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Pathfinder Adventure: Malevolence

4.30/5 (based on 15 ratings)
Pathfinder Adventure: Malevolence
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The house has stood abandoned on its lonely hilltop, brooding quietly over the ruins of a once thriving town for decades. No one has lived within its walls since the night a terrific storm flooded the coastal town below—and since a tragedy struck down the noble family that once dwelt within—but now, the mansion has attracted the attention of a curious group of adventurers. What is the truth behind the tragic past that empowers the evil that grips the mansion today, and what might happen to the world of Golarion if the sinister influences that grow within these haunted walls are allowed to build beyond the breaking point?

Malevolence is a horror-themed adventure for 3rd-level characters written by James Jacobs featuring sinister new monsters, mysterious magical items and spells to discover, and a fully-detailed haunted house for players to explore, exorcise, and endure. With an immersive method of researching the history and truths of the mansion's macabre secrets through visions, dreams, and good-old fashioned ghost-hunting and investigation, Malevolence is ready to test the limits of any heroic party's bravery!

This adventure can be used with the Pathfinder Flip-Mat: Malevolence.

ISBN-13: 978-1-64078-315-7

"Malevolence" is sanctioned for use in Pathfinder Society Organized Play. The rules for running this Adventure and Chronicle sheet are available as a free download (812 kb PDF).

Other Resources: This product is also available on the following platforms:

Fantasy Grounds Virtual Tabletop
Pathfinder Nexus on Demiplane
SoundSet on Syrinscape
Archives of Nethys

Note: This product is part of the Pathfinder Adventure Subscription.

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PZO9559

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Average product rating:

4.30/5 (based on 15 ratings)

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Fun Haunted House!

5/5 —

Malevolence is something I've run multiple times and it's a wholly unique adventure that feels experimental and different than any of the other 2e adventures.

It focuses on being a semi-sandbox and "adventure in your own direction" but with you basically fenced-in to one property with multiple paths to the same places and content of a RANGE OF LEVELS spread out across those multiple paths. It's very much like Dark Souls 1's multiple paths of differing difficulty and this product really wants you to run it with XP for that reason.

The level differences, path choices really make it feel like the horror house it's supposed to be. Every one of those windows is a possible entrance and the set pieces are interesting. The story of the Xarwins is dark and pretty messed up and the later relevance of the Ashen Man to Revenge of the Runelords is really cool now in retrospect/the lore also linked to Seven Dooms.

as-written, there's no buying and selling, nothing to adventure visit or explore EXCEPT THE MANOR AND IT's GROUNDS! And it's akin to LUIGI's MANSION THE ADVENTURE where your party will be inheriting, investigating or etc what is widely known as a haunted, spooky manor. But the theme twists and turns into a pleasant blend of lost omens and the cthulu mythos.

The Research subsystem is very heavy with this one and I feel like a lot of the thresholds when they happened would be describing information I would of already described naturally in spirit/camera cutscenes or that one of the NPC's would of discussed. I highly suggest a fluid extra-giving of RP points in some of the library rooms.

Another thing I don't like about it and change is it really emphasizes respawning/resetting hazards. Personally, I don't get a lot of fun out of repeated encounters and keep it only to the bosses and their conditions which ARE FUN and REALLY change the vibes of the house. It goes from a contained house to slowly realizing your trapped here now, to realizing your pushing forward has resulted in you now being hunted and having to undo this puzzle.

There's a lot of reading and a lot of lore here that's self contained but really interesting. For instance, Xarwin's wife Arvanxi is related to Illeosa from Crimson Throne/Korvosa and there's all kinds of deep little lore references from jacobs to various universes and little teasers and ideas. From what I understand this product came about one of their own home games and it's really original and it shows. It's also a early product and I'll tell you now... THEY MISPRINTED THE ENGULF ABILITIES ACTION COST!

I really like this adventure when I run it with XP and it knows what it wants to be. Toss in extra opportunities and saves against malevolence, allow those dreams to unlock naturally as suggested, be nice with research and be forthcoming with thresholds/information/lore via dream sequences, flashbacks/flashforwards and out of body camera cutscenes or the literal painting on the walls to reference and tell the stories of what's happened in the rooms. I call it Luigi's Mansion the Adventure.





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Paizo Employee Webstore Coordinator
5 people marked this as a favorite.

Announced for March! Product image and description are not final and may be subject to change.
Silver Crusade
1 person marked this as a favorite.

Hell yeah.
Liberty's Edge

My body is ready.

Yessssss
2 people marked this as a favorite.

I wonder where on Golarion
1 person marked this as a favorite.

Sweet! James is one of my favorite adventure writers. You have my full attention now.
Horizon Hunters
1 person marked this as a favorite.

I am screaming inside my heart.
3 people marked this as a favorite.
Lanathar wrote:
I wonder where on Golarion

Southwestern border of Ravounel.

Grand Lodge

Huzzah!

This looks so good. I'm assuming it's another 3 chapter module?
Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber

Oh man! This is going to be good.
Dark Archive
1 person marked this as a favorite.

Well this somehow strikes me as good title and summary for movie :O
Pathfinder Pathfinder Accessories, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

Woohoo looks awesome

Birthday present!
Paizo Employee Creative Director
13 people marked this as a favorite.
Sporkedup wrote:
This looks so good. I'm assuming it's another 3 chapter module?

I'm still working on it, but it's currently got four chapters. It's still aimed at being 64 pages long though.

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path Subscriber

I am excite. :D
Sovereign Court

Awesome!
Dark Archive

Very excited about this, and I love that it's a low-lovel adventure; there are never too many of those! :)
Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Any chance of the Necronomicon making a cameo and starting some Evil Dead like trouble in this adventure or a future product?
2 people marked this as a favorite.

Hopefully for Golarion, it won't rear its head for a while - it features heavily in a little adventure path called Strange Aeons...
6 people marked this as a favorite.

Haunted house, sweet setting! Gives me an idea to run a Shoony Investigator named Scooby.
Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Might actually pick this one up, I love location based adventures
Dark Archive
Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Mmm spooky times!
Paizo Employee Webstore Coordinator
1 person marked this as a favorite.

Update: This product has been moved to an April release, along with the corresponding Flip-Mat.

Very nice!
Grand Archive
1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Katina Davis wrote:
Update: This product has been moved to an April release, along with the corresponding Flip-Mat.

Just realized it was pushed to April. Will be a nice birthday present for me!

Elfteiroh wrote:
Just realized it was pushed to April. Will be a nice birthday present for me!

Heh. I've been robbed! See my post of Jul 21, 2020 upthread.

Marketing & Media Manager
3 people marked this as a favorite.
Ed Reppert wrote:
Elfteiroh wrote:
Just realized it was pushed to April. Will be a nice birthday present for me!
Heh. I've been robbed! See my post of Jul 21, 2020 upthread.

I think you get short fiction based on Malevolence for your birthday instead. We've that for March.

Grand Archive
Pathfinder Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Ed Reppert wrote:
Elfteiroh wrote:
Just realized it was pushed to April. Will be a nice birthday present for me!
Heh. I've been robbed! See my post of Jul 21, 2020 upthread.

Aaaw! :( I had forgotten you had posted that when I made mine. I wouldn’t have gloated had I remembered. :X

(I’ll be honest though, that we got confirmation of a new short fiction for it sounds very nice, I always love these fictions.)

Short fiction is acceptable. :-)
Paizo Employee Creative Director
4 people marked this as a favorite.
James Jacobs wrote:
Sporkedup wrote:
This looks so good. I'm assuming it's another 3 chapter module?
I'm still working on it, but it's currently got four chapters. It's still aimed at being 64 pages long though.

UPDATE: It's 3 chapters long. (I combined what was initially chapters 2 and 3 into chapter 2.)

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

This is gonna be the first adventure I bbuy for PF2e, definitely looking forward to the 'immersive research' oriented materials, I love exploration and environmental storytelling.
James Jacobs wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
Sporkedup wrote:
This looks so good. I'm assuming it's another 3 chapter module?
I'm still working on it, but it's currently got four chapters. It's still aimed at being 64 pages long though.
UPDATE: It's 3 chapters long. (I combined what was initially chapters 2 and 3 into chapter 2.)

I see this is designed for level 3 PC's, what level do they end the module at?

andreww wrote:
I see this is designed for level 3 PC's, what level do they end the module at?

I'm guessing five or six.

f-word yeah! Paizo, you are the best!

Awesome cover!
1 person marked this as a favorite.

oh wow yeah that new cover art is fantastic, props to the artist
Dark Archive

Is that one of those undeads with jars whose name I forgot? :O
Paizo Employee Creative Director
1 person marked this as a favorite.
CorvusMask wrote:
Is that one of those undeads with jars whose name I forgot? :O

It's a...

Spoiler:
...vampiric mist.
Paizo Employee Starfinder Senior Developer
7 people marked this as a favorite.
James Jacobs wrote:
CorvusMask wrote:
Is that one of those undeads with jars whose name I forgot? :O

It's a...

** spoiler omitted **

Oh gosh, those *wrecked* us in this game.

This is a delightful adventure. We just happened to spend a lot of it screaming as a result of both the creepy fun and our B-horror-movie degree of reckless exploration.
Paizo Employee Developer
3 people marked this as a favorite.
John Compton wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
CorvusMask wrote:
Is that one of those undeads with jars whose name I forgot? :O

It's a...

** spoiler omitted **

Oh gosh, those *wrecked* us in this game.

This is a delightful adventure. We just happened to spend a lot of it screaming as a result of both the creepy fun and our B-horror-movie degree of reckless exploration.

I still think we should have split up. I mean, split up *more*.

Paizo Employee Creative Director
5 people marked this as a favorite.
John Compton wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
CorvusMask wrote:
Is that one of those undeads with jars whose name I forgot? :O

It's a...

** spoiler omitted **

Oh gosh, those *wrecked* us in this game.

This is a delightful adventure. We just happened to spend a lot of it screaming as a result of both the creepy fun and our B-horror-movie degree of reckless exploration.

I'd be lying if I said that the mayhem those things caused you all didn't factor in to my decision for what to put in the art brief for the cover...

Ron Lundeen wrote:
John Compton wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
CorvusMask wrote:
Is that one of those undeads with jars whose name I forgot? :O

It's a...

** spoiler omitted **

Oh gosh, those *wrecked* us in this game.

This is a delightful adventure. We just happened to spend a lot of it screaming as a result of both the creepy fun and our B-horror-movie degree of reckless exploration.

I still think we should have split up. I mean, split up *more*.

"We should split up. We can be spread over more ground that way."

Paizo Employee Starfinder Senior Developer
5 people marked this as a favorite.
Ron Lundeen wrote:
John Compton wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
CorvusMask wrote:
Is that one of those undeads with jars whose name I forgot? :O

It's a...

** spoiler omitted **

Oh gosh, those *wrecked* us in this game.

This is a delightful adventure. We just happened to spend a lot of it screaming as a result of both the creepy fun and our B-horror-movie degree of reckless exploration.

I still think we should have split up. I mean, split up *more*.

Me: "Okay, there's a lot of this place to explore, so let's proceed methodically."

Ron: "I found four doors!"

Me: "Okay, good, let's start over here and—"

Ron opens all four doors at once.

Ron: "What? Couldn't hear you over all these creaky hinges!"

Four Encounters of Creatures and Haunts Triggered Simultaneously: "SKREEEEEE!"
1 person marked this as a favorite.

Ron, if you do that again, I will kill you.
Scarab Sages

Excited to run this one
2 people marked this as a favorite.
John Compton wrote:

...

Ron opens all four doors at once.
...

Is that an ancestry feat? ;D

Scarab Sages
1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber
chris manning wrote:
Excited to run this one

Me too.

I am especially interested in the research aspects mentioned in the description.
Visions, dreams, and investigating. It sounds like fun!!
4 people marked this as a favorite.

Foxglove Manor 2.0.
Count me in!

Ruyan.
1 person marked this as a favorite.
Katina Davis wrote:
Announced for March! Product image and description are not final and may be subject to change.

I love these short APs, especially with different character levels. Keep them coming Paizo!

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