tenfootpole.org

By Hexplore Publishing
Hexplore Publishing
B/X
Level 1

Orin, the Wizard is missing. And his apprentice is hiring adventurers to go look for him in his last known whereabouts: The infamous Tower of Zaradon, the Twisted Mage.

This 28 page adventure features a “tower” with four levels and about sixteen rooms, using about nine pages to do so. So generic that I had to check, multiple times, to ensure I had not reviewed it previously. It’s throw-away garbage.

You see a dude in the market place looking around. I hope you go talk to him because if you don’t then there’s no adventure to be had! An apprentice, named either Kendrick or Cedrick (both names are used for him … and not on purpose …) wants you to go to this tower that his master was exploring and never came back from. Why doesn’t he? Well, gentle reader, you see, this is just a garbage adventure. In a garbage adventure we don’t bother even mentioning such things. But, whatever. 

You walk down a country road to get to the tower. On the road you have an exciting encounter from a table! Just one though … from the table of eight. So, let’s see … “A tree has fallen across the path, blocking the way forward. The players must find a way to remove the obstacle or go around it.” Joy! Wonder! Excitement! I’m so glad I’m playing D&D tonight! I had been looking forward to it all week! Our boots might get muddy! Ohs nos! Look, if you’re just gonna force one encounter then don’t use a fucking table. A table was used for wanderers, if the PC”s are dawdling, or exploring, or some such. Not for a programmed encounter. Instead of saying “A group of bandits has set up a makeshift roadblock. They demand that the players pay a toll to pass.” then write a short paragraph about the Murphy Boys Independant Tax Agency.” 

Congrats. You made it to the tower. You may now enjoy majestic room descriptions that say things like a LARGE room” a room with “HIGH ceilings.” Don’t fucking do this. I know you think you’re doing right, but stickin gin an adjective. But, maybe, pick a better one? Large and high have little meaning. Use a thesaurus. Conjure an image in your mind. Describe that. Ceiling tower overhead. Or loom overhead, or stretch in to the shadows above. Don’t fucking say high. The purpose of a room description is to inspire the DM. To conjure an image in their heads that they can riff on for the players benefit. Large don’t do that.

And, maybe, watch your rooms text for padding also. Telling us that the room has two doors, as the maps clearly fucking shows, and has no encounters or traps in it is not helpful text in the room description. What’s the fucking point? You think there might be some, that the designer left out? Why? Why the fuck say there are no traps or encounters in the room? You don’t even consistently do it for all the rooms with no encounters or traps! “After defeating the rats, the players may find some treasure scattered among the bones.” Why? Just why?! That sentence does nothing. N O T H I N G. Oh oh oh, and then it sticks the door descriptions IN THE NEXT ROOM. So if the door from room one to room two is described, you know where it is described at? In room two. Room one tells us there IS a door, but the actual description is in room two. Now, I know my readers, you’re thinking “that could be ok”. Maybe. But what if room two is a corridor. It makes no fucking sense at all. 

My favorite, absolute favorite, encounter that I may have even seen in my entire worthless piece of shit life, is the mirror maze in this adventure. “To go forward, the PCs must pass three Wisdom saves. Failing any of the saves forces a restart. If they pass all three, they reach the end of the maze”. Tedium. Just an exercise in tedium. Just like the fallen log encounter. Tedium. Nothing but tedium. Tired of reading the fucking word tedium yet? Too fucking bad. I had to deal with this adventure. 

When you leave the tower you meet 1d6 rival adventurers. That’s all you get. Nothing more. 

There is NOTHING here. The same room concept, a room with a stone pedestal in the center with a glowing crystal on it, appears twice. Not for thematic reasons. Not for puzzle reasons. Just because. It’s the most basic of descriptions. Dull and boring. Padded text. Unimaginative encounters. Tedious play. No specifics to bring something alive. 

This then is the curse of man. To be forced to create only to spew shit eternally.

This is $5 at DriveThru. The preview is eight pages. Because of all of the advert padding you don’t actually get to see any rooms. Shitty preview.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/437138/The-Tower-of-the-Twisted-Mage-A-OneShot-Dungeon-Crawl-Adventure-for-Starting-Players?1892600

Is it possible to live a simple life without flax seed and hemp indoctrination?

By Malrex
The Merciless Merchants
For Gold & Glory
Levels 1-3

War in the tunnels below the dwarven city of Axeholme has kept the city guard busy. This caused the Constable to close down the Axeholme Museum in frustration and until further notice!! Why? Due to ‘hauntings’! Rumors have spread through the streets that locals have witnessed strange lights, noises, and normal objects that move on their own accord! Sounds like the usual to a group of adventurers such as yourselves. The Constable seeks adventurers to figure out the mystery of these hauntings….and you are hoping the reward will just be some of that sweet, sweet dwarven beer! 

This 21 page adventure details a three level dwarf museum with about 35 rooms. It’s probably fine. But I hate dwarf adventures and I hate museum adventures. Yes, I am a hater. The worst thing I’ve seen from MM, and Mr Bad King? Probably.

Let’s see here, plant room? Check. Statues that come to life? Check. Things coming out of paintings? Check. Animated things? Check. Earth plane creatures? Check. Some kind of forge thing? Check. Some kind of mine thing? Check. “Bryce, stop being so cynical!” Well, stop making it so easy! Sure, a museum is going to have those things. Sure a dwarf adventure is going to have those things. Just like an exploratory adventure will have a secret door and a chasm room. 

But I don’t care. I hate the implications. Museums. Phooey! And the dwarves here are nothing but a pretext. It could be a human museumfor all the theming. Yeah yeah. Bar in the museum. Mining exhibit. Whatever the nature of dwarves is, it’s not present in the adventure. And if you figure out what the nature of dwarves is let me know. That does seem to be the problem with all these dwarf adventures. No one seems to know what the vibe is. Including me? Anyway, museums suck in D&D, just like archeologists do. There are, of course, the required continual light lamps throughout the museum. Joy. Did I mention the legendary gnomish artist thing? No? I’m just ranting and rambling at the beginning of a review? 

Ok, so, the dwarf museum is haunted. Everyone is too busy so you get to go look in to it. What does haunted mean? No clue. Nothing provided. The curator opens the doors for you. What can the curator tell you? No clue. Nothing provided. Yeah, sure, you don’t have to. But, also, one fucking sentence would be nice. One sentence to communicate the curators vibe? Nope. I guess the intro says the constable is looking for volunteers, and the intro in the adventure says Balgor the curator is looking for volunteers. Whatever. There’s 35 rooms. Lets get in to it. Oh, shit, I forgot. You get 300gp each and please don’t steal.

Room one. Giant closed doors with a dwarf face on eit. Got it. Room two. Statues. One of them comes alive. Starting strong, I guess. “Three dwarven statues and one gnome statue stand in alcoves lining the walls, each graffitied with colorful war paint. The statues are expertly crafted with name plates. Each statue holds the tools of their particular trade.” *YAWN* Room three, Foyer, with “gigantic thich multi-hued glowing crysta;s emerging from the ceiling, floor, and walls.” *yawn*. Room four, Trophies. Statues of monsters. That have … come to life. Seven kobolds, five goblins and an ogre. Enjoy. Room five, mining exhibit. “Various sized lanterns hang from the walls emitting a glow on stone tablets of cartographic information. Wheelbarrows are half-filled with bits of golden and copper ore chunks and in-between piles of rubble. A few empty bird cages, expertly crafted hang from the north wall.”

Is this what you want from D&D?

The adventure is not badly done. You can understand what is written and follow along. I just have no idea WHY you would to do so. For a generic description? For seeing a trope that has been done a hundred, if not thousand, times before done in exactly the same way it was done those previous times? For a plot driven by a gnome illusionists search fo a book of literature about his dad. A BOOK OF LITERATURE?!  

I fucking hate magical society adventures. Just as I hate hell and all Montagues. 

Enjoy this, plebiscite. I trust you’re all comfy on your tacky sofas from Rooms-to-Go, lots of nibbles close at hand? Well, tuck in! And why not smoke between gobbles? Yes, go for the gusto America!

This is $5 at DriveThru. The preview is fourteen pages, so you get to see everything. There’s no faulting that! Just the way things should be.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/422993/The-Caper-of-Lanjin-Kettlespin?1892600

It’s Tuesday, as I write this. I leave Thursday night to go live on a commune.

By John Cunningham
SBM Press
OSR & Dark Albion
Levels 1-2

… in the village of Bacton in Herefordshire in 15th Century England, but can easily translate into any fanasy setting. The PCs are called upon to investigate the disappearance of a child amidst a rising tide of pranks and odd goings-on that has caused the local priest to beg for help.

This eleven page adventure details a small “investigation” in a village with an imp in it. Oops, gave it away. Now you wont be able to enjoy this outline of an idea for an adventure.

Well to do chick wants to marry a petty aristo kid. But her parents die, so shes sent to the country to live with granpappy orchard man, who is a bit of an ignorant lout. And now shes too low to marry the aristo, so, to improve the orchard she gets the local wisewoman to tell her how to summon brownie, and is wanted against mixing in blood to the milk becauseit will summon too powerful an entity. She wants a great orchard, so she adds some blood and get, unknown to her, an imp. Who is doing shit around the village. And eventually convinces her to get it a baby for its more powerful blood. Oops. 

The editing here is not great. The opening paragraph is immediately duplicated as the second paragraph. The imp is noted as a Imp of Desire. And then an Imp of Conceit. These are, of course, minor issues, and only stand out as witness to the more serious affair.

It’s an outline. You get a VERY basic list of major NPC’s. With descriptions that focus on background rather than the bits you need to run them. Griff and acerbic. Clever and oddly charismatic. I’m a fan of these sorts of quick hit descriptions for an NPC, but these don’t cut it. They are too abstracted and need supported by more, and I don’t mean their character history.
And then, as the main part of the adventure, you get a list, in bullet form, that takes up about two pages. This is, essentially, a list of 24 things that the party can learn as they investigate the village and ask about after the missing child. It is, essentially, a rumor list. Mixed in to it, though, are a few things to learn is you talk to NPC Frank, Sur, or Mary. And they all start with “If you talk to Sue then you will earn that … “ or something like that. Obviously, not the best presentation for information. You can’t make the DM hunt for things. It should be easy to locate the specific NPC and what they know. 

And, I should note, most of the rumors are from a rando villager. As in “There’s a Full Moon in a few nights, best to be indoors that night if you know what’s good for you!” or “Another villager complains their cow has run dry.” We don’t get these villagers. Just the core NPC’s. 

On top of that are the consequences for what’s going on. We get a couple of paragraphs describing complications. “they must realize that if Annes dies or is executed for witchcraft the High Sheriff will be angered, as will the Talbots when Humphrey holds them to blame.” Will they, though? Has the adventure done ANYTHING to help the DM communicate this AT ALL? No. Gonna blame the wise woman? She aligned with the House of York. Ok. And? I get it, War of the Roses, but, …. And? How does the party know this? How are the consequences made clear to the party? 

I could be missing something here. The main rulebook for Dark ALbion could have a great villager generator and make it clear all the consequences. But, even if it does, that’s no excuse for the information presented in this adventure. It is a rough outline of an adventure. A rumor table. A list of bullets that an adventure would then be designed around. It’s missing EVERYTHIGN that a modern adventure should have, meaning, supporting the DM in the play of the game. Theres none of that here.

This is $2 at DriveThru. The preview is six pages. You get to see all of the major NPC”s and all of the adventure bullet points. ALl that’s missing is that short consequences section … Good preview.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/437300/Milk–Blood–an-OSR-and-Dark-Albion-Adventure-12-Level?1892600

By Noora Rose
Monkey's Paw Games
OSR
Level 1

In the Long-Ago, this was not a marsh but a rugged mountain, ruled by a fierce people of stone with singular, burning eyes. The remains of their Empire lie scattered about the marsh, in places called taboo by the Luds.

This 42 page adventure is a hex crawl with about eighteen hexes detailed. The hexes are decent enough situations. There is a distinct lack of adventure motivation, though, and a descriptive style that meanders a little too much for my tastes. It’s a decent idea for an adventure that is not executed as well as it could be.

Ok, so, You’re staying a little village town one night and it gets attacked by four titans. This is a level one adventure, so, they are more environmental than creature. Anyway, they destroy the place. Ok. So. Now what? *twiddles thumbs* Oh, they attacked another place in the swamp also and destroyed it. Ok. And ….? I guess the party looks in to things on their own or some such? There’s really no motivation for the party to do anything in this adventure, and there’s no advice to the DM to get things moving or the party involved. What’s actually happening is that an escalade slave was in town with an artifact and the titans are showing up to get it back. The dude wanders the hex map and the titans show up wherever he is to destroy it. There’s supposed to be, I think, this great refugee clogged area, in a swamp, and so on. 

Each location has a little blurb about it. They are generally decent with some situation going on interesting enough for the party to interact or poke around in, for the most part. There are a few too many “ruined city” locales with rado destroyed building searches, but, whatever. Those are always a pain to handle well and never are anyway, in any adventure. Wanna get rich in the OSR? Figure that out and make $5. Anyway, each location finishes up with two little sections: one details what is going on if the escaped slave is there and the other details what happened/location changes if the titans have been through. Nice enough. The dude wanders around randomly but the text tells us that “there’s always some clue as to which way he went.” Which is hanging statement if I’ve ever read one. There is no advice to the DM to keep these clues  fresh and interesting. So, good luck.

The rumor table is ok, as if the wanderers table, who are doing things. Good things? Meh. “A swirling, buzzing cloud of mosquitoes. Perched over a corpse.” Ok, sure.. Not really a situation. The NPCs present are fairly well described. Some sentences that give their appearance and motivations/quicks  pretty well. Something short to hang your hat on when running them. Three asshole soldiers from a nearby Baddy Empire will  “At the first sign of trouble all three will don conical bronze helms with chain veils and flee, stabbing anyone who steps in their way” Yeah, I can run that. And, all of the descriptions in the adventure are fairly well done. They do have enough specificity to start brining the area to life without really going on too long. 

But there’s a caveat to that statement. ALl of the descriptions are also too long. Padded out. How can it be both? Well if you just deleted the padding then you’d have a pretty focused and decent description. “There are ancient etchings upon the dolmens, their meaning lost to the elements and the Long-Ago, but each standing stone bears a small stone votive-bowl at the base” So, if I just deleted the “their meaning lost to the elements and the Long-Ago,” then it would be a decent description. Terse, with some decent specificity. Dolmens. Moss-covered. The etchings are ancient. Stone votive-bowls. Not bad. Not rock star, but not bad. 

And thus it is with just about everything in this. It’s ok. Those wanderers are better than most adventures use, but really still not great. The hex descriptions are ok, better than a decent number of adventure in giving us situations for the party to work through or use to their advantage. But, still, padded out and you have to dig through them to run them, as with the NPC’s. Monster descriptions are almost there, almost giving a description of the monster instead of their society, etc. Everything int he adventure is almost where. 

Just like the core concept idea. Sure, you’re chasing this dude through the swamps, I guess, while the four titans follow behind with their destruction. But there’s no real motivation to do so. Why not just move on? And if it is a more typical hex crawl, with just the slave and titans as window dressing … I don’t know. It doesn’t seem like there’s enough here to take advantage of. 

I think the entire thing just needed a little bit more work. A little bit more trimming/focus. A little bit more on the chase/motivations, and the window dressing of the refugees. A little bit more, in just about every single aspect of the adventure. It is interesting to see, though, something come so close in so many different areas.

This is $10 at DriveThru. The preview is ten pages. You get to see the first hex location, Lud proper, but it’s not really a great indication of the hex situations to come. The descriptive style, both positive and negative, are fully on display though.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/397329/Hard-Ticket-to-Lud?1892600

By Nova Yttrium
Self Published
Shadowdark
Levels 1-3

In this adventure, the PCs are hired to find the missing daughter Kyla of a wealthy merchant that has been kidnapped by acolytes of a cult that recently plagues the land and abducts women and men alike. The Cult of Ankh-Ra, as they call themselves, is trying to revive the forgotten goddess Ankh-Ra by sacrificing humans and performing an ancient ritual that they found on an old scroll in a former temple of Ankh-Ra that lies in ruins nowadays. Once the PCs reach the temple, they witness the result of the ritual: The soul of Ankh-Ra has been resurrected and takes possession of Kyla’s body. She then uses her magical powers to transport her temple from one thousand years ago into the current time along with all creatures that lived in her temple all those years ago. Can the PCs stop Ankh-Ra, banish her soul and rescue Kyla from the grasp of the cultists? [Ed: One hopes not …]

This nineteen page digest adventure uses about eight pages to describe about thirty rooms. It’s one step removed from minimally keyed. So, you know, at least it’s overwritten. It also lacks just about everything that actually brings a D&D adventure to life.

There is one nice thing. You enter a room, a guard shouts that he’s willing to die for his god and pulls a lever, locking the doors and causing the ceiling to lower, classic trap style. Ten rounds to get out, with a dude in the room. Nice twist.   

Frank the merchant hires you to go get his daughter back, who was abducted for sacrifice “a few days ago.” Nice job Frank. You’re father of the year for that one. You approach the ruined temple the cult uses and there’s a flash of light and the temple repairs itself. Looks like In Media Res is the new hotness. Anyway, there’s no pretext before the actual room keys. Yeah, there’s eleven pages of intro, but none of it is about Frank, the abduction, the journey to the temple or anything else. It’s just mostly creature stat blocks, up front instead of behind in an appendix. Not that there has to be more. But, you know, an order of battle for the temple would have been nice, instead of everyone just staying in their rooms and ying, the way they do. Or, even, sticking monsters on the map for reaction purposes. Whatever.

Here’s a kitchen: “This big kitchen spans the whole room and is used to prepare various meals for the entire temple.” Yes, kitchens usually look like a kitchen. I would want to know if it ididn’t, and don’t want to know if it does. How about a dorm? “More than 20 simple beds are in this room.” Now, why would you say that? Why would you say “More than 20?” 6000 beds? 21 beds? Presumably the DM should know? No? It’s not important? Then why the fuck mention it? And why put it in such imprecise language for the DM? “The pit is more than 10 feet deep.” Uh huh. In other places guards “performing an obscure ritual”. Or “One giant scorpion is being trained by a jackal guard.”

This is just minimal keying. It’s one step removed from just listing “1 scorpion, 1 jackal guard.” There’s no value in that. There’s no language being used to bring the environment to life. To create a dynamic situation to be excited about. There’s no thrill. There’s jus a grind. One room after the next.

The resurrected queen, Ankh-Ra, is in Kyla’s body at the end. Dressed in yellow and blue silks and covered head to toe in jewelry. Which is some nice imagery. That’s what you do to your sacrificial victim to bring back your god. But, once you gack her, that’s it. We never learn anything about the jewelry. You see, it doesn’t matter. There was no thought about this. Fuck D&D. And so it goes, even with the puzzles. “Give your goddess an offering and bow down or face her wrath! Also, put it in the bowl, at least 10cp worth, preferably in cash. No checks. ApplePay accepted. Exchange rate set by the latest edition of The Times.”

Oh, hey, did I mention there’s not actually a cult? They don’t appear. Just the guards and shit, transported from back in time. This is just more garbage being churned out.

I’m done with Shadowdark for awhile. To my readers great joy and mine own further cynicism. 

This is $3 at DriveThru. Preview is six pages. You get to see nine rooms at the end of it, so, decent preview.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/435860/Cult-of-AnkhRa–An-Adventure-for-Shadowdark-RPG?1892600

By Wayne Robert
Wyrd Valley Press
OSE
Level ?

Pan, His Majesty in Yellow is a fairy tale cosmic horror sandbox campaign setting that combines the lore of Peter Pan, Hastur, Neverland, and Carcosa into a strange and unique experience.

This 76 page supplement is a setting guide fo a Neverland that is mashed up with Carcosa. Maybe it does that well? But the hex crawl sucks ass.

This isn’t a real review because I screwed up. But, I do talk about hex encounters. I don’t know why I thought this was hex crawl, but I did. Anyway, it uses about ten pages to describe 38 locations on the Never Island chain. The rest of the pages are creatures and the general vibe of the place.

And, as far as Peter Pan settings go, this one is ok, I guess. It expands on the genre (or, maybe there are more books? I’m too lazy to find out) and then mashes the entire thing up with some Hastur/Carcosa shit. Which, kind of makes perfect sense. There’s the usual stuff, with a new pirate in town, the faeries, the lost boys and so on. And then there’s a Carcosa-like dream city full of nightmares from beyond that melts in. There’s a continual theme of Pans capriciousness, and the consequences of it. There were Wendy’s before Wendy and Wendy’s after Wendy. What becomes of them? Hence The Old Ladies, appearing in the adventure. Other items are expanded upon as well. And almost everything has this slightly dark twist to it. What appears to be the frivolity of Peter Pan and the environment has dark undertones and origins. And it all works out pretty good, as a theme. It’s not my thing, but it brings the weird … never in your face but hiding as origin stories and in deep dark caves.

The hex crawl is, well, not a hex crawl. In several aspects. First, the hex map has no keys. The map WITH the keys, more artistic, has no hex boundaries. In spite of a big deal being made of wanderers and travel times. So, good luck with that.

Ten pages for 38 locations isn’t much space. It is certain hex energy in that respect. But the encounters would have to be more Gazetteer in flavour. Both because it’s not a hex crawl and therefore a setting and therefore a Gazetteer, and in their details. 

You’ve got three old men who live in a little hut. “Hank PuddingbottomsS regrets the capitol S he once acquired in trade to add to his name and would like to trade it in for an o. Or, from those same three, an elephant shows up and they can’t agree on the nature of it and its causing an awful ruckus during their breakfast. The absurdism comes through well, as is befitting a Pan setting. But they are only ideas, with nothing to carry them along. Go Forth and figure out a way. This borders on some of the artifact destruction themes in the 1e DMG. Or a site where “Something” has begun hunting inhabitants of the island. They are looking for help in hunting it. The IT is not expanded upon. None of the ideas are. Not even outlines, these are mere thoughts. Disconnected from most of the rest of the entries (usually) and given not much to help the DM breathe life in to it. This is much closer to the Isle of the Unknown. 

There is a big purple bird here. It sings to the sun.” [My example] Ok. And? Why do I care? There’s no real reason to gain an ally for most folks. And therefore there’s no real reason to interact. Except, in your quixotic tasks for the sake of tasks. 

And, perhaps, this is what makes a setting The DM must put something together to tie everything together and use this booklet to help inspire that. 

Meh.

This is $20 at DriveThru. Only a quick preview. Boo! Hiss!

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/420759/Pan-His-Majesty-in-Yellow-OSE?1892600

If I didn’t want to know where you were April 29th then I wouldn’t have asked, now would I?