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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rechan" data-source="post: 5108160" data-attributes="member: 54846">I'm going to just stick to using modules H1-3, P1 & 3, the Scepter Tower of Spellguard, and the Scales of War AP (because I'm familiar with those). As far as I'm concerned, those are where WotC is putting its Publishing on the line; everything else in Dungeon is under the radar/less casual, I haven't read every adventure that's been out, and I think the Published official modules are the most important here. So the following post contains spoilers. Published adventures seem to be the gateway here. It lets people get a handle for the system (as well as a taste), and if the delivery (the adventure) doesn't taste good, the system likely isn't going to either. And it leaves a bad meal for those who use adventures 90+% of the time (a recent poll here, the majority was split between little to no adventures, or almost exclusively published adventures). So here's the problem areas I feel exist with the modules. Bare in mind that these flaws I think exist in many modules, not just WotC's, and are colored by what I want to see in addition to what I just don't see. I see three areas that need the most work. I'll break this into three posts.Plot1: The Villain in the StoryThe villain's plot is not compelling. Typically, the plot consists of "There's bad stuff going on over here, and there's a guy behind it all. This isn't related to you in any way. He's at the bottom of the dungeon. You hear his name dropped once or twice, or read a letter(!) or get asked to just go deal with him."In KotS, Pyramid of Shadows, and in P3, the villain Sits in his Room and is only tangentally related to the PCs; they get there and face him at the end. Until this point, he really isn't present at all. The PCs never interact with him, see him, or see what he has done in general (making lots of undead/stealing souls), but not experiencing the loss, or seeing the damage he has wrot. Thus the villains are not compelling, interesting, or personal. He isn't an antagonist, he's just the final speedbump. An antagonist needs to antagonize.To some respect, this made me really enjoy Trollhaunt, because it meant that the PCs interact with Skalmad thrice. It really let them build a relationship with him, if at least it was "You're going to get it now!" But more on Skalmad later. Granted, you're making an adventure generic enough to suit even a homebrew game and any general party. It's hard to make it relevant to any character, and tailoring to the PCs is the DM's job. But the PCs need to put a face to this guy. They need to hate him, they need to want to stop him. Let them see him do bad things. Let them know "Oh, it's the work of THIS guy? Oh it's on now." Do that, and you have a memorable villain. 2. The Villain's GoalsAs stated before, the plot isn't compelling. "Go here to kill this guy in order to stop whatever he's doing." That works. It's traditional. And really, there's nothing wrong with simple and straight forward. But a published adventure should be a cut above the average adventure. There needs to be more to it than just "Putting your sword in him pulls the plug". The plot needs more than "it was going smoothly until the adventurers walked into my inner sanctum". A <a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SlyFlourish/~3/10kcyRJXKGA/" target="_blank">recent post on Sly Flourish[/b] addressed this issue at length: The villain needs quests. This gives the feeling that the world is alive, gives the PCs something to go after, and give them a sense of time crunch.</a><a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SlyFlourish/~3/10kcyRJXKGA/" target="_blank"></a><a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SlyFlourish/~3/10kcyRJXKGA/" target="_blank">Hell, perhaps even the villain's Plan is all ready in motion, and fighting the villain is almost secondary; when someone pushes a boulder down a hill, it's the rolling boulder that's the real thing to address, not the guy who pushed it. Stop the boulder first.</a></blockquote>

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