WARNING: Potential Spoilers ahead.
Now that I have both played and run this module I can safely say this one of my favorite T1s around.
Excellent roleplay opportunities and a bit of puzzle solving, plus the challenges themselves were enjoyed immensely by my players. Be sure to make a fanfare of it! Clap, laugh, use your announcer voice like a wrestle match. Gralm was great to roleplay. The adventure does not offer much guidance on how to handle the roleplay though, so prepare some lines/demmands in advance.
I would add that the tanagram can be very time consuming and a bit of a letdown to slog through all three. If time looks like an issue (and it likely will be), just give them one of the shapes (the house) and leave it at that.
Fights wise, the Hobgoblin has nearly murdered a PC in one hit both times I've seen this mod, especially if you bump him to captain. Be careful not to accidentally kill someone 15mins into the module. Final fight is cool, but I would swap out the halfling wizard's spell list to make him more threatening. Just mirror image makes him difficult to deal with - add magic missiles and blindness/deafness as debuffs and the party will see him as a real threat. For added fluff, I had it seem like he was animating the animals that were attacking them (mechanically, they were as in the stat-block, but this was a circus after all, and all these dolls are lying around...)
The only thing I dislike about the module was the incoherence of the plot/npcs. Oblivilish's motivations felt weak, as did the presence of the wizard. Make up your own reasons or try to tie it together better - for me, I made the halfling wizard an agent of Fruul looking to disrupt Gralm and pressure him into joining. The pixies were bribed with candy.
Ratings:
- Combat: 6.5/10 (hobgoblin cap can accidentally murder a low-level T1, final fight against wizard can use some spicing up but has a lot of potential to be made interesting)
- Puzzles: 7/10 (fey crossings and puzzles are interesting but can waste a lot of time)
- Social: 9/10 (Gralm is a treat to play, the competition using strength and cons means even non-charisma characters feel valuable in negotiations)
- Explore: 5/10 (Pretty linear approach, but feels quite organic anyway)
|