{"id":4430,"date":"2018-09-17T07:17:55","date_gmt":"2018-09-17T11:17:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/?p=4430"},"modified":"2018-09-10T11:18:56","modified_gmt":"2018-09-10T15:18:56","slug":"phaunts-tower","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/?p=4430","title":{"rendered":"Phaunt’s Tower"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>
\nBy Jonathan Hicks
\nFarsight Games
\nSwords & Wizardry
\nLevels 1-3<\/p>\n

Welcome to Wherwest! This is a town full of opportunities at every corner, adventure through every door and danger at every turn. Glory and gold awaits! That is, if you can get past your first night here.<\/p>\n

This 22 page adventure details a nine room friendly wizards tower that has been invaded by demons. Event based, forced fights, and sloopy text detracts from the attempts to add a little sparkle to the adventure.<\/p>\n

Well, there\u2019s some nice wording here and there. Nice imagery (with art attached) of a small fortified village with a tower in the middle, blue light on top, acting as a kind of beacon in the wilderness. After a magical explosion there\u2019s the smell of sulphur and rotting meat wafting through the smoke and fog around the tower. <\/p>\n

There\u2019s also a nice scene or three, like \u2026 \u201ca badly damaged gelatinous cube sloshing its way down the street, falling apart with great globs splashing onto the ground \u2026\u201d Or people trapped inside that need escorted out. Or a cleric fighting for her life \u2026 who heals you if you save her. And \u2026 consequences. Going after the cube or saving the people slows you down; it\u2019s a distraction from your main mission: getting to the top of the tower to stop a demon infestation. Getting distracted has consequences: an extra demon added to encounters after that. <\/p>\n

This sort of consequence based events appeals to me. Fuck around and it gets harder. Save a villager and it gets a little easier with heals, etc.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s less interesting is \u2026 well \u2026 everything else. 22 pages and nine rooms means issues. In this case, single column, long read-alouds, and extensive DM text, all of which detract from the adventure. \u201cThis is the main hall where Phaunt receives guests, petitioners and dignitaries\u201d, begins the description for room one. And then dimensional data. And then a description of a normal room. And THEN a description of the combat with demons in the room. Most important things come first people, and room purposes are not needed, nor are histories or descriptions of typical things. <\/p>\n

The DM descriptions are expansive, with a lot of asides \u201cso the party should be able to deal with them [demons] quickly.\u201d says the text, adding nothing to the adventure except a conversational style that clogs things up. Text is wasted describing the detailed mechanics of an archery contest, with no hint of flavour to make it exciting, like onlookers, other contestants, the judge, etc. That\u2019s what will make the context interesting and memorable, not the mechanics. <\/p>\n

And, of course, there\u2019s the forced fights. S&W level one. What\u2019s that mean, something like 2hp each? Maybe 3? The party faces forced combat after forced combat. That’s ok though, we\u2019re told repeatedly that if they get in trouble then the DM should send a town guardsman in to help them. Ug. <\/p>\n

The main treasure room in the tower exemplifies the adventure. Lot\u2019s of simple book +1 items \u2026 that you can\u2019t use because they are locked down by the wizard. What\u2019s the point of it all?<\/p>\n

This is $3 at DriveThru. The preview is four pages and doesn\u2019t show you much. But \u2026 that long read-aloud? While nothing else reaches those heights it is a good example, nonetheless, of the style.https:\/\/www.drivethrurpg.com\/product\/251353\/Phaunts-Tower?affiliate_id=1892600<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jonathan Hicks Farsight Games Swords & Wizardry Levels 1-3 Welcome to Wherwest! This is a town full of opportunities at every corner, adventure through every door and danger at every turn. Glory and gold awaits! That is, if you … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4429,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4430","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reviews"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/phaunt.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4430","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4430"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4430\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4431,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4430\/revisions\/4431"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4429"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}