Mutants of the Vast Swamp is a short open-world adventure set in Cormyr, by Travis Legge, JM Woiak, and Heather Shinn.

Disclaimer: We were provided with a free digital copy of this product.

Story

Taking place in the territory of the Vast Swamp in Faerun, near Cormyr, a strange event draws many eyes towards a place that is normally avoided. A star has seemingly fallen from the sky, a rare portent that has people scrambling to figure out its meaning, as well as its location, as whatever remains of it is surely precious and will fetch a good price in the right hands.

The “star” is, in fact, an eldritch meteor; while several disparate groups like the Purple Dragon Knights, the local lizardmen, and even a pair of trolls (as well as the player party, of course) are converging towards it, the first one to arrive and claim ownership of the star is a Tiefling Warlock by the name of Misery. Living deep in the swamps as a hermit, she saw the eldritch energies emanating from the meteor warp and mutate a local bullywug tribe; eager to claim such strange powers, she set herself up as their queen, and isn’t very keen on letting someone else take the star away from her.

While technically the adventure is open-ended, and the players can choose to cooperate with Misery and let her rule her little slice of swamp (at least for now, since as I mentioned many others are rapidly closing in), in reality you’ll most likely meet a few encounters while traversing the swamp before facing off against her. We also don’t get a lot of details about what exactly the meteor is; it’s just a weird chunk of rock that mutates things around it. While that means that you can easily slot this short swamp-crawl pretty much anywhere and add your own flavour (maybe it’s a piece of an old illithid ship that’s about to crash-land, or something even more alien), I’d like to have some more background on it.

The adventure is meant for a 2nd level party, and is pretty straightforward, making it a good choice for new players that have played a few more “directed” one shots and are ready to handle both a level 2 character, and a bit more freedom in the world.

Layout, Art, &Misc

The layout is the standard double-column, with the book split into four chapters: Intro, Travel (going through the swamp), Misery’s Court, and a final chapter with new items and creatures. As for art, there are some very nice pieces interspersed throughout by J.M. Woiak and Heather Shinn, giving it a very old-school feel; the creature statblocks in particular all have portraits as well, looking more like little character sheets rather than just the usual statblocks. There are also several battle maps, as well as some pages you can print out with descriptions on how to fold and cut them to make little huts to put on the maps, which is pretty fun.

Final Thoughts

Mutants of the Vast Swamp is a fun, short little adventure that has an old-school feel that many will appreciate; and it is also available in a physical, softcover form.

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