itch.io

Such a fun idea and a great execution. I love the tables and NPCs. My players would love this. I wish there was a map and maybe a clues table to help players identify who is the daemon, but otherwise no feedback.

So fun! I’m giving my son Mausritter for his birthday and will let you know when we play this how it goes. A perfect adventure heading towards the Fall/Halloween season. I like the goat morph spell. I would have liked a bit more flavor text for each location, maybe an adjective that sets the tone, otherwise I have no feedback.

I love the art and the images and the adventure. What a delightful world to step into!

Great layout and maps! All the content was formatted well, allowing for a ton of content per page. The writing was both vivid and super clear and functional. I appreciated that this was a unique adventure compared to many of the others I’ve read. I wish there was more art included, but what are you going to do.

Very clever and fun! I loved what you did with the field journal and notes in the margins. The map was great, as was the torn cover. Would be fairly easy to pick up and play.

An extremely clever and unique adventure! The layout and design is beautiful. It’s a little out of my experience in terms of running something this introspective for my players, but the right group would adore this module. I love the ending, but it’s also a shame it concludes with such finality. There’s a real shortage of adventures that can be plugged into a campaign to help with character development.

Brilliant. I was inspired by this competition to buy Mork Borg and will run this as my first adventure!

This made my day, thanks!

I appreciate the response and take no offense! Again, great work!

I like the cover a lot, super fun use of the t-rex skeleton. I like your title font and the use of the white background here as well. It might be worth making the title font a bit larger, it feels a little under weight to me looking at it. 

The odd quotation marks on stop the ritual are fine, but I'm not sure what I'm supposed to getting from them and it seems like you drop their usage after the first paragraph.  Given the centrality of the Stop the Ritual advancement, I think adding some kind of tracking table would be useful. 

One thing I'm a little unclear on, is the Saurian King himself on the island or just his agents? Also, I get that he's the bad guy, but who is he and what is the ritual going to do?

I think the layout of the text heavy pages works. Given the white space on page 3 , it might be nice to have an additional illustration.  

I would use the red border completely around the exterior of specific locations. and change the interior borders to be clear. The black borders with the ocean and interior kind of threw me off and there is a bit of an optical illusion effect with my tired, old eyes when I look at it. Alternatively, you could add a legend. I would also include the relevant number in the location titles on the map. 

Overall, I think it's a really fun idea and I would be able to pick up and play this with some prep. I think the locations are really strong and vivid, as is the race against time and the people we will be competing against. I would like some more characterization of NPC personalities and worldbuilding around the ritual and why we're trying to stop it. 

I really like the cover. Great color selection and use of fonts. I appreciate the space and room you were able to give it.  

I haven't played Shadow Dark and am unfamiliar with it's lore, so I'm assuming this is more intuitive to someone who knows those things, "Ranmyaku, Chaos-Papess, rides this decaying orbit into the gas giantʼs core. The World-Makers trapped the Old Ones inside during the Dawn Epoch; now, Ranmyaku's sacrifice threatens to free them!" I have done enough of these that I get the gist of it all, but it might be worth elaborating some on  Ramnyaku, Chaos-Papess, World-Makers, Old Ones, and Dawn Epic if a Shadow Dark user wouldn't be familiar with some of the terms.  

I love the use of the spiral map, excellent leverage of the theme. The map is super flavorful as well.  

Hell yes, barbarians riding pterodactyls in space. It gives me Heavy Metal vibes. 

This is very minor,  but it might be worthwhile to experiment with different background images or textures or perhaps more stylized header fonts. There is a little bit of a brochure feel, especially with the timeline flowchart on page 3, which does a disservice to the content.  

I love the illustration of Ranmyaku and that she's bathing in poisonous serpents, badass. 

 I don't think you necessarily need the random encounter table, it sounds like there is something going on in each room already? 

Super fucking fun. Love the story and the art, would love to play this someday. 

I'm surprised this only as 8 ratings so far because the art on your cover is super eye catching and well done. For me, this was THE stand out art leading up to the deadline in the Discord chat. I remember someone suggesting using perspective lines on the scaling and positioning of the people and I see the benefit of that extra effort you put in.

The background art on pages 2-4 works incredibly well. 

"Temperatures hover near 500°F in direct sunslight, 120° in shade, and cool to 100° during the 15-minute night that occurs once every 16 hours. " First, let me note that this is a clever, visceral game device, I think players will enjoy it and I would enjoy running it. Also, "sunslight" is very fun play on sunlight for multiple suns. I realize this is fantasy so scientific accuracy isn't paramount, but this doesn't seem realistically survivable. The hottest sauna is 195° F and you can really only hang out in there a short while before passing out (30 mins?). Also, if it's 500°, I think it would be much hotter than 120 in the shade. Again, I know this is fantasy and it doesn't really matter, but I was like, wait what? If they have to travel a mile and have a 25ft gnome movement that's 106 rounds of dashing that's 106 6 second rounds  or ~10 mins 30 seconds.  Anyway, it's a fun in game puzzle problem (I have scientists and engineers in my group so this is the kind of pedantic shit I'd have to litigate, lol). Misty step wouldn't get you far, I think teleport is too high a spell for 5th level, maybe you could cast a fog to in the sky to lessen the damage or something but your little magic guys might be on deaths door and using their healing potions just to get across without a combat encounter. Of course, if they solve waiting for night that's probably only a little bit of damage.

All of the encounters are really fun and flavorful. In general, I love this setting.  The map and the canyon people are very cool.

I would maybe change "TO DEAL WITH IFRIT IS TO BURN" to "YOU MUST BURN TO DEAL WITH THE IFRIT" or something else with a bit more of a wink towards the solution. As written, I wouldn't make the jump to pressing burnt flesh to open the door.

Super tight, evocative adventure that would be really fun to play. I could pick this up and run it with one read through, which is impressive in and of itself.  I think you've done a great job flavoring things while also supplying tons of information. Top marks!

Man, you are a GOD! I deeply, deeply appreciate your feedback. You definitely hit on some concerns that I wasn’t quite able to voice. Initially, I wanted to structure it where the decisions made pushed the tracker but I wasn’t quite able to figure it all out. Perhaps I will reduce the clues to the ten strongest and make it larger (it has 8 pt font) and pad out the hazards more with some decision +\-

I’m not super familiar with solo RPGs, this was kind of a self imposed challenge. It seems like part of the enjoyment is in providing flavor and the space for the player to interpret but personally I tend to fall into being more prescriptive and railroading my players. The clues were kind of my gesture towards (hopefully) inspiring the player’s imagination, but I personally felt it was the weakest part.

You were right about my hopes for replay ability. My thinking was someone could print this out and play it 2-to-4 times on a flight or something and put it down feeling satisfied.

If I can ever offer feedback on something you’re working on send it my way!

I love the color and font choices. The cover art and map are both excellent. I love a human sacrifice ritual adventure. 
I will say, when reading the poem, I was like, "Elves only have to give three blonde hairs but you have to kill two dwarves and a human baby?!" I see later you clarify the elves must die as well. Maybe change it to "it orders us to bring / three elven heirs, dying." 
I like that your NPCs have personality characterizations. 
I really like the dice icons you used and appreciate that you clarify which rumors are true and false. 
A lot of the information in the About the City, section is superfluous or redundant.  Could be tightened or replaced with other information if needed. 
In the Three-headed snake section cultists is misspelled. 
I think it would be worthwhile to develop the climactic ritual chamber battle settings a bit more. Is there high ground, cover, can Orobus cause an earthquake that makes stalactites fall, etc.  Maybe there are baby snake guards or the cultists are murdering the sacrifices with venomous snakes or turning into snake men? 
Everything feels very true to the theme and the Appx. N/OSR genre. I think it would be super easy to pick up and run this as written. Great work!

I was thrilled when you said this was your adventure as I had it open to print already and is one of the ones I am most excited about reading. The Cube is one of my favorite horror films and this reminds me a of that a lot. 
I love the interactive map and it's very clear how to assemble and operate it from a gameplay perspective.  Any group would be thrilled for their GM to bust out a Rubix cube with this on it at the start of a session. 

I love that you included drawings of Haumea and Kaulu, I think they add a lot. 
Maybe bold phylactery in room 10 just to make it a bit clearer. 
I like the Ohe Hano Ihu, the placement of it's details on the cover is a little odd, but I understand you have to make things fit where there is space. I wish it was integrated into the story a little bit more, maybe as part of the timeline it could included like, "Used her Ohe Hano Ihu to secretly casts a spell to grant Kaulu eternal youth."?

On a similar note, it might be fun to have the tortured remains of Kaulu's killer in one of the rooms. 

This is minor, but I feel like you might want to rethink the font choice, formatting and background on pages 3 and 4.  I'm not knowledgeable enough to make suggestions, but it doesn't feel like it all works together. For example, I thought the Mutants of Catfish Hollow and The Piteous Priests did a great job on their text heavy, white background pages of creating a cohesive and visually interesting vibe.

Excellent use of the theme, brilliant job with the map. This is a great dungeon crawl, very Appx. N. appropriate, supported by a really clever story device. Great job!

P.S. I just printed this out and ordered a Rubix cube, haha. 

Incredible art. I would definitely stop to pick this up and look if I saw it while walking through a store.

Some of the weathering effect is making the text hard to read, maybe consider selectively erasing or moving the weathering that falls directly on words.

So if an 11 or 12 is infected, that’s only like a 16% chance. It seems like that might be too low, especially for a small party, as infection is central plot for the story moving forward. I kind of feel the same way about it only being curable at stage 1. I’m reading this as a “race against the clock for a cure” adventure but it seems like it might be more “try and seek revenge before you die” type of scenario. Alternatively, the players are trying to save an infected NPC, but I think that lowers the stakes some.

Ok I just reread that section and see it’s reversible up to stage 4. Maybe change the first sentence to it’s only “easily curable” or “curable with a potion”.  Or if your intention is this is a chronic condition that keeps coming back if it progresses past stage one I think you should explicitly say that. “Halted or reversed but will return when wounded” or something like that.

I love the rumor table and that you list which ones are true and false.

I see that the Bloom is spread through a restorative potion but that doesn’t appear to be for sale on the wares table. If I were to run this, I would probably start as if they were just shopping ahead of the adventure and this is a flavorful stall at the market. Then when they take the potion mid combat, they start sprouting flowers from their wound, haha.

Really fun adventure, excellently executed!

I love how hard you went for it with the worms. The worm candelabra made me laugh out loud.

I really enjoyed the visual style. It was a simple concept well executed. The map is great. Excellent font choice. I like the worm on the cover a lot, but for the purposes of scoring in a competition it’s maybe too plain for top marks.

Overall, this adventure is one of my favorites I’ve seen so far!

Really love the weirdness. I think this is my favorite of the 10 or so modules I've read and reviewed so far. The art is phenomenal, great color selection.   The Daptorkin are my favorite thing, I think. You pack a ton of information into the pages without them feeling cluttered and you still manage to include awesome images of the creatures and each location on the map. Great use of tables. Just a really cool, unique world to play around in. I'm not sure if you changed much or it's just looking at it a second time after we spoke, but I feel like i have a clear idea on how to run this adventure. 

I am unfamiliar with the Vaults of Vaarn, but I'll try my best to provide useful feedback.
When I looked up "councilor vs counselor" it suggests that councilor is specifically for elected officials and not mental health professionals. 
Great use of the word ulfire. 
I don't understand the purpose of the decimal digits on the hexes. I assume it's a Vaults of Vaarn thing. 
I would love another sentence on the 21st century man's character/state of mind.  
This is an extremely inventive and fun adventure. I love the art and the color scheme. The use of water rationing is also great. I have a clear understanding of how to run it and, assuming I knew Vaults of Vaarn, think this would be easy to pick up and play with little additional prep. You did a good job of packing in a lot of content while making it clear, imaginative and visually interesting. Loved the x-ray lantern, Faa nomads, space whale, Autarch clones and gravity well- very cool ideas!

Thank you! I did the ship with a different image and made it much more polished, but then realized a few days before the deadline the image wasn’t free to use. So I did it again with another photo and just didn’t have it in me to keep adding and refining it, haha.

I mentioned this already, I love the cover art and the choice of font. The bright colors and style really stood out in the sea of submissions.  You also did a great job with the font/color choice/layout/styling on the text heavy pages. Taking what is essentially a page of text and making it visually engaging with a clear hierarchy of information is something most entries I've see so far haven't been able to pull off and it's something I struggle with as well. 

 I think it's super intuitive how to pick up and play this adventure. Even reading through it once, it's clear how the different NPCs should work in the story with and against one another. 

Adding the Duke's Bastard's name would be helpful. I initially missed the stat block for the Chimeral Lord- maybe try to fit the stat blocks closer to the relevant text?

Also, on the stat block for Amir Briones I would change it to Captain Briones to make it consistent with the rest of the text. 

The white font on the pale green background is a bit hard to read, maybe choose a darker background color and I would center the text in the row vertically so that the lower case letters don't cross row borders (for example the y in Pyrebulb)

As a southerner, I appreciate the inclusion of kudzu at Catfish Hollow, haha.

Great job! It looks like it will be fun to play. 

Thank you so much!

I really enjoy the art, especially the hand drawn map and time's needle magical item. The magic items seem like a lot of fun and I think my players would enjoy them.  The paper textured background is a nice touch. I could easily see myself picking up and playing this. I could pick this up and run it with minimal prep. The astral butterfly and Yahsa-Gok are very cool. One thing I don't understand is "Astral Silkworm, as Remorhaz", but I assume that makes sense if you go to the page in the parenthetical. 

Very cool setting, I love what you did with it. It reminds me of the House of the Maker in The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie. 

A few quibbles:
There needs to be more vertical space/padding on the rows in the random encounters table. 
The last e in Mirage and Astral Gemstone kind of looks like e_, because of it's long tail. I had to really zoom in to figure out what was going on the first time I saw that. 
You might want to differentiate the font size between headers and subheads to help create visual cues, for example Magic Items vs Time's Needle and Astral Gem. 

I think this sentence needs to be broken into two sentences, "Cultists who venerate her now exist before and after her birth, gamblers and seers alike seeking insight." Are the cultists gamblers and seekers?

Great work! I think this could be a strong contender for one of the top spots, but I've only read like ten entries so far. 

I love the page one art. I totally get the vibe you are going for here and I think you have accomplished it superbly. Also your language and word choice is excellent and really supports the setting. I like the Neso to N350. I am not familiar with Mud + Laser, so perhaps I'm not the best to give feedback here, but it seems like a cool system that I would enjoy from what I read. 

In terms of visual design, I think everything is perfectly functional and clear, but for the purposes of the competition I think it could be developed further in terms of background, font choice, and maybe a more dynamic layout.  There is a lot of content, which is fantastic and well done, but pushes it towards being a bit of a "wall of text". This might benefit from being edited down some to allow the highlights to stand out more. A picture of one of the "nymphs" would add a lot. 

I think it's very clear how to run it. I would have no trouble picking this up and playing it at my table!

Great work! 

After reading though this, the adventure makes perfect sense. I think it would be pretty straightforward and fun to pick up and play.

The cover art looks good to me for the most part.  Having Vast and Trunkless first and larger than Mercy in the Ram's Hall makes it seem like "Vast and Trunkless" is the title and "Mercy in Ram's Hall" is a subtitle, which confused me a little at first. Also, I think you should do away with the curve in the ax handle above the shoulder. 

I think this sentence could use some cleaning up, "The shepherd became the lords Carnifex, and, Each winter, the serfs were to elect a champion to challenge the Carnifex, or risk joining the lords' obedient herd." "each" should be lowercase, and "lord's" instead of "lords'", unless there are multiple lords. Also, I think "risk joining the lord's obedient herd." could be clearer, do you mean all the nomads would become his servants and no longer allowed to wander?

OK, based on that they're growing horns, I'm guessing if the pact isn't fulfilled they all turn into sheep.

"The cell is overwhelmed with a weathered, huge blue-skinned man with bull horns in undergarments" Initially, I read this as him having horns in his undergarments, haha. 

The layout on pages 2-4 is perfectly serviceable. I wouldn't think anything of it if this was an adventure I bought but for the purposes of the competition it's not a dynamic visual design. Maybe consider a more weathered page background as a quick change to add more flavor. One thing, I would like to see the map and the writing on the map to be a bit bigger to improve legibility. 

Hope this helps, it seems like a super fun adventure! I could see myself playing it. Let me know if you have any questions for me. 

First off, the scotch tape on the cover was a nice touch, as was the Made by Humans bar code. I am not familiar with Mythic Bastionland, so I might not be the best person to give feedback on this. 

The writing is super evocative, it reminds me of a prose poem. This is a very vivid location and the imagery is exciting. 

I love the art as well, they look like awesome settings and I think seeing them will be "worth a thousand words" for the player in terms of grasping what you're going for. 

After reading through everything, I'm still a bit confused as to how it all works together. Here is my understanding after reading: The Sea Knight seemed to me to be a player character option. I presumed that there was going to be a strong sea element but it seems like we're kind of in a land of streams and lakes and the Lady of the Lake is presumably in the lake with the Repentant Tears, judging from the image.  The land is called The Tears and there is a cavern with The Sink inside it which is the main area of the adventure. 

I'm not sure what to take from this, "gaping clouded maw delusion urging freedom the boon, at what cost" freedom from the boon? but I'm not seeing any other mention of a boon. 

Again, I'm probably not the best person to weigh in on this because I don't know the system, but I think while the art and writing is very vivid, I would need a little more grounding in terms of how these elements are connected to one another in order to be able to run it. 

Happy to answer questions if you have any for me!

I loved the commitment to the vintage book aesthetic and the incorporation of it into the design!  Great use of the theme and title. The back cover was perfect, it really took me back. 

The drawings are awesome,  you did an exceptional job selecting them. Everything works together. 

You have "Obsesse" on the dragon sickness table, but I think it should be "Obsessed"?

Incredible art and layout. This is probably my favorite submission I have seen for Visual Design. I love the concept and the use of the theme. 

I would have liked to have the Living Candles developed a bit more mechanically. Having a Golem, for example, that is only vulnerable to fire damage would be essentially impossible for most parties to kill in D&D.  On the flip side, having a bunch of wax work villagers and rats that are only vulnerable to damage attack a mid-level party has the potential to be really fun and force some creative thinking.  For example, maybe they could also be only resistant to slashing damage? Or perhaps a table of outcomes, some positive some negative, when attacked by non-flame weapons. 

I loved the tables, especially the bonus room table. The optional bonus at the end was also super fun and something I  definitely want to do.  

Incredible art and layout. This is probably my favorite submission I have seen for Visual Design. I love the concept and the use of the theme. 

I would have liked to have the Living Candles developed a bit more mechanically. Having a Golem, for example, that is only vulnerable to fire damage would be essentially impossible for most parties to kill in D&D.  On the flip side, having a bunch of wax work villagers and rats that are only vulnerable to damage attack a mid-level party has the potential to be really fun and force some creative thinking.  For example, maybe they could also be only resistant to slashing damage? Or perhaps a table of outcomes, some positive some negative, when attacked by non-flame weapons. 

I loved the tables, especially the bonus room table. The optional bonus at the end was also super fun and something I  definitely want to do.  

Love the concept! This is a fantastic setting and I'm seriously thinking about using this in my upcoming D&D sessions. I love the incorporation of Tibetan art and mythology. The Valley of Anchorites is great in particular. I really like the Tibetan demon biting the moon. 

Some Quibbles:

Shangri-La is in the grip of no grand war or apocalyptic disaster.  Awkward phrasing, maybe, "

Shangri-La is not in the grip of grand war or apocalyptic disaster. "

I'm unclear if the diamond symbols next to the location names have a mechanical impact. I understand that this indicates the area is more dangerous or less dangerous, but I'm not sure if that means we should roll for encounters more frequently or something like that. 

The icon art on the map feels a little underdeveloped to me.  Same with the pixelated yellow around the demon.

I'd love to see additional art incorporated the way you did with the deer on the last page. 

Great work!

Thank you! I'm super excited to check out your submission as well.  

I've only played two solo RPGs, and they were kind of like writing a short story with a series of writing prompts that excite the imagination. It's my hope that having this internal mystery will create dramatic tension and help players inhabit the POV. I'm a little concerned that the resolution being determined by a dice roll will leave people feeling cheated instead of a story twist/reveal.  

Played this the other night with my group and we absolutely loved it. It has a great central mystery with excellent reveals for the players. The setting was horrific and uniquely flavorful while still familiar enough for everyone to navigate. Very easy as a warden to pick up and run after one or two read throughs.

Can’t say enough good things about it, would be great for a new group or seasoned mothership players!

hey, I saw your comment on Discord- not sure if you’re looking for additional feedback, but I think including “the players are trapped in a tin can where everything is going wrong, worms are burrowing through the hull, and oxygen levels are plummeting.” as a tag line on the cover would contextualize the module a lot. A few sensory details for the malfunctions, the smell of ozone, the shrill alarm, etc. would go a long way to make it feel more immediate and immersive.

Thank you! Let me know how it goes if you use it!

Thank you! I really botched the theme. When I first read the rules I conflated theme and focus and thought both were optional and then didn’t reread the rules until I was about to submit. I’ll be more careful next time.

Thank you! These are great suggestions!

Incredible submission! I love the three competing NPCs as a device, especially the trust fund weapons dealer. 

This is just my personal opinion, but when I see a star destroyer/end of the world or universe type plot device my eyes glaze over a little bit from its overuse. But other people clearly love it! One thing to consider, I think part of why the original Star Wars trilogy worked is because they were trying to stop the Death Star after it destroyed Alderon. Same with Avengers Endgame Part 2, Thanos successfully did the snap. I don’t know why, but it counterintuitively seems to raise the suspense and it might be worth setting the Star Killer adventure post first use.

I love the incorporation of the Sisyphus myth! In general, I love morally gray problems so the alien lifecycle being interrupted was a wonderful turn of the screw. I think the title, layout, design and utility are all fantastic. For me this didn’t “emanate horror”, their description was a bit scientific/clinical, which I liked, but I think that undercut the tension in some ways? I think some art of the aliens would go a long way. The tables were awesome and I intend to use them immediately, especially the decompression table which I loved.

One of my favorite submissions, great job! I hope you keep developing this story. 

I think this was my favorite submission. The cover is great, the concept is great, I love the weirdness. Great job!