I am *so* stupid! 'Heathen' is Heart of Darkness/Apocalypse Now!

[DNH]

I must have read this adventure (Dungeon 156, I think; one of the earliest issues anyway) three times through at least but it was only while reviewing parts of it the other day, in preparation for our next session, that I realised that the story is essentially Joseph Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness', aka Francis Ford Coppola's 'Apocalypse Now'. All the elements are there; go read it and you will see.

How did I miss that?!

 

[McTreble]

Holy crap! The second I read it, that hit me. Never saw it originally myself either!

Awesome!

 

[Tazawa]

It wasn't the first. Zenith Trajectory, in Dungeon 102 was clearly a homage to Heart of Darkness as well.

 

[Viking Bastard]

I'd welcome further details/summary.

 

[Fkewl]

It also has a resemblance to 158 Umbraforge which is the same type of adventure (get into armed camp/city) , with similar skill challenges, except it's for Scales of War

I started a SoW campaign, ran Umbraforge, then we switched to an LFR campaign and ran Heathen

I had a "du'h" moment after my players remarked on that , and i confirmed that the writer is the same for both adventures. Seems Scott Fitzgerald Gray likes to recycle ..

 

[Siberys]

The Mission: Track down another member of your organization that's gone missing in the horrible, violent wilds.

The Twist: The guy you're tracking down has gone insane! Though still honorable in a way, he has joined the enemy!

Name that story!

a. Heart of Darkness
b. Apocalypse Now
c. Heathen

Answer: d. - All of the above

It's actually in Dungeon 155, the very first 4e Dungeon. It'd probably need a heavy update, mechanically, but hey, I loves me some Heart of Darkness. I may end up using some of this.

 

[DNH]

It's got the river journey and everything. No decapitated water buffalo sacrifice though, unless I missed that somewhere.

That's right about the mechanics, Siberys. I updated all the NPCs according to the new monster maths and it seems to be working.

 

[Windjammer]

Holy crap! Thanks for the reference. It made me realize that Paizo has gone there too with one of my all time favourites of theirs:

http://paizo.com/store/byCompany/p/paizoPublishingLLC/pathfinder/modules/35E/v5748btpy82qf

And in contrast to the others cited upthread, it actually contains a very strong hint in its very title. Edit. And had I ever bothered to read the reviews on that very same page I would have hit upon this much sooner.

 

[renau1g]

I've run it. Very cool adventure IMO. Part of the reason I chose is it because it seems almost based on those two sources.

 

[Riastlin]

I'll have to check it out then. Hopefully its better than Umbraforge though since I thought that particular adventure was a bit of a trainwreck.