Light of Xaryxis - Spelljammer: Adventures in Space Review

Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• Lots of full colour art. The scenes are space + sailing vessels. There are some more sci-fi looking ship designs too, though more fantasy in layout. Resembling insects or creatures. It gives the book it’s own subject matter, and it looks great.

• The setting work is particularly good. The ships, the layouts, the locations. I just wish there was more.

• Spelljammer is back! Whoo!

• The abandoned spelljammer encounter in particular is good.

• Tear away map, and hard cover map.

Could Go Either Way

• It’s shorter than previous adventures. Though page length doesn’t always translate to being useful, or quality.

Cons

• The MSRP is higher then previous sets. Probably because of all of the hard cover elements in the set.
  

• No PDF*

* Denotes nitpicking.

Introduction

I’ve been crying for a new setting for a while. Planescape. Spelljammer. Well, here we have Spelljammer. For those who aren’t aware, it’s a science fantasy style setting. While there are some more advanced looking ships that evoke feelings of Star Wars, there are also literally ships sailing through space. As in they actually have sails. After seeing how the set looks, I was excited to get into it. Did it meet my expectations? Well, let’s find out!

The Adventure

New Player Options

Not really anything in the way of new weapons. That said, some firearms that were in the Dungeon Master’s Guide and seldom used are here in full force. It helps give the adventure its own feel. There’s not new classes here, which is to be expected. Generally speaking, I prefer if such big changes aren’t bolted on to an adventure. What it does have is some new playable races which tie into the settings. What’s also nice to see is that they are featured multiple times in the adventure. So a player who reads these while thinking of their character gets to see them in game, and they double as world building. Another example here are ships. It isn’t directly related to a class or character, but a ship in such adventures becomes their home base, and their literal home. So having so many options to choose from, with interior floor plans is very nice, and appreciated by players. I know mine did.

New Monsters

An entire book is dedicated to new monsters.

What You Need to Play

It’s business as usual here. The Monster Manual, Player's Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide are referenced at the start of the adventure. These have become necesary, compared to earlier in the edition when the basic rules and/or SRD were enough. You could probably mostly get by with this one actually. But they no longer put in the effort to check. And naturally, as a new Dungeon Master any missing creatures would need to be created by you. Such a thing wouldn’t be too difficult, though possible still annoying, for an experienced Dungeon Master. But I wouldn’t recommend it for a new recruit.

The Adventure Itself

I have to come out and say this. In terms of page count, this is one of the thinner products that have been released in a while. This is despite the increase in price. This results in a more expensive but small page count product. I would prefer that adventures aim for 250-300 pages. Rime of the Frostmaiden hit this area of 300 pages. What’s the reason? Well, I think that some choices in terms of the quality and design did this. By having 3 hard cover books, a hard cover map, and a box, I think the cost of production was increased. This further bit into the adventure because of the emphasis on things like ships, locations, and worlds. I love those parts of the adventure. World building and setting is important for a D&D game, and campaign. However, 160 pages isn’t much for an adventure. And that includes all 3 of the books in this box. Just the adventure is about 60 pages. Low levels were sacrificed, with not even a short adventure to help players level. I wish there was more.

The adventure itself feels very Star Wars, or earlier science fantasy. Saving the world, space princesses, space elves, spaceships as in ships in space, cities in space, and more. It also has a big of Cthulu and that special D&D feel too. Mind flayers in space. Magic and spell casting. Fireballs being shot in space. It really does give it a unique feel. A fantasy planet feels like a space port. And space has its own special feeling. I think a setting should feel that way.

The characters we travel with have something to them. A vampirate captain. A wizard cartographer. A talking hippopotamus with a drinking problem, and a difficult past. And luckily, they come along for the ride and join the party for a significant amount of time. The ships have a character to them too. They look different, have full features maps, and even crews. To any good pirate story, a good crew is important. And as the adventure continues, the crew expands here. The villains...well, something more could have been done but I feel there is a fairly decent twist lined up. Though arguable predictable, I think the added complexity is a benefit and a good twist shouldn’t be able to be predicted by someone.

How are the encounters? Honestly, pretty good. That’s not to say every encounter is incredible. I’d ideally like even a small tactical map with something interesting to add to the encounter. I also like encounters that evolved over time. Reinforcements, crumbling terrain, an additional goal being present, etc. However, while there are some simple encounters here, there are also some standouts. One involving a mindflayer ship. Plot turn after turn occurs, leading to a pretty fun feeling encounter. And yes, I ran it. The other part of encounters, is that you’re on a ship. So there’s ship combat too. The ship combat has different parts of the ship we can target. Ships typically have some number of catapults or ballistae. You fire these at long range to do things like disable sails. And of course, boarding is an option too. It’s not too complex, but enough to give options while also keeping combat fast. Like many other aspects of combat, good location design makes the encounters better. Also, there’s some nuance about air envelopes and what happens when we fall overboard. We’re in space after all.

The ending...had me confused a bit. It said a creature must wear the ring, but one of the characters has a crawling claw. Doesn’t it count as a creature? That loophole doesn’t seem to be considered or explicitly rejected, so it kind of diminishes it a bit. That said, it’s an easy thing to fix I think. Just something to consider. For the ending to have appropriate weight, I think it should be clear why the item can’t be just thrown in, or why a crawling claw can’t be used. Or just tying it to a chicken, a rat, or a horse or something. It’s a small thing and rarely happens in this adventure. I just wish it was even better and avoided such issues.

The plot is decent, and even offers some interesting situations and twists. The majority of it though sends the party on their space ship from location to location. As they do so, they meet new characters, and often bring them along for their ride until the end. So it’s important to know that even though characters may stay in one place for some time, they’ll eventually leave and continue on their journey. A big part of the adventure is visiting and seeing new locations, so their home is their ship. Despite my confusion above, it really does offer a good ending for the campaign. A big ship battle, on foot stuff, the plot being resolved for the adventure. And even a big choice is offered. Though for many parties, I think it’s an obvious choice. I just wish it was longer, started earlier in terms of levels, had more ideas for random encounters or things found while drifting through space, and provided more ideas for what happens after the end of the adventure. In its current state, there’s not much to choose from either. If players had to visit to areas and could choose the order, that’d already be an improvement. A slight branching in other words. Further options would be if they wanted to stop and investigate things randomly found during their travels. Randomizing them would help with replay value. And lastly, even half a page of sample ideas of what the empire would try after the ending would be very helpful to new Dungeon Masters. Also, as it is, if the Dungeon Master wants to start at level 1, they’ll need a little mini-campaign to bring them up to level before they’d leave their world behind.

The Art and Book Build Quality

This is where the adventure really knocks it out of the part. The card cover map really looks and feels impressive. The hard cover box it comes in also helps to make the whole adventure feel expensive. From the art, to the multiple hard cover books. Normally, the set would come as one book with sections. Here, we have 3 different hard cover books dealing with each part of the adventure. There’s also a hard cover map. And, one of the books has a tear away map too. From a quality standpoint, it feels good. I think this affected the price, and the page count though. For more detail, see the adventure itself above.

The art itself is that style of science fantasy that makes me happy. Sailing ships in space. Vampirates. Yes, vampire space pirates. This means that even if the style isn’t my favourites, backgrounds are often interesting and even breathtaking. The maps are good. And there’s a good amount of art. I wish there was more photo real style art in it. A classic drawn ship with a beautiful background. But what we have here is good.

The quality here is mostly good too, in terms of condition and finish. The binding was good. The covers were good. There were a few seeming minor colour mistakes, but they were very minor. All in all, one of the better quality sets in that regard for me. The art was untouched, and the books were all as I expected them to be. Keep up the good work.

Price

The MSRP for this one is more than normal. I suspect it’s because of the multiple hard cover books, the hard cover map, and the hard cover box. In this way, it’s more like one of the gift sets. Well, that’s how it is I guess. And as always, there are sales if you can wait.

What I felt was Missing

It just needs more given the price tag I think. We don’t get an introductory adventure going from level 1 anymore here. The ending, while addressing the main conflict, sets up further conflict with the empire that are the antagonists of this adventure. I’d have liked to see a page or so of ideas to happen in the future. It’s amazing what kind of seemingly obvious ideas can be missed. I know I’m guilty of it as a Dungeon Master. Some settings books did this fairly well, such as Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft.

I’d also love to see some more option sights, and encounters. We’re in a ship sailing through the stars. It should be a very free experience, with the ability to visit many places at the players’s will. Some way to allow players to maybe visit locations in the order they wish, with complications and optional ship disembarking would have been welcome. 

 

Ultimately I think it's mainly an adventure book. It's partially also sold as a Spelljammer book, but doesn't really do a lot there. We need a big full book just going over the setting itself to make people happy. Though I guess this could work as an introduction, as people dig up the older edition books that already exist.

Free Stuff

Nothing here really. Move along.

Summary

All in all, the material provided here is solid. The adventure is fun with nice encounters. A highlight is one occurring on a damaged mindflayer ship. Complication after complication occurs, which is advice I generally give for fun encounters. And the setting of spelljammer, a world ships flying through space in a science fantasy manner, is unique. It gives a specific science fantasy sailing through the stars feeling that nothing can really capture the same way in D&D. The production value of this set is also greatly improved. So what’s the catch? The price is higher, the page count is lower, and the adventure covers a smaller level range than normal. No introduction adventure either. Page count isn’t necessarily a show of quality, but more pages make it much easier to give more. So ideally I’d like to have both. Page count, and quality.

Other Stuff

• There’s a pretty serious typo on the ships. It references the wrong ship, which is actually the previous ship. Copy paste issue? They meant to replace it for the new ship, but left the section including referencing the wrong ship type.

• The ending needing a creature, but missing some obvious examples that would negate the sacrifice. Also, explaining why a certain vampirite captain wants to volunteer would help. Even if by subtext earlier in the adventure. Well, probably preferably through subtext.

Journeys through the Radiant Citadel Review

Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• Lots more full colour art.

• Lots of maps, even for the same adventure. So basically every important part of the adventure is mapped. I really like it.

• A wide level range.

• The adventures are more than just dungeon delves, and maps are provided for the other parts. There’s a chase or two, with tables provided. All of this combines to make really quite enjoyable adventures.

Could Go Either Way

• Not related to an existing property or area. Though the adventures can be set anywhere with suggestions for alternate locations.

• Compared to some other adventures, the framing device doesn’t really apply much. What this results in is that the adventures are easy to run as one-shots, or as side quests. But they don’t combine well into a story based campaign with what’s in the book. A little bit of work is needed to link them together. Without it, it’s more of an episodic TV show as opposed to an overarching season. Both are fine, but you need to know what you’re getting into.

• I kind of wish more effort was made to adjust the adventures for lower levels, and also for different sized parties. I’ve run one of the adventures twice, once as written, and once adjusted down for a party of new level 1 players. Clearly I liked the adventure to run it twice, and once to use it as an introduction for new players.

Cons

• No PDF*

* Denotes nitpicking.

Introduction

In my opinion, there can never be too many adventures. Whether we run them as written, steal parts, steal maps, steal combat encounters, or are simply inspired by some part of them, it never hurts to have more options. So here we have another. Journeys through the Radiant Citadel is a new such adventure book for this edition of D&D. It follows the previous simplified spell rules, and like many previous adventure books it’s made up of multiple small adventures that are held together by the framing device of The Radiant Citadel, a hub with portals leading to its founding peoples. In general, I quite liked it. There were some adventures that I really enjoyed. So with that, let’s jump into the specifics.

The Adventure

New Player Options

There is not much here. Most of the new options simply deal with role-play options due to being born in the location the adventure takes place, or on the citadel itself. I think some effort to allow players to tie backgrounds to areas is important. In completely home brew campaigns we can easily add characters from the same lands, or even visit them. But when running pre-made content, often the opposite approach is needed. Describing the location and cultures, and watching as players willingly and happily add details about the world into their backstory. So such efforts are appreciated.

New Monsters

There’s a few here. Not an incredibly large amount, but what’s here is interesting. My favourite is the Soul Shaker from an early adventure. Of course it’s undead, but it’s perfect for a low level horror centred game, like for Halloween. So in general, it’s a good addition. Too many new creatures that are the same as we already have is a bad thing in my mind.

That said, they’ve continued their simplified stat cards in this book. Instead of providing spell slots and known spells, they just give 3 times a day or 1 time per day in the stat block. I’ve made my opinions known that I find this inferior, particularly where spellcasters are concerned. This is made worse by having way too low level spells provided for some challenge ratings, leading to an easy counterspell. However, the creatures in this book tend to be more monstrous. For a wizard, such simple rules are a problem. But for a ghost, or some special necrotically infused undead, it works just fine. And in fact, some previous monsters did have abilities they could only use once a day. So in summary, though I dislike the simplification this book manages to mostly avoid my main issues with it.

What You Need to Play

The Monster Manual, Player's Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide are referenced at the start of the adventure. With the SRD, Monster Manual, and Dungeon Master's Guide, it should be enough to run the adventure. But your players will be more limited. This is pretty standard these days.

 

The Adventure Itself

As previously mentioned, this book is composed of multiple largely disconnected adventures. They go up in level the further you read, and they are loosely held together by The Radiant Citadel, which lends its name to the title. It’s a sanctuary that links to the homes of the founding peoples through portals. It was once lost, and then rediscovered and resettled. However, some of the original founding groups remain missing. And generally, each portal links to an adventure of a given level. The need to do so, short of being part of a Star Gate like group on the Citadel, isn’t that well defined and would require some fleshing out by the Dungeon Master if run as a campaign. It is particularly sparse even when compared to some recent adventures. It’s not necessarily a bad thing to be more episodic. Some people like that setup, and it can be easier to have players miss sessions when there’s self contained chunks. Of course, some can be run as one-shots, mini-campaigns, or side quests. However, be aware going into it that this book is like that. And combining it into a campaign will require a bit of Dungeon Master work to create an overarching narrative and reason to visit each place.

Each adventure takes place in it’s own location. These are separated by portals, and allows for vastly different settings and even cultures to populate each place. As a result, each has its own flavour, and the locations themselves tend to have their own character. That makes each a breath of fresh air. What makes this book particularly good when it comes to maps, is that there are often adventures that occur in multiple places. In addition, these adventures are often more than a single location dungeon delve. There is role-play, mystery, exploration, chase rules being used, and even multiple locations. What this book does particularly well, and I’ll go into more depth below when discussing the art, is that it provides maps for multiple locations that feature in an adventure. Anywhere that combat occurs I think benefits from even a simple map. It allows tactics and locations to be used, and having these considered by professions can be a great help to new players. It’s also often important to keeping an adventure from feeling stale. 

 

My favourite adventure is probably the second one. It fits all of my usual hallmarks. Undead creature bad guy called a Soul Shaker. One of the reasons I like this guy so much, is because it has some abilities that make it perfect for manipulating people and helping in setting up the adventure. Small amount of mystery, kick started by strange behaviour in the opening. It's really well done. The main antagonist is creepy in the way that undead should be. There are side characters, and each one adds to the adventure and builds towards a satisfying ending. They are helpful, and the adventure also can get them out of the scene before the finale. This both helps to build the suspense, but also to make it the job of the party alone. And there is a great bitter sweet feeling throughout. It really feels like a good complete adventure. I ran it for a new group this Halloween, and it was a blast. I do wish there was a lower level variant. I guess I'll do that myself later. But really, I was surprised and really enjoyed it.

The Art and Book Build Quality

The art continues to maintain it’s quality in this book as well. From the cover, to the internals, the style remains consistent and there’s quite a bit of art. This extends to maps as well. What makes this adventure particularly good when it comes to maps, is that there are often adventures that occur in multiple places. For both places, maps are provided. I think in general pre-made adventures should strive to give as many maps as possible, particularly where combat encounters are concerned. Simply having a list of enemies isn’t nearly as interesting as also have interesting tactics for them to use, and this tends to demand a good location. I do wish there were more realistic style landscape art though. Many of the locations, and the Radiant Citadel itself are just begging for it.

Price

Same as always.

What I felt was Missing

The main thing I felt was missing was more effort on the connective tissue to turn these adventures into a campaign. Maybe not the best campaign, but at least something. It also feels like a missed Planescape opportunity. It’s a better known location, and I can’t help but feel that it could serve as the setting for these adventures. Though I’d still appreciate effort to tie them in together into a campaign even in this case.

I also hope they can come up with a standard language to describe quest rewards. Sometimes they mention reward amounts of currency at the end which are bigger, or smaller than what was promised. Did the party get ripped off? Did they add a bonus? Is the bonus on top of the previous amount? It shouldn’t be so hard, and some consistent language would go a long way.

When preparing notes, I often write a few lines that may come up during play. They help describe each character, and also some plot points I may want to tie together during play. And having them ready to consult helps me more naturally bring them up during play, and also not forget them. I wouldn’t mind 3-5 quotes for important characters that can be dropped right in, or used to get a good impression of the character. It’s a little different than traits, bonds, and flaws. But for me, those often serve a similar purpose.

Free Stuff

Nothing to see here.

Summary

So here we are. Another book of adventures. Each one handles a level range, and is connected together through a hub world of sorts. In general, I think the adventures are solid, and they do a good job of providing lots of maps, and lots of opportunity for role-playing. Not much effort is put into combining them into a campaign, so it’s more of an episodic TV show of old. Part of me also wonders if they missed a chance for this to take place in Sigil from the Planescape setting. Though in general, if you need these sorts of adventures I think it’s a good choice. They are varied, they cover a wide level range, and the new casting rules don’t get in the way.

D&D Campaign Case: Creatures Review

Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• Lots of tokens with small, regular, and huge sizes.

Could Go Either Way

• There are 64 plastic discs that serve as a base. And there are many more flat pieces that cling to the bases, called clings. This means that as you need them, you can combine the two parts together to get as many tokens as you need. The plastic bases are also more durable than cardboard pieces. However, I’m not sure how well the clings themselves will hold up to long use. They’re not actually sticky like a sticker, and they don’t feel as bad as I expected.

• It’s nice that there’s a case. I’m not sure how well it’ll hold up to repeated use. Especially the handle. Handles on these sorts of sets always make me nervous.

• The art is the same as from the books. It looks nice, and it’s easy to recognize creatures if you’ve look at the books. On the other hand, the only new art is on the carrying case.

Cons

• No gargantuan token or inserts. Even just one would be very nice. Potentially could even cut out the centre so we can put the huge token inside if we needed to save on plastic for the cost?

• Figuring out how to open the main box is...not easy. Please put some kind of mark at least so we can easily open these things. I think many will give up and just use force.

• No PDF*

* Denotes nitpicking. Ha. I’m just kidding. How would you even PDF this? Hmm, it would be pretty cool if we could just print the art perfectly sized for these disks directly from a special section of the official website. Well, I can dream at least.

Introduction

If you play D&D, sooner or later you’ll want to try tokens, miniatures, or some other physical representation. Theatre of Mind can be fun, but there are also advantages to being able to see distances and features of a map accurately. If you’re using a Virtual Table Top...well, this review isn’t for you. For those of us who can play in person, are options are plastic miniatures which are expensive, or tokens of different types. The set I’m reviewing today is one of those types.

What’s In The Set

There is also a special case to keep all the pieces safe, as well as a folder for the sheet. When done using the token, I’d recommend putting them back on the paper as it seems to stick. And in the folder which is in the box, even if it falls out, it won’t be lost.

What box? All of the pieces mentioned above fit together in a special travel box that has a handle. Though being a card box, I’d be worried about using the handle. The card used on the box feels good. But my previous experience with such handles makes me nervous.

The Art and Build Quality

The art is pretty good, but it’s not new art. This is nice, since Dungeon Masters and players will recognize the images from the books the read. On the other, there’s not any new art except for the boxes that are used to hold the components. The build quality for my copy turned out pretty good. No obvious problems. Which interestingly enough, is better than some of the experience I’ve had with the books so far.

The disks are made from plastic which feels sturdy. The case to hold everything feels good too. The clings feel better than I expected looking at the pictures too. They aren’t just paper coming out of your printer. That said, they are still a thin material. So I’m left wondering how well they’d last over long term use. I’ll update it in the future with my thoughts. Also, there isn’t a good way to keep them except the folder. And the folder expects paper. This mean that in the heat of a game, I could see people getting the clings they need, and then not remembering which sheets they came from. On that topic, I found myself having to look through all the sheets for the clings I wanted. Even some kind of small title to each sheet like “humanoids” would help with my organization. That way I could find the correct sheet quickly if an unexpected combat encounter broke out.

The main issues assuming you like the clings concept is that the box it comes in is difficult to remove without damage. There’s another box inside which is used to keep the components inside when not in use. That’s fine...but I wish the outbox could be removed in one piece too. It doesn’t even say which side to open from. Compared with the starter set boxes, or even board games, it’s not easy to figure out and like it’s almost intended. After all, who cares if it’s meant to be thrown away anyway.

So overall, the build quality is good for what it is. If you’ll have a problem with this set’s components, it’s more a design issue from the clings itself. I’m sure many will prefer Pathfinder tokens, or just old fashioned miniatures. There’s been many products over the years to help people keep track of monsters on their grids. And no matter the build quality, clings and bases like this will have certain disadvantages. I expect to see future sets that use the same bases in the future.

Price

The set is standard $64.99 USD which is pretty high. The old D&D Adventure System board games came for 40 unpainted minis for the same price. The Dungeon Command board games came with pre-painted miniatures for $40. Do I ever miss those sets. Is this inflation? I think the WizKids new D&D Adventure System games also are significantly more expensive than that.

Summary

There you have it. If you need tokens, it’s not a terrible set. The standard price is pretty expensive, but so are plastic miniatures these days. There are ways to make tokens yourself. And many people prefer miniatures due to their more impressive appearance at the table. But if you can get this set at a good price, it should work well. There are many discs, there are many clings that can customize their appearance. I find myself wondering if more clings will be available with future sets. The standard price has me in an odd state though. On one hand, this set is pretty expensive. On the other, miniatures are even more expensive these days. This one set, however, should provide enough tokens for whole campaigns without running into a situation where there’s not enough discs. So it will serve well. It’s just there’s also many other alternatives. If you can find a good deal on the set, it’s a workable solution for tokens and miniatures.

Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse Review

Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• Collection of monsters from previously published adventures. Not interested in the adventures but want more monsters? You can find it all in one place.

• Also includes some player options from previously released books.

Could Go Either Way

• There’s art, but it’s mostly recycled art from previous books.

Cons

• The style of NPCs when dealing with spell casting is different. Instead of complete spell lists being provided along with spell caster levels, now we just get a small list of limited spells and more damaging cantrips. I don’t like this for many reasons, but I think a solution that allowed both a simple stat block and the classic complex stat block would’ve been ideal. That way Dungeon Masters could choose which style they prefer, or even mix and match.

• No PDF*

* Denotes nitpicking.

Introduction

We’ve had many books so far in this edition of D&D. They’ve come with new races, class features, and monsters. One of the upsides of the approach taken so far is that we’ve only needed the core rules (Player’s Handbook, Dungeon Master’s Guide, Monster Manual) to run an adventure so far. We didn’t need a Monster Manual II. However, the downside of this approach is that new monsters are often split among many adventures. This book aims to address one of these problems by pooling together monsters and player options from different sources into one place. However, it also made changes to simplify the monsters. This is a part I had an issue with, and I’ll go into a long explanation of why I don’t like it.

I’ve already covered the adventures these monsters are from too. So I’ll instead make this in a quicker format specifically focusing on the changes they went through from the original adventures they were in. If not for the changes, I’d say it was a book that wasn’t necessary if you had the adventures. But if you didn’t, you could treat it as a Monster Manual II. With these changes though... it gets more complicated. I’m not a fan of this book.

The Book Itself

The book is made up of previously released content. In that way, it’s a collection of existing material. Part of it is new player options. Sub-classes, races, that sort of thing. The main part is a collection of monsters from previously published adventures. They are not exactly as previously presented though. They have been changed in ways to make them simpler and easier to run, particularly where magic is concerned. The major change here is that spellcasters were greatly changed. Which is where my problems come from. There’s also some added damage on some attacks.

The Monsters, The Changes, and Why I Don’t Like It

There is a big effort here to take some of the previous monsters, particularly spell casters, and simplify them. In the past the stat blocks for monsters and creatures had a section with their known spells, their slots, and their spell casting level. This was useful for multiple reasons. If the enemy was killed and their spell book fell into the hands of the party, you know which spells they would see. There are also many spells which have utility function, and are useful for defending their lair, but not in direct combat. These sorts of spells can really help with story telling, and with setting up interesting encounters outside of direct confrontation. We also knew what level of spell caster they were. So we could swap spells and further customize the encounter.

The new spell list is heavily reduced. The monsters are also limited to 3 casting of a single spell, 2 times, or a single casting. Compared to the number of spells that they could use previously, this is a massive reduction. There is an attempt here to increase the basic attacks to compensate. However, I’d say compared to real spells they are lacking in potency and additional effects. Spells can target multiple people, change the environment by catching the environment on fire, and more.

As a result of this reduction, the spell casters have fewer options to choose from. I think that was part of the point. To make them simpler and easier to run. However, these run out and often have a daily recharge time. Which means if multiple encounters are going to occur, either I ignore that limitation and treat it as an encounter, I have to try extremely hard to prevent the party from falling back, or I run it as written with the spell caster being defanged. In general, I don’t mind my party falling back if it looks like the best option. Though I want them to work for it. And sometimes it’ll be harder than others.

To make things worse, they no longer tell us the spell caster level of the monster. So it’s not even easy to recreate the stat block in the old style. By old style, I mean the style of the Monster Manual. I tried using one such stat block and it didn’t seem to add up. The spells they had didn’t correspond to the challenge rating. I’d say this is the bare minimum I’d expect. Tell me the level on the monster like it used to be done so I can recreate my own spell list.

This adds an additional problem. My players have long enjoyed wizard duels, or fights against wizards. Trying to counter spell to reduce the damage, dispel effects ongoing in the environment, that sort of thing. While this is still possible, for higher levels the spells the creature uses are often so low level that a counter spell is basically guaranteed to work as soon as players realize what spells are used. For example, the highest level offensive spell for a Drow Consort, a challenge rating 18, is fireball.

Also, the Monster Manual still uses the old style of monster. I very much don’t like that the two styles are mixed together without my input. As a general rule, I don’t mind being able to make the decision myself. Maybe I’ll have an encounter with a mage and his two apprentices. To make it easy to run, I’ll use the simplified mage stats for the apprentices, but the full archmage. However, I don’t like being forced into which style to use merely based on the creature chosen. I guess there’s the option of finding the old stat blocks from older adventures. But I know that at least two adventures already use these new stat blocks, with no option of the old.

Lastly...these blocks even with so few options force us to go and refer to the spells themselves. In a virtual environment, it’s actually my preference. You mouse or click, or whatever other operation on the spell and you see its effect. This can also be done if you use your laptop in person as an aid when playing. I personally do, and recommend this approach often. However, if you’re only using the books you’ll still need to flip to the spells and do your preparation work. I imagine they couldn’t shoved them into the stat block at the cost of additional pages and space. There’s few enough spells in the block. But I also agree there's be repetition if this was done. Regardless, the new style still doesn’t help you avoid preparation of going to the spell list in the Player’s Handbook. Though admittedly, it’s a bit easier because there’s fewer spells. In the past though, we could easily pick a spell per slot level, instead of all of them. Or even just reverse to at-will attacks after a certain point even if we had slots left.

What I’d Like To See

In general, I’m not totally against a simplified version of monsters. They’d be easier for new players to run, and would help experienced Dungeon Masters manage complexity by being able to mix them. However, we should absolutely have a spell caster level on the block always. This is the bare minimum, as it easily allows Dungeon Masters like myself to prepare my own spell list. Ideally, the stat block would have remained as before. At the end of the block, or off to the side there’d be a simplified section that could be used instead. So the Dungeon Master would have the option to use a simplified version. I think monster at-will, cantrips, etc. should be viable and effective anyway. Being able to rely on decent ones for spell casters greatly helps in preparation if something unexpected happens, if they run out of spell slots, or whatever else. Basically the fall through option when nothing else is possible.

The Art and Book Build Quality

The art and build quality is what we’ve come to expect. My copy is pretty good this time. The pages are good, the art looks good, the binding is good. However, with some of my previous issues I’ll continue to recommend looking through the book and looking for defects if you are able. Flip through the pages and look at the binding, especially around the middle of the book. You don’t want to see the threads. Also look at the pages themselves for bleed through or even stuck pages. I’ve also experienced pages that were not properly cut, so the paper was actually stuck together. Obviously this isn’t possible when ordering online.

Free Stuff

Nothing to see here.

Summary

I’ve generally enjoyed the books in this edition. This is the one book so far that I really don’t like, and makes me very confused. The stat blocks as before were fine, allowing complexity and detail. If simplicity was needed, it’s easy for experienced Dungeon Masters to take away from what’s there. So in general, I don’t like these changes. If they had simply compiled the monsters together from the multiple adventures they’re currently spread across, it would be an unexciting book that could be useful to people who are not interested in published adventures. But now it also changes them in very significant ways. That’s the short version. Look above to see what I’d prefer instead in detail. Yeah....I really don’t like this one. I may prefer the colouring book. At the very least there should’ve been some thought given to the experienced Dungeon Masters who want to continue to use the old style. Some sort of backwards compatibility, or to present both options. But that’s not what we got.

Dungeons & Dragons: Fizban's Treasury of Dragons Review

Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• Lots of full colour art. It’s really really good.

• Lair maps are included for each type of dragon. They’re quite impressively big, each one being big enough for a mini-adventure.

• Very entertaining read on dragons, as well as many interesting details. Life spans, activities, hoard composition, how new dragons occur, and much more. It really is interesting and generally useful stuff. I had a blast reading it, reminding me of going through some of the old books one of my friends had.

• Dragons are one of the iconic classic creatures. So as far as types of creatures to write a book about, this is a good choice.

• 124 (give or take a couple if I miscounted) new stat blocks of creatures and NPCs (most of which are humanoids) with those not mentioned in the first chapter being treated the same way as monsters in the Monster Manual

Could Go Either Way

• There is a Forgotten Realms focus, but there is time spent for other settings as well.

• New races that are fun...but they are also much better than previous ones. They are variation of dragonborn, and they are better than the old version found in the Player’s Handbook. Humans needs a lot of help now.

• There aren’t that many insights from Fizban here. Some previous books had little notes from the character that was mentioned on the cover. If you didn’t like it, then great. You’ll like this one.

Cons

• At 224 pages, it's a bit short. Again, I’d like more. 250-300 is a reasonable page count I think, and we’ve seen it before in this edition.

• Feel like they missed a chance to do some cool undead creatures based on dragons here. I’d have liked more monsters and again split throughout the level range.

• No PDF*

* Denotes nitpicking.

Introduction

It’s even in the name of the system, and technically in the ampersand too. Dragons hold a very important part in Dungeons & Dragons. They are very iconic challenges in medieval fantasy, and naturally that translates to tabletop role-playing games. We got dragons before in the Monster Manual, but only a page or less was really offered describing their majesty, and place in the world. Now we have an entire book to add more detail, more options, and more dragons themselves. What do I think of this book? It was an enjoyable read, but let’s jump into the specifics.

The Internals

First and foremost, this book is focused on monsters. Adventures until now have contained a bit of everything. There were a few new monsters for the adventure, quite a bit of effort on the setting, the adventure itself and sometimes a player option or two (spells, etc.). This book is kind of like that but there is no adventure. Instead we get about 124 new stat blocks and a lot of lore and description of the monsters. Some groups are described more than others (chapter 1 is the majority of the lore and it covers 9 types of creatures).

The Monsters

As would be expected from such a named book, there are dragons here. Every creature is some sort of dragon creature. One big addition is gem dragons, which are the neutral aligned dragons. Perhaps my favourite is the dragon hydra. A multi-headed dragon that regrows heads. I think the emphasis directly on dragons is also one of the weaknesses of this book. I’d have loved to see some more dragon minions, encounters for a dragon riding wizard, that sort of thing. Another missed opportunity is to do a whole bunch of dragon themed undead. My dragon zombie mini is begging for it. Oh fine, I’ll do it myself. We did get a few undead included, but I want even more!

The total number of creatures with stats in this book is 70, taking up 64 pages. It’s a fairly decent number, but I really wish there would’ve been more. The nice part is that there’s quite a few different mechanics, breath weapons, and creatures that are interesting for story reasons. Dragons naturally are a bit more interesting than humanoids as they have breath weapons, flying, and even lair actions. This continues here, though there are some standouts. Some of my motivation for wanting some more undead is that they can provide some very cool encounters for lower level parties. Dragons are often very high Challenge Rating creatures, and the same is true here. It does fall a bit short of being a Monster Manual. There is an attempt to give a bit of everything. Some fluff, some monsters, some maps. And as a result expect quite a few monsters, but it being decidedly less than a majority of the book.

I do wish more was given for the tactics of the creatures included. I don’t mean just attack actions. I mean a rough guideline of how they’d act. Of course, I don’t have to follow them. But an idea or two per monster could go a long way to help inspiring Dungeon Masters when making encounters. If they wanted, they could also go as far as making some encounter groups too. Some variants per dragon would also be nice to see. In particular, these variants would affect combat actions. This way, each dragon has more personality. Of course I can do this myself, but I think it’s useful for new people. But also, it’s good for inspiring me to come up with my own new variants.

New Races

There are 3 new races. One for each kind of dragon here. And these...are quite a bit stronger than the previous dragon born found in the core book. In fact, one is just like that one, but with an extra ability after level 5 to become immune to a particular type of damage. The other main difference is that they can choose one ability to increase by +2, and another to increase by +1...which is better than the feat version of human. So really, humans are not good at all anymore and don’t even provide versatility. We can probably give them an extra feat or something, or +1 to everything or something. But really, I hope something is done to give us a better option for humans.

The other big change here is that they all have a line for their breath weapon. Previously, depending on the type of dragon it could be a line or a cone. I’ll miss this part of it. It was a nice difference. Though, this is also pretty easy to house rule back to the same breath weapons as in the Player’s Handbook.

The Writing

First thing’s first. We’ve had a few different books now with a character's name in the title. In the past these characters would have a few lines of comments in these yellow sheets of papers drawn on the page. Did you like it? I hope not, because it’s not here. This is both a positive and a negative, as I know many people considered this unused space. I did like the personality it added though, especially given the title character. Perhaps it could’ve been done in the introduction to keep the personality, while not wasting too much space? Regardless, it’s something to be aware of.

In terms of content and layout, this book is more in line with Volo's Guide to Monsters and Mordenkeinen’s Tome of Foes. There’s a bit of everything. A small amount of content for players, and a small amount of new monsters. These parts make it part Player’s Handbook, and part Monster Manual. There’s also a fairly big amount of new rules like hoard magic items, Dungeon Master advice, maps for dragon lairs, dragon life cycles, mythology, and the like. This all feels very similar to a Dungeon Master’s Guide, but focused on dragons. So all in all, it tries to have a bit for everyone, but really most largely focused on Dungeon Master.

The writing itself is easy to read, and really enjoyable. I really had a good time just reading it end to end. It flowed well and easily, and the subject matter was interesting. I’ve said before that I like it when some Dungeon Master facing books give options, or make it clear that what’s written isn’t necessarily the way it is 100% of the time. This is especially useful for new Dungeon Masters who have a tendency to try to run things exactly as the books say. Partially due to a lack of confidence, and partially not being familiar enough with the mechanics and math. So I appreciate such things. Dragon life cycle, hoards, relations, and even customizing dragons are mentioned here. Oh, and dragon names. All very handy, and very fun reading.

I think the writing really is the highlight and emphasis in this book. The core meat of this book is the writing about dragons themselves. Their living habits, lairs, and other aspects of their lives. Also, there is an effort to provide tools for coming up for dragon personalities, which differ based on the type of dragon. Think of the personality trait, bond, flaw stuff we’ve seen before. Though there’s a bit given for adventure hooks, and connections too. Also a bit of how they affect the environment around them. Those sorts of flavour and world building questions, and the options that need to be thought of when making an adventure revolving around dragons are what’s being presented here. There is a bit of everything for most people, but I think the writing and world building is the majority of the focus. And of course, it’s dragon focused.

The Art and Book Build Quality

The style of the books hasn’t changed. The binding is the same, the materials are the same. It fits wonderfully together. I will say though, the cover for this one is exquisite. The appearance of the dragons, the posing, I love it all. It’s my favourite cover in a very long time. And that includes the standard edition cover too, which is truly gorgeous.

Defects

Unfortunately, one of my book had some defects. It only appeared in the standard edition though. I’m inclined to think that’s not the cause. Two pages had tears in them, which resulted in them being stuck together. Also, one page had ink that was either misprinted, transferred from another page when closed, or soaked through the page. Whatever the cause, the result is ink discoloration. I could still luckily read the page, but it’s still disappointing to see. If you can, flip through the book before buying. In this current climate though, you may not have the option as you’ll only be able to buy online.

Price

It’s the same price as we’ve come to expect, and your local store may have a deal as well. Besides the MSRP of 49.95 USD. I can’t really say what it is at the time you read this. But of course, better prices are possible with sales as always.

What I felt was Missing

I really would’ve liked to see more minions. Groups of enemies that can be just tossed into a game, small tactic outlines, a few small maps, that sort of thing.

In a similar way, give us some encounters we can just plop in our game involving the dragons. Complete with tactics. In a similar way, more scenarios involving dragons in our campaigns that aren’t combat related. A polymorphed dragon runs a shop, specifically listening for activity about other dragons in town. Those sorts of things.

Also, I’d loved to see just more creatures in general. More dragon themed undead. Constructs shaped like dragons. That sort of thing.

I’m very happy we got maps for the lairs of these majestic beasts. But I’d also like to have some pre-made encounters for them, and even an additional lair per dragon. The additional lair is probably unfeasible. The encounters for the lairs I think would’ve been easier to do, and adding about a page or so per lair wouldn’t be that much to ask.

Summary

Dungeons & Dragons, now with more dragons. Like with previous books it tries to give a bit of everything. New creatures to fight, new races for players (in this case they are also redone races), new magic items, and advice for Dungeon Masters. A new type of dragon is first presented, filling out the neutral alignments. Of all of these elements, the focus is given to the Dungeon Master side of the screen. And a great deal of this is in the form of world building and helping Dungeon Masters fit dragons into their own world. Relations, the way they affect the world, and so on. All of this made for a very enjoyable read. It took me back to my days of reading a D&D book for the first time, and reading of the possible inhabitants I may encounter as a player. The down side of all this is that it’s quite light on things Dungeon Masters could directly. I’d like to have seen more combat encounters, combat groups, tactics, and even more monsters. These sorts of things can inspire new encounters easily through minor changes, but also make it easy for new and old Dungeon Masters alike to drop parts into their campaigns. Overall though, I really liked this one.

Dungeon Master's Screen Dungeon Kit Review

Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• The art on the outside of the screen is really gorgeous. If every piece of art was like this, I’d have no complaints.

• Having rules within a screen like this is extremely useful during play. Many people build their own screens for this reason.

• The Geomorph cards are useful for quickly making dungeons. Each one would fit nicely as a dungeon on its own.

Could Go Either Way

• The interior of the screen is basically the same as the ones previously released, including the art on it for conditions, which are also found in the Player’s Handbook.

• The cards provided come in perforated pages you need to break. This isn’t the same kind of cards some of the previous card packs provided. The addition is nice, but you may want a better material.

• The normal price could be a bit steep, especially since many people made their own custom screens by now.

• The dry erase grid page is nice for completion. Personally though, I prefer printing tiles and making maps out of them. Or using 3D printed tiles. Most experienced Dungeon Masters I know already have their own too.

Cons

• The box to keep the extras inside seems really flimsy. I wish they’d be some better way to keep them together provided. They did this before too...and seems kind of a waste of a page.

Introduction

And so we have another screen product for this edition of D&D. I liked the previous Wilderness screen quite a lot. But this one is a bit different, focusing on dungeon creation. Many of the things I liked from the old set are here, such cards being included. However, the cards themselves are different. They cover things like status cards, which were in the previous. But it also has “geomorph cards” to allow quick planning and generation of dungeons. These are meant to help make the game easier to run, and provide references. In general, it’s good, but it’s not as much of an improvement as the last 2 sets. What do I mean by that? Well, let’s dive in!

The Screen Itself

The art again is very impressive. I don’t think a single one of the Dungeon Master Screens made so far has had bad art on the outside. The inside has many rules listed. This is very similar to the Wilderness screen I previously covered here. In their place are rules for travel, foraging, tracking, prices for services including lodging, tables for damage by level range and DCs, object DCs and hitpoints, skills and associated abilities, exhaustion, suffocating, jumping, light by light source, obscuring rules, cover, dungeon generation tables, monster motivation, encounter suggestion, and visibility distances based on terrain.

This is a good collection, but there’s a bit of a problem. Some things in the Wilderness screen are dropped. The prices for travel, the weather tables, extreme weather, spell concentration, and visibility depending on time of day are all dropped. These are useful tables, spell concentration being particularly useful in every case. The dungeon generation tables are really only useful for a particular kind of Dungeon Master too. The type that generated dungeons on the fly, or who has players that had gone off plan and went somewhere unexpected. This can make them not as useful as many Dungeon Masters I’ve seen, including myself, have maps ready ahead of time. So even if I were to use these tables, I’d usually use them outside of the session and be able to consult the book that the table is from.

Additional Resources

The same style of laminated cards come back for a return here. They again detail conditions, and combat rules. But now they also have cards for tracking initiative and geomorph cards. The geormorph cards each have a small portion of dungeon on them. Really, they could be a mini-dungeon on their own. They have tunnels on different sides, and you can quickly combine them to make a dungeon on the fly. This is pretty useful and cool on the fly. The one issue though is that like the rules for generating dungeons in the screen, I know many Dungeon Masters who would use this before a session, rather than during. Sometimes players will be players and force our hands of course.

There are cards to track initiative count. There are also condition cards, like what were provided before. I also like that there’s a card for the basic combat rules. Such a card is easy to pass around the table, especially for new players. The unfortunate thing is that these are the tear away perforated sheet cards from before. They do have a bit of a glossy feel, but they aren’t the best feeling cards. They included a dry erase grid map, that is meant to be used as a battle map. This I like. And again, you can use tokens to build up the map. The only issue here is most experienced players already have grid maps of their choice, or tiles. Whether that be 3D printed tiles, or 2D printed tiles. On the down side, they still have a fold up container for the cards, and it still feels flimsy like before. I just never liked this, and I prefer just putting the cards into a plastic bag or something.

We’ve got these two screens and sets now. Another thing to keep in mind is that this set and the Wilderness screen don’t strictly combine perfectly. There will be duplicate cards. Which is a con if you get them both, but if you only plan to get one, that’d be a plus. I wish they all were combined in one set though. As there’s useful things from both sets that would be absolutely complete if combined.

The Art and Book Build Quality

To start off, the art on the outside of the screen is truly amazing. I wish all of the books used this style. If they did, I’d never have a complaint. A fairly realistic style that also looks like a painting. The sort of thing I could imagine on the walls of my noble’s walls.

As mentioned before, the fold up card holder thing is a bit disappointing and feels flimsy. I don’t think it’d last for very long in use. The pages themselves feel treated with something glossy on the outside, almost giving them a laminated feel. I’m glad they put the effort in there. The outside and inside of the screen feels like other Dungeon Master screens we’ve previously had. They aren’t glossy in the same way, and feel more like the hard cover of a book. That said, the card is sturdy and it stands well. One of the bends was strange in my screen though compared to the other two, which were very neat. The paper popped out a bit, but it seems to work well in use. Unfortunately, these packs are sealed in plastic so you’ll be at the mercy of luck. You can’t look for a better copy like you can with the books.

Price

For the suggested retail price of this product, you can check here. It’s $24.99 at normal price, which can seem a bit steep, especially if you didn’t need a screen.

What I felt was Missing

The pages are pretty useful. Something like dice being included would really make it a must buy. Or stock tiles. But I imagine that’d be too expensive to produce. I also kind of wish there was a set containing all of the cards from all the sets. I would also say compared to some tile sets I’ve seen, or even the board games like the Ravenloft Board Game, there’s not much in the way of tokens. The 4e starter set did include creature tokens, but they’re not here.

As I write this, perhaps my dream set is a well/low priced screen, basic adventure(s), tokens, cards, dice, and screen?

Free Stuff

Nothing to see here.

Summary

There we go. The outside art is astoundingly beautiful. The inner screens include good and useful rules, and generally quite well combined. I wish there were a few other sections somehow fit in, but they’re quite complete. Just be prepared to possibly keep an additional cheat sheet somewhere. The cards are also a nice to have, covering many useful things like basic combat rules, initiative, and geomorph cards to quickly generate dungeons. There are cards I miss from the previous Wilderness screen though. And the price can be a bit up there based on the MSRP. In general though, as a screen and if you find it at a good price, it’s a pretty good set. I just wish there was a bit more to make it an easy recommend. Though with how stingy I can be, maybe I ask too much.

The Witchlight Carnival Dice & Miscellany Review

Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• They’re a complete set of dice. There’s even a pair of D20s for advantage rolling.

• The card box with inner felt is nice, and closes well.

• A very nice map. I really like this.

Could Go Either Way

• If you’re already an expert on the Forgotten Realms, the cards are going to be of no help to you. The same goes if you enjoy crafts and can just make cards yourself. And include whatever you want. The map is still nice though.

Cons

• The set can be a bit pricey, especially compared to other dice manufacturers. The Wizards of the Coast sets often go on sale, but the MSRP is rather high when you can buy sets for 10 bucks at your local game store.

• The colour is very Halloween-y. I prefer the colour scheme and designs of the previous sets.

* Denotes nitpicking.

So, a large part of this will be duplicated from my previous reviews. That’s because this set is almost identical to the other sets. Below are a list of differences, but I’ve also written my thoughts out in full.

Differences

• The D20s are both normal size. I really do prefer it this way.

• The map has a reverse side with maps of locations found on the big, overall area map. Also a good choice. It would be cool though if it was printed on small cards. That way you could place them down as they arrive, and also gives the Dungeon Master more freedom to choose which maps they want the players to see and when.

• Everything is Witchlight themed and meant to go with the adventure.

• Previous cards had the description of the character on one side, and the picture on the other. Both are now on the same side. A marked improvement.

Introduction

Another set of new books, another set of dice. This time the dice set is released to go with the release of the The Wild Beyond the Witchlight adventure. Well, more specifically, the carnival itself I'd say. The set features 4 d6s, 2 d20, 1d12, 1d10, 1d8, 1d6, and 1d4. The dice are pretty standard, are really quite nice. There’s also a box included, and cards relating the adventure. The box is what we’ve come to expect from these sets, so the question that’s left is how are the cards? The price is quite high, so your need for dice and the miscellaneous part of the set is what will probably determine your need.

The Specifics

The dice are good and roll well. It’s what you’d expect from D&D dice. But the colour really doesn’t do it for me on this one. There are many other dice sets, specifically from Wizards of the Coast, which look much better in my opinion.

The price continues to be a big barrier. For the price of two such sets, you can buy a new book at full price. That said, the addition of handouts and pages helps to add value to the sets.

The Box

There’s a card box that comes with the set as well. As was previously, this is very nice looking. It has a padded inside, and artwork on the outside. I’d be concerned about damage. The box is something I think that you keep on your shelf, and you move the dice into a dice bag when actually going to play. Of course, if you’re playing at home it’s not an issue. I’ll never say no to more dice of course.

Cards

Included are a range of cards with descriptions of characters, factions and enemies found in the adventure. This time, they also include some of the carnival games, and the prizes for winning the carnival games. They are nice aids for running the adventure. Of course, they aren’t really needed. They’re an aid for running the adventure itself. In terms of style, they’re more like the Rime of the Frostmaiden set. There’s a title card that has a design, and then a description on the back. This is where Descent into Avernus had the card with the infernal script. Perhaps the card could’ve been better used for Sylvan.

Map

There’s a small player safe map included of the carnival itself. In general, it’s a smaller version of the map at the back of the book. Which makes it a bit less useful, but that it’s player centred is nice. That way I can keep it in front of my players as they explore. The real missed oppertunity here is that the other side simply has a piece of artwork on it. It’s a nice piece of people attending the carnival, but I can’t stop the thought that a map of some sort would be well suited on the other side. It looks nice in general though, and in terms of feel it’s the same sort of thinner map as the previous sets.

The Wild Beyond the Witchlight Review

Review copy courtesy of Wizards of the Coast.

Pros

• The full colour art continues in this book. Locations, characters, and more are here and in the similar style we’ve come to expect.

• The high quality art continues to the maps. They are full colour and looked great as handouts to the players. This is especially nice, since the first area is a carnival that they can see and plot the next attraction to visit.

• The character summary section is nicely done, and I hope future adventures continue with this organization. The major characters are summarized in their own sections. Stats, traits, flaws, and bonds are all listed with some character background. Their personality is summarized into “Roleplaying Cards”, which covers just the summary of their personality and their alignment, personality traits, flaws, and bonds.

• There are a few handouts, which is nice to see. Really, I hope adventures going forward put more effort into making things easier to run, and easier to track. Many people pay for adventures to make things easier for us to run.

• In terms of organization, it’s probably one of the best books we’ve seen in a while. Multiple sections are separated, and a story tracker is provided.

• Sections of the adventure have non-combat solutions. Many players like negotiating, so it’s a nice to see the options provided when many other books don’t even spare the space for 1-2 sentences for such possibilities, or what happens should players lose combat.

Could Go Either Way

• Parts of the adventure, like items the players look for, are randomly determined. This adds replay-ability. And as someone who has run the same adventure multiple times before, I welcome alternate ways to replay the adventure. However, it does make reading the adventure more challenging and makes the reminders eat up word count. Personally though, I think this is a plus.

Cons

• The stats for some characters use a simplified stat block. This means that if they are a spell caster, you won’t get all of their prepared spells listed. Instead they only get a few daily use spells, and often powerful at will. Think you can adjust it yourself? You could, but some characters don’t add up. Based on their spells, their proficiency should be higher.

• No PDF*

* Denotes nitpicking.

The standard cover for the adventure. Pretty good, though I could've also gone for some Feywild scenery.

Introduction

We have another large spanning adventure. This time, taking place in the Feywild. A location that hasn't got much attention in this edition yet in terms of adventures. Though it has got some in the past. In this adventure, we are back in the Feywild. Interestingly, it also focuses on ways to avoid combat. We have a fairy tale atmosphere, villains straight out of a fairy tale, characters, and an adventure with some twists and turns.

What do I think of the adventure? It’s an interesting one. I like the non-combat resolutions, and think this is a good adventure for new players. Combat can be kept low, and role-playing as well as character mechanics can go to the forefront. It’s not perfect however. The middle portion can feel a bit repetitive, so I think it’s important to make each of the villains different. The final location though? Love the concept. I ran the opening carnival twice. Once as intended in the adventure, and once as an attraction. I then ran the whole thing beginning to end. My players were experienced, and they loved to role-play. The two combined made the adventure go well, since they played to its strengths. Which is also why it took so long for this...but it also wasn’t so bad due to most of the adventure being playable without combat. Which my players avoided. A lot this time. Including some brand new players. In fact, I’d say players are encouraged to play avoiding combat.

The Adventure

New Player Options

This really is an adventure. A little bit is given here for players though. There’s a couple of backgrounds, lots of trinkets, and two new races. When I say that, I mean there’s a lot of trinkets in the table. I always like seeing these, as they are nice useful things to put in occasional desks players may check. The adventure gives an option for the adventure to involve the player’s childhoods. But there isn’t too much crunch here in terms of new mechanics. It’s really about exploring and interacting.

The new races are roughly in line with what we’ve come to expect. They are significantly more powerful than the original ones. Humans in particular continue to have their value diminished due to the ability score bonus being worse than the +2 and +1 of the new ones when using the variant with a feat. And these races often have at least one feat worth of bonuses. Though the flexibility and potential for combat may still entice some. Just keep an eye out for this, as some minor adjustments (custom feats, minor magic items, expanded background option, etc.) may need to be made if used alongside some of the weaker options.

New Monsters

There’s not much here either. Most monsters and characters are existing creatures, and races. Most are also based on simplified character sheets. If you like seeing the full spell lists of characters, this will be a bit of a problem. Also if the characters expected to find a spellbook from the body of a dead wizard. Making it even worse, the stats don’t note their level in their class like cleric, and their spells known can even contradict their proficiency bonus. Provide us both versions please. This should be easy, and can even be provided through the website without losing anything. The very least I’d like to see is the character’s level, so I can make their list myself.

What You Need to Play

The Monster Manual, Player's Handbook and Dungeon Master's Guide are referenced at the start of the adventure. The standard collection of books we’ve come to expect. I miss the days when the basic rules were enough. But this is normal now.

Non-Combat Options

One of the big things of this adventure is that there are many non-combat options. And even combat options often have non-death results. So it makes it a pretty good adventure for new players, or those that like the exploration and role-play components most. This doesn’t mean it’s the easiest adventure to run. It’s a bit better than some others due to the layout, and also it’s more linear than some others. The non-combat options will also help make it easier for new Dungeon Masters to run, though I do suggest you learn how to manage combat quite quickly. But it also will require some prep time. Especially the conclusion due to a rather complicated lock devise. What this does better than some other adventures is that it provides papers to fill out to keep track of adventure elements. These are especially useful for those parts of the adventure that can change every time the adventure is run. I’d probably say it’s somewhere in the middle. I hope thinking of ways to make it easier for Dungeon Masters to run continues to be a priority in future adventures.

The Adventure Itself

The adventure itself goes from level 1 to about level 10. As is common, levels are given out for particular events in the story. The nature of the story also means that combat can play a far more negligible role than other previous adventures. So the challenge becomes navigating and role-playing. A nice change, though combat is not completely absent, which is my preference anyway. This also comes along with a more constrained story than some previous adventures. It’s not as much of a sandbox. It’s more like multiple smaller and constrained sand boxes one after another. There’s still wiggle room, but there’s also an order to the sandboxes as well. This can be beneficial for newer players I think, as it gets them role-playing and interacting with different skill checks. But it may not teach them enough about combat for other campaigns. So don’t be afraid to run a few scenarios before this campaign, or before whatever more combat heavy campaigns you have planned after. It can obviously also be an issue. I know many of my previous groups really do like combat encounters with a twist or puzzle element. Though they also liked the occasional break, this is quite a long campaign in that style.

The opening provides two different options to bring players in. They both work, but I think there’s an obvious choice. This is because it forces more role-play, and also makes the campaign more personal. I do appreciate the other options, and it’s easy to come up with other motivations. Such as being a hired hand for another player. These sorts of options are often essential for players who want to make their attachments during gameplay. Put another way, some players like to write big backstories. Others prefer to keep it simple, and discover their character through role-play. And once they find a dynamic they like, or experience things as their character, they push forward forming their character through those interactions. Some level of both is impossible to avoid, but the balance can shift from player to player. So in general, I recommend asking the players on this one. But I think most would prefer the motivation that ties into their backstory.

The adventure itself is fairly well laid out. There is an introduction section with a hook early in the adventure that players take part in. It’s also randomly generated (or can be, if you don’t prefer to decide yourself), adding some mystery about where they need to go. They then go through a fairy tale like realm, and engage with 3 hags. Finally, it ends in a puzzle stage. A palace frozen in time, with some adversaries being free to move and attempt to half the party’s progress.

The introduction is fun. In fact, I ran it twice, though once in a more modified state. It takes place in a mystical carnival, so it was a breather session where the players could enjoy the sights, while also looking for someone. The real nice thing here is that there is enough here to be like a mini-guide to running the Witchlight Carnival. It’s also beginner friendly. The carnival mood also changes based on player actions, and there’s a few small subplots going on at the carnival to help fill things out. Some tie into later parts of the adventure too.

There are three realms, one per hag. They are all a bit different, and have their own theme. This should be handled with care, since I can see it feeling repetitive. But the differences between them are big enough that each one can be made interesting in its own way. The appearance of each also plays into their themes. There’s also a supporting cast for each location, and extra subplots. Each hag also has her own weakness, which further plays into the more relaxed combat nature. It turns it into more of a puzzle, which I think is a good thing, but it’s something that can be group dependant.

The realm of Hither is a swamp area. The side content here is very solid and entertaining. The court of Bullywags is particularly fun, and I played into the schemes with a hint of comedy. The exploration of the hag’s lair is more standard, but can also be made interesting by using the weakness, and playing into the character.

The realm of Thither is a forest, and contains a hag and stolen children. It’s the most fairy tale the adventure gets, and really playing into it was appreciated for my players. Even going as far to make sure to do a voice like telling a kid a story. The side content is good too but the main area with the hag...I’d suggest reading it carefully. And especially notes. There’s just many ways for this to go, particularly if your players will try to save the children.

And finally, the realm of Yon. The opening art to the chapter is also beautiful, and one of my favourites in this book. The same goes for the design of the hag herself. It’s Shakespearean, with the hag having a flair for the dramatic and loving to have plays put on for her enjoyment. There is also a prophecy element, that further plays into the theatrics. When I ran this, it was my favourite of the three, and my players felt the same. It also takes some setup, but absolutely I’d say the trick for me was playing up the theatrics. My players also improvised a tragic play on the spot. Which was entertaining for us all. The role-play opportunities are very good on this one.

And finally... the ending. The palace of the archfey the players have heard about since the start, frozen in time. Really, this is a very solid ending. Other characters are frozen in time too. It’s a setup that leads to good role-play, and potential combat scenarios. Also it leads to interesting visuals. It’s a suitable payoff to the mystery built early with what happened to the archyfey. You’d expect something serious to have occurred, and this fits. Some fun encounters, including the possibility of combat. Puzzles, role-play chances, and the setup means it’s fairly easy to add rooms, change rooms, or add more frozen time fun. I really do like this ending. It feels like an event, and makes sense in the context of the adventure.

 

The alternate cover for the adventure. I really like this one. Though it's not as obviously fitting as the standard.

The Art and Book Build Quality

The art again maintains its quality. The large scale maps in particular are evocative and in character with the adventure. Characters get portraits often, along with their descriptions. The big bads also get portraits, making it easy to show players. Which I really like. Always do this please. It makes it easy to show the players and have them on the same page when it comes to the general appearance of the big bad they meet. Come to think of it, it’d be cool to get a few set piece pictures to show players when they enter a room. Anyway, it’s more of the same. If you liked previous books, you’ll be at home.

I had no issues with condition of the book on this one. But as always I’ll say to flip through and check the binding if you are picking it out from the store. Most people will probably order online at this time, which won’t afford the same ability to check the book.

Price

For the suggested retail price of this product, you can check here. The cost is the same we are used to for adventures of this size at $50 in the States and $65.95 in Canada (poor Canadians, the price went a little in the years I've been reviewing). As usual though, taking a quick look for sale prices can find you a good deal.

What I felt was Missing

A PDF of the adventure would be nice (like always I mention this). Having the supplement containing all of the creatures to run the adventure would also be nice...but looks like this ship sailed. Some big pictures that can be shown for set piece encounters before it starts would also be cool.

Please provide spell lists for characters, along with the reduced stat blocks. If I want to have them do more, or help in utility ways, it makes life easier. Sure I can do them myself, but the way they’re written I need to decode them because their spells and proficiency modifiers don’t line up. 

 

It needs to be said that since combat is not emphasized, this is not a good adventure to get in order to re-use combat encounters. I know some people who look for maps, and entire combat encounters to re-use and modify. If this is what you wanted, this will not be the adventure for you.

Free Stuff

Nothing to see here. Yeah, I know. I miss opening adventures being free too.

Summary

It’s a good adventure. Combat is not de-emphasized, so if you’re a combat loving group it may not be the best choice. In such a case, a Dungeon Master can adapt around it...but it’ll be significantly more work. It also makes it a good choice for new players who want to role-play, and may not have a good handle on combat yet. Though I do suggest that new players do get to experience the combat to see if they like it. The characters are good, the areas are interesting, and the final area is great in concept alone, and I like it otherwise. A palace frozen in time. It’s also a great concept to build your own version, or to add to what’s there. However, there is a repetition of three locations in the middle, one for each hag. These don’t have to be repetitive, and I’d say effort was taken to make them different. But when running, I’d keep an eye out to make sure it doesn't’ feel too samey. In general, I was surprised by how much I liked this one.