[HoE] The Boise Horror...my $0.02 (spoilers) [LONG]

[Xotzil@aol.com]

Hi there.

Someone asked for a review of this a few days ago. I had to go back and read 
it again to get my thoughts in order. I've done an overview of each chapter, 
and my own opinions of the same. If you disagree with me, that's cool…again, 
these are MY opinions, and as one sig line has said in the past, they will 
not become YOUR opinions until I can get the mind control rays fully 
operational. :-P

I make a comment at the end about the fixed storyline nature of the module. 
This is one of the areas that I'd like to hear what people think about. As I 
say at the end, I can't offer an alternative for the way this and Fortress 
o'Fear were put together, but I'd like to hear if other people can, or if 
they don't see it as being the way I do. Just a thought.

One last thing…I've TRIED to keep out any direct reference to who's 
responsible for what going on at what time in the module. No names or stats 
or anything like that, but there is STILL major spoilage going on here. 
Posses have been warned, as have Marshals who want to wait, buy the module 
and be surprised on their own.

Proceed At Your Own Risk.

* * * * *

Boise Horror is a 64 page storyline pivot point adventure for Hell on Earth. 
Events that take place in this module will have somewhat long-range effects 
on the HoE world, and your posse gets to be involved in them…assuming they 
have a Templar they regularly associate with, that is. Without some 
revisions, you can't really play this module without one.

The adventure is divided into four parts. Each one (thankfully) comes with an 
overview…something I've always found helpful when dealing with adventures 
that are pretty in-depth, as this one is.

Part One has the posse arriving in Boise…the main bastion of the Templars in 
the Wasted West. It gives you a brief-but-useable overview of Boise 
itself…certainly enough to use to give your posse all the amenities they 
could be looking for. People of note, and places too. It then kicks into high 
gear almost immediately, by "inviting" them to an audience with da Big Cheese 
himself, Simon, leader of the Templars, who has a mission he'd like to invite 
them on.

Everything in Chapter One is pretty straightforward. Posse arrives. Posse 
meets Simon. Posse gets asked along on mission. Mysterious Death happens. 
Posse sees body. Posse leaves on mission.

Part Two is more complicated, and if your posse do not have a lot of tactical 
sense, and rely too heavily on their own ability to mete out brute force, 
some (if not all) of them are going to die (this WAS written by Messire Goff, 
after all). Transport for Simon's mission arrives, and the posse is taken on 
board a dirigible to be taken to their destination. Partway along, they are 
ambushed in the air and have to fight a desperate battle against those who 
are overgunning them by quite a substantial amount to escape alive with 
Simon. After their escape, they race across the Wastes towards the mission's 
destination, chased by the remnants of their attackers, and harboring a 
cuckoo in their midst.

This chapter requires the Marshal to be VERY prepared, as a lot of stuff 
happens in a very short time. Aerial combat, tactical troop movement on the 
dirigible, quick escapes, infiltrations and a last stand or two. Complicated, 
but I'd bet it'll be a pulse-pounding, chip tossing time if you can make it 
work. READ THIS CHAPTER CAREFULLY BEFORE YOU RUN IT. I've worked out some of 
the stuff on paper in a few different ways to see how it works, and I'm still 
not sure if I'd be able to make it work properly and/or smoothly yet.

Part Three completes the posse's escape across country and gets them to their 
destination. Along the way, they're ambushed again, and have to fight their 
way free. Upon their arrival, another mysterious death occurs, and the posse 
have to start to wonder whether there might not be another sheepskin-wearing 
wolf following them around.

Nothing terribly complicated here. Note that not being complicated does not 
equate to things being easy. The ambushers have nighttime and two vehicles on 
their side. The posse is wounded, on foot, and, if they put up a big fight on 
the dirigible, probably low on ammo. It could (scratch that...it WILL) get 
deadly if they decide to just wade in guns blazing (or, more likely 
clicking). The death at the destination is kind of a tip-off that All Is Not 
As It Seems, and the posse should be getting an itchy, paranoid feeling by 
now.

Part Four is the culmination of Simon's Mission…not! <chuckle> Things go to 
heck in a handbasket of rusty razor blades that just happen to be coated in 
blazing napalm. Lots of death will be meted out here, make no mistake. First, 
another mysterious death occurs, and as the posse is mulling that over, 
another close-quarters, bullets-flying, chip-chucking, combat that will test 
your posse's survival ability to its limits blows up around them. Simon is 
abducted and taken "below," which prompts your posse to go after him. At 
last, the Horror is revealed in all its eldritch equine glory, and the final 
battle against its nastiness comes to pass. Think you'll survive? For pity's 
sake…GOFF wrote it. Good luck. :-P

If you think the battle in part two was complicated…you haven't read part 
four. The battle in the conference chamber is going to be very difficult to 
run. To make things easier, Pinnacle has helpfully provided you with your own 
set of Cardstock Figures to help you run it, but it's still going to be 
tough. LOTS of people and things to keep track of. Another READ THIS SEVERAL 
TIMES AND WORK A FEW THINGS OUT ON PAPER BEFORE YOU RUN IT warning applies.

Then, the climax. The posse goes below to face the Horror itself. Although I 
understand that there wasn't a lot of room left at the end of the adventure 
(we're on page 60 now, and all the previous stuff is pretty well detailed), 
there is virtually nothing on the layout of "below" to help you run it. A 
minor point, really, I suppose. Sketch yourself a few twisting sewer-like 
tunnels and sub levels so the party get a feel for what it's like and you 
should be okay, but it is one of the few "holes" that I felt was in the 
adventure. With so little detail, this is also one of the points that feels a 
bit "forced," although, again, I understand that to cram it all into 64 
pages, something had to go.

Finally, the Horror itself. What needs to be said? It's a John Goff beastie, 
and it will rip at least a few new holes in your posse before the end of the 
combat. Note that I said before the end of the combat, and not before they 
manage to kill it. There's a very good chance your posse will lose. The 
Horror is a Monstrous, Eldritch Killing Machine, and it's not going to go 
down easy. If they manage it, they really deserve the Legend Chip they get 
for putting it down, and I wouldn't make that one one-use, as the module 
suggests.

Afterwards, there is the usual mopping up...rewards are given out, tales are 
told (one way or another) and the posse's Templar (assuming he/she survived) 
gets a new Saint. I don't think I need to tell you who (BTW, John, what's the 
Vexation? It was the one thing missing from the description).

Okay. It's deadly, and it's complicated, and it's jam packed with action…but 
how GOOD is it?

I love the storyline aspect of Pinnacle's worlds. I really do. It feels like 
it's evolving around you and that you have the power to influence it by your 
own actions. Having said that, in this case, the outcome has already been 
determined. Simon HAS to remain alive until the very end of the adventure, 
and there's more than several good instances during the adventure where he 
could buy the farm, and GM deus ex machina has to prevent it. It all feels 
very linear and pre-ordained, but I guess that's kind of the price you have 
to pay for having that kind of evolution of storyline that Pinnacle is so 
good at. This was the main drawback I had with the last part of the Fortress 
o'Fear trilogy, by the way. Things just seemed like they were going to happen 
whether the posse acted or not, and if the players manage to figure that out, 
it kind of leaves a hollow feeling (it would to me, anyway). Having said all 
this, I can't really suggest what I might have done differently. This 
adventure is just one of the pivot point type adventures that is going to be 
released throughout the year (the Unity adventure, and the Urban Renewal one 
are the other two that I can think of off the top of my head…perhaps the 
Ghost Busters one for the Weird West will also fall into this category…I 
don't know), and I have a feeling that the outcomes of those are also kind of 
already sorted out (the Unity Adventure will presumably lead to Lost Colony 
in the same way that Fortress o'Fear did to Hell on Earth). Again, I don't 
know how I would have handled it differently, but it just hits kind of a 
discordant note with my GM sensibilities.

This is also not a module for beginner or intermediate Marshals. You have to 
be pretty able to think on your feet and be sure of the rules governing 
vehicular combat, Cyborgs and lots of different types of combat situations, 
or these supposed-to-be-moving-so-fast-that-nobody-has-time-to-think combats 
are going to bog down unbearably. It also sort of requires that you at LEAST 
have the Cyborgs book in order to run it (you can get by with Iron Oasis in a 
pinch, but aspects of one of the nasties in the book are overlooked by IO), 
and a working knowledge of Iron Oasis wouldn't hurt either, nor would having 
a working knowledge of what's in Last Crusaders, nor would having played the 
adventure FROM Last Crusaders. Simon's reasons for taking your posse's 
Templar are somewhat spurious unless they've garnered some renown for 
themselves. Not a MAJOR detraction, but it will make things seem to flow more 
nicely if that is the case.

All in all, though, if run by a seasoned Marshal who can think on their feet, 
it carves (bloodily, I might add) a nice chapter into the annals of the 
Wasted West, and, ironically, is very Templar like in its own way. If you'll 
pardon the analogy, it'll weed out the stupid and the unfit and the survivors 
(if any), as well as the Wasted West itself, will grow stronger as a result 
of their involvement.

--Jacques