Original Scenarios Resurrected VIII: The Devil's Quagmire (1980, Andrew Ravenscroft)

Welcome to the eighth entry in the series Original Scenarios Resurrected, wherein D&D scenarios from the 70s and early 80s are republished with the permission of the authors, usually together with extra contemporaneous material. Today is the turn of The Devil's Quagmire by Andrew Ravenscroft, with illustrations by Quentin Manley. For all entries in the series see here.

The Devil's Quagmire, published in The Beholder #16 in June 1980, was the last of Andy Ravenscroft's three published D&D scenarios, all illustrated by his friend Quentin Manley. Thanks to Andy I've already republished Clearwater Caverns and The Temple of Psaan, but in this third effort he really raised his game both in the quality of the content and the scope of the adventure. 

There is perhaps no better way to introduce The Devil's Quagmire than to quote a recent review at Prince Of Nothing of the adventure:

"Throw this in your campaign RIGHT NOW."

Read on to find out more and download it...

The Devil's Quagmire bills itself as an adventure for 6-9 characters of levels 3-4. It details a "series of islands of solid ground in the heavily-overgrown swamp, connected by trails of questionable safety". Step off the path and you'll soon find yourself sinking in quicksand. This isn't a linear adventure though - there are many paths to take and five different entrances to (or exits from) the swamp. The islands vary from single encounters to mini-scenarios with 9 or 10 numbered locations. The fourteen encounter areas all have one thing in common - they are creepy and inventive.

Without giving too much away: an underground ferryman who pilots his boat with a song, a pillar engraved with runes that initiate the coming-of-age challenge for the aquatic Piasa, the keeper of the roll who is pleased to meet you but can't entirely be trusted, a sentient house that wants to kill you, a path blocked by a chained swamp demon, a gateway of evil with a guardian that only leads you to a temple to death.

My only real criticism of The Devil's Quagmire is that there isn't more of it - but it couldn't have been any larger as this single adventure already took up half of the entire 'zine! Fortunately, due to its modular design it would be easy (and fun) to develop some of the keyed locations further.

Two items reference other issues of The Beholder. The Pentagram of Power in the last encounter is from TBH 13, and the Marsh Hag in the Wandering Monster list is from TBH 14. For completeness I've included these at the bottom of this page, but I'll remove them if the authors wish (I think they're both by the editors, Mike Stoner and Guy Duke).

To download it click on the arrow in the top right to open in a new window, you can download it from there.

There is some extra associated unpublished material for this scenario - a much larger scenario, part of which was canibalised to form the swamp - but this is so large that it will form a separate future blogpost. Keep posted for future updates!