Mark of Amber (Mystara Audio Cd Adventure)

Rating:
Summary: Excellent sequel to module X2, Castle Amber
Review: Mark of Amber is an elaborate boxed set adventure that picks up the story of the classic Lovecraftian jaunt, X2 Castle Amber (Chateau d'Ambreville)! Clark Ashton Smith's venomous faerie dreamworld of French romance and intrigue comes vividly alive once more as Etienne d'Ambreville, the most powerful Archmagus in the magocracy of Glantri, is missing and presumed dead... worse, a sinister assassin of seemingly endless power and ingenuity is stalking the d'Ambreville nobles one by one, and only you can save them... how? By plunging yourself into the living nightmares of a dying Immortal. Told you it was fun... :) for levels 4-6.

Rating:
Summary: Castle Amber is a tough act to follow
Review: My all time favorite module was "X2 Castle Amber". This was one of the original D&D modules and remembered by many as one of the most fun, imaginative adventures of all time. I played this module over and over, both as a PC and as a DM. When I heard of that they made a nostalgic sequel called "Mark of Amber", I bought it and really tried to like it, but it was difficult for many reasons.

First, "Mark of Amber" does not capture the original feel of "Castle Amber". The original "Castle Amber" module was a dungeon crawling adventure where the PCs are trapped in a magical mansion with strange monsters and crazy and/or evil Amber family members. It was exploring, hack and slash, puzzle solving, treasure finding and lots of special magical effects. It was fun because the game had a little bit of everything and was rewarding to the PCs. The sequel "Mark of Amber" is a who-done-it murder mystery with family politics and a story line around Etienne Amber (Stephen Amber from "Castle Amber"?!?!). "Mark of Amber" brings back the original eccentric Amber family members and the magical mansion, and does a great job recapturing the French atmosphere of "Castle Amber". But beyond that, "Mark of Amber" is a very different adventure than "Castle Amber". It is more of a mystery novel rather than a fantasy adventure. The PCs will not have a lot of monsters to kill nor a lot of treasure to win, instead spending most of their time exploring many plain empty rooms for clues while reliving the main character's past experiences.

The book is broken awkwardly in 3 parts: the first is a room by room description of the mansion, the second is the adventure events, and the third is the description of each of the family members. The first part describes over 140 rooms, most of them empty rooms with nothing interesting (no monsters, no treasure, no puzzles, etc.). This is very tedious for a DM to read through so many unimportant rooms and is very boring to the PCs to explore. (Most of the rooms in "Castle Amber" had something of interest, such as a monster to kill, a treasure to obtain, or a magical effect to conquer). There are about 10 rooms behind high level (15th level) wizard lock spells, some of them are important to solve to mystery. Since the PCs must solve the mystery in 4 days, unless the PCs have enough high level knock spells (the adventure is for PCs levels 4 thru 6...) and have the patience to explore all of the boring rooms, they may not solve the mystery (a design flaw in the adventure). The second part describes the events in the game. This part is used with the audio CD for NPC dialogue and atmosphere, which adds a nice and unique touch to this adventure. Unlike "Castle Amber" and other older modules, the story does not unfold as the PCs explore room to room. Instead the story unfolds by scripted events which the DM coordinates with tracks on the audio CD. Instead of the adventure unfolding around the actions of the PCs, the PCs must react around the predetermined events in the adventure (which I don't particularly like). As a PC, I rather have my destiny in my own hands and explore at my own pace. As a DM, I rather not micromanage scripted events and allow the game to move at a more natural pace. The third part describes each of the Amber family members. There are a lot of members for the DM to memorize and to track, which can be overwhelming. Even if you are familiar with the members from "Castle Amber", many of them changed since. Because of the reasons above, this adventure is difficult to DM, which can affect the fun of playing it.

The best features of "Castle Amber" are the influences from Clark Ashton Smith stories (Tales from Averoigne). If you are sharp, you will also see other influences in "Castle Amber", such as Edgar Allen Poe ("Premature Burial" and "Murders in the Rue Morgue"), Arthurian legends (the green giant, a la "Green Knight"), fairy tales (the billygoat and the troll). "Castle Amber" has also influenced other adventures (the grey mists of Castle Amber seeped its way into Ravenloft!). Unfortunately "Mark of Amber" did not carry over many of the elements that made "Castle Amber" great and fun to play. There is one dream sequence from Etienne's memories where the PCs explore the old Castle Amber trapped in the mists. This would have been a perfect chance to add in the reprint of the original X2 module and allow new players to experience the original within the context of the adventure. That would have been a great treat to nostalgic players (they included a reprint of the original module for "Return to the Tomb of Horrors"...). Too bad they didn't do this. (By the way, Etienne's dreams is the same plot device used in "Knight of the Black Rose" where players must interfere in Lord Soth's dreams to affect the outcome of the adventure...hmmm...).

In summary, "Mark of Amber" is a decent sequel to "Castle Amber", but it does pain me to say it is not that great (as much as I wanted it to be). The best part is the audio CD because it adds atmosphere. The adventure may be boring to PCs because there are not a lot of monsters to kill, experience points to earn, nor treasure to gain. Unless your players like murder mysteries with some political intrigue and you are a very skilled DM who can handle the format of this type of adventure, both PCs and DMs may not find this adventure very rewarding. If you want the old "Castle Amber" feel and experience further adventures in Averoigne, this adventure doesn't have it.