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Raiders of the Serpent Sea - Third Party 5E Review
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<blockquote data-quote="Sparky McDibben" data-source="post: 9206247" data-attributes="member: 7041430"><p>Alright, y'all, now we're going to delve into the Witch's Shrine. It is, I think, an almost perfect antithesis of fun dungeon design.</p><p></p><p>The setup here is that the prime antagonist, the Matron (also known as Boða - props to you if you know how to pronounce that, 'cuz I sure as hell didn't), is trying to get a better read on the PCs. She's sent this sort-of-illusion to get the PCs to appear before her, so she can mark them.</p><p></p><p>And hey, it's a...</p><p></p><p>[SPOILER="BioWare Trope Alert!"]</p><p>Ah, the dream dungeon. Whether that's the Fade from <em>Dragon Age: Origins</em> or the weird alternate future in <em>Dragon Age: Inquisition,</em> there are sometimes entities that can't be fought in the real world, and must also be challenged in the dream world. Unfortunately, this version isn't nearly so well done as those.</p><p>[/SPOILER]</p><p></p><p>Anyway, while your PCs are on the sea, a storm springs up. The weather clears a bit, revealing a small island with a weird shrine on it.</p><p></p><p>Now, if I were to lay out the principles of good dungeon / encounter design, I'd say they follow something about like this:</p><p></p><p>a) Multiple paths in and a strong, associated reason to engage</p><p>b) Allows the PCs to engage and disengage with the content at-will</p><p>c) Interesting rewards for overcoming obstacles with clever decisions</p><p>d) Fun denizens the PCs can choose to engage with, and choose the manner of engagement</p><p>e) Internal logical consistency</p><p>f) Meaningful decisions to make</p><p>g) Stakes</p><p></p><p>The Witch-Shrine cleverly subverts all of these. The dungeon itself is only 10 rooms, and occupies 5 pages, including the map. However, there are fun lessons scattered throughout on "How Not To Design A Dungeon!"</p><p></p><p>For example, if your players go, "This is obviously a trap," and attempt to sail away, the text advises you to have your players roll to see who gets tossed overboard by the storm. If someone is tossed overboard, you have to pull them back in. You have the PCs make this check six times, or until the PCs give up and recognize that they need to stay on the railroad tracks. There is exactly one door in, and once in, you can't leave.</p><p></p><p>So that's (a) and (b) in one nice little bit.</p><p></p><p>The authors put some nice little mundane items (and one magic item) in front of the PCs...all of which require varying DC Charisma checks to pick up. The heroes can only make four attempts before these items vanish. Why does the bad guy have a magic weapon and trinkets sitting out? Beats me. Why only four tries, especially if you have more than four players? Beats me. So this adventure gives the PCs the option to try for some interesting rewards...but then leaves it up to a (DC 20!) Charisma check, with zero character choices or player decisions involved.</p><p></p><p>So that's (c) down.</p><p></p><p>After that, the adventure puts an NPC in front of you who does not engage with the players except to stare at them and set out bowls of squirrel stew. Basically, this is a recipe for frustrated RP'ers who really want to talk to someone, but who get stymied by this individual. (By this point, the PCs should have picked up on the This Is No Ordinary House theme, so it's not even doing a good job underlining that point).</p><p></p><p>Also, remember how in the previous room, the PCs had to really try to interact with certain objects? Not here! Here they can have as much delicious stew as they want. But they can't interact with the only NPC at all, either physically or socially. So this is basically telling the PCs that "You can only interact with it if the devs thought of it," which I think is sort of contrary to the whole point of TTRPGs.</p><p></p><p>So that's (d) and (e) down.</p><p></p><p>The rest of the first floor is mostly in this vein. There is a cool scene where the PCs can watch one of the witches who inhabit this building in real life open a secret door...except the witches can see the PCs (that was who the NPC was in the last room I described), so why would they open a secret door in front of them?</p><p></p><p>After that, they mostly ride the railroad until they meet the BBEG in her original form, a terrifying Yoten! She monologues for a bit, then gets angry / scared about Siddhe (oh, Siddhe's here too, because of course she is!) and marks the PCs (which was the entire point of putting the PCs through this exercise).</p><p></p><p>The PCs can't do anything, can't really affect anything, and have zero meaningful decisions or input. So that's (f) down.</p><p></p><p>Finally, they get trapped by tree trunks and slowly throttled until they wake up in a shallow grave with a level of exhaustion. What happens if they dodge those tree trunks? They wind up in the same spot. In fact, if they die at all during the adventure, they wake up in the same spot.</p><p></p><p>And that's (g) gone.</p><p></p><p>Look, I know I'm complaining a lot. But we're continuing to see some problems that will plague later sections of the adventure into unplayability (at least for me), so I think it's important to highlight where the devs absolutely fail to capitalize on the concept they were given. If the point is to mark the PCs, why not simply have an ironthrall in the next chapter do that? Or steal something of the PCs so the Matron can mark them? In addition, layout continues to be an issue, and the devs seem to be obsessed with these video-game-style gimmicks.</p><p></p><p>Solid 2 / 10. Creepy but not actually scary, with no real choices, fun characters or action? Hard pass.</p><p></p><p>Next time, we set out for Drifthall, and another BioWare Trope Alert!</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Sparky McDibben, post: 9206247, member: 7041430"] Alright, y'all, now we're going to delve into the Witch's Shrine. It is, I think, an almost perfect antithesis of fun dungeon design. The setup here is that the prime antagonist, the Matron (also known as Boða - props to you if you know how to pronounce that, 'cuz I sure as hell didn't), is trying to get a better read on the PCs. She's sent this sort-of-illusion to get the PCs to appear before her, so she can mark them. And hey, it's a... [SPOILER="BioWare Trope Alert!"] Ah, the dream dungeon. Whether that's the Fade from [I]Dragon Age: Origins[/I] or the weird alternate future in [I]Dragon Age: Inquisition,[/I] there are sometimes entities that can't be fought in the real world, and must also be challenged in the dream world. Unfortunately, this version isn't nearly so well done as those. [/SPOILER] Anyway, while your PCs are on the sea, a storm springs up. The weather clears a bit, revealing a small island with a weird shrine on it. Now, if I were to lay out the principles of good dungeon / encounter design, I'd say they follow something about like this: a) Multiple paths in and a strong, associated reason to engage b) Allows the PCs to engage and disengage with the content at-will c) Interesting rewards for overcoming obstacles with clever decisions d) Fun denizens the PCs can choose to engage with, and choose the manner of engagement e) Internal logical consistency f) Meaningful decisions to make g) Stakes The Witch-Shrine cleverly subverts all of these. The dungeon itself is only 10 rooms, and occupies 5 pages, including the map. However, there are fun lessons scattered throughout on "How Not To Design A Dungeon!" For example, if your players go, "This is obviously a trap," and attempt to sail away, the text advises you to have your players roll to see who gets tossed overboard by the storm. If someone is tossed overboard, you have to pull them back in. You have the PCs make this check six times, or until the PCs give up and recognize that they need to stay on the railroad tracks. There is exactly one door in, and once in, you can't leave. So that's (a) and (b) in one nice little bit. The authors put some nice little mundane items (and one magic item) in front of the PCs...all of which require varying DC Charisma checks to pick up. The heroes can only make four attempts before these items vanish. Why does the bad guy have a magic weapon and trinkets sitting out? Beats me. Why only four tries, especially if you have more than four players? Beats me. So this adventure gives the PCs the option to try for some interesting rewards...but then leaves it up to a (DC 20!) Charisma check, with zero character choices or player decisions involved. So that's (c) down. After that, the adventure puts an NPC in front of you who does not engage with the players except to stare at them and set out bowls of squirrel stew. Basically, this is a recipe for frustrated RP'ers who really want to talk to someone, but who get stymied by this individual. (By this point, the PCs should have picked up on the This Is No Ordinary House theme, so it's not even doing a good job underlining that point). Also, remember how in the previous room, the PCs had to really try to interact with certain objects? Not here! Here they can have as much delicious stew as they want. But they can't interact with the only NPC at all, either physically or socially. So this is basically telling the PCs that "You can only interact with it if the devs thought of it," which I think is sort of contrary to the whole point of TTRPGs. So that's (d) and (e) down. The rest of the first floor is mostly in this vein. There is a cool scene where the PCs can watch one of the witches who inhabit this building in real life open a secret door...except the witches can see the PCs (that was who the NPC was in the last room I described), so why would they open a secret door in front of them? After that, they mostly ride the railroad until they meet the BBEG in her original form, a terrifying Yoten! She monologues for a bit, then gets angry / scared about Siddhe (oh, Siddhe's here too, because of course she is!) and marks the PCs (which was the entire point of putting the PCs through this exercise). The PCs can't do anything, can't really affect anything, and have zero meaningful decisions or input. So that's (f) down. Finally, they get trapped by tree trunks and slowly throttled until they wake up in a shallow grave with a level of exhaustion. What happens if they dodge those tree trunks? They wind up in the same spot. In fact, if they die at all during the adventure, they wake up in the same spot. And that's (g) gone. Look, I know I'm complaining a lot. But we're continuing to see some problems that will plague later sections of the adventure into unplayability (at least for me), so I think it's important to highlight where the devs absolutely fail to capitalize on the concept they were given. If the point is to mark the PCs, why not simply have an ironthrall in the next chapter do that? Or steal something of the PCs so the Matron can mark them? In addition, layout continues to be an issue, and the devs seem to be obsessed with these video-game-style gimmicks. Solid 2 / 10. Creepy but not actually scary, with no real choices, fun characters or action? Hard pass. Next time, we set out for Drifthall, and another BioWare Trope Alert! [/QUOTE]
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