This was a great way to start a Pathfinder group full of complete noobs to the PnP RPG world. The game went smoothly and within minutes, the group wizard was casting burning hands instead of the basic magic missle. The pre made characters were a nice addition but we disregarded them. Climbing was nice to have for it showcased some of the other mechanics PCs have to encounter in the world. This was my 2nd time being a GM and I would say this is a great module for new GMs. Great Work!

Threw the players into this recently. It went really well, they were mostly experienced players. A lot of opportunity for close-quarters stairway fighting with limited movement. Trogs are the enemies here, there are a few things assisting them also locked away in this tower. The art is also very fine and possessing a sense of being animated, the maps are clear.

As the players reacted to what was going on, the clearing of this tower actually took quite some time, despite its small size. See, a dm shouldn't just restrict the sentient opponents to one area, they should move and react to the players actions. As a dm I made this harder, so two tries were required to clear it, and although challenging, no party member died, although there were some incapacitations.

Some changes that were made, which made it harder and more exciting:

1) More spiders less dogs.
2) Use full troglodytes, not young trogs.
3) The no 2. trog has a great crossbow and moves around to use it (sniper in the tower). This makes entering or exiting quite exciting, but not overwhelming (as it would be with six archer trogs on the balcony).
4) The crocodile is put to good effect in the stairway, and limits the potential for players to really flank and get around it.
5) Have the loot be quite variable in the armourer, potentially with some nice pieces the trogs haven't used yet (due to a lack of proficiencies).
6) If required, change the hostage to a ranger, so the players can heroically fight their way out if they barricade themselves inside the guard room.
7) Make getting into and around the tower easier.

As a free pdf, as an introductory or low level adventure, I was very impressed with this product. A DM makes a dungeon interesting, this is not dull by default (look at that exciting cover art).

For an adventure designed for new players it was exactly what I wanted it to be. It had a sprinkling of undead, a little perception, some climbing, some locks, some big baddies. It was what my veteran friends and I refer to as cookie cutter. Though because I was running some relative newbies through, it was awesome. I give it a 4 star, it's 5th star would have been if it hadn't been quite so predictable, but that may not even be attainable.

Look, I can't really complain because I got this adventure on Free RPG day and Paizo still offers it as a free download to this day. Putting the adventure in that context helps to understand its design goals and make sense of its shortcomings. This is a free adventure and it's not going to be Tomb of Horrors or Shackled City level of epic awesomeness. However, for what it is, it's pretty decent and the production values that Paizo maintains are still some of the best in the business, IMHO. However, I have to be honest about the written content to help others evaluate its appropriateness for them and their intended use of it.

First off, this adventure definitely has a first edition feel to it because it's pretty much a linear, dungeon crawl with few role-play moments but a decent amount of action. My group used the 1st level pre-gen PCs for Pathfinder Society and a few of the combats ended up being one-hit wonders, and few lasted more than a round or two longer. The combats do increase in difficulty as the players progress which helps build the tension. And when the big boss fight arrived at the end, the combat proved to be a harrowing experience and more than made up for the previous warm-up fights.

There's very little background story here, and the plot is almost non-existent until the very end. The choice of creatures was logical and varied which helped to maintain the interest of the party. And lastly, the quantity & quality treasure (especially on the Adventure Chronicle if it's being used for Pathfinder Society) makes it worth the work.

In the hands of a good GM that takes time to spice the game up by supplying a stronger, character-related background, and flesh out the dungeon by emphasizing the danger of an unstable tower on the verge of collapsing, this adventure could truly blossom beyond it's humble beginnings. Normally, this is where criticisms about the job of a published adventure is to provide the background and spice, but it's a free product so those criticisms carry less weight (or if you choose to purchase the print copy at least you'll have advanced warning).

On a side note, if you are planning on using this for Pathfinder Society, it's really best used as an introductory game, as there is no Prestige Award and no faction quests provided for existing PFS players.

But not bad. No major plot twists...no major plot, in fact. For an introductory adventure for people new to Pathfinder, it's pretty good. It showcases a bunch of different rules well and shows off the shiny, new character classes as well. Veteran gamers might find it ho-hum, but I think it's good for new players.

The Physical Book
The adventure is a 16-page, full-color, saddle-stapled book. Like all of Paizo's Pathfinder products, the production values of this item is really nice, something which is especially worth noting considering the book was given out for free. The art, especially the cover and the Wayne Reynolds' pieces, is very good. The cartography decent but pretty basic and, to be frank, rather boring - the rooms are almost all octagonal in shape, being differentiated only by the number of doors and the contents of the room.

The Adventure
The adventure, which is designed for 1st level characters, is nothing special nor particularly interesting. The basic premise is that a recent earthquake has provided access to an ancient siege tower which gives the PCs the opportunity to explore. There's a little more going on in the tower, but that at its core is what the adventure is about.

As for what's inside (remember I promised this would be spoiler-free), there's a decent enough reason provided for what's taken up residence within the tower, but for the most part the adventure is pretty much a room-by-room dungeon tower crawl. The PCs move from room to room, killing (or maybe talking) to what's inside before moving on to the next room. While the arrangement of the tower means it's not a linear crawl, it's still a crawl.

The Other Contents
Of the 16 pages, the adventure only takes up pages 2-9. Pages 10-15 contain pre-generated PCs, each of which also serves as a preview of the upcoming Paizo's Advanced Player’s Guide. These are pretty cool and not unexpected since part of the strategy behind Free RPG Day products for many companies is to provide something that also doubles as advertising or preview material.Each of these characters includes a small, iconic-style portrait, and a complete write-up which is quite nice although of limited utility to anyone not actually wanting to run the module using the PFRPG.

The Verdict
The Master of the Fallen Fortress is a decent enough adventure for a free product but nothing I would recommend paying money for or going out of your way to buy unless you're a die hard completest. That said, Paizo deserves some kudos for producing such a good looking free product.

WARNING! This review contains spoilers.

I have GMed this adventure for one group, when all of us were new to PFRPG. I had Gmed 3.0 in the past. It is now my standard introductory adventure I will use for all groups wanting to try Pathfinder.

Visual appeal: Amazing. Full color, pretty art, great layout, very sexy map!

„Out of the box" playability: The GM doesn't really have to do a lot to prepare. It's all there. Some of the monsters use a template, but with the quick rules that is easily taken care of.

Structure: 16 pages and yet there's choices? Believe it! Despite the small scope of the module, the players are not completely railroaded. At several points they actually have two ways to go, or different ways of handling a situation.

Story: The one weakness of the module and the reason why I would like to substract half a star. Some of it doesn't make too much sense. Some of the monsters seem a little arbitrarily placed and there's a couple of logic/consistency issues with the layout of the dungeon. Nothing that isn't easily taken care of (see my post in the discussion), but just enough to make me go „uh, what?“ when I read it the first time.

Suitability as an introduction to RPGs: Very good. You have roleplaying opportunities before the heroes set out, although these have to be prepared completely by the GM. Then there's exploration, fights, skill use and another roleplaying opportunity inside the dungeon. Also, the fights show off several different types of enemies, lots of different abilities, with each fight adding something new in terms of tactics or rules elements.

Extras: The preview of the new classes from the Advanced Player's Guide is a great extra for people who are already familiar with Pathfinder.

Conclusion: Amazing product, especially seeing how it's completely free! Great start into the Pathfinder experience and also a nice kick-off for a Pathfinder Society Campaign. My players loved it and I loved it!

Over all this one was kinda bland. It did not give a good feel of what can be expected in most pathfinder organized play scenarios, (spoiler)
there were no faction missions, no real society mission, and really not a lot to it other then a straight out dungeon run.

It all began with an earthquake and an ancient siege tower that apparently wasn't built to code... a bit crumbled away, providing an opportunity for some neophyte adventurers to go exploring. Needless to say, they weren't the first to take advantage of the crumbled wall.

The exploration of the tower - and dealing with an assortment of creatures that have taken up residence there - provides a neat and compact adventure for starting characters, with some interesting leads to future exploits especially if they choose to take up the introduction to the Pathfinder Society that's a likely reward. Groups wishing to participate in the Pathfinder Society shared campaign could use this to launch their involvement, as it is authorised for campaign play and the required record sheet is included.

The pre-generated characters provided are also interesting, as they are 1st-level examples of the iconic characters from the Advanced Player's Guide - this adventure was released a couple of months prior to this work's publication.

Overall a neat adventure that would make a good start to a Pathfinder campaign, particularly if you intend to use Pathfinder Society adventures or indeed wish to participate in the shared campaign.