This adventure isn't some huge expansion dungeon or wilderness adventure. It's more of a side-trek between adventures. I strung this along with D series and Dungeon articles, and this works well, so I have enough random encounters to tie-in to other adventures, allowing my players to pick and choose where they quest in a non-linear fashion. The thing about the evil adventuring party is that they can compete and spoil other adventures to come, unless they party stops them in this adventure IMC.

The thing I really love was the investigation about who stole the dagger. That was amazing and REALLY great ROLE PLAYING fun for this situation. Right now IMC, we are before this part; I have a gnome PC in party that is desperately trying to steal it from one of the other PCs, which if things work out later, that PC gnome might be one of the suspects...

Anyhow, as a side-trek type of adventure, this one is really nice. I took the NPCs and use them with other adventures, and use other NPCs in this adventure. It works out very well.

NOTE - The comment about see MM for stats is due to licensing of WotC/Hasbro content. With future Pathfinder Core Book and other books, they no longer have this restriction.

I would have rated this very good product a 4.5 stars as it is perfect for me to insert as a side trek adventure for my playgroup in RotRL. The adventure was modified for a 2nd level party as it was easy to expand the basic encounters. I ran this module in the north western section of the Whisperwood south of the Lost Coast Road.

The layout is excellent and it is really designed for beginner DMs to start off their first campaign. It can equally be used as side trek or by an experienced DM to begin a new campaign. This module is different to a most of the Pathfinder modules as it instructs the DM what maps and item cards from Paizo to use to enhance the adventure.

A major issue is the lack of encounter tables that could be used while travelling between sites. This is easily fixed by using encounter tables that can be found from a number of different publishers' books. A minor issue is the setting the adventure in Golarion's Arthfell forest. I would have kept it as a generic forest but it is easy to put it into any forest in any campaign a DM wishes. It can be linked to other modules as it is not far from Darkmoon Vale.

I highly recommend to get this product in Paizo's Treasure Chest product if you are a beginning DM.

This adventure is a great one for playing with younger gamers. My son enjoyed the riddles, the 'treasure hunt' mission, and the artifacts. I probably should have got the whole treasure chest not just the adventure but he loved it nonetheless.

(Ugh, first post was eaten...)
I liked the idea behind the adventure, recovering the lost artifacts of a druid guardian. But overall, I agree with the railroad comments and I didn't really care for most of the encounters and the items were weak. I did like the showdown at the inn as well as the Wooden Protector but that was about it.

Don't make the mistake that I did...buy this in the Treasure Chest and don't just get it by itself. Now this is a very good module, but when paired up with all of the stuff in the Treasure Chest it just soars! All of the little bits come together to form a very evocative adventure! Thanks Paizo!

A good side-trek or beginner's module.

The Good: The adventure is exactly what it is meant to be: the Paizo equivalent to the D&D Basic Game (sans miniatures). It’s a fun treasure hunt against a rival group of adventurers, which you can expect players to complete easily in one or two gaming sessions. The artwork complements the module nicely, and the final fight should put the players to the test (the party had better be on their toes and working together by then)!

The Bad: There is a lot of popping about, where the party is assumed to just have “gotten there.” You may want to add a wilderness encounter table to lessen the “teleport effect.” The module is meant to accompany the boxed set, so if you buy it as a stand alone the module is rife with references to things you may not own (as expected; and they aren’t required to play the module, simply nice to have). Magic items drop like flies for a first level campaign, though they aren’t overpowering. There is significant railroading, and in some cases, ad-libbing around potential plot holes may become necessary.

The Ugly: None.

I ran this as an addition to the RotRL adventuire series. Made the Artfell forest a few days from Sandpoint & had Foxglove hire them for the job. Adjusted the items as they were certainly ok but too weak in my opinion. I made them expandable magic items so they grow with the players & will add them to the campaign I am running. Fun game but needed few GM fixes.

Although beautifully produced, as usual, this module does seem to railroad the characters, as has already been mentioned.

In my opinion it also doesn't explain certain plot aspects very well, so be prepared to ad lib a bit, if you decide to run it.

Basically, the mystery needs more explanation of how it was achieved and the links with the objects, the notes of how to find them and the map are also a bit shortchanged.

Some lovely creative plot issues, with the good doctor and the Indiana Jones-style sheriff, but does seem a bit unfinished.

All in all worth $3.50 to complete your collection and I think my players enjoyed it, but read it through very carefully before you start, as it needs more thought than you would expect. If you can think of ways to avoid the railroad aspects too, then your players will enjoy it more.

I purchased this module half an hour before I ran it on our regular Game Night when we couldn't play our regular campaign. It's a fun multi-path adventure with one of my favorite gimmicks: the evil rival party!

There were two major complaints I had:

1. I hate typical woodland creature fighting like dogs, bears, and wolves. There are a few interesting creatures in here but not many.

2. I hate hate hate it when an adventure points me to the monster manual. Just give me the stat blocks in the adventure, don't make me look up a freaking dog on page 277 of the monster manual.

I love 16 page one-night stand alone adventures. I think there is a huge market for them. However, these adventures should be built to play with almost no prep time. Include all monster stats, outline the main points of the adventure, the chapter, and the encounter quickly so I can skim read it and be ready.

Spoiler Alert: Stop reading if you want to play this one.

In our run of the module, the sheriff, who is portrayed as sort of a tough guy, ended up being more of an idiot.

At the end of the adventure, my players decided they wanted to keep the trinkets for themselves and go steal back the blade. The rogue broke in to the sheriff's house, rolled some horrible sneaking rolls, grabbed the dagger from the woken sheriff, and fled out of town on horseback with all of the artifacts with a naked sheriff running after them. It was a great improv ending to the adventure. The players had a lot of fun.

I really hope Paizo prints more 16 page mini-adventures of level 3 to level 8 with simple dungeon designs, brief outlines of the plot, and all required statistics. I think there is a huge market for one-night adventures for the working folk.

Thanks for a great night!

This review is pre-play, but the adventure is both short and simple enough for me to be able to gauge it without play.

I'm pretty sure it has to be the best 1st Level adventure I've seen for 3.5. It is well laid out and pretty, as is the Paizo standard so it seems. I also find their chapter layout easier to use than the tactical encounter set-up of WotC's official releases.

The book was bought as a prospective 1st game ever, but thankfully this small, short and intriguing little story is good enough for the old hands. It is not far-reaching or over-long, but has a few loose ends to lead to more, just right to me.

There's really no negatives that don't come down to being limits of the page count. I'd certainly have preferred a few more details here and there, but for 16-pages Haunted Forest is very complete.

It's the first GM module I've bought, but likely not to be the last.