Hey brother! I’ve been gone for a while but trying to catch up with your content. I’m running this now with my nephews over fantasy grounds, so huge help as always.
My player had a brief encounter with Cryovain. The only thing he said was," Why does food fight back?" when a sword strike hit home. He left when the food hit him a second time.
It should be noted that Cryovain doesn't just appear in Dragon of Icespire Peak. In Storm King's Thunder, Cryovain makes an appearance as an adult white dragon (perhaps a few years older) who has mated with Isendraug. In the adventure, Cryovain's eggs were captured by the frost giants, forcing Cryovain and his mate to serve the frost giants (with Cryovain forcibly chained to the deck of the frost giant jarl's longship, the Krigvind). I have used this as motivation for Cryovain in my adventures. I am currently running a combination LMOP/DOIP intro that transitions into STK. In my adventure, Cryovain has fled south, rebelling against his frost giant masters. He is full of rage against the frost giants and regret at having deserted his eggs and mate. Prior to fighting the PCs at the end of DOIP, he will try to strike a deal with them. Cryovain will offer to freely leave the region around Phandalin and return north if the PCs agree to help him. Cryovain offers to leave if (and only if) the PCs agree to help him in his revenge against the frost giants. If the PCs agree, Cryovain will fly the PCs north (avoiding the awkward deus ex machina appearance of Zephyros' flying tower). This also serves as a nice transition point between the two adventures. After Cryovain delivers the PCs into Icewind Dale, he will try to liberate his mate and eggs from the frost giants but will ultimately fail, resulting in him begin re-chained to the deck of the Krigvind in the service of the frost giant jarl. If the PCs try to retrieve the frost giant jarl's conch of teleporation, they will re-meet and possibly fight a stronger version of Cryovain under service to the frost giants.
PCs: alright, we will help you Cryovain: thank you so much! PCs: let's take a rest to get our HP up and spells back. *while the party sleeps, the young dragon murders the party" The End
Even though I doubt I will be running it anytime soon I still found this extremely useful for Dragons at large and has provided me with inspiration for future encounters
Cryovein does not flee in the fortress because he has a reason to stay there. It's a shame the booklet never explains why. I have a cheff warlock with a patron that demands exotic foods, so the patron points out that cryovein is protecting an egg in the fortress.
Thank you so much for these videos. I am running both LMOP and throwing in DoSP for added benefit. Your videos give me so much awesome information. Keep doing what you are doing!!!
Absolutely helpful informations here I'm not really a dungeon master I just like to write stories on available settings and maybe play my own party literally (literally) so thank you again for all of these videos on how to explore and dive a bit deeper on what's available to us in the books, tremendous work !
My group killed Venomfang from the Lost Mines of Phandelver. They also did nearly 100 damage to Cryovain, in one turn, during a random encounter, admittedly they almost wiped. Anyway, the point is Cryovain is now an adult white dragon. Doing a whole "Rally up your allies" kinda deal, though their still dealing with the Orcs atm, the excuse is the dragon displaced the lot of them.
Regardless of how dumb a white dragon might be intellectually, _It knows that it's a dragon!_ If DMs and players remember that one simple fact, it should play out well.
Yes! This is why I’m not going to make him flee right away, and he’s going to be a formidable boss for my characters. I’m weaving in the story to include his past so that if one of the characters were to find more information on him or ask around, they’ll be able to find out that his eggs are being held hostage (actual lore) by a mage who blackmailed Cryovain into serving him. I really liked the idea of Cryovain having personality, he’s stubborn and prideful with a bit of an inferiority complex. He’s not just some dim-witted number or boss that’s there for your party to defeat, he’s a breathing character and a fucking dragon. He’s not going to flee to some mere band of adventurers! It should be the other way around. Dragons are prideful. Yes white dragons are cowardly in the face of a greater danger but what if they don’t see it as a threat? What if they incapacitate you, breathe on you, try to fly away from you? Why on earth would a dragon ever believe that the lesser species would be able to kill it if they weren’t very wise? Wouldn’t a young dragon be naive, without much experience? Naive doesn’t mean stupid, but it DOES mean that you can make mistakes that you wouldn’t have made if you knew better. That includes knowing when to flee. You’re right that he’s dim-witted and not very experienced with combat, but his lore explicitly states that he’s competent enough in it to get him this far. This could mean you can make the fight as hard as you want and if things turn sour for the players, as long as they’ve injured Cryovain enough, you’ll be able to make him go back to his lair to recover and make a NEW encounter with him in a more confined space with less HP. I like to combine elements. It doesn’t have to be simple. Make it yours.
I'd say it depends a bit on how you define being 'stupid' or 'smart'. An intelligence of 6 is pretty darn low, so it's fair to call him 'stupid' in a sense. Having said that, stupid does not necessarily mean gullible, reckless, or easily tricked. The intelligent stat is primarily about education, not necessarily judgement and the like. Cryovain's 11 wisdom isn't all that impressive, but it implies he has a pretty firm grasp on 'common sense', if you will. For example, someone with low intelligence, but average or better wisdom, wouldn't know what a Nigerian Prince scam /is/, but would nonetheless not fall for one, because the offer sounds too good to be true. Similarly, if they heard a particularly bad snake oil salesman say that silver water could cure pinkeye, the flu, cancer, and AIDs, they'd doubt those claims. Not on the basis of any particular understanding of medicine, but on the basis that the salesman is clearly acting like a con man, tossing around a lot of claims without evidence, and that selling fake medicine is an obvious strategy anyone with sufficiently low dignity would try.
In my game, I started my players in The Sunless Citadel, which I placed in the Dessarin Valley so I could transition into Princes of the Apocalypse. In TSC, the players encountered a white dragon hatchling, which they decided they absolutely did not want to fight, so instead made a pact and brought her, and her kobold dragonkeeper Meepo, along for the journey. I also decided to make it my canon that the kobolds got her egg from Cryovain's clutch (though I never figured out thr specifics of how it landed in their hands), so I'm going to have the players along with Cryovain's daughter confront the now-adult white dragon.
Got it. D20 perception check on leaving the excavation mine if they choose(dwarfs hiding); plus a Dodge against the ice to get away(because fun) minus d4 from dragon(because fun). Freeze the orcs if possible. Let the dragon fly away with one or two orcs. Fun game for all the kids. By the way you're awesome
My PC are at lvl6 and just retrieved the sword from dragon barrow. When they get back to town, They will find Harbin's home and himself frozen solid. Halia Thornton has taken charge of the town. This should spur them to go after Cryovain. If they interact with the dragon, I think he is going to allude to being lured there with promise of treasure for his horde.
I'm playing through DOIP with my group on tabletop simulator by beserk games. We just finished LMOP. What adventure would you recommend for new players with new DM? Group size is 2-4 adventures depending on attendance but we can double up character sheets.
I'm running this one on one with my brother. Gave him a snow leopard warrior Sidekick using Tasha's. It looks like this thing might be tough, but if he builds up a few more sidekicks he might go down too easy. Seems like you've probably run this a few times and you might have some insight on his power going against a 5th level/6th level party. What do you think about giving him legendary/lair actions and/or minions? I was thinking a tribe of kobolds could seek him out to worship him.
Hey man, Im finishing this adventure with my players and all went well so far, I'll start Tyranny of Dragons with the same characters I just need to adapt it for 5th level players
@@HowtoRPG Honestly, I liked the Dragons on Rick and Morty more than I do lost other forms of media. They talked, made complex plans, and were actual characters on the show. Having a dragon be a big dumb monster, like in most shows or movies, is such a waste of story telling
Hey everyone! This is my first time being a DM and I'm wondering how do I determine the location of the flying Cryovain? I know it's said to roll a D20 but does rolling a 15 mean they see the dragon and 20 mean they encounter it? Or does the number rolled mean the number of miles he's flown away from the lair it's in? Sorry if that's a stupid question, I really don't understand how the D20 determines where Cryovain is. Any advice would be amazing, thanks in advance :)
Problem with trying to trick a white dragon, they are actually too dumb to fool. They have short attention span, even shorter tempers, they don't understand abstract concepts very well, and they lack the foresight to delay gratification. They are either not going to understand your con, or they just aren't going to pay attention. Their intelligence lies mostly in their photographic memory, which means is you piss one off, they are never going to forget it.
I think this is a good video in terms of "what the dragon would do" but I think it's a bit to much "dm vs player." Maybe flying out of reach and dropping players off the mountain would be good tactics for a dragon, but it wouldn't be fun at all for the players, especially martial characters without range.
If the PCs go up against a dragon unprepared, I.e no ranger weapons, they are looking for death. Dragons of all ages are dealt and loosing a player it totally reasonable for the climax of a campaign! Less antagonistic and more about giving your players a challenge, make the win mean something.
Thanks for the video but ya lost me when you failed to define "dimwit". It does mean stupid or presenting slow mental processes. Also this module is for newbies sure mod what ya want but it's for bady DMs like me to get our feet wet.
Dimwitted is LITERALLY defined as STUPID or silly! XD “Yeah so he’s silly, not stupid” Silly is defined as having or showing a lack of common sense or judgement, hence stupid.
IMHO: this was the biggest waste of time in prepping to run Icespire I've encountered so far. I disagree with almost every point you make. Smarter than any beast. Still INT of 6. Let him encounter the party at a lower level and scare the p**s out of them with how hard he hits. He flies away after he takes what like 10 damage? He's a BEAST. A cornered animal. In his lair, let him fight to the death. If you and your party have agreed you want to continue playing after the adventure is over, maybe let him try to escape. But if you're running a game for new players... WHY would you rob them the satisfaction of killing their first dragon? Introduce the Orcs early on. Why would you not? Have the townsfolk mention Orc sightings. Orbs destroyed Phandalin a few generations ago, but then nestled into their mountains and so now people are rebuilding. But with Cryovain invading their home, the orcs ARE A THREAT TO PHANDALIN. You said if you roll a place far away, mention that there's potentially a... seagull..? In the sky? Did you even think before you wrote the script for this video? All in all, won't be watching any more of your videos. This put such a bad taste in my mouth for you, as a cc, and as a DM, (I'd rather not play DnD than be a PC in one of your games... and that's saying something) Everything you're saying is subjective. I understand that. It's just that I disagree with literally everything you said.
Hey brother! I’ve been gone for a while but trying to catch up with your content. I’m running this now with my nephews over fantasy grounds, so huge help as always.
Thank PJ. Will we be seeing you make any videos on your channel in the future?
My player had a brief encounter with Cryovain. The only thing he said was," Why does food fight back?" when a sword strike hit home. He left when the food hit him a second time.
It should be noted that Cryovain doesn't just appear in Dragon of Icespire Peak. In Storm King's Thunder, Cryovain makes an appearance as an adult white dragon (perhaps a few years older) who has mated with Isendraug. In the adventure, Cryovain's eggs were captured by the frost giants, forcing Cryovain and his mate to serve the frost giants (with Cryovain forcibly chained to the deck of the frost giant jarl's longship, the Krigvind). I have used this as motivation for Cryovain in my adventures.
I am currently running a combination LMOP/DOIP intro that transitions into STK. In my adventure, Cryovain has fled south, rebelling against his frost giant masters. He is full of rage against the frost giants and regret at having deserted his eggs and mate. Prior to fighting the PCs at the end of DOIP, he will try to strike a deal with them. Cryovain will offer to freely leave the region around Phandalin and return north if the PCs agree to help him. Cryovain offers to leave if (and only if) the PCs agree to help him in his revenge against the frost giants. If the PCs agree, Cryovain will fly the PCs north (avoiding the awkward deus ex machina appearance of Zephyros' flying tower). This also serves as a nice transition point between the two adventures.
After Cryovain delivers the PCs into Icewind Dale, he will try to liberate his mate and eggs from the frost giants but will ultimately fail, resulting in him begin re-chained to the deck of the Krigvind in the service of the frost giant jarl. If the PCs try to retrieve the frost giant jarl's conch of teleporation, they will re-meet and possibly fight a stronger version of Cryovain under service to the frost giants.
I JUST MIGHT DO THIS! GREAT IDEA!
PCs: alright, we will help you
Cryovain: thank you so much!
PCs: let's take a rest to get our HP up and spells back.
*while the party sleeps, the young dragon murders the party"
The End
Even though I doubt I will be running it anytime soon I still found this extremely useful for Dragons at large and has provided me with inspiration for future encounters
That is excellent. Thanks for the kind words and taking the time to watch the video and comment.
Cryovein does not flee in the fortress because he has a reason to stay there. It's a shame the booklet never explains why. I have a cheff warlock with a patron that demands exotic foods, so the patron points out that cryovein is protecting an egg in the fortress.
Thank you so much for these videos. I am running both LMOP and throwing in DoSP for added benefit. Your videos give me so much awesome information. Keep doing what you are doing!!!
You are welcome. I will :)
Absolutely helpful informations here I'm not really a dungeon master I just like to write stories on available settings and maybe play my own party literally (literally) so thank you again for all of these videos on how to explore and dive a bit deeper on what's available to us in the books, tremendous work !
Glad it was helpful, Pyrhaa. I will be making videos for this adventure for years, lol.
My group killed Venomfang from the Lost Mines of Phandelver. They also did nearly 100 damage to Cryovain, in one turn, during a random encounter, admittedly they almost wiped. Anyway, the point is Cryovain is now an adult white dragon. Doing a whole "Rally up your allies" kinda deal, though their still dealing with the Orcs atm, the excuse is the dragon displaced the lot of them.
Thanks for sharing your groups experience.
@@HowtoRPG And thank you for the video's. I review them to help me brainstorm how best to flesh out the experience for my table, very helpful.
Regardless of how dumb a white dragon might be intellectually, _It knows that it's a dragon!_ If DMs and players remember that one simple fact, it should play out well.
Very true.
Yes! This is why I’m not going to make him flee right away, and he’s going to be a formidable boss for my characters. I’m weaving in the story to include his past so that if one of the characters were to find more information on him or ask around, they’ll be able to find out that his eggs are being held hostage (actual lore) by a mage who blackmailed Cryovain into serving him.
I really liked the idea of Cryovain having personality, he’s stubborn and prideful with a bit of an inferiority complex. He’s not just some dim-witted number or boss that’s there for your party to defeat, he’s a breathing character and a fucking dragon. He’s not going to flee to some mere band of adventurers! It should be the other way around. Dragons are prideful. Yes white dragons are cowardly in the face of a greater danger but what if they don’t see it as a threat? What if they incapacitate you, breathe on you, try to fly away from you? Why on earth would a dragon ever believe that the lesser species would be able to kill it if they weren’t very wise? Wouldn’t a young dragon be naive, without much experience? Naive doesn’t mean stupid, but it DOES mean that you can make mistakes that you wouldn’t have made if you knew better. That includes knowing when to flee.
You’re right that he’s dim-witted and not very experienced with combat, but his lore explicitly states that he’s competent enough in it to get him this far. This could mean you can make the fight as hard as you want and if things turn sour for the players, as long as they’ve injured Cryovain enough, you’ll be able to make him go back to his lair to recover and make a NEW encounter with him in a more confined space with less HP.
I like to combine elements. It doesn’t have to be simple. Make it yours.
I'd say it depends a bit on how you define being 'stupid' or 'smart'. An intelligence of 6 is pretty darn low, so it's fair to call him 'stupid' in a sense. Having said that, stupid does not necessarily mean gullible, reckless, or easily tricked. The intelligent stat is primarily about education, not necessarily judgement and the like. Cryovain's 11 wisdom isn't all that impressive, but it implies he has a pretty firm grasp on 'common sense', if you will.
For example, someone with low intelligence, but average or better wisdom, wouldn't know what a Nigerian Prince scam /is/, but would nonetheless not fall for one, because the offer sounds too good to be true. Similarly, if they heard a particularly bad snake oil salesman say that silver water could cure pinkeye, the flu, cancer, and AIDs, they'd doubt those claims. Not on the basis of any particular understanding of medicine, but on the basis that the salesman is clearly acting like a con man, tossing around a lot of claims without evidence, and that selling fake medicine is an obvious strategy anyone with sufficiently low dignity would try.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts Matthew.
In my game, I started my players in The Sunless Citadel, which I placed in the Dessarin Valley so I could transition into Princes of the Apocalypse. In TSC, the players encountered a white dragon hatchling, which they decided they absolutely did not want to fight, so instead made a pact and brought her, and her kobold dragonkeeper Meepo, along for the journey. I also decided to make it my canon that the kobolds got her egg from Cryovain's clutch (though I never figured out thr specifics of how it landed in their hands), so I'm going to have the players along with Cryovain's daughter confront the now-adult white dragon.
Thanks for sharing your story and experience.
Also Cryovain appears in another adventure older, so having the option for him to flee away makes sense
Thanks for sharing that. What old adventure?
@@HowtoRPG storm king's thunder,
he's an adult during the events of this campaign
Thanks again Fred. Great job 😎🤘
You are welcome Jim :)
What a nice channel really like the stuff you put out,hope your doing fine with all this Coronavirus stuff
Thanks Bradlee. I am currently sick. I see the doctor today.
Got it. D20 perception check on leaving the excavation mine if they choose(dwarfs hiding); plus a Dodge against the ice to get away(because fun) minus d4 from dragon(because fun). Freeze the orcs if possible. Let the dragon fly away with one or two orcs. Fun game for all the kids. By the way you're awesome
so im running this with my fAM so ty for info
You are welcome. Great to hear you are playing with family.
My PC are at lvl6 and just retrieved the sword from dragon barrow. When they get back to town, They will find Harbin's home and himself frozen solid. Halia Thornton has taken charge of the town. This should spur them to go after Cryovain. If they interact with the dragon, I think he is going to allude to being lured there with promise of treasure for his horde.
Thanks for sharing your story.
I'm playing through DOIP with my group on tabletop simulator by beserk games. We just finished LMOP. What adventure would you recommend for new players with new DM? Group size is 2-4 adventures depending on attendance but we can double up character sheets.
Try this video out for a few options.
ruclips.net/video/Jxs9mlnC78c/видео.html
Storm kings thunder is a good option
I want to give cryovein a small horad. Just some silver and gold it picked off it's meals.
I'm running this one on one with my brother. Gave him a snow leopard warrior Sidekick using Tasha's. It looks like this thing might be tough, but if he builds up a few more sidekicks he might go down too easy. Seems like you've probably run this a few times and you might have some insight on his power going against a 5th level/6th level party. What do you think about giving him legendary/lair actions and/or minions? I was thinking a tribe of kobolds could seek him out to worship him.
It depends on the total number of players characters and Sidekicks. Don't have the Dragon asleep.
Hi, which It's my First time as a Dungeon Master, do u recommend any adventure to rum after I finish this one, so I can use the same characters.
I can't comment yet. Still testing.
@@HowtoRPG ok, thanks.
Hey man, Im finishing this adventure with my players and all went well so far, I'll start Tyranny of Dragons with the same characters I just need to adapt it for 5th level players
@@SuperTimDt Great. All the best with ToD.
Dimwitted should be swapped for brutal a d simplistic. (Cryovain sees everything through the lens of fight or flight.)
@@billdalton1477 Sure. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
I absolutely hate the idea of dim witted, or stupid dragons. That's why I bumped Cryovain's intelligence up, and boy were my players surprised.
Wisdom is more the aspect of a Dragon that is important.
@@HowtoRPG
Honestly, I liked the Dragons on Rick and Morty more than I do lost other forms of media. They talked, made complex plans, and were actual characters on the show. Having a dragon be a big dumb monster, like in most shows or movies, is such a waste of story telling
@@mr7oclock346 Yes.
Hey everyone!
This is my first time being a DM and I'm wondering how do I determine the location of the flying Cryovain? I know it's said to roll a D20 but does rolling a 15 mean they see the dragon and 20 mean they encounter it? Or does the number rolled mean the number of miles he's flown away from the lair it's in?
Sorry if that's a stupid question, I really don't understand how the D20 determines where Cryovain is. Any advice would be amazing, thanks in advance :)
The number rolled on the dice determines the Dragons current location, ever time the party arrives at a different location.
The chart in the module reads:
Dragons Location
D20. Location
1 Axeholm
2 Butterskull Ranch
3 Conyberry
4 Dragon Barrow
5 Dwarven Excavation
6 Falcons Hunting Lodge
7 Gnomengarde
8 High Road
9 Icespire Hold
10 Leilon
11 Loggers' Camp
12 Mountain's Toe Gold Mine
13 Neverwinter
14 Phandalin
15 Shrine of Savras
16 Starmetal Hills
17 Tower of Storms
18 Trioboar Trail
19 Umbrage Hill
20 Woodland Manse
My party mayyy or may not have befriended cryovain-
Good luck 👍
Problem with trying to trick a white dragon, they are actually too dumb to fool. They have short attention span, even shorter tempers, they don't understand abstract concepts very well, and they lack the foresight to delay gratification. They are either not going to understand your con, or they just aren't going to pay attention. Their intelligence lies mostly in their photographic memory, which means is you piss one off, they are never going to forget it.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
The dragon is an april fool?
I didn't make it for April Fools day. That would also be bad taste with the world in its current state. It's a serious video topic for DM's.
I think this is a good video in terms of "what the dragon would do" but I think it's a bit to much "dm vs player." Maybe flying out of reach and dropping players off the mountain would be good tactics for a dragon, but it wouldn't be fun at all for the players, especially martial characters without range.
Thanks. The Dragon will never get a chance and will get crushed.
If the PCs go up against a dragon unprepared, I.e no ranger weapons, they are looking for death.
Dragons of all ages are dealt and loosing a player it totally reasonable for the climax of a campaign!
Less antagonistic and more about giving your players a challenge, make the win mean something.
@@stuartbanana5083 Take what you want from the video.
Thanks for the video but ya lost me when you failed to define "dimwit". It does mean stupid or presenting slow mental processes. Also this module is for newbies sure mod what ya want but it's for bady DMs like me to get our feet wet.
You are welcome.
Dimwitted is LITERALLY defined as STUPID or silly! XD
“Yeah so he’s silly, not stupid”
Silly is defined as having or showing a lack of common sense or judgement, hence stupid.
IMHO: this was the biggest waste of time in prepping to run Icespire I've encountered so far. I disagree with almost every point you make.
Smarter than any beast. Still INT of 6. Let him encounter the party at a lower level and scare the p**s out of them with how hard he hits. He flies away after he takes what like 10 damage?
He's a BEAST. A cornered animal. In his lair, let him fight to the death. If you and your party have agreed you want to continue playing after the adventure is over, maybe let him try to escape. But if you're running a game for new players... WHY would you rob them the satisfaction of killing their first dragon?
Introduce the Orcs early on. Why would you not? Have the townsfolk mention Orc sightings. Orbs destroyed Phandalin a few generations ago, but then nestled into their mountains and so now people are rebuilding. But with Cryovain invading their home, the orcs ARE A THREAT TO PHANDALIN.
You said if you roll a place far away, mention that there's potentially a... seagull..? In the sky? Did you even think before you wrote the script for this video?
All in all, won't be watching any more of your videos. This put such a bad taste in my mouth for you, as a cc, and as a DM, (I'd rather not play DnD than be a PC in one of your games... and that's saying something)
Everything you're saying is subjective. I understand that. It's just that I disagree with literally everything you said.
This is a very rude comment that you put a lot of time into. We can disagree.