(Review) Cube World #23: Screaming Lake

 Name: Cube World #23: Screaming Lake

Author: Zak Sabbath

What is it: According to Zak, “A very LofFP 17th century one-shot (?) adventure.”

The (?) means quite a lot.

In the text Zak describes it as “Maybe a one-shot. It’s one of those “investigate for a while in a normal place, then eventually go to a completely weird place with an apocalyptic monster” adventures”

It is found on Zak’s Store on his blog, dndwithpornstars, and all these Cube World Modules mentioned later in this review are individually purchasable.

*(In the upper right-hand corner, read through, pick what you like, and read how to order.)*

Screaming Lake could fit easily into many campaigns, and is very simple and evocative in execution, with the actual conflict very manageable and the directions left fluid based on player actions. There is not much for the DM to memorize, and all the details that are present are concise and follow logically, with the events linearly progressing as the players become involved. There is a lot of space to allow the players to wander and look for clues, and good players will add a great deal of detail with their investigation, whether delaying the story or progressing at a good pace, there is interactions that will speed up players that are confused or wasting time.

While on first inspection this module might seem to be very simple, small, and linear, that is the way Zak writes adventures in many cases when it comes to cube world, with the understanding he has garnered through play. All the Cube World modules have come straight from his GM notebooks, and because of this, are great insight as to what he considers when playing and refereeing. This is very evident from the fact that through reports and descriptions, Zak actually plays the modules or setting books he releases, testing and tweaking them before putting them up for sale. Suffice to say, if you have enjoyed any of his other work, this Cube World module will be right at home.

Screaming Lake is particularly important because in the timeline of Vornheim, A Red and Pleasant Land, Death Frost Doom, Maze of the Blue Medusa, Frostbitten and Mutilated, and soon Demon City, there is one book that got cancelled, namely, Violence in the Nympharium.

Violence in the Nympharium was to be the book after Demon City.

Now all we have is the Cube World modules that connect it together loosely, and many of the research and images on the three Nympharium tagged posts on his blog discuss ideas and adventures that are further explored only in Cube World supplements, but would have been included in Nympharium. Some Cube World adventures could fit in with or are for use in other work discussed above, and some are scrapped material from those works, or further exploration done post-publishing.

Examples of published works expanded by cube world supplements include Four-Dimensional Rooms for ARAPL, other sisters of Psytharella and Thrace and Moroshka, and locations between The Devouring Lands and Gaxen Kane and other locations mentioned throughout Zak’s work on Brocelieande are all included in various Cube World PDFs. Additionally, if you go to Fredricks and Fraiser or Saatchi gallery, and marvel at Zak’s art, much of it will be very familiar to anyone who has read any of his work, or even just looked at the illustrations.

And of course, Zak was a painter first.

Maze of the Blue Medusa’s Medusa Maze is the most cited example of this, but Vornheim’s art features Mapped House, ARAPL has Putting Lewis Carroll Down Here Gets Him Out of My Head, Demon City has Foetal God, Stoya (As Werewolf), Choking Ghosts, In the Horror Light, and She's Trouble, She's Trouble, She's Trouble, and Frostbitten and Mutilated has amazons_contrast_ref2, all of which are paintings used for art in their respective books.

This is all to say that Violence in the Nympharium was going to be an RPG supplement based on the 98-painting series Zak did much earlier than most of the paintings mentioned above, a series titled 100 Girls and 100 Octopuses.

Visually the module contains original art and older work repurposed or fully described, just like most all of Zak’s work, and looking at his blog posts on Nympharium alongside the text at the end of Cube World #23 will reveal that many other modules/supplements in Cube World are fragments of this book that got cancelled/delayed.

Cube World #25 - The barony that has the temple that has the room that has the toad demons,

Cube World # 18 - Gérome (The Time Thieves), St Paulin Priory, Hrothgar Grasp, and Vast Shrike Crossing,

Cube World #9- Temple of the Mantis and Wargenfels,

Cube World #17 – Portal To Limbo and Fourm d’Ambert Tower,

Cube World #4 – Tower of the Octophant,

Cube World #12 - The Isle of Massive Crustaceans and The Isle of Lava Trolls,

Cube World #13 - The Hyperlarvae of Triplet Velve,

Cube World #38 Three Adventures At Sea,

Cube World #39 Tomb of the Spider God and The Idiot Well,

Cube World #40 In The Rolling Green,

Cube World #41 In The Land of the Southern Daimyos,

Cube World #42 The Cat The Sphinx and the Spinneskelle,

Cube World #43 The Stair and the Vizier's Secret,

Cube World #44 Traps And Abelard Goatslayer and the Temple of Angra Mainyu,

Cube World #45 Warmutants of the Cube & Abominations and the Murder Hole,

Cube World #46 Goblins and MURDER,

Cube World #47 The Pentamorph and more,

Cube World #48 Two Cults, Cube World #49 Two Gimmicky Dungeons (genizah! Hurrah!),

Cube World #50 Hell on Earth,

Cube World #51 Four Elementals and a Giant's Gut,

Cube World #52 The Fox Witch and the Freckled Hog,

Cube World #53 Quiet Places, Cube World,

#54 Crawling Lake and the Ghost Army,

and Cube World #55 Defense of the Ruined City.

These are all individual Nympharium chambers, or in some case multiples. Each of these adventures would have culminated in or contained one of the 98 paintings, and this means that so far, we only have about 29 of the supposed 98 Nympharium chambers.

From a gameplay perspective, this module uses the best of LotFP and creates a great reason to use Summon, one of the best/most interesting spells in the Rules and Magic book. The stats and mechanical actions therein are simple and understandable, and memorization is very de-emphasized, with sections like the Set-up, Investigating, asking around, and other characters the players might deduce as pertinent to the case or communicate with. All this is within the first three pages, and once the players have investigated around town, if they do not continue to move, a small fight will ensue, with easily usable stats for the NPC enemies. Following this is a description of the namesake Screaming Lake and the castle built on an island in its center. There is a very streamlined map of the castle alongside what happens and where. This involves the aforementioned apocalyptic monster and the inclusion of a significant painting from 100 girls and 100 octopuses. The final two pages explains how this individual module could be separated from the Nympharium implications, but also mentions that this is where the work was originally intended.

 

So, is it worth ten dollars?

I would say that anyone who enjoyed any of Zak’s published works could find some Cube World that could be used in their favorite work, and anyone who wants more content for these works would need to look no further than something in the store. *(If in doubt, Email him, he will answer!)* However, Screaming Lake is an interesting case, as are the rest of the Nympharium intended works, because they are missing the published work as a backbone, and are just fragments of what they could have been. They are simple referee notes with some clarifying paragraphs for people running them, and so I do not think they are as accessible as some of the other dungeons or encounters put out in his store. Four-Dimensional rooms and the other creatures and places enumerated in Cube #10, Red and Pleasant Miscellany is one of these very good examples of work that will further an already purchased book, and things like Cube #6 Ortheque Teeming and Cube #21 Fortress on the Goblin Sea are both excellent adventures that could be added to any fantasy LotFP campaign.This work is still pretty strong, but as Zak says at the end of this module, this “was originally all going to be explained in the LotFP module ​Violence in the Nympharium ​ but that got cancelled. So you can do whatever you want and explain how this image of this woman and this octopus ended up in the 17th Century any way you like. For now it’s just weird treasure”. I think for right now, many of the modules listed above as Nympharium-related are just that, weird treasure, including Screaming Lake.Because of this, I think the module is overall well written, but not as spectacular or useful to anyone who wants more content for an already published book, and there are plenty examples of both in the store. For ten dollars though, it is still a good buy if you are interested in this cancelled book, or if you like quick, one shot, weird fantasy adventures.

More reviews to come, and if you are interested in any individual Cube World please comment and I will carefully read it and discuss it.

I am still learning LOTFP, but have ALL current Cube World modules, and have skimmed or read all of them. Eventually I plan to playtest some or all of them as well, and that will also be put somewhere, and long-form reviews/discussion about full length books of Zak and LOTFP will be created eventually. Any questions posed will be answered, so please feel free to raise any query in the comments!

Thank you for reading!

 

(Art by Zak S)