In 2025 I’m reviewing zungeon zines. They’re stream of consciousness and unedited critiques, just like Bathtub Reviews, but they’ll be a little briefer. The goal here is a little different: I want to spotlight what a craft-based, just-do-it approach to module writing can do.

Taken By The Blood Men is a 1 page zungeon for B/X-like games (with versions for Into the Odd, 5e, and Tunnels and Trolls) by Andreas Folkesten. In it, you venture in to a dungeon populated by the titular Blood Men, perhaps to prevent the ritual to return them to a waiting prisoner’s body.

I say perhaps, because the first striking thing about this tiny module is that the framing changes drastically depending on the hook you choose — You might be Lennart’s lover, prisoner, or simply stumble upon the dungeon unawares. These hooks are stellar, changing the experience of the module from one where you’re assisting the villain, to an escape room, to a survival horror module. It pretty seamlessly absorbs these different approaches. It’s pretty cool.

These hooks, and the timed ritual, together are what really make the module tick. You have 7 turns before the ritual is performed, unless it’s interrupted. I love these as a core drive for a small module, rather than a random encounter table Very cool. Because of this, a lot of the rooms are waiting in stasis — for example, the ritual assumes that the Amalia is ready to be sacrificed, unless you first find her in room 6, in which case she has to escaped. A lot of people hate a dungeon where everyone is in stasis until someone walks into the room, but I think this is forgivable in a dungeon only 8 rooms and 1 page long.

I adore the literal blood-men — not what I expected, and the logical extensions that they bring — can’t talk so they write in blood, vulnerable to vampire bats so half the dungeon is barred to them. This is a cool centrepiece to the modules, for me, but I’d love for the characters here to be given a little more meat — I don’t really know how the mute Lennart-clones interact or what they might communicate, nor do I Amalia, the only other character. But, another sentence or two on those two subjects and I wouldn’t have any concerns.

Overall, Taken By the Blood Men is a neat little dungeon to drop onto your campaign map. It’s a night of play, it’s fun, and it has a variety of options for how to incorporate it into your game. If you want a small module, are happy to improvise and rely heavily on your reaction rolls, then this is a fun inclusion.

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