Review of Infestations: Deadlands HOE Dime Novel #2

First, let me say the fiction in this Dime Novel was great, the second best I've read in the Dime Novel series, right behind The Forbidden God for the Weird West line. The cover art was pretty good; I'm not usually a Tom Fowler fan, but he did a good job on this book. Then again, Tom Biondolillo did his usual less-than-stellar job on the interior art, so I guess it evens out.

Then there was the adventure.

Spoiler Space

I liked the way the nomads slaughtered the occupants of the truck in the beginning of the adventure, as it showed just how desperate their situation was. I didn't care for the way a posse needed to defrost the cryogenically-frozen wasps to defeat Desimone. It wasn't the most obvious of weaknessess, and my posse turned tail and ran when their traditional methods of killing didn't work on Desimone. The way the adventure is written Desimone can kill the posse a half-dozen times over before they have an idea of how to hold her off, let alone kill her. The clues to Desimone's demise should have been clearer.

Frankly, if I were to rate this Dime Novel on just the adventure and not the fiction I'd give it a 2 for Substance; there are just not enough clues for the posse to find regarding Desimone's weakness. One of my players is a firm disbeliever in cryogentic suspended animation, and could not believe that it would work even in a game where the solidified souls of the damned power fantastic devices and the Four Horsemen walk the Earth, so he ignored the wasps when he found them.

When I told my players the correct way of how to deal with Desimone one of them brought up the old nursery rhyme of "There Was An Old Woman Who Swallowed A Fly." Methinks inspiration for Infestations might have come from that old tale.

Style: 2 (Needs Work)
Substance: 4 (Meaty)