DM Guide to House of Moonlight
- Towering Tales AB
- Jan 3, 2020
- 4 min read
Warning: contains spoilers for House of Moonlight, and minor spoilers for other adventures.
Aaaaaand we're live! House of Moonlight is finally up on DMsGuild and available for your DMing pleasure. As this is part 1 of 7, I wanted to put together a little bit of a tips repository on possible ways to approach the series.
So we should totally run the Swords trilogy first, right?!
Honestly - not at all. When I say that the new series doesn't require any knowledge of the previous trilogy, it's 100% true. House of Moonlight assumes that the characters had not played the other trilogy. They're not expected to know anyone from those adventures or anything about the Zethlentyn Protectorate, which was very briefly visited in them.
Can you run it? Absolutely. I mean, in my heavily biased opinion, it's pretty cool. If you do run it, I would recommend emphasizing a few things:
First introduced in Six Striking Swords, the NPC Liana Tuffletackle starts out as a quite out-of-her-element minor Lords Alliance official in Melvaunt. After helping resolve the trade dispute, she finds her stock rising, and starting with House of Moonlight she acts as the adventurers' main benefactor or quest-giver throughout the series.
Also introduced briefly in Six Striking Swords is the caravan master Zim Von Zeam of the ZVZ Trading Company. Though mentioned only briefly in Six Striking Swords, Zim makes another appearance in House of Moonlight and later returns as the main questgiver NPC in the 4th adventure House of Blades.
Finally, the ending"after credits" scene of Six Swords Unbound is the thing that sets up House of Moonlight and subsequently the entire Spies series. The note and coin that get secretly slipped to the party have very little to do with anything that happened in the Swords trilogy. Instead, it's a message from a different drow house, one with their own agenda.
It's of no great importance that the same adventurers who ran the Swords trilogy are the ones that sign up to investigate the note and coin. It makes sense if they do, but it's also perfectly reasonable that they finish their task and leave the mystery items with Liana to deal with. Player - rather than character - knowledge of the the above events can help make it somewhat easier to introduce the world and NPCs. In this way, it's possible to have one set of characters play the Swords trilogy and another set to play Spies.
Ok, here come dem spoilers, final warning!
House of Moonlight Talking Points
The adventures in the new series are very much intended to be playable stand-alone. That being said, if there is a "must-play" adventure, it's House of Moonlight. It introduces the main NPC protagonists for the series - the drow House Tor'Erhyl ( toe-ray-hill ). Worshipping the good goddess Eilistraee, these drow work to free slaves from the other houses and to redeem other drow from their darker paths.
House Tor'Erhyl acts as the characters' way into the drow city of Zethlentyn. They provide a safe haven within its borders, as well as a number of things for them to do while there. the sword dancer Kayleth and Matron Meriele Tor'Erhyl are major NPCs throughout the series.
Part of House of Moonlight is a journey into the Underdark that is comprised of several optional encounters. While none of these are critical to the overall storyline, they provide an opportunity to establish the geography of the vast underground world that is the Underdark. The Spies series as a whole does not make use of random encounters, so this is the series main opportunity to introduce players to the more "general" Underdark. After the first adventure (with one notable exception) it is generally assumed that the characters are able to make their way to and from Zethlentyn when required.
The Underdark encounters include brief introductions of seafaring House Briz'belar, the dwarves of Clan Moontunnel, and some spider-selling derro. While none of these introductions are 100% required to run, all of these make subsequent appearances in the series and time spent on them isn't wasted.
Once the characters arrive in Zethlentyn, they are sent on their first spying mission. A key tip here is to establish very early on that the mission is about gathering information. House of Moonlight is structured in almost an inverse way from typical adventures - the major combat happens at the start and info gathering at the end.
House of Moonlight establishes three of the running storylines for the series:
Spies & Saviours: LIana Tuffletackle - representing not only the Lords Alliance, but surface interests in general - sees the alliance with a drow house as a unique opportunity, not only to liberate surface slaves, but also to learn a great deal about this drow city and its people. The theme of learning about the other houses in order to report to the surface is a motivation that carries on throughout the series.
House Tor'Erhyl slave rescue: starting with the surface raid they help foil at the start, the Tor'Erhyl drow establish their mission to liberate slaves from the other houses and - with surface assistance - to move them out of Zethlentyn and to freedom. House Tor'Erhyl's rescue of slaves forms the core of the first 3 adventures - House of Moonlight, House of Revenance, and House of Webs. Even when House Tor'Erhyl is not directly involved, their liberation efforts continue to serve as a key motivating factor for characters' adventures throughout the series.
The Axcelon Mine: the mine visited at the end of the adventure is the focus of intrigue throughout the series. Different houses are vying for the mine and there of course is a dangerous secret at its bottom. The 4th and 7th adventures - House of Blades and House of Diamonds or The Treasure of Axcelon Mine - further explore and conclude the story of the mine.
What's Next?
The next two adventures - House of Revenance and House of Webs have already been approved for DMsGuild posting and I'm aiming to have the next up in a couple of weeks. Please note that I don't control the exact dates these are released to the public - once I upload them to DMsGuild, it typically takes 3-10 days for them to be made public.
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