A Friend In Need | Waterdeep Dragon Heist | DMs Guide

[@MrR2TheZ]

In the quest to find Floon, one good tip I heard was to give him distinct prayer beads that would leave a trail. Volo would remember him wearing his distinct jewelry the night of his disappearance. When I DM'd it, he wore one with amethyst beads. He was grabbed, the necklace fell apart, and scattered many of the beads right outside the tavern. So what should they find in the Old Xoblob Shop, but a fresh pile of purple beads the old man decided to keep out to turn a profit. He'll be hard pressed to explain his way out of that. Plus, now the players have a way to organically discover Candle Lane by following the lagging trail of amethyst all the way to the Zhent's hideout. Just an idea for people planning to run the game!

[@seankopper2233]

These videos helped me a lot so thought I would drop one of my ideas I used that anyone can steal to deal with crazy players: I was struggling with how to keep my players from going down the YP shaft too early. So I had the troll from chapter 1 fall back into the shaft and smash the wall. So now Durnan has the dungeon shaft closed for repairs until the PCs get high enough level. This worked pretty well at my table

[@NoFunAllowed]

haha sometimes you gotta stop your players from doing the worst of things!

[@seankopper2233]

@@NoFunAllowed Yup. And I find it goes over better at my table when I can give my players in-game reasons

[@mikelewis495]

The Volo encounter is where we're going to start our next session. We ran the bar/troll fight at the end of our session zero. Following the Lazy Dungeon Master's guide formula, I'm thinking Gildroy Lockhart as the archetype for Volo.

[@NoFunAllowed]

haha i do the same exact thing!

[@an8strengthkobold360]

Good to know I'm not the only one.

[@manofhonor1685]

That’s what I did excet I ended with meeting Volo and him giving the quest. Im kinda worried about how long my players will be lvl 1

[@vworpin9945]

Thanks, My first time DMing a campaign i didn't make up myself/one-shots so i was a bit overwhelmed. this video helped me feel a lot more prepared for it!! :)

[@NoFunAllowed]

heck yeah thank you!

[@furnoyt5889]

What can I say? That's the perfect video I was looking for. Thank you for making it! Gonna help a ton in the next session.

[@NoFunAllowed]

thank you! I have the series up on the playlist, more coming soon!

[@RatOfTheWoods]

Thank you so much! A handful of more experienced DMs & I are planning on running chapter one for the cast & crew of the show we just did, She Kills Monsters!! This will be my first time behind a DM screen so having as much help as I can get before hand will be great, I don't wanna make too big a fool of myself infront of all the rest of my crew lmao! Having someone to walk me through this was very helpful for getting this stuff better put into my head

[@NoFunAllowed]

awesome stuff! I know youll do great haha!

[@manofhonor1685]

How’d it go?!

[@bytecode5834]

Fantastic video, thanks for the gift!

[@macchannell1582]

Gosh Dang It My Guy! I Am So Thankful You Made These Videos! You Are The Bomb My Dude!

[@NoFunAllowed]

thank you!

[@YR_1.1.1]

SO AWESOME! thanks for your titanic work!

[@NoFunAllowed]

Thank you so much!

[@mtheoryx83]

Check out number 85 on the yawning portal illustrated map.

[@TylerWx]

Yeah, I was really surprised that they don't give a map of the Yawning Portal. I'm also going to run Dungeon of the Mad Mage after this, and they don't even give a map of it in that. Weird.

[@NoFunAllowed]

very strange indeed!

[@manofhonor1685]

Where did you get the map that’s behind you in the background? I can’t find anything like that with land markers like how yours has a “the yawning portal” bullet

[@AndICanTalk2]

So I am about to run a campaign, that will be set in Waterdeep, with a little from this adventure, and a ton from Dungeon of the Mad Mage. Taking a bit of what Sir Lucien, from Saturday Morning D and D show, has been playing in, the campaign will feature an Adventurers Guild that will have jobs the players can pick up, a bit like a job board, but with the benefit that the guild should separate the crappy jobs for the good ones for them. This way I can have hooks from various parties to explore parts of the city or Undermountain, in kind of a bunch of 1-2 shot adventures, at least to start, while giving me flexibility for them to decide who they want to work for to explore it. Still trying to find good information on an Adventurers Guild.

[@NoFunAllowed]

awesome stuff! if you want to ask a bunch of people about adventurers guild ideas, drop by the discord!

[@mikelewis495]

I rolled 2 nat 1s with Durnan while running this encounter for my party last night. First one he rolled a nat 1 on his dex save and I briefly thought about making him drop his sword down the well, but then decided against it since I didn't want to kill my party. Second one, I rolled the 1 on the first attack, he succeeded his dex saving throw, so I proceeded to make 3 more attacks and missed them all. It made for some pretty comical hilarity for my party.

[@NoFunAllowed]

haha a not so grand entrence!

[@shweppy]

I'm planning on taking over DMing duties for my group once our current campaign wraps up to give our usual DM a break, and this is one of the options I am considering. I was thinking of throwing a little Acquisitions Incorporated flavor into it since it flows so nicely with the players owning their own inn, and can play well with the factions. On a side note, I don't have a lot of experience in the Forgotten Realms setting or Waterdeep. Can you recommend some of the novels that feature the city (or Volo) so I can get some inspiration?

[@NoFunAllowed]

I don't know of any books that talk about the "new" waterdeep, however there are several older books by tsr floating around!

[@RatOfTheWoods]

@@NoFunAllowed Do you think you could suggest a handful of those older books? Thank you!

[@NoFunAllowed]

@@RatOfTheWoods I would suggest looking at TSR Reads! He is reading through a bunch of the old books!

[@GeiderLeal]

Now I'm hyped to run this adventure. Do you plan to continue on mad mage after Dragon Heist guide?

[@NoFunAllowed]

I will do all the modules sooner or later! Mind you Mad Mage will probably be one of the longest ones to make though haha

[@KaiPotter15]

I'm 17 and really new to DnD but loving it so much, I managed to get 6 friends into it as well and we are gonna do this as our first campaign?! I'm not quite sure how to run as a DM, I've read into it but still a tad confused on what to do if players go off track and when to stop the game and ask the questions like What do you do? How do you react? Please help?!!!!

[@NoFunAllowed]

The thing to consider is before running the campaign, you need to sit down with everyone and talk about what you all want out of the game. If you plan on running the kind of game where you move them from scene to scene and react, they need to buy into that and not fly off the rails. if they do want more freedom in how they tackle the world, then you need to be ready to throw them some bones and get them back on track once they are done with their escapade!

[@KaiPotter15]

@@NoFunAllowed OKAY THANK YOU SO MUCH, THIS HELPED ALOT!

[@NoFunAllowed]

@@KaiPotter15 thank you and no problem!

[@KaiPotter15]

@@NoFunAllowed Also sorry but one more thing, when do I ask questions? Like perception checks and initiative rolls?

[@NoFunAllowed]

@@KaiPotter15 you ask for perception if they want to look around at something that may not be obvious. You roll for initiative when Combat is inevitable!

[@manofhonor1685]

My volo sounds a lot like forge from the dnd movie lol

[@ericka_akcire2193]

What program are you using on your desktop and where did you get the Waterdeep info on there? I'm a newer DM. Did you make it? Is it available on the patreon?

[@NoFunAllowed]

This program is roll20.com , and all the info is from the book!

[@CircusYT]

Glad you have a series on this, my group is just on the back half of Strahd currently, and this is next. How many sessions do you think Dragon Heist is? I know it can vary - but ballpark?

[@NoFunAllowed]

id say purely as written, around 10-15 sessions. But the big asterix here is how much time you and your group spend on exploring the city and fleshing out the tavern and the factions!

[@CircusYT]

@@NoFunAllowed Out of curiosity, how many sessions would you ballpark Curse of Strahd if ran as written? Just trying to find a baseline -- I don't care, just curious. We're on session 44 of Strahd!

[@EclecticK]

Go ahead.

[@NoFunAllowed]

if you had a shot for every time i said that, youd be dead haha

[@viktordjambov1437]

What are the odds, This 28th, sunday, i Ran my Friend in need first session!

[@NoFunAllowed]

haha awesome! more coming from this series real soon!

[@Slicknick72636]

Running this next just did Strahd let me know if you have any pointers

[@NoFunAllowed]

haha i have all the pointers! id say to keep this adventure light hearted and give empasis to the parties tavern!

[@rvrblu4487]

Is waldo in that big piece of the bar

[@NoFunAllowed]

haha im sure he could be!

[@thevrynprodigy]

Very helpful guide. But omg, my friend, you say "go ahead" as much as I say "like"...

[@NoFunAllowed]

i get the habit broken out of me over the course of this series haha