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Does anyone have any information about this product? I went on to the Wicked Fantasy Factory website, and it doesn't even appear to me that the first product is out, nevermind any mention of the other two listed here on Paizo.
Try the Goodman Games site instead. #1 came out in May. #2 will be out in August, and #0 is due in September.
This was one of Goodman's offerings for Free RPG Day. It's comes across as a cross between D&D and Mortal Combat. The story is a basic "rescue the kidnapped damsels" one. If you like hack & slash gaming (or X-Crawl), it might be enjoyable.
Our distributor says that it's "a $2 version [of the] module previously available only on Free RPG Day"—so I don't know if there are any differences between it and the freebie.
This was one of Goodman's offerings for Free RPG Day. It's comes across as a cross between D&D and Mortal Combat. The story is a basic "rescue the kidnapped damsels" one. If you like hack & slash gaming (or X-Crawl), it might be enjoyable.
it is a very basic crawl, good for newbies to learn from, and a good excuse to use all those D&D minis kobalds - as IIRC almost every bad guy is a kobald (although they are part of a clan with its own template, and some of the later ones have class ranks) in my opinion it had the second best art in the free RPG day material.(DO blew that category away)
Does anyone have any information about this product? I went on to the Wicked Fantasy Factory website, and it doesn't even appear to me that the first product is out, nevermind any mention of the other two listed here on Paizo.
I picked this up for free on Free RPG Day (along with D0). Overall, it's a solid adventure or "module" as we old-schoolers say.
Temple of Blood is a D20/OGL dungeon crawl adventure for 4 to 6 first level characters.
I'll start with the negatives first. In its attempt to set itself apart, this module has occasional expressions and turns of phrase that seem forced and awkward, and that make it seem more geared toward 14 year olds than adults. For example, the introduction says, "Maybe you want adventures that are WICKED SICK! That's what Wicked Fantasy Factory gives you: axes hacking, spells exploding, and blood spewing. Don't just crawl through dungeons -- make them sorry they ever met you!"
Wicked sick? Who talks like that? Okay, okay, I've been known to say things like "wicked-cool" but posting on a message board and writing for an adventure are two different things. I don't know, it just felt like they were trying too hard at times to be hip and young.
Another thing I wasn't crazy about was...
I wish the back inside cover was used for something other than a full color advertisement. Some more of that neat artwork would have been nice.
And my last criticism is that part of the "reward" seems to be winning the gratitude of the ladies they have rescued. My suspicion is that this might be something of a turn off for female players--especially if this were used to introduce them to the game. It's kind of sexist. On the other hand, it is also kind of old-school, so I'm conflicted.
Now, on with the positives. The artwork, including the full color dungeon map on the inside cover is really pretty decent. I like most of the artwork throughout (including the aforementioned ladies-fawning-over-the-heroes), although nearly all of it is black and white. Still, it is pretty solid old-school type art and I like every single illustration in it.
It is 16 pages, counting two pages to detail a new magic item and new monsters and one page for the OGL legal stuff.
It is a straight-forward, no BS dungeon crawl and it is solidly delivered.
There are a couple of new optional rules type components, and here is where the module really comes into its own and sets itself apart from the competition. One is that this adventure (and supposedly, all WFF adventures) has a piece of "Phat Lewt," which is a piece of loot that is worth at least as much as the rest of the adenture's loot combined. ("Maybe in the boss's stash, maybe in some secret room.") "That's right, WFF adventures provide double the normal amount of treasure compared to your standard adventure, and half that loot is wrapped up in a single item." I actually like this idea. I know, I know, the campaign world is a delicate ecosystem and blah blah blah, but when you're a player, sometimes it is fun to find a really great piece of treasure. And it can always be hidden so that maybe the players don't find it. And it may be over the top, but that's how these adventures are intended, I think. And it really fits with the whole "beer and pretzels" feel they deliver.
They also have rules to allow a player character to execute a "finishing move," which I won't go into, other than to say I think it is kind of a neat idea and I think the rules are solid for the sort of game-play the authors intend. It reinforces the concept that the PCs are the bad-ass rock stars of their campaign world.
They also have special rules for dealing with Mooks (again, calculated to demonstrate that the PCs are special and to allow for some cinematic, "everybody's kung fu fighting" action). The flip side of this is that they have special rules for the BBEG which makes him even tougher.
The adventure even has a couple of situational options to allow the PCs to pull off cool tactics with cinematic results
In all, I'd give Temple of Blood an Eight out of Ten. I would say Seven out of Ten, but it is so rare to find a module I really like, I think they get a slight bump. This adventure delivers a brief yet solid, old-school, beer and pretzels dungeon crawl. The artwork combined with the (admittedly cheesy yet intriguing) optional rule components pushes this adventure a solid notch or two above most of the competition.