Adventurers League: The Old Order Changeth!

Anyone who is followed the Marvel Comics series the Avengers is familiar with the phrase "The Old Order Changeth!". In all frankness, the same could be said of each season of Adventurers League. Starting yesterday, the 30th of August, Season 8 set in the urban sprawl of Waterdeep initiates the biggest change of them all.


Season 2: The adventurers go from Phlan to Mulmaster.


Season 3: Hillsfar replaces Mulmaster as the primary region. Oh, sanity loss is a major concern as the Madness rules are used a lot.


Season 4: Not only do the adventures leave the Moonsea area; but they leave Faerun altogether. PCs stumble about within the Demi-plane of Dread. Barovia to be precise. They're stuck there and can't leave until completing certain quest points.


Season 5: The focus of adventures leave Barovia unless they're unfortunate enough to be stuck there such as one of my PCs. I'd have to DM a couple modules to garner enough Downtime Days to free the PC. Been going on a couple years... but I digress. Anyway, the PCs operate within the Sword Coast. Region is dictated by level Tier.


Season 6: Regions, bah. We don't need to worry about a specific region. Let's go dungeon crawling instead!


Season 7: Bye, bye European environment! Jungle adventurers here we come! What, there's a death curse?! Death, pretty much means death unless you've reached Tier 3 Season 7 modules with a PC... Egads! Sure, came January, there was an opt out clause. However, you'd have to swear off much of the Season (Tiers 1 & 2). CCCs became... questionable.


Season 8: Huzzah! Resurrection magic is back again! Furthermore, plus PCs are once again operating on the Sword Coast. Waterdeep to be precise. However, Waterdeep is an urban sprawl compared to the Moonsea and is home to the mega-dungeon of Undermountain.


That, however, only scratches the surface of the changes. The experience, treasure, and gold system is changing. For example, under the old order, I wondered how a 5th level PC could afford to cast Revivify. 1,000 gold pieces is a luxury in Tier 1. After playing Tier 2 modules, the material cost is within reach. Under the new system, forget about it. You'll be lucky if a PC cleric has the resources to cast to Revivify!


A topic for another blog installment. I've only skimmed the rough draft of the new rules. Much reading awaits. Yet, a mammoth change invites further thoughts. So I will be blogging my opinion on them in the future.


Happy Gaming!


Next time.