Does anyone have suggestions for published adventures/modules to run as a prelude to Red Hand of Doom? I'm thinking of starting the game at level 1. Refluffing isn't a problem.
If you can find them, the 3.0 modules The Sunless Citadel and The Forge of Fury are decent fits (both contain dragons and/or dragonish elements), with some minor reworking (such as replacing the orcs in Forge with hobgoblins to tie in better with the goblinoids in Red Hand of Doom; changing Belak in Citadel from a human to a hobgoblin is also an option).
I DMed the Forge of Fury, my players enjoyed it.
Sunless Citadel is a really good fit IMHO since it features hobgoblins (which you can change into a scouting party of the Red Hand send there to find magic items for the war), a dragon (if you don't intend to run all the Ashardalon adventures you can make him the father of Azarr Kul or something like that to draw a connection), and an undead evil druid (make him an ex-apprentice of the Ghostlord who found his own way to avoid eternal death after a fallout with his master). Heck, even the whole location where Sunless Citadel takes place fits the RHoD map pretty well, just locate it west-south-west somewhere along the Thornwaste with enough distance to the Ghostlord's lair so the players don't stumble upon it prematurely and you're good to go. Plug in another adventure on the road to Drellin's Ferry to cover Level 2-5 and you end up with a complete adventure arc.
Thanks, I'll give them a look! :)
In keeping with the Dragon/Kobold motif (also written by Mike Mearls of wotc fame)
|
I ran Sunless Citadel and Forge of Fury as prequels to Red Hand of Doom and it worked quite well. (I also ran the Standing Stone in the middle of it.)
I didn’t amend them much. I gave the kobolds some links to the Red Hand, and used Drellin’s Ferry as the home town instead of the one in the modules. I also added some ties to Tiamat to the Sunless Citadel site's history.