 Howdy how's it going? My name's Davy Chappy, and I run premade adventures. A lot. Like, a lot a lot. Like, I'm currently running for premade's week, and this is the lowest my schedule has been for a year and a half a lot. So, I am in a particular position where my exposure to the other side of official books that most people avoid on contact with is extremely high, especially in the case of the adventure that's meant to bring people into the hobby. D&D's own The Lost Mine of Fan Delver. Fun fact, I've ran this module four times, played it once, and completed it twice. At this point, I am a Lost Mine master of the arts. The Lost Mine of Fan Delver comes packaged with the D&D starter set, and it serves as an introduction to all things D&D, providing an adventure from levels 1 through 5 that gives new players a taste of all that D&D has to offer. But how well does actually manage to be a comprehensive story that you will remember for days to come? Well, settle into your seats for the first day of class, because we're going to be reviewing the introductory module for the fifth edition of Dungeons & Dragons. As always, keep in mind that most of this is just my opinion, so if you really feel like the module is called The Lost Mines and not Lost Mine, then feel free to experience your Mandelo Effect however you want. But with that out of the way, let's begin. THE GOOD! So, starting with the good, The Lost Mine of Fan Delver does a lot of heavy lifting to ensure that new groups, both players and DMs, are eased into the game gently, like getting slowly acclimated to a hot tub. And that's really necessary considering that the actual first module of D&D, Horde of the Dragon Queen, is like getting slowly acclimated to Sulfuric Acid. The starter set comes with a watered-down version of the rules, some dice, as well as five character sheets covering the archetypical party composition, the Halfling Rogue, the Elven Wizard, the Dwarven Cleric, the Human Fighter, and another Human Fighter, because we should get people used to seeing that race-class combo is early as possible. From there, the adventure book also comes jam-packed with blurbs and footnotes, walking the DM through their first adventure, giving them a gentle guiding hand on things like playing NPCs, describing areas, directing the party where to go, and holding back your tears when the party breaks the game by going completely off-book. Most of this doesn't have to do directly with the adventure, but it's worth mentioning, because it all helps take as much work out of the new group's hands as possible. As for the game itself, LaMop is a simplistic romp through the backwoods of the forgotten realms, where players fight goblins, help out a small village, and foil the plot of an enigmatic bad guy. The story beats are really easy to follow, but that predictability means that DMs and players won't get confused easy, which is a good trade-off when you're trying to keep the kitty wheels on. The fights are, for the most part, fair and balanced, although the Goblin Cave could maybe do with a couple less goblins, and there's enough variation in strange traps sprung on people that it should keep players entertained whenever they start DRAGONING their first dungeons. By the end of the adventure, the heroes will be level 5, although I actually recommend leveling them up a bit earlier than that, just because the last dungeon can be a bit hellish if you make the wrong choices. The way I've done it is that I level them up to 4 after they visit Thunder Tree, and just level them up normally after that. As far as NPCs go, you get a lot of really basic NPCs that fill the classic archetypical roles, again so that new groups will have an easy time digesting them. Sildar Hallwinter is an honorable knight, Gundren Rockseeker is a dwarf, Iarno is a smarmy, greasy guy, and so on. It really doesn't spend a lot of time getting you used to these characters, probably because you won't see any of them again after level 5, and because not having a lot of discernible character traits makes it easier for DMs to slip into the role and make some up on their own, and that flexibility isn't just given to the DM. The players also get a bit of breathing room where they would like to go during the adventure. While it does take place mostly in the sleepy town of Fandolin and its surrounding areas, all the dungeons have multiple access points, the town locations are readily available, and the party can sort of put the main adventure on pause for a little while if they want to pursue the snack-sized side quest. It all portions out to give both sides of the table guidance and the freedom that they'll need to be satisfied. The bad! LaMop is a small-scale adventure, meant to give your players a taste of what the world of D&D is like without dropping a load of world-shattering consequences on you and your Squirrel Scout party. This mostly works to the adventure's favor, giving you an easily digestible story where you can mostly relax and enjoy the company of your party members, but it does come with some unfortunate side effects. Namely, none of the characters you meet will be memorable in any way. Sildar Hallwinter is a stock tutorial NPC, Iarno is a stock first villain, the Black Spider is a stock final boss. All these people are very basic in their stories, and you don't really get a feel for who they are outside of the events unfolding in the game. Literally, every character you meet is one note and unimaginative, with the exception of Droop the Goblin, who became every party's mascot. Don't worry, I know he was yours too, it happens to all of us. This isn't the worst problem in the world since it's just a level 5 adventure, so it doesn't get much time to develop the characters anyway, but it doesn't leave the DM with a lot to go by, which considering this module is meant to bring in new DMs, as well as new players, is a little disheartening. Also, it makes the villain's plan really boring and uninteresting, because the writers failed to watch my DM guide on villains, which came out five years after this module was released. They had time. It also has a weird way of forcing the faction system that 5e had been pushing for a while down your throat. With certain NPCs working for the Xentareem, the Lord's Alliance, all that, and they offer certain players the chance to join, which is a tiny plot line that leads to absolutely nothing and is forgotten about just as quickly as it's brought up. I suppose it was added as a way of continuing the story past 5, but no, I'm sorry, but the game ends at 5. You can keep going if you want, but don't throw an entire faction system into the pot for a new DM to wrap their head around just because you want to push your adventurer's leak nonsense. Honestly, I'd recommend completely ignoring the faction system if you're not going to use it yourself, because the module won't change at all. Also, the lack of NPC motivation goes further by creating a serious issue where the party will forget about an NPC as soon as they've left their field of view, unless you went out of your way to push that NPC as hard as you can, which is similar to pushing a dog off of a couch. It's difficult, and you feel bad that you had to do it in the first place. THE AUGLE! Okay, if there's one real nail in the coffin to the reputation of the lost mind of Fen Delver, it's that it loses its steam at the midway point, and it really doesn't get it back, even during the last dungeon. There's one cardinal sin that you can't break with D&D, and that's that the game cannot be boring. So when the initial business in the town is over and the players are left to search for clues regarding the Black Spider, the motivation to really continue adventuring outside of it's just what the adventure wants you to do, sort of evaporates, and the party feels left out as a result. Obviously, you can avoid this if you give your players personal story hooks that make them want to keep going anyway, but as it is in the adventure, the Black Spider is just some dude the adventurer's real letter about once, and if you've watched my villains guide, then you know that that is not enough for an interesting villain. Honestly, I would make sure that Yarno escapes the first battle so that the party feels a little more personal about chasing this Black Spider plotline, but even then, it's not the biggest hook in the world. As soon as the party gets back to town and has to go looking for the Black Spider, they sort of have to be prodded to do anything else, and until you go to Kragma Castle, your players will sort of be wondering what the big deal is and what they're supposed to do next, constantly reminding the players what to do is not fun, and it'll make you feel like you're a bad DM when I'd like to think that I'm a good DM, and yet I run into this problem every time. It's one of those things that make you feel inadequate, and it only gets worse when you realize that the final dungeon is... not that interesting. It's a cave with someone dead in it. Cool, but by this time, you already fought undead, and the Black Spider is an underwhelming boss that doesn't really have a lot of memorable features about him. I think that's the biggest issue with the Lost Mine of Fen Delver, a lack of memorable features. It makes sense because, you know, it's the new player module. It's trying to set the standard for what is normal, so it can't just go twisting around the concept of what is normal, but if the bad guy falls down in a dungeon and nobody ever remembers it, did you really get the XP? Overall, the Lost Mine of Fen Delver is a quiet success. It does exactly what it wants to do. It gives you exactly the experience you could expect, and it leaves silently when its work is finished without so much as waking the dog. The forgetfulness that your players may have over the aspects of the adventure can be forgiven because once those players come out of Wage of Echo Cave, they will have all the skills and knowledges that they need to be an adventuring success. But that'll about do it. I hope you enjoyed this video. Be sure to leave a like, comment, subscribe, ring the bell, check out all my social media in the description below, and maybe support me on Patreon so that I can afford to keep buying all of these modules and review them so that a small amount of my fan base will watch them. But yeah, Davio.