The Haunt

By Phil Beckwith
P.B. Publishing
5e
Levels 4-5

In ages past, an ancient town was lost and destroyed to a seige of orcs. Only one building survived and to this day, the manor is the only still standing building to be seen for miles around. Some say it is haunted, a few whisper of great treasures within, whilst others whisper that it is the manor itself that lives!  No one knows for sure, only that a great evil haunts its halls. Do you dare enter Montarthas Manor?!

This sixteen page adventure presents 24 rooms in a two floor haunted house. If you liked the Dwimmermount chess players then this adventure is for you. Otherwise, it’s just a collection of what not to do in an adventure.

For [reasons] you are entering an abandoned manor home. You know the deal, tired old generic you were hired or you need a place to stay or it feels evil shit. You approach. There are front doors. You try to enter them but you cannot, in any way, open them. Then, as you turn to leave, the doors open with a creeeeaaakkkk. Welcome to this adventure, where the tropes are done childishly and the adventure is a railroad.

You are not adventuring here. You are EXPERIENCING this. Because it’s a railroad. It’s all telegraphed through a series of simplistic vignettes that tell you how to feel and what to think instead of showing you. There is the front door thing, it not opening until you turn your back on it after trying. Because a front door opening on itself with a creak is c00L! No mention of the doors, windows, roof, or anything else. YOU WILL DO AS THE DESIGNER INSTRUCTS YOU!! You want free will? You want to explore? You want some player agency? Fuuuuucccckck you! “A portcullis blocks the way up until the party has explored at least 5 rooms on the Ground Floor (in total)” It’s clear what is meant to happen. There’s no mention of the windows or roof or balconies or alfresco areas as entry points because that’s not how the adventure is meant to be experienced. I can, perhaps, get behind this. If this were some story game and not D&D. Write the fucking thing for a story game if you want to fucking story game. This is a shitty fucking D&D adventure. “Once the heroes enter the basement, the door slams shut and a noxious green gas begins to fill the room” Yes, I am fucking aware that this has happened in many an adventure. And it was bad then and its bad now. There have always been designers doing these shitty things. 

And the prose. It is almost purple, and not for lack of trying. I suspect that if it could be it would “The looming black space behind the entryway stares menacingly at you, inviting you into its abode.”  Ug, ok, so, second person. Never good. It tells you what to think instead of showing you, with that menacing word. And the room descriptions aren’t even god at all. It’s just barely a description, at all, with nothing evocative about them and sometimes the read-aloud telling you what to feel. It’s fucking weird. 

The map is super simplistic. You can go right or left, down a hallway, with rooms hanging off of it. Oh, I guess you can dgo up one set of spiral stairs to the second floor. Where you can go right or left with rooms hanging off the hallway. And the kitchen is on the second floor?

Whatever. I mentioned the chess players. I don’t mean to keep crapping on it, but it was an iconic moment in the OSR. This thing has, I don’t know, eight chess player rooms? Meaning that there’s a hologram in the room that you watch and essentially has no impact on the adventure. There is the (required) ghostly dining room. If you do nothing they do not interact with you, or have anything to do with the  adventure, just floating around. If you do then the host screams at you “You should not be here! Leave this place!” and then everyone disappears. Or, perhaps, if that’s too much interactivity for you: “A ghostly apparition is stirring an ectoplasmic load of dirty

clothes. She fades once the party attempts to interact or they enter the room.” This is not horror. 

It’s padded out. “But the heroes must defeat it [ed: the monster]  one way or another to retrieve the jeweled sword.” Yup, sure is. “This is the tea room. Where the residents drink tea and have refreshments.” Yup, that’s a tea room all right. The read-aloud over reveals details of the rooms. The adventure is DESIGNED to split the party. For “Atmosphere” purposes. I fucking HATE running splot parties. One group is always bored to death. I don’t know, maybe I don’t know how to run a split party. 

The main baddie is a hag. You meet her in the last room to stab her. There are attempts to foreshadow, through the ghost vignettes and diaries, but her evil never really comes through. The more relatable evil is a little childs doll that does hit and uns on you when you reach the second floor. No description of it, of course. But it drops from the ceiling, stabs you with a knife and then teleports away … as a bonus action. A little uncool. More like a “take damage” situation. Don’t get me wrong, an evil little possessed doll with a knife and glinting eyes is, BY FAR, the best concept in this adventure. It’s just not handled well and doesn’t really have enough room to breathe. Also, you actually find the doll in room two, inert. If I found a doll like that I’d destroy it. No notes from the designer about that. It’s just a doll laying on a chair. Maybe its not the real doll? But I think the adventure says it is. It’s fucking weird. It doesn’t occur in the plot yet so it doesnt occur in the design yet, of course.

I leave you now with this read-aloud, the last thing in the adventure: “You manage to escape the falling manor, which has been the epitome of true evil. The night hag, Gertrude, has been defeated, the horrifying evil doll was removed from this world, and the undead have been laid to rest. You know not who the hag’s victim was, however, but they did leave you the emerald in their departure. Now, standing before you, are the piles of rubble and decayed remains of the manor; finally resting in peace. The night begins to grow old as the first hints of dawn start to creep over the horizon. Today is going to be a good day, well a better day, you hope”

This is $7 at DriveThru. The preview is three pages, with the last page showing you some rooms. If the entire preview were like that then it would be a good preview.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/206076/the-haunt?1892600