[Review] Ice Daemon

Written by Creede and Sharleen Lambard (1992, GDW)

is a 16-page adventure published in 1992 by Game Designers’ Workshop for Dark Conspiracy. The first of the folio-style adventures produced by GDW, it hailed a dynamically different but ultimately short-lived approach to the company’s publishing methodology in the early 90s (with this format also used for two other Dark Conspiracy products – Nightsider and the PC Booster Kit – as well as at least one adventure for the MERC: 2000 game line). Generally well received at the time of publication, Ice Daemon continues to be a worthy addition to the line, especially as an introduction to players entering the world of Dark Conspiracy for the first time!

While the print format of Ice Daemon deserves its own description (see the call-out box below for more details), the production quality of the supplement, at least in terms of art, is a little below what GDW usually produced during this period. (Although whether this was due to focusing on publishing a lower price point adventure, or as the result of its production method, I can’t speculate). Fortunately, the cartography is still top-notch and the adventure’s overall presentation does have a nice ‘unified’ design style and theme; ice blues mixed with washed-out colours on the cover and end pieces, complementing its easy-to-read black & white text.

The Hook

I love the introduction to this adventure, it brings out one of the best aspects of horror gaming – the ability to throw the characters into the deep end of a situation at any time, and in any place. Ice Daemon does just that, starting the adventure in Texas during what could easily be one of those cut scenes when the Referee says – you head out from X and arrive in Y a few days later. Sure you’re tired, and a little short on ready cash, but you made it in good time. In particular, the characters here are travelling in the desert heat, likely bored, hot and more than a little irritated. Into this monotony come reports of strange weather patterns – unseasonably high cumulus cloud – that at first sight seem to indicate a welcome thunderstorm. But, as the Minion Hunters will soon find out, this storm brings with it impossibly cold weather that starts to freeze the countryside quicker than the party can reach for the car heater!

This style of ‘surprise, you’re in an adventure now’ setup, as I said, really appeals, especially in a game like Dark Conspiracy, where the evil facing the world is usually only encountered in chance encounters by most of the population. Here you get the mental image of a Dark America, which, while it might be bad by our standards, is still a place where you can live, work and raise a family in ignorant bliss – unless you luck out and have an encounter like this one.

The Chase

The adventure proper starts when the group are forced to seek shelter from the worsening storm, which as you can well imagine, is causing havoc on the usually parched land around them. Here the party meets Albert Vincent, a helpful, though cowardly, young man who will assist the Minion Hunters to survive in the face of the sudden change of weather. Once sheltered, the party will chance across the knowledge that the sudden change in weather seems to be focused a few miles north of their present location, and centres (as the reporter or weather channel graphs will report) on a spot that seems to blink like a beacon on the weather radar.

It is here that Albert’s role as a Non-Player Character can come to the fore, either as a prompt to get the characters out investigating the strange weather or by dying horribly at the gnashing jaws of the first Dark Minions the group will encounter, the Ice Wolves. A battle with such supernatural beasts should also remove any suggestion that the ice storm now ravishing Texas might be in any way a natural phenonium. These large, aggressive beasts seem to be hunting people in the snow, and whose presence should lead the party to investigate the strange source of the weather.

Once at this epicentre, the characters come across an odd mound clouded in ice and snow, and more worryingly creatures that could only be described as Yeti! However, these shaggy beasts seem uninterested in the characters, ignoring them even if they enter the strange hill. Within the characters will quickly realise that they are now in the midst of some odd research facility, finding everything from a Greenhouse growing hydroponics, human and Yeti-sized bunk rooms, and large storerooms packed with technological marvels. Exploring this complex is easy enough until the group encounters either more wolves or one of the humans who are seemingly working alongside these monsters, a meeting that will likely result in a sharp and deadly firefight for parties not able to think fast enough on their feet.

It is when the party locates the largest of the complexes’ caverns that the truth of the site is revealed. This chamber houses numerous databanks and workstations and is dominated by a strange platform from which Yeti seem to suddenly appear from nothing. Here also is a small alien creature unlike anything so far encountered – the titular Ice Daemon. This Dark Lord has infiltrated a corporation and is now funnelling its resources to build the complex and manufacture a dimensional gateway. As the group watches on, it soon becomes clear that some sort of interdimensional invasion is in progress, one that must be stopped!

The climax of the adventure is likely one large battle, from which the Ice Daemon will flee, escaping through the portal (in a rather Deus ex machina moment). After its departure the real threat to the party appears – the Ice Wyrm. This massive creature is described as “…10 meters tall and has a snake-like shape. Its long muscular body is armoured with sharp, chitinous plates. and ends with a spiked tail that it lashes as a weapon” and much too small for the room started to destroy the complex.

After what is likely to be a long and bloody fight, the characters must then stop or destroy the beacon – the now obvious source of the increasingly cold weather. Once achieved, Texas will slowly return to normal, although the Ice Daemon still remains at large.

Extras

Ice Daemon rounds out with notes on awarding experience, and a couple of pages of descriptions on the main enemies in the adventure; the Yeti, Ice Wolves, Ice Daemon and Wyrm, although details on their stats are listed on the third panel of the wrap-around cover (see below). Included here also, is information on the various items of Ice Dimension Darktek the group might have seen in action or have come to possess. None of this is very new or interesting, but it is good to see it collected together like this.

Opinions

I have fond memories of Ice Daemon, having run it a couple of times. It is a brief (4 or 5 hours in my experience) adventure that gets right to the point and into the action. Players have said that it is atmospheric (especially when run in winter) and has a nice climatic ending.

From a personal point of view, the scenario does what it says on the cover, and I could only gripe about a few things. The way Albert is used in the set-up confuses me a little, and I get the feeling he might have been a bit of a late inclusion aimed at ensuring the players get quickly on with the plot. I’ve always used him as a bit more of an extra party member, using his motivations and personal goals to assist and hinder the party. In this way, he moves away from simply being a ‘trigger’ personality (i.e. someone who acts as a gateway to a particular scene or event) and a ‘red herring’ (i.e. could he have something to do with the sudden snowfall) and into a more interesting personality.

I’ve also always set the beginning of the adventure in a small town somewhere in the heart of Texas, demonstrating how ill-equipped the townsfolk are to deal with the sudden storm of snow and sleet. This, I feel, helps place a sense of urgency, between the rapid collapse of the town and the attacks of the wolves, on the characters to solve the mystery. I’m probably being a little harsh here, as Ice Daemon is only 16 pages long, and does a good job of creating enough of a narrative to at least build on with ideas like this.

That said, one aspect of the plot I can never abide by is the ‘miraculous’ escape of the Ice Daemon needing to trigger the arrival of the Wyrm. Sure, there are a myriad of options a Referee has to make this scene feel a little less ‘contrived’, but I’d have preferred if at least some of these had been included in the adventure as a point of reference. Beyond that, however, I think Ice Daemon is a damn good example of an adventure of this sort, and demonstrates a style of plot that is, in my opinion, sorely missed in this day and age of gaming.