Pathfinder Compleat Encounter: "Death Shrine of the Ninja Cult" [RPG]

Death Shrine of the Ninja Cult was another set in Paizo's short-lived "Compleat Encounter" line of products, each of which included a short adventure, some flip-cards that connected together as a battle-mat, and three pewter miniatures.  Some sets were sold at a reduced price without the miniatures in "adventure only" form, and I either got one of these or the miniatures were lost before I picked this up used.

This set represents a nice little evening's drop-in adventure for any campaign in an urban area.  As the title indicates, the adventure takes place in a secret shrine to a death god operated by a trio of ninjas (one of whom is a doppelganger!).  Because this uses 3.5 rules, the enemies mostly have rogue levels with some use of the assassin prestige class.  The adventure is pitched at levels 6-8, though there are scaling adjustments for various other levels.  I didn't think the scaling was handled well though, as it basically just adds additional monsters of an easier or harder level while keeping the main antagonists (the ninjas) exactly the same.  In any event, I stuck with the default range and it worked fine for PCs who were around level 5--and may have been a bit too easy (sneak attack damage can only take enemies so far when fighting in confined quarters).

There's not a firm hook to get the PCs involved here, so the GM can come up with pretty much anything that will get the group to stumble upon the ninjas' secret lair.  There's a cool (and fair) trap at the entrance, and some of the treasure is seeded with potential hooks for further adventures that a homebrew GM can use to continue the adventure.  For the most part, though, this adventure is a setting (the lair) and three enemies (the ninjas) and the GM can pretty much improv from there.  I love the artwork by Wayne Reynolds for each of the ninjas, and two of the three (Eseldrin Nightstar and Kelzerin Thoughtstealer) have interesting backstories.

I did find the product confusing in how the numbering of the encounter cards jumps unintuitively (a requirement, I think, so that the grid cards can be double-sided).  In addition, I didn't really get the difference between what the two sides of the grid cards were supposed to be showing: as far as I could tell, one was a "neat and orderly" presentation of the lair and one was a "bloody and messy" presentation--I guess the latter is for after the battle is over?  Again, it was just confusing during the session and complicated the matter of figuring out which sides to use.

On the whole, the product is okay.  It's definitely useful in the way in which it's intended (as a quick encounter for a busy GM), though it can be a bit harder to use than it should be.  It doesn't have any ties to cool early Golarion lore like some of the other Compleat Encounters packs.  I also can't judge the miniatures since I don't have them, though there are painted pictures online.