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The first location is Am’Elvat, an open-air elven bazaar held
around the autumnal equinox. The market setting provides
for quite a number of interesting NPC’s who run and
frequent the shops of the bazaar. This location is rated for
any encounter level and can easily be a place for the start
of numerous adventures for a party before they get
involved in the back-story about freeing an imprisoned evil
force.
Another interesting location is the Colony of The Afflicted.
The colony is a quarantine zone for those suffering from a
disfiguring disease - very similar to the Molokai Leper
colony in Hawaii. The concept of island of “unclean” in a
campaign can quickly add depth and interest to most any
campaign.
At an encounter level of 10, the Shadowgloom Ranch is one
of the more advanced locations. It is designed to use the
psionic rules but includes notes on adapting the game to
non-psionic settings. On its surface, Shadowgloom ranch
deals in horses, but there are also rumors of the
establishment willing to buy females of exotic and
dangerous species. The reasons why involve an elf, a
dragon, and some rather interesting other encounters.
BASICS
“Foul Locales: Beyond the Walls” is a 128-page soft cover
book published by Mystic Eye Games. The front and back
covers are full color but the illustrations inside are black
and white. This book provides detailed pre-generated
wilderness locations and some associate encounters. The
retail price is $19.99.
BETWEEN THE COVERS
“Beyond the Walls” is a companion volume to “Foul
Locales: Urban Blight”. Where the other volume deals with
locations inside of a city, this volume presents encounters
that occur outside the city walls.
Thirteen locations are presented with encounter levels
ranging from 2 to 14 with most in the 7 to 8 range. Lowerlevel
parties can just pass through an area until they reach
a level when they can fully explore it.
Each location is presented in a standard format that
includes a brief description, details about the location,
NPC’s and creatures, adventure and plot hooks, and maps.
There are also notes on how each location can be placed
into an existing campaign as well as sidebars that add extra
information for the location. Each location is presented with
enough information to allow the DM to incorporate it into
an existing campaign or to serve as the start of a new one.
VALUE
Like the other Foul Locales book, “Beyond the Walls” is a
volume for DM’s. There is no useful information for use by
player characters in it. In fact, a player who purchases this
volume might just ruin the surprise of an adventure run by
his local DM who also has the book.
Where the first volume was fairly straight ahead with its
locations and encounters, this volume presents all of the
locations with a hidden background. This is intriguing to me
as both a DM and player. This appearance of normalcy,
which marks the best thrillers and mysteries, is present in
these locations. It is only waiting for the party to start
looking closely to reveal what is actually going on.
For example, using the high encounter level locations early
in a campaign will familiarize the party with the façade of
the area. Revealing the underlying encounters later can
give a definite “X-Files” feeling to the campaign.
This book is an excellent resource for the harried DM who
needs to flesh out existing adventures. Once you introduce
these places, your games will probably start adding a level
of misdirection and illusion that will quickly increase the
interest of your players and, in the end, may make your job
more difficult but more interesting at the same time.
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