Gateway Pass Adventure Path #1: Brighton Road

Gateway Pass Adventure Path #1: Brighton Road

This module clocks in at 44 pages, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page SRD, 1 page back cover, leaving us with 40 pages of content, so let’s take a look!

 

Well, before we dive into the nit and grit: To me, an adventure path is a campaign that covers the majority, at least 2/3rds, of an adventurer’s career. I get why many a publication uses the AP-moniker, but personally, I’d consider anything less than that an arc. I know, I know, not too relevant, but I still felt the need to spell that out.

 

Anyways, what do Star Trek, Twin Peaks, Esoterrorists in station duty mode, Red Dwarf and daily sitcoms have in common? Simple: A central location. Many a campaign has a hub, from Lankhmar to Feeport and this location and its quirks and NPCs slowly grow upon the PCs, It’s one of the points of criticism fielded against the otherwise excellent CotCT-campaign that the PCs had to leave their home. It thus should come as a surprise, that so far no series of adventures has really capitalized on the notion of the PCs really getting to know their home, their base, and defending it from whatever may come their way. This series of adventures, then, would do just that – the premise centers on two feuding fiefdoms, the Ottonians and Goodchilds, and a border fortress between them. The PCs, via one of various hooks, will be in the employ of the Ottonians, specifically, in the employ of the charismatic inquisitor Nathaniel Lyon, who has opted to reopen the Brighton road, for in the years since the road’s closure, the area has become poor and destitute, with many a former soldier falling to a life of crime.

 

And this is pretty much as far as I can go without getting into serious SPOILER-territory. Potential players should definitely jump to the conclusion.

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All right, still around? Great! You see, Nathaniel has begun covertly recruiting the less corrupted of the criminal elements, for he suspects something lurking…and how better to ensure plausible deniability than via a band of miscreant low-lifes? Opposed to Nathaniel’s agenda would be the rebellion slowly engendered by one Robert Cornelius, who is using smuggling tactics and whisper campaigns to build his strength, all in the ultimate goal of ending the serfdom system that has ruined his life. The primary foe of Nathaniel would, however, be the armiger Cadwell Brunson, a former guardsman who has retained his bandit network and seeks to lead Nathaniel into an ambush and eliminate him for once and for all. So these three fully statted individuals would be the power-players here, representing the matrix of intrigue and machinations here.

 

The PCs, however, won’t know any of this right away. Instead, this adventure will begin with a burning wagon crashing into the doors of the Starry Sky Inn, while the PCs are en route to reopen the Brighton Output. Dealing with the fire and bandits constitute an interesting first encounter, though one that does not feature a map or the like – granted, most GMs have a bunch of tavern maps ready…but yeah. In the aftermath of the combat, the GM gets a chance to introduce the PCs not only to the excessive poverty in the area, but also to a helpful witch named Rosin Sinti and their fellow guards, who come with brief, fluff-descriptions to set them apart. En route, tracking can help determine some pieces of information about the environments and a handy random encounter chart is included as well.

 

The outpost has obviously seen better days – it receives a nice b/w-map and the PCs will have a chance to start cleaning up the place, fixing roofs…and then there’s the dead cleric outside, killed by a storm. Her spirit lingers in the officer’s quarters as a haunt, guarding the children she sought to guide to a better life. The kids, all marked by poverty, can make for interesting sidekicks or, in some cases, potential apprentices/cohorts…for their home, the hamlet of Wassail, is one sans perspective for them. Beyond that, the PCs have a chance to deal with a shambling stalker and potentially find a secret tunnel, which may become relevant later. A handy table of 8 random events helps btw. establish a concise mood here. Speaking of mood: From dining to the sheer amount of information herein, the adventure takes a refreshing stance regarding that aspect – we take a bit of time, yes, but from tax costs to be levied to the NPCs, there is quite a bit of roleplaying.

 

This extends, btw., to day 2, where perceptive PCs get to notice a scout and his hunting crows keeping an eye on the outpost and have their first major social encounter, as they check the wares of Mr. Lilliputian, a dwarven diplomat. And indeed, the PCs can find various discrepancies in his papers…and several pieces of cargo he tries to smuggle through: Black powder weapons and baby rust monsters, to be more precise. (And yes, alternatives are included if you don’t like blackpowder firearms in your game.) While in the end, when bribes etc. fail, Lyon does let him off with a warning, this still represents a rather fun encounter.

 

During the night, a guardsman, however, will have found a rather mysterious death, as his fellow watchman dozed the night away, which will cast a somber tone on Roisin the witch returning – she can act as courier between the output and civilization, offer healing and return every other day…she also has her own agenda, but precisely which, I won’t spoil here. In the following days, the PCs will have a chance to deal with a shambling mound hunting in the vicinity. Beyond that, a local baker is probing the waters to come over once in a while to sell cookies, and a pig farmer asks for the possibility to leave some of her pigs she is bound to buy in Norwich here. It is such pieces of local color that make the place feel organic, that make players fond of it in the long run.

 

Lilliputian will return (and continue his smuggling), though this time, a man named Kier is following hot on his heels, arriving soon after the dwarf has passed through. Kier is a ranger, has no travel papers…and claims that Lilliputian is wanted for carrying contraband across territories. While he is not wrong, having no papers would make it within the purview of the PCs to refuse him…and a similarity between the attire of the man and that of the scout watching them should also make the PCs rather suspicious. When later, a wealthy merchant arrives, a subsection of Cornelius’ men attempt to kidnap the fop in broad daylight, unaware of the strength of the outpost’s folks (read: The PCs) – though their knowledge of smuggler’s tunnels may help them escape. Later, the PC’ll meet a hermit with, surprisingly, imperial travel papers, setting up an interesting mystery for the future.

 

On day 6, the PCs may get a day off, but the pdf still depicts, in detail, what actually transpires regarding the various NPCs that return. In the following days, the PCs will have a lot of choices on their hands: Do they help Roisin smuggle folks who can’t pay the high taxes through the gate? How do the react to the disguised Cadwell, who poses as a Goodchild…and the man seems to know the hermit, who utters some warnings…Daniel, one of the folks, wants forged papers (and may slip off into the night as a deserter later); new guardsmen arrive, And indeed, from day to day, the intrigues subtly grow – trolls need to be dealt with, Kier returns, will-o’-the-wisps haunt the night, drawn by the sorcerous power within one person’s blood..

 

Beyond further smugglers, wine merchants and a Romeo and Juliet-undercover-scene with the children of the rival fiefdoms, there is a lot to be found…interestingly, the latter may actually blow Cadwell’s cover. At one point, a fight between heavy drinkers passing through on a gambling night may erupt into violence and Kier…well, he’ll find a rather nasty end at the hands of a doppelganger, who is btw., surprise, up to no good.

 

Beyond aforementioned star-crossed affair is discovered by the hermit, he mentions several key facts about the environment to the PCs…before a frickin’ CR 17 green dragon swoops in. And no, the PCs should not try to fight that beast…and instead perhaps establish a tithe or something like that? On their next day, the PCs may find a camp within the woods if the choose to escort the hermit, including several pieces of much needed loot…and encrypted papers…but they’ll also have to evade goodchild guards.

 

Cadwell arrives on day 14, demanding payment from Nathaniel, for he has been blackmailing the inquisitor…and, depending on the PC’s actions, he may bring grisly trophies along….and it his here that the PCs get to defend the fortress against the forces of Cadwell. How the adventure ends depends largely on the PC’s actions – Nathaniel Lyon may well be hanged…or the PCs could keep him in charge, forgiving him his well-meant duplicity…though not all story ties have been closed…

 

The pdf comes with a high-res labeled .tif of the fortress and an unlabeled, high-res jpg. for use as a player’s map.

 

Conclusion:

Editing and formatting are pretty good, but not perfect -there are quite a few minor hiccups regarding punctuation. Layout adheres to a nice b/w-version of Rite Publishing’s standard layout. The pdf features b/w-artworks for all key NPCs, though I have seen most of them before. The cartography is really good, but I do wish that e.g. tunnels, environments, inside of buildings, etc. had also been covered.

 

Greg LaRose’s Gateway Pass is completely different from what I expected – this could actually, theme and atmosphere-wise, be an old-school Bandit Kingdom Greyhawk module, an OSR module or the like; it breathes this sense of antiquity, of a world at a declining stage in its phases, of a place that has moved on. This is a surprisingly low-magic, down to earth module that works rather well thanks to its very dense atmosphere, remarkable characters and details – the details, repetition of characters and the like generate a rather interesting, very organic and believable simulation of an organic world and appropriate consequences.

 

The level of detail, however, also means that this module requires that the GM tracks quite a few decisions, which, while not hard, could have been better laid out. You see, this is basically a LOT of text and the lack of highlights via bolding, references to consequences and the like can make the module slightly harder to run than it needed to be. I for example, had totally forgotten about the tunnel mentioned and had to look that back up. This module basically represents scenes, but doesn’t concisely separate the rules-relevant aspects from the key-story aspects and agendas in the respective encounters – you need to know precisely how it’ll work, particularly since, unfortunately, in two cases, an editing glitch of a typo-level made such a key sequence a bit more opaque than it needed to be – I was more than once both tantalized and surprised by some new revelation/note while reading a day’s event. Much of this could have been avoided, if the adventure synopsis in the beginning simple featured a cliff-notes version of day-to-day-events for the GM: You know, like “Day 1: Event x, event z; NPC y arrives, NPC W leaves; if a) has happened, then c).”

 

I also think that the decisions the PCs make regarding smugglers, etc. could matter a bit more and that excelling at a given encounter/acting with tact and smarts, should yield a bit more rewards…but that may just be me.

 

So, in short, structure-wise, this is not the best module; however, its concept is pretty novel and exciting and the set-up is great. The best component would be the almost realistic atmosphere and (mostly) low fantasy-feeling nature of the proceedings, with the eerie and fantastic only sometimes rearing their heads…but when they do, they do so rather neatly. You can *feel* like a soldier in a dangerous wilderness, hunting trolls and slowly putting two and two together regarding the agendas and allegiances of the NPCs. In short: This series has plenty of potential.

 

I was, however, also kind of disappointed to not get maps for the inside of the buildings and the lack of a scale on the maps means that this is a module that’s mostly intended for mind’s eye-style playing, though in the finale, the works slightly less well than in the rest of the module.

 

How to rate this, then? I adore the atmosphere herein, as you may have noticed – it’s my kind of gritty fantasy, of realism and simulated life; the module achieves the illusion of an organic world. At the same time, the module does have a few drawbacks on the formal side that drag it down a notch. Ultimately, I can’t go higher than 3.5 stars, though I will round up due to in dubio pro reo on this one. This is not a go-play module, but if you like gritty fantasy, this may well be worth getting.

 

You can get this module here on OBS!

 

Endzeitgeist out.

 

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