A Page of Scrolls is an adventure that serves an adventure that serves as part one for more to come. As an adventure product I'll try to get by without any spoilers to players while still giving a general impression of what it's like.
The backstory of this book is such: Big evil guy takes over the city and the citizens spend almost two decades ousting him in an insurgency campaign. However now the city is getting an influx of refugees fleeing from some threat in a nearby civilization. The PCs are there for reasons looking for adventure.
The first bit is probably the most difficult of the adventure to manage. It starts off with the PCs helping to free a pickpocket but its in a way that the PCs have to be altruistic enough to step into things that's not their own business. With a bunch of typical adventurer types the scene plays out to make at least one party member want to get involved. but I've had plenty of tables where the party would just avoid something like this. Overall this is the fault of not having any real assumptions that the PCs have to fill in. They don't start off with an inherent direction and aren't in any direct danger so the pieces that kick off the entire story is somewhat avoidable. On the flip side the PCs have to definitely not be Lawful Stupid or they're liable to burn the whole town to the ground.
Other than that the adventure is fairly basic. As the first instance of an adventure path it is lacking a few things. Mostly more locations to interact with and a guide to leveling for those of us who don't do leveling by XP. It also feels much more like a module over the beginning of an adventure path. I would say that with a normal party this all will take three sessions to complete the adventure even if they blow a lot of time roleplaying. Its basically a go in the dungeon and find a thing quest that's more complicated than it seems but still simple for the adventurers. I can definitely see it as a good generic thing for first time adventurers to get into without being overwhelmed by a bunch of story things that don't matter. This is still while giving enough details to know that the area is a lot more complicated and is capable of delivering more adventure and more complexities as time goes on.
The adventure gives you quite a bit to set the mood and flesh out details, particularly at the beginning. It also leaves room for expansion. The appendix gives you enough to work with to liven up the experience for the players. Despite needing to hit the rails hard at the beginning the city is expanded enough where you can sandbox a bit once the adventure proper is started. Once you get to dealing with the dungeon at hand the whole thing is pretty dense. I'm sure you're going to retreat to level and rest at least once. If you're running with a bunch of optimized characters the whole thing isn't terribly challenging but whenever a whole group of monsters show up there are variable amounts that the book lists so that you can up the challenge. If they get to level three though it will be a cake walk either way. Normal adventurers will be challenged a bit but nothing too stressful.
The artwork is charming for what it is. It feels very old school and more evocative than detailed. The dungeon maps definitely feel home made but not in a way that really detracts from the whole experience. There's definitely roleplaying opportunities outside for the dungeon.
Overall I like it. Its simple but can lead to a lot which is what one would expect of a 'part one' adventure. I cannot see it as the first book of an adventure path because really not much happens but it is a pretty decent module that can be used as an intro to your own adventures. You have what serves as a home base with lots of opportunities and problems which serves as great 'blank space' for more story. It has some rough edges but covers a lot of bases and gives you what you need to run a decent adventure that leads to greater things. I want to give it four out of five stars but I'll knock it up to five because really whatever adventures are further down the line makes or breaks it. Its decent and does it's job well but isn't particularly memorable, except for that it's hinting at more exciting thing and leaving threads to go there easily, whether it's further adventures from Casey Brown or something that you make up yourself.
You can find this over on Paizo.com here.
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