Shades of Gray

[Le Noir Faineant]

Hello together,

Has anyone already got NG's Shades of Gray?

(link:http://www.necromancergames.com/upcoming.html#sog)

With Christmas near, I am toying with the idea of buying this one.

What's your opinion on it?

I should add that I didn't like NG's Bard Gate and Trouble at Durbenford. (No real opinion here, just flipped through them in my FLGS and found them not interesting for me.)

...And that I'll most likely either run the adventure in Judges Guild's Known World (Wilderlands, Blackmoor) or as a Ravenloft campaign.

So please, can anyone tell me

a) What's the module all about? (Spoilers welcomed.)

b) If it is worth buying for me, having the interests I named above?

Thank you in advance,

Rafael

 

[Psion]

Hello together,

Has anyone already got NG's Shades of Gray?

I'm sure somebody does. Me being one of them.

What's your opinion on it?

I like it. It's a pretty classic "Dingus hunt" sort of campaign. That may strike longstanding players as a little cliche, but I will be running it for my daughter in a family campaign, so classic and cliche is just what I need.

I'm editing the details and circumstances to give it more of a draconic theme. See:
http://p105.ezboard.com/fnecromancergamesfrm88.showMessage?topicID=13.topic

I should add that I didn't like NG's Bard Gate and Trouble at Durbenford. (No real opinion here, just flipped through them in my FLGS and found them not interesting for me.)

Never seen Trouble. Just ordered Bard's Gate. It is slotted into the nominal mini-setting provided in SoG.

a) What's the module all about? (Spoilers welcomed.)

[sblock]A magical plague called the Gray Death has been unleashed upon the land. The PCs eventually discover that the plague can be cured by an artifact called the Rainbow Harp. Its strings, however, have been dispersed across the land by a lich-king fearful of its power. The PCs must track down these strings and reassemble the harp.[/sblock]

b) If it is worth buying for me, having the interests I named above?

No idea, neither knowing what bugged you about those two nor owning either of them myself (yet).

 

[Arnwyn]

Has anyone already got NG's Shades of Gray?

Still waiting for my LGS to get it in for me...

 

[Le Noir Faineant]

That sounds lexactly like I was searching for! Thanks!

Never seen Trouble. Just ordered Bard's Gate. It is slotted into the nominal mini-setting provided in SoG.

So, SoG was explicitely written for the *Necrolands*? :\ Well, though that's easy to adapt, I hope they put not too many references into it.

As far as I see it, I might come to use this either for a Ravenloft-Hybrid campaign, or set it in somewhere in the Known World...

Your idea with the dragon soudns very interesting. - Though, of course, I'll have to read the mod before I can see if that will work for me.

THE NG page, obviously in terrible need of updating, lists the book still as upcoming, though my FLGS - in Germany - already has it for sale...


BTW, I hope those eleven adventures won't be each one about getting the dinguses one by one...

 

[Psion]

So, SoG was explicitely written for the *Necrolands*? :\ Well, though that's easy to adapt, I hope they put not too many references into it.

There is a map and it has some common Necromancer Games sites on it. But the author is pretty careful about keeping the adventure sites flexible, and lays out some pretty simple guidelines for the sorts of sites that each adventure would occur in. For example:

Adventure 1, Palmer’s Field can be placed in any small shepherding village near a trade route. Adventure 2, Danger at Darnagal, can take place in any small frontier town. Adventure 3, The Haunted Forest can take place in any primeval forest.

And so on.

BTW, I hope those eleven adventures won't be each one about getting the dinguses one by one...

The earlier adventures are about finding clues to the cause of the Gray Death and its harbingers. The later ones are hunting down pieces of the Harp.

 

[Le Noir Faineant]

Ah, well, then it will be okay.

Not that it would have kept me from buying this one, I think, but since there were no previews from NG, I was a bit sceptical. Thanks again.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I bet someone could make a living by being a full-time Webmaster for multiple RPG companies. Necromancer Games and Eden Studios could share one, for instance, and I bet there are more. Keeping four company sites up to date (and relatively modern in their feature set) would probably be a full-time job and not be prohibitively expensive for an individual company, especially if said Webmaster also included hosting. Say, $5,000/year from each company for hosting and service.

 

[Le Noir Faineant]

Yeah, really, because it begins to suck to read all the old news every month...

Especially NG was a site with a splendid itnernet representation, but I fear not anymore...

 

[DM_Jeff]

What a coincedence, I just opened this from the mail a few minutes ago. First impressions? Big and sweeping. 180 pages? Thank goodness they weren't tempted to make it a hardcover. Instead, $23 bucks for a full 1-13th level campaign isn't bad at all!

Lots of different quest styles to go on. The adventure ends around page 130, and then it includes a load of stuff in the appendixes, NPC stat blocks, new moster pages, 3.5 revisions of "Tome of Horrors I" monsters, new deities & domains, new magic items & spells, a new prestige class, and a half-dozen detailed handouts for the players.

Initial impression is that it's classic classy Necromancer style. Ed Bourelle on maps is always a treat, and the d20 stats were gone over by one of their regulars I've come to trust. The 10 pages or so used to update ToH monsters is fine; sure they could have just done the stats needing updating and saved a few pages, but this means owning that other book isn't necessary, so that was a sound design decision.

I feel this was money very well spent. I can run nearly a year of gaming off this in the future.

-DM Jeff

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

How many Tome of Horrors monsters are statted out? Could I ask which they are?