Tomb of the Tin Templar

By Jospeh R. Lewis
Dungeon Age
Cairn/OSE/5e
Levels ... 2-3?

The ancient world of Harth withers beneath its dying sun… but it’s not dead yet. Face off against electric jellyfish, tinker gnomes, and the rusted corpse of the noble Sir Tristan, as well as a few other creatures that have clawed their way into this marvelous mechanical vault. Discover windup toys, clockwork companions, and baffling devices. Negotiate with the guards and intruders alike, using clever words or whatever sharp objects are close at hand!

This six page adventure presents a small tomb dungeon with ten rooms. There are some interesting encounters, although the primary writing lacks the verve of, perhaps, a more intensive effort in evocative descriptions.

This is a small tomb of a kind of mechanical/low-fantasy steampunk paladin. The timing in emphasized with gears and steam in a few places, as well as rusty wall panels and a small troop of tinker gnomes. While I usually LOATHE tinker gnomes I’m giving them a pass here since they are not high fantasy but rather more akin to gnomes working in a workshop. It’s interesting to me that this reimagining of the tinker gnome has hit. King to the reboot of the Bond franchise with Casino Royale, it’s stripped off the more egregious streampunky aspects and is only a little jarring to see. I’m not sure they completely mesh with the mechanical man motif we’ve got going on here, but, also, that may be because things are a little weak in that department. 

It just doesn’t seem to ‘hit’ as hard as previous Dungeon Age entries in that regard. I think it’s because of the writing. The descriptions here seem a bit … mechanistic, perhaps in a “insert adjective here” sort of manner. I look at a description like “Cluttered wooden tables fill the room. Four small people sit on tall stools, working diligently.” Or even a better one like “Stone stairs spiral down, and stop at a steamy abyss. Shining metal platforms float in the darkness. Tiny blue lights glimmer all around.” I’m not sure either of those, even the second one, really bring home a really great image in the DMs head. Stone Stairs. Spiral Down. Tiny blue lights. I admit that I did the same in some of my efforts, but, also, I think there’s another step here. I think it’s taking your reworked sentences and then trying to put them together in to a cohesive whole. Something like – Now that I’ve got a better description, what does this evoke and how I can further rewrite this to bring it in to something that’s alive. I’m not telling anyone how to do things, I’m just trying to describe how I think that descriptions are close to being pretty good but just seem to be lacking that extra little reimagining that cements them. 

And that, I think, is part of what makes the mechanistic nature of the tomb so … disconnected? It just doesn’t seem to come together in any way that would lead you in to a consistent theming, in all but a paper way. Some of this may, also, be contributed to by the lack of an introduction. The intro is literally “This is a (very) small templar tomb full of treasure and danger, easily run as a one-shot or dropped into a larger campaign setting.” I think, perhaps, an additional sentence or two of lore would have helped quite a bit to set the stage and frame the content that was to come. Without that we’re relying on the weight of the descriptions to carry the load by themselves, which is possible in some cases but not overly successful here.

There are, however, some decent little encounters and vignettes. The opening to the dungeon is a cave mouth with a huge bronze gear set in to the floor with three smaller silver spheres set in to it. Solving that puzzle causes it to open up, revealing a spiral staircase going down. I think that certainly qualifies as a great appeal to a trope that brings the game to life and creates moments of awe and wonder. 

For a small dungeon, there are a couple of other nice room challenges also. That steaming abyss with its floating silver platforms … there’s water underwear and you jump from platform to platform. There are glowing blue jellyfish in the air and water, as well as a sapphire on each floating platform. Removing the jewel means the platform falls. That should be fun, both in the initial challenge and in figuring out how to collect the jewels. Those sorts of “Free form” challenges are by far my favorite. A puzzle without a solution. Left to the party to come up with a plan. Which will no doubt go wrong. THAT is one of the hearts of a good D&D game.

The jellyfish, also, is kind of fun. Slow. Numerous. Put them in a jar to act as a torch for a few hours! That’s a nice little addition! And, on a critical hit, you get shocked and your hair turns white, with a DEX loss. Nice way to push a real world effect in to the realm of fantasy. Small changes, not the end of the word changes, but a fun way to engage in play. I’m not saying every monster has to have a critical hit impact, but it was cute to see here. 

Treasure is probably light for an OSE game. There’s also a nice little “Templar Sword” that can absorb or reflect lightning damage. That’s fun … and has no plusses. No more description than that, which I enjoy. I’m looking for, overall, inspiration and not a mechanistic heavy magic item. 

This is an ok little dungeon. I’m not mad at it. It suffers, as to most small dungeons, from their lack of depth, there’s just no room to allow the environment o breathe. Maybe a nice little sub-level for an existing dungeon? I’m gonna regret this one, even though I have some reservations.

This is Pay What You Want at DriveThru with a suggested price of $1.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/485014/tomb-of-the-tin-templar?1892600