The Jade Hare

 

By John Nephew

TSR

Basic, 1st level

Premise: A warlock got some goblins to steal a religious statue from a village, go get it back for them.

What do we get here?

 Given away for free back in the day this ten page starter adventure has thirteen keyed locations in a dungeon.

 Usability/formatting

  The adventure suggests starting your players off at the opening to the dungeon rendering useless the large backstory you have to read through at the start. You could actually cobble up a nice little investigation start with some social encounters for the players to find who took the statue and where to go however the adventure just wants you to drop a big block of read aloud on them instead.

 Mercifully the box text of the dungeon rooms is much shorter, it is not well written really but at least short. Some of the box text over shares, none of it is evocative instead it is all very dry. 

 Putting in a gargoyle that can only be harmed by magic or magical weapons is an interesting choice for a starter adventure that is not chucking magic items at the players for free. I do like that the text includes tactical tips for running the boss and his major lieutenant, definitely something that would be helpful to new DMs.

There is nothing in the way of faction play here and the treasure that is given out is pretty basic. We do get a nod to interactivity with a rack of unfinished or failed potions, that is about the only part of the adventure I would want to steal honestly.

Portability

 Nothing is unique or flavourful about this adventure so it has a high degree of portability, you could drop it anywhere you want to kick off a campaign.

 Recommendation

 I suppose as a free give away for mail orders this was okay for getting you going if you had no idea what you were doing. Now this is by no means a good adventure or one that will wow your players, which is what you really want from your opening salvo as a DM. You can buy the adventure now but I have no idea why you would want to.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/17140/The-Jade-Hare-Basic

Well of Lost Gods

 

By Rich Lescouflair

MCDM

5E 8th level

Premise: Recently, a powerful earthquake opened a rift in the mountainside, unleashing waves of unstable magical energy and deadly automatons. The nearby town of Ashtead is simple, modest, and ill-equipped to deal with the magical monstrosities attacking the town. 

What do we get here? 

 This is a 9 page adventure with an extra 4 pages of monsters for a two level dungeon that has 10ish rooms.

Usability/formatting

 Not much is offered in the way of hooks for this adventure, characters should be passing through town when weird shit happens and the local big wig offers you 2000 gold to sort it out. A bit more thought please? Even if it is just a list of bullet point options that are not fleshed out, give me something to work with.

 The different parts of the adventure are explained fairly well upfront. I do think more could have been made of the tavern encounter in the first act, the hard no on being able to save any tavern patrons straight away is a bit of a railroad. We get another annoying railroad in the second act where detect magic will not work on illusory paths because reasons.

 

 Most of the writing is fine if not evocative. The double column format is about average, some more use could have been made of bullet points and the information in act one on the town could have been trimmed down a bit in my opinion.

 It could be that I just do not like sci-fi in my fantasy but the actual dungeon itself is not that interesting, there is not much unconnected to the main plot to interact with, no real loops and no faction play. For a fantastic lab from an advanced civilisation it is a bit of a let down.

Portability

 Nothing much ties this adventure to a specific location and there is advise on how to frame the lost civilisation as something that fits your world. The downside to this flexibility is a lack of interesting details or personality to the adventure.

 Recommendation

 You can run this 5E adventure perfectly well as a short drop in on a journey or as the kick off to exploring a lost city. I am just not sure in either instance there is much that makes this one jump out as something you would have a burning desire to run. All in all a bit linear and lacking in personality or wow factor.

https://shop.mcdmproductions.com/products/arcadia-issue2

RC1 The Valley of Karaccia

 By Matthew Evans

Mithgarthr Entertainment

Rules Cyclopedia , levels 1-2

Premise: Responding to a flier promising payment for kobold heads, the party gathers in the town of Brink. From there, they set out on an expedition to the Crimson Caverns, a known kobold lair. After proving their mettle, the PCs will be hired by the Church of Erm to recover a needed artifact from Fallsbarrow.

What do we get here?

 Over 16 pages (with some extra for hand outs) we get a small area and a couple of multi level dungeons.

Usability/formatting

 Straight off the bat there the backstory section is just way over written. We need enough to get his going not two pages detailing every NPC and building in the starting village. The fact that there is a 10th level cleric sitting in the starting village is not great, he could easily solo everything in the region and be back in time for lunch which does not leave much room for the players now does it?

 Despite kicking off with a hex map of the region there is not actually much in the way of overland travel before you get to the first dungeon, the over land travel section only appears after the first dungeon and is just encounter tables.

 There is nothing doing in here in the way of evocative writing, you have to come up with descriptions on your own. What we do get is at least clear and well laid out short entries that are easy to read and contain the necessary monster stats.

 The first dungeon is fine, if incredibly bland. There are a few things your players can interact with and the monster actions are at least well thought out but no faction play on offer here. Treasure is possibly a bit high on the gold side and nothing unique on the magical side.

 When we get to the second dungeon via an unnecessarily complicated hook, it is much larger and better for exploration than the first. Much of what is on offer here is of a similar level of quality to the first dungeon however the magic items are slightly more flavourful. Again I think there may be way too much gold knocking about here, one room has a chest with 5000gp in it! Most of the monsters here are undead making them slightly less interesting from an RP stand point. This dungeon also contains a bit of an unnecessary diversion to a third, smaller, dungeon to pick up a key.

 The maps in the adventure are clear enough and amazingly put before all the keys! Nice to see someone actually doing this.

Portability

 Like many starter adventures you can plonk this down fairly easily in any campaign setting in a valley out of the way somewhere.

 Recommendation

 There are a lot of would be starter adventures out there and I am not sure this one does anything special or good. Yes with some work you could jazz it up/fix it, is that really what you are spending $4.99 for though? I think not.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/359427/RC1--The-Valley-of-Karaccia

Titan Skull

 

By Horoscopezine

OSE

Levels 1-4

Premise: There is a dungeon by a big skull, go explore it.

What do we get here?

 This is a one page dungeon that comes with pretty much no text, all art.

 Usability/formatting

 What is on the page is easy to understand, you get an assortment of monsters and a couple of traps as well as the map of the dungeon.

 As a one page dungeon I think the real problem here is all the space taken up by unnecessary pregens that could have been used to add some flavour here. There are no magic items for a start. Any room descriptions are supposed to be inferred from the image given and there does not appear to be anything to interact with really.

 If you want to build a usable adventure out of this one page you are going to have to do most of the work yourself.

Portability

 Lack of details always makes an adventure portable however it is much easier to change details to fit your own world than to have to invent them wholesale as you would have to to make this an engaging adventure.

 Recommendation

Nice art, just too bare bones to run. There is no story or personality here.

https://horoscopezine.itch.io/titan-skull

Please go to sleep, Arthur Cobblesworth

 

By Niklas Wistedt

Paths Peculiar

Any basic system, low level(?)

Premise: “The eccentric, but rather successful, merchant Arthur Cobblesworth died a few months ago and was buried in his mausoleum. Since then there have been reports of Arthur “howling like a bloody banshee” during dark nights. The townsfolk are afraid that Mr. Cobblesworth will wake the other dead in the cemetery, and want the player characters to go and put him to sleep again.”

What do we get here?

A simple one page dungeon with six keyed locations.

Usability/formatting

  If you are ever looking for an example of a simple, clean way out to lay out a one page adventure I highly suggest using this one as inspiration. Everything is clean an easy to understand from the art to the map and writing.

 Because of the shortness of the one page set up there is not a lot of depth here however this is a fun little scenario to play out for your players thanks to the demon possessed parrot and wandering, mostly harmless zombie.

 The writing could be a little more evocative, it is very workman like leaving it up to the referee to build the atmosphere. Where the adventure could also do with a bit more personality is in the treasure, there are no magic items just some mundane loot which your players might have a hard time selling anyway unless they haul it out of town.

 Portability

 Short on specific details you can drop this adventure any place that has merchants and pet parrots.

 Recommendation

 I really like this as a diversion from the usual undead problem adventures. Things may be a little on the short side here but you get more than enough frame work to graft on to. Can you really go wrong with a demon possessed parrot and whatever chaos might ensue from releasing it?

 The adventure is free at the link below

https://www.wistedt.net/2020/04/02/please-go-to-sleep-arthur-cobblesworth-one-page-dungeon-adventure/

Grieving Road

 By Gus L.

Self Published

Level ?

Premise: The old roads are lined with the tombs of the imperial dead, lets have a poke around in some tombs!

What do we get here?

 This is a one page effort that covers 6 different tombs or mausoleums for your players to explore.

Usability/formatting

 This adventure is fairly neutral on system, you should be able to run it in an d&d or OSR type system. 

 It would help a little if some of the flowery writing had key detailed bolded a bit more often but over all it is quick to read through the text and figure out what is going on here. The art work provides pseudo maps, given the small size of the various tombs real maps are not really required.

 Each tomb has a nice little twist to it and there is a decent amount for players to interact with here for the small size of the adventure. The magic items and monsters included are both suitably unique to keep things fresh for experienced players.

Portability

 Nothing ties this to any setting, as long as you have a road and dead people in your setting you can slap this location down anywhere. You may wish to flavour up the locations a bit to fit the local stylings of your world however that should be fairly easy.

Recommendation

 A fine little drop in piece of content. You could run a couple of sessions with this depending on how long your sessions are. Freely available at the link below.

https://alldeadgenerations.blogspot.com/p/pdf-adventure-archives.html

Fire Elemental-Kin (new class)

  Elemental-kin were created by the djinn to be their slaves by binding the shard of an elemental to the soul of a mortal. Modern elemental-kin are the descendants of those slaves who were traded with the elves of the summer court and brought into the mundane world. Of the four types of elemental-kin the fire elemental-kin were considered the highest caste, using their arcane powers to help control the other elemental-kin.

Fire Elemental-kin

Requirements: None

Prime requisite: INT, CON

Hit Dice: 1d4

Maximum level: 10

Armour: None, no shields

Weapons: Dagger, staff

Languages: Alignment, Common, Primordial




Prime requisites: A fire elemental-kin with at least 13 INT and CON gains a 5% bonus to experience. A fire elemental-kin with a score of 16 or higher in one prime requisite, and a 13 or higher in the other gains a 10% bonus.




Arcane Magic

Magical research: A fire elemental-kin of any level may spend time and money on magical research. This allows them to add new spells to their spell book and to research other magical effects. When a fire elemental-kin reaches 9th level, they are also able to create magic items.

Spell casting: fire elemental-kins carry spell books containing the formulae for arcane spells. The spell casting chart (opposite) shows both the number of spells in the fire elemental-kin’s spell book and the number they may memorize, determined by the character’s experience level. Thus, a 1st level fire elemental-kin has one spell in their spell book, selected by the referee (who may allow the player to choose).

Using magic items: As spell casters, fire elemental-kins are able to use magic scrolls of spells on their spell list. They can also use items that may only be used by arcane spell casters (e.g. magic wands)




Energy Resistance

Fire Elemental-kin gain a +2 bonus to saving throws against fire and are unharmed by non magical fire effects.




Infravision

Fire elemental-kin have infravision up to 60’.




Produce Flame

Once per day a fire elemental-kin may cast the produce flame spell.




After Reaching 9th Level

A fire elemental-kin may build a stronghold,often a great tower. 1d6 fire elemental-kin apprentices of levels 1–3 will then arrive to study under the fire elemental-kin.





Fire elemental-kin Level Progression          Saving Throws         Spells

Level     XP                 HD         THAC0       D  W  P  B  S           1 2 3 4 5

1              0                  1d4         19 [0]         11 12 11 14 12         1 – – – –

2              2,700           2d4         19 [0]         11 12 11 14 12         2 – – – –

3              5,400           3d4         19 [0]         11 12 11 14 12         2 1 – – –

4              10,800         4d4         19 [0]         11 12 11 14 12         2 2 – – –

5              21,600         5d4         19 [0]         11 12 11 14 12         2 2 1 – –

6              43,000         6d4         17 [+2]         8   9  8  11   8         2 2 2 – –

7              86,000        7d4         17 [+2]          8   9  8 11   8          3 2 2 1 –

8              172,000      8d4         17 [+2]          8   9  8 11   8          3 3 2 2 –

9              325,000      9d4         17 [+2]          8   9  8 11   8          3 3 3 2 1

10            475,000      9d4+1*   17 [+2]          8  9   8 11   8          3 3 3 3 2

* Modifiers from CON no longer apply. D: Death / poison; W: Wands;

P: Paralysis / petrify; B: Breath attacks;

S: Spells / rods / staves.

Thunderhead Manse

Gus L

Self published

System neutral, lowish level(?)

Premise: A dead warlock's cloud based castle is ripe for pillaging, just mind the flying monkey guards.

What do we get here?

 This is a one page adventure that has 8 keyed locations.

Usability/formatting

For a one page dungeon there is a lot of information on the page. thankfully it is fairly easily to read through. The theme of the dungeon is evident through out and generates some nice little quirks for players to interact with.

 It is a bit disappointing that enemy creatures are just deployed in two large lumps for the most part, spreading them out a bit more might be more interesting than just having two huge combats to run.

 The maps took me a second or two to grok but once you get them they are clean enough to show how everything fits together.

 There is a variety of loot for the players to pick up, some of which could be magic items. Since this is a fairly system neutral adventure you will need to figure out your own magical effects for the items included.

 All in all this is an easy to read through and run adventure.

Portability

 You do need to have a decent amount of magic in your campaign world to slot this in as well as some self motivated players. This is very much a situation for the players to explore rather than an adventure with a clear plot.

 Recommendation

 Definitely a fun drop in, something you could stick in a hex or run at a random village on the road. Just be aware before running this adventure it may end up with your players having an army of flying monkeys and a flying castle at their disposal by the end.

 The adventure is free at the link below.

 

https://alldeadgenerations.blogspot.com/p/pdf-adventure-archives.html

The Lustrian Bubble

 

By James Wallis

Cubicle7

Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 1e

Premise: Did you give your players too much gold? Divest them of some with this proto-stock exchange bubble themed adventure

What do we get here?

 Over 8 pages we get an adventure that is mostly social/investigative with not much combat.

Usability/formatting

 As written the adventure is formatted in several long paragraphs so you are likely going to have to break things down into bullet point notes for yourself after reading the whole thing through. You do need to read the whole thing through because some of the details are no included upfront and this adventure has a fair number of moving parts. Thankfully the text does explain things, including how to run a stock market bubble clearly.

Having a passing familiarity with the setting helps because not everything is explained there. It could also be made a bit more explicit the ways to drop hints to the players that this is a scam, the clues are dotted through the paragraphs and would be better off in a bullet point list.

 The major NPCs tend to have decent personalities to play around with, especially the halfling broker who is very clearly reminiscent of a certain British tv character of the 80s.

 How the adventure plays out is pretty open which is a bit of a double edged sword, great for your players to do as they will but requires the referee to be on their toes.

 Portability

 With a bit of work you can set an adventure like this one in any city that serves as a major trading hub. How well the adventure will fit into more combat focused systems is hard to say, you could have one potential path be infiltrating elf town and sneaking onto an elf ship to steal a log book which could bring some needed combat. You could also drop in some thug encounters round the city if you make one of the rival groups a bit more proactive and nasty. If you are running something like D&D you could have more success dropping this in as a solo down time adventure for a specific player.

 Recommendation

 I would not recommend this one to new referees or necessarily for every table/campaign, that being said I really want to run this one when the opportunity arises. There is a ton of fun to be had here, plenty of potential for chaos and a refreshing change of pace from the usual.

 You could also find some use for this adventure as edu-tainment, it does do a good job of showing off how insider trading and stock bubbles work.

 Yes the adventure does need a re-write to bring the formatting up to modern standards but given that it is only 8 pages long it is not too much of a burden to read through and make your own notes on.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/248770/Warhammer-Fantasy-Roleplay-First-Edition--Marienburg-Sold-Down-the-River

The Workshop Watches

 By Leon Barillaro

MCDM

5E level 5

Premise: Wizards invented a sentient magical workshop, workshop kills wizards. A tale as old as time.

What do we get here?

 This is a 15 page adventure covering a dungeon that has 7 keyed locations. Originally this adventure shipped in the first issue of MCDM's online 5E magazine called Arcadia, now it is being given away for free.

Usability/formatting

 Mostly the formatting of the adventure is decent and the writing good. I do feel like some of the paragraphs could be broken down into shorter bullet points to make them easier to scan in the moment however as this is a short adventure it might not be needed.

 What hooks are provided are a bit bland, just go there for money. I think there was the option to include a few more such as set the players up as burglars, see a rumour for a magically interested player or have one of the wizards working at the lab be a mentor/friend that needs checking up on. We can do a bit better to motivate our players than just a lord is willing to drop some gold on them.

 Like many 5E adventures there are some places where there are roll DCs given when stuff could have been left up to the players to figure out themselves, this is more an issue with 5E than this adventure though.

  We do not get an overland travel section to this adventure, you have to figure that out for yourself. When the characters arrive at the mountain is not a lot on working out how to get to the adventure site, finding the path has a couple of skill checks involved which rather than straight up stop you getting to the adventure come with an exhaustion penalty which is better done than you find in a lot of adventures.

 There are some neat tricks in the adventure, mostly related to how the sentient workshop watches and learns from the PCs based on what they do. Having their own spells turned against them is a nice little twist. I also like some of the flavour in the table of reactions for the workshop which you use when a spell has been cast by the players.

 The "lets fight anyway" friendly fight ending feels like a real railroad to me, I feel like the players should be able to RP out of this rather than be forced to have a combat encounter no matter what.

 Portability

 Your world or setting needs to have a decent level of magic for this adventure to slot in but as long as it passes that bar you can easily drop this into anywhere in a campaign world. The adventure specifies a mountain setting but I think anywhere sufficiently remote should work.

 Recommendation

 Using a number of familiar sci-fi tropes this is a decently constructed adventure. I do not like sci-fi in my fantasy so it does not fit my taste however it is a good exploration of the themes around newly created sentient beings so if you like the premise you should definitely consider running this adventure. You will definitely be able to find a few of your favourite sci-fi films or stories lurking as inspiration for this adventure. 

 If I was going to run the adventure I would only tweak one or two small things but you can run it straight out the box fine. There is definitely the potential for the DM to have a lot of fun role playing as a newly sentient creature.

 Now the adventure is being given away for free it is well worth at least reading through.

https://www.patreon.com/posts/72065178

Falkrest Abbey

 By Andrea Tupac Mollica and Giuseppe Rotondo

Axian Spce

OSE levels 1-3

Premise: The forlorn Falkrest Abbey in the icy Lune Mountains is where the Queens and Kings of Yore used to be crowned and buried, along with their treasures. According to legends, the Fountain of St. Brynedd still pours its miraculous water somewhere inside. But what caused the fall of the blessed Abbey?

 What do we get here?

 Over 43 pages this adventure covers a 19 room dungeon.

 Usability/formatting

A lot of thought has been put into the formatting of this adventure. All monsters and treasure is listed upfront. Inspiration is taken from the OSE house style in terms of text formatting and repeating sections of the map through out. It is very easy to find what you are looking for, scan text and run this at the table. 

Some of the writing could be tweaked to be a bit more evocative and suck the players in. There just need to be a little more effort putting the flavour into the adventure after all the effort put into the formatting. We get precious little information on the saint the abbey is dedicated to when you would expect art, writings etc scattered through out the place. Too much of the focus of the history through location is on the royal function the abbey had which is not what I would expect reall.

 The now of the abbey works really well, it is just the past that should be hinted at through out is a little lacking. 

Portability

 No doubt part of the reason for leaving the history and details of the abbey a little on the short side is to aid with the portability of the adventure. Honestly though having details you can reflavour is a lot easier than having to put the stuff in from scratch yourself.

 Still you can fairly easily pick this adventure up and plop it down somewhere with a snowy mountain in your setting.

Recommendation

 For the low price of $1 and the whole adventure available in preview it is very hard to say not to this one. This is not the great adventure to slay all rivals but it is more than adequate to use at the table, especially with how easy the formatting makes that.

 Personally I do not care for the chess related stuff so I would probably rip that out and put some other themes in if I were to run this.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/409280/Falkrest-Abbey

There is one further thing I want to talk about here and that is the price. For the consumer an adventure with really good formatting and production values like this at $1 is fantastic. I have to wonder is this low pricing good for the hobby?

 When prices race to the bottom like this do we leave any space for writers and artists to get paid something that is worth their effort? Do we end up pushing out creators if they can not make any money? 

Answers on the back of post card, or in the comments please.

Brittlestone Parapet

By Gus L

Self Published

Low level(?)

Premise: A valley scared by the battle between wizards draws in treasure hunters

What do we get here? 

A micro setting with five points of interest and a dungeon that has 6 keyed locations.

Usability/formatting

 Short and easy to read through this is a good example of a one page dungeon. It would help if the rooms on the dungeon map were numbered but you can figure it out yourself, it does not really matter too much which room you put where.

 As a drop in location there is plenty to interact with here and the potential for faction play although the factions do not have too much interaction with each other out of the box.  The magic items and other curios available are fun, definitely something for players to mess about with.

 You can easily expand out the content provided for some of the points of interest based on the text provided. The writing is succinct with a decent amount of flavour.

Portability

 

As this is a self contained valley it is easy to drop in anywhere. This is not a full gonzo setting but it is definitely nearer that point on the axis than low fantasy so you might want to consider if the tone fits your world/campaign. 

Recommendation

 Freely available at the link below you can do a lot worse than picking this up to fill in a few sessions worth of content for your players.

https://alldeadgenerations.blogspot.com/p/pdf-adventure-archives.html

Demi-giants (new class)

 These demi-giants are themed to fit my homebrew world where demi-giants live on the far north island of Strangur, a viking themed region.

Demi-Giant

Requirements: Minimum STR 9

Prime requisite: CON

Hit Dice: 1d10

Maximum level: 12

Armour: Any appropriate to size, including shields

Weapons: Any

Languages: Alignment, Common, Giant

Demi-giants are descended from the true giants who were exiled to the north pole during the time of the Spring Court. Proud warriors who stand over 7½’ tall demi-giants believe it is the responsibility of the strong to protect the weak.

Combat

Demi-giants can use all types of weapons and armour, but it must be tailored to their large size.

Two-handed melee weapons: A demi-giant can wield any two-handed melee weapon, such as a battle axe, with only one hand allowing them to use a shield when others might not be able to.

Defensive Bonus

Due to their large size, demi-giants give a +2 bonus to AC to one adjacent ally of human or smaller size.

Encumbrance Bonus (Optional Rule)

 If using a system to track encumbrance then demi-giants are able to carry 50% more than an equivalent human sized character before becoming encumbered. For example if the maximum load a character can carry before becoming encumbered is normally 1,600 coins of weight for a demi-giant this would be 2,400 coins of weight.

Energy Resistance

Demi-giants gain a +2 bonus to saving throws against cold and are unharmed by non magical cold effects..

Giant Affinity

Demi-giants still share a kinship with giants and gain a +1 bonus to reaction rolls when encountering giants.

Open Doors

Due to their large size, demi-giants have extra leverage when forcing doors open. Demi-giants have a +1 to all open door rolls to a maximum of a 5 in 6 chance to open a door.

After Reaching 9th Level

 A demi-giant who reaches 9th level becomes a jarl and may build a feast hall to found their own demi-giant village around. Demi-giants from other villages will generally be friendly and jarls may collaborate in times of war or disaster.

 A demi-giant ruler may only hire demi-giant mercenaries. Specialists and retainers or any race may be hired.

Demi-giant Level Progression

                                                                                        Saving Throws

Level XP         HD         THAC0 D  W   P    B   S

1         0         1d10 19 [0] 8   9   10  13 12

2         2,200 2d10 19 [0] 8   9   10  13 12

3         4,400 3d10 19 [0] 8   9   10  13 12

4         8,800 4d10 17 [+2] 6   7     8  10 10

5         17,000 5d10 17 [+2] 6   7     8  10 10

6         35,000 6d10 17 [+2] 6   7     8  10 10

7         70,000 7d10 14 [+5] 4   5     6    7   8

8         140,000         8d10 14 [+5] 4   5     6    7   8

9         270,000         9d10 14 [+5] 4   5     6    7   8

10         400,000         9d10+3*         12 [+7] 2   3     4    4   6

11         530,000         9d10+6*         12 [+7] 2   3     4    4   6

12         660,000         9d10+9*         12 [+7] 2   3     4    4   6

* Modifiers from CON no longer apply. D: Death / poison; W: Wands;

                                                                                        P: Paralysis / petrify; B: Breath attacks;

                                                                                        S: Spells / rods / staves.

Disturbance at Whisperwind Estate

 

by James Hostetter 

Arcy’s Arcanum

Shadowdark RPG, 1st level

Premise: A spooky mansion is held in the thrall of a vampire

What do we get here?

 Over 21 pages this adventure has a mansion with 20 keyed locations split over 4 flaws. The adventure itself is only 7 pages the rest is maps, legal and other housekeeping.

Usability/formatting  

 Right off the bat I like that the adventure tells you how to scale the combat encounters depending on the number of players you have, this is something really helpful for newer DMs especially as this is a low level adventure for a new system so it is reasonable to expect this to be something run by a new DM.

 The read aloud sections are short but a bit hit and miss. Some are good while too many others are more tell rather than show. Room 4 is a good example of where this goes wrong:

“This room once housed a great feasting hall. The remains of the furniture are visible in the center of the room. All finery has been removed long ago.”

 Describe the broken furniture, let the players draw conclusions on what the room was. I also find it kind of frustrating to have the read aloud after the DM text for the room.

 I have my usual bugbear that the maps only appear at the back of the adventure so it is a pain to orientate yourself. When you do get to them the maps are very clear and easy to use.

 On the plus side the double column format and succinct writing are easy to scan so you can run this adventure easily. I also like that it spells out upfront what is going on with the adventure.

Portability

 There is little in the way of specific setting or lore so you can easily drop this adventure down anywhere that fits with having a spooky mansion.

Recommendation

 Sadly this is going to be a probably not from me. The adventure is perfectly serviceable and you can run it, the problem is it just lacks some flavour. I am also not sure the twist really works because thanks to the cursed weapon it appears the bad guy is functionally a vampire in the end?

 To make this something I would be excited to run you would need to rework the read alouds, add some kind of approach to the mansion that builds the atmosphere and the mansion itself needs to do a better job of "telling the story" through what you discover rather than being rooms to clear on the way to the boss battle.

 For a first effort, which is what this appears to be, there is plenty to applaud. The adventure is pay what you want on itch.io

https://arcysarcanum.itch.io/disturbance-at-whisperwind-estate

Hel's Crow's Final Rest

 

By Gus L.

Ratking Productions

Basic levels 1-3

Premise: Undead raiders hold the survivors of a small village hostage needing a relic from the village temple to end their unlife.

What do we get here?

 This is a simple six page adventure that comes with a temple that has 8 rooms.

Usability/formatting

 Thanks to the double column format and some good use of bolding this is a really easy to scan and use adventure with some really nice art work. The whole thing is based around faction play which is clearly described for the DM to understand.

 Everything you need is included from simple maps down to all the stats for possible combatants. There are not many magical items included but the ones that are have a decent amount of flavour to them.

 I got a little confused as to where some of the NPCs should be in the temple however that is a minor quibble and possibly a fault on my end.

 This is a great example of how to set a short adventure and how to resist the excesses of over writing.

 Portability

 Viking themed so that will be the best type of campaign or part of the world to drop this adventure down into however you can easily reskin this adventure to fit other locations or themes. You could just as easily make this about desert raiders for example.

 Recommendation

 Perfect for plopping down in a hex or slotting between larger adventures in a campaign. Just make sure your players understand that the this is an adventure focused round RP/negotiation or they are going to get themselves splatted by one of the two faction leaders.

 You can't argue with free, especially at this high level of quality!

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/377007/Hels-Crows-Final-Rest

Vile Vengeance of the Bees

 By Michael Palacios

Three Swords and Three Ravens

B/X or LL "low level"

Premise: A colony of super-intelligent bees have discovered metallurgy!

What do we get here? 

This is a nine page adventure that comes with four new bee types to fight and a final dungeon that has 9 points of interest.

Usability/formatting

 There is not huge amount of structure to this adventure, you can run it in a fairly free form way. 

 I appreciate the thought the designer put into making it clear the tactics/motivations of the creatures in the various encounters, unfortunately no thought has been put into describing any of the locations to bring things to life. If your players do not just peace out entirely and do get to the final dungeon it is mostly just rooms with monsters in it.

 There is not really much in the way of faction play or magic items on offer, only one of any interest. Once in the dungeon there is a small bit of interactivity but nothing much to write home about.

 Portability

 You need to be open to a bit of gonzo to really want this adventure in your world. Bees dropping fantasy napalm on a village is not going to fit with every setting.

 Recommendation

 On the plus side this adventure is essentially free, on the down side you will have to do some work to bring it to life and even then it looks like it is kind of a slog, especially the village defence section. You can pick it up on drive thru at the link below.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/265246/Vile-Vengeance-of-the-Bees

The Lost Souls of Ethandun - Part One - Burggeat (The Gatehouse)

 

By DroidAvoid

Self Published

Worlds Without Number 1st-3rd levels

Premise: A character inherits a compass that points to a location near a valley which has been covered by toxic smog for generations.

What do we get here?

 Over 12 pages we get the opening section of an adventure, a short hexcrawl with 12 points of interest. Really this is just the set up and the actual adventure locations exist in later parts.

 Usability/formatting

 If you want to wade through huge paragraphs of padding then this is the adventure for you, if you want something you can run easily then look elsewhere. This is about 4 pages of content stretched to 12.

 Over written and unnecessary details are everywhere. Actual useful gaming content is hard to find. I also wonder why the need to stretch things over 4 documents rather than just put it all in one, especially as all parts are free anyway.

 Some of the NPCs show promise, like everything else they could be written in a much more concise manner. We do not need a whole paragraph to know that someone is a gambler and a cheat, you can do that with two key words which is more than enough to get the DM off on their merry way.

 It is a shame because the author clearly worked hard on some nice maps but the adventure itself needs a complete rewrite, preferably with a lot of red pen usage. 

Portability

 As long as you have a place you can stick a valley in your world then you can drop this adventure in easily. The names in the adventure are all old Anglo-Saxon so you may need to switch that up to fit your world, otherwise there is nothing really specific to a given setting here.

Recommendation

 Despite this whole adventure being completely free I have no interest in checking out the other three parts. You could run this adventure as is, there are just better options out there.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/348052/The-Lost-Souls-of-Ethandun--Part-One--Burggeat-The-Gatehouse?manufacturers_id=18628

MA#99 Fetid Waters

 By Tim Shorts

Self published on Patreon

OSE levels 1-2

Premise: A simple, water logged dungeon you can use as a drop in adventure location.

What do we get here?

 Over six pages we get a dungeon with 6 keyed locations.

 Usability/formatting

 The adventure could really do with another pass on the writing. There are references to a skull in area 1 which is not mentioned in area one as well as a few general language errors.

 Given the shortness of the adventure the formatting of the text is fine for the most part. Paragraphs are short so you can run the whole thing on the fly. There is no use of bolding or nesting of information but for the shortness of the adventure it is probably unnecessary. All needed monster stats are included as needed which is nice.

 The small dungeon manages a loop and some faction play which is nice. What is missing is some decent treasure beyond stacks of cash, there are no interesting magic items here.

 I do think the general descriptions are pretty evocative helping you build a nice atmosphere. The dungeon itself could do with a bit of history or purpose, the implication is it might be of dwarven construction however that is not really built on.

 Portability

 There is no backstory to the dungeon so you can easily drop it in any suitably swampy location without problems.

 Recommendation

 As a first draft this adventure is fine, you can run it and have a decent enough time. With a little clean up and maybe some addition of a bit of depth you could make something really good out of it. For the one dollar cost of the patreon this seems like value for money out of the gate.

https://www.patreon.com/posts/ma-99-fetid-55596748

The Prison on the Mountain

 By HoroscopeZine

Self published

System-neutral

Premise: The Prison on the Mountain. A sinister place full of dark sorcery from which many brave adventurers never return.

What do we get here?

 

What you get here is a hex map with 11(?) locations and an abstract dungeon map with 6 rooms.

Usability/formatting

 Originally this adventure was written in Portuguese and has been translated to English. Unfortunately there is not really enough text to go with this adventure. In fact calling it an adventure is a bit much really.

 You get two maps and are mostly left to figure it out yourself.

 Unless I am missing something massive here this is basically a starting point to nudge you in the direction of an adventure. You are supposed to make up the contents of the hexes after you figure out which ones go with which hex. When it comes to the dungeon there is also a fair amount of work figuring out what goes where due to the abstract nature.

 Given this is a translated adventure I was preparing to cut it some slack going in ahead of time but the amount of Portuguese text appears to be as long as what we get in English.

 Portability

 You are doing most of the work yourself to get this to the table so sure, in that regard it is very portable.

 Recommendation

 The art is decent, there is just nothing beyond that. Even the pregens are just sketches, no stats at all. 

 If you wrote an adventure round the art it could be decent, as is this is unusable without a bunch of work on the DMs part. Even for a free adventure this is taking the piss really.

https://horoscopezine.itch.io/prisao

Barrow of the Elf King

By Nate Treme

Highland Paranormal Society

The Vanilla Game level 1

Premise: Wandering through the forest you come upon a lost cairn, the burial place of a long dead elf king.

What do we get here?

 This is a very simple opening one shot that covers 10 rooms in a single html file.

Usability/formatting

 Everything you need is provided here from monsters to treasure. The map is simple but more than enough to get you going.

 Room descriptions do not overstay their welcome and are easy to parse. Text is not long enough to need splitting up into bullet points or require bolding to make things stand out. Most of the rooms have something fun going on in them and the NPCs are more than just meat bags to kill. Nice public domain art is used to break up the blocks of text.

About the only change I would want to make is the opening trap seems a bit too likely to TPK so I would lower the damage on that one.

Portability

 This adventure does the classic trick of being generic fantasy while being memorable by having plenty of character. As long as you have elves and a forest you can easily plop this down into an existing world. I might make one or two flavour tweaks to run this myself however it is fine as is.

Recommendation

This is a really strong example of a starter adventure you can get through in one night, you could run it as an introductory one shot or use to kick off a campaign. Pay what you want on itch.io, can you really go wrong with free? 

https://natetreme.itch.io/botek

The Monk: Part 7 - My OSE Monk

 To find out how I got here check out parts one, two, three, four, five and six of this series. I was not able to fit in everything I wanted and ended up putting the class on par with the Paladin for XP costs.

The Monk

Requirements: Minimum DEX 9, minimum WIS 9

Prime requisite: STR, DEX

Hit Dice: 1d6

Maximum level: 14

Armour: None, no shields

Weapons: Any

Languages: Alignment, Common

Alignment: A monk must be lawful. If the character’s alignment ever changes (for any reason), they lose all class abilities and become a fighter of the same level.

Prime requisites: A monk with at least 13 in one prime requisite gains a 5% bonus to experience. If both STR and DEX are 16 or higher, the monk gets a +10% bonus.

Agile Fighting

Upon reaching 4th level, a monk gains a +1 AC bonus. This increases to +2 at 6th level, +3 at 8th level, and +4 at 10th level.

Awareness

Monks are only surprised on a roll of 1. This may mean that a monk is able to act in the surprise round while their companions are surprised.

Increased Movement

 Upon reaching 4th level, a monk gains an extra 10’ of encounter movement. This increases to 20’ at 6th level, 30’ at 8th level and 40’ at 10th level.

Limited Possessions

 A monk may only keep four magic items at a time and must donate 90% of their wealth to their order or other worthy causes.

Monk Skills

Monk can use the following skills, with the chance of success shown below:

▶ Climb sheer surfaces (CS): A roll is required for each 100’ to be climbed. If the roll fails, the monk falls at the halfway point, suffering falling damage.

▶ Deflect Missiles (DM): A roll is required to attempt to deflect non-magical missile attacks.

▶ Hear noise (HN): In a quiet environment (e.g. not in combat), a monk may attempt to listen at a door or to hear the sounds of something (e.g. a wandering monster) approaching.

▶ Hide in shadows (HS): Requires the monk to be motionless—attacking or moving while hiding is not possible.

▶ Move silently (MS): A monk may attempt to sneak past enemies unnoticed.

Order Code

Monks are bound by the stringent codes of their orders. A monk must never break his word or fail to pay his debts, specific codes depend on the order the monk is a member of. A Monk who fails to live up to the code of his order loses all class abilities and becomes a fighter of the same level.

Strike Invulnerable Monsters

A monk of 4th level or higher is able to use unarmed attacks to hit monsters that can normally only be harmed by magic.

 Unarmed Combat

 A monk’s unarmed strikes do 1D4 damage instead of the usual 1D2, upon reaching 4th level this becomes 1D6, at 8th level 1D8 and at 12th level 1D10.

 Unarmed attacks which hit by 5 or more than the required amount have a 4 in 6 chance to stun (unable to move or act on their next turn) the target.

 After Reaching 9th Level

  There can only be a limited number of monks at each higher level. When a monk has enough experience points to reach 9th level, they challenge an existing 9th level monk. The character only advances to 9th level if the other monk is defeated. Such challenges may take any form that is agreed by both parties, including combat (which need not be fatal). This process is repeated at each subsequent level.

 

Monks who attain 9th level or above may found their own cloister which is funded by their order. 2D6 1st level monks will join the new cloister as students.

Monk Level Progression

Saving Throws

Level XP HD     THAC0 D   W  P  B   S

1         0     1d6       19 [0] 12 13 14 15 16

2         2,750     2d6       19 [0] 12 13 14 15 16

3         5,500     3d6       19 [0] 12 13 14 15 16

4         12,000     4d6       17 [+2]         10 11 12 13 14

5         24,000     5d6       17 [+2]         10 11 12 13 14

6         45,000     6d6       17 [+2]         10 11 12 13 14

7         95,000     7d6       14 [+5]           8   9 10 10 10

8         175,000     8d6       14 [+5]           8   9 10 10 10

9         350,000       9d6       14 [+5]           8   9 10 10 10

10         500,000     9d6+2*       12 [+7]           6   7   8   8   8

11         650,000     9d6+4*       12 [+7]           6   7   8   8   8

12         800,000     9d6+8*       12 [+7]           6   7   8   8   8

13         950,000     9d6+10*     10 [+9]           4   5   6   5   5

14         1,100,000 9d6+12*     10 [+9]           4   5   6   5   5

* Modifiers from CON no longer apply. D: Death / poison; W: Wands;

                                                                         P: Paralysis / petrify; B: Breath attacks;

                        S: Spells / rods / staves.

Monk Skills Chance of Success

Level CS DM     HN HS MS 

1         87  10 1–2 10  20 

2         88  15 1–2 15  25 

3         89  20 1–3 20  30 

4         90  25 1–3 25  35 

5         91  30 1–3 30  40 

6         92  40 1–3 36  45 

7         93  50 1–4 45  55 

8         94  60 1–4 55  65 

9         95  70 1–4 65  75 

10         96  80 1–4 75  85 

11         97  90 1–5 85  95 

12         98  95 1–5 90  96 

13         99  97 1–5 95  98 

14         99  99 1–5 99  99