This is fantastic! It's great that you've thought through so many NPCs, including "villainous" ones that you might not typically expect to join a party. Because, as we all know, players will try anything.
Thank you! I made a point to look at villains because when I first ran this campaign, if the players tried to negotiate too well or cooperation with the baddies, I would always say no because I had NO clue how to resolve it. So hopefully this video gives permission to some DMs to say yes!
My players captured a random goblin in the Cragmaw hideout. Got some info from him, and then the Paladin set about trying to redeem the goblin and teach him to exist in society. Led to some good roleplay as Gobby (as he is now known) tried to steal all the offerings at the shrine. Love the battle companion rules!
Cheers Carrie! Something similar happened when I ran it last. The party convinced the goblin to strive for success and sent him packing, so he replaced King Grol when they got to the castle
I love the way you start this video with the idea of the Black Spider joining from the beginning. Particularly because that's exactly how I started my campaign. One player is "Nessar", and the others won't know anything about it for the first 2-3 sessions, until she's got a good opportunity to betray them, like stealing the box. Probably when they reach the boss of Cragmaw Castle, or maybe she'll free the owlbear while the party's hurt. After that, that player will bring in his actual character.
Another great review video. Your LMoP series was so helpful on my 2/3rd run. Cool sponsors!!!! So hyped to see the AMAZING growth of your channel. You’ve put in admirable and inspiringly hard work.
Thanks Jangy! It's only moderately hard work though - I've got a small team of writers who help lots of this stuff. The Battle Companion rules for each of these NPCs was written by Randall Right :)
As someone whom used your guides to run LMOP campaign, this is amazing! My party tried to make a pact with the Nothic, they wanted Hamon (the Necromancer) to help them, loved Sister Garaele so much and were helped by Nezzar by a couple of rounds! These would've worked so nicely with the campaign! Thanks for making them
Great timing! I'll be dipping back into LMOP pretty often over the next few months :) But in the background I'll be working on the NEW Starter Set -- Dragons of Stormwreck Isle
It's my first time commenting, but I've been watching your videos for a while now. I want to say they've been so helpful to me as a dm and player! Always amazing work! This video is so helpful, especially since I'm currently running a LMoP+DoIP campaign. We just finished the Goblin Arrows part too. Also, I want to share that, subsequently, the party left Klarg's wolf, Ripper, alive to..."interrogate." They want to know if it knows where Gundren is being held, and they're trying Ripper to open up to them with treats and affirmations, and surprisingly it's going well with animal handling checks. No one knows Speak with Animals though so this is going to be fun shenanigans haha 😅
Haha! Players love animals, it's true! Wolves are great fuel for the old "an ally leaves the party but rejoins at a dramatic moment much later in the story" trope. They'll hate it when he leaves, but it would be the highlight of the campaign if he jumps in at the right time later.
Just had a second LMOP session last Sunday. First time DM'ing with 5 first time players. The players have managed to make a deal with Yeemik that they are going to siege the cragmaw castle together. Currently the party is on the road to Phandalin and Yeemik has told them to return in 2 weeks so he can gather more goblin allies. I don't know how am I going to pull this off, but it's going to be fun.
I’ve run this module 10 times now, and in my most recent game of it my players convinced themselves that the Black Spider was really a good person. They managed to find Glass Staff’s phone and contacted the evil wizard. They hired the party to take out the other threats in the region until they ended the game as “middle managers of doom!” The players still thought Black Spider was secretly good.
My favourite story in the vein is one commenter who said their paladin's character fell in love with The Black Spider. But out of game, the player's brother had bought the starter set and was showing him pictures from the books, and the Paladin player saw the name and said, "Hey! That's the name of my French girlfriend!"
In my last session we just went through the redbrand hideout and when they got to the room with the goblin and 3 bugbears. They asked them to leave the bugbears to help them and rolled a nat 20... on top of this earlier in the session i did a random woods encounter and my druid befriended the brown bear I sent at them... we may have a huge party coming up soon lol
@@heyitsMattyP On the next session I set up an encounter with the bugbears and some redbrand stragglers with the intention of the bugbears to be easily turned. The party just ended up slaughtering everybody... I was like oh boy well I guess that settles that
What about Reidoth? Any suggestions for his action? I was planning to have the druid be the one to guide the party to Cragmaw castle in return for helping him remove the green dragon.
Matt I love your guide videos there are so good! Do you think you could do a full guide into making Venomfang the true BBEG for the story? I think they make a much more cinematic villain than the black spider. And I feel I can tie it into STK better since giants and dragons lol. Any extra tips you have for doing so is much appreciated!
Thank you! I think there's a very low chance I'll make something like that. Maybe the closest is doing it as part of a actual play series of alternate LMOP variations, but even that's still a distant possibility.
Matt, can you recommend a monster other than a wolf with Klarg in the Cragmaw hideout? I don't think they will want to fight a wolf and was wondering if there is a more monstrous monster that is still 1/4 challenge. Tried to find one in dnd beyond but the search isn't very friendly.
I decided on a giant crab. Can up the stats but they are actually really close. Will say it emerged from the depths of the cave river. Kids don't love crustaceans, do they?
Phew! Lucky, because I thought there was a good chance it might be someone who stands shoulder-to-shoulder and makes a wall so people can't pass through. Like, a line at the back of the field or something.
Hi Mathew. These rules work great, but I'm afraid it would give too much of an advantage to the players' side. Would you recommend increasing the numbers of enemies in order to keep things challenging and interesting?
Some of the abilities are more powerful than others, for sure. But I'm OK with that generally - some NPCs should feel special. And every NPC in this system is much less powerful than giving the players a full NPC ally who behaves with a normal statblock. I wouldn't recommend adding more enemy numbers to encounters.
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What about Droop? In our game, Droop became the party's business partner. We took over the Sleeping Giant and Droop became the manager.
Droop could use the stats of Yeemik as a Battle Companion :)
Droop was a doppleganger spy for the Spider in my game, and the party loved him (until he betrayed them in the Cragmaw Castle fight).
@@tayvonyeah oh, you play dirty!
This is fantastic! It's great that you've thought through so many NPCs, including "villainous" ones that you might not typically expect to join a party. Because, as we all know, players will try anything.
Thank you! I made a point to look at villains because when I first ran this campaign, if the players tried to negotiate too well or cooperation with the baddies, I would always say no because I had NO clue how to resolve it. So hopefully this video gives permission to some DMs to say yes!
My players captured a random goblin in the Cragmaw hideout. Got some info from him, and then the Paladin set about trying to redeem the goblin and teach him to exist in society. Led to some good roleplay as Gobby (as he is now known) tried to steal all the offerings at the shrine. Love the battle companion rules!
Cheers Carrie! Something similar happened when I ran it last. The party convinced the goblin to strive for success and sent him packing, so he replaced King Grol when they got to the castle
I love the way you start this video with the idea of the Black Spider joining from the beginning. Particularly because that's exactly how I started my campaign. One player is "Nessar", and the others won't know anything about it for the first 2-3 sessions, until she's got a good opportunity to betray them, like stealing the box. Probably when they reach the boss of Cragmaw Castle, or maybe she'll free the owlbear while the party's hurt. After that, that player will bring in his actual character.
Another great review video. Your LMoP series was so helpful on my 2/3rd run. Cool sponsors!!!! So hyped to see the AMAZING growth of your channel. You’ve put in admirable and inspiringly hard work.
Thanks Jangy! It's only moderately hard work though - I've got a small team of writers who help lots of this stuff. The Battle Companion rules for each of these NPCs was written by Randall Right :)
As someone whom used your guides to run LMOP campaign, this is amazing! My party tried to make a pact with the Nothic, they wanted Hamon (the Necromancer) to help them, loved Sister Garaele so much and were helped by Nezzar by a couple of rounds! These would've worked so nicely with the campaign! Thanks for making them
Cheers Platy! Always good to hear from you mate. The Nothic is my favourite moment in the campaign, so I'd take any excuse to bring him along :)
Thanks for putting out new content on this! I’m just starting to run LMOP and using a lot of your suggestions.
Great timing! I'll be dipping back into LMOP pretty often over the next few months :) But in the background I'll be working on the NEW Starter Set -- Dragons of Stormwreck Isle
It's my first time commenting, but I've been watching your videos for a while now. I want to say they've been so helpful to me as a dm and player! Always amazing work! This video is so helpful, especially since I'm currently running a LMoP+DoIP campaign. We just finished the Goblin Arrows part too.
Also, I want to share that, subsequently, the party left Klarg's wolf, Ripper, alive to..."interrogate." They want to know if it knows where Gundren is being held, and they're trying Ripper to open up to them with treats and affirmations, and surprisingly it's going well with animal handling checks. No one knows Speak with Animals though so this is going to be fun shenanigans haha 😅
Haha! Players love animals, it's true! Wolves are great fuel for the old "an ally leaves the party but rejoins at a dramatic moment much later in the story" trope. They'll hate it when he leaves, but it would be the highlight of the campaign if he jumps in at the right time later.
Just had a second LMOP session last Sunday. First time DM'ing with 5 first time players. The players have managed to make a deal with Yeemik that they are going to siege the cragmaw castle together. Currently the party is on the road to Phandalin and Yeemik has told them to return in 2 weeks so he can gather more goblin allies. I don't know how am I going to pull this off, but it's going to be fun.
The siege! Well done. I still haven't had a siege of Cragmaw Castle, but maybe one day!
Will Yeemik betray the party at some point?
I’ve run this module 10 times now, and in my most recent game of it my players convinced themselves that the Black Spider was really a good person. They managed to find Glass Staff’s phone and contacted the evil wizard. They hired the party to take out the other threats in the region until they ended the game as “middle managers of doom!” The players still thought Black Spider was secretly good.
My favourite story in the vein is one commenter who said their paladin's character fell in love with The Black Spider. But out of game, the player's brother had bought the starter set and was showing him pictures from the books, and the Paladin player saw the name and said, "Hey! That's the name of my French girlfriend!"
In my last session we just went through the redbrand hideout and when they got to the room with the goblin and 3 bugbears. They asked them to leave the bugbears to help them and rolled a nat 20... on top of this earlier in the session i did a random woods encounter and my druid befriended the brown bear I sent at them... we may have a huge party coming up soon lol
Haha oh dear! That's why I limit it to one active battle companion at a time :)
@@heyitsMattyP On the next session I set up an encounter with the bugbears and some redbrand stragglers with the intention of the bugbears to be easily turned. The party just ended up slaughtering everybody... I was like oh boy well I guess that settles that
What about Reidoth? Any suggestions for his action?
I was planning to have the druid be the one to guide the party to Cragmaw castle in return for helping him remove the green dragon.
Matt I love your guide videos there are so good! Do you think you could do a full guide into making Venomfang the true BBEG for the story? I think they make a much more cinematic villain than the black spider. And I feel I can tie it into STK better since giants and dragons lol. Any extra tips you have for doing so is much appreciated!
Thank you! I think there's a very low chance I'll make something like that. Maybe the closest is doing it as part of a actual play series of alternate LMOP variations, but even that's still a distant possibility.
Matty P! Back with a video... for me!
Also... I won't tell you how long it took to notice "NEW TEXT L"
Now it's been noticed, I'll have to retire the gag haha
@@heyitsMattyP OMG please don't! inside jokes are the best, even when they're shared with 15k other people
Matt, can you recommend a monster other than a wolf with Klarg in the Cragmaw hideout? I don't think they will want to fight a wolf and was wondering if there is a more monstrous monster that is still 1/4 challenge. Tried to find one in dnd beyond but the search isn't very friendly.
I reckon use the stats for the wolf, but reskin the visuals to look however you want
@@heyitsMattyP why didn't I think of that! That will work.
I decided on a giant crab. Can up the stats but they are actually really close. Will say it emerged from the depths of the cave river. Kids don't love crustaceans, do they?
Where did you get that character sheet you are using in your sponsorship section? Looks really nice
I made it! www.drivethrurpg.com/product/183668/DD-5th-Edition-Character-Sheet
Ohhh noooo poor sister Garael, I could totally imagine my players being like "heck yeah possess her and join us" but damn that's harsh.
I know, right! I'd like to think no players would accomplish any of the evil affinity stuff, but then... well I wrote it for a reason haha
That was an accurate example of a linebacker lol
Phew! Lucky, because I thought there was a good chance it might be someone who stands shoulder-to-shoulder and makes a wall so people can't pass through. Like, a line at the back of the field or something.
What about Halia as the new acting sheriff for the town?
Maybe! Depends on what purpose she serves in the story.
Love that shirt!
danke danke danke
Hi Mathew. These rules work great, but I'm afraid it would give too much of an advantage to the players' side. Would you recommend increasing the numbers of enemies in order to keep things challenging and interesting?
Some of the abilities are more powerful than others, for sure. But I'm OK with that generally - some NPCs should feel special. And every NPC in this system is much less powerful than giving the players a full NPC ally who behaves with a normal statblock. I wouldn't recommend adding more enemy numbers to encounters.
Real homies know that Sildar actually has aggressive harry
Aggressive Harry sounds like a fictional cocktail or secret piercing
I made Carp Alderleaf the party’s ally.
Yeah nice one! But isn't he like 5 years old?
Let's goooooooo!
Let's gooooooooooo!
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