By Karla Adder
Karla Adder Press
OD&D
Level ... 4?
At the base of the northern mountains, within the twisted ruins of a great subterranean fortress, the vicious Twilight Dragon – known to his slaves as Stallas the Great – has amassed a legendary horde of golden treasures and magical relics. From this fastness his armies of orcs, goblins, kobolds, and other monsters launch raid after raid on the civilized lands to the south. His Majesty the King, seeking to reclaim the lands his Imperial forefathers withdrew from generations ago, sees a chance to gain the loyalty of the North by defeating the draconic menace. But the dark and winding tunnels of Stallas’s treasure vaults are no place for a massed assault; such a task requires a team of specialists to infiltrate and systematically wear down the Dragon’s layered defenses. Thus, he has turned to the Adventurer’s Guild, offering the King’s seal and a commission in his army as a special reconnaissance squad tasked with defeating the dreaded foe. The reward? Fame, fortune, the favor of his Majesty – and all the treasure they can haul out of those miserable halls.
This 47 page adventure presents a three level dungeon with about a hundred rooms. It’s a dragons lair populated with an army of humanoids at his command. It’s got the B2 style of minimalism going on. It’s going for a quasi-military “raid on the lair” thing, complete with some guidance on using Chainmail in places.
The dragon has an army of humanoids and evil men. He’s been collecting tribute from the towns and villages of the north. The king has decided its time to reassert his claims to the north and thus sends in his army. The party acts as a kind of special forces group. Thus, in addition to the dungeon description you also get a couple of missions to go on. Assassinate general Whatsit, outside the dungeon. Raid it to rescue some prisoners. Clean out some nearby caves to act as a forward base for the kings army. And then do a full on wargame scenario to keep reinforcements from reaching the lair. You’re fighting goblins, orcs and kobold troops with some evil men and occasionally a beast such as a room with some harpy, beholder, basilisk, or ghouls in it. There is a notable section which contains “assorted other things”, the home of the future lawful forward base.
Your enjoyment of this is going to be influenced mostly by what you think of B2. This very terse minimalistic room style is common between the two of them. There is a room with a monster in it for you to fight. There is sometimes a pit trap or a scything blade trap. The monsters may run for help to the next room. The room contents, other than a stabby stab, are generally only VERY briefly covered, with a word or two. If you examine this room, does it leave you fulfilled? “Against the eastern wall a stone statue of the Twilight Dragon has been erected. The Kobolds have left offerings” We can say for sure that the terse descriptions, as well as the formatting present, make locating information easy enough 😉 If this is what you’re looking for then you’ve found it. I would have two comments though. The first is easy: I don’t think this is a good thing to do. The designer clearly had a vision and they implemented it. But, I would assert, we should expect more than that. The VERY terse nature of the rooms is done at the expense of evocative environments to adventure in. And while I am supportive of raid type adventures I think that they also offer a substantially reduced D&D experience than exploratory adventures. I’m willing to be told there is room for disagreement here, or, rather, to the size and frequency of such.
The more interesting discussion, though, is what a raid tyle adventure should consist of? What qualities make it good? The closest analogy I can come up with here is that to DCC and the fighters might deeds. You can’t swing from a chandelier if there is no chandelier. You cant kick over the boiling cauldron is there is no boiling cauldron. You gotta have something to work with. This is, I believe, an argument for interactivity in a fight/raid/stab adventure. The minimalism in the rooms doesn’t really lend itself to interesting combats. At most we’re told “theres a barricade”, but that’s it. The monsters reacting to parties incursion isn’t really covered much either, other than they might run to the next room to get help. And there’s not really anything in the way of faction play to turn them against themselves or to stick in some roleplaying. I’m not the biggest fan os 4e, but it did introduce the terrain and tactics stuff in a more organized form that helps bring more dynamic environments. Otherwise things devolve in to rolling to hit and damage over and over again. And that ain’t fun.
I have a few other complaints as well. Sometimes we don’t get a race for some of the named commanders. I guess the general of the orcs and goblins ais a human then? And some of the map stuff feels disconnected. I can’t really figure out how the “second caves” are supposed to work. It really feels like there’s an underwater portion, and there are (otherwise normal dungeon rooms) with a ships hull in them. In the middle of the dungeon? I can’t really figure out how this fits in to the adventure and the entrance to the main dungeon.
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention my way description in the adventure. It is, admittedly, VERY good. “Nearby are two half-consumed goblin corpses, wild dogs gnawing on what remains.” Ouchies! I’m still not sure that is what I’m looking for in a description, but it is certainly a whole fuckton closer! It has the energy of the orcs playing knucklebones, I guess. Which, while still not exactly the interactivity I’m looking for in an adventure it IS better than a simple hack room.
The designer specifically notes, in the adventure forward, that this is a hack adventure. Which is fine. Perhaps putting it in the product description would have been a better choice, so as to make an informed purchasing decision. They also note an explicit appeal to nostalgia. I’m not going to go too far down this road, but I reject those statements. A good adventure is a good adventure and mimicking a bad way of doing things (*clutches pearls*! Bryce judged a playstyle as bad!”) doesn’t make that an appeal to nostalgia. If that’s the goal then it needs to be accomplished while still explicitly being worthwhile. (And none of those “what is good” bullshit things there. You gotta be able to run it and it needs to be evocative and have interactivity.)
This is $7 at DriveThru. The preview is six pages. It shows you the map and encounters, so VERY good preview. I am disappointed by the lack of any level ranges though, for the party. You can also see that second set of caves, on the south, that gave me such problems understanding. The big thing running down the middle? The stairs up? I’m not sure. There’s not much context at all to the location of the entrance, except “a short flight of stairs leading up.”
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/508658/treasure-vaults-of-the-twilight-dragon?1892600
Had me at Chainmail. I like the idea of integrating more wargame into the adventures.
Why take 8 dudes to the Caves of Chaos when you can take 80?
These sorts of terse, monster stronghold dungeons fail what I call the Quasqueton test: If you remove the monsters from the dungeon, is it still an interesting and challenging site to explore? B1 (Quasqueton) passes that test. B2 fails.
And if you are going with a monster fortress rather than detailed, strange, and engaging physical environment, then you need to give the GM some tools: an order of battle; patrol rosters and routes; tactical responses.
A map keyed with monsters isn’t enough to make for a compelling adventure.
I agree, with an emphasis on the Tactical Responses within this setting, given the size and armed populations. TR’s within the scope of the resources and command could give the adventure the added spice it needs.