So Wizards of the Coast has a new published campaign, and for the first time in 5th Edition we are going to the far northwest of Faerun: Icewind Dale.
I have been excited to see Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden (RotF) come out because my Forgotten Realms experience began with The Crystal Shard, many, many moons ago. So just picking the book up brings back memories of the Ten Towns, Sea of Moving Ice, Kelvin’s Cairn, ambushing yetis, quarrelling fishermen, and much more.
Why “First Impressions”? I’ll be honest: I haven’t played through it yet. Thanks to generous players I have a physical copy and the Roll20 module (thank you to both of you. You know who you are.)
However, I have read through it (maybe skimmed a couple pages…) and would like to offer my thoughts at this point.
I’ll go through what the book offers, and sum up my thoughts at the end.
Icewind Dale and Ten Towns
I won’t get too much into chapters, since I want to avoid spoilers as much as possible, so instead I’ll be dealing with the “story” portion of the book as a whole (at least for the most part).
This section defines where the characters will start the game, gives historical background and current political and logistical data for each town, along with a map of the town marking points of interest. Quests are associated with each town, and far from the endless “fetch quests” so common in many MMOs, the quests are unique and well suited to the towns, the campaign, and the region in general.
I like this for a number of reasons. Obviously it provides players with a genuine sense of exploring the Ten Towns, but more than that it provides DMs with enough information to include the towns in other campaigns. The quests aren’t massive things that will take a long time to complete, but should be achievable within a session or two (depending on player’s decisions and how long you play for), providing a sense of accomplishment early on. This can also give new and struggling DMs inspiration for their own quests for homebrewed campaigns, and hopefully get them accustomed to different styles of gameplay.
Characters eventually move beyond Ten Town and into the more remote areas of the Dale. What follows is a rolling ride of locations, creatures, plot and sub-plot, harsh weather conditions, and oddities to amuse and astonish most players. More than a couple times I found myself going, “Oh…that’s cool…”.
The story is somewhat linear, but the campaign is not. It’s really like a big sandbox full of toys and distractions, where you don’t really feel like you need to rush to get to the other side of it; it’s ok to go slow and check out all the toys and cool stuff that you find. There’s a lot of fun things to explore, but large and small, and I would encourage DMs not to rush a party through this in a hurry.
Appendixes and Other Features
In addition to what looks like a great story (I haven’t played it, just read it), the book also features the following:
A trinket list specific to Icewind Dale, to complement or replace the one in the Player’s Handbook. Nicely done, it showcases the same creativity that the original list does, with a blend of mundane, odd, and downright peculiar (if not creepy) trinkets for characters to either start with or come across during their travels through the Dale.
Character secrets, which I am very fond of. I have used character secrets before, but this actually ties them into the campaign directly, which adds another dimension to them. Again, something to provide inspiration in other campaigns.
A bestiary, which at thirty-five pages certainly ranks among the largest in a published 5th Edition campaign. There’s a lot of cool stuff in here that I’ve been wanting to see in 5th, such as verbeeg, new duergar, and several cold weather beasts. Also (and I hope that this isn’t a spoiler since if you’re a true D&D nerd, you know that the Frostmaiden is the nickname for Auril, the god of winter, cold and ice), it prints useable stats for Auril herself, adding to the short list of lesser deities whose stats have been printed in 5th (not counting archdevils and demon lords printed in Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes).
A section on magic, including both new items and new spells. Admittedly, there’s not a ton of either, but there’s certainly enough to add appropriate flavour to the campaign as well as to add to the toolbox of the DM for use in other campaigns.
A large, pull out map of Icewind Dale and Ten Town. This, out of necessity, is attached to the book and must be removed along a perforated line, which means for some bibiophiles it will likely never leave the book, but regardless, it is there. All of the maps can be found (albeit in smaller form) through the rest of the book.
We also find additional rules for wilderness survival, a new sport: goat ball, and a number of other treats throughout.
What I Didn’t Like
As with anything, there may be ways that I think something could be improved upon. However, since that is true with almost any published material, I’m not going to include my thoughts on minor improvements to the story because it’s highly subjective. Overall I think the campaign is well thought out and well written, with care and attention paid to minor NPCs as well as more important ones, giving the campaign a lot of flavour and potentially making it one of the best 5th Edition campaigns to date.
However, two things stand out (I’m sure there may have been others but since I can’t remember them, obviously they weren’t that important).
First, I would have liked to see the area map (in the book, not the pullout) printed closer to the start of the book where it’s easier to find. It’s about a third of the way in, which means when I go looking for it to reference, it takes more time to locate. I think I understand why the choice was made to put it where it is, but out of overall convenience, my preference stands.
The second is goat ball. Not the game itself, but the rules. I’m going to do a post about this in the next couple days with my own homebrew rules, but as written in the book, it’s not really a game so much as a single contested group roll. I know that at least some of my players would be interested in spending part of a session actually playing goat ball, and I think I have an idea of how to handle it.
Concluding Thoughts
Icewind Dale: RotF is absolutely worth the money and the time. I can’t wait to start running it with one or more of my groups. The tools the book provides are spectacular, the story (stories) are well done, and Icewind Dale, as a setting, gets a lot of life breathed into it, not just in this campaign, but in the scope of Faerun, Toril and The Forgotten Realms as a whole.
I would also be remiss if I did not mention the artwork, which is spectacular. Cold, dark scenes look foreboding and give a genuine sense of chill, while NPCs, monsters, and maps are all rendered remarkably well.
There’s always room for improvement, but in my opinion, the entire book is very well done and the entire team that worked on this deserves a heartfelt congratulations. Well done!