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IRON DM 2017 Tournament
- Thread starter Rune
- Start date
Rune
Once A Fool
Round 1, Match 4: Deuce Traveler vs. Lwaxy
[MENTION=34958]Deuce Traveler[/MENTION] and [MENTION=53286]Lwaxy[/MENTION], you have 24 hours to post your entries to this thread. Please limit your entry to a title, a list of the ingredients used and 750 additional words. Please include your list of ingredients at the beginning of the entry and please do not edit your post once it is submitted. Please refrain from reading your opponent's entry until after you have posted your own. You are on your honor to do so.
Entries that are between 1 and 59 minutes late will have their word-limits reduced to 675. Later entries that are at less than 1 day late will have their word-limits reduced to 525. Entries that are at least 1 day late will have their word-limits reduced to 375. In addition, entries that are at least 2 days late may be disqualified at the discretion of the judge with consent from the match's opposing competitor. Entries that exceed their word-limits will be considered to end once they reach that limit; I will ignore everything after.
Your ingredients are:
Forsaken Avatar
Ruined Vassal
Twisting Tunnel
Goblin Tribe
Chaos
Mundane Quest
[MENTION=34958]Deuce Traveler[/MENTION] and [MENTION=53286]Lwaxy[/MENTION], you have 24 hours to post your entries to this thread. Please limit your entry to a title, a list of the ingredients used and 750 additional words. Please include your list of ingredients at the beginning of the entry and please do not edit your post once it is submitted. Please refrain from reading your opponent's entry until after you have posted your own. You are on your honor to do so.
Entries that are between 1 and 59 minutes late will have their word-limits reduced to 675. Later entries that are at less than 1 day late will have their word-limits reduced to 525. Entries that are at least 1 day late will have their word-limits reduced to 375. In addition, entries that are at least 2 days late may be disqualified at the discretion of the judge with consent from the match's opposing competitor. Entries that exceed their word-limits will be considered to end once they reach that limit; I will ignore everything after.
Your ingredients are:
Forsaken Avatar
Ruined Vassal
Twisting Tunnel
Goblin Tribe
Chaos
Mundane Quest
Rune
Once A Fool
Judgement for Round 1, Match 2: Gradine vs. Slit518
First, the adventures:
Basically, I like "A Kingdom in Strife" (henceforth, "Strife"). It 's got some potential for investigation, some decent combat possibilities (although, what spells does the Queen have? It would help to know), and an interesting premise. A decent adventure for low-level characters.
There are, however, some disconnects in the structure of the adventure that need to be filled in and a number of questions need answers for things to make sense.
The first encounter has a lot of potential, but I don't understand the pay-off. Do the undercover guards know about the PCs? Surely the chancellor knew they would be there when he sent the PCs in? Is it all just a murderhobo test? What possible reason would the PCs have for killing a revealed guard?
It seems very much more interesting if nobody knows what's going on until it's too late, and the PCs don't find out they are guards until after at least one is dead.
Moving on, though. I'm not sure how the PCs go from investigating where they can buy drugs to suddenly hot on the heels of their new boss. Nothing in the text is offered to bridge this gap, except the nebulous phrase, "rumors of the chancellor's hand in all this." A few more details would have helped.
Speaking of the chancellor (and his conspiracy with the Queen), we never really find out what he wants (or how he knows the PCs are after him. Perhaps he has spies amongst their fellow cops?).
So, the assassination attempt. Never mind that it happens off-screen (what a waste of an opportunity for an exciting encounter!), when the PCs find Raegard in a totally healable state and he gives them an info-dump, no clue is given about how he knew any of that! Or how he knew enough about the assassination to stop it. Is this guy a spy for the king? A really dedicated investigator who's working overtime and off the books to get to The Truth before his retirement in two weeks? Who is this guy, anyway?
As with "Strife," "The Death of Oberon" ("Death") has some significant issues that are hard to ignore. There are a lot of things that this adventure does well, though – some of them possibly not so evident to a casual reader.
First, let me say just how delighted I was to see a five act structure, given the Shakespeare-inspired subject matter. In Elizabethan plays, however, the turning point happens in Act III. How well would that work in an roleplaying adventure?
The adventure itself is investigative, giving a noir overlay that makes for an intriguing juxtaposition with all of the faerie-influence. I'll go through this act by act.
Act I: This is just backstory, right? There's potential for investigation here, but it looks like that really happens in Act II. It is, at least, concise.
Act II: So the PCs infiltrate and act and earn the company's trust well enough to hear the gossip. There doesn't seem to be a time-frame here, so a DM ought to be able to adjust the pace to fit the players' playstyle.
Act III: In an Elizabethan play, I would look for a turning point in this act – an event that sets the characters on the courses they will follow for the rest if the play. The closest we get here is that, by the end of the act, the PCs know what the they need to do to save Gash, although not where to look.
There is, in fact, a true turning point in the adventure, but I'll discuss it when we get there.
Act IV: In which the PCs research the whereabouts of a faerie dragon and answer some unspecified riddles or seek out rare ingredients (that it needs because?).
But wait. The adventure doesn't specify the system, but, presumably D&D is an option. If so, any party with access to protection from poison (or neutralize poison in older editions) – in other words, most of them – will try that immediately and completely bypass this part. Which is a shame, because it seems like a fun change of pace. I'm not sure how to fix that off the top of my head without resorting to a very unsatisfying bit of fiat. Or, I don't know, running the adventure for level 1 characters. Yeah, that would work.
Act V: So here's the turning point, and it's a good one. This being an adventure scenario and not an Elizabethan play, the timing is right, providing an exciting (possibly even chaotic) climax for the end. And, fortunately, it can happen whether Act IV did, or not.
As far as the adventure goes, I think "Death" edges out "Strife." Its problems are fewer, and less crippling. Mysteries can be tough to do in D&D, but this looks like it has just enough detail to make it work and be fun.
Now, to the ingredients:
Withered Husk. The faerie dragon cocoon in "Death." A creative use undercut by the liklihood (in low-mid level or higher D&D, at least) that it will never come up.
"Strife" uses this ingredient in a much more convoluted way. The use that is called out – the remains of a failed plan – is terrible. However, as a metaphor for what happens to Fey Mood addicts (although it would have been cool if it was also physically happening) and what is happening to the kingdom, it becomes a strong thematic component to the adventure. If not for the called out use, I would have assumed it intentional. Either way, its a strong use – stronger than in "Death."
Improvised Solution. I am never quite sure in "Strife" just what the improvised solution is. Hiring the PCs could be a solution, but the chancellor isn't really looking for a solution is he? Even if he is, the improvised nature of the solution isn't explained and doesn't seem relevant.
In "Death," the ingredient is so much more: it provides the climax for the adventure and may necessitate improvised solutions from the players. But, it's all planned in advance! Planned on short notice is not the same thing as improvised! Still, it is, at least, a solution.
Internal Strife. In "Death," this is excellent. The web of intrigue it creates among the NPCs lays the foundation for the adventure and is woven in with at least three of the other ingredients. Well done.
"Strife" has internal strife as a central ingredient as well, but it lacks the detail necessary to bring it to the forefront. Almost all of it is off-screen and we never even meet all of the major players (the King, for instance). What could have been a great source of intrigue is instead relegated to scenery.
Clandestine Plot. This ingredient was used in "Strife" in such a clandestine way that the reader doesn't even know what's going on for a hefty chunk of the adventure. That's clever, but I'm not sure it facilitates running the adventure. Let's take a look: At first, it seems like the undercover operation that the PCs come across is the extent of this ingredient, but then you have to consider that their boss is the same guy who hired the PCs (I think. It's never explicitly made clear that the chancellor hired the undercover agents, too) and that means the PCs are a part of it, somehow. And "it," whatever it is, goes all the way up to the Queen. And includes an assassination attempt. This isn't just a part of the adventure. It is the adventure!
The same can be said of "Death," though. The plot(s) drive the action from start to finish. No advantage to either entry for this ingredient.
Assassination. In both entries, this is tied in with the clandestine plot (as is natural). Only in "Death," however, do the PCs get to get involved.
Fey Mood. The fey mood is a little difficult to pin down in "Death." Fey means (among other things), fated to die, and a fey mood is the mood of someone who knows he or she is going to die. Gash is the closest fit, but doesn't quite make it there.
Possibly the ingredient is meant to apply to the fairie dragon's trickster spirit, since it is a fey creature, but that isn't really played up, so I don't know.
It is, in "Strife," the strongest ingredient. It isn't normally a good idea to present an ingredient as the name of a thing, but, in this case, the name says a whole lot about the thing. Not only does the description of erratic behavior evoke the capricious nature of fey creatures, the unspoken implication is that it is also lethal (even inevitably so?). This is the heart of the adventure; the internal strife might have caused it to come about, but this is where the real damage is being done and, if the DM can show its effects throughout, I think the adventure could be remembered for a long time.
These two entries are closer than I thought when I first started writing. A comparison of the ingredient-uses is pretty tight, although it took a close look to realize it, because the tendency to use ingredients as names of things in "Strife" suggested otherwise at first. In the end, though, "Death" has the stronger set, if only by a factor of 3:2.
Added to that, "Death" is also the stronger adventure. "Strife" has a lot of potential buried within, but it is too disjointed, has too much of the interesting stuff happening off-screen, and, frankly, focuses a little overmuch on the mundane combats and not on the really cool things that are happening in the background. Not that combats are bad, but even these had no details to make them interesting. I'd have much rather seen the focus shifted towards making the investigation awesome and exploring the effects of Fey Mood on the NPCs, the kingdom as a whole, and maybe even the PCs. Those were the interesting parts, and the pieces were all there to do it. Oh well.
I commend Slit518 for a pretty good debut performance; I expect that we will surely see great things from you in future tournaments.
If you're looking for some specific area to hone your chops, I'd say you should focus on your strengths. You are very good at setting up a scenario with layers of complication and interesting implications. If you can flesh those out and make them more explicitly the backbone of your adventures by giving the PCs things to do with them – and if you can keep things clean and easy to follow at the same time – you'll be winning these things in no time.
This time, though, Gradine will advance to Round 2.
First, the adventures:
Basically, I like "A Kingdom in Strife" (henceforth, "Strife"). It 's got some potential for investigation, some decent combat possibilities (although, what spells does the Queen have? It would help to know), and an interesting premise. A decent adventure for low-level characters.
There are, however, some disconnects in the structure of the adventure that need to be filled in and a number of questions need answers for things to make sense.
The first encounter has a lot of potential, but I don't understand the pay-off. Do the undercover guards know about the PCs? Surely the chancellor knew they would be there when he sent the PCs in? Is it all just a murderhobo test? What possible reason would the PCs have for killing a revealed guard?
It seems very much more interesting if nobody knows what's going on until it's too late, and the PCs don't find out they are guards until after at least one is dead.
Moving on, though. I'm not sure how the PCs go from investigating where they can buy drugs to suddenly hot on the heels of their new boss. Nothing in the text is offered to bridge this gap, except the nebulous phrase, "rumors of the chancellor's hand in all this." A few more details would have helped.
Speaking of the chancellor (and his conspiracy with the Queen), we never really find out what he wants (or how he knows the PCs are after him. Perhaps he has spies amongst their fellow cops?).
So, the assassination attempt. Never mind that it happens off-screen (what a waste of an opportunity for an exciting encounter!), when the PCs find Raegard in a totally healable state and he gives them an info-dump, no clue is given about how he knew any of that! Or how he knew enough about the assassination to stop it. Is this guy a spy for the king? A really dedicated investigator who's working overtime and off the books to get to The Truth before his retirement in two weeks? Who is this guy, anyway?
As with "Strife," "The Death of Oberon" ("Death") has some significant issues that are hard to ignore. There are a lot of things that this adventure does well, though – some of them possibly not so evident to a casual reader.
First, let me say just how delighted I was to see a five act structure, given the Shakespeare-inspired subject matter. In Elizabethan plays, however, the turning point happens in Act III. How well would that work in an roleplaying adventure?
The adventure itself is investigative, giving a noir overlay that makes for an intriguing juxtaposition with all of the faerie-influence. I'll go through this act by act.
Act I: This is just backstory, right? There's potential for investigation here, but it looks like that really happens in Act II. It is, at least, concise.
Act II: So the PCs infiltrate and act and earn the company's trust well enough to hear the gossip. There doesn't seem to be a time-frame here, so a DM ought to be able to adjust the pace to fit the players' playstyle.
Act III: In an Elizabethan play, I would look for a turning point in this act – an event that sets the characters on the courses they will follow for the rest if the play. The closest we get here is that, by the end of the act, the PCs know what the they need to do to save Gash, although not where to look.
There is, in fact, a true turning point in the adventure, but I'll discuss it when we get there.
Act IV: In which the PCs research the whereabouts of a faerie dragon and answer some unspecified riddles or seek out rare ingredients (that it needs because?).
But wait. The adventure doesn't specify the system, but, presumably D&D is an option. If so, any party with access to protection from poison (or neutralize poison in older editions) – in other words, most of them – will try that immediately and completely bypass this part. Which is a shame, because it seems like a fun change of pace. I'm not sure how to fix that off the top of my head without resorting to a very unsatisfying bit of fiat. Or, I don't know, running the adventure for level 1 characters. Yeah, that would work.
Act V: So here's the turning point, and it's a good one. This being an adventure scenario and not an Elizabethan play, the timing is right, providing an exciting (possibly even chaotic) climax for the end. And, fortunately, it can happen whether Act IV did, or not.
As far as the adventure goes, I think "Death" edges out "Strife." Its problems are fewer, and less crippling. Mysteries can be tough to do in D&D, but this looks like it has just enough detail to make it work and be fun.
Now, to the ingredients:
Withered Husk. The faerie dragon cocoon in "Death." A creative use undercut by the liklihood (in low-mid level or higher D&D, at least) that it will never come up.
"Strife" uses this ingredient in a much more convoluted way. The use that is called out – the remains of a failed plan – is terrible. However, as a metaphor for what happens to Fey Mood addicts (although it would have been cool if it was also physically happening) and what is happening to the kingdom, it becomes a strong thematic component to the adventure. If not for the called out use, I would have assumed it intentional. Either way, its a strong use – stronger than in "Death."
Improvised Solution. I am never quite sure in "Strife" just what the improvised solution is. Hiring the PCs could be a solution, but the chancellor isn't really looking for a solution is he? Even if he is, the improvised nature of the solution isn't explained and doesn't seem relevant.
In "Death," the ingredient is so much more: it provides the climax for the adventure and may necessitate improvised solutions from the players. But, it's all planned in advance! Planned on short notice is not the same thing as improvised! Still, it is, at least, a solution.
Internal Strife. In "Death," this is excellent. The web of intrigue it creates among the NPCs lays the foundation for the adventure and is woven in with at least three of the other ingredients. Well done.
"Strife" has internal strife as a central ingredient as well, but it lacks the detail necessary to bring it to the forefront. Almost all of it is off-screen and we never even meet all of the major players (the King, for instance). What could have been a great source of intrigue is instead relegated to scenery.
Clandestine Plot. This ingredient was used in "Strife" in such a clandestine way that the reader doesn't even know what's going on for a hefty chunk of the adventure. That's clever, but I'm not sure it facilitates running the adventure. Let's take a look: At first, it seems like the undercover operation that the PCs come across is the extent of this ingredient, but then you have to consider that their boss is the same guy who hired the PCs (I think. It's never explicitly made clear that the chancellor hired the undercover agents, too) and that means the PCs are a part of it, somehow. And "it," whatever it is, goes all the way up to the Queen. And includes an assassination attempt. This isn't just a part of the adventure. It is the adventure!
The same can be said of "Death," though. The plot(s) drive the action from start to finish. No advantage to either entry for this ingredient.
Assassination. In both entries, this is tied in with the clandestine plot (as is natural). Only in "Death," however, do the PCs get to get involved.
Fey Mood. The fey mood is a little difficult to pin down in "Death." Fey means (among other things), fated to die, and a fey mood is the mood of someone who knows he or she is going to die. Gash is the closest fit, but doesn't quite make it there.
Possibly the ingredient is meant to apply to the fairie dragon's trickster spirit, since it is a fey creature, but that isn't really played up, so I don't know.
It is, in "Strife," the strongest ingredient. It isn't normally a good idea to present an ingredient as the name of a thing, but, in this case, the name says a whole lot about the thing. Not only does the description of erratic behavior evoke the capricious nature of fey creatures, the unspoken implication is that it is also lethal (even inevitably so?). This is the heart of the adventure; the internal strife might have caused it to come about, but this is where the real damage is being done and, if the DM can show its effects throughout, I think the adventure could be remembered for a long time.
These two entries are closer than I thought when I first started writing. A comparison of the ingredient-uses is pretty tight, although it took a close look to realize it, because the tendency to use ingredients as names of things in "Strife" suggested otherwise at first. In the end, though, "Death" has the stronger set, if only by a factor of 3:2.
Added to that, "Death" is also the stronger adventure. "Strife" has a lot of potential buried within, but it is too disjointed, has too much of the interesting stuff happening off-screen, and, frankly, focuses a little overmuch on the mundane combats and not on the really cool things that are happening in the background. Not that combats are bad, but even these had no details to make them interesting. I'd have much rather seen the focus shifted towards making the investigation awesome and exploring the effects of Fey Mood on the NPCs, the kingdom as a whole, and maybe even the PCs. Those were the interesting parts, and the pieces were all there to do it. Oh well.
I commend Slit518 for a pretty good debut performance; I expect that we will surely see great things from you in future tournaments.
If you're looking for some specific area to hone your chops, I'd say you should focus on your strengths. You are very good at setting up a scenario with layers of complication and interesting implications. If you can flesh those out and make them more explicitly the backbone of your adventures by giving the PCs things to do with them – and if you can keep things clean and easy to follow at the same time – you'll be winning these things in no time.
This time, though, Gradine will advance to Round 2.
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Rune
Once A Fool
Incidentally, once judgement for a match has been posted, I encourage the contestants to share insights into their creative process and perhaps clarify things that may have had to get cut or left vague due to the parameters of the medium. I always find that part quite interesting – and I doubt I am alone in that.
Also, one of the nifty byproducts of these tournaments is that they provide a trove of easy-to-quickly-use adventures for short-notice games. The added clarification can be quite useful in that regard.
Also, one of the nifty byproducts of these tournaments is that they provide a trove of easy-to-quickly-use adventures for short-notice games. The added clarification can be quite useful in that regard.
Gradine
The Elephant in the Room (she/her)
Congrats to Slit on a hard fought match! I'll admit I was sweating bullets for a while.
I think I got a little too subtle and tricky with a few ingredients, and Fey Mood was spread pretty thin (between the faerie dragon, the plot change with Titania, and the Dwarf Fortress reference with the Dwarf locking himself in his workshop). The Clandestine Plot was, more specifically, the change in the climax of the play ("Plot" being the sequence of events in the play, being kept secret from Gash). And the Improvised Solution was the dwarf's second rate antidote ("Solution" being in this case an ingredient being dissolved in liquid). I had a thought to explain the ingredient list but I instead chose to use the words to flesh out a few things. Oh well.
The twist on "plot" along with assassination and "solution", led me towards the Shakespearean. Fitting everything else in was easier than I expected, except again the Fey Mood, which I should have made more clear.
I also always forget how many basic plots get ruined by low level D&D magic. ><
I think I got a little too subtle and tricky with a few ingredients, and Fey Mood was spread pretty thin (between the faerie dragon, the plot change with Titania, and the Dwarf Fortress reference with the Dwarf locking himself in his workshop). The Clandestine Plot was, more specifically, the change in the climax of the play ("Plot" being the sequence of events in the play, being kept secret from Gash). And the Improvised Solution was the dwarf's second rate antidote ("Solution" being in this case an ingredient being dissolved in liquid). I had a thought to explain the ingredient list but I instead chose to use the words to flesh out a few things. Oh well.
The twist on "plot" along with assassination and "solution", led me towards the Shakespearean. Fitting everything else in was easier than I expected, except again the Fey Mood, which I should have made more clear.
I also always forget how many basic plots get ruined by low level D&D magic. ><
Rune
Once A Fool
Ya know, I was specifically looking for that definition of "solution" to come up and I still missed it, which is on me. That's pretty clever, but I don't think, in the end, it would have been as strong as what I did pick out.
No stronger than the "withered husk," for the exact same reasons: its relevance to the PCs is pretty minimal (even more so) and it is pretty easy to bypass. An explicit non-D&D system, or an explicit level 1 expectation would have fixed that, though.
Slit518
Adventurer
I really liked Gradine's entry, a lot. And as everyone else had said, it reminded me of Shakespeare.
I was struggling with the whole 750 word limit, I couldn't express myself to the fullest, hence the reason for the "holes."
I also had no idea I was supposed to mask the ingredients, I thought I had to point them out, that is why I made them blatant and bolded.
I also had no idea what Fae meant, I just thought it was referring to the D&D creature type.
But then again, this is why this is an Iron DM tournament and not some other tournament.
All-in-all, it was fun.
P.S.
And I couldn't change the story, because the story told me what it was about when those ingredients were given to me.
I was struggling with the whole 750 word limit, I couldn't express myself to the fullest, hence the reason for the "holes."
I also had no idea I was supposed to mask the ingredients, I thought I had to point them out, that is why I made them blatant and bolded.
I also had no idea what Fae meant, I just thought it was referring to the D&D creature type.
But then again, this is why this is an Iron DM tournament and not some other tournament.
All-in-all, it was fun.
P.S.
And I couldn't change the story, because the story told me what it was about when those ingredients were given to me.
Rune
Once A Fool
I really liked Gradine's entry, a lot. And as everyone else had said, it reminded me of Shakespeare.
I was struggling with the whole 750 word limit, I couldn't express myself to the fullest, hence the reason for the "holes."
I also had no idea I was supposed to mask the ingredients, I thought I had to point them out, that is why I made them blatant and bolded.
I also had no idea what Fae meant, I just thought it was referring to the D&D creature type.
But then again, this is why this is an Iron DM tournament and not some other tournament.
All-in-all, it was fun.
P.S.
And I couldn't change the story, because the story told me what it was about when those ingredients were given to me.
Some people like to call the ingredients out directly. Some don't. I tend to ignore that kind of thing when I judge (and, in fact, the word-processing app I copy/pasted it into and was reading it in so I could take notes didn't keep the formatting, anyway).
The problem isn't how you present the ingredient – it's how you've used it. In particular, it is almost always a poor appeoach to name a thing the ingredient and hope that does the trick (your use of fey mood being a notible exception).
This is because an ingredient needs to be integral to the entry and irreplaceable. Calling a failed plan a "withered husk" doesn't cut it unless the adventure demands not only that the plan has failed, but also that it is important that it is withered in some way, and also that it is a husk. If any of that isn't true, it doesn't work.
As far as the story goes, it had a lot of promise (and, yeah, sometimes the ingredients take control like that!); I would just aim for a clearer presentation and focus more on the parts that make the story matter. That's subjective, of course, but, for me, the fey mood backdrop is too compelling to pass up.
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