Vladar's Blog

Planescape review: Doors to the Unknown

For the last three years, I've run a Planescape1 campaign through almost all of its modules. Now, after successfully finishing it, I want to look back and review these adventures, highlighting the pros and cons of each one.

Each module will be rated in three categories, up to 3 points in each:

The full list of currently published reviews is available under the #planescape tag.

doors-to-the-unknown

Doors to the Unknown

When four doors appear in the Cage, the barmies crawl out of the shadows, and the heroes get drawn into events that could have consequences for the entire multiverse. Each door leads to a different plane and a different deadly challenge for the player characters. Together they offer a way to stop an ancient menace before it strikes again.

The prologue to the adventure happens in Sigil, in front of the Shattered Temple, where the player characters witness a strange sermon held by a barmy dwarf Garmundi to a gathering of bystanders. The dwarf preaches the teachings of the dead god Aoskar and prophesizes about the four doors (or blinks) that soon shall open and lead to some obscure places of the multiverse. Since worship of Aoskar is a capital crime in Sigil, the unauthorized event quickly gains the attention of Athar, Mercykillers, and Harmonium.

πŸ“ NOTE: This is a good place for the new characters to meet others, so consider dividing the characters into groups of one or two, and running the short events proposed in this chapter in parallel, switching from one place in the crowd to another one, so no one is left untended for.

During this part of the module, the characters will meet some important NPCs affiliated with the organizations interested in the four doors, as well as get the leads for the first two doors. Alas, since each subsequent door/chapter is designed for a higher level of play, if the characters decide to explore the second door first, they will most probably die. I consider this to be a huge drawback of the book, and you should be prepared to see this kind of barely concealed railroading throughout the whole adventure.

planescape-doors-garmundi

The First Door: The Thuldanin Gargoyle

In which our Heroes are mistaken for a famous Solver of Mysteries and are hired by Estavan of the Planar Trade Consortium to recover a simple ledger from beyond an impossible door.

A calling card received by one of the characters in the prologue will lead the party to the office of Balthazar Thames, a "solver of mysteries". The office is located on Gray Dragon Lane, and there is a good and pithy description of each neighboring house the characters might take an interest in.

Once the characters arrive at the office though, they won't find the proprietor. Instead, the party will be greeted by Estavan β€” one of the merchant lords of the Planar Trade Consortium. Using his immense size (since he's a 10Β½' tall ogre mage) as an excuse, Estavan will politely employ the characters to investigate Balthazar's office and find a ledger that Balthazar was hired to find some time ago.

Immediately upon entering, the characters are sucked into the first door and arrive at Thuldanin, the second layer of Acheron. More precisely, they found themselves inside one of its hollow metal cubes. Of course, this comes with a set of specific magical and physical conditions. You can find detailed information on this topic in the Planes of Law3 boxed set.

The territory described in the module has about ten points of interest which can be tackled in any order. There are some good fun ideas here, including a flying ship with wing-mounted fireball wands, "living" devices, gearwork guardians, and a semi-intelligent fireball bomb. One of the key artifacts needed for the successful completion of the adventure is located here as well. Hopefully, one of the characters will also stumble upon the first of the dabus puzzles, which will come in handy later.

The Second Door: The Forgotten Vault

In which our heroes must leap toward a Certain Death to discover the fate of Garmundi the Street Preacher at the behest of Athar or the Will of the One.

Following Garmundi, the characters figure out the key needed to activate the second door. It leads to the deepest and most hidden layer of Pandemonium. Following the usual nature of Agathion, the portal leads into a small secluded complex of caves unreachable by any other known means. More information about the plane and its conditions can be found in the Planes of Chaos4 boxed set.

Aside from a small regiment of baneguard skeletons, there are four other inhabitants in these caves, if we count Garmundi. The second one is Argathorn. This black dragon, a former ex-proxy of the dragon god Chronepsis, is quite interested in Garmundi himself. There's also a wounded mercurial Zarulaz, who is directly involved in the main plot of the adventure and can provide the party with some valuable information about what is going on. Finally, an old retriever (a giant spider-like demonic construct) is currently holding Garmundi as a prisoner.

Sadly, the dungeon itself has a practically linear design and is quite boring in comparison with the first door. Once again, there's an important artifact (in the retriever's possession) and the second dabus puzzle (hidden behind a Wisdom check). Argathorn is quite interested in Garmundi and wants to keep the dwarf by his side as an apprentice. If the characters decide to take Garmundi back to Sigil though, they must deal with the Sign of One and Athar who want him dead.

One could think that the players' decision about Garmundi's fate would make a great impact on the conclusion of this adventure, judging from the aforementioned details. Alas, the party probably won't hear about the barmy dwarf at all! Moreover, I also didn't find any connections to this theme in other official adventures. So, if you want to expand upon the plot about servants of the dead god of portals, you must do it on your own.

The Third Door: Logicus Prime

In which our Heroes enter the Third Door and find themselves on a Prime World where Magic doesn't function and everything - even the inhabitants - is mechanical in Nature.

Once again, Estavan the merchant lord seeks the characters' assistance. He located the whereabouts of the third door and now wants the party to escort a Consortium agent exploring the plane on the other side of the portal. The characters also need to find the right key, dealing with the fanatical Society of the Locked Door in the meantime.

Once the key is found, the party ventures into the most weird place in the whole adventure. The post-apocalyptic prime world of Logicus is sundered apart, its technologically advanced civilization clinging to the last remaining shards of the planet. They are doing all right though, by the watchful eye of the World Mind β€” the city-sized computer that manages all important aspects of life. The heart of this machine is a living being under the title of Logicus Prime. The current Logicus Prime is an ancient modron who wandered here 500 years ago, but it's about time to hold the competition for the next serving term.

πŸ“ NOTE: Here, Logicus Prime declares a prophecy about the upcoming unscheduled modron march, clearly foreshadowing the events of The Great Modron March, so if the March had already started in your campaign, you should omit this event.

The characters are free to explore this strange world on their own or even partake in the competition for the Logicus Prime's throne. Of course, the victory means that the character will be pretty busy for the next 500 years, and the player should be ready to roll a new one in this case.

While all of this exciting stuff is going on, the next railroad track is reached and the adventure's arch-nemesis Lathuraz is released from his prison, escaping to Sigil. One more key artifact, one more dabus puzzle, you know the drill…

The whole idea of a magic-averse technological world is pretty good, but it barely gets explored in the course of the module. You could think of multiple ways to use this concept in your own campaigns, but again, you must do it yourself.

The Fourth Door: A Reality Beyond

In which our Heroes enter a Higher Reality and discover that some Secrets are best left in the dark.

At last, all puzzle pieces, both figuratively and literally, are gathered together. What is left is to assemble them and figure out what to do to thwart the Lathuraz's scheme. If the party is stuck here, their NPC allies could provide some tips, of course. In any case, what happens next is pretty much predetermined and the characters must act quickly if they want to stop the evil mercurial.

The fourth door leads to the "fourth-level of reality", or a "hyper-reality" as some might call it. Why we need yet another layer on top of the Outer Planes is anyone's guess. Moreover, technically this place is a realm of Mount Celestia, which makes matters ever so confusing. As usual, this world has its own physical and magical conditions, so keep this in mind.

The party will wander through the forest of this plane for some time, encountering its strange inhabitants, before discovering the Lathuraz's sanctuary, where part of his mortal body was hidden. Without doing this, the characters have no chance to kill this higher being. If the players are clever and smart, arriving here before Lathuraz, the showdown will be quite underwhelming, despite respectful combat statistics of the mercurial, since he is alone against a whole group of high-level adventurers.

Once Lathuraz is killed, the party can safely return and gather their rewards. That, of course, if they win. Otherwise, the mercurial will soon restore his full power, starting his conquest of the lesser reality anew.

Presentation

πŸ–‹οΈπŸ–‹οΈ useable

Overall, the presentation and layout are good. The synopsis and the structure of the adventure are stated at the beginning, followed by the list of notable NPCs with their statistics and motives in the grand scheme of things. Adventure chapters are rich with read-aloud blocks of flavorful text if you prefer to use those. At the end of each module, there is a section on GP and XP awards and penalties based on the actions performed by the characters. As a whole, the book makes sure that even novice DMs don't get lost in the complicated plots and intrigues of the adventure.

πŸ“ NOTE: The detailed information for most of the NPCs taking part in this adventure can be found in the "Uncaged: Faces of Sigil"5 supplement.

Now, for the weak part. There are four maps, one for each door, if you don't count the depiction of Gray Dragon Lane where the first door is located. None of these maps I would call good, though two most are at least useable, but only one of them has stated scale. The worst offender is probably the map of Logicus, barely qualifying for the title of a map.

planescape-doors-logicus

I've removed all of the labels to avoid spoilers and just gave this version as a handout for the players.

Speaking of handouts, there are a lot of them, including three dabus rebuses. You better hope that your players like solving these! If not, there are some workaround ways stated in the adventure.

πŸ“ NOTE: Regarding the version sold on DTRPG,6 there was some contention about missing maps and handouts in the comments. But as of today, I can confirm that it has all of these materials, including the dabus picture puzzles and the fanatics' pamphlet.

Openness

β˜€οΈ linear

As stated before, this adventure is a linear affair for the most part. The characters may choose which organization involved in the conflict they shall align with (if any), but this decision barely changes the main plot.

Another strange thing is the level range. As you can see, the characters start at the 2nd-4th levels with the first door and must be at least the 7th level for the fourth one. Naturally, this implies that the party will partake in other adventures between the doors. In fact, this exact suggestion is included in the book. However, the four doors will stay open for a mere two months before shutting again for another 500 years. What if the characters get involved in some grand and long adventure meanwhile? What if they get hurt badly and must heal for a couple of weeks? And what amount of adventures the party must go through to level up this much? Well, my players went through about eight adventures to do so, including 2-3 big ones, and not in a two-month game-time period in the slightest!

When I ran my main Planescape campaign, I used just the first door as a standalone adventure, ditching the other three doors since they didn't mingle well enough with my campaign. In fact, you can do this for the two (or even three) first doors quite easily. After the main campaign had ended, I ran the whole adventure as a separate mini-campaign. To do this without any additional in-between modules, you should start at 10,000 XP per character, awarding an extra 20,000 XP per character after completing each of the doors (in addition to the rewards stated in the module).

Quality

β˜… mediocre

Being for the most part confusing and limiting from the players' perspective, this adventure wasn't a big hit with my group. It still has some redeeming qualities, but you will need to change and add a lot of hand-made content to ascend the four doors to the peak of their potential. If rated separately, the first and the third doors were the favorite ones with the players, and I think the second one would also qualify, be there a better dungeon.

Of the three adventures Bill Slavicsek wrote for Planescape, I rate this the weakest one. Good news then, it could only be better from here. Till the next time, we'll meet at the steps of Harbinger House!

planescape-logo

Discuss this post on Reddit

  1. https://www.dmsguild.com/product/17267/Planescape-Campaign-Setting-2e?affiliate_id=850783↩

  2. https://www.dmsguild.com/product/17290/Doors-to-the-Unknown-2e?affiliate_id=850783↩

  3. https://www.dmsguild.com/product/17272/Planes-of-Law-2e?affiliate_id=850783↩

  4. https://www.dmsguild.com/product/17298/Planes-of-Chaos-2e?affiliate_id=850783↩

  5. https://www.dmsguild.com/product/17285/Uncaged-Faces-of-Sigil-2e?affiliate_id=850783↩

  6. https://www.dmsguild.com/product/17290/Doors-to-the-Unknown-2e?affiliate_id=850783↩

#adventure #dnd #osr #planescape #review #ttrpg