you feel that your PCs might not want to confront a dragon, have the dragon show up later. But if your PCs are the self sacrificing types of heroes, then have the dragon there right away so that they can shine.". This would have been a better setup, especially for new DMs.

 

[jayoungr]

Expecting all PC heroes to act suicidal is a huge stretch.

It's not clearly suicidal; they're helping to defend the town, not doing it single-handedly. And they do not have to confront the dragon.