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Message: <blockquote data-quote="FitzTheRuke" data-source="post: 9764624" data-attributes="member: 59816">Judgement for Iron DM 2025 Round 1 Match 2: [USER=6789971]@bedir than[/USER] vs [USER=5948]@humble minion[/USER]Rules CompliancyBedir Than’s On the Iron Diem (BT:OtID) came to us early, 13.5 hours after the ingredients were posted. Humble Minion’s Seeds of Corruption (HM:SoD) was 23 hours late.Unfortunately, there is no benefit for being early, and according to our official word-counter, BT:OtID came in at 754 words, forcing me to cut off the last four words. Luckily, that simply changes the last phrase from “plus a favor from the two teenagers” to “plus a favor”, which changes its meaning not one bit.HM:SoD is penalized by lateness down to 525 words, and comes in at 524, so we’re good to go. For those watching at home, this might seem no big deal (or alternately, not enough punishment for lateness), but the usual 750 word-count is brutal as it is, 525 is harsh – this is going to be tough for HM.So far, close enough to call it even.Style & ReadabilityBoth entries I found easy enough to read, even with HM:SoD’s very short sentences. For me, most of the time, those brief snippets portrayed what they needed to while obviously necessary to meet the word count. BT:OtID’s overall structure met my expectations.Not much to add here. Pretty even so far.Ingredient UsageHere’s where we start trading blows. As anyone who’s competed in Iron DM knows: You can’t win ‘em all. But doing your best is what this competition is all about. Let’s dig in and see how they do:Iron DiemIn BT:OtID we have a ‘duke’ (more on that later) who once-a-month gives out iron, gunpowder and unspecified ‘supplies’, and sometimes petrol or alcohol to those who ‘qualify’. The PCs are there for petrol, which they qualify for if they succeed on ‘four or more’ challenges. I have a few quibbles with this ingredient use: Iron Diem is what the locals call the dole, presumably from the name of the event that offers the dole. But Iron is only one of five listed things that the dole gives out, and it’s not the one that the PCs are there for!This isn’t terrible by itself; people name things that way all the time. It makes sense in the setting for the people to call both the event and the thing that the event offers by the same name. But as an ingredient, we need to remember that both words matter. If the PCs are to interact with the ingredient, both parts of that ingredient should be meaningful to them – so in this case, it would be a better use if they were there for Iron, rather than Petrol, or we have Petrol Diem. We are also left with the question: What happens if they don’t succeed at four or more challenges? That might be hard, as challenges go A to D – by my count four – so, they must succeed at everything, other than stuff that pops up along the journey, improvised by the GM.In HM:SoD we have the Day of Iron Cult that is causing all the trouble, which turns out to be the slogan Iron Every Day that keeps the zealous Inquisition agents persevering in their thankless task of inciting rebellion while they wait for backup that, given the setting, would likely never come. Or in this case, come in the form of the PCs working against them (if only until they uncover the truth). I’m only vaguely familiar with the setting, but it seems appropriate. In addition, this ingredient use has the benefit of pointing out, from what I can gather, a more proper use of the Latin. Sometimes when an Iron DM entry tries to use an ingredient “two ways” it backfires, muddying the whole, but I think it works here.I’m giving the edge to HM:SoD here.Ugly Duke-lingIn BT:OtID we have two teenagers who are pretending to be the Duke’s children, but are also pretending that there is a Duke, when there isn’t. Neither of them are described as Ugly, but I think some of their behaviour is? But they also give out the much-needed dole. But we also have a building, that is called “The Ugly Duke-ling”, where one of the Duke-lings likes to party. I guess some of her “ugly” behaviour might be on display here, but it’s not entirely clear. Remember how I spoke about using an ingredient “two ways”? That’s on display here, and I think it fails. I don’t see much reason for the building to be named that, other than its name somehow describes its contents.In HM:SoD we have the boss of the harvester, who seems decent only to turn out to be the BBEG. I’m not sure why his title is Duke - I understand that the harvester is BIG, and people like grand titles – but I think that it would have been enough for him to be the son of the governor, himself a Duke, making him a “Duke-ling”, rather than a Duke himself. Both entries have something of this problem, though. And both have the problem with the word “Ugly”. Is this Duke-ling ugly? It’s hard to say. I would think when he becomes a Slaaneshi warlock he could be all mutated and stuff, but the text doesn’t make that clear, and I don’t know enough of the lore. Before that, he’s described as ‘charismatic’.Both entries have their troubles, and that’s okay – it’s a tricky ingredient. I’m going with maybe a slight edge to HM:SoD, if only because I don’t like the building name in BT:OtID.Sniper BlindIn BT:OtID, we have a bandit who uses a church as cover to enact revenge on the PCs. Trouble is, the bandit has encountered the PCs before, and in my experience, that will most often make him dead. The adventure points out that this encounter only occurs if the bandits survive. If they don’t, presumably, it never happens. Ingredients need to happen. Also, it is not entirely clear in what way the church is used as a blind. Sure, it’s easy enough to invent: A bell-tower with a low wall, sandbags on the roof, a gargoyle to hide behind, etc. But the GM will have to make it up. Asking the GM to make up details is fine, in particular when an Iron DM entry is generally simply an adventure outline, but… this is an Ingredient. It needs to be made as solid and important as possible.In HM:SoD, we have another double-use, and I think it works again! The sniper, hidden behind a blind, is also a blind sniper, having presumably traded his eyes for psychic powers (or at least, having sacrificed them to show devotion to a crazed cult that gave him psychic powers – again, I don’t know the lore, but I feel the vibe.) Sometimes that kind of stuff might be “too clever”, but it works for me here, in particular as the fact that the sniper sees psychically is important: It allows him to detect civilians that are succumbing to their daemon blood. Uncovering this fact is important to the PCs in deciding who’s side they’re on.Again, I’ll give this one to HM:SoD.Open Heart SurgeryAnother tough ingredient! (Aren’t they all, much of the time?) And I think both entries struggle a little.In BT:OtID, we have an act that the PCs need to perform, both in order to complete a challenge, and to save the victim of a Sniper, though it appears to be not the one who uses the Blind, though maybe it is. (But if it IS, it has the issue that he may already be dead from a previous encounter with the PCs). At any rate, the PCs have to try, because the town has no medical supplies. This scenario has a number of problems, because I think there’s a good chance that the PCs wouldn’t volunteer for this, thinking that they’d have no chance to succeed. Or even if one of the PCs is somehow qualified, it’s a very difficult task, and they may fail. And if they fail, what happens? One of the Duke-lings is dead – the one that gives out the dole – so they may never be able to get their petrol.In HM:SoD we have a monster who’s been chopping out lung implants. He has a great ‘reveal’, in that he’s doing it on behalf of the ‘rebellion’ to remove a thing that is corrupting the workers with daemon blood, but… it’s not really Heart Surgery, is it? It’s Lung Surgery, and if he’s been accidentally ‘damaging their hearts’ while he does it, I’ve got to wonder, how have they all survived? The imagery is awesome. The ingredient use is weak.I enjoy how I like the adventure part more in the second entry, but I have to admit that the ingredient is slightly better used in the first, though flawed. This one goes ever so slightly to BT:OtID, which makes up for the previous near-tie.True IdentityIn BT:OtID we have the True Identity of the Duke is that there isn’t a Duke. It’s just his two “children” (who may-or-may-not at all be children of a Duke) pretending he exists. It’s fine, I guess. This is a relatively ‘easy’ ingredient (in particular in comparison to Iron Diem or Ugly Duke-ling) but can be surprisingly easy to mess up. My only issue might be that the “True Identity” is an absence. I can’t fault it much, but it doesn’t excite me.In HM:SoD, on the other hand, the whole thing is a mystery, and the True Identity of what seems to be the bad guys (I’m going to call them that, even though in Dark Heresy, from what I gather, everyone is pretty much the bad guys) is that they are just like the PCs – agents doing their jobs. And further to that, they are telling the Truth about their Identity.I was expecting to call this one a draw, but on refection, I really think that HM:SoD’s use is stronger.Broken Wagon WheelAnother “easy” one, but fitting that sort in can sometimes be tricky, and I think both entries struggled a little, making this ingredient seem ‘tagged on’. But let’s delve into it and see if I change my mind on that.In BT:OtID we have our opening Scene, on the road, running into a busted wagon. It’s on-the-nose, but gets the job done. I also notice here that my earlier admonition regarding the chances of the Bandits being dead might come off overly harsh, as there’s a good chance that the PCs won’t encounter them to kill them. On the other hand, in that case the Bandits have no reason for “revenge” at the Church. The ingredient gets a pass, but the adventure suffers.In HM:SoD, the harvester’s presumably gigantic tread is sabotaged by a militant agent of the opposition (that turn out to be acting as close to rightly as this setting seems to get). Of course, the results are nearly disastrous for both sides, as the whole harvester nearly crashes into a ravine. I don’t think that anyone would want this. At first, I think that I was going to say “but that’s not really a wagon wheel, is it?” And that’s true, but while the words of an ingredient need to be important, they don’t always need to be exact. I think that the fact that this event is both exciting, and important to the overall adventure, that it tips it up to be a good use.Looks like I was wrong at the start. Both of them get the job done. I’m going to give the slight edge to HM:SoD here, for being more overall satisfying.PlayabilityAn Iron DM entry should be possible (and hopefully enjoyable) to RUN. Usually, they make good one-offs. I’ve actually run a few, and not just my own! So… how do these stack up?BT:OtID is runnable, as long as you have an idea of how to judge challenge difficulty in whatever system you use. But there’s quite a bit of work to do on the part of the GM to pave over some of its flaws. This is okay, in that again, it’s just an outline, and any good GM should be used to this task – even with fully published adventures! I’ve certainly seen worse – by which I mean adventures where the task of turning it into something that can actually be done at the table take more adjustments than this one would – but ultimately, I’m not sure that I’d want to run this.HM:SoD, though, I think I’d actually enjoy running. It has a good mystery with a good reveal, and some exciting scenes. I can see how I’d run it, without much in the way of changes. I’m honestly shocked that it works as well as it does, in particular because I don’t really know the setting or the game, and I don’t really need to. Any over-the-top Sci-Fi game would do it.This isn’t a final judgement (that comes later), but it’s another point to HM:SoD. Let’s see how they add up:[spoiler="Final Judgement"][USER=5948]@humble minion[/USER] takes the match!It might be a surprise, what with the lateness and the reduced word-count, but you handed in, in the end, a solid adventure with mostly good to great uses of the ingredients![USER=6789971]@bedir than[/USER], your entry was solid, but probably could have used a bit more time taken (I assume that you needed time to prep for your conference, or you know, sleep) to polish it up to the next level. I think it was just a few inconsistencies that caused it to fall behind, which I think you could easily fix in the future. [/spoiler]</blockquote>

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