Review Of New Mutant Future Adventure "The Ruins of Woebrook"

Those who frequent my little slice of the Wastelands here are no doubt also fans and visitors to A Field Guide to Doomsday run by the ever-genial Justin Davis. Justin has populated the Mutant Future with dozens -- nay -- hundreds of creatures, and his blog has released two very well-done B-movie critter compendiums:  "Devastation Drive-In" and "Spawn of Devastation Drive-In."  This week, he compiled his notes and behind-the-scenes materials from his Don't Mess With Wrexus home campaign into a 16-page Mutant Future outing titled "The Ruins of Woebrook AKA Fane of the Frostgod." The adventure is free and available to download right darn now.

The exploratory adventure takes place in a nearly-buried ruin found deep in a fetid swamp near Hugeston. This monument to Ancient capitalism is isolated by distance and hard-to-traverse terrain...meaning it's a PERFECT lure for curious post-apocalyptic scavengers. There is no "plotline" to speak of in the adventure, but rather an opportunity to go exploring in one of the bastions of Ancient civilization: the mall. However, this is no mere abandoned hulk. The mall is inhabited by an odd assortment of crazed service bots, a sandlewood-scented arachnid, and (my favorite) a bigoted pile of algae. As the PCs move from store to store and encounter to encounter, they may discover the cult-like creatures lurking at the heart of the mall. But that's a secret I'll leave you to discover on your own. (You'll never look at breakfast pastry the same way again.)

"The Ruins of Woebrook" is a very tightly constructed piece of adventuring. I'm a huge fan of the standard fantasy RPG dungeon crawl, and Justin's taken this trope and transplanted it nicely into the Mutant Future. Some great encounters and fabulous Ancient treasures await those who can find Woebrook and escape with their lives. Sniderman says check it out!