The Lost Books of Appendix N

Pushed into motion by the Appendix N Jam (find my entry here) I have engaged in an intensive, rigourous (and two-fisted) period of study, research and legwork looking into the early literary inspirations of D&D and have discovered a veritable corpus of lost works of fantasy fiction. A protracted campaign of beatings, blackmail and bribery has revealed the following titles were excluded, for mysterious reasons, from AD&D's Appendix N:

1. The Cruel Curse of Tzan-Tzeng
2. Through the Ghost-Field
3. Night of the Spine-Beast
4. Invaders, Ironclad... Invincible!
5. The Ghoul Machine
6. The Siege of Stinghollow
7. Across Broadsword Lake
8. To Duel the Devil's Daughter
9. Swords Against Prophecy
10. Lo, Death-Lords!
11. Against the Marquis of Madness
12. Sphere of the Godlings
13. Beyond the Impenetrable Darkness
14. Amazons, Charge!
15. The Twelve Tales of Tlalaklax
16. Into the Veridian Pit
17. Locked In Silver Shackles
18. Empire of the Eternity-Bomb
19. Adrift on Typhon's Trireme
20. Beware the Wizard's Eye
21. Die, Demon, Die!
22. A Vision of Burning Spires
23. The Beetling Bastion of Emperor Bhzz'tl
24. Mozag-Shah's Mountain of Power
25. Curses Upon Carloman 
26. The Gilt Death of Loquacious Grey
27. Not for All the Gold in Hell
28. Bathed in Troll Blood
29. Rise and Ride Again!
30. The Amphibane Cycle 
31. Flight from Castle Cromlech
32. Belburbug's Bloody Playthings
33. Damocles, Draw Thy Sword!
34. The Saga of Sigurd Silver-Eye
35. Ixø - City of the Witches
36. Beneath Foreign Planets
37. The Fiendish Company
38. In League with the Lizardmen
39. Sir John Sneak - The Rat with Twin Daggers
40. The Ringamble Series, particularly Ringamble the Crypt-King, Ringamble the Revolutionary and Ringamble - Upon a Backwards Horse

Also check out my module title generator.

Low Tidings - A Fort Defense One Shot

Low Tidings is a defensive one shot for Old School Essentials. Chiefly inspired by Fritz Lieber's legendary, picaresque Fafhrd and Gray Mouser series of stories, tales whose weird, fantastic, sword-swinging and roguish charm in turn inspired Dungeons and Dragons and feature in AD&D's famous Appendix N. Low Tidings is a something of mini-module, condensed to 4 sides of A5 but very playable.

On a bleak and savage coast a pair of sorcerous sisters vie for the patronage of a pelagic god-wizard. Now, promised magical favours, gems and more by a talking gull, your party find themselves fighting through the night - besieged in a crumbling sea-fort, defending an eldritch ritual against a crazed witch-queen's army of blood-thirsty pirates and worse!

The Sea Witch by Frank Frazetta (anyone who speaks of a bootleg edition of this adventure is a liar)

In this adventure you will find:

• A hand drawn fortress map, ready for your players to repair, barricade and rig with tricks and traps.
• A 12 hour timeline detailing the events of the siege - assaults, infiltration, ruses, magical attacks and the things and places revealed by the receding tide.
• An IRL scavenger hunt mini-game!

While written with the world of Nehwon in mind, Low Tidings be easily adapted to any fantasy campaign setting. It can be quite challenging and is not recommended for new DMs. Low Tidings was written with OSE stats in mind and was submitted to the Appx. N Jam who provided me with the title. Illustrations by William Stout, Map by me. (Special thanks to the DCC module 'Acting Up in Lankhmar' by Michael Curtis, my favourite one shot, for inspiring me to write Low Tidings). While not perfect, this was a long and tricky write so I hope you enjoy it.

Six Savage Lairs

Lo, warriors! In ill caverns, places-weird and ruins-haunted, squat and gibber; lair-lurks, foul fiends, sea-things and stooped troglodytes, all atop spilling heaps of forgotten treasures. So leap, spring cunning and battle-crazed - broadsword humming - indue your thick-thewed frames in blood, gold - glory and legend!

Here are six, free, lair-style dungeons, inspired by the 3lbb and written for an OD&D lair design contest. They are lurid, savage and pulpy. The layout was predetermined quite stringently. Most notably, each lair must fit on a single side of A5. This proved a fun, albeit tricky, constraint. My first attempt; Caveman Lair, 15%, though terse, spilled over this single side limit, - though Diogenes of Dio's Dungeon did ascribe it "vance-quality" (while discussing its disqualification). See:

😏

Remember these are Lairs, different but closely related to 'true' dungeons. While largely occupied by a single 'monster' type, do not assume these are not places of tension and of simmering conflict that your players cannot explore and exploit. Some of the lairs are linked narratively but can be played in any order, making them a good fit for sandbox campaigns or linked one-shots. Each lair should be a good fit for a single session of play. 

Also four of the lairs belong to cavemen 💪

Herein you shall find:

• The Lair of the Cavemen (Oopulg's Tribe), suffering in a sea-cave under the yoke of savage merman conquerors.
• The Lair of the Mermen, a hub of imperial conquest, led by an imperious queen blinded to the traitors in her midst by the loss of her daughter. 
• The Lair of the Brigands who took her, and the foul fate they are suffering at the hand of their disinterested and capricious dark-lord.
• The Lair of the Cavewomen (Lankimbirizin's Tribe), hunted by chaotic humanoids and led by a dying magic-user who seeks to a new chief to lead his tribe to safety. 
• The Lair of the Cavemen (Big Borguluu's Raiders), a vicious band of raiders encamped in a ruined minster that holds its own secrets. 
• The Lair of the Cavemen (Bruug and Eewallaaa's Tribes), two tribes joined by the pairing of the chief and chieftainess suffer clashing cultures and the moral predations of two human missionaries.

Most art by Frank Frazetta with maps by Dyson Logos and Watabou's dungeon generator.