Top 10 Dungeons & Dragons Campaigns for Beginners: Easy Adventures to Start Your D&D Journey
“I think I want to play D&D.”
You’ve heard it from friends, family members and strangers. They’ve heard of the game from friends or the internet or (most likely) from you because you’re dice-hoarding, dragon-slaying, crit-rolling warrior who loves to delve into dungeons and have a great time playing Dungeons & Dragons with your pals.
So how do you introduce the newbie to the game?
You want to choose the right campaign for beginners. You want an adventure that introduces them to the game in a way that intrigues them without scaring them off. An escapade that teaches the rules without being overbearing. Basically: Don’t chase them off. Keep them coming back for more!
Understanding Beginner-Friendly Campaigns
What makes a campaign beginner friendly?
The obvious: It has to be exciting for the beginner.
Good advice for DMs of all stripes: Pick something that suits your players. If they’re dying to get into high fantasy and dragon slaying, do that. If they like gothic horror, you have options there. If they want a heist or pirates or ghosts or werewolves or monster hunting, pick an adventure that features those things. If they want a dungeon crawl and you pick a campaign filled with political intrigue, they might not come back for the second sessions.
Any beginner-friendly adventure should be straightforward. The players shouldn’t have to do a lot of discovery. There should be simplicity and clear objectives from the get-go. Someone needs to be saved. An item needs to be found. An evil needs to be rooted out. Make sure the goals are compelling but uncomplicated.
While most official D&D adventures don’t include them (outside of the excellent Starter Set products), think about offering pre-generated characters. Numerous websites have loads of them, but the easiest way to pick a character is to head to dndbeyond.com and pick from their list of 35 characters (many of whom are based on iconic characters from D&D media such as Baldur’s Gate and the D&D cartoon).
Alternately, you can create a character using dndbeyond.com’s Quick Build feature, where you choose a class, species and name of your character. It even auto-fills all the other choices, so you can whip up a new character in about two minutes. Easy stuff.
Tips for Choosing the Right D&D Campaign for Beginners
So you have some ideas on where you want this adventure to go. There are a few other things to think about, especially for the Dungeon Master.
Consider the experience level of the DM. Is the DM new, too? If so, they’ll be learning the rules along with the players, so something that really lays out the rules for you such as a Starter Set, which assumes everyone playing is brand new and introduces rules to everyone with game elements designed to teach.
Use comprehensive guides and resources that will help you play the campaign. Even if the DM is super experienced, everyone will benefit from . When I ran Curse of Strahd, I was immensely helped by an online guide that enhanced the information I found in the sourcebook. Even players can benefit from guides as long as they’re not cheating by revealing secrete information their characters shouldn’t know.
Make sure players are interested and engaged. An adventure that quickly gets to the point is good. A standard D&D session is about three hours, so within that first session, you’ll want the adventure to be kicked off: Typically with introductions of characters (often in a tavern!), something to compel them into action (a quest!) and the first combat encounter (let’s fight!) to end the session.
Balance combat and role-playing elements. Though combat is exciting and players are often concerned with how much damage they’ll do, D&D isn’t only for combat. The best adventures for beginners include a good mix of swordplay, spellcasting, exploration, conversation, discovery and intrigue. Finding traps, picking locks, meeting NPCs, sneaking past guards and exploring new dungeon rooms are a huge part of the experience that aren’t related to fighting at all.
Top 10 Dungeons & Dragons Campaigns for Beginners
With all that in mind, what are the best D&D adventures for beginners? We picked 10 official D&D adventures that are great for newbies.
Dragons of Stormwreck Isle
Don’t overlook the Starter Set. Several versions have been published (including some based on Stranger Things and Rick & Morty), but the latest is the Dragons of Stormwreck Isle, which features the prototypical D&D story people might be looking for when they first try the game. It’s also inexpensive (about $15 on Amazon) and includes everything you need to play: a set of dice, an adventure book, a rulebook and five pre-filled character sheets. (Read our full review.) It also eases everyone into the rules with encounters designed to explain things to new players.
Dragon of Icespire Peak
An expansion on the starter set idea, the D&D Essentials Kit also has everything you need to play (dice, character sheets, an adventure book, etc.) as well as helpful cards, a 1-vs.-1 rule system and other stuff that improve the D&D experience. Dragon of Icespire Peak is a bit more of an advanced adventure. It runs to higher levels and it’s more of a sandbox without a rigid narrative structure. Adventurers act like heroes for hire, traveling the countryside and completing quests.
Waterdeep: Dragon Heist
Assemble your crew. It’s time to steal a big pile of gold. This has been called the perfect starter adventure for D&D because of the wondrous urban setting of Waterdeep as well as the loads of characters to meet and mingle with. The mission is straightforward and it’s a great way to immerse new players in the setting as well as give plentiful opportunities to roleplay and get into big fights.
Curse of Strahd
A fantastic introduction to gothic horror, Curse of Strahd is both simple (there’s an evil and ancient vampire with an iron grip on the land of Barovia) and complex (Count Strahd von Zarovich can only be defeated with magical artifacts that could be hidden almost anywhere in this accursed realm). The goal is straightforward, but achieving it is the adventure. The fun is in how your party pulls off the ultimate vampire hunt.
Storm King’s Thunder
This is an epic adventure for players that has clear guidance for DMs. Giants run amok. And our heroes, standing in the frozen wasteland of the Savage Frontier, have to make a choice: Stand with the giants or stand against them. The whole adventure is one big sandbox, and the choices for players make them feel like they’re driving the story. Meanwhile, the DM has a handy flowchart to guide you through the adventure. No matter what your players pick, you’ll be ready to guide them through.
Tales from the Yawning Portal
If you’re not quite ready for a full adventure, try out this collection of shorter adventures perfect for new players. It’s a mix of old adventures redone for the latest D&D rules. Some are more recent while others are D&D classics. Now, that doesn’t make these adventures easy. Tomb of Horrors, for example, was specifically designed to buzz through players like a wood chipper. It’s nearly impossible. But that’s kind of the fun of that one, and every D&D player should try it at least once. That said, adventures like The Sunless Citadel and The Forge of Fury are great for first-timers, and it includes dungeon crawlers like the epic Dead in Thay.
Watch out for that Tomb of Horrors. It’s rough.
Ghosts of Saltmarsh
If you’re looking for something spooky and straightforward but with a slight twist, take a trip to Saltmarsh. Adventurers are tasked with investigating a haunted house outside of town, and there’s more than meets the eye. After discovering what’s at the heart of the menacing mansion on the hill, adventurers complete the adventure by heading out on the high seas.
Tyranny of Dragons
This is a classic dragon-themed adventure with beginner-friendly elements. The Cult of the Dragon have allied with the nefarious Red Wizards of Thay to free Tiamat, the five-headed dragon goddess, from her prison in the Nine Hells. That’s no good. They should probably be stopped. So it’s a race to stop the cult from terrorizing the land and bringing their notorious goddess to reign destruction upon anyone. (Spoilers: If you don’t manage to stop the cult, they raise Tiamat. And you have one EPIC story to tell.)
The Wild Beyond the Witchlight
A strange carnival, a faerie realm and simple adventure locating and defeating the hags who have taken control. Plus, all encounters can be resolved without combat, rewarding clever ideas and players who aren’t into fighting. Simply put: It’s really, really fun. And for DMs, it includes story tracker, roleplaying cards and maps to help navigate the campaign.
Candlekeep Mysteries
This anthology compiles 16 different one-shot adventures, and it spans adventures from levels 1 to 16. There’s something in this for every gaming group. The basic premise for each adventure is that you’re on a search for a particular missing book from the arcane Candlekeep Library, but the beauty is that you can pick and choose any single adventure to play any time without weaving them together. Perfect for groups looking to try out D&D for just one night.
Choosing the right campaign for a group of new players is so important. Get something they like and take your time exploring. Once you step foot into the world of D&D, there are countless adventures, innumerable epic quests and limitless entertainment in store for you.
Welcome to Dungeons & Dragons.
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About The Author
Kevin Coffey
Kevin is the editor-in-chief of Crit For Brains. He's also a husband and dad, full-time reporter and part-time Dungeon Master.
