tenfootpole.org

By Tolkraft
Dendrobat Productions
OSR
Levels 4-6

The sole heir of Baron Solreigh was kidnapped, in the middle of the night, in the heart of the castle! The ransom letter is signed by Masked Harald, a thief, robber and benefactor of the poor.

His lair?–?the Bloody Cliff?–?is known, but would resist a frontal assault, which would also put the young heir in danger. Bringing the Baron’s son back safe will require a very cunning plan…

This 45 page adventure uses ten pages to describe a 26 room bandit hideout; their lair outside in the woods and the caves nearby, as well as a short “investigation” phase. The intent being a raid on the lair by the party to free an NPC. The maps are essentially unusable, and the formatting TOO formatted. A good lair assault ruined. This is an EASL adventure from our friends in Vive la France, but doesn’t really have EASL issues other than an awkward word choice or two. 

So, the asshole barons son has disappeared and Robin Hood wants some cash and tax breaks for the poor as ransom. Oh, and the new young pretty maid in the castle is missing too. Things that make you go Hmmmm…. The baron hires you to go on a commando raid to rescue his sweet loveable boy, all Longshanks/Prince Braveheart style. You can poke around the castle a bit, asking questions of people and looking at rooms, maybe turning up two or three bits of information. There’s caves in a cliff, there’s an entry at the river, and so on. So, fucking around ahead of time pays off with alternative points of entry and approaches. That’s good. You then walk over to the cliffs and do your assault the usual way: sneaking around until your plan goes to shit and then stabbing everyone. Most of whom are 1HD in this instance.

Base assaults are near and dear to my heart. Sandboxy, a good base assault supports the DM and lets them run things on the fly, giving them the tools for the “normal” base and then how the base adjusts and reacts, etc. As well as supporting play with multiple ways in and a good map. This is trying to do that, but not very well. 

The maps are a major issue. They are done in some arty program, I suspect one meant for battlemaps, with colors and features. But they come off crowded and confused, with an inability to really tell what you are looking at, where the rooms are much less what the features are or how they work together. You’re fighting the map the entire way, trying to figure out how things fit together. There are some photos in the back, showing a DwarvenForge type 3d terrain set of of a portion of the inside of the caves. I guess that helps a little. 

Our issues continue with the text. There is generous usage of long blocks of italics for read-aloud, making it difficult to sort through. There is a fancy gothic font used as a header throughout the adventure, even in room names, that I can’t for the life of me read. I actually had to go through the adventure searching to find the name of the kings son because the first letter was in the fancy gothic font, all illuminated manuscript style. Man, you gotta think about this shit. I know, I know, you want to make a pretty product. I want one also. But not at the expense of the legibility. Or, rather, not in a way way that impacts legibility to the extent that I can’t read it/figure out what the fuck room is where.

And the room formatting. I am a victim of my own words sometimes. Highlighting, building, bullet points, white space, they can all be used to make a text easier to scan and to find information. And when TOO much is used it then becomes harder. The text becomes disconnected from itself, too much space between things, the natural “grouping” of items is broken and your brain can no longer recognize (or, “easily recognize …”) that differing items are related. And that’s a major problem here. Long sections of DM text with too much shaded text blocks, highlighting and bullets. The read-aloud can be cringe-wrthy in place, with phrases like “ … as if even the water was afraid of the sinister name [the bloody cliffs].” *sigh* This is not what I need in my life. I want a description that makes me, and the players, think “wow, even the water is afraid of the cliffs!” not, being told directly, what to think. That’s telling instead of showing. You always want to show. 

We can combine this with some basic issues around base assaults. There is little to no guidance on an order of battle and/or how the base reacts to incursions and alarms. There are four lieutenants in the base and we get VERY little guidance on where they how, what they do, or how they react. (Although, its implied that at night they are all sleeping in the same room.) There’s very little in the way to help the DM. I could also point out that while there is guidance for climbing the titular cliffs, there is none for just walking around the other side. I mean, cliffs, not mesa, right?

Oh, I don’t know what else. I mean, there are separate entries for how to find the place in the day vs the night, which is good. And there’s a cute little section about what you can overhear the bandits talking about if you listen in or buddy up to them. And, yes, there is some guidance on negotiating with them (only works on a critical success!) or bluffing your way in. So, varying success levels there. And NPC descriptions tend to be too long. They do have some “three words” personality summaries, but their goals and what not are buried in text, with no highlighting. Not that they ever show in the adventure, except sleeping in their rooms. 

And there’s a lot of abstracted shit. Observing the cliffs is just a skill check, and if you critically fail you get captured. Doing a jailbreak (at the barons castle) on the one bandit who’s been captures is just a skill challenge. Climbing the cliffs, the DM can, the text tells us, be a real hard ass and make the players note HOW MUCH rope they have, to see if they have enough to scale the cliffs. If this a thing? Abstracting a climbing distance? You have rope listed so it doesn’t matter how far you repel? I get it, resource management can be a pain, but, fuck man …

Hard pass here. And, mostly, because of the map and the lack of comprehension on how it works. Reworking the map and formatting would help a lot. 

This is Pay What You Want at DriveThru with a suggested price of $3. The entire thing is available as a preview, so, good job with that. The map is on page 24 of the preview. Check it out now, the funk soul brother.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/352361/The-Bloody-Cliff?1892600

By Robin Fjarem
Self Published
Knave
Levels 1-3

The melting ice has revealed the walls of a long-forgotten temple at the summit of Glacier Peak. Historians and adventurers travel from afar to witness this legend come back to life, hoping to get a slice of the untold riches surely contained within. There is just one problem: The entrance is yet to be found.

This 24 page digest adventure uses thirteen pages to describe about 32 rooms in a three level dungeon. It’s got some norse folklore theming and tries to keep the writing focused. I get the concept that it was going for, but it feels constrained. I THINK it’s possible, tough, to come off with some PHAT L00T with no fighting; a nice folklore element.

Ok, so, cave up on the frozen mountside. And, in spite of that “historian” crack in the blurb, there’s no hint of magical renaissance in this at all. It’s pure norse mythology. We’ve got three levels to the dungeon. The first is a relatively empty abandoned temple with, I think, eleven rooms. You get reindeer hides on the walls, and antler carvings and small little figurines at modest shrines. The overall vibe here is one of a place empty, and abandoned. In fact, I believe the only encounter is with a centipede hiding in the chest of a skeleton. Old. And then you come to a stairway leading down. It’s covered, blocked with ice. Here we have a pretty literal transition to the mythic underworld. You need to find you way past it. Level two is linear, with just a handful of rooms. A giant lake, some islands. A small shrine on the second to last, that lets you turn the water in to a portal you can jump in to. And, at that last island, a 6HD norse troll, in a deep sleep. So, you know, don’t go too far. Finally, the lake portal leads to you level three with the rest of the rooms: norselandia.  Dark elf, grey dwarf, some frog-people, sprites, and a wingless dragon: the lindwurm. And, of course, his hoard. 

We are now in full on fantasy realm and you can talk to most of those bizarro people. The dwarf, chained to the wall by the dragon, his keys around the troll-kings neck … who was turned to stone by the dragon. Freed, he forges an adamantine sword for you. Or the gnome living in a cabin next to wall that has colossal door in it, the keyhole 8’ off the ground. He’s got the key, but will only give it up if you go X and get him Y. (Where X&Y are mushroom forest related.) Or the sprite that has lost his drum … that will put the dragon to sleep. And on it goes. So we’ve got a good transition in to the fantastic and strong folklore elements. And, as I’ve mentioned, it might be possible to snag a decent amount of loot with no combat.

The writing tends to the brisk side: “Grand hall with a high ceiling. Empty torch sconces in the walls. Reindeer pelts hang stretched out on the walls with stone benches beneath.” Not droning on, to be sure. Other rooms are perhaps too terse in their descriptions “Frozen Shrine: Encased in ice.” There might be some EASL issues with the quality of the imagery/evocative word choices, but I think the issue more comes down to imagining the scene and trying to get it down on paper. There is clearly an attempt made, in most cases, but one that falls short in almost all cases of bringing a truly evocative environment to match the interactivity in them. It’s not doing anything special in the formatting area, other than staying focused on the length and using some bolded words. I’m not on board with what IS being bolded, but clearly there was an attempt. Better writing and better bolding choices come with more time and more experience.

So, what the fuck is wrong with, besides some less than stellar evocative writing?

I could point out some mistakes in the design. The sleeping troll is at the END of the path, and wakes up if you make noise … but you don’t really know he’s there … and thus are not worried about making noise. Placing him up front, or, stronger signalling or snoring would help. And there’s a bit of this and that similar in the adventure in which there are things to do/not do that could cause tension but are, I think, mishandled or not telegraphed well, working against their intent. 

It’s also got a little bit of a fetch questy “find the red key for the red door” sort of CRPG thing going on. “So what do we need to do FOR YOU to get you to give us something?” came to mind. This is hard. You want interactivity. With NPC’s, them wanting things is good. But too much and it starts to feel like you’re running up to someone with a gold star flashing over their head and pressing the “skip dialog” button as fast as you can. 

It’s also constrained in its size, and I’m thinking particularly level three and its fantasy-land fetch quest stuff. Everyone essentially is right on top of each other. Melan and I differ, I think, to the degree we dislike this element, but I think we both recognize it and don’t care for the constrained spaces. I recognize that it exists, and why, and that NOT being constrained is far better. I just don’t ding something as much when it shows up. I’d much rather have some gravitas behind the distance, and quest, than just walking next door, etc, to pick up the thing and stab the thing guarding the thing. In particular, the lost drum, hanging in some random (literally!) tree in the swamp comes to mind. There’s no weight behind this. There’s no feeling of having earned that golden fleece. The adventure is trying to do too much in too small a place. But, meh, it’s 2021. 

Other things comes to mind, like the use of a random table for a treasure behind a waterfall. I don’t get why designers do this. Just place a treasure. The fact you have a table for it shows a lack of understanding of what random tables are used for in old school design. It’s far, far better to place a treasure, or monster, in an integrated way in to the design. Yes, there IS a time and place for random tables in an adventure. But not for general use. 

So, slow start, probably on purpose, and strong theming. But the language use doesn’t convey the theming well, although the interactivity does. 

This is $3 at DriveThru.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/370215/The-Frozen-Temple-of-Glacier-Peak?1892600

By Edward Deboinare
Esoterik Games
Knave
level 1

Something has happened to the northern mountain pass, those who have survived to  return reported the smell of nutmeg before their party was ambushed in the dark. The town guard is raising a party to go clear the pass. He enters the local tavern to conscript all the patrons …

This 46 page adventure uses twenty pages to describe 33 rooms in a single column format. The rest of the page count is new monsters and some new class backgrounds. But, those 33 rooms? A combination of goofy funhouse puzzles and bizarrely minimal writing. To no effect.

Let’s get this out of the way: the shambling woodpecker boss monster at the end smells like nutmeg. You now know why the title is what it is. No, I am not holding out on you. It makes no sense to me either. I’m a square though so maybe I’m missing something.

The map is … different. The entry room is, like #14 and the exist #23 and there is no number ten on the map. You can’t really make out any doors. There are minimaps next to the individual (single-column) room descriptions, but, you can’t really make out the features on them. And this is blown up on my monitor to about 1.5! Printed out, in digest form, as the adventure suggests …  there’s Norfolk & Way for shipping an elephant overnight from New York to LA. Or to make out the map. Also, weirdly, the formatting doesn’t work at all on my mac, for the text. The built-in PDF viewer gives me garbage, so I have to use the Chrome built-in PDF viewer … which still will not render certain pages. 

The writing is … interesting. Here’s a room entry: “Roll an encounter with [-] guarding the room, its unhappy. The chest contains loot.” No? Not your thing? How about “Ceiling is magically the night sky; there is loot[-] here.” Ok, ok, how about this one? “That is blood on the floor from the giant guillotine blade trap located there; it goes off every time.” That’s the extent of the description. There is nothing else. No mechanics, nothing. These sorts of things make up maybe about a third of all the encounters in the dungeon.

Room type two, Hezrou, has a few more things going on in it. Such as “A Grasping Giraffe guards this room; upon entering the giraffe will trigger the switch on the wall, causing the door to slam shut; investigating behind the throne near the switch will reveal a wheel that can be turned to lift the plate shutting the door. There is a set of platemail here.” No, that’s all of the description. No, I don’t know what a Grasping Giraffe is. There’s no pic. There is an entry in the rear in the monster appendix. “Their eye stalks enable the giraffe precision and protection during their head-whip attacks.” So …. They must have eye stalks. You should be detecting a pattern by now. There is something here, just under the surface. But it’s almost like 50% of the sentences in the adventure were left out … the 50% that would explain what the fuck is going on and add depth to the thing. A giraffe with eyestalks? Uh, ok. Sure. I’m in. But … you need to actually put enough words in to make this work. Another room has “a dire shadow bear with a silver dagger stuck in its heart is frozen into a statue, in mid-attack.” Nice! It’s ALMOST there. It’s ALMOST an actual encounter. Maybe it would be in Dungeon of the Bear days. 

Room Type III is an actual funhouse room. One of the rooms starts with “When the party sees the mirror or is in range, have the mirror introduce it self as the Opposite Mirror.” So … uh, I guess there’s a mirror in the room then?  Anyway, there’s a message on the floor. “Always coming to take me down.” If you give the password (the opposite, of course!) then the figure in the mirror (ok, so, now I guess there’s a figure in the mirror?) reaches through the mirror and activates two immovable rods that he uses to pull himself out of the mirror.” So … there’s two immovable rods somewhere? Outside the mirror I guess? And the figure comes out of the mirror? I mean, I’m not leaving anything pertinent out of the description here. The map doesn’t show anything important … or legible. It’s a funhouse room. And there are other funhouse rooms. And I can almost grok out what is going on. ALMOST. 

The boss monster is labeled as BOSS on the map. It’s a  Shambling Woodpecker. It can the flying tree from the cover (Small Evil Flying Needle Tree) are listed as Unique monsters. Which means that the grasping giraffe and putrid peacocks are not, by inference? DId I mention the electric deergull, a seagull with the head and antlers of a deer? It’s weird all right. It also feels PROCEDURALLY weird to me, rather than a creation. Like someone stuck some words in n app and is testing their new AI program. 

The loot table, which you dice on for all oot, is full of hings like “Magic Weapons [+] to hit” or Magic Weapon Damage Die Up. 

Things like a dire shadow bear that can be turned in to a statue by stabbing it in the heart with a silver dagger? Excellent! Idiosyncratic and great! I’m not morally opposed to a funhouse room; they are not my favorite, I prefer cohesive design, but I recognize them as a thing. But, the minimal encounters, lack of effort in a third of the rooms, and incomplete data in the other ?’s, along with map legibility issues? A hand drawn cover is only going to get you so far with me. That charm has to pay off, and it doesn’t. In the same vein, but less coherent, as Unbalanced Dice.

This is Pay What You Want at DriveThru with a suggested price of $7. The preview is eight pages but doesn’t really show you any encounters. Maybe check out that last page for the flying tree thing to start to get the right ideas about how it is written. 

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/366931/Nutmeg-in-the-Dark?1892600

By Brian Rideout
Deathtrap Games
OSR
Levels 5-7

Ninety-seven years ago the Cult of Malphas created the greatest library of Arcane Lore ever collected : the Maze of Yes’od-caj. They invited Sages and Luminaries from all over to witness its consecration. When the guests arrived, the cultists set upon them, beheading every sage and trapping their minds inside their undead skulls to serve as the source of the library’s lore. One sage avoided the slaughter and took revenge, poisoning the Cult with a killing spell, sealing the library to all but himself. Now, a century later, the doors to Yes’od-caj are open, and something stalks the streets, collecting the heads of the wise and holy… And there is Forbidden Lore and lost treasure ripe for the taking…

This 52 page adventure uses 22 pages to describe a 22 room dungeon. It’s trying to pull off a “trapped in a maze” thing, with a couple of options to get out. It’s got a couple of decent ideas, and a nice “bargain with a demonlord” encounter, but overall comes off a very samey in almost every room. This combines with some long winded read-aloud to produce what, I think, would be a dreary exploration.

So, let’s talk about those encounters/rooms, since that’s what a substantial portion of my negative feelings on this one come from. There are two environmental conditions in the dungeons. The first level (15 rooms) has a bunch of “scholar” skulls embedded in most room walls that scream gibberish. (This is meant to be satire about some specific online forum, but “the conversation has moved from scholarly discussion to furious shouting” could describe every online forum.) Because of this screaming, every party member must make, every two turns, a save vs spells or be confused for 1d4 rounds. I get the desired impact, but I also think this is quite a tedious mechanic and could have used more thought on how to implement it. On the second level (eight rooms), most rooms have a fine layer of dried poison dust on everything, which forces saves if kicked up through searching, fighting, etc. Again, I like the concept, but again, I think it might be a bit much. I like the push your luck aspect, but the concept here would seem to encourage an avoidance of interaction with the environment … not a good thing. Finally, something like twelve of the rooms on the first level (fifteen rooms) are essentially the same room encounter. A bunch of skulls on the wall, screaming at each other. That save vs spells effect. They each have some treasure in an alcove underneath them and they each have some kind of words of wisdom carved in to the wall above them. The formula for Gaseous Form potions, or some spell, or some other “word” treasure. In a couple of the rooms something drops down on your head to ambush you. You go in, collect some loot, question the skulls to get a clue about the riddle for the exit (you’re trapped inside, remember) and then rinse and repeat. In all of these cases, to one degree or another, the designer has taken a good concept and just repeated it just a little too much. There is a sameness to them that begs the question: why not just have fewer rooms? 

Against this samey-samey interactivity are three other encounters that DO stand out. First, we’ve got two linked rooms. The undead bad guy can be talked to and will let you out if you kill some NPC roaming around in the dungeon. She’s the second part of this linkage. So, a little bit of talking, some negotiation, and maybe a showdown with the bad guy … or killing the NPC so the bad guy can take her skull. Second, we’ve got the “secondary” exit on level two. It’s guarded by a giant ooze. The idea here is that you put a giant monster in front of the exit and force the party to make a choice: stay inside and dea with the skulls/baddie or risk the fight with the monster guarding the exit. Except … this isn’t really telegraphed at all. And the monster hides on the ceiling. And, it’s not really an impressive creature to be feared … I mean, it’s an ooze. Yeah, sure, maybe it has a lot of HP and kills people, but, it’s not TELEGRAPHED that way. Which is its purpose. Finally, we’ve got the demon lord. In an evil chapel you can sacrifice some treasure and/or people to summon a demon lord and ask for favors. Including getting you out, or a variety of other things. And there’s a book that explains what you need to do and a variety of “Reward” levels. This, then, is a classic push your luck. Look, right there, you can get out. All you have to do is summon Bob and promise him X. Oh, and want a stat bump, or XO, or something else? He’s ready and willing to respond, assuming you offer enough. That’s a PERFECT D&D encounter. You are making a choice. And, it probably leads to further, longer-term in-game complications. 

I should cover the text a bit. We’re looking at longer read-aloud, multiple paragraphs … although many of them are single sentences. Again, read-aloud should be kept short. Further, the read-aloud over reveals information, citing things like “the bronze plaque appears burned” and other details that, ideally, should be left for the party to investigate and learn about. The back and forth between party and DM is a critical part of the game, the heart of it, and over-explaining in read-aloud kills that interactivity. Finally, the DM text can off backstory and justifications for whats in the room, neither of which add anything to the game. I would normally add “and that makes it harder to scan and locate information …” but, in this case, since the vast majority of the rooms are essentially the same, that’s not an issue. 😉

“But, but, it’s a satire of an online forum!” … being sold as an adventure. If you want to be an adventure, castle greyhawk, then you have to be an actual adventure.

This is $4 at DriveThru. The preview is six pages and, unfortunately, doesn’t show the buyer anything interesting to help them make a purchasing decision.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/368087/Maze-of-the-Screaming-Heads?1892600

By James & Robyn George
Olde House Rules
Pits & Perils
Levels 1-3

Years ago, a sudden earthquake buried the Abbey of Saint Tabitha and ever since, evil things stalk the hills east of Dunkirk.  Can a novice group of heroes reclaim the abbey for law?  Let your players decide!

This 48 page adventure details 27 rooms in a ruined abbey. Partially keyed, room backstory, conversational writing, and generally low interactivity makes this something to steer clear from.

Let’s cover the layout/formatting first. It’s single columns and uses a faux-typewriter style. I generally don’t like weirdo fonts and choices because they tend to reduce legibility, but, surprisingly, neither of these choices seems to impact legibility at all. It brings the nostalgia without the legibility issues. The Same cannot be said for the map, which uses a kind of “we pasted this together” style, and leads to thick black lines between certain areas that could be open to interpretation as to if they two areas are connected. And, level one (there are two levels) is essentially linear, the “abbey” being tunnels and rooms carved in to the side of a mountain. 

The big deal, though, is the B1 style keying. Each of the rooms has five of so “blank lines in which the DM can fill out trease and creatures, with some room descriptions offering some advice to the DM on how to do this. “The referee can place several small coins at the entrance and/or top steps still visible through the murky water (by way of enticement.” One of the appendices has a second set of minimal room keys that detail the treasure and monsters for the Pits & peril game, such as “The shambling zombie that initially greets the party here has a silver

dagger worth 3 GP in its belt. This will never attack.” So, if you want to run the game you need to key the place yourself or consult the two keys at the same time, the descriptions and contents, and put it together. I have absolutely no idea why someone would choose to do this. I mean, I understand why b1 would no this. Literally no one knew how to play D&D. It had tables to roll on and taught you how to stock a dungeon. But this? Why would you not just stock the thing in the main room key? So you can have a generic/universal adventure for other systems? It’s far FAR better to create a fully formed and cohesive environment, that a DM can then convert, then to just write room descriptions and tell the DM to go do work. If I wanted to work I’d write my own adventure.

The room descriptions, such that they are without the encounters/treasure, are written conversationally, with  lot of used to be’s and so on. This bads them out, filling the descriptions with anthropology information that’s not relevant to running a game. “Observant players may notice …” the dwriting likes to tell us. Or this statement “Prior to formal consecration, this sacred place might be inhabited by nearly anything, as determined by the referee.” Great. “Prior to consecration …” “might be anything.” I feel empowered knowing these things. The prior to consecration thing, which is something that the party MIGHT do, at some point in the future, if they take the place over, is really a great example of these sorts of filler phrases. 

“This somber place was once a well-tended garden, a lovely portion of the creator’s paradise on earth.” This is how the very first room description starts, and exemplifies poor adventure description writing. Don’t tell us what USED to be here. Tell us what the place looks like NOW. That famous Dungeon Magazine trophy room has a very long reach, it seems. “Observant players, meaning those who ask, may notice small (goblins) footprints in the loose dirt leading to the abbey proper.” Note the extensive padding. Rewritten this could be something like “Withered Garden: Dry & dead shrubs in loose dirt, but for tangled ivy overtaking the walls and weathered stone benches. Barely noticeable goblin footprints leading in.” Dishes done! The adventure writing engages in these sorts of descriptions over and over and over again.

Interactivity is … poor. For a fantasy game. There’s the nudist pool you can walk through and maybe set it on fire cause there’s oil in top of the water. And, maybe, a secret panel or two to find and open. You can do some praying, etc to get some blessings/bonuses. A few natural hazards, mostly in the “water to a depth of 4 foot” variety. I guess for a low./no fantasy game it could be cool, with bandits in the place. I mean, the undead would be a problem. Maybe they could lepers, or mutilated people instead? I don’t know. I guess what I’m saying it that it seems a little staid. No much to do except stab people.

Well, except for that room that you can use weekly that has a 33% chance of healing you and/or curing disease. If _I_ were playing this, I’d clear this place out, retire, set up shop, charge, and become king from the income, funding my next PC to go, I don’t know, find the Hand & Eye or something like that. Fuck me, 33% each week, per person?I wonder if I should charge more for syphilis? 

There’s like six kitchens & dining rooms & pantries in the 27 rooms. The thing needs more cross-references for the big bads, to more easily locate information.

Someone spent some time writing this. And editing it. And locating/creating art. And doing the layout and getting that typewriter look right. And doing the maps and fidgeting with them. And dreaming about it. And making it their baby. And what it’s competing with are the other 10,000 adventures on DriveThru that were released today, as well as every other adventure that has ever existed ever. Journeyman products CAN be produced, and are worth supporting. But, you have to put worthwhile effort in to creating them. You have to understand the craft and the purpose behind the decisions being made. And this doesn’t.

This is $3 at DriveThru. The preview is six pages and shows you nothing of the adventure, so you can’t make an informed buying decision.Six reviews with 4.5 stars as a rating. We are DEVO, D.E.V.O.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/135316/The-Ruined-Abbey-of-Saint-Tabitha?1892600

By Thom Wilson
ThrowiGames
Five Torches Deep
Level 1

What Lies Below takes characters into a druid’s tomb below a rotten stump. The characters will quickly find that the druids buried within dabbled in magic and enchantments well outside their traditional schools.

This eight page adventure features an eleven room druid lair under a tree stump using five pages. Interactivity is rather basic. I’m going to spend most of the review talking about the ThrowiGames Sensory Descriptive Style format, and it’s failings, and what it means for writing a good description and organizing information for the DM to use.

So, lair under a tree stump. Some earthen cave-type rooms with a few undead and a spider in it.Interactivity is spares, and you’re gonna have to take my word on that, as I want to talk about Evocative Writing and Formatting. In this case, the interrelation between the two. This is the format used in the adventure for rooms. Other rooms mauve have other sense also, like “Taste” or “Sense” or “Exits.”

<pre>

Area 1: Tree Stump Entrance

A chain around the base of the rotting tree stump drops into a dark hole below.

GM Notes: Although rusty, the chain can support up to 500 pounds of weight.

Quick View: Wide, rotten, hollow stump. 

Detailed View: Rusty, thick-linked chain. Various animal footprints around the hole.

Listen: Air whistles up through the hole below the stump.

Smell: Rotting tree and vegetation.

Secrets: The hole is discovered with a DC 9 check. Exits: A hole below the stump drops over 40 feet.

</pre>

What we have is an attempt to well describe the room. Laudable, especially bringing in other senses, however I would argue that the formatting fails and that because of that the Evocative nature of the room also fails. Looking at the very first sentence, the chain around the base of the rotting stump … what’s the purpose of that line? Is it read-aloud? If so it may be TOO terse, ignoring such great features as the air whistling up, which should be obvious, and the rotting vegetation line. Is it a general overview of the room for the DMs needs? Then why the extra lines for the whistling and the rotting? 

There’s a Quick view section … how does this differ from the initial opening line? What is it adding that the opening line isn’t? Just repeating data, in the same way that the “Exits” portion is? Listening and Smelling are relatively specific actions. Further, both, in this rooms case, help set the general mood of the room and you, generally, want the players exposed to that mood initially, rather than making them “tease it out” of the DM. (With exceptions for things like a Revelation.) Further, the format, separated on different lines, with things breaking up the relevant sections from each other, takes more time to scan over and grok. When giving the initial room description you’re reading the room title, the initial italics line, the quick view, the listen, the smell, the exits, and probably the GM notes and secrets, all in order to synthesize the description in to something to relate to the players. 

This gets to the issue of being limited by a format instead of being enabled by it. I’ve almost always encountered this in adventure that, as this one does, explicitly has heading information for a variety of topics. Exits, smells, tastes, sounds, door construction material/DC, light in the room, and so on. I get where they are going with this. Light, in particular, is an easy thing to relate to, as something that we generally want to know. But what happens is that these rigorous formats begin to take over. They become the focus rather than the room and the DM running it, being the focus, even though they are supposed to be enabling that. In the end we see that the rigorous adoption and devotion to the format creates a room description that is less useful than the sum of its parts. Whatever effect a dotting hole in the ground, a rotting tree stump, wind whistling through the hole, might have had, it’s lost when you separate them out like this.I strongly believe that there is no one true way to write a description, but I do know that this isn’t it.

Also, when you approach the tree stump, entrance to the druid lair, you are attacked by four halfling thieves, life-long “Protectors of the Druids Lair.” WTF is up with this? Is has absolutely no theming with the rest of the dungeon, in any way. Another party, or bandits camped above, or something would have fit in better and made mode sense.

This is $1 at DriveThru. El Senor Preview is four pages, more than enough to get a sense of the room encounters, for format and interactivity.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/368106/What-Lies-Below?1892600