In my quest to support the delusion that folks care what I think I've decided to start doing a series of quick and dirty reviews of all the Spelljammer products. I hope these will be useful to newcomers and those without all of the products.
Rating System:
| * | Mediocre, poorly written product with little usefulness. |
| ** | A bad product for several reasons with one or two useful aspects. |
| *** | An average product with some good and some bad points. |
| **** | An above average product with few bad points. |
| ***** | An excellent product with few if any bad points. An essential SJ product. |
"A rotting ship holds the secrets of all the universe, but its crew wants you only for the 'fuel' you carry."
An excellent little adventure that plays up Spelljammer's strength of "mobile dungeons". Obviously written to provide the PCs with an introduction to Spelljamming, it accomplishes that goal well. The "ecology" of the ship is a bit off, and the colored skeletons should have been explained in some way, but otherwise a very nice introductory adventure.
"A star falls from above and terror follows in its wake."
This is a Forgotten Realms/Spelljammer cross-over adventure. It provides some interesting information about a dwarven clan in the Tears of Selune, and another nice method of introducing PCs to Spelljammer. The plot is tight and all the NPCs have realistic plans and reactions. The Whitebeard dwarves are a particularly nice touch, a model for Spelljammer/groundling interaction. We even get alternative galleon deckplans and stats for their "mining ships" I do wish we had some details on their Citadel, however!
"The wildspace monster is deadly, but its lair is the real killer."
One of the best adventures written for Dungeon, period. In fact, one of the best adventures TSR ever produced in any format, module or magazine. Not only do we get a historical mystery, a truly imposing antagonist, and a concise, tight plot, we also get an entire sphere, its history detailed, AND the "Arcane Inner Flow". This should be the model for all sphere and adventure design in Spelljammer. It does more in its few pages than Astromundi Cluser and Legend of the Spelljammer do in full boxed sets.
"In the phlogiston, everyone can hear you scream (and you'll scream a lot!)."
This collection of mini-adventures is nice for GMs, because Spelljammer really requires many "wandering encounters" to maintain the proper feel. The real stand-out is the Ivory Knight and his pirate vessel, but everything in this collection is useful.
"The elves thought they'd destroyed it forever, but this problem's too big to go away."
Another "mobile dungeon" this nice little adventure uses one of my favorite ships, the Mammoth, and some really well done historical plotting. But its flexibility is key. With literally no changes a GM can plop this down anywhere and keep his players busy for several sessions. Every Spelljammer GM should have this if only to have something ready if a game unexpectedly breaks out. Great stuff.
"The reigar believe that Art is everything, and this reigar will do everything to retrieve her stolen property."
Another in Dungeon's tradition of fine Spelljammer adventures. Excellent, evocative NPCs, a tight plot, plus the introduction of drow into space. And we finally get deckplans for the Damselfly. Its set in the same sphere as "The Sea of Sorrow", and adds more detail to that sphere as well as more detail to Realmspace!
"Out-of-this-world adventure."
This adventure details the dealings of some spelljamming gnomes with a group of groundlings as they hunt for some lost autognomes. It takes place entirely ground-side, but would be a decent introduction to Spelljammer.
"No one returns from Revular's Island, and for good reason."
Though the focus of this adventure is spelljamming Syllix, it breaks several spelljamming rules. Most importantly, the Syllix Island should not be capable of flight, it's far too large (it would be far larger than the Spelljammer!). Though technically set on a planet, this adventure would actually work better placed in space. In either context, it's a good adventure with a bit of tweaking.
