So... I have never played the same AL adventure twice... but to me it just seems like it would be fairly boring. You know all of the secrets, you know which good guy is really the bad guy, you can't be surprised by a secret door or surprise ambush....
I understand some folks play the same ones multiple times, what is the draw for you? What makes them still fun the 2nd, 3rd, etc time through the same adventure.
I haven't done it yet, but if I did it would be for the necessity of there only being X amount of expeditions and I want XP (and maybe gold) for my PC.
Besides, so far they are railroaded as heck - it doesn't matter what you know, it all ends up at the same place.
Actually some of the adventures have more than one way to solve them. DDEX1-13 comes to mind from this last weekend. I suspect no two tables at Winter Fantasy had all the same encounters. Given that some adventures like that one have different ways to finish them, I could see some players wanting to see if they can solve the challenge in different ways and get very different play experiences.
Different DM read, interprate and present the adventure differently, Yes at the end of the day you still beat the dragon at the end of the adventure and bring the cultist back in jail (or kill him) but on the way their one DM read that the lizardfolk tribe join you and help you, while the other DM read it as they join you then backstab you when they see an opportunity. Playing an adventure with miniatures and Dwarven Forge and everything is a very different adventure then theater of the mind or even a drawn map.
Different Player will bring different strategy and option to the game, like in DDEX10- if you have a harper in your group you get an extra piece of the adventure, if you have a lord alliance you have an other part.some player might want to run away from town right from the start, while other might want to go save more villager, some might want to escape by the sewers, other want to escape by the docks etc... Some group might talk with the bad NPC at the end, and learn something more then the barbarian group who killed him on sight. So group might be able to find the secret door and get a surprise attack on the BBEG whiel the other group miss that secret door and need to plan a frontal attack, etc... Playing the adventure with opimizer is also very different then playing it with role players.
Finally as a DM when I know that some of the player already played the adventure, I will change the secret door in room 2 and move it to room 3 (but still allowed this door to surprise the BBEG) so the player doesn't know where the secret door is. If there is 3 NPC that are suspected of a crime, I might change which one is guilty so the player don't know from the start amd I tell that to my player from the beginning that I changed some details in the adventure, but the overall experience and rewards are the same.
Then yes I would replay an adventure a 2nd and 3rd time, because if I need a new character level 5 their is only 3 different option: LMoP, HotDQ and doing 10 Expedition. and my halfling rogue might need some google of night vision so running Due for the dead is a chance to get that item even if my cleric already did it.
DDEX1-10 Tyranny in Phlan also has several different ways to end the adventure. My table used the ending that was provided from the Lords Alliance secret mission, and completely skipped the Harper secret mission on account of not talking to the quest giver.
It's pretty rare for me to want to go back through an adventure I've already played; if I'm jonesing for a random AL game, I'm more likely to run one as a DM.
Of those already published, I'm most tempted to replay Drums in the Marsh, and really only because the "party" I was with the first time was a total nightmare of sullen bickering, refusal to participate, and general not-fun-to-spend-four-hours-with-ness. I liked the adventure, even though we failed to complete it, and would be interested in attempting it again (with fewer asshats), so I've held off on reading/running it myself.
Thanks for all of the replies...
QwertyAzerty wrote:
Coredump00 wrote:
Mirtek wrote:
Coredump00 wrote:
I think this comes down to :
How much of a metagamer are you as a player? If you dont immerse yourself in character you will likely find the scenarios predictable when you play for the second time. You will of course not go anywhere near that pressure plate, you will avoid the left hand side of the corridor as the Zombielich comes out there and you will of course bring an umbrella to combat the acid rain. If you immerse yourself in your character and do what THEY would do, and not what you as a player would do then you would have a lot more fun.
I prefer to GM. I make no qualms about that. I like being surprised by new players actions, or inaction. I like running the show.
As a player though, people have said I am pretty good at 'pretending I dont know whats coming up', which I hope is a good thing. I generally help out on puzzles if needed but I tend to hang back in the deductive parts of the story, and surge forward when we need to talk to npcs and the like. As a rule I generally do play some socially agressive characters... whether they be nice types or antisocial gits.
Ive yet to play too many Expeditions scenarios. Ive played a couple of minis from Defiance in Phlan and Ive done Secrets of Sokol Keep. My character Valeria, is a sword and board fighter. She is a mercenary who is no nonsense. Ive also seemingly adopted a strange germanic/south african butch voice for her. I dont know why the hell I did that, and It will probably change. She is also a member of the Zhentarim as they have afforded her the opportunity to fight in different locations. I also made her an ex soldier in the Zhentilar.
You will of course not go anywhere near that pressure plate
If my first party failed its mission because of bad dice rolling (DM crits; PC '1's) then I'd want a do-over !
When I have two different characters with different capabilities, I'd like to take both through the challenge.
If I played a session with a 'contagious defective adventurer', I'd want to play with a different group so I can pay attention to the story rather than the jerk.
If there is a neat Magic Item that would be right up Character #2's alley (and Character #1 did not gain it), I'd take Char#2 through that adventure so HE has a chance to get it.
If the adventure totally overwhelmed my party the first time, I would want to level up some and try again - when I am tough enough for the challenge !
P.S. "Googles" of night vision ?! 
I just went through our stores copies of the Expeditions certs..... I didn't realize, but we have a metric tonne of them.... more than enough to run most adventures 6 or more times and give out a cert each time....... I probably have a good 12 rings of evasion and an equal number of wands of detect magic, thanks to the rings/wands coming in two separate cert kits (one that contained 1 ring + 1 wand, and the other containing 3x ring or wand each).
Do you know all the secrets by playing it once?
I thought most of the modules had some optional stuff that wouldn't happen unless go to x or do y.
(I haven't read any of them, only played).
IxidorRS wrote:
It'd be interesting if there was a newgame plus mode.