A review copy of “Drop-in Dungeons Tier 1” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel. Support my reviews via Patreon.

Designed by: Beatriz T. Dias

Some of my favorite supplemental material for Dungeons & Dragons (and tabletop RPGs in general) are one-shot dungeons. I’ve used a dungeon from Kobold Press’ Book of Lairs for our Princes of the Apocalypse campaign, and plan on including one from Prepared 2 in Tomb of Annihilation.

“Drop-in Dungeons Tier 1” provides the same concept on a much cheaper level. Five fairly generic dungeons are included, using material from the Monster Manual and Dungeon Master’s Guide. The dungeons aren’t particularly unique or memorable (save one), however, and I strongly dislike the black and white graph paper art style for the maps.

The compilation includes five dungeons, which I’ve summarized as follows:

• A warehouse full of kenku, designed for level 1
• A crumbling temple full of plant monsters (blights), designed for level 2.
• A brothel with some nobles and thugs, for level 3.
• A forest cave home to a druid, beasts, and a lake of healing, for level 4.
• An active temple full of cultist worshiping a dark god, for level 4.

None of those fall into the low-level tropes of rats in a cellar or goblins in a cave, yet they’re also mostly generic by design. It’s easy to throw them into commonly used areas, like cities and forests, which is entirely the point.

Out of the five, only the brothel really caught my eye as something unique and memorable, though it’s disappointingly mundane, with a few patrolling guards and a thug who runs it. Still, the pair of panthers lounging on silk pillows is a nice touch.

None of the dungeons have any kind of story or hooks to get the PCs interested – these are drop-in dungeons in the truest sense. It would’ve been a nice bonus to have some sort of story or quest, however. It’s something I’m glad to see in bigger one-shot dungeon compilations like Prepared.

The only dungeon to get any kind of background lore or expanded information is the last one, which gives a few notes on the dark god that the cultists worship, but it all boils down to “they kill people.”

But what it really comes down to are the map themselves. The blank ink on graph paper design gets a hard pass from me every time. My group and I enjoy tactical battle maps for our dungeon crawling, and this minimalist style is essentially unusable as is – negating the whole concept of a drop-in dungeon.

There’s a lot of nice detail and things going on in each room, but none of that is physically represented on the maps. I would have to build each one from scratch, and that’s a big turn-off to using them in the first place.

Pros: 

• Does what it says on the tin: 5 fairly generic dungeons designed to drop in to existing campaigns.
• A range of leveled dungeons are provided throughout Tier 1 (levels 1-4).
• A brothel is a neat and unique idea for a ‘dungeon.’

Cons:

• The maps are black lines on graph paper – not a style I like nor can use on something like Roll20.
• A few typos and grammatical errors.

The Verdict: “Drop-in Dungeons” provides a cheap and easy way to add some low level dungeons to your campaign, though the actual map art is disappointingly bare.

A review copy of “Drop-in Dungeons Tier 1” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel. Support my reviews via Patreon.

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Previously on Tomb of Annihilation

Starring:
Mannix, level 2 Human Rogue
Khaless, level 2 Half-Drow Rogue
Therin, level 2 Hill Dwarf Druid

As the only major city in the entire campaign, Port Nyanzaru has a lot to offer. Shopping, hiring guides, racing dinosaurs, and lots of interesting quest hooks. I’ve read and seen many reports of players getting out of Port Nyanzaru as fast as possible to begin their jungle excursion, but I was ready to relish this unique city by throwing several major events and quest chains for my PCs.

In this week’s session we learned about the various guides the PCs can hire, teased the upcoming dinosaur race, and visited the Temple of Savras, which lead to multiple quest chains – including a rather thrilling rescue mission around Executioner’s Run.

The PCs reached level 2 after their first long rest in Port Nyanzaru. In the lobby area of the Thundering Lizard Inn, they found a notice board that included details on the guides, the dinosaur races, and the Temple of Savras.

I showed each guide’s handout, with the option to follow up with the innkeeper on each one. Obviously Hew Hackinstone is of particular interest to my group, since I made him part of Therin’s backstory and personal quest. I told them the guides would be available later for proper interviews.

My PCs don’t have much money (or so I thought) so there wasn’t much shopping to be done around the marketplace or Grand Souk. They went towards the Temple of Savras since they’re all looking for something or someone, and Savras’ divination could prove useful.

I had an encounter planned en route. When passing by an alleyway near the docks, they heard the sounds of a struggle. A jockey was beating beaten by a group of goons from Merchant Prince Ifan, and his hadrosaurus was in the middle of being repo’d.

Khaless went stealth mode while Mannix and Therin actually strode right up to them.

We were short two players this week. I made the decision to simply keep Gillian and George out of the session. It was easy story-wise since we were in the middle of a city and with milestone XP we don’t have to worry about anyone missing out on progress. It also very much changed the power level of the party, and how they approached different situations in this session.

All three of them engaged in some diplomacy as they learned of the situation. Dengo owed Ifan the tidy sum of 40gp, and failed to win in any recent races to earn the money.

After a bit of back and forth, Khaless simply threw a coin bag with the full amount at the goons, shocking everyone – including me! Poor Therin and Mannix had literally thrown all their money at the dragon turtle encounter, creating an apparently huge wealth disparity between the party.

With the full debt paid, there was neither a fight nor CHA checks needed. The four goons left, and Dengo was quick to relinquish his racing dinosaur to the party. Not only does the party now own a hadrosaurus, but Therin was quick to use his druid skills to gain a new beast shape. They have several interesting options for the upcoming dinosaur race.

At the Temple of Savras the PCs met the head priest Grandfather Zitembe. He was in a heated discussion with a trio of rogues who left in a huff after he couldn’t find Artus Cimber for them.

Mannix stopped them and offered his own services as a detective, but they remained coy and suspicious. One of them did stop and slip a message to Mannix. His name was Rokah, and he told them to meet him back at the Inn later that night for a possible job.

Grandfather Zitembe was grateful for the intrusion, though he didn’t entirely warm up to the PCs (and their newly acquired dinosaur). In exchange for his divine guidance, he offered them a quest: to find a missing acolyte, Inete. The only lead was a patron whom she had gone to help.

The patron’s name was Viplo, a halfling merchant with a stall in the Grand Souk. Mannix did some detective work and learned a location in Old City by a ziggurat. They dropped off their dinosaur at the pens, picked up Undril from the Inn, and headed out of the city gates for the first time.

Like all the areas outside the walls, Old City was a poor district with practically its own system of law and order. In this case, criminals were thrown into a 100-ft gauntlet of a pit. They could earn their freedom if they made it to the other side.

A worried man ran up to the PCs begging for help. His husband, Draza, had been caught stealing, but he professed his innocence. He was being thrown into the pit along with a cage holding a pair of velociraptors. Dozens of people were cheering and taking bets at the poor man’s expense.

The party sprang into action. Therin cast Speak with Animals to get the raptors’ attention. Khaless distracted the nearby guards, while Mannix ran toward the other end of the pit, fastening a rope and signaling to Draza to escape.

The tension mounted as the guards quickly realized that Therin was some sort of dino-whisperer, and clearly interfering with Executioner’s Run. When the nearest guard attempted to arrest, then attack him, Therin morphed into a Giant Bear, and chaos erupted all around them.

The chaos helped Mannix finish rescuing Draza and secure his escape. Mannix cleverly pointed everyone in a different direction, sowing even more chaos.

Meanwhile the bear was causing a localized panic. One guard retreated from a vicious mauling while the other found himself wrapped around a vicious bear hug. Therin surprised everyone by rolling into down into the pit and using Speak with Animals to tell the raptors to have at it.

The raptors pounced gleefully, killing the poor guard while Therin-bear rolled away and climbed out of the pit.

More guards were approaching. Therin had the clever and heroic idea to split their egress, letting the others flee in a different direction while he drew very obvious attention to himself. He rounded a corner and de-morphed, effectively escaping the city’s wrath.

I was really impressed with the way the party handled this entire situation, using a combination of skill checks, deception, heroics, and some vicious violence. There wasn’t much of a reward for them – the two men lived in Old City and had only a few dozen silver to their name. But they did get a more exact location for Viplo’s residence.

I also loved that each of the three players got to shine this session: Khaless paying off the goons to buy the dinosaur, Mannix doing detective work to find Viplo, and Therin doing both beast-speak and morphing in a very chaotic situation. Everyone definitely earned inspiration.

Hopefully next week we’ll be back up to a full crew as we continue the search for Inete in Old City.

Streamed, recorded and uploaded every week. Subscribe for our weekly adventures. Join us live on Fridays at 7pm Pacific/10pm Eastern! 

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Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I still enjoy Scott Lynch’s writing style and characters, but this follow-up to The Lies of Locke Lamora is a bit too bloated, resulting in some odd pacing issues.

We don’t get to the pirate stuff (as evidenced on the cover) until much later in the book; until then it’s a casino heist that only circles back around at the very, very end. The casino heist peters out but the entire pirate plot line is absolutely fantastic, with a rich cast of characters and some much deeper emotional stakes.

Red Seas Under Red Skies thus ends up too long and too grandiose for its own good. A few chapters early on even add an additional timeline of events that happened after LoLL but before this one. They’re not bad at all, and I continue to enjoy learning more about this relatable fantasy world, but it makes getting through the first half of the book much more of a slog than it should have been. Thankfully the ending climax ramps up very nicely – I devoured the last 100+ pages in about a day.

Overall a worthy sequel but I wish it had done a bit less and focused entirely on the pirate plot line of the latter half.

View all my reviews

Read the full article at Pixelkin

I’m about a dozen hours into Dragon Quest 11: Echoes of an Elusive Age and the smile has rarely left my face. Dragon Quest is one of the most resilient RPG franchises in video game history. The latest installment proves why it’s such a winning formula by embracing its classic roots while sprinkling in many welcoming improvements and features.

If you’re a newcomer to the series, Dragon Quest is a bit like Final Fantasy. It’s a classic 50+ hour Japanese RPG with each entry a standalone adventure (save DQ 10, which was an MMO).

Read the full article at Pixelkin

A review copy of “Storm King’s Barrows: Tombs and Crypts of the North” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel. Support my work via Patreon.

Arranged by: Christian Eichhorn

One-shot dungeon designs are some of my favorite content to consume on the DMs Guild, and “Storm King’s Barrows: Tombs and Crypts of the North” is one of the biggest dungeon packs I’ve seen.

Taking its cues from the far-reaching Storm King’s Thunder campaign from Wizards of the Coast, “Storm King’s Barrows” includes over 130 pages featuring 10 mini-dungeons from 4th to around 10th level that all share a theme of exploring the dangerous caverns and crypts of the frozen north.

The dungeon pack includes the following 10 mini-dungeons, which I’ve summarized as follows:

• An underground temple full of ogres and a firbolg worshiping a dark god, designed for levels 1-4
• An excursion through a dwarven hall to hunt a xorn, designed for level 3.
• A miniature, light-hearted version of the Tomb of Horrors/Annihilation, designed for level 6.
• A black dragon lair in a mountain, designed for levels 7 to 15.
• A trapped crypt holding an undead wizard, designed for levels 7-8.
• A monster-filled mine in the midst of a hostile giant takeover, designed for levels 8-10.
• A wave of undead attacking a chapel, designed for levels 8-10.
• A cavern where an undead barbarian is rising an army of undead forces, designed for levels 8-12.
• An expanded Great Worm Caverns with undead, a demon, and a dragon, designed for levels 9-11.
• A demon-infested crypt with an evil warlock, designed for level 10.

The mini-dungeons range from meh to awesome, and thankfully it averages much more positive than negative. The dungeons average about 10 pages each, including most with custom monsters and magic items.

Each dungeon includes DM and Player’s maps, but unfortunately these are the Adventurer League style bare-bones maps, featuring black lines on graph paper. A hard pass from me every time.

All of them are specifically designed to slot into Storm King’s Thunder, most of them during the open world chapter that has the players hunting the giant relics all over the the northwestern part of Faerun. Of course, you aren’t limited to using them in Storm King’s Thunder, as much of these caves and tombs could fit in almost anywhere.

Oddly the adventures aren’t organized by level range. Instead I’ll cover them as they’re presented in the PDF.

Breve Heeros Onli is written by George Sager with the rather audacious level range of 7-15. It’s a shame that it’s the first adventure presented as I found it to be the weakest overall.

The PCs meet a fast-talking kobold who tries to lure the party into the lair of a black dragon inside a mountain. I don’t see any party falling for any of these schemes. In fact I see many simply threatening or even killing the kobold, then marching into the black dragon’s lair and murdering her.  There’s not much going on here and there’s way too many words spent on the kobold character.

Christian Eichhorn, the designer of the entire compilation, also wrote Geschmalig’s Tomb (level 10). It’s the largest dungeon of the bunch, and also one of my favorites. There’s a huge amount of rich backstory that reveals the titular barbarian’s tragic backstory as his best friend in life returns as an undead menace with an army at his disposal.

The PCs arrive at his lair to ally with some crafty grave-robbers, rescue some tribesfolk, and witness Udiken transforming the living into undead servants via a chemical vat, reminding me of how super mutants were created in the first Fallout. There’s a lot of great custom creatures and loot, as well as a compelling little story between the two undead barbarian war lords.

Grotto of the Death Giant (Eddie Gioffre) is the lowest level dungeon in the pack, designed for 4th level. It uses a lesser known giant god from the Greyhawk universe, Karontor. The giant connection pretty much ends there, as otherwise it’s a cave full of ogres that leads to a small temple where a firbolg is trying to start up a death cult. It’s short and mostly forgettable, though the boss battle with the avatar of the god could prove interesting.

Most of the adventures include giants in some way, but Saving Barbadoo’s Mine (Matt Butler, designed for level 9) uses them more directly than most. It has one of the best introductions: the PCs see what looks like a cloud on fire, only to discover a cloud giant’s house is being attack by a fire giant! They hear a child screaming and rush inside to help defend the 10-ft tall cloud giant child against a wyvern.

That leads them to a nearby mine, where the kid’s father has been taken captive by a rival fire giant who wants the brightsteel mine for himself.

The mine is absolutely crawling with monsters, almost at video game-level proportions, including grey oozes, piercers, ropers, and a bunch of xorn. The end features a nice boss battle with the fire giant, who’s able to control the xorn using the cloud giant’s necklace. A really fun, action-packed scenario crammed into a relatively small area.

Stone Giant’s Lost Rock (Micah Watt) is the other lower level mini-dungeon, designed for level 3. While a stone giant does indeed offer the party the quest, it’s actually more about a clan of dwarves having a difficult time with a xorn. The dungeon itself is kinda meh but there’s a good betrayal later on by the clan chief’s only daughter who had orchestrated the whole thing, providing an exciting twist at the end.

The Barovian Book of the Dead (Andre Dempz, level 9) doesn’t seem to fit the giant theme much – in fact it even mentions Strahd as the book’s owner. Yet it’s a neat scenario that feels much different than a standard tomb raid.

The PCs investigate a chapel and find an evil book. Upon touching the book (a book-seeking NPC is included in case the PCs are justifiably cautious), a veritable horde of undead is spawned in the area, and make their way to the chapel.

What follows is a Night of the Living Dead scenario (or every zombie scenario) where the party has to survive against waves of undead laying siege to their building. It culminates with a pair of giant skeletons who rip open the chapel to get to the book inside. A very memorable encounter whose concept could be adapted to multiple situations and areas.

The Great Worm Caverns (Christopher Walz, level 10) attempts to re-purpose and expand the same area from Storm King’s Thunder. The frozen caverns are home to several undead, including a goofy yet awesome zombie polar bear. A couatl guardian pleads for the PCs to defeat the white dragon Winterhorn and cleanse the cave of an evil demon.

I was particularly impressed with how much space is devoted to the white dragon’s tactics. Nearly a full page is dedicated to how Winterhorn uses his lair, his flight, and his range do maximize his potential against the party. As someone who often doesn’t use monsters to their full potential, I’m very grateful for these kinds of tactical lessons!

Creating a dungeon crawl by playfully mocking another dungeon is an odd recipe, but Jason Bakos does just that with the Tomb of Mild Discomfort (level 6). It rips entire sections out of the Tomb of Annihilation (not the campaign, the actual dungeon, which is itself a modernized version of the classic Tomb of Horrors). But the deathtraps are more silly and fun rather than horrible and deadly, including a talking skull that follows the PCs around and consistently annoys them, and traps that simply teleport the PCs back out of the dungeon.

It’s an interesting concept that could work very well with the right group and the right context, though it does feel a bit overly silly.

The Vault of the Undying (David Flor, level 7-8) is a mostly straight-forward dungeon crawl into a sealed tomb. There’s some very deadly traps preventing an undead wizard (a mini-lich at CR 6) from escaping. There’s not much story-wise in here but I do like the layout, the traps (including multiple keys, only one of which works correctly), and a very nice secondary boss battle against a giant scorpion construct that animates when the PCs try to leave.

Yancazi’s Crypt (Darren Parmenter, level 10) is yet another crypt, but this one features a lot more story elements, including a friendly NPC who’s mostly there to translate abyssal in case the party lacks that language. The party delves into the final resting place of a warlock who supposedly defeated the Demogorgon, but really ended up becoming a demon himself.

The upper half of the dungeon is filled with some nice environmental story-telling, while the lower half is filled with demons and demonic portals. The dungeon seems to have more in common with Out of the Abyss than Storm King’s Thunder, but it’s a solid demon-slaying excursion nonetheless.

Pros: 

• 10 dungeons with a huge amount of content, mostly for upper Tier 2 parties (levels 7-9).
• Each dungeon has multiple adventure hooks and flexible level scaling for weaker or stronger parties.
• Each of the contributing authors gets a nice paragraph blurb at the beginning.
• Some of the dungeons offer some really interesting and memorable moments and story beats, including an undead barbarian raising an army for his lost love, and rescuing a cloud giant child from a fire giant’s pet wyvern.

Cons:

• All of the maps are black and white graph paper style with no details. Player versions are provided but none of the maps are designed for digital tabletop or battlemap play.
• A few of the adventures don’t fit as well with the theme of giants or frozen tombs, notably the black dragon mountain lair, the demonic tomb, and the undead assaulting the chapel.

The Verdict: Even if you’re not running Storm King’s Thunder, “Storm King’s Barrows” provides an excellent assortment of mini-dungeons with some very memorable tomb raiding scenarios and battles.

A review copy of “Storm King’s Barrows: Tombs and Crypts of the North” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel. Support my work via Patreon.

Behind-the-scenes DM-only live stream of building and preparing our ongoing Tomb of Annihilation series.

Streamed live every Thursday.

Support the channel at https://www.patreon.com/Roguewatson

Read the full list on Pixelkin

When Sony announced the PlayStation Classic, they teased only five of the 20 included games: Final Fantasy 7, Jumping Flash, Ridge Racer Type 4, Tekken 3, and Wild Arms.

The original PlayStation has plenty of great classics to get excited about, so we’re listing the 15 other games we’d like to see on the mini emulator. Some of these games face an uphill battle given licensing and company restrictions, so consider this our dream list representing multiple genres and gameplay styles.

The PlayStation Classic is launching December 3.

Read the full list on Pixelkin

Adventuring through my backlog of games, one game at a time. 

Developer: Square
Publisher: Square Electronic Arts
Release Date: August 15, 2000
Played On: PSP

I have a somewhat complicated history with Chrono Cross. It’s one of my  all-time favorite RPGs, hell one of my all-time favorite games. I even named one our cats Lynx, and yeah, he’s kind of a jerk. But my secret shame is that I never actually beat the damn thing.

Now, almost two decades later, I finally did. Chrono Cross is still an amazing game whose early 3D graphics have aged better than most, but it’s not without some major design flaws that somewhat tarnished my teenage memories.

I actually owned Chrono Cross before I ever owned a PlayStation. In the late 90s/early 2000s, emulators were all the rage. We were going nuts over being able to download ROMs of SNES games and play them on our PCs. 8-bit and 16-bit games were easy, but modern CDs proved tricky. A PlayStation emulator existed, but you needed to own the actual game discs for it to work.

I was becoming more and more of a PC gamer at the time, but still loved a few Japanese RPGs, such as Suikoden 2 and Chrono Cross. I purchased and originally played both of those games on an emulator on my PC.

Unfortunately I reached a point about 3/4 through where my game consistently crashed during a boss fight in Chrono Cross. I couldn’t finish the game. Eventually I moved on.

Leaving it unfinished has been hanging over my head for years. I was a big fan of Chrono Trigger and the sequel had a large, diverse cast of characters, interesting battle system, and an amazing soundtrack. At one point I tried to start it up on an actual PlayStation (which I eventually bought a few years later for super cheap) but never got more than a few hours in.

This year I saw it on sale on the PlayStation Store, and was determined. My wife had won or earned (I forget) a Sony PSP-3000 a few years ago, and it had sat mostly unused in a closet. I dusted it off, ordered a new battery, downloaded Chrono Cross, and finally played through it all over again.

As a direct sequel to Chrono Trigger, Chrono Cross alters the time-theme quite a bit. It does away with time-traveling in favor of jumping between two distinct dimensions, and saves much of its sequel connections until the last few hours.

The opening is very cool, however, as our protagonist, Serge, falls into a time-hole and ends up in a bizarre alternate version of his world in which he had died as a child.

The story teases out the lovely, bright world of the El Nido archipelago while sprinkling in its many, many characters. I’ll be honest: there’s too many damn characters. Chrono Trigger had all of seven party members; the sequel added over 40. Having a huge cast is awesome in a series like Suikoden, which is all about gathering allies and building an army (not to mention having six people in your active party).

With Chrono Cross, however, you only ever have three people in your party, and one of them is your main character. It would take an annoying amount of grinding to get everyone up to speed, fully equipped, and have their Element grid filled out. It’s also frankly unnecessary as the game almost never forces any particular characters upon you. Other than a very major event at about the 1/3 point, you can feasibly take the same few people with you everywhere.

That major event is still chilling and fantastic. After you battle your way through the alternate world, making friends and uncovering mysteries, you reach a climax where the main villain, Lynx, murders your best bud as he and Serge literally switch bodies, and you’re catapulted into a weird time vortex, stripped of all the allies you’ve made along the way.

It still ranks up there as one of the best twists and moments in RPGs (and the cutscenes still look pretty good). On the flip side, I was much more critical with going back through the same content again. The entire world of El Nido isn’t very large compared to most RPGs, and it feels artificially lengthened since you essentially go through each area twice via the two different dimensions.

It makes the back half of the game far less interesting, even though you’re meeting new people and engaging in different events. Not until the very late stages of the game do you open up the final two dungeons that actually offer new areas to explore.

I also disliked that most of the big story stuff is saved until the very end. The first 40 or so hours can be played on Disc 1, with Disc 2 holding the last 5-10 hours, most likely due to the large number of cutscenes.

The story devolves into some tenuous and borderline awful connections to Chrono Trigger that treat the previous characters very poorly. There’s too much exposition and plot reveal dumped on you. By the end I cared little about the main quest, as you defeat Lynx/Dark Serge/Fate even before you step foot into the final dungeon.

While the story was ultimately disappointing, where Chrono Cross really shines is its incredible character design. Yes there are too many characters and only playing with three at a time is a big bummer, but nearly each character is well-written, well-designed, and has at least one nice little personal quest you can engage in.

Much of the latter parts of the game involve going around with different party members and completing their personal stories. I appreciated these moments even if I ended up ignoring most of the cast to focus on the ones I really enjoyed. The Dario saga between Karsh and Riddel is particularly engaging.

The combat is also a lot of fun. Any JRPG that lets you see enemies before you enter the turn-based battle gets a big thumbs up from me. Each character can equip a variety of spells called Elements along a grid. I’m not going to try and explain the entire system but it allows you to use abilities in every single fight rather than having to worry about conserving mana or spell slots.

Post-battle healing is also done through these Elements, which has the interesting side effect of making battles kind of pointless. Characters don’t level up at all, instead they get little incremental stat boots, with the biggest ones coming in the next few battles following a boss fight. It’s very odd and motivated me to skip battles whenever I could in the latter half of the game as the challenge level completely dropped off.

The other weird effect is that the main character becomes disproportionally stronger than everyone else. It makes sense – keep changing around the other two slots and Serge will naturally be stronger since he’s always there getting the stat boosts.

Once I obtained the mastermune, my best strategy in every fight was to use everyone else for healing and buffs while Serge did all the work, doing like four times as much damage as my next best character regardless of elemental affinity. Considering there’s so many cool characters to choose from, from cigar-smoking pirates to cutesy aliens and faeries to mermaids and even two different sentient flowers and a sentient mushroom, it’s extremely disappointing that they all boiled down to simply keeping Serge alive so he could do all the heavy lifting.

Yet despite all my nagging criticisms, I still love this game. The island setting is fun to explore, there’s a ton of secrets and characters and things to find, and it still has my favorite soundtrack in gaming (calm down, Chrono Trigger is like my no. 2 or 3).

I also appreciate that despite my overall enjoyment falling off at the end, the game doesn’t wear out its welcome. I was able to beat it at 45 hours, though admittedly I skipped quite a bit of optional content. Chrono Cross still deserves all its praise as one of the best RPGs around, but ultimately Chrono Trigger stands the test of time a bit better.

PROS

• The best soundtrack in gaming.
• Huge, diverse roster of party members, most of whom are well-written and interesting.
• Element grids offer a unique approach to spells that gives total customization for each character, and lets you unleash abilities in every fight.
• The islands are fun locations to explore, especially when you gain the freedom to explore them on your own.
• The opening hours do a wonderful job setting the stage, teasing the mysteries, and teaching the game.

CONS

• There are way too many damn characters, and the Element system makes it a pain to equip them all, and makes them a bit too homogeneous since anyone can use any Element (with a few exceptions).
• Chrono Cross is not a difficult RPG but the challenge level drops off sharply in the later stages of the game. Only boss fights matter and even then, most aren’t very challenging.
• The story becomes convoluted and obtuse by the end, neutering its primary villain and saving too much exposition for the penultimate dungeon crawl.

Final Thoughts: Though it doesn’t quite maintain its high quality all the way through, Chrono Cross remains one of the greatest console RPGs of all time.

Streamed, recorded and uploaded every week. Subscribe for our weekly adventures. Join us live on Fridays at 7pm Pacific/10pm Eastern!

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Previously on Tomb of Annihilation

Starring:
Mannix, level 2 Human Rogue
Khaless, level 2 Half-Drow Rogue
Gillian, level 2 Triton Bard
George, level 2 Tortle Fighter
Therin, level 2 Hill Dwarf Druid of the Moon

We’re back up to a full squad in our fourth session, which put our team in the middle of a mission, taking them deep into a dark, heavily trapped chamber full of zombies.

With multiple missing players last week the party was split up, so we spent the early part of the session leveling Gillian and George to level 2 and letting them engage in an activity before joining the others out in Old City.

Gillian opted to use her performance to make a fair bit of coin playing at an inn, while George met with his mentor at the bathhouse, receiving a magic scroll that tasked him with killing and harvesting monster parts to craft unique equipment (yes, we got super into Monster Hunter World earlier this year).

Our party rejoined forces with Mannix, Khaless, and George (and Undril) coming off the zany rescue scheme at Executioner’s Run. The party had learned Viplo’s location, the halfling merchant with whom the Savras acolyte Inete had gone to help.

For this quest I slightly repurposed the When Death Calls mission from the “A City on the Edge” Adventurer’s League mission pack. It was a fun way to include a mini-dungeon crawl with some simple monsters right in the middle of the city.

I added all the story bits incorporating Inete and changing Viplo’s motivation to make it more directly relevant to the death curse. I kept the layout with the hut and the zombies, as well as the trapped passage leading to the nifty scenario of Viplo releasing a horde of zombies on some captives.

Note: I used the full color battle maps from the DDAL 7-01 A City on the Edge map pack by Gail D.

A journal in the bigger hut provided some explanation of Viplo’s motivations – his son was afflicted by the death curse. He had found no help, and when his son succumbed, it warped his mind enough to begin capturing people and feeding them to him. Inete was the latest victim.

Finding the secret entrance into the ziggurat was easy, and tracing the mazes was a good way of introducing one of the big puzzle themes throughout Chult. Ubtao loves his mazes!

To get to the sacrificial chamber, the party had to pass through a series of rooms. As one door opened, the rear one would close. Someone had to successfully trace the maze (Investigation check) to open the next door. Failure resulted in blades slicing down from the ceiling.

Mannix is preternaturally designed to kick ass at Investigation rolls, so it was delightfully funny when he made George do it first while everyone hid in the back room.

George failed miserably but succeeded at the DEX save. After that Mannix was able to handle each of the successively more challenging mazes, rolling 20+ on every single skill roll. All my traps were neutered, but Mannix was able to show off his non-combat skills very well.

After passing through three trapped rooms, they emerged into a large chamber. A pair of crumbling staircases lead down to a lower floor, where three captives struggled against their bonds. Viplo was seen on the opposite ledge throwing a lever just as the PCs assessed the situation, releasing a horde of zombies on his victims. Roll for initiative!

This was a fun situation. The PCs were on a rescue mission, and couldn’t simply hang out on the crowded ledge to plink the zombies below. I was impressed that most everyone leapt down to the rescue, with several of them failing the DEX save on the crumbling stairs, falling down prone right in front of a bunch of zombies!

Khaless used her first turn to run up to Inete, even using Inspiration for another roll, but not quite able to free her. After Undril cast Sanctuary on Inete, everyone turned their attention to the six zombies. Viplo stood up on his platform raining down Firebolts, as well as a Burning Hands when the things started to turn in the PCs’ favor.

Everyone took some nasty hits but Gillian and Undril both provided a fair amount of healing, preventing anyone from going down. Well, except for the two poor no-name captives on either side of Inete.

I was confused why Therin never Wildshaped nor cast a spell, instead spending every round bonking with his staff, and hilariously missing several times despite the zombies’ garbage 8 AC.

Gillian and Mannix had the most impressive moments, with Mannix throwing a bag of ball bearings, causing several zombies to stumble and miss a round, while Gillian unleashed a Thunderwave, hitting three zombies (and comboing well with the ball bearings!).

Towards the end George climbed up to the ledge to cut down Viplo, finally kicking him off the ledge and sending the deranged halfling mage to his death. The PCs mopped off the final few zombies.

Inete was slightly scarred, but alive. She was incredibly thankful for the rescue. She explained that she had gone to help Viplo, not realizing that his son had already died and his father had gone mad from grief.

We hadn’t yet had a session that was almost entirely combat. Despite zombies’ relative simplicity, the unique scenario made it a tactically interesting situation, and I like the way everyone rose to the task of rescuing the young acolyte.

Next week: returning to the Temple of Savras, and probably dealing with slightly fewer zombies.

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A review copy of “Calpurnia’s 101 Lesser Magical Items” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel.

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Designed by: Joel Kelley

I like almost everything about Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition with one exception. In making player characters more inherently powerful, magic items took a major step backward. They still exist but the game is much less loot-based than it used to be. And I love loot!

The Dungeon Master’s Guide has a bunch of great loot to choose from, but one of the most requested features are more items that are less powerful. Since PCs are so strong, giving them any magic items in the lower levels can be a huge power boost that can wildly swing the level of balance.

“Calpurnia’s 101 Lesser Magical Items” offers a nice solution by presenting dozens of magic items that are interesting and fun without upsetting the balance of low-level gameplay.

Despite the self-imposed restriction there’s a ton of solid variety to be found. Everything from animated armor you can wear to over a dozen different magical rings. Some, like the Cloak of Colors, are simple little items that offer barely any gameplay benefit – like shifting colors, but can still be a lot of fun to the right players that have fun with them, and don’t ruin the game balance.

Nearly every single item is listed with several optional variants that add different traits or attributes. The Blindfold of Truesight blinds its user, but grants them Truesight out to 30 feet, though the blindness lasts until the next Short Rest. Optional variants include Perceptive, which changes the Truesight range to 15 ft x your WIS modifier, and Active, which only grants Truesight if you’re concentrating (as if on a spell) but doesn’t blind you once removed.

Most items also have a Cursed variant, adding some deliciously debilitating effects. With the above magical blindfold, it can be cursed so the blindness isn’t cured on a rest, but must be removed with magical healing. A cursed version of the Periapt of Wild Shape leaves its owner permanently in their beast shape form, unable to revert back. These variants add a ton of new uses and options for a compendium that already offers a ton of items.

“Calpurnia” isn’t just a flavorful title either, she’s the in-character scholar and author of the guidebook, much like Xanather and Volo in the official Wizards of the Coast books. Her flavor texts are frequent – about one for every two items, if not more – and excellently written. They’re often humorous and insightful, cleverly suggesting ways in which certain items can and should be used. It makes the entire compendium a much more entertaining read.

For a rare moment in a DMs Guild Review, I have no real complaints. If I’m being exceptionally nit-picky I could lament the plain white paper background, or the minimal amount of pictures. But none of that takes away from this very well-written compendium with enough content to delight any low-level (or low-magic) group.

Pros: 

• PDF Bookmarks for every single magic item entry.
• Many items actually care about a PCs skill level or modifiers.
• Every item has several variant traits that can be added for even more options.
• Calpurnia has a fun, college professor-like voice who makes insightful comments on items throughout the compendium.

Cons:

• None!

The Verdict: “Calpurnia’s 101 Lesser MAgical Items” is the perfect shopping list of fun, varied magic items for your lower level characters.

A review copy of “Calpurnia’s 101 Lesser Magical Items” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel.

Support my work via Patreon.

A review copy of “Widow’s Peak” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel.

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Designed by: Oliver Clegg

“Widow’s Peak” is a horror-themed adventure for 5th to 10th level characters. It takes place in its own demiplane within Ravenloft, which means you can get your party there by the usual misty teleportations – or even better, a misty teleportation when they’re on a boat.

The horror theme combines with the fear of the sea quite well, and while there are lots of interesting, well-written locations to explore, the adventure lacks a solid overarching narrative.

The 40+ page adventure is broken up into nine chapters, each depicting a different location within Craven Cove. The titular town provides a number of colorful NPCs to chat with, including the daughter of a local witch who was burned at the stake. Before she died the witch cursed the town to be barren, and now folks fear the witch has returned.

The shocking twist, if you could call it that, is that the witch hasn’t actually returned at all. In fact it’s the townsfolk who are the evil assholes (most of them anyway) and have adopted a new cult of human sacrifice in the hopes of currying favor from a dark god to help save them.

Much of the adventure is designed around exploring the many notable locations of Craven Coves, though the adventure gives little reason to explore them. In fact the only real quest is to break the witch’s curse, which they can’t ever accomplish.

Fortunately all of the areas, including the many random encounters, are excellently written and interesting. None are huge dungeon crawls; instead we get tombs, caves, beaches, a lighthouse, and a rocky area full of shifting rocks and living statues. There are extensive backstories that bring each area and its denizens to life (or unlife), though the adventure lacks solid side quests or hooks to give the characters any reason to actually venture there, other than the witch’s cabin.

The creepy carnival is a particularly interesting location where nothing actually happens, yet it’s still full of fascinating, richly drawn characters whom the party can interact with, and provide a respite from the dangers of traveling.

The adventure can end whenever a DM decides to end it. The leader of the carnival is actually a Celestial, Isolde, and the party can meet her at the witch’s house, where she tells them to help her rid the area of the cult. There’s not much a party can contribute when a CR 21 Celestial’s involved, which can render much of the final area (a one-room cave full of cultists) moot.

The ending climax gets a bit trickier, however. There’s an optional Corruption mechanic DMs can use to track player decisions. The person with the highest Corruption could be offered a job to be the new Darklord of this demiplane. Acceptance transforms that PC into a Kraken (!) which then fights the rest of the party (!!).

Other options include turning Isolde evil with the same Darklord offer, or simply denying it altogether and letting the domain collapse on itself. That last option is still viable, creating a fun chase situation as the PCs race with Isolde toward the carnival to be spirited away, before the rampaging swarm of seagulls and possible Sharknado can get them.

I like that “Widow’s Peak” avoids the usual graveyards and swamps in favor of craggy mountains and dark beaches, and the individual locations could all be easily pulled out and dropped into existing adventures – Curse of Strahd being an obvious choice. It fails to tell a compelling story by itself but puts enough pieces in play that a DM could certainly fill in the gaps to craft a grand, memorable seaside vacation.

Pros: 

• The writing throughout the adventure is evocative and immersive.
• Richly thematic random encounters that are more than just monster attacks.
• World map and isometric dungeon maps look fantastic.
• Several unique, interesting monster stat blocks, magic items, and new tables for more thematic trinkets and wild magic.
• A selection of suitably epic ending climaxes to choose from.

Cons:

• No separate grid-based battle maps.
• More a series of locations and events than an overarching narrative.

The Verdict: While it uses its fair share of classic horror tropes, “Widow’s Peak” breathes fresh salty sea air into the genre by providing a mini-world of horror to explore.

A review copy of “Widow’s Peak” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel.

Support my work via Patreon.

Behind-the-scenes DM-only live stream of building and preparing our ongoing Tomb of Annihilation series.

Streamed live every Thursday.

Support the channel at https://www.patreon.com/Roguewatson

Streamed, recorded and uploaded every week. Subscribe for our weekly adventures. Join us live on Fridays at 7pm Pacific/10pm Eastern!

Support my channel via Patreon!

Previously on Tomb of Annihilation

Starring:
Mannix, level 2 Human Rogue
Khaless, level 2 Half-Drow Rogue
Gillian, level 2 Triton Bard
George, level 2 Tortle Fighter
Therin, level 2 Hill Dwarf Druid of the Moon

After a lengthy battle with a small horde of zombies in a sacrificial chamber last week, the team gets a much quieter aftermath. Returning to the Temple of Savras results in a sizable monetary award of 20gp each, as well as the opportunity to ask Savras for guidance on several different characters, locations, and objects that our party is searching for.

The Savras ritual takes head priest Zitembe a full 24 hours, however. With evening approaching, our party returned to the Thundering Lizard Inn, where they could properly interview all of the guides.

The Thundering Lizard was alive with activity. The innkeeper had been able to contact most, though not all, of the Port Nyanzaru jungle guides. Eku and Salida were currently out of the city on previous expeditions, but the rest were found there in the bar area.

The one-armed dwarf Hew Hackinstone approached his old friend Therin. Hew was a disheveled mess, obsessed with returning to Wyrmheart Mine. His previous expedition had ended in disaster, and he was the only survivor when his crew discovered it had become the lair of a red dragon named Tinder.

He pleaded to Therin to travel there, defeat the dragon, and split the spoils. More than that, he had discovered an ancient, but active dwarven forge connected via an underground mine shaft. It had been taken over by Firenewts, however.

This was further confirmed by another dwarven guide, Musharib, an albino dwarf who sadly recounted his tale of his people being driven out of their dwarven forge home, Hrakhamar, due to volcanic eruptions. He claimed his people once lived in peace with the Shield Dwarves of the mine, but now the Firenewts had enslaved some of his people, while the rest tried to survive in the surrounding jungle.

The two dwarven guides are at odds. Musharib is kind, pathetic, and desperate to help his people, while Hew aggressively lays claim to both the mine and the forge.

Therin, and the party, ultimately wanted to help both dwarves. Hew revealed that the Mine is very far away, as I would show them on their player’s map of Chult each time the PCs learned of a new location. He suggested they get a boat and sail around the coast rather than journey through the full jungle.

The PCs know they will have access to a boat, eventually. Ortimay has agreed to give them her boat if they can find the ruins of Orolunga and Nangalore first. Hew agreed to wait in the city until they return, ready to leave on their ship excursion. Presumably they’ll be picking up Musharib as well, which could lead to some interesting drama. Assuming they both survive.

Next the players were drawn to Azaka Stormfang, whom I had arm wrestling a bulky dude to show off her physical prowess and confidence. Azaka is a fun character that the PCs immediately warmed up to. She’s very blunt and straight-forward, and has little respect for those who can’t take care of themselves. She liked the party right away, particularly as George immediately sat down for an arm wrestling match – beating her with an impressive STR check.

Agreeing to her personal quest to waive her fee is a bit of a no-brainer, especially because Firefinger is fairly close to Port Nyanzaru (although, it’s on a different river than Camp Righteous). The PCs didn’t ask very many follow-up questions about it or her, a testament to how much they liked her. In fact, it sounds like they’ll take her right away when they go to the jungle, while hitting up both Camp Righteous and Firefinger.

Rokah isn’t a guide, but he wanted to meet with Mannix after the chance meeting at the Temple of Savras earlier that day. Rokah did have access to a pair of guides, two tabaxi siblings named River Mist and Flask of Wine. Rokah is willing to call in a debt from them and offer their jungle guide services for free, provided the PCs complete a little task: Get him into Fort Beluarian, where he can search for any evidence of collusion between the Flaming Fist mercs and the local pirates of Chult.

The party accepted the quest. Mannix picked up that Rokah works for the Zhentarim. This party, unlike our last one in Storm King’s Thunder, has no real beef with the criminal organization. I also teased that it’s under new management: Bryseis, one of the player characters from our Storm King’s Thunder campaign.

The PCs had already heard rumors about some kind of possible shenanigans between the pirates and the mercs. Captain Ortimay of the Brazen Pegasus was willing to ferry them across the bay to the Fort, for a nominal fee. Rokah jumped at the chance, suggesting they leave first thing in the morning.

My players are adamant about doing the dinosaur race, but it’s not for another two days. Plenty of time to go to the Fort, and return to town to meet up with Zitembe for the ritual results. Assuming everything goes according to plan, of course.

The final guides were Faroul and Gondolo. I had a lot of fun role-playing these entitled assholes, constantly trying to cut a deal or treat being jungle guides as their latest business plan. The PCs did pick up on the most important detail – they had a treasure map in their possession.

What followed was the most player interaction we had all session. This session was a lot of dialogue and a lot of me acting in different voices. It was fun to step back slightly and let my players work out a little plan.

Gillian used her charm to hand Faroul her bagpipes and dance with Gondolo. Khaless swiped the map, and Mannix used his Forgery Kit to quickly make a copy. It was a resounding success, with our pair of city boys none the wiser. Mannix even offered to buy the copy-map for 10 gold, but Faroul balked, and let them walk away.

The PCs were rewarded with a new location on their map, Needle’s Bones, the supposed lair of a dead green dragon.

Almost the entire session was relegated to a single scene in a bar, and as one of my players mentioned, this may be the first time ever I’ve DM’d a session of D&D without any combat. I think it was a lot of fun expanding on the guides and creating fun little role-playing scenes rather than simple one-on-one interviews, and now my PCs have gained a ton of new locations and quests.

Our first full day in Port Nyanzaru is complete. Next week: Fort Beluarian!

Streamed, recorded and uploaded every week. Subscribe for our weekly adventures. Join us live on Fridays at 7pm Pacific/10pm Eastern! 

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A review copy of “Sharn: The Missing Schema” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel.

Support my work via Patreon.

Designed by: Elven Tower (Derek Ruiz)

As awesome as Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition has been, Wizards has relied almost exclusively on the Forgotten Realms setting. This has the advantage of creating an ongoing, shared universe that people have come to associate with D&D, but at the expense of many of their other worlds, including Eberon.

Eberron was created around 3rd edition as a hyper-magical, technologically advanced fantasy world. Think arcane steampunk, with magic trains and sentient golems. It was explored again in Fourth Edition, but sadly, as with other fantasy worlds, it has been noticeably absent from any official support in Fifth Edition.

“Sharn: The Missing Schema” is an introductory adventure for levels 1-5 built around Eberron, specifically the city of Sharn. It serves as an excellent starting point for this intriguing fantasy universe while providing a classic, action-packed adventure that nicely shows off Eberron’s unique flavors.

Part 1 introduces the players to each other, the city of Sharn, and their quest-giver, Professor Daela. Daela has a simple task: retrieve a schema (a magical blueprint) from the sewer depths of Sharn. It’s the kind of paid dirty work suitable for low-level adventurers.

In Part 2 the PCs journey into the underground depths of Sharn. They meet a wolf shifter who attempts to extort, then ambush them with his buddies, then a warforged who was sent before to retrieve the schema but unable to bypass the door to the ancient laboratory. The laboratory servers as mini-dungeon crawl with some rats and mechanical security measures the party will need to defeat to claim their prize.

Part 3 offers an interesting twist to the rote mission. Upon turning in the schema and collecting their reward, the PCs witness a group of thieves stealing the Schema, stabbing the Professor, and fleeing the scene. The party can catch up by hopping aboard a skyraft and soarsleds, creating an exciting airborne chase sequence over the vertically-themed city of Sharn.

It’s a tricky situation to handle, and unlike the other sections, there isn’t a map to use. But there are notes on how to run the encounter, including a nifty d20 list of possible outcomes for falling party members. I would’ve preferred a bit more structure and framework, however.

Part 4 begins when the chase ends at  a warehouse. For higher level parties, or those that had a streak of luck in the adventure so far, there’s an option to charge right in, dodging ballista shots and making a hell of an entrance. Otherwise the adventure encourages a chance to rest up and infiltrate the warehouse on foot.

The warehouse is basically just one big room with the final battle, although the boss of the Emerald Claw thieves, Arthemis, is talkative and attempts to persuade the PCs to his side. Unfortunately there aren’t any notes if a particularly chaotic party actually takes him up on the offer.

As a low-level urban adventure, “Sharn: The Missing Schema” doesn’t go much beyond a classic MacGuffin set-up, but I do enjoy the shock in the middle when you think the adventure is over, only to end up in an airborne chase sequence. It’s extremely well made, with fantastic maps and artwork throughout, and represents a solid introduction to Eberron and the uniquely vertical city of Sharn.

Pros: 

• Excellent background information and lore on the city of Sharn.
• Variable informational rewards based on different DC skill checks.
• Excellent formatting and use of art, maps, handouts, and flavor text.
• Adjustable encounters for level 1-5.
• Vehicle chase in the sky!

Cons:

• Joining the villain at the end is a neat option but it results in no final boss fight, and an aftermath that isn’t covered in the scope of this adventure.
• Part 3 (Flying Chase) could use a bit more clarity and structure in its design.

The Verdict: Straight-forward and easy to run, “Sharn: The Missing Schema” is the perfect introductory urban-based adventure into the world of Eberron.

A review copy of “Sharn: The Missing Schema” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel.

Support my work via Patreon.

Thanks to meeting my latest Patreon goal, I’m announcing another new weekly live streamed series: Let’s Play!

Airing every Monday at 7:30p Pacific/10:30p Eastern. Starting TONIGHT beginning with Darkest Dungeon!

Support the channel at https://www.patreon.com/Roguewatson

In case you missed it: my first episode of my new live streaming Let’s Play series.

We’re starting with Darkest Dungeon, and it’s a totally blind playthrough. Thankfully chat is there to help!

Streamed live every Monday.

Support the channel at https://www.patreon.com/Roguewatson

Read the full review at Pixelkin

It’s easy to get jaded about the RPG genre, specifically Japanese RPGs. Every trope has been well-worn, every character archetype has been fully exploited. Dating back to the 1980s the Dragon Quest series is one of the most egregious examples of many tiresome gameplay elements and story beats.

Yet each new Dragon Quest game proves why the series remains beloved and resilient. With an irresistible charm, modern design conveniences, and excellent writing, Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age is a wonderful RPG for newcomers and a delightful return for series veterans.

Read the full review at Pixelkin

A review copy of “Creature Feature Quarterly volume 1” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel.

Support my work via Patreon.

Designed by: Jeremy Hart

“Creature Feature Quarterly volume 1” is a compendium of 13 monstrosities (and otherwise) in a black and white zine style. I’m not normally a fan of that style, but the monster artwork is very well done, and the black ink fits the theme of the grotesque monsters.

Out of the 13 monsters, 10 of them are between CR 5-10, making this a solidly Tier 2 compendium. There’s a decent amount of variety to be found, though it relies too much on the hulking brute archetype.

Each monster entry is given a full page of information beyond the stat block, organized between Description, Ecology, Lore, and Seeds. Seeds are story ideas and hooks on possible ways to include the monster in your campaign.

I’ve never seen story hooks used in a monster compendium before – I love it! Some are quite clever and inventive and reveal some interesting ways to use the monsters, particularly the ones that aren’t immediately hostile to players, such as the Cerebran Warlock and Protocol Imp.

Most of the creatures err on the challenging side, which tends to be the case for new monsters. Nobody wants to make simple fodder – they want their big bad beasties to be main events and epic boss battles, capable of instilling terror into the most confident of players. That being said some creatures like the Star Tyrant seem eye-poppingly powerful.

At CR 7 the Star Tyrant has impressive HP, AC, and saving throws and Perception, as well as several condition communities and damage resistances. It can paralyze in a cone, innately dominate PCs and teleport them, and make three tentacle attacks at +8 with an average of 15 damage each. But the craziest part is its Energy Drain attack: +8, deals 6d10+12 damage plus 4d6 psychic damage, gaining temporary hit points of half damage dealt, and paralyzes on a failed save. Holy bananas!

Oh and it also reproduces like the xenomorphs in the Alien franchise, chest-bursting and all. That’s a hell of a monster design.

The monsters work best when they operate around a new concept or wholly original design, like the Star Tyrant. The Mantid Stitch Golem is a unique cross between a giant spider, golem, and ghoul, capable of climbing on walls and pouncing on victims with its giant blade arms. And the Tatterdemalion Lich is based around the Magic Jar spell, capable of possessing anyone around it.

There’s a lot of impressive monster designs found in “Creature Feature Quarterly volume 1,” and the full page descriptions go a long way in painting a vivid picture of the creature’s habitats and quirks beyond the stat blocks.

Pros: 

• Monster information is well organized, including background lore and ecology.
• Visual size comparisons for each entry.
• Each monster has several story seeds and hooks as fun examples to include the creature in your campaign.
• Black ink zine art style works well for the mostly alien and demonic creatures.

Cons:

• Mostly focuses on Tier 2 creatures, some of which seem insanely powerful.
• Several monsters are slightly different variations of the ‘hulking brute’ concept, and none are particularly interesting.

The Verdict: A solid collection of creepy and otherworldly monsters await in “Creature Feature Quarterly volume 1.”

A review copy of “Creature Feature Quarterly volume 1” was provided by the publisher. Find more DMs Guild Reviews on my website and YouTube channel.

Support my work via Patreon.

I interviewed Paradox Interactive and Free League Publishing on Paradox’s recent board game licensing extravaganza, including the Kickstarter-funded Crusader Kings: The Board Game.

You can read it in the October issue of Tabletop Gaming Magazine, available now in print and digital.

Behind-the-scenes DM-only live stream of building and preparing our ongoing Tomb of Annihilation series.

Streamed live every Thursday.

Support the channel at https://www.patreon.com/Roguewatson