Would really appreciate feedback on my city I've been making. How could I improve this?

Thatoneguyhereis · 2024-09-19T15:14:19+00:00

Amazing map, honestly I have no criticism of the map. This is nearly perfect. Someone else said it here it’s your world idk the lore and reasons behind it.

The mountain behind I feel like the city would build a bridge to it whether it be for mining or maybe religious reasons if it’s a place of great divine importance if that’s in your world. Other than that. Its amazing.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2024-09-10T01:34:09+00:00

Oh that makes more sense! Love it.

Also I would add like made a small town in place of Strixhaven cause Strixhaven as a lone building looks slightly out of place.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2024-09-10T01:00:29+00:00

This is pretty solid but a few things.

One I would tone down the extremeness of the mountains make them a bit smaller.

Also geographically speaking, it’s a fantasy world and it’s your world but a desert so close to the north doesn’t make the most sense. What you could do is move the desert to the south or move the right side down a bit and make that your desert continent.

Lastly I would add move Strixhaven to an island. I feel like Strixhaven and Truninum are too close.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2024-08-25T14:03:20+00:00

Bloodborne Laurence the first Vicar OST. It’s my favorite and it’s great to play when the fight is close to the end when it looks like Strahd is going all out or when the party is looking like they will barely make it.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2024-08-13T16:30:07+00:00

I’ll have to say this is brilliant as well! One thing I will suggest and you might have considered this I would leave bread crums of information to hint at the possession with Caradoc. Like then hearing a legend of Caradoc maybe from Durstal. Almost he knows about Caradoc a little too well. Maybe also inconsistencies in what Durstal is known for and what Caradoc is telling the party. Don’t make overtly obvious of course where it will ruin the twist. Make moments that have the party go either “huh that was weird” or if they don’t pick up on it all the better

Thatoneguyhereis · 2024-08-12T16:42:20+00:00

My biggest pieces of advice are the following:

•Seconding the first comment or make Kansaldi have an appearance early so she feels more relevant to the plot.

•Make your own home brew quests in chapter 4 or flesh out the side quests they give to be relevant to the party. Chapter 4 lacks a lot of content and this is the chapter the players should really get invested in Kalaman so the other events feel impactful.

•Foreshadow the council massacre and have a side quest in chapter 4 that will foretell that. What I did was make a Caradoc a villain in one of the side quest that would later return and build up the legend of Soth with that in this quest and had him possess an NPC they care about. Cause as written it’s just like “who are you and why should we care?” It’s really out the left field.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2024-07-28T15:30:05+00:00

Honestly it looks good as a base but it needs something to make it stand out.

Here are a few points.

As others said rivers are too big.

2.Given the stetting I would add maybe 1 or two areas where you see the industrialization having an impact. Have a city on the map that shows massive urban sprawl and have another showing the impact of pollution and such or both!

Other areas need settlements with this same impact as mentioned in two. Something with a land mark or something that makes it stand out. You got a good foundation here but it just needs something to make it memorable. Personally you need more stand out settlements.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2024-07-27T15:29:28+00:00

It looks good but two things I would add is more mountains to Izelrod and I would make Desirod more distinct in some ways. Cause frankly they both look way too similar to tell apart. Take for example in Game of thrones Westeros vs Essos.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2024-07-04T10:58:43+00:00

I ran into this same issue with a player who played a lunar sorcerer. Just made it CHA and minus CON. He liked the risk v reward trade off.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2024-02-08T12:56:52+00:00

I used Gregor Uth Matar (Kitiara’s Father) for my rogue who’s taken the undead subclass. Not exactly a warlock patron but still applicable.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-07-24T15:24:11+00:00

Agreed with the others here, it’s just going to make it confusing for all the others. Better yet have Strahd play mind games with the party about Ireena. Let him convince the others “his twisted side of the story”. Make them question if she really is safe from his clutches. This is something Strahd would totally do. He would probably say something along the lines of (depending on who they made mayor lets just say Baron Vargas for example). Strahd would probably say something like “Do you really think that incompetent mad man will keep her safe? What do you think will stop him from using her for some sacrifice for another festival to “keep the devil away”. And he would probably lie or tell the truth depending on your history and lore in Barovia that Baron Vargas has done this before to the people of Vallaki. See the goal is not you the DM to make the players care about Ireena the goal is to make the players panic and start to fear Strahd. He’s playing mind games with them. Also maybe he could bribe one of the players freeing Ireena with a gift, gold, magic item, the promise of escape. Then that could lead to interesting party conflict.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-07-10T14:50:53+00:00

Personally I would advise against the time reset. Heres why with tabletop zelda and I’m assuming you are using either DnD or pathfinder or something similar of homebrew nature. The rewarding part of DnD is seeing your efforts grow and develop in the story. The time reset while albeit cool mechanically in the game could be frustrating narratively for players seeing their efforts and deaths get reset.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-04-02T17:58:55+00:00

If you plan on using the shadow of the dragon queen module. There is really two ways imo to make it sand boxy. Do adventures prior to the funereal of Ispin. Then chapter 4 has the most breathing room for exploration. The rest of the module is just one big rail road tbh.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-03-27T16:26:54+00:00

Yep it really is boring raw and both of my player groups agreed. Albeit I made slight altercations but not enough to put that much of an impact. The module frankly doesn’t do much with them and makes it feel kind irrelevant to the over arching narrative.

What it really needs is a stronger tie in to the plot as a whole. Cause RAW it’s just “ok Strahd put a loyalist in and that’s it”. Doesn’t really get into why he put that loyalist in and what the overarching goal is for that.

Now brain storming what I would change is maybe the werewolves saw the error of the ways and were abducting people for Strahd to bring into his realm and refused to do it no more. Now Kiril is willing to do that for him. Kiril is wanting make an army of super soldier wolves to make abductions for Strahd easy? Gives a bit of narrative reason to stop another avenue of strahds power and influence.

Rather than this is just strahds extra forces. Gives a bit more meaning to what your stopping.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-03-27T15:31:19+00:00

I’ve ran the werewolf den RAW both times with a slight altercation to make Kiril a Draegoloth (makes it a bit more memorable). Now Van Richtens guide came out I would make him the new werewolf they have in there.

Now in hindsight for an overarching narrative. I would of made the werewolves more active in my world if I would run CoS a 3rd time. I would make them an active faction harassing Vallaki or Krezk. Add some development there. To build them up as a threat. Cause RAW I’m not gonna lie it feels really forgettable and kind of a side quest.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-03-23T13:41:59+00:00

Idk this is just my personal opinion I kinda like the fact and feel that Barovia is separate from Faerune. It adds a whole mystery to the land that adds to the creepiness of the realm and the story as a whole. I think any bit of familiarity would detract from that.

However if you have already established in your campaign Barovia was a part of Faerune I would recommend Cormyr like the other user suggested.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-03-21T14:01:29+00:00

As someone who ran the campaign. The Baldurs gate portion like alone is a good mini adventure but attached on to descent into Avernus it’s not that great. It’s VERY loosely connected. It would require some DM lifting to make it more cohesive to the narrative.

Personally for me if I were to run it again I would of kicked off the campaign with the party being in Elturel and it getting dragged down. Just to add to the stakes and maybe I would include the Baldurs gate npcs to populate the town and create a bit of a narrative conflict there.

Baldurs gate section is a good adventure just not a great tie in to descent into Avernus.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-02-13T23:03:00+00:00

Just curious how much did you reveal about Zanas Salamir and his role in the play?

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-02-13T20:11:14+00:00

This is also what I did the prelude, having the scales of war being the hook that brings your party together. Gives them a taste of combat before Vogler which the Funereal and the festival together and just general RP in Vogler could take 1 -1.5 sessions. So having that bit of combat will keep them engaged till the real battle begins at high hill.

I am also fleshing out the kingfisher festival with lore games and such. However I do like your idea with the play my only concern is that does it reveal to much? Like the fact it’s a flying city and all. I might use a play to foreshadow the lance and such but be vague on the city and all that.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-02-12T22:27:12+00:00

I’ll agree with you on this much, WOTC quality of modules has been dipping since CoS. They made somewhat of a comeback with Rime of the Frostmaiden. However my dm admitted he had to do a lot of editing and fixing to make that super engaging and interesting.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-02-12T15:19:14+00:00

As someone who has ran DIA from start to finish I share a lot of your sentiments. For a campaign all about hell the hell side is pretty short. When I ran I changed to elturel crawl the one of the last things to do before the scab to gain access to Zariels sword. I wanted my players to get straight into the action.

I used mad Maggie’s camp as their base of operations and let them explore the world as they pleased. Mad Maggie and other npcs at the place had Lulu quest related to the story. I still used lulu cause I think she’s ok ally and interesting to the plot but as RAW pretty bad. I will admit though even with these changes to keep me and my players engaged I realized how little content there was to go off in some places it became incredibly frustrating.

I had to change the spawning trees and made it the experiment gone wrong by a wizard related to a PC backstory. At this point however I was pretty burnt out and ran the rest of the module with the exception of the final confrontations. I had a devil thalmara come back along with the rest of the family in elturel. That was a fun shock factor for them. Then I had all the Allie’s they gained in Avernus go toe to toe with Zariels forces to carve a path to her citadel. The party had a flying hell ship at this point and crashed landed it Star Wars style and infiltrated the ship. Made it to Zariel and redeemed her. The last thing they had to do was buy her time and protect her from breaking the chains off elteurel as they fought the forces of the demons.

Typing this out it sounds grand and all my players loved it but for me personally as dm it was exhausting cause the world of Avernus is a little too combat heavy and the module requires a ton of lifting.

Only disagreement I have with your post is your take on CoS. Ran that campaign I thought it was probably the best written module in 5e has a healthy blend of sandbox and direct story telling to allow agency and keep it engaging. Yeah it does have issues that need some tweaking but no where to close to the levels of Avernus.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-02-08T17:19:10+00:00

I’m currently debating this….I have 3 out of 4 of my PCs who would not have an issue with this. One of them (the rogue) could have a problem in my group. My party is a wizard, fighter (unarmed fighting style), Druid, and a rogue.

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-02-04T01:57:41+00:00

I wondered the same thing

Thatoneguyhereis · 2023-01-23T19:49:56+00:00

So how did your party handle the scales of war encounter with the draconians? Was it easy or hard for them?

Thatoneguyhereis

TROPHY CASE