I'm going to be running the entirety of tyranny of dragons for my players, hoard of the dragon queen and rise of Tiamat. I am definitely more character to the villains any other suggestions for improving the experience for my players?
Are you starting the adventure with characters at level 1? If not, you'll need to do some creative scaling for the earliest sections.
I've been running my group through ToD for the last 2-3 years (until recently we've played rather sporadically so it took a while.) Below are links to other forum threads where I've shared advice about ToD before.
Actually, the one thread I linked where I was looking for feedback on Galvan and Varram stat blocks was me homebrewing the two wyrmspeakers who don't get stat blocks in the published adventure. I wanted them to be present since they're both mentioned and player choice led to them encountering Galvan and Varram. YMMV on those stat blocks. I think the PCs were around level 6 when they encountered Varram and Galvan. They (the party) had a lot of allies around them at that point. (This was a big set-piece battle with both Galvan and Varram and their dragon compatriots, a lot of cult allies so I gave the party a bunch of allies- Waterdhavian soldiers, some of the Lords' Alliance and Remi Haventree along with I think Onthar and Leosin. This battle was not in the adventure as published but was something I added in because of all the other changes I've made to the adventure as it went along.)
You can make the adventure not feel quite so linear if you work at it. But it does take a lot of work. Rise of Tiamat gets a little less linear as each time you meet with the council, your players have two choices of where to go next. You'll have to get creative with getting your players to the other choice afterward but it definitely opens up a bit more in the second half.
It's very linear and doesn't make a lot of room for exploration off the beaten path. If anyone wants to play a ranger, I recommend the optional features in Tasha's.
The first couple of levels are rough. I strongly suggest having your players already be in Greenest when the attack begins in Chapter 1. The gauntlet of encounters, IMO, are intended to be run as vignettes. Don't be afraid to give them some NPC guards to help out. The rest of Tier 1 can be challenging if tackled head-on. If they're smart, they'll sail though. And they should have more than enough money, once they reach Elturiel, to afford some good upgrades. If they buy horses to speed up the trip, remember that they can also sell them at-cost. There's no loss of investment unless the horses die.
If you don't yet have Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus for its gazetteer, consider picking up Murder at Baldur's Gate. It has a lot of the same information, and your players should spend at least a tenday there. That's time enough to run the short little module, if you want, but you can also treat it as downtime. And that means you can use the rules for buying magic items from Xanathar's. They might only be able to afford 1 or 2, but they otherwise won't find any for a very long time.
The math in the caravan's travels is way off. Scaling issues with 5e aside, the pace is super slow (16 miles per day, IIRC) and just doesn't jive with some other known distances. It's over 100 miles from Daggerford to Waterdeep, which is 5 days at the normal 24 miles per day, but at the slower pace, it should be more like 7 or 8. If you want a map to the proper scale, Storm King's Thunder has it. It doesn't extend all the way south to Baldur's Gate, but there's enough there for you to figure out that first leg thanks to the hexes. Do with the scale what you will, but don't run it day-by-day. Feel free to montage that. For example, King's Landing and Winterfell are a month apart by road. Episode 1 is Winterfell, episode 2 is a town partway, and episode 3 is King's Landing. Make liberal use of time skips between random encounters, and run as many or as few as you like.
And feel free to adjust the magic items if nobody can really use what's there. I mean, that shouldn't really be a problem. But it could.
There are a couple of guides to running this adventure and I would (and did) read a few. Most of the issues I had with it were the first few chapters, I added a couple of encounters before they even got to Greenest, and I had that be part of a mission they set out with. So they were level 2, I picked a few of the possible encounters in chapter 1 and generally gave them choices of one out of two where it made sense. I warned them it would be linear in parts ie take the next quest.
I have tried to flesh out the villains a bit and give the party the idea that maybe they can talk their way through bits not have to fight (because as written there is no way that a group of players can work out who is not a fanatic and might be open to negotiation), so NPCs, journals etc.
There are definitely parts where the adventure wants/expects/allows the party to take only one approach and not a logical one at that, I suggest being a bit more creative and if your players come up with other solutions even better.
I added a ton of stuff to BG and Waterdeep, because arriving at and then immediately leaving two of the most interesting locations makes no sense. I also added ways for them to get magic items, mostly very low power because otherwise they will likely get to the end of HoDQ with nothing at all, which I know some DMs seem to be in favour of but I think is a bit dull, (especially when one of the only locations where they could loot some is near the end and where they are most likely not to fight and kill everyone for their stuff).
I have done so foreshadowing and Rise will need more work too, I don't see the point in so many gotcha moments to stop the party getting the masks, the cult will have two which is all they need. Otherwise I think the main issue is fixing the encounters some are far too deadly others trivial.
I would be interesting to see how much the players cared though when finished because I suspect they will not have minded some of the poor design and glossed overcome of the holes.
I ran Sunless Citadel from TotYP and made Belak a cultist. The Sunless Citadel is an old dragon worshipper's citadel so it fit nicely. And I changed the town of Oakhurst in SC to Greenest so the players come back to town with it being attacked by the dragon in the first episode of Hoard of the Dragon Queen.
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I'm going to be running the entirety of tyranny of dragons for my players, hoard of the dragon queen and rise of Tiamat. I am definitely more character to the villains any other suggestions for improving the experience for my players?
Make sure that your players are aware and ok with the fact that it is a very linear adventure ( some call it railroad).
Attack: [roll]3d20dl2+6[/roll] Damage: [roll](if([roll:-1:critical], =0, 1d8, 2{1d8}.expand()))+4[/roll] Sneakattack: [roll](if([roll:-2:critical], =0, 2d6, 2{2d6}.expand()))[/roll]Are you starting the adventure with characters at level 1? If not, you'll need to do some creative scaling for the earliest sections.
I've been running my group through ToD for the last 2-3 years (until recently we've played rather sporadically so it took a while.) Below are links to other forum threads where I've shared advice about ToD before.
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/7917-hoard-of-the-dragon-queen?page=2#c28
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/96531-horde-of-the-dragon-queen#c3
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/85251-tyranny-of-dragons-story-help#c1
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/85251-tyranny-of-dragons-story-help#c1
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/homebrew-house-rules/41834-feedback-needed-wyrmspeaker-galvan-and-wyrmspeaker#c7
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/49283-more-rot-prep-advice-requested#c2
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/48918-first-time-dm#c5
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/46241-my-home-brew-hoard-of-the-dragon-queen#c2
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/44598-help-with-hoard-of-the-dragon-queen#c8
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/44690-how-to-slowed-down-hotdq#c3
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/43736-feedback-for-lmop-transition-to-hotdq-please#c5
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/42058-from-lmop-to-hotdq#c2
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/40720-key-episodes-events-encounters-of-hotdq#c4
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/dungeon-masters-only/39177-adventures-after-lmop#c4
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/tips-tactics/35600-buffing-tiamat-the-dragon-queen-for-my-op-table#c4
My Homebrew Backgrounds | Feats | Magic Items | Monsters | Races | Subclasses
Actually, the one thread I linked where I was looking for feedback on Galvan and Varram stat blocks was me homebrewing the two wyrmspeakers who don't get stat blocks in the published adventure. I wanted them to be present since they're both mentioned and player choice led to them encountering Galvan and Varram. YMMV on those stat blocks. I think the PCs were around level 6 when they encountered Varram and Galvan. They (the party) had a lot of allies around them at that point. (This was a big set-piece battle with both Galvan and Varram and their dragon compatriots, a lot of cult allies so I gave the party a bunch of allies- Waterdhavian soldiers, some of the Lords' Alliance and Remi Haventree along with I think Onthar and Leosin. This battle was not in the adventure as published but was something I added in because of all the other changes I've made to the adventure as it went along.)
My Homebrew Backgrounds | Feats | Magic Items | Monsters | Races | Subclasses
You can make the adventure not feel quite so linear if you work at it. But it does take a lot of work. Rise of Tiamat gets a little less linear as each time you meet with the council, your players have two choices of where to go next. You'll have to get creative with getting your players to the other choice afterward but it definitely opens up a bit more in the second half.
My Homebrew Backgrounds | Feats | Magic Items | Monsters | Races | Subclasses
It's very linear and doesn't make a lot of room for exploration off the beaten path. If anyone wants to play a ranger, I recommend the optional features in Tasha's.
The first couple of levels are rough. I strongly suggest having your players already be in Greenest when the attack begins in Chapter 1. The gauntlet of encounters, IMO, are intended to be run as vignettes. Don't be afraid to give them some NPC guards to help out. The rest of Tier 1 can be challenging if tackled head-on. If they're smart, they'll sail though. And they should have more than enough money, once they reach Elturiel, to afford some good upgrades. If they buy horses to speed up the trip, remember that they can also sell them at-cost. There's no loss of investment unless the horses die.
If you don't yet have Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus for its gazetteer, consider picking up Murder at Baldur's Gate. It has a lot of the same information, and your players should spend at least a tenday there. That's time enough to run the short little module, if you want, but you can also treat it as downtime. And that means you can use the rules for buying magic items from Xanathar's. They might only be able to afford 1 or 2, but they otherwise won't find any for a very long time.
The math in the caravan's travels is way off. Scaling issues with 5e aside, the pace is super slow (16 miles per day, IIRC) and just doesn't jive with some other known distances. It's over 100 miles from Daggerford to Waterdeep, which is 5 days at the normal 24 miles per day, but at the slower pace, it should be more like 7 or 8. If you want a map to the proper scale, Storm King's Thunder has it. It doesn't extend all the way south to Baldur's Gate, but there's enough there for you to figure out that first leg thanks to the hexes. Do with the scale what you will, but don't run it day-by-day. Feel free to montage that. For example, King's Landing and Winterfell are a month apart by road. Episode 1 is Winterfell, episode 2 is a town partway, and episode 3 is King's Landing. Make liberal use of time skips between random encounters, and run as many or as few as you like.
And feel free to adjust the magic items if nobody can really use what's there. I mean, that shouldn't really be a problem. But it could.
There are a couple of guides to running this adventure and I would (and did) read a few. Most of the issues I had with it were the first few chapters, I added a couple of encounters before they even got to Greenest, and I had that be part of a mission they set out with. So they were level 2, I picked a few of the possible encounters in chapter 1 and generally gave them choices of one out of two where it made sense. I warned them it would be linear in parts ie take the next quest.
I have tried to flesh out the villains a bit and give the party the idea that maybe they can talk their way through bits not have to fight (because as written there is no way that a group of players can work out who is not a fanatic and might be open to negotiation), so NPCs, journals etc.
There are definitely parts where the adventure wants/expects/allows the party to take only one approach and not a logical one at that, I suggest being a bit more creative and if your players come up with other solutions even better.
I added a ton of stuff to BG and Waterdeep, because arriving at and then immediately leaving two of the most interesting locations makes no sense. I also added ways for them to get magic items, mostly very low power because otherwise they will likely get to the end of HoDQ with nothing at all, which I know some DMs seem to be in favour of but I think is a bit dull, (especially when one of the only locations where they could loot some is near the end and where they are most likely not to fight and kill everyone for their stuff).
I have done so foreshadowing and Rise will need more work too, I don't see the point in so many gotcha moments to stop the party getting the masks, the cult will have two which is all they need. Otherwise I think the main issue is fixing the encounters some are far too deadly others trivial.
I would be interesting to see how much the players cared though when finished because I suspect they will not have minded some of the poor design and glossed overcome of the holes.
I ran Sunless Citadel from TotYP and made Belak a cultist. The Sunless Citadel is an old dragon worshipper's citadel so it fit nicely. And I changed the town of Oakhurst in SC to Greenest so the players come back to town with it being attacked by the dragon in the first episode of Hoard of the Dragon Queen.