Illustration by Sally Gottschalk
It's no secret I love adventures first and foremost, and the upcoming Pathfinder Module: Cradle of Night is one of the highlights of my first year at Paizo. This adventure was crafted by several of Paizo's veteran contributors: James Jacobs, Wes Schneider, Neil Spicer, and Greg Vaughan. Don't let the multiple authors fool you into thinking this is a collection of stories—it's a single super-adventure with a stunning beginning and a desperate urgency all the way to the end. Cradle of Night was a long time coming, but it's all the better for it, and now it's here!
In this deluxe adventure for 8th-level characters, the heroes receive a plea from a desperate caligni refugee. Her cosmopolitan subterranean city of Lyrudrada has fallen into the grip of a fanatical cult called the Reborn. This wicked cult seeks an artifact called the Cradle of Night, an important piece of caligni history and lore. The heroes must keep the artifact out of the cult's hands and fight to bring light to the shadows that threaten to consume them.
One of the reasons I was glad to jump in on this project—apart from it being an exciting adventure into new lands and themes—is the opportunity to address the name and history of the caligni. There's an unfortunate trend in fantasy fiction to equate "dark" with "evil," and the "dark folk" monsters have been carrying this baggage for years. Of course, these subterranean people don't call themselves "dark folk;" they call themselves "caligni," and since they're at the center of this adventure, it's a great time to pull back the shadows around their naming, history, and secret lore.
Venture into the depths of the earth and claim the Cradle of Night!
Ron Lundeen
Developer