My Top Ten Tips for Running Icewind Dale Rime of the Frostmaiden

[@GreycatRademenes]

I actually did the exact thing about the Secrets you said, I modded them a bit (though one of my players went full hog on the Ring Seeker) and gave each player two to choose from based on their character. I think the Cold Openings can work, but you still need to touch them up. 1. The Chwngas are a sidequest - they get to do it as a bonus thing to get some cash, handy magic item, especially if a character has no darkvision and some charms from the Chwingas if they play House with them. Don't count it for level progress. 2. Make it a mystery, have Hlin only tell the players she's been doing some investigating, but she's too old and lost track. All she tells them is about the victims, what town she last investigated and that the killer keeps moving. In the next town they gather more info and in the end they find the killer in the 3rd or 4th town, when they are Lv2-3. Meanwhile they can do Town Quests. I agree on the Chardalyn Dragon bit and that pretty much what I intend on doing. Also my group actually befriended a Duergar they captured and he told them that Xandarok is making something, but doesn't know what. I also loved the idea they meet Vellyn in the Duergar Prison instead of a random town. On the other hand, my friend who is also running RoF plans on Starting with the Dragon Attack, so the players will avenge the attack instead.

[@RogueWatson]

Great tips on fixing the cold open quests!

[@DiscountCheeto]

Exactly what I did with the murder mystery!

[@socialcommentary]

Great content, very helpful for me DMing Icewind Dale! Cat meowing in the background is pretty hilarious! More cat content (a la the toad hunting the moth video) please!

[@skyeerayjea7836]

I thought the Id Ascendant quest was oddly put there. I turned that into a mini “welcome to the setting” one-shot where they played premade characters of the class they chose for the campaign (all new/newish players) and it ended with everyone’s vision going to black and a young voice going “Dad please leave the adventurers alone, they just want a warm meal” - they later found an older gentleman and his daughter in a tavern while traveling the tentowns, and as the older gentleman asked if they wanted to hear of his greatest adventure a familiar voice spoke up saying “Dad please leave the adventurers alone, they just want a warm meal” Fun little way to still have it. Only the notetaker caught on to what I did but it was worth it

[@RogueWatson]

Ha, that's a clever idea!

[@stanwolford9743]

Excellent recap and concise primer on Rime

[@BeingtheBard]

This is perfect i just had my first session of icewind and i really like it but i do find some faults in the book itself so this is really helpful thanks!! (also currently going through your chapter by chapter guide and that is super great as well)

[@RogueWatson]

Awesome, good luck with the campaign!

[@Tusitala1967]

Great stuff, Eric! I'm considering Rime for the future. Right now we are Pre-Omu with 11th level characters in ToA. I revisted your encounter with the Oracle and Ras Nsi's agents for inspiration, and had them encounter a legendary harpy guarding the top of a ziggurat to gain entry. By the time they made it through the upper levels, Ras Nsi's agents had come in from the flooded lower levels and subdued S'jann Sobann, the Oracle. The players had encountered a water elemental in the upper works who was concerned about the pollution of the lower waters of the ziggurat. Several other elementals had already been corrupted by this presence, and were subsequently encountered as "Filth Elementals". As the players were fighting the Yuan-ti enemies, a Shoggoth emerged from the waters and steamrolled over the last of the snakes. The party freed the oracle and she fought alongside them to destroy the Shoggoth. The oracle gave them information and asked each of them what they desired; rewarding their answers with amulets appropriate to their choices. So thanks for providing the framework for a very fun sidequest. 😀

[@RogueWatson]

Dang that sounds awesome, well done!

[@GreycatRademenes]

Here's a fun fact about Netherese Lore in regards to the last tip - One of the most important archmages of Netheril became and Elder Brain Lich and still exists somewhere in the Underdark. So that change was very much on point, though I recommend this change only if players are higher level than 10/11.

[@RogueWatson]

I probably should've mentioned that my party reached lvl 15 in the end!

[@ijokerdu4902]

Thank you for this. I am just starting to dig in before running this campaign.

[@RogueWatson]

Good luck! It's a messy campaign that needs a bit of work, but I had a blast with it. Our full 2-year campaign is up on the channel, as well as my Crafting streams.

[@moffinbont1713]

Overall great tips, would second. I was a little worried about the Expanded Towers tip but with the caveat to ensure not all get run makes it a great addition. Yythren can drag on way to long (like chapter 1/2) if you let it.

[@RogueWatson]

Looking at my notes, it looks like we ran Ch1 quests through session 23. (Ch2 was interspersed, but also somewhere around 20 sessions), and Ythyrn took 11 sessions, not including the Spire. RotF is definitely not lacking for content, but I still loved all the extra stuff we added/expanded to Ythryn, including Expanded Towers of Magic.

[@moffinbont1713]

@@RogueWatson Ever the struggle, wanting to add even more content but without extending the campaign duration so I’m gonna need to find something to cut. Maybe the Duergar…

[@RogueWatson]

Noo the duergar are fantastic! Unseen -> Easthaven -> Sunblight -> Destruction's Light is a fantastic sequence. Sunblight was easily the highlight of our campaign (one of my PCs used Disguise Self to appear as one of the slain sons, and hilarity ensued).

[@moffinbont1713]

True, but they’re just a step too far away from the other plots for me. Thinking of giving the dragon to the Cult of the Black Swords (which continently removed the race between Sunblight and TT) and replacing Sunblight with The Severed Hand - an ancient elven fortress which got converted to Undead by a Mythal magic going wrong - so it will have great info about Netherese and the Mythallar etc.

[@shogunnate7724]

This was an amazing campaign. I think the changes you made really made the sessions fun and interesting. Definitely stealing ideas...mah wee dirt nappers are thinking that they're all safe and sound....and then WHAM-BAMetc., I'm dropping them into H.P. Lovecraft's Icewind Hell...😐

[@RogueWatson]

Thanks Nate! Lots of opportunities to go hard on horror, for sure.

[@NotThatHarrison]

My plan to add more eldritch horror and link it to that creepy ebon star bit is have Iriolarthas be an eldritch list and wielding his staff of power

[@Serinde_73]

Agree that choosing the best secrets from the list and matching them to the players is a great idea. I did a similar thing. Really like the idea of allowing the players to keep the nautiloid to fast travel around Icewind Dale and even been able to fight the chardalyn dragon in the air later on 😮🤯. Possibly after a positive social encounter with one of the Ceremorphs who could remain as pilot… Maybe the other one already left with some or all the squidlings to look for psi crystal and the remaining one fears for their lives. So PCs are asked not only to look for the crystal but for the rest of the crew as well and the reward is their ship and alliance for a certain period of time 🤔. How does that sound? Considering it now for our game if we ever get to that point ( the eternal scheduling issues 🫣)

[@RogueWatson]

After fighting off the ship's automated defenses, my party killed one of the ceremorphs and left the other alive, forcing him to pilot them around. They developed a fun camaraderie (RPing lovable sociopaths is so fun) while they had the airship.

[@GateKeeperPat]

Awesome video! In Sunblight Fortress with my group now. Looking ahead in the campaign I was wondering if cutting the Caves of Hunger would be a good play and have more focus/time spent in Ythyrn. The Caves don't seem to do much for the story besides be a large barrier. Am I crazy for wanting to cut it?

[@RogueWatson]

You could certainly cut Caves of Hunger if you wanted to speed things along. I think it's a neat dungeon with multiple paths and lots of spooky stuff, but your mileage may vary. Story wise the caves do have some fun teases for what's in store at Ythryn, like some ruins, the golem head, the dryad grove, etc. We had fun in there but we probably only did half of it, and my party nope'd out of the big Remorhaz fight in the middle.

[@LawofOne222]

thank you sooooooooo much for this!

[@bigH101]

At what point did they fight Auril? I might have missed it when you stated they actually fought her. Thanks for the great breakdown. I found the campaign to be very weird as far as things not being tied together.

[@RogueWatson]

The very end! Auril showed up after they gained access to the spire and defeated Irolarthas. They were sort of working for her after the island (at least one PC was!) Up until then, when she wanted the Mythallar power for herself.

[@bigH101]

@@RogueWatson Thanks so much for responding back. I really appreciate it. Very cool concepts.

[@MrDinmaker]

So I don't have the book to hand and so might he wrong, but given the travel times of an average party and the speed of the chardalyn dragon, doesn't it wipe basically everything except the last few towns off of the map before the players get a chance to catch up? Iirc it's in lonely wood before the party are able to make it to dougan's hole or something like that. I resolved this by turning Dannika from the cold open chwinga quest into a Harper conjurer, messaging the party when they were chasing the dragon and casting T.Circle. then giving them the choice of who to try save

[@RogueWatson]

When I ran it, I had the dragon launch during the climactic battle with Xardarok (and they slowed it down a bit by closing the blast doors on the roof). They caught up to it in Easthaven but couldn't quite catch it, and lots of things happened, then they eventually dealt with it when it circled around to the town west of Bryn Shander. Definitely destroyed most of Ten Towns in our campaign, but the PCs were able to give some warning and evacuate many towns.

[@user-qg5tn7bf2p]

From my understanding this advice is from DM perspective, right? What advice do you have from player perspectives?

[@CrimsonGuard1992]

I find it odd how the Frostmaiden herself does not play a big role in the module.

[@RogueWatson]

If you find that odd, wait til I tell you how much of a role Acererak plays in Tomb of Annihilation!

[@alazdmfirst5980]

I agree. Not sure which you tube content had it but the suggestion was to have her play a larger part. I had her appear at the Black Cabin (first form only) and at the Reghed Glacier when the rhyme was read (first and second form) . I also found that the players studied her more because of it, recurring villin and all

[@manta894]

i dissagrea on ID ascendant. this is just silly and does not fit at all with the overal tone of the campaign for me. i left that one out

[@RogueWatson]

I did end up changing it in my campaign: the device Dzaan found could clone people, but it was damaged, and each clone was more mutated and deranged than the last. It was full of monstrous Dzaan clones, and the final boss was a huge amalgamation. Very body horror/The Thing!

[@alazdmfirst5980]

I agree. If it had been actual full grown Mind Flayers I could have seen it fitting in. But gnome squidlings just sounded dumb to me.