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Message: <blockquote data-quote="WizarDru" data-source="post: 5581496" data-attributes="member: 151">Thanks for the recommendations.  Several people point to 'Reavers', so that'll be one I definitely investigate.To be clear, this is not meant to be a criticism of 4E in any way shape or form.  I don't believe my dissatisfaction stems from the edition even slightly.  Instead I think the issue is one of focus and design intent.  Someone suggested that perhaps it was because the earlier modules were originally 3E modules that were clumsily adapted.  I don't think that's the case...again because the problem isn't a mechanical one.  The issue I have is not with the balance of encounters or the lethality or anything like that.  It's with the narrative and the story...or often the lack therein.Let me give an example.  [Warning: Blathering to Ensue]The module "The Tyrant's Oath" is from Dungeon 178.  There's nothing particularly wrong with it and I don't mean to imply that it's poorly done.  But it's the first module to hand and illustrates some of my issues, so I'll use it.  In it, the players are supposedly trapped between a warlord and yuan-ti leader vying for control of a valley.  The main plot is that the players end up at a village (somehow) and the village gets attacked.  Villagers get kidnapped.  The village elder give the players expositionary info and then either they go to the first warlord or she sends her people to the party.  She will win, regardless, and then the village elder NPC (who is also her mom) will then cajole her into helping the PCs eradicate the yuan-ti.  The players then lead her barbarian army against the yuan-ti with the module's obligatory skill challenge.  The temple they reside in contains a water-trap, although the module seems more concerned that this is just a tricky combat environment.  Then a showdown.  The End.So there's several things I don't like, here.  First, there is NO MAP.  Well, actually there is a bunch of combat maps, but there's no linkage.  There is no regional map, for example.  And why would there be?  The players have no choice in navigating one since everything is really just being shuttled from one encounter to another.  While the module suggests that the players might actually choose one option over another once or twice, it doesn't entertain the idea that the players have any agency.  The combat encounter will happen, one way or the other.  I should point out, to be fair, that the module does entertain the option of the players doing slightly different things...but offers no suggestions on how to keep the players on the path organically.At one point, there's a section where the module says "This is a perfect opportunity for roleplaying."  That's odd only in that it waits until halfway through the module for it, despite there having been several such moments prior.  By this point, it's when the PCs encounter the human warlord.  The act of calling it out almost implies it as a mechanical option: "Okay, now we'll do some role-playing.  Right here.  On this spot."  I'm being a little unfair, here, but it feels weird for it to be called out like that.  The module NPCs kind of run into a few logical inconsistencies, but that's nothing to do with my complaints.  I see what the writer was going for, regardless of my opinion of the execution.  That's something I, as the DM, can fill in.Right smack-dab towards the late-middle of the module is the Obligatory Skill Challenge.  That's what it looks like, how it reads and how it feels.  The rules require at least one and There It Is.  In this case, the players have to help the warlord's army fight yuan-ti cultists on the way to their hideout.  It has a nice feature in that skill usage unlocks other skill usage possibilities, but is pretty limited.  It suffers mostly from being the only skill challenge; because of this, it has to serve many masters and feels under-developed because it offers no options for deviation from it's script....not a problem when a couple of players get to contribute to another challenge.  But if there ISN'T another challenge, it becomes less enjoyable for some.  It also doesn't encourage skill use, but just throws the skills out there and some of them feel a little forced.  It's a decent skill challenge and I don't want to make you think it's a bad one.    But if it wasn't for the cascading skills, it's something I could have improvised...most of the skill checks are justifications, not suggestions.  When I compare these with some of the Skill Challenges that I've seen Piratecat devise (and that I've made myself, with his input)....they just seem rote.I harp on the Skill Challenges because they are something that I most want out of printed modules.  I look to a module to SAVE ME TIME.  Ideas I can steal, rules I can adapt, monsters I can use and skill challenges I can't improvise in a moment's notice.  The skill challenge in 'Tyrant's Oath' feels like one that was required, not that was desired.I think that other thing that feels dull here is that it's all so...linear.  I realize most D&D modules are exactly that and I'm not sure why THIS feels different to me.  Certainly, there's nothing wrong with the story idea: it's actually a decent story idea and is executed fine.  My problem feels more with the module layout and focus.  It feels like the players don't really have much effect on the story, just some nominal ability to adjust the outcome.  And the layout appears to be focused solely on moving characters between combat encounters.  There is no careful exploration, no developing the village and it's inhabitants and certainly no jumping the tracks.  It feels like the module doesn't care about anything but getting the players to their starting markers for Encounter X and assumes you wouldn't, either. And perhaps that's the issue that bothers me the most.  A lot of the emergent gaming elements that I've always taken for granted in D&D appear to have been de-emphasized or removed from most of the modules I've read.  There is little to no implication of players going off-the-rails even a little or even the assumption that they'd bother.  I hate to sound so negative, here.  It's just that lately I've been going through modules and they just leave me bored or unenthused and I'm trying to figure out why.  When I read "Forge of Fury", I couldn't wait to run it.  When I got my hands on "Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil", we started a whole campaign just to run it.  "Shackled City" was exciting (at first).  When I see more recent modules...I just don't feel like it's anything more than setup for specific encounters with stuff used as mortar to join them.My assumption is that there must be some really great 4E adventures...I just need to find them.  If folks have more suggestions, please add them.</blockquote>

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