There's a good chance I'm going to have 5 players to DM instead of the 4 recommended by the Beginner's Box. Will the scenario given in the box still work with 5 players? I don't want it to be too easy. If necessary, how would I go about increasing the difficulty appropriately?
I would increase the difficulty marginally for some encounters. The first encounter could have three goblins instead of two. They are pretty easy, as is. King Fatface(?) could have one or two more goblins added to his entourage. You could try two spiders - your call. I'd also judge whether or not to add a second reefclaw depending on how many characters swim to the island. Only half of my group of 4 felt comfortable swimming, so the encounter was somewhat challenging for them (plus the wizard was stingy with his magic missiles). Add one more skeleton if the party is doing okay once they get to the top of the cliff. As for the finale, if they have the sword and are using it, then perhaps add 10 hit points to Black Fang. But you don't have to do that officially, just fudge his hit points as the fight goes on.
That's my take, given the one time I played the session my players had almost no trouble at all with any encounters.
Have fun!
- Niilo
Thank you, just the kind of information I was looking for!
I concur with LazarX. I would at least see how they perform in the first few encounters as written before trying to increase the difficulty level. It's a tricky thing to fiddle with encounter difficulty level. For newbie GMs I usually recommend just minor boosts to the existing monster's hit points before trying anything like adding new monsters.
You could add a goblin to the king's retinue and an extra skeleton to the skeletons. You could also increase goblin damage to d6. I don't recommend boosting the solo monsters; in particular don't increase damage!