This week I continued with the creating a shortened Zine, something that fits on a single A4 sheet of paper with just enough information to set the scene, plot and hook with some NPCs sprinkled through that it could be used in any system.
I think its still working well so without any further waiting I present The Dark of Parsh Forest, in the short format, as a fun one-shot to assist GMs when they need a night out of the books whether you run Pathfinder, Open Legend RPG, D&D or any other RPG System.
There is references to the blog nights which are D&D centric (regarding Friday night’s Stat-blocks) but this adventure can be used system agnostic more so than my regular Zines. As always Kobold fight club can be used to quickly balance an encounter for Dungeons and Dragons and Tetra-cube provides the stat-blocks for many of my D&D creatures.
So I hope you enjoy this weeks adventure, The Dark of Parsh Forest, and that your rolls are made with advantage.
The Dark of Parsh Forest
439SuDaPaFo
As they sat around the tavern, they heard increasingly wild tales of the Parsh forest. A merchant swore he’d seen a two-headed creature, while a woman mourned her missing daughter, whose blue ribbon was found in the woods. Seven children had vanished, and a hunter who searched for his sister never returned. Drunken hunters admitted their fear of the forest, revealing they hadn’t ventured deep in. The old hermit, with supposed elven blood and a history of the forest, was absent but known for his tales that blurred the line between truth and folklore.
‘Old Garet would have a story about what’s happening. He will know what to do.’ a young man said nervously after hearing the story of the missing young ones.
‘Garet? He’s mad. Got that madness the elves of Parsh had, I wouldn’t trust anything he says.’ an older woman said as she eyes the group. “Remember when he burnt down the corn as he said it would curse the village?” she continued. ‘Don’t you trust mad Garet.’
‘He may be mad, but he is the only one that knows the tales of old. Surely he knows what is going on and can help’ the same young man rebutted which earned him a mixture of nods and murmured disagreements.
Garet was easy enough to find and opened the door with a near jovial expression on his face. ‘Guests! Guests! I better put the tea on’ he exclaimed as he hobbled off towards the hearth of his mudbrick hut. Using a worn wooden ladle he scooped out some water and poured it into a cup which had a sprinkling of leaves in it. Shuffling back, most of the boiling water ending up on the dirt floor, he handed the cup to the first in line for his hospitality.
‘Some tea…?’ he asked, looking at the others. The first cup looked to contain half an earth worm, a few pine needles and what appeared to be dog or cat hair; potentially even one of his scruffy beard hairs. After asking he scooped out his own serving, sprinkling his own few leaves into it and sat down, gingerly, on a pile of furs near the hearth to stay warm. His thin frame looked tiny in comparison to the cloak of furs he held around his shoulders.
After sipping from the obviously too hot tea he smiled, nodded once as if satisfied with the brew before looking to the party. ‘The woods have ears, did you know that?’ he began. ‘When the elves first left the woods and headed south past the human lands they encountered the first settlers of this village. Back then the woods were said to come alive at the beck and call of the elves to build their houses and fight their enemies.’ he paused to sip his scalding tea. ‘But when the winged ones left the trees stopped.’ he paused to pick out the other half of the worm from his tea. ‘A Pity as I always wanted to talk to a tree.’ he mused to himself.
Synthia walked into the room hastily putting down a basket that had dozens of root vegetables assorted in near piles. ‘Sorry Garet there was word that some hot shot adventurers had come to the village so I tried to find them.’ she began before turning around and noticing the party. ‘Oh, I guess I found them. Hi I’m Synthia. I am Garet’s apprentice, come household help.’ she added with more than a bit of disdain. ‘I am here to learn all I can from Garet so that he can retire while he still has some of his memories. I have started to try and write them down in books but,’ she paused looking at the man who was scooping out the other half of the worm, ‘Somehow I don’t think I’ll fill a book of actual history. All his stories he tells don’t make sense or are impossible.’ she added with frustration.
‘Synthia, dear girl. Did I tell you about the spell at the heart of the forest? The one that called the winged ones home and silenced the trees?’ he added, chewing still. ‘They say that nine are needed to bring back the trees but I don’t think we could find nine more winged ones. They all disappeared.’ he paused again before telling another story.
‘See, wild stories.’ Synthia added, looking at the party knowingly. ‘I do have some of the ones that made sense in this book if you want to take a look over it. If there’s any questions I’m from Remale, the village one over. I will be here not long as I must leave before dusk.’
PDF adventure – The Dark of Parsh Forest
Thanks for joining me today for another Zine this year. This is a condensed version of the Zine, but I hope the format works and is good to look at! Please feel free to leave comments if this format is appealing – so make sure to grab a copy of the PDF.
Next time you get a party together consider running this adventure and I hope that you enjoy it.
I hope you don’t miss a thing so come back daily in the coming week and year. This is so you can experience the creation of the next adventure as it evolves and shapes out. And as always, don’t forget to roll with advantage,
The Brazen Wolfe
Brazen Wolfe Tabletop 