Barrowmaze: My favorite module...ever.

Barrowmaze is a self-published megadungeon from Greg Gillespie, originally published in 2012 for the Labyrinth Lord B/X retroclone rule set. It has since seen a revision with Barrowmaze Complete from a successful Kickstarter along with a conversion to the 5E ruleset. I first became aware of this adventure after I returned to the hobby in 2013. Back then I had no concept of the OSR jumping back into playing Pathfinder at the time, but boy oh boy when I got my copy of Barrowmaze Complete not soon after, my world was changed.

Barrowmaze centers around the rustic backwater town of Helix located in a far flung duchy. South of Helix are the Barrowmoors, multiple burial mounds nestled in a swamp a few hours from town. Somewhere within these mounds rests Barrowmaze, a forgotten and ancient labyrinth that houses multiple catacombs and crypts, the engine of this adventure is that something is driving the dead to rise from the crypts, something of power which has brought numerous rival adventuring group, along with competing factions into play. There is a lot to work with here for a DM.

I'll do my best to avoid spoilers, but there are numerous factions at work, along with the grand undead theme (a favorite D&D enemy of mine), all posted in a familiar and believable setting. It just feels so real, the atmosphere that is conveyed by Greg Gillespie is just outstanding: I love the mood of the darkened-quiet halls full of treasure, surprise and danger. What really bowled me over was the art....my god, this takes me back to my childhood growing up reading and playing the D&D Rules Cyclopedia (BECMI) version of the game. It is just so fantastic and really brings this module to life, along with illustrations to show your players, just the chef's kiss of amazing. Really you have to see for yourself, my words as a DM will never do justice for what I can show my players with the fantastic art included here.

There is also a lot to work with in the regional setting. Two smaller towns and larger city are detailed along with important NPC's, particularly those located in Helix, again art is included here. Some of the references and names are a bit tongue-in-cheek with some notable pop culture references, but I am buying all of this. My players tend to do this on their own with anything I've created and it will only help to make the NPC's more memorable and bring personality in play. Unique treasures abound as well once the players start to plunder the crypts, including runic tablets which serve as a deck of many things type of occurrence should your players stumble across those. Gillespie also included unique spells, magical items along with a full bestiary with each creature getting art, take note literally every other D&D publisher, this is how it is done. Art is all top notch and in theme throughout the book, this was clearly a work of love and passion and it pays in spades. I should note that some of the general monsters included can be found with use of the free Labyrinth Lord companion available through Drive-thru RPG.

I've had this book on my shelf for several years now, having read and reread it on multiple occasions. My greatest crime as a DM is not running this for my group yet, but....there is still time....talking my players into running this using Labyrinth Lord or Old-School Essentials is a different matter, but I suppose that gives me a reason to pick up the 5E conversion of this really outstanding book. Greg Gillespie has followed produced a couple of other modules along the same line as well: Forbidden Caverns of Archaia (a Keep on the Borderlands homage) and Highfell: The Drifting Dungeon. Both are equally great and follow a different theme unique to the respective book. For now, though, I'll continue to secretly load Barrowmaze into Roll20, sooner or later my players are going to find it.