Short, sweet, and emotional. The twists are immediate and powerful.

I used this after Keep on the Borderlands and it ended with the Keep's stables being set on fire. If you follow the rules, it really pays off.

I have run this for my group, and we had a blast. It is an interesting juntipasition of fairy tale and psycotic nightmare that really hit a stride with us. It is easy to die in the LotFP system, but it is easy to convert to another if you so like. Really great scenario if you have player that overthink things.

An Endzeitgeist.com review

This adventure clocks in at 20 pages, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page back cover, leaving us with 17 pages of content, which are laid out in 6’’ by 9’’ (A5), which means you could fit up to 4 pages on a sheet of paper, so let’s take a look!

This is an adventure intended for characters level 1 – 4, and it is one that can have some high-impact consequences. It should be known that, at level 1 and 2, the likelihood of PC death is pretty high. Compared to many Lamentations-modules, the adventure is not as lethal, though. The OSR-rules-set employed is obviously LotFP (Lamentations of the Flame Princess). The module does not feature read-aloud text.

While it looks cutesy, this is a pretty dark adventure (big surprise!), so no, this does not belong in the hands of kids.

This being an adventure-review, the following contains SPOILERS. Potential players should jump ahead to the conclusion. … .. . All right, only referees around? Great! So, King Connolly VI (or another minor king/lord/whatever have you…) is a bit of a racist prick. He started a pogrom against the local halfling populace…and only thereafter noticed that they made up for most of his income, being the manufacturers of luxury goods, apple brandy…and now the ruler wants the PCs to find the halflings that have escaped through the dark forest.

If you know Zzarchov Kowolski’s modules, you’ll notice a leitmotif here, and indeed, the first section of the adventure will have the PCs harry through the sheer endless forests. One encounter per 12 hours, different dice are used for day and night – and the exploration has an interesting angle: You see, the forest has a Dark Heart and actually hunts the PCs, at least in a way – depending on party composition, the dark heart will become more agitated…and it will be able to sooner or later form a dark avatar. From fearie knights to other, strange inhabitants, this first section is rather cool, but it should be noted that the stats are rudimentary: The statblocks note HD, armor in analogues (“armor as plate”), damage, and similar basics, but doesn’t provide the usual statblock segment we see in LotfP scenarios. It may not be issue for you, but it represents an unnecessary comfort-detriment for the referee. As a nitpick: The font used for the random encounters section is different. On the plus-side, we do get a rather interesting table of changes that are wrought upon PCs, should they choose to imbibe some potentially mutating mushrooms.

The module takes a complete 180° towards the weird promised by title and cover once the PCs find a hedge – moving through it will deposit them in basically a demiplane, where mild and honey literally flow. A candy-based place, where all the halflings have gone and no inhabit a gingerbread village in the shadow of an ivory tower. Obese and unhealthy, they smile neurotically, and indeed, from the pink poodles to the happy cupids flirting through the air to the teddy-bear patrol…this place is actually a nightmare.

The PCs will get to see as a halfling is rounded up, impaled, and then his guts are used for the happy, mandatory maypole dance – unless the PCs want to take up arms against the cutesy bringers of death. The fully mapped gingerbread village doesn’t offer much beyond this scene, though – no NPC personalities or the like.

Instead, the pdf pretty much clearly shows what the PCs are supposed to do – enter the ivory tower and confront the lord of the place – Mistysparkles. A pastel-blue unicorn with pink Pegasus wings. Who happens to be a true sadist. Alas, this fellow is far beyond the capabilities of the PCs to defeat, so smart players are required here. How did this place come to be? Well, you see, there is a portal towards an interstellar void, in which an idol stands. Devoted to a trickster god, it allows for wishes, but adds something to them – here, the result was “…or else!”, added to the wish for universal happiness. Mind you, clever players can actually deduce how this statue works! It should also be noted, that the module can end in a variety of ways. The girl that uttered the wish is actually kept drugged and docile. How to deal with here depends on your proclivities, but the wish must end in some way...

The module also features 5 different magic-user spells that are pretty interesting: Two of the deal with the gingerbread curse, which can make your hit point loss really hurt…or revert becoming cookie-like. As a cool aside: While partially gingerbread-ified, you will always outrun pursuers! That made me laugh. Nightmare fuel lets you animate toys with unholy life (hint: risky!), and there is an interesting spell called fireworks. It has you roll d6s for damage, but only 1s and 6s are applied…all others are rolled again next round, until they come up as 1s or 6s, making this hilariously chaotic. Rainbow bolt is another pretty chaotic spell, but it’s a direct damage spell, which feels a bit odd for LotFP. (There is also a wand for these included.)

Conclusion: Editing and formatting are good, but not as tight as usual for LotFP. Layout adheres to a 1-column b/w-standard, and the interior artwork…is b/w and okay. Very comic-like. This also holds true for the maps provided, which lack scale etc. They are not particularly useful and represent a weakness of the scenario. On the plus-side, the pdf comes with excessive bookmarks, making navigation easy. I only own the pdf version, so that’s the only one I can comment on. Zzarchov Kowolski’s “Lamentations of the Gingerbread Princess” is an interesting, hyperglycemic nightmare – at least in the second part. The first part is wood-crawling excellence, as expected by the author that brought us the fantastic “Gnomes of Levnec” and “A Thousand Dead Babies,” two dark-fantasy wood-crawls he released under his own label. That being said, apart from the sheer oddity of the second part of the module, there isn’t much going on within this weirdness – it ultimately just works as dressing for the encounters: There is not much going on in the second part of the adventure. The design as a free-form “This is what’s here, insert PCs” is great and all, but no matter how you use the second half, there isn’t much to work with, at least not without expanding the material on your own. All in all, I couldn’t help but feel that this one is weaker than the author’s other , aforementioned “Dark Wood”-focused adventures with weirdness sprinkled in. My final verdict will hence clock in at 3.5 stars, rounded up due to in dubio pro reo – if you’re looking for a wacky, but dark baseline or a pretty quick to run/prepare scenario, this’ll deliver.

Endzeitgeist out.

Its just about six A.M. and I'm not entirely sure what the hell Zzarchov Kowolski's fairy tales were as a kid but Lamentations of the Ginger Bread Princess is an inversion of every single fairy tale trope on the books. This is only about twenty pages long yet it can be spread out over at least three or four days of game play. And the PC's are not going to be happy about it at all. I went to James Raggi IV and asked for a review copy of this module with the full understanding of what it is. Well, according to the the Drivethrurpg blurb: Sometimes you want to play an adventure where you can recapture that feeling of childlike innocence. And, sometimes, wishes do come true. LotFP presents more hard biting horror: Now with unicorns, gumdrops and rainbows! By Zzarchov Kowolski (Gnomes of Levnec, A Thousand Dead Babies) for character levels 1-4. This is an interesting gonzo over the top pink laden fairy tale adventure. Definitely don't believe Drivethrpg reviewer Troy V who describes this adventure as and I quote here, ' Interesting tables and encounters, but the results of some choices and punishments depicted for unhappiness are unsettling, gruesome, sick, and wretched, and my players would not stand this adventure in whole as written, and neither do I.' Excuse me whist I take acceptation to this review and Troy V's reviews on the whole are done with a sense of malice for the Lamentations of the Flame Princess rpg and their product line as a whole on purpose. While, preparing for a Winter Lamentations of the Flame Princess game I came across at least eight reviews of his on Drivethrurpg and found them with all the same opinion verbatim and some of them varied just enough to be vile and on purpose about it. So I'm taking exception to his reviews and I'm going to show you how to run, deal with and use some of the LoFP modules. Is the Lamentations of the Gingerbeard Princess adventure twisted and utterly sick? Yup, it certainly is. I had no idea that Zzarchov Kowolski had written this module but I'm not surprised at all. I seem to be drawn to his adventures. So what is Lamentations of the Ginger Bread Princess? Well, its a fairy tale inversion adventure involving a bunch of factions and hobbits in a mechanically pretty well done style. This adventure revolves around a Dark Woods setting and all is not happy in this fairy tale land. Not because this is a Lamentations adventure but because this adventure touches on the darker, nightmare aspects of a LoFP fairyland. Power gamers are going to be in for a very bad time in this adventure. Because there are lots of pop culture fairy tale high weirdness for the PC's to encounter. This module takes full advantage of that fact;the real reason is that this module is so weird is looking at fairy tales as adults we see the inherit creepiness of them. Yeah, this module takes full advantage of this fact in spades. This whole adventure centers around the Dark Woods location, the maps fit the adventure, there are at least three or more NPC's that I can see using and without spoiling the demented fun there's lots that can be done with this adventure. One place that Zzarchov Kowolski excels at is taking existing preconceptions about mythology and pop culture legends and twisting them around like balloon animals. No more so then with this adventure and yes this will be your characters if your not careful. Because in fairyland, PC's are in for a very rough time. These will be your PC's bones which will be play things for the Fey. Do I love this adventure? Yes, I do because last year I actually got a chance to check it out and almost die in it. There are several interesting wrinkles in this adventure because this is a Kowolski adventure and mechanically its a really wild ride to play in. I suggest several read through though before attempting to play. There are two or three major play areas and some very dangerous encounters straight out of the gate. What's going to keep the PC's right in the middle of the action in this module is simple human greed straight out of the gate because from there on out it get's weird in a majorly twisted way. If your thinking that this is a one trick pony like an episode of Robot Chicken, the Simpsons, etc. in the way that it plays with popculture fairy icons? Not a chance, this is a LoFP module that takes those and wrecks them in spades. There are some issues with this module its not perfect by any means, the layout, graphic design, and some other elements leave something to be desired. But that doesn't detract from using the adventure. It not on sale at the moment and runs about four dollars over at drivethru. There will be other sales coming up and I do think its worth picking up. Eric Fabiaschi Sword and Stitchery Blog

Interesting tables and encounters, but the results of some choices and punishments depicted for unhappiness are unsettling, gruesome, sick, and wretched, and my players would not stand this adventure in whole as written, and neither do I.

This is a well playable adventure that's tasty and filling, with the right amount of sourness. I'd definitely go for the Opportunist ending.

Incidentally, it makes good use of this variant's take on Law and Chaos, possibly offering source detail for fey regions.

This adventure is dark, weird, bizarre and quite wonderful, very old school and wacky. If you do not mind letting something a little outre loose in your campaign world, then give Lamentations of the Gingerbread Princess a try, I do not think you will be disappointed.

Lamentations of the Gingerbread Princess is a short module for the Lamentations of the Flame Princess weird fantasy RPG but compatible with most OSR style games (or similar games, I ran it with Pathfinder).

The basic plot is straight forward, recover and rescue a group of displaced halflings for a reward of course (this is old school, people are not expected to do thing because they are nice). They must be tracked into the Dark Wood, which comes with a fantastic set of random encounters, to find out where the halflings have gone.

Where they have gone is a literal land of milk and honey with gingerbread houses and everyone is happy or else. Perfect poodles, animated teddy bears and impish cupids enforce mandatory happiness on the surviving halflings. To free them, an ivory tower must be stormed, a fairy queen defeated and, possibly, dark deals must be made.

While the structure of the adventure seems humorous, it is a very dark humor and the stakes can be very high. One of the best modules I have ever read and that it also plays well, just makes it perfect.

Note: Read more reviews and other gaming articles at my journal https://seaofstarsrpg.wordpress.com/