{"id":5178,"date":"2016-05-02T07:12:11","date_gmt":"2016-05-02T11:12:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/?p=3009"},"modified":"2019-02-24T10:14:47","modified_gmt":"2019-02-24T15:14:47","slug":"dungeons-of-felvalashar-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/?p=5178","title":{"rendered":"Dungeons of Fel’Valashar"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"felv\"<\/a>
\nBy Steve Gilman
\nSundered Blade Games
\nSwords & Wizardry
\nLevels 3-4<\/p>\n

Written in celebration of Swords and Wizardry Appreciation Day 2016, Dungeons of Fel\u2019Valashar is a collection of mini dungeon adventures with a small region called Fel\u2019Valashar that they take place within. Each of these adventures is written in such a way that they don\u2019t have any ties to each other or to Fel\u2019Valashar. This means you can easily drop them into your own world with no fuss.<\/p>\n

This is a very basic set of three mini-dungeons, with about eight rooms each, located in a small little region. It\u2019s all quite bland and provides few details that could not have come from a random generator, either for monsters or dungeon trappings. It begs the question: what are you actually paying for? I think you\u2019re paying for the designers imagination, and alas there\u2019s little here.<\/p>\n

The first clue is probably the wandering monster table. Owlbear. Goblin. Orcs. Bandits. Ogres. Nothing more than stats. The value add here consists of copying the monster stats out of the Monster Manual and on to the page in abbreviated format. No one is doing anything, there\u2019s no content that adds any value at all. Soooooo\u2026. Why is it there? Because it\u2019s supposed to be? Because it\u2019s required to be? It\u2019s the accepted form of adventures with a wilderness component to include a wandering monster table? If it\u2019s going to be generic then it probably shouldn’t be included.<\/p>\n

There are four mini-dungeons, in various forms, from partial caves, to an abandoned village. There\u2019s an earth temple. As soon as I read \u201cEarth Temple\u201d I knew it was going to be some symmetrical dungeon design. I was not disappointed. The first map, an old cave system is one of the more interesting, with a ledge or two, some statues, a big pond, and other cave features mixed into a transition to dungeon chambers. The problems with the rest of the dungeons are fully in view in just this first one. The hooks are obvious: \u201cunnaturally large dogs have been seen in the area\u201d or \u201clocal wildlife has been found dead in the area, drained of all blood.\u201d I would suggest these are not hooks at all. They are simply facts. They lack anything interesting or fun that the DM can leverage to get the characters involved. The actual dungeon has room descriptions like \u201cMain Hall. The large hall was used for entertaining guests […]\u201d or \u201cServant Quarters. Rows of dusty beds line the walls of what was once living quarter for the staff.\u201d Yes. We know they were living quarters for the staff. You told us that in name of the room, Servant Quarters. We also know what is in it. You told us that also IN THE NAME OF THE ROOM. \u201cDining Hall.<\/p>\n

This room was once the dining hall for the inhabitants of the complex.\u201d This is nothing but filler. It\u2019s not needed. It clogs up the adventure text. It adds nothing to the adventure. The designer must either add value OR OMIT THE TEXT. The text here almost ALWAYS fails in both of those basic tasks. Each dungeon does typically have one bit, maybe two, that is not completely generic. \u201c4 zombies are bent over the blood-drained corpse of an adventurer, feasting upon it, while 4 others shuffle around hungirly.\u201d There\u2019s another room, a cave, that has a two statues in it that you can loot. That has potential. Two statues, a cave room with a pond in it \u2026 it\u2019s begging for something else, but nothing comes of it.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a village with a harpy in it, almost completely empty except for generic adventurers wandering about as random monster encounters. \u201c Human Warrior\u201d or \u201cHuman Magic-User\u201d \u2026 that adds NOTHING. \u201cFarm. Crops were once grown at this fenced in farm.\u201d *sigh*. Again, \u201cthe rotted remains of pigs that were left here \u2026\u201d is one of nicer bits of text in the the town, as is the very concept of a spiraling pit mine in another of the mini-dungeons. But it\u2019s just not enough. One idea per mini-dungeon is not enough to sustain play or justify an eighteen page booklet with four dungeons.<\/p>\n

The product is only offensive because of it\u2019s lack of value. You\u2019re not going to be bombarded with volumes of text ,but I\u2019d assert that you\u2019re not going to get anything here that 5 minutes with a pencil and paper wouldn\u2019t get you. It\u2019s safely generic, and I\u2019ve no place in my life for that.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s Pay What You Want at DriveThu, but you have to want it first.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.drivethrurpg.com\/product\/180802\/Dungeons-of-FelValashar-Swords-and-Wizardry?affiliate_id=1892600<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Steve Gilman Sundered Blade Games Swords & Wizardry Levels 3-4 Written in celebration of Swords and Wizardry Appreciation Day 2016, Dungeons of Fel\u2019Valashar is a collection of mini dungeon adventures with a small region called Fel\u2019Valashar that they take … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3008,"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-5178","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reviews"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/felv.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5178","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=5178"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5178\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5714,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5178\/revisions\/5714"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}