Thread by @hexcrawl

Our Let's Read of the #Dragonlance Saga has arrived at the final installment: DL14 Dragons of Triumph by Douglas Niles.

This adventure picks up right from the end of DL13: The PCs have just left Glitterpalace and returned to Godshome.

If you're wondering what's going on, you might want to pop back to the beginning of our Let's Read over here.

https://twitter.com/hexcrawl/status/1528081088001605634

As the PCs return to Godshome, the voice of Paladine, God of Railroads, echoes around them.

First he tells them that the entire premise of DL13 - that the dragonarmies have broken the defensive lines of the Council of Whitestone and the PCs need to go to Neraka and win the war singlehandedly - was bullshit, because the exact opposite is what actually happened.

Second, he gives them their new marching orders: Pick which PCs are going to go be the generals in the army and which PCs are going to finish the quest in Neraka.

Notably, however, he still doesn't tell them WHY they need to go Neraka.

"If I tell you, then how will you be surprised?" really is the bane of these modules.

Let me spoil this for you:

Takhisis is trying to open a permanent gate to the Abyss, which will allow her to cross over and rule the Material Plane with an iron fist.

The PCs need to stop that from happening.

(And the method, as we discussed last time, is determined randomly.)

I'm not kidding, though, when I say that, AFAICT, there's nothing in the entire Saga that tells the PCs this is what she's doing or that their goal is to stop her.

Even once they get to Neraka, the structure still seems to be just kind of wandering around until they semi-randomly stumble into the ritual site and say:

There's clearly a better way to do this: Move this entire conversation to Kalaman at the beginning of DL13 and also tell the PCs about the ritual to open the gate.

The focus of Glitterpalace/Godshome can be on portents and advancing the stakes, not establishing them late.

"Some of you need to be a strike force to prevent the gate from opening, the rest of you will be leading our armies in the counter-offensive."

... is a choice that makes a lot more sense BEFORE you've gone halfway to Neraka and somebody else has already launched the invasion while you weren't there.

If you wanted to get really fancy, you'd seed in some clues into the Saga that would let the PCs be the ones to figure out that Takhisis is trying to open a portal.

You could also go completely rogue and drop clues revealing where the ritual was being performed, so that the PCs could initiate and plan their own mission without an NPC giving them homework.

But you can also keep it simple: Some group of PCs figures out that the ritual is happening.

Then you can frame the Council in Kalaman as, "Our spies have no learned where the Dragon Queen is plotting her dark ritual."

If you do want the "Takhisis is doing a ritual!" revelation, a good place to drop those clues is probably DL9 Dragons of Deceit.

First, as written, it's the only place in the Saga where the PCs are likely to learn that Takhisis even exists.

(Although this is truly bizarre in its own right, and something you almost certainly want to adjust.)

Second, after DL9 the action cuts from Group 1 to Group 2. So you can have the revelation, "There's a terrible ritual!"

And then hit the big red CLIFFHANGER button.

In any case, DL14 consists of three booklets serving three functions. (Although the functions are not actually split up by booklet.)

1. BattleSystem scenario for the climactic battle of the war.

2. AD&D scenario for infiltrating Neraka and disrupting the ritual.

3. A sourcebook for the setting, for continuing your adventures.

"Wait, wasn't DL5 Dragons of Mystery already a sourcebook for the setting?"

Yes, but you may recall that DL5 ended up being less sourcebook and more marketing supplement. So this is a change to mulligan + give some info on Ansalon after the War of the Lance.

The Battle of Neraka is pretty straightforward.

The dragonarmies "cannot bear the thought of Neraka coming under siege" / know that we already did a siege scenario in DL8 / have limited page count, so you're given a fissured plane for your table setup.

The infiltration scenario is also fairly straightforward.

First, the PCs have to use a network of underground tunnels to infiltrate Neraka.

"Ah, yes!" you say. "I understand. The Dark Network from DL13."

No, no. A completely different network of underground tunnels totally unrelated to the network of underground tunnels from the previous adventure.

Once in Neraka, you'll find another network of underground tunnels, this time leading to the Temple of Darkness.

The Temple of Darkness is a pretty standard dungeon crawl, which leads to the final ritual chamber.

Here the players can dot their i's, cross their t's, thwart the Dragon Queen and bring the Saga to (hopefully!) a triumphant conclusion.

A final element here are the presence of the Dragon Highlords. DL14 seems interested in having their politicking and internal rivalries play a part in how the PCs maneuver their way to the final ritual (which takes place during a council meeting of the Highlords).

In practice, I once again found the Event/Encounter structure of the modules hampering the effort.

There's something potentially interesting muddled in there, but I think you'll have to do a lot of work to piece it altogether.

Toede is also present, having been recalled from Istar and implausibly promoted to a Highlord himself in the time it took the PCs to sail from DL12 to DL13.

It feels as if the climactic Battle of Neraka should be happening simultaneously with the grand finale of the Ritual.

See:
- Luke and the Emperor, Return of the Jedi
- Frodo and Sam at Mt. Doom, Lord of the Rings

Etc.

But there's a logic problem the authors can't quite overcome:

If the Highlords are all at the Ritual, who's commanding the dragonarmies?

So the decisive battle happens at 1pm and... doesn't decide anything.

Then the Highlords all leave the battlefield at 4pm and pop back to Neraka for the ritual.

My solution to this would probably be to give the Highlords some sort of scrying orbs of command, so that they can lead their troops from within the sanctuary itself.

You could introduce these earlier as some sort of counterpart to the dragon orbs.

So, at long last, the Dragon Queen has been defeated!

Takhisis and Paladine leave this plane of existence and return to the divine realm. Looking up into the night sky, the PCs can see their constellations once again hanging in their rightful places!

... oh, yeah. Did I forget to mention that the constellations of Paladine and Takhisis have been "missing since the start of the DRAGONLANCE epic"?

Man, what an embarrassing oversight!

... guess who else forgot to mention that?

That's right! The entire DL series of modules!

To tie this all back around to the beginning: The missing constellations would actually be a great hook for explaining the original 5 Year Mission of the Innfellows/PCs.

Why have the constellations disappeared?

Is it a sign?

Or have the gods finally abandoned us entirely?

Thus framed, the missing constellations are the very first moment of the entire campaign.

The reason for their absence can be given definitively in Sanction (Takhisis) and Godshome (Paladine).

And their restoration thus gloriously concludes the epic.