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I’m launching an Icewind Dale campaign for my local group and, if all goes well, I’m hoping to give a ring-side sea to how the campaign is developing.

The first thing a campaign needs, of course, is the player characters. There are five PCs in the group:

• Mara Brightwood, a half-elf bard
• Wrenn Pilwicken, a gnome druid
• Ygra Dunn, a human monk
• Hugin Jorhund Athukavore Thuunlakalaga, a goliath sorcerer
• Avral Terikson, an awakened axebeak warlock

For a deeper insight into how I collaborate with my players in creating their characters, check out Running the Campaign: Designing Character Backgrounds and Dragon Heist: Creating the Characters. This series will be more narrowly focused on just introducing the characters.

MARA BRIGHTWOOD

(Created by Kristina Fjellman)

ALIAS: Mara Blackoak

Mara Brightwood, now 31 years old, was born in Neverwinter in 1461 DR, ten years after the eruption of Mount Hotenow which devastated the city and formed the Chasm in its southeast district. Her parents were the proprietors of the Frozen Bear tavern in the Blacklake District, which thankfully was spared the worst of the Ruining’s destruction. Many of the city’s nobles lived in the district, and that enclave of power helped ensure its safety even as the rest of the city struggled with the strange ash zombies and plaguechanged horrors which clawed their way out of the depths.

In the Year of Splendors Burning (1469 DR), when Mara was eight, things changed considerably. Lord Neverember of Waterdeep declared himself a descendant of Neverwinter’s dead noble family and the rightful “Lord Protector” of the city. Neverember marched into the city with Mintarn mercenaries and began spending profligately to rebuild the city’s infrastructure. Although many muttered that much of this cash was going to Waterdhavian workers and craftsmen who were being shipped up the High Road, Neverember’s presence was probably good for Neverwinter.

But not everyone agreed, and when Neverember signed a treaty with the Many-Arrows orcs which essentially surrendered the River District to them, it led to popular unrest, fomented by a number of factions, including disgruntled Neverwintan nobility. The Blacklake District was torn apart by fractious conflict and riots. The streets were filled with violence which prevented efforts to rebuild, while the Nashers robbed from the poor to finance their rebellion. As a result, most of Blacklake fell into ruinous poverty. These were hard years.

In 1479 DR, Mara was now eighteen and the civil violence was heating up considerably. These events would eventually conclude with the Siege of Neverwinter, in which a force of Thayans unsuccessfully attempted to take advantage of the chaos within the city to invade, but Mara would be long gone before then: During the Spring of Smoke, numerous buildings were burned in the riots. Among these was the Frozen Bear, a conflagration in which Mara’s parents were both killed.

It would later by revealed that a group of Asmodean cultists known as the Ashmadai, or the Messengers of the Raging Fiend, had infiltrated both Neverember’s New Neverwinter organization and many of the rebel groups, as well. They had played both sides of the conflict, escalating tensions for their own gain. It was tiefling agents of the Ashmadai who Mara saw light the fires at the Frozen Bear, and she never forgot not only who was responsible, but the corruption made possible by the ambitions of powerful men.

THE DAUGHTERS OF THE SWORD

In the wake of the destruction of the Frozen Bear and Mara’s entire life, she fled Neverwinter as a member of the Daughters of the Sword, a traveling troupe of musicians and entertainers who toured the northern part of the Sword Coast. The Daughters were an all-female group and were often considered a novelty act because of this, despite being quite talented, and they would usually perform at the Frozen Bear when they could come to

Mara had been enamored with the Daughter’s performances, and had been taken under the wing of Sanela Mushina who had first taught Mara how to play the harp. Mara had actually joined their performances on several occasions at the Frozen Bear, and it seemed perfectly natural to leave Neverwinter with them now.

Mara toured with the Daughters of the Sword for more than a decade, mostly in the northern reaches of the Sword Coast — making long passes up and down the High and Long Roads to Neverwinter, Luskan, Mirabar, Longsaddle; occasionally south of Waterdeep to Daggerford. Leveraging some of her old connections from the Blacklake District, Mara was particularly adept at making connections with noble patrons. In addition to their public gigs, the Daughters were asked to many private venues and high society events.

Mara also picked up all manner of gossip and secrets from these high-born connections, and she would actually write songs including this scandalous information… which only increased the demand for the Daughter’s performances!

At one of these soirees, Liara Portyr, niece of Grand Duke Dillard Portyr of Baldur’s Gate, heard the Daughters perform and invited them to come south to the mouth of the Chionthar River at a price they couldn’t refuse.

While in Baldur’s Gate, however, Mara uncovered a terrible secret: Several prominent patriar families of the city — including members of the Vanthampurs, one of the Council of Four grand dukes that ruled the city — were devil worshipers. Furthermore, these devil worshipers had connections to the Cassalanter noble family in Waterdeep, suggesting an axis of corrupt nobility conspiring along the length of the Sword Coast.

With flashbacks to the horrors she had experienced in Neverwinter, Mara composed “The Hellbent Highborn” to reveal what she had discovered.

This, ultimately, proved to be a mistake. An assassination attempt drove the Daughters of the Sword out of Baldur’s Gate and back up the Trade Way to Waterdeep. It seemed they had escaped the scandal and the danger, but The Hellbent Highborn pursued them: The lyrics to her song, now attached to a collection of lurid tales regarding Asmodean cultists, were published as a pamphlet of the same name by a scurrilous broadsheet publisher named Shan Chien in Waterdeep.

The Daughters of the Sword fled further north, but danger pursued them. Or, more specifically, Mara. All the ire of the cultists seemed to be aimed squarely at her. Hiding in a small inn in the tiny hamlet of Longsaddle, Mara tearfully parted from the friends who had become her family and headed north.

She hoped to disappear into the anonymity of the Luskan underworld. And, when that failed, she decided to head even farther north into the Frozenfar. Now traveling under the alias of Mara Blackoak, she seeks refuge in Icewind Dale.

DESCRIPTION

Mara is a half-elf bard. She thinks of herself as somewhat average looking, with dark brown hair and an average height and build. But she has striking blue eyes, like looking into the depths of a frozen lake. She often has her pale blue lyre of wave cypress close at hand.

Go to Wrenn Pilwicken

REVIEWS

Review: Rime of the Frostmaiden
Review: Legacy of the Crystal Shard

ARTICLES & VIDEOS

Icewind Dale: Running the Sandbox
Advanced Gamemastery: Running Icewind Dale (Video)
Sandbox & Simulation
Forgotten Realms: Arveiaturace, the White Wyrm

RESOURCES

Icewind Dale: Travel Times
Icewind Dale: Goat-Ball

CAMPAIGN

Creating the Characters

Published in 2013, Legacy of the Crystal Shard was created as part of the D&D Next playtest which bridged the 4^th Edition and 5^th Edition eras. It was designed by R.A. Salvatore with Jeffrey Ludwig, James Wyatt, and Matthew Sernett, and originally sold as a bundle including a 64-page setting book, 32-page adventure book, and four-panel DM screen, supplemented with downloadable PDFs which contained all the stat blocks necessary to run the adventure with 3^rd Edition, 4^th Edition, or the D&D Next Playtest rules (which are now “close enough” compatible with 5^th Edition). It’s now available as a print-on-demand title from the DMs Guild, combining all of these elements plus a micro-prequel adventure that was released during the D&D Encounters Launch Weekend.

I grabbed a copy of Legacy to see if the material could be adapted to flesh out the sandbox of Rime of the Frostmaiden, and this review will be embracing that and, at least in part, assessing Legacy’s value to a Rime DM.

The first thing to note is that large chunks of Rime of the Frostmaiden’s text was actually lifted directly from Legacy of the Crystal Shard. For example, here’s the first couple paragraphs of the “Life Off the Lakes” section of Rime of the Frostmaiden:

Most of the ten towns except Bryn Shander are built on the shores of three big lakes. The largest population of knucklehead trout is in Maer Dualdon, the deepest of the lakes. Redwaters, the shallowest lake, almost completely freezes in winter, making the fishing there difficult. Lac Dinneshere catches the worst of the winds blowing off the Raghed Glacier to the east and thus has the roughest waters. Small thermal vents at the bottom of these lakes keep them from freezing completely, even in the coldest winters.

Ten-Towns fishing boats are simple affairs. The smallest are rowboats and single-masted skiffs that require careful handling to avoid capsizing. Larger, twin-masted cogs and keelboats with single decks handle the wind and waves better. These ships fly the flags of their towns and provide fish for the whole community, not for any individual fisher.

And here’s the “Life Off the Lake” section from Legacy of the Crystal Shard:

Except for Bryn Shander, each of the ten towns is built on the shore of one of the three lakes where knucklehead trout swim, surrounding the mountain of Kelvin’s Cairn. The largest population is in Maer Dualdon, the deepest of the lakes.

Ten-Towns fishing boats are generally simple affairs. The smallest are one-masted skiffs, which are rowed as often as oared – not least because the harsh winds of the dale can capsize each small craft. Larger, two-masted cogs with single decks handle the wind better, and their crews exemplify the neighborly cooperation that makes Ten-Towns function. These ships fly the flags of their towns and provide fish for the whole community, not for any individual fisher.

Rime of a Frostmaiden (1489 DR) canonically takes place a few years after Legacy of the Crystal Shard (1485 DR), so there are a few minor changes. But for the most part, Rime of the Frostmaiden largely assumes that the events of Legacy of the Crystal Shard will have had no meaningful impact on the Dale, and thus large swaths of text are either directly copied or lightly rewritten like a fraternity bro trying to dodge a plagiarism detector.

However, the material in Rime of the Frostmaiden is notably incomplete in several regards. So there’s still value to be had in scooping up the Legacy campaign guide. In particular, Legacy has sizable entries given for the Reghed tribes, Kelvin’s Cairn, the Arcane Brotherhood, and, strangely (given Rime’s titular focus), the worshippers of Auril, the Frostmaiden that are absent from Rime of the Frostmaiden.

THE ADVENTURE

As noted above, the current version of Legacy of the Crystal Shard includes a Launch Day micro-adventure that takes place immediately before the primary adventure kicks off. It takes place while the PCs are traveling to Icewind Dale as part of a caravan, but despite being sixteen pages long, it consists almost entirely of a single, notably overwritten, combat encounter with a crag cat. Its usefulness, therefore, is almost nonexistent.

The primary adventure begins as the PCs’ caravan arrives in Bryn Shander and is ambushed by yetis. This encounter is quite cleverly framed, forcing the PCs to make interesting choices about what to defend and how to strategically split up their efforts.

In the immediate aftermath of the encounter, the PCs are presented with three adventure hooks, each one pointing to a different crisis which is developing in the Dale:

• A member of the Arcane Brotherhood named Vaelish Gant is attempting to establish a mafia in order to seize political power.
• An Ice Witch in the service of the Frostmaiden seeks to bring frozen devastation to the people of Ten-Towns and the Raghed tribes.
• The undead Akar Kessel has escaped from his icy prison and is corrupting the Dale with black ice created from the ruins of the legendary Crystal Shard.

If you’re a long-time reader of the Alexandrian, you might immediately identify that as the textbook introduction to a node-based scenario. Unfortunately, Legacy of the Crystal Shard doesn’t quite follow through on that promise. While the scenario is obviously striving to be open and dynamic, the book struggles to clearly present it as such using largely linear techniques.

You can see this uncertainty and confusion manifest in several ways, but perhaps the most notable is the overall structure of the campaign. In trying to grapple with the diverse and divergent continuities possible with three villainous agendas and PCs free to choose which to confront, Legacy frequently becomes mired in contingency planning, but it crucially attempts to rise about this by implementing two incompatible approaches.

First, there is a timeline of how events will play out unless the PCs get involved. This is a venerable technique, although the execution here is a little problematic: The pace at which things happen on this timeline, combined with the stated travel times in Icewind Dale, makes it exceedingly unlikely that any of the plotted adventure material in the book will be usable as written.

Second, there is an alternative structure in which (a) the PCs get to pursue two of the three threats facing Icewind Dale in Act I and then (b) whichever threat they didn’t deal with advances their schemes in an Interlude before Act II begins. This is another solid way of presenting material like this (particularly in a published adventure), but the specific execution here is once again a little sloppy, with the primary problem being that the continuity of the villains’ schemes in the Interlude don’t consistently carry through into Act II.

The discord between these two approaches combined with the awkward, reflexive use of plotted scenario techniques in an adventure desperately crying out for non-linear design results in a number of weird continuity glitches throughout the text, the most notable of which is almost certainly the rather forced “finale” in which two of the villains are revealed to have been secretly teamed up with each other the whole time in a way which makes absolutely no sense until you realize that they’d probably run out of page count and couldn’t squeeze in a proper conclusion for all three threads of the adventure.

CONCLUSION

Laying all these caveats aside, Legacy of the Crystal Shard is a really good mini-campaign. The three independent crises, mixed with the rich setting of Icewind Dale, creates a really compelling premise, which is then stocked with individual scenarios which are delightfully varied and chock full of vividly creative material: mafioso protection schemes, corrupted ice pirates, undead dragons, dwarven zombies — it’s all the stuff that gets you excited when you think about running it for your players.

If you’re getting ready to run Rime of the Frostmaiden, these scenarios can be almost seamlessly dropped into the campaign, adding some really dynamic elements that will enrich the Icewind Dale sandbox. (The only thing you’ll need to tweak, as far as I can tell, is the “Behind Bars” scenario hook on p. 104 of Rime of the Frostmaiden, which features one of the villains from Legacy of the Crystal Shard. There will almost certainly also be ways in which you’ll want to tie the villains of Legacy to the ongoing events of Rime.)

In short, I recommend Legacy of the Crystal Shard for any D&D fans. And I strongly recommend it for those DMing Rime.

Style: 4
Substance: 4

Author: R.A. Salvatore with Jeffrey Ludwig, James Wyatt, and Matthew Sernett
Publisher: Wizards of the Coast
Cost: $14.99 (PDF) or $19.99 (POD)
Page Count: 112

Go to Icewind Dale Index

Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden is designed as a sandbox. And not just in name only. It’s the real deal: A campaign where the players are empowered to either choose or define what their next scenario is going to be.

In the latest Advanced Gamemastery video, I simulate the opening sessions of a campaign in Icewind Dale, walking you through how a master GM brings the Forgotten Realms to life.

ICEWIND DALE ARTICLES
Review: Icewind Dale – Rime of the Frostmaiden
Icewind Dale: Running the Sandbox
Icewind Dale: Travel Times
Icewind Dale: Goat-Ball
Sandbox & Simulation

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Goat-ball is a team sport similar to dodgeball that’s played by goliaths. It uses a furry, misshaped ball made of stuffed goat hide and also requires a dozen or more elevated platforms (usually pillars, boulders, or tree stumps) arranged in a random pattern. Two teams leap from platform to platform, pass the ball back and forth, and try to knock their opponents off their platforms.

STARTING THE GAME: Traditionally, the ball is kicked into play by a goat and the two teams try to catch it to gain first possession. It’s not unusual, though, for a referee to throw the ball into play instead.

POSSESSION: The possessing team’s goal is to complete three passes between teammates standing on four different platforms. (You can’t just pass it back and forth between the same platforms.) Once you’ve completed three passes, the ball becomes hot. You can throw a hot ball and strike a member of the opposing team to knock them out of play. (This is referred to as a knock off even though the player does not have to be physically knocked off their platform by the throw.) If the hot throw is successful (i.e., it knocks off a member of the opposing team), the ball is placed on the platform of the player who was knocked off and remains hot and in the possession of the throwing team.

CHANGE OF POSSESSION: If the ball is intercepted, the ball hits the ground, or the player holding the ball hits the ground, the other team gains possession of the ball. (The ball is given to a player of that team’s choice.)

KNOCK OFFS: A player who is struck by a hot ball or who touches the ground for any reason is knocked off. They are eliminated from play until a change of possession.

WINNING: A team loses when all of their players have been eliminated. The last surviving team wins the game.

Note: The game is usually played by two teams, but “thunder scrums” featuring multiple teams all playing against each other at the same time can also be played.

GOAT-BALL MECHANICS

A game of goat-ball is divided into rounds, with each round being referred to as a pass.

STARTING THE GAME: When the goat kicks the ball, all players make a Dexterity (Acrobatics) check. The highest result gains possession. In the case of a tie involving multiple teams, have the tied characters roll off with an additional Dexterity (Acrobatics) check.

INITIATIVE: In each pass, the players roll initiative and declare their intended actions in reverse initiative order.

The current ball carrier makes their action declaration in secret (writing it down on a piece of paper and revealing it only after all other actions have been declared). If they are attempting a Throw, they must indicate who they are throwing the ball to or at.

ACTIONS: Characters who have been knocked off cannot take an action in the game until a change of possession allow them to rejoin the action.

• Throw: Players on the team which has possession can participate in the Throw. Every player participating in the throw makes a Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check (their choice) vs. DC 5. On a failure, they have fallen off. On a success, add the margin of success to the throw total.
• Intercept: Players on the opposing team can attempt to intercept. Every player taking the Intercept action can make a Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check (their choice) vs. DC 5. On a failure, they have fallen off. On a success, add the margin of success to the intercept total.
• Knock-Off: You can attempt to physically knock off a member of the opposing team by making a Strength (Athletics) check contested by the target’s Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check (the target chooses the ability they use). On a success, you knock them off. If the ball carrier is knocked off, the pass immediately ends and possession changes. If the target of the current Throw is knocked off, the Throw automatically fails.
• Defend: You can take a Help action to grant advantage to a character targeted by a Knock-Off action.

PASS: If a pass was attempted, compare the throw total to the intercept total. If the throw total was higher, the pass was successful and the target becomes the new ball carrier. If the intercept total was higher, the opposing team has gained possession and the character with the highest Intercept check result that round becomes the new ball carrier. (In practice, this might be due to an actual interception or the ball may have simply hit the ground.)

HOT THROWS: If three passes have been successfully completed by the possessing team, they can instead attempt a hot throw to knock out an opposing player. This is resolved like a pass, but if the throwing team succeeds, the ball carrier can make a Dexterity (Acrobatics) check with advantage opposed by the target’s Dexterity (Acrobatics) check. On a failure, possession changes. On a success, the target is eliminated and the throwing team retains possession. (In either case, the possessing team chooses the new ball carrier.)

OPTIONAL RULE: ZONES

For the purposes of resolution, you can break the field of play up into multiple zones.

• Move: Players can Move to an adjacent zone as an action.
• Throw / Intercept: Being in the same zone as the ball carrier or target grants advantage on throw and intercept checks.
• Knock-Off / Defend: You must be in the same zone as the target to attempt a Knock-Off or Defend action.
• Block: A player can attempt to block opposing players from entering their zone.

Design Note: I’m not sure what the right number of zones is. I think the sweet spot might be roughly three times as many players as zones, but it needs some playtesting.

OPTIONAL RULES: QUICK RESOLUTION

To quickly resolve a goat-ball game, simply have all the players on each team make either a Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check (their choice). Add up the total score for each time. The team with the highest total wins. In the event of a tie, the team whose player had the highest single untied check result wins. If the result is still a tie, the game ends in a draw after several exhausting hours of play.

BLOOD-BALL

Blood-ball is a variant of goat-ball in which the ball is replaced with a spear. The rules remain the same, except, of course, that getting knocked off by a spear throw can often be a lethal experience. In some cases, any knock-off is lethal in blood-ball (with all such players being executed).

Blood-ball is usually only played to resolve the most serious of clan rivalries or disputes. It may also be played as gladiatorial sport by smaller races in the decadent south (which goliaths find distasteful).

EMPOWERED GAMES

Goat-ball is usually a contest of purely physical skill, but some goat-ball games allow the use of spells or supernatural abilities. In some cases this is limited to a specific set of magical abilities. Lethal spells are usually banned (with the exception of blood-ball matches). Flying is always banned, since it largely negates the whole point of the game.

Note: Empowered games are rarely played and blood ball is never played at Wyrmdoom Crag, but they’re the kind of thing youngsters gossip about in scandalous whispers.

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