Adventures in High Fantasy (1981) was the immediate companion to High Fantasy. Mostly it is a collection of adventures, with a rules expansion for large scale miniature combat rounding things out. Disclaimer: I read this book with a head cold, so it might be very good, but I was baffled by it. First off, the adventures aren’t…arranged. They just sort of unfold before you in a linear yet still confusing jumble. It is hard to explain. There’s just no structure. It is odd.
Also odd: the adventures have no in-line stats. They are all at the end. There is vague reference to the map key, but mostly it is just a prose description of spaces and events. I feel like I should like this. I don’t. I hate it. You just slip from one thing to the next and never get a feel for the shape of the thing. It is also odd.
The ideas are good. The first scenario has you enacting someone else’s harebrained scheme to retake a citadel. You sneak in and…release the demon imprisoned within, through the use of an elaborate spell that no one is entirely sure how to cast. Theory being that the demon will make the place uninhabitable for the Dark Lord and then the original owner can just come back and…re-imprison the demon. All of this is explained with great sincerity.
The second adventure takes place in the giant corpse of a god that has been converted into a sort of temple complex. There is a lot more going on that I was never quite able to get a handle on. There is a horde of enemies pursuing you. The dead god’s ax and shield are very important to a lich and also some…aliens? If you find them, or rather, the miniature duplicates of them, you shouldn’t let those folks have them. I give this one an A+ on the merit of the dungeon being the corpse of a dead god.
The third adventure is the longest and…I’m sorry, I don’t have a clue. There is a spa for adventurers and some assassins and your friend is actually a horrific murderous villain.
There are some rather nice illustrations by Steve Paddack. I particularly like the one of the drowning (?) guy riddled with arrows.
