Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Neutrilino Aug 25, 2014 15:05:03	I ran my first session of Hoard of the Dragon Queen last Wednesday.  There was general appreciation of my notes from the first session I ran from the Lost Mine of Phandelver so I figured I would publish my notes again.   Players:  - Fighter (Dual Wielding with the Mounted Combatant feat and a Draft Horse)  - Barbarian  - Cleric  - Wizard   We played through six encounters in 4 hours and progressed through two of the missions.  Here is a rundown of the encounters I ran:   Seek The Keep - Encounter 1: 8 kobolds - Encounter 2: 2 kobolds, 1 cultist - Encounter 3: 4 kobolds, 2 cultists - Encounter 4: 1 winged kobold, 5 kobolds, 3 cultists   The Old Tunnel - Encounter 1: 2 rat swarms - Encounter 2: 2 cultists, 6 kobolds   For the first encounter, I gave the characters automatic surprise as the adventure text states that the kobolds "... assume the characters are cultists and ignore them ..."  With surprise, this encounter becomes straight forward. I'm not a huge fan of being given systems for randomly generating mobs.  Wandering encounters are one thing, but being told to generate three encounters with 1d6 kobolds and 1d4 cultists seemed a little lazy and potentially dangerous.  While not probable, it's possible for a rookie DM to think that three encounters with 6 kobolds and 4 cultists would be reasonable.  For the sake of experimentation, I rolled out the numbers but then organized them from easiest to hardest in case I needed to balance on the fly.   The mounted combatant feat + draft horse combination was quite deadly.  For reference, the key part is that a rider has advantage on melee attack rolls against any unmounted creature that is smaller than your mount.  This seems a little OP to me but the horse didn't get to come through the entire session (see below). My group rolled through the first three encounters with ease.  They were supposed to.  The first of the cleric's healing spells got used at the end of encounter 4.  It should be noted that they were rolling well and I was rolling poorly for these four encounters. Once the group got to the keep, they met Castellan Escobert and then Governor Nighthill.  I had the Governor give them the Prisoners and Sanctuary missions.  In order to get out of the castle, they had to get through The Old Tunnel. Entering the tunnel was where my fighter lost his horse.  A poorly rolled animal handling check meant that the horse would not enter the small tunnel.  So, the fighter was horseless for the rest of the session. The rat swarm encounter went well.  It also represented the first time I handed out inspiration.  The barbarian character described an attack whereby he used his shield to squish the rat swarm (thereby ignoring the written rule to halve physical damage).  I thought the idea was novel and he described the attack well so I rewarded him with an inspiration point.  I like this system. Finally, the group got out of the tunnel and ran into the raider group that were searching the stream banks.  The groups dice luck ran out and this encounter showcased how vulnerable level one characters are.  In the end, the encounter involved a sleep spell and the barbarian and fighter unconscious.  At the end, the cleric had to burn the second healing spell and the group took their first short rest. Through the session, they accrued enough experience to get to level 2.  Since they won't have an opportunity for a long rest for a while, but I want them to have their level 2 skills for the rest of the episode, I'm going to let them level up but keep track of what skills they have used.  For example, the cleric has burned two healing spells so after leveling up, she'll have one new spell slot available. Overall, it was an enjoyable session.  However, without the mounted fighter and the good dice rolling for the first 3/4 of the session the group could have been a lot worse off.  My biggest advice would be to make sure you get your group to the keep.  Once they're there, you can always add clerics or potions of healing to the equipment available there to help characters top up.   Finally, there was one instance where we ran into something that I couldn't solve in the rules.  At the end of the last encounter, the barbarian was unconscious and stable and the cleric had no healing spells left.  At this point, the group took a short rest.  My question is, can a stable, unconscious character with available Hit Dice take advantage of the healing from a Short Rest?
#2 Eugee Aug 25, 2014 16:37:40	Please keep posting on this, I'm starving to see more experiences with HotDQ.     To answer your question from page 197 PHB   A stable creature doesn't make death saving throws, even though it has 0 hit points, but it does remain unconscious.  The creatue stops being stable, and must start making death saving throws again, if it takes any damage. A stable creature that isn't healed regains 1 hit point after 1d4 hours.   Italics are my emphasis.  Because there is a specific sentence stating that it takes 1d4 hours for a stable creature to regain 1 hit point, I feel that overrules a Short Rest.
(Reply to #2) Neutrilino	Eugee wrote:
#4 Eugee Aug 25, 2014 17:01:14	I agree with you.  Hell it's easy enough to say he got the 1 hp back in that hour, and because he wasn't doing anything strenuous (you know... snoring) he's able to spend HD at the end of that time.   It all works.
#5 JohnLynch Aug 26, 2014 2:51:12	I'm glad to hear how others are finding this. I had a less standard group so my results were a bit different. Details here:  https://nat20games.wordpress.com/2014/08/24/hoard-of-the-dragon-queen-session-1/