Planescape review: The Modron Judge
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:
- Presentation: how easy it is to understand and run the adventure.
- Openness: how open the adventure's scope is, regarding the freedom of choice.
- Quality: Overall quality of the adventure, including the originality and richness of its content, and players' enjoyment.
The full list of currently published reviews is available under the planescape tag.
The Modron Judge
In which our Heroes discover that the Modron March creates all manner of castoffs, and they free a lost Child from captivity.
- Designers: Monte Cook and Colin McComb
- Source: The Great Modron March2, Chapter VII
- Party: 4-6 characters of 5th-8th levels
- Play-time: 1 session
- Locations:
- Outlands / Bedlam
Overview
The wizard Bachalis encountered earlier in the Recruiters module from the Well of Worlds3 anthology, has a new job for the party. This time, he wants the characters to bring him a pinch of volcanic ash from the Pandemonium gate. As usual, he's quite generous, offering 100 platinum in advance, 200 more to each character when they return, and coverage of any expenses if they provide receipts.
Immediately upon arrival, the characters discover the horribly mutilated and disemboweled body of a githzerai nailed to a doorframe. Moments later the town's watch patrol arrives, ordering the party to surrender to the authorities. From this moment, it's obvious that the module has the only intended way to play out. If the characters try to split up and evade, the watchmen will pursue and catch the slowest ones, if they attempt to fight back, more and more guards will arrive each round until they subdue the characters by sheer number. If the characters submit to the patrol, they will be arrested and still beaten up, just in case.
What is unknown to the party at this point, the watchmen themselves are guilty of this murder, along with other ones that happened in the past. Why? For the glory of CHAOS of course! I'm not even kidding, this is almost a verbatim explanation from the book. Now these members of a semi-criminal Sarex organization try to blame the murders on the characters. What they intended to do if no one happened to be at the murder scene tonight isn't clear.
The characters are thrown into prison, and their weapons and equipment are confiscated. In the morning the party is escorted to the courthouse for the trial. The town's current judge is Trictacalus β a rogue decaton modron from the previous March that happened over 100 years ago. The modron is still holding to its decaton form somehow, instead of assuming the usual rogue form of a quadrone. Held here by force, Trictacalus serves as the judge for the denizens of Bedlam.
If any of the characters plead guilty, they are immediately executed. Assuming they plead innocent, the following trial soon shows itself to be a complete mockery, with fake evidence, paid-off witnesses, and a blood-thirsty crowd cheering for the upcoming execution. What is also apparent, the judge doesn't question any of the outraging claims presented by the prosecution, be it from not knowing the very concept of lying, or from the years of imprisonment that drove the decaton insane.
Halfway through the defenders' presentation, the judge declares the case closed and the characters guilty and locked until the evening when the public execution will occur. Instead of escorting the party back to the prison, the characters are brought to the judge's private quarters. Once alone, Trictacalus proposes the characters escape together, threatening them with the promised execution if they refuse.
You might ask, what's stopping the party from killing the rogue modron? After all, isn't it Trictacalus who sentenced them to execution unlawfully? The answer is β pretty much nothing. They might even play along for a while since the modron will help them in combat, but once they get back their equipment from the prison (if the characters decide to do this at all), they can just decide that killing the annoying judge would be much easier than escorting it through the belligerent streets of the whole town. Trictacalus is a tough opponent, but nothing the party of this level couldn't deal with.
Assuming the party decides to follow the modron's plan, they must sneak through all five zones of the town (meaning five pre-planned encounters with various local factions and people), finally arriving at the Pandemonium's gate, where a shadow fiend Hrava will congratulate them on doing its bidding by removing the modron judge from Bedlam. At this point, the adventure is effectively over.
Presentation
ποΈποΈ useable
The isometric map of Bedlam is quite schematic, without any scale given. The city is divided into five zones, with a total of four key locations marked. As usual for this book, all stats for the patrols and important NPCs are present and detailed. There's also a one-page write-up on the town, describing its layout, inhabitants, and three local organizations.
As usual, A Player's Primer to the Outlands4 has some additional information on this burg, but not that much. The map included differs from the one given in the adventure and is somewhat more useable in my opinion, giving us a clearer top-down perspective, along with some additional points of interest.
Openness
βοΈ linear
No question about it. The module isn't just a railroad, it's a quite rickety one at that. The module suggests a 5th-8th level party, and at this power level the characters can get shit done, even against all the odds that the module can throw their way. Run from the Sarex at the beginning, escape the prison, or just kill the barmy modron when they are alone and just sneak out of the town (that's what my party did) β the possibilities of abandoning the plot line are numerous, and nothing is planned for this occurrence.
Quality
β bad
One of the worst official Planescape modules receives a zero-star rating. Blackmailing the characters for a crime they didn't commit to make them follow the orders is a horrible way to start an adventure. You might get away with such a hook for a lower-level party, but it would still leave a sour taste. Doing this with relatively powerful and established characters is a recipe for disaster.
Can it be fixed (at least somewhat)?
You have yourself a hefty task if you plan to make this module more palatable. I would suggest changing the hook to have some NPC friends of the party be arrested instead. The characters can then represent the defense while trying to find clues and witnesses to prove the defendants' innocence, noir investigation style. Flesh out the shadow fiend's plan, add some acquaintances of the deceased victims who might seen the real killers, and make the modron judge contact the party in secret, without the whole "do as I say or you all die" thing⦠But at this point, it will be a totally different module.
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https://www.dmsguild.com/product/17267/Planescape-Campaign-Setting-2e?affiliate_id=850783↩
https://www.dmsguild.com/product/17302/The-Great-Modron-March-2e?affiliate_id=850783↩
https://www.dmsguild.com/product/17269/Well-of-Worlds-Planescape-2e?affiliate_id=850783↩
https://www.dmsguild.com/product/17301/A-Players-Primer-to-the-Outlands-2e?affiliate_id=850783↩