Lance Rock. The Dessamber Valley. 3rd Mirtul, 1491 DR The adventurers considered the two paths before them and chose to move along a narrow, winding tunnel further into the cave system. They were met with an unusual sight: three zombies dressed in strange garments – one as a bear, one as a clown, and one as a lady. Thumbalina immediately wanted to acquire the bear … Continue reading Princes of the Apocalypse, session 2
I own a lot of board games – at last count, over 500 of them – but I’m always looking for good new games. Dungeons & Dragons-themed board game are something I always want to try, and yesterday I had my first chance to play the new instalment in the Adventure System: Temple of Elemental Evil. The box is heavy, thanks primarily to the large … Continue reading A first look at the Temple of Elemental Evil board game
When creating a character, many players I’ve known have neglected to select a ranged weapon. This is normally a mistake. Without a ranged weapon, you’re vulnerable to any beastie that can sit back and shoot at you, especially when you can’t reach it yourself. Whether it’s a flying dragon or an archer on the other side of a crevasse, having a ranged weapon handy means … Continue reading Choosing the right ranged weapon in Dungeons & Dragons
The Breaking of Forstor Nagar is a 46-page adventure from Rite Publishing for 8th-level characters. It’s a real curiosity: it has absolutely fantastic imagery, good backstory, and enthralling situations, wrapped up in a package of major set-pieces that looks like it’d work best in 4E! This doesn’t mean that it won’t be fun to play, but it does mean that it stands aside from the … Continue reading 5E Adventure Review: The Breaking of Forstor Nagar
The Black Ruins is a short adventure written for old-school D&D (that is, AD&D 2E and before). It contains no monster statistics, only including the number and names of those encountered. In theory, it could be used for 5E play, although the suggested monsters would have to be modified to fit the level of the 5E party – a berserker means a very different thing … Continue reading OSR Adventure Review: The Black Ruins
The Tomb of Gardag the Strange is a short adventure written for the Labyrinth Lord system (a variant of the 1981 Basic & Expert D&D set edited by Tom Moldvay and Dave Cook). The adventure contains seven first-level pregenerated characters, so I presume that it’s a first-level adventure. The adventurers are hired to discover the remains of an assassin from the tomb of the warlord … Continue reading OSR Adventure Review: The Tomb of Gardag the Strange
Winterheart is the second adventure to be produced as part of EN5ider, a patreon-backed magazine produced by EN Publishing. The adventure is designed for a party of 4th-level characters, and is written by Esper. The adventure takes inspiration from the film Frozen and sets the party the challenge of rescuing a kidnapped girl with the mystical power to unleash winter on the land. At that … Continue reading 5E Adventure Review: Winterheart
Frigga’s Chosen is an adventure by Johua De Santo for 2nd-4th level characters. It’s presented as a 23-page pdf, nicely illustrated. My major problem with the production comes from the computer-generated maps: they look great, but the grid pattern is nearly invisible, making it very hard to judge their scale. Indeed, the scale of the maps is very interesting: if the grid is 5 feet … Continue reading 5E Adventure Review – Frigga’s Chosen
Red Larch. The Dessamber Valley. 1st Mirtul, 1491 DR. Adventures begin in small places. As these things happened, it was in the small town of Red Larch, in the Dessarin Valley, that a group of six adventurers met and began their investigation into the rumours of trouble that had been coming from this land. The adventurers? Their names and stations? Let me lay out for … Continue reading Princes of the Apocalypse, session 1
Xonthal’s Tower, Mount Hlim. 1489 DR. Beneath the tower, the adventurers were soon attacked by a number of elementals – earth and fire elementals – which attacked as soon as they came into the chamber. Music and Mordechai, both tieflings, scorned the scorching touch of the fire elementals, with the doughty eldritch knight engaging all three of the elementals and swinging about lustily. When naught … Continue reading The Rise of Tiamat – Session 10
