The Inside Scoop on Gaming

This is my second review for RPGNet, dealing with another Lankhmar product - Tales of Lankhmar. Rather than repeating myself, please refer to my Wonders of Lankhmar review for my "mission statement".

After the disappointment of Wonders of Lankhmar, it was with some trepidation that I moved to the next in the series, Tales of Lankhmar. This is another adventure anthology containing a varied selection of short scenarios. I'm glad to report this is a much better book than the first, though in truth it would have been hard to be much worse! The improvement may be due to a change of author, or it could be because the adventures are much longer in this book (7 spread over 64 pages compared to 48 in 96 pages), thus enabling more complex storylines and greater detail. Whatever, I got much better value for money from this product, despite the reduced page count.

The book comes with a foldout cardboard cover with floor plans on the inside and a page of pre-generated characters on the outside. The characters are reasonable enough, though not especially memorable, and I was disappointed that there weren't any links to them in any of the adventures. The book was printed on durable thick paper and all the pages were still intact despite the fact that I'd got my copy secondhand.

I'll go through the contents section by section, so you have a good idea of what the book contains. Beware of spoilers below...

Introduction

This is similar to other Lankhmar books, summarising the necessary changes to the AD&D rules to make them fit a Lankhmar campaign, describing the currency, adding a Social Level mechanic and altering the spell casting rules slightly (all casting times are increased to the next highest unit of measurement).

Silver Eel Tavern

This notable location, apparently mentioned in many of the original novels (not that I've read any, yet), can count Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser among its clientele. The inn is described from top to bottom in sufficient detail for most purposes. The maps on the inside cover mentioned above include floor plans to go with these descriptions. There's no great surprises or innovations, it's basically a standard fantasy inn, but it all fits together neatly and would make a good setting for the PCs' base of operations. After the descriptions come a series of random encounter tables, so if your PCs have nothing better to do than sit around the inn, drinking, then you can come up with something to liven their evening up. These vary from a drunken fighter challenging a PC to a fight, to more detailed "special" encounters involving well known personalities such as the aforementioned Fafhrd or Grey Mouser.

A Cask Full of Trouble

Following straight on from the description of the Silver Eel, this adventure features its owner, Braggi. He has obtained a cask full of rare violet wine from Kiraay which is worth a small fortune. Naturally the Vintner's Guild want a cut of the profits and they ask the Thieves Guild for assistance when Braggi refuses. The PCs' job is to guard the cask until after a wine tasting the following day. This is straight forward guardwork and the PCs will need to disrupt half a dozen or so attacks attempted by the Thieves Guild if they are to earn their pay. This adventure could be used to introduce the PCs to Braggi who may give them free food and board afterwards (assuming they are successful). The roles could be reversed if the PCs are thieves themselves, they may have to circumvent hired guards in order to steal or destroy the wine on behalf of the Thieves Guild.

Red God's Curse

This adventure is the opposite of what you might expect - the PCs start off with a large, valuable ruby and must break into a temple to return it to its rightful place, not normal behaviour for PCs, you have to admit! Now of course there's a reason why they'd do this, the ruby is cursed so it's in their best interests to rid themselves of it. The scenario starts in an inn with the PCs overhearing a conversation from a neighbouring table where two thieves are discussing what to do with a large gem they've "found". This proves to be a great way to stitch up unscrupulous PCs who steal the ruby for themselves, as its curse of bad luck soon reveals itself. Sheelba of the Eyeless Face (a powerful sorcereress for those of you who don't know Lankhmar) informs the PCs that the only way to rid themselves of the curse is to return the gem to the temple of the Red God. This is where the adventure falls down, the PCs can't simply take the gem there and hand it in to a priest, that would be much to easy. Instead they are forced to break in and fight their way past guards and traps in much the same way as they would if they were there to steal the gem instead of return it! Obviously the PCs have some motivation to continue the quest in order to rid themselves of the curse, but you can't help feel sorry for the priests throwing themselves into desperate combat with the PCs not knowing what their actual reason for intruding was. Floor plans and room descriptions are included in case the PCs don't head straight for the altar. Again, you could quite easily reverse this adventure and run it in a more traditional sense with the PCs trying to steal the gem.

When Walks the Wyrm

In order to save the entire world from destruction by the Wyrm of the title, the PCs must steal a magical flute and play a tune on it to send the Wyrm to sleep again. This is basically a break-and-enter job on a noble's mansion with the added incentive of apocalyptic consequences should they refuse or fail. If I ran this adventure, I'd drop the entire end-of-world nonsense, forget about the Wyrm and provide a far more mundane starting point, such as a contract from the Thieves Guild. As for the previous sections, good floor plans and room descriptions are supplied, though a couple of problems exist. One is a skylight which links the roof straight to a ground floor room, somehow bypassing the first floor room inbetween! There's also a large number of random traps scattered about but many of these could be ignored. Lastly, I'd expect a huge mansion to have more than just two bedrooms. However, this would make a good introductory adventure for thief PCs, maybe even run as a solo adventure.

In the Land of the Pale Ones

The PCs are sent to the snowy north to bring back a Snow Behemoth, dead or alive. This actually turns out to be an exercise in tact and diplomacy rather than a straight monster hunt. During their travels in the north, the PCs meet a tribe of snow barbarians. The PCs act as a catalyst which brings to a head a schism which has developed between two factions within the tribe. The first is a conservative group, lead by the shamans, who believe that all southern city dwellers are degenerate scum and want the tribe to rigourously adhere to tradition. The opposition is a more progressive group, lead by the healers, who believe that much can be learned from "civilised" people and that the tribe needs to move with the times. To complicate matters, one of the tribe's sacred animals just happens to be the Snow Behemoth the party were looking for in the first place! Assuming the players are not hack-and-slay merchants intending to butcher their way through the barbarians, this could turn into a complex political scenario as they try and play the two sides off against each other, all the while trying to find an elusive Snow Behemoth.

House of Mazes

For me, this was the weakest scenario in the book, it's basically a complex dungeon layout with a scattering of random traps and monsters - fairly powerful traps and monsters at that - so your PCs will be lucky to escape with their lives. The premise for the scenario is that a bored and rich noble steals a valuable crown from the Thieves Guild, secretes it in the centre of a deadly maze and then challenges the Thieves Guild to recover it. Rather dull and overpowered, best ignored.

A New God

Once again Lankhmar is threatened with destruction! A new god, Askhal the Merciful, has appeared, his followers preaching love and peace. It turns out the people who worship him become possessed by aliens. These aliens have a plan to take over Lankhmar and even the Overlord may become a convert to their religion. Of course, it is up to our trusty heroes to stop this. As written this shouldn't be too difficult, after a couple of minor initial encounters, the PCs need only disrupt a ceremony to initiate the Overlord to successfully foil the Askhalite plan. This scenario has a rather rushed feel to it, with a bit of work this could be extended into the basis of a campaign which might work better than a short adventure.

War in Lankhmar Below

This can be linked to the CA2 module Swords of Deceit. The rats living below Lankhmar are in the midst of a civil war between the evil Hisvin (from CA2) and the so-called Lawful Rats. The PCs are enlisted to aid the Lawful Rats and are given potions to shrink them so that they might fit down the rat tunnels. The first part of the adventure involves rescuing the kidnapped leader of the Lawful Rats, the PCs are then required to guard the Lawful Rats as they attempt to evacuate to a waiting ship which will return them to Ilthmar where they plan to regroup. Along the way there are various attacks by rat warriors of varying power and numbers. Quite a linear plot but with plenty of opportunity for future adventures, this may be of greater interest if you have the CA2 module. Various maps relating to this adventure are printed on the inside of the cover.

Appendix

Last of all, bestiary details in standard AD&D format are provided for an Askhalite and an Ice Cat.

Summary

All in all this is quite a useful book. The scenarios are sufficiently varied that you should find something to fit your group and campaign style. Even if the material is not used exactly as presented, it would be easily customised to suit your purposes. If nothing else, the floorplans would come in handy for use as generic locations. This is a vast improvement over the pitiful Wonders of Lankhmar book and goes some way to restoring my confidence in the remaining books. I still have Thieves of Lankhmar, Nehwon, Prince of Lankhmar, Slayers of Lankhmar, Rogues in Lankhmar and Cutthroats of Lankhmar to review - please let me know if you wish my next review to be about one of these in particular.

Style: 3 (Average)
Substance: 4 (Meaty)

Tales of Lankhmar
Author: Anthony Pryor Category: game Company/Publisher: TSR Line: Lankhmar Cost: £3 secondhand Page count: 64 ISBN: 1-56076-135-0 SKU: 9329 LNR2 Capsule Review by Luke Twigger on 03/26/00. Genre tags: Fantasy	This is my second review for RPGNet, dealing with another Lankhmar product - Tales of Lankhmar. Rather than repeating myself, please refer to my Wonders of Lankhmar review for my "mission statement". After the disappointment of Wonders of Lankhmar, it was with some trepidation that I moved to the next in the series, Tales of Lankhmar. This is another adventure anthology containing a varied selection of short scenarios. I'm glad to report this is a much better book than the first, though in truth it would have been hard to be much worse! The improvement may be due to a change of author, or it could be because the adventures are much longer in this book (7 spread over 64 pages compared to 48 in 96 pages), thus enabling more complex storylines and greater detail. Whatever, I got much better value for money from this product, despite the reduced page count. The book comes with a foldout cardboard cover with floor plans on the inside and a page of pre-generated characters on the outside. The characters are reasonable enough, though not especially memorable, and I was disappointed that there weren't any links to them in any of the adventures. The book was printed on durable thick paper and all the pages were still intact despite the fact that I'd got my copy secondhand. I'll go through the contents section by section, so you have a good idea of what the book contains. Beware of spoilers below... Introduction This is similar to other Lankhmar books, summarising the necessary changes to the AD&D rules to make them fit a Lankhmar campaign, describing the currency, adding a Social Level mechanic and altering the spell casting rules slightly (all casting times are increased to the next highest unit of measurement). Silver Eel Tavern This notable location, apparently mentioned in many of the original novels (not that I've read any, yet), can count Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser among its clientele. The inn is described from top to bottom in sufficient detail for most purposes. The maps on the inside cover mentioned above include floor plans to go with these descriptions. There's no great surprises or innovations, it's basically a standard fantasy inn, but it all fits together neatly and would make a good setting for the PCs' base of operations. After the descriptions come a series of random encounter tables, so if your PCs have nothing better to do than sit around the inn, drinking, then you can come up with something to liven their evening up. These vary from a drunken fighter challenging a PC to a fight, to more detailed "special" encounters involving well known personalities such as the aforementioned Fafhrd or Grey Mouser. A Cask Full of Trouble Following straight on from the description of the Silver Eel, this adventure features its owner, Braggi. He has obtained a cask full of rare violet wine from Kiraay which is worth a small fortune. Naturally the Vintner's Guild want a cut of the profits and they ask the Thieves Guild for assistance when Braggi refuses. The PCs' job is to guard the cask until after a wine tasting the following day. This is straight forward guardwork and the PCs will need to disrupt half a dozen or so attacks attempted by the Thieves Guild if they are to earn their pay. This adventure could be used to introduce the PCs to Braggi who may give them free food and board afterwards (assuming they are successful). The roles could be reversed if the PCs are thieves themselves, they may have to circumvent hired guards in order to steal or destroy the wine on behalf of the Thieves Guild. Red God's Curse This adventure is the opposite of what you might expect - the PCs start off with a large, valuable ruby and must break into a temple to return it to its rightful place, not normal behaviour for PCs, you have to admit! Now of course there's a reason why they'd do this, the ruby is cursed so it's in their best interests to rid themselves of it. The scenario starts in an inn with the PCs overhearing a conversation from a neighbouring table where two thieves are discussing what to do with a large gem they've "found". This proves to be a great way to stitch up unscrupulous PCs who steal the ruby for themselves, as its curse of bad luck soon reveals itself. Sheelba of the Eyeless Face (a powerful sorcereress for those of you who don't know Lankhmar) informs the PCs that the only way to rid themselves of the curse is to return the gem to the temple of the Red God. This is where the adventure falls down, the PCs can't simply take the gem there and hand it in to a priest, that would be much to easy. Instead they are forced to break in and fight their way past guards and traps in much the same way as they would if they were there to steal the gem instead of return it! Obviously the PCs have some motivation to continue the quest in order to rid themselves of the curse, but you can't help feel sorry for the priests throwing themselves into desperate combat with the PCs not knowing what their actual reason for intruding was. Floor plans and room descriptions are included in case the PCs don't head straight for the altar. Again, you could quite easily reverse this adventure and run it in a more traditional sense with the PCs trying to steal the gem. When Walks the Wyrm In order to save the entire world from destruction by the Wyrm of the title, the PCs must steal a magical flute and play a tune on it to send the Wyrm to sleep again. This is basically a break-and-enter job on a noble's mansion with the added incentive of apocalyptic consequences should they refuse or fail. If I ran this adventure, I'd drop the entire end-of-world nonsense, forget about the Wyrm and provide a far more mundane starting point, such as a contract from the Thieves Guild. As for the previous sections, good floor plans and room descriptions are supplied, though a couple of problems exist. One is a skylight which links the roof straight to a ground floor room, somehow bypassing the first floor room inbetween! There's also a large number of random traps scattered about but many of these could be ignored. Lastly, I'd expect a huge mansion to have more than just two bedrooms. However, this would make a good introductory adventure for thief PCs, maybe even run as a solo adventure. In the Land of the Pale Ones The PCs are sent to the snowy north to bring back a Snow Behemoth, dead or alive. This actually turns out to be an exercise in tact and diplomacy rather than a straight monster hunt. During their travels in the north, the PCs meet a tribe of snow barbarians. The PCs act as a catalyst which brings to a head a schism which has developed between two factions within the tribe. The first is a conservative group, lead by the shamans, who believe that all southern city dwellers are degenerate scum and want the tribe to rigourously adhere to tradition. The opposition is a more progressive group, lead by the healers, who believe that much can be learned from "civilised" people and that the tribe needs to move with the times. To complicate matters, one of the tribe's sacred animals just happens to be the Snow Behemoth the party were looking for in the first place! Assuming the players are not hack-and-slay merchants intending to butcher their way through the barbarians, this could turn into a complex political scenario as they try and play the two sides off against each other, all the while trying to find an elusive Snow Behemoth. House of Mazes For me, this was the weakest scenario in the book, it's basically a complex dungeon layout with a scattering of random traps and monsters - fairly powerful traps and monsters at that - so your PCs will be lucky to escape with their lives. The premise for the scenario is that a bored and rich noble steals a valuable crown from the Thieves Guild, secretes it in the centre of a deadly maze and then challenges the Thieves Guild to recover it. Rather dull and overpowered, best ignored. A New God Once again Lankhmar is threatened with destruction! A new god, Askhal the Merciful, has appeared, his followers preaching love and peace. It turns out the people who worship him become possessed by aliens. These aliens have a plan to take over Lankhmar and even the Overlord may become a convert to their religion. Of course, it is up to our trusty heroes to stop this. As written this shouldn't be too difficult, after a couple of minor initial encounters, the PCs need only disrupt a ceremony to initiate the Overlord to successfully foil the Askhalite plan. This scenario has a rather rushed feel to it, with a bit of work this could be extended into the basis of a campaign which might work better than a short adventure. War in Lankhmar Below This can be linked to the CA2 module Swords of Deceit. The rats living below Lankhmar are in the midst of a civil war between the evil Hisvin (from CA2) and the so-called Lawful Rats. The PCs are enlisted to aid the Lawful Rats and are given potions to shrink them so that they might fit down the rat tunnels. The first part of the adventure involves rescuing the kidnapped leader of the Lawful Rats, the PCs are then required to guard the Lawful Rats as they attempt to evacuate to a waiting ship which will return them to Ilthmar where they plan to regroup. Along the way there are various attacks by rat warriors of varying power and numbers. Quite a linear plot but with plenty of opportunity for future adventures, this may be of greater interest if you have the CA2 module. Various maps relating to this adventure are printed on the inside of the cover. Appendix Last of all, bestiary details in standard AD&D format are provided for an Askhalite and an Ice Cat. Summary All in all this is quite a useful book. The scenarios are sufficiently varied that you should find something to fit your group and campaign style. Even if the material is not used exactly as presented, it would be easily customised to suit your purposes. If nothing else, the floorplans would come in handy for use as generic locations. This is a vast improvement over the pitiful Wonders of Lankhmar book and goes some way to restoring my confidence in the remaining books. I still have Thieves of Lankhmar, Nehwon, Prince of Lankhmar, Slayers of Lankhmar, Rogues in Lankhmar and Cutthroats of Lankhmar to review - please let me know if you wish my next review to be about one of these in particular. Style: 3 (Average) Substance: 4 (Meaty)