Aldennians still tell tales of the Spindlewood Hydra more than a century after its death. The eight-headed monster was a singular scourge, even compared to others of its kind. Spawned from some deep, black pit of the Night Hag, the Spindlewood Hydra terrorized the countryside around Mor Aldenn for a decade, slaughtering entire families, killing sheep, goats and cattle, and decimating caravans. A band of five brave adventurers finally managed to halt the creature’s depredations. Now, agents of the Night Hag, employing secret rituals and foul necromancy, attempts to return the hydra to life, only this time deadlier and more powerful. With the newly regenerated hydra the Night Hag hopes to weaken Mor Aldenn so that the City of Mages can no longer resist her armies.
"Death in the Spindlewood Marsh" is a Pathfinder Roleplaying Game mini-adventure designed for four 7th to 8th level characters. The adventure occurs in the great marsh just outside Mor Aldenn known as the Spindlewood Marsh. However, the adventure can take place in any area where swampland and forest meet.
This FREE adventure is 11 pages long, written by Stefen Styrsky and with interior artwork by Mike Burns.
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This free little adventure is 11 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1/2 a page editorial, 2 pages of advertisements and 1 page SRD, leaving 6 1/2 pages of content.
This being an adventure review, the following contains SPOILERS.
Still here? All right! The City of Mages has been beset by the forces of the legendary Night Hag for quite some time and one of her most deadly assaults/ insidious plans centered around a terrible creature, a extremely deadly hydra. Now, a henchwoman/hag of the Night Hag has reclaimed the corpse of said legendary monster and returned it to life - unfortunately sans the heads, as they are on display in Mor Aldenn.
It's up to the Pcs to find the monstrosity and slay it again before it can reclaim its head. Via the Headless Hydra inn and its Tapestry (included as a one-page hand-out - neat!) the PCs journey to the place, kill some skeletons, the hag and battle with the dread HEADLESS HYDRA! (great piece of meta-humor, btw.!) The Headless monstrosity can spew acid from its head-stumps, is surrounded by an extremely virulent aura of disease and had me cackle with glee - lethal, bad-ass, deadly - what more does a DM want?
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are top-notch, I didn't notice any glitches. The b/w-artworks are beautiful for a free product and the hand-out rocks. The pdf adheres to HHG's 2-column layout standard and the adventure has no bookmarks. The monster is iconic, you can easily spin an elaborate investigation around the pieces of the creature and the write-up of the final beast is awesome. Iconic, old-world style, an intriguing creature and all for FREE! Author Stefen Styrsky provides us with some fun little, easily expandable encounters and thus my final verdict will be 5 stars + the Endzeitgeist seal of approval - check this out!
Endzeitgeist out.
Help!!!!...It's the Attack of the Logo!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm going to start by saying I thought this was a brilliant concept. To take the name you publish under, and not only stat it, but make it the centerpiece of an adventure...Oh the possibilities if other companies followed your lead on this one...
This PDF weighs in at 11 pages with 1 page apiece going to Cover and OGl, 2 pages to ads, and a half page credit/ID on the Intro page. That leaves us 6 and 1/2 pages of crunch and fluff. Within those 6 1/2 we not only get a backstory explaining how the hydra came to be headless, but a "where are the heads now?" if you will, helping detail what happened to the missing pieces. We're introduced to Zanthike (Green Hag Witch 3) who is responsible for the disease and acid spewing headless beast, as well as her Barghest lover in the way of not only stats, but tactics, and motivations (at least for the witch). We're given a random encounter list to work with while our hapless hero's search the swamp for the big guy who's got no grins, and even a new form of skeleton (formed from the teeth of lost heads).
The story explaining why the Green Hag has revived the hydra is believable, the current whereabouts of missing heads/pieces is logical, and the swamp encounters are manageable. The adventure flows quickly enough for this to be a side trek for a group passing through a town, but gives enough to work with that a clever Gm could expand this into much more, spending a session or two on just the thefts of the Hydra "trophies" before the group even heads to the swamp to learn what is going on. Obviously the adventure was written to compliment the Mor Aldenn setting, but I doubt anyone would have trouble using it outside of that.
Artwork is all B&W, and is limited to :
Cover - A Hydra Skull "trophy"
Tapestry - Hanging within a local inn, depicts the battle between the Hydra and a group of adventurers who slew it.
Zanthike - The Green Hag Witch, fairly well drawn picture.
Ads - The only full color artwork, showing covers of three other products that are available.
Overall I enjoyed reading this adventure, and am looking for a place within my campaign schedule to be able to place it, as I wish to see how my group will handle the headless beasty.
I'm giving this one a 5 star for delivering an interesting adventure idea without bogging it down with needless wording, giving me a great chuckle as I contemplated your logo neck-squashing my playgroup.
The only thing I felt might have been missing was a statblock for the Agents of Zanthike that are mentioned, in case a GM chose to use them as the method by which to introduce their playgroup as to what's going on. It's a small thing, as henchmen types are pretty quick to stat, but it would of been nice to have them already done and geared up appropriately as in employ to the Hag.
Reviewed here and sent to Gms magazine - I also tried to post the review on DTRPG, but could only rate it and ggot an error when trying to post my review. Oh well, great job. ^^
Thanks for the review, End! I am glad that you like it, but sorry to hear that you couldn't post the review to DTRPG.
In hindsight, I should have added this to the setting guide as well. But decided against it as I wanted to use it in promotion of the guide... I could have done both.
I think this is a great freebie outside of the setting-book - it's free after all an a great way to make people more excited about your setting as it provides some examples of what you and your guys can do. Two thumbs up!
