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Pete
United Kingdom
Oxford
Oxfordshire
Brofist
I have eaten the plums that were in the icebox
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Yo! This review is spur-lattered with SPOILERS like rice is spur-lattered with white.
Quote: Black Leaf knew that something was terribly wrong the moment she set foot on the island. The muddy swamp soil that clung to her boots was the colour of greasy half-cooked sausage; the humid air was suddenly thick with the cloying odour of the charnel house; and most ominously of all, no birds were to be heard where only moments before the swamp had echoed with eerie birdsong.
It was only when the ground moved that Black Leaf realised that she wasn't standing on an island of solid rock, but rather... a floating barge of impossible size where the dead were lashed to the dead with wicker and mud, a hellish vessel gravid with undead crocodiles who even now slithered forth from the foetid hold to drag the thief down, down, down...
The inspiration for this week's Death of Black Leaf episode is Dyson Logos' Challenge of the Frog Idol, a short module for Old School retro-clones like Labyrinth Lord. I'm only interested in using this module with the Dungeon World RPG, so I'll just note that Challenge is pitched at lower level parties with characters in the 3-6 level range.
(As a long-serving member of The Cult of The Harnish, where my master leads I must follow; this then is the first of my own old-school renewed reviews in the same vein as The Harnish's own reviews of classic AD&D modules.)
Quote: The Frog Idol has stood in the Black Mire for ages untold—an idol of an ancient and forgotten god who now only manifests through this ancient rock in a forgotten place. However, with the conquest of the dwarven citadel of Kuln by the giants, adventurers have been seen again in the city of Coruvon. And from Coruvon, the Black Mire is always in sight.
Challenge of the Frog Idol is a swamp-set sandbox ripe for exploration that'll provide a good handful of play sessions. The module's setting of the city of Coruvon and the surrounding Black Mire ain't tied to any particular fantasy setting, so you can easily slot the module into your own setting and game.
Challenge of the Frog Idol presents...
 a lightly sketched frontier city complete with factions (Coruvon).
a neighbouring swamp rich with encounters including that "island" of corpses (The Black Mire).
a small (12-location) dungeon (The Fortress on the Ironflow) that provides access to a greater mega-dungeon (Kuln).
The expectation is that the Dungeon Master will graft his or her own meat to the bare bones that Challenge provides. For example, the 'mega-dungeon' of Kuln is marked on the hex map of the swamp, but ain't detailed any further than that. This leaves you free to slot in a dungeon of your own creation or slot one culled from elsewhere: you might use this map of the Dwarven Barracks at Kuln that Logos posted to his blog ages ago as a starting point. Extension points in modules are cool to see, so hurrah!
One of the "bones" provided by the module is a set of Rumour Tables reminiscent of those found in classic AD&D modules like The Keep on the Borderlands and The Secret of Bone Hill. Challenge of the Frog Idol presents three D12 tables of rumours—some true, most false, all colourful—, one for each of Coruvon, Kuln, and the Black Mire.
Each rumour is just a one-liner, but for my money that's plenty enough to hang a cool scene or even an evening's worth of play from: if you've spun characters, setting, and situation out of the short and colourful text provided by the Oracles of In a Wicked Age, then you're all set to rock out with the rumours from this module.
Cool Stuff To Do In The City Of Coruvon & The Black Mire:
gain an audience with the Oracle of Coruvon, a Living Alabaster Statue!
 gamble on the life and death struggles of the prisoners forced to fight in Coruvon's famed arena!
indulge in the honeyed loins and fragrant lips of the Courtesans of the Red Lanterns!
accept the Alabaster Oracle's quest to seek out her husband—yea, the Frog God himself—in the swamp!
discover an entrance to the treasure-rich depths of fabled Kuln!
frustrate the predations of the gnomish necromancers and assassins in the surrounding hills!
brave the Labyrinth of the Rains, a thorny maze raised in worship of a long-forgotten god!
ally your party with the Ogres in The Fortress on the Ironflow!
The rumour about the gnomish necromancers sounds suspect. (It is, hehe.) The, similarly bogus, rumour that Alabaster Oracle is a hag who seeks only to lure folk to their death in the swamp is rich with the promise of hot gaming action, because the Alabaster Oracle is actually really helpful.
Here's the skinny on the island I mentioned at the start of this review...
Quote: This island isn't so much an island as a collection of decomposing undead crocodiles and other swamp life that has been built up into an island. It will be first encountered in this hex, but will then travel one hex per day in a random direction. The floating zombie island can actually engage in combat, and cannot be turned by a cleric.
Now ain't that just seven flavours of fried gold? (It is! I dig that the text is explicit that the island cannot be turned.) The text adds 2 more pages of sweet rotting meat to the island, including a cool-looking map of the interior, a massive treasure that's part of the Frog God's quest chain—yeah, the Frog God comes complete with a quest chain—and, naturally, an insane necromancer.
Presentation
Challenge of the Frog Idol is a 21-page PDF available as a free download here.
You can have a gander at the PDF's simple and attractive layout in the screenshot that I've embedded to the right. The PDF doesn't really have any illustrations, bar the scaled-down version of the frog idol featured on the striking cover that decorates the page numbers, and of course the maps.
The maps are lovely examples of the form. I first became aware of Logos while searching for tips concerning the drawing of cool maps for my review of How to Host a Dungeon. Dyson sure does pen sweet-lookin' maps and Challenge of the Frog Idol contains five maps done in his crisp and charming style.
Closing Thoughts
Challenge of the Frog Idol is just the ticket for those times when you're hankering for an evening of old school fun playing adventurers fighting off moss-covered zombies and braving ancient traps while they wade waist-deep through a mucky old swamp.
Logos has crammed plenty of cool in just 21 pages, so almost everything is painted in broad brushstrokes: forex, none of the NPCs in Coruvon are given names. For my money, the broad brushstrokes are pitched just right: there's enough inspiration for me to riff with, but not so much that my eyes glaze over. I want to be able to bring my own cool to the table when playing, and in that regard the Challenge of the Frog Idol suits me just fine.
Top banana.
Further Reading
the adventure can be downloaded here.
my other old-school renewed reviews.
Mike Harnish's old-school renewed reviews.
read other reviews here and here.
Black Leaf's adventures will continue...
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Brofist
