I wrote a review of them in Polyhedron BITD, and don't recall any products beyond those three ever being published.
Allan.
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Thievery 101: Join the Watchers
A 15 page .pdf format d20 adventure with b&w illustrations
By John Merrill and Paul Taylor
Published by Wyvern’s Claw Design (
www.wyvernsclaw.com)
$2.95 US
A d20 solo adventure for a new, 1st level Rogue. The PC is tested by The Watchers, the local Thieves Guild, and is sent to perform an urban burglary to test her worthiness to join the Watchers . The adventure challenges the Rogue’s skills, and will teach the PC valuable lessons in caution, trust, and loyalty.
d20 showing 14
Accessibility: 3
Art: 3
Design: 3
Value: 5
Thievery 101: The Periapt of Famidon
A 17 page .pdf format d20 adventure with color and b&w illustrations
By John Merrill and Paul Taylor
Published by Wyvern’s Claw Design (
www.wyvernsclaw.com)
$2.95 US
A d20 solo adventure for a 1st level Rogue who already belongs to the local Thieves Guild. The PC is assigned by The Watchers to case the home of a prominent moneylender and his family, and to steal the Periapt of Famidon within the next three days.
d20 showing 15
Accessibility: 3
Art: 4
Design: 3
Value: 5
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“Joining the Watchers” and “The Periapt of Famidon” are the first two products released by Wyvern’s Claw Design. Like many second- and third-generation d20 companies, Wyvern’s Claw releases their material in .pdf format through their web site (
www.wyvernsclaw.com). Unlike many online d20 releases, however, which appear to be cobbled-together home campaigns that should have never left the front door, “Join the Watchers” and “The Periapt of Famidon” exceed the originality and quality of many online and in-print d20 adventures.
Both adventures involve a solitary Rogue PC in burglary missions on behalf of The Watchers, the local Thieves Guild. In “Joining the Watchers,” the PC must prove her mettle before being admitted into the guild by collecting some overdue protection money from a local fishmonger. “The Periapt of Famidon” presumes that the PC succeeded in the previous test, and was admitted into the guild. In the second adventure, the PC must case and break into the home of a wealthy moneychanger to recover the Periapt of Famidon, a piece of expensive jewelry once owned by a prominent druid.
Without spoiling the adventures’ plots themselves, both scenarios offer many opportunities to test a lone rogue character, without presenting challenges beyond a single PC’s capabilities. The urban settings encourage a rogue to case the target, and to consider all available methods of entry. The city setting also allows a rogue PC’s many Charisma-based skills to shine through information gathering, fast-talking the local folk, etc. The PC’s full thiefly portfolio of skills will be well-tested in these adventures, however, so have no doubt that she will need to scale walls, pick locks, and disarm traps. Some challenges are specifically set at the edge of a first level rogue’s ability to perform them, in order to force the character to wait in agony for the dice to be generous, all-the-while exposed to possible discovery. This close attention to plot and design is reflected further within the adventure background through the use of the Eye. The Eye is a higher-level rogue who assigns the PC to jobs, provides background and information, and mentors the character to be sure that they don’t break the strict codes of the Watchers. The Eye provides continuity between each adventure, and can provide specific feedback to the developing rogue, since they observe each mission in disguise.
Unfortunately, some of Wyvern’s Claw’s attention to detail falters in “The Periapt of Famidon,” where some key NPC characters are rated at one CR level higher than they should be (because they are NPC classes). In addition, a gaggle of minor editing errors appear throughout both adventures. While they don’t unduly impact either text’s meaning, they are a distraction. These flaws remain minor, however, and are easily correctable by Wyvern’s Claw, given the electronic format of their products.
The art and layout of the two adventures are similar. Each page employs the ubiquitous outside-edge banner, over which sidebars detail notes to the DM, new d20 content (magic items, skills, spells), and encounter stat blocks. Other than the cover for “Joining the Watchers,” which features a somewhat bizarre close-up of an eye with radiating cracks, I found the art in both adventures to be well-illustrated, topical, and placed well in relation to the surrounding text. The illustrations in “The Periapt of Famidon” improve over those in “Joining the Watchers,” and include a full-color cover that depicts the title piece of jewelry.
“Joining the Watchers” and “The Periapt of Famidon” are priced competitively with lines from AEG’s (“Adventure Keep” at $2.99 for 8 pages) and Fantasy Flight Games (“Instant Adventures” at $3.95 for 8 pages). However, both of Wyvern’s Claw’s adventures offer about twice as much content for less cost. In addition, Wyvern’s Claw will release a free 25 page adventure on their web site entitled “A Thief Among Us.” It supplements “The Periapt of Famidon,” and should be available by the time you read this review.
Both “Join the Watchers” and “The Periapt of Famidon” are reminiscent of the computer game “Thief: The Dark Project,” as well as the Lankhmar Thieves Guild of Fritz Leiber. While not as in-depth as either of these settings, both modules are well-planned and intriguing adventures. Easily adaptable for use in the Greyhawk, Lankhmar, or the Forgotten Realms campaigns, Wyvern’s Claw has produced good products that you should buy the next time you’re online.
---Allan T. Grohe, Jr.
