Looking for advice on starting a new campaign for a large party. They're wrapping up Lost Mines of Phandelver and I'm looking to continue their party at level 5. It's a mix of new and veteran players, and I'm looking to stick in Forgotten Realms as they start to explore beyond the Sword Coast.
Any advice on quality campaigns for me will be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance!!
How about Tomb of Annihilation? It has built-in entry points at levels 1, 5, and 9. I guess you would probably have to scale up the difficulty of lots of encounters, since you have such a big party, but I think that's probably the case no matter what.
If they like dungeon crawls you could try Mad Mage. It's quite long, and since it's a dungeon crawl probably not that hard to scale up to more players (just throw more monsters at them). The main praise of MM is that the dungeons are pretty neat and fairly easy to run (supposedly). The main knock against it is there isn't really a story -- it's mostly just dungeon crawling for the sake of it.
I haven’t played Icewind Dale but I’ve only heard and read good things. I’m not much of an official adventure guy but I really want to DM it or be a player in it.
from an article I read:
“The campaign itself has two viable points of entry. Players can start at level one, visiting the Ten Towns region and introducing themselves to Icewind Dale’s icy climate and its frontier villages. Alternately, parties could easily transition into the campaign from elsewhere in the Forgotten Realms around levels four, five, or six. Advancement is milestone-based throughout, so don’t expect to be paying much attention to experience points as you go.”
That's on my short list for sure!! Yeah it's a big group but ive already gotten used to scaling up with them. A big thing I like about ToA is more open-world fighting, seeing as how 8 players in a dungeon tends to get cluttered. Thanks for the input!!
Not really looking for dungeons if I can help it. The last campaign had plenty of dungeons and it became a hassle moving and fighting with such a large party. Thank you for the input though!
If you want to stay in the same region as Phandalin, there is a series of three modules, centered around the town of Leilon to the south. These are Storm Lord's Wrath, Sleeping Dragon's Wake and Divine Contention and will take your party to level 12. They are available on DnDBeyond or with the Essentials Kit and make an easy transition/sequel to what you have already run.
A standard party is considered 4 members. Just double the creatures in an encounter(theoretically) and pick a campaign that has a theme you and your group might enjoy.
I am running 7 players in Descent to Avernus, plus an occasional guest. We had already completed Waterdeep Dragon Heist and the PC's were at 5th level. I skipped most of Chapter 1 in Descent to Avernus starting at the last dungeon (Vanthampur Manor). I think if you look at some of the other publish adventures, you will find that around Chapter 2 they head to 5th level. With a little creativity you can rewrite the hook to work for your game.
To accommodate a large group of players in combat, I do two things:
First I max the hit points of every monster. This is to make the encounter long enough so all 7 players get to do things in initiative combat.
Second I use encounter builder to re-calculate the danger level of an encounter for the large party. For example I might enter in a party of 5 - 5th level characters (APL 5) and put in the monsters that the published adventure called for. I check to see the danger level of the encounter (easy, moderate, hard, deadly). Then I change the party level to the actual number and level of the party, and adjust the monster numbers until it equals the same danger level as the encounter was originally designed.
I also recommend watching Critical Role on YouTube. It is an excellent (maybe the best ever) example of how a large D&D group can work.
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Hey all!
Looking for advice on starting a new campaign for a large party. They're wrapping up Lost Mines of Phandelver and I'm looking to continue their party at level 5. It's a mix of new and veteran players, and I'm looking to stick in Forgotten Realms as they start to explore beyond the Sword Coast.
Any advice on quality campaigns for me will be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance!!
How about Tomb of Annihilation? It has built-in entry points at levels 1, 5, and 9. I guess you would probably have to scale up the difficulty of lots of encounters, since you have such a big party, but I think that's probably the case no matter what.
If they like dungeon crawls you could try Mad Mage. It's quite long, and since it's a dungeon crawl probably not that hard to scale up to more players (just throw more monsters at them). The main praise of MM is that the dungeons are pretty neat and fairly easy to run (supposedly). The main knock against it is there isn't really a story -- it's mostly just dungeon crawling for the sake of it.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
I haven’t played Icewind Dale but I’ve only heard and read good things. I’m not much of an official adventure guy but I really want to DM it or be a player in it.
from an article I read:
“The campaign itself has two viable points of entry. Players can start at level one, visiting the Ten Towns region and introducing themselves to Icewind Dale’s icy climate and its frontier villages. Alternately, parties could easily transition into the campaign from elsewhere in the Forgotten Realms around levels four, five, or six. Advancement is milestone-based throughout, so don’t expect to be paying much attention to experience points as you go.”
That's on my short list for sure!! Yeah it's a big group but ive already gotten used to scaling up with them. A big thing I like about ToA is more open-world fighting, seeing as how 8 players in a dungeon tends to get cluttered. Thanks for the input!!
I was also looking at this, as well as Storm King's Thunder, as an alternate to Tomb of Annihilation. Thanks for the input!!
Not really looking for dungeons if I can help it. The last campaign had plenty of dungeons and it became a hassle moving and fighting with such a large party. Thank you for the input though!
If you want to stay in the same region as Phandalin, there is a series of three modules, centered around the town of Leilon to the south.
These are Storm Lord's Wrath, Sleeping Dragon's Wake and Divine Contention and will take your party to level 12. They are available on DnDBeyond or with the Essentials Kit and make an easy transition/sequel to what you have already run.
A standard party is considered 4 members. Just double the creatures in an encounter(theoretically) and pick a campaign that has a theme you and your group might enjoy.
I am running 7 players in Descent to Avernus, plus an occasional guest. We had already completed Waterdeep Dragon Heist and the PC's were at 5th level. I skipped most of Chapter 1 in Descent to Avernus starting at the last dungeon (Vanthampur Manor). I think if you look at some of the other publish adventures, you will find that around Chapter 2 they head to 5th level. With a little creativity you can rewrite the hook to work for your game.
To accommodate a large group of players in combat, I do two things:
First I max the hit points of every monster. This is to make the encounter long enough so all 7 players get to do things in initiative combat.
Second I use encounter builder to re-calculate the danger level of an encounter for the large party. For example I might enter in a party of 5 - 5th level characters (APL 5) and put in the monsters that the published adventure called for. I check to see the danger level of the encounter (easy, moderate, hard, deadly). Then I change the party level to the actual number and level of the party, and adjust the monster numbers until it equals the same danger level as the encounter was originally designed.
I also recommend watching Critical Role on YouTube. It is an excellent (maybe the best ever) example of how a large D&D group can work.
"The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel." – William Gibson, Neuromancer