Adventures Abound! New single player module and module series

philbo

Hey everyone! I've just released a module onto the Steam workshop and the NWVault that will be the first in a series of modules I have planned under the project name "Adventures Abound!"

The module is a quick 1-2 hour adventure for low level players that is combat focused. It is called Journey to Whitehawk Mountain and it can be found here on Steam or here on the vault

The module's webpage with additional information can be found here

There is a website for the Adventures Abound! project that can be found here but the overview of the project is as follows:

Adventures Abound! is a collection of individual modules, or adventures, which take place in the same fantasy setting of Hephaestion. Each adventure is a self-contained story that can be played independently of other adventures with the same or new characters. Some adventures are part of a "saga" or collection of adventures that involve the same world event. For sagas there is still no required play order for each of the saga's individual adventures.

Every adventure provides content for different play styles (combat/stealth/story-heavy/etc...) and settings (urban/wilderness/dungeon/etc...) and incorporates old and new game mechanics, including: Classic dungeon-crawls and boss fights, Engaging stories and mysteries to be solved, Tower-defense and onslaught minigames, Large-scale battles, and more

I'd love it if you took some time to check out the module and the project!

I'd also love to hear your thoughts on the project as a whole. Is this something interests you as a player or even as a creator?

Thanks and enjoy!

philbo

I've just added the module to the NWVault here!

DerpCity

I completed the module starting as a level 1 druid a while ago and I thought it was pretty fun. Though its objective is simple and its story linear, it doesn't detract from the experience, as its main focus was combat and what writing it did have was still good. I'll provide my own thoughts and suggestions below, though they get into spoiler territory and are probably rather verbose, so I'll keep them under a Spoiler tab. That said, I hope to see the next module soon.

Suggestions

1. I feel that the area you can buy your starting equipment is a bit bare bones. You basically have to hope what you need spawns in the chests in the room or you're not going to get what you want, as the merchant doesn't buy for a good price and there's a very limited selection of weapons and gear to choose from. I'd suggest broadening the list of available equipment so more characters can start fresh instead of having to use external means to get their weapon or armor of choice, and perhaps providing some gold so that you can actually afford it. A character who plans on using a greatsword shouldn't have to be restricted to a morningstar or quarterstaff.
   
2. Starting at first level, Juvenile Wolves seem pretty scary. They don't seem much weaker than game's default wolves outside of having reduced AB and a little less health, likely due to a reduction in level without adjusting their base hitpoints. Considering they had a habit of one shotting my spider animal companion (RIP about 100x over, Lire the Giant Spider), I feel very fortunate to have had access to Summon Creature I, which this module reminded me is one of the most versatile, and powerful in regards to the early levels, spells in the game. Also, a minor suggestion, but considering this is an EE only module it'd be cool if the different stages of wolves were scaled using SetVisualTransformScale so that you can tell them apart easier and better reflect their power relative to each other.
   
3. I feel the fact you're occasionally poisoned for picking the Berry Bushes is an odd and somewhat meaningless choice, considering that you're required to pick them and can just rest it off if you kill off the nearby wolves first.
   
4. The "Defend the Horse" segment feels very awkward as the area is very small: this results in wolves appearing out of nowhere when coming to attack instead of feeling like they're coming through the woods to charge at me. I feel the area should be lengthened a bit so they can spawn farther away to prevent them from mostly spawning in right on top of players, making it both look better and allowing both mages and archers to be able to play to their strengths, as they'd be able to pick off a wolf or two before they get to the horse. A similar spawning problem occurs in the last "wave" section of the module within the bandit lord's hideout, where the same enemies repeatedly spawn inside the room you're in without any visual effects bringing them in. The variety part seems odd to me because the previous encounters leading up to that wave section, including the previous bandit wave section, was incredibly varied, so I don't get why it was a problem there. Perhaps I was just unlucky in the RNG of the spawns, so I'm not sure what could be fixed about it.
   
5. Some of the traps feel a bit overkill in the damage and size department. I picked up on where some of the traps were going to be based on observations of others and I was going to disarm one with a summoned badger, but I still ended up dying due to a mix of it being much larger than I anticipated, doing an incredible amount of damage, and my elvish keen sense having failed to notice it, which made it just feel cheap due to me already knowing the general location of it. Granted, I'm not much of a trap guy, so perhaps take this criticism with a grain of salt.
   
6. As stated earlier, some enemies spawn within your sight without any visual effects bringing them in, which simply looks and feels bad. I've had moments where despite not seeing enemies in the area in front of me there was suddenly a battle I couldn't have prepared for, a callback to the Defend the Horse segment. Such enemies include some of the bandits, namely a group that spawn after a gate next to the dire animal and skeleton tower, and two automatons that spawn near one of the chests, which would have been a cooler trap had there been some kind of summoning visual for when they spawned in. I'd suggest moving some of the encounters around or modify the area geometry so that they spawn out of sight.
   

philbo

@DerpCity Thank you for the feedback! I appreciate it very much as it gives me perspective on factors I had not considered and ways to polish up for a more professional looking/feeling experience.

#1 is 100% correct. the limitations were a result of my approach to a multi-module game world, but I think it is to the detriment of fun and convenience.
#2 I played the module from level one with every type of character and did not have this problem, but I will adjust, as your experience is not what was intended. Also scaling is a great idea! Thanks!
#3 I agree, this is unnecessary.
#4 will give me trouble as the way I have the minigame designed the area needs to be that small Good news is I've already taken a different approach to a similar minigame in the second module that could get me out of this bind. Not sure why the variety was different where you mentioned.
#5 The Foothills area is intended to have several spots where very big and very easy to spot but very deadly traps "suggest" the player should take another rout. Perhaps more indication is necessary here, as the severity of a trap cannot be assessed. I will look into the traps elsewhere as well.
#6 While some of the spawning is intended to surprise, I do like the idea of spawn indication. I always know where everything is spawning, so I didn't notice this issue :P.

The second module is about 60% done and is much more story/choice driven. I'm excited to share it with you and get your feedback!

Carlo_One

Looks like a neat project. I saw on the Vault page for the first mod (AdvAb Journey to Whitehawk Mountain) there was some demand for inclusion of multiplayer co-op, and that you're working on it. If/when that's done, let me know and I can add it to the Neverwinter Connections MP mod list.