Chapter 1 Final Thoughts | Rime of the Frostmaiden DMs Guide Chapter 1 

Great job with these videos! I read the material before viewing, and I appreciated the commentary and tips you provide. As a new DM, these recommendations were really useful.

I had my group complete both starting quests, Cold Blooded Killer and Chwingas. I modified the CBK to a CR2, similar to Bandit Captain. Then they completed 3 quests, sandbox style, not 2. And I selected quests for them that I considered doable for a 2nd level group, mostly western Towns. At level 3 I opened up the rest of Ten Towns. They completed 4 quests, not 2 to reach level 4. Great story, great art, interesting quests. Too much DM homework. Thanks for the videos!

Really enjoy these videos bud, please make a patreon or host a game on twitch

I’ll be adding some of our group’s characters from prior adventures as NPCs to surprise my players: my female cleric from LMoP will replace Mishann as priest of the House of The Morning Lord, my wizard, and his warlock buddy from a homebrew one-shot, will run a magic shop (location tbd), our druid from LMoP will make an appearance to alert my players to the presence of evil frost druids working for Auril, and even our ranger may show up to help guide the party on some of the longer wilderness quests in Ch. 2

@13:40... “remorhaz hole”- had to play it back a few times to get what you were saying ;)

On the way to Bryn Shander there were enough encounters to level my players from 1 to 2 and they took Sephek with some challenging combat. I didn't mind giving this quest to my players at level 1 as I knew they were going to have to fight to get to him.

I feel like everyone overlooks the fact that the party is suppose to spend their first couple levels trying to locate torgs before fighting sephek

I Have decided my campaign is starting in and mainly running out of Bremen, it has exactly 1 fleshed out character in the book and while the quest is fine, it doesn't tie in to chapter 3 in any way and starts really badly (imo) I am bringing the Frost druids to the fore for Chapter 1 and Duergar for chapter 2 As a result I so far I have written up 23 characters in the Bremen, totally changed the start of the quest to get the party to explore the town instead of getting randomly picked up at the docks and introduced Chardalyn as the way the frost druids are awakening the Monsters. I have made Tali the Dougan Hole speakers Half sister and used that as the second quest (more Chardalyn awakened foe's and hints to the druids) My main criticism of the book is that there is no reason for the players starting Chapter 3 and little to no foreshadowing that they are making a Dragon. and no way to connect chapters 3 and 4 to Auriel in any way.

We really like the lower levels, so I am planning: [Everything is runned as Horror - and the players don't know anything, even at the beginning they are presented for the Extreme cold in normal clothes] - Also added Encounters on long-travels between towns. (The intro starts in Neverwinter (Ironic right?) with The Lord's Alliances hiring the players, have written a long prologue - where their choices of background, etc. taps in) Level 1: intro (in the intro they travel along Ten Trail, no knowledge of what awaits them) + a 14 days old killed corpse in the outskirts of Bryn S. (prologue for the cold H. killer) + Bryn Shander +including additional quest I made up. (later on, The Cold H. Killer will kill one of their beloved NPC - I changed the moon-time for sacrificing to be more regularly than each month). In Bryn, they also see a man getting dragged from his crying family, going to get sacrificed. Level 2: Targos and Bremen +including additional quest I made up Level 3: Lonelywood, Termalaine, Good Mead, Dougan's Hole, again + a lot of side quests Level 4: Easthaven (completing Cold H. Killer quest here - recurring), Both Cear towns, + a lot of side quests. (completing Chwinga quest here) - Added some political dilemmas between the towns, espec. Zhentarim, made the Cold H. killer a murder-mystery (without any info), then they investigate the towns where people were murderer. Chapter 2: level 4-5 (all quests) Chapter 3: level 5 Chapter 4: level 6 Chapter 5: level 7 Chapter 6: level 8 Chapter 7: level 9

So I didn't really mean for this to happen, but my party did foaming mugs first and befriended the goblins pushing the cart by giving them blankets and rolling well and convinced them to join them. They went to d hole next and were actually able to defeat the winter wolves. They ended up befriending the hungry wolfpack by giving them food and the goblins tamed the wolves (I gave em advantage since, you know, goblins and their wolf affinity) and now they have goblin wolf riders. And then they defeat the mammoth straight up and then get the kobolds to join the team and now I have a "problem" haha. - I mean, it's not a problem cuz everyone's having fun. But it's a problem cuz I feel like the purpose of chapter 1 is kinda giving the party a very similationy sandbox within which to be immersed as a member of ten towns...and they're instead quickly becoming a powerful mercenary force that finds itself a big fish in a small pond XD. At this point, they've passed so many social skills checks to solve issues of trust and greed from the goblins that I feel like it would be very unfun for the party if I took away this army they built on the first failed skill check. - Anyone who's read all this is likely the type to have an opinion. What do you think I should do? Any advice on how to continue the campaign with the party having access to a squad of minions? I've been having civilization give the goblins trouble and not allowing them in town, but each time they complete a quest for a town they make an effort to share the loot with the goblins (they literally earned one magic item this whole time, and instead of using it they gave it to one of the goblins as a symbol of trust) and then they also make an effort to sing the praises of the goblins to the town and I feel like the towns would accept these goblins. They're honestly on the way to becoming famous heroes in ten towns as "that group with the goblins" XD

In my session 0 the party learned of Sephek. And were told he may be in Targos. They were in Termalaine. During the travel a blizzard hit and some wolves attacked in a random encounter. 1 player died. By wolves.. in session 0. Lmao I felt terrible but it really solidified the dangers of icewind dale.

I think I will drop the question here: I was wondering, going through all your vids, and the IWD Campaign book. Do you use minor treasures through out the game? - Like for instance Treasure trove decks or List of items matching the CR level? - I have also found a D100 list with fun odd items that is more meant for Roleplay & creativity - What about Masterwork items, or +X items, etc.? How often do you grant your group these? etc. If you have any thumb-rules or advices.

I think I'm going to try to have sephek as a re occuring villain through the game till the confrontation with Auril. We are one session in and it's really turned into a mystery since I didn't read the block text and just paraphrased what i wanted them to hear.

be GM [yes this will be green text format] session 0 character creation and intro starting/meeting in targos and get rescue the guy in kelvins cairn and cold blooded killer quests the rescue seems time sensitive so the do that first session 1 head out to bryn shander short recap of meeting and quests givers party the night and plan to wake up at 5 and leave for bryn shander at 6 the leave at 8 arrive in bryn shander and find out torgs is in termalaine then lonelywood, the opposite direction and hear a rumour that a bunch of adventurers went to kelvins cairn to find oyaminatok very useful... about to leave for caer-dinnertable and meet some dwarves get foaming mugs quest we're in a hurry but it'll only take a few hours blizzard = 2d4 = 7 hours hunker down and wait night time random encounter rolls a 6 oyaminatok not doing that one... 2 crag cats they see them just on the edge of their light source encounter reads if there's 2 or less than they stay back and wait for a character to get separated before attacking druids last words where 'oo kitty!' before getting crit to 0 health and the 2nd one over-killed her. only one character goes to help and the cats drag her body away. she plays the rest of the session as boi, the sled dog [who is actually stronger than who lv 1 char at this point] the next morning I read the text block for finding the half eaten corpse in foaming mugs and the table loses its shit they track the tread to the goblins and with a surprise round alpha strike them into the ground druid now sled dog runs towards the goblin wagon and gets hit by the archers and almost dies again goblin boss he-ya's the polar bears which a turn later actually start moving in that time the sorc throws some firebolts at the wagon trying to catch it on fire and the ranger shot the polarbear harness letting one escape before stopping to save boi pulling a page from Puffin Forest's Curse of Strahd series [so you know this will work out just fine] the party returns to bryn shander and on the way they see the druid alive and wel, wearing less cloths and a cold-brand symbol of auril on her chest. they completed the quest, hit lv 2 and ended the session a solid 2 minutes before the FLGS closes next session is in 2 days and I plan on using some of your suggestions and have them about to depart bryn shander again when a caravan arrives saying a massive avalanche hit and the ten trails is now closed off and it's only just the beginning of winter. In that caravan is w/e her name is that I've dubbed 'Elyse Starseeker' [if you understand why you get inspiration] who'll give them her quest for the chwinga and Dzaan will be heading to easthaven along side them until they part ways at the cross roads. the knights of the blade sword will be like 'need a place to stay? have you tried the inn? hahahaha... funk off.' and duarger happen. They then get befriended by the cultists and maybe do stuff there. or maybe the just head right to caer-konig and then I just do that. The druid will get killed by the crag kats probably... will mention the red yeti at some point and also that they're running out of alcohol and could use some good mead or pirate stuff. If they do both duargers then they should be level 3 by the time they get back to targos and then head to termalaine/lonelywood for sephek. I kinda hope he escapes because once the towns get destroyed I want him to join the party.