![]() ![]() The adventure starts by setting out the bare necessities of facilitating an invasion force of Qeodhar, meaning an army at least 4000 strong and assorted transportation, and providing about 4 fleets worth of ships and crew if you are using premades. In actuality, this is all a ruse by Alphaks, an Immortal with a milennia old grudge against Alphatia, recently arrived on Mystara to cook up a dish that is best served cold. King Ericall sends you, his top guy, to assemble an armada to lay down the law, with the caveat that Qeodhar is on the border of Alphatia, ancient Atlantic superpower ruled by a council of 1000 level 36 MUs and you might set off a war between two empires in the process. Baron Norland of nearby Qeodhar is believed to be the culprit behind the pestilence. Harvests, cattle and people are dying by the day. A poisonous fog has descended on Norworld (previously seen in Test of the Warlords, among others). The result is something that feels grand in scope, proper for epic heroes and certainly has moments of genuine game design but also feels disconnected and at times unnecessarily railroad-y. Reading M1 you get the idea that Heard understands the implications of, say, the Mass Combat System pretty well but either did not fully anticipate the capabilities of level 25-30 characters or perhaps considered the anticipation of high level character magic to lie outside his responsibilities as a game designer. A good adventure anticipates such obvious shortcuts and either blocks them or preferably, is designed so that those shortcuts are actually a vital part in achieving success. I teleport without error into its lair that I have first scried. I turn ethereal and wait until it falls asleep. I project an image to expend its breath weapons. An ancient red dragon awaits? I cast Clairvoyance. At higher levels, you can have an idea of what a high level adventure might be about but unless you also have knowledge of what the gameplay is actually like the effort is likely to fall effortlessly to players that know what they are doing. In an adventure for levels 1-3, you can make something which resembles a sword and sorcery adventure in broad strokes and if you don’t fuck up the math and whatever peculiarities of the particular ruleset are minor enough so that this does not completely collapse. This perhaps explains the OSR’s gravitation towards low level adventures, a fear of getting caught. There is something revealing about high level adventures because of the disparity between the fiction and the actual game design. There are 30d6 fireballs galore but no globes of minor invulnerability to counteract them (although I did find the 9th level spell IMMUNITY in the Master series, which would serve well). There are no breaks, caveats, limitations, no item saving throws, no material components and no system shock to prevent rampant abuse of magical power. Its spells and abilities have not been honed and balanced by years of play. Part of the problem might be that unlike level 8-12 AD&D, level 25-30 BECMI does not seem real. ![]() M1 does not buck the trend, although there are some highlights in the scenario. Thus far the most we can reasonably expect is playable, with perhaps a few good ideas. The quest for excellent high level material continues. ![]()
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