I’m a first time DM trying to actually play by the rules (for the most part) and this series has helped me so much with understanding things! Thank you!
Happy to help! It's good to stick to the rules as best you can when you start out, I've seen plenty of people break things because they didn't see how certain rules connect to others for balance. That being said, it's not a perfect system and it is highly customizable. Every game out there was once somebody's homebrew hack of a different game
09:24 omg this gave me an idea! I'm making Barthens the shop owner a super friendly npc who's always eager to offer tips and hints. I'm hoping he'll be someone my group grows to love. At some point, I might just have him either become grievously injured...or even die, at the hands (claws) of Cryovain! It'll be a big dramatic turning point in the adventure both displaying how powerful the young dragon is, as well as a real hook to get the group to want to avenge their fallen friend.
Oh perfect. An NPC with items is always a bit more likely to stick, be nice to them and maybe they'll give you a discount... You could even have Barthen get snatched and potentially rescued, if they hurry of course
Hi, I'm 49 yo, played maybe 1-2 game nights in my mid-20s; most of my D&D knowledge comes from video games and lately Critical Role (halfway through C1 podcast) has revigorated my love of fantasy. I purchased DoIP a few weeks ago and reading slowly through the material in order to launch the adventure as a DM for my wife and daughter on a game night. I was surprised with how much prep this one requires, as the reviews on Amazon, where I purchased it from, made it look so darn easy. These vids are very helpful, thank you for your service. :)
I wish I would have found this before my first game ever running this campaign. I played as a kid but have never DMed, so it was my first. I foolishly followed to books advice and only skimmed a few pages ahead while the players were in town. It was nerve wracking to feel lost and to fumble with NPCs. It was definitely a learning experience, lol. Long story short it was a TPK because they went after a rumor that ended up being too hard for them. I will go through the rumors for our next game and omit ones that are too high level. It was a great time though, and I learned a lot of what not to do.
Lessons learned the hard way are lessons you don't forget lol. Glad to be of service here, I bet the players are excited to level up and get revenge now
Super excited to see what this mega sandbox has in store! I love a lot of the dungeons from TFTYP, and the town of Phandalin and the surrounding region are so cool but I never thought to incorporate it all together. I have seen many a version of LMOP and DOIP combined to great effect but adding in some homebrew things, some excellent random encounter tables, and some of the most iconic dungeons of all time from TFTYP sounds like a slam dunk to me. It really feels like this recipe is managing to take the absolute best parts of each of these published works and creating something so much more than the sum of its parts. Love the idea, can't wait to see how it's all tied together!
Thanks Nextgen, I'm really excited to. I've got it all worked out for me to use in my homegame, but to create something polished and sharable is going to be a heavy lift. I have big plans though and I think it's going to be great. But first, Dragon of Icespire Peak
I'm trying to do this myself atm, by combining DoIP and the expansions with LMoP and the new Shattered Oblisk content into a big Phandalin set sandbox.
Thanks for the tips, I will be running this tomorrow for the first time, for new players, me being new myself, kind of nervous as I hope people will like it.
You’re welcome! Have fun with it and do what you can to keep the spotlight on the players. It can feel like the DM’s job is to present challenges, and it is, but the point is to make the player characters heroes. Make your group feel awesome and they’ll like it
Thanks for these videos. Finishing up my first ever DM adventure running stormwreck isle. Looking at icespire peak and changing a few things with cryovain and making him related somehow to sparkrender.
Thanks for the thanks. I think DoSI -> Phandalin is a great move. Maybe Runera tells them there's more dragon trouble to deal with, (but they'll have to level up first by helping out around town)
Looking a the book and seeing the maps with squares and characters having movement. I'm kind of confused on how to DM the battle phases and how movement works and letting the characters make their decisions in battle. It's been 20 years since I played DND now my kids want to run this adventure and I've never DMd before. I want it to be a great experience but I'm also trying to get the grasp of how to keep them engaged and make sure I don't absolutely mess up the whole story by not knowing battle tactics and not knowing if I should let them take certain quests or not off of the board based on how difficult it is.
It's natural to have a lot of worries before you set out and I've got a video about Anxiety and D&D that is one of my favorites on this channel. I'm convinced you and your kids are going to have an awesome time and that the best way to get comfortable answering all of these question is by jumping in
Yeaaahh!! Great stuff, man! It's an ambition of mine to run DoIP and Lost Mine together as one, but I also really dig the idea of Icespire being a prequel. Also, am really looking forward to hearing more of what you got for this "Mega Sandbox" 🙌
Im runing DoIP after LmoP and just adjusting for my players higher level. I love staying in the same area. Actually I already had them go to the Dragon Barrow, so I guess I am combining them!
Awesome! Yeah there’s such a focus on hopping from place to place it seems but giving the players a home base that they care about and see their impact on is huge, I love it. That’s a big part of the mega sandbox idea. A lot of DoIP is pretty easily scaled. I’m curious what you had to change for story reasons
Do you think the new Phandelver campaign will be new? I have a feeling it will be DOIP/LMoP Storm Kings, and the other collected together! With some better cohesive detail.
It wouldn't be the first time they just repackaged stuff so you may be right. The first time we ran LMoP we followed up with Storm Kings Thunder and still talk about the battle of Triboar years later. The only thing I know so far is that they said summer 2023 and it will be cosmic horror, so that definitely sounds like a different product and (perhaps naively) I'm optimistic
@@RdotDoyle i'd not seen the mention of cosmic horror, maybe they are going to take us back to Phandalin the place we all love so much and wipe it from the face of Faerun :D cos that's always a fun hook.
That could be very cool. There’s also the ruins of the previous settlement all around, and beyond Tressendar Manor they don’t do much with them, so maybe something lying buried beneath the town gets uncovered to kick things off
Recent word from WOTC is that Beneath Phandelver will include the adventure from LMoP & then expand on it from there. I already ran LMoP for my current group so I would have to maybe to run DoIP for them first to level them up for the remainder of the campaign. The new Phandelver campaign does sound interesting so far.
I can't even find the Stone Cold Reavers in the book. What page does it talk about them on? I am actually still doing Phandelver right now, but want to segway into this one so I'm doing some research and reworking things to make them work better. I'm having Halia Thornton take over the Redbrands and rebranding, the Stone Cold Reavers sounds like an interesting direction to take it...
They are in a sidebar on page 32 of DOIP, but the Redbrands are in LMOP so double check you're in the right book. I think you're probably combining the two, which is a popular move that I am personally a big fan of
I always thought of DoIP happening after LMoP because the presence of the Redbrands would make the job board kinda... strange? I mean, why would you say "we have problems here" when there's a bunch of jerks going around. But now that think about it, putting it BEFORE makes a lot of sense, because then the so called Stone Cold Reavers (or even the wererat gang) could be the beginning of the Redbrands, somehow. That's a really really really interesting video as always, Ryan, hope you doing fine!
I'm doing great and I hope you're doing better! I try to be all about options here and the best thing I can achieve is to get the viewers imagination firing and making connections. The Redbrand to Stone Cold Reavers connection is really great, I've thought about the wererats before, but it kind of only works in one direction, though I guess the curse could have been removed. But yeah, the Stone Cold Reavers feel like they have so much potential and are so little developed, to have them be the seeds or the remnants of the Redbrands is a brilliant option
While recently playing LMoP one player asked me what the population of Phandalin is. The starter set doesn’t say. The listed town NPCs are only a few but looking at the number of buildings in the map there must be more permanent residents than the listed NPC. Travellers & miners make the population larger at any given time but about how many permanent residents do you think Phandalin has at the time of the Starter Set?
This is a great question and I don't have an informed answer for it. My instinct is in the low hundreds, maybe 500 if you count nearby farms, ranches, mines, etc
You can go either way. I'm a big fan of "theater of the mind" where we go pure description and leave the imagination to fill in the blanks. Some people don't have as active a mind's eye and prefer a map in front of them. In combat, especially at higher levels, a map is almost a necessity as exact relative position because more and more important
@@RdotDoyle Thak you. Im watching your series on the Essential DnD kit, and was super lost because the book leaves that out entirely... There are even more places than missions.. Thank you! I followed your tips and got a 5 player adventure going with kids and adults. Lots of fun so far!!
I’m a first time DM trying to actually play by the rules (for the most part) and this series has helped me so much with understanding things! Thank you!
Happy to help! It's good to stick to the rules as best you can when you start out, I've seen plenty of people break things because they didn't see how certain rules connect to others for balance. That being said, it's not a perfect system and it is highly customizable. Every game out there was once somebody's homebrew hack of a different game
Same
09:24
omg this gave me an idea! I'm making Barthens the shop owner a super friendly npc who's always eager to offer tips and hints. I'm hoping he'll be someone my group grows to love.
At some point, I might just have him either become grievously injured...or even die, at the hands (claws) of Cryovain! It'll be a big dramatic turning point in the adventure both displaying how powerful the young dragon is, as well as a real hook to get the group to want to avenge their fallen friend.
Oh perfect. An NPC with items is always a bit more likely to stick, be nice to them and maybe they'll give you a discount... You could even have Barthen get snatched and potentially rescued, if they hurry of course
Hi, I'm 49 yo, played maybe 1-2 game nights in my mid-20s; most of my D&D knowledge comes from video games and lately Critical Role (halfway through C1 podcast) has revigorated my love of fantasy. I purchased DoIP a few weeks ago and reading slowly through the material in order to launch the adventure as a DM for my wife and daughter on a game night.
I was surprised with how much prep this one requires, as the reviews on Amazon, where I purchased it from, made it look so darn easy. These vids are very helpful, thank you for your service. :)
That's great, welcome back! Happy to be of service. Being a DM is work for sure, but can be very rewarding
I wish I would have found this before my first game ever running this campaign. I played as a kid but have never DMed, so it was my first. I foolishly followed to books advice and only skimmed a few pages ahead while the players were in town. It was nerve wracking to feel lost and to fumble with NPCs. It was definitely a learning experience, lol. Long story short it was a TPK because they went after a rumor that ended up being too hard for them. I will go through the rumors for our next game and omit ones that are too high level. It was a great time though, and I learned a lot of what not to do.
Lessons learned the hard way are lessons you don't forget lol. Glad to be of service here, I bet the players are excited to level up and get revenge now
Super excited to see what this mega sandbox has in store! I love a lot of the dungeons from TFTYP, and the town of Phandalin and the surrounding region are so cool but I never thought to incorporate it all together. I have seen many a version of LMOP and DOIP combined to great effect but adding in some homebrew things, some excellent random encounter tables, and some of the most iconic dungeons of all time from TFTYP sounds like a slam dunk to me. It really feels like this recipe is managing to take the absolute best parts of each of these published works and creating something so much more than the sum of its parts. Love the idea, can't wait to see how it's all tied together!
Thanks Nextgen, I'm really excited to. I've got it all worked out for me to use in my homegame, but to create something polished and sharable is going to be a heavy lift. I have big plans though and I think it's going to be great. But first, Dragon of Icespire Peak
I'm trying to do this myself atm, by combining DoIP and the expansions with LMoP and the new Shattered Oblisk content into a big Phandalin set sandbox.
Just found this channel. It's a gem!
Thank you!
Thanks for the tips, I will be running this tomorrow for the first time, for new players, me being new myself, kind of nervous as I hope people will like it.
You’re welcome! Have fun with it and do what you can to keep the spotlight on the players. It can feel like the DM’s job is to present challenges, and it is, but the point is to make the player characters heroes. Make your group feel awesome and they’ll like it
Thanks for these videos. Finishing up my first ever DM adventure running stormwreck isle. Looking at icespire peak and changing a few things with cryovain and making him related somehow to sparkrender.
Thanks for the thanks. I think DoSI -> Phandalin is a great move. Maybe Runera tells them there's more dragon trouble to deal with, (but they'll have to level up first by helping out around town)
Looking a the book and seeing the maps with squares and characters having movement. I'm kind of confused on how to DM the battle phases and how movement works and letting the characters make their decisions in battle. It's been 20 years since I played DND now my kids want to run this adventure and I've never DMd before. I want it to be a great experience but I'm also trying to get the grasp of how to keep them engaged and make sure I don't absolutely mess up the whole story by not knowing battle tactics and not knowing if I should let them take certain quests or not off of the board based on how difficult it is.
It's natural to have a lot of worries before you set out and I've got a video about Anxiety and D&D that is one of my favorites on this channel. I'm convinced you and your kids are going to have an awesome time and that the best way to get comfortable answering all of these question is by jumping in
Yeaaahh!! Great stuff, man!
It's an ambition of mine to run DoIP and Lost Mine together as one, but I also really dig the idea of Icespire being a prequel.
Also, am really looking forward to hearing more of what you got for this "Mega Sandbox" 🙌
Always appreciated! We're just piling up the toys to put in the sandbox
Tons of great ideas and inspiration here! I appreciate you….
Thanks so much, I appreciate you taking the time to comment
Im runing DoIP after LmoP and just adjusting for my players higher level. I love staying in the same area. Actually I already had them go to the Dragon Barrow, so I guess I am combining them!
Awesome! Yeah there’s such a focus on hopping from place to place it seems but giving the players a home base that they care about and see their impact on is huge, I love it. That’s a big part of the mega sandbox idea. A lot of DoIP is pretty easily scaled. I’m curious what you had to change for story reasons
i’m thinking of running the lost mine of phandlin and going to play this one after and i’m curious if i’ll be able to link the two for the characters
Great stuff as always. I am running this for my players. We just finished the tier one quests. I can't wait to see the follow up videos.
Thank you as always! I hope I catch up to your group so this is more helpful 😆 These should drop every Monday, are you playing weekly?
@@RdotDoyle yep. Tuesdays. Will be taking a couple weeks for vacation soon. Thanks Ryan!
Feel free to share what you did, other voices in the mix can definitely be helpful to others
Great stuff!
Thanks!
Do you think the new Phandelver campaign will be new? I have a feeling it will be DOIP/LMoP Storm Kings, and the other collected together! With some better cohesive detail.
It wouldn't be the first time they just repackaged stuff so you may be right. The first time we ran LMoP we followed up with Storm Kings Thunder and still talk about the battle of Triboar years later. The only thing I know so far is that they said summer 2023 and it will be cosmic horror, so that definitely sounds like a different product and (perhaps naively) I'm optimistic
@@RdotDoyle i'd not seen the mention of cosmic horror, maybe they are going to take us back to Phandalin the place we all love so much and wipe it from the face of Faerun :D cos that's always a fun hook.
That could be very cool. There’s also the ruins of the previous settlement all around, and beyond Tressendar Manor they don’t do much with them, so maybe something lying buried beneath the town gets uncovered to kick things off
Recent word from WOTC is that Beneath Phandelver will include the adventure from LMoP & then expand on it from there. I already ran LMoP for my current group so I would have to maybe to run DoIP for them first to level them up for the remainder of the campaign. The new Phandelver campaign does sound interesting so far.
I can't even find the Stone Cold Reavers in the book. What page does it talk about them on? I am actually still doing Phandelver right now, but want to segway into this one so I'm doing some research and reworking things to make them work better. I'm having Halia Thornton take over the Redbrands and rebranding, the Stone Cold Reavers sounds like an interesting direction to take it...
They are in a sidebar on page 32 of DOIP, but the Redbrands are in LMOP so double check you're in the right book. I think you're probably combining the two, which is a popular move that I am personally a big fan of
I always thought of DoIP happening after LMoP because the presence of the Redbrands would make the job board kinda... strange? I mean, why would you say "we have problems here" when there's a bunch of jerks going around. But now that think about it, putting it BEFORE makes a lot of sense, because then the so called Stone Cold Reavers (or even the wererat gang) could be the beginning of the Redbrands, somehow.
That's a really really really interesting video as always, Ryan, hope you doing fine!
I'm doing great and I hope you're doing better!
I try to be all about options here and the best thing I can achieve is to get the viewers imagination firing and making connections. The Redbrand to Stone Cold Reavers connection is really great, I've thought about the wererats before, but it kind of only works in one direction, though I guess the curse could have been removed. But yeah, the Stone Cold Reavers feel like they have so much potential and are so little developed, to have them be the seeds or the remnants of the Redbrands is a brilliant option
While recently playing LMoP one player asked me what the population of Phandalin is. The starter set doesn’t say. The listed town NPCs are only a few but looking at the number of buildings in the map there must be more permanent residents than the listed NPC. Travellers & miners make the population larger at any given time but about how many permanent residents do you think Phandalin has at the time of the Starter Set?
This is a great question and I don't have an informed answer for it. My instinct is in the low hundreds, maybe 500 if you count nearby farms, ranches, mines, etc
Do we have to show the dungeon maps to players?? Or is it pure description?? Super lost here
You can go either way. I'm a big fan of "theater of the mind" where we go pure description and leave the imagination to fill in the blanks. Some people don't have as active a mind's eye and prefer a map in front of them. In combat, especially at higher levels, a map is almost a necessity as exact relative position because more and more important
@@RdotDoyle Thak you. Im watching your series on the Essential DnD kit, and was super lost because the book leaves that out entirely... There are even more places than missions.. Thank you! I followed your tips and got a 5 player adventure going with kids and adults. Lots of fun so far!!
*Rolls for Initiative*
This guy is ready
The Lore lul