I think that the first episode for Hoard of the Dragon Queen has been proven very challenging for 1st level characters as there are a lot of encounters and no time for a long rest . I think each character should start with a healing potion. Allow a the priest in the Sanctuary to fully heal any characters once. And finally each player should be able to get a potion of greater healing once per visit for a total of 2.
That's a load of extra healing, not sure they will need all of that - Even with first level characters, the party should have a little bit of healing between themselves (or learn the important lesson that a balanced team will progress further). Remember they could squeeze in a short rest and get a hit dice roll back each if they really need to.
I'd be wary of throwing out magical healing potions, but you are empowered to make it fun for the group and go easier if things are tough - An NPC or commoner with a healing kit who knows how to use it (healer feat) could come in handy.
Hope it goes well!
is hoard of the dragon queen suppose to be played by caracter level 1? Maybe start with lost mine of Phandelver get to level 3-4 then HotDQ would be easier?
Mattprowse wrote:
WelkerJ wrote:
Yes, we found the first episode to be a real meatgrinder. We always seemed to be outnumbered and/or swarmed. I am playing the primary healer- a ranger with the healing feat and 3 healing kits (sort of a combat medic). I have already burned thru 1 healing kit (that's 10x 1d6+5 uses of healing).
Granted we have an unbalanced party- lots of squishies:
2 wizards
1 sorcerer
1 rogue
1 bard
1 paladin
1 ranger (myself)
We'll kick butt at higher levels if we live that long.
If you're playing HotDQ as part of D&D Encounters then you pretty much have to let the party plod through and take their licks. As public play / Adventure League you have to ensure that everyone is on level footing. If you hand out free healing potions then people who play at your FLGS will have an easier time of it than those who play elsewhere. Now if you wanted to sell the party healing potions I'd see no problem with that.
At my FLGS we've learned the value of ranged attacks and smart tactics. I've been running a table of seven PCs. The only healers are two Bards. Even after four tough combat encounters and numerous random encounters only 1 PC has even fallen unconscious and 3 PCs have taken no damage at all. Encourage the PCs to take the dodge action when they're in danger and to disengage when they get in over their head. The players who think that they have to have their PC attack every single round are the ones who end up in the most trouble. Play smart and you shouldn't have too many problems. Of course if your DM is just out to kill the party then there's not much you can do about that.
After completing the first two sessions the party decided to take a short rest so the few PCs who took damage can spend their hit dice to heal up. I haven't found episode (chapter) 1 too difficult for level 1 PCs and I've been scaling it up for a larger party of experienced players.
cave2626 wrote:
While I have yet to run Hoard, I don't think a group can easily handle every encounter in the first section. Some of the missions can be skipped, or completed "off-screen".
It can be a tough lesson for groups but, PC's in Fifth are not superheroes (not at first level anyhow). And, if they decide to run, reward their good sense by letting them.
My group of 5 (Ranger, 2 Fighters, Monk, Druid) found the first session extremely difficult.
There is not enough healing in HotDQ/Encounters, especially if you don't have a cleric. Even with a cleric there is not enough healing.
Just one example. One fight starts with 2d12 reflex half to ALL pc's on a surprise round... if Monsters get init after that.... no way for one 1st or even 2nd level character to keep up.
I don't have a solution. Looking at other systems, 4E did great with healing. Pathfinder Society has wands of healing you can get with 2 renown (prestige in PFS)... we need somethign similar for encounters. Most times encounters are NOT going to be ideal Tank/Healer/DPS/Control/Buffer group.
We start HotDQ on our next session, having been running LMoP so far and the heroes reaching 3rd level. My players have elected to begin with fresh characters for HotDQ (hopefully we'll be returning to LMoP as time allows for their further adventures).
They have learnt valuable lessons in the need for cautious play and managing their resources (all so far without any healer other than a bard) so I'm hoping they'll be able to cope with the opening chapter.
I've played three sessions of Hoard so far, my warlock was running around with 4 hp through the last session hiding out, and not doing much. I did grapple a Wearer of Purple who magic missiled me (almost killed me outright). We've had multiple party members die, nobody regularly plays a Cleric (one guy showed up with one for a session then never showed up again, guess he didn't like it or something). Our regular party is a Fighter/charlatan/zhent, a Warlock/pirate/zhent (me), a Wizard/entertainer/harper, a Barbarian/pirate/zhent, and another Fighter/???/emerald enclave. We had two druids show up in the first session, neither took healing powers, and we had a cleric of Talos show up in the second session he took thematic storm powers like fog cloud, guiding lightning, and create water instead of healing powers. We used to have a rogue but he died at the Mill, and we had another Wizard but when we tried to capture the cult leader she rolled a one on her second death save and died.
The adventure has been a freaking meatgrinder.
My group of 5 a cleric, ranger, wizard, sorcerer, and palidan had a challenging time but we made it. We had our palidan knocked out one in a encounter and at the last battle the the half dragon. My cleric took some heavy damage to. It got pretty scary but that's all the fun right.
Hi guys,
As a player I'm finding 'The Tyranny of Dragons' quite challenging. Our party consists of a Fighter, a Bard, a Rogue, and two Clerics. We were almost out of healing spells the first session (the bard had one cast left). We took a short rest in the keep which helped a lot at the beginning of the second session, but the Bard did have to burn his heal that evening. Except for me, the players are no slouches. They understand combat very well, and use weapons and positioning to maximize their damage while minimizing ours. But even so, outnumbered as we are, several of us have gone unconscious in battle due to wounds already.
Still, no one actually died, so I'd have to say it's 'challenging', not 'impossible'. I am a little afraid of facing 4 or more sessions of combat without many more short rests though.
Someone said that cautious play can be necessary, and it's true, but our party is good aligned, and honestly, we are willing to die to save the townsfolk, so we shouldn't whine if that happens. We fight every fight when innocent lives are on the line. Angst if we have to leave an npc behind is part of the alignment we freely chose I guess. But sometimes I wish Lawful Good gave you extra armor class and hit points ha ha!
I think the scenario and the DM are not solely responsible for the level of challenge. Our party actually met early the first night and discussed what we wanted in the group character wise. If everyone comes in with a lone wolf attitude with no interest in party balance, they are only hurting themselves. Likewise, sadly, evil and neutral characters might last longer due to a less lofty and self sacrificing set of ethics. Their alignments place more emphasis on self preservation, so it's only natural they would profit from it in the short run. Our DM assured us we would be welcome to resume the adventure with new characters if any of us are unfortunate enough to die. The level cap and lack of downtime in the initial stretch of sessions kind of works for that doesn't it? After two sessions of intense combat and rescuing a fair number of townsfolk, we are nearly able to hit level 2. If any of us die, and we come in as new personas, there is still time to earn enough to catch up, as the original characters won't have leveled yet. Death may be the end for the character, but not the player
I love our sessions at 'The Armchair Adventurer' in Hawaii! I look forward to our Wednesday nights 'Encounters' games very much. Our DM Jason is doing a terrific job, and the party, you couldn't ask for nicer, more helpful players. Thank you Wizards, for organizing these events! I haven't had this much fun gaming in many years
Anyhows, best of luck to all of you DMs and players who are playing 'The Tyranny of Dragons'! Whether you triumph as victors or die heroically, have fun!
I think we have only been hearing tale of the statistical aberrations - the TPKs that occur as a result of an (un)lucky dice roll, and the like.
My party managed to get through 5 back-to-back encounters (without even taking a short rest) before we even reached the keep. Two of these encounters were major missions, The Sanctuary and Search The Keep respectively, with StK accounting for three of the above encounters.
The DM had roughly doubled the difficulty of the encounters as well due to our party size (seven players). Our party consisted of the following:
- Three 1st level bards. None of which were injured. Between them, only two non-cantrip spells were cast all session. Healing Word used to heal the party Paladin, and cure wounds used to heal the shieldmaiden (mother) in Search the Keep after she dropped to 0HP.
- Two 1st level Rangers (Half-Elf and standard human respectively). Neither were injured.
- One 2nd level Paladin, who was untouched until the second last encounter, and dropped in the final encounter. Said Paladin was revived with a Healing Word spell, then self-healed using Lay on Hands.
- One 1st level Wizard, who only cast 1 non-cantrip spell all game: Burning Hands. Said Wizard thought he was a fighter, and when reinforcements arrived in our final encounter, did not disengage and defended himself against two cultists with his quarterstaff, only suffering one minor injury (3HP damage). He did not even know (let alone prepare) Mage Armor or Shield and IMHO, was a complete newbie to RPGs based on his performance.
We killed 20 Kobolds, and 8 Cultists in a single session - most of which without suffering a single scratch. This is an example of the other side of the coin when it comes to statistical aberrations - a Cakewalk. Most parties experience will fall somewhere between the two extremes.
Lharn wrote:
Yeah, its in the human section. You replace the standard Human bonus with 2 stats at +1, a skill of your choice and a feat. A lot of people have been targeting a feat that lets you use Healing kits in the non traditional way.
This adventure really doesn't feel like it's for newbies. Level 1 characters are expected to go 4+ sessions (an IRL month) with no replenishment of dailies? Who decided this was a good way to introduce people to D&D?
Kalani wrote:
prospero3042 wrote:
Uthrac wrote:
No worries! We're all adjusting to learning the new system ... especially DMs who are trying to determine where the "sweet spot" of challenge is.
Run as written, Episode 1 of Encounters is at a very high challenge for (1) Level 1 PCs and (2) players new to the system.
My recommendation is ...
1. Run DDEX1-1 Defiance in Phlan from Expeditions first. This should be most PCs to 2nd level.
2. Then, run Encounters Episode 1. Level 2 PCs have a much better chance to survive / get through Episode 1 in a fun way.
Tyranthraxus wrote:
HotDQ starts off fairly challenging, I got to say. Some of it has to do with how the game is balanced. Given that you double your hit points going from level 1 to level 2, the game stabalizes quite a bit once you get up a few levels but at level 1 can be very "Kill or be Killed". While just about every group I have seen go through it, usually has someone in the group fall unconious just about every other fight at least, rarely do you see actual deaths. Good use of healing resources and short rests and you will be fine. You also dont have to do all the encounters that are avaiable in Epsode 1, once the party decides to take a long rest which it can do at almost any time, you skip right to the end with the boss fight.
The one perma death I saw was a paladin was fighting the swarms of rats, they do 2d6 damage normally. Then I rolled a crit as DM, that 4d6 damage hurts (that can do as much as 24 damage for a level 1 character! enough to insta perma kill almost any 1st lvl chars even at full hp). Needless to say that was able to drop the paladin from full hp to 0 in one hit, but didnt outright kill him. He went next and failed his death save. Eventually one of the characters tried to stabalize him, but failed. Next turn came around and he rolled a natural 1 on his death save, 2nd round into the fight from full hp as a tank with 18AC he was perma dead.
We've just finished the first episdoe and it wasn't too bad.
However, I think it would be really difficult only with the premade characters.
Having just 1 human cleric who takes the Healer Feat can make a tough evening into a smooth running enjoyable event.
Getting 1d6+4 healing for every character and being able to stabilize an unconscious toon to 1 hp is amazing for only 5 gp.
There should be a premade that has this feature.
We just finished episode 1 last week and our party had little difficulty finishing it.
Party is:
* fighter
* fighter
* druid
* bard
* rogue
* paladin
Both fighters dropped to 0 hp but managed to not die due to making their death saves. The rest of the party got banged up pretty good but no other deaths beyond that. I don't think that healing was an issue with just the druid.
Scottbert wrote:
WelkerJ wrote:
If you want healing potions, pick up proficiency with a herbalism kit and craft your own.
Yunru wrote:
Blade2718 wrote:
Yunru wrote:
There are other threads addresssing healing potions.
They are magical, so PCs cannot craft them.
Although the herbalism kit is needed as component, nowhere does it say that it is the only thing needed (wait for DMG).
So, you can purchase healing potions. You cannot craft them.
That is incorrect. The exact wording is "Also, proficiency with this kit is required to create antitoxin and potions of healing." It does not say that all you need is a Herbalism Kit and having one lets you craft healing potions. The Admins have already ruled on this. You may not craft any magic items. A healing potion is a magic item. Also, the herbalism kit does not say it lets you create healing potions. It says you will need to know how to use one to create them. Buying a 5 gp item does not give the ability to make magic items.
Greg Marks
Associate Resource Manager, DnDAL
Good catch. Ironic! I have edited the original post.
If you are having difficulties in Episode 1, wait until you meet the halfdragon and raging barbarians in episode three as you have no magic items.
Are they harder than the half-dragon in Episode 1?
Paladin: I crit!
DM: OK, he's still standing. Doesn't look very hurt, even. He breathes on you.
Paladin: I save!
DM: OK, you take 36 damage.
Paladin: : (
--
Pauper
I have read but not played HotDQ.
I think that I would 'stretch out' the raid to last all night, more stuff happens during the next day (including the hero trap and the flying strafer attack) trying to force the PCs and refugees to remain in the Keep while the town is plundered, then the raiders escape under cover of the next night's darkness.
This offers time for everybody to take a full rest (in shifts !) and some short rests, based on party need. Pacing can be set based on party effectiveness (or lack thereof); a party that clobbers everything they meet might chase the raiders off in disgrace about dawn*, while a party that gets clobbered most of the time might watch from the battlements as their foes disappear over the darkening horizon.
*Edit the one scenario so that tough guy is a rear-guard, sent to distract / delay any counter-attacks while the raiders make tracks.