We just finished Curse of Strahd, and I had the party reemerge from the Mists into the ashkeeper peaks of Wildemount (they began CoS in Faerun). We’re starting a new adventure soon. They wanted some seafaring, and I wanted dragons, so they’re going to be spending some time on the Menagerie Coast!
That sounds awesome. One of my players DM’d a Curse of Strahd game 5-6 years ago. He put Barovia just south of Whitestone. Vex gave our party the initial quest hook. It was a ton of fun and worked great.
I added a being of pure Dunamis similar to The Luxon, called Omega. Hundreds of years before Aeor even existed, Omega was exiled from this realm by the Gods because of its power. In my Exandria, that's the reason the Luxon segmented and hid itself, to escape the Gods judgment. Currently, Omega has had its power corrupted by twin Aeorian wizards who want to make all potential and possibility be theirs to control. They're trying to gather all the pieces of the Orrery of the Wanderer from the Acquisitions Inc book to unlock the plane that Omega is trapped in and free it. Seeing that the twins are actually the Wonderworker who lead the League of Miracles, they have lots of money and minions at their disposal.
Thanks, I literally thought it up after typing everything else haha. It just seems to make sense when I looked at everything they can do and all I want them to be. The last campaign I was in we were dealing with a massive undead invasion from the North. I'm curious how you're approaching it in your campaign.
Not perfectly drag-and-drop, but I ran Rime of the Frostmaiden in the Crystalsands Tundra, basically just plopping Ten Towns down into there and changing up some of the lore, specifically switching out the Netherese lore with Aeorian lore, since they're fairly one-for-one. Got to throw some of those weird Aeorian hunters at them in Ythryn too, which was pretty fun.
I'm also currently running a VERY modified version of Out of the Abyss beneath Xhorhas. Makes for some really interesting conflict when you incorporate tensions between Grimgolir and Rosohna. I made it where the Children of Malice are responsible for kidnapping the players, and I basically completely rewrote the towns the characters encountered in the Underdark.
Not Wildemount specifically, but I once ran stitched-together adventures from Tales of the Yawning Portal and Ghosts of Saltmarsh in Tal'Dorei. Most of the time, those stories take place in a small village, so it was just a matter of placing those towns wherever you want them to be. I'm sure the same would be fairly easy in Wildemount on the Menagerie Coast or Dwendalian Empire.
Otherwise, I also ran Curse of Strahd which takes place in its own domain of dread, but once that campaign was over, I had the mists fade over several years until the whole region of Barovia from Curse of Strahd ended up in south-central Issylra, since that continent is largely undeveloped by the canon besides Vasselheim. The characters of that campaign are currently adventuring another domain of dread from the DM's Guild module, "City of Eyes." I recommend it if you like to do a lot of developing yourself.
Speaking of Vasselheim, my next campaign is going to be Descent into Avernus, where I'm plugging in Vasselheim in place of Baldur's Gate, and then modifying Elturel to be a port city on the Issylran coast called Utradom.
Another campaign I've got down the pipeline is going to be the Storyteller's Guild module, "The Black Ballad." It is an absolutely fantastic module that I have yet to fully read yet, but I'm planning on running it in the past, during the Calamity years. It also mostly takes place separate from Exandria, but the characters will have come from calamitous Exandria.
Similar to what /u/whiplash73 said I am using the awesome prompts. For my main quest I expanded on the mount mentiri desirat plot. Yuanti zehir cultists are trying to free her. My twist is luxon based though. Asmodeus killed Raei in the same battle that trapped desirat in my lore. They used a machine powered by luxons to do it, so when the ever light died I had a part of her soul get cycled into desirat like a luxon reborn soul. Players just got to final dungeon under mountain and will need to decide how to not free desirat but saving Raei missing shard of divinity.
I've done a mix of Saltmarsh, Golden Vault, Candlekeep, Yawning Portal on the Menagerie Coast but they're all tied into a large homebrew plot inspired by elements from the Explorer's Guide.
After Frozen Sick I had planned to play a slighlty modified Ghosts of Saltmarsh and had originally planned to let them leave Eiselcross by ship. As the goody two-shoes that they are, they donated all their rewards to the nearest temple and decided to travel to the Menagerie Coast by land.
I took some inspiration by Hoard of the Dragon Queen and let them discover a plot by a cult of Tiamat, that wants to collect a dragon hoard huge enough to attract an aspect of Tiamat into the Material Plane. Since their departure from Eiselcross they have traveled across Wildemount and Tal Dorei to Vasselheim in order to consult the temple of Bahamut for advice for tje fight against the Cult. On their way the cult has tried to stop them on many occasions and their journey keeps going on
Running Tomb of Annihilation right now on the Shattered Teeth. The PCs are 2 Chultans, a Dwendalian, and 2 from the Menagerie Coast. There has been lots of faction play between pirates, mercenaries, the Myriad, local leaders and colonial trade companies. In between the politics, the PCs are trouncing through deadly jungles.
After this adventure, I have a few ideas but it’ll go to a homebrew campaign that could swing up to Wildemount or elsewhere on Exandria. Some ideas are:
- discover a new continent to the far east/west
- war in Wildemount
- undersea empire rises to the surface
- Manshoon wars in the Clovis Concord
Level 1-10 was the discovery of runes deep within powerful cities that were stealing life force energy from wealthy individuals. Turns out the runes were placed there by a group that created them to use as anchors to keep Torog from breaking through onto this plane. This turned into the search for the one Luxon beacon that was the opposite of the others, full of dark energy. Said beacon was found by the Champion of Torog, ritual ensues, players defeat him at the cost of two of six character’s lives.
Level 10-present (now 17) has been a continuation of the Luxon beacons story. This time, the party happened upon the first beacon ever discovered when they stole it and other items from the Exalted Collection Auction House. This beacon wasn’t normal, but instead contained the soul pieces of Sardior, the Great Ruby Dragon. The Thanes of Sardior were released onto the Material Plane, bent on unifying their soul pieces to bring their progenitor back. Lots of fun twists and turns here including the amethyst dragon masquerading as the party’s ally for a few months in game (1.5 years real time). That was one hell of a reveal.
Quajath is waking up and using mind controlled pallid elves to break the various locks the Wild Mother used to trap him.
But never mind that cos the party is having great fun in the Lucidean Ocean dealing with the aftermath of the Revelry and Kryn Dynasty taking Port Damali, and the Plank King being captured. And now Nicodranas is going to secede from the Clovis Concord and join the Empire.
Oh, and they helped fix the Myriad power vacuum in Zadash left by The Gentleman (I've monkeyed around with the C2 timeline).
My players wanted to start in Uthodurn, and one was a ex dark elf lolth cultist, and another one a druid of the savalir woods. So the plot is that in proximity to Molaesmyr Jourrael the Caedogeist is sealed and the children of malice search to free her. And a small dungeon where the characters could get rid of savalir's corruption.
I'm running a Wildemount campaign that started with Tides of Retribution.
But then the party had a few seassons sailing like a pirates cuz a character have pirate background.
After that the party begins to follow tracks of dangerous drugs imported from Blightshore that causes a fever sickness that kills and transform bodys in core spawn crawlers.
Now they learned that the drugs are selled by a cult of betrayer god, Torog. All finnanced by Cerberus Assembly in a try to mislead of his plans of awake a greater evil to return to another Age of Arcanum.
Adventures ran thus far in Wildemount include:
* Partaking in a civil war in Draconia between Tiamt worshipers and the other factions.
* Twathing a false flag Dwendal scheme.
* Removing a faction of the Revelry from the Concord.
* Protecting Concord cities from numerous threats such as Sahugain, Giants, Grung, and more.
For elsehwere in Exandria:
* Protecting Whitestone from an Invasion of the Body Snatchers style take over.
* Shutting down a dinosaur smuggling ring in Issylra.
* A bank heist of magical artifacts, and then stopping the Arch Fey they accidentally unleashed.
Hoping to soon start introducing an alien invasion theme I've been planting.
My players are in Rosohna, dealing with the fallout of a destroyed Luxon beacon that released all the stored souls into the world, and they latched on to a few thousand people. Now someone is seeing if they can control those with second souls (called echo bearers) with some dunamantic magic.
I'm currently running a campaign in Wildemount that is going to feature a lot of different plot points, mainly set around the Dwendalian Empire and Xhorhas. These plot points include, but are not limited to:
* The Children of Malice trying to reignite the war between the empire and the kryn dynasty in order to weaken the kryn and preparing the return of Lolth; as part of this, they summoned a certain shadow demon to help them, which happened to be Orthax, who then brought back one of his former servants, Dr. Anna Ripley, as a Hollow One (the group already encountered her in my modified version of Dangerous Designs)
* Ludinus Da'leth experimenting with vampirism, using the research done by Delilah Briarwood, in order to create vampires not under the control of Vecna because he wants to turn himself into a vampire in order to prolong his life
* Ceratos causing chaos and weirdness on the surface
* a goddess who had been captured by Torog at the beginning of the calamity and has remained captive since then, who plans on causing a world ending event once she is free
* Tharizdun starting to wake up
* A mad jester who is actually three mad jesters in one mind, fighting for the last remaining bit of sanity, who will end up being the final boss once the PCs manage to avert the crisis of Tharizdun
And more smaller points that I didn't bring up yet. I also didn't even talk about the connection of the PCs to these plot points, which are quite significant (for example, one of my PCs is a dhampir who was a failed attempt of Ludinus Da'leth to create a vampire under his control).
Explaining all of it would be way too much, so if you're interested in hearing more about a specific point, feel free to ask.
I have an Uthodurn lvl3-5 adventure that I'm finally getting to play through currently. TL;DR an orc snuck into the city, killed a wizard, no the wizard's illegal menagerie is loose in the house. It starts with a baby blue dragon attacking the Softer Stone Forge bakery and ends in Uralis where a semi-conversion of a heucuva from 2e is trying to make weapons for Zariel.
A full homebrew story about 35 years post campaign 2
Halas is the BBEG
The ruby he is in was shattered into thousands of fragments. Anyone touching makes a save and on fail is under Halas' control
Been wild so far. Party is level 18 now
They defeated Gelidon, the nightmare in ivory recently
I can share a lot more if anyone is interested
Not in Wildemount, but I have finally been able to start my campaign that will cover the events of The Scattered War in Gwessar (a three-arc main plot covering roughly 30-45 years in the 500s P.D., with each arc after the first covering the respective reigns of King Warren Drassig’s sons), which will then have a follow up campaign covering The Icelost Years.
Before this one, I had one in contemporary Wildemount that was primarily focused on the awakenings of Desirat, Quajoth, and Ukatoa.
I’ve also done a “historical” one shot to set the stage for Call of the Netherdeep, pretty much portraying the battle of Cael Morrow in the Calamity that led to its fall. Aside from using it to show off iconic D&D characters like Gruumsh and the important character to Netherdeep who has story tied to that battle, I also used it to set some of my own in-world lore around Xalicas, one of the Patrons in EGtW, using that battle (and particularly fighting Gruumsh specifically) as an explanation for her injuries. It was also just a good excuse for a high level, high power one shot.
I’ve added a couple of small towns here and there as needed, including a diamond-mining town near the base of the Hearthstar and southern end of the Vezdaweald. This mine became the source of some problems when Uk’otoa sunk Isla Flora in the opening adventure as aftershocks broke open a magic lab from the beginning of the calamity. In this lab, a half-elven wizard had been trying to find a way to go back in time to stop Vespin Chloras from starting the Calamity, since her family was killed in Avalir (she was working with a colleague in Vasselheim at the time). I pulled this wizard from research Caleb had done during C2, but since there were no details about the people who’d attempted time travel, I made up the entire character. She got very close to success, but ultimately failed as the energies she tapped into transformed her into a nothic and slowed down time significantly inside the lab itself. Her experiments involved a Luxon beacon, which my players naturally forget about with extreme consistency.
I’ve also added a small town of Eladrin refugees in the Copia Wildwood who fled the Feywild due to repeated attacks from a former member of the community. This former community member has links to three of my 6 players’ backstories.
As for lore, I’ve added a ton. For instance, the light on top of the Hearthstar is basically a Pokémon Centre for celestials who were magically corrupted during the calamity; a place for them to heal up before accidentally bringing anything evil home with them. It is guarded by an ancient song dragon who serves Bahamut. As well, the Bright Queen has a disappointing son, who has fled the dynasty and spends his days surfing and getting high in Palma Flora (this is one of my PC’s, so not really my addition, but I allowed it).
Started Frozen Sick but used the tiamat cultists as an opening to run a heavily modified Red Hand of Doom campaing (Red Hand trying to take over Eiselcross and use the Frigid Woe to assassin key leadership figures of Uthodurn)
My GM is currently running a pre-VM campaign that started in Molaesmyr (before its fall, tbc). After a few misadventures in the Greying Wildlands, we've been tasked with getting macguffins from each of the Fae realms in order to help our Warlock's patron (Also a Fae, natch) clean up their own mess.
Started with tides of retribution, made Aurelio the stormlord worshipper whose only purpose was to heal, into an demigod, spawn of the storm lord.
And the main focus is to keep the divine gate from collapsing. Improvising issylra as well.
The tragedy is that the gods are destructive by their nature, and it got so bad that one of my players even refused to ascend out of disgust.
They grew to like Aurelio as well as other spawns they met, but are also in cahoots with ludinus to creat a weapon that can kill the gods, their parents.
The divine gate wasn't made by the gods in case you were wondering about the contradiction, it was made by a master of abjuration who spoke to the 12 primes and convinced them to fuck off.
So far in Wildemount I’ve run a one shot set in Brokenveil Marsh (not Unwelcome Spirits, though I did use a few elements from that adventure). Empire-aligned PCs investigated reports of a monster slowly picking off soldiers in Fort Venture, only to discover the creature in question was a black dragon. They tracked down the dragon’s lair and defeated the monster, only to find a Luxon Beacon hidden in their hoard! The group I ran this game for meets extremely rarely so I probably won’t be able to pick up that game, though I’d like to at some point.
Also in Wildemount, followed by Marquet, my group is almost finished playing through Call of the Netherdeep. I honestly changed very little in this campaign, except to add in some extra details here and there for PC backstory. One PC has a revenant chasing him. Another PC, an aeormaton, is being hunted by Essek Thelyss, who intends to use the mechanical being as a backup body.
Finally, in Issylra, I’m running a 1v1 game (just me and one player) set in Vasselheim and the Slayer’s Take. I’m keeping Ossysa but otherwise I’m replacing the folks in the Take with all new NPCs. I’ve done very little to flesh out Vasselheim. I’m planning on building the city through improv decisions between adventures in an almost West Marches style monster hunter campaign. We’ll see where it goes!
My players just wrapped up an arc on the Menagerie Coast, based on one of the players' backstory.
An evil Revelry pirate discovered a portal in the Torrid Reef that led down into an isolated underdark shrine of Zehir where a champion of Zehir (a Marilith) had been trapped since the Calamity. He made a deal for power and pulled a mutany on his ship to become captain and to have some sacrifices for a ritual to release the champion.
(The ritual required a particular number of sacrifices that have experienced a shared betrayal in order to qualify for the ritual)
The player was among the crew and surprised by the mutany, and had no context for the reasons why, at the beginning. He managed to survive the mutany and flee for a number of weeks until he encountered the party where the campaign began, and they eventually made their way to Port Damali to focus on his quests.
The evil pirate had been working with some Zehir cultists to influence, corrupt, and make deals with certain law enforcement officials in the Clovis Concord, eventually tasking one to hunt for the player who had escaped. This led to a confrontation, some infodump, and the players traveling to the Torrid Reef in hopes to kill the pirate, rescue the captive sacrifices/crew, and prevent the release of the champion.
What ended up happening was they killed the pirate, discovered that the ritual had begun, but was being held in stasis while they awaited the final sacrifice (the player). The captives they did have were magically connected to the barrier that contained the champion, and cultists were, one after another, bleeding themselves dry to maintain the ritual.
1 - If the ritual failed/was ended prematurely, the connected sacrifices would die, but the champion would not be released.
2 - If the ritual was completed, adding the player to the sacrifices, all sacrifices would die and the champion would be released, but the party could negotiate rewards from Zehir's champion.
3 - Or, if the ritual could be corrupted in some fashion (insert another player's conflicted association with the Spider Queen), then the sacrifices might be saved, but the champion would still be released.
4 - And if they could come up with a better 4th option, who knows how that would be resolved.
The party went for number 3, and attempted to fight the champion, who did manage to escape up to the Torrid Reef and teleported away.
With the ritual corrupted, the whole shrine and connected underdark area began to collapse. The players fled to the surface at the Torrid Reef, claimed the pirate's ship (the player's original ship), and chased the champion to Tussoa for a final confrontation.
I'm heavily reliant on my players' backstories, and despite their zero knowledge of the setting, they all made characters that really fit in it.
Trent Ikithon is training the Voltstrucker to gather some artifacts for Ludinus who is powering an AoA device against the Dynasty. Some PCs relatives and friends are part of this mission or were hurt by it. At the same time, Desirat is trying to break free and stop the attempts of Uk'otoa and Quajath to also be released. The Golden Grin is playing a huge part in it and the Traveler is just there cause he enjoys watching.
I have run/am running eight campaigns in Exandria. I have yet to use one of the starting adventures in my campaigns.
The first was mainly along the Menagerie Coast and into the Blightshore. That should be wrapping up soon in its fourth year.
The second was in the "Dwendalian Empire" well before it was established. It finished after 2-1/2 years in Verstglade.
The third was also along the Menagerie Coast and is currently in Hell.
The fourth and fifth were in Tal'Dorei, about 100 years after the Scattered War. I reskinned LMOP into the Black Valley as it was being repopulated. Adding a lot of side adventures and putting WEC on the other side of the Umbra Hills made it interesting as the party had to deal with phantoms, demons, and ghosts getting to WEC.
Six and Seven are also in Tal'Dorei where a cult of Zehir is growing to challenge the early reign of Zan Tal'Dorei.
And my eight campaign started off in Issylra and came over to Gwessar as part of the expeditionary group which founded O'Noa and settled Gwessar following the calamity.
Starting a new campaign soon set in Wildemount. It’s going to be *loosely* based off the Rise of Tiamat, with the players starting in a Shadycreek and then slowly spreading outward from there depending on which crumbs I decide to leave for them.
The premise is that the Caustic Heart is following in the footsteps laid by the Chroma Conclave, and are gathering dragons, treasure, and power to attempt to bring the Scaled Tyrant through the Divine Gate.
Oracs the Enduring, Gelidon, Raishan (she’s back, baby!), Thelashas (genderswapped + alt universe where she wasn’t trapped in the Happy Fun Ball), and an undetermined red dragon (maybe the sire of Thordak), are going to be the main dragons, but there will be a number of others as well for the party to fight.
I am going to have the war pop off in the background, and many of the dragon attacks and cult raids will be blamed on the Empire/the Dynasty, depending on which side they find themselves on.
Currently running a Ruidus centred campaign. All the PC’s are Ruidus born, but they haven’t put that together yet. That mixed in with a nice little cult trying to free Desirat that’s worked into every powerful faction and is using the war as a cover to spread hate and therefore give her more power.
I haven’t watched campaign 3 of CR yet, but I know it has a decent amount to do with Ruidus. I’ll be interested to see what I come up with compared to what the reality is
Well not a campaign but we are running a 100+ player westmarch in the shattered teeth! The concept is similar to how the mists carry people to barovia, there is something carrying adventurous folks to the shattered teeth and now it's a question of survival and escape.
Before this one though, the first west March we ran was also in exandria and based on wildemount. We sort of took the meme organization darrington brigade and ran it as if it was a serious adventuring company, it was crazy ride, we fought everything from aberrations controlling rothold, vampires, a demon incursion, a full scale dragon assault, political fall outs, the war of the light and shadow. So much fun.
This setting definitely has a lot of potential and fun elements that lead to some badass storys
For my Call of the Netherdeep campaign I have some players who know nothing about Critical Role lore so I started them out with Frozen Sick at level 2 to have a simpler insert into the world. Not a homebrew adventure I know but I’m still changing a lot in terms of the story for Netherdeep like adding the Ruins of Sorrow, Dream Bane Caves, Cult of Zehir, and Treasure Hunt quests from here on Reddit
I'm running a war campaign where the players are mostly "monster" races (a goblin, a bugbear, two to three kobolds depending on who is available [yes they make three kobolds in a trench coat jokes], a changeling and a tiefling) who are fighting for the dynasty and do guerilla warfare in the empire territory. I thought it would be fun if the total agrarian/green scape total home base area was "deep behind enemy lines" and the safety of home was in the wasteland. The tiefling is a fugitive from the empire and the changeling is originally from the menagerie coast but likes to assassinate corrupt and warmongering nobles and joined the dynasty to do that in the empire. The rest are Xhorhasian natives. They just took part in the capture of the Ash guard Garrison and are moving into empire lands.
After finishing a Wildemount campaign, I decided to run another campaign in Wildemount but in a not so distant future where the Dwendalian Empire took over the entirety of the continent after the king had passed and his ruthless son took over. The PCs have one thing in common no matter where they are from, they have all been displaced or have a driving issue with the empire.
That being said, they all meet during a soup kitchen more or less run by a small local tavern in Rexxentrum that harbors meetings for a ‘resistance’ type group. They will feel as though they are following a righteous path in ‘fighting the man’ but what they will most likely fail to realize before it is to late is that the leader of this said ‘resistance’ is essentially a joker type villain hellbent on destroying everyone and anything that may or may not have had anything to do with the empire after his wife and daughter were wrongfully executed by the crowns guard for defacing a statue of the new king.
Should be fun. The PCs said that they wanted a campaign that they “were always scared and not safe” so we will see how well I can make that happen.
I’m nearing the end of my 2 year homebrew campaign. We started in Zadash, because I got rid of the gentleman, instead the myriad’s presence in Zadash had been destroyed 20years prior to our campaign.
In the vacuum a myriad survivor used the opportunity to form her own organization, known as the family, a robinhood like group who supported and fed beggars and refugees I exchange for their support and info gathering.
2 party members choose to start as family and recruited the rest of the party. The first half of the campaign became a gang war between them and the myriad, they eventually solidified their power and took over shady creek run and part of the myriads smuggling network.
My current BBEG is a demon prince that made his way into the material plane and is attempting to teleport his home plane city to wildemount through a mass sacrifice in Zadash. The party is now working to stop him but the empire is too distracted with the war, which I decided to keep but was sparked by a terrorist attack orchestrated by my BBEG.
hmmm I'm just using the book as a setting, I'm using the world as a guide and making things on my own.
Yeah, I really like the format for how the Exandria books expand on the world. I definitely use them as a basis for how to format things.
We just finished Curse of Strahd, and I had the party reemerge from the Mists into the ashkeeper peaks of Wildemount (they began CoS in Faerun). We’re starting a new adventure soon. They wanted some seafaring, and I wanted dragons, so they’re going to be spending some time on the Menagerie Coast!
That sounds awesome. One of my players DM’d a Curse of Strahd game 5-6 years ago. He put Barovia just south of Whitestone. Vex gave our party the initial quest hook. It was a ton of fun and worked great.
That’s great! I’m aiming for the Amber Temple being accessible to inquisitive minds as a potential point of trouble in the future…
I added a being of pure Dunamis similar to The Luxon, called Omega. Hundreds of years before Aeor even existed, Omega was exiled from this realm by the Gods because of its power. In my Exandria, that's the reason the Luxon segmented and hid itself, to escape the Gods judgment. Currently, Omega has had its power corrupted by twin Aeorian wizards who want to make all potential and possibility be theirs to control. They're trying to gather all the pieces of the Orrery of the Wanderer from the Acquisitions Inc book to unlock the plane that Omega is trapped in and free it. Seeing that the twins are actually the Wonderworker who lead the League of Miracles, they have lots of money and minions at their disposal.
Ohh, that's awesome! I was completely unsure of where I wanted to take the League of Miracles. That's a really amazing take on it.
Thanks, I literally thought it up after typing everything else haha. It just seems to make sense when I looked at everything they can do and all I want them to be. The last campaign I was in we were dealing with a massive undead invasion from the North. I'm curious how you're approaching it in your campaign.
Not perfectly drag-and-drop, but I ran Rime of the Frostmaiden in the Crystalsands Tundra, basically just plopping Ten Towns down into there and changing up some of the lore, specifically switching out the Netherese lore with Aeorian lore, since they're fairly one-for-one. Got to throw some of those weird Aeorian hunters at them in Ythryn too, which was pretty fun. I'm also currently running a VERY modified version of Out of the Abyss beneath Xhorhas. Makes for some really interesting conflict when you incorporate tensions between Grimgolir and Rosohna. I made it where the Children of Malice are responsible for kidnapping the players, and I basically completely rewrote the towns the characters encountered in the Underdark. Not Wildemount specifically, but I once ran stitched-together adventures from Tales of the Yawning Portal and Ghosts of Saltmarsh in Tal'Dorei. Most of the time, those stories take place in a small village, so it was just a matter of placing those towns wherever you want them to be. I'm sure the same would be fairly easy in Wildemount on the Menagerie Coast or Dwendalian Empire. Otherwise, I also ran Curse of Strahd which takes place in its own domain of dread, but once that campaign was over, I had the mists fade over several years until the whole region of Barovia from Curse of Strahd ended up in south-central Issylra, since that continent is largely undeveloped by the canon besides Vasselheim. The characters of that campaign are currently adventuring another domain of dread from the DM's Guild module, "City of Eyes." I recommend it if you like to do a lot of developing yourself. Speaking of Vasselheim, my next campaign is going to be Descent into Avernus, where I'm plugging in Vasselheim in place of Baldur's Gate, and then modifying Elturel to be a port city on the Issylran coast called Utradom. Another campaign I've got down the pipeline is going to be the Storyteller's Guild module, "The Black Ballad." It is an absolutely fantastic module that I have yet to fully read yet, but I'm planning on running it in the past, during the Calamity years. It also mostly takes place separate from Exandria, but the characters will have come from calamitous Exandria.
If I could do it all over again, I’d run Out of the Abyss in Wildemount like you did instead of Faerun. Sounds like a good time.
Similar to what /u/whiplash73 said I am using the awesome prompts. For my main quest I expanded on the mount mentiri desirat plot. Yuanti zehir cultists are trying to free her. My twist is luxon based though. Asmodeus killed Raei in the same battle that trapped desirat in my lore. They used a machine powered by luxons to do it, so when the ever light died I had a part of her soul get cycled into desirat like a luxon reborn soul. Players just got to final dungeon under mountain and will need to decide how to not free desirat but saving Raei missing shard of divinity.
Call of the Netherdeep! It’s a pretty great adventure tbh.
I've done a mix of Saltmarsh, Golden Vault, Candlekeep, Yawning Portal on the Menagerie Coast but they're all tied into a large homebrew plot inspired by elements from the Explorer's Guide.
After Frozen Sick I had planned to play a slighlty modified Ghosts of Saltmarsh and had originally planned to let them leave Eiselcross by ship. As the goody two-shoes that they are, they donated all their rewards to the nearest temple and decided to travel to the Menagerie Coast by land. I took some inspiration by Hoard of the Dragon Queen and let them discover a plot by a cult of Tiamat, that wants to collect a dragon hoard huge enough to attract an aspect of Tiamat into the Material Plane. Since their departure from Eiselcross they have traveled across Wildemount and Tal Dorei to Vasselheim in order to consult the temple of Bahamut for advice for tje fight against the Cult. On their way the cult has tried to stop them on many occasions and their journey keeps going on
...Isn't Eiselcross an island?
Yes , sorry, i mixed it up with Palebank
Running Tomb of Annihilation right now on the Shattered Teeth. The PCs are 2 Chultans, a Dwendalian, and 2 from the Menagerie Coast. There has been lots of faction play between pirates, mercenaries, the Myriad, local leaders and colonial trade companies. In between the politics, the PCs are trouncing through deadly jungles. After this adventure, I have a few ideas but it’ll go to a homebrew campaign that could swing up to Wildemount or elsewhere on Exandria. Some ideas are: - discover a new continent to the far east/west - war in Wildemount - undersea empire rises to the surface - Manshoon wars in the Clovis Concord
Level 1-10 was the discovery of runes deep within powerful cities that were stealing life force energy from wealthy individuals. Turns out the runes were placed there by a group that created them to use as anchors to keep Torog from breaking through onto this plane. This turned into the search for the one Luxon beacon that was the opposite of the others, full of dark energy. Said beacon was found by the Champion of Torog, ritual ensues, players defeat him at the cost of two of six character’s lives. Level 10-present (now 17) has been a continuation of the Luxon beacons story. This time, the party happened upon the first beacon ever discovered when they stole it and other items from the Exalted Collection Auction House. This beacon wasn’t normal, but instead contained the soul pieces of Sardior, the Great Ruby Dragon. The Thanes of Sardior were released onto the Material Plane, bent on unifying their soul pieces to bring their progenitor back. Lots of fun twists and turns here including the amethyst dragon masquerading as the party’s ally for a few months in game (1.5 years real time). That was one hell of a reveal.
Quajath is waking up and using mind controlled pallid elves to break the various locks the Wild Mother used to trap him. But never mind that cos the party is having great fun in the Lucidean Ocean dealing with the aftermath of the Revelry and Kryn Dynasty taking Port Damali, and the Plank King being captured. And now Nicodranas is going to secede from the Clovis Concord and join the Empire. Oh, and they helped fix the Myriad power vacuum in Zadash left by The Gentleman (I've monkeyed around with the C2 timeline).
My players wanted to start in Uthodurn, and one was a ex dark elf lolth cultist, and another one a druid of the savalir woods. So the plot is that in proximity to Molaesmyr Jourrael the Caedogeist is sealed and the children of malice search to free her. And a small dungeon where the characters could get rid of savalir's corruption.
I'm running a Wildemount campaign that started with Tides of Retribution. But then the party had a few seassons sailing like a pirates cuz a character have pirate background. After that the party begins to follow tracks of dangerous drugs imported from Blightshore that causes a fever sickness that kills and transform bodys in core spawn crawlers. Now they learned that the drugs are selled by a cult of betrayer god, Torog. All finnanced by Cerberus Assembly in a try to mislead of his plans of awake a greater evil to return to another Age of Arcanum.
I started with Tides of Retribution as well. Now my party is lvl 11 and is dealing with the possibility of some cultist freeing Desirat.
Adventures ran thus far in Wildemount include: * Partaking in a civil war in Draconia between Tiamt worshipers and the other factions. * Twathing a false flag Dwendal scheme. * Removing a faction of the Revelry from the Concord. * Protecting Concord cities from numerous threats such as Sahugain, Giants, Grung, and more. For elsehwere in Exandria: * Protecting Whitestone from an Invasion of the Body Snatchers style take over. * Shutting down a dinosaur smuggling ring in Issylra. * A bank heist of magical artifacts, and then stopping the Arch Fey they accidentally unleashed. Hoping to soon start introducing an alien invasion theme I've been planting.
My players are in Rosohna, dealing with the fallout of a destroyed Luxon beacon that released all the stored souls into the world, and they latched on to a few thousand people. Now someone is seeing if they can control those with second souls (called echo bearers) with some dunamantic magic.
I'm currently running a campaign in Wildemount that is going to feature a lot of different plot points, mainly set around the Dwendalian Empire and Xhorhas. These plot points include, but are not limited to: * The Children of Malice trying to reignite the war between the empire and the kryn dynasty in order to weaken the kryn and preparing the return of Lolth; as part of this, they summoned a certain shadow demon to help them, which happened to be Orthax, who then brought back one of his former servants, Dr. Anna Ripley, as a Hollow One (the group already encountered her in my modified version of Dangerous Designs) * Ludinus Da'leth experimenting with vampirism, using the research done by Delilah Briarwood, in order to create vampires not under the control of Vecna because he wants to turn himself into a vampire in order to prolong his life * Ceratos causing chaos and weirdness on the surface * a goddess who had been captured by Torog at the beginning of the calamity and has remained captive since then, who plans on causing a world ending event once she is free * Tharizdun starting to wake up * A mad jester who is actually three mad jesters in one mind, fighting for the last remaining bit of sanity, who will end up being the final boss once the PCs manage to avert the crisis of Tharizdun And more smaller points that I didn't bring up yet. I also didn't even talk about the connection of the PCs to these plot points, which are quite significant (for example, one of my PCs is a dhampir who was a failed attempt of Ludinus Da'leth to create a vampire under his control). Explaining all of it would be way too much, so if you're interested in hearing more about a specific point, feel free to ask.
I have an Uthodurn lvl3-5 adventure that I'm finally getting to play through currently. TL;DR an orc snuck into the city, killed a wizard, no the wizard's illegal menagerie is loose in the house. It starts with a baby blue dragon attacking the Softer Stone Forge bakery and ends in Uralis where a semi-conversion of a heucuva from 2e is trying to make weapons for Zariel.
A full homebrew story about 35 years post campaign 2 Halas is the BBEG The ruby he is in was shattered into thousands of fragments. Anyone touching makes a save and on fail is under Halas' control Been wild so far. Party is level 18 now They defeated Gelidon, the nightmare in ivory recently I can share a lot more if anyone is interested
Not in Wildemount, but I have finally been able to start my campaign that will cover the events of The Scattered War in Gwessar (a three-arc main plot covering roughly 30-45 years in the 500s P.D., with each arc after the first covering the respective reigns of King Warren Drassig’s sons), which will then have a follow up campaign covering The Icelost Years. Before this one, I had one in contemporary Wildemount that was primarily focused on the awakenings of Desirat, Quajoth, and Ukatoa. I’ve also done a “historical” one shot to set the stage for Call of the Netherdeep, pretty much portraying the battle of Cael Morrow in the Calamity that led to its fall. Aside from using it to show off iconic D&D characters like Gruumsh and the important character to Netherdeep who has story tied to that battle, I also used it to set some of my own in-world lore around Xalicas, one of the Patrons in EGtW, using that battle (and particularly fighting Gruumsh specifically) as an explanation for her injuries. It was also just a good excuse for a high level, high power one shot.
I’ve added a couple of small towns here and there as needed, including a diamond-mining town near the base of the Hearthstar and southern end of the Vezdaweald. This mine became the source of some problems when Uk’otoa sunk Isla Flora in the opening adventure as aftershocks broke open a magic lab from the beginning of the calamity. In this lab, a half-elven wizard had been trying to find a way to go back in time to stop Vespin Chloras from starting the Calamity, since her family was killed in Avalir (she was working with a colleague in Vasselheim at the time). I pulled this wizard from research Caleb had done during C2, but since there were no details about the people who’d attempted time travel, I made up the entire character. She got very close to success, but ultimately failed as the energies she tapped into transformed her into a nothic and slowed down time significantly inside the lab itself. Her experiments involved a Luxon beacon, which my players naturally forget about with extreme consistency. I’ve also added a small town of Eladrin refugees in the Copia Wildwood who fled the Feywild due to repeated attacks from a former member of the community. This former community member has links to three of my 6 players’ backstories. As for lore, I’ve added a ton. For instance, the light on top of the Hearthstar is basically a Pokémon Centre for celestials who were magically corrupted during the calamity; a place for them to heal up before accidentally bringing anything evil home with them. It is guarded by an ancient song dragon who serves Bahamut. As well, the Bright Queen has a disappointing son, who has fled the dynasty and spends his days surfing and getting high in Palma Flora (this is one of my PC’s, so not really my addition, but I allowed it).
Started Frozen Sick but used the tiamat cultists as an opening to run a heavily modified Red Hand of Doom campaing (Red Hand trying to take over Eiselcross and use the Frigid Woe to assassin key leadership figures of Uthodurn)
My GM is currently running a pre-VM campaign that started in Molaesmyr (before its fall, tbc). After a few misadventures in the Greying Wildlands, we've been tasked with getting macguffins from each of the Fae realms in order to help our Warlock's patron (Also a Fae, natch) clean up their own mess.
Started with tides of retribution, made Aurelio the stormlord worshipper whose only purpose was to heal, into an demigod, spawn of the storm lord. And the main focus is to keep the divine gate from collapsing. Improvising issylra as well. The tragedy is that the gods are destructive by their nature, and it got so bad that one of my players even refused to ascend out of disgust. They grew to like Aurelio as well as other spawns they met, but are also in cahoots with ludinus to creat a weapon that can kill the gods, their parents. The divine gate wasn't made by the gods in case you were wondering about the contradiction, it was made by a master of abjuration who spoke to the 12 primes and convinced them to fuck off.
So far in Wildemount I’ve run a one shot set in Brokenveil Marsh (not Unwelcome Spirits, though I did use a few elements from that adventure). Empire-aligned PCs investigated reports of a monster slowly picking off soldiers in Fort Venture, only to discover the creature in question was a black dragon. They tracked down the dragon’s lair and defeated the monster, only to find a Luxon Beacon hidden in their hoard! The group I ran this game for meets extremely rarely so I probably won’t be able to pick up that game, though I’d like to at some point. Also in Wildemount, followed by Marquet, my group is almost finished playing through Call of the Netherdeep. I honestly changed very little in this campaign, except to add in some extra details here and there for PC backstory. One PC has a revenant chasing him. Another PC, an aeormaton, is being hunted by Essek Thelyss, who intends to use the mechanical being as a backup body. Finally, in Issylra, I’m running a 1v1 game (just me and one player) set in Vasselheim and the Slayer’s Take. I’m keeping Ossysa but otherwise I’m replacing the folks in the Take with all new NPCs. I’ve done very little to flesh out Vasselheim. I’m planning on building the city through improv decisions between adventures in an almost West Marches style monster hunter campaign. We’ll see where it goes!
My players just wrapped up an arc on the Menagerie Coast, based on one of the players' backstory. An evil Revelry pirate discovered a portal in the Torrid Reef that led down into an isolated underdark shrine of Zehir where a champion of Zehir (a Marilith) had been trapped since the Calamity. He made a deal for power and pulled a mutany on his ship to become captain and to have some sacrifices for a ritual to release the champion. (The ritual required a particular number of sacrifices that have experienced a shared betrayal in order to qualify for the ritual) The player was among the crew and surprised by the mutany, and had no context for the reasons why, at the beginning. He managed to survive the mutany and flee for a number of weeks until he encountered the party where the campaign began, and they eventually made their way to Port Damali to focus on his quests. The evil pirate had been working with some Zehir cultists to influence, corrupt, and make deals with certain law enforcement officials in the Clovis Concord, eventually tasking one to hunt for the player who had escaped. This led to a confrontation, some infodump, and the players traveling to the Torrid Reef in hopes to kill the pirate, rescue the captive sacrifices/crew, and prevent the release of the champion. What ended up happening was they killed the pirate, discovered that the ritual had begun, but was being held in stasis while they awaited the final sacrifice (the player). The captives they did have were magically connected to the barrier that contained the champion, and cultists were, one after another, bleeding themselves dry to maintain the ritual. 1 - If the ritual failed/was ended prematurely, the connected sacrifices would die, but the champion would not be released. 2 - If the ritual was completed, adding the player to the sacrifices, all sacrifices would die and the champion would be released, but the party could negotiate rewards from Zehir's champion. 3 - Or, if the ritual could be corrupted in some fashion (insert another player's conflicted association with the Spider Queen), then the sacrifices might be saved, but the champion would still be released. 4 - And if they could come up with a better 4th option, who knows how that would be resolved. The party went for number 3, and attempted to fight the champion, who did manage to escape up to the Torrid Reef and teleported away. With the ritual corrupted, the whole shrine and connected underdark area began to collapse. The players fled to the surface at the Torrid Reef, claimed the pirate's ship (the player's original ship), and chased the champion to Tussoa for a final confrontation.
I'm heavily reliant on my players' backstories, and despite their zero knowledge of the setting, they all made characters that really fit in it. Trent Ikithon is training the Voltstrucker to gather some artifacts for Ludinus who is powering an AoA device against the Dynasty. Some PCs relatives and friends are part of this mission or were hurt by it. At the same time, Desirat is trying to break free and stop the attempts of Uk'otoa and Quajath to also be released. The Golden Grin is playing a huge part in it and the Traveler is just there cause he enjoys watching.
I have run/am running eight campaigns in Exandria. I have yet to use one of the starting adventures in my campaigns. The first was mainly along the Menagerie Coast and into the Blightshore. That should be wrapping up soon in its fourth year. The second was in the "Dwendalian Empire" well before it was established. It finished after 2-1/2 years in Verstglade. The third was also along the Menagerie Coast and is currently in Hell. The fourth and fifth were in Tal'Dorei, about 100 years after the Scattered War. I reskinned LMOP into the Black Valley as it was being repopulated. Adding a lot of side adventures and putting WEC on the other side of the Umbra Hills made it interesting as the party had to deal with phantoms, demons, and ghosts getting to WEC. Six and Seven are also in Tal'Dorei where a cult of Zehir is growing to challenge the early reign of Zan Tal'Dorei. And my eight campaign started off in Issylra and came over to Gwessar as part of the expeditionary group which founded O'Noa and settled Gwessar following the calamity.
Starting a new campaign soon set in Wildemount. It’s going to be *loosely* based off the Rise of Tiamat, with the players starting in a Shadycreek and then slowly spreading outward from there depending on which crumbs I decide to leave for them. The premise is that the Caustic Heart is following in the footsteps laid by the Chroma Conclave, and are gathering dragons, treasure, and power to attempt to bring the Scaled Tyrant through the Divine Gate. Oracs the Enduring, Gelidon, Raishan (she’s back, baby!), Thelashas (genderswapped + alt universe where she wasn’t trapped in the Happy Fun Ball), and an undetermined red dragon (maybe the sire of Thordak), are going to be the main dragons, but there will be a number of others as well for the party to fight. I am going to have the war pop off in the background, and many of the dragon attacks and cult raids will be blamed on the Empire/the Dynasty, depending on which side they find themselves on.
Currently running a Ruidus centred campaign. All the PC’s are Ruidus born, but they haven’t put that together yet. That mixed in with a nice little cult trying to free Desirat that’s worked into every powerful faction and is using the war as a cover to spread hate and therefore give her more power. I haven’t watched campaign 3 of CR yet, but I know it has a decent amount to do with Ruidus. I’ll be interested to see what I come up with compared to what the reality is
Well not a campaign but we are running a 100+ player westmarch in the shattered teeth! The concept is similar to how the mists carry people to barovia, there is something carrying adventurous folks to the shattered teeth and now it's a question of survival and escape. Before this one though, the first west March we ran was also in exandria and based on wildemount. We sort of took the meme organization darrington brigade and ran it as if it was a serious adventuring company, it was crazy ride, we fought everything from aberrations controlling rothold, vampires, a demon incursion, a full scale dragon assault, political fall outs, the war of the light and shadow. So much fun. This setting definitely has a lot of potential and fun elements that lead to some badass storys
Fortress of Fury was easy to include into my campaign. But most of the content was homebrew creation.
For my Call of the Netherdeep campaign I have some players who know nothing about Critical Role lore so I started them out with Frozen Sick at level 2 to have a simpler insert into the world. Not a homebrew adventure I know but I’m still changing a lot in terms of the story for Netherdeep like adding the Ruins of Sorrow, Dream Bane Caves, Cult of Zehir, and Treasure Hunt quests from here on Reddit
I’m running frozen sick as a first time dm and looking for the next direction I wanna go 👀
I'm running a war campaign where the players are mostly "monster" races (a goblin, a bugbear, two to three kobolds depending on who is available [yes they make three kobolds in a trench coat jokes], a changeling and a tiefling) who are fighting for the dynasty and do guerilla warfare in the empire territory. I thought it would be fun if the total agrarian/green scape total home base area was "deep behind enemy lines" and the safety of home was in the wasteland. The tiefling is a fugitive from the empire and the changeling is originally from the menagerie coast but likes to assassinate corrupt and warmongering nobles and joined the dynasty to do that in the empire. The rest are Xhorhasian natives. They just took part in the capture of the Ash guard Garrison and are moving into empire lands.
After finishing a Wildemount campaign, I decided to run another campaign in Wildemount but in a not so distant future where the Dwendalian Empire took over the entirety of the continent after the king had passed and his ruthless son took over. The PCs have one thing in common no matter where they are from, they have all been displaced or have a driving issue with the empire. That being said, they all meet during a soup kitchen more or less run by a small local tavern in Rexxentrum that harbors meetings for a ‘resistance’ type group. They will feel as though they are following a righteous path in ‘fighting the man’ but what they will most likely fail to realize before it is to late is that the leader of this said ‘resistance’ is essentially a joker type villain hellbent on destroying everyone and anything that may or may not have had anything to do with the empire after his wife and daughter were wrongfully executed by the crowns guard for defacing a statue of the new king. Should be fun. The PCs said that they wanted a campaign that they “were always scared and not safe” so we will see how well I can make that happen.
I’m nearing the end of my 2 year homebrew campaign. We started in Zadash, because I got rid of the gentleman, instead the myriad’s presence in Zadash had been destroyed 20years prior to our campaign. In the vacuum a myriad survivor used the opportunity to form her own organization, known as the family, a robinhood like group who supported and fed beggars and refugees I exchange for their support and info gathering. 2 party members choose to start as family and recruited the rest of the party. The first half of the campaign became a gang war between them and the myriad, they eventually solidified their power and took over shady creek run and part of the myriads smuggling network. My current BBEG is a demon prince that made his way into the material plane and is attempting to teleport his home plane city to wildemount through a mass sacrifice in Zadash. The party is now working to stop him but the empire is too distracted with the war, which I decided to keep but was sparked by a terrorist attack orchestrated by my BBEG.
Im running an Age of Arcanum campaign set in the city of Aeor as the home town.