Trading with the Black Spider in LMOP - D&D 5th Edition Starter Set Guide
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 9 ก.ค. 2024
- The Lost Mines of Phandelver is the D&D 5th Edition Starter Set. Let's learn about how to run the trading sidequest when the Black Spider wants the mysterious puzzle box in LMOP.
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▶ Previous advice about the Trade scene: • How to run the Triboar...
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▼▼ Timestamps ▼▼
0:00 Sidequest Overview
1:17 Pre-quest considerations
2:40 The bar
5:32 The cellar
8:00 The gambling hall
12:58 The most important part
#dnd #5e #lmop - เกม
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The crossbow could play different notes in a sequence as it gets fired and be a clue for a musical puzzle later.
Thank you so much for everything Matthew, here's a story from my campaign inspired by your ideas!:
My Players got into phandalin and into a bar fight against the redbrands , The blackspider majestically intervened and helped the party
She gave them a 'healing' potion (wink wink) after the fight to truly gain their trust.
She introduced herself as Haila Thornton (One of the Pc's goal was to meet with her and get revenge on the blackspider so they immediatly believed it was her while in reality, Nezzar had already killed and stole Haila's identity)
'Haila' went adventuring with them! She helped with agatha's quest and with the interrogation of the town's mayor.
they bonded! the party liked her.
Eventually Nezzar told them party that she worked for the black spider,unwillingly
The black spider held her family captives and she has to do her biddings.
She assured the party she can get gundren rockseeker in exchange for the puzzle box in their posessions
The night of the exchange has arrived
One of the PCs was Gundren cousin, a cleric with a strong compass
He decided to meet up with the blackspider alone (Which was definetly a death wish in my book)
He let another PC know of it and told him ..."If I'm not back in time,know I',m in trouble
At the night of the exchange ,two scenes were happening at the same time:
1)The cleric Pc's encounter with Nezzar and the betrayal:
They met under the full moon in the empty orchad and a fight ensured
a fight the cleric could not win by himself
2)The party's unlikely realization that Haila wasn't real
The other party was hanging out in the tavern , when a familliar figure stepped in
Quillin , one of the PC'S aunt
when asked why was she in phandalin she told the party
"I've come to attend a funeral of a dear friend of mine,Haila thornton"
At that moment all the pieces came together
They realized Haila isn't really Haila
If so,who is the Cleric meeting with now?!
A race against time ensued while the cleric fought for his life
The party finally arrived (after a few brutal rounds of combat)
they party was shocked at the unexcpected betrayal
The cleric was KO'd and was rolling death saves
one of the PC's tried to revive him with the potion they were given earlier.
"Excuse me ,but who gave you that potion?"
the moment I asked that question their eyes went wide in realization that Nezzar had given it to them
"Make a con save, with disadvantage, roll once below 10 and you'll need to prepare a new character sheet"
I told the cleric...but he succeded!
It was epic,the buildup towards that moment was peak!
There's so much more that happened but I rumbled too much haha
YES! I'm glad to see that potion's still out there wrecking havoc.
More, please more details, what a great story!!
I think I'm gonna try this out. This is amazing! xD
First of all, love this series, it has gotten me to run multiple games of LMoP all of which have been a blast.
Now a couple names for the crossbow:
Twang
Sharp
6th Shooter
Oh my god, The 6th Shooter is very good
The +1 crossbow: "Middle C You Later"
sam that's somehow worse but i love it
In my session I completely forgot about the saloon so I made up a random crater on the spot and this exchange happened:
"meet me at the crater"
"Which crater?"
"Y'know.... the crater"
Haha, well that's certainly an interesting enough location!
Thanks a lot Matthew! My group will have this stand off against Black Spider THIS SATURDAY. This vídeo sure came at the perfect time. I loved the Saloon setting and all the loose boards on the floor
The number of people who are running this session immediately is very surprising haha -- thank you and good luck!
Crossbow name: C# for sharp crossbow.
Been waiting for this one, and it comes just in time.
Thanks Matthew
I was gonna wait till tomorrow, but then I thought, "No. Santiago needs me."
Hope it helps mate!
So glad you are still adding to this playlist. My party is currently in the redbrand manor and they just missed their meeting with the black spider while they were suiting up in the armory.
You know what that means? After the players realise they've missed the meeting, when they take a long rest while depleted, The Black Spider attacks, tries to get the box and bails!
This scene is so cool! Also, for the bow, could be the +1 "Not Low-key bow", which makes a high pitched sound. Maybe, being mischievous, could be named the +1 "Loki bow". Get it?
Cheers Matt!
Cheers Platy! I think I might have sent you a version of this like six months ago when I was playtesting it, right?
@@heyitsMattyP actually yes! I believe I'm one of your first playtesters if not the first one. And the scene was epic as hell, as it was the first real encounter my party had with Nezzar. Great scene and ambiance
My players took the bait with Nezzar, hook, line and sinker!
Unfortunately, they weren't completely convinced by the crying Molly who told them about the Reds pesterin' her all day and then looming around outside her house after she went home. They took little Molly back to the Stonehill Inn for some fajitas and left her there in the company of Bart. We'll see how that turns out for the party...
BUT they are super clever. As soon as they got in range to cast Message, the wizard tried to message Gundren. I had already decided it was the doppleganger, not the real Gundren, so there was no response. They messaged Nezzar and she responded. So they already went in suspicious about Gundren being there or not. Then, as they placed the puzzle box on the table, which they had already opened and made a replica key, but modified slightly, they asked "Gundren" a question from their shared party backstory and the dopplegagner got it wrong! The gig was up and Nezzar said, "No one backs out of a deal with the Black Spider!" Then she blasted the player still holding the puzzle box. ROLL INITIATIVE!!!
I hope Molly is OK!
With impeccable timing, I just ran this exchange last week, based on your (impeccable) advice in other videos. Nezzar had "Gundren" to offer as back up, in case her offer of Cragmaw Castle's location wasn't enough to make them hand over the box. Once combat broke out, she Webbed half the party and had the doppelganger pinpoint the box's location using mind reading, before trying to swipe it with Mage Hand. She failed, but that gave the party time to rally and mess her up to the point of her fleeing empty-handed. They really don't like her now 😁, thank you for dreaming this up.
Well done! I don't think that could have gone any better
This is great!! I've set up a trade appointment between Nezzar and the party for the next session. She dropped down from a rooftop as soon as the Redbrands were very much winning the brawl, all black cloak and no identifying visuals for the players that were still standing. She does a couple attacks, then runs up to the player thats down and throws a healing potion down his gullet. He wakes up - staring into the face of a woman with white hair and purple skin, exactly like the epilogue I'd done a couple sessions before. The players lost it!
Also, in this case, the 'puzzle box' is an all-opening magic key that only works once. I plan on coming up with some extra reason as to why Nezzar wants it so badly (such as: this was crafted specifically FOR the forge of spells, or: keeps the Guardian docile). For now, the party has no idea who she really is. Can't wait to run this trade, thanks for this entire series, Matthew!!
Nice one! Now the trick is to reveal her true nature ASAP
Ah I have JUST run my trade with the Black Spider, gutted I didn't see this before but it had a lot of similarities! Ran mine at a crumbling bridge over a fast flowing river, trading Gundren for the puzzle box. The players lay in wait for the black spider, so I had her turn up after casting invisibility, frog marching Gundren ahead of her. The plan was to do a prisoner exchange, but Gundren as the Doppeganger, so he would backstab and down whichever player received him. There was also scope to kick a gagged and bound "Gundren" into the fast flowing river if it didn't go well and tempt them to dive in after him. Sadly my players set a TON of traps and absolutely stomped the black spider, even when invisible! She had to bug out pretty rapidly, but left the doppelganger. Sadly, a good insight check meant they found him out and chucked him in a barrel down the river... Thanks for the inspiration though!
Are you kidding!? My players have also very specifically barrelled a doppelganger down a river! Great minds haha
Fantastic timing, my adventurers just saw her looking for the puzzle box so we'll be here soon! 😀
So many people are in the same situation! Everyone's telling me that they're running this showdown this weekend haha
This series has helped me so much as I worked to rewrite LMoP, and this session is coming up soon and I am beyond excited!
Good luck!
The +1 crossbow shall be known as the “Treble-maker”
Ooooh that's good!
The handpianbow has a nice ring ;D New Dm here! I've been learning so much with your videos! I'm running the LMOF with a group of newbies and your videos have helped make everthing seem less overwhelming.
Hey that's great! That's the goal: give people the keys to the adventure and help them see through the pressure
I love the ideas for making the Black Spider into a better villain. Thanks for the inspiration!
Cheers Eric!
Hey Matt. I hate your ideas, but I love your videos. Hearing your thoughts always makes me hone in on what I want to try at my table. Please never stop producing.
I take this as a high complement - thanks! Sometimes when I meet people in real life who also have seen my videos, one of the first things they'll say is something like, "Hey, I wanna talk to you about how you skip Chapter 3 in SKT (or similar), I think that's fucked up for these reasons..." And my attitude is always that I don't care, because I hate arguing, but I'm glad they're thinking about their own style and their own game. Worst thing someone can do in D&D is base their style on some stupid, unthinking book.
running the black spider trade this weekend so this was great timing! my players are using the starter set characters and i was pretty thrown when the rogue character (with the redbrand history) demanded that he would only trade for glassstaff. so instead of trading for gundren, they're trading for the leader of the redbrands (or so they think). super excited to see how its going to go down. thank you for all your guides on this adventure!
Oh that's cool! It's good that your players are leaning into their characters and thinking about their goals. Good luck with the trade! Let me know how it goes.
My friends asked me to add to this campaign because they needed additional time to prepare our next campaign. I made the puzzle box a key to the Forge of Spells. I added three quests where they had to collect missing box pieces. Each piece is with a race that is mentioned in the Phandelver pact. Hope this gives the people running this an idea regarding what they can do.
Siiiiick! Very good way to tie in the lore.
@@heyitsMattyP Yeah, for sure. People with the Essentials Kit can use locations/quests like Gnomengard, the Dwarven Excavation Site and Thundertree if they want to do the same thing. If I remember correctly, I gave one piece to the gnomes (Gnomengard), one to dwarves (Dwarven Excavation Site), and one to spell casters because these were the three groups mentioned in the pact. I put the one for spell casters in the tower in Thundertree and made it a mage's tower. My dragon was the Black Spider, so they had to defeat the dragon to get the final piece.
The last time I ran LMoP, I changed it so that the person running the Lionshield Coster was actually secretly the Black Spider (though I also changed it to the Black Fox). She was a warlock to a forgotten god, imprisoned in the Astral Sea, and the Forge was built upon a plane rift into the Sea. Anyway, this switcheroo meant that she was in town all the time, regularly interacted with the players, and they let her know what they were up to. She even hired them to accompany her to a nearby mine that had stopped sending in orders, to see what had happened (what do you know, the miners were all dead, and a few demons appeared to attack the players!).
When it was finally revealed that it was her, the players were shocked. All ya gotta do is give her a fun, quirky habit (like smoking cigars, or snappy back talk, or just a sweet voice) and the players adopt her as one of their NPCs, which makes the betrayal sting all the more.
Well done :) The players should be travelling with at least three villains in their 100-NPC entourage at any time.
My players B-lined it for the redbrands cause 2 of them have backstories in phandalin. I used flashbacks to get them attached to phandalin, give them an in with gundren and sildar as “the boys” so when they got to town and their old friend Bart is letting them in on the local drama, they were already invested, and when one of the redbrands stole the barbarians girl while he was out of town that made it personal. Now after they clear out the hideout I’m excited to see which quests they bite on. The rogues father is a logger in phandalin therefore it made perfect sense to adapt the loggers camp from dragon of icespire peak. Additionally to bolster the dead dwarves theme, I’ve stolen the dwarven excavation and left the two remainders talking about how the rockseeker bros were taken by orcs.
I’ve left out wyvern tor, and Agatha, and I haven’t really emphasized old owl well very hard, and I may even port falcons lodge as the location of the meet
Sounds like they're loving it! Well done :)
the +1 loud crossbow, name it "Fortississimo"
fff love it :)
Also, as a first time DM, your guides have been INVALUABLE! Thank you so much
Thank you!
i ended up making my Black Spider a pawn for Venomfang and her cultist leader Iarno(glass staff)
He was under the assumption that the they were going to ise the forge to lead the Drow out of the Underdark. Made Black Spider sympathetic while the Dragon and Iarno were the true villains. I gave my players extra magic items so they can fight to the death with Venomfang instead of an anticlimactic fight lol
Thanks mate ❤ your great
I like the name Fortissibow for the bow. Fortissimo is a musical term that means "very loudly." Fortissibow= a very loud bow.
I used to kinda enjoying DM:ing for my group of friends. Since I discovered Matthew Perkins I now fully enjoy it. Thank you Matthew Perkins.
Oh that's rad Modguw! I'm working super hard on these! Glad you're getting something out of the videos :)
Ahhh so exciting to see my maps on your video
Haha thanks for the help Virus! Do you have a particular social media account I should link in the description? (I probably already asked about this but forgot, sorry!) I've just gotten another adventure back from my writers which will need maps too - I'll email you about it soon!
Love your videos. Just got a Patreon. Keep it up!
Thank you!
Matty P! Just wanted to say I love the new brand/ thumbnail. Fits the spirit of your channel really well.
Thank you! The original little drawing was something I made at zero subscribers with very little thought, so this is my first deliberate stab at making an identity for this gig. I'm also now @heyitsMattyP on every social platform, which is simpler!
Crossbow names:
Melody Malady
Rather Highly Strung
Always B#
ArpeggiOW
Haha appegiOW is a contender
One of my players: A wood elf, lawful good Paladin.
His forbidden love (his idea): a beautiful drow.
Best BPD ex storyline ever.
THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE WHO ARE TRYING TO / HAVE ALREADY DATED THE BLACK SPIDER, good grief, you dungeon masters and players out there haha
I twisted the knife effectively enough (and made Nezzar suspicious enough) that the players decided not to show up to the trade with her, but now I'm the one disappointed they missed this cool scene. I'm temped to leave a note at the saloon telling them to give her a call via attached sending stone to give them 'one last chance' to get Gundren from her.
Then, when/if they call, she'll tell them a new location (maybe the ruins of old owl well, now that I'm not using it for zombies?), and I can run the scene mostly the same as I would have otherwise, but without as well-designed an environment for the fight. It's a little cheap to railroad the encounter in, maybe, but I like that opportunity to establish the doppelganger, which is less likely to have if T.B.S. just ambushes them out of the blue later. Fingers crossed that it works!
Update!
They did a very speedy surgical strike on the Redbrand hideout to rescue Qelline since they had insider knowledge from the rogue with the former-Redbrand background. Probably took less than an hour, all told. So they're going to head for the Crossroad Saloon after all, knowing no other way to contact Nezzar, and just ending up an hour or two late.
When they get there, I think I'll have Nezzar be in the process of writing them the "you have one last chance to get your friend" letter I was already planning, and the fight will break out as it would have before, except now half of them are quite injured from their fight at the Redbrand Hideout. If they're sneaky enough coming in, they might catch the doppelganger transforming back to look like Gundren.
I feel like I'm maybe letting them have their cake and eat it too, since they get to have both encounters. But on the other hand, they haven't fully dealt with the Redbrands yet, so that encounter might be harder when they get to it. They'll certainly have had time to realize the jail guard is dead, the skeletons are nonfunctional, and their captives are missing. So I guess there's still drama, even if it's not playing out how I expected.
I reckon it's best to reward their decision with drama. They were late, so TBS is not there. She attacks them during a long rest in an attempt for the box.
Like so many others have said, this came at just the PERFECT time.
I’m in the process of writing this scene for our group!!!
Absolutely love the idea of rain to make it more dramatic! In our game, Nezzar asked to meet at an abandoned house on the west side of town.
As much as I love the saloon, I think I’m gonna keep the meeting outside in the rain. I think it adds even more drama the combat. Maybe someone could get struck by lightning or something too.
Haha! A lightning dice is a must, then. Roll a d100 every round, and if it lands on 69, a random combatant gets struck by lightning.
I was all set to play the trade scenario but my party have ended up befriending Nezzar and she is currently tagging along with them! I’m playing it out all the way to the Forge (hopefully!!!) but that betrayal will be a sweet pay off hopefully! So excited!!!
Good luck Chris!
My biggest change was making the magic of the puzzle box contingent on it being given completely willingly.
So I created a secondary antagonist Kelaboar Terron, A vile merchant lord looking to profit off the forge of spells as a red herring.
Than I had Nezzar infiltrate the party, earn their trust, and during a staged hostage exchange the party gave her the box in order to make the exchange.
But plot twist she was the black spider all along. It fucking blew my players minds!
Well done!
The doppelgänger double cross is a nice touch
I used this puzzle box idea and what I liked the most out of it is that my players have "created" what's inside. All I put in the physical box was an opal stone that I had laying around. Now they're convinced that it's magic and does something, so they kind of test it on random things that give me ideas on what to do with it later. Now it drains blood...for some reason and changed to a red color. Coming up with a way for this to help access the forge has been very fun.
Also only one of my players has met Nezzar because she sneaks out at night to explore the town and now has secret rendezvous with Nezzar every night in town. That character now has a sorta crush on Nezzar, it's gonna be great.
The players always have the best ideas haha
Crossbow of HARMony.
I had a great intro into the black spider for my players. First off I did the "hooded figure watching them enter Phandalin" which was great. They had the fear of being watched at least for that whole session. Then I had the black spider being an NPC talking and interacting with them without them knowing at all. Fast forward to the session after they solved the puzzle box, and the character holding the box, "which was empty and another player had the key", decided to try and lay with a maiden in town. Since I don't like having to dm an npc for that kind of thing, I took the opportunity to teach him a lesson. Once they were about to do the deed I had her paralyze him and steal the empty puzzle box and then dimension door out. My players have caused me to make a lot of on the fly decisions like that.
My favorite addition came with the Old Owl Well and the necromancer there. My party has been slightly murder hoboish so I have been trying to set them up to be....better.... lol. So they go to the Well and immediately cast fireball on the tent and blow up half the zombies in the process. I made Hamun Kost a traveler from a distant school running tests in the area. I specifically worded things coming up to that quest like the zombies "Scared off or chased away" anyone who came near. So when they launch the fireball Kost is just like, "WTH! My school supplies and all of my money and belongings". The party ended up giving him money and stuff to compensate and gave him a sending stone on his way out. They got the better of me with that sending stone I think as now I will have to make a whole school that he works at as these characters will be going all the way to lvl 20.
I could imagine him just throwing the Sending Stone away haha, "These guys just burned all my stuff! I don't want them calling me ever!"
That's a great idea an exactly the perfect timing for the next session :D rn they failed to get the spellbook and the bandits from wyvern tor are up to attack phandalin I told the players that this might be a little war since they don't know how much are coming xD and after that they want to meet nezzar... I think it's a good timing and maybe I let random redbrands set the house on fire and let them think the redbrands just killed Gundren, so they try to follow them to their base :D
I just finished LMoP last week with my party. My barbarian wife killed Gundren at the end because he only helped the party with 1 combat encounter 😢. Don’t let this happen to you! Watch Matthew’s recent sidekicks video and get Gundren in the mix.
Oh no! Well at least she saved it for the epilogue haha
There's a drow poison from third edition that killed you by making millions of spiders spawn inside you. I always thought it would be neat if the Black Spider assassinated someone in Phandalin with it.
Now there's a uniquely terrifying prospect :( :( :(
If the puzzle box was just a macguffin why did we need to make a reason to use it for the guardian or challenge in the wave echo cave? I'm new to dming so I'm probably lost on this
Great stuff, as always! How do you feel about the upcoming Phandelver campaign? It's the most exciting piece of news I've heard imho!
Thank you! I'm worried about what it will mean for my work-life balance haha. But overall, I think the original LMOP was perfect in terms of scope, and all they can do is add bloat.
I would say, make black spider give the dwarf if the party had some difficult times so that you can ease them phycologicaly, If your party is fierce and had a lot of successes then make their life a bit harder
Our party captured Nezznar, adopted him and he became a NPC party member for a 5 year campaign.
Holy cow! Love it :)
ok so I generated an image of the black spider being a badass high heeled wizard and now my party wants to change sides hahaha Don’t know what I’ll do or what will happen but i’m here for it
Femme Fatale is a classic trope, well worth exploring and inflicting on your players :)
I ran this for my party last session and oh my god did it turn out SOOOO good. Back in Phandalin the party decided to.... burn down the Sleeping Giant Inn after defeating a few Redbrands there. My Spider approached them and told them they had something he wanted. They were given a stone by Gundren at the beginning of Session 1 that allows entry into The Forge of Spells. The Spider offered any magic item, within reason, 2,000 GP or someone they are seeking in exchange. They decided to attack him, because that's just what they do and well.... he f*cked them up in one turn and knocked one of them down. He went over and was prepared to kill one of them and told them to meet him at the Saloon in 2 nights time or he will come back and finish the job.
After they finished the Manor and Glasstaff got away they decided it was time to head to the Saloon because they didn't want to be hunted. Two more people had joined their party, so they were up to 6, and they had went from level 2 to level 3, so they all had it in their head that maybe they can kill him and keep the stone. They decided to try and blow up the lower level and attack with full force and that lasted all of about 2 turns. The Spider knocked down the one with the Stone and took it out of their pouch and used his necklace to get away. Well..... there was a Wild Magic Barbarian that rolled a 2 so he could teleport 30 feet so he decided to pursue. Then there was an Owlin Sorc that decided to fly up and try and help. Then the Bard that was carrying the stone was a Harengor and he decided to pursue and the Aasimar made a very good athletics check to get up onto the roof. Once on the roof The Spider let loose all of his power and had all 4 of them down that followed him over the next 3 turns as they kept coming up 1 by 1. The two others went outside the Saloon and threw a grappling hook to try and climb up. As one of them climbed up they witnessed the Owlin fail his Death Saving Throws and die. Then he saw The Spider kneel down and slit the throat of the Barbarian that had been with him since Session 0 all while staring The Ranger in the eyes and smiling.
I was a little nervous about doing all of this since we were only on Session 4, but doing about 4 hours per session. The party absolutely loved it! They all started saying how much they messed up and kept chasing a broken cause and should've just licked their wounds and moved on. Now they all HATE the Spider and cannot wait to eventually kill him, no matter the cost. However, I am going to twist the knife at their next session. The Spider brought 'Gundren' with him and it's actually the Doppleganger and he's been on the second story this whole time just sitting in the corner. No one is around him and he is going to jump out of the window and join the Spider outside. The two that are still standing will see Gundren and The Spider together and then Gundren will transform into the basic Doppelganger form and then immediately into one of their dead friends while smiling.
Siiiiiiiiick! Well done :)
A boat's a boat but the puzzle box could be anything............even a boat!
Okay, this is good, but dumb question: what if they grapple and restrain the Black Spider and prevent them from teleporting? I feel there should be more minions involved in this fight than either a doppelgänger or a giant spider? I know it’s meant to be a legendary action, but it’s possible.
Grappling just reduces the movement speed to zero, so she can still rip her necklace
Hey Matt!
How to recover from a TPK from this encounter? hahaha
Or some players getting killed?
My players did not expect the treason at all and went there without spell slots :(
Oh no! Did you really have a TPK!? I'm so sorry!
So, I have to subscribe to a monthly subscription just to get this pdf? Why can't I just buy the pdf without subbing? I don't want to do a subscription so how can I simply purchase the pdf as a one time purchase?
Hey mate! That's just the model of Patreon. But I sent you the PDF for free via email :)
Crossbow name: A-Sharpshooter
I like the idea of handing over the real Gundren and then having the spider target him first.
Would really make the players mad, lol.
It's certainly a moment :)
New DM here. I only have one question. You suggested that the party meets the Black Spider early (seen on roof then she helps during Redbrand fight). At this time she only reveals her name and potentially that she is working for the Black Spider if pressed. So, how do you go about setting up this side quest? Why would she trade Gundren when the players don't know she has him? How do the players find out? In short, when do you reveal SHE is the Black Spider exactly? Before the side quest? During the side quest? Not at all?
also curious about this
My goal is that the players will work it out - she's running around with a big spider staff and creeping around on rooftops. The ruse should only last for a session, but even if players don't 100% pin her as THE Black Spider, they should at least be super sketchy on her. But if the players don't work it out and you haven't ripped the band-aid after one session of meeting her, you could have her volunteer the information with the justification that her ruse was just to gather Intel on the party.
I put in a bit of work to make my PC’s like Gundren, and he told them to protect the puzzlebox. Does Nezzar straight up tell them that she wants to get into Wave Echo cave? Why would they do that when they’re meant to be helping Gundren?
Especially if they knew she kidnapped Gundren!!?
Wouldnt that be my party saying “Hey stuff our beloved Gundren, lets help the enemy!?” It doesnt make sense to me
If your players love Gundren, they'll want to save him.
I thought of Chord Keeper.
Is it too late to suggest "Death on the G String" for the +1 crossbow?
It is not too late to suggest this :)
I'm having trouble coming up with a session zero idea for how the party get the puzzle box in the first place. Running the game in a couple of weeks. Any ideas?
I used a bit of a prologue as Matt suggested in an earlier video. I had Gunderen and Sildar meet them in Neverwinter in the Fallen Tower and Gunderen tells them he has a great business opportunity for all of them, but he needs to stay intentionally vague until he can verify a few things. So, first he needs the party to retrieve the box from one of the crypts below Neverwinter before meeting him in Phandalin. The crypt I ran was very simple, basically just a short creepy hallway with the puzzle box at the end on a pedestal, but the pedestal is a weight triggered trapped and unless they were able to either disable it or swap the box out for something of a similar size a specter rises up and attacks them. It was a fairly easy encounter if they decided to fight, but my party decided to just grab the box and run so I just said the specter was confined to the walls of the crypt so they could easily get away. That night they all had the same vision as Matt suggested of seeing the hooded Black Spider and Monteith in the crypt and realized the box was missing. Hope that gives you some ideas!
I ran Matt Colville's Tomb of the Delion order preceded by a skill challenge I came up with to find the tomb as my session 0.5 mysterious puzzle box fetch-quest. Instead of it being the Delion Order's tomb, however, I made it Dumathoin's Order to connect it with Wave Echo Cave.
@@GMsteph Great, thank you for the response! Short and sweet. I like it.
@@WillKub92 Thank you for the response! I'm going to look this up.
I made my own intro for it. The PCs started at a mausoleum for a wizard that helped create the forge of spells, the puzzle box was in the mausoleum and skeletons rose to attack as soon as they touched the box
So, isn't Black Spider generally male? Just curious if my DM mixed that up (as I did on another adventure I'm running now, hehe) or is it one of your twists to things.
I think I'd personally like her more as female character tbh, not really sure why though.
I just think this villain works better as a woman
This Saloon, it would be in Phadalin or outside the town ?
Might be I use the Sleeping Giant for this location and just add a second floor to it.
I'd put it outside of town. Imagine Phandalin use to be much bigger, so the outskirts are old abandoned buildings.
Okay... I did the encounter and the players hate the Black Spider, what does she do next?
She's done till the campaign's over -- now she's just a boss fight
@@heyitsMattyP Wow, thanks for the answer, I guess It makes sense for her to be just a boss now
"You're succesful if your players hate the Black Spider"
My players recruit Nezznar to the party after they defeat him in Wave Echo Cave
Oh...
Everybody loves a good villain :)
I say call the hand crossbow "The Pianist's Hand Bow", then sit back and count how many jokes your players make.
That sheet is sick tho. But... What is a bonk attack?
It's when she hits something with her staff
Why does everyone make the black spider female, i dont get it.
The adventure already has too many dude villains. Gotta even it out!
@@heyitsMattyP That I get, but when looking around on the internet it seems to have become the default. I find that interesting.
Personally, I like a male drow more because it lets you approach the drow society from the oppressed PoV.
Is there a reason why Nezznar is female?
Should be answered in the first video of the series: because all the other villains are male.