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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Neuroglyph" data-source="post: 5360803" data-attributes="member: 85633">I appreciate your clarification regarding the bar fight and skill challenge, however, it should be noted that there is no skill challenge that fails after a single bad skill check.  All skill challenges are now designed upon 3 failures, and there is no skill challenge complexity calling for 3 successes before 1 failure.  Regardless of that, a Level 1 Complexity 2 Skill Challenge is not worth 750 XP, but only 200 XP, which is equivalent to defeating two 1st Level monsters.  As to the believability of whether a barroom brawl would break out from a single failed Diplomacy check is up to individual DMs to decide.     I agree that there is sufficient experience points to level up to 4th level by the time the Characters reach the tomb encounter under the manor (even after correcting the skill challenge XP), but that assumes the heroes search the entire manor and encounter every possible combat there.  And by story XP, I assume you mean Quest Rewards, which are not designated in the module, but which DMs could award based upon the story.  However, the encounter, involving the elite brute that self-heals upon death back up to two-thirds its starting health, along with the artillery leader that resurrects fallen enemies, is still a poor encounter design, and would likely cause a TPK even for 4th level adventurers.  And whether the party is 3rd or 4th Level, the encounter would take an excessive amount of time to run, given the amount of hit points they would have to do to drop all the monsters.       Regardless of your disclaimer regarding the treasure distribution in your adventures, and the fact the party will level up to 5th by the end of the module, handing out almost 8000 gold is still completely “out of whack” for Heroic Tier characters at this level.  Even if a DM were to hand out monetary treasure for all of Level 3, Level 4, and Level 5, that only totals 5035 gold, which is why, as I stated in my review, the treasure listed does not conform to any 4E treasure parcel practices.  And while adhering to the treasure theme of the original module might be nostalgic, it places a burden on the Dungeon Master to completely revamp every bit of treasure distributed during the adventure, which is quite a bit of work for a published and ready-to-play adventure.   Even if your playtesters managed to complete each encounter in a “3-4 hour time slot”, most 4E gamers are used to completing multiple encounters and during each game session, and some role-playing to boot.  Long, drawn-out encounters are something that the 4E gaming community is not looking for, based upon what I have read on numerous forums and blogsites.  There are any number of bloggers such as Phil the Chatty DM over at Critical-Hits.com and Mike Shea at Sly Flourish, that have written dozens of blogs about how to design encounters that are both challenging and playable in a short time frame, without becoming a bogged-down “at-will” slugfest.  While there are a few of the encounters in The Manor of Deceit can be played back-to-back in a gaming session, many of them, particularly the ones I noted in my review, would take a very long time to complete, and that is an important consideration when evaluating a modules encounter designs.   As far as other reviews you have received for this product, I cannot speak to the reasons why the other bloggers failed to note and report the issues that I found during my own review.  As a reviewer, I have a responsibility to the 4E gaming community to provide a balanced and in-depth analysis of the products I evaluate.  And not only does this review process benefit the purchaser, who can then make an informed decision about the product they are buying, but it also helps the publisher, by giving them honest feedback about problems, errors, and issues found in their works.  Personally, I would be chagrined to learn that readers were dissatisfied with a GSL product I reviewed favorably, and so I have always tried to be conscientious and thorough when reviewing products.  And I hope that my review process helps to make the products offered third party GSL publishers better and more marketable as D&D 4E continues to grow and evolve as a game system.</blockquote>

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