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"read Aloud" MAKE ME
A Black Metal Arena Fight. No less. It has what it needs, and if you like this kind of thing you will LOVE this submission. Whoever wrote this was writing with fire on their blood.
"read Aloud" MAKE ME
A Black Metal Arena Fight. No less. It has what it needs, and if you like this kind of thing you will LOVE this submission. Whoever wrote this was writing with fire on their blood.
The crowd here is spot-on: the cover is excellent. The use of blood feels moody and dreamlike, a fun way to mechanicalize a fight–dance arena as a messy place of horror that is felt by each individual body, with each individual wound. The sketchily evoked encounters are interesting, but the sheer volume of them is perhaps a tad much for a four-page adventure. That said, if the intent is a combat-focused arena, then the more monsters, the merrier.
That cover is striking. I enjoyed the double(triple?)-twist on the princess and her crown. The 9 distinct, bizarre, and utterly unique creature are awesome. I'm stealing some of these. Layout is dense, but readable.
Thematically, I don't fully understand the obelisk's connection to the princess/crown and why it's setup as a multi-fight arena. A little more connective tissue would be helpful. As awesome as the different creatures are, I feel like I'm also missing some thematic connection between them. I've only played Draw Steel briefly as a player, so I can't intelligently comment on the statblocks or tactical layout. That said, it seems like there are a lot of individual enemies in each arena. I see the stats have mechanical effects and actions, but a note on how they might fight or react to PCs may be helpful since this is such a combat heavy module.
Cover: The artwork makes me think of Robert E. Howard’s The Black Stone (1931) or Dr. Who The Stones of Blood (1978) or British folk horror children’s TV series Children of the Stones (1977). It has a definite horror vibe.
The background colour is quite dark so you have to look hard to see what it is. A little more contrast between the sky and the stones might make the image more arresting.
Nice choice of fonts but looks a bit squeezed at the edges of the page. Some space around the text would give it room to breathe.
Interior layout: I like the double-page interior spread with map and descriptions, with detailed stat blocks on the back page.
Moon phases in place of page numbers is a nice touch.
Text is very tiny. Stat block text is even tiner! I have to zoom in to read it. If it was printed out on a single A4 page, I’m not sure it would be legible.
Adventure: The setup is a classic quest for the missing princess. The read aloud section sets up the mood nicely.
After that I was a little confused. The language is quite evocative but I didn’t follow the logic of the scenario. The mechanic about pools of blood is interesting, but why? I didn’t really understand what had happened to the princess. Why is she now a bloodsucking monster?
The numbers on the map presumably correspond to the creatures on the left. There are 10 or 15 of each number, is the intention that the party encounter them one-by-one? The first encounter would be interesting but after that it could quickly become repetitive. If the intention is to encounter a group, you could just write the number of each creature in the description.
It would have been nice to include the creepy standing stones from the cover into the adventure.
There are a lot of interesting ideas and potential here, but I felt like I am missing the link that draws it all together. I admit I don’t play Draw Steel so forgive me if I am missing some important background info about the game or setting.
Thank you for this incredibly detailed comment! I understand all of your points around the layout and colors/darkness. This is definitely one of those things where it looked fine on my monitor and phone, but I can see where it would be not exactly right on all devices. More contrast, bolder brighter colors could definitely be a fix there. You're right.
To clarify, the princes is meant to be closer to a werewolf type creature. I decided to leave quite a lot of details out of what happened and why. The definitive "what" of the events is that she and the Prince went into the woods and the inference that I mean for the players to make after obtaining the Tiara (one way or the other) is that she killed the Prince. Hence the text on the Tiara noting that it is cursed and one must kill someone they love to remove it. Whether or not the Prince knew this was going to happen is up to the players.
The blood part is meant to feel something like a ritual, with each section being explicitly themed around the trappings of Royalty and royal obligations. The Laminate of Scrutiny being about the constant attention one receives in that position. The Knot of Succession being the way royalty, especially feminine royalty, gets stuck with the obligations of furthering the bloodline whether they want to or not. The Gibbet of Hegemony being an allusion to shadowy figures pulling people of power into their influence as a trap, etc.
The numbers indicate exact monster placement. In Draw Steel these would be most analogous to running into a room full of monsters. Narrative time stops, combat starts, etc. The Laminate of Scrutiny can be run closer to a crawl though. DS is suitable for both.
I hope this was helpful. I know that keying this to a specific system is a risky choice but hopefully at least the descriptions were fun. Thank you again for your very thoughtful words!
Lovely colors & map. Agree with others that the writing is a bit crowded, but I personally didn’t think it was too small. The monsters, though, and that writing- incredibly visceral, gory, uncomfortable, and horrifying. Fantastic work there! I want FromSoft to see these!
The invocation of FromSoft may be the highest compliment I've ever received. I'm so happy right now :D
Thank you for stopping by and checking it out as well as the wonderful comments here and on BlueSky! I'm glad my monsters resonated so well!
The blood mechanic is really cool! The font is so tiny, but I guess there’s no other way to fit so many different stat blocks.
Thank you! Yeah I shot myself in the foot wanting to have as many unique monsters as I did. For what it's worth I didn't back down from my challenge to myself. Also for what it's worth, I probably should have lol
Clever use of the blood mechanics to progress the module. Interesting locations and enemies and s solid writing style. The visual design is awesome (love the cover art!) and the layout is excellent.
Thank you so much! I appreciate you stopping in to check it out and leave a thoughtful comment!
The blood mechanic is very good and thematic. It was a little difficult to understand how to run this module, but the story and ideas are very good indeed.
Thank you for stopping by and leaving a comment! As part of my plan to revise and expand this after the jam judging, I'd love to know what could use some help regarding understanding how to run it! Anything specific or just in general?