The Nobleman’s Manor

By Christopher Wilson
Self Published
OSE
Levels 3-5

A nobleman from Glaustshine, Duke Bartholomew, has taken up residence in a local hunting manor.  The manor seems to have been renovated nearly overnight and farmers in the area report that the duke seems to enjoy hunting at night, as they can hear the howling of his dogs at the edge of the Solvanus Forest late in the evening.

This 78 page adventure features a manor with three levels and about thirty rooms. It’s a social adventure, maybe? Except it’s not, it’s just a hack? Some delightful farm encounters can’t save a hack adventure, literally and figuratively, with bad descriptions.

Somehow, the party gets mixed up in this adventure. I don’t know how. You’re supposed to get an invitation to dinner at the manor when you are wandering through the woods. WHY you’re wandering through the woods near town is never expanded upon. I guess there’s a rumor table that might, eventually, lead you to go poking around in farmers fields and the like? Anyway, absolutely no hook, just somehow end up wandering in the woods so you can get an invite to dinner by the guards. (There are, by the way, about a zillion normal human “veteran” guards. Holdovers from the imperial army. I guess they follow orders well and don’t question things. It’s always amazed me WHY these dudes do what they do. The seemingly mindless and never-ending number of low level mercenaries that do their masters bidding. A paychecks a paycheck, I guess, but, I’d love to see them as a faction … the big bad cant be TOOOO obviously bad, they need to maintain a pretext, and the muscle is much more easily bribed,  in my fantasy world, I guess.) 

Once you get in I think that this is supposed to be a social adventure. Interact with the duke, his wife, their friend, and so on. Maybe while exploring the manor? And there’s a ball with elf dignitaries the next night after you stay the first night. So, I guess you’re supposed to just explore things? There are no real guidelines on how people react, when the gig is up, how they react to shit and so on. Like I said, I think this WANTS to be a social adventure but it’s not. It’s keyed and stated like a hack fest. The dukes friend gets a 2.5 page stat block, right in the fucking middle of a room description. Like, seriously, the rest of the room, MENTIONING THE FUCKING GUARDS IN IT, shows up as like a couple of sentences at the end of that stat block. What the fuck man? You want me to follow this at the table? And the entire thing is just keyed like a normal explore adventure. Different adventure types require different keying. And while I’m a big BIG fan of the standard map/room/key format, there are times when it’s not appropriate in its usual form. Like in a social adventure. No factions, the social shit is just mixed in to the room keys willy nilly so you never really know whats going on, no timelines …. It’s really that “social shit mixed in to the room keys” thing that is a major problem here. Putting the dignitary ball in the ballroom stat block, for the next night, is the best example of this.

Wanderers are meh. They are doing something but the encounters are not interesting at all. You see a ghost and it goes away. Nothing to do with the adventure. Yo usee kittens playing. There’s just nothing to the encounter details; they don’t contribute to the adventure. And not everything has to, but, if it’s not a hack encounter then it should do SOMETHING, yes?

The adventure has $12k in treasure. Enjoy trying to level on that. Also, the cover says levels three to five while one of the first sentences says levels three to four. I wouldn’t really care about that, except it’s indicative of the degree of care, or lack thereof, expressed by the designer.

Quarter to half page stat blocks to distract. Padding in the text “The characters may choose to travel through the forest during the day, or perhaps set up a camp to rest.” Descriptions, in OSE style, which miss the point of how descriptions are supposed to work in the OSE style “White gravel (carriage turn around in front of double door entrance). Stone and polished wood beams with white plaster (manor foundation and walls).” That, gentle readers, is not how an OSE description style is supposed to work.

There are a couple of highlight though. They all involve the various farm encounters you can have while traveling around through the wilderness. In one you see a boy and ox killed, disemboweled, in a field. More dead family members are in the small home. Arrayed around it are scarecrows, facing it. And another one has been set up in the living room. Super creepy man! They are “hay golems” of course, but, still, nice! No way, as a player, I’d do anything other than burn them ar first sight, but, I like the encounter! And another with a farmer who lets you stay in his barn overnight … just keep away from his daughter! Who is VERY interested in the party. I love the classics! Another has a family in the midst of being killed by brigands burning their home, while another in a classic Dingo got my baby! Encounter. These are all delightful. Nice situations for the party to find themselves in. The entire adventure needed to be like that.

So, wrong format chose, used in the wrong way. And the duke is a doppelganger assassin, is wife actually a fey hag and their friend a necromancer wight. I mourn for the future where people think this set up makes for a good D&D adventure.

This is $6 at DriveThru. The preview is five pages and tells you nothing but the irrelevant backstory. Shitty preview.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/422733/The-Noblemans-Manor?1892600