Under the Dolmens, Delve

By B. Wraven Wright
2Die10 Games
OSE
Levels 1-2

An Audrune hires the adventurers to deal with “what lies below” a particular dolmen and to “leave nothing moving”. He says the party can keep anything of value they find and to burn the place out when done. He provides a map to the location of dolmen and sets off on his way. He is of little words and refuses to entertain further questioning. The dolmen is easy enough to find with a fairly sturdy stairway leading down below

This six page adventure uses three pages to describe seven rooms in an underground dolmen. It’s error-prone, makes simple logic mistakes, and is little more than an excuse to kill things. 

Yes, I know. I say that a alot. But a lot of adventures deserve to have that said about them. I still believe in magic. And, this thing starts with a passing wizzo hiring you to “deal with what lies below” and to “burn the place out when you’re done.” Well howdy! Always a big fan of fire and salting the earth in an adventure. There’s a dude with something going on who, for some reason, doesn’t want to deal with it himself. 

The adventure explains nothing. Just a dour passing dude hires you to, as I noted. There is nothing more. He is of little words, recall, and refuses to entertain further questions. Always a good way to get your job done. Go fuck yourself man. How much extra you paying for the privilege of being an asshole who needs something done? Oh, no notes on what hes paying you or what you’re reward is. Nothing more than what I posted in that intro. At the end of an adventure you, perhaps, find a secret door to the last room. Inside is an invisible old woman. Sobbing. She laments all of her dead children (the six previous rooms being littered with little clay fetish dudes, all broken to pieces. So, she’s hiding out in this secret room, crying and invisible. Until you open the door. Then she “Stops at nothing to leave the dungeon until killed.” Okaaaaay. I guess we’re killing her for some reason? No? She escaped? Then when you exit you find the dude that hired you standing over her, having killed her. Uh. And he wants all of the gold and magic from the dungeon, which he originally said you could keep. Also, he has no stats. This is all a confusing mess, as is the adventure. Except … I wonder if this was supposed to be a domestic violence situation? I’m filling in some shit here, but they start a quarrel for some reason, he breaks the dudes or she has them attack him? He leaves, gets the party to kill his wife and burn down his life. She’s inside, either the victim of abuse or dealing with him having gotten rid of her clay friends (rightfully or wrongly) and she comes out of her sobbing when interrupted by the party, only to flee, meeting him outside. We don’t see the outside so she attacks him or he attacks her? So, he called the cops on his wife and it ended in violence. As presented the adventure is a mess. Me filling in the gaps turns it in to something I don’t think I want to play. 

The wandering monster table, and many room keys, have “soldiers” in them. Actual soldiers? People who we are using soldier stats for? What are they doing there? It’s not clear they talk. Who are they? Absolutely no fucking idea at all. There is nothing here to guide using any way. They are just stat blocks to stab. AND, the killings? They explode for 2d6 damage, save vs half. And there are A LOT of then. I’m not sure thats survivable for levels 1-2? Playtested? Probably not. And there’s a 50% chance, in every hallway, of encountering a fight. This is not a old school thing.

Each room starts with read-aloud. Room one tells us: “ Opening the double doors, soot and ash swirl about the air. A large kiln fashioned from crude, clay bricks is built into the wall at the opposite of the room. Broken kilnlings litter the floor in front its numbered of it. Tables littered with jars and kilnling parts face the walls.” Note that the kilnlings are new monsters. How do you know what they are? This is pretty classic telling instead of showing. Another room has a state of a god in the middle of a pond. We never hear anything more about the statue. The party will OBVIOUSLY be investigating it. To no end, since there’s no information on it. 

And I’m pretty sure there are obvious map and keying errors. Rooms five and six appear to be swapped. This is pretty basic shit. It’s as it the entire thing was written in one sit down and then no effort was made to read through it or edit it or anything. Not that it matter. 6 SOLDIERS and 6 PIKES attack immediately after the cottager dies. They able to narrowly squeeze through the prison bars.” So you’re just gonna be stabbing shit. Regardless of what the designer places in front of the players, the monsters will get to do whatever the designer wants them to do, but fiat. Also, that cottager wants you to kill his bitch wife, so, maybe his wife and not the dude who hired you? 

Anyway, just a complete mess of an adventure with nothing more than stabbing and some domestic violence. What a fun night of gaming ahead of you!

This is $1 at DriveThru. There is no preview. Sucker.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/527686/under-the-dolmens-delve-a-one-shot-dungeon-for-level-1-adventurers-in-the-dolmenwood-setting?1892600