Ultimate Greyhawk & Tales from the Yawning Portal

Let me tell you about a place called Greyhawk.

I haven’t had a chance to do more than a fast scan of WotC’s new hardcover, Tales from the Yawning Portal. I have to say I was super happy to have a bunch of adventures from across D&D’s history converted 5e. Especially The Sunless Citadel, which was the first D&D adventure I ever ran and Against the Giants, a classic I’ve been dying to run for a long long time.

The 5e version of Against the Giants is set for 11^th level characters and fits perfectly into the Ultimate Greyhawk campaign I hope to run one day. I also think that it might be useful as a guide to convert older D&D modules to 5e. The thing I’ve noticed is that treasure and magic in old modules tend to be on the high side. This may be because that’s how xp was gained back in the day, but it’s an easy thing to fix.

Traditionally, the Steading of the Hill Giant Chief is placed in the Jotens between Sterich and Geoff. I feel however that for a campaign that features the Temple of Elemental Evil, it would be better served placed in the Kron Hills. I feel that there is much more incentive for the players to get involved if the giant raids begin happening in the area they have spent so much time in. At an appropriate time, I would have a mixed contingent of giants and their allies attack Homlet and then have the players decide how and if they will track the raiders back to the Steading.

Fee Fi Foe Fum, I smell the blood of  adventurers!

Finally, this would lead the players into the Underdark and all the way to the Vault of the Drow. One of the story elements I really liked from D&D 4e was that it was Lolth’s Webs that had chained and imprisoned Tharizdun. In order for the Chained God to be free, Lolth’s webs needed to be weakend and destroyed. Thus, in my mind at any rate it makes much more sense of why the drow are involved in all this and how you can make allies from enemies.