Dungeons and Dragons Adventurer Magazine Review Index

I've been reading through Hachette's D&D Adventurer part work and giving my opinions. To make things easier for readers I'm linking to all my individual reviews here.  I'll keep this page updated with links to all my reviews.  There has been a lot of interest in the magazine, especially from overseas.  As the run continues it is becoming increasingly difficult to find it in the shops.  Some newsagents are happy to reserve a copy, though experience with other part works has shown this to be unreliable.  

Hachette do take subscriptions, but they are only for UK addresses.

Just a few words; I'm an experienced D&D player and DM, and I'm not really the target audience (and I  already have plenty of dice), so if you are relatively new to the game you may have a very different opinion.

It's my intention to read through the first eleven issues, which covers the first Adventure, and should give a good idea of where the part work is heading.  

Full disclosure; I bought these myself (in conjunction with a friend to spread the cost).

My first thoughts based on looking through Issue one

A more in depth look at Issue one

Issue two

Issues three and four

Issues five and six

Issue seven

Issue eight 

Issue nine

Issue ten

Issue eleven

Issue twelve

Bonus issue thirteen

Dungeons and Dragons Adventurer Issue 7

Yes, another week, another part work, though this was two weeks coming due to 'production issues '. Perhaps there was a shortage of glow worms for the dice?

Sage Advice

Sage advice completes the conditions started in issue 3? with Exhaustion, Grappled, Paralysed, Petrified and Stunned (once placed in a ring binder these will be adjacent pages), then a page looking at currency. There's a bit on different types of treasure along with a description of the different standard coins. 

I do like the sentence for each giving an idea of the sort of things one such coin will buy. 

Then a page introducing puzzles. Sample puzzles are given, along with ways to integrate them into an adventure. The importance of the DM being prepared for the players failing is mentioned. There are no mechanics for puzzles given, perhaps in future issues? 

Puzzles are a divisive issue in D&D. There is an argument that puzzles properly only test the players, not their characters, relying on the players to work out the answer from their own knowledge. Conversely, the solution can simply require one or a series of successful dice rolls, player skill has no bearing, except, perhaps, in choice of skills.

The final Sage Advice page looks at Actions and Bonus Actions, including a list of possible Actions in combat. There was a similar list in issue one in the combat booklet.

Character Creation

Character creation looks at weapons and armour over two pages. Complete lists are given, along with the definitions of the keywords. 

At last, the heroes have something to spend their treasure on.

Finally, an introduction to gnomes, as we are getting a new pre generated character soon - every DM's favourite, the gnome bard.

Lore

This issue has no lore section.

Conclusion

I found this issue a little underwhelming. Completing the conditions, for instance, or a full two sides on coins and currency.  Both these articles contain something of use, but nothing I felt really exciting.

This is an issue that the format emphasises.  There are some parts of the rules that may be important for play, but are pretty mundane.  Important, but not exciting,  they do need to be included.

The puzzles articles is it's saving grace, though as I mentioned above, including puzzles in an adventure is very much a matter of personal taste (This short video addresses the issue rather well I feel).

A quick check on Amazon shows that equivalent dice are £7.59 for a set, so I suppose the cover price is still worth it.

If you want glow in the dark dice.

And finally...

Encounter - Graywind's Conundrum

This should have been excellent. A puzzle box that the players/characters have to solve. It ties into this issue's pages covering both gnomes and puzzles. There is a nice reward for solving it, but sadly the actual solving requires very little choice from the players.

They have to choose the correct order in which to do six tasks, but these tasks are simple Dexterity checks. There are consequences for failed checks, such as combats or effects applying conditions to the characters, but nothing to stop repeated attempts, other than a time limit for the whole exercise.  

The earlier article on puzzles discusses the use of props, and the encounter suggests that the DM show a picture of the cube to the players. However there is only one picture of it in the Encounter (there is a nice picture of a different cube on the first page, but that's an irrelevance) and it only shows two of the faces. It seems as if each Encounter gets one or two new pieces of artwork, I would suggest that an exploded diagram of the cube faces would have been far more useful here.

A couple more grumbles; it's another Encounter where the characters just happen upon an NPC who asks them for help. There's no extra information given on the NPC, though the assumption is that the PCs will be spending their treasure at her shop. A page or two for DMs on how to start adventures would be really useful (to be fair, it may yet be presented in the future), but the series seems happy sticking to the format of the rest of the Encounters with their 'you just happen across' hooks.

There's another example of wrong artwork here as well. One of the monsters has a half page illustration, but it's actually of a different monster. Both constructs, but not the same, and the picture is misleading as to it's capabilities.  If they couldn't find a picture of the actual creature that would have been another use for new artwork, though I'm pretty sure that earlier editions featured suitable illustrations.

This is an Encounter that works OK, but I had such hopes for it.  Since I have been so scathing, perhaps I should offer some suggestions for improving it?

Make your own version of the box.  You'll have to redesign the different faces, but that also allows you to remove references to wombats!  In essence, each face needs a different number of creatures, and those creatures should have some sort of tenuous link to the effect triggered if they are chosen out of sequence.  I'll leave you to decide what, as it may well depend upon the lore in your game (or real world folklore that you and your players are aware of).  I'd certainly keep the dragon and the six hound creatures.  Dormice might work instead of badgers, with a sleep effect.  In fact, different colour dragon heads with appropriate traps could work for some of the faces.

6mm Dwarves for Fantastic Battles

As I mentioned previously, I'm putting together some 6mm Fantastic Battles armies using minis from my pile of shame.

I have decided that one of my first armies will be dwarves, partly because they are a relatively elite force, so I shouldn't need too many, and partly because I have quite a few already painted; they just need basing for Fantastic Battles (besides, they make great opposition for Bodvoc's Naughty Elves, and my orcs and goblins, if I ever get around to them).

Building the Army

Now Irregular do both Dwarves and Dark Dwarves, and of course I have quite a few of both. The former are one of their first 6mm armies. The detail is subtle, and they are slightly smaller than their dark kin, but overall they fit together pretty well.  None of my Dark Dwarves are painted.  No doubt when I bought them I intended them to be an army in their own right, but Fantastic Battles has lots of options for troop types, and I reckon the Dark Dwarves will provide the elites for my dwarves.  They give me pikes, crossbows and halberds in addition to spears, axes, crossbows, heroes and artillery from the original range.  

Looking at the sample Dwarf Kingdoms list in Fantastic Battles, I  can match a lot of the troop types there.  It does include Outcasts, which are basically berserkers.  I've never been fond of this trope for dwarves, but it would be nice to have something a bit different, so I'll include some Rangers whose job is to keep the trade roads open. These can easily done using a mix of the axe armed dwarves and the crossbows.  I'm not sure about Miners, it would be nice to have something to make use of the new Emerge trait, but I'm not sure what minis to use.

I'll use the Dark Dwarf Halberdiers as Royal Guard and the Pikes as City Watch.  I'm tempted to paint up some of the Crossbows as hunters to guard the royal family and fetch delicacies for the kings' table.

The Dark Dwarf command strips should provide the Warlord (The Dwarf King) and his various Captains, and the older Dwarf range will provide the bulk of the army; Clansdwarves, Clansdwarf crossbows and Militia (using the spear armed dwarves)

I'm short of anything fast though, I did think that the Irregular range included dwarves on ponies, which would give some sort of cavalry, but I was mistaken (probably confusing the 6mm range with the 15mm range).  So I decided that my dwarves, who I'm calling the Dwarves of the White Mountain, ally with the centaurs of the plains.  After all, the centaurs have to get their horseshoes from somewhere, and where better than from the best smiths in the world?  The centaur range gives me centaur archers and centaur spears/lancers.  I'm tempted to go with the Classical image of bucolic wine drinkers and give them the Stimulants trait.

I'm even tempted to make some crude stone constructs for Earth Elementals to add something a bit bigger to the list.

The Biggest Army starts with a Single Company (or three)

I've rebased some of the stuff I already painted (though a lot of it has gone missing - it'll turn up eventually).  This is a temporary measure while I paint up unpainted stuff, and I'll gradually replace the older dwarves, which will then be brought up to the current standard.

Rebased Clansdwarves

And how they looked before.  I think I must have based them for Hordes of the Things at one time, but I've no recollection of that project

So far I've got two companies painted, though the centaurs were already undercoated and drybrushed brown, so just needed a few little details.  As they are light troops, I cut the strip up to make a less ordered company.  The Dark Dwarf halberdiers, which are now the Royal Guard, were fun to paint, and pretty quick too.  There's enough detail to pick bits out, but not so much that your trying to paint belts or buttons on everything.  The White Mountain uses green and blue in it's heraldry, with a white mountain in the middle on flags and standards (where big enough for such detail).  Units get a distinguishing colour as well.  For the Guard, it's their purple cloaks, though of course I haven't shown this in the photo below.

Dark Dwarf Halberdiers (Royal Guard) and Centaur archers awaiting base finishing

6mm Fantastic Battles

When I did my look back at abandoned projects to celebrate 50,000 views I mentioned a couple of pre-blog projects.  One of these was 6mm fantasy using Irregular Miniatures range of figures.  Bodvoc (or Merlin as he was then known) and I first tried writing our own rules based on, if I recall correctly, a set of SciFi rules from one of the wargaming magazines.  It used a combination of ordinary d6 and average dice*.  I recently found my notes, and I may type them up just for nostalgia's sake, though I doubt we'll be revisiting them for actually play.  While there was nothing wrong with them , we never quite sorted any form of points costings, so battles could be a bit unequal (there is an argument for unequal games being more 'realistic', as few generals would willingly engage in battle unless they felt they had an advantage, but for testing new rules, balanced games are important).

Anyway, the project died off over time, but we revisited the scale years later (2015) with our fantasy version of Neil Thomas' One Hour Wargames Rules.  This was fun, but it came at a time when our gaming opportunities were limited by time and distance, so it eventually died off, to be replaced by another bright new shiny game, no doubt.

Now I'm in the process of thinning out my collection (I know, again. But this is a more comprehensive exercise involving looking through all my possessions, even books and music!) and either using or getting rid of stuff.  No keeping stuff on the off chance I might get around to it sometime in the future**.  So what to do with the 6mm fantasy?

I enjoy Fantastic Battles, and have quite a bit of 10mm stuff which is painted up for Middle Earth gaming.  However, there are certain aspects of the rules that don't have a place in our vision of Middle Earth, and I do like the idea of games that aren't set elsewhere, with armies and abilities that don't belong in Tolkien's world.  I'm not rebasing my 15mm Kings of War stuff, and I'm not planning on buying a load more minis just for this, but I've still got the old Irregular Fantasy minis in my garage, some of them are even painted!  Sounds ideal.

Bodvoc has already experimented with basing some of the Irregular Dark Elves for Fantastic Battles, so we have a standard base width of 25mm.  I happen to have quite a few of the Renedra 25mm plastic bases and they are ideal.  Now all I have to do is find the 6mm stuff, decide what to do first and get painting.  I should have quite a few dwarves, orcs and goblins from the previous projects, so that might give me a good few just to base up.  Alternatively I might decide that they are all so awful that I need to start again, so off to the pile of shame to start digging.

* A staple of pre GW wargames, average dice were numbered 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 5, giving a narrower spread and emphasising the middle results.  They tended to be used for regular troops as they were more predictable.  Irregular troops used a standard d6, with the possibility of extremes.

** I am, of course, aware of the irony here. If I hadn't kept the 6mm fantasy just on the off chance, I wouldn't be doing this project.

Artefacts From My Gaming Past 4 - More Orc's Drift Pictures

While doing some long-overdue clearing out today, I found a couple of photos from a long ago game.

The photos weren't in great condition, but I've scanned them as best I can, and they are fun.  At least, they bring back fun memories to me.

Orcs assault the barricade, stout dwarven defenders try to hold them back

The orcs force their way forwards and into the compound

Now I'm not completely sure, but I think they are from the final Orc's Drift game I had with Bodvoc (then Merlin) and his gaming group.  I've posted a couple of pictures of the game before.  I think these are later in the action, it doesn't look good for the dwarves!

Budget Painting Handles

For a long while I've used bottle tops as paint handles. They do the job, but as my hands get older I'm finding it painful to hold them for long periods of time.  Recently I used an old toothpaste lid which was taller and more comfortable to hold*, but top heavy; fine for light minis (like the goblins I painted here, check out the first photo of the third goblin) but not ideal. However, turned upside down they were much more stable, but with no upper surface. Clearly I needed to fill in the void.

The obvious material was hot glue and I added a metal nut for extra weight and stability. I finished it off with a milk bottle cap, which I trimmed down once the glue had cooled.  I'll use blu tac to hold minis in place.

The raw materials, just add hot glue

All stuck together

Trimmed and finished

This works fine for minis with bases, but if I'm preparing minis for clear basing I remove the broccoli base and glue wire into the feet.  In the past I used crocodile clips to hold the mini for painting (as with the Apache band here), fastened to BBQ skewers, and stuck in holes drilled in a block of wood. This tends to be a bit unstable and fiddly.

I decided I might as well upgrade these too, and thought about just filling in with hot glue around the skewers. Then I tried the bolts that came with the nuts I used earlier and they fit nicely in the tops and the clips screwed onto the thread. Much better!

The raw materials, again, just add hot glue

Clip screwed on to the bolt

Two completed painting handles

So two different model paint handles at very little cost. The only outlay was a pack of eight nuts and bolts from the local 'cheap stuff' shop. 

I've not used them much yet, but they are bound to be more comfortable than the old caps or the skewers. 

I'm sure other toothpaste lids would work, or indeed other lids or tops. They just need to be relatively tall compared to the width to keep them stable.

EDIT:  Crocodile clips are easy to get hold of online, 5 amp clips are sufficient.  The nuts and blots were 40mm long M4 bolts, which are just the right size for the clips and long enough to attach the clip to, but not so long as to be unstable.

*I've been saving these for a while simply because they have an interesting shape.  I have used them as rocket exhausts in scrap piles.

D&D Adventurer Magazine parts 5 & 6

I'm continuing to look through these.  It's now possible to work out roughly where they are heading and what they are covering by looking at the Hachette website.  They are starting a new Adventure in issue 12, so I'll probably finish with issue 11 (always assuming I can find them, they are getting thinner on the shelves - which is normal for partworks).

Both issue continue to develop all four of the sections, and I'm getting a better idea how these are put together now.  

Issue Five

Sage Advice covers the Three Pillars (exploration, social interaction and combat) in a very general way. A nice touch is suggestions for including aspects of one pillar within another. 

Then there are pages covering the different ways time passes in the game and how different light levels affect characters. 

Finally there's a section on damage resistance, vulnerability and immunity.

Character Creation covers the fighter class. As with the previous classes, there is a page of background and a page on first level features.

Lore covers the Neverwinter Wood. While it would have been nice to have details of potential wandering monsters, there is a very useful map of the region. This is the same area as the big map in issue two, but has the adventure locations from both Lost Mine and Icefire Peak marked, along with short paragraphs describing them. 

The second Monsters page looks at skeletons. No stats unfortunately, it looks like these will only ever be included in the Encounters.

The freebie in issue five is another set of dice, the third so far.

Issue six 

This issue is mostly concerned with levelling up. 

Sage Advice is a single page looking at magic items and discussing attunement. 

Character Creation is a large section, with an overview of levelling up and giving details of hit point increases. 

Then a page about Orcs as a character race followed by four pages detailing the new stuff the four classes covered so far gain at second level. If you're building up the collection in binders, these pages slot in after the relevant class sections covering first level abilities.

Lore continues the orc theme by looking at the Kingdom of Many Arrows.

Issue six also includes another dice tin and set of dice (two tins and four dice sets now, plus the bigger D20) and four more character sheets promoting the pre-gens to second level.

As previously, I'll look at the Encounters at the end, so you can avoid them if you don't want spoilers.

Summary

Honestly, for me the Encounters are the draw in the magazines. I've found useful stuff in nearly all of them. I will also be sharing the relevant class information pages with any new players in my campaign, though so far this covers only the options chosen for the pre-gens. 

It's interesting to see how the information is presented, and also how things have changed since fifth edition was first published. The inclusion of orcs as a player race so early in the run marks quite a shift. Previously, you had to wait until Volo's Guide to Monsters for this.  It emphasises the shift towards treating the different races as all essentially neutral, with certain individuals, perhaps, giving them a bad name.

The page on levelling up confirms that the Adventures use milestone XP, but does mention XP points as an alternative method.

The features at second level are designed specifically for the pre-gens. Whilst this is fine, and only what the starter sets do, I'd hoped that the collection would build up into a complete set of rules. There is a suggestion that other wizard schools will be covered in future ( the halfling has abduration), but there's no option for readers to make different choices. Of course, D&D Beyond is an option, though it isn't specifically mentioned here.

Given the total cost of the collection, I was hoping that more choices would have been covered.

The Encounters

The Crypt of the Elf Lord is almost brilliant.  It's another one I'm stealing for my campaign.  Briefly, the adventurers follow a lead from Carp Alderleaf, who, judging from his role as 'finder of concealed places' in The Lost Mine of Phandalin, must be a bit of a tear-away.  The crypt  is the last resting place of an Elven king and his crony's.  There is a trap, a puzzle, potentially a couple of combats and a nice treasure.  

However, the crypt is accessible for 'a few nights' only,  and characters can get trapped in it if they remain for more than eight hours.  The Encounter gives no method of escape, meaning a potential TPK. It's relatively easy to address this though, here are a few options that immediately occurred to me.

Extend the time limit and warn the players; Carp got trapped in the crypt for a day, only able to escape the following evening.  Thus he can both inform the characters of the location of the crypt, and warn them that it is likely to be difficult to get out (though he won't know that this is the last chance for a year).  The characters could even start the Encounter by looking for Carp after he fails to return home rather than the hook as given.

Foreshadow the danger; What if others managed to get into the crypt but fell afoul of the transitory nature of the entrance?  The remains of a couple of adventurers will show that there is some danger.  Maybe they are the ones who conveniently placed the silver coins in the goblet, but were unable to solve the rest of the puzzle.  One of them has a bundle of papers that note star constellations, especially Lavarandar's Lantern, with a mention of the dates it should be visible in the night sky.

Make another exit; If we assume that the crypt exists on both the material plane and the Feywild, presumably it should be possible to exit into the Feywild at other times.  The actual exit might only be present in the Material Plane, but the characters should be able to dig to freedom with appropriate Strength checks.

Queen of Scars has yet more orc action. It's an interesting Encounter, presenting a problem with several ways of solving it, though it's clearly intended that the problem be talked through rather than fought through. I'd have liked to have seen the titular Queen being a bit tougher, but that would make a violent solution much harder (its already very tough to fight to a win here). 

It's nice that the Encounters are demonstrating that there should be non-combat Encounters as part of a balanced Adventure, and although the writer discusses various ways of solving the problem, this is not prescriptive.  There are also repercussions to the solution chosen, which should influence the way the characters are viewed in Phandalin going forward.