itch.io

I just re-downloaded and checked again, opening it in affinity, chrome, and acrobat, and in all three each spread is embedded as an images, on mine. I suspect there's some export setting flagged incorrectly.

A very cool zine, although I think it's got too many pieces to fit into 8 pages. You've got:

• a new class
• a new ancestry
• a new gear section
• a complex set of factions and npcs
• a hex-crawl with a timed event list

To me, that didn't all fit into the space, making the whole a bit hard to read. That said, if you spread things out after the jam with a few more pages, I think this could really sing. Dedicate a page to each single topic so it's not jockeying with other elements for focus and I'll have an easier time parsing it.

Other notes:

• About the hours, are those only covered by the hex-crawl times, or does shadowdark realtime-play also count against it? I feel like realtime should count against it, but also like that's going to not add up. Like, my read of the hex-map says just going across the center, 1->3->8, would take 11 hours. Add in many events in real-time, you're running out of hours, and that's only 3 locations hit.
  If players try to go in any more complex routes, I feel like they're gonna only be able to get to a few, and never double back, which means they probably are deciding on their route at the start, before arriving at locations has informed them enough about the decision to choose a more informed route.
  I think that, in practice, I would run it with the travel-times halved, and possibly some other things to give the PCs more freedom to operate in that 24 hours span.
• Also about the hours, you say that "Hour 1 starts at 8 PM, 24 hours before the Lunar Shadow", but on the hours table you have "20 - Lunar shadow cloaks the valley in darkness", so it sounds like hour 1 is 19 hours short of the lunar shadow.
• More on the hours: I'm not sure what happens after hour 24. Maybe I just missed it, but if that's the case, I think this falls under the overcrowded page concern again.
• Final note, the hexmap is not on the same page as the hex descriptions, nor even on the facing page if viewed in two-page view, which makes that difficult to work with.

Hopefully this comes across as the constructive criticism I meant it to be. It's a very cool zine and I love the ideas, especially the fleaborn as a race, having something that makes more sense than vampires fighting against the werewolves. Not sure if you're going to revise it after the jam is over, but if you do, maybe my thoughts help out a bit. Whether you make changes or not, very cool zine.

A very cool adventure, beautiful to look at and a good read.

I'm always wanting constructive critique, so I also give it, so here are the few things that bugged me in an excellent adventure:

• Because it's images, I can't search for text, which is mostly an issue because the layout is very complex. I got halfway through and saw "So they ran into the seekers" and had to skim back to find that because I didn't immediately remember who they were. Not that it's easy to change that (I probably wouldn't), but that did give me trouble.
• The maps aren't on the same pages as the rooms they reference, and I think there's space for them to be, or at least for smaller replicas to be. The need for page-flipping to go between the most-complex level (Even Further Down) and its rooms bugged me.
• Also on the maps, very small thing, but the "S" for secret doors being in the same font+color as the numbers of the rooms made it so I had trouble picking out room-numbers at a glance.
• On the calligrapher, very flavorful class, just some minor notes:
  • It's not entirely clear to me if you can do both a flourish and a brushstroke on the same inkshot
  • I don't feel like the class is going to scale past the early levels very well, although that's true of almost every class not in the core-4.
  • You have a harmless entry for the last option for flourish and brushstroke. Because the players only get to select a few of these ever, I would make the harmless ones free for anyone, as they otherwise will just not get used.
• Regarding the origami master, a very cool idea again:
  • I'd love a note on how much space paper takes up, as you had for ink
  • I know sentient fold can go up with a talent roll, but I feel like anyone that doesn't get that is going to be very weak after the first few levels

Honestly, really loved it. I wouldn't spend the time writing all that out if I didn't think this was a good adventure that could be made better.

Anyways, maybe you find some of that helpful if you decide to revise this, maybe not. Either way, what you've got already is excellent.

This was a super-cool adventure/setting. I had fun reading it, and I think I could run it fairly well.

My only complaint, one that I run into with a ton of dungeons, was that the map seemed so small, the rooms so close, that it felt like the events should bleed together, yet each feels distinct.

I suspect I'd be happier, if the map were just plain larger. I saw 30x12 tiles and thought 150x60 ft, but you reference the USS Johnston, which is apparently about 370x40 ft. To me, having longer, tighter, more claustrophobic passages would reinforce the feel of being inside a ship, where your current map is a bit boxy.

That's my only minor quibble, just a though in case you decide to revise it.

Overall, loved it.

This is a very clean adventure. Feels like I could run it without much prep. Very well done.

The only things I would suggest, if you expand on this, are a set of hooks for how the PCs might get quested towards the sinking sanctuary, and some notes about the trip from Poe's Lantern to the sanctuary.

Great job.

This is genuinely excellent, I really enjoyed reading it.

You managed to fit a ton in without any of the pages feeling crowded. The tight NPC descriptions are especially well-done.

Only suggestions:

• Differentiate the guns more and open them up beyond fighter/rogue. In a setting that's basically guns-only, locking half the classes from using guns hurts the feel. I think you could get far by adding more guns and splitting them differently. Obviously you were space-limited here, but if you go back I'd expand that. Something like:
  • Fighter: Carbine, rifle, revolver, derringer
  • Priest: Rifle, derringer
  • Rogue: Revolver, derringer
  • Wizard: Derringer
• The functionality of gunner badges feels weird. They represent your skill, but you just buy them? And as only fighters/rogues can use them, this puts fighters/rogues at +6 AC compared to priests/wizards for most combats here. Not sure what, but I think some refinement is needed there.
• I found the force-field functionality a bit unclear, especially on the aliens stat-block. Not so unclear I'd have trouble running it, but I think I'd actually be just making up half the rules.

Anyways, that's my effort at constructive criticism. Excellent adventure.

I'm gonna add maps and a tracker sheet soon. I left it as just the core 8 pages because that's what's judged for the jam.