“Barrowmaze is the real deal. It delivers. Its not weird. It’s not gonzo. It doesn’t deliver that idiosyncratic OD&D feel. It does feel real; it’s pretty internally consistent. And it’s a GREAT environment to explore with your buddies on a friday night. Err … lots of friday nights … this dungeon is HUGE. This is worth having, and I don’t say that about many products”
“This is a strange product to review because it fills a strange niche. It’s not a megadungeon like Stonehell. It’s not a mini-dungeon like the VAST majority of nonsense published. It instead fills some gap between the two. Many Gates of the Gann, WG5, ASE1, G1-2-3 (taken together) and S3 all kind of fall in to the same category”
“These are large enough to support many nights of play and offer a decent exploration element, with the mystery and unknown that delivers, but are still self-contained products. There’s a clear beginning and ending, unlike a megadungeon. The players can get it in to trouble and see the results of their actions in a way not possible in shorter products. And this is a very good thing indeed”
“Taken together it presents a vivd picture of what exploring THIS dungeon is like”
“The Barrowmaze map is FRIGGING AWESOME! It’s HUGE! It’s ginormous! It’s got like 190 keyed encounters on it, but that ignores the fact that many encounters have sub-rooms. A, b, c, d, etc. Or, actually, 142 D1, 142 D2, 142 Q3, 142 D4, etc”
“It’s an excellent example of dungeon level design. There are several “sub-sections” with their own feels, varied room shapes, a WIDE variety of secret doors, numerous pits, portcullises, etc. It is GREAT! Loops are everywhere!”
“Each section of the dungeon has it’s own wanderers table (undead & vermin heavy) and I’m happy to say that NPC parties show up! I LOVE NPC parties in my dungeons! They offer an opportunity for roleplay and significantly different combats than the party is used to. They also have a different feel to them that makes the party more emotionally connected, I believe”
“The encounters here are pretty decent. Just like the wandering tables the rooms are dominated by undead and vermin. Skeletons, rats, spiders and zombies, oozes and shadows. These are augmented by factions within the dungeon. There are at least three major groups in the dungeon, and that doesn’t count the undead, the intelligent undead, the NPC parties or the independents. This allows for a great deal of interaction”
“The room descriptions are terse (12-15 rooms to a page) and yet give me what I need to help me run a game. No wading through mountains of text and no spoon-feeding, just good assistance”
“A great many of the rooms have the occupants DOING something. A zombie stabs at a wall, beetles feed on lichen, or two ghouls argue over who gets to eat a tasty morsel. These sorts of encounters help the dungeon seem like a real living place”
“there are A LOT of dead adventurers in this place. Impaled. Gutted. Crawled in to a hole a dies from wounds. You get the picture, A LOT”
“This, along with the living NPC parties, also helps give the place a sort of living history outside of the party”
“It’s big. It makes sense. It’s full of great encounters. Go get it and play it!”