So I'm running an Eberron game, and after putting the PCs through The Forgotten Forge (from the ECS book), they got hooked into the Queen with Burning Eyes. Didn't use DDM tiles for the dungeon, as I don't own them, but I replaced most of the rooms with tiles from the D&D Basic Game; I can list them if anyone's interested.
The Party: (3 characters, 2nd level when the adventure began)
* Sheldon, a Human Cleric of the Sovereign Host
* Qual, a Human Artificer
* Tom, a Warforged Fighter (Adamantine Body)
Sheldon maintains a small shrine in the upper Cogs (the PCs have been barely scraping by ever since the Last War), and one of his parishoners came by to beg for help with the disappearances surrounding the excavation that he and his work crew had been digging out for Lord Vestran. Motivated by a desire to help, Sheldon rounded up Tom and Qual, and headed to the excavation, where they met with Vestran and were offered a moderate sum of money to deal with the disappearances and clear out the monsters in the ruins.
*Area 1*
The 'rat creatures' in the first room made the players groan (none of their characters knew what kobolds looked like), and some good tactics on the part of the kobolds pinned the cleric and artificer near the door while the warforged got sneak attacked and stabbed at. Soon enough, though, the warriors were dead, and the rogue drank his potion of invisibility only to be cut down in spite of it.
*Area 2*
Descending into the dungeon, Tom, Qual and Sheldon alighted from their rope only to be attacked by a pair of beasts with scabbed and cracked flesh where their eyes should have been (I made the grimlocks look creepier than usual- see below), and a hyenalike creature with a tri-pronged tail (a Staj, or "Eye Hunter", from Monte Cook's Legacy of the Dragons- it plucks and consumes eyes from its victims). This fight lasted a bit longer, and the Staj almost tore out Qual's left eye, but in the end our heroes were victorious, and plunged onward.
*Area 6*
The Dolgrims creeped the party out (I gave them four eyes each, with several missing - eaten by the Staj), but they died before they could lure the heroes into their pit trap, and the party rested here with Tom standing guard.
*Area 7*
The chill from the brown mold drove the party away from this room before they even entered it (metagaming - they came back later), but the Dolgaunt followed them as they retreated, and some good Listen checks led to a confrontation in room 2. Though the Dolgaunt drained a portion of Tom's alchemical fluids, it too fell swiftly.
*Areas 8, 9, & 11*
Ambushed by the ghouls, Tom and Sheldon were struck several times, but neither was paralyzed (Tom was immune and Sheldon saved), so on Sheldon's first action, he destroyed the undead with a blast of holy power. After looting the sepulchers and examining the idol, the party ignored the door to room 10 and headed into area 9, taking minor damage from the scythe trap. After opening the door to area 11, Sheldon and Tom noticed that Qual had disappeared, and turned around to rescue him from the Choker that had grabbed him. After healing up, they skirted the pit into Khyber and headed on to the lair of the Queen with Burning Eyes.
*Area 12*
The party confronted the Queen with Burning Eyes, and without her court, she died in two rounds, taking 25 points of damage from a single critical hit from Tom. After lashing the Queen's body to an improvised sledge and collecting her treasure and the contents of the Dolgaunt's chest in room 7, the party left the dungeon, heading for home.
*Events 1 & 2*
Travack stopped the party as they left the excavation site and gave them his spiel, but the party asked for a way to contact him without telling him they already had the amulet. After dropping off the Queen's body at a tannery, they headed home for a good night's rest. The next morning, on the way to the library to research what it was they'd just killed, the party was ambushed by Vestran's thugs, and prompty killed and routed all but one of them, who they interrogated in a nearby alley. After babbling about the Dragon Below for a time, the thug let slip that he was fighting to avenge the Queen, and bit off his own tongue.
This left our heroes somewhat disturbed, but they proceeded onward to the library, and armed with the knowledge that they possessed a nearly intact Bright Naga specimen, they headed on to the Morgrave Museum of Natural History, where they found a curator who them promised payment appropriate to the quality of the specimen. The rest of the session was taken up in banking, the sale of goblin relics, and similar logistical fun, although the group also recruited an NPC to accompany them on their next delve into the dungeon.
A few comments on the adventure and Eberron's flavor in general:
* The first thing my players did after killing the Queen was to ask how damaged her body was, so they could sell it to a museum. I suspect this was partially motivated by the fact that a prior visit to Thurias Tower after the Forgotten Forge impressed on them that antiquities and rare specimens are quite valued, and is partially just the pulp trapping rubbing off on my game. Either way, it's a trend I like.
* Adamantine Body (the warforged feat) is just brutally effective. Tom has had AC 21 since 1st level, and that'll only increase once Qual picks up Craft Wondrous Item. It's not really a problem, as running a 3-player game means that the party either needs to be a bit tougher than normal, or encounters have to be adjusted to compensate (by adding friendly NPCs or lowering ELs).
* I really didn't expect the party to head straight for the Queen and take her out, so I'm glad that the adventure had instructions on what to do if that happened. Things lose a bit of their drama with both the Queen and Vestran's thug brigade dead... but I suppose it beats having three PCs being kidnapped and having to fight Vestran, the Queen, and hordes of thugs and cultists unprepared.
Anyway, now that I've run most of it, I must say I'm liking the Queen with Burning Eyes a lot more than I did on paper. The dungeon crawl itself isn't particularly outstanding, but the event-based stuff surrounding it and the world context really work for me.
I also ran The Queen With Burning Eyes adventure with a party of three (two and a character-driven NPC, actually), and Alec is dead on with his assessment. It's a lot better in play than it seems on paper.
I've read a lot of posts where someone is bashing it, but it was a great little adventure, although the ending made the ending of Shadows of the Last War predictable.
The Party: (using classes from Unlikely Heroes, by Plot Device)
Human Laborer, blacksmith
Goblin Noble, and her servant
Hobgoblin Professional
I ran it with Vestran actually joining the group, waiting for a chance to subdue the characters before they made it to the end encounter. It turned out to be a classic:
Vestran helped out clearing some of the rooms (seeing them as intruders to his cause), and the players trusted him implicitly. When they got to the ghouls, all three were paralyzed. They looked at me, and said, "Well, I hope Vestran can finish them off..."
Then Vestran called the ghouls off the attack, and smiled as he went up to each of the paralyzed characters and whomped 'em into unconsiousness.
They awoke, bound, laying in separate arcane circles, just in time to see the queen herself come up from the pit in the center of the room.
Then one of the young nobles freed the biggest PC (the blacksmith), who then went toe to toe against the naga.
At the end, they were subjected to give up the amulet to the agents of the Emerald Claw, and they still hate that they didn't keep ahold of it.
They didn't kill the young nobles, but to add insult to injury, they went to the parents of each of the youth, and recommended that they learn the value of honest work... by working a month in a forgehold in the Cogs.
I loved it.
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I really liked Queen with Burning Eyes. I think James Wyatt did a great job and the players I judged the game for still reference it when discussing other adventures. I refereed a party of four PCs through Vestan's mine below The Cogs, all first level initially, but advanced to second after their first foray into the mine.
kalashatar psychic warrior
shifter barbarian (longtooth)
half elf hex blade
warforged fighter
I made some initial coomments on this forum - that were of course met with disdain and dislike. So, I'm glad to see others whom enjoyed QwBE. It is a fun adventure if you sit down and play. Here is the other thread:
http://www.paizo.com/paizo/messageboards/dungeon/generalDiscussion/queenWit hBurningEyesRave
-------- Don (Greyson) --------
Salt Lake City, Utah
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I also played Queen with Burning Eyes, but i adapted it to the forgotten realms campaign setting with little diffculty by combining the adventure with Serpent Kingdoms.
The only major changes i had made was that it took place in Sundabar(The Silver marches)and that the order of the emearld claw were agents of the arcane brotherhood.
After a two week hiatus, my party finished off the Queen with Burning Eyes last night. Having recruited Kettrin the Inscribed (a female wizard) to back them up, they returned to the excavation and exterminated the giant spider, along with Krang and his hordes of kobolds. As they headed down to Area 10, however, Sheldon heard a man in the room with the pit berating his followers for being unsucessful in acquiring the PCs as sacrifices!
Bursting into the sacrificial chamber, the PCs made short work of Vestran and the surviving thugs, though they were somewhat disturbed to find that his armor and his greatsword were attached to his body through plugs of flesh that fit into sphincter-like sockets on his body. (This was foreshadowing for a plot involving the daelkyr and Vallorians from Malhavoc Press's Legacy of the Dragons.) After scraping off the fleshy attachments, the party headed home to their flat in the cogs, only to discover, as they came closer, that their home was in flames!
On their arrival, the heroes discovered that Demise and Travack had animated several of the PCs' neighbors as undead and destroyed the artificer's apartment and notes. Enraged by Demise's demand that they turn over their golden prize, the heroes turned successive waves of undead and burned through all their remaining action points as Travack, the Emerald Claw soldiers, and the animated forms of former friends sought to bring them down. In the end, Demise fled for her life as the last of her soldiers fought to the death to cover her escape.
Having finished the adventure, I really like the sense of context that the Queen with Burning Eyes presents in its sidebars and scheduled event encounters. As I mentioned earlier, the dungeon itself is a bit static, save for room 11, and it would have been nice to have advice on having the monsters react to events outside of their immediate area. OTOH, I love the sheer number of hooks that the adventure introduces into the game, as my characters were very frightened of selling Vestran's gear on the open market, for fear of political and personal reprisals, now have a reason to visit Xen'drik, and hate and abominate both the Emerald Claw and the Cults of the Dragon Below.
Overall, a solidly enjoyable adventure, although I would have appreciated it if I didn't have to flip from page to page quite so much when running Events 2 and 3.