Module- The Ballad of Red Kent

Hey saw your post. Gave your dungeon a try. One thing, in several places, you didn't define all the monsters in an area as an encounter group. As a result, I could sneak a thief forward and attack one with a bow, and only that monster would respond. With the first spider encounter and later, the mixed priest/ghoul/etc pack, I could draw the groups off a monster at a time and kill each individually. Sneak into range, sneak attack with bow while the rest of the party stays back, the one attacked and only that one would chase after my thief, right into a prepared killing ground with the whole party. So long as the rest of the party stayed back, none of the rest of the monster group would respond.

Also, if you could add a second bow and more arrows to the start, that'd be great. Many people run elven mages with high dex and at low level, a longbow does better damage than a cantrip.

The Ogre/White Wolf were pretty tough at second level. I maybe should have gone left instead of right.

Oh, and if it's me you mean by borrowing "your" storyline, I had written up the lore intro last week before I ever saw your module. So no I didn't borrow your story idea. Rescuing the [insert important figure]'s kidnapped son/daughter/kitty is about as trope as they come. Not that there's anything wrong with the standard storylines. They just reappear quite often even without copying. 

Alrighty, fair enough. I didn't know who it was, I hardly glanced at the username, only the description. We are all anonymous here on the interwebs so, if you say you didn't, I believe ya. There is more to it then you are mentioning however. When I was posting my module on this forum, I had just opened my page on nexus mods, and saw the very next one nearly had my exact plot descriptor: baron's daughter, offered reward, captured by scoundrel etc. I mean, not even a duke instead of baron, or a niece or son instead of daughter. You can surely see how someone may think that? I'm sure you would have thought so too, roles reversed. So I left a little snarky, sarcastic sentence. I apologize if I was incorrect.

Buuuuuutt..For a crypt setting my story is kind of unique. Look at ALL the other mods currently on nexus. Every single one is: Undead this, vampire that, ogre this, skeleton that.. I was kind of the first to make it about actual humans using it as a hideaway. My scenario is more suited to a forest/mountain setting, which I am hoping to do if they add that to dungeon maker. 

 No big deal in either case, it's not like we are making money on any of this. It's all just fun. You are right, there is nothing at all wrong with standard storylines. I've written many of them over the years. Its the style, texture, meter and prose of how its done that makes it interesting. All that boring writery stuff which I quite enjoy. I'll give your module a whirl when I have time. I'll even give you feedback, if you would like :)

 Aaaaaaand I'll be sure to group my monsters next module per your advice. My thinking when not grouping them was, that once you are close enough, they would become hostile. But as you outlined, they clearly do not. I had never approached the encounters quite in that way when I play-tested. so I am glad you did.

Well I had been in a holding pattern on this one because I didn't quite or rather couldn't quite put my finger on how to define this module. 

First of all let me say I had already noticed the minute you released this, you actually customize a lot of your design. So I was impressed, the only other module designer i've seen do it was Lastrati with Tomb of the Fallen Apprentice. 

So well done on that. 

For the most part, its not really a combat module. so standard combat balance doesn't apply. But it still needs a way to pull it into a format that people can define when they want to go play it that won't wreck their parties. 

As I was playing through it, I thought, wow this would be a really good 3rd-4th level module... if not for just a couple of monsters in there that would totally wreck a 3rd level party. But then I realized because of the way you faced those monsters away from the party, you didn't actually intend people to fight those. 

You had intended people to be able to sneak by them without actually fighting them. 

So I finally came up with a way to define it. 

This module is for a party of 2nd-4th level party of Thieves, Shadow Casters, Spellblades, and Rangers. This is obviously intended to be more of a stealth module not a combat module, and it works out very well because of that.  

These types of modules did exist in AD&D and 2nd Edition but were very rare and I think this is what you were going for. 

So I think you should define your module in that way, instead of just a generic 1st-8th level "any group" module, because that really just doesn't fit at all. 1st level party of an "any group" will get wrecked in some of those encounters, and so would a 2nd or 3rd level one. A 5th-8th level party would be bored. 

This will help people understand it and help target your audience better. 

For the most part this is a story based module, and more of a mystery of sneaking around and learning things. while there is no actual resolve on it, the story behind it is fascinating to learn. 

I only had minor piddly things, the encounter indexing like Acadiantri brought up and. 

1. Module entry chest: This is kinda critical... you forgot to leave spell focuses and holy symbol slot items in there. This is important because the types of characters your module is targeted to, are things like... Rangers, Shadowcaster Thieves, Leather Armor wearing Spellswords, and various hybrids who will enter your module bare as a 1st level character with no other gear than starting gear... no matter what level they are. You want those hybrids to be able to use their magic, Without those they can't. 

2. Some of your Lore Plates get a bit long... while this is ok, what I might recommend doing in some cases is like you did in your Journal Entry area. Split them up into multiple trigger segments for people to read. 

3. There is one trigger where you are telling the party to go back to the campsite to rest quickly as they don't know what will be ahead. But there is a portion of it where you say... "to reflect on what we've learned". That kinda threw me for a loop since we hadn't learned anything at that point yet. So you might want to take that little portion out of there. 

4. Your Ending Portion: This gets tricky because of that Badlands Ranger in there that is around 7th-8th level that you faced towards the wall. I believe you intended the party to sneak past him and out the exit... one problem... right now due to the Beta Toolset... you can't see the Exit point, ie... it doesn't light up.
So you are going to have to come up with another way to let people know there's an exit point there because they can't see it. It was obvious you intended them to sneak out the back door... but they won't be able to find it under current conditions and will be lost and unable to complete your module.  

But yes, overall it is a solidly designed story based module. 

Hmm.. Your critiques and compliments mostly make sense until you started saying my module isn't doable with a 3rd level party. It makes me suspect you did not play it, you just looked at the map in editor and then left your two cents. In part, it could be an issue of word phrasing. I did not mean to say the entire module is beatable with a 1st level party. That would be ridiculous. By the time you reach the last few encounters, your party will be 3rd level, assuming they defeated everything up until then.

 You are partly correct that I left option to sneak by certain encounters. One person on GoG told me they decided to leave the ogre and his "friend" alone because they had sympathy for them. As a story-crafter I love hearing that sort of thing. True when you first encounter them, that's a tough 2nd level fight, no doubt. But at 3rd level? An ogre and winter wolf with a surprise round? That's absolutely winnable, even for an inexperienced player. Nothing in here "would wreck" a 3rd level party whatsoever. Honestly, I don't see how its possible for a 3rd level party to lose to one Badlands Hunter. I believe it is literally impossible. If you haven't, try it out. Just paste a room in dungeon maker, gather a level 3 party, give yourself some +1 gear and and fight a Badlands Hunter. Sure, he may take out whichever front-liner aggros him, but with three other characters hitting with range attacks, magic missiles and other spells, I don't see a situation where he wipes party. Sorry, you are wrong there. I'm tempted to leave a playthrough video to show just that. 

Luckily, I don't think I need to. Honestly, thanks to everyone who downloaded and enjoyed. My module is now at, or near, the top of trending mods and also endorsement to download ratio of any gameplay mod on Solasta in nexus since I posted here. I was going to make a part 2, but honestly I will probably wait until there is another scenario available. I just don't think I can design a better room layout in the crypt than I already have (takes a while to do it right).  Silverquick, you seem to post quite a bit, I'm not sure if you know, or are involved with any of the devs? If you are, please whisper sweet nothing's in their ears about having a forest or mountain setting in later dungeon maker updates. As I'm sure you are aware those are technically difficult to do, but the pay-off would be sweet. 

Nope I definitely played it, 

I can guarantee you that. Kinda insulting that you would think otherwise. I don't do cheap crap like that.