Played through this session twice with two groups of players around Halloween time. Five 5th level players in one and three 6th level player in the other. Both groups loved the experience. Used my Hue color-changing lights and pre-selected music to create a distinctive and fantastic ambiance for each area of the adventure that my players are still talking about. By far and away my favorite room is: Area 8: Feed Me, or the banquet hall. It has this Wonderful vibe of the scene in Spirited Away when the parents are turned into pigs.
Tip to other DMs running this, really focus on roleplaying the NPCs in Area 8: Feed Me as being truly desperate to keep eating the food, even off the floor or other extreme circumstances, unless the party can shock them out of it with that intent. Made for easily the most memorable part of the adventure for both groups.
It can, and did, run a bit long (5+ hours) especially if your party gets distracted losing direction between rooms, or wants to fight everything. It required a bit of prompting and on the fly reworking to keep a good flow. I can definitely recommend limiting or even removing the combat encounters in the bedroom and kitchen to keep the session moving, especially since they are 3-4 hours in and my players were having much more fun exploring this wonderfully designed world and groaned at the idea of taking 30 min for an OK encounter. Neither of my groups wanted to fight them when introduced, so I made them much quicker and easier to beat than recommended. I reccomend instead, make the fight with Tasha more intense, possibly even adding some minions to balance the action economy in her favor if you decide to remove the others.
Overall, with a little reworking, this is an amazing module with great horror vibes, an engaging hook, and an interesting setting. I will absolutely keep this one as a go-to in my one-shot rotation.
|