Quote:The first Blackmoor adventure since 1987! This exciting adventure takes players to Dave Arneson''s Blackmoor, the First Fantasy Campaign, on an epic quest through the depths of the terrible Redwood Forest. A new terror has risen deep in the forest, making the powerful elves tremble in fear within the borders of their own forest kingdom. A group of hardy adventurers must find and quell this evil power before its shadow covers the once mighty Redwood Forest!

http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_i ... s_id=51488

5 of 5 smashed Afridhi skulls.



In my humble opinion, THE BEST ADVENTURE in the entire line, apart from, maybe, "Ties That Bind".

For me personally, this was the reason I got into Blackmoor for real, and its influence on my take on the setting is enormous.

GO AND BUY THAT ONE.

That said, it obviously has a few flaws:

• It has few, if anything to do with the older BM modules, and none of the usual BM NPCs makes an appeareance.
  
  
• The premise of the adventre, "defending the village", is kind of overused in most beginner adventures for D&D.
  
  
• The adventure is open-ended, and thus rather confusing. You certainly cannot play it only btb.

Then again...

• The setting, the Elven village, is rather charming.
  
  
• The adventure features some epic, epic moments you have not seen like that ever before.
  
  
• From all the BM d20 books, it's certainly the product that brings most innovation. From the point of a DM,
  it's the most inspirational reading for the setting that ZGG published.

On a side note, in the LFC campaign's continuity, Gawaine and Merowech the gnome,
as well as Cooper and Sir Zenzen (who made a cameo during The Battle of the Longest Day), are supposed to have participated in an attack on the Scar.

Of those that fought the monster, only Gawaine returned alive.

My main problem with this module was that, as you mention, it wasn't linked to any of the elements that I regard as core Blackmoor. None of the NPCs were used, and the origins of the Scar were not explained, much less linked to any of the likely suspects, such as the Afridhi, the Egg of Coot or the Valley of the Ancients, which would have helped forge this adventure deeply into the foundation of Blackmoor.

That said, Jeff Quinn is a very talented writer and it is a great adventure on its own.

I wrote a commentary on it on my blog, further exploring my ideas for it right here:
http://blackmoormystara.blogspot.com/20 ... -scar.html

Havard

One thing that may be helpful for you guys to consider is that ZG was intentionally working to expand the Blackmoor universe with the idea that publishing would continue into a "New Lands" or some other derivative world that held the same structure as Blackmoor.

This module was the first big step beyond the changes to Magic, The Wizards' Cabal and the races. It was a very important module. I only wish it had sold better.

TheMystic Wrote:One thing that may be helpful for you guys to consider is that ZG was intentionally working to expand the Blackmoor universe with the idea that publishing would continue into a "New Lands" or some other derivative world that held the same structure as Blackmoor.

This module was the first big step beyond the changes to Magic, The Wizards' Cabal and the races. It was a very important module. I only wish it had sold better.

Thanks for providing this bit of background on the module, Dustin! Your strategy of working towards a product line that did not depend on the goodwill of WotC makes sense, though it was also a risky one I guess, since hard core fans were screaming for adventures that were tied more closely to the core elements of Dave's original campaign.

In the end it was a good module. I've heard that making money off modules is really difficult though, so perhaps the low(?) saltes rates of this module can be explained by that?

-Havard

The Redwood Scar was revisited in today's episode of Blackmoor the MMRPG.

I have also once again made these old promo items for the adventure available:

Web Enhancement: Maps and Handouts
Web Enhancement: Circati Vale, An elven settlement in the Redwood Forest

-Havard

If you consider the full Redwood Scar saga, adding to this module the other MMRPG related modules, it becomes one of the best roleplaying sagas ever!
I would love if it could be reunited and re-written as a single adventure sourcebook in episodes.

Yaztromo Wrote:If you consider the full Redwood Scar saga, adding to this module the other MMRPG related modules, it becomes one of the best roleplaying sagas ever!
I would love if it could be reunited and re-written as a single adventure sourcebook in episodes.

That would be very cool. Would you include Ties That Bind into such a mega adventure?

I don't think so: Ties that bind is mostly part of the Egg of Coot saga, rather than of the Redwood Scar saga.