Wave Echo Cave DM Guide - D&D Starter Set Adventure

[@Keldren.]

My players didn't take hints and inadvertently created a lich.. soon after actually befriended nezznar who is now a member of their party.. so just in case they decided WEC doesn't matter and they don't need to go there anymore... my answer was when one of my players rolled a divine intervention (I let anyone do this at any level if there's no cleric in the party) and he actually succeeded. But.. he's a wizard and had no deity in mind.. just prayed into open air to "anyone who is listening" so guess who was listening and told him to come to wave echo cave and find him to have his question answered... yup.. Haman Kost... who is now a lich and the new bbeg lolol

[@RdotDoyle]

Wow, sounds crazy but fun. It seems you’ve done a great job adapting and adjusting. BBEG is now they’re best bud? Roll with it! There’s a new BBEG in town. Your group must be having a lot of fun

[@Koshak87]

11:50 - holy smokes, this is exactly what I was planning for Nezznar for my PC's. A two-stage campaign boss fight. Spiders and drow magic and, if the story allows, 1-2 "named, elite enemies", that they've had run-ins with throughout the adventure. I've decided to focus on Nezznar as a BBEG of the campaign, since it ties really well into one of my player's backstory. Also, gonna hint at "drow rabbit hole" going much deeper, than one (all-in-all quite mediocre) sorcerer, should the players be interested in going down tha road. Maybe, it's not Lols herself, who's gonna transform Nezznar, but one of her high priestesses. We'll see.

[@RdotDoyle]

Drow are a great villainous society, plenty of room to carry on from here with them

[@ThatOneLadyOverHere]

This ended up inspiring an idea where when the party got to King Grol the doppelganger left with a hobgob dragging Gundran. Gundran kicks off his shoe with a backup map in it (drawn to look like directions, kind of silly as if his brother had drawn a map for him). When they were leaving the forest Gundran ran back up to them and ushered them to go straight to WEC without restocking to save his brothers. During the night Gundran tried to kill the player, failed his stealth check and took of running, chase ensued which took them to a cave (was gonna be a relocated Wyvern Tor, but I changed it up because I had him do Shrine of Savras recently and it's basically the same) full of Orcs with a Orog leader and a giant bat mount. Gundran turned out to be the doppelganger trying to lead the loose ends into a death trap, which they actually survived just fine even with the bear they encountered during the chase. The doppelganger said something into her hand when she died and they found a small carved stone (sending stone but they don't know that yet, but she sent a message to the other doppelganger).

[@friendlyfire1016]

First time DM here for a group I started at work! I’ve been nervous to run such a big dungeon tonight, but your video helped me take a step back and really think through how I’m going to be connecting the macro decisions my players have made to the finale that is Wave Echo Cave. Thanks again!

[@RdotDoyle]

Amazing, love to hear it. I started this channel for this exact reason so I really appreciate it

[@jopestus]

Thanks for the tips. Saw it now, 5 days after we actually finished the campaign :D

[@RdotDoyle]

Ha! Well maybe the Shattered Obelisk video could be helpful, or maybe you'll run this again one day?

[@jopestus]

@@RdotDoyle not planning on shattered obelisk. I ran phandelver as an introduction to a player group and around 20% of what ended up happening was in the book. :D We are moving to moonshae isles now and improvising a lot. I might watch that video anyways, since it is always useful to see visions of other people in this sport. :)

[@RdotDoyle]

@@jopestus Ah fantastic, love to hear it! Inspiration is everywhere, I agree

[@moonwatcher8657]

@RdotDoyle You give all this great advice, and all one commenter could say was to pick you up on making 'mine' plural 🙄 I became a returning DM last year after a 23 year gap(!) and am currently running LP. All your LMoP vids have been invaluable, Ryan. Well done, and thank you 😊👍

[@RdotDoyle]

Hahaha, thank you. I can tell you after years of data slightly more people are typing the plural into the search bar. I hope it's good to be back behind the DM's screen friend

[@moonwatcher8657]

@RdotDoyle It's good, Ryan. A lot of work, and still learning, but good 👍 Please keep up the great vids 😊

[@HowtoRPG]

Interesting take.

[@RdotDoyle]

Wow! Thanks for taking the time to watch and comment, it means a lot to me. I point people your way in the next video in this series. Not that my viewership is much compared to yours, but give me a little time to catch up 😆. Thanks again for commenting, any and all input from you is definitely valued

[@HowtoRPG]

@@RdotDoyle It should be obvious from my Dungeon Master Round Table discussions that I watch smaller channels. You are welcome :)

[@RdotDoyle]

@@HowtoRPG Love it, let me know if you ever need to fill a seat

[@Krazog]

So helpful! I noted this down - just about to run the session... already seems a lot more suped up than what was presented in the book by using your tips

[@RdotDoyle]

Glad you find this helpful. WEC always felt like it needs a little boost to be a big finale, but it also needs to be flexible because the designers don't know which way the party is going to experience it.

[@danielkomarov5086]

In my Lost Mine game I’m running at the moment, the Black Spider is a female drow sorcerer instead of a male and is called Nezzaria (she calls herself Nezzie). I went with female because drow society is matriarchal and the females would be seen in their society as the stronger sex, which adds some depth to the character. She has also been cursed by Lolth and is secretly a Drider, but thanks to an ancient Drow amulet she wears, she can continue keeping the form of a drow. Lose the amulet or piss off Lolth any more by say, failing to acquire the Forge of Spells and the vast wealth of the mine, then she is permanently a Drider with no way back. I feel this means that a lot more is at stake for The Black Spider and that she is not truly the main villain, but rather a pawn of Lolth’s sadistic making. This will also make the final battle much more action packed and climactic and hopefully more memorable. I also made it that Harbin Wester was murdered and replaced with an extra doppelgänger, which the party only found out long after being sent to Wyvern Tor to take care of the orcs. Hamun Kost also betrayed them by agreeing to help them reach Cragmaw Castle, but deliberately blew their cover by firing three scorching rays at the castle entrance. The PCs were mega pissed at Hamun Kost and ended up executing him pretty much on the spot. They found Glasstaff in King Grol’s quarters and found that he had been released by the Harbin Wester doppelgänger and escaped to Cragmaw Castle where he worked with the tribe. I love the idea about Mormesk being potentially stronger than The Black Spider and getting the better of them. It totally makes sense that he’d think the PCs are in cahoots with The Black Spider. Thanks for these tips, I’m starting to feel more confident about running Wave Echo Cave and making it more structured and free flowing.

[@RdotDoyle]

Oh nice, some twists and turns there. Sounds like you'll bring things in for a cool landing at WEC too

[@Grimmlocked]

I made the black spider female as the mini I had painted that was closest was a female drow sorceress

[@ifaslapufoo]

This was so helpful!! Thanks so much for putting this together

[@RdotDoyle]

Glad it was helpful! Thanks for taking the time to comment

[@TurboWulfe]

I like the Mormask angle, thanks man I'll use that. Great vid and thanks for the hints. I had Glassstaff escape from prison and King Grol escape as well a bigger final confrontation

[@RdotDoyle]

That’s great, should make a better ending

[@brianbays867]

This has been the best guide I have found, thank you so much sir!

[@RdotDoyle]

Awesome, glad you found it helpful

[@brianbays867]

@@RdotDoyle For sure did, I especially liked the bits showing more of the Black Spider's men being shown actively fighting the ghouls and other occupants of the cave. Really helps drive home that there's a third party in play, where as written it can be confusing to new players thinking the Spector/skull etc work FOR the black spider.

[@RdotDoyle]

Definitely, it’s easy for players to default to bad guys = team bad but I really like putting that nuance in there. It makes it feel more like a living world and less like a video game level

[@boejuh1]

Driderism is seen as a curse; they can no longer reproduce and the process is horribly painful. The transformation is seen as being a failure to the Spider queen and most have a deathwish and are mad - His death of course being a failure. Alternatively, you could give Nezznar the ability to wild shape into a Giant Spider if you need to beef him up without sticking a CR 6 creature on your party. Is also fairly in flavour

[@RdotDoyle]

Yeah it fits the standard lore pretty cleanly and I bet it's more of what the players were imagining in the first place at most tables, right?

[@sandorfalusi3486]

I found a homebrew monster called the Bone Spider, it's a CR 5 large beast that can swallow creatures and poison them, and I'll have the Black Spider ride it with mounted combatant. I think that raises the stakes high enough. My party is 5 people with 3 healers (life cleric, paladin, celestial warlock), so I always have trouble challenging them properly in a fight, and I started buffing up the enemies already. Using bugbear chief stats, hobgoblin captains, and giving the goblins an enslaved ogre or two... I also swapped out the random encounter table for my own, that has bigger, more badass creatures, like trolls on it.

[@RdotDoyle]

Sounds pretty epic! If you're party is really outpacing the enemies lair actions are also a good tool. A dangerous one, but a good one.

[@sandorfalusi3486]

@@RdotDoyle I'm actually thinking of making the Black Spider into a legendary creature while he is mounted. Resistances and legendary actions. 3 legendary actions to have the Spider mount do an attack action, 1 for a cantrip, 2 for movement. But I'll have to do some balance calculations.

[@RdotDoyle]

@@sandorfalusi3486 Love it! Mobility can be huge, especially with spider climb. Add web into the mix and use those columns to block line of site and you've increased the difficulty before touching HP

[@sandorfalusi3486]

@@RdotDoyle half cover for Nezznar on the mount, and if I'm evil, then his favoured cantrip is chill touch, and see how my Healer Hobo party deals with that.

[@sandorfalusi3486]

​@@RdotDoyle I can finally update this, since my party just finished the campaign. They friggin' stomped my legendary Nezznar riding the Bone Spider in under 3 rounds, even though I went all out. But I'm not annoyed at all, since they went in cautiously, cleared any potential ally of Nezznar first, and did the fight in a very tactical way. It was such a proud moment for me, since 3 of my 5 players are new to D&D and they really learned the ins and outs of fighting and tactics, and didn't underestimate the enemy. The legendary resistances and actions, and the swallow ability freaked them out a bit, but it just made them fight that much harder.

[@Rinz-Aide]

Gundreon unfortunately got trampled by an owlbear

[@DrAndrewJBlack]

👍🏻

[@RdotDoyle]

😀

[@dutchwarrior2192]

Hey man, I was wondering if you could make a level 3 fighter guide video?

[@RdotDoyle]

Funny, I just started doing Druid but I could shuffle around a bit. I’ve been doing basic rules subclasses so I think that’s Champion for fighter. Did you have something particular in mind?

[@dutchwarrior2192]

@@RdotDoyle yeah actually, I was wondering if you could shine some light on the purple dragon sub class because their role in the party is a bit hazy to me.

[@RdotDoyle]

Ah ok. Purple Dragon Knight is not very well regarded. I for one think you can have a great time with any subclass in 5E. To answer your question, it’s going to depend on the party, obviously, but you’d likely be up front in a fight, and consider position carefully when you pop second wind and rallying cry. It depends on how far up you’ll level, but that seems like the defining feature here, a fighter who can do an AoE heal once per rest. At 7 you’re getting expertise in persuasion, which will make you a pretty good “face,” (taking the lead in social encounters,) if you invested in charisma. Charisma based classes might have you beat in that department though, especially 1-6. Maybe it’s meta but I’ve found there are players who love being the one up there doing the talking, while others can take it or leave it, and some rather hang back. Everyone should get their time in the sun, and at some tables what you are saying to persuade an NPC is more important than having an extra +2 on the roll. Inspiring Surge and Bulwark are kind of cool support abilities, but unless you’re starting at higher levels I always recommend you ignore the later stuff because for a host of reasons you might never see them. I’d be happy to give more specific answers if you give me more detail. Again, I think go for it if you think it will be fun for you at your table. Personally, I think I would go with a different fighter subclass that gave me more complexity and more things to do in combat. Simple isn’t bad, it’s just that usually I prefer more. I’d also take a look at Paladin to build a charismatic martial class that can do some healing, for the same reason. I think either way you could still draw on the flavor and even the lore of the Purple Dragon Knight

[@dariusdale3946]

Lost MINE, there is only one mine.

[@RdotDoyle]

Ha! I mentioned in one of the videos in this playlist how it wants to be plural in my mind. I consider it a success that I said "mine" more often than "mines." Now that I've got a few months of data I can see that I'm not the only one out there doing it, because a lot of people type the plural into the search bar. I think maybe the "S" sound in "Lost" is linguistically sticky and attaches itself to "mine"

[@GregoDoblaje]

Having Nezznar drink a potion of healing is terrible advice. It won't make him survive for another round, let alone two, because that's not how healing works in 5e. Even with a maximum roll, the amount of hp he's gonna regain is waaaaaay lower than the amount of damage that a full party of level 4 PCs can deal to him. If Nezznar's low on hp, the best you can do is having him cast his biggest spell, surrender, or whatever you can think of BUT drinking a healing potion in the middle of combat.