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This review contains spoiler, please do not read if you plan on playing it as a player.
This module is intended for a group of 1st level characters beginning their careers and can easily be used as the start of a new campaign. However, pretty much all of the encounters in the adventure are CR 3 or more, which makes it a very tough adventure for a 1st level group. It might be wise to have one 2nd level character or a larger party of 5 or 6 characters.
Using one of the several plot hooks provided or one of your designs, the characters attend the funerals of a local hero in the Town of Brighton: Gendrin Windrider. During the funerals, fast zombie ogres attack the attendants and abscond with the corpse of the deceased hero. Either on their own, or after accepting a job from Brighton’s mayor, the group tracks the zombies through a dense forest and catch up with them after they delivered the corpse to their master. After dispatching the zombies and a hungry decapus, the characters are free to explore the caves. These caves used to be the lair of an ogre tribe, followers of Shub-Niggurath. Many relics of the ogres occupation can be found and their disturbing drawings still adorn many walls. The party must finally confront Aalric, a zombie lord necromancer and his new servant, Gendrin Windrider, now a skeletal champion. If they overcome the opposition, the characters can return to the town and be hailed as heroes, even becoming the owners of the estate of the late sir Gendrin.
My first comment is about formatting. I usually do not say much about this, but this adventure has a several typos and several places where text is missing. Although the main idea can be understood, it makes reading the adventure a bit awkward. However, this was the first product published by Wayward Rogues and having read a more recent pdf for one of their other product, I know that these issues are less frequent now.
The encounters are tough. The first one, with the two zombie ogres is even tougher because the characters are not allowed to bring their weapons in the cemetery, and if they do, they will be put under a new protective spell that makes it hard to draw a weapon. So, the players must understand that this first encounter is not one in which they are expected to fight. Even if your players still want to fight, one of the ogres flees and the second one will fight for only two rounds.
Once ready (not that the town stats are not provided, so the adventure can used with any other town or with the town of Brighton supplement), the group can start following the Ogres and may stumble upon several interesting locations adding color to the area and helping to develop this new world. Although a random encounter table is mentioned, none is provided. This is most likely an oversight, but again something that needs to be fixed.
Another point of improvement in my opinion would be the fact that when the characters reach Aalric’s lair, they face a hungry Decapus lying in ambush and the same ogre zombies they faced at the beginning of the adventure. Although they may not face the two threats at the same time, even if they face them one after the other, considering they are level 1 and the CRs are 4 for each encounter, this could be where their career will end.
One last note is in the fact the caves contain a lot of drawings in blood, legacies of the ogres. These enhance the powers of the necromancer. It would have been nice to have a list of possible skill checks and skill use to have the group realize that destroying the altar of Shub-Niggurath would weaken their opponents.
On the bright side, this adventure is founded on an extremely well crafted back story. The main antagonist, Aalric, has a very good reason to seek revenge on his brother and the characters can find hints in his journal of this and witness the slowly increasing frustration of Aalric with his careless and lustful brother. In a master stroke, Aalric’s frustration and the fact that sir Gendrin became a hero despite an evil scoundrel puts a certain strain on the characters conscience should they succeed. If they reveal the truth, the consequences have an impact on their reputation in town and on the town itself. Something I have never seen before, and despite the fact that the no stat block is provided, the town stats will be modified following the loss of their hero and its now tarnished reputation. This is simply awesome! In my opinion, the story behind the events of this adventure, the ensuing consequences based on the choices made by the characters and the richly detailed locations with the underlying menace of the cult Shub-Niggurath are the strengths of this module. This is good enough for me to forget about the missing encounter table and the several typos and formatting issues in this PDF.
The adventure also makes use of the reputation system which is nice and complements the tone of the module very well when combined with the moral outcome of revealing the truth about the town’s hero. Three new spells and one new magic item are also provided.
If you are looking to start a new campaign or if you are looking for an adventure with a well-crafted background and a lot of possible implications for the future of your party, this module is for you. If you are a stickler to formatting and encounter balance, I say you will be missing out.
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