DISCLAIMER: This review copy was a comp, meaning I paid nothing for it. I was asked to provide an honest review, even rip it apart if I felt so inclined. I don't really do the "ripping apart" thing, though. I leave that for other people. But I will post any honest criticisms I find. Also, this review contains affiliate links. Purchasing through said links my provide me store credit at DriveThruRPG.
JUST THE FACTS
- Price: $1.50 (in PDF at DriveThruRPG)
- 14 pages.
- And still bookmarked.
- Uses the D&D 5e system. (Converted from For Gold & Glory, an AD&D 2e retroclone).
- Designed for 4-7 PCs of levels 4-6.
BUT WHAT IS IT?
Published by The Merciless Merchants, The Covey is an encounter for D&D5e that you can insert anywhere that feels appropriate, but was written with their home campaign, The Dragonback Mountains setting, in mind. But all you need to work it into your setting is the presence of hags, dwarves and ogres, so most of your typical fantasy campaigns probably has them or their equivalent.
Note that it's an encounter, and not a full adventure...and that spoilers will follow.
So the idea is that the PCs are traveling wherever they are bound for, when they find a lovely maiden in the woods. She panics and runs off. The idea, presumably, is that the PCs try to follow her to calm her. At her hut, she lives with two other women...presumably her mother and grandmother.
This may set off alarm bells for savvy groups.
These three women are actually hags and, if the group accepts their hospitality, they find themselves magically drugged and in the fight of their lives. Where this takes on an extra interesting hook is that they have "dwarves" imprisoned here as well, though only one is an actual dwarf, and he's building a cave complex for the hags. (The rest of the dwarves are actually polymorphed ogres).
The encounter takes up about half the book, whereas the other half or so is stat blocks for the hags, the polymorphed ogres, and the dwarven engineer. Also included is a keyed map.
PROS & CONS
- As noted above, it's easy to fit into most fantasy campaigns, as long as the campaigns have hags, dwarves and ogres (or reasonable equivalents).
- The types of hags are left up to the DM, to help set the challenge of the encounter.
- The encounter as written can easily led to the death of a party member or two, if the group doesn't pick up on what's going on.
- Some nice little world building has been sprinkled around, like letters from other hags (which can turn into a sequel hook for the PCs if they kill the hags).
- Looks like stock art was primarily used. None of it looks bad at all (and some of it looks quite good), but there are pieces that somewhat clash stylistically. This is hard to avoid unless there's a stock artist who has covered basically everything you need, but it stands out regardless.
- I didn't do a deep dive into seeing how balanced it was (in my experience over two campaigns, balance in 5e is more of an art than a science), but there are still a couple of references to saving throws versus Poison. These are not a thing in 5e, and should likely be replaced with Constitution saving throws (as the most likely substitute).
- Along those lines, skills were spelled out correctly for the hags and ogres (with bonuses), but for the dwarf NPC, they lacked skill bonuses and didn't even line up 100% with the 5e skill list, making me wonder if they weren't proficiencies from For Gold and Glory carried over.
WORTH IT?
I think so, especially for the price. I'm not likely to use it myself, because I had a memorable encounter with hags in my last 5e campaign, so my group's spider-sense would probably absolutely blow up, but I think it's a fun set piece if you can trick your group into going in a little off guard. I might modify that opening encounter by having the hag set up a trick to lure the group in, rather than hoping they follow her, but that's me.
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