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Whining about modules Anonymous 04/15/2023 (Sat) 03:40:16 Id: 3f7671 No. 769
I was told to repost my post from /v/ onto here so I'm going to do it. Let's talk about modules that you hate from any system. Any books that you fucking despise, and if you want, compare them to ones you like. All of my shit is mostly homebrew, I use books of course for monsters, characters, maps and items, but I make a lot of shit myself. That is because I absolutely fucking despise some of the official adventures. Descent into Avernus is a literal joke, it ruins Baldur's Gate as a setting after Murder in Baldur's Gate made it into such a fucking good setting for adventure. Generally Murder in Baldur's Gate was a top tier adventure, even if it was slightly railroady. >Expands the city so much that it feels like a perfect starting city with a shit ton of things to do in it and interesting politics >Introduces a cast of really good characters >Gives the players the illusion of choice, which although I usually disagree with, I think the story that is told is so fucking good that it is deserving >Gives an actually good story with an actually good, gray conflict with a political story that could geniuently be a reflection of our real world, in a very subtle manner. Murder at Baldur's Gate is a story about extremism and violence, about political violence to be exact and how it spirals out of control, and good intentions leading into hell. It is set in a refugee crisis, and struck between three major political players that all want to improve the city in one way or another, but all of them being manipulated by Bhaal to serve as vehicles of his rebirth. And it's done in such a fucking amazing way that it geniuently feels moving even if you just read through it. And it it quite obvious that it was written by Ed Greenwood, it makes great use of the games as well. You have a choice between three characters that you can support (Pics related) >Ulder Ravengard - A simple son of a blacksmith who rose through the ranks of the Flaming Fist due to his geniuent honestly and adherence to the law. He is a pragmatic politician that wants to make the city into a lawful place, but instead due to his actions and constantly instigating violence he turns into nothing else than a fascistic, brutal dictator at the end of the campaign >Rilsa Rael- A Calimshan Crime Lord, someone who is at the head of the Calimshyte Refugees which are discriminated against in Baldur's Gate, generally forced to live outside of the city in their own ghetto. She wants to protect the underclass of the city and do good for the refugees, but as time goes on becomes nothing more than a simple, violent murderer. >Torlin Silvershield- An aristocrat from the Upper City who wants nothing more than to make sure that the city's traditions are upheld as well as making sure that it survives, but in the process of trying to enforce his vision of what is the best for the city, he becomes a skull and dagger schemer. No matter which one of them you pick, they will keep instigating violence against each other, trying to do different power plays believing themselves to be completely in the right and completely refusing to meet on even ground. They are all extremists, good-intentioned ones, but still extremists, which are too blinded by the idea of protecting the city to realize that they are the ones killing it. It's such a well-written conflict, especially that every single one of them does something fucked up at the end. Ulder turns Baldur's Gate into a Police State with mass executions for even the slightest crime. Rilsa Ravengard goes against the city in a bloody coup and frees several prisoners from the prison. Torlin Silvershield tries to blow up the fucking parliment. The only choice you have is who will become the next Chosen of Bhaal and cause his rebirth, you can not avoid it, but two of them will realize they fucked up depending on your choices while the other one will go on a murder spree. Ulder Ravengard will start shooting at civilians from a ballista, Rilsa will go full slasher villain and Torlin will poison most of the aristocracy. Your heroes will go there, kill the newly risen Chosen of Bhaal and the city will be left forever scarred by the events that happened, with your heroes deciding afterwards if it learns anything from it or not. I really like this plot, because it is subtly written, being really mostly about how political violence spirals out of control to the point where no one actually profits off of it and everything becomes worse. It's a really good message, and written in a way that isn't completely fucking annoying. Descent into Avernus on the other Hands is fucking awful in every concievable way. >Ulder Ravengard is portrayed as someone who is the only person who keeps the Flaming Fist from becoming a brutal police organization, despite the fact that he was literally supposed to be part of the problem >The adventure literally fucking railroads the players by sending FUCKING DEATH SQUADS after them until they comply with it. >The Flaming Fist officers are outdone by fucking WORKER GANGS. And I'm 100% sure this is a rerence of some braindead communist to worker unions. >Following the previous point, while Murder at Baldur's Gate handles its politics beautifully, technically making some allusions to fascism, it actually explains how such a thing happens and why it's a bad thing, and makes it work in the context of its story. Meanwhile Descent into Avernus just makes the Flaming Fist into the bad guys, despite the fact that they were always supposed to be Lawful Neutral. And they don't even go all the way and use the actual flaws of Ulder Ravengard, who is a good fucking character in Murder at Baldur's Gate, but is... just handled fucking terribly in Descent into Avernus Probably because he is black, so all of his bad qualities that made him compelling are shoved to the side, despite the fact he is literally said to be on a road to becoming a fucking fascist in Murder at Baldur's Gate and becomes one during the adventure. >It spends a lot of fucking time explaining Baldur's Gate and yet uses it for only ONE FUCKING CHAPTER before moving to Candlekeep and then Avernus. >Not only that but IT ISN'T EVEN FUCKING GOOD AT IT. It activelly FLANDERIZES THE FUCKING CITY and makes it worse. Murder at Baldur's Gate has a similar description of the city... and YET IT IS BETTER IN EVERY CONCIEVABLE MANNER. It's more detailed, written with more care, the locations are described better, and it lacks the absolutely ridiculous ideas of fucking butcher gangs going fist to fist with the fucking Flaming Fist. It's better in EVERY SINGLE CONCEIVABLE WAY. >The entire adventure constitutes of different NPCs spewing exposition to the characters while moving from place to place randomly, in a completely convoluted manner while not being able to stick to a fucking theme or actually take the time to allow the players to get accustomed with the characters besides a fucking Hollyphant that follows them like fucking Navi. >The actual SCUMMY FUCKING ADVERTISEMENT THIS ADVENTURE DOES, WITH PUTTING THE SYMBOL OF FUCKING BHAAL ON BOTH OF THE FUCKING COVERS WHILE THE ADVENTURE DOES NOT INCLUDE BHAAL IN ANY WHAY OR FUCKING FORM. At best you can claim that the first chapter says something about a cult of the dead three which you deal with in the CONSTRAINTS OF THAT FIRST FUCKING CHAPTER. Bhaal is not even an overarching threat, he geniuently has FUCKING NOTHING TO DO WITH THE STORY. I'm activelly using info from Murder at Baldur's Gate in my campaign while I basically threw Descent into Avernus into the trash save for a few maps, enemies and items. It's literally fucking useless. Never fucking get it, even pirating it is not really worth it. Maybe at best for some maps.
>Have an actual fascist in your game >Make him not a fascist in the sequel >But make the faction hes apart of even more fascist. Kinda sounds like the writers were a bunch of commies. They wanted to demonize them but they didn't want to look racist while doing so.
>>770 The faction wasn't initially fascist, he himself basically acted fascistic. In the sequel they basically made them lawful evil for no reason.
>>773 I dont really read modules since I prefer the idea of making up my own adventures. You think I should still read murder at baldurs gate?
>>774 Absolutely, you don't even have to read the adventure, the description of the city is a reason enough to read it.
Ive never used a module so idk. Wait no I ran a modified ashes to ashes VTM campaign last year. It was not universally well recieved.
Honestly, almost every 5e module sucks in some way, even the most popular Strahd one is awful to use for the GM. The best module content for 5e is when they do those compilations of adventures, you can just plop them in a game you like without it having to be a whole ass campaign. But that only really applies to them adapting old content, when they make new short adventures they fucking suck too.
Descent into Avernus' biggest sin is that the players don't go to Avernus with the city they go down separately, makes no sense
Are you familiar with Warhammer's Enemy Within campaign? It was originally conceived to explain certain map inconsistencies. For example in some maps you can see a province named Sudenland and in others the province is gone. The writers came up with this idea that the province (and others) was dissolved by Emperor Karl Franz in late 2512 after its rulers were caught plotting against the empire, collaborating with Chaos cultists. (They weren't chaos cultists themselves, they were just opportunists) its actually a really cool way to fix inconsistencies within the setting instead of just handwaving them. Props to the writers for that. Enemy Within is basically Warhammer: The Manchurian Candidate. The premise for the campaign is AMAZING. The idea is, chaos cultists are trying to kill Karl Franz and manipulate the Imperial succession in order to put a chaos cultists in the throne. Which isn't easy to do because the Empire has an electoral monarchy. So they've organized this huge conspiracy to gather the votes they need. They've also created huge problems within the empire and plan to have their candidate fix them in order to win more votes. It's brilliant. Sadly the campaign itself is TRASH. Nine of what I've said so far ever comes into play at any point in the campaign Let's start with Volume I. The PCs visit a festival in Bogenhafen and investigate some mysterious disappearances. They find out a chaos cult is abducting people and preparing a ritual to open a huge chaos portal in the middle of the city! The book mentions in passing that this will benefit the Manchurian Candidate since he will lead troops into the city and close it. However... this is not the actual goal of the cultists trying to open the portal. They're being manipulated by a daemon. The daemon is connected to the Manchurian conspiracy, but hes trying to open the portal for lols. He's not actually working to advance it. Seriously. What a mess. Volume II. The PCs follow clues obtained in Volume I and track down a sorceress who corresponded with the cultists from Bogenhafen. She's trying to obtain a magic item. She's not connected to the conspiracy at all. Shes not even aware it exists. It is one big side quest. At the end of the volume you HAVE to let one of the enemies run off with the special magic item or Volume IV falls apart. Volume III. The PCs travel to a big city and get involved in a big conspiracy there. Some cultists are planning to have an elector count killed and replaced with a magical doppelganger. This specific elector actually controls 2 votes in the election. You'd think they're doing this to advance the Manchurian candidate conspiracy.... but NO. They're just doing it for themselves. They want to rule the city. They are power hungry. They have no interest in the election. Wtf. Keep in mind that at this point in the campaign, 3/5ths of the way in, the Pcs are still NOT aware of the Manchurian candidate plot Volume IV. Another big side quest. The PCs stop a skaven plot. It's not related to the Manchurian candidate conspiracy at all. (Well actually the skaven did some mercenary work for the cultists but this isn't developed at all) Volume V. The elector counts gather to discuss the future of the empire. Karl Franz is very ill. There is no actual election. No intrigue. No politics. Lol. The PCs rush to recover a magical item and then there's a boss fight at the end. There's There's much wasted potential here. The books themselves are awesome and worth buying just for all the info they have. But the campaign itself is terrible


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