Lost Shrine of Vaelor

By FEI Games
FEI Games
OSE
Levels 6-9

The local Scholar’s Guild has obtained information of a long lost temple of an abandoned god located out in the marshlands. Guildmaster RHorrell has requested your services based on your reputation that is known far and wide. The Guild’s only request is that any artifacts are to be brought back so they can document and study them. They are willing to compensate your success with 5,000gp each as well as equip you with provisions. 

This eleven page digest adventure features a temple with five rooms. It is a one page dungeon without that charm that takes up eleven pages. It reinforced my bewilderment that someone thinks these types of things are products.And the ONLY reason I’m looking at this at all is that is says the entire thing is available in the preview. Since this is a common bitch of mine I thought that maybe FEI Games had improved things. Guess whose boundless optimism was once again crushed underheel … and not by a humble ant?

The intro to this? You read the intro. It’s that little blurb up above. That’s usually the marketing blurb from an adventures DriveThru page, but, when they don’t have one there I try and snag one from the product. That’s the intro blurb from the product. And I have a few things to say about it.

First, there’s absolutely nothing else in the intro to this adventure. After that little column (this is a digest, remember) then room one starts. Nothing more. So that’s ALL you have to go on. That, and, presumably, that cover art? Is that suppose to be the temple in question? We’ll assume so. The thing just launches in to room one. Journey to get there? Is it out in the woods somewhere a day from town? Is it above ground or below ground? There is absolutely no contest to this thing. 

And that intro is one of the most generic on earth. “The local scholars guild” is boring as all fuck. “Abandoned god” is even more boring. Wasn’t their entire volume called Petty Gods?  You couldn’t just pull something from it, or make up a name? You couldn’t do ANYTHING to give this thing some kind of character? Specificity. You need specificity. That’s what brings something to life. Not long winded detail. Specificity. And this is wholly lacking in it except for naming the guildmaster. Not exactly vividly evocative. Or interesting. In any way. 

But, hey, your level nines are gonna get 5k in GP! So, take that fucking cash to bank, right man?! The dungeon, proper, has $10k more in treasure. And you need 100k in XP to gain a level. One person. I am dazzled and amazed by the hubris required to produce something like this.

Did I mention the six hit die shadows? Or the nine hit die crypt keeper? The shadows should be an automatic destroy and the crypt keeper an automatic turn, if memory serves me correctly? Perfect. A perfect design job.

Let’s see here … the art implies the temple is above ground. So, you know, we don’t go through the front door in such cases. We go through the roofs, or tear down the walls. Seems chill to me. Maybe some divination to figure out which room has the loot and then bring out the sledgehammer to knock the back wall to it down? We could use a wizard spell, but, that seems like overkill. Look, I know, but, fuck man, you have to invest SOME effort in design, don’t you? And that clearly was not done here.

Let’s see here. Fiv rooms. Two pages (pffft!) Two riddles, maybe some shadows if you riddle wrong. A crypt thing. A guardian thing and some six HD “strangler vines”. Oooh! Scary scary! Nothing here. Just garbage. One of the riddle is on a bridge crossing a chasm. If you answer correctly you get some magic stones to cross the chasm. The chasm is 10 feet across, sigint diagonal in a room that’s thirty by fifty. Seriously. Ten feet. Maybe, just, step across it?

Room one, titles The Entrance, starts with “This entrance chamber … great, we’re already padding. And then it continues “As your party enters”, so, we’ve got some second person shit going on also. Great. ITS NOT EVEN READ-ALOUD. It’s just there the DM text is formatted like that. Fucking wonderful. How about The Crypt room, eh? Let’s talk a look at that one: “This chamber [more padding!] is filled with ancient sarcophagus. [not specific!]] In the center of the room is a sarcophagus that is partially open. Suddenly a menacing guardian, a Crypt Keeper, rises to protect the temple’s treasures.” That’s all you get for the room. Nothing more. Enjoy that shit. 

You get what you give, that much is true. 

This is Pay What You Want at DriveThru with a suggested price of $.50. The whole thing is available in the preview. That may be the best part of the adventure. 

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/454189/Lost-Shrine-Of-Vaelor?1892600