Sphere of Sunlight Review (Spoiler Free)

The Sphere of Sunlight (Designed by James Pianka, art by Mateusz Katzig) is a wonderful tale for a starting group of players roughly 4-6 players in size. This adventure is designed with a lot of love and care, and that is seen throughout the entirety of the adventure. The art is stylized and really gives players who are new to Theater of the Mind an opportunity to see what the DM is describing, and then have a visual to fill in any gaps.

Pacing - This was one of the first adventures I ran for a new group of players (group size 6, only 2 played D&D before). Now, truth be told, the larger the group, the less stream lined things are, which can make pacing an issue in any adventure. Sphere of Sunlight battled this in creative ways, the encounters with both NPCs and enemies alike are on scale. Very rarely did we get bogged down by random details or an overflow of NPCs. Over all, pacing is solid! 4 out of 5

Flow - Similar to pacing, flow is how seamless the transition between one stage of the adventure to the other. This one shot accomplishes this very well, using a NPC to deliver information as well as act as a guide to the next leg of the journey. 4 out of 5

Difficulty - Now, when you boil it all down, this category comes down to two things: Proper planning, and Luck. When I ran this adventure, the Planning was there, but luck was not on my players side. One particular point was a group Dexterity check to reach the next area. My players continued to fail this check, and so given the story, it took time to reset (I judged it to be two times a day, after travel time). It took my players 3 days worth of tries to get it! That's just my personal experience in that moment, as the DC was a little high, but over all, not bad at all. 3 out of 5

Atmosphere - Oh man, the joy of narrating the rooms in the tail end of this adventure were truly wonderful. This is where the great artwork really comes in, either for the DM to enjoy and describe, or to share with your players, the atmosphere gave off a rich, spooky vibe that was a delight to explore. Even the room where you fight a baddie further compliments and enhances the experience. 4 out of 5

Enemies - Similar to the feel of creep in the atmosphere, this One Shot has a good and proper, down right scary baddie (To add extra flavor, I added snapping bones and dislocating joints when they moved). I also upped their HP, but that's because my group had a ton of range, and wanted to stay at a distance and plink. There is another enemy that gave my party some issues, but hey, I love making victories feel hard earned, and even sprinkle some lose in there too! 4 out of 5

Treasure - Always hard to scale, this one, because it really depends on the DungeonMaster and the party. The treasure here is a bit lacking, really only one party member may find something they are interested in. Now, that's not a bad thing, it's a level 1 campaign, we can't have 5 flaming swords and 8 wands of "kill EVERYTHING" laying around. With that in mind, I don't mind the treasure being low. 2 out of 5

Final Thoughts - Solid, fun adventure that's for sure worth the time. It's easily to work into a homebrew or published campaign, or simply be what's written as a one shot and let things settle themselves.

Overall score - 3.5 out of 5!