{"id":4464,"date":"2018-10-06T07:19:58","date_gmt":"2018-10-06T11:19:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/?p=4464"},"modified":"2019-01-21T13:17:56","modified_gmt":"2019-01-21T18:17:56","slug":"5e-rats-of-waterdeep","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/?p=4464","title":{"rendered":"(5e) Rats of Waterdeep"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>
\nBy Lysa Chen, Will Doyle
\nSelf Published
\n5e
\nLevels 1<\/p>\n

Solve a brutal crime on the mean streets of Waterdeep in this madcap companion adventure for Xanathar’s Guide to Everything!<\/p>\n

This 29 page city adventure is fun. Modeled on a Noir novel, it doesn\u2019t take itself too seriously, but never falls over the line in to humor or sillyness. It walks up and leans over it, waving its arms to not fall over it, but stays firmly planted while looking over its shoulder and giving the finger to the hardcare serious adventures behind it. Pretty well organized and written, I\u2019d be happy to run this, and it\u2019s good enough that I\u2019ll look up the authors others works. Also: One of my vices is city adventures, so, be warned.<\/p>\n

The docks are quarantined, there\u2019s a plague. The watch has a message from someone inside that says they know what\u2019s behind it. The party gets to escort the detective in \u2026 only to find the informant dead and the detectie most likely compromised.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a touch of noir in this. It\u2019s a mystery, the party escorts a detective. He\u2019s new to the squad and wears a fedora and trenchcoat and doesn\u2019t understand why the rest of the watch detectives just wear the city uniform. There\u2019s a crime lord with a henchman, jilted lovers in the form of the Rat King and the Lady of Plagues, bored secretaries causing trouble \u2026 a lot of fun shit to roleplay with.<\/p>\n

In this case the crime lord is Waterdeeps on Beholder Bob, and his lacky Mind Flayer. He meets the party after they find the first body, is bored, and sends his thugs after them while he floats away, bored and distracted, with his lacky. I bitch a lot about forced fights and so on, but, if you\u2019re gonna do it then having your 1sts meets a behold and a mind flayer and get a chance to talk before thugging it up is absolutely one way fun way to do it. Plus, he disintegrates the detective you\u2019re escorting if the party get lippy. NPC removed! Yeah! Fun! Yeah! This is almost a DCC aventure! Well, no, but still, closer than most!<\/p>\n

It\u2019s got a nice map\/adventure flowchart up front explaining the area and the adventure and how the hooks and clues work together. PERFECT for a nice overview. It uses bullet points to convey information. PERFECT for scanning and locating information and breaking it up.<\/p>\n

The elements are great. For example, at the apothecary-with-something-to-hide the secretary is trying to get rid of the players using the usual bored clerk gimmicks. The roleplaying notes for the NPC\u2019s are good \u2026 pretty nice.<\/p>\n

Oh, and the usual \u201clets explain everything in a diary?\u201d bullshit? It\u2019s handled through a player handout. Players LOVE handouts AND it doesn\u2019t overstay its welcome by droning on. Great!<\/p>\n

And, and, if you CATCH the plague you will turn in to a rat! You get features, like beady red eyes, or whiskers, for each save you miss in the adventure. FUN!<\/p>\n

And there\u2019s a town newspaper handout!<\/p>\n

And on the down side \u2026<\/p>\n

The bullets are good, as are the NPC notes, but they do get a bit long at times. A little bolding, or a sentence or sentence and half less would be better, as would a more direct writing style. You\u2019re conveying information to the DM who is scanning during play \u2026 it has to be terse \u2026 while remaining evocative. Cut the bs.<\/p>\n

Certain details are abstracted. We\u2019re told the plague goes by many names, including Rat Pox. Well, fuck, the fact that you named that one means rats are important. A few more naes mixed in would have been fun.<\/p>\n

Finally, the two main characters are the Rat King and the Lady of Plagues. They are demihumans. B O R I N G. Think of how much more fun it would have been if they were straight out Petty Gods?!?!?! A REAL rat kind and a minor god plague?!?! FUN! And fun friends to make!<\/p>\n

I\u2019m clearly a fan of this. I like city adventures, this one is fun in the way I like adventures to be fun. Not humor, not silly, but with some nods to those elements. It’s not Sliced Bread quality, but it’s solid enough.<\/p>\n

This is $5 at DriveThru. The preview is broken. I has sads.
\nhttps:\/\/www.dmsguild.com\/product\/240322\/Rats-of-Waterdeep?affiliate_id=1892600<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Lysa Chen, Will Doyle Self Published 5e Levels 1 Solve a brutal crime on the mean streets of Waterdeep in this madcap companion adventure for Xanathar’s Guide to Everything! This 29 page city adventure is fun. Modeled on a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4456,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,3,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4464","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-level-1","category-reviews","category-the-best"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/ratdeep.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4464","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=4464"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4464\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5093,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4464\/revisions\/5093"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}