Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 mickeyt66 Jul 18, 2014 13:32:45	Spoiler alert . . . . . . . . . . . .   . . .   . .   . . What prevents the party from immediately going to Cragmaw Castle after they find out that is where Gundren was taken? The goblins have that information and directions to the castle. And if the pregen dwarf cleric is playing, his bond is to his cousin. But then they would miss out on a lot of encounters and XP probably not high enough level to deal with the challenges at the castle.
#2 Noon Jul 20, 2014 21:54:29	Are you asking what signs there might be that they'd be facing something above their level?   Or are you asking how it's supposed to work when the players don't make any tactical evaluations at all, they think they can just go wherever and it'll be okay (when not even world of warcraft was like that back when I played)?
#3 Skerrit Jul 21, 2014 6:53:05	I suggest you note that town is really not that far away and they might want to stop, get help, warn others first, sell off loot, or deliver the wagon to their employer.
#4 Alphastream Jul 21, 2014 8:24:43	It's really up to you how much the goblins know about how to get from one place to another. Messengers are clearly sent to them, so it is possible that they really don't know much about how to get there. That alone may suggest to your group that going to town is best.    If you want a more organic experience, you can let them go to the castle and they may need to retreat to get to town. Town is a good place to rest, resupply, and they do have that wagon to deliver. How heavy-handed you want to be in suggesting they visit town is up to you. (Personally, I would make the goblin knowledge very uncertain and even contradictory, such that the party sees going to town as the best choice... but it feels like their decision. If they still went to the castle I would play it as it is, while keeping it fun, and be ready to suggest going to town may provide them with better information and resources on how to confront the castle.)
(Reply to #4) mickeyt66	All great and helpful suggestions. The party I ran yesterday got to the cave then ran into the bugbear encounter and got TPKed. So when their sons came to avenge them, they killed all the goblins and got no information. Then went into the town and decided to deal with the Redbrands when given all the choices of missions in town. Almost got through it, but lost initiative to Glasstaff and was fireballed into another TPK. Fifth edition is much more deadly than fourth at early levels. The lethality reminds me a lot of 3.5 at early levels. So we are going to start the next session with their second sons of the original PCs taking vengence for their fathers and brothers to continue their quest.
#6 JodyJohnson Jul 21, 2014 12:23:47	Evil Mage is 5HD but doesn't have Fireball. That's why he is CR 1 instead of 5.
#7 Alphastream Jul 22, 2014 7:08:13	One thing to note on lethality: it encourages players to take a few extra steps with regards to planning and try to keep things in their favor. For us DMs, it encourages us to be open to those ideas and frees us up to give them a few benefits.    As an example, I missed an opportunity when running for a group of young players. They wanted to try to tame the wolves. I said it couldn't be done and then regretted it, because that both would have been fun and wouldn't have been overly strong in the context of 5E. Unlike 4E, where every encounter's math was really solid and an advantage would make it unfair, in this edition the encounters can be far more swingy and introducing new factors is okay balance-wise.
(Reply to #7) Adinell	Alphastream1 wrote:
#9 Alphastream Jul 23, 2014 6:39:15	Yeah, and it can be a lot of fun! They might start taking on that army, fighting one of the rear units. They barely survive that, but they capture an enemy and she happens to be a cook, providing them some insight into the vulnerability of the supply lines and a way they could defeat the army.   As DMs we can help reorient the players so things make sense, so they can still make good on their ideas, but so it works within the logic of the world. Ideally it doesn't feel like we are saying no. Rather, they get to act on their ideas and the world gives them feedback, which in turn stimulates more ideas on their end. It encourages them to continually come up with ideas.
#10 Plaguescarred1 Jul 23, 2014 6:38:18	Alphastream1 wrote:
#11 Spykes Jul 24, 2014 23:16:56	Along these lines of letting the players make their choices... We had a young boy, 9 yrs. old. show up with his Dad this week to play D&D. He had made a character prior to arriving and was really excited about it, bragging of his ability score rolls as the first thing out of his mouth. He had done quite a bit of reading of his Dad's 1st ed. books and had a character that was waaay off base for our games, but really wanted to play him. He had a 20 in one stat when he showed him to me and by the time he got to the table to play, several more stats had climbed to that level as well. Not wanting to rain on the boy's enthusiasm to play, the DM handled it with calm and let the boy play his character. Since we have had many new players at Encounters recently and we are at the end of the season, we formed a casual table for Lost Mine of Phandelver. When they got to Cragmaw Hideout, things got desperate in the bugbear fight. The boy's fighter was at 2 hp and he made the choice to charge the bugbear. He missed badly. The bugbear retaliated and one shot the boys Fighter taking him to negative his max hp, killing him outright. He was not happy.    There are probably lots of folks that would say that was heartless or cruel or that he should have never let him play that character in the first place. I, however, think he handled it brilliantly. The boy was pretty crushed at first, but the DM stayed after the game an hour helping him roll up a new character that was legal, and that he could get excited about. Plus, he learned some important lessons about playing D&D that you can only learn by actually playing. First of all, it can be lethal! There's always someone bigger. Also, it's not about how powerful your character is that produces the fun, it's how you play them and the choices you make. A lethal campaign is exciting and fun because of the stakes. By the time he left he was excited and ready to come back next week to try out his new character. I have no doubt that he is hooked.
#12 Archon007 Jul 26, 2014 23:08:06	Huh? Only Klarg knows the location of the castle.
#13 strider13x Jul 28, 2014 7:13:32	Archon007 wrote:
#14 Greyson Aug 01, 2014 20:07:06	Speaking of this (mediocre) adventure, for Adventurer League purposes, when is an episode over in Lost Minr of Phandelver? After a chapter ends?
#15 trigician Aug 04, 2014 1:00:58	I second Greyson's question. I'm finishing up running the Lost Mine of Phandelver for my crew this weekend. I need to know how many episodes so I can award an appropriate levels of downtime and reknown.   Moreover, I am playing some Expeditions adventures at a local convention at the end of the month. I need to know how many episodes worth of XP and downtime to give myself so I can prepare my own PC for that convention.   Four episodes seems rather thin for the length of the adventure, even though the adventure is broken into four chapters. The PCs get about enough experience to take them to 5th level, so the adventure seems like more than four episodes worth of gaming. Awarding them only 40 days of downtime in the first tier seems light. At that rate (about 8 days per level), a PC could not hope to even learn 1 new language or to use 1 new tool over 20 levels of adventuring.   Similarly, four episodes does not translate into much renown. PCs can achieve the third rank within a faction at 5th level, so long as they have 10 renown points. However, if this adventure is only divided into four episodes and only 4 renown points are awarded, PCs may have a very hard time reaching the top levels of their factions by 20th level.   As far as DM rewards go, if the adventure is only divided into four episodes, at 300 experience points per episode, DMs' PCs won't even be halfway through 3rd level after this adventure. The XP disparity would make it hard to rotate judging responsibilities after the adventure. PCs who play the entire adventure could have in excess of 6,500 xp, while the DM, rotating in as a player, would only have 1,200.   Mathematically, it seems that between 9 and 12 episodes would be appropriate. A number in that range would put the PCs at or near the 3rd tier within their factions. It would give them 90 to 120 days of downtime, too. In addition, the DMs' PCs' would get between 2,700 and 3,600 xp, putting them at 4th level, so if judging rotated, they would not be too far behind the other PCs.   An official answer on this would be really helpful. I would hate to award my group too much or too little renown or to shortchange myself on XP going into the local convention.   Art
#16 Ramzour Aug 04, 2014 2:54:11	I think it's pretty easy to come up with a list of episodes in LMoP. Here's a quick shot at it.   Episode List Part 1: Goblin Arrows (includes Goblin Ambush and Cragmaw Hideout) Part 2: exploring Phandalin and talking to all of the NPCs. Part 2: Redbrand Hideout Part 3: pick any two from: Agatha's Lair; Old Owl Well; Ruins of Thundertree; Wyvern Tor Part 3: pick any two from: Agatha's Lair; Old Owl Well; Ruins of Thundertree; Wyvern Tor Part 3: Cragmaw Castle Part 4: Wave Echo Cave
Chris Tulach Plaguescarred1 Aug 04, 2014 6:41:12	FYI The term episode came after the Starter Set was published, but Chris Tulach said Part = Episode on Facebook     Chris Tulach Yeah, I think the term episode came after Phandelver went off to press. Part = episode. We'll add it to the update list.
#18 DM_HEEGZ Aug 04, 2014 11:30:41	Ramzour wrote:
#19 Ramzour Aug 04, 2014 12:24:03	DM_HEEGZ wrote:
(Reply to #17) trigician	Plaguescarred wrote: