Any good 4e adventures that arent dungeon crawls?

[Totte]

I love a good dungeon crawl but I was wondering if there are any adventures using the 4e rules that people could recommend that spread encounters out a bit, mix in more investigation or puzzle elements and less combats strung back to back... like the traditional dungeon/keep crawl?

Check out my 4E adventure collection 4EYes! @ 4E Adventures

// Totte

 

[Jack99]

One of the D&D designers (forget who) has a houserule where you need two milestones before an extended rest. That's how he deals with encounters on the road.

Jonathan Tweet

 

[Nebulous]

I love a good dungeon crawl but I was wondering if there are any adventures using the 4e rules that people could recommend that spread encounters out a bit, mix in more investigation or puzzle elements and less combats strung back to back... like the traditional dungeon/keep crawl?

Well, my current Story Hour is a 4e adaptation from an adventure in Dungeon #18 called Tallow's Deep. I had to add a lot of plot to bookend the whole thing, and the middle of it has a lot combat, but the beginning is very much an investigation where we had probably two sessions with no combat.

But yeah, that's kind of a problem with the current 4e adventures, they just look like one combat encounter strung after another. It takes some work to add in variability.

 

[Riley]

Wrath of the River King is available to members of the Halls of the Mountain King 4E project.

With Paizo going the Pathfinder way, I've been on the lookout for good 4e adventures. After all the good talk about Wrath here (and elsewhere), I signed up for Halls of the Mountain King (4e version), and just got my hands on a printed copy of Wrath of the River King this week.

I can't praise it highly enough.

Wrath of The River King is a thing of beauty, full of vivid characters, and it gives the Feywild the otherworldly air that it deserves. The PC's are clearly outsiders in a world with rules of its own. Think 'Through The Looking Glass,' - but without all the silliness, and with plenty of danger lurking around every corner.

I hope that Wolfgang won't mind if I post a bit from the introduction, to get a sense of the flavor of the thing:

The fey lords and ladies... have always struck me as purely Arthurian and feudal, at least in outward form. There are Queens like Titania, and Kings like Oberon. If you don’t want to wind up with frog legs and a croaking voice, you better show them some respect. The fey nobles are cruel and violent and not to be trifled with. You, Dear Adventurers, are Not Worthy of their Notice....

This is all a long-winded way of saying, the Fey of Wrath of the River King are all arrogant bastards who are certain that humans, dwarves, dragonborn, and halflings are really just talking animals with less fur or more scales. This adventure is about wandering around in that alien world, with different laws and customs, and trying not to offend the Really Big Powers that run the place.

Oh, and yes, there is a rather clever plot to it, but I won't spoil it here, because almost none of it is quite as it seems when the adventurers start out.

 

[Riley]

My current Scales of War adventure in dungeon (#9, Haven of the Bitter Glass) has a giant chunk of roleplay as its core. It's for level 12-14, though, and I'm not sure how well it would transfer for someone not playing through SoW.

I was going to say something similar about "The Temple Between" (SoW #6). While the middle part of the three-part adventure is a crawl, parts one and three are not. But as PC said, it'll require a little work to remove from the SoW context.

I agree - these are probably my two favorite Dungeon Magazine 4e adventures so far (great job, guys!). A couple of the others in the series have left me cold (especially at the start of the AP), so I'm trying to figure out how to either 1) string the really good bits together while skipping the merely decent ones, or 2) repurpose the really good pieces for use elsewhere. I think I'm not going to know which until I see how the whole thing plays out.

(BTW, could either of you comment on how much/little latitude or direction you were given in writing these? They certainly seem less tightly scripted than Paizo's AP's. For variety's sake, I think that's probably a good thing.)

 

[hbarsquared]

Thank you, Riley, for directing me to this thread!

I am definitely going to have to check out Wrath. It certainly looks like one of the best 3rd party non-crawl 4E adventures out there.

I'm behind on my Dungeon DDI adventures, but I am very much looking forward to Piratecat's and Ari's adventures: they sound exactly like what I've been looking for.

And here's to hoping other publishers will take up the mantle!

 

[Mouseferatu]

(BTW, could either of you comment on how much/little latitude or direction you were given in writing these? They certainly seem less tightly scripted than Paizo's AP's. For variety's sake, I think that's probably a good thing.)

Quite a bit, in my case. I had to incorporate certain plot points and characters, and it had to include certain concepts, in order to fit into the AP, of course. But most of the details and specifics were mine.

 

[Riley]

Quite a bit, in my case. I had to incorporate certain plot points and characters, and it had to include certain concepts, in order to fit into the AP, of course. But most of the details and specifics were mine.

Thanks. I particularly love the first third of The Temple Between. It seems to be a perfect illustration of how to weave skill checks and challenges seamlessly into an adventure narrative. ('It seems to be' is the most that I can say, since I haven't had a chance to try it - or the principles that it seems to illustrate - out yet.)

I plan to use this adventure and Monte Cook's articles on skill challenges as guides when I finally get around to running my own 4e adventures.

 

[Jack99]

I plan to use this adventure and Monte Cook's articles on skill challenges as guides when I finally get around to running my own 4e adventures.

What? Last I heard, Monte knew jack about 4e.

 

[Riley]

Oops.... I meant the other guy who used to publish for Malhavoc. Mearls? Mike? Something like that.

Oh well; what would I know? Neither of them is particularly flammable, after all.