D&D (2024) WoTc and TSR... what is D&D

[Lanefan]

They put out whole books of 16-32 page Adventures every year...sometimes they pretend there is a unifying plot to them, sometimes not (like witht he upco.ing Journeys Through the Radiant Citadel).

The problem with a whole book of 'em is if I only wanted one of those adventures I'd still have to buy the whole book.

 

[Retreater]

that is intresting. I am going to reread Curse of Strahd and RIme of the Frost Maiden and Strixhaven with that in mind

With Curse of Strahd, you might just need to remove the Tarokka deck items - like the allies and items of power - from showing up in the locations. Each of the towns is pretty well fleshed out for adventures. You obviously have Castle Ravenloft as a satisfying dungeon. Then the Amber Temple comes to mind as an individual location- though I'd probably want to add a little more of a "boss" element to it just to make it feel more complete.

 

[Parmandur]

I'll have to disagree with Perkins that these are individually satisfying adventure locations like traditional modules. Looking at something like Rime of the Frostmaiden, you have numerous locations that are 2-3 rooms in a dungeon with 1-2 encounters in it. Compare that to something like The Sunless Citadel, which has traps, monsters, factions, story, multiple levels, a memorable boss fight, etc. This was the stuff that we used to get in previous editions as a 32 page adventure.
Not only is The Sunless Citadel better than any of the side locations in Rime of the Frostmaiden, I'd go so far as to say (in my opinion), it's a better adventure than the climax of Rime, which essentially had one encounter worth fighting in the whole darned castle.
And I'm not trying to promote Sunless Citadel as the pinnacle of adventure design. It's merely above average, but compared to most of 5e's adventure design it's a masterpiece.

A better comparison on that front are the meaty modular chapters from Curse of Strahd, or the Giant fortresses from Storm King's Thunder. Icewind Dale has intentionally micro encounters, by and large, but there are still big fat dungeons in there.

 

[Parmandur]

The problem with a whole book of 'em is if I only wanted one of those adventures I'd still have to buy the whole book.

Yeah, but that's a business and marketing issue with the bindery, not the modules being 16-32 pages

 

[Parmandur]

that is intresting. I am going to reread Curse of Strahd and RIme of the Frost Maiden and Strixhaven with that in mind

Strixhaven has 4 modules pretty clearly labeled, one for each academic year. Probably one of the most obvious examples, though Perkins usually gives his 16-32 page chapters very Gygaxian module names.

 

[Lanefan]

I'll have to disagree with Perkins that these are individually satisfying adventure locations like traditional modules. Looking at something like Rime of the Frostmaiden, you have numerous locations that are 2-3 rooms in a dungeon with 1-2 encounters in it. Compare that to something like The Sunless Citadel, which has traps, monsters, factions, story, multiple levels, a memorable boss fight, etc. This was the stuff that we used to get in previous editions as a 32 page adventure.
Not only is The Sunless Citadel better than any of the side locations in Rime of the Frostmaiden, I'd go so far as to say (in my opinion), it's a better adventure than the climax of Rime, which essentially had one encounter worth fighting in the whole darned castle.
And I'm not trying to promote Sunless Citadel as the pinnacle of adventure design. It's merely above average, but compared to most of 5e's adventure design it's a masterpiece.

The one 5e-era WotC adventure book that really is pretty good for this is Princes of the Apocalypse. There's about 15 small-medium stand-alone adventures in there if you chop off some interconnecting bits and forget about the overarching backstory, and some of them are quite good.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

With Curse of Strahd, you might just need to remove the Tarokka deck items - like the allies and items of power - from showing up in the locations. Each of the towns is pretty well fleshed out for adventures. You obviously have Castle Ravenloft as a satisfying dungeon. Then the Amber Temple comes to mind as an individual location- though I'd probably want to add a little more of a "boss" element to it just to make it feel more complete.

I wont get the chance tonight (our once a month game is tonight) and may not tomorrow (after work I have plans) but I am going to try this... it intrigues me.

in my head I am now imagining going to strixhaven and taking 'spring break' in Voloki' and having to stop some cannibals on the way back to school... and if that would work.

Maybe get a ticket to a circus along the way.

 

[Retreater]

The one 5e-era WotC adventure book that really is pretty good for this is Princes of the Apocalypse. There's about 15 small-medium stand-alone adventures in there if you chop off some interconnecting bits and forget about the overarching backstory, and some of them are quite good.

Oh yeah! I ran PotA in just that way. We did an episodic "dungeon of the week" campaign with my group of old gaming buddies from college whenever we could get together for a gaming weekend (twice or so a year). It was a blast - very beer and pretzels type of gaming.

A better comparison on that front are the meaty modular chapters from Curse of Strahd, or the Giant fortresses from Storm King's Thunder. Icewind Dale has intentionally micro encounters, by and large, but there are still big fat dungeons in there.

Yeah, when I was breaking it down for @GMforPowergamers I was thinking that CoS had more than its share of satisfying locations (every village, the Castle, Amber Temple, the Mountain Pass, the Winery). I guess it's just my tastes, but I'd put any location in CoS against anything in Rime.
Storm King's Thunder I don't remember too much because I heavily altered it because we went way off the (admittedly nonsensical) rails Wizards of the Coast laid for that campaign. If I remember right, the Fire Giant area was really solid, though.

 

[Stormonu]

They started with Hoard of the Dragon Queen in 2014, and just put out Call of the Netherdeep.

All of the 5E Adventure books have chapters that are "coincidently" about 16-32 pages long. When Perkins was on Dragon Talk for the Tyranny of Dragons reprint he was pretty open about how they design the books as bundles of modules with removable veneer of story that can be mixed and matched.

This is really apparent in Ghosts of Saltmarsh. It's three interconnected modules (U1-3) and four additional (unrelated, but fitting theme-wise) old Dungeon Magazine adventures rolled into one book, with some extras (Seaborne encounter tables, extra maps and rules/stats for seaborne vessels).

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Yeah, when I was breaking it down for @GMforPowergamers I was thinking that CoS had more than its share of satisfying locations (every village, the Castle, Amber Temple, the Mountain Pass, the Winery). I guess it's just my tastes, but I'd put any location in CoS against anything in Rime.

and I appreciate it. I don't know how true it is but the more I think about it the more sese it makes and the more i WANT you to be right.