An adventure by Melan, level 5-7.
Written for Swords & Magic
  I have a little side project here. I started this foray into the TTRPG space first as a module writer, beginning with The Fall of Whitecliff and continuing with the dozen or so more I’ve released over the past eight years. It’s only been a little over a year since I’ve started writing reviews, although checking my composition document it looks like I’ve cracked 100,000 words of reviewing already (I have reviews written all the way out to April right now). I’m not the only mixed reviewer/module seller, though, others have come before…Ben Milton, Gabor Lux, GusL, and Prince of Nothing come to mind. So, over the next few months, I want to review the reviewers here, looking at how an acclaimed adventure from one of these deeply-steeped holds up. Mr. Lux, known also as Melan, is the first one I’ll look at with his oddball In the Name of the Principle. It’s what he considers his most iconic, so let’s see how it plays.
  First off, this is a very unusual adventure. Just look at the summary blurb:
  Central concept: Open-ended assassinations
in the picturesque city state of Akrasia,
with the most state-of-the-art implements
of murder, including various futuristic
devices.
  So, we have a city adventure, which is rare. We have sci-fi devices handed out to the PCs, which is rare. We have a timed(ish) mission of assassination (not that rare) that ends with a full-fledged coup and seizing control of the city, which is so rare as to be unheard-of. Added to this mix is that the sending agency who gave the PCs their mission changed their minds and sent a second team of twelve hitmen, also equipped with sci-fi gear, to protect the PCs’ target. Now, add in the fact that there’s an impending festival that has tons of strangers filtering into the city and how the ruling clique are all paranoid, use secret police, and are equipped with some nice defensive magic and you’ve got an incredibly complex adventure here.
  Format and art won’t win any originality accolades, but the module is clean and clear, mostly conveyed in two-column paragraph-based prose, with simple hand-sketched (MS Paint?) maps sprinkled in where needed. As is normal for a city adventure, sub-maps are simple, almost more diagrams than proper room-by-room exploration maps. I think that’s probably the right call for assassination use, which is similar in game mode terms to a heist. Charming gear handouts and the occasional flourish of the orders sheets for the PCs and the hit squad are nice.
  The four rulers of the city are the standard prince, general, wizard, and priest, well-characterized in succinct paragraphs that give us what we need to run interactions with them, along with just enough stats/gear to make their assassination very difficult. The other factions are faceless but described in terms of motivations and plans/responses, which is fine, but the biggest interactive group that’s only characterized in asides is the mob of the city itself.

  I love the city writeup, which is where the main meat of the module is found. Akrasia is a wealthy city, not at the center of an empire but almost a bedroom community for the “big city” elite. Greco-Roman elements convey a certain feel, conjuring an impression of a Rome or Constantinople in miniature, complete with essentials like a main aqueduct, a temple (one target here), a wizard’s tower (one target here), and a Neo-Classical palace (two targets here). The biggest campaign-significant element about the city is that the whole thing is focused around a big planar gate where annual sacrifices of young men and maidens get sent off into the unknown during the mystery festival. The least obvious element of the whole scenario is how the PCs are supposed to rule it if they manage step 2, control the darned thing. One assumes that at some point the PCs find the second hit squad with the order rescinding the initial plan, but if they don’t, then there’s not much GM support on how to wrangle the restive city. There is a chance to blow the whole place up though.
  Which leads me to probably the most controversial aspect of the adventure, those sci-fi elements. In addition to starting the players out with laser pistols, force cubes, and a bomb, there’s integrated futuristic stuff throughout the adventure, most notably that the middle of the palace holds a rocket ship; launching the ship destroys the palace outright and there’s a 1-in-3 chance that the thing malfunctions during ascent, turning into a fireball that wipes out there whole city. If the rocket doesn’t blow up, whatever hapless PC(s) are aboard are more or less out of the game heading to interstellar space. More intimately, the grand poobah of the city does all his public appearances in a Magic Popemobile: A hovering glass bell that blocks all weapons and deflects most rays/magic. While this hews to a very respectable tradition of classic D&D, your own personal milage may vary. While some of the gear could be reflavored as magic items, the underlying technomagical assumptions underlay a lot of the adventure’s core.

​  This thing is hard to accurately access because it is Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. Not only does it assume a lot on the part of the DM, what with all the timers, factions, and locations…this is also not an adventure for all players. The sprawling open-ended nature of the scenario demands a lot of agency from the PCs. Treating this like a loot ‘n scoot assault, even at levels 5-7, will see the PCs failing fast, and the scenario falling apart once its clear that the mission is cancelled by the original senders will frustrate some parties. Not a scenario for every table I’m sad to say. Hard to seed into an ongoing campaign, and rather complex for a multi-session one-shot.
  There’s going to be a break out of ratings, then, because I’m always looking for usability. I admire this scenario a lot, but I’m not going to be one of the primary audience of users. Thus:
****/***** for most users, challenging as it is there’s also a lot of value for inspiration/stripping for parts.
*****/***** if you’re an advanced DM with high agency players who’s not allergic to gonzo elements.
***/***** for the single session/con slot user or someone with more go-along to get-along players.
  An impressive adventure, I suspect it’s going to be the best of the reviewers’ modules. Worth checking out for anyone, as it’s free and fascinating.  

A space hulk by Sean McGee, level nil
Written for Mothership
  Happy Halloween everyone, just a little bit early but it’s the right week. I’ve not done any Mothership-only modules before I think, so here’s a little trifold for our horror delight. My experience with trifolds hasn’t exactly been stellar before, but I’m always a hopeful reviewer. Formatting is pretty understandable, little intro blub in the front, fold-side has loot/monsters/dialogue snippets, and the inner fold is a “map” with nine nodes in a link diagram to represent a ship. From these humble elements we are commissioned to go forth and assemble an adventure, ideally a scary one. Let’s see how successful we are.
  I don’t even think the plot needs to be said with the title up there. The Siren’s Song is a derelict space ship. The PCs are tasked with retrieving valuable technology from the wrecked ship. There are other mercenaries aboard, and it’s yet another bug hunt with the ZORAX, a species of hundred-pound dire roaches that make up the wandering encounters of the adventure. Everyone is trying to kill you, the map isn’t particularly interesting, we’re not in Alien, it’s Aliens, and I hope your horror is into automatic weapons and screaming.
  Scraping the bottom of the barrel for what I liked, there is a bit of intelligence in how the bridge of the ship (with valuable tech loot) is locked down but there are a couple methods of bypassing, either finding a locker code to access a keycard or using wounded mercs and a Chewbacca Gambit to get in.

​An adventure by Sahaak Games, level indeterminant.
Written for “D&D and Other Things” (it’s 5E)
  Hey cool, it’s a trifold, been a little while. I’ve definitely never regretted one of these. Upon this trifold is engrained an adventure where reasonably high-level PCs (not said how high, but able to fight 60hp of vine-monsters and an ent+evil spellcaster combo, at least) get employed by a local herbalist as escorts in a forest that’s getting run as a turn-by-turn outdoor dungeon on a really pretty map that you’re not allowed to show the players. Yep, another one of those.
  I have no fundamental objections to the wafer-thin premise, it’s standard but there’s nothing wrong with a forest having an evil druid and a nice cowardly NPC companion can always add spice. The druid, one MALAKAR, THE GREEN SHADOW (love it) is corrupted by…stuff…and vaguely pursues power, which is causing problems for the forest inhabitants. I’d tell you more but that it, no personality notes, no details, no location names, no backstory. The central temple where the herbalist’s flowers grow has three slots for three magic runes, so wander the forest grabbing runes and then have a final bossfight with the quantum druid+ent. Rewards are literally random mundane seeds, 1d4 goodberries, and up to 3d10 gp.
  I guess it’s time to say what I liked…uh, that’s what I mentioned, great job on the evil druid’s name and very pretty forest map. There’s also a runic math puzzle player handout, which is exactly how you want to use table handouts. Beyond that, a couple of descriptions aren’t too bad.
  What can be improved here is all of it. Of course, having less vagueness goes a long way to generating more interest too, but that’s an ironically vague solution suggestion. The forest map looks nice but there’s not any use of the branching paths half of the time, coupled with the complete lack of and random encounters you’re looking at not having any use for the potentially interesting terrain features. The very simple puzzles to recover two of the Rune McGuffins are easy enough (which is good) and can be alternately solved with sledgehammers (which is good) but the approach is all wrong…sequence goes puzzle->solution->reward->VINE ATTACK. Much better to have an ongoing fight while solutions are worked out, particularly for the linear algebra puzzle that can be brute-forced.
  The best use case for this product is probably just yanking out the two puzzles for use in other situations, if your group enjoys puzzles. My kids group loves this stuff, that handout will go over very well. The thing can be run as a one-shot, but you’re going to be pulling hard to make it interesting.
  Ergo, final rating? */***** due to dryness. Pity because there’s good efforts and artistry that went into this, just not enough focus on it being played at a gaming table. 

​A one-page dungeon by Jason Thomas, level 1
Written system agnostic (boooo)
  First things first, I like the term “predator worms”.
  Mr. Thomas has delivered us a very pretty one-page-dungeon, built primarily around the isometric map of an oddball little complex beneath an old dry well. It’s a bit of a strange setting when examined closely but it is well-crafted little environment, not keyed in a traditional sequence but with little signposts indicating what’s going on in each area. Couple that with a short and sweet backstory plus handout and a trio of statblocks for the monsters, this “system agnostic” adventure more complete than a lot of “for X system” dungeons out there. The only main criticism is that there’s no random encounter chart or order of battle for a dynamic delve.
  The basic plot is standard-issue alchemist-makes-accidental-monster-which-eats-homeless-people-with-predator-worm-tenticles. Now the mayor’s son is missing, go kill the worms. The setting is a little confusing, elements like metal grates, ratfolk, and the impetus for exploring being the kidnapped mayor’s son make it almost a city/urban adventure, but the grassy well entrance, pool, and crystals/stalagmites growing from the floor make for a more naturalistic environment. Charitably, it’s a gonzo discordance, uncharitably either the author doesn’t understand how caves work or expects us not to? Meh, it’s okay.
  So, while I have ranted against isometrics in the past, what I liked here was the map, it’ll actually translate pretty reasonably to graph paper and the verticality is decent. There’s some okay interactivity with the friendly ratfolk, a hiding rogue, the hunted kid is hesitant and scared, all fun enough. I like that the alchemist’s journal dumps the story of the monster-thing, fun. The treasure is okay, a few cute ideas like the locked chest having a hidden key OR can be broken open but some of the stuff in there is breakable.
  Biggest part of what can be improved is coherence, I think. Although there’s plenty of individually good things happening here, once I start thinking about putting this in an ongoing campaign it starts to fall apart a little bit. It’s not just the setting…if I’m playing something in an urban environment I have so many sewers, so many wererats, and so many secretive alchemists…it starts to feel a little more awkward. The “stickiness” is a hard thing to improve, but I think attempting to add realism would go a long way to making this memorable, elevating the whole into at least closer to the sum of their parts.
  Still the best use case in this one is as a gonzo one-shot. Only have two hours on your DCC con slot? This thing fits the bill. I wish I could say it’s an adventure site to weave into your city, but it’s a little bit of a hard fit.
  Final Rating? **/***** because it’s something you could have fun playing, but sadly it won’t be something you tell stories about weeks after.

​A dungeon by Revivify Games, mid-level
Written for Vaults of Vaarn
  Let’s make a gentle transition away from sci-fi month back to the more standard fantasy fare with a Vaults of Vaarn joint. I was less than impressed with the last time I encountered this heartbreaker system, but the vaguely Tron-ish synthwave post-apocalypse aesthetic at least isn’t Troika, so it could always be worse. This particular eight-page document is attractively minimalist, with generous margins, tasteful art, and tight language used to convey a fourteen-key mystical temple. It’s almost soothing how pleasantly its conveyed.  Couple this with a pretty but reasonably designed map, and I’m going in filled to the brim with almost childlike hope.
  The plot, such as it is, doesn’t break any new ground but it’s fine enough for a night of D&D. The faa, whatever they were, made a vault of magic thingies in a temple buried underneath the “interior sands” with two mirrored pyramids the only hint to its presence. Fine, good, let’s go loot. Most of the fighting is going to be from the random encounters, which are two different columns for “Lower Levels” and “Higher Levels” and pull from a monster manual I’m not aware of but I hope “d6 Phthalo-Hackals” is a nice surprise. Low levels getting either a d6 or a d4 of monsters while higher nets 2d6 or d6 of the same monster types makes me scratch my head. Anyway, enjoy the semi-linear map with each “progress” branch unlocked by a “relic” found on the other branch, ensuring almost all rooms much be explored. Flavor text is working hard but the contents of each room are pretty simple, just a puzzle or a monster or a helper. The bottomless pit, if fallen into, just teleports characters to a fountain asleep at 1 hp, lame, but at least there’s an NPC handy there. This is essentially a plunder scenario, and the final vault (opened via simple mirror puzzle) has a special grail on top of a pile of explicitly worthless currency. There were…choices being made here.
  This is another one where what I liked is going to make me sound a little shallow. It’s an attractive little product, aesthetically pleasing. I like the idea of some of the gear around the temple/vault, like a reflective butterfly-wing shield or the swords and loot made out of crystal…
  ….but unfortunately, what can be improved is that all of this, like that apparent bottomless pit, is actually in fact shallow. Pretty aesthetics aside, what you have in the end is a trio of forced fights, some very simple key puzzles, and a “secret thing” that’s this mystic fountain thingy. Focusing on sizzle to the exclusion of steak is a common problem, and I’m not sure how to fix this is each case but I think the aforementioned pit is where to start…make falling into the bottomless pit an actual fall into eternity. If a PC falls, that’s the end. It’s a real danger. I think that focus on having real threats instead of mood-setting would improve every single room, and then you can make the fights unforced, even.
  I reckon the best use case for The Temple of Mystic Light is to run it as an adventure site. A few mild ideas like the butterfly-wing reflective shield are worth looking at, but in the end you’re just left slightly singed by the grill and hungry for Angus.
  Final Rating? */***** and kind of mad about it, this is tragic misallocation of talent. 

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  The beacons are lilt. The challenge has gone out. Adventure is calling. Countless hexmaps, open table campaigns, and con slots are waiting for whatever you’ve come up with, your mixture of creativity and practicality that is MADE TO BE PLAYED. To the victor goes the glory.