I'll be kicking this off tonight for an online group, but I must admit in preparing for it, there are a few things that is relatively concerning:
First, with the whole bounded accuracy business, I think it's more important to keep tighter control on encounter strength. Funny part is, when I first saw the initial encounters my knee-jerk reaction was "Hey, cool...just like the old days! Random encounter strengths."
In retrospect, as I prepped these encounters, it really became apparent that this was a bad idea. As often as not, the number of creatures impacts the difficulty of an encounter as much as the actual strength of the creatures themselves. Thus, the difference between a potential 2 creature encounter and a 10 creature encounter is enormous.
Second, they really didn't pay attention to their own encounter building rules. I'll avoid spoilers here, but the first mission after arriving (presumably) safely to the group's destination, has the potential (pretty reasonable one) to result in an encounter against 13 creatures. 25 XP each for 12 of them, so the majority are low challenge to be sure, but that number is very deadly - even by their own encounter building standards. The base XP is 400 (which, incidentally, already puts the encounter at "Deadly"). The modified XP for encounter size (# of monsters) is a whopping 1200 estimated difficulty.
For a party of 4 PCs, 1200 would be a Hard Encounter for Level 4s. Deadly for level 3s.
For level 1s, it's relatively suicidal without some DM finagling.
Heck, for that matter, the encounter leading into it would be hard enough (8 creatures, 25 XP each, 200 XP base, 500 XP difficulty level determination - Deadly).
Granted, there's creatures that are worth 25 XPs that are pretty easy, and some that are let's-be-careful-here (which the vast majority of the 13 were of this type), but in general, I am not sure enough thought was put into what can be expected as reasonable challenges for 1st-level characters.
Finally, in a bit of a humorous moment for me, I did note that for those DMs that are using Milestone XP Rules, the "Developments" section reads, really quite literally, that a group that avoids all combat (doesn't even enter the town), will reach 2nd level at the end of Episode 1.
As Joshua (the computer) said in War Games (the movie), "A strange game. The only winning move is not to play."
Yeah i believe Steve and Wofgang worked with alpha material with no CR or XP value when they developped the adventure, which may show in some encounters overall difficulty when comparing with final monster design. You may want to use caution when very tough encounter show up on your radar.
Looking forward to it and to try Fantasy Grounds 
''If this is to end in fire
Then we should all burn together
Watch the flames climb high into the night
Calling out father oh
Stand by and we will
Watch the flames burn auburn on
The mountain side hig
And if we should die tonight
Then we should all die together
Raise a glass of wine for the last time''
- I See Fire by Ed Sheeran
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fngvQS_PmQ
"I See Fire"
I have not read the adventure, but in principle I would advise the following:
- make the PCs realize how strong the opponent is. Invite them to take precautions and make plans to split the group in, at least, three consecutive fights.
- separate the opponents beforehand yourself. Make them less prepared for the arrival of the heroes than what is written.
Both points would enable the original overly deadly encounter to be run as e.g. three or four medium-to-hard encounters (I didn't do the math yet, just estimating) back to back. It will be taxing, dangerous, with no rests but hopefully regrouping, spellcasting, etc, possible in between.
I look forward to receiving my copy in September, and appreciate your feedback on how the adventure runs.
- Vargtass
Oh, I have no problem giving adequate clues and narration to deliver the message on encounter strength.
Thing is...
You can't expect every 5th Edition DM and Players to be experienced. You have to assume that there's at least a chance that those involved in this adventure will take on challenges straight up.
Now, a few hard lessons are fine-and-dandy, but there's no supportive text in the adventure to help inexperienced DMs understand how to deal with encounters that are beyond normal expected difficulty. In fact, in reading the adventure, it wouldn't be an inaccurate conclusion to think that these early encounters and missions are supposed to be fought and overcome. Even a veteran DM, playing it "by the book", could easily overwhelm a 1st level group.
In fact, some veteran DMs would argue that "smart play" (intelligent DMing) would have these encounters played out so that the enemy would seek to annihilate the party in their attempts to achieve their (the enemy's) goals. I don't want to get into a debate on DMing style and encounter tactics, just pointing out that the encounters as listed are not necessarily level appropriate if played literally as presented.
I expect a good time in running this, but I am already putting my personal stamp on the adventure (which, of course, would happen regardless) that will include some different approaches to encounters and events to ensure that a very well presented module offers a good chance to be as entertaining as possible (for all involved).
That said, I do not believe it's a safe practice for the publisher to assume that every DM is willing to put for the effort to customize or alter accordingly. In truth, I expect that a good portion of DMs who buy adventures want to be able to run them with little to no alterations at all.
ShadeRaven wrote:
Much of the reasoning is dealt with at a macro level. The encounters themselves are offered as combative in nature. DMs will have to "read between the lines" if they want more depth or if they are seeking alternative methods for party success.
I don't want to spoil anything, so I won't go into any more detail. One interesting side note, there's almost a penalty for avoiding combat (higher likelihood of additional encounters).
Actually... To be fair, there's a good deal of player determination when it comes to what becomes actual physical confrontation.
It's not so much that there isn't routes to success (including the do-nothing option) that don't include direct attack, but that I expect a good many groups that run this adventure to rely on that (combat-centric) particular path. If that's one obvious way to successfully overcoming obstacles, it's fairly important that the adventure is designed to allow a fair chance of victory.