So I have stewed on this a while now. I have recently just posted this eg in a thread on ENWorld talking about what you don't like in a game. I did not say I would 'walk out' on a game for anything short of very bad behaviour from a fellow player, but did mention I did not like 'no choice' sort of situations.
Now this fight with the blue dragon certainly got some coverage over at ENWorld simply b/c it is such a powerful dragon vs low level party. I have no qualms about this. I don't expect to win every fight. It is a dragon. Don't fight it openly.
The part I did not like about the situation was we were clearly 'meant' to go to the keep. So, we, the heroes run for the keep whilst the dragon and cultists and kobolds continue to kill all of the common townsfolk? I really did not get that, even though it was strongly hinted we needed to go to the keep several times?
I know my PC was never going to do that when more commoners kept appearing in trouble. It is situations like this where I get a little peeved as a player.
Maybe Blair can shed some light on how the module approaches this, but from what we went through I am suggesting there is very little there. Blair ended up sending the 'force' to us. I was wondering whether anything like that was in the module. Surely if the PCs are making a stand then the local authorities may want to help? Anyway, I just felt frustrated that there seemed to be one obvious choice and we were 'dumb' for not taking it, when that is exactly what my PC was about. Not leaving common folk to die when he can help. Seemed odd.
“It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.” – Harry S. Truman