The Whispering Woodwind

[Mark]

[imager]http://www.creativemountaingames.com/images/new_releases/cmgfav/cmgww_med.jpg[/imager]What do a twenty year old wrecked ship and an exquisite musical instrument have in common? You'll have to catch up to a certain bard to find out but there may be other old secrets that need to be dealt with before all is done! This finely crafted adventure is geared for characters up to fourth level and easily added to any DM's campaign setting. Players will love this adventure, which will have them guessing and keep them on their toes. Packed with vivid NPCs, Questus - The Whispering Woodwind is a chase to right that which has gone terribly wrong...and there are plenty of surprises along the way.

Available as part of the Favorites Bundle at the EN World GameStore.

 

[Shadeus]

Before I begin, I want to mention that I occasionally playtest for CMG games (although not this particular adventure)...if that affects your opinion of this review.

The Whispering Woodwind is the first "for pay" product from Creative Mountain Games. It is a "Questus" (to use their terminology) or adventure intended for low level adventures (2nd-level). It is a .PDF download totally 38 pages. The artwork is grainy, which is typical for a CMG product. The maps are all full color and of excellent quality. The editting is fairly well done, but I did find a few errors in some stat blocks.

The adventure begins with the unfortunate tavern owner watching as his establishment, the Belly, is burning to the ground. He suspects a recently hired bard is to blame for the blaze, who was also seen running away from the tavern in the dark after amassing quite a debt. The tavern owner wishes to hire the party to track down this bard and recover his exquisite flute, which should just about cover his losses from the fire.

Of course, there is more to the story the the PCs will uncover as the adventure unfolds. They will follow the bard's trail from the Belly tavern, just outside of Jalson (set in CMG's world of Revloc) finding the plot twists along the way. The adventure is generic enough to fit into any campaign world. It uses several of CMG's free downloads, but they can be easily adapted.

The adventure has two strengths which really allow it to stand out among other d20 adventures I've seen. First, it is very easy to scale the adventure. At the start of the adventure, a set of guidelines are spelled out how to "adjust the bar" making it easier or more difficult depending on the party. In each encounter, there is a sidebar that indicates how to adjust it for the party, depending on their numbers, levels, and grasp of the rules.

The second real strength of the Whispering Woodwind is the characterization of the NPCs. CMG uses a system they call the "CMG Prose System" which they use to break down the personality of an NPC. It's heavily based on the NPC's alignment and Charisma. The Prose System seperates their personality into five seperate factors: Politics, Religion, Others, Self, and Economics. Each attribute is rated on a scale of 1 to 10 (10 being the most important). The system offers some possible explanation behind different combinations of numbers.

The result of this are very well-developed NPCs that really tell the story. It is a common problem with published adventures that DMs need to develop these personalities before they can play a module. CMG has made that work much easier allowing the NPCs to tell the story and NOT the DM.

The adventure itself is not earth-shattering. The party is not out to save the world. But it is beautiful in its simplicity. The task is mundane enough to fit into any campaign world easily. And the intricacies behind the adventure itself would not cause DMs to adjust much in their own world. It's a very good adventure where the party will meet NPCs they will always remember.

 

[alsih2o]

The one thing that immediately grabs my attention about this product is the sense of "Reality" that surrounds it. With realistic flavor, fleshed out characters and a sense of continuity to the surrounding world my sense of disbelief is never disturbed.

The player is never left wondering about the feasability of the obstacles as the world operates in a straightforward manner that is easily accepted by anyone who enters it.With a well paced story and a highly feasable "hook" most parties will be easily swept up in the plot. An excellent balance of crunch and fluff leaves the D.M. with plenty of backstory while also giving enough info on the encountered people that they may be included in future adventures without having to add to the D.M.'s workload.The sneaky D.M. will find many opportunities to bring a new party closer together, or to draw on a parties differences with the variance of encounters

Creative Mountain Games has given the N.P.C.'s contained within the module a sense of realism through their inclusion of the prose sytem which clearly spells out each characters level of concern with the details of the world and the goals of the P.C.'s. The D.M.'s job is made much easier through the inclusion of such easily read information.

Another benefit of CMG's approach to modules is "adjusting the bar", an encapsulated guide to gearing this adventure towards your party's power lvl, assuming they do not stray too far from the reccomended 2nd lvl.

As a testament to the strength of the writing and story, my biggest complaint would be the maps included with the material. The maps do their job well enough, and all the information they need to communicate is included, but they are garish and bright. This makes them suffer by comparison to the usual subdued and appropriate content of CMG's graophics. Whereas most of the previous material rests on a graphic base reminiscent of Durer illustrations in tone if not complexity these maps scream out from your monitor and would greatly benefit from a little graying down.

While the author does use material to be found outside the module (such as trundlefolk) all of that information is contained free on the company's website(www.creativemountaingames.com) The information presented tends to be self-referential in regards to this free information but retains a looseness that will allow almost any group to fit this adventure into their world.

 

[drnuncheon]

Clay, I'd love to see more details here - especially since I can't go page through this at my FLGS. Things like:

* Assumptions the adventure makes about the gameworld (standard default semi-medieval, presence of a nearby dwarven settlement or goblin raiders, etc) Since you comment on the "reality" aspect this is especially important for DMs to know when deciding whether the adventure can fit into their campaign.

* Assumptions the adventure makes about the characters (that they are good, that they are willing to adventure for money, presence or absence of certain character classes, etc). More details on the "hook" would be appreciated.

* Plot! What is it, does it hang together, does it depend upon the PCs acting in a certain way, etc.

Thanks!

 

[William Ronald]

The Whispering Woodwind: A Review
By William Ronald

A good adventure should have several elements to challenge and entertain players: good role playing opportunities, a chance to overcome obstacles, whether traps or opponents, and an opportunity for players to use their wits as well as their weapons. On all these criteria, The Whispering Woodwind is a success. The adventure is designed for a group of four 2nd level adventurers, but can easily be adapted for more players.

To summarize the adventure: the player characters must investigate the disappearance of a bard from a tavern that was once a ship. The adventure ties up the past of the tavern in an interesting way, and gives the characters several challenges. There is a bit of detective work to be done by the heroes, as well as an unexpected, but fitting adventure. Without giving away any spoilers, let me just say that paying close attention to the adventure's background will help the players. The adventure is fast paced, so the players should also pay attention to time, which becomes crucial towards the end of the adventure.

There are several features that Mark Clover, creator of the adventure and owner of Creative Mountain Games, has included to help DMs. He offers advice on altering the adventure to the knowledge, number, and skills of the players. Of particular help is a system he devised for helping show NPC motivations that can help define how an NPC will react to a given situation. The CMG PROSE system stands for Religion, Others,
Self and Economics. For example, some NPCs are rated as being more concerned with economics than some of the other PCs. Expect such NPCs to be shrewd bargainers. An NPC with a high rating in Religion and Others will tend to be religiously inclined and concerned about the feelings of others.

There were many encounters, some with a greater emphasis on role playing, others focusing on combat or solving a mystery. The encounters were challenging, and the party's opponents will use the best tactics available to them against the PCs. The encounters were a success, and several can easily be used in other adventures during a campaign.

One thing I particularly liked is the chance for the heroes to form ties with three different communities, including a nomadic group, the Trundlefolk. (More information on this nomadic group can be found as a free download at http://www.creativemountaingames.com. They can easily be adapted to a variety of homebrew or commercially published settings.)

So, in summary, The Whispering Woodwind is fun, easily adaptable, and has much to recommend in it.

 

[Crothian]

Review of Whispering Woodwind by Creative Mountain Games

This product I received as a review copy.

Non-Spoiler Section

The Whispering Woodwind is a nice little adventure for 2nd level characters. It is a pdf that is 38 pages long. The adventure is relatively straightforward and interesting. The best part of this adventure is the Non Player Characters. They are very well fleshed out and detailed making them very easy to use. The adventure is well organized and easy to follow. There are a few options that are well laid out and different possibilities are considered. The adventure also uses the inconveniences of darkness and weather. The maps are functional and simple in appearance. There is room for greatly expanding these ideas and to have this adventure serve as a starting point for many other activities. The places are well defined and it would be easy to come back to them and use everything and everybody in here in further adventures.

The two best features of this module are the NPCs and the ways of adjusting the encounters. Both of these are done very well in good detail making them very easy to use. I was impressed with the level of detail in the NPCs. They are all much more then a simple stat block and it will be easy for any DM to make these characters come alive for the party to interact with.

The storyline may be a little simple with a nice twist at the end. It is designed for low level characters; so simple is usually the way to go. The adventure is not a dungeon crawl, nor does it take the adventures underground in any way. They travel from a town to a thorp and have some encounters along the way. The adventure does a good job of not having all of these encounters mandatory. Parties can pick and choose if they wish to investigate them or not.

The module does work best with good aligned characters. It is assumed that they will want to help out people and general do the right thing. It can be used with neutral or evil characters, but the DM will need to make some adjustments with the way the NPCs react.

Spoiler Section

The adventure starts out with a building on fire in a town the players are just arriving at. The owner, Tardak, blames a bard and hires the party to bring him back so he can make restitution. There is a nice section of how Tarduk deals with different types of personalities and how he negotiates this offer. The party then heads off into the night and into a storm to catch up with the Bard. Both the darkness and the weather make this adventure more interesting and difficult. They are used well and are important side players in all of this. The party can talk to an older farmer to purchase horses and dogs if they wish. And on they way down the road they can stop in by the Guard Shack. Both of these encounters are well defined and both are encounters that the players can easily avoid.

Down the street the players come across a wild bear and her cub. The bears are interested in a dead horse lying in the middle of the road. This is presented as an encounter and not a fight even though it could lead to one.

Next, the party may encounter the Trundlefolk. This is a group of nomadic people. They are all very well drawn up and this whole encounter is greatly detailed. However, the only purpose here is to delay the party and I feel that too much effort may have been taken to describe these people for an encounter that may not even happen. These people are very interesting and can easily become a more permanent member of the campaign world, so they do have some purpose for a DM that looks ahead.

Next, the party gets to the thorp and discovers a more sinister plot-taking place. A local lumber camp has been taken over by bandits and the sheriff has been beaten to near death. They may catch up with the bard here or the bard may have gone to the lumber camp ahead of them. It is also possible the party not realize what is going on at the lumber camp and just follow the bard’s tracks down there. At the lumber camp the party hopefully defeats all the bandits and captures the bard.

There are some other interesting details along the way of these adventure but these are the highlights. This adventure is well done and can be used for beginners and veteran gamers alike. It can be used as a stand-alone adventure, or many of the people, places, and ideas can be interweaved into a campaign. The adventure seems like it can be done in a normal gaming session, but it can also take longer if the party interacts with many of the interesting NPCs presented here.

 

[Messageboard Golem]

The Whispering Woodwind
a 3rd-edition D&D adventure for four 2nd-level characters
designed and written by Mark Alexander Clover, Creative Mountain Games

This is not a playtest review. It does contain possible spoilers.

It's hard to be too disappointed with a product that only costs five dollars, but that is how I feel about The Whispering Woodwind: disappointed. This is an ambitious product that doesn't quite accomplish what it sets out to. While the adventure is probably playable as written, it will require significant DM effort to make it flow smoothly.

Published by Creative Mountain Games, Whispering Woodwind is a questus (adventure) for four 2nd-level PCs. It's available as a 38 page download and is supported by two free web enhancements, Locus - Jalston (a player's overview of the town in which the adventure starts) and Lexus - Culture Class - Trundlefolk (a DM's overview of a gypsy-like race).

It's clear that CMG founder Mark Clover has put substantial effort into Whispering Woodwind and its supplements. Unfortunately, part of that effort will be wasted for the simple reason that the PCs will likely spend little time in Jalston (thus mitigating the need for the Locus). Furthermore, the 10 pages of Whispering Woodwind that describe the Trundlefolk encampment are dismissed by the author: "You may wish to eliminate this [encounter] entirely," as the adventure "might be stalled by a heavily descriptive encounter such as this." These are strange recommendations for a passage as lovingly detailed as the Trundlefolk encampment, which includes two maps; geographic information, including individually named hills and knolls; 30 named NPCs with full stat blocks, background information, and motivations; and descriptions of each wagon. The previous sentence should convey the breathless and exhaustive feeling Mr. Clover creates in this section.

The adventure itself seems straightforward at first: Tardak, an innkeeper in Jalston, hires the PCs to track down the bard Contel and his magical flute. Tardak blames Contel for the fire that is burning his inn to the ground as the PCs arrive. Here's a problem. The Whispering Woodwind gives two pages describing the inn-burning scene to the players whose characters are presumably standing around doing nothing while the fire rages. Generally, it's a bad idea to assume inaction on the part of the PCs. It's also not advisable to bore the players with lengthy, non-interactive narrative passages, such as the one in which Tardak berates a man for salvaging a box of rags from the burning inn, then rewards him anyway. Only after some more to-ing and fro-ing by the crowd and speechifying by Tardak are the PCs given an opportunity to act.

In addition to the lengthy setup, DMs must also slog through Mr. Clover's dense prose. In places, Whispering Woodwind reads like a rough draft. Sentences are awkward and full of adjectives and adverbs. Whole paragraphs could use a rewrite. There are few outright mistakes or typos, though.

One area in which Whispering Woodwind shines is its approach to NPCs. This approach is sufficiently novel that it warrants lengthy paraphrasing. CMG uses the PROSE system to break down the attitude of primary NPCs, prioritizing how they view the world in five areas. Each area receives a rating from one to ten indicating how highly the NPC regards that aspect. To his credit, Mr. Clover doesn't merely introduce the PROSE system; he provides solid advice on what a high or low rating in each aspect means. He also instructs on how to use the system to create realistic NPC interaction. This is good stuff that should be helpful to many DMs, especially those new to the task.

My only quibble is that the PROSE system's one to ten scale implies a level of precision that is neither possible nor desirable when dealing with something as amorphous as NPC attitudes. For example, Tardak is rated a 4 on the P-axis while Contel is rated a 5. What does this mean? How differently will the two react when dealing with P-related matters? A simple descriptive scale (high, medium, low) might streamline the PROSE system and make it even more useful.

The Whispering Woodwind also deserves kudos for its method of scaling encounters to provide an appropriate but not overwhelming challenge for varying groups of PCs. The adventure is written at a baseline level ("Playing By the Book"). For new players or smaller groups, encounters can be scaled down to "Allowing Some Leeway" or even "Holding Their Hands." For experienced players or larger groups, encounters scale up to "Bumping a Notch" or "Dialing Way Up." Again, this is good stuff, solidly conceived and pretty well executed. A couple of the early encounters have no "Holding Their Hands" adjustment, but DMs can extrapolate downward from the "Allowing Some Leeway" recommendations that are provided.

Mr. Clover also provides a one page summary of the sites and events in the Whispering Woodwind. This is a welcome addition to any adventure as it lets the DMs know what's supposed to happen. Another welcome addition is the conclusion that explains what the PCs can expect when mopping up the villains and settling up with the authorities and with Tardak. Too many adventures leave DMs hanging, but Whispering Woodwind avoids that mistake.

The pacing of the adventure is also addressed. The PCs are supposed to proceed swiftly along the track of the bard Contel, although there are numerous opportunities for them to be delayed or sidetracked. What's odd about the emphasis on pacing is that while "speed is of vital importance" for the PCs to be successful, the encounters do not contain notes on time. If pacing is truly crucial, DMs need to know when Contel passes through each location in order to determine when and where the PCs catch up to him. Without this information, DMs are left to adjudicate this aspect on their own.

Actually, it's likely the PCs will not overtake Contel. In that case, Contel - the NPC around whom the entire adventure revolves - ends up casually slaughtered by some stock villains. In fact, the first time I read Whispering Woodwind, I missed the passage describing Contel's eventual fate: that's how underwritten and abrupt it is. I am really at a loss to understand why Mr. Clover chose to kill off the story's pivotal NPC at all, let alone why he chose to do it offstage with no possibility for PC intervention. I had hoped for a scene of confrontation between the PCs and Contel, with the former attempting to convince the latter to give himself up and return to face Tardak and pay off his debts. This would've been a great opportunity for role playing and would've highlighted PC social skills like Sense Motive, Diplomacy, or Intimidate.

Instead, it is far to easy for the PCs to dawdle in their task and miss out on any chance to speak to Contel. In that case, the adventure ends with one of the oldest D&D cliches of them all: a cutthroat ambush. This ambush is potentially quite deadly. It takes place during a storm and in the dark, imposing harsh penalties on ranged combat. The PCs are opposed by five 1st-level rogues, four 2nd-level rogues, and their 4th-level leader (who is equipped with magical weapon and armor). While I haven't playtested this encounter, it seems likely that the four 2nd-level PCs for whom the Whispering Woodwind is intended will suffer serious casualties when ambushed and outnumbered more than two-to-one.

Assuming the PCs survive, they will recover Contel's flute. It is actually a cursed item that subtly disrupts part of the owner's free will. Adjudicating the effects of this curse could prove problematic for all but the most experienced DMs and dedicated PC role-players.

As I noted in my introduction, the Whispering Woodwind needs some work before it will flow smoothly. Realistically, any adventure ought to be reworked by the DM rather than used as written. The Whispering Woodwind is no different, and that is the source of my disappointment. Mr. Clover obviously understands how to create a compelling story and back it up with useful DM advice (the PROSE system, notes on scaling, the summary and concluding notes). These strong elements gave me hope that the Whispering Woodwind would not require as much reworking as most adventures. However, the weaker elements (the mishandling of Contel, the potentially deadly climactic ambush, and the problematic magical flute) counteract the strengths, leaving the Whispering Woodwind feeling decidedly average.

At only five dollars, the Whispering Woodwind is still a reasonable buy for DMs willing to put some effort into their adventures. If nothing else, you get several intriguing NPCs plus a slew of Trundlefolk who could be modified for your homebrew campaign. You will also be supporting an author who shows real promise and a love of the game. Whether or not that's worth the money is up to you.

 

[MerricB]

The Whispering Woodwind is a d20 System adventure for four second level characters. It is set in the World of Revloc, Creative Mountain Games own campaign setting, but could easily be adapted for use in your personal campaign world. The player characters are hired to recover a valuable flute from an itinerant bard who has committed some serious crimes, and must track him wherever he has fled. This review is not a playtest review - although I plan to use the module in the future, that time has not come yet!

I like this adventure, although it has numerous flaws. The adventure is relatively short, and can be divided up into the following sections:

An introductory section where the basics of the adventure are explained and the PCs are hired.

The chase section, which details the pursuit of the bard by the PCs along the South Coast road. There are several encounters along the road, some incidental to the plot, and some important. Some of these encounters are placed here only to distract the characters, and to see if they can keep to their main objective: that of capturing the bard and recovering the flute. I found this quite a nice touch.

The final section details the discovery of where the bard has gone to ground, and the resolution of a few other matters that have arisen. Suffice to say that the flute may not be as easy to recover as the characters might expect!

The best thing about this adventure is the attention given to each of the many NPCs encountered along the way. I have rarely seen an adventure give so much attention to providing the referee with adequate role-playing notes. There are times when there is almost too much information given for what are relatively minor encounters. Based on what is given here, a good referee should be easily able to turn many of these NPCs into recurring characters that can interact with the player characters.

The actual adventure is in a low fantasy style. Almost all threats encountered by the characters are mundane in nature - bandits, wild animals and the like. There may be a problem with the difficulty of some encounters, especially those at the climax of the adventure; there just seem to be too many opponents for the PCs to defeat. When added to the possibility of ambush, the referee will probably need to adjust what occurs if the party is not to be defeated. However, as I have not yet refereed this adventure, I may be mistaken on that point. Role-playing is exceptionally important in this adventure, although combat and tracking skills would not go awry.

There are numerous lapses in writing style, grammar and spelling throughout the module that I found quite irritating. Many sections are excessively wordy. "Questions coming from the player characters are staid[sic] by the scribe recording names in the ledger as too early to be posed" is a typical example of such a lapse. This is actually a major problem because it caused me to miss a vital point in the adventure the first couple of times I read through it.

Although the NPCs are excellently described, the actual relation of the plot could occasionally do with some work. I found the suggested motivation for the PCs to take the quest to be quite weak, but there should be no problem in adapting it so it works better for your characters.

Another problem I have with the adventure is the way it is formatted. Quite simply, there are too many stat blocks. Many NPCs whose only purpose in the adventure is to be role-played with are given full combat stat blocks. They don't need them. I would have much preferred to see only brief descriptions of race, gender, class and level, as well as a couple of important skills. As well, some of the NPC descriptions are placed in a manner that detracts from the flow of the text - they are really in their own sidebars, but the formatting does not make this clear. Boxes around this material would have been appreciated.

It is worth mentioning the encounter with the Trundlefolk; a gypsy-like people in the World of Revloc. This encounter has absolutely no bearing on the plot, but is filled with interesting NPCs. Its description takes up about a quarter of the module. Full stat blocks are given for each of the Trundlefolk, despite it being extremely unlikely that the PCs will engage them in combat. In addition, the referee is advised that it might be worthwhile eliminating this encounter entirely! It just seems so out of place. On the other hand, you could easily create many adventures based on the material in this one encounter. This dichotomy illustrates much of what I feel about this adventure: great material, but not always in the right place.

It is wonderful to see an adventure with so much attention given to providing NPCs with proper motivations and good role-playing notes. I recommend it greatly to those with groups who enjoy interacting with NPCs. As a fantasy adventure, I am more cautious about my recommendation. There is good material here, but it may not be to everyone's taste, and some work may need to be done on balancing the adventure. I do look forward to seeing further adventures from Mark Clover and Creative Mountain Games, as there are indications here that they might some day produce something quite special.

The adventure is available as a pdf file from the Creative Mountain Games website: http://www.creativemountaingames.com/

This review was originally posted on rpg.net

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

The Whispering Woodwind by Creative Mountain Games (CMG) is a d20 system adventure designed for 2d level characters. It is set in Creative Mountain Games’ World of Revloc, though it could easily be adapted to any campaign setting by simply changing the names of the locations. The adventure would easily fit into a coastal setting close to a medium-sized or larger town.

The Whispering Woodwind uses both site- and event-based encounters to develop its story. The adventure begins in the town of Jalston, where in reacting to a local emergency the party meets an innkeeper with a problem. Eventually, the adventurers are hired to recover an item from the inn’s former bard, and are led on a merry chase down the coast. On the way, they meet a number of colorful inhabitants, and eventually find a small hamlet with troubles of its own, where the adventure climaxes.

The great strength of this adventure is the depth of the setting and the development of the non-player characters the adventuring party will encounter. CMG has gone to great lengths to create vivid, interesting NPCs that the game master can portray in a realistic manner. Each of the primary NPCs is described using CMG’s PROSE system, which rates each character’s outlook in terms of view on Politics, Religion, Others, Self, and Economics, along with some basic character traits. With a little study of the system, the GM use these NPCs and their surroundings to create a living locale in which to base a campaign with a great deal of realism and internal consistency.

The adventure also makes good use of boxed text both for encounter descriptions and to provide suggestions for the game master. Its handling of skill checks in roleplay is particularly effective, with a number of possible responses for each situation mapped out depending on how players handle each encounter. This assistance is invaluable for a relatively novice GM who is attempting to introduce more roleplay and character interaction into his or her game.

Another strength is the scaling of the adventure. Tough designed for 2d level characters, each encounter provides a sidebar on "Adjusting the Bar", enabling the encounter to be easily scaled for levels 1-4, or to adjust if the party is having too easy or too difficult a time with the encounter.

The Whispering Woodwind is not a hack-and-slash dungeon exploration. While there are several combat encounters, the adventure provides many encounters that can best be handled with shrewd roleplay. The setting for the adventure is relatively low fantasy – most of the encounters are with animals or humainoids in a civilized setting. The overall feel is more gritty and realistic than some of the more high-magic, high-monster adventure offerings.

The adventure includes a brief supplement that outlines a culture called the Trundlefolk, nomadic bands of people reminiscent of gypsies. The supplement provides two complete NPC classes for the Trundlefolk, and this culture could easily be imported into any campaign.

The Whispering Woodwind does have a couple of challenges a prospective GM should be prepared for. Though many of the encounters are event-based, the exact timeline is left to the GM to develop. The GM should be familiar with combat-based rules. Though a great deal of effort is spent providing help for relatively novice GMs to better roleplay NPCs, other encounters still require some basic proficiency. Because of the detail provided, the GM should also be sure to study the links between events carefully, to be better prepared to transition from one to another. At least one significant encounter is not directly relevant to the basic adventure plot, but could be used to develop a number of interesting future adventures.

Lastly, the town of Jalston in which the adventure begins is not described – there is a $1 player download from CMG that gives some good basic background, and a full DM‘s treatment of the town is forthcoming. This might pose a challenge for a GM whose players decide they want to spend some time in town before proceeding on the adventure. Taken together, the town of Jalston and this adventure provide an excellent starting point for a low-level campaign in a believable setting with richly developed NPCs.

I would recommend this adventure to GMs who are looking to introduce their gaming group to a higher quality of roleplay, to GMs looking to improve their own handling of NPCs, or to those looking for a nicely developed setting for starting a low-level campaign. For the $5 price, one can mine this product for a host of good ideas, encounters, and NPCs, even if the full adventure is never played.

Rated 4 stars out of 5 for great characters and roleplay opportunities, though requiring some additional work for DMs to execute event-based portions.

 

[Messageboard Golem]

Every once and while I get surprised. Maybe it's because I don't expect much in life but when it comes adventure modules, there are things that do surprise me. This adventure is definately one of them.

The Whispering Woodwind is a pdf adventure module for 2nd level characters. At 38 pages long, the module is some what straightforward but very easy to understand. At it's core, the players are asked to find and retrieve something, the woodwind and the man that plays it. But what really makes the module shine is are the NPCs as well as the adjustments made for not just party size, but also for how to make it more for rping as well as . There are a good number of options which are laid out and different possibilities are considered, so as each DM has his or her own unique way of making this module work for his/her party. Another good feature details the penalties of both darkness and weather, making this an exceptional wilderness adventure too. The maps are easy to read and understand. I certainly appreciated the cartography work. Overall I think this is a very strong module and one I'd certainly recommend.

Spoilers:

The module begins with the players are just arriving in town to see the only inn burn to the ground. The owner, Tardak, blames a local wandering bard that had passed through. He hires the party to bring him back so the bard pay for what he did. The party then goes off into the night and into a storm to find the Bard. Because of the weather and darkness, the party ends up trying to get a farmer to help them find their way back. One of the more interesting encounters the party may face is the Trundlefolk. These are a group of nomadic people that apparently appear to aid and add to the story. very well drawn up and this whole encounter is greatly detailed. However, the only purpose here is to delay the party. Thus they are probably not really that worth mentioning. However they are very interesting people and can easily become a more permanent member of the campaign world. So there's that if you're a DM looking to build character into your world. Finally after all this, the party gets to the thorp and discovers something very wrong is going on here. Thelocal lumber camp has been raided and overcome by bandits. The local law enforcement, the sheriff has been beaten to near death. The party might be able to catch up with the bard here or the bard may have gone to the lumber camp ahead of them. It is also likely that the party might not realize what is going on at the lumber camp. Thus they might just follow the bard’s tracks and wind up facing the bandits in any case. At the lumber camp the party with some good skills, defeats the bandits and rescues the bard.