Dungeon Crawl Classics #66.5 - Doom of the Savage Kings - Final Thoughts and Review

Now that we've capped off this adventure, I figured this would be the time to put to paper my thoughts about it. Prospective players, be warned that spoilers will ensue. I probably shouldn't need to say it but eh.

Quick hits:

• Short but sweet, there is exactly the right amount of material here for a little pocket sandbox adventure
• Rewards intelligent play 
• Threatening enemies and environments
• Hirot is well realized and requires little to no expansion by the Judge 
• Very readable format, excellent maps

Hirot is a fantastic little town with just the right amount of detail to support the Judge running it's little intrigues. There is a lot of latitude in how the Judge can run the Jarl. The thanes present a very credible threat to the party, hopefully discouraging them from just duking it out. I was very happy with the detailed NPCs and volume of locations to visit in Hirot. 

The serpent mound was a lot of fun. It's a very nice mini-dungeon with a sufficient number of entertaining rooms to finish within about a session's worth of playtime. It's also got the potential to be extremely lethal to a reckless or incautious party.

My only... I don't think I'd call it a gripe exactly, but Judges should recognize that if their players manage to penetrate the dungeon via the front entrance (as opposed to the very safe and convenient side breach) it seems pretty likely to initiate a TPK. First, there's the very awesome snake spirit and its associated pit trap that it washes characters into. I think this trap is fantastic and I was ambivalent about my party circumventing it. It seems like a super fun and scary encounter but yikes, that thing could easily kill multiple characters. Then there's the huntsmen on the way out who, if the gang leaves via the front entrance, will ambush the battered players at their most vulnerable. A great learning opportunity but I can imagine it cutting plenty of adventures short. Actually, the serpent mound is a great deal more dangerous than the hound, which is but a single moderately tough monster. The tomb ghouls (especially the one hiding in the secret room) are also pretty nasty, but a little more 'fair' to me than the double whammy if the party enters/exits via the main doors. I also love all the misdirection and hidden stuff in the tomb, as well as Harley's details regarding its construction. One thing a lot of old dungeons fail to do is really present any internal logic as to how and why they are the way they are, but here it's very well communicated to the Judge, who will then be able to pass it on through discovery to the inquisitive players. It's also clearly designed not to be looted, which I appreciate, especially the misdirections.

The fens: the random encounters for traversing the fens are fine. Nothing special. Not a huge fan of these but you never know how much blundering around a party will do so it's useful to have. The sinkhole was a fun encounter, good old fashioned environmental puzzle solving.

If I ran this again I would probably think of ways to make the Hound more threatening and insidious. DCC characters are considerably more powerful than their OSR D&D counterparts, and the Hound is probably going to be flattened by most parties in a stand up fight. Our final battle started out tense and ended somewhat farcical as three giant-sized players pinned and bashed the Hound to ruins. Not that I'm unhappy about that, those sorts of moments are rewarding and usually well-earned. 

Compared to Sailors on the Starless Sea, I actually think I prefer Doom of the Savage Kings. It feels very polished, and I would certainly recommend it to anyone looking for a good 1st level starter adventure!