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| Git thee on mah train! |
So Dragonlance is the archetypal railroad in many ways -- I don't believe that automatically makes it unfun. However, for the choo-choo train to run correctly, I think it needs to do a couple of things better than DL1 does as written.
We had a moderate breakdown in Haven last night. We know that the ultimate destination is Xak-Tsaroth, and the Haven interlude is supposed to be one method of getting characters interested in going there. But given the build-up and characterization of the Seekers (especially Hederick in Solace) the party likely already doesn't trust them (or even like them much).
The module seems to think the players will march up to the Councilhall and show the staff to the Highseekers. After playing through this section last night, this seems exceedingly unlikely. So the players naturally concealed the BCS from the Highseekers and suddenly the train was out of steam, stuck in Haven with no natural next move for the PC's.
I was able to salvage the scene with some heavy handed DM fiat; I retroactively suggested that the party noticed one seeker (Elistan) did not seem to agree with Lorcar's plan (after the players suggested this, thank god.) So we did a little impromptu scene and got the plot-train back on the tracks. I think any DM attempting this should prepare alternative measures for when the PC's don't play nice with the seekers.
The other major issue we had was monster math/encounters. I'm new to DM'ing 5E, though I have played some. I tend to err on the side of having tougher encounters, as I believe the vast number of player's abilities and healing makes weak combats nothing more than a time waster. If we are gonna ride the plot-train, the payoff MUST be cool as hell set-piece encounters and general epic-ness.
We had 1.5 combat encounters. First was with the disguised draconians. I used enworld's draconian conversions for this purpose and I definitely miscalculated AC, having it be 1 higher than it should be. That said, the Draconians as written on Enworld are faithful conversions, but they seem to buck 5E's monster design trends. There is a lot of 4E's monster roles in 5E -- some monsters are easy to hit but have high health, others have high ac but low damage, etc. Draconians are pretty well rounded without an obvious weakness, and this threw the players for a loop -- especially my buddy that is a 5E DM.
Now not all was lost, as the encounter was not overwhelming and we had loads of fun, but something to think about.
The second combat encounter was with my version of Dragonlance's spectral minions. I basically combined a ghost and a wight to make these guys and WHOOPS. They were probably too strong. If we didn't have the plot-train swoop in to end the combat, it could have gotten out of hand. I'm not sure how my players felt about the whole thing, but I know that myself as a player, an aborted combat ending in deus-ex-machina would probably annoy me. I would caution DM's to think hard about the spectral minion encounter in general. It may be more frustrating than its worth.
I've got one week to prep for next session and I'll be examining encounters a little harder. I'll also try and keep an eye out for times when there is a potential stall-out. Again, I don't think railroad is necessarily an invalid way to play, but in the IDEAL scenario the players decide for themselves to go to the right places. You have to anticipate how they are thinking and leave lots of hooks for them.
Just my thoughts after week 2.
Onward and upward.
DM CHAS
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