[UPDATED] Out of the Abyss Reviews Have Started Rolling In

I just found one of the first reviews of Out of the Abyss. I thought it could be nice to keep all links to reviews in one thread, so here is the first I found:

http://diehardgamefan.com/2015/09/0...he-abyss-dungeons-dragons-fifth-editiondd-5e/

The previews have been okay, but this review is what has me stoked. This kind of adventure is right up my alley. Can't wait for it to show up!

 

[Cadriel]

One of the big negatives with the 256-page tome style of book is that the monsters are always conveniently located in the back of the book. So when you run a combat, you often have to save your previous spot and turn to the back of the hardcover, use the monster, and then flip back to your original spot. Literally the only space-saving thing they do (aside from, in the case of OOtA, repeatedly referring the reader to the DMG rules for poison) is to not have any stat blocks in the middle of the text. It's really a shame that 5e's monster format doesn't allow for a "quick view" so that we could have nice, compact monster listings along with the running text.

At the prices we're paying, if boxed sets could be done for $10 or even $20 more, I'd gladly pay it. For instance, with OOtA, I'd picture four booklets. You have one called "Into Darkness" covering chapters 1-7, and one called "Against the Demon Lords" covering chapters 8-17. Both could be sturdy perfect-bound softcovers. Then you'd have a big poster map of the Underdark hex map on page 19, and a separate booklet with all the other maps in the adventure. Then, one more booklet, this one saddle-stitched, with all of the appendices. You could even have cardstock sheets with all of the NPC stat blocks that get distributed to the players in chapter 8. WotC seemed willing to play with boxed sets in the 4e era, but has since retreated, which is a shame. An adventure this big deserves one.

 

[Dire Bare]

Has anyone purchased both the hardcover and the Fantasy Grounds module for Tyranny of Dragons and/or Elemental Evil? Does the digital format "fix" or improve the organization issues of having to flip and search for relevant information?

I'm fairly certain that SmiteWorks (the guys behind Fantasy Grounds) are planning on releasing their version of Rage of Demons on or near the official release day, and I'm wondering if skipping the physical release and investing in Fantasy Grounds is the way to go.

There are lots of good (business) reasons why WotC is giving us these adventures in a hardcover tome rather than smaller releases and/or boxed sets . . . but there are definite drawbacks to be sure!

 

[graves3141]

I wonder if they're wary to release multiple books because if players don't like the first module, they won't buy the others. If they release it in one book, players have to buy the whole hog or nothing.

That's exactly why it won't happen. I admit I like the initial setup of Out of the Abyss (being prisoners and all) and I like low level adventures over high level ones so I would probably only buy the first half of Out of the Abyss if I could and not the whole thing.

An all or nothing strategy makes them way more money than a piecemeal approach.

 

[Mistwell]

Here's what they should do. Wizards, if you're listening, heed this advice:

These unwieldily campaign hardcover books are the worst format you could choose to put your adventures in.

They are selling really well, getting lots of free press, and seem to be working better for WOTC than prior formats.

It's also too much information to drop at once for anyone seeking to run the adventure.

And yet tons of people are running these adventures...so obviously it's not too much information for people seeking to run them.

They are cumbersome to read as 256 page books. For DMs who like to feel really prepared before running an adventure, slogging through these huge tomes and hoping all bases are covered before starting seems like a really impractical way to present the material.

But people seem to be doing just fine running them.

Also, when you're actually running it, flipping back and forth between the huge number of maps and plot details is a pain.

This does seem to be a common issue. People seem to be dealing with it OK, but there does seem to be some room to improve this aspect of formatting.

Six months between releases seems to be universally disliked by the 5e player base.

Look, every time this topic comes up MANY MANY people say they like the release rate so far. I find it really difficult to believe you've been active in those threads and never seen those replies such that you would make such a patently false claim like "universally disliked". So is it hyperbole, or did you really miss all those people saying they like it? Here you go - I like it. It takes about that long to run these things at one game a week. I have heard of very few people claiming the run out of adventure to run before the next release - that doesn't seem to be a common complaint. I have seen a lot of people say they want more splat (which they are addressing - with more splat in Sword Coast), but it's not a particularly common complaint that people run through these huge adventures so fast they run out long before the next one comes out. In fact, looking at page count, it's about the same rate of releases for long form adventures that Paizo often runs. So, where are you even getting this complaint from, much less that it is universal?

It's too short of time to run a 1-15 campaign and too long a time to wait if a particular campaign book doesn't interest you.

OK so that is a different argument and definitely no universal. The pacing is such that a one game/week campaign gets through it in just about the right amount of time. It's not too short to run 1-15 in that time frame. As for not liking it - that's fair, but not universal as these things are selling well and being played a lot.

As a game store owner, I can tell you that it also feels like a glacial release schedule that makes for little to discuss and talk about with customers. "What's new for D&D?" "Well, there's this campaign book that you saw last time you were in five months ago."

So far they've released at a rate of roughly one book every two months - not every 5. As a store owner, you know this - you got the starter set then core books then three adventure books in your store over that year of time. Why did you represent it as one book every 5 months?

You should release these adventures in three parts, presented in the old-school, softcover, folio format.

The bigger books have proven, over time, to sell better than the many smaller books. It also allows them to consolidate all press coverage over one product. and match it with announcements in other brand-related releases, rather than spread over several, which diminished the total coverage the were getting.

 

[graves3141]

One of the big negatives with the 256-page tome style of book is that the monsters are always conveniently located in the back of the book. So when you run a combat, you often have to save your previous spot and turn to the back of the hardcover, use the monster, and then flip back to your original spot. Literally the only space-saving thing they do (aside from, in the case of OOtA, repeatedly referring the reader to the DMG rules for poison) is to not have any stat blocks in the middle of the text. It's really a shame that 5e's monster format doesn't allow for a "quick view" so that we could have nice, compact monster listings along with the running text.

At the prices we're paying, if boxed sets could be done for $10 or even $20 more, I'd gladly pay it. For instance, with OOtA, I'd picture four booklets. You have one called "Into Darkness" covering chapters 1-7, and one called "Against the Demon Lords" covering chapters 8-17. Both could be sturdy perfect-bound softcovers. Then you'd have a big poster map of the Underdark hex map on page 19, and a separate booklet with all the other maps in the adventure. Then, one more booklet, this one saddle-stitched, with all of the appendices. You could even have cardstock sheets with all of the NPC stat blocks that get distributed to the players in chapter 8. WotC seemed willing to play with boxed sets in the 4e era, but has since retreated, which is a shame. An adventure this big deserves one.

A boxed set might be nice, but at $70, I think it would be out of a lot of people's price ranges. Even now, at $50 and with an Amazon discount, I have to think twice about buying an AP. I don't understand why they can't make the big APs and also make a few shorter adventures too (maybe in the 32-64 page range) at the same time. If they were serious about getting people to play D&D and the whole branding thing, they would be providing people with some variety and some choices. Right now, you either love the hardcover APs or you don't. That's a pretty inflexible strategy.

 

[CapnZapp]

Here's what they should do. Wizards, if you're listening, heed this advice

I believe they are doing the opposite of what you said simply because of one thing:

Release only one book at a time and EVERYBODY buys it.

The time for a FLGS shelf with multiple new releases where you can simply pick the one you fancy and ignore the rest has passed.

Hasbro has probably told WotC to step up their game and sell each book in the hundreds of thousands, or else.

But back to the reviews, please...

 

[Nebulous]

It's challenging to run the APs as written because of the poor organization of information. All of them are overwritten and actually running an area usually means flipping back and forth between 3 or 4 places in the module to get all the information you'd want to use as a DM. WotC is bad at presenting information concisely (which is ironic when you consider that the Magic: the Gathering cards are marvels of info design).

Red Larch in Princes of the Apocalypse was extremely difficult to run, because NPCs with unpronounceable names are cross-referenced over and over, and you have to go hunting through the whole town to find them. (It breaks down badly when PCs go to the tavern, which is supposed to be haunted by various NPCs but only one is specified.) The drow outpost that Out of the Abyss starts in is marginally better at this but still has a lot of cross-referencing to do. Better information design would've presented this in a more concise manner and made it easier to pick out salient ideas quickly.

I can't say anything about Abyss because I don't have it, but yes, Red Larch was filled with TOO much information, and yes, nearly every PC had a first name and surname that was hard to pronounce. I boiled them all down to shorter names and usually scrapped the last name, or changed some letters around so they didn't sound so...weird.

Prepping for Princes I admit IS a bit of a challenge, you do have to flip around a lot. And yeah, having to flip to the back to pull up statblocks is annoying. It's a great adventure overall though, but it's a bit disconcerting to hear that Abyss has some of the same organizational problems.

And to chime in on what some others had said, I would liked to have seen this as a boxed set too broken into booklets. Probably not as economical for WotC, but from a user standpoint it would be cool. You wouldn't even need to open the 8th-15th level module for months! And yes, a great big huge glossy poster map of the Underdark for visual reference would have been amazing. I guess that's gone since more of the 2e era....

 

[pukunui]

What makes people keep saying the APs are unorganized? Is it just a matter of the campaign world/setting info and the story elements not being separated well?

The main thing is all the page flipping. Also the vast amounts of setting and NPC info that the DM needs to remember - or spend time taking shorthand notes on. These massive adventures are not as user-friendly as they could be. Even the core rulebooks aren't as user-friendly as they could be.

 

[Fralex]

Well, so far so good. One "this is really great" review and one "I hate the way this and every other 5e adventure path has been organised, but other than that this is really great" review. I'm ordering this now.

But man, I have to aggree with the others that some less big, less expensive adventures would be really awesome. I wanted to buy PotA, but $50 was just too much of an investment when I can't easily find people with the desire and time to play a huge campaign. I mean, that's the cost of a core rulebook right there, and at least with those I'm guaranteed to use one every time I play.

Didn't they do a survey a while back and learn that a lot of people would like to do a long campaign but usually only have the time for short ones? Hopefully they'll make use of that data.

 

[Mad Zagyg]

They are selling really well, getting lots of free press, and seem to be working better for WOTC than prior formats.

Yes, that's right. I don't think that has anything to do with the format whatsoever. That's because they've been marketing it well. Room for improvement remains.

And yet tons of people are running these adventures...so obviously it's not too much information for people seeking to run them.

Yup, tons of people are running them. What's impossible to know is how many people would rather the contents be presented in a more palatable format.

But people seem to be doing just fine running them.

My topic is how they could improve the format, not whether or not people are doing just fine running them. I'm doing just fine running Princes of the Apocalypse, but I am distinctly aware of how the presentation is not optimal.

This does seem to be a common issue. People seem to be dealing with it OK, but there does seem to be some room to improve this aspect of formatting.

That's what I'm saying.

Look, every time this topic comes up MANY MANY people say they like the release rate so far. I find it really difficult to believe you've been active in those threads and never seen those replies such that you would make such a patently false claim like "universally disliked". So is it hyperbole, or did you really miss all those people saying they like it?

Hyperbole.

It's not a particularly common complaint that people run through these huge adventures so fast they run out long before the next one comes out. In fact, looking at page count, it's about the same rate of releases for long form adventures that Paizo often runs. So, where are you even getting this complaint from, much less that it is universal? ... The pacing is such that a one game/week campaign gets through it in just about the right amount of time. It's not too short to run 1-15 in that time frame. As for not liking it - that's fair, but not universal as these things are selling well and being played a lot.

That's not what I was saying, but can see where it wasn't clear. I'm not saying that people are finding that they are running through the adventures too fast. In this case I poorly segued into the experiences of my D&D Encounters groups that are running into the problem of not being able to finish the last adventure before the new adventure season begins. I recognize this is only a D&D Encounters issue and did not make that clear. Apologies. We keep having situations where groups are split in their choice of what to do when a new season starts. Some don't want to stop the previous season with the campaign left unfinished, while others become interested in starting anew with the latest adventure. Most groups don't even come close to the halfway mark. As you say, it's a different argument and probably belongs elsewhere since it has no bearing on home games.

So far they've released at a rate of roughly one book every two months - not every 5. As a store owner, you know this - you got the starter set then core books then three adventure books in your store over that year of time. Why did you represent it as one book every 5 months?

The initial release schedule was very satisfying. Starter Box interspersed with three core books and a two-book adventure story. It has, however, been five months since the last release for D&D (Princes of the Apocalypse). The book prior to that was Rise of Tiamat, which was released in November (around 6 months). So, it appears as though they have decided that after the initial release, one book every five or six months is a good model. I disagree.

Splitting the big adventure books into a trilogy of softcovers as I described would improve the release schedule and would allow the adventures to be organized into a more palatable format.

The bigger books have proven, over time, to sell better than the many smaller books.

Do you have some data on this? I'd like to see where this has been true for WotC products. I don't mean that in a "prove it" kind of way; I'm just really curious if it's true, and if so, consider the real reason why that might be. Red Hand of Doom sold very well, as I remember. Better than many hardcover books from that era. Late 3.5 and 4e probably don't make for the best barometer for reliable data because of the climate then (restlessness/boredom/dislike). I think the folio adventure format would work very well with 5e's slower release schedule and real focus on adventures. At minimum, I'd like to see them do a box set instead of a hardcover. Lost Mine of Phandelver was delicious, and I'd like to see a LOT more of it.