Vecna: Eve of Ruin Review

Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• Lots of full colour art. I do think it’s a bit worse than it was closer to the start of the edition. There’s more misses, and it’s not just me complaining about the art style. But there’s lots of it. If you can, I’d recommend taking a quick skim since it could full into a lower category depending on your tastes.

• A lot of different locations are visited over the course of the adventure. There’s a lot of variety of where we go and what we see.

• The little extra with learning secrets is an interesting idea, and I like that it also has some mechanical elements too. I’d surely steal this if I was running my own Vecna themed adventure.

• We finally have a high level adventure after a while.

• The final confrontation is interesting, with some interesting mechanics inside a memory before reaching the very final point.

Could Go Either Way

• Some of the choices of locations are odd? We revisit Death House again.

• The villain/villain(s) are not really so present. You don’t get that introduction like you do with Strahd for example. This will be more of an issue if your players aren’t well read on D&D and the Forgotten Realms. They simply won’t know who Vecna is unless you tell them.

• Vecna: Nest of the Eldritch Eye was included for pre-orders and is a pretty reasonable 3^rd level adventure that helps to introduce players to Vecna and the cult. It’s a fun little thing to run for Halloween. Problem is, it’s not that widely accessible.

• There are a lot of references here. To places. To characters. If you don’t have the time put into D&D, it may not hit nearly as hard.

• Lot of mono-colour maps.

Cons

• The overall flow of the adventure is formulaic, and is quite similar to the Planescape adventure. A series of somewhat disconnected adventures held together by a thin meta-narrative of collecting things in each place. We’ve had years now of adventures. I want to see the weird, unique, and out there stuff now.

• We’ve had a long list of adventures by now. I want some more tactical encounters in these books. I’m not even asking for a lot. Give me 1-3 big set piece encounters with gimmicks, interesting tactical features, and full beautiful battlemaps.

• It uses those new rules for NPC spellcasters we’ve had for a while. And wow, it really felt underwhelming against a spellcasting god like Vecna.

• No PDF, though the D&D beyond version is something (it requires internet).*

* Denotes nitpicking.

The cover of Vecna Eve of Ruin.

Introduction

It’s an important anniversary for D&D. And with it, we have this adventure. It’s meant to bring Vecna back. It’s meant to take us around various places like a “best of” and is part of D&D’s 50^th anniversary. It’s meant to give players a challenge that takes them to their highest levels. Before this, most campaigns ended somewhere between level 10-12. How does it do this? Well, let’s jump right in. At the time of writing, I’ve run the first 4-5 chapters and read the whole adventure. I’ve also run and played selected parts with a different group just to get a feel for some of the big moments.

The Adventure

New Player Options

Not much here. We’ve been here before. Let’s keep going.

New Monsters

There’s a little in the way of monsters, and we get a stat block for Vecna. It’s not full power Vecna, but it’s something. There's 43 by my count, but as usual not all of these are new. Probably a little over half of them are new. That's not terrible at all, but it's also not a new Monster Manual.

What You Need to Play

The Monster Manual, Player's Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide are and needed as usual. The old days of being able to run the adventure using purely the basic rules are over. 

 

A lich on his throne. How's it look?

The Adventure Itself

This adventure starts at level 10, but there are guidelines if you want to start at lower levels down to level 7. The adventure ends at level 20. This is very high for this edition, and I am happy to see this part of character advancement get more attention. I want to see more. The result of this is monsters are higher level, and the early levels many people don’t like (not me, I love me some level 1 play) is gone. Along with those mechanical considerations, it means the threats the party can deal with is much bigger. It’s not a small cult mostly using sticks, or a small group of goblins.

The adventure goes to many places. And I do mean that. From Barovia to Eberron, from Sigil to Oerth, a lot of ground is covered here. There’s a lot of characters too. Characters will be on speaking terms with Tasha, Mordenkainen, and Alustriel. This is interesting in theory. What happens if this is your player’s first D&D campaign? These references, and places will fall flat. This becomes a bit of a problem with Vecna himself. He doesn’t feature so prominently in the events of the story until the end directly. Sure, he’s doing stuff of screen, and he’s the reason behind the events, but we don’t see him. Personally, I’d add some sort of adventure in between that helps players get introduced to the world and some of the big name characters. There’s the other hand though. What if your players do know and like these characters? Does this adventure do them justice? Eh... that’s, a complicated question. It’s big enough that I want to do an entire article on it. That I am not emphatically declares yes though is worrisome.

There is an adventure only available to pre-order customers. It’s an alright classic dungeon exploration sort of thing. But it really is too bad it wasn’t more widely available. Combining that with some custom adventures to get players hooked would really go a long way. And if I was running it for a group of D&D newbies, it’s what I’d do. Here’s an idea for Wizards: make an adventure going levels 1-10 that can get players antiquated with the cult of Vecna and the big players.

The structure of the adventure is...not my favourite. A series of mostly disconnected chapters held together by a meta-plot about obtaining pieces of something is fine. It can be fun. But we just had that with the Planescape adventure. There we collected memories instead of items, but the same structure is present. It allows players to set their path and where they want to go next while they check off each location. But in D&D, adventures often take that away too since different areas are intended for different levels. This adventure should really have been something different. Something more narrative focused, where each part interacts with the next tightly. Something more like Curse of Strahd. We need variety. Quests from the Infinite Staircase is similar in this regard, but I make an exception for anthologies (quick preview, I actually quite liked that book). For those, the book could be sold with no glue holding the adventures together. An example for this glue really helps, and I can easily ignore it if I hate it.

The encounters themselves are very similar to what we had before. And honestly, I want to see more here going forward. I want at least a few encounters in every book to be special. With interesting gimmicks and tactical considerations. The fights my players remember are not when they stood static in a blank room rolling dice until the other side fell down. They were racing against another group to get to a switch while exchanging fire. They were trying to use features of the environment for an advantage. The enemy goblins were falling back over a rope bridge and getting ready to cut it, as the party chased after them. The rogue was breaking into the vault while the rest held off the incoming security, before making an escape from rooftop to rooftop. The party was trying to interrupt a ritual, and how well they did affected the strength of the summoned creature. This would require a map for an encounter, rather than an entire dungeon. But I think the way it pays off is worth it.

This is kind of where I contradict the above complaint a bit. The final conflict had an interesting gimmick where players went through different versions of possible futures if Vecna succeeds. They then escape it, and go into the next one before finally reaching Vecna. This is interesting, and it actually helps introduce the players to Vecna and what he’s all about. The reason my above critique is still valid though is because when the players finally reach him in the end, the tactical considerations from the location itself weren’t present. Sure, they still had their class features. But I want this fight to be unique. What they did do is have a mechanic where players collect secrets and can trade these collected secrets for mechanical benefit, including at the end. This is good. I like it a lot. But I’d like just a little more to really make this combat special.

Part of this is made worse due to those simplified rules for NPC casters. If Vecna had a full spell list like the lich did in the original Monster Manual, it’d be a bit better. Worse, it’s still hard to even convert them to the older style. Please, just give us spell caster levels on the stat block at least so I can do it myself. Better yet, just support the old version too. I like having the option. If I had players break into a necromancer cult, I’d probably use the old rules for the leader and simplified for the apprentices. But it should be MY choice to make.

There are some decently interesting things here. Some of these chapters would make excellent asides of the basis for arcs of your campaign. The start of the adventure I would say is quite strong in terms of the narrative it sets up. I wish the overall plot had more effort put into it. I wish some more effort was put into encounters. I think this is one of those adventures that needs a lot of effort by the Dungeon Master to make it good. I predict that a lot of groups will find it “just ok” enough to be annoying. We don’t want ok or bad. We want great. And we’ve had some excellent content in this edition. We’ve had good but needs serious cleanup by the Dungeon Master to make it great. And some are highly flawed. I think this one is flawed.

What Would I Like For a D&D Anniversary?

If I were to sit down and try to write an adventure for a D&D anniversary, I’d want everything. I’d want large scale battles. I’d want low scale tactical combat. I’d want a strong narrative flow through the whole adventure. I’d want famous characters and villains in their mighty splendour. How about lots of space for players to run around, explore, and investigate? 

 

One of the environment pieces.

The Art and Book Build Quality

My book was good in terms of physical condition. There was no issues with the binding. I had no stuck pages, no issues with pages being cut. It was to the physical quality I expected. The art was plentiful throughout the book and the colouring was what I expected. I’m happy to see some of the issues I’ve seen in the past were avoided.

How about the art itself? Well, there’s some really good art. The art relating to the Eberron section was stuff I liked. Seeing ruined machines of war, broken and rusting littering the landscape. It makes for good art, and a good setting. There’s also some eh art as well. As always, I want to see some more realistic scenery art. If one day they make an adventure with all of the main adventure scenes and rooms done in beautiful realistic style, I’ll be very happy. The maps are varied in style, and nice as well. There’s some with colour. There’s some monochromatic ones too. But they’re easy to read and understand. In general, it’s solid, but I find myself thinking there hit to miss ratio is worse compared to earlier books in this edition.

Price

It’s the usual price we’ve come to expect. I wish they were longer or cheaper, but that’s what we deal with now.

What I felt was Missing

One day, I hope people get a digital version with their physical release. It doesn’t cost that much more, so it’d be a great bonus. I also hope one day we do get real PDFs. So we can access the books digitally with no restriction or DRM what-so-ever. 

There's a lot of encounters I would've liked to see, especially given the fact it's an anniversary and the books are getting pricier.

Vecna and Kas fighting each other.

Summary

It’s an alright adventure with some interesting ideas and locations. But it also has some very serious flaws that are non-trivial to fix. It can be broken up for parts easily and reused by the resourceful Dungeon Master. It really is like a loose collection of adventure tied together by an overarching narrative. The adventure itself is a mixed bag in many ways for me though. That overching plot is a bit thin and messy. For something like this, bringing such big classic characters together, I want a strong plot with strong characters and strong characterizing of the villains. It’s Vecna. I want it to be legendary. In such an adventure, it’s important to do justice to such important characters when you bring them out. We also have a lot of adventures published in this edition to compete with. If I were to sit down and run a game for someone who has been gone from D&D for a while as a celebration of 50 years of D&D in 5^th edition, it would be Curse of Strahd. Being alright is not enough, because people want to run good adventures, and we have a lot of choice now. The adventure needs to be special, especially as prices rise. What’s frustrating about adventures like this is they could’ve been great. I play tabletop role-playing games to experience great.

The Book of Many Things Review

 Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• Lots more full colour art.

• A little bit for everyone with some new monsters, new maps, and a whole lot of fluff and advice about the deck of many things.

• The fluff is really quite good, and I enjoyed reading it. There are some books that do a good job of getting the creative juices going, and just make us excited about D&D.

• There’s some good stuff here for making characters, with the deck being tied to a past event. We know the mechanics well by now. But I’d argue the most important thing from a background is the story itself, and those special benefits due to how your character is tied to the world. More help and inspiration with that is welcome.

• 
  

Could Go Either Way

• Ultimately, it is about the deck of many things. It’s a very iconic D&D item. But also, it may not be the one that catches your imagination. If it doesn’t, there’s still some other stuff that you may like, but the focus is on the deck. Sometimes there are good things that simply aren’t to our tastes.

• My god the price for the full set is up there. The Book of Many Things is cheaper, but also much shorter.

• I can’t speak for the physical build quality for the first time I remember. I only had access to the digital copy for this review.

Cons

• Each chapter is named after a page of the book. That’s kind of cool and thematic. However, that’s the only name. Some like the Knight are straight forward. It’s about companions, right? Well, except that’s also where the magic items are in this book. The Skull? Well, it’s about a faction related to the Deck of Many Things and their hideout. But there’s no subtitle to make that clear. It makes navigating the book quite hard.

• The size of the books have been getting smaller

• No PDF*

* Denotes nitpicking.

The cover of The Book of Many Things. The conversion slightly shifted the colours.

Introduction

There are some extremely iconic items in D&D. I’m sure you have stories from your own homebrew campaigns of items that became so closely tied to an object, even when they re-appeared with another group, that character’s story lived on. But there are also ones that have been in the published pages for a long time. One such item is the deck of many things. It has the power to absolutely destroy a campaign. But from it come many hilarious and amusing stories. It is a very famous item, after all. Helping Dungeon Masters wield this item in a way to bring happiness to the table is a noble goal, and it’s what the book sets out to do based on the title. There's more here, as one might expect. A whole book on the deck is hard to do.

Please note that I only got to review the digital The Book of Many Things. I cannot speak to the cards, or the additional book included there.

The Adventure

New Player Options

If what you want is new races, mechanics, rules, that sort of thing, you’ll be disappointed. However, there is a lot of advice on how to include effects from the deck of many things in your past. I have players who do struggle with the story part of their character sheet (including backgrounds), so I’m happy to see this. Some adventures did provide ways for the players to more closely tie their characters into the main story like this. But I hope to see this continue.

New Monsters

There are a few monsters provided for this adventure, as we've come to expect. They are well fitted to the adventure and there aren't too many. This adventure, even at the level of monsters, tries its best to be creepy just like the module that inspired it. Quite a few of them are specific NPCs and a lot of material is given for playing them.

What You Need to Play

As usually you’ll need the Monster Manual, Player's Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide. I miss the days when the basic rules were enough.

The Book Itself

There’s a lot of different content here. There’s help with running helpers, like what may happen if you draw the Knight card. There’s help with coming up with events in your character’s life influenced by the deck of many things, or just following a similar theme. Ruin doesn’t need to happen when you draw a card, but it’s an interesting element to add.

The writing is interesting, and the amount of things covered is surprising. To be honest, I expected this book to be worse. How much can you write about the deck of many things? Turns out, you can write a lot. Several factions related to the deck are detailed here, as well as possible conflict. The character and story hooks that result are interesting, and when I finished the book I realized I had actually enjoyed the read a lot. Some people read adventures as a form of entertainment, and those sorts of people will probably enjoy this one.

The supernatural gifts are a nice addition too. Having more options to give really makes things easier. It also makes it less boring, as the gifts can be unique or rarely given. As a result, instead of a route response, players need to think. There’s some nice trap rooms too, even with pictures. Puzzles and riddles too! Puzzles are a good part of D&D, so some more help is appreciated. It’s easy to put such a riddle onto the entrance of a tomb, and have your players enjoy the solving of it.

What about the new Decks of Many Things? There’s many included decks here, including the Deck of Many More Things. I like the concept, and I like the addition of new cards. These cards tend to skew to the positive side, which makes sense. Why would I spend so much time and effort to make a card to rig the deck against me? But it also helps address a concern from the original deck: it being easy to ruin a campaign with a bad effect. There’s some good advice here to help reduce the severity of the bad cards as well, and turn them into adventures on their own. However, there is one big problem. One chapter gives cards their own daily use. It’s fun, I like this idea. However, the new cards from the Deck of Many More Things don’t have such abilities detailed. That’s an annoying oversight. They did include some help for the players to make their own cards to add to the deck, which is appreciated. I wish there was a bit more though. It’s a bit vague, but enough is given along with effects for having completed such an undertaking. There are also some other decks that allow you to have similar mechanics. I like the idea, it's interesting...I'm not sure if they're balanced. And I haven't made my mind up on it yet, which may mean they're a bit strong.

 

Lastly, there are a few mechanics presented here that are based on a deck. One example is the “encounter deck,” a way to create and manage encounters for a party in an area using a deck of cards. There’s the “journey spread”, a way to make travelling more interesting. There’s card sparks, a way to help inspire Dungeon Masters. And finally, probably my favourite, the inspiration deck. This deck provides some more interesting and random benefits to players when they gain advantage. Coming up with new mechanics is important. Some campaigns will be based on intrigue, others on military battles, and others again about travel and searching for things. We could use all the mechanics at once, or we could focus on the ones that closest pertain to the campaign and make things simpler overall. It also gives each one a unique flavour. I hope to see more of this sort of thing in the future, and it’s some of the biggest help and most interesting content in the whole book. 

 

One of the maps. The art can be really nice here.

The Adventure Itself

Huh? Why is this section here? It’s true there’s not a large multi-level spanning adventure here. What there is though is several maps, with details layouts, and factions or characters occupying them. A couple are a location, and a small 1 level adventure put together. I wasn’t expecting that when I started this book, but I’m happy to see it. There’s a haunted mansion section that works quite well even if you remove the connection to the deck. It really is everything you’d expect from a short adventure. The location is detailed in map form. Characters with their own motivations are present in the location. Advice on how to get characters there, and how to kick off the adventure is present. It’s really pretty well done, and now I want another anthology book. Anthologies may be the big strength in this edition.

The Art and Book Build Quality

The quality of the art is certainly better than some recent books I remember. The cards themselves look beautiful in the book. The monsters and characters look good, and the maps continue that high quality appearance and colour we’ve seen for years. It’s certainly better than some previous art I remember thinking looked awful. I do wish there were more scenery shots here though. I love being able to show such a picture to my players. When they can see it first person, and top down, it makes them feel closer to the location.

That said, I can’t comment on the quality of the physical set. I was only given access to the digital version. So unfortunately, I can’t comment on any issues in the physical copy.

What I felt was Missing

A Dungeon Master can make their own deck of many things in any number of ways. So I think the other book should have been included. It may make the most sense in the physical set, but it’d be a nice value add, and I should be the one to choose if it has value or not. It doesn’t look like a digital copy is available at all.

Free Stuff

I miss the days when there were free things. Come on, give us a printable Deck of Many Things set I can glue to playing cards. Or a fun quick introduction adventure. Make me excited. Well, if that’s any clue, there’s not much here. Though I must say, even in the past they did a rather poor job of advertising it.

One of the cards. Even without the card set, the art still features throughout the book.

Summary

I enjoyed this book more than I thought I would. After all, a whole book on the Deck of Many Things? However, the content is varied, and before I got bored of riddles or puzzles, the next section started. There’s new locations, mini-adventures, new mechanics using cards for Dungeon Masters, new magic items, new creatures, new factions, a whole lot of new. There’s a lot here to help with campaigns in general, and with the Deck of Many Things specifically. I wish there was more content, I wish the other book from the physical set was available digitally, and I wish the new cards from the Deck of Many More Things also had daily effects for single cards detailed in chapter 2. I wish there was more, and I think the books should get longer over time. Otherwise the value proposition gets worse. This is especially true since the prices climb higher. Give me more sample encounter decks. And why aren’t there pages we can print off to get a deck of our own? I could easily make a deck with some glue and a printer that way. And some free stuff to help get people excited is always welcome. It’s not a flawless book, and I want more, but I did enjoy the read. Please though, please improve the chapters. It's very hard to find stuff.

Planescape: Adventures in the Multiverse Review

Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• Lots of full colour art. In fact, it’s some of the best I remember seeing recently. It could be my bias for environmental art and scenery, but I really liked it here. Some truly beautiful stuff.

• There’s a pretty cool gimmick dealing with death here. The characters don’t really die like normal for most of the adventure. Instead, they come back in a different form. It really does give this adventure something of its own, and allows solutions to situations that normally wouldn’t be considered by a party.

• There’s lots of variety since the adventure is mostly a tour of the different gate towns, each with their alignments and vastly different inhabitants.

Could Go Either Way

• There’s quite a bit of referencing going on. Morte from Planescape:Torment shows up. I like the character, I like his use of cant, but something comes to mind. If Morte is still there in the Mortuary, when does Planescape: Torment actually take place?

• The adventure plot itself isn’t the strongest I’d say, but it is done fairly well and allows some creative things to happen. It’s one of those where oddness will be important, and you have to like the exploring side of things. The locations are better than the story connecting them.

Cons

• If you’re a Planescape fan, there’s nothing new here and you probably wanted to see more. You can’t fit all Planescape into a single adventure, or even into 2 books. So without those extras, it remains an incomplete Planescape.

• No PDF*

* Denotes nitpicking.

 

The boxed set itself. It looks impressive.

Introduction

I’ve been saying “it’s not Planescape” during Dungeons & Dragons 5^th quite a bit. And that we got several Magic the Gathering books before Planescape tells me I wasn’t wrong. But here we are. It’s finally here. Years of waiting.

What is Planescape? It’s a well loved setting having to do with travelling through different planes across the multiverse. That you and the Dungeon Master have so much freedom to make an adventure really makes it a feast for the imagination. You can visit impossible cities full of portals to anywhere, where angels and devils share a drink at a bar, or compete in seemingly trivial games as part of an ancient bet. Whether your experience was through games like Planescape:Torment, or through D&D itself, it has a rich history. But all of that is what Planescape was, and why I wanted it. What is it in this edition? Let’s jump in.

The Adventure

New Player Options

There not much here, but there is a little bit. Most of it deals with helping to make player characters who are related to a plane, or to Sigil itself.

New Monsters

There’s more here than I expected, but there's not tons either. What I do like is there’s very little fluff. Not tons of very similar creatures. The creatures included are interesting and there’s not near repeats.

What You Need to Play

The Monster Manual, Player's Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide as usual. This is the standard at this point in this edition. 

 

An example of a piece of art for a gate-town. Really, please show more environmental art in the future.

The Adventure Itself

The beginning of the adventure starts off pretty strong. The characters meet in The Mortuary, and begin exploring Sigil afterwards in a quest due to their unique condition. A lot of time is spent on the factions of Sigil themselves, and also gives the characters a chance to join them. I wish more side stuff was given though. All kinds of side quests they can do. It would also give players a chance to explore and have more adventures, would make this book more useful outside of just the adventure, and give material for the Dungeon Master if they wanted to keep the party in Sigil longer.

There’s also something of a weakness right at the start too. The players run into Morte, an important character from the video game Planescape:Torment. It’s a good one, I recommend it. But it’s an odd cameo, and it confused me when I saw it. At what point does Planescape:Torment take place then? Shouldn’t the story be over already? I’m not the biggest Planescape expert, but this sort of situation has me worried about other reference sin the adventure for those that are.

My players had a real good time with the gimmick of this adventure. Basically, the characters come back when they die. But rather than a certain grey-skinned amnesiac who woke up in the mortuary, the players jump right back in the same place, but with a slightly different character. I really like this. My players liked it too, as it gave them new ways to solve challenges in the campaign that are normally not possible. I like it enough to use it even in a mini-campaign of my own later, or at least something like it. We’ve had years of standard adventures by now. I think we need more of this sort of thing to help keep things feeling new and fresh. Let’s have some more experimental elements and gameplay features that make a campaign unique.

The adventure takes place in Sigil, and the surrounding areas of the borderlands. The cities on the borderlands are close to different planes, giving them their own unique feelings. The city in tune with the plane of logic and reason is not the same as the one attuned to hell. This makes exploring and seeing the differences really quite fun. There’s a lot that could be done here too. I wish we had some more side-quests here though at each location. The Dungeon Master could add a few to mix things up as needed, and it’d help have more material to work with if you don’t use the included campaign at all. I also wish was more spent on the planes themselves. And that there was a bit more plane hoping in the adventure.

The borderlands are perfectly adequate for a D&D campaign. The planes are vast, and not all of them can be captured in this adventure. The borderlands provide a very understandable and interesting place to explore, and for players to get their feet wet with Planescape. That said, it would be nice to see the planes get some more attention in the future, and for things to go beyond the borderlands.

The plot, well, I think it’s one of the less strong aspects. There’s an interesting aspect there where the players have a personal stake in events, and they are trying to solve the mystery of their affliction. And it does do it’s job of getting players through the borderlands. But it doesn’t really have that villain, or plot point that players mention years later. When my players discussed the adventure, they instead said “remember when we were in this town and that happened? Remember that cool town?” The locations and the gate-town are the big standouts. It’s serviceable, and there’s certainly parts I like. My players have always liked role-playing casino scenes. But some more would be nice, like a truly memorable combat encounter and intense ending fight.

Some of my favourite examples of scenery and art. Please, show more scenery in future products too.

The Art and Book Build Quality

The environmental and scenery art here is beautiful. I like it. There’s some odd parts sometimes to do with shadow and texture. I’m used to seeing 1 or 2 pieces I really like and then more of the normal cartoon-y style I’m fine with. Here there was beautiful scenery after beautiful scenery. Seeing the gate towns and different plane influence was just beautiful. It’s miles ahead of the previous book I reviewed. Actually, really do show more scenery in future books. I want to see the location, and even show my players some of the illustrations to spur their imagination. Reading through this book, it became clear to me that this was an area of bias for me. Even if the art isn't the best, if it's got lighting and it shows a nice scene, I'm prone to liking it.

It comes as a set. There's three thinner books, a Dungeon Master's screen, and a fold-out map. The fold-out map is something that has become standard for this edition, and I'm glad it's not gone. The screen and 3 books thing isn't as standard. I find myself wondering if combining it into one thick book while keeping the other parts of the set wouldn't have saved on costs. Sure, it'd be harder for players to look at their options without spoilers. But previous adventures were a single book with everything inside, including player options.

The physical quality of the book and the set is good. Being this sort of multi-book collection, it looks impressive on the bookshelf. It also matches well the style of previous books in the edition. If you have other books, you know what to expect. I’m also happy my copy didn’t have any of those quality issues I’ve observed with copies in the past. No pages are stuck together. The pages are nice and undamaged. The covers are fine. It’s not my favourite cover art, but also not my least favourite. It’s good.

Price

It’s the new larger price. Since it’s a set, the price is again higher too. I wish there was a single book version or something, just so the costs could be lower. The covers, and box cost extra, and help to push the cost up. And of course higher cost for the same number of pages results in lower value.

What I felt was Missing

No adventure can capture all of Planescape. This adventure is trying to, or at least capture Sigil and the border towns. However, for fans of the setting, this is just an appetizer. And I wonder if we’ll ever get more. Ravenloft probably got the most love this edition in terms of number of books, but it also falls short previous editions.

I really would like some more side quests for each location. These could be easily reused by Dungeon Masters seeking to set their campaigns in these locations. And I always do like a good side quest.

There’s just a need for more. One set would never to Planescape right, and I wish they had gone more weird and out there, instead of what feels to be very Planescape: Torment inspired.

Old Books

If you like this setting and this set, you really should dig up some of the older books. The stat blocks will require a lot of work. But adventures, and the world are well developed there. Really, it can’t be said enough. Older editions are a treasure trove, and unfortunately there isn’t as much work building up settings as there once was.

Free Stuff

Nothing to see here.

Summary

I did like this adventure. The art was a step up from the previous book by a lot. Or at least it feels that way to me. The environmental and location artwork is wonderful. The gimmick was fun, and it’s one that can have big changes on how your players act. In fact, it’s so good I’d consider stealing it for other campaigns. Maybe a devil’s contract gone wrong, or a way for one devil to snub another. The detail given to the areas is pretty good for this kind of adventure in this edition of D&D. But if you have the previous Planescape books, it’s hard to give a reason to get this one. As common for this edition, it tries to be both setting and adventure all at once. But that also means there’s less setting than a pure setting book, and Planescape has a large wealth of previous work that fills in the setting. The plot is serviceable, but not my favourite. I think this adventure is most fun when your group likes travelling and exploring. The plot is really a vehicle to have you moving through and enjoying the sights, with a few moments that rise about that. And as an introduction to Planescape for a new generation, it’s not bad at all. But we could also use more, especially since books prices increased.

Phandelver and Below: The Shattered Obelisk Review

Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• Lots more art. It’s pretty good, and the painted ones in particular were nice to look at. Some of it is more cartoony and not my thing. There’s a problem here though. Look below in the cons.

• Lots of full colour maps. I like that.

Could Go Either Way

• Not much in the way of new creatures.

• Not much in the way of new character options. No power creep, and nothing new.

• A return to Phandelver. If you don’t care about it from the original starter set at the start of this edition, then it’s not a benefit or an issue.

• First half is a lot more typical D&D. 2^nd half is a lot more weird, almost horror like. Some people only want one or the other. But for people who like both, it’s a delicious combination.

• Adventure goes up to 12^th level. It’s a nice level range that allows for interesting challenges. But it also doesn’t go all the way to level 20. And high level play is an area many people feel is most challenging, and could benefit from some more aid to players.

Cons

• It’s a return. It should be possible to link the previous adventure here into a bit of a campaign. But it’s not an option as written.

• If you try to put these two adventures together into one, you’ll see right away that many maps are reused. That means if you did try to run one after another, your players would play through the same encounter locations twice. Without a break, it’s not so good. It’s more tolerable with a break, like if you haven’t played Mines of Phandelver since release. But really, it redoes that previous adventure and then continues forward.

• The reuse extends as far as the art and images. I don’t like paying again for something I already have.

* Denotes nitpicking.

The cover for Phandelver and Below: The Shattered Obelisk.

Introduction

It should come as no surprise that I like long campaigns, and also low level adventures. So I’m happy to see and read large adventures spanning large level ranges. One of the best received and classic adventures in this edition of D&D is Lost Mines of Phandelver. In this new adventure, players are back to the famous town. Is the return worth the time? Let’s jump right back in.

The Adventure

New Player Options

There is not much here. Moving on.

New Monsters

Not much here either. What’s nice is that some of the monsters here are less common, and they tried to give several a personality and motivations. I’d always take well designed encounters with

What You Need to Play

Everything is normal here. You’ll need the Monster Manual and Dungeon Master’s Guide. For monsters and everything else you’ll need to consult those books.

The Adventure Itself

The adventure takes players from level 1-12. The scale of things is also pretty wide. The players will visit many places, all centred around the town of Phandelver. Also integral to a previous adventure, players will get to know the area, town, and inhabitants well over the course of the adventure.

The adventure can really be split into 2 parts. Part 1 is a more typical D&D adventure. Goblins, rescuing villagers, adventuring, it’s pretty classic and also borrows many elements from the adventure Lost Mines of Phandelver. Those who like the more classic D&D experience will like this section. It borrows not only the location, but also maps and encounter locations completely. The encounters are different, as well a show it ties into the overarching story in this adventure. However, it means you’re getting a different version of an existing adventure. And instead of being an adventure from 3 editions ago, it’s from the start of this one. So it’s quite recent. You’ll probably have to choose Lost Mines of Phandelver or this one to run, as one character can’t really do both easily. And if they did, there would be too much repetition. I wish it kind of worked as a sequel that could be run right after as well, though over-levelled for a little bit until the events catch up.

The 2^nd part is the news stuff. It’s also where things get weird. The adversary the players fight against is a big threat to the town they grew to know. It’s also an alien threat. Reality can become complicated as it gets more and more warped. This part goes into a wildly different direction with elements of horror too. I liked this part, and I liked the characterization they have. No-one is very deep here, but what’s here is efficient and effective.

I personally liked that weirdness. It helped make the adventure not overstay its welcome by changing things up. However, it’s something your players need to be on board with. I can see some groups finding the start too derivative and boring, while others finding the 2^nd half to sudden and out there. But for those who like both, it really it’s really a delicious combination that you couldn’t get otherwise. The general progression of the story and where it leads is fun and interesting. So I had a lot of fun running it.

The ramp up from the earlier section is particularly handled well. The choices of locations help give a good impression, and there’s some dungeon delving for the parties who like that sort of thing. Still, effort is spent on giving character to the, erm, characters. It’s not to the depth of Strahd or something. Typically what you see is what you get. However, you do need some characterization to start the role-playing so it can evolve into something more.

The combat encounters are fine, but also not super special. It’s at its best when a puzzle element is at play, or some character building is being done. Often monster choice helps to tell a story through the environment. The tactical considerations though are not as exciting. The presence of cover, accomplishing other objectives, or quirks for certain encounters really isn’t here. I do wish at least one adventure in this edition really tried to go for some tactical encounters and be the best combat adventure of this edition. What these encounters do, especially in the 2^nd half, is bring the character of the location into the encounter.

An example of some of the better art from the book. When it's not reused, it can be really beautiful.

The Art and Book Build Quality

The art is mostly what we’ve come to exist. Some of it is very good and done in this painted style that I like a lot. The scenes depicted are also interesting. Weird creatures, warped reality, and other such odd sights that is nice to see brought to life. There is also my less well liked cartoon-y style present, but that was a feature of this edition for a while already.

The big issue here is much of the art, even for maps, is from the older adventure. They call it a re-imagining, but it also means you get less new art in the book than others. For art lovers, it’s an important thing to consider. That said, the 2^nd half of the adventure is brand new and also completely new art. This includes new locations and maps. It would be nice for the maps to be slightly different, and completely new visuals being made for this book like some of the previous ones.

I had no issues with the book itself. Binding was good. There were no stuck pages, improper cuts, or any other issues I experienced earlier in this edition. Of course, I could’ve just been lucky this time. But it’s a good sign when my copy isn’t mangled. Instead it was as perfect as I could expect.

The sort of thing to expect from the 2nd half of the adventure. Weird, isn't it?

Price

It’s the new usual price. Nothing different here, though I do wish they tried to make each book cheaper. It’s hard to keep up.

PDF Version Critique

For a long time I’ve asked for a combined PDF and book version. We now have one, but they’re more expensive. Always worth noting. Really, it comes from D&D Beyond. If you don’t like D&D Beyond, you’re unfortunately stuck. Also, to access it you need to log in. That makes it not quite as convenient as a PDF you could just always access on your machine. The closest they come is to have an app so you can read the modules you purchased from your phone. It’s convenient, but still requires logging in so not really an option if you’re going up to your cabin with no internet.

What I felt was Missing

The adventure really would be interesting to people who played the previous adventure in this location, but there’s no way to tie them together. Not even a mention really. And in fact, many aspects of the first part of the adventure is recycles from the older adventure. So it would mean players play through the same maps twice. I really wish more of an effort was made here to make that first part more of a supplement to the original adventure, instead of a replacement.

Free Stuff

Nothing here. I really do miss those free introduction adventures for people.

Summary

So here we are. It’s an adventure that goes from a tradition fantasy into something more weird. That transition and the level range all make for an interesting adventure. The problem is that it’s also a re-imagining of a previous adventure for the first half, complete with reused images and maps. All of that makes the adventure less impressive if you’ve run Lost Mines of Phandelver before, and harder to recommend compared to other adventures. This is even more so the case if you’ve gone through Lost Mines of Phandelver recently. I did enjoy the 2^nd half where things got weird, but it’s also hard to recommend someone buy an expensive book for half of it. If it’s your first time visiting Phandelver, it’s a more appealing option. However, this adventure lacks the “ease of use” compared to its predecessor.

Keys From the Golden Vault Review

 Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• Lots more full colour art. It continues to be a highlight of the edition.

• Different adventures have different flavour, and different settings. This contributes to a different feel.

• Effort is made to give each heist its own feel, and different characters are involved in each adventure. The setups are different, and cover a wide variety. From stealing money from a casino, an item from a museum, to artifacts of evil. There’s a reverse heist, where an item needs to be returned.

Could Go Either Way

• Not much in the way of new creatures.

• The adventure is very episodic. Each adventure covers a level, and is completely on its own. This gives it a feel more like an episodic TV show rather than a giant long running narrative. It also makes it easy to repurposed particular levels for your own games. From maps, to largely using the heist as presented when your players want to break in somewhere.

Cons

• A page or two for a unified narrative to tie together the adventures would’ve been nice. I tend to prefer adventures when they have a bigger narrative, but which I can ignore. That way I can use individual adventures as is in one of my existing campaigns, run a whole campaign using the book, or chop up the adventure for parts (usually maps and cool puzzles).

• Despite efforts of different settings, the adventure structure can get too similar. They involve a single location, sometimes with a twist at the end. I’d have liked to see some connective material leading to new locations, and some more twists. Maybe we need to hunt down a stolen artifact first, and then we have a smaller heist.

• There is some 3D art here which is below the standards I’ve come to expect of this edition.

* Denotes nitpicking.

The standard cover for the book. Not bad, but not my favourite.

Introduction

One of the classic D&D archetypes is the thief. A stealthy character who pickpockets, steals, or sneakily back stabs enemies. And now we have a movie playing with that archetype too. But in D&D, this often means a heist. I think it was my third session of D&D where I had my heist. And it’s an incredibly fun scenario to play. However, a good heist is not easy to make. Here we have a book that attempts to give us Dungeon Masters some heists to play through. How does it stack up? Let’s jump right in.

The Adventure

New Player Options

There is not much here. Moving on.

New Monsters

There are a few monsters provided for this adventure, as we've come to expect. They are well fitted to the adventure and there aren't too many. This adventure, even at the level of monsters, tries its best to be creepy just like the module that inspired it. Quite a few of them are specific NPCs and a lot of material is given for playing them.

What You Need to Play

Pretty typical here. You’ll need the Monster Manual and Dungeon Master’s Guide. Everything not added in the adventure, which is a lot, is found in those books. I miss the days when all you needed were the basic rules and adventure. But that time has long passed.

The Adventure Itself

The adventures cover a wide range of levels, many scenarios, and items to steal. There is quite a lot of variety here. From infiltrating a tournament, stealing from a museum, to disrupting a magical ritual. The variety in the premise and setups of these heists is one of the strengths of these adventures. There are 13 adventures here, covering a level range from 1 to 11. Each level gets an adventure, while two special levels get 2 adventures. That also means there’s a variety of possible combatants and targets. It’s not all simple human targets.

There’s some options included to help make the adventures into a campaign with advice for players to make a base and make it into a proper operation. There’s also some advice on how to add complications to a heist by moving the target item. And a favourite of mine, there’s some great options for alternate crews that try to interferes and steal the item before the party does. Often, they have more evil plans for the item. This section was great. I wish it was longer. A nice 10-20 page section on different options would’ve helped take the book from a collection of adventures, to a masterclass in heist adventures. I hope future adventures look more at aiding Dungeon Masters, reuse, and look to address multiple different uses.

I wish there were more cool secondary items to steal too. Often the main target of the theft is the most interesting, but of course the party will be forced to part with it. I’d like some additional curiosities for the party to be able to pocket for themselves. They don’t all need to be powerful items either, as unique and situational items are also fun to receive. Something as simple as a cloak that can change colours can help make a character unique. Though some powerful items would be nice, especially given that we should be able to play these adventures as a campaign. One misstep here though is that it seems like a good party is assumed. Some groups like to play more morally dubious players, especially in a theft based campaign.

One of the big issues here is that there is no connective parts of a campaign. So running a full satisfying campaign is hard. Just doing one heist after another when they share a similar structure and there’s no overarching narrative is not the best player experience. As a result, these adventures are best in moderation for the heist component of a campaign or as one-shots. Or you as the Dungeon Master need to come up with good connective tissue to make an overarching fun narrative. It’s not an easy problem to solve, and I really wish there was something here.

The structure of missions is also fairly similar from adventure to adventure. There is a location described. A heist must be performed to get some important item (or in one case put it back in a reverse heist). There are often some tricks in the mission itself like decoys, a possible double cross at the end, and it’s finished. You don’t need to go to multiple locations. You don’t get role-play sessions of returning the object. You don’t get an extended chase, or find out the person you gave the item to is a doppelganger. They do try to give each adventure its own feeling and difference within that structure. But some wildly different structures would be nice too. Maybe even have a part 1 and 2 heist spread across 2 levels and locations?

One of the better examples of art within the book. I quite like this style.

The Art and Book Build Quality

The drawn art continues to be in the typical D&D style we’ve come to expect. The same slightly cartoony style is there. I wish there more realistic images playing with light, but it’s not bad. The maps are also well drawn with many nice details. Some look hand written. Some have tears in them and represent in-game maps. These look generally good, and what we’ve come to expect.

Wait, but I said drawn. Is there some art that isn’t drawn? Yes, unfortunately. Two adventures have pictures at the start which don’t look good compared to the art surrounding it. It’s done in this 3D style with what looks like posed 3D models. To be clear, I’m not against 3D art in general. I’ve seen some truly beautiful screenshots from video games. Movies and TV series are increasingly using 3D game engines like Unreal. And you can do some truly incredible art with truly beautiful lighting. However, the art here falls well below that. I’d prefer we get more art like I admired back at the start of this edition with beautiful hand drawn lighting, But if you need to do 3D, it should look better. Luckily it’s only 2 images in this book.

The book itself is the same cover and binding as the previous books. The cover follows the same art style. My copy had no physical issues either. All in all, the physical condition and quality of the book remains high.

One of the maps from the adventure. I like the art and character, and the way it looks like a real drawn map from the inside.

Price

So, the price has gone up. I’ve been at this for a long time now. So I expected it to eventually come. But still, given the books would already benefit from a price drop, it’s particularly painful. Sales continue to be plentiful though, so it’s tough to get an exact price.

PDF Version Critique

For a long time I’ve asked for a combined PDF and book version. Now you can pay a bit more to get both. It’s good that this option exists, though the online version is D&D Beyond. Also given the costs involved, it would’ve been nice if they always came together at a lower price.

What I felt was Missing

There really needs to be some connective material to be able to run this book as a single adventure. The Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos book did a pretty good job of this. Each year could be run on their own, or combined to have a single cause of all the events. Here, they are very disconnected. Having 2-3 adventures to bring everything together, some kind of double cross, that sort of thing would go a long way. Games like Hitman have done this for years, while also being somewhat a close comparison. As it is, the adventures feel disconnected.

Free Stuff

Nothing here. I really wish we got some connective material here, and opening adventure, something. This part has gotten worse since the Curse of Strahd time. Or how about a teaser adventure at level 1 to get people excited?

Summary

It’s a good collection of adventures. They cover a variety of heists, with a variety of situations. The main weakness is that each one follows a pattern of arriving at one location, and trying to steal something. Running this as a full campaign can be tough, unless your party really likes heists. There’s no glue to hold a campaign together, except as an episodic TV show with a heist of the week. But combined with the structural similarities, I think they’re best run as one-offs or as the basis of a heist for your campaign, before returning to business as usual.