Seeking Advice on Modules

[Treebore]

Vault of L.K. is a Necromancer Games module published through White Wolf, not a S&S title.

Not slamming or anything storyteller, just a lot of people don't realize that White Wolf/S&S is just the publisher of Necromancer Games' modules and material, and that they are separate companies with different "goals". That is why you'll find stuff made by Necromancer but published by WW, Troll Lord Games, and now Kenzer. Plus they still, and will always, publish stuff through WW.

As for the difficulty DMing it, well yes, it is more challenging if you have players who don't know how to run, or are not good at figuring out running is a good idea.

However, you as the DM can counter that by arbitrarily lowering AC's, giving minimal HP's, and then of course lowering the xp award accordingly. Definitely beat the crap out of them, though. They need to learn to run some time.

 

[jollyninja]

On Red Hand of Doom: I never run published adventures because I've never liked them. I ran red hand of doom when i got to busy at work to spend time planning adventures. I loved Red hand of doom as the dm. If you guys are saying that the ravenloft adventure is as good as that, I'll be running it next time my players and I can set a day aside to game.

Let me reiterate, this adventure is spectacular. great pacing, tension out the wazoo. compelling npc's. characters feeling both insignifigant and as though their quest puts the lives of thousands in their hands all at the same time.

 

[Voadam]

For non-dungeon stuff pretty much anything from Atlas-Games.

 

[Olaf the Stout]

Vault of L.K. is a Necromancer Games module published through White Wolf, not a S&S title.

Not slamming or anything storyteller, just a lot of people don't realize that White Wolf/S&S is just the publisher of Necromancer Games' modules and material, and that they are separate companies with different "goals". That is why you'll find stuff made by Necromancer but published by WW, Troll Lord Games, and now Kenzer. Plus they still, and will always, publish stuff through WW.

As for the difficulty DMing it, well yes, it is more challenging if you have players who don't know how to run, or are not good at figuring out running is a good idea.

However, you as the DM can counter that by arbitrarily lowering AC's, giving minimal HP's, and then of course lowering the xp award accordingly. Definitely beat the crap out of them, though. They need to learn to run some time.

I think that before I ever run a Necromancer module I will remind my group that running from a fight is sometimes not only the right thing to do, but necessary to ensure that they live to fight another day.

So many adventures that are published nowadays seem to assume that the PC's will never have to run from a fight. They will always be able to win. I don't necessarily agree with this assumption and, after reading some of their modules, I don't think that the guys at Necromancer Games do either!

Olaf the Stout

 

[Treebore]

I think that before I ever run a Necromancer module I will remind my group that running from a fight is sometimes not only the right thing to do, but necessary to ensure that they live to fight another day.

So many adventures that are published nowadays seem to assume that the PC's will never have to run from a fight. They will always be able to win. I don't necessarily agree with this assumption and, after reading some of their modules, I don't think that the guys at Necromancer Games do either!

Olaf the Stout

No they don't. Your best chance of "winning" is to master the fine art of running away. Hit and run is also another good idea. There are plenty of stand and fight encounters, but there are also the ones where you better figure out you should run, and do it soon enough that you can live through running away.

A lot of Goodman DCC's are like that too. In fact that is why I don't like Bloody Jack's Gold as written. One of the last encounters can "trap" you, so you won't have the opportunity to run if the encounter is too much for your group. So I change how Ice Walls are used and positioned so that running away can still be a viable option.

 

[KorkyKwalish]

Find an adventure that involves traveling overland, perhaps with a caravan or on a religious pilgrammage, or a sea-based adventure, or an urban adventure.

 

[Dykstrav]

I love Necromancer Games material. Rappan Athuk is hands-down my favorite non-WotC publication. But it's also 'just' a dungeon crawl. A very interesting, expansive, and challenging dungeon crawl, but it's still a crawl. I happen to dig adventures like this, Necromancer Games does a good job of getting that "first Edition feel" that they shoot for.

Red Hand of Doom is pretty neat. Easily my favorite WotC pulication from 2006. Expedition to Castle Ravenloft is reasonably neat. I don't think I dig it as much as some other fans because they changed alot of the details I liked about the original. Most notably, you fight alot of people that you just got information from in the original.

I'm planning on running Expedition to Castle Ravenloft some time, but I'll be making a few changes. (Spoilers here.) Madam Eva won't be a hag. She's just going to be an old fortuneteller that does the fortunes of Ravenloft. Danovich won't be a corrputed priest with the blaspheme, he'll just be a distraught priest at the end of his nerves. The zombies and the guardians of the wilderness fanes will be the doings of a night hag leading a warlock cult in the mountains. The characters will actually have to perform counter-rituals to disrupt the fanes, not just kill the current guardians. I just don't like the idea of solving all these challenges with a straight-up fight. (End spoilers.)

If you don't like dungeon crawls, I'd suggest you check out the Speaker in Dreams. It's an older adventure, but it still takes alot of the elements of a good dungeon (i.e., keyed encounters) and builds them around a nonlinear plot. Although it doesn't explicity have adventures in it, Heroes of Battle also has alot of good material for designing and running nonlinear adventures that have all the good features of a dungeon (such as traps, plot twists, NPCs and other goodies).