Beneath Haunted Halls is at best a mediocre D&D module, usable for purposes of introducing new players to 4e. It is an execrable module for purposes of introducing new players to Living Forgotten Realms.
I consider the most glaring problem with this module to be that, beyond the introduction, this module could be placed anywhere, in any setting, in any campaign. This was a generic adventure, with only the most minor of ties to any existing Forgotten Realms locations, people, deities, organizations or events. Changing this to an adventure set in Greyhawk, the core generic setting or the home setting of your choice would be a matter of a few minor cosmetic changes.
Beyond the generic nature of this module, the next strike against it is that it is a simple dungeon crawl, with little opportunity for roleplay, interaction or much of anything beyond combat.
Were this module to be blurbed in Dungeon Magazine as "Generic dungeon crawl suitable for casual hack 'n slash use in any setting", that description would pass without complaint.
My impression was that this module is to be used to introduce new players to LFR and tell them what the campaign is about. If this is truly representative of what LFR is all about, I can't say I'm that interested.
Beyond the module's failure as an introduction to LFR, the module fails in several important places as an adventure.
While linear railroading is part and parcel of being a mindless dungeon crawl, the module author appeared to lack the desire to make it even subtle. The most egregious example of this was the key magic ritual that has 6 rounds to go whenever the PCs show up, regardless of time spent resting or on the optional encounters, and must be completed in order for the PCs to be able to get to Part 3. Considering that it's quite possible (albeit difficult) for a competent party to manage to stop the ritual, it was irritating for the module to make no allowance for this.
These omissions pale, however, before the ending of the module, which appears to have been completed with the same careful consideration and attention to detail as a 5 a.m. term paper.
The very nature of the means of exiting the module is poorly conceived, as, in the best case scenario, it takes one or more PCs completely out of the module for some period of time. Considering that the 4e design paradigm explicitly recognizes how bad of an idea it is to have "save or be out of the combat" effects, intentionally using this type of effect is, at the least, quite bizarre. I'm a bit perplexed as to who thought, "You know, a great way to end the final combat is to have one or more players have to sit there and quietly watch for up to an hour, waiting until they can get to the conclusion and fill out their logsheet. That'll really make them want to come back and play another LFR module."
As a somewhat minor issue, the implication of having no rules on how to willingly enter a portal (other than wait and ready an action to run to the right row) is that it's all about the players figuring out the trick. Once the players realize what the module author wants them to do, the PCs basically automatically succeed, unless you judge empower some extra requirements in. I find that a bit less than a satisfying end.
The worst problem, however, is that, if the players don't figure out what the module author wants them to do (and you're not kind enough to prod them along), the module does not so much end as just stop.
So far as I can tell, if the players simply go up the stairs, it's all up to judge empowerment what happens, since the module lacks any opinion on the subject. If you'd like, the players are lost in the Shadowfell and are effectively out of play until someone does a sequel; indeed, that is the implication made by one of the questions you're supposed to answer on the tracking form. Alternatively, I suppose you can just handwave it so that the PCs somehow mysteriously find themselves back on Faerun after wandering around. Since the former is unlikely to entice new players to return to the campaign and the latter makes the entire random portal method pointless, I find neither answer particularly satisfying.
I do, however, find it mind-boggling that the module author chose not to give any explicit ending for this result. "Some or all of the PCs are lost in the Shadowfell, adventuring there until they can make their way home" might be a great continuation for a generic dungeon crawl module in a magazine intended for use in a home campaign, but is rather poor idea for a living campaign module.
As both a module and as an introduction to the campaign, I found this adventure a failure. With the right group, you can certainly have an enjoyable day playing this, but it's very much a "bring your own fun" module, where you enjoy yourself in spite of the module author's efforts, rather than because of them.
The lack of story in an LFR introduction was particularly glaring in light of this being a "Weekend in the Realms". With a name such as this, the portals that kept popping up in the story could very easily have had the characters travel throughout the FR setting, learning about the (in theory) gloriously fascinating and thoroughly unique stories and adventures that can be had in the FR setting.
I'm not saying that there had to be a lot of -plot- ... this is just the start of the LFR campaign, after all, but my gods people, give new players some sense of what the Realms ARE! No, I learned about a completely boring and uninteresting dungeon in the middle of nowhere, which as the OP pointed out, could have been dropped in wholesale just about anywhere and anywhen. And before folks say, "but you got to hear about Cormyr and Myth Drannor and the tensions these newcomers from the Feywild are causing" you need to give me some reason to care. What is Cormyr, why is it more interesting than say any land in Eberron, and why is Myth Drannor so much more fun than Celene? And by the way, this was such an uninteresting tidbit that I almost wish we -had- busted up an arranged Fey wedding. That at least would have been fun.
Personally, after playing two LFR mods and this game, I don't actually know much about FR. And the campaign staff and writers need to be paying attention to this, because if the games continue to be uninteresting, why should we play? Because I like rolling dice? *Bzzzzt* Wrong, thank -you- for playing, please come again.
When I judged I threw in a little RP at the beginning by doing the background as a social interaction between the guards, commanders and PCs. But there was little else I could do, other than to try to make it a fun dungeon crawl.
I also agree with the assessment of the ending. When I did the slot 0, my character was doing his defender duty and jumped across the pit first. I was hit by the portal home before I had another turn and could do nothing but watch as the rest of my table was almost TPK'ed. It was frustrating to be reduced to cheering from the sidelines.
For the most part I still thought it was a fairly fun (if linear) dungeon crawl. Given lead times, it's probably inevitable that some of these early mods are lacking in "flavor". I just hope the mod authors are listening and try to give us more of a feeling of this being Living Forgotten Realms and not just Living Generic World.
Allen.
When I ran it (and I did so twice), the players kept the elves alive and questioned them afterwards or tried to stop the fight through negotiations - RP scene. They also kept Thraven alive, which again generated another potential for roleplaying. Finally, they tried to talk with the princess at the end of part 2, which was also a good place for a roleplay scene (although this does take DM adjusting since the adventure assumes she just handwaves the monsters in as soon as the PCs appear).
I can only appologize to my players that I had to cut those scenes short due to time constraints, but those had mostly nothing to do with the adventure and all with the organizers of the event misjudging the time required to run the adventure (and I was one of those organizers).
Pieter Sleijpen
RPGA LFR Global Administrator
As a somewhat minor issue, the implication of having no rules on how to willingly enter a portal (other than wait and ready an action to run to the right row) is that it's all about the players figuring out the trick. Once the players realize what the module author wants them to do, the PCs basically automatically succeed, unless you judge empower some extra requirements in.
I would disagree with this. The portal is still random, and in our case the correct portal never showed up after round one. Had the GM not given up after more than a dozen random portal rolls he could have easily TPKed our group of fairly experienced players.
This was a huge test of the DM empowerment clause. Running the mod strictly as written likely led to disappointment, because different tables will react differently and will have very different capabilities. If the DM tailors the mod to the players (which I think takes very little work), the adventure is a blast.
There was plenty of RP at the tables I judged and played. Thraven and Eldara have the makings of a solid RP-bit. Eldara undergoes a significant change from her haughty self-serving decision to please her needs (return to the Feywild) vs her obligations (serve her family and people by playing a key role to cement peace). When she fails, she becomes undone. The players can then play a huge role in who she becomes. Does she see them as victors, and herself as a prisoner? Does she learn from them and embrace her duty?
The monsters can provide plenty of RP. Our DM had each summoned creature appear in the middle of what they were doing. A dark creeper appears through a portal, outstretched hand, speaking about the deal being concluded, then looks around and curses as they realize they won't get their money. The rest of their life was spent cursing how we had foiled their deal. The shadowfell creatures spoke of our world as the hunting grounds and laughed at our predicament. When we walk into the dark creeper room, several hands of cards drop onto a table, their owners nowhere to be seen. Once combat starts we get to learn who had the winning hand and just how mad they are. We had a blast RPing while blasting them away.
What we need is the editing to make these possibilities clear to new DMs. Special events, from LFR preview mods to Gen Con specials, have often been anything but special. Dungeon crawls with little flavor have been the norm. Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun or Caversn of Tsocjanth... was there really a difference? This mod had a lot of great ideas and some good concepts (Cormyr's delicate balance with Myth Drannor, the differences between elves and eladrin, the shadowfell's corruption of the Haunted Halls (probably due to the Spellplague)). What it needed was the editing to prevent a literal running of the event that would simply create TPKs and miss out on the many epic opportunities therein.
Teos
When I first heard about this event at GenCon, it seemed like it would be for introdcucing new players to the game and campaign. I think it's difficulty was set a bit high for that.
I would disagree with this. The portal is still random, and in our case the correct portal never showed up after round one. Had the GM not given up after more than a dozen random portal rolls he could have easily TPKed our group of fairly experienced players.
Same here, when I was DMing. After about a dozen rounds of combat, I found myself examining my d4 to make sure it still had a 1 on it.
That would have tempered that encounter some. But then of course the players may never have run towards the stairs and found the other story award.
We had players that were willing to to the Shadowfell up the stairs. Take an extended rest and go back at it.
I think the comments by Teos, that the adventure suffered from a lack of editing and was a "test of DM Empowerment," are so true. What I don't know is how to convince many of the DMs who seem to be stuck on "I must do exactly what the adventure says, even if my players are not having fun and the challenge is not appropriate for them, or it just plain does not make sense," that they have the power to do something different.
I also wish that a little background had been included that referenced back to Ed Greenwood's adventure, Haunted Halls of Eveningstar (1992) and maybe info for a History check that the Knights of Myth Drannor and the Company of the Unicorn (among others) adventured here.
Keith
I think the comments by Teos, that the adventure suffered from a lack of editing and was a "test of DM Empowerment," are so true. What I don't know is how to convince many of the DMs who seem to be stuck on "I must do exactly what the adventure says, even if my players are not having fun and the challenge is not appropriate for them, or it just plain does not make sense," that they have the power to do something different.
What you seem to be missing is that a lot of serious problems aren't a matter of blindly following the adventure, but rather of misinterpreting it because it's poorly written. The adventure is full of contradictions, ambiguities, and outright omissions, all of which make it more difficult for the DM to figure out what he is supposed to do.
DM Empowerment really isn't suited to deal with these kinds of issues. The DM wants to run a fun game, but if he doesn't know what the author intended, what the playtesters decided was a suitable challenge for a party of 4-6 characters of levels 1-4, then he might give them something far above or below their level. The result of such encounters is usually the exact opposite of fun.
I don't think it's fair to the DM to always expect him to pick up the slack from the adventure writers. People seem to be saying, "Well, yeah, the adventure is poorly-written, but you're empowered to change it, so that doesn't matter."
If we're going that route, why even bother with the adventure? Just send the DMs a sheet of paper that says, "You're empowered to do something fun. Good luck!"
I really hope the quality of the writing and editing of Beneath Haunted Halls isn't indicative of the quality we should expect from future LFR adventures.
What you seem to be missing is that a lot of serious problems aren't a matter of blindly following the adventure, but rather of misinterpreting it because it's poorly written. The adventure is full of contradictions, ambiguities, and outright omissions, all of which make it more difficult for the DM to figure out what he is supposed to do.
You make a good point. We should still hold WotC and the RPGA to high standards. But comments like "worst mod ever" are way off base. The mod has great creativity and really is a good mod. It needs editing. And no doubt about it, the DM's job is harder for that.
However, I do think we as DMs bear that responsibility. A few months ago, I was really resistant to DM empowerment. I'm still a fan of each table offering the same level of fun and I'm still worried that bad DMs will overreach and cause horrible experiences. However, LFR is the way it is. As DMs, given that our top priority is fun, we should correct the problems.
When we see a confusing encounter, we should make changes such that it is not confusing to the players.
Now, the problem with the bad editing is that it absolutely hammers new DMs that lack the experience to make changes. But, even a new DM can fudge an attack roll, change which portal shows up, or lower a monster's AC on the fly. The more experienced, the better this should play out.
I play with guys that are pretty 'genius' DMs. The changes they make are awesome. WotC/RPGA absolutely has to improve editing so that new DMs are given options and so the rough edges/trainwrecks/confusions are removed. More playtesting is needed. In the meantime, we as DMs should hone our skills.
In LG, you could judge without ever knowing how to create an encounter. In LFR, under the new mantra, I would argue that really isn't the case. To be a good judge you want to understand what it means to add a monster, drop a monster, turn an elite into eight minions, remove one of two traps, let a monster use a magic item, and so forth. I had WiR in my hands much earlier than I had the typical LG mod premiering at a con, so I had plenty of time to make changes. I probably spent an hour of work and made for a much better table.
I'm nowhere near where I want to be. I'm still trying to retrain myself to really see how DM empowerment can make for really good changes that still hold true to the plot and concept while tailoring to the players and creating balanced play. Just like authors and editors are still new at this, I suspect the DM pool will rapidly come up to speed.
Teos
Yes the randomness of the portals in the final encounter should have been handled differently. I think that the portals should have started to deposit the monsters when the PC's opened the door. Do Portal 2 then 3 then 4 etc.
Yes, more guidelines clues would have been helpful. Random positioning (d8) for the portals on each wall would still add the randomness intended.
I believe the encounter would have been better as:
On initiative count 20: Read boxed text describing Elemental Chaos portal flying across the room from East Wall. Princess Eldara oohs and ahhs at the presence of portals. (Mechanics for attacking/dropping monsters stays the same.
On initiative count 15: Different boxed text describing Feywild portal from North Wall. The princess indicates that she could use it to go to the Feywild. (Group gets a full round to convince her otherwise before the next Feywild portal returns.)
On initiative count 10: Send through the Shadowfell portal from South Wall. More descriptive text.
On count 5: The portal home has some descriptive text hinting at its destination - or Eldara can tell them. Until players realize that the critters will keep re-spawning, they likely won't be in a rush to jump the gate.
I think this would have made for a much better & more interesting encounter, and given DMs enough structure to (1) Give hints to the players as to where each portal leads and (2) Give the players one shot home each round.
Just my two coppers.
Admittedly, the DM may have to alter the DC to find this way out if there's a problem, but that's a really minor thing to alter. It also fits with the guideline at the beginning of every LFR mod about giving the players the data they need...at least a hint that something's there they should investigate should be enough for most players.
What I don't know is how to convince many of the DMs who seem to be stuck on "I must do exactly what the adventure says, even if my players are not having fun and the challenge is not appropriate for them, or it just plain does not make sense," that they have the power to do something different.
Significant judge empowered changes to a module should be the exception, not the norm. I should be able to run a module as written, without changes, and have the plot of the module make sense and be reasonably enjoyable for an average standard LFR table.
Judge empowerment should be the answer to "My table didn't have fun because of bad luck, a bad party mix or some unusual situation the module author couldn't have anticipated."
Judge empowerment should never be the answer to "My table didn't have fun because the module didn't make much sense and was a generic dungeon crawl without any depth."
Judge empowerment is a tool to deal with the unexpected or make a good module great, not a necessity to make a bad module mediocre.
I also wish that a little background had been included that referenced back to Ed Greenwood's adventure, Haunted Halls of Eveningstar (1992) and maybe info for a History check that the Knights of Myth Drannor and the Company of the Unicorn (among others) adventured here.
I would have had a much different response to the module had that been the case. As far as I knew, this was just a generic one-shot dungeon created by the author which had no history beyond that mentioned in the module and would never be heard from again.
If the campaign's expectation is that judges will all be well-versed in Realms history, so they need only give us a generic combat-focused shell of a adventure for us to add in all of the backstory, history and depth needed, we might as well just write our own adventures and play in a home campaign.
Significant judge empowered changes to a module should be the exception, not the norm. I should be able to run a module as written, without changes, and have the plot of the module make sense and be reasonably enjoyable for an average standard LFR table.
*Hugs bgibbons*
Significant judge empowered changes to a module should be the exception, not the norm. I should be able to run a module as written, without changes, and have the plot of the module make sense and be reasonably enjoyable for an average standard LFR table.
Judge empowerment should be the answer to "My table didn't have fun because of bad luck, a bad party mix or some unusual situation the module author couldn't have anticipated."
Judge empowerment should never be the answer to "My table didn't have fun because the module didn't make much sense and was a generic dungeon crawl without any depth."
Judge empowerment is a tool to deal with the unexpected or make a good module great, not a necessity to make a bad module mediocre.
+1
Well spoken!
Did everybody miss the bit about if you take the stairs, there's a linked portal bit you can discover? I keep seeing people talking about players "wandering the Shadowfell".
If you read the Story Award related to that discovery, you'll find that the Linked Portal is not, itself, a way back from the Shadowfell. Instead, it's a destination that characters elsewhere in the Shadowfell can link to, in order to reach the Halls - after which they can get home the same way the party does in this module, by braving the monsters of the portal room and leaping into the appropriate portal.
I am confident that most if not all of the LFR Writing Directors and Globals, feel that Beneath Haunted Halls would have benefited by a round of editing by someone of the LFR campaign staff. (maybe anyone?) It certainly would not pass Claire's and my standards for an LFR adventure.
My preference for DM Empowerment is that "normally" a DM should only have to worry about concerns, such as inexperienced players, unbalanced (roles and levels) teams of PCs, really bad luck with dice, and such. But when a DM recognizes there is a problem with the adventure, yet still says to run it "correctly," he must follow the letter of the adventure as written (or as understood), then I wince.
Sharing DM tips on running adventures such as this on a spoiler thread sounds like a good practice. Perhaps one board/thread for a given adventure.
After our first slot 0 at the beginning of October, I sent my first email of concern & questions on October 5th, and Claire and I had started the process of trying to figure out (1) what did the author intend, and (2) how did we need to adjust the adventure to make sure there was no randomly caused TPK and the adventure could be completed within the designated play time. I shared our insights with the DMs who were working our WitR event, and another Senior DM (a friend) for another site.
Realistically the campaign authors and editors are still learning about 4E and exploring how to best present adventures. There are going to be a few bumps along the way and as there are more than one person involved, there are more than one opinion as to what to do for best success.
Keith