I noticed a thread on ENWorld talking about starting campaigns in The Tomb of Annihilation. I read through some of it, and found most of it dealt with questions about the weather, and its effect on travel, exhaustion levels, and the effect of wearing armor in a jungle climate.
I started wondering about Chult and the jungle, how to prepare for an adventure, and how best to juggle the non-combat effects of travel, exhaustion, and direction in the jungle. I've thought about building some charts and such to help tracke them all, or at least to remind myself of them as I play. I've also seen the DM screen for the adventure setting, and I think it might be a good investment for all of those reasons.
I need to pick up a copy before I get too far into this topic. That way, I can filter out what is there, and concentrate on what is missing to prepare. For now, there are other thoughts. Namely, how to build characters and parties. This looks like a setting that will reward some non-traditional character types. In particular, rangers, rogues, barbarians, druids, monks, and arcane spell casters that are more mobile and ranged, relying less on AC and melee defenses than range and movement. Also, with spell casters of any kind, there is a benefit to choosing non-combative spells, such as Purify Food and Water, and spells that boost saving throws and skill checks.
There have always been good reasons to use a lot of these options, but this adventure path seems to really reward characters that are mobile and versatile. Even the encounters in the setting rely on puzzles and riddles as much as traditional combat aspects, further enhancing the value of any characters that have strong skill check modifiers.
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