Psion
Adventurer
River of Blood
River of Blood is an adventure for d20 System fantasy games written by Douglas Sun and published by AEG. The adventure does not follow the half-sized format of AEG's prior "adventure keep" series of adventures by AEG. Rather, it is a full-size soft color booklet similar in format and cover design to AEG's "one word" topic books for d20 System fantasy games.
A First Look
River of Blood is a 48-page perfect-bound softcover book priced at $14.95. This is expensive for a d20 System book of this page count and format.
The cover of the book is illustrated by David Horn, and depicts a ghoul-like creature feeding of some remains in the moonlight.
The interior of the book is black-and-white, and most illustrations are by Storn Cook, with cartography by Rob Lee. The artwork is generally good. The maps are very good with the exception of the fact that none of them have any sort of scale.
The interior of the book is layed out in two colums with frequent headers, similar to the AEG topic books. The body text font used is moderate in size and single spaced, though the price tag is high enough to make the book a bit expensive for the content.
A Deeper Look
(Warning: The following section contains spoilers to the content of the adventure.)
River of Blood comes packaged with its own mini-setting, and a fair amount of the books space is spent detailing this nations and leaders of the setting. The action occurs at a river on the frontiers of three kingdoms that are perpetually locked in war.
The premise of the adventure is that the continual bloodshed that occurs along the so-called "River of Blood" has awakened a number of undead creatures, including a former hero whose shield has become to focus of the strong necromantic magic in the area. Through the course of the adventure, the players deal with the threat of undead (and other creatures) while investigating the cause of the evil near the river, hopefully discovering its source.
The adventure begins when the PCs are called before the rulers of the three warring nations so that they can request an investigation into the disappearance of patrols and related events. I found this a little unusual; the background describes three nations that are perpetually at each other's throats. I found it a little unlikely that the rulers themselves would physically convene to call such an investigation.
Oddly, the author seems aware of this flaw, as a sidebar presents alternate NPCs that might appear in their stead. The idea of the rulers themselves appearing collectively in front of the PCs considering the background seemed preposterous enough that I am not sure why the delegates were not the default.
The adventure is staged into three "acts." Generally speaking, the acts are stages of an investigation that eventually lead players to the undead warriors that are the focus of the problems. Each act is comprised of a number of encounters that the GM is expected to throw at the player; the end each act provides a little guidance on when to conclude the act and segue into the next act. As near as I can tell, the approach seems to hit the traveling PCs with streams of encounters until they get the information they need and can move forth.
In addition to the adventure material and background and setting material, the book includes a new prestige class (the royal guardsman, which seems balanced enough) and some new magic items, mostly undead related.
Conclusion
The adventure comes embedded in the background, and a fair proportion of the text is devoted to this setting. Considering the book is expensive to begin with, if you wish to adapt the adventure to your setting, you may find that the cost is rather dear for what you get.
The adventure itself does seem to be a fairly simple to run adventure with combat and investigation elements. If you don't have a setting already and just want to run a quick pick up adventure, River of Blood seems well tuned to the task.
Overall Grade: C
-Alan D. Kohler
River of Blood is an adventure for d20 System fantasy games written by Douglas Sun and published by AEG. The adventure does not follow the half-sized format of AEG's prior "adventure keep" series of adventures by AEG. Rather, it is a full-size soft color booklet similar in format and cover design to AEG's "one word" topic books for d20 System fantasy games.
A First Look
River of Blood is a 48-page perfect-bound softcover book priced at $14.95. This is expensive for a d20 System book of this page count and format.
The cover of the book is illustrated by David Horn, and depicts a ghoul-like creature feeding of some remains in the moonlight.
The interior of the book is black-and-white, and most illustrations are by Storn Cook, with cartography by Rob Lee. The artwork is generally good. The maps are very good with the exception of the fact that none of them have any sort of scale.
The interior of the book is layed out in two colums with frequent headers, similar to the AEG topic books. The body text font used is moderate in size and single spaced, though the price tag is high enough to make the book a bit expensive for the content.
A Deeper Look
(Warning: The following section contains spoilers to the content of the adventure.)
River of Blood comes packaged with its own mini-setting, and a fair amount of the books space is spent detailing this nations and leaders of the setting. The action occurs at a river on the frontiers of three kingdoms that are perpetually locked in war.
The premise of the adventure is that the continual bloodshed that occurs along the so-called "River of Blood" has awakened a number of undead creatures, including a former hero whose shield has become to focus of the strong necromantic magic in the area. Through the course of the adventure, the players deal with the threat of undead (and other creatures) while investigating the cause of the evil near the river, hopefully discovering its source.
The adventure begins when the PCs are called before the rulers of the three warring nations so that they can request an investigation into the disappearance of patrols and related events. I found this a little unusual; the background describes three nations that are perpetually at each other's throats. I found it a little unlikely that the rulers themselves would physically convene to call such an investigation.
Oddly, the author seems aware of this flaw, as a sidebar presents alternate NPCs that might appear in their stead. The idea of the rulers themselves appearing collectively in front of the PCs considering the background seemed preposterous enough that I am not sure why the delegates were not the default.
The adventure is staged into three "acts." Generally speaking, the acts are stages of an investigation that eventually lead players to the undead warriors that are the focus of the problems. Each act is comprised of a number of encounters that the GM is expected to throw at the player; the end each act provides a little guidance on when to conclude the act and segue into the next act. As near as I can tell, the approach seems to hit the traveling PCs with streams of encounters until they get the information they need and can move forth.
In addition to the adventure material and background and setting material, the book includes a new prestige class (the royal guardsman, which seems balanced enough) and some new magic items, mostly undead related.
Conclusion
The adventure comes embedded in the background, and a fair proportion of the text is devoted to this setting. Considering the book is expensive to begin with, if you wish to adapt the adventure to your setting, you may find that the cost is rather dear for what you get.
The adventure itself does seem to be a fairly simple to run adventure with combat and investigation elements. If you don't have a setting already and just want to run a quick pick up adventure, River of Blood seems well tuned to the task.
Overall Grade: C
-Alan D. Kohler
