Halls of Undermountain Review

Halls of Undermountain is a hardcover supplement that presents just under a hundred pages of pre-made dungeon, and oddly still sets you back just under thirty bucks.

For those not in the know Undermountain is a dungeon built underneath Waterdeep, which is a city in Forgotten Realms. It originally started a dwarven mine before an insane wizard moved in and stockpiled the place with monsters and straps…kind of like a meta-Dungeon Master. While personally not a fan of Forgotten Realms (though a huge fan of Neverwinter Campaign Setting), the dungeon is exceedingly easy to drag and drop basically anywhere.

The first 13 pages are dedicated to the dungeon’s history and various entrances that include the Yawning Portal, an inn built on top of a well that leads directly into the dungeon. Again even if you do not run in the Realms you can use or lose the inn backdrop, NPCs and all. The rest of the book features three adventures, but there are also tips on running, pacing, and making your own adventures, as well as tables for random room generation/encounters.

Given enough time and/or players I would not mind running my players through this. While on the surface you can run it simply as a theoretically never-ending dungeon crawl, the DM advice and adventures make it clear that there is room for an overarching story and social interaction. I consider it a good buy despite the page-count to price tag ratio. If nothing else in the interim I am sooo going to use the random tables.

Feywild Themes

I am really pleased with the timing of the recent Feywild love, because my group has pressed me into re-visting Erui, a homebrew campaign that I ran and shelved over a year ago.

The first article is really in name only intended for the Moonshaes, a region in Forgotten Realms (which as an aside has an interesting-looking related article that I will write about later). In addition to giving some advice for reskinning some existing themes out of Neverwinter Campaign Setting, we also get the Sarifal warden and Callidyrr dragoon themes and a new varient elf.

Sarifal wardens start out with a turn-long aura that grants scaling energy resistance/vulnerability to your allies and enemies respectively. Level 5 gives you a bonus to Nature and lets you cast Spirit Fetch once per day for free, and level 10 gives you a Fortitude bonus.

• Sarifal Advisor (level 2 daily): You can summon a pixie that cannot attack, and is better than you at Arcana, Nature, and Stealth. It can also talk to natural and fey animals, and you can use its senses for a turn. Mostly I can see this being good primarily for social roleplay situations.
• Light of Sarifal (level 6 daily): A sustainable aura that imposes a damage penalty based on your highest stat.
• Level 10 is different; instead of choosing from a specific power, you can instead choose from blur, mirror image, shadowed moon, or warlock’s leap.

Callidyrr dragoons are like elite knights that are geased, but are generally charged with going on adventures anyway. On the plus side, violating the geas just causes a memory wipe, which could have some interesting side effects. You start out with Mounted Combat and a free martial weapon of your choice, making it ironically not too well suited for the types of classes that I would most often expect. Level 5 gives you a bonus to Diplomacy and Intimidate, and at level 10 you can use Diplomacy instead of Heal for triggering a saving throw or second wind. Oh, and you can do it at a distance. Fucking sweet.

• Dragoon Warding (level 2 encounter): An adjacent ally gains a AC and Fortitude bonus, and you take hits on melee and ranged attacks.
• Dragoon Parry (level 6 encounter): An interrupt that gives you a bonus to AC and Reflex against a melee attack targeted at you, and the enemy grants combat advantage for a turn.
• Dragoon Summons (level 10 daily): You summon an ancestral defender, which I guess is a natural animate that packs a damage boosting aura, can heal as a minor action, and take hits for allies as an interrupt. The downside is that it cannot attack, but then it is a defender.

Llewyrr elves are eladrin that can swap out their Arcana bonus for Insight and use long- and shortbows at the expense of Eladrin Weapon Proficiency.

The second article is a tad shorter, giving us the wild hunt rider and oracle of the evil eye.

Wild hunt riders give you a Perception bonus, but only when looking for a creature. On the plus side you ignore partial concealment entirely. At level 5 you can use Phantom Steed once per day for free, using Arcana or Nature (whatever is best). At level 10 you gain a bonus to save against effects that hinder your movement.

• Wild Hunt Leap (level 2 encounter): You can jump your speed, and gain combat advantage for a turn if you land next to an enemy.
• Moonfire Aura (level 6 daily): A small aura that negates invisibility and concealment. It is not friendly, so you gotta be careful.
• Relentless Pursuit (level 10 encounter): If an enemy moves away from you, you can teleport next to it as a reaction, and you do not need line of sight. Awesome.

Oracles of the evil eye are unfortunate victims that undergo a ritual that results in them gaining a fomorian’s iconic…well, eye. You can an at-will minor power that causes a non-marked creature to take a piddling amount of automatic psychic damage after damaging you. Like “normal” evil eyes it only works on one creature at a time. At level 5 you gain a bonus on Bluff and Intimidate, and at level 10 you gain low-light vision (or darkvision if you already had low-light vision).

• Eye of the Fomorians (level 2 daily): You can a bonus to Perception and can see invisible creatures for the encounter.
• Urge of Destiny (level 6 daily): An ally deals bonus damage for the encounter. If the creature marks them, they deal even more. 
• Evil Eye Mesmerism (level 10 encounter): A reaction that prevents a creature from attacking you at all for a turn if it misses you.

Aside from the elf variant I pretty much liked all the new themes for one reason or another. The oracle and dragoon can introduce some interesting adventure hooks–such as a key villain or memory loss plot hook respectively–and social roleplay elements to a game. I am also liking the ritual freebies, which if nothing else will hopefully encourage players to try more out (especially with the heroic rituals article).

Gond’s Way: Artificers of the Realms

Outside of Arcane Power I cannot remember the last time artificers saw some decent support. At this point despite my fondness for Neverwinter I would still not say that I am an overall fan, but almost all of the flavor content can serve as a foundation for other campaigns despite all the Realm’s references; for example instead of Gond you could substitute Moradin or Ioun, and the Lantan Scholar background can just be renamed to whatever lost civilization you want. I do like the idea of tying the artificer to a divine organization, if for no other reason than I have been playing Space Marine and it makes me think of techpriests.

There is also seven spells and two feats for the crunch fans:

• Ice Shard Traps (level 1 encounter): You create two invisible traps on the ground that deal cold damage and both cold vulnerability and combat advantage for a turn after an enemy steps on one. The downside is that they only last for a turn, so they would work best for groups that have forced movement (or you could combo it up with thundering armor or unbalancing force). Depending on your DM, you could use these with as part of a surprise attack against patrolling monsters.
• Shadowy Figurine (level 2 daily): You create a sustainable figurine that grants partial concealment and a Stealth bonus to nearby allies. 
• Smokepowder Detonation (level 5): A ranged attack that deals fire damage and ongoing fire damage. As an effect, an ally can make a basic attack (with an attack bonus from your Con or Wis if the initial attack hit).
• Arc Infusion (level 7): Lightning damage, grants an ally a save with a bonus from your Wisdom, and deals more damage plus a daze if the ally’s save actually worked.
• Siphon Fate (level 17): Targets one or two creatures, deals psychic damage and imposes an attack and defense penalty (save ends). As an effect, an ally gains a bonus to attack and defense bonuses based on the number of targets you hit.
• Synchronized Weaponry (level 25): A sustainable effect that allows you and an ally to attack a monster after the other has hit it as an immediate reaction, but both attacks need the weapon keyword.
• Coiled Spring Traps (level 27): Similar to ice shard traps, this gives you three, and they deal force damage, slide and prone, and impose a penalty to AC and Fort based on your Con or Wis for a turn.
• Arcane Trapsmith: Gotta be trained in Thievery, but it lets an artificer use her Intelligence mod to disable traps and open locks. Even better, you gain an Arcana bonus when dealing with traps or hazards.
• Hammer of Gond: You have to worship Gond (but any good DM will handwaive this), and it lets you use a warhammer as an implement (which you can treat as a heavy thrown with a range of 6/12).

Shards of Selune Review

Fetch quests are not new to Dungeons & Dragons (or games in general). In many cases they require you to go to point A to get something that lets you go to point B, and so on and so forth until the writer gets bored or runs out of points. Other models adopt a more free-form “sandbox” approach, giving you all the points and leaving it up to you to tackle them in whichever order you prefer. Shards of Selune opts for the latter, and requires that the characters go about the dark places of Neverwinter on a treasure hunt to locate three of Selune’s tears ’cause the bitch couldn’t cry in one spot.

Eh, could have been worse.

The adventure hook is basically this: the players see some falling stars one night–or don’t–and are petitioned by an eladrin priest named Lady Jasmine to go get them. She gives you the vague locations of all three, but it is up to the party to determine which ones to after in what order. Things get complicated because other factions saw them and want them for various reasons, but character themes can also further complicate things, which is fucking awesome. This part of the adventure design is what draws my interest to what would have otherwise been another ho-hum “go get that thing I want ’cause I want it and oh here is some magic shit”.

Though it seems to work for 99% of World of Warcraft…

Almost every event either requires one or more themes to trigger, or has additional stuff that can occur if a character has one of the indicated themes. None of the events with required themes are mandatory, and either provide extra background information, potential hooks into other adventures, and/or give you a benefit to help you out. It is really nice to see player decisions like this integrated into the overall larger picture, and hopefully it is something we will see in future adventures.


Another thing that sets this adventure apart from others is the almost even mix of skill, social role-playing, and combat challenges (though most of the role-playing ones have required themes). Of the seven combat encounters, only three have tactical maps; the rest give you guidelines of the layout, such as “any city map featuring an alley/road”. While I expect people to complain about cutting costs or whatever, there are plenty of stock city maps, and if nothing else it would give me an excuse to actually use my Dungeon Tiles.

The encounters with maps are well done, with interesting terrain features and potentially dynamic monster rosters depending on the party’s previous actions. For example one encounter involves dealing with a gang that found one of the shards on their flooded-building pissing ground. If you dealt with other factions previously, then the DM swaps out some of the gang members for imps, zombies, dwarves, etc. It is a small thing that helps reinforce that the actions of the players can have consequences, and I fully endorse this move.

Yet another good adventure for the Neverwinter crowd. I am liking a lot of the adventures coming out of Dungeon, and I would like to see WotC round up some of the more talented authors and get a nice adventure path rolled out. Hell, I would settle for an adventure arc that at least runs through the heroic tier. I had heard that they were wrapping up Chaos Scar (yay), so here’s hoping.

Neverwinter Campaign Setting Review

Do not worry: that dracolich is only a Heroic-tier threat.

Neverwinter Campaign Setting is a 222-page hardcover that takes a close look at Neverwinter–which I guess is one of the more noteworthy regions in the Forgotten Realms–providing you with a heap of information with a focus on Heroic-tier campaigns.

Before I get into the chapter-by-chapter overview, I want to open up by (re)stating that I stopped being a fan of Forgotten Realms well before the god/goddess of magic was killed for the umpteen-millionth time in order to lay the chaotic foundation for 4th Edition’s iteration; basically I felt that there was too much damned history and supplements to muck through, in order to find a small plot of land that did not already have its own three-part book series. Sure, Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide fixed a lot of these problems by blowing the place up and advancing the timeline by a century, but by then I had already moved on to Eberron/my own homebrew words.

With that being said I actually kind of dig this book. While it features all the stuff that I griped about in previous editions–extensive information on Neverwinter, the surrounding regions, and factions actively pursuing their own goals–the information provided and the way it is delivered makes it more conducive to planning adventures and campaigns. It is smaller than Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide, which along with its tight focus probably makes it less intimidating for new DMs, DMs new to the Realms, or DMs like me that just did not like all the historical baggage. With that out of the way, here’s what you can expect from the book at a glance:

• Chapter 1: Jewel of the North glosses over Neverwinter and the surrounding locales such as Neverwinter Wood, the Dread Ring, and Old Owl Well (along with a map), a two page history of Neverwinter, and tips and tropes on running a campaign in Neverwinter (or just using the book in general).
• Chapter 2: Character Options features a ton of flexible content: themes, racial variants, warpriest domains, and the bladesinger class. Even though a lot of the flavor material is tailored for Forgotten Realms, all of it could be easily be ported out for Eberron, Dark Sun, or homebrews (yeah, even the spellscarred harbinger). I will go into more detail on this stuff in a bit, because I know people looove crunchy content.
• Chapter 3: Factions and Foes details the various factions–such as the Abolethic Sovereingty and Thay–that players can interact with. I like this chapter because it makes it very easy to assess what the faction is all about, and build adventures around them without having to do a lot of research or deal with a lot of history. Even better, each faction has a section where it tells you where they stand with other factions and provides tie-ins for character themes, which makes it easier to work character backgrounds in. Oh yeah, and some factions have ways of granting characters powers in a similar vein to divine boons.
• Chapter 4: Gazetter is the last and longest chapter it is similar to Chapter 3, except that it takes a closer look at six areas in the Neverwinter region, providing you with sample adventure sites, more adventure hooks, tips on using different sites (or what might happen depending on how the characters deal with the inhabitants, such as taking out the mythallar in Kolthunral), more theme tie-ins, advice on leveling/de-leveling threats (including adding some traits to an ogre to get a level-appropriate fire giant), monsters (more nothics and werewolves, a heroic-tier grell, illithid, elder brain, and more), monster themes, sample encounter tables, and more. A very meaty, very useful chapter. 

I hear these guys are big names in the Realms.

Before I go into more depth on the crunchy content, I want to say that if you are a Forgotten Realms fan I would definitely pick it up. If not, depending on your reasons you might still like it; if you do not like the tone and feel of the setting, this is not likely to change anything, and the same goes if you did not like it being “blown up”. Otherwise, give it a flip through and see if anything grabs you (especially if you do not have/cannot get DDI and want more crunch).

I really like the way the information is laid out and dispensed, and think that not only should Wizards of the Coast make similar books for Eberron, Dark Sun, and the implied setting, but that they could get away with making several books for each setting. It is kind of like a middle-ground between a full-blown campaign setting and an adventure path; a lot of the foundation is done for you, but it is not so expansive as to overwhelm you.

Themes
Themes in this book also come with backgrounds, allowing you to gain a bonus or other background benefit along with theme benefits if you want. There is some advice on themes during character creation, how different themes might interact those other party members choose, and making fun choices. All in all, some pretty staple social role-playing advice. Of the thirteen themes I am going to mention the Dead Rat deserter and devil’s pawn, because of the vocal minority bitching about the lack of a vampire theme and my preference of the warlock’s infernal pact respectively.

The deserter starts out being able to change into a Tiny rat whenever she wants, gains a bonus to Bluff and Stealth at level 5, and an at-will bite at level 10. The three utilities include an encounter that lets you hiss when you score a critical hit, imposing an attack penalty for a turn, a daily that gives you an encounter-long skill bonus to Stealth and lets you reroll in exchange for losing the bonus, and another daily that gives you an initiative bonus as well as standing up or moving your speed. While I like it, I cannot see a all the benefits of the vampire class being shoehorned into this and still evoking the same feel. As a side note, the pack outcast is a similar theme that lets you have werewolf stuff instead of wererat.

The devil’s pawn starts out by giving you an encounter minor-action attack that creates a zone that deals automatic fire damage and imposes a penalty to both attacks and defenses. The only downside is that it targets creatures. The level 5 benefit is just a Diplomacy bonus against devils and creatures that consort with them, but if you are playing in Neverwinter those odds can go up quite a bit. At level 10 you get fire resistance or a bonus if you already have it. The utilities are all dailies, and let you deal automatic fire damage against a creature that hits you (similar to infernal wrath), enter a stance that gives you a Stealth and fire resistance bonus (as well as damage bonus if you are an infernal wrath warlock), and turn into a devil for a turn with an AC bonus, fly speed, and more fire resistance. The drawback is that you have to attack or take damage. The upside is that you can sustain the form, and if you are an infernal warlock gain temporary hit points each time you do.

Racial Variants
There are only dwarves, eladrin, and elves, so no ghostwise halflings or odd-gnomes-out. As seen in a preview, these just let you swap out some racial traits with others, which while not overpowered might upset people who did not like having subraces serve as just another means for optimization. Since dwarves were covered before, I’ll just mention some stuff on eladrin:

• Moon elves–aka eladrin–can swap their skill bonuses to Insight and Streetwise, and also replace Eladrin Education for bow proficiencies.
• Sun elves–again, eladrin–can change their skills to Bluff and Insight, swap Eladrin Weapon Proficiency for all the basic wizard implements, and also lose Eladrin Education for bows.

Warpriest Domains
There are four new domains–Corellon, Oghma, Selune, and Torm–each with their own set of at-wills, utilities, prayers, and class features. I am not about to type out the benefits of even one in its entirety, but I will give a small preview of Selune at 1st-level:

• You gain necrotic and radiant resistance.
• Blessing of light is Wisdom vs. AC at-will that deals weapon plus Wisdom modifier radiant damage, and deals radiant damage if the target hits you or any ally before the end of your next turn.
• Brand of the moon is similar in terms of attack and damage, but deals cold and radiant as well as granting you and all allies a saving throw bonus.
• Moon weapon is a daily utility that cause a weapon to shed light, act as a silvered weapon, and deal radiant damage for an encounter.
• Illuminating blow is a level 1 encounter attack that deals 2[W] radiant damage and grants you or an ally a damage bonus for a turn.
• Life and light is a channel divinity power that grants you and all allies necrotic resistance, and enemies radiant vulnerability. A nice followup for all the radiant damage you can deal.

Bladesinger

I will go into this class in more detail in another post, but for now I’ll post up the two Heroic-tier class features: Arcane Strike (level 3) lets you make a basic melee attack as a minor action after using a daily power, while Steely Retort (level 7) lets you make a basic melee attack as an opportunity action when an adjacent enemy hits you while bladesong is active.

But feel free to mull over the paragon tier table until then.

Gamer’s Library: Mistshore

One of the best things about reading a fantasy novel is being able to take the best parts of a book, whatever they may be, from imaginative plot ideas to fascinating locations, and introducing them into your own D&D games. Mistshore, written by Jaleigh Johnson, is the second installment of the new Ed Greenwood Presents Waterdeep series, each book detailing a different part of 1479 DR Waterdeep. Mistshore provides us with not only a great story but an excellent and most interesting locale.

Mistshore itself is basically an entire ward of the city of Waterdeep, completely comprised of rotting, half-sunken ships rigged together, more and more over time, within which is home to “the monstrous, the lawless, and the violent.” The sort of place normal folk never see. The sort of place one would go if you wanted to disappear for a while, surviving only through wit and cunning. While reading this book I thought of over a dozen great ideas I’d use if I ever incorporated Mistshore into one of my games. If not playing in Forgotten Realms it’s the prefect type of setting you could easily add to any city of your own to make it much more interesting – there are a lot of adventures to be had in a place like this, obviously. Ed Greenwood describes it as a corner of Waterdeep “much whispered about by the fearful, who believe all manner of sinister half sea-monsters , half humans lurk in its sagging riggings and rotten cabins. Creatures with webbed fingers, gills hidden under high-collared robes, and sly, stealthy tentacles waiting to throttle or snatch. Welcome to Mistshore.“

The plot of the book revolves around Icelin, a beautiful young sorceress and street urchin with a haunted past, some of which she cannot remember and some of which she can. Icelin has been touched with the Spellplaugue, one of it’s symptoms causing her spells to go wild – once causing a boarding house to catch fire, killing many people. Something Icelin has had to live with, and since then she has avoided using magic as much as it is possible for her to do so.

Part of Icelins unrecollected past catches up with her in the form of a scar faced eladrin named Cerest in a chance meeting. Figuring out who he has just stumbled upon Cerest takes it upon himself to abduct Icelin at any cost, including the murdering of Icelin’s great-uncle and caretaker. Not knowing why she is being pursued by Cerest and now wanted by the Watch for the murder of her great-uncle Icelin flees to the shadows of Mistshore, with the help of a few allies along the way.

Ever worried about revealing too much in these posts, I don’t want to give away too much about this book but the bulk of this novel follows the hunted Icelin and her few companions through the darkest corners of Mistshore, all the while dealing with her cloudy past and dealing with her spellscar. There are plenty of unexpected twists and plenty of action. One of the strengths of this book, and Jaleigh Johnson’s writing in general, is most definitely bringing the characters to life. The personalities, the dialogue and the development of characters over the course of the book is done very well, to a point that other writers in the game should take note.

This one is definitely a recommended read.

Gamer’s Library: Blackstaff Tower

Now that much of the contention has passed regarding the new 4th Edition version of the Forgotten Realms, I really feel that, for those who may have stayed away from checking out the Realms ala 1479 DR, now is a great time to take a fresh look at the new setting.

I will state my personal piece – when I first heard about the shaking up of the Forgotten Realms campaign setting – the Spellplague, that the timeline was being pushed a century ahead etc., – the information was met with an anticipation induced smile. I was happy to see a sweeping-off-the-table of the many high level npc’s, that was one of the factors that turned me off to FR and drew me to the fresh, young setting of Eberron. I think Antioch, along with many many others, can relate to the attempt at running Forgotten Realms games and having players constantly interjecting with things like, “That river isn’t supposed to be there,” or “That inn is in Neverwinter not Silverymoon.” – Well, you get the point. After so many years the Realms basically became just plain overused, and overused means boring.

But why bother completely up-ending a setting that so many people have come to love for decades and just release something completely new? Love for the Forgotten Realms, that’s why. Wizards of the Coast could have easily let the FR game setting fall by the wayside and into the hands of a core group of fans while still making a killing from Salvatore novels. In my opinion they didn’t want to see that happen, they (and many of us) knew that Toril had many more stories to tell – a new, fresh epoch was what was needed to make that happen – even if it took an event as big as the Spellplague to usher it in.

As the novel has long been the companion to the core game, it is still, gladly, the case today. Enter the new Ed Greenwood Presents Waterdeep series, and it’s first installment: Blackstaff Tower. This series is based on the 4E incarnation of what is probably the most famous, (or infamous depending who you ask) grand city in probably all of fantasy (excluding maybe Lankhmar) – Waterdeep. Each book in the series is set to explore a different section of the new Waterdeep.

I picked up Blackstaff Tower the week it came out back in September and plowed through it pretty quick, hungry to soak in all of the new sights and sounds of a city I have come to love myself over the years. While I do think it really helps to have previously read Steven E. Schend’s Blackstaff before picking this one up, it’s not completely necessary. But it does help. Quite a bit.

Overall the plot is pretty simple – BBEG wants to usurp the power of the Blackstaff, for reasons not altogether evil in his mind, killing the current Blackstaff of Waterdeep, Samark. (Yes, Khelben is dead) And in doing so he leaves the young, foreign, exotic lover of Samark, Vajra Safahr true heir to the Blackstaff. This is where your typical, young band of adventurers comes into play. However Schend’s descriptive style of writing really brings these characters to life. You really feel as if your running through the back alleys from the city watch alongside the young upstart Renear, or trudging through the sewers with beautiful Laraelra and the mountainous barbarian Meloon.

In the end this group of friends must come together and yet also face their innermost selves in order to protect their friend Vajra, and help her obtain the Blackstaff. Once the introductions are over and the plot gets going, this book gets pretty fast paced. Throw in a more than interesting battle at the end and you’ve got your self a great, albeit somewhat typical at times, adventure in a new yet familiar setting.

Pick this one up if you haven’t already, especially if you want a taste of the new Forgotten Realms.