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Message: <blockquote data-quote="gambler1650" data-source="post: 2800069" data-attributes="member: 11033">Good Low Level Midnight adventure with some problems.As always with an adventure review, there will be spoilers and as such this is much more geared towards the DM than the players.  If your DM may use this adventure, then stop reading... NOW! <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />Please note that I have not played or run this adventure.This adventure or mini-campaign aims to do three things:1. Provide an introduction to the world of Midnight to the DM and the players.2. Establish the PCs as fledgling heroes of note.3. Move the characters from a first level party to a fifth level party.The basic adventure synopsis is that the party is composed of two groups: members of a dwarven clan that's been contacted by Aradil and agrees to give her vital information, and an escort for the elven emissaries who are coming to collect the information.  Things go wrong almost from the start and the party is convinced to carry out the mission themselves.  After being chased around the mountains for awhile, the rest of the adventure is a gazeteer of sorts as the party moves across the plains of Eredane, has encounters with halflings, a gnome village, humans (in Baden's Bluff), gnome vessels and finally the Caraheen.  Oh yes, and lots of orcs and goblins and the occasional nasty creature.  The party then deals with a betrayal from the inside (sort of) and the survivors complete the mission by giving the secret information to Aradil.There are a lot of things to like here.  There's a lot of variety (pure roleplaying encounters, dungeon style crawls, wilderness encounters, moral dilemnas, hiding, combat, puzzles, etc).  Almost every player should find something to do.  The 'gazeteer' feel of traveling in every land means each PC should get a chance to take center stage at some point (until they reach the Caraheen, and then because there are probably no elves in the party - a restriction suggested in the adventure) they have to rely on their guide.  Almost all of the unique elements of Midnight are touched on: The Fell, the dangers of being Fey or using magic, the darkness of the setting, the lack of easily obtained resources, etc.  There's a lot of advice for the DM, seeming geared towards someone new to the setting.  The adventure itself is pretty straightforward with a simple goal.  The writing is clear, easy to read and entertaining.  The villain of the piece has a more subtle goal than simply to kill the party.  There are some simply wonderful roleplaying scenes built in to make the world come alive.There are a few problems though.  My first problem is that this feels more like an adventure that should only move the characters up a couple of levels.  I understand the concept of story awards, but even so, the mission itself seems relatively low level in spite of the importance of the information being delivered.  My second problem is that the villain is a bit inconsistent.  He's portrayed later on as following, gaining information and then infiltrating the party to achieve a goal within the forest of Erethor.  In the early scenes though, he's much more direct, having attempted to capture and interrogate the emissaries from the elves, which would of course have eliminated much chance of his mission succeeding.   My third problem is with the gazeteer nature of the adventure.  I know the characters are moving quickly, but every area is only briefly described, with the assumption being that the DM can flesh it out from the Midnight sourcebook.  My fourth problem is with the portrayal of Aradil.  The upshot is, she knows that the party's been infiltrated and is using them to find out more about the infiltrator's plans, considering the party as acceptable losses due to her alien (8000 year old) way of thinking.  That's fine.  But then when the party succeeds she's all smiles and gentleness and bestows great honors and compliments on them.  The end scene with her just felt so out of place with the rest of the adventure.  It feels like the authors wanted to make up for the darkness of the rest of the adventure by giving the characters a truly happy ending, instead it just felt jarring to me.  Finally, some elements seemed forced.  The characters' charge at the beginning to take on the mission comes when high level member NPCs from each group are mortally wounded (along with anyone else who could complete the mission) and have just enough time to get a promise from the party that the mission will be completed, but no chance of being healed.  At one point the characters are encouraged to plan out their entire route to the Erethor, and then funneled very blatantly into one possible path.  Finally, the villain's infiltration is done in such a way that the characters will probably be suspicious, but at one point the adventure says "There is enough truth in his words that 'Sense Motive' checks won't reveal the deception." or similar.  Um, as far as I know, 'Sense Motive' isn't quite that restrictive. Problems aside, many of which are common in adventures (railroading to some extent always happens), this is a solid first adventure for characters.  Personally, I would lower the XP awards as the challenges overcome simply don't seem commensurate with the rewards, but the characters and DM will have had a good introduction to the world of Midnight.</blockquote>

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