Islands of Plunder: Raid on the Emperor's Hand (PFRPG)

All right, this installment of the "Islands of Plunder"-series is 28 pages long, 1 page front cover, 2 pages editorial/how to use, 1 page ToC, 1 page introduction, 1 page SRD, 2 pages of advertisement, 1 page back cover, leaving us with 19 pages of content, so let's take a look!

Wait, before we go into the details - what is this series about? Well, essentially, the Islands of Plunder-sub-series is a part of expansions intended for the Skull & Shackles AP, providing sidetreks etc. on an island per island base - they can essentially be considered island-focused mini-adventures that work just as well within the context of a Freeport campaign, Razor Coast or Savage Tide - if it's remotely pirate/island-themed, these will work - and probably beyond that, but that I'll take a look at on a case by case basis. This island of plunder is intended for 8th level PCs, which render it appropriate for just about every pirate-themed campaign

Hence, since this is an adventure-review, the following contains SPOILERS. Potential players are strongly advised to jump to the conclusion.

Captain Alban Thekros is back from a lucrative trade-run to the South -he's been drinking heavily, and, to be honest, he's not used to steering vessels of the size of the Emperor's Hand. Subsequently, he ran the massive ship aground a sandbank. While fortunately, the ship was damaged to sinking conditions, but the warship escort ships were not signaled and thus, sailed on. Now, things become interesting -the PCs have a massive treasure trove right before their noses - but they will have to hurry!

The massive Emperor's Hand is fully mapped and in order to take their spoils, the PCs will have to defeat the vessel's crew - and then it's looting like there is no tomorrow! The big issue becomes soon apparent - if the PCs are to try their hand at ransacking the boat, they better hurry: In order to win here, speed is the key - hence, this module uses a massively detailed ransacking mechanic to count points. This includes using extradimensional storage, creatures, etc. and on the combat-side, troop subtype adversaries and cool archetype'd, versatile builds for the NPCs to make the whole thing more interesting as well. Have I mentioned that the vessel has 6 (!!!) levels, fully mapped? This massive caper has all the makings of a cool heist indeed and sports easy ways for the PCs to actually come up with ways to efficiently plunder! Better yet, a DM can easily think about ways to make the misfortune of the Emperor's Hand the work of the PCs for a full-blown heist module!

Conclusion:

Editing and formatting are top-notch, I noticed no significant glitches, though e.g. one reference to the "King's Hand" instead of the "Emperor's Hand" could be consider a slight confusion-causing blunder. Layout adheres to a drop-dead gorgeous 2-column full-color standard and the pdf comes fully bookmarked for your convenience. Each named NPC receives his/her own artwork, which is awesome. Even better, both island and fortress come in lavishly drawn full color maps that also sport player-friendly maps to use as handouts - kudos to the cartographer! The pdf comes fully bookmarked for your convenience.

Matt Goodall and Joshua Root have created one fast-paced, highly uncommon sidetrek - the looming return of the escort, the high-adrenaline escape, the unconventional focus of this sidetrek -all of these conspire to make this module fun and uncommon, eliciting a nice sense of jamais-vu. This Island of Plunder is very uncommon, fun and just exciting - well worth a final verdict of 5 stars + seal of approval.

Endzeitgeist out.

I ran this adventure for my gaming group this Sunday. They loved it. They enjoyed the surprise nature of the introduction, the quick paced plot, the boarding action, the capable and dangerous enemies, and the fact that they could tackle the situation in whatever manner that they could conceive. Matt Goodall and the rest of the Legendary Games Team have once again produced an outstanding piece of work and my players and I could not be more pleased.

If you have not tried Legendary Games Adventure Path Plug-Ins then you seriously ought to. I, personally, have run more than a half-dozen of them now and they all bring something unique to the table as well as serve to expand and complement the Adventure Paths in a seamless and synergistic fashion. Simply put, if you are running the AP's without these plug-ins then you are missing out. They are that much fun.