SF9 – Duel of Magic

This is the ninth module in the Frog God Games Splinters of Faith adventure path. Each module has a stand-alone adventure of they can all be linked together to form a campaign in which the lowly PCs advance in power, reconstruct an artifact, and battle the Big Bad. In each of these modules we get a description of a good temple and a description of an evil temple which is the adventure site.

In this installment we visit with two differing god of magic, one good and one evil. Our good temple is a rather boring structure however it does have two notable features: the magic students practice their arts out in the open for the townsfolk, giving it it a circus sideshow feel, and the Angel trapped in a block of crystal that stands in the middle of the main temple done. The city the temple is located in is a seaside/docks kind of place where everyone lives in peace and harmony, thanks to efforts of the local magic temple. The adepts clean walls, cure the sick, do public works projects, and generally turn the place in what a REAL society would look like if magic was present and common. I am not a big fan of this sort of thin. I like my magic rare and my items weird. Other than the brief mention of a side-show atmosphere, and the angel, which is part of the adventure hook, the place, and the city, is a little bland. Although, you could probably work some kind of Stepford Wives/Orwellian vision of the city based on the temples public works.

The adventure takes place at the evil temple of magic, up the side of a nearby mountain. 14,000 feet up. It’s a slog to get up there and there are rules for altitude sickness and acclimation. Strangely enough there is no wandering monster chart for the ascent or the evil temple. This is made even stranger because the ascent is going to take something like 18 days in order to fully acclimatize. (Two days for each 1000 feet above 8k, 1/2 day to climb 1000 feet.) And no wandering monsters. Go figure.

The temple proper reminds me of that old Role Aids modules Lich Lords. In the temple we have some priestess-wizards of the evil magic-user god, each of which has some hook. The evocation master. The necromancy master, etc. There’s a ghost priestess-wizard, and a medusa priestess-wizard, and so on. There’s an entry which states that they all plot against each other unless under a common threat but there are no additional details given except for a brief mention that one of them would gladly work against the high priestess and turn on the party if it helped her. It’s disappointing.

The temple proper is set on two floors with a small dungeon underneath. That’s ‘dungeon’ as in ‘prison’ rather than ‘dungeon’ as in ‘chock full of adventure.’ There are a couple of interesting encounters in the temple; mirrors of opposition, tricky demons/devils, and creatures from the pit and the like. For the most part though it’s just a slog through an evil magic-user temple. If the party sneaks in and is careful then it could be a nice stealth mission to learn the secrets of the hook and free some prisoners that the party doesn’t really know exists. If the party wades in and hacks their way through then they are going to have a tough fight with all of the evil magic-users and their minions.

Overall the adventure feels a little bland and forgettable. It’s lacking in tricks, traps, encounter flavor, and memorable environments. It feels an awful lot like the Temple of Elemental Evil, only smaller.

This is $5 at DriveThru.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/93865/Splinters-of-Faith-9-Swords-and-Wizardry-Edition?affiliate_id=1892600