D&D Encounters: War of Everlasting Darkness

I would be remiss not to touch on the last season of D&D encounters, as it felt like a vast improvement over the previous two seasons I have participated in. You may recall my previous complaints about D&D Encounters and its overemphasis on combat. This season tried hard to showcase the other aspects of D&D. There was a lot going on each session.

This adventure in this season of D&D Encounters was reminiscent of the sorts of adventures you would see during the hey day of 2nd Edition AD&D. The story is as follows: there is some crazy evil magic turning the sky black in the Forgotten Realm; the PCs are travel all over the realms collecting artifacts, seeking allies, and doing the sorts of things one does in an epic fantasy adventure; things conclude with a crazy boss-fight. The adventure was still ultimately a rail-road, as each weekly session needed to lead into the next, but each individual session was also a lot more free-form. At the store I play at we often have 2-3 tables playing, and each week the path through the adventure would vary greatly between tables. In the previous D&D seasons the only variety came from how the different groups approached combat. The big win this season was that each session featured a lot more to do beyond fighting monsters.

Ameron from Dungeon’s Master has an extensive write up about what he liked and didn’t like from the last season. I’m curious to hear more from fans of 4th Edition about how they found the changes made to Encounters this season.

I’m looking forward to what they do in the next season of D&D Encounters. The teaser for the adventure sounds like just my sort of thing:

This D&D Encounters season takes inspiration from classics such as Village of Hommlet and Against the Cult of the Reptile God. Not only does this new story feature characters and locations from beloved past adventures, but there’s another compelling reason to participate.

Players will be able to choose to play using the D&D Next rules or the 4th Edition rules. I’m hoping there is enough interest at the Silver Snail—where I play—to try out the new edition.

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