tomorrow night some friends of mine and I are getting together to build some characters and test the game out. I have been mostly a DM during 4th edition and PF. Only played a few sessions of 5th edition. One of the other players has been playing just as long as I have, but the other 4 are completely new.
I want to run the new people through a sort of training session on the first session. Looking to see if any of you seasoned players have ideas for some encounters I can run them through.
Id say keep a flexible number of enemies and CR rating.
You could even do a legit, non lethal mission if it makes sense narratively. Provide itrms to heal and opportunities to rest, but let them know its an ice breaker adventure.
My favorite total newbi adventure is thr rats in the cellar trope, expanded to an underground labyrinth with surprise NPC rat king that may or may not be hostile. Some kobolds have forced them put of their old city and you need to retake it. Then they will leave the town in peace.
One of the things I'm going to have my PCs go through is a beast with lots of hit points, but still only able to attack one at a time. This way everyone gets to act in combat, the beast has almost no chance of killing anyone in the first round, and the PCs will win way before anyone has a chance to make three death saving throws should they fall in a second round.
Overall, just make sure the encounters lean toward the easy end of things, with medium being the most challenge you give them for a while. Stay clear of Hard and Deadly encounters until they get the hang of things.
Keep the monsters at a CR below their level. Honestly I would say CR 1/8 and below. or no more than 2-3 CR 1/4 creatures at once.
Generously give them options to get healing potions, and healing potions. You aren't going to break the game by letting someone in the city, or letting them find, 2-3 healing potions at the start of the adventure with more throughout. Depending on how things go, you can let them find more later. Sometime down the road you might have to give them a couple of hard encounters to force the use of the stockpile of healing potions, but if their future trips the potions become more rare, the problem should sort itself out.
Basically I'm going to have the villagers give the PCs 2 healing potions as part of their fee. Another Healing potion near the trap in case they fail to disarm it (Its going to be a bad trap with the person who gets hit likely ending up unconscious, so the healing potion is there to basically keep the player from dying from a 1st level trap that I made hard on purpose.
in a much earlier campaign I ran, the PCs were put through 'try-outs' to become part of a mercenary company. It allowed everyone to get used to combat with the knowledge it was non-lethal. I also ran an intro to 5e with a Christmas one-shot with the idea being that, like many Christmas specials, it was 'non canon'
What I did in that vein is adventurers are required to get an "Adventuring License" before they can quest. The guy they got their's from didn't want people to die as adventurers, so people had to pass a test and get their AL for free (rather than pay a bunch of gold like most places). So there was a "training simulation" and if they survived, they got to be adventurers.
Could copy that. Constructs with non-lethal type things.
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hey everyone,
tomorrow night some friends of mine and I are getting together to build some characters and test the game out. I have been mostly a DM during 4th edition and PF. Only played a few sessions of 5th edition. One of the other players has been playing just as long as I have, but the other 4 are completely new.
I want to run the new people through a sort of training session on the first session. Looking to see if any of you seasoned players have ideas for some encounters I can run them through.
Id say keep a flexible number of enemies and CR rating.
You could even do a legit, non lethal mission if it makes sense narratively. Provide itrms to heal and opportunities to rest, but let them know its an ice breaker adventure.
My favorite total newbi adventure is thr rats in the cellar trope, expanded to an underground labyrinth with surprise NPC rat king that may or may not be hostile. Some kobolds have forced them put of their old city and you need to retake it. Then they will leave the town in peace.
One of the things I'm going to have my PCs go through is a beast with lots of hit points, but still only able to attack one at a time. This way everyone gets to act in combat, the beast has almost no chance of killing anyone in the first round, and the PCs will win way before anyone has a chance to make three death saving throws should they fall in a second round.
Overall, just make sure the encounters lean toward the easy end of things, with medium being the most challenge you give them for a while. Stay clear of Hard and Deadly encounters until they get the hang of things.
Keep the monsters at a CR below their level. Honestly I would say CR 1/8 and below. or no more than 2-3 CR 1/4 creatures at once.
Generously give them options to get healing potions, and healing potions. You aren't going to break the game by letting someone in the city, or letting them find, 2-3 healing potions at the start of the adventure with more throughout. Depending on how things go, you can let them find more later. Sometime down the road you might have to give them a couple of hard encounters to force the use of the stockpile of healing potions, but if their future trips the potions become more rare, the problem should sort itself out.
Basically I'm going to have the villagers give the PCs 2 healing potions as part of their fee. Another Healing potion near the trap in case they fail to disarm it (Its going to be a bad trap with the person who gets hit likely ending up unconscious, so the healing potion is there to basically keep the player from dying from a 1st level trap that I made hard on purpose.
in a much earlier campaign I ran, the PCs were put through 'try-outs' to become part of a mercenary company. It allowed everyone to get used to combat with the knowledge it was non-lethal. I also ran an intro to 5e with a Christmas one-shot with the idea being that, like many Christmas specials, it was 'non canon'
What I did in that vein is adventurers are required to get an "Adventuring License" before they can quest. The guy they got their's from didn't want people to die as adventurers, so people had to pass a test and get their AL for free (rather than pay a bunch of gold like most places). So there was a "training simulation" and if they survived, they got to be adventurers.
Could copy that. Constructs with non-lethal type things.