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Michael Smith
Mini-Dungeon #017: Shadows of Madness
For 4-6 Characters of Levels 6-7
Many years ago Tibor, a wizard with an overwhelming desire for knowledge of the plane of shadow, locked himself away in a tower to pursue his studies.
Shortly thereafter, his tower was consumed in a dark explosion, and the mage was assumed dead. However, assumption can never be taken as fact, and now the PCs have stumbled upon a hidden stairway where the tower once stood, leading down into the shadowy earth below…
5E Mini-Dungeons are single page, double sided adventures for 5th Edition which are setting agnostic and are easily inserted anywhere in your campaign.
$1.99
5th Edition, Mini-Dungeons1 review for Mini-Dungeon #017: Shadows of Madness
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An Endzeitgeist.com review
This pdf clocks in at 2 pages and is a mini-dungeon. This means we get 2 pages content, including a solid map and all item/monster-stats hyperlinked and thus, absent from the pdf, with only deviations from the statblocks being noted for the GM. Oh, and the series now comes in an archive that also contains…*drumroll* a .jpg-version and a .tif-version of the map! Yeah, that’s pretty amazing! The dungeon’s number-less version of the map doesn’t sport any deceptive trap icons or traps – kudos, though the place where the secret doors are can still be gleaned by proximity…but if you conceal that part, it works well. In short: Full, proper VTT-support and help for guys like yours truly that can’t draw maps.
Since this product line’s goal is providing short diversions, side-quest dungeons etc., I will not expect mind-shattering revelations, massive plots or particularly smart or detailed depictions, instead tackling the line for what it is. Got that? Great!
This being an adventure-review, the following contains SPOILERS. Potential players may wish to jump to the conclusion.
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Still here?
All right!
Wizards strive as wizards are wont to do, for knowledge – and much like dwarves digging too deep, they are prone to being destroyed by this thirst for knowledge. Exactly that has, alas, happened to a wizard names Tibor – and now the PCs have found a stair amid the rubble of his former tower.
In this small dungeon, the PCs will fight undead foes and ultimately, save a woman -who was kidnapped by ogres to facilitate the planned retribution of said aforementioned wizard . This guy, now, driven mad by gibbering mouthers, constitutes the boss of this dungeon.
Loot-wise, there is a mirror of life-trapping to be found here, and skill-wise, you’ll find the usual: Doors to break down or crack…and no social interaction, which highlights a weakness of this module
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are very good, I noticed no significant glitches apart from the hyperlinks – there are quite a few that don’t work, which is a bit annoying. Layout adheres to a beautiful 2-column full-color standard and the pdf comes sans bookmarks, but needs none at this length. Cartography is full color and surprisingly good for such an inexpensive pdf. The pdf does sport one nice piece of original full-color art – which I’d applaud, were it not for the fact that it depicts a bugbear, which was present in the PFRPG-version…but doesn’t show up in the 5E-iteration. The cartography, with player and GM-VTT-maps, is nice.
Michael Smith delivered a nice mini-dungeon in its original iteration. Alas, Kyle Crider has done better conversions in the past. You see, this mini-dungeon, in the original, was pretty much defined by its strong shadow-leitmotif, with templated foes, rare enemies and a medium to save – all of this has been lost in translation, when a couple of minor modifications could have retained that feeling. In short, this leaves the mini-dungeon very much bereft of its soul and renders it much more generic in its 5E-iteration. The damsel to save, relevant in the original, is relegated to commoner status and once again, there is no social skill component here. While not bad per se, this is also a long shot from what I’d consider great. My final verdict will clock in at 2.5 stars, rounded up due to in dubio pro reo.
Endzeitgeist out.