Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
The Maze of Zayene 3: Tower Chaos
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Simon Collins" data-source="post: 2009289" data-attributes="member: 9860"><p>Beware! This review contains major spoilers.</p><p>This is not a playtest review.</p><p></p><p>Tower Chaos is the third in Robert J. Kuntz's Maze of Zayene series. It is an adventure designed for 4 to 6 characters of 9th to 12th level characters. It is published by Necromancer Games ("Third Edition Rules, First Edition Feel") under the Sword & Sorcery umbrella.</p><p></p><p>At $11.95 for 56 pages, this is fairly average pricing for the type and size of product in terms of volume of content. This is spoilt somewhat by the three pages of ads and a good deal of white space, particularly at the end of dungeon levels, where this can be nearly a full page. The subtitles and spaces between paragraphs also take a lot of space though the font and margins are themselves average. The internal mono art is mainly average to good, with one or two superb pieces - though all done by Brian LeBlanc. The cover art is slightly cartoony and did not live up to the art quality within, in my opinion, though the use of light and colour was good. The basic maps are clearly labelled with a good key, but have no scale specified for the grid used and no compass direction. The writing style is dry and a bit boring, occasionally confusing. Different types of text (e.g. text to be read to players) are not delineated well. Editing is average, with occasional but regular mistakes.</p><p></p><p>The five-page introduction contains a variety of information:</p><p>* Advice on using the adventure stand-alone, a prequel, or a follow-on from the previous Maze of Zayene adventures. Some pre-generated PCs are provided at the end of the adventure for use as a once-off adventure. There is also advice for using the castle as a setting for a solo high-level thief/assassin adventure.</p><p>* Adventure Background - essentially the evil court wizard keeps the king prisoner, creating simulacrums to fool the servants, in his attempts to gain total control of the kingdom by getting the simulacrums to give his orders. The PCs, in most scenarios, enter the castle in an attempt to assassinate the 'evil' king, only to find (through various clues hidden in the castle) that the wizard is behind it all, and they must rescue the king.</p><p>* General information on the tower/castle</p><p>* Details of the various clues to be found around the castle to the real plot. </p><p>* Rumours and Facts (slightly confusingly labelled 'F' for Fact (not False) and 'R' for Rumour).</p><p>* An explanation of a set of teleporting mirrors the wizard has installed to keep the ruse going.</p><p>* Similar to Gaslight Press' The Gryphons Legacy, Tower Chaos uses a 'real' time system for occupants of rooms - with different occupants at different times of the day and night. This section explains the system with various references to charts at the end of the adventure and a good tip for using an alarm clock to keep track of all the comings and goings.</p><p>* Some advice on concluding the adventure and future related adventures.</p><p></p><p>There are five levels of the tower/castle. Each room has a listing for the main occupants and any possible visitors that might be in the room with the times that the room is occupied. Treasure is identified in the room description but NPC stats are given at the end. Details of the tactics of the occupants if attacked are given. The usual assortment of creatures, traps, puzzles, and treasure adorn the various rooms along with the commensurate lack of roleplaying information that identifies the adventure as '1st Edition feel'.</p><p></p><p>There are nineteen pages of appendices covering the following information:</p><p>* Some new magic items and minor artifacts, including magic tobaccos and incense cones.</p><p>* Two new monsters, a Death Demon (summoned using the essence of a dying person), and a Myrmic (a semi-intelligent baboonish animal with an ability to mimic speech)</p><p>* A page on King Ovar, or rather the various simulacrum that the evil wizard creates. Gives stats, tactics, routine, spells, and possessions. Roleplaying notes are limited to a "purposeful demeanor".</p><p>* The pre-generated PCs - Ragus The Righteous, Merrick The Mage, Kuryck The Mercenary, and Creys The "Luckster".</p><p>* NPC Stats (with no stats for non-combatants), which are riddled with mistakes.</p><p>* 6 pages of random encounters in the hallways with any of the tower's inhabitants over the 5 levels</p><p>* The master list of tower inabitants that the rooms refer to</p><p></p><p>Conclusion:</p><p>There is nothing particularly original in this adventure. The writing quality is poor, the plot basic, the characters leaden, the stats incorrect, the layout confusing, the timekeeping complex, and little or no explanation of the existence of certain monsters (troll guards, a berserker earth elemental, a black dragon, and kobolds) within a castle ruled by a neutral-aligned king.</p><p></p><p>I did like the advice at the beginning on different ways of running the adventure, the internal art, the use of clues planted round the tower as to the plotline, and the Death Demon.</p><p></p><p>It may appeal to those GMs and players who particularly like hack'n'slash and tripping traps, if the GM is willing to correct the stats for the NPCs, as there is theoretically a decent adventure hidden in the confusion for this type of gaming. For me, it exemplified much of what I disliked about 1st Edition adventures and sparked off my pet hates - complex timekeeping and no characterisation. Add to this the mistakes in the rules, and the poor layout and writing style, and I can't give this more than a score of Poor.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Simon Collins, post: 2009289, member: 9860"] Beware! This review contains major spoilers. This is not a playtest review. Tower Chaos is the third in Robert J. Kuntz's Maze of Zayene series. It is an adventure designed for 4 to 6 characters of 9th to 12th level characters. It is published by Necromancer Games ("Third Edition Rules, First Edition Feel") under the Sword & Sorcery umbrella. At $11.95 for 56 pages, this is fairly average pricing for the type and size of product in terms of volume of content. This is spoilt somewhat by the three pages of ads and a good deal of white space, particularly at the end of dungeon levels, where this can be nearly a full page. The subtitles and spaces between paragraphs also take a lot of space though the font and margins are themselves average. The internal mono art is mainly average to good, with one or two superb pieces - though all done by Brian LeBlanc. The cover art is slightly cartoony and did not live up to the art quality within, in my opinion, though the use of light and colour was good. The basic maps are clearly labelled with a good key, but have no scale specified for the grid used and no compass direction. The writing style is dry and a bit boring, occasionally confusing. Different types of text (e.g. text to be read to players) are not delineated well. Editing is average, with occasional but regular mistakes. The five-page introduction contains a variety of information: * Advice on using the adventure stand-alone, a prequel, or a follow-on from the previous Maze of Zayene adventures. Some pre-generated PCs are provided at the end of the adventure for use as a once-off adventure. There is also advice for using the castle as a setting for a solo high-level thief/assassin adventure. * Adventure Background - essentially the evil court wizard keeps the king prisoner, creating simulacrums to fool the servants, in his attempts to gain total control of the kingdom by getting the simulacrums to give his orders. The PCs, in most scenarios, enter the castle in an attempt to assassinate the 'evil' king, only to find (through various clues hidden in the castle) that the wizard is behind it all, and they must rescue the king. * General information on the tower/castle * Details of the various clues to be found around the castle to the real plot. * Rumours and Facts (slightly confusingly labelled 'F' for Fact (not False) and 'R' for Rumour). * An explanation of a set of teleporting mirrors the wizard has installed to keep the ruse going. * Similar to Gaslight Press' The Gryphons Legacy, Tower Chaos uses a 'real' time system for occupants of rooms - with different occupants at different times of the day and night. This section explains the system with various references to charts at the end of the adventure and a good tip for using an alarm clock to keep track of all the comings and goings. * Some advice on concluding the adventure and future related adventures. There are five levels of the tower/castle. Each room has a listing for the main occupants and any possible visitors that might be in the room with the times that the room is occupied. Treasure is identified in the room description but NPC stats are given at the end. Details of the tactics of the occupants if attacked are given. The usual assortment of creatures, traps, puzzles, and treasure adorn the various rooms along with the commensurate lack of roleplaying information that identifies the adventure as '1st Edition feel'. There are nineteen pages of appendices covering the following information: * Some new magic items and minor artifacts, including magic tobaccos and incense cones. * Two new monsters, a Death Demon (summoned using the essence of a dying person), and a Myrmic (a semi-intelligent baboonish animal with an ability to mimic speech) * A page on King Ovar, or rather the various simulacrum that the evil wizard creates. Gives stats, tactics, routine, spells, and possessions. Roleplaying notes are limited to a "purposeful demeanor". * The pre-generated PCs - Ragus The Righteous, Merrick The Mage, Kuryck The Mercenary, and Creys The "Luckster". * NPC Stats (with no stats for non-combatants), which are riddled with mistakes. * 6 pages of random encounters in the hallways with any of the tower's inhabitants over the 5 levels * The master list of tower inabitants that the rooms refer to Conclusion: There is nothing particularly original in this adventure. The writing quality is poor, the plot basic, the characters leaden, the stats incorrect, the layout confusing, the timekeeping complex, and little or no explanation of the existence of certain monsters (troll guards, a berserker earth elemental, a black dragon, and kobolds) within a castle ruled by a neutral-aligned king. I did like the advice at the beginning on different ways of running the adventure, the internal art, the use of clues planted round the tower as to the plotline, and the Death Demon. It may appeal to those GMs and players who particularly like hack'n'slash and tripping traps, if the GM is willing to correct the stats for the NPCs, as there is theoretically a decent adventure hidden in the confusion for this type of gaming. For me, it exemplified much of what I disliked about 1st Edition adventures and sparked off my pet hates - complex timekeeping and no characterisation. Add to this the mistakes in the rules, and the poor layout and writing style, and I can't give this more than a score of Poor. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
The Maze of Zayene 3: Tower Chaos
Top