This is an extensively detailed low-level module which reminds me a bit of The Village of Hommlet. Its length is probably because it's actually two modules combined. It's very playable and has the potential for providing hours of fun for those wanting a good all-around wilderness/dungeon adventure for a beginning party for fantasy rpgs, particularly d20 or AD&D (probably up to 2nd edition). Don't let its design for the World of Stronghold put you off. If I have one wish for this adventure, something to make it memorable, would be for it to have had more specific information; names, personalities, unusual or new monsters, items and spells. As it is, everything is fairly generic, although a competent DM should have no problems giving it a bit more specialness. Also a shame that customers don't get the cover in this free download.

It's a pity that Barratarria never published a couple of promoted upcoming products; in this one there is a BL3 Mountain Redoubt of the Hobgoblin Legion but I've heard of another someone else mentioned.

Given that this is free, it's well-worth the download.

The clarity of the images, are more than I could have hoped for. I’m very pleased with the final product.

Excellent site based campaign with several locales presented in good detail. Just shy of being spectacular. If just a small amount more were included to expand the scope it would be an easy 5/5

A interesting starter mod. I haven't run it but it looks well laid out. I aim to convert to RQ6CF and run it with that system

The Ruined Hamlet/Terror in the Gloaming is an excellent free adventure resource that features the art of William McAusland and author and designer Barrataria. The module is a solid low level crawl and features some other solid adventure resources that can be used with any number of other old school campaigns. The author and designers have done an excellent job of creating an adventure that can easily and quite seamlessly be incorporated into an old school campaign. The work is well done and the adventures can easily work with many of your favorite old school original D&D style games or with the retroclone of your choice. The basic plot of the adventure is straight out of the old school play book and works well along the usual and solid line of D&D style design and this is one of the modules strengths in my estimation. A module that offers all of the basic tips, tricks, and tools with just enough of a twist to have PC's in the middle of the adventure. The plot goes something like this The wilderness around the cave stronghold called Gold Hill Trading Post is dangerous and scattered with ruins of large and small settlements. Will your party find fame and fortune, solve ancient mysteries, or just disappear into the Borderlands like so many that came before? Everything here is well designed and built so that all of the adventure elements can easily be used for any number of old school adventures and this is one of the reasons why I love this module. This module contains underground and wilderness maps that form a detailed adventure and mini-campaign for beginning characters, including an abandoned village, haunted graveyard, ruined church, traders’ camp, wilderness encounters, and monster lairs. It also includes a ruined keep and dungeon as well as a mapped and detailed “base camp” stronghold. The module is designed for use with all “classic” fantasy roleplaying game rulebooks or sets for Basic- and Expert-level players and dungeon masters It can be converted for use with “Advanced” fantasy game rules and compatible systems with a minimum of effort. Cover art by William McAusland! This is a module that has some unique changes for thieves and adds a bit of flare flare to the DM who really wants to customize this adventure as a part of their own DYI D&D style campaign. This is really one of my favorite modules to run across in recent days as I keep looking over adventures from the past couple of years. This module really has everything a DM could need or want to construct his or her own mini campaign from the resources provided. That being said this is still a deadly little adventure product. Care should be taken. This adventure works for either OD&D or AD&D styles of games but care should be taken because of the spin on some of the PC classes and their uses within this mini campaign. The artwork, maps, elements and adventure pieces in this adventure are vary welcome as well as concise details throughout make this an adventure with lots of repeat play value. This adventure could also be used for the Adventurer,Conquerer, King rpg system but it might require some adaptation. This is more like an adventure kit as well as module so its almost like getting two products for the price of one. B1-2 can be used for quick play or as an adventure resource over and over. All in all this is a solid product and one that deserves far more air time then its gotten. Eric F from The Sword and Stitchery blog

A good low level adventure. There are some 50 pages of adventuring and 6 pages of maps! The settings include a fully detailed hamlet, a widerness section, a graveyard, a trading post, and much more. The module is action-packed and enjoyable.

Personally, I found this fairly clunky to read through and get a handle on. There's a lot of stuff semi-detailed which might be ideal if you want to take raw materiel and mould it to your own ideas, but many of the elements of the area seem without clear concept or purpose.

There's definitely enough going on, built in, however, to make the adventures work without a lot of creativity from the game master.

What I really did not like was the organization. The numbering scheme led to a lot of duplicated numbers and repeats which made referencing maps and items unnecessarily clunky. In print this might be mitigated, but in a PDF it really hurts, at least for me.

This is all WITHOUT playing it. I might find a hidden brilliance when doing so, but it didn't really turn my crank in terms of the mini-adventures or setting either, so I probably won't get around to giving it that fair shake.

A free adventure, and pretty good stuff.

I wish I got the cover art with the PDF download, but it was not included for some reason.

This is actually a very nice little opening adventure area for groups of low rated Characters (really levels 1-3 for D&D). I picked it up for use with "The Fantasy Trip," and I think it will do very nicely for introducing some new characters (especially if the Players have never done "Fantasy Role Playing" before) to the concepts and ideas without overwhelming them. It lays out the basic ruined village and the surrounding areas for the players to adventure in, gives them a relatively tough monster to tackle at some point, and there are plenty of things for them to do which can earn them rewards. All in all, its a pretty classic introductory set-up, though it does lack a "home base" area a la "Village of Hommlet" for the players to work from. Still, this could easily be combined with "Village" or the "Caves" setting from classic D&D to provide a relatively complex area for the beginning characters to work through and having enough stuff in it so that the players won't be railroaded into any particular set of adventures -- always a plus when first working with a new group. In fact, there would be so much stuff in such an area that they might not even get to it all! Anyway, I enjoyed reading this one and can see how it would be easy to work into as a start for a much bigger campaign. I haven't tried it out on my players yet, but give me time; I think they'll love it. Production quality is pretty good (basically on a par with the classic AD&D Modules from yesteryear) and easy to read. RPGNow's production values are high as usual. The module includes some handouts and mostly blank map sheets for the players (par for the course with these modules), and is friendly to the GM. Overall, a good solid effort, only slightly marred by the lack of a working village or hamlet as a base area. I give it a "four."