Sunday 20 March 2016

Dungeons & Dragons: Death House

Curse of Strahd has been out for a couple of days. However, the adventure Death House (click here for the PDF) was released in Dragon+ and I thought it would be a good thing to talk about it. I do plan to review Curse of Strahd later, but for now I'll just do Death House. Being freely available, it presents a great way to try out part of Curse of Strahd.

Overall Structure

This is one big adventure aimed at level one characters and takes them to level 3. Leveling up is included in the adventure and takes place after specific objectives are met. If you decide you like what you see and would like to play the rest of Curse of Strahd, it looks like it would be easy to do so (the introduction makes it seem like it would easily fit into the adventure, it puts them into the correct location and also to the correct level).

Problems

This adventure is quite solid in my opinion and by far my favourite released on Dragon+ so far. The main problem comes from some of the rooms. Most don't have a part to be read to the players. This means that the Dungeon Master will either need to make it up on the spot or come up with their own vignettes. That being said, the descriptions provided make it quite easy for more experienced Dungeon Masters and also fairly easy for inexperienced Dungeon Masters with some preparation time.

The other problem has to be with the mists. It gives a reference to an effect from that the mists cause but it is not included in the adventure (it's in Curse of Strahd). This isn't the end of the world, but it does make running the adventure a bit harder, especially since it seems like the fog is meant to make sure the players have to take refuge in the house.

What Can Be Scavenged

The entire adventure is easy to drop into any campaign. There are a couple of Curse of Strahd details that will need to be changed but they are trivial to do. The biggest one is location, but the main way to get players into the house can be the exact same regardless of setting. The fog may be a bit hard to alter, though. This adventure is best and most easily salvaged as one whole. That being said, certain details, rooms or even entire floors can be taken and used by the Dungeon Master if they so need. The options for salvaging parts of this adventure are quite vast. The maps can be reused. The adventure can be reuse. Rooms and room description can be reused. Some plot points can be reused and fit into another adventure. Even if you don't run it, I'd recommend the read (it's pretty quick). It also makes for a good one-shot adventure (I've already run it as such and had a blast). I'd use it to get first time tabletop role-players hooked instead of Monster Slayers in a heartbeat.

Overall Opinion

Overall, I've already mentioned that I view it as the best adventure released in Dragon+ so far. It's one of those adventures where atmosphere plays a big role. It also provides plenty of opportunity for role-play (the kids make this easy) and problem solving. I'd also say it isn't that hard to run for a new Dungeon Master, though I'd recommend a read through first. That said, it's more evocative than some other adventures I've read that are fully ready to go and that can just be played through without reading a head of time.

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