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Saturday, June 16th is Free RPG Day ‘12 and with it comes a slew of new and interesting little releases. They can usually be divided between tasters for new games that will be released at Gen Con this forthcoming August and support for existing RPGs or pieces of gaming ephemera. In general, the tasters for the new, “hot” games are highly anticipated and on the day itself, in high demand, but come the day, it would be remiss of us to ignore the less-in-demand titles. Many of these it should be made clear, are worth your time and effort to make it to your friendly, local gaming store to get hold of a copy. One such title is Dungeon Module GP: Slavers of the Sunken Garden, published by Gaming Paper LLC and designed to make use of its Gaming Paper product.

Sold in convenient rolls, Gaming Paper is simply squared paper. Available in either one-inch squares or hexes, it presents a low-cost alternative to expensive battlemaps and tile sets, and so can be used for both miniatures games and roleplaying games. Dungeon Module GP: Slavers of the Sunken Garden is written for use with Paizo Publishing’s very popular Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and included with the module is a sheaf of sheets of paper upon has been printed the whole of the map for the locations described in the module. Done in greyscale, the complete map covers a large area, and even breaking down the map location by location calls for a good sized table.

Dungeon Module GP: Slavers of the Sunken Garden is written for a party of four to six characters of sixth to eighth levels. The adventure is suited to Barbarians, Druids, and Rangers, and does have some demands in that the Wizard or Sorcerer in that the party should have access to the Fly spell. It takes place within the environs of a natural sanctuary known as the Sunken Garden which has become a haven for fey creatures. Located deep in the mountains, this sanctuary has unfortunately, been invaded by a band of Kech, leathery, simian slavers that have a means to corrupt the fey and breed their offspring as evil creatures. When done, they plan to sell them off to the highest bidders. How the characters come upon the Sunken Garden is up to the GM. Perhaps paladins hire the party to prevent antipaladins from taking such creatures as their unholy mounts, perhaps a sentient water lily comes in search of the party’s aid, or perhaps a former guardian of the Sunken Guardian left his treasures within its verdant walls. Whatever the reason, the lush and leafy environment will be a complete contrast to the mountains outside, and hides some nasty surprises beneath its verdant canopy.

Unfortunately, Dungeon Module GP: Slavers of the Sunken Garden does not quite live up to the high production values of its maps. True, the layout is clean and tidy, but the editing is poor and the artwork does not live up to the target set by the publisher. The five pieces will immerse neither the GM nor his players in the adventure, whereas the maps will. That said, running the adventure will be hampered because the GM’s map has been wrongly labelled. Not adversely so, but enough to be a nuisance.

There is an obvious ambition to Dungeon Module GP: Slavers of the Sunken Garden as the adventure is well written and challenging, and the maps are more than a gimmick. That said, the adventure does feel a bit short and perhaps a longer length might allow the authors room to create something of a greater depth. Nevertheless, Dungeon Module GP: Slavers of the Sunken Garden is a solid first scenario from a new publisher.