AceofMoxen's page

I played 6-99: Under the Eye of the Mantis at Gen Con 2025 as a 7th-level tank monk/druid, and I'm seriously considering if I ever want to play a special again.

To clarify, with the exception of one PC, everyone I interacted with during the special was wonderful. I have serious concerns about the design of specials, and some specific points on this one. I've played several specials, and they may not be for me. If you play a low-level tier, you don't get any plot relevance to your activities, and if you play a high tier, you never finish combat. Since you don't finish combat, high-tier tables don't use as many resources, and the special provides lots of healing and refreshing, so High-Tier combat is entirely pointless. The PCs don't get hurt or tired, and the enemies don't get defeated.

This is worse as a Tank, because preventing damage doesn't matter, and this scenario seems designed to hate on shield-users.

Every special I've played, the PCs (and often even the GM) have agreed that completing challenges quickly is more important than having character interaction and exploration, or even planning. This is fine in combat, but it makes social encounters (of which I had two in this session) meaningless. Rather than showcase the unique worldview of a Red Mantis assassin who works and flirts with Pathfinders, Social encounters are relayed at speed. "I roll diplomacy, did we get enough points yet?" Lore-building descriptions are also wasted. The opening to this adventure spends a while describing the ship Pathfinders are traveling on, then asks any questions. Aside from the fact that it's big, the other details don't matter, and asking questions about the ship will only slow the group down. Specials incorporate the worst parts of Multiplayer video games into tabletop. "Skip Cutscene" is encouraged!

Specific to this adventure, any PC who might need convincing that their God or ethics allows working with assassins is absolutely wasting the table's precious time. This is juxtaposed [Major Spoiler] against an offer from the villain. The PCs could take a bribe of gold (allowing them to earn more than ten treasure bundles) in exchange for a point of infamy and letting the villain go free. I'd be interested in exploring this a regular scenario, but in a special, it's outlandish to expect the PCs (who are probably strangers) to debate the morality of such an option. I consider this to be a mistake, worthy of errata.

As mentioned above, taking quick turns is essential in a special. However, every special grants minor bonuses to the players. This makes players need to recalculate math on the fly, without a dedicated reminder like the bard players. As specials are often played late at night, I've completely given up on reminding players of their +1's. [Minor Spoilers] This adventure has the worst version of these bonuses I've ever seen, however. A boon in the adventure gives +1 circumstance to AC and Saves against the rogue Red Mantis Dispatch. However, even in a single encounter, some enemies are Red Mantis, and some are not, so players who remember have to constantly ask the GM if they get the bonus or not to calculate their AC and Saves. Being a circumstance bonus to AC, it doesn't stack with my shield, so, late at night, midway through the adventure, I have to recalculate if my shield is worthwhile when it's providing only half the normal bonus.

All specials seem to hate on shield-users. There's always plenty of HP-restoring, and some focus and spell slot restoring, but I never see any shield repair. Also, the spell slot restoration in this adventure gives "one slot of your highest level restored." As a Multiclass druid, at level 7, I have one 2nd-level slot, and one 1st-level slot. No one is going to be much impressed by damage or healing of those levels, so I prepare utility. I chose Gentle landing (feather fall) and spider climb. Well, early in the adventure, I used gentle landing. Then, I got a restore of my 2nd-level slot. In the future, could "one slot of your highest level restored" become "one spell slot of your choice is restored?"

There is one part of this adventure I want to praise. [Major spoilers] In what I think is act two, the party might find a Tavern (?) with the inside obscured by steam. Moving in, it becomes clear that the place filled with wood objects made out of dryads, and metal objects made from other living creatures. No one is in the place, it's haunt/hazard. This is a wonderfully spooky place, and I wish there was more about how and why it was created, or a choice to be made about its future. This one encounter left me wanting more, and so I loved it.

As a special, I rate this 2/5 (below average), but I rate specials instead of scenarios as a 1 or 2/5.

It's a wacky maze where anything could happen. There's hardly any theme besides "wacky" and "random." Many times common sense doesn't apply. Spoilers:nothing is connected. Just roll dice when the gm tells, don't use logic or try to solve the mystery.

Also, there's a chase near the end. It goes on for ten challenges, and there's no reward or penalty for catching up to the target. I hate challenges with no point, and I'm not a fan of the chase rules in general.

This adventure is a pit without fun. Skip it.

I've looked at the special PF or SF dice online dozens of times and said "How ugly and hard to read!" Well, I was wrong! I was buying individual mini from an online store, and I needed five more bucks for free shipping, and these were on sale, so I took a gamble. And it paid off! These dice are beautiful and unlike any others I own. However, compared to a standard Chessix set, they are harder to read, but not as hard as they look in photos. They are a fantastic addition to my collection. I mostly use them to count the rounds remaining in my weapons. I don't worry about accidentally rolling them, since they look so different.

Hint:

I think this adventure has a lot to offer. It's a great social and stealth quest, with enough combat for the barbarian.
However, this adventure should not be for 1st level characters, I think. Sneak around an evil country to smuggle people out? It's conceptually hard for new players and separate, but relatedly, for low-level characters.

This a wonderful happy little pig.

This was fun, but way too short. It's barely two hours. I'm also unsure who this product is for. The 5th level characters are too complicated for beginners, and experienced players would probably rather be playing their own characters. The characters have nice backgrounds, but only the cleric is really integrated to the adventure. There's one good puzzle. There's no reason to recommend this adventure when you could run anything else for more playtime and with your own character.