| Prodigalson |
I'm about to have the final push and finish up the module this weekend, then move onto module two. A few thoughts for DM's running this:
I am glad I picked up the second book. I have allowed my players to start their kingdom immediately after saving Fasturvault. That's been a lot of fun.
I've included a lot more on the gnomish settlements that they mention in the book (Kladenvault).
I thought that it was unfortunate in a dwarven campaign that there were not any goblins and or/orcs that were in the campaign at all. Dwarves love to kill them, and Drow love to enslave them. Also, while the Xan and the Spiders are there, neither are made to be specific enemies per se. I placed a third settlement of goblins/hobgoblins down near the giant mountain, and also for fun game them the Blade of Vostenstadt, lost when the Drow assaulted Vostenstadt, when the Hammersvald sank. The PC's had a great time killing the goblins, recovering the ancient weapon, then finding the lost heir of Vostenstadt (Elias Lost-But-Not-Forgotten). He rallied his people with the return of the city. I gave them 20 free build points that could be used in Vostenstadt to rebuild.
The other reason that I liked that the goblins and orcs were there was that the module has a huge amount of beast like encounters. Non-thinking enemies, and very little intelligent creatures.
The maps are great on this, and I have used photoshop to blow them up to one square = an inch then copy them. They look great.
Also, while I realized that Gary could not include them, I want to encourage all the DM' for this to work in mind flayers, beholders and other enemies into this. I've placed a gauth in the random encounters, and my players flipped out during the encounter. It was great.
I'm considering replacing the bat people in book two with some illithids as well, as I'm not too keen on the bat people in general. Illithids scare the hell out of people.
Some things that would have been great to include:
1. How many build points would it take to fix the Hammersvald. My PC's are bound and determined. For book 3, he may want to consider the cost and stats for the ship as it may be used in the war with Tissarya in book 3.
2. Some notes regarding some of the other things around the tunnels in the other directions would be great. I've put in the Obsidian Citadel (Duerger that have the only access to Admantium) and now the legendary city of Xantool, the Beholder City that lies far away).
3. Some hints to the DM about what the super threat is in book 5 would be nice. Something below? I would like to start dropping hints besides the Xan god, but I have no idea.
Great module so far though. It has been exactly what I needed. A nice sandbox underdark adventure that I can work with and color outside of the lines when I feel like love it.