DriveThruRPG.com
Browse Categories
$ to $















Back
pixel_trans.gif
Other comments left by this customer:
You must be logged in to rate this
pixel_trans.gif
DDAL07-01 A City on the Edge (5e)
Publisher: Wizards of the Coast
by Adam G. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 12/10/2017 12:27:34

City on the Edge serves as a good introduction to Port Nyanzaru, a key location in Season 7 and Tomb of Annihilation. There is good variety, althought some of the encounters were pretty plain. I both played this and DM'd it in 4-hour slots (even though it is officially 5 hours of play), and it took significant planning to make the timing work.

What I liked

  • The overall framing and some of the mini-adventures had good flavor. Players really get the feel of being in a large, steamy city on the edge of the jungle that has a wide variety of factions and political interests. I especially liked the flavor of mission 2 and mission 3, which were just different from the usual.
  • Lots of variety in locales and encounters. The party travels to different parts of the city and outside of the city. and encounters actually occur in diverse settings.
  • Some good roleplaying opportunity, especially with the faction heads.

What I didn't like

  • The dinosaur race was confusing and got old quickly. I love the flavor of the race, but the mechanics were a bit hard to follow. When I played as a PC, the DM misread the instructions and the race took over an hour. I made some changes when I DM'd that moved things faster, and I think the players enjoyed it more.
  • The combat encounters were not very tactically interesting and tended to feel like a slog. I probably could have made them more interesting, but that would have made the mini-adventures run longer than an hour each.

DM tip: If you are running this is a limited time slot, make a plan ahead for pacing and what you'll drop. There is no way you can cover all the content in a 4-hour time slot!



Rating:
[3 of 5 Stars!]
DDAL07-01 A City on the Edge (5e)
Click to show product description

Add to DriveThruRPG.com Order

pixel_trans.gif
DDEX2-06 Breath of the Yellow Rose (5e)
Publisher: Wizards of the Coast
by Adam G. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 12/10/2017 12:02:41

Breath of the Yellow Rose has great story content, an investigation, and lots of roleplay opportunities, but may be less interesting for players who prefer combat. It requires a reasonable amount of DM prep to keep track of the story and NPC threads, and the DM should plan ahead if time is limited. This can be a lot of fun with the right players and sufficient DM preparation.

What I liked -

  • This adventure has exceptional roleplay opportunity. There is a good variety of NPCs, many that PCs need to get information out of. The author did a good job with gray boxes containing tips about roleplaying each of the NPCs. After running this adventure, I got super motivated to create my own PC hailing from Mulmaster.
  • The story and campaign tie-ins are strong. The adventure dives deep into politics and personalities in Mulmaster, and ties well in with other season 2 adventures. The cult that is the center of the adventure is both funny and sad, and most players should have context from media portrayal of cults to enjoy it.
  • The investigation was a good chase for the party. I've run other adventures where investigation felt either too linear or where players could easily get stuck if they missed a clue. This was not that -- the party hit lots of dead ends, but they always had other options and didn't require much nudging from me.

What was OK -

  • Part 4 (everything after the investigation) was OK. I felt like there was an illusion of choice, but the party was going to have to fight several key NPCs no matter what they chose. After completing the investigation part, I actually think my players were tired of sandbox and would have preferred something more obviously linear in Part 4.
  • Pacing required some forethought. I opted to let my players enjoy the investigation, but we had to move pretty fast through the last two combat areas because we had a limited time slot (4 hours).
  • The gala. I'm just not a big fan of running parties. While there was a lot of great material provided, some of it did not contribute to the party's mission and I chose to skip it for the sake of time.

What I didn't like -

  • I thought the combat was less interesting. There is a small encounter during the investigation that felt like it was thrown in to break things up, but it wasn't especially interesting and felt random. In the main encounter area (Part 4), there were several opportunities for combat, but they didn't require much tactical thinking.

Ovearall, I thought the adventure was well written with lots of flavor. It probably needs a 5-hour time slot to really do it justice.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
DDEX2-06 Breath of the Yellow Rose (5e)
Click to show product description

Add to DriveThruRPG.com Order

pixel_trans.gif
DDEX3-10 Quelling the Horde (5e)
Publisher: Wizards of the Coast
by Adam G. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 12/10/2017 10:47:17

Quelling the Hordes has opportunity for light investigation, roleplaying, and a good variety of combat. It is fun if run well, but the adventure can easily turn into a slog-fest. The DM should make conscious choices about how to run it. I ran this in a four-hour slot and was nervous beforehand that the party would feel rushed, but that ended up not being the case.

It starts with a simple investigation that includes both combat and a small roleplay opportunity. There is no puzzle-solving, but the story pieces provide good flavor. If you have limited time, DMs should make sure the party keeps moving through the investigation because the meat of the adventure is after this.

The trail leads the party to a large set of caves where there are many encounter opportunities. There is good variety here where fighting head-on is often not the best approach -- so the players need to make decisions about how to proceed. This variety includes:

  • A CR 4 monster that can easily TPK a low-level party, but can be negotiated with.
  • A village, where the party can use stealth or other means to avoid being attacked by everyone at once.
  • Possibility of equipment destruction, which is especially worrisome for poor 1st level characters It is easily possible for the party to explore/encounter everything else before finding the boss. If time is limited, the DM may need to steer them.

When I first picked this up, I would have liked it if the adventure had more guidance for DMs running this in a standard four-hour slot. Fortunately, there is enough advice out there -- here on DMs Guild and out in the web -- for DMs who are preparing to run this.

(Note: In one place the text says that the adventure is optimized for 1st level, and in another place it says it is optimized for 3rd level. Reading around on the web, I settled on 1st level.)



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
DDEX3-10 Quelling the Horde (5e)
Click to show product description

Add to DriveThruRPG.com Order

pixel_trans.gif
Hero Kids - Fantasy Adventure - Curse of the Shadow Walkers
Publisher: Hero Forge Games
by Adam G. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 09/15/2013 17:21:26

I just played this adventure with my 8 and almost-5-year old. We started playing Hero Kids about 9 months ago, and I think this is my favorite so far -- mainly because there were more, and more diverse, roleplaying opportunities than I've seen in other adventures.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
Hero Kids - Fantasy Adventure - Curse of the Shadow Walkers
Click to show product description

Add to DriveThruRPG.com Order

pixel_trans.gif
Displaying 1 to 4 (of 4 reviews) Result Pages:  1 
pixel_trans.gif
pixel_trans.gif Back pixel_trans.gif
0 items
 Gift Certificates