In the deep, it has awoken. Hidden in the ruins of an old dwarven kingdom awaits a powerful relic, and an army kobolds are on the march to retrieve it. Dare the heroes enter this ancient place, and will they find the relic before the army arrives. In a race against time the adventures may unleash the greatest evil, while trying to save the world from a grim fate. Tomb of the Dragon's Heart is a low-level OSR adventure suited for Labyrinth Lord and other oldschool retro clones. The adventure was originally written for the Danish Living Campaign The Hinterlands, and it is for the first time presented in English. The adventure introduces the players to a different tradition of adventures, and it one with a focus on exploration and encountering the unknown. The adventure contains new magical items and relics and new monsters to challenge your players. Tomb of the Dragon's Heart also functions as a prequel to The Flooded Temple and to Grave of the Heartless. Published by Greis Games.
Legends tell of a wizard so arrogant that he felt the entire sky was naught but a lens for him to view the stars. So great was the hubris and defiance of this man that the gods smote him with the power of storm and fire. Oh did the wizard laugh at such a pathetic gesture. He did not fear the gods, for he drew his knowledge from something greater. Something darker. The legend of this wizard grew, first whispered by men in fear, and later in awe. The wizard, they said, attacked the gods just as they had attacked him. And his joy only grew as the land around him died. But then there was no more news. No more talk. Something had finally brought the wizard low, for though the sky still blazed down on him and his abode, he no longer blazed back. And now you’re going to walk right through this wizard’s front door.
INTRODUCTION Some say the world is dying. Others say the desert is growing. In either case, merchants and princes always desire new ways to cross the Great Sand Sea. Today, someone has found a way to fly over it. Who will tempt fate and join the maiden voyage of the Desert Angel? No one knows what dangers or treasure have lain hidden in the heart of the desert for all these eons. If you survive, you will be the first. ONE-SHOT This adventure is intended as a one-shot, but it can easily be inserted into a campaign. Any time your players wish to travel to a distant city, you can simply say there is a large desert in their way, but luckily there is a new flying ship they can travel on. Good luck with that! DESIGN NOTES This adventure is intended for low-level characters (1-3). It is primarily geared for social encounters and combat. It runs 2 to 5 hours. Players ride a flying ship across the desert. Monsters attack. Passengers plot treachery. Mysterious locations appear. You can keep the tone serious or play up this ridiculous sequence of disasters for laughs.
The lost city of Archaia - an ancient ruin sunken into the earth - lies deep in the badlands. In recent years, caravans from Eastdale have come under attack from orcs, goblins, and worse. Some say these blood-thirsty warbands have made lairs in the deep caves and ruins. Sill others say the ancient halls are filled with magnificent treasures left by the Archaians. Are you brave (or foolish) enough to delve The Forbidden Caverns of Archaia? The Forbidden Caverns of Archaia (FCoA) is a 296-page classic megadungeon for use with any old school fantasy role-playing game. The pages of Forbidden Caverns are crammed full with new material, maps, amazing art (including special surprizes by former TSR artists), as well as an amazing colour cover art by Ex-TSR artist Erol Otus that matches Barrowmaze Complete as a sister-book. The Forbidden Caverns of Archaia will keep your players on their toes and your campaign going strong for years. FCoA is brought to you by the Old School Renaissance (so don’t forget your 10’ pole).
(EQ1) The Cursed Ring is a generic fantasy short adventure for low-level players, themed around puzzle hunting, traps, and monster combat. It is designed to be solved in approximately 5-6 hours, depending on the size of the party and skill of the players. This adventure takes place in a cursed fortress, where they must find a powerful mythical ring capable of granting great power, in exchange for enormous sacrifices. Players must recover the ring and get out of this dangerous place alive.
The rich merchant Quintus Felerius has not slept in a week. He is paranoid of vengeful nightmare wraiths that seek to kill him in his sleep. Exhausted and delirious from his lack of sleep he hires experienced adventurers to stand guard in his bedroom while he sleeps. Little do they know that the curse upon Quintus is about to sweep them into the Nighmare Zone of the vengeful Ikari... Nightmare Zone of the Ikari is a Shadowdark RPG adventure designed for 7th level characters that takes them inside the mind of their troubled patron after he and his previous mercenaries were cursed by a vengeful Oneiromancer. Explore his troubled past and see if you can keep him from panicking and taking all of your minds with him. The adventure is designed as a oneshot, but can be incorporated into an ongoing campaign pretty easily since it takes place in another dimension.
The dead are all mad in this place. Jaume made the most unfortunate mistake of seducing Ysabel and taking her virginity — a sacrilege for which the sentence was death. Enraged upon finding this out, Joudain cleaved Jaume’s head in two with an axe and then raised him from the dead to continue his duties. Not long afterward, Joudain decided that, because the twin footmen no longer “matched,” he had no choice but to inflict the same fate on Miqèl — who now looks exactly like his older brother. Join them. This heavily revised and greatly expanded deluxe edition of The Cursed Chateau is an adventure for use with Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Role-Playing and other traditional role-playing games. Death is just the beginning.
The Drunderry River runs narrow and fast through much of its course, before tumbling into the lowlands beneath the Fallow Hills, in the shadows of the Blacktooth Ridge. From there, the river spreads out across fertile plains, laboring slowly to the south before emptying into the Elmarsh Lake. Until recently this area was unsettled, but a writ of the King's has brought many people to the area. The village of Malforten, nesteld along the banks fo the Drunderry River, near the Fallow Hills, is just such a place. A quiet village with simple people, they learned the hard way the Blacktooth Ridge casts a deep and dark shadow. Seeing rich prizes in cattle and grain, people and other movables, Gritznak the Gnoll has come down from the Blacktooth with loot on his mind. All they've done to drive him off have failed, at their wits end the villagers turn to others, more experienced in combatting evil. They look to a rising knight to save them . . . . Also available for 5E: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/160855/A0-The-Rising-Knight--Adventures-for-5th-Edition-Rules
The City of Bergholt lies upon the southern shores of the Interzae. Her crumbling walls and ancient cobbled streets are little more than a backwater, controlled by powerful merchants and thieves. In these darkened streets and twisted alleys people claw their way to the top through violence and guile. In Bergholt, the fear lingers in every shadow. In By Shadow of Night you’ll find a complete detailed description of Bergholt, a rich cast of NPCs who all have their own plots and plans, over 20 encounter areas, including a small dungeon and a large fold-out map of the city. All this setting material comes to life in the dark and deadly adventure, also included within, that is By Shadow of Night. By Shadow of Night picks up after the Death in the Treklant series, available from Troll Lord Games, though it can be a stand-alone adventure if desired.
Baron Ketterall’s lands are beset by a plague of marauding goblins! Goblins you say? Pah! Who's afraid of few poxy goblins? But two experienced parties have already gone looking for the goblin lair – never to be heard of again. Poxy goblins you say? Be afraid, be very afraid… The scenario is designed to be an extremely challenging adventure that might undermine a player’s bravado in dealing with low-level monsters such as goblins. Unusual traps, tricks and special weapons are used by the inhabitants of the dungeon to cause the party as much trouble as possible. Published by Dunromin University Press.
A 26-page low level adventure for OSE and other OSR rpgs. "The swamps? Oh, that's a long time since someone got out of there. Vines and crocodiles they say in the big city. But down here we don't believe everything they say up there. Everyone knows what's up with the swamp! The hydra is hungry! We tried to hunt it down last year... that's how i got this wooden stump! What? you? killing the Hydra? well... i didn't make you out for the brave type, that's all..." -Old Mika, fisherman of Gren Against the Hydra The swamps near Gren are infested with strange creatures preying on travellers, the hydra has begun her yearly hunt and the river woman’s daughter has vanished. Last year the neighbouring towns have all gathered together to mount an expedition inside the swamp, but none returned. With nothing more to do priests, druids and citizen have gathered a 2000 gold pieces to clean out the swamp and save the river woman’s daughter from certain death. The adventure comes with detailed tables to explore the swamps, a complex dungeon riddled with encounters, treasure and lore for you to explore. Handouts are also included in the adventure pdf, for you to give to your players and excite their imagination.
The Archpriest, leader of the Church, has defied a summons to the Immortal Capital. You have been chosen to retrieve the recalcitrant pontiff. Kidnap the Archpriest is designed to be an implicit tutorial for diplomacy, stealth, theft, bluffing, and cunning. It is a system-less, setting-less heist module featuring: a city (with a map) a fortress (with interior and exterior maps) two hectic days and nights a guide to designing your own heists. glorious black and white art by Luka Rejec scheming cardinals, frantic servants, and secret plots By the author of the CoinsandScrolls blog and Tomb of the Serpent Kings.
The ancient world of Harth withers beneath its dying sun…but it’s not dead yet. Welcome to the strange and dangerous city of Carcassay, huddled below the skeleton of a titan rat, sprawling above the ruins of countless dead civilizations. This is where folk come to find wealth, power, revenge, secrets, oblivion… and everything in between. Carcassay is a sandbox city adventure. There are many locations to explore in, around, and under the city. Players can explore any place at any time, and may radically reshape the city’s politics, economy, religions, and physical existence. There are standard dungeons stacked under the city, and GMs are encouraged to keep adding more dungeons… all the way down. Tone. It leans more toward low fantasy or sword-and-sorcery. Most shops look like real shops. Most people look like real people. But strange and horrible things lurk everywhere as soon as you start to scratch the surface. This is my Lankhmar. Carcassay is a vast, bizarre city. It has over 100 locations where you can meet Chaos cultists, Lawful knights, retired adventurers, shopkeepers, brewers, musicians, artists, scientists, hermits, royalty, beggars, doctors, space vampires, eldritch horrors, machine priests, crab colonists, mushroom farmers, mummies, assassins, and diplomats from distant lands… and the moon. And every one of them has goods or services to sell, and a quest (or three) to offer. What sort of quests? Fetch a relic, assassinate a rival, find a relative, steal a soul, implant an agent, cure a disease, stop a riot, solve a murder that hasn’t happened yet, hunt a thief, locate a shrine… the list goes on. And for every Quest, there is a specific Reward: money, weapons, relics, Chaos mutations, exclusive memberships, information, Angelic miracles… the list goes on. This is a place where you can make a lot of money, but also where you can spend that money on interesting goods and services. Factions? We have a few. Seven Chaos cults, five knightly orders, two mercenary companies, four wealthy families, six (seven!) Corpse Lords, foreign diplomats, rival innkeepers, rival tavern owners, plus all the dungeon-delving gangs currently mucking about underground. When you grow weary of all the adventures at ground level, there are three classic dungeons buried under the city to explore. This book contains months (if not years) of campaigning. Enjoy the Chaos.
Short free/pwyw adventure for Shadowdark RPG or similar roleplaying games. Months ago the snow elf princess Ysren was pressured by her mother to begin accepting suitors. To thwart them, she vowed her suitors that anyone who brought her a piece of the moon would have her hand in marriage. The sorcerer-prince Sandor of Excelsis took up the challenge & began building an ambitious spiraling tower atop the highest nearby peak. Once it was high enough, he would begin a ritual that would open a portal from the top of the tower to the moon. One cold day all communication with the tower seized & the “Spiral Prince” has not been heard from ever since. King Galian has sent men in search of his lost prince, but none have succeeded in besting the frigid mountains. He offers a hefty bounty for the return of his son. Will you brave the rime-covered cliffs of Mt. Excelsis to save the prince... or perhaps scour his tower for arcane knowledge & regal wealth?
Long ago the dwarf-like "Dverg" established a "forge" hidden deep beneath the earth where they forged weapons of "cold" iron. Cold iron was considered a far superior material and was especially effective against Trolls and could even damage ghosts. The forge is thought have been long abandoned and priceless artifacts of great power are rumored to lie forgotten beneath the Altis mountains. Among them is rumored to be the fabled Axe of Mortality - a weapon said to be powerful enough to slay a god. Is your party brave enough to venture out in search of these valuables? Flameless Forge of the Dverg is a free/pwyw dungeon crawling adventure designed for level 1-3 Shadowdark RPG characters. The adventure is assumed to take place in a viking-esque fantasy setting, but can be adapted by tweaking some names and figuring out replacements for the nordic gods.
A Gritty OSR Fantasy Setting by Travis Legge The mortal lands are divided. A dozen kingdoms lie scattered across the world, separated by dangerous wilds filled with bandits and monsters. The bravest mortals act as adventurers, guiding travelers between the kingdoms, killing monsters to thin their numbers, and plundering ruins in search of the lost treasures of the golden age. This is the world of Odysseys & Overlords! The party are traveling west through the Untamed Gauntlet, on their way to somewhere else and using a stream to guide their steps. They step out from under the eaves of the forest to spy looming before them a cliff, a tall wall of stone which stretches away to either side as far as they can see. A waterfall cascades onto sharp rocks into a pool from which pours the stream they were following. The sheer cliff is easily 100 feet high, and too wet and slick to climb safely, though it can be tried. Atop the cliff is a bare stone hill which looks like it was at one time worked by intelligent hands; a look-out post of sorts has been carved into its southernmost peak. The map says it’s called “Wyvernseeker Rock,” but it doesn’t say why. The hill appears deserted. A long age ago, beyond mortal memory, a forgotten people built a watching post and refuge atop and within Wyvernseeker Rock. A hundred years ago, an adventurer named Olaf Wyvernseeker claimed the Rock for his own and set out with companions to clear the lands thereabouts. They were never heard from again. The upper chambers of the Rock are a convenient lair for a Giant Rhadogessa and its spider servants. Still, it’s got to be safer than climbing the cliff. Right? Published by Aegis Studios
"The broken outline of Cear Ferros emerged on the horizon. Its ancient walls stand silent and looming as you approach them, casting long and eerie shadows across the land." An adventure through a cursed castle crawling with undead in search of missing merchants. For Shadowdark Published as part of the Shots in the Dark collection.
Farms in the hamlet of Winterton are being raided at night. Who, or what, is doing the raiding is a mystery. Animals have disappeared and now a visiting merchant has gone missing. The only clue is a blood drenched hat sitting in the snow along a stretch of road. Blood in the Snow is intended as a small side-adventure set in Winter, in a tiny village in the Bay of Spirits. A desperate clan of goblins are raiding the settlement and the player characters have been asked, or hired, to help. Published by Roan Studio
By a well-trodden road lies the estate of the Eryx family. At some point the estate was converted into a roadside inn. The merchant Robert E. Wardlove has received an urgent letter from his daughter Derleth. She begs of her father to arrive in haste to the faraway inn and take her back home safely for the Evening of Still Streets draws near... Enigma of the Eryx Estate is a break from the usual dungeon crawls of the Shadowdark RPG system recommended for characters of lvls 1-3. During this adventure players get to solve a murder and the mysteries that surround it. Exploration and intrigue are emphasized as player characters gain XP for uncovering secrets. Combat is in a more minor role during this adventure, but if the players don't figure out the mystery by midnight, they might be in a fight for their lives. The adventure is designed for ease of running with punctual room and character descriptions.
Characters track the kidnapped Evanna to a goblin outpost with a dungeon underneath. They must successfully infiltrate the stronghold to rescue her and get out, before the goblins can mount a counter offensive against them.