Terrible Writing:
Cool ideas, really lackluster execution by junior writers. It felt like the first two adventures didn't need to exist, maybe even the entire book until the end fight, my opinion is you are probably better off making your OWN adventure. The module is well made, my only complaint being the content of the adventure and that the module creators contracted for this overused certain tracks despite having multiple to pick from.
Graveland Survivors:
Ideas, Yua's Hope, Then Nothing
The first adventure has a great initial feel, a good introduction in the crypt and a solid "reason" for you having to care, stay, know and ETC with the various NPC's your expected to go on this survival horror road trip to Vellumis. Once you leave to Yua's Hope, it feels pretty open-ended and good, I really enjoyed having people do the avoid undead activity at the end of every round if they decided to stand in the streets which really linked the combat and exploration together.
And it's on the Road to Vellumis that this product really shows from the get-go that this needed more time in the oven.
The Road to Vellumis is just pick a pace with no difference in the choice. They sell you on this big influence once you leave the crypt to setup "morale" and gain boons from the NPC's with the idea that NPC drama / interparty conflict and possibly losing these NPC's is a part of this. You'll spend a hour doing this big influence and it feels like it has direction. Then you leave yua's hope and you realize that the road is just random encounters like somebody tossed darts at a board and they never actually wrote so much as a suggestion to spice up the road. It really is befriend brushpaws, get forager on EVERYONE to invalidate the survival aspects and once you leave Yua's Hope, you'll be on a rather meaningless railroad where Omelia the main opposition has no written reason for being there with a ending that has also no writing or reason really. You really are supposed to chalk most things up to "Multiverse theory, OOOOO SELDEG CHANGED TIME!!!!" I don't find that satisfying or compelling.
It expects you to have a valiant end of getting this bloodstone (that you find out never really mattered.) to the city but they didn't even write a satisfactory battle other than "Plunk them with arrows after questioning the party for some reason that's not elaborated on by Omelia." Omelia isn't scary. Your supposed to scare the party with her, but there's no written advice on how to do so and no written events hyping her up. But that's what your supposed to be doing. Actually, none of Seldegs Lackeys have written reasons in A1, A2 or A3 or deep backstories even although A1 is entirely about Omelia and a multi-session scare that they just expect to happen without writing any support.
Roleplay is Context, we need context:
Why does a ghost attack you randomly at a random cottage you don't need to stop at? Why are her bones there for us to disable? Nearly everything interesting or for there to be a "reason" for something, it really feels like you have to write that all yourself and at time you wonder "why" you need to reference a lot of exterior material. I had no problem with this but it just felt like a lot of referencing for referencing sake for how short of a distance it takes most of it's content. It's offensive when a chapter ends saying to just toss meaningless zombie encounters at the group until they get XP and its even more offensive when that's the bar we're using for the reasons and why of the story. (If X doesn't make sense, calculate and figure out Y.)
"Anthology" feels like a marketing line...
The IDEA that this 3 episode anthology gives you different perspectives is COOL but in execution it doesn't accomplish that and it tries to be Pulp Fiction but without any interconnectedness beyond theme and "I guess so." The bridge at the end of A1 also seems misprinted as a simple hazard with a reaction describing it's a complex one that regains reactions like they just didn't play test it which is sort of what the road to vellumis felt like entirely once we left yua's hope in both cases we got hyped up on the NPC's, roleplay, etc just to see it go a very short distance and that this wasn't really put through a thorough testing phase. It's good until the road, and then the rest of the entire book feels like your just sort of on a road first, the reasons for doing so coming secondary. A scary ghoul opposition with no supporting material. NPC's with morale that's never referenced again.
Ashes for Ozem:
Second Adventure, Ashes for Ozem has cool lore about Nirmrathas/that Nation and they invented a keep from before Iomedae's ascension. This was the most enjoyable of the 3 thus far. Again, little reason beyond "you are seldegs evil lackey." And your thrust into a conversation with him and doing a research subsystem to set the pace of it. This adventure is a Infiltration but, in-encounter with a emphasis on the GM making it feel seamless and it being very short and sweet.
Ironically despite being the shortest and in many ways the most skippable, it's the most concise and filled out with various options with commentary such as the various ways to destroy Fort Ozem and even if your party fails there's a lot of leeway to pick it right back up as another evil party and it was enjoyable tossing some challenge at the party. Despite it being enjoyable, it still had the same lack of supporting text that the entire book suffers from, it just so happened to scratch at that itch a little better than 1 or 3.
However my enjoyment of it was entirely hinged on how I handled battle with the keep commander (keeping focused on her goal to protect the dragonball/special object.) This one really feels like a super generic fort infiltration about the tomb of Nirmrathas that's been given reason to exist within this adventure after-the-fact sort of like how A1 feels like a Walking Dead episode with great themes just to have 0 execution or follow up.
Of Blood & Faith:
The Third Adventure Of Blood & Faith and adventure 1 and 2 very very lightly catch-up to A3 after the mid-point of A3 and really felt like you could just view adventure 1 and 2 as totally separate/as if they didn't happen. The bloodstones never even matter because all that's needed is the object from A2 for purposes of this ritual and it's entirely on you to make any meaning beyond them giving him some extra control/a better future possibility that also has no written support for interest.
It doesn't seem like this was designed with the idea of the party being as high level as they are. It starts out with a meeting about undead activity and undead lt's/seldegs forces and your just expected to go on very little detail after it mentions multiple locations and your put on-to figuring out two days of travel to Corlach Keep. The writers anticipate your party to have Teleport and have a block about that being viable, but they didn't anticipate the level 18 party to have Flying and they toss entirely skippable encounters at you and they put this keep on an island and the worlds most obviously dangerous bridge that have no answers to it after tossing a death and a wyrm at you in a otherwise skippable piece of content. Oh it exists because the death is protecting the wyrm bones... And how is that relevant? Where's the support for that? Where's the depth? Supporting ques? It just has a block that talks about their friendship... And then... Nothing as it goes to the next encounter.
A1, A2 and A3 basically are just "Roads to Vellumis" in of themselves.
One of the hyped-up points of this and why I bought this to play it was meeting Arazni and maybe seeing some of the inter-conflict between the Shining Sentinels and the Crimson Reclaimers. But Arazni just sort of is summoned which you find out they can just do at any time in a ridiculously badly written moment where we're brought to what's supposed to be a secret place, inquiring comedically "you don't want us to discuss Arazni and all these secrets in the hallway now do you?!" There is no inter-faction drama just like there's no interparty drama written in A1.
You NEED the Lastwall Lost Omens Book!
They make up as if Arazni's own choice now is somehow equal to what the shining crusade did to her. (This seems like good marketing, bad execution like one of thousands of uninspired re-boots we see.) The adventure doesn't explain Beirivelle Starshine's position and relation to Aylunna in the high-command of the knights and sort of just expects you to read the lost omens books and be able to navigate all of that.
The pages where you talk to Arazni, this big moment, is very bare. At many times throughout claws it feels like whereas in other adventures they'd elaborate or even write some extra blocks of "what ifs" to support or indulge the "why" they've tried to cram this anthology together and cut corners. Corlach Keep's premise at the end of it is also a cool idea. But without any setup to who the researcher is that's down there or their relevance etc. To have a good sense motive situation, you need to have the information/context.
You can't just have a block of text explaining Seldeg has captured a researcher and hope on a fairy fart that the GM is doing flashback style cutscenes without directing them or supporting them. A constant thing I felt while running this was feeling the need to have out of character movie-style scenes to fill in "what the heck" was happening.
That's how I felt by A3 was that this comprised of ideas that don't have a page count to support them and an over-dependence on exterior material to overcome the cramming of this. It's like a museum that has no information plaques and your left a little confused what some of the exhibits were trying to convey on the fieldtrip.
Meeting Arazni felt disrespectful
My best stab at this is to reference the Starfinder society scenarios where there has been a change in the future where Arazni/Iomedae is switched around and to pull a groundhog day and say all of this is different snippets of broken time because seldegs ritual is changing everything. (When something doesn't make sense, it's time or something, duh! Multiverse theory! Not that it isn't valid, it just feels disrespectful to sell us on meeting arazni like this.
Arazni judges the party like Iomedae does in Wrath of the Righteous by Owlcat, they just can call her ANYTIME and the entire Truth of the Crimson Oath being related to Arazni is a passing line of laughter. "We can go talk to arazni" isn't new information, it's just a tie to get you back on the road. It's not a moment built up to, it's just a moment that appeared to get me hyped. Then there was NOTHING!
There's some interesting questions that come up with no answers which is a real shame. Why did Seldeg abandon Geb and join TB in actual detail than assumption? He really didn't do this all just from some messed up idea you also aren't ever going to elaborate on did he? Where and how did Seldeg gain this Flayed Files thing beyond it just being a cool idea? Hell, the Flayed Files is more interesting than the ENTIRETY OF THIS ADVENTURE! Oh, Fort Ozem is iomedae's home pre-ascension? Cool idea! Oh, Nirmrathas' tomb? Lore of the day of vellumis getting blasted? NEAT! NOTHING!
And then you get there and you realize it's only as interesting as the taglines. "Meet arazni!" "Destroy a fort!" "Survive the undead!" So many possible details and so many things could of been done to make this feel and flow better rather than hinging it 100% on the GM to make up content aside what's supposed to be a fully featured adventure. It felt a bit railroady but without interesting set pieces -- which sucks. A story of really cool taglines that feel like they were given off to other junior writers as an assignment.
It's a ritual that doesn't need the stones that the storyline follows all the way to the end (a hole to allow any result of A1, A2, A3 that also just invalidates their story involvement.) It's a sort of sandbox when you get back to Vellumis with sort of a gadgetzeer, it's sort of a anthology but isn't. You should play A1, A2 but you can also skip A1, A2...
You can't have your cake and eat it too like that.
It's cosmopolitan ice cream that tries to be everything and ends up not really doing anything well.
As a standalone product to be run as-is it's just not what I expect or want out of adventure products, the lack of playtesting, the lack of nuance, the lack of direction or scenery despite being a road for that buy-in. And I really wanted to enjoy the pulp-fiction like aspect but that was pretty much non-existent. I've played most of the adventure products and most of them usually come-through on the premise/theme, this one sold me on a really impressive idea. And I'm left with nothing but spaget on the floor.
Age of Ashes and similar early products get flak for their balance, yet here they couldn't anticipate fly at level 18. Fall of Plaguestone and some of the writing of products get flak for one-dimensional BBEG writing, but in those products there's pages longer than the entire arazni meeting (one page) on why/how/context. It's so sparse that the page on Firehair of Castle Firrine or the page of backstory from the Commander of Fort Ozem read like booklets despite being so irrelevant.
It's a short anthology with hurting page count, so naturally, we're going to fill it with irrelevant "what if your evil" information in A3 rather than actually explaining how any of this interlinks.
The end fight ritual is a joke. My only explanation is "small flip mats really hold us back, don't they?" He's just doing the ritual in a building with a broken wall you can either A. Fight him or B. go around the back to fight creatures that otherwise show up while fighting him and the first half of A3 is irrelevant... But there's a wall of flesh behind that "decision". Honestly, you could skip the ENTIRETY of this adventure and do a one-shot where aeoan or gods sends you to fight Seldeg at the last pages and it'd be a more cohesive, enjoyable experience.
The bloodstones felt like they were just inclusions to further sell me on meeting Arazni. When we met arazni, it was a terrible comedy skit. The secret of the Crimson Oath being related to Arazni and all the knights finding out about it is just one big joke.
I was Sold on Arazni, Left questioning why the Knights laugh about the Crimson Oath like a casual episode of Friends:
I was sold on meeting arazni and this inter-conflict to be told they have a red phone to arazni 24/7 but nobody questions, argues, talks or otherwise about it and that entire story is boiled down to slap-knee comedy of "let me in, you don't want me spilling secrets in the hallway do you?!" -- it felt offensive as a long-term enjoyer of Lost Omens. We did two adventures of build-up to get 5 written sentences.
Arazni is a unique concept in the IP of lost omens and she's being depicted as unlikeable, judgmental and inept and it left me wondering if the writers thought about what they were doing when they decided to make such a meeting so bad you wish you could forget it.
Claws of the Tyrant is about as important to the overall lore of lost omens and related to arazni's overall story as the fart I took last night thinking about this review, and Seldeg is basically just a ex-abusive boyfriend throwing a tantrum. if reviews were actually deeper than "I flipped through it, seemed cool!" I would of 100% skipped it.
I love making adventures my own, but this really feels like your buying a template of an adventure, an unfinished bullet point list for a story akin to the meaningless encounters on the road.
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