I wish I could scan the maps for these two adventures. They are literally lines that run in to rooms. I’m not even sure why maps were included.
Racing the Snake
By John Simcoe
Level 6
This is a linear 16 encounter chase adventure. The party is being voluntarily used as bait to distract an assassin. They have 16 pre-programmed encounters. The assassin has a 38 to spot a disguised character impersonating the real mark … which is the whole point of the adventure. Because of this one of the party members basically gets to sit the adventure out, doing nothing but pretending to be a helpless girl the entire time. Imagine 16 combat encounters and your only action is “I cower” during the interminably long 3e combats.
I’m really questioning my review standards here. The encounters are not terrible (in a set-piecey sort of way), have some variety, and have some supporting information. In particular, each tells you how long it took to get to it from the last one, at various speeds. I wish more adventures, especially wilderness ones, did something similar. Even with the charts on my (homemade) screen I tend to have trouble with that. If the encounters appeared in an exploration dungeon (and were trimmed quite a bit) and tweaked a little to be more neutral/obstacle based …
That’s a lot. And it’s not what is in this adventure. This is linear. And it makes one party member essentially sit out the entire adventure. Dark days ahead. Dark days.
The Stink
By Monte Lin
Level 4
Please. I’m begging you. Send a search party in for me. Rescue me. Give me a purpose.
This is a linear crawl in a … sewer! Yes, that’s right, it’s a linear sewer crawl, that most exciting of all adventure types. Actually, I’m being unfair. You can select the right or left hand linear room set to go down. Well, before they merge into one and then it’s REALLY linear. 35 linear encounters, diverging by about six if you select right vs left. The sad part is that this had a decent little overview. One part of the city is walled off, The Stink, and all of the filth is dumped there. That could be a cool little Escape From New York type thing. Breaking in. Dealing with the various factions inside. All of that weirdness that could result from the premise. But you get none of that. The Stink is not really detailed AT ALL. It’s just a linear sewer adventure, with evil locath at the end. There’s a decent wandering encounter, with a desperate escaped criminal who takes a hostage, but that’s it. And even that is oriented more towards combat.