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Designed by: Daniel Kahn
Like the excellent Hither Adventure Bundle and Thither Adventure Bundle , the Yon Adventure Bundle enhances a chapter of The Wild Beyond the Witchlight by expanding underdeveloped content, or adding all new mini-adventures, in three different locations.
This adventure bundle focuses on chapter four. Yon is a mountainous realm of constant thunderstorms ruled by the melodramatic hag, Endelyn Moongrave. It includes the Astronomer’s Throne, Korred Clans, and Mill in the Mists, which can also be purchased separately. Each adventure includes maps, statblocks, and magic items, and are designed for parties around sixth level.
Astronomer’s Throne
Astronomer’s Throne is based on a relatively simple random encounter in the campaign book: the party finds a stone chair on a mountain peak with an inscription. By sitting on the throne, they enter a trance as their mind hurtles through space in what I presume is a trippy, colorful montage. Afterwards they gain a free skill proficiency.
In this new version, the party finds the throne next to a telescope. The inscription on the throne includes a riddle, while the telescope points to a constellation. By moving the telescope around, they can point it at different constellations in the order of the riddle. It’s a fun little puzzle reminiscent of classic point and click adventure games, or something like Myst.
Once the right objects are lit up, a portal appears and takes the party to the Dream Star Sanctum, where a sleeping dragon lies. The dragon is Lyrinth, a companion to the star-seeking owner of the throne, Mazikoth. Mazikoth has long left, and the distraught dragon was cursed by the hag to dream endless nightmares.
The nightmares are captured by crystals around the sanctum, which in turn convert the nightmares into the stormclouds that plague Yon. It’s a neat explanation for one of Yon’s biggest features — not to mention a chance for the PCs to end the constant storms around the region.
First they’ll need to defeat the dragon’s caretaker, a magic item-eating beholder called a gauth (from Volo’s Guide to Monsters).
The sanctum is a cool boss arena. Not only does each crystal provide ongoing affects around it, but destroying a crystal grants the gauth a significant buff. Meanwhile the dragon acts as player-allied lair actions, healing and protecting them even while unconscious.
If they save the dragon, they end the stormclouds and gain some nice loot from the dragon’s hoard. And yes, among the loot is a book that grants a free skill proficiency. Astronomer’s Throne is a nice improvement over the original encounter, and a memorable boss battle.
Korred Clans
Chapter 4 of The Wild Beyond the Witchlight features two feuding races, the korreds and the brigganocks. Each blames the other for working with the hag. It’s a simple matter of visiting both and convincing them of their mistakes, and gaining their trust.
While the Brigganock Mine includes several NPCs and locations, the korred home of Lockbury Henge involves little more than playing a game and dancing with the korreds.
In the original adventure, only two of the eight clans even bother meeting with the PCs, and their task is to deal with the brigganocks. Korred Clans adds a ton of content by featuring quests from the other six clans — a six-in-one mini-adventure!
- Save korred kids from the Basalt Clan, who accidently took a salamander’s eggs thinking they were gems. Fight the salamander or parley with it, promising to return the eggs.
- Destroy an infestation of mites plaguing the Flint Clan, who mistakenly believe they’re being attacked by brigganocks.
- Impress the Granite Clan via series of athletics competitions, from Tug of Hair to a 300-ft rock climb (with a d10 table of complications).
- Challenge the hag-corrupted leader of the Obsidian Clan to a duel, hopefully ending his charmed condition during the fight.
- Produce a work of art using a series of skills (or spells) for the Marble Clan.
- Solve a sliding puzzle box for the Slate Clan, earning the magic item within.
Korred Clans may be my favorite of all nine of these Witchlight enhanced adventures. The amount of content is awesome, and I love that each of these quests is different and focuses on different pillars of gameplay (all that’s missing is a murder investigation and a chase sequence).
Plus, the maps and handouts really shine here. All of these Witchlight adventures include full color battle maps, including non-gridded versions for VTTs. Korred Clans features three maps for the Basalt, Flint, and Obsidian quests.
The adventure also includes an interactive puzzle handout for the puzzle cube quest, so players can slide the squares around. I’m a huge fan of tactile puzzles, and this is an awesome addition.
Mill in the Mist
In each of these adventure bundles the designer picks one interesting location on the Prismeer map that isn’t actually given any content in the book, and writes a quest for it. The Mill in the Mist is this bundle’s all new-adventure, adding a questline for the mysterious mill in the middle of the map, surrounded by the obscuring mists.
Mill in the Mist has the most story tie-ins of the three Yon adventures. The backstory includes a fomorian, Boidheach, who was tricked by the hag. The deformed giant wanted to be beautiful, and Endelyn granted his wish so long as he turn the crank on the mill once a day, ensuring the realm-dividing mists stayed in place, and protecting meddlesome outsiders from reaching the finale in the Palace of Heart’s Desire.
But the hag cruelly tricked the fomorian. He wasn’t transformed at all, but was given a magic mirror that makes him think he is. It wouldn’t be that hard for a party to convince the fomorian that the hag tricked him, and to betray her. Once the mill stops turning, the mists begin to recede, and the entire realm opens up, allowing safe passage to the palace.
While the mill itself is disappointingly short and bare, save for a simple puzzle to reach the third floor, reaching the mill itself is all kinds of fun.
The adventure expands the section of the Motherhorn dungeon in Yon where the party can commandeer a rain cloud balloon from some darklings, whether diplomatically, monetarily, or violently.
The adventure provides an awesome rain cloud balloon map as it soars over the stormy skies of Yon and into the dangerous enveloping mists. Travel complications can include several skill checks. Failure results in a roll on the mist encounters table, which could feature a cloaker attack, or some nasty spells descending on the party. How about some Crown of Madness while crammed into a tiny balloon?
All three adventures are excellent additions to The Wild Beyond the Witchlight, making this bundle another must-have expansion for the campaign.
Pros:
- Effectively expands Chapter 4 of The Wild Beyond the Witchlight with fun side-ventures and meaningful tie-ins.
- Full color gridded and grid-less maps for each location
- Interactive handout (or map) for sliding tile cube and constellation puzzles.
- Helpful ‘Troublehsooting’ notes if the party fails any steps of the mini-adventures.
Cons:
- None!
The Verdict: As with the previous adventure bundles, Yon Adventure Bundle expands and enhances The Wild Beyond the Witchlight with an excellent assortment of role-playing, combat, puzzles, and memorable moments.
This review has been sponsored by the publisher Find more reviews on my website and YouTube channel.
Support my work by using affiliate links for shopping and pledging via Patreon.
RogueWatson 