As always
You didn't ask for them, and you probably don't want them, but here are my hard-nosed, pull-no-punches reviews of the current entries.
I haven't voted yet, and will have to chew on which entry I think I should pick in this heat. Haven't decided as of yet.
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Culinary Delights
This encounter is suitable for most worlds, and could occur anywhere the DM desires. One problem I have with this encounter at face value is the sheer "been there, done that" factor of it. I've been a DM for so long that if I actually ran this, my players would go, "what, another astrally traveling tavern?" Don't get me wrong, it's cool, but been done to death. There's no real problems with the encounter as described. Heck, it will probably win since it takes place in a swamp! (including references to lizardfolk!) The chef's stat block could have been better (spells memorized?)
Down by the Sea
Here, the party meats Molor, a surly dwarven druid. I'm quite certain this is at least one of two dwarven druids I've encountered in this competition, maybe one of three. Druids tend to be a popular theme here, not sure why. Not a big druid fan myself. Probably because I've never seen anyone play one accurately, and this portrayel of a druid seems to be about the same as others I've seen. There's nothing *wrong* with this Druid, per se, but just tends to fit the stereotype - loner, activist, hates people, hugs trees, etc. In this case, the trees are crabs, and with a twist, the druid is a Dwarf. There isn't really an encounter here so much as there is an opportunity to kill a mean dwarven druid. The major problem I have with encounters like this is that it forces the DM to move from a "macro" view of the geography to a "micro" view. In other words, the PCs are travelling up the coastline, and all is going well until the DM says, "but wait, you see some crabs on the beach, what do you do?" This is immediately going to raise the suspicious eyes of the PCs who are going to declare things like readying weapons and spot and listen checks. I'd like to have seen a better lead-in to introduce this Druid rather than through possible hostile intentions. And the location here is nothing fancy, just a seaside cave. Definitely, I think there could be more here than there is.
Multhana Veloor at the Ship on the Mountain
Whatever the author was smoking when they wrote this, I want some. This is truly unique. Not only do I like the location - a wrecked gnomish flying vessel (ok, I have a thing for gnomes), but in all my years, I've never seen a cannabilistic human female rgr1/drd5. Despite the fact that this is probably not something I'd ever run, having the stats for a flesh-eating human female druid around just seems like a good idea somehow. I guess what I *don't* like about this encounter is just that it's such a dichotomy. The gnomish ship is a generally really cool idea, and investigating it seems like a glorious thing for a party to do. But to have the guide turn out to be a cannabil is so out of the ordinary it's like going to the bank to deposit your paycheck and seeing that only prostitutes work there. You'd be like "what the heck!?" It's just that off-the wall. On the one hand, the PCs would NEVER suspect that their guide is what she is, since they'll be too busy admiring the ship. But, on the other hand, I'd like to have seen a more applicable NPC. Something like a gnome or a gnome ally who tries to kill the PCs to prevent them from learning the truth about the wrecked aircraft, that maybe it's hulls are full of illegal narcotics or something. It would have helped tie it all together a little better. Besides that, you'd think people would stop relying on Multhana as a guide if she kept eating all her clients.
Pond Scum
This encounter involves a green hag and her ogre companion. It's designed to be very much a 'side-trek' adventure that takes place on a roadside near a small pond in the forest. The plot involves the green hag (Esmurea) luring the party into her trap by pretending to be a damsel in distress. Even if the PCs fall for the trick, only the hag gets in a surprise attack, but by then, the party is already engaging the ogre. Once the hag attacks, the party will trounce the hag, and both the hag and the ogre will die in a matter of rounds. The end. What I'd like to see here is some more personality. And by that I mean some sort of sense of realism with the hag and the ogre. As it is, these monsters are not much more than cardboard cutouts who have arisen in the woods to challenge our heroes, and once vanquished, will be forgotten. The author could have done a lot more fleshing out the ogre or the hag, or both, and maybe talking more about the hag's lair (which seems nonexistant). What does the Hag do all day when she's not luring unsuspecting PCs? This encounter just seems kind of hollow.
Dark Valkyrie
This encounter has a very heavy, very gothic feel to it. I like the descriptions of the silent cathedral and the allusions of the decaying town, and the decrepit cemetary. These paint very vivid pictures for me. What is lacking, for me, is the Dark Valkyrie herself. While I think the puzzle of the Valkyrie is a very intersting one, what is lacking is the leap between the town militia's problem to the PCs problem. At what point in this do the PCs get involved? Situation - PCs walk into town and the town guards, seeing their obvious puzzle-solving ability and magical weapons plead with them to help with their problem. That's unlikely. So, I guess what I'm saying here is that I'd like to see some sort of PC tie-in here to make it a little more personal. What I'd also like to see is some more clarification of the Dark Valkyrie's motives. What is she doing, and why? I'm unclear on whether she is looking for someone in particular, or just anyone willing to join her group. It's not clear there. I do really like the word scrambles that represent the clues. The author obviously spent a lot of time coming up with those. Very clever.
Kole Blak and the Seven Dirty Dwarves
Ok, first off, I'm getting pretty tired of repeating myself - "ROUGE" is make-up that women, homosexuals, and maybe actors wear to give color to their cheeks. "ROGUES" are thieves who ply their shady trade at night. Aside from being a "railroad" type of plot, the story is pretty weak here. Why DOES Kole hang out with Seven dwarven rogues? What's their story? Is there a reward on their heads? Why are they willing to travel 2 miles into the dark forest to steal horses to eat? Aren't there other sources of food for them? What does horse meat taste like? Does it make a good stew? All these questions could be answered, but weren't.
Narvesh the Seer
This is a light-hearted encounter which involves the PCs meeting a stereotypical "crazed old man" atop a hill in the woods. What I find humorous here is the image of the PC hounding the prophet after he spouts his wisdom all the way back to his lair. I have this crazy image of this old man hobbling through the forests giving paranoid glances over his shoulder as the PCs hunt him down. I also like the seer as a possible source for potions and as alchemical sage down the line, becoming a possible vehicle for future plot development as the encounter suggests. I'd like to have seen a more indepth stat block, and a map to his abode would have been nice, but not a significant detractor. I would also just remove the "gold-making" ability in favor of alchemy and Craft Potions. Giving out free gold isn't generally a good idea, but having a place for PCs to buy hard-to-find potions is a true treasure!
Bibliothèque
Here, the PCs encounter a treant guarding a library of maps. How a huge walnut tree treant fits in a 30-foot domed building is beyond me, but then what do I know of walnut trees? That aside, this is a fairly interesting concept, although I also don't know how the treant gets a source of water. There's nothing particularly wrong with this scenario. Oh sure, the author switches from 10-pt. font to 12-pt. font, but far be it from me to nitpick such things. I guess what this is, mostly, is just a location, and there happens to be a Treant there. There's really not much of an encounter here to speak of. Not much more than say, an encounter with a condom machine in a road-side bathroom. It's more a facet of the location. I could see myself including something like this in my game in the future. Very usable idea, and not at all ordinary. But still, it's missing some sort of angst that we might associate with an encounter.
A Hunter in the Darkness
I hope everyone appreciates the work I go through for these reviews. I also feel sorry for whoever I review *last* since by this time, I've already spent a couple of hours reading, and typing and thinking about the review. I end up getting pretty spent by the time I get to the end and I have to avoid just hacking out "it's lame!" for the review. I'll avoid that here, especially since this encounter isn't lame; it's quite good. Aside from the DM railroading PCs into a possible encounter with a high level wizard, this encounter poses an interesting challenge. Although, if the party does challenge the wizard, 1 14th level wizard would pretty much get smoked by an EL 15 party. It's pretty much a non-issue, in fact. But, I do like twist. Rather than kill the vampire, the wizard wants to BECOME a vampire, and then use his shield guardian to kill the original so that he can become his own master. So, the wizard becomes a nemesis if the PCs try to stop him, OR if they try to kill the vampire. This would be a good adventure if the PCs are somehow convinced to not interfere at all, and then they have a Wiz14/Vampire on their hands to deal with.
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