Rate the Published Adventures

[Duck Call Lass]

Hi all,

There were 5 adventures published for Birthright:

TSR #3102. Sword and Crown
TSR #3110. Warlock of the Stonecrowns
TSR #3118. Sword of Roele
TSR #3125. Legends of the Hero Kings
TSR #3142. King of the Giantdowns

Which are the best of the five? Which are the worst?

TSR #3140. Blood Spawn -- also has some mini-adventures, any opinion on those?

EDIT:

And these published adventures within various sourcebooks, or Dungeon magazine:

TSR #3100. Birthright: Campaign Setting (Boxed Set), "Family Matters"
TSR #3103. Cities of the Sun, "Coils of the Serpent"
TSR #3121. The Rjurik Highlands, "Njalgrim's Doom"
Dungeon #59. "Seeking Bloodsilver"

[Arawn76]

Hi all,

There were 5 adventures published for Birthright:

TSR #3102. Sword and Crown
TSR #3110. Warlock of the Stonecrowns
TSR #3118. Sword of Roele
TSR #3125. Legends of the Hero Kings
TSR #3142. King of the Giantdowns

Which are the best of the five? Which are the worst?

TSR #3140. Blood Spawn -- also has some mini-adventures, any opinion on those?

EDIT:

And these published adventures within various sourcebooks, or Dungeon magazine:

TSR #3100. Birthright: Campaign Setting (Boxed Set), "Family Matters"
TSR #3103. Cities of the Sun, "Coils of the Serpent"
TSR #3121. The Rjurik Highlands, "Njalgrim's Doom"
Dungeon #59. "Seeking Bloodsilver"

I remember enjoying Legend of the hero kings most, not necessarily all of it but my players loved the part with the Ogre

[Lee]

TSR #3102. Sword and Crown
TSR #3110. Warlock of the Stonecrowns
TSR #3118. Sword of Roele
TSR #3125. Legends of the Hero Kings
TSR #3142. King of the Giantdowns

Which are the best of the five? Which are the worst?

I really liked "King of the Giantdowns," was less than impressed with the first three. They seemed too over-the-top-gonzo, with kitchen-sinks full of monsters that are NOT in the list of monsters that one should find in BR. (Keep in mind, I consider the limits to monsters a strength of the setting.) "Sword of Roele" was the worst at this, IMO, it felt like someone took an FR module and slapped on just enough Cerilian names to make it look like it fit. "Warlock" at least tried to include some regent-level activity, but there were too many contradictions or inconsistencies; another DM and I both went nuts trying to make head or tail out of it. In the end, neither of us ever tried to run it.

I think I used a few of the "Hero Kings" plots, but "Giantdowns" is the only one I've really used.

TSR #3140. Blood Spawn -- also has some mini-adventures, any opinion on those?

Never tried to run any of those.

And these published adventures within various sourcebooks, or Dungeon magazine:

TSR #3100. Birthright: Campaign Setting (Boxed Set), "Family Matters"
TSR #3103. Cities of the Sun, "Coils of the Serpent"
TSR #3121. The Rjurik Highlands, "Njalgrim's Doom"
Dungeon #59. "Seeking Bloodsilver"

I played in "Family Matters", it seemed too scripted at the time.
I ran "Seeking Bloodsilver"once, it was OK as a dungeon-crawl. I made it the finale adventure of a year-long campaign, with a majority elf/half-elf party-- the magic spear was their goal the whole time.

[AndrewTall]

"Sword of Roele" was the worst at this, IMO, it felt like someone took an FR module and slapped on just enough Cerilian names to make it look like it fit.

The use of the Monkey is a fairly blatant giveaway of the Kara-Tur origin in my view ;-)

Sword of Roele got something of a re-write on the wiki.

My list of the main 5 in order:
1. King of the Giantdowns
2. Legends of the Hero Kings (they vary but it's a great concept)
3. Warlock of the Stonecrowns (but as noted it needs some work, and removal of the drow, dracolich, etc)
4. Sword & Crown (this was just begging for rules on grand events and domain play when so many of the might are present, great concept, but not worked thru')
5. Sword of Roele (needs a complete re-write in my view)

The mini's are harder, Njalgrim's end is very weak, Seeking Bloodsilver should perhaps have made more of the Shadow World's weirdness, coils and family are about equal in my (hazy) memory but the best of the four.

[Raesene Andu]

TSR #3102. Sword and Crown
TSR #3110. Warlock of the Stonecrowns
TSR #3118. Sword of Roele
TSR #3125. Legends of the Hero Kings
TSR #3142. King of the Giantdowns

If I was to rate them,
1. Sword and Crown
2. King of the Giantdowns
3. Legends of the Hero Kings
4. Seeking Bloodsilver
...
5. Sword of Roele
6. Warlock of the Stonecrowns

I put Sword and Crown first because I really enjoyed it and it was a true adventure module, while the other two were more mini adventures or sourcebooks.

While I didn't like the last two, I thought Sword of Roele did have some useful material in there but it needed a lot of changes to fit properly.

[rugor]

TSR #3102. Sword and Crown

TSR #3142. King of the Giantdowns

Giantdowns is a great entry into Birthright for D&D players unused to the setting, it allows you to transfer from the hack+slash gaming to running a realm in Birthright.

Sword and Crown sets up a great scenario for those more used to running a realm to get in on some intrigue and hack+slash adventuring. I love how this especially allows a DM to take off with some Tournen, Avanil, Boeruine, and Manslayer plots and take things in so many different directions.

Its a shame there was never a real tie in with the Gorgon, the Falcon and the Wolf, even the Iron Throne, hinted at how the Gorgon was interwoven into the happenings at the highest levels in Anuire, would have loved to see how Baker interjected the Gorgon into a Adventure.


TSR #3125. Legends of the Hero Kings

Any of these adventures can be tied into either setting above, or any campaign, great book with lots of ideas.

TSR #3110. Warlock of the Stonecrowns

Not a fan of it, but it has a couple decent ideas and expands the Birthright world a bit.

TSR #3118. Sword of Roele

Ughh.

[Sheigh]

I ran a campaign based on Warlock of the Stonecrowns and other source material, and I ran a campaign based on King of the Giantdowns. Both seemed more like campaign modules than one-off adventures. The Sword of Roele was a great dungeon-crawl but didn't really "feel" like Birthright. Legends of the Hero-Kings works great as filler for domain events, with some adventures being stronger than others. I have not run the other adventures.