One of the things I love about the Throne of Eldraine set for MtG is the theme, and it’s take on fairy tales. It really is a fantastic mash up of fairy tales, Arthurian legend and the MtG universe. Did I say how gorgeous the art is?

It’s very inspiring. Especially the twisted take on fairy tales. And I love anything that inspires ideas for adventures for my campaign or even a one shot.

I’ve been meaning to create a one page dungeon (although this years competition has ended, and next years is along way off). I want to create a few and share them on here. After all practice makes perfect. I also want to combine the one page dungeon with the 5 Room Dungeon. It seems a natural fit.

The three cards that I’m using for inspiration for this adventure are Gingerbrute, Flaxen Intruder and Trapped in the tower.

Although there are some great cards to inspire objects to populate the adventure with also.

I’ve also been reading The Curse of Strahd campaign book recently and think that this twisted fairy tale idea would fit in nicely with the Barovia setting.

So based on my initial inspiration, A Goldilocks and the 3 bug bears comes to mind, as does rescuing a princess/maiden (could be a prince or some other being) from a tower that is guarded by those 3 bug bears. With the gingerbrute being the main bad guy. I also like the idea of using something like the corridor monitor as a roaming guardian in the tower.

With that brainstorming I have three locations, a cottage, a tower and the space between them. The tower can break down to another 2 locations, the stairs and the room at the top. Finally that room at the top can be split into 2. Which by my count gives me five locations.

The tower itself is surrounded by a wall of thorns. That is only broken by the cottage. So to get to the tower you have to pass through the cottage.

This poor attempt at a map is how I envision the layout.

Tarokka cards are used in Curse of Strahd “to randomly determine key aspects of the adventure.” I’d like them also to be used in this adventure. But at the moment I just can’t get that to work.

Sadly after writing the 5 Room Dungeon in Scribe, and then transferring the words into GoodNotes. I just couldn’t make it fit without cutting a lot of text. I suppose I could do that. But for the time being I’m going to put out the initial version of this as a 5 Room Adventure. When I get time I’ll try to fit it onto a single page.

The adventure is aimed at a tier 1 party. Apart from one instance I try and avoid giving quantities for monsters. I like to give a bit of wiggle room, and allow for the DM to adjust on the fly based on how the party are doing.

You can get the draft pdf of the adventure by downloading that link. I’d love some feedback. I’ve not tested the adventure. So if you get a chance to try it I’d love to hear how you got on.

UPDATE: Once Upon v2 – updated with feedback from Scott and Jacob.

Once upon v3 – updated with feedback from Duncan.