I’m currently running my players through TSR’s B10: Night’s Dark Terror, by Jim Bambra, Graeme Morris, and Phil Gallagher. I had read some good reviews of it and thought it would provide an interesting story for my 5e players. Needless to say, this post is going to contain spoilers for the module. If you are a DM – read on. If you are a player… you do you, I ain’t your mama.

The first chapter of the module that gets the PCs to the Siege at Sukiskyn went pretty much as written. Granted, my players have faced a lot of goblins in their playing lives, so I substituted some custom saurian enemies to replace the goblins. Other than that, though, it ran as written.

As I began preparing for the second chapter, though, and started looking at the timeline for the raids on the other homesteads and lumber camps, I realized they didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me. This post, therefore, is an overview of how I “fixed” the raid timeline so that I could run it comfortably with an underlying logic I could present to my players should it come up.

Let’s look at the timeline, as written. Note, I do not use customer calendars and made up day and month names. It seems cool as a DM to have them but I have never found it to be of interest to my players and it just leads to confusion. And so, I will primarily use day numbers to describe the timeline.

First, in The Long Night, Pyotr indicates that there have been several attacks on homesteads in recent weeks. Weeks!?! Given how small an area we are talking about, it seems crazy that the raiders would move so slowly and give their targets a chance to prepare defenses. Golthar is an intelligent wizard with a specific goal in mind – find the tapestry. That means move quickly before the tapestry can be moved. No lollygagging!

There are six named locations that have been targeted, though we can certainly assume there are other homesteads not appearing in this module. Cherkass, Hokol, Segenyev, and Sukiskyn are identified as homesteads while Ilyakana and Sielo are lumber camps. Segenyev and Sukiskyn are the furthest from each other and only about 30 miles. Given D&D movement rates from pretty much any edition, even with forest, it does not take weeks to cover this area.

In Bad Tidings, Gregor arrives to inform everyone that Ilyakana was attacked the night before the attack on Sukiskyn. If Sukiskyn is T0, Ilyakana is T-1. We also learn in Scenes of Destruction that Sielo was attacked the day before Ilyakana (T-2), Hokol two days before Ilyakana (T-3) and Cherkass three days before Ilyakana (T-4). Segenyev is attacked the day after Sukiskyn (T+1). We also have some details about the clans that were present some of the raids, which I will note with each location.That gives us:

• Cherkass (Unknown)
• Hokol (Unknown)
• Sielo (Wolfskull, Viper)
• Ilyakana (Red-blade, Wolfskull)
• Sukiskyn (Red-blade, Wolfskull, Viper)
• Segenyev (Wolfskull)

Looking at this in map form, it’s a rather random path to take. We could certainly try and justify it with some landmarks/obstructions that simply aren’t shown on the map, but I’d rather adjust the timeline. 

It is never presented directly that all the raiders gathered first in Xitaqa or if Vlack received his orders there and then word went out to each tribe in their lairs to then gather… where? In my interpretation of the module, the various tribes were summoned to Xitaqa where they were given their orders and the entire campaign put under the command of Vlack.

Taking into account the various tribes involved and Xitaqa as a starting point, my adjustment is as follows.

Day 1: At nightfall, Vlack leads the Wolfskulls, Red-blades, and Vipers out of Xitaqa to the Sielo Ford, where they camp for the day in some caves in the cliffs.

Day 2 – Night: Vlack splits the raiders into two forces. The first, made up of members from all the clans and led by Vlack, make an overnight march towards Cherkass. They spend the day (Day 3) camped in the woods, awaiting nightfall. The second force, made up of Vlack’s trusted Wolfskulls and the Vipers, focus on the lumber camps, starting with Sielo. They will wait until Wednesday night to cross the Ford.

Day 3 – Night: The attack on Sielo begins around 9PM. There are no survivors. The two clans take cover during the day on Day 4. The attack on Cherkass occurs just after sundown. The Wolfskulls capture Babushka and a small girl, who are taken to the Wolfskull Lair. A number of homesteaders were still out in the woods observing some religious ritual and were spared the destruction but are now beggars in the wilderness.

Day 4 – Night: The attack against Ilyakana occurs a little before midnight. Stefan is taken captive and a small group takes the prisoner towards the Wolfskull Lair. The attack against Hokol occurs around 10PM. The homestead attackers use the remaining night to approach Sukiskyn.

Day 5 – Night: The attack against Sukiskyn lasts the entire night but the raiders are repelled. The Vipers break rank, stealing horses. The Red-blades are seriously weakened and disband, with their leader dead. The Wolfskulls first go after the Vipers for revenge and then head toward Segenyev.

Day 8 – Night: Having regrouped, punished the Vipers, and tended to wounds, the remaining Wolfskulls attack Segenyev. Stefan reaches the Wolfskull Lair.

This gives us a new map of the raids:

With the above in place, I have a better sense of what has and will happen outside of the control of my PCs, and should be able to handle their investigative questions without worrying about major errors. If you’re planning on running this module, I’d be curious to hear how it goes and if the above was helpful to you in any way.