D&D 5E Justin Alexander's review of Shattered Obelisk is pretty scathing

[Staffan]

That explains a great deal, not least why they kept appearing in early adventures but basically didn't do anything but give five different reasons for the PCs to finish the adventure.

I think factions would work better in an environment like AL where you primarily play short adventures, and where there's room to have some form of reputation mechanic that lets players get a feeling of actual progress with them. It doesn't work so well with campaign-scope adventures like most of Wizards' offerings.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I think factions would work better in an environment like AL where you primarily play short adventures, and where there's room to have some form of reputation mechanic that lets players get a feeling of actual progress with them. It doesn't work so well with campaign-scope adventures like most of Wizards' offerings.

Yes. And they are potentially problematic in a home campaign if PCs belong to different factions. Which I guess is why 5e has moved on to the "group patron" idea. All the party members on on the same side.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

That said, I do (mostly) like the faction idea - one of the things I wish they'd leaned into a bit more was the notion of having the tiers of play be about different things (tier 1 being beginner adventurers, tier 2 being about their place in their world, tier 3 about shaping that world, and then tier 4 about some sort of legacy - these latter two being essentially the Paragon Paths and Epic Destinies of 4e). The factions would then be a big part of tier 2. But, of course, they never did anything with that.

An externally imposed level based narrative structure does not work for every playstyle.

No Frodo, the rules say tier 1 characters are not allowed to take the Ring to Mount Doom.

 

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

An externally imposed level based narrative structure does not work for every playstyle.

No Frodo, the rules say tier 1 characters are not allowed to take the Ring to Mount Doom.

The hobbits may have started out in tier 1, but by the time they reached Rivendell they would have leveled up, ready for new challenges.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

The hobbits may have started out in tier 1, but by the time they reached Rivendell they would have leveled up, ready for new challenges.

Tier 2 at most. At tier 3 Frodo and Sam could have just hacked their way through the orcs blocking the way to Mount Doom.

Victory is achieved by not-powerful people is the point of the story.

 

[delericho]

An externally imposed level based narrative structure does not work for every playstyle.

No Frodo, the rules say tier 1 characters are not allowed to take the Ring to Mount Doom.

In fairness, I said "a bit more", rather than "they should have imposed an inflexible straightjacket, with absolutely no exceptions allowed". I apologise that the distinction wasn't clear.

 

[delericho]

Fully agreed. Dragon of Icespire Peak was definitely a less cohesive, less complete adventure than Lost Mine of Phandelver, but it did flesh out the same area to an extent.

But when I previously suggested that this new product should integrate both and make a thorough mini-setting of the Phandalin region, I got a lot of flak comments to the tune of “This book is already going to be 50% reprint and you want it to be even more redundant?!?!?” No, I want it to integrate and synthesize the existing materials. Big missed opportunity here by WotC.

Thinking on it, I wonder if this was an adventure calling out for a treatment like "Return to the Tomb of Horrors"? That is, produce it as a boxed set that includes a reprint of the original adventure, a booklet giving a guide for the wider region, and then one or more adventure books providing further quests, culminating in a return to the Forge of Spells for... reasons.

And, ideally, I think they'd have been well served to pitch it as the first campaign for people who have just completed the new Starter Set - LMoP is fairly generic, and deliberately designed to break new DMs in gently, so rather than a tonal shift, or pitching it for 'us' they'd probably have been better going for more of the same.

 

[tomedunn]

Sorry if this has already been covered, but since I own this adventure on DnD Beyond, I thought I'd do an audit of the specific claims in this review (specifically, from part 2).

The mind flayer’s name is Qunbraxel. He’s been here for weeks or possibly months (the adventure is unclear), accompanied by his grimlock servants. Unfortunately, the only hallway to the room where the shard is located is blocked by a regenerating magic item: No matter how much his grimlock servants hit it, it just regenerates.

Qunbraxel’s only idea? Have the grimlocks hit it some more.

The activation word to bypass the magic item can be found by reading the thoughts of a creature in the next room. Or Qunbraxel could walk across the hall and find it written down.

Qunbraxel has 19 Intelligence.

There are several things wrong about this statement.

First, the book describes Qunbraxel as “insufferably arrogant” and as “more interested in establishing a court of grimlocks and turning Gibbet Crossing into a lair” than finding the obelisk shard. Its weak efforts towards finding the shard can easily be attributed to these personality traits.

Second, the creature that knows the command word for the magic items is not in the next room. The rooms share a wall, but it’s a 10 foot wall of stone with no passages between them through it. To get from one room to the other, Qunbraxel would need to travel through six other rooms.

Once there, it’s debatable whether or not it would be reasonable for Qunbraxel to assume any of the elemental creatures inside would know anything about the magic item. Also, three CR 5 elementals would likely be a very challenging battle for a CR 9 mindflayer and his posse of CR ¼ grimlocks, should Qunbraxel try to extract their brain to learn the command word by force.

Third, while the command word is written down in a room “across the hall”, it’s guarded by a CR 10 yochlol that is hostile to anyone who enters the room, and it’s written in a language Qunbraxel doesn’t understand.

Given the complete failure to execute on the fragment race, it’s perhaps unsurprising that the promised pay-off also lands with a dull, wet thud. There are three triggers:

• If the flayers got five pieces, then one of the flayers is standing 100 ft. closer to the entrance of their lair.
• If the flayers got four pieces, then a different flayer is also standing 40 ft. closer to the entrance of their lair.
• If the flayers got all seven pieces, then two additional flayers are present.

Note how incredibly pointless this is. Also, that none of it has anything to do with the obelisk or its capabilities. It’s just dissociated noise.

This is technically correct but grossly misleading. These aren’t just mindflayers, they’re the leaders of the mindflayer efforts in this module. The differences in their locations changes whether they are fought together or individually. If the flayers get four pieces then each is fought alone. If they get five then one is fought alone and the other two are fought together. And if they flayers get all six or more they’re all fought together. This dramatically changes the encounter difficulty the PCs face. This is the difference between the PCs facing three Easy encounters prior to the final boss, or facing one Medium encounter followed by one extremely Deadly encounter prior to it. It may not be as creative as some would like, but its effects are significant to the party's chances of success.

Multiple NPCs with no viable route to get where they’re located.

This is hard to check without more details. If it’s in reference to the NPC in area P9 of Crypt of the Talhund then the adventure does give a clear explanation for how they got there, but I haven’t extensively checked all of the dungeons for out of place NPCs.

A hydra in a crypt that’s been sealed for centuries. (What does it eat?)

While it is true the entrance to the crypt is sealed, the adventure establishes there are other entrances. In area P9, there is an NPC who entered the crypt several days before the PCs arrived. He did so via “a secret Underdark passage leading to the pool” the hydra sleeps in, and he “swam past that room’s treacherous inhabitants” to get to his present location.

The map for the crypt also shows the pool the hydra lurks in extends off the map, and it describes that room as having “collapsed into a flooded pit”. Indicating the pit was deep enough to consume the entire missing portion of the room.

A barricade (Z7) that stops goblins from going to the lower level of the dungeon… but the dungeon key makes no sense if the goblins can’t/don’t go down there.

I’m not sure how this invalidates the dungeon key. It just numbers the rooms. Perhaps “key” is just a typo here?

Regardless, the barricade doesn’t prevent the goblins from going down to the lower level of the dungeon. They can still move between levels via a mine shaft that connects to the goblins sleeping quarters in Z4. The lift in the shaft doesn’t function when the PCs find it, but the shaft only descends 30 feet so it’s possible for the goblins to descend and ascend using ropes (possibly by climbing?). Also, the leader of the goblins, the only one found on the lower levels in the adventure, can fly, allowing them to traverse the shaft with ease even without climbing gear.

Maps that don’t match the text, and vice versa. (For example, room keys like X8 that list doors that don’t exist.)

The description for X8 does not mention any extra doors, but the one door it does mention is described as connecting to the hallway instead of the lounge (X7) it's shown connecting to on the map (thanks @occam for pointing this out).

And then you get to the point where Wizards of the Coast forgets how to key a dungeon.

On page 98, midway through Zorzula’s Rest, the PCs enter a new level of the dungeon and… The map is no longer numbered. The description of the dungeon bizarrely shifts from keyed entries to rambling paragraphs describing various unnumbered rooms.

I'll skip this one since it's been talked to death here already. I just wanted to include the claim for completeness.

There’s a poster map that you’re supposed to give to the players at the beginning of the campaign, but you can’t because it shows all the hidden locations they’re supposed to discover through play.

In the introduction to this adventure it says “One side of the poster map shows the Phandalin region, including prominent locations in the Underdark where the characters will travel. If the players don’t recognize these names yet, that’s good! Once they learn in the game where they’re headed, they’ll realize they’ve heard of the location and can head in the right direction at will.” So, while some may disagree with the designers' choice to include these, it was done intentionally on their part.

Later, the players receive a handout with a different overland map showing the location of the three dungeons in which the obelisk shards are located, but the dungeons are actually in the Underdark and two of them are actually different levels of the same dungeon, despite being shown in different locations on the handout.

While the two dungeons mentioned are shown in two different locations, those locations are extremely close to one another on the map. The map even makes note of one being under the other by labeling one as “Talhundereth (underground dwarf temple)” and the other as “Crypt of the Talhund (under temple)”.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Most superintellegent villains are complete numpties.

 

[Mistwell]

The review is quite justified. I think people conflate 5E being a big success with the idea that 5E has great adventures. It doesn't, most of the WoTC efforts are terrible and muddled things.

I disagree THIS adventure sounds not good (though I am hearing differing opinions on that - maybe it is good). That's not an indictment of "all" adventures. WOTC has some truly fantastic adventures from WOTC and I'd say the majority are excellent.