Fan of Nostalgia? Phandelver And Below: The Shattered Obelisk Review (D&D5e)

During the 5 year anniversary of D&D 5th edition, I did a review talking about how I liked the idea of celebrating how well D&D 5th edition was by going back to where it all started. The problem was that the review was for the reprint of the horrible adventure Tyranny of Dragons, which anyone who has heard me talk knows how much I hate that adventure. It made some sort of sense, with it being the first adventure printed for 5th edition. 

Except…Tyranny of Dragons wasn't the first adventure for 5e….

The real first adventure for 5e was found in the D&D Starter Set, the first D&D5e product Wizards of the Coast released. Even before the Core Rulebooks were released, this box set gave gamers a preview of the new D&D ruleset and a way of introducing it to their friends. Inside was Lost Mine of Phandelver, a shorter adventure that took characters from Level 1 to Level 5. This made sense as it was the *Starter* Set, and this would encourage people to move on to the other D&D products to continue their journey.

Lost Mine of Phandelver has a special place in our friend group, even though we never finished the adventure. But one night in 2014, a bunch of us were hanging out in our hotel room, anxious to go to the Baltimore Comic Con the next day. I pulled out the D&D Starter Set and we got to experience 5th edition D&D for the first time. The most memorable part was how Philip (yes *that* Philip from the podcast), managed to get his character killed almost immediately. Goblins got him with a surprise attack and we learned quickly that 1st level characters in 5e can easily be killed. To this day, we still reference that game and joke about how memorable it was.

Once more, with feeling…

It arrived a year early for the 10th anniversary of D&D5e, but I think that Wizards of the Coast finally achieved the sentiment that they tried for with the Tyranny of Dragons reprint. This time, instead of referring to that dumpster of an adventure, we have Phandelver and Below: The Shattered Obelisk. This adventure takes the now-classic Lost Mine of Phandelver adventure, reprints it with a few minor changes, and then adds on a second half that takes the original boilerplate fantasy adventure down a dark cosmic horror pathway.

It's been so long since the original Lost Mines adventure that I can't accurately compare the original to the reprinted version in The Shattered Obelisk. At this point, between 3 storage units, I'm not even sure where the original version *is*. So the focus of this review will be primarily on the new sections within The Shattered Obelisk. Based on the notes within the book, I would imagine any changes are very minor anyways, aside from substituting a couple of monsters and throwing in a couple of plot hooks for the later chapters.

Darkness Rising…

To quickly summarize Lost Mine, the players are traveling to the town of Phandalin and end up getting pulled into helping out the town as it is being ransacked by a gang of Bandits called the Redbrands. The players manage to take care of the Redbrands, but find out that they are taking orders from a shadowy figure known as "the Spider". The players track down the Spider to the "lost mine" referenced in the title and deal with the Spider and his minions.

The Shattered Obelisk picks up the adventure by having the characters discover that a group of Mind Flayers are attempting to collect pieces of an obelisk to cast some kind of dark ritual on the town of Phandalin. Over the next few chapters, as the characters are attempting to stop this ritual, they will start to see how the town is affected by this dark magic. There are several side quests planted in the book that give good visuals to the characters, providing them with foreboding examples of what will happen if they fail in their quest. ("Daisy the Cow", shown below, is my favorite example of this…)

You might be saying: "Hold on a sec….if the town is slowly being corrupted, and the player characters are in the town, then shouldn't *they* be affected as well?" You'd be correct, and The Shattered Obelisk contains mechanics for how you can slowly cause your characters to be corrupted by the Far Realm over the course of the adventure. This *does* come with a warning tag about making sure your players are ok with this type of twisting of their characters before doing so (a very nice addition in my opinion).

They tried so hard, and got so far…

While the players will try their best to keep the mind flayer fanatics from getting all the pieces of the obelisk, the fanatics will gather enough pieces to begin their ritual. So the heroes will have to venture into the underdark to try and find where the fanatics are conducting the ritual and put an end to it. The book does a great job of showing how NPCs that characters have been interacting with during the past few adventures have started becoming twisted versions of themselves. Fighting is breaking out in Phandalin, townspeople are showing all kinds of corrupted deformities, etc.

Once the players have reached the site of the ritual, they discover that it is being conducted in the remains of an old Mind Flayer enclave that has seen better days. The three remaining Mind Flayers have been coerced by a godlet from the Far Realm. The Mind Flayers need their ritual to succeed in order to rebuild their empire and bring new worshipers to the godlet, increasing its power and influence. Ultimately, to stop the Mind Flayers and the ritual, they will have to go to the Far Realm themselves and defeat the evil trio of fanatics.

Killing the Mind Flayers isn’t the end of the adventure though. Ilvassh, the godlet influencing the Mind Flayers, is pissed that his minions are dead and conjures up an avatar of his power to deal with the players once and for all. There’s definitely some great possibilities for roleplaying here, as your players will probably expect the Mind Flayers to be the “final boss” of the campaign, only for you to turn around and have them roll for initiative again. Considering that the players will be fighting an entity with power similar to a god (even if it’s just a fraction of said godlet’s power), setting the scene appropriately will help make this last fight one to remember.

It's been a long road…

It's hard for me to not make comparisons to that Tyranny of Dragons reprint. Like that adventure, they could have just put a new cover on the adventure and released it as such. Yet, there are bits throughout the adventure that have been added to make the whole thing cohesive. One bit that I don't remember in the original adventure is that there are a lot of notes in the sidebars of the early chapters that give DMs hints about how to get the players "on track". Not that the adventure is railroaded, but tips on how to prod the players if they need it.

Towards the end of The Shattered Obelisk, Wizards of the Coast pay homage to not just that original Lost Mine adventure, but several other scenarios that have come out over the past 10ish years. It turns out that the titular Obelisk is similar to other ones that have been sprinkled through 5e books, such as Rime of the Frostmaiden, Storm King's Thunder, and even Tomb of Annihilation. There's also a hook at the end of the adventure that ties back to Journeys Through The Radiant Citadel if players are interested. 

Conclusion

1. Really like the idea here about taking a "basic" adventure and wrapping it in a more complex package. Players could easily dig out their old characters from Lost Mines and jump into the second half of the adventure.

2. The Shattered Obelisk really shows how much D&D5e has grown over 10 years - specifically the writing. It was rough in the very beginning but this book is a proper guide in how to write an adventure in 2023.

3. I'm totally using the "Fiendish Auger" (see above) in a future adventure.

Notes/Disclaimers: This review is based on the product itself, I have not had the chance to play this adventure. Also, I generally assume I know nothing. So if I've missed something, let me know in the comments. Or let me know on Facebook. If you like these types of posts, consider subscribing to our patreon. Lastly, thanks to Wizards of the Coast for providing a review copy of the book.