{"id":6790,"date":"2020-07-25T07:25:00","date_gmt":"2020-07-25T11:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/?p=6790"},"modified":"2020-07-15T13:28:03","modified_gmt":"2020-07-15T17:28:03","slug":"beneath-the-ruined-wizards-tower","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/?p=6790","title":{"rendered":"Beneath the Ruined Wizard&#8217;s Tower"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/ruined-820x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6789\" width=\"410\" height=\"512\" srcset=\"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/ruined-820x1024.jpg 820w, https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/ruined-240x300.jpg 240w, https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/ruined-768x959.jpg 768w, https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/ruined.jpg 900w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 410px) 100vw, 410px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<pre class=\"wp-block-preformatted\">By Jonathan Rowe\nFen Orc\nBlueHolme\nLevel 2<\/pre>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>The haunted caves where Smugglers hide their contraband and the Undead Corsair whose tomb has been disturbed<\/li><li>The Temple of the Rat God and the sinister secret society that has infiltrated the unsuspecting town above<\/li><li>The ancient Pre-human City where a foolhardy Wizard unearthed something that destroyed his Tower, fifty years ago, and guarded by its own deadly occupants<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>This seventeen page adventure details level two of the Holmes sample dungeon and has 26-ish rooms. It doesn\u2019t make me wish I was never born which, I guess, is a compliment? But it has some serious map issues and a genericism, combined with a lack of interactivity, that causes the finished thing to suffer.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Layout was in Word, I think, because it\u2019s in docx format. It\u2019s relatively complex though, so the designer must be quite proficient in Word. BUT \u2026 I almost didn\u2019t open the document BECAUSE it was in docx. Don\u2019t put your work in docx. Put it in PDF. Everytime I see a doc file I think \u201cThis is an attempt to infest my computer with malware.\u201d There\u2019s no wat around that; unless you\u2019ve got a really good reason then put your work in PDF.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The dungeon map has three-ish zones and is one of the greatest disappointments I have ever seen. Not the map design, proper, it\u2019s ok. Some details, not the worst layout possible, etc. But then it\u2019s hand numbered. Or, well, lettered, since it follows the Holmes example of using letters instead of numbers. And the designer is using some kind of fancy fucking font, or added flair to the fucking letters or something. Little lines at the end of letter strokes, etc. I can\u2019t read the fucking thing. Oh, I can make out a letter or three, but there are some that I just stare at and can\u2019t figure out what the fuck room it\u2019s supposed to be. It took me five minutes to find room \u2018B\u2019 on the map. It\u2019s fucking bullshit. Is this really what you want my commentary on your work to involve? \u201cThe fucking thing isn\u2019t legible; don\u2019t buy it!\u201d? No, of course not. Just fucking cut it out with the cutsy fonts, etc. If I can\u2019t read the fucking thing then I\u2019m going to fucking run it.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There\u2019s a disconnect, also, between the text and the map. The text has some good ideas: sea caves, an underground water filled tunnel and so on. But it is displayed terribly on the map. The sea caves look like just normal dungeon rooms. The underground water tunnel is the same. You can\u2019t tell there\u2019s water, or that it\u2019s a tunnel or anything else. Tunnel slopes and light are contained in the room descriptions. \u201cOops, that tunnel you just walked down was severely sloped. Sorry, guess I should have mentioned that sooner \u2026\u201d The logistics of the fucking map are TERRIBLE.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The read-aloud is \u2026 I don\u2019t know. Generic? It overreavels, that\u2019s for sure. Over and again it tells us things about the rooms that should be for the players to discover. \u201cThis room is storage for a pirates treasure.\u201d or \u201cThis is a maze of caverns\u201d or \u201cThe water extends under a wall down a long submerged tunnel.\u201d How the fuck do the players know any of this? It\u2019s for them to discover, as they interact with the environment with their characters. It\u2019s quite bad. On top f it is the genercism. It\u2019s like the read-aloud is a room note for the designer to expand upon rather than traditional read aloud. \u201cThis chamber contains only a deep pit. A prisoner at the bottom shouts and waves, desperate for you to throw him a rope to release him.\u201d So, yeah, that\u2019s iconic. But it doesn\u2019t really have any life and it\u2019s written in some kind of weird manner. I don\u2019t know how to describe it, but I know it when I see it. Genetically iconic? Conclusions instead of environment descriptions? \u201cThis maze of caverns is made from an indestructible crystalline material that reflects light and images in dazzling kaleidoscopic confusion\u201d It\u2019s missing something. It\u2019s like its abstract.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Interactivity is mostly fighting. There are some obstacles to overcome, the usual rope bridge over a chasm and the like. Every once in awhile there is a \u201csolve a puzzle\u201d or \u201cbring item A to room b\u201d type thing. It just isn\u2019t very \u2026 exploratory? I mean, you do get to explore, but the amount and number of things you get to interact with, beyond combat, seems very limited.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I wouldn\u2019t buy this. Which is good cause it\u2019s free. But I wouldn\u2019t run it either. There are far better choices that you don\u2019t have to fight to use and are more interesting. Another vision unfullfilled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is free at DriveThru.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.drivethrurpg.com\/product\/310408\/Beneath-the-Ruined-Wizards-Tower?1892600\">https:\/\/www.drivethrurpg.com\/product\/310408\/Beneath-the-Ruined-Wizards-Tower?1892600<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Jonathan Rowe Fen Orc BlueHolme Level 2 The haunted caves where Smugglers hide their contraband and the Undead Corsair whose tomb has been disturbed The Temple of the Rat God and the sinister secret society that has infiltrated the &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/?p=6790\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6789,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6790","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dungeons-dragons-adventure-review","category-reviews"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/ruined.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6790","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=6790"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6790\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6791,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6790\/revisions\/6791"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tenfootpole.org\/ironspike\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}