The playtest is complete! I’m collecting feedback this weekend and will start building out the rest of the campaign. Let’s talk about the playtest!

I’m writing a homebrew campaign in the style of a Hades-esque roguelike. I’m playtesting it with my group before I run it for real! These posts talk about my experience making a campaign like this from the ground up.

What went well

  • DM Prep sheet

I consolidated a lot of my reference material into one document. This allowed me to have fewer things to reference during the session. This felt a lot more organized, and I feel like I ran things more smoothly this time.

  • Priority determination

Instead of randomizing who got first pick of the room reward, we had a static order. This helped players get a fair turn at selecting the next reward.

  • Pacing

The group had a similar number of encounters as last time, so that was good. They had a much rougher run this time, dying twice and getting pretty unlucky. Regardless, I think the fact that they still got to about four rooms means that this floor is about the right size for low-level adventurers.

  • Fun

Even though they got into some bad situations, people still said they had fun! Everyone is still interested in playing the full campaign!

What needs work

  • First room

The first room is still very rough. The group had more than one encounter with the first room this time, but the dice were against them—generating tougher encounters and having the enemies score critical hits surprisingly frequently.

Because of this and player feedback, I’m considering a slightly modified table for the first room that will have a more restricted selection of enemies, plus reducing the number of enemies that can be in the first room.

  • Lingering debuffs

Shadows can reduce your Strength score for the rest of the run. An intellect devourer can eat your brain and replace it. A rust monster can impose a permanent attack and damage roll penalty on your metal weapons. Wights can reduce your maximum HP. A mummy can curse you so that you can’t heal.

Many of the monsters I’m using here have effects that linger after you defeat them. Players have had to track these lingering effects and have felt them inhibit their performance in later rooms. I think these lingering effects are the hardest on low-level characters without resources like greater restoration or higher to-hit bonuses.

I’m going to look at these effects and see if I can either tone down their effect or their duration. I’ll probably decrease the duration of these effects to be for the length of the encounter, or something like that.

Next steps

I’ve got more work to do! I’m collecting feedback from a survey, building out the final areas and boss fights, completing the room rewards pool, fleshing out NPCs and the tavern area… there’s a lot left before the campaign is ready to go. But everyone is excited, and I’ve received really helpful feedback from my players!