Hearts of Darkness: Feedback

The 5th Editon playtest campaign.
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EvilGenius
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Hearts of Darkness: Feedback

Post by EvilGenius »

Heart of Darkness Feedback

Ok, as some of you know, I’ve been reworking HoD with an eye toward publishing HoD adventures through the DMs Guild. To that end, I’d like to solicit some feedback from you about some of the adventures.

Overall, are there any parts of the campaign that stand out as your favorites? I know it may be difficult to remember all 6 years of the campaign, but anything that sticks with you?

For me personally, there are story points and adventure points that I remember.
  • I really liked the initial Clone reveal;
  • Replacing Onarra with her (compromised\working for the enemy) twin for a while;
  • The revelation that the PCs were responsible for Quirinseyru’s death;
  • Followed shortly thereafter by the revelation that your inactive PCs (Zack’s character, for example) were fighting for the Master;
  • I LOVED LOVED LOVED the revelation that Shining Justice were evil adventurers (Dapple!!);
  • I loved revealing the rakshasa identity as Bern Haupt;
  • I really enjoyed finally revealing that The Heart of Darkness isn’t just the campaign title, but is the actual Sphere of Annihilation inside of the Book!! Ha!
Adventure points that I loved were:
  • The fight at the Standing Stones (only Ken and Jim were there for that, out of the present players);
  • I loved when you found two identical chests in Farweald, one of which was a mimic (mimic was always going to be the first one you picked), then defeating the mimic and looking ominously at the second chest;
  • Similarly, I loved when the PCs were moving through the Winter Woods and were ambushed by ice mephitis that looked like big icicles, then looking up after the fight and seeing everything as far as you could see covered with big icicles;
  • I really liked the adventure and fights in the City of Brass (though I have to work on the adventure itself because I don’t think it really conveyed the story import of being re-united with Gwendolyn Haupt);
  • I liked the fight at Brigga’s old stronghold with the Blackrazor dwarves trapped inside the adamantine shells (turning them into sort of adamantine golems);
  • I LOVED LOVED LOVED the enhanced gelatinous cubes!!!
  • I liked the fight in the middle of Farweald on the Day of Fire;
  • And I really liked the final fight against the Master.

Also, are there parts that you guys didn’t like so much? I already know that the story was too dense, which made it difficult to follow after 6 years (or after 1 year). And I think I should have built in greater PC choice; sometimes it felt a little forced, to me. What about you guys? All comments are valid, I want to sand off rough edges as I rework the adventures! :D

Finally, I just want to thank you guys for seeing this through to the end. This has been an incredibly rewarding campaign for me, not least because we actually finished it! I have a lot of good ideas that only see an introduction and a little development but then die off for lack of (my) follow through. So this campaign was somewhat of a test for me, and I appreciate you sticking with me. 😊
Another daring escape for the intrepid Spaceman Spiff!
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Fen's Ego
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Re: Hearts of Darkness: Feedback

Post by Fen's Ego »

Story-wise, it may not be that it was 'too dense', but rather that we were. Punning aside, the point may be rather than tear down the story you constructed, consider how it may be consumed. Twice a month for 6 years was NOT ideal for the degree and quality of content and repurcussions, as recall falls off. That said, my favorite narrative moments probably happened locally in Farweald. The choices and influence our party had in town had more meaning as it was our touchstone for the state of the world/adventure. While the adventures we had out of town were more fun to play through, it was the shifting of undercurrents in town that bucked our stasis and connected me. If the sometime lack of choice plagued our big picture interactions, our local interactions felt dynamic, with more fluid relationships. Example: helping the tieflings integrate and dealing with the systemic racism in town was more engaging then being a bid damn hero.

Mechanics-wise, I apprecitate the tailored homebrewing of levelling, stat-bumping, loot, and other character development choices. Random loot generation will always have a place in my heart, for it makes the adventure seem more authentic and organic, but a timely artifact to assist in playstyle or plot twisting is exciting.

I'm writing this too late and am losing focus, but I wanted you to know how much I appreciate you making a story world for us to play in. Rolling up a new character for a game system, but especially D&D, is one of the few, pure insights into how I felt as a kid playing the solo adventure in the red box.
"Good, bad, I'm the guy with the gun."
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EvilGenius
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Re: Hearts of Darkness: Feedback

Post by EvilGenius »

Cool, thank you, Tom. :)

I've been considering how to present the story in the best manner as a published adventure. What I've got so far is that after some of the early plot revelations, like getting to Farweald, or discovering Lucky Break, there will be a "Clue Sheet" or "Mystery Sheet" to give out to players which will be really just a numbered list, like an outline. The things they've discovered already will be pre-filled, which will give them a sense of the things that they haven't discovered yet.

So, for example, a line could be
3) Lucky Break - former stronghold of X pc, now used by servants of the Master.
....a) ???

So that indicates that there's something else at Lucky Break that the PCs haven't found yet, and later in the adventure when they find the Soul Portal in the secret basement level, they can fill in those ???s.

My thinking is that the lists will both provide outline style notes, and give the PCs a sense of how things fit together and at least how many things they haven't found yet. And there will be different sheets for the different mysteries. So there will be one for Farweald plot points (monster in town, tieflings discriminated against, someone setup the PCs and sent them into an ambush, what's a "hravja", etc) and then when the PCs find Lucky Break, for example, they'll get a new Mystery Sheet.

I'm hoping that when the PCs uncover an important new piece of information, getting a new, partially filled Mystery Sheet will feel kind of like getting treasure. :) And then at the end of the series, all of the Mystery Points will be filled in (hopefully).
Another daring escape for the intrepid Spaceman Spiff!
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