How is DnD Encounters shaping up for you?
Any stories to share and tall tales to tell. Any advice on running or problems that you have found in the adventure?
The first session started in a pretty entertaining way. The first person to try to cross the bridge ended up falling into the water below and the second ended up tripping on the bridge as well (but luckily didn't fall into the water).
At first it looked quite bad for the party. I was hitting pretty much every time and they were missing a lot. A large chunk of the party were bloodied before any of the enemies and I thought the party might quickly start falling. Thankfully for them it turned around and they started taking out the enemies quickly.
The second session was pretty fun as well, but the enemies seemed to fall a lot faster. Some of it was because of the minions, but after about two rounds almost all of enemies were taken out leaving only the two guards and the doppelganger. Quickly after that the enemies were just overwhelmed and destroyed.
Because of that the second encounter only took about fifty minutes to complete, leaving everyone somewhat unwilling to just leave when they were ready for another hour of game. Given the free time I decided to run a sort of endurance mock-battle.
After recording everyone hp, surges left, and dailies expended, I had everyone place their figure on the first encounter area. Each round I rolled to determine what enemy from the last two sessions appeared to fight the party. It was a pretty fun way to spend the remaining time.
Afterwards, it was decided that next week would be the last session. In part due to the chance of a short session, but mostly because one player didn't especially care to continue to play 1st level characters for so many weeks. He was willing to continue if anyone really wanted to continue this as opposed to the previous game, but no one else was really interested in continuing D&D Encounters. It was set that after next week, everyone would level and the game would continue with the same characters but use different encounters as the party levels every two to three sessions.
It is interesting to me because we have two tables that have played the first and second encounter at our store.
The first group was most composed of experienced 4th ed players. The second group was people fresh to 4th ed (a couple had played 3.5 some no pen and paper experience).
The players in the first group with more experience in 4th ed playing complained some on the 'rail road' nature of the adventure. The encounters were 'set' to occur and they felt their should be more openness for them to do 'anything' in the waterdeep and undermountain world.
The first group used the pre-made characters in the first encounter and then brought in their own creations for the second adventure. This resulted in some confusion on usage of Action points, dailies, surges and hit points. The characters were starting fresh and not wanting to carry forward anything that had done from the first encounter.
The GM of the first group is also used to doing more free form when it comes to adventures and the players being somewhat chaotic (like possibly going for looting Fayne rather than taking the adventure).
They found the two encounters fairly easy and handled them without too much trouble especially the second encounter with their own character creations. This group also is playing in another regular established campaign with Paragon level characters.
The first group is not expected to last for many more weeks of the DnD Encounters.
The second group is having a blast.
Everything is new and wonderful to them. They enjoy having the minatures to 'see' the combats and the monsters. They enjoy having the various abilities and the chance to do some pretty amazing things. The players mostly do MtG and find the roleplaying a fun change.
I know that I added and changed bits of the adventure to make it more come alive for the players and to help them get into the story.
The players in the first encounter did a lousy job of rolls to overhear the 'bad people's plan' and I had to give some quick visual clues that Fayne was being set up for a shake down.
The second adventure, I brought some Dungeon Tiles from home and extra minatures (the first week, I was drafted to DM and didn't have my supplies with me). I set up the Yawning Portal Tavern with some scenery and did a bit of roleplay with Fayne and the players prior to going down. I did a bit of the tavern players holding bets and the players choosing to bet all their available money on themselves to come back alive with three 'trophies' and one 'magical item'. The players had not bothered to chat up Fayne for extra cash so I was happy to allow the extra bid up of loot as it was still within the adventure limits.
The extra bit of dungeon tiles made it more visible for the players to decend to the second encounter. I also started the second encounter with one of the Halaberders saying, "It's about time they got here. I was getting tired of waiting."
The players instantly got the clue they had been set up by someone and that there was another 'group' working against them.
The seond week, the group had four players instead of five; so, I choose to cut 2 of the minions from the encounter. It would leave the encounter challenging but still give the Doppleganger some people to blend in with.
The halaberders rolled well on initiative and clubbed two of the players to the ground in the opening of the combat. Things got tough and desperate after that for the players. They all expended their Daily and Action Points by the end of the second encounter. One of the uses of the Daily and Action point could have been skipped by the player but when the last Halaberder was choosing to run, the players were not going to allow that to happen after being chopped and knocked around by the pair. The scorpian didn't do much as it had a low initiative that missed on the first attack against the Paladin. It was then singled out for two Daily attacks including the Paladin rolling over 30 points with a Two Handed Sword attack.
I had the Doppleganger do a bit of a switch with the cleric and then later shift to look like one of the Halaberders (since the players were pretty terrified of how they were hitting and clubbing them to the ground).
So, I can see that it is a mix on players and DMs as to the level of fun that the adventure can bring out and how 'scripted' it will feel. The 'scripted' or 'rail road' quality of the adventure is something that most pre-made adventures have but this is likely a bit more as there are not a 'dungeon' of rooms to explore but specific locations each week.
I also understand the not wanting to do first level if you have done other levels of play. For the new person this is great (BTW the next adventure for Athas/Dark Sun is supposed to be 16 weeks of play and level 1 to 3). For the new players, the first Daily is a big thing but I can see that it could have an effect when viewed over a four week period to have the one Daily to use before reaching the milestone and recharging.
|
I enjoyed my first week of DnD Encounters. The first encounter was quite challenging for my group, but we did make it through. I used the pre-gen cleric and revived party members 7 times. Seven. Times.
Unfortunately I wasn't able to make it to the second week's adventure, but I heard it was a romp that lasted all of 25 minutes. I guess the DM rolled pretty poorly.
I'd like to take the pre-gen cleric and tweak her to have a different race and a better feat, but I'm not sure if it would be considered a "new" character or not.
Lessons learned:
Do not run a party of all Strikers. You may be tempted, but don't do it. If it occurs accidentally, THROW A FIT. We had enough players for two tables and everyone that sat at our table was a striker, well we actually had a Controller - the other table had a Paladin and 2 Leaders. No one wanted to leave their table so they drew straws and we got.. a striker. Tools. We would have wiped on the first encounter if the controller wasn't a Tiefling and wasn't immune to the fire thrower.
Also, hit things harder and more. I almost managed to take the Scorpion down in one shot then didn't do much else the rest of the fight besides put a crossbow bolt in a minion.
Another important lesson: Let the Rogue flank. For the love of god. I'm running a Ruthless Ruffian with the Backstabber feat. I can do 3d8+8 damage on a single hit but will anyone let me flank? No. They all seem to dive into a flank as soon as possible. I am fixing this soon as we hit level 2...
At-will: Clever strike
At-will: Clever strike
I don't think that was in the Character Builder.
But really, they all know I'm a Rogue and I'm over here begging for them to save the flank, and then they dive in to flanking position, when theu could go somewhere else. I think it is just to spite me.
I think it may only be found in DDI, as it was from the Heroes D&D miniature release, and basically allows you to have combat advantage against on opponenet, as long as an ally is adjacent. There is also a feat that allows you to have combat advantage against a single opponent, without no one else adjacent or flanking, if you are using a rapier.
With the above in mind, you could also try a hybrid ranger (beastmaster)/rogue, or fighter/rogue (fighters have strikes that grant combat advantage).
Also consider a bugbear to use larger weapons.
There is a feat that can give combat advantage if you hit with an OA or the opponent misses and OA on you. Though that's a little tricky.
But I don't think I will have to worry with it for a while because it will be another month or two before we level up the way it is going...
At-will: Clever strikeI don't think that was in the Character Builder.
But really, they all know I'm a Rogue and I'm over here begging for them to save the flank, and then they dive in to flanking position, when theu could go somewhere else. I think it is just to spite me.
It is the the CB. I gave my rogue clever strike so I do nopt ahve to worry about trying to get into a flank if I didnt need it.
It is a must have more many rogues.
I just noticed the CB does have clever strike. I think I skipped it to get Riposte Attack (and the required Rattling power Disheartening Strike).
Probably should've taken Clever Strike instead of Riposte.
I wasn't using the correct term, as I meant CB (DDI). I just tend to state DDI, since you need to subscribe. My bad.
Just a little update on how this appears to be going at my FLAGs (Favourite Local Area Gaming store).
I haven't been involved in GMing for the last couple of weeks as I've been switched to an afternoon and evening schedule (1 to 9) till the end of April.
I did walk into my FLAGs on Saturday and what did I see?
I saw 7 players playing DnD 4e (8 if you count the GM). Four of the players were people that I had worked with on those first two nights of DnD Encounters. The three others I guess were friends trying out the fun.
The GM was my fellow gamer who had drafted me to run the table when we had to many players on the first night of DnD Encounters for one table.
It was good to see that group of players playing and enjoying the crawl, Keep on the Shadowlands.
It was also a bit funny as a couple of the players looked at me awkwardly like they had been caught at a movie with another friend. The old 'cheating' on the GM with another GM look, hehe.
Still, I was glad to see seven people enjoying DnD that as far as I know weren't players before.
It's like that baseball movie. 'If you build it then they will come.'
Our group did ok. We just managed to not get killed during the skill challenge. Then we hosed the imp and statues even without our Paladin (luckily our Leader came in or we would've have bit it)
And we almost got beat up by rats -_-
I post a weekly update fromt he game I DM, we are having an incredible blast with the game. my table is a mix of new players and old, and everyone seems to be having a real good time, at least thats what the 8 players returning every week tells me.
Here's a link to week 5:
http://panzerleader.wordpress.com/2010/04/15/dungeons-and-dragons-encounter s-undermountain-week-5/