The Standing Stone, an adventure for 7th level characters, is the fourth of eight stand-alone adventures from Wizards of the Coast designed to show off the nuances of the latest incarnation of Dungeon's & Dragons while taking a party from first through twentieth level. In it the adventurers come to the rescue of a forest thorp besieged by wild elves and a ghostly horseman. Unable to leave, and kept even from farming their meager fields, the villagers are starving and desperately need the heroes to help or they will all starve come winter.
What follows is a scene by scene review of the adventure that covers the good, the bad, and the spoilers. The purpose of all these little details is to assist a DM in deciding whether to buy the adventure and, perhaps more importantly, what changes will have to be made before the adventure is run.
SCENE 1: THE OLD FOREST ROAD
As the adventure opens, the party is travelling deep in the forest when they witness a commoner being chased by a ghostly horseman who ruthlessly cuts him down. The horseman ignores the characters and rides off, fading into nothing as he does so. Investigation reveals two other victims farther up the road and a wagon containing some empty feed sacks. The horseman is a wonderful and flexible tool for the DM to use throughout the adventure and this first scene is just a taste of what he can do. Even if the characters kill the horseman, he will continue to haunt them until they discover how to put him to rest. It is here that DMs will first notice a welcome change from previous adventures: the stats at the end of the adventure include both flat footed and touch ACs for all the monsters.
SCENE 2: SHELTER FOR THE NIGHT
Here, the characters come upon a farmstead and get to speak with a crazy old man and his "daughter." Aside from noting how unworked the fields are and how thin the couple is, this scene will make clear that the area is troubled by the horseman as well as murderous elves. By the time they leave, the characters will likely want to get the full story from the elder located in nearby Ossington.
SCENE 3: THE CHAPEL OF NINE GODS
An ancient chapel located by the side of the road on the way to Ossington contains shrines to each of the nine neutral gods of Greyhawk. The number of gods, that they are neutral, or that they are from Greyhawk is irrelevent to the adventure. The chapel caretaker seems a bit obsessed with death and her ritual chanting will likely have the players convinced that she's just as crazy as the farmer up the road. Her pet, a cross between a monkey and a cat called a Hobyah, will be of particular interest should the party contain a Druid since the creature is unidentifiable, Nature Sense ability notwithstanding.
SCENE 4: OSSINGTON
The village has a celtic feel to it as it is surrounded by two rings of standing stones with a set of three trilithons in the middle. Characters may note that there are carvings in Druidic on the trilithons and that a druid of sufficient power (9th level) could use them to cast a Create Faux Human spell. Protective magics prevent any but a druid from deciphering the writings, but the author doesn't make clear what a druid PC could discover from them. This seed of a clue is left to germinate later in the adventure.
As the characters enter Ossington, they are mobbed by villagers desperate for help. A quirky bard known as the Cuckoo calms the crowd with a gentle tune and at some point the characters will get directions to Ossington's elder.
There is both good and bad in this scene. The idea of the standing stones around the village is original and fun. Celtic symbolism and hints of ancient druidic power run throughout the adventure and that's what makes the relatively mundane story of rescuing a starving village something special. On the other hand, the presence of the Cuckoo is particularly jarring from the DM's standpoint. Having a bard there helps to tie in with some of the story hooks provided, but the Cuckoo is not human, and though he looks human he has no ability to appear so (such as the Alternate Form (Su) ability.) Even supposing that his Disguise 7 were enough to cover his true identity, a Vrock (see Monster Manual pages 41 & 45), his role in the adventure is completely unsuited to a creature of that type (as opposed to a succubus, which would have worked well and made more sense.) Why the author chose to use a Vrock with three levels of bard at any point in this adventure is a complete mystery. Fortunately for the DM, the Cuckoo can be a normal human bard and the adventure will not suffer in the least for it.
SCENE 5: INFORMATION
Soon after entering Ossington, the characters will likely speak to Murdows, the elder. Murdows tells how the elf attacks began soon after the horseman arrived and that when the villagers went to speak with them under cover of a white flag, the elves slaughtered them. The characters will likely head in one of three different directions after hearing Murdows's monologue: to talk to the elves, to talk to a group of local adventurers, or going to visit the local landmarks (as the horseman did when he first arrived three months ago.) Unbeknownst to the players, Murdows is lying.
SCENE 6: ASSASINATION
After relaying the information above, Murdows is shot by an elvish arrow. The characters will have no trouble defending themselves during this encounter, but the elves will likely escape. Astute players will note the use of magic to cover the elves retreat. This scene ran very well during playtest and gives the players their first taste of just how clever and elusive the elves can be.
SCENE 7: DYSON'S TOWER
Characters will come here if they wish to talk with the local adventurers mentioned by Murdows in Scene 5. Dyson comes across as an intellectual too wrapped up in his research to notice what's going on around him. He can provide information about local landmarks and will even offer the help of some of his fellows, should the party need some added muscle.
SCENE 8: INTO THE WOODS
In this scene, the party goes into the woods in search of hostile wild elves. Unfortunately, rather than a set of encounters that build upon previous ones so that the characters slowly realize that the humans aren't as innocent as they seem - the DM is provided with a set of tables. For each hour, roll on a table to see if nothing happens, the characters find signs of trouble, a trap is sprung, or they are attacked by the fey. Then go to one of the three tables to see exactly what manner of the trouble, trap, or attack is. Experienced DMs know better than to make such rolls during a session and will simply pick the encounters they want and in what order. Less experienced DMs would be advised to do the same.
This scene also introduces a problem that's found throughout the adventure and that's the complete disregard for the guidelines provided in the Dungeon Master's Guide (DMG) on balancing encounters (see "Difficulty" on DMG page 102.) The characters are either dealing with nuisance encounters of EL2 to EL5, such as in this scene, or overpowering encounters of EL12 or EL13, such as in the two most likely climaxes to the adventure. There is nothing even approaching the appropriate distribution of encounter diffficulties that the DMG says "...an adventure should have."
SCENE 9: THE HORSEMAN RETURNS
This is used at the DM's discretion throughout the adventure and is simply a guide for running encounters with the horseman at appropriate times. He's a memorable encounter and the characters will learn to respect and fear the approach of hooves.
SCENE 10: HOBYAHS BY NIGHT
This is another open scene wherein the characters are tracked through the forest by a pack of Hobyahs and attacked. The only problem area is the explanation of the the Hobyah's damage reduction found in the creature's description. It gives the impression that only wood can harm the creature, which is far more powerful than the standard version of damage reduction given in both the DMG and Monster Manual. If this is the standard version, then why has the author elaborated upon it in the descriptive text and not simply left it only as the standard abbreviation in the main statistics block?
SCENE 11: THE WARLORD'S TOMB
The Warlord's Tomb is a massive barrow located north of town. The characters may hear of this local landmark at several places in the adventure, and will almost certainly come here looking for a way to put the ghostly horseman to rest. When the characters make their way to the center of the barrow, they meet with the warlord and, based on their actions, the scene becomes deadly or remains cordial. The warlord is a Gravewight, a new template that is an excellent addition to those found in Appendix 3 of the Monster Manual. There is a good chance the characters will get information out of him that, like their explorations in the forest, will make them suspicious of the town's inhabitants. In addition, the warlord is the only one likely to fill the characters in on the history of the area, which should indicate the reason for the standing stones.
Unfortunately, in order to enjoy the roleplaying aspect of the warlord encounter, the characters must first get to him. To get to him the characters must traverse what should never be put in any D&D adventure of any kind for any reason - a maze. If there was such a thing as an "Adventure Designer's Certification" for makers of role-playing game adventures, then Mr. Rateliff's should be revoked for life for the single act of allowing such an abomination into print. Even a good maze (one with a pattern, with clues, with interesting features) is less enjoyable for the average player than a root canal without painkiller - and the maze in this scene is not a good one.
As with the Vrock in Scene 4, the maze is easily dropped without the players being the wiser and a good DM will create a small, and far more interesting, tomb to put the Warlord in.
SCENE 12: THE FEY'S LAST STAND
If the player's are determined to see the elves run off or destroyed and have been playing cat and mouse through the forest long enough, then this scene is the climactic battle. This scene was not run during our playtest, which is probably a good thing, because rather than a good knock-down drag out battle, the characters are subjected to an EL12 encounter. Since the characters are level 8, at the most, by this stage of the adventure an encounter like this would be described as: "...more dangerous than an overpowering one, because it's not immediately obvious to the players that the PCs should flee." (DMG102) On the off chance that the characters are victorious, this is also the first scene where the NPCs allergic reaction to coins reveals itself. As in The Speaker in Dreams, none of the NPCs in this adventure carries any coins at all.
SCENE 13: THE HORSEMAN'S REST
When and if the characters visit a local landmark known as the Tarn, they will encounter the horseman, hopefully for the last time. It is here that the horseman gives clues to indicate that he (?) was a paladin and his remains are at the bottom of the lake. That the party should retrieve his remains and bury them in order to put the horseman to rest, is not obvious and our group had to resort to the Speak with Dead spell to get this information. DMs should be prepared to make up the Paladin's name, where the paladin came from, what he or she discovered prior to death, and so on, because none of that information is provided.
SCENE 14: SHOWDOWN
When and if the characters deduce that the real causes of the trouble in Ossington are the "retired" adventurers there, they will return with a righteous fury. This is a standard battle, but given that the party now knows that it has been duped into doing the dirty work of evil adventurers who ally themselves with demonic forces - it's emotionally satisfying to say the least. The only problem with this scene is that it's EL13 and, left as is, one or more characters will die.
REVIEWER'S CONCLUSION
Our group enjoyed this adventure just as much as the other three in the series (The Sunless Citadel, The Forge of Fury, and The Speaker in Dreams), even though it lasted only about 12-15 hours of play time. In the final tally, that's all that matters. It must be said though, that changes were made to the trouble spots before play began. I simply could not subject my friends to the tears of frustration that are an integral part of maze navigation only to slaughter their characters a few scenes later. All in all, even with the problems, this adventure is better than most out there and well worth the cost.
Go to forum!
(Due to spamming, old forum discussions are no linked.)