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OK, OK! Stop the hate mail my inbox is full, here it is, the Death Duel review! Geesh!
For some reason, a conversation about V&V can’t come up without some mention of the adventure Death Duel With the Destroyers. It may not be the best V&V adventure, but it is certainly the most popular (or at least the most famous). This might be due to the fact that it was one of the very first adventures published for the game, so a lot of people got to play it (including myself).
Right off the bat, it should be mentioned that this was the inspiration for the comic series The Elementals, by Comico. Although I’ve never had the pleasure of reading them except issue #1, I believe the first few issues are a remake of the adventure.
I can honestly say that Death Duel, written and illustrated by Bill Willingham, is probably the most “professional” of the V&V adventures I’ve read. While that may be a good thing, to me, it takes some of the appeal away. Most V&V adventures are written by guys like you and me, and they read that way. I think it’s this casual friendly style that attracted me to V&V and it’s product line in the first place. Death Duel reads more like the average D&D module of the time. Just the dry hard facts, without the personal (sometimes comical) touch of most V&V adventures.
It should also be noted that Death Duel is technically part one of a larger adventure, with The Island of Dr. Apocalypse being the conclusion...er...I’ll review that next!...promise! Another point to note, is that this adventure is written with stats and details for both the first and 2nd edition of the V&V rules. This was probably important at the time, but I doubt if anyone these days would be interested in using the 1st edition rules. Fortunately, these don’t take up to much space.
At the time of this writing, Death Duel is currently out of print. So, if you want it, you’ll have to look on eBay or at half priced books, or beat up the wimpy kid who keeps waving a copy in your face!
Appearance:
This adventure follows the standard V&V format of black and white interior with 2 column small print text. The cover is cardstock and color. There are no counters in this adventure, one of only 3 (I think) adventures that don’t include them. It’s a shame, because they would have been particularly useful in this adventure. Fortunately, there are enough blanks, and other counters, from other adventures for you to improvise with.
Of course, the HUGE thing about this adventure is that it’s illustrated by Bill Willingham. Not only that, but there are more illustrations in this book than the average V&V adventure (woohooo!). The cover is by far the most professional and attractive of the V&V covers, much better colored than the ones by Dee. Also, we get a little comic strip for each of the super villains, 3 of them are full pages. They are fun to read, give a little insight into how the characters act, and really nice to look at . Above and beyond that, we get 3 other illustrations! That might not sound like a lot, but most V&V adventures only include illustrations of the characters, so it’s a LOT, especially at a mere 21 pages (this adventure utilizes the inside back cover as a page).
The Story:
The story is divided into 3 major sections. Spoilers galore, so stop reading if you ever want to play this one!!
The first part is the introduction. It is presented as a prequel, that you can play out if you so choose. A huge storm has been covering a huge chunk of the USA. The storm is very intense (hurricane strength), and is also effecting the moods of people. After a while, the PCs begin to have hallucinations. Finally the party responsible comes forth, via a video sent to the news stations. The culprit is Dr. Apocalypse, who threatens to destroy a city each day until he is given the island of Manhattan (basicly). The storm was a demonstration of his mystical might, so now he will give a demonstration of his technical might, at noon tomorrow at times square. Of course the PCs are contacted to be there.
The second part involves a HUGE robot (the Doomsday Robot) attacking Times square, smashing and destroying buildings. The robot is controlled by a 12 person crew, and the robot has 5 mapped out “levels” inside it. The players have 2 choices. Either fight the robot itself, or, if they are smart enough, figure out that there are people inside, and enter the robot and fight the crew. Win or loose, they get the heads up on the Destroyers (who hired the crew) hideout. Of course, the PCs are asked to take a look.
The third and final part of the adventure involves the PCs putting down the Destroyers. We get a map of their hideout, the top 4 floors (of course) of a skyscraper. Unfortunately, this hideout doesn’t have the charm of the Crusaders Citadel hideout, and is kinda a dry read. There are 3 things worth mentioning. First, it is nice for them to point out that Behemoths bathroom has a super sized industrial strength toilet! Makes you assume the dumps he takes makes Fat Bastard smell fragrant! Another hoot, is the Dayroom, that contains such state of the art equipment as a “Sony Beta-max and Intellevision video game”. Of course, it’s easy enough to exchange those for a DVD player and an X-box...but it might be fun just to leave them as is :). The single best part is Ratmans room! It’s a pigsty covered with comic books, sex mags, and role playing games (oh, and “a half-eaten ham and cheese sandwich placed neatly on the carpet under the bed”...nice!). In any case, there are a few scattered clues about that will lead the PCs to Dr. Apocalypse’s base on Nacht Island (the sequel adventure.) As far as the Destroyers themselves, it is left up to the GM on how to place them in the hideout. My personal favorite, is to make them absent when the PCs arrive, and fly in later on their Gyro-rocket plane fully aware that they have intruders. Questioning the Destroyers (assuming they are defeated) will reveal DR. Apocalypse’s evil plot...HA! Not going to tell you!
The destroyers themselves are a pretty decent Super Villain group. In my humble opinion, they aren’t as diverse, unique, and cool as the Crushers (form There’s a Crisis at Crusader Citadel), but they do have their high points. They are more “true” to “classic” comic books, in that they only have a couple powers each, and the powers go well and logically together, I like this. They also complement each other well. They are a bit less developed in their background than the average V&V villain, and this is a bit of a disappointment. They are so cool looking, but we really know little about them and their motivations, other than they are the bad guys.
grubmans Conclusion:
Death Duel is a good solid well developed adventure. It is chocked full of GREAT Willingham art, and probably the most professionally written V&V adventure. All the material is here for a good GM to play with, and make a kick ass adventure. I’m sure it will be reprinted my FGU as it’s one of their (his) biggest “moneymakers”...of course, who knows how long that will be.
Just for the record, one of the villains hails from Wisconsin! Woohooo, the V&V boys just love WI.
