The first adventure of the Splinters of Faith-adventure series is 20 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page ToC, 3 pages of advertisement, 1 page SRD, leaving us with 13 pages of adventure.

This being an adventure review, it contains SPOILERS. Even worse, since it (and I) discuss the metaplot, there are MASSIVE SPOILERS for the whole series.

Players should really skip to the conclusion of the review.

Still here?
All right! Once upon a time, a priest-king named Akruel Rathamon, a vile man of unrivaled power subjugated all the lands under his tyrannical rule in the name of a deity that we now know as Orcus and said priest-king was winning the war, especially after turning himself into a super-powered version of a vampire with lich-like immortality. To stop the tyrant, an artifact was crafted, the Scepter of Faiths. Said scepter was jammed into the tyrant's heart - but it didn't kill him - unbeknownst to the forces of good, his true life-force was sheltered elsewhere and thus his empire and minions faded to distant memory, while a mausoleum was built over his motionless, artifact-staked body. Over the years, a natural hill has formed over the crypt and all the once powerful wards have slowly deteriorated...

Deteriorated is also what should be best used to describe the village of Lessef - 30 houses (more shacks, really) form a dilapidated, poor community that borders on being a ghost town. Even the impromptu Inn is only a side-business run by the local priest and almost all youth seems to have (justifiably) fled this place. Looming over the hamlet, a church called aptly Poverty's Brethel, situated on a large hill, remains standing. The town is aptly presented in its state of dilapidation and the town has a problem - a rather smart fox has been killing the settlement's chickens, threatening the little livelihood the place still has left. Of course, the culprit is not a fox, but rather a group of thugs guarding a badly hidden excavation site on the other side of the looming hill. Hired by a necromancer who has managed to revive the priest-king, they await a return of entities who have already left via magic. Once the PCs have defeated the thugs, they'll have to explore the decayed tomb, battle its ghoulish inhabitants and find both the shattered scepter of faiths and cryptic instructions on how to recreate it to stop Akruel once and for all. It should also be noted that some side-quest-style hooks that entwine this adventure with other installments of the series are included.

Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are very good, I didn't notice any significant glitches. Layout adheres to an easy-to-read two-column standard and the b/w-artwork and maps rock. The pdf unfortunately has no bookmarks. Oh boy, on the one hand I enjoyed this adventure, on the other hand, I did not. Let me elaborate: This is a sandbox that is not a sandbox - the village is depicted in a compelling way that hearkens back to classic fantasy, where a looming threat of human extinction was present, however, essentially we get the village as a kind of gazetteer. After the gazetteer, some rudimentary information on the thugs is provided and then there's the dungeon. The adventure does not cover the PCs setting traps for the "foxes" (no map of the chicken stalls etc.) and assumes the PCs find the perpetrators etc. The dungeon is, apart from the foreshadowing elements, just, I'm sorry to say, boring. The maps are not depicted on pages of their own or in large, making handing them out to the players harder than it should be. Additionally, we don't get player-friendly maps of the village, temple or dungeon. And then there's the amount of content: 13 pages is just not enough for 5 bucks - especially when taking into account that the background story further diminishes the page-count of the overall module. I really liked the atmosphere transported by this module and thus it pains me to do it, but for the price, I don't consider this module a good investment. It's necessary for the series, though. Thus, If you're planning to run the arc, this is 3 stars for you. For those of you undecided/looking for a nice introduction, I can't recommend this - for you, this module is 2.5 stars, rounded down to 2 for the purpose of this platform.

Endzeitgeist out.

Splinters of Faith 01: It started with a Chicken by Frog God Games

This product is 20 pages long. It starts with a cover, ToC, and credits. (3 pages)

Introduction (5 pages)
In this section it explains how this is the first of a 10 part adventure path. It is a first level adventure and says by the end of all 10 adventures PC's should be 14th level. It gives a very brief overview of the series of adventures. Next it moves onto a history behind the adventure series, then list each of the 10 adventures with a small blurb about them. Followed with advice on how to use the adventures series, plot hooks and overview map of the area. With a final section on a magic item, which I won't mention to avoid spoiling the adventure. :)

It Started with a Chicken (3 pages)
Really this section is the rest of the book but I am going to break it up for ease of the review. This section deals with a small town the PC's come into. There is a local small reward for missing chickens believed to have been taken by a fox. The reward is for the capture of the fox. The section details the small village and a few of the important NPC's. It also has two possible encounters, assuming the PC's take up the bounty on the fox.

Akruels Tomb (5 pages)
Looking into the missing chickens should eventually lead the PC's to a old tomb that has recently been opened. There is 8 possible encounters including traps in this mini dungeon. I won't get into any details as it would spoil things to much. Two encounters might be a little tough depending on the party mix but with smart PC's none of it should prove to dangerous. At the end of the adventure they learn some disturbing news which should lead them to the next part in the adventure series.

It ends with a OGL, and 3 pages of ads. (4 pages)

Closing thoughts. This is a pretty simple and straight forward introduction to the adventure series. It should be pretty easy with a few hooks to get the PC's to investigate the area around the town even if they ignore the fox hook. The art work is pretty good black and white art. Other than the region map, there is also maps of the village, a couple of the builds and the tomb.

Not all the monsters are fully stated out. Some of them just list what they are, hp etc. So you will need access to the Pathfinder Bestiary or a Monster Manual if you want to run it with 3.5 DnD or older edition. It is like all Frog God Games a old style adventure, PC's should be smart or they could get themselves in trouble.

There is no bookmarks but with a product this small they are hardly needed. I did notice one error in the book. On page 10 the first letter of the first word in the left column is partially cut off. That is the only page it is on. It is still pretty easy to read but a odd error. So whats my rating? For the price I am going with a 4 star. It is a simple and very straight forward adventure. It didn't wow me but then it is setting up something that does perk my interest. So as a introductory adventure is accomplishes it's task.