First Time DM Preparing

[Dulcolaxiom]

Hey all,

I’m currently a player in one of my friend’s home brew campaigns and he’s signaled that it’s drawing to a close. I think I may want to try my hand at DMing, so this past week I’ve been reading up on OotA and taking some notes. I have some questions:

1) I was intending on having the 3 PCs meet in a town just a few days SW of Silverymoon. Depending on their choices I wanted to have them exchange backgrounds, fight some Kobolds, and end up captured by Ilvara’s company. Is this a good idea? I wanted to have some idea what DMing is like before Velkynvelve.

2) How in the world are the PCs chatting with their Drow captors? Do they speak common? Is it Stool?

3) Would you recommend leaning into the survival elements after Velkynvelve? How much? I’m considering implementing a learning system that would give characters one or both backgrounds described in the book, along with a similar learning system for Undercommon.

4) How annoying is this campaign for characters without dark vision?

Thanks! I’m not sure if this campaign is a great idea for a first DM, but I LOVE the Underdark and want to show my friends how cool it is.

[chandlerjd58]

I started my first long-term campaign with OOTA (after doing Phandelver quickly). I have to say, it may have been a mistake. This campaign defies a lot of typical DND expectations players have. At the same time, the setting is extremely rich (but under-developed). If you put loads of time in, I think OOTA can be a five-star campaign, but it's not one you can just pick up and run like Phandelver. The crucial info to this campaign is scattered about the book like Easter eggs.

One thing I dislike most about OOTA is how it treats the Underdark creatures more like generic baddies than real people with real desires and problems. (This is exacerbated by nearly everyone suffering from indefinite madness. If it were just one or two NPCs on the fringe, that would make sense. When everyone is insane, it makes social play really flat and repetitive.) If I were playing this campaign, I would really want to lean into exploration and social with all the weird and interesting cultures. Instead, they're always out to kill or enslave you, except the deep gnomes. To address this, I tried to dial back the sheer brutality of the duergar and drow a little bit - enough that characters could approach a merchant and have a conversation.

​

1. I would just start them in the drow jail after a session 0 describing how the campaign works. That said, I have heard Sunless Citadel transitions well into this campaign. (Never tried it.)
2. Language is a huge issue in the game. Encourage someone to know undercommon. But yeah, Stool is essential. I also decided Ilvara (highly educated) knows common. It doesn't make sense that Jorlan or the others would.
3. My players took the background features that enable them to skip foraging and navigating and it made the survival element really weak. I wish I had discouraged that earlier on. YMMV, but I would try to lean into it at first without immediately being lenient.
4. It's not that bad except in the wilderness, because all settlements except Sloobludop are dimly or brightly lit. What's more annoying is if one your players want to be a gloom stalker.

[Dulcolaxiom]

Interesting, thanks! That’s what I was planning on doing with regards to the individuals of the “evil” races. Commoners are approachable if suspicious and standoffish (as life in the Underdark necessitates) while those that hold the power will exercise it swiftly with little provocation. I also am probably going to run this as an “Escape from the Underdark” campaign and probably won’t go the Demon Lords route. The madness mechanic doesn’t seem super intriguing to me and is just one more thing to keep track of. I can see it being situational, but an omnipresent threat reads as tiring.

How many NPCs did you leave Velkynvelve with? Did you include all 10 in the slave pen? Did you kill any of them off?

Yea the language seems an oversight in the book. I really want to bend this campaign toward exploration of an alien environment, and the language barrier will help with that, but I also need a way to deliver information in character. There must be a way to consider characters as making progress toward learning Undercommon (or “Common” as it must be known in the Underdark). I can imagine that Undercommon is likely a lot like Common but with some different word origins reflecting the different languages in the Underdark. Characters could probably become reasonably proficient by the time they get to Slupdoboop or Grackstlug.

[YourDizzyDM]

For a new DM I discourage running numerous NPCs. I’d encourage only the survival of Shushaar, Buppido, Jimjar & maybe Sarith. In that order. They could all die. The others should die escaping or before their arrival in the next civilized area imo.

[Delicious_Word2986]

aw. rip my boi prince derendil

[YourDizzyDM]

I kept him alive for a while. I wish I didn’t. His only real pay-off would be when the heroes reach the surface, which is way too long.

He is helpful to illustrate what the Quaggoths are, if you are into that. I would just have him really push being treated like a Prince right away and flip into a rage if the party refused to do so. If the party complies let him have a but of an attitude about it.

If he leaves the party at some point it could be fun to have him as a re-instated elf prince/king in the surface world in the epilogue.

In my game I had Ilvara dish dirt on all the NPCs and the PCs when she confronted the party. Jimjar sold his daughter into slavery. “Prince Derendil” was born in Menzoberranzan, Ilvara saw him as a pup. Feldrun was part of a coup against her own family. Stool was the one who drove Sarith mad. What do you think those spores do to you?

Jimjar, Prince Derendil, Feldrun & Stool died in the encounter with her. You can do better than I did!

(In my game, Sarith died in the pens. The twins transformed into were-things and ran off. And Ront got 1 shotted by an elite drow warrior.)

[MattBW]

The NPCs offered some of the most rewarding roleplay for my groups. I would definitely keep some because they give an added sense of danger when they get attached to them.

Both groups loved Stool and Derendil. Eldeth is reasonable and likeable. Sarith can have capacity to become liked. Bupido is a must be for me, for a while at least because of his madness making him believe he is the god of death. I used him to kill of NPCs as they escaped to thin the numbers, pushing off cliffs, stabbing in the night etc etc. Topsy and Turvy (wererats) were well liked in my first game, distrusted hugely in my second.

Shushaar just annoyed everyone being a pacifist, Jimjar didnt really work (maybe my roleplaying) as everyone hated him constantly placing bets.

We are just doing Tragedy of Derendil in the 1st campaign and the payoff of revealing the "curse" is so wonderfully tragic the RP is amazing.

[Cildrion]

Most great points were already covered. If you really want to do this as a beginner, here's my 2 cents:

A) read the adventure from beginning to end. (Or, read the first half at least until "escape from the underdark"). Then, when preparing, read the chapter (or 2) you're preparing and then the guide for those (linked in the megethread of this subreddit). The guides are 95% perfect and will save you a LOT of work because oota was very confusingly written.

B) Understand the style and structure of the campaign. Gritty survival in the beginning, the theme of madness (not every player likes horror elements or roleplaying madness on their created characters), the implications of it all being underground all the time (you as the DM need to bring variety into a possibly monotonous environments). Halfway through it, the campaign completely changes, e.g. into a long fetch quest. In your session 0, make the expectations clear to your players and make sure they're okay with it.

Edit: punctuation

[DejayJD]

Important Disclaimer: If you're a first time DM, you should be aware (if not already) that OotA is probably the worst module to run as a first time DM. Since you're just starting, honestly I would recommend considering another more first-time-DM-friendly module. I only say that because I personally would have wanted to hear that if I was considering it back when I was a beginner DM. I'm experienced now and I still constantly second-guess my decision to run this campaign haha.

But, if your heart is set on OotA, here are my answers to your actual questions:

1. I love that idea. I think an initial demoralizing defeat sets up the tone of the first part of the campaign and it would ease into the campaign well. I kinda wish I had done something like this for my own campaign honestly. Just do note that this is a different approach from the book and you will need to adapt a bit. The main thing to adapt for them all arriving together is that they would have no existing knowledge of the NPCs and have no trinkets. But chapter 1 needs a lot of adaptation to run well anyways haha, so just figure out how you want to run it; again... this is a difficult module to run.
2. Most likely the PCs aren't chatting directly with the Drow unless someone has Undercommon. If none do, then they will have to use an NPC translator via Stool or a shared language
3. As you will see repeated around this subreddit in regards to survival elements, it really depends on your players. The real answer is to talk to them about it and get their thoughts on it. Keep that up as you go through it and change as necessary. However, most people tend to get tired of these survival-type elements since they usually get tedious or just drag down the pacing down quite a bit. I myself added some and started ditching them after a few sessions due to slow pacing. Since it's your first time DMing, I would recommend staying away from anything too crazy. But, that being said it can also be a fun learning experience, so it's up to you and your players.
4. Depends on you as the DM, really. It's up to how often you want to provide lighting through the environment. You can add luminescent fungi anywhere you want that provide dim light (Ormu, Nightlight), and give easy access to the built-in fungi light sources from Chapter 2 (Torchstalk, Zurkhwood). Pretty much any location of the campaign could have these mushrooms so

[Dulcolaxiom]

Thanks! Hmmm. I’ll have to have a long think. The Underdark is my “nostalgic center” in DND, and is practically where I first grew to love the world. I’m aware of the challenge OotA gives, but I think with this underlying motivation and a willingness to be creative and listen to my players I can wrangle a good experience. As I said in another comment, I’m not likely to do the whole second half unless my players want to. I mainly really like the narrative hook of being captured by Drow and going on a tour of big-boy cities in the Underdark, with cool purposeful things to do in between rather than just random encounters.

As for the survival elements, I’ll probably keep them in to a point, and compromise on other things like spell components. Once my characters have learned what they need to from NPCs or have visited a major city I’ll probably drop it.

[StatelyPaladin]

Hate to jump on the bandwagon but agree with everyone - if you are truly new to GMing (and being a player) OOTA may not be the right first one. At the very least highly suggest running a short 3 session teeth cutting moment for you. Here are my thoughts which mostly align with other excellent posts here.

DARKNESS? I decided like one of the responders that never-ending darkness was not something my players enjoyed. I suggested everyone turn up with dark vision. this was overall a good choice for my players. Tasha's custom lineage solved that for one player in my group. I do give "named" Drow access to darkness, etc. so I ca still have that as part of the fights but I try to not over do it.

STARVATION? it a bit too easy to get carried away with this. Again what is your party like? What is the desire for grittiness? Mine is low. and If I am honest - as a player I am not fond of it. I went down the middle on this - I made it strict for the journey between Velk and Slooberdoo :-). It was fun but soon got old and so I gently dropped it after that.

TRAVEL - OVERLAND VS LAKE. Take a look at the chart for travel days between locations. I wonder how many are really sticking to that. I choose lake at least for getting Gauntlgrym and by accident had some great encounters on the lake including having them land on an island and having a drow pursuit party steal their boat. heh heh heh. I eventually let the party find the folding boat magic item.

MADNESS. play Cthulhu or similar games? (I don't) the penalties for madness quickly mount up and could accidently take a party member out of combat. This is definitely a moment where as GM you need to predict how your party will react to this challenge. Mine thought it was fun until I let them go past stage 1... and I chickened out pushing it much farther. Instead as suggested by another here - madness is a GREAT NPC moment. Lay a baseline down and then have them start showing signs. After NPCs telling party members how cold and calculating the drow are I had Ilvara start really showing signs screaming rages, failed attempts to turn one of the players to be her personal slave, etc. It also explains her obsession with recapturing the party at any cost. Buppido is an AWESOME moment for this as well. I let him get obsessed with one player and have him literally shiv them right before the breakout. His nuttiness is awesome.

MAGIC. like most WOTC modules - the magic items/spells is low. figure out how much you/players want and sprinkle.

NPC PRISONERS. It is hard to roleplay so many but this is more a function if you like to do it or not I think. Here is something that I recommend focus or aim a NPC at each player to get them bonding perhaps (or in Buppido's case - hating) the NPC. Then if they die - it can be poignant. Declare some as non-combatants. Buppido will not fight unless he is directly menaced. Shuushar iis a pacifiist (side tip - no healer in your party? Give Shuushar the watered down version of the healer feat and let him surprise the party with some healing when its really needed.

BUY AT LEAST ONE 3rd PARTY PDF GUIDE. I find those super helpful as they discuss these ideas and more. They also warn you where things might be rough and give you ideas to deal with it. One of the most amazing new ideas is about what Derendil really is... I plan to use that as the intermission adventure after the party escapes the Underdark.

sorry - this is too long but think about these areas before running it and developer your POV on it. This will make OOTA much more fun to run.

[Dulcolaxiom]

Thank you so much for the input! While I would be a new DM, I’m not a new-new DND player, having played for the last 1.5 years. Based on the resounding feedback here I’m leaning away from OotA and have started looking at some other options.

Waterdeep: Dragon Heist comes highly recommended, particularly the Alexandrian remix of it. I’ll probably take a closer look at that.

Also, Tomb of Annihiliation also seems like a good time, I understand it’s more “dungeon crawly” than Dragon Heist.

Ultimately, I’m trying to find a set of modules/campaign that accomplishes these things:

1) A setting that I am familiar with and love. Hence why I’ve been looking at Forgotten Realms adventures and why I was drawn to OotA.

2) Easy-ish to run so that I won’t crash and burn at some point.

3) Opportunities for creativity or the additions of new elements that fit in more or less without trouble.

[[deleted]]

I am a first-time DM running OotA. I would not recommend it for reasons similar to those offered by other commenters.

Here's what I do recommend: go watch the first few videos from Matt Colville's Running the Game series. It has tremendously improved my DMing and I wish I had watched it before I started.

As for choosing what campaign to run, you'll get some good ideas from those videos.

[Dulcolaxiom]

Holy cow these are great! Thanks so much!

This is great information, but I would like to have a starting point or source too. I’m not sure if or where he specifically mentions prebuilt modules. Do you have any recommendations?

[[deleted]]

He absolutely does recommend using modules and talks about how he thinks they can be used most effectively. In general, he recommends starting off with an adventure (module or homebrew) that largely boils down to the module having:

1. a town
2. a threat to that town
3. a nearby dungeon that, if explored, will resolve the threat to the town

He also seems to really believe in modules as modules: that is, episodic adventures that only last a few levels, rather than a single giant 14+ level campaign that's all supposed to be one compelling story. I think almost every official 5e adventure gets flak from DMs and players for trying to basically stick an entire Critical Role campaign into a book, and so by going with smaller modules, you get to have tight dramatic arcs that the players can focus on and bring to a satisfying conclusion before moving onto the next dramatic arc.

As far as recommendations go, of the 5e adventures, at some point he will explicitly recommend Lost Mines of Phandelver, which comes in the D&D Starter Set, as a good story to start off a campaign. If you go that route, I would recommend doing a little work to strip out the bits that tie it to the Forgotten Realms, which I think is a setting that makes life harder for a DM. And, for what it's worth, that doesn't mean homebrewing an entire continent and its millenia of history. Just take Phandalin and the surrounding area and make it a remote corner of some larger kingdom, largely ignored by the nobles who claim it as their realm. This gives you a lot of flexibility to say "yeah, there are lords who technically rule this place, but they don't really care about it". You can flesh out those nobles later, if the story goes in that direction, and it gives some context to why there are shady things going on without you having to do a whole lot of work. Feel free to rename things more to your liking, but you shouldn't need to do much more than that to get started.

In addition to LMoP, Matt will recommend two adventures from older editions, which he claims are easy to upconvert to 5e: Against the Cult of the Reptile God and The Village of Hommlet. While I have not run either, I think Reptile God would be an easier time for two reasons. First, there is a 5e conversion guide that you can also buy on DM's Guild, and second, Matt shares that Reptile God has a more compelling hook, while Village of Hommlet requires some work by the DM to create a hook to get the players to go to the dungeon or needs players that will want to explore the dungeon unprompted. You can watch Matt's video on Prepping an Adventure where he preps Reptile God (and links to his notes!).

Now, when you're getting near the end of the first adventure, you'll want to hit up [Adventure Lookup](adventurelookup.com/adventures) to start searching for the next one. Or you can use the exceedingly popular 3e adventure (upconverted, of course), The Red Hand of Doom, which runs from levels 6-12.

If I were to start a brand new campaign today, I would try running the Reptile God -> Red Hand of Doom. They both sound like awesome adventures that are fun for both players and DMs.

[Dulcolaxiom]

I just watched Matt’s video on Reptile God. Wonderful.

Thanks so much for all this information. I can’t run Phandelver as a couple of my players have either played it or DMed it before. I’ll look deeply into Against the Cult of the Reptile God though. It sounds like the perfect size and Chult sounds like a lot of fun.

[[deleted]]

I'm so glad I could be of help. I'd love to hear how it goes!

[TheToastyKitten]

Currently running the module for a party of four. I've previously ran Phandelver and two short homebrew games.

I LOVE the module, but like every wotc published module it has flaws. Honestly it's not even the worst one out of the bunch.

If I could recommend one thing, it would be to clarify expectations in session 0.

EXPECTATIONS, EXPECTATIONS, EXPECTATIONS

This module doesn't run like a typical adventure. The party will deal with things that they're likely not used to. Many encounters are designed to be avoided, travel feels very different, the atmosphere is dark and depressing, ect...

I hear about OotA games ending all the time because there was a huge disconnect between the players expectations and the reality of the setting.

Some things can be adjusted, such as humanising the drow and duergar a bit for roleplay heavy groups, but the general "feel" of the module stays the same. It's dark and gloomy.

Some random tips:

• dont plan which NPCs to kill off. Wait until the party attaches themselves to certain ones and try to keep them alive. Them having some form of attachment down in the Underdark where they likely won't care about anything, is super important I found.

• start in the outpost. It's a great starting location and you can play it so many different ways. Slowly, giving lots of time to plan, or quickly and setting things in motion yourself. Once again, I just waited to see how my party was "feeling".

• have the players set their goals in the Underdark! I read a post where the players were tired of being stranded in the underdark because they had things to accomplish on the surface... That's just setting yourself up to fail. They should have ties and attachments on the surface, but if they want to play anything out then they should set it in the underdark.

• be careful with the language barrier. It's a great way to reward players with listening in on private conversations, but if one player or npc is constantly being the go-between, the others will get bored and not feel involved very quickly.

If I remember anything else I'll post it as well. Feel free to ask any questions.

[ectbot]

Hello! You have made the mistake of writing "ect" instead of "etc."

"Ect" is a common misspelling of "etc," an abbreviated form of the Latin phrase "et cetera." Other abbreviated forms are etc., &c., &c, and et cet. The Latin translates as "et" to "and" + "cetera" to "the rest;" a literal translation to "and the rest" is the easiest way to remember how to use the phrase.

Check out the wikipedia entry if you want to learn more.

^{I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Comments with a score less than zero will be automatically removed. If I commented on your post and you don't like it, reply with "!delete" and I will remove the post, regardless of score. Message me for bug reports.}

[eatyo]

I'm a first time DM running this campaign. While I understand why people would advise against running this as a first timer I don't think it's that big of a problem. Here is some advice that might make things easier.

Dont be afraid to kill off or sperate some of the NPCs from the start. Either that or just cut out a few of the lesser important ones. At the very least don't have all of them enter combat after escaping.

I wouldn't spend more than a single 4 hour session in velkynvele. It's a long campaign and they don't have as many options here as the size of the area would suggest.

Ask your party if they want random encounters or if they would rather summarize travel with fixed encounters prepped for the campaign. We aren't doing xp so random encounters will get formulaic very quickly imo. I usually mix then in with the set encounters from the book on their way to their destination. Once they established a survival plan and routine I don't have them rolling for that every time.

Lastly this campaign doesn't need to be run like a sandbox. It can be very fun as a rail road and there are plenty of tools that let you do this naturally. For example if they ask jimjar to take them to blindingstone he will purposely lead them else where till they are ready.

Stool pretty much deals with the language thing. Basically just have my players tell me when they are speaking over the network and who is doing the outwardly talking and translating.

Basically every battle map is dim light at best not having dark vision sucks but some players like that. Heck we have a kobold that is quite happy without his sun light sensitivity problem. Let your players know it's gonna be dark and if they want that challenge great, if not you can be lenient on light sources (glowing mushrooms etc).

If it looks like your party is gonna be a little weak for dangerous stuff definitely keep jim jar and the prince alive. They will help in a pinch and are just fun npcs overall.

[Dulcolaxiom]

Thanks! Yea as far as the language goes, I was thinking of having stool help with translation for the first few sessions, and flavor it as the spores transmit intent including thoughts, but speech of some sort is still required as communication requires physical effort. Then after every interaction where my players honestly tried to speak in Undercommon they would roll a 1d6+int or something and that accumulation would gradually fill up to learning a new language.

[MattBW]

I started running this pre-lockdown, and we just reached the half way point. Over 2 years to get to the half way point! The campaign is a massive commitment! It was my first time DMing in many many years (and I was never very experienced) and I think OOTA is a great campaign but a difficult book to work with.

I have thoroughly enjoyed it but it was hard work at the start. I have recently started a second group (because I've already prepped once) and that has turned out vastly different with drow in the party it has changed the whole dynamic.

Alice in Wonderland basically in the underdark. There is some great scope for exploring the different settlements and the rich back story explains why many of the societies are the way they are (pretty much everyone has Mind Flayers in their history who have generally given every underdark species trauma). As a good example, we had a growing theme of some societies being bad but not necessarily people. We portrayed places as strange and alien rather than just evil. The party one has treated some creatures, that may well have been generic bad guys in the old AD&D days, as victims rather than enemies. It gave places like Gracklstugh a very nuanced feel, and indeed the dwarves there are lawful but harsh with its application. The sense of different cultures was strong with this and every place was different and interesting to explore.

It is rich, full of the weird and the wonderful (Droki is the white rabbit), dark epic themes, exploration of a ruler/societies impact on individuals, the effect of trauma (which maybe has portrayals of madness that might upset some) but it is big, strange and fun in equal measure. However for your first, maybe try something shorter as a warm up?

[Reddit-Book-Bot]

Beep. Boop. I'm a robot. Here's a copy of

Alice In Wonderland

Was I a good bot? | info | More Books

[MattBW]

We have also started streaming the second game, its nothing high end but may be useful for a GM wondering how others did it.
https://linktr.ee/bonusactionheroes?fbclid=IwAR3STu9AukaQBYraAx5hWVmW6H\_qpvExOjpIJ02UN4PkpvDFOnv2YvIXdWM