u/ExoticDumpsterFire

I’m 3 sessions into ToA. Because I want to actually finish the campaign, I’m shooting for 25 sessions or so - about a year.

For DMs who have ran the whole thing, what would you trim?

• I‘m already tweaking the hex crawl to more directly support the story, rather than an endless stream of random encounters. Moving locations around, making knowledge easier to come by, etc.
• I saw someone suggest scattering the temples of the nine gods into the jungle, to kind of double up Chapter 2 and 3. Otherwise 9 temples could be 9 sessions.
• Ive heard some people think Fane of the Night Serpent could be cut entirely.
• I don’t actually know much about the final Tomb, though I’ve heard of parties spending a year in there.

So what’s your opinion?

I read this a long time ago at my library (probably 00s) and it stuck with me. I still think of it from time to time, but I can’t remember the title or author. Hoping someone here recognizes it.

What I remember:

• The premise is that great warriors from all over the world and across history die and end up in a kind of shared “Valhalla” afterlife together. I think maybe someone was collecting them for a purpose
• One of the the main characters is Mesoamerican, I’m pretty sure he was Tlaxcalan, because it’s first time I ever saw that word. Or maybe he was Aztec fighting Tlaxcala when he died.
• The best friend was a Viking, and I recall other warriors like Zulu fighting too.
• Warriors were summoned by individual sorceresses. So they were all sort of paired up.
• The plot involves them having to defend the afterlife from some kind of invading hord.
• Lots of over the top combat and violence
• Honestly, i don’t know if it was super well written but as a teen boy it really hit the “badass“ notes. The fight sequences really stick with me - one warrior would kill lIke 200 enemies at a time.

Hoping to reread to see if my nostalgia holds up.

In 2 weeks, my party is on their first jungle expedition, down to Camp Vengence. We are using the Roll20 ToA module.

Ive never actually run a true random encounter hex crawl - only lovingly crafted, artisanal encounters since I do mostly mini-arcs. As a DM, I think doing a true random day by day roll might make my job more fun, so I’m leaning toward as written - 3 d20 rolls per day, then d100, etc.

But now I’m doubting myself. All the advice I see on YouTube and blogs and subreddits almost universally warns that it’s a slog that few players actually enjoy.

Is it really that bad to play the crawl as written? It seems to me I have 3 options:

- Run true random encounters, at least until they reach 4 or 5, then fast forward them.

- Run modified encounters, as several online resources suggest. Fewer rolls, fewer encounters, etc. But keep some randomness

- Another common suggestion, pre plan the journey and give the illusion of randomness.

So what did you do?