Falkrest Abbey Review

Hello All – It has been quite some time since we talked. There was this little pandemic that happened, and life got all crazy. I played a hell of a lot of D&D/OSE in that time, but kind of got discouraged with the community at large. I think there was a lot of stress going on and people were just being a bit savage online, and I didn’t like the negativity and just went off on my own. I stopped recording my games and posting to Youtube and stopped writing the blog. I just started gaming for gaming’s sake.

Times are a bit different now and I wanted to dip my toe back into the water especially since OSE is in a totally different place than when I first started writing. It has grown by leaps and bounds, products are rampant around the community, and it really has become a brand unto itself. I am proud of the community that has been built and the extremely small part I played in that construction. Anyways, enough of my prattle, lets dust off the keyboard and review a product that kicks ass.

Have you all seen Falkrest Abbey? What am I saying of course you have it is a Mithral Best Seller on DTRPG. For those of you living under a rock, you are generally missing out on, in this DM’s humble opinion, the best dealing in gaming. For ONE SINGLE DOLLAR, you can get this great adventure with all the trimmings. I go to my local Wawa and get a fountain drink and it is twice that amount. So for half a fountain drink in price, one can obtain a true gem of an adventure. You are crazy to not buy it. 

What do you get, you might ask? Well, quite a bit for a single dollar. A forty-page dungeon suited for low level play. The maps are done in an extremely clean fashion that allows the DM to immediately know what is going on. The layout of the entire book is in a fashion (now well respected) akin to the main OSE products and can only be also described as clean. To sum it up, this book is a DMs best friend as far as easy of use. I could easily run this without reading it beforehand and still be fine.

The content of the adventure is simple, but evocative. The abbey, once a holy place, was corrupted by a former abbot and it led to its ruin. The book comes with a few hooks if you want to use them and plenty of rumors about the abbey. I think this adventure is a great 2nd adventure for a party as characters around level two will find it appropriate. Also, I think the best hook can be done after a first adventure. The abbey is known for its healing waters, this gives you the opportunity to have it needed by the PCs. In the first adventure did one of your PCs get poisoned, diseased, or even die? Maybe a quest to get magical healing waters to bring them back. Maybe an NPC that helped them early on took a near fatal wound and the clock is ticking, only the magical waters of the abbey can save them. You can see the adventures write themselves with this.

The abbey itself and its background are generic enough that it can be squeezed into any setting, and you really could go gonzo with it if you like. Why not change the mythology slightly and this is a corrupted Jedi temple in a galaxy far, far away? Or a rumored safe place away from the toxic and irradiated wastelands in which they travel. With minor tweaking, you can use this in a variety of formats. Since this runs on the OSE/BX engine, it is about to be ported into White Star, Mutant Future, etc. 

Final say, get it if you have not already. If you have it, run it.

To purchase Falkrest Abbey click HERE.

The Chronicles of Amherth Setting

                  I was encouraged to check out Small Niche Press’ “The Chronicles of Amherth” setting. This was originally created for Labyrinth Lord which makes it perfectly compatible with all BX/OSE products specifically, and OSR products as a whole. DrivethruRPG had a small press sale and I thought it would be the perfect time to try these products out. The PDF itself is 77 pages and comes with a free adventure all for the cost of $1.49. Once I read it, I liked is so much I invested in the POD which came in at a staggering $5.99.

                Amherth is what I would call a classic D&D setting. The world is humancentric, magic is considered rare (1 in 10,000 people), and it has an ancient past with civilizations that have long since left the world. The book has several different cultures throughout the world each with notes about their creative inspirations. An example might be the Empire of Xanne, which is a Roman inspired area with an Emperor that apparently cannot die. Another example is Guildeland which use to be a part of the Empire but broke free to be a merchant paradise. This was inspired by the merchant princes in the Italian Renaissance. Each entry has a few pages dedicated to fleshing out the environment of the area which give you a good idea of what is going on, but enough room to make you own ideas. I think there is where the strength of the product lays, enough details for clarity, but a lot of room to grow.

                Beyond the world description of the various areas, you get the following (from Drivethru):

-The Gods of Amherth: Twelve detailed gods and how they fit into the setting.

-History of the Ancients: Details of the powerful beings who almost destroyed the world and the legacy they left behind.

-The Known World of Amherth: A detailed overview of the setting's major realms and regions, including the Duchy of Valnwall. (Gazetteer-style guidebooks to follow!)

-New Flora: Twelve new magical plants.

-New Monsters: 40 fully detailed races and monsters for use in your Labyrinth Lord campaign.

-New Magic Items: 22 new magic items.

                If you are the type of person that wants more information, there are three books that expand on the details of the material. There are two guidebooks to specific city-state regions of the world and one book dedicated the Ghoul Lands which is an area dominated by the undead that frequently likes to invade neighboring territory. I believe the PDFs are currently under a $1, with one being pay what you want. Overall, I am quite impressed with this little setting, and I am planning to use this as my setting in my upcoming games.

If you are looking for the book click HERE. 

PS: Small Niche Press also makes WWII: Operation Whitebox a World War II ruleset based on Swords & Wizardry. I really like it too and the main PDF is pay what you want. You should take a look.

I run Old School Essentials weekly and post our games to YouTube, click HERE to see.

Like my work? Follow me on Facebook here.

Spell & Blade - OSR Retainers Review

 

            This is a quick review of a cool product by Mesozoic Press called Spell & Blade OSR Retainers. I am reviewing both the digital and physical product. What is the product? This solves the problem of having to come up with retainers on the fly. Each 1^st level retainer comes on its own card with stats, gear, personality, appearance, and a quirk. It includes the following: 15 Clerics, 10 Dwarves, 10 Elves, 20 Fighters, 10 Halflings, 15 Magic-Users, and 20 Thieves. As you can imagine this makes creating rival adventuring parties easier too by just dealing out a hand. Need a quick thieves guild representative, pull one. Party wants to hire on some added muscle, let them draw and find out.

One of the main uses I see for this is quick character generation too. When I go back to face-to-face gaming, if I get a last-minute addition to the party, pull a card, and let them have at it. I used to run a gaming club at the college where I teach, and I would often have players show up with little to no experience. I had pre-made characters that took time to create and would just give them to new players. At the end of the session, I would allow them to keep the character or make their own PC and transfer the XP and gold acquired in the first session. This deck makes it that easier to do that then ever. At the end of the session have them transfer the card to an actual sheet and you are good to go.

The Card Box

The characters are made with Old-School Essentials/BX in mind but would work for almost any OSR system with light conversion. One point that has been made, and specifically spoken to on there webpage, is that the NPCs have slightly hirer than average stats if you are a 3d6 down the line sort of person. This to me is one of the things that separates it from the official OSE Rouges Gallery. I love the quirky style of the OSE characters, but many of them are quite a bit…quirky. There is nothing wrong if that is your taste, but Spell & Blade is a bit more my speed. These NPCs reflect more of how my PCs in my party look and fit like a glove. If you are a 3d6 straight down the line sort, then these might not be for you. If you are a 4d6, drop the lowest, and place as desired type, these will work well.

Front of a Card

I am not the biggest computer whiz, but I have some experience with printing on cardstock for game materials and I do not think it would be hard to accomplish that with these files. For the time and effort though I would recommend buying the cards from DriveThruRPG. This is my first experience ordering physically anything other than books from DriveThruRPG and it was quite the success. The cards are reasonable, seem as durable as you would expect, and the box fits them nicely. If you plan to use them at the table, I recommend sleeving the cards, but other than that you are all set.

 

Back of a Card

If you want to purchase this product, click HERE.

I run Old School Essentials weekly and post our games to YouTube, click HERE to see.

Like my work? Follow me on Facebook here.

3 Great OSR Zines

I relatively recently backed/bought 3 new OSR zines and I was waiting to get all of them in so that I could do one review for all of them. That day has come, and I can say from the get-go that I enjoy all three of them and I do not regret getting any of them. Let’s not bury the lead and just get straight into it.

 

#1 – Delver

                This zine was created by James Floyd Kelly and it is specific to support the “random” Dungeon Master. The zine is a collection of random chart, tables, and other little goodies that can add flavor to your game or help with specific circumstances. Charts like, “Keeping Watch”, “Ixra’s Wondrous Tomes”, and “The Auction House” are arrayed throughout the book. Each listing has multiple charts underneath it for added detail. James also has a section in the zine for DM advice called, “The Referee Roundtable” where he passes out some knowledge from his years of gaming. Lastly, you get an entire low-level adventure called “Secret of the Shattered Fist Monastery.” This adventure is designed to be played with Old-School Essentials for 4 to 8 1^st level characters. It is a small-ish 3 level dungeon that seems perfect for a one-night starter adventure or a 4-hour convention game. It has an illustrated map and some handouts for the players. All-in-all this “zine” comes in at almost 50 pages and was more than worth the price I paid for it.

 

If you are interested in purchasing this item, please click HERE.

 

#2 – Carcass Crawler Issue #1

                Carcass Crawler, if you do not know, is the official zine of Old-School Essentials. With issue #1 Gavin Norman (and team) come up with a variety of useful add-ons to the base OSE game. All of these are completely optional but do add a lot of cool flavors to the game. So, what do you get inside? You get six new Character Classes, of which 3 are new Race-as-Class. These include some of the following, Acolyte, Goblin, and Gargantua. You also get the Character Race adjustments for the new Race-as-Class if that is your style of game. We get an entire section on adding black powder firearms to your game. Lastly, you get an option rules section that has some expanded Fighter options, a new method for using thief skills, and some advice on adjudicating thief skills. To me this is a great edition to any OSE collection, and I have already put some of these rules into play for my Tuesday night game.

 

If you are interested in purchasing this item, please click HERE.

 

#3 – Back to BasiX Compilation (1-10)

                This is both a new and old product to the scene dating back to 2017. Back to Basix was created by ThrowiGames and is in the vein of old Dragon Magazines. Each issue has a smattering of different material in it. There are always new monsters, new items, a small dungeon, and an interview with a figure from the community. People like Frank Mentzer, David Cook, and Erol Otus all offer some insights into the creation of the hobby along with some interesting stories. I admit that I really enjoyed reading these again because it made me feel like I was young again. Getting a copy of Dragon going home and cracking it open to see all the different stuff this month. As the issues increase so does the page count and the issues get longer and longer. The dungeons tend to get a bit larger, and I have already incorporated them into a sandbox I am planning on running soon. There is really something in there for everyone and it gets my highest recommendation.

 

If you are interested in purchasing this item, please click HERE.

I run Old School Essentials weekly and post our games to YouTube, click HERE to see.

Like my work? Follow me on Facebook here.

Lands of Legend OSR Toolkits

 

Do you like random charts? Do you like Mork Borg style layout? Then these are the books for you. I recently was sent a copy of Axian Spice’s Lands of Legends – Mundane and Lands of Legends – Grim.  Both books provide you with 100 random encounters (broken up into ten d10 charts) and 100 random area. The encounters and areas and reasonably generic to be used with most games, but the two different books add a bit of flavor. The Mundane book most likely has the most versatility as it could be used in almost any setting. The Grim book has a darker twist that might not be suitable to certain campaigns and fit others like a glove (I am looking at you Warhammer Fantasy). These encounters do not contain specific "monster" encounters or layouts to small dungeons. They are more like seeds for overall plotlines and interesting obstacles that the party must overcome. You will not find an entry like, "You run into D20 Kobolds hauling a chest." The entries are more unique and engaging. 

The layout for these books has a large leaning into the style department. To me, it does really look like Mork Borg and that artistic outlook. Some people absolutely love that style some favor a cleaner layout like Old-School Essentials. Taste will vary on this issue. I find that it increases the experience of reading the entries and is part of the flavor of the text. While flipping through the PDF you get a sense for how the author wants you to feel about a certain section, with the layout.

I will admit, I am not the biggest on using random tables at my game on the fly. On occasion I use them in prep, but I mostly read through them for ideas and then use the ones I like. These books are chocked full of those. Here is an example from the chart labeled Grim Civilization. “NIGHTMARISH EXECUTION. A murderous witch is about to be burned in the main square. A crowd has gathered, as many blame her of all their ills. As soon as the flames touch her, the crone curses the city, laughing and prophesying the death of all those who have gathered within the next new moon. After that, her twisted body becomes a cloud of bats, flying towards the nearest dungeon or Grim area. In the following days, the authorities might hire adventurers to investigate.” This to me is a good plot device that can be used to kick off an adventure. This starts the wheels turning in my head as to what I can do with the witch, who is the witch, or who will come for revenge because of the witch.

Overall, I think these products are good and you can get some great inspiration from the entries. According to the author, these are the first two of a series of Lands of Legends. I cannot wait to see what comes from this company.

If you want to purchase these products, please click the link HERE.

 

I run Old School Essentials weekly and post our games to YouTube, click HERE to see.

Like my work? Follow me on Facebook here.

In the Shadow of Tower Silveraxe Review

 

Have you seen this module? It is a bit of the alright.

 

This zine was a part of Zinequest III from this past year and it is the type of module that I love. It hits the low to mid-levels of your favorite fantasy-based RPG (OSE), it is a sandbox, and it is wonderfully organized. This is akin to Thunder Rift of days-gone-by with a small setting that is infinitely expandable. Coming in at 64 pages it is jammed with wall-to-wall dungeon delving action with roughly 15 locations to explore. The module has a just enough backstory to push the DM off in the right direction but allow them to do their own thing with it. For me these would be low-prep dungeons to run, and you can even take the dungeons and sprinkle them in another setting if you wanted.

The basics of the setting is that at the heart of the area is a dwarven settlement. The area was once occupied by and ancient race that is no longer with us. They left a great tower in the woods that the elves dedicated to protecting. For some reason, the creatures of the great woods are now fleeing and that is leading to conflict with the local settlers. Throughout the area is old ruins and places of power to explore and there is even a plot brewing under the surface if the players want to engage with it. There are numerous rumor charts for different areas and the players are truly free to go where the please and seek their fortune. This is certainly going to go into my circulation at some point.

The book is $15 and comes with the PDF. You can also tack on $3 more and get a lovely map of the region printed out as a small poster. My hats off to Jacob Fleming for this little piece of brilliance. You can purchase the physical copy at https://gelatinouscubism.bigcartel.com/ or you can get the PDF by clicking HERE.

I run Old School Essentials weekly and post our games to YouTube, click HERE to see.

Like my work? Follow me on Facebook here.

The Isle of the Plangent Mage Review

The Isle of the Plangent Mage

By Donn Stroud

                I am going to get this out of the way in the beginning, I love this adventure. Not that I did not love the other two that I have reviewed so far, but this one fits my exact GM style. This, to me, is not an adventure, but a mini-campaign in the style of Keep on the Borderlands. It is designed for characters in the 3^rd – 5^th level range with the appropriate old school caveat that encounters are not balanced. It is hard to know where to start on this one, because I like so much, but I also do not want to give away crucial details of the adventure. In general, there is a seaside town, and it has the support of a local Magic-User and his wife. Both have gone missing, and some strange occurrences have started to happen, like sea life beaching itself regularly. The DM has several hooks provided to get the players to the town and searching, the rest is up to them.

                The adventure is set around the town of Imbrich and anyone who has read their Lovecraft will see another obvious connection with a seaside village. The town had formed a relationship the local Magic-User, Cetus, who ran local lighthouses. Cetus used the lighthouses and the grounds underneath them for his experiments with both sea life and sound. You get a complete work up of the local village complete with notable locations and personalities. This can serve as your party’s home base as they delve into the various locales of the setting. Several of the villagers are noted as willing to pay for certain items or information from Cetus’ grounds. An example might be that the local blacksmith wants some of Cetus’ ever-burning logs. This gives the players even more reason to venture into the locations and find these items for the locals.
                There are several locations that the parties can explore that each have their own feel, dangers, and rewards. There are a series of caves along the coast, a place called Darksand Isle just offshore, the isle has two separate Lighthouses that can be explored as well. Then you get the Magic-User’s Undertower, which his underground domicile and laboratory. This Undertower is eight levels deep and certainly qualifies as a dungeon. Each level generally has about six to ten locations in them, so it will take the players a bit of time to explore. Strange beings lurk through these halls along with strange devices imagined by Cetus himself.

                As for the book itself, it has the same quality layout that Old School Essentials is becoming known for throughout the industry. Maps are clearly readable and accessible without excessive page flips. The bullet-point format allows a GM to easily run this off the cuff, but a read through before would not hurt. The art is brilliant and colorful, it brings the setting to life. This is also a bit of a unique setting. There is a lovely nautical feel throughout the entire book. If you are looking for a classic sandbox that is not a typical dungeon, then you have found it. 

               I think this is a great example of a sandbox adventure. There is not set destination that the players must go, but they get to make their own choices about what to explore. There is not a “quest” per se, but there is a story to what has happened at this town and it unfolds as the players gather information. You can plunk this little town into almost any setting, and it will blend in with the background seamlessly, the only thing you need is a coastline. I give this this my highest recommendation and think everyone should check this out.

Click here to buy The Isle of the Plangent Mage

DriveThruRPG is currently having GM's Day Sale click HERE to see the deals.

I run Old School Essentials weekly and post our games to YouTube, click HERE to see.

Like my work? Follow me on Facebook here.

The Incandescent Grottoes Review

The Incandescent Grottoes

By Gavin Norman

 A bubbling stream cascades into a hole in the earth, leading to a series of underground watercourses and scintillating grottoes. Adventurers who delve within may discover odd mosses and fungi, a ruined temple complex, and the lair of a crystal-eating dream dragon.

                This is the next installment of adventures from Old School Essentials creator Gavin Norman. This adventure is for beginning characters of 1^st – 2^nd level. It is designed with challenges that are way above a 1^st level character’s ability, thus the characters will have to play smart or die quickly. The format of the book seems to be standardized and resembles Halls of the Blood King. The maps are incredibly functional, and this adventure would be simple to run with little prep and straight from the book.

                There is no over-arching plot in this adventure, but a couple of key factions that have cross purposes in the dungeon. Examples of these factions are a Dream Dragon who has their lair in the Grottoes, a Necromancer looking for knowledge, and even a Cult who has run on hard times. This dungeon does not have the gonzo-like features of Halls of the Blood King, but a more classic fantasy approach with a lot of whimsy. Norman tends to write in an almost fairy-tale like manner and the creativity is abundant. It feels like a child’s storybook with meat. Just when the whimsy of the setting is taking you in, your characters catch a glance of something that is just a bit not right. They then only discover some concept, item, room, or monster that is deeply disturbing. It combines a lot of what these kind f stories are expected to be, cautionary tales. Adventurers can profit greatly from entering these halls, but the more they travel the more likely they are to die, or worse.

                This has a hugely similar feel to me as A Hole in the Oak. I would say if you liked that adventure you are almost guaranteed to enjoy this one as well. If you are a fan of Norman’s Dolmenwood setting this adventure will fit in perfectly. The art style in the book reflects the tone and nature of the adventure with a magical and fae-realm quality. The adventure itself is great for first time OSR players to give them a taste of what a classic adventure feels like, but it has all the modern sensibilities as far as layout, structure, and production value. I give this one a 5 out of 5 if you are in the market for a dark fairy-tale dungeon crawl. This would be a great product to do for a short campaign or even a convention, as long as you focused just on one aspect of the dungeon.

Click here to buy The Incandescent Grottoes

DriveThruRPG is currently having GM's Day Sale click HERE to see the deals.

Like my work? Follow me on Facebook here.

Halls of the Blood King Review

Halls of the Blood King

By Diogo Nogueira

 

With the rising of the Blood Moon, the accursed abode of the Blood King returns to this world. The lord of all vampires comes to claim the blood that is owed to him. His halls contain treasures and secrets that would make any ambitious adventurer abandon reason and caution to seek them out. Will you risk your soul for gold and glory in the Halls of the Blood King?

                With OSE releasing all of its adventures today from the latest Kickstarter, I figured I would go ahead and start reviewing them and seeing if they are worth the purchase.

                This adventure is a bit different from what I have seen so far from Old School Essentials. Halls of the Blood King is certainly not a “boot-it and loot-it” adventure. This adventure is a bit more subtle if you want to get everything out of it. This adventure will require the players to use their heads, sneak, and parley if they do not want to get slaughtered. I feel this has a lot of the great things about good Lamentations of the Flame Princess modules, without a lot of the troubling things that can sometimes appear in them. Overall, I like the adventure and it is well thought out and put together, but what were you expecting from OSE?

                Halls of the Blood King is made for adventurers of 3^rd – 5^th level (though if the party is smaller you might be able to get away with slightly higher) in which they are venturing forth into the manor house of the Blood King. Who exactly is the Blood King? He is the first vampire ever that all other vampires come from. His manor house hops from dimension to dimension where he can inspect the local vampires and collect his blood tax. The book gives several quite dissimilar hooks to get the PCs involved in this plot, which is nice so that you can tailor it to your setting. Once on the grounds of the manor the PCs are thrust into a strange world with different factions vying for different goals. Most of the NPCs are in fact vampires and unless the party comes quite prepared to deal with them subterfuge and parley are the ways to go. The scenario also has a built-in time limit too because the manor house is continuing to hop from location to location and the PCs most likely do not want to get caught inside. This also means the party cannot take extended time or rest to recover spells, once they head inside, they basically have what they have.

                The adventure is leaning a bit more towards the gonzo side as opposed to the classic medieval fantasy tropes. The setting reminds me more of the French Sun King’s court, then something out of Arthurian lore. The various vampires vary quite a bit in style and substance. These are not all your dark, brooding Vampire Hunter D clones, but one is a pile of red gel with eyeballs floating about. This might be amazing or terrible depending on your taste. The one thing I can say is the environment is evocative and never dull.

                As for the book itself (I am reviewing the PDF) the layout is everything you expect from OSE. The layout is concise, yet detailed. The different locations on the make highlight the important descriptors of each location. There is a lovely map of the manor house and mini-maps are provided throughout highlighting the areas in which the players currently are exploring. The PDF comes with a Virtual Table Top map for use with the various VTT programs available nowadays. This is a nice little bonus that more companies need to include. The art in the book is amazing and strikingly different from much of the OSE materials thus far. There is something with the color pallet choice that seems both alluring, yet off in some way. I will provide some examples throughout this article.

                This module is for the DM that wants something a bit different than the standard dungeon crawl. It can be easily slid into any campaign and the good thing is that it can exit just as easily. I think there will be a lot of newer DMs that really dig how different this journey can be and how nicely the book creates a mood. The adventure is designed for Old School Essentials, but can work with any OSR/D&D like game. 

You should check this out if you have not already. 

Click here to buy Halls of the Blood King

DriveThruRPG is currently having GM's Day Sale click HERE to see the deals.

Like my work? Follow me on Facebook here.

Review of The Temple of the Blood Moth

The Temple of the Blood Moth

By Jacob Butcher

Edited by Skerples

If you want a bit more science in your fantasy The Temple of the Blood Moth by Jacob Butcher is a great place to start at the price point. This 24-page, black and white module is a perfect short adventure for an extended session at a convention or a 2-4 nights delve for your weekly game. The book is designed to work with your standard OSR games, like Old School Essentials, but could easily be converted to 5e with little problem. It is considered a “hard” adventure for levels 1-3 and “moderate” difficulty for levels 4-5. The layout of the book conforms to the 2-page spread motif that is popular right now. This makes for easy use at the table whether in physical form or on a PDF reader. The art and maps of the books matches the tone, which is an eerie and grotesque mutation of a common D&D type temple adventure. 

According to the zine you will find, “Inside you’ll find Monsters, original Spells, new Magic Items, and three Random Tables for Mutations, Revelations, and Madness” and it is true. The adventure has plenty of cosmic-style horror with a healthy side of body-horror. The basic premise of the plot, without spoiling the adventure is that zealots are kidnapping people for sacrifice to their abomination of a god, The Blood Moth. If you put this into your existing campaign world just know it could forever change it with the ramifications of the story. Also, the PCs can go through some intense, will say “changes”, over the course of play. This adventure is not for the faint of heart.

        The adventure is provided with several hooks to get the PCs started, in general they mostly revolve around the players finding an abandoned town with tracks leading to the temple. This leaves a lot of room for interpretation or hacking. One option given is to have the players wake up in the temple, taken as prisoners and working their way out. This would be a good option for convention play in my assessment.

One of the features that I like a lot was an escalating random encounter chart. The chart goes from one to twelve with the challenges being greater the higher the number rolled. Surface level encounters roll a d6 and the deeper you go the die grows to a d8, d10, and then 2d6. I am sure this has been used before, but this is the first time that I have seen it, so I was impressed. It comes with several handy random charts and a few new spells that fit the theme of the zine overall. 

I think this is a great zine for the $5 pdf price point. Is it perfect, no. It has some issues with the many of the combatants having the Sleep spell, some of the damage by the new creatures is a bit intense, and without modification the BBG is going to be rarely seen in any adventure. All these issues are significantly outweighed by the other quality bits you receive inside with a cool setting and theme. You can smooth out the rough edges with just a minor amount of work. It is a strong recommendation from this blogger, check it out.

Click here to buy The Temple of the Blood Moth

Like my work? Follow me on Facebook here.

Stonehell - A Megadungeon for the DM on a Budget

 

       Stonehell is one of the neo-classic OSR megadungeons that I am currently running on Roll20. This has given me ample time to study the book(s) and see how I am planning on implementing it into my current shared universe. I am trying to weave both Stonehell and Barrowmaze together into one grand cohesive area and it think it will go over well. I have already reviewed Barrowmaze and I gave it quite the kudos for its quality and abundance of play material. Stonehell and Barrowmaze are similar and vastly different in many ways. I believe with both games you are getting some amazing products, but the devil is in the details on both.

What is Stonehell?

Stonehell is a megadungeon that has been constructed in a clever manner. It was designed for Labyrinth Lord Revised, so that means it is easily compatible with all TSR/OSR products, like Old School Essentials. All dungeon levels are made up of four separate smaller dungeons that when combined make a super level. Each of the areas has its own flavor and its own unique traps and denizens, but the game has some lovely theme going on here. The full dungeon is separated into two books, basically the first 5 levels, and the last 5 levels. As the dungeons go deeper, they get not only more dangerous, but more and more unusual. There are some gonzo things that can be thrust upon the players, and the survivability of the dungeon is grueling. 

        Stonehell in the fiction was a social experiment gone wrong. It was designed to be a prison that the prisoners dug for themselves. Eventually the prison became filled with so many people, it took on a life of its own. The prisoners dug deeper to escape the prying eye of guards and rules and set up mini-domains in the dungeon’s depths. Eventually the prison was liberated, but many decided to stay, and many were driven so mad by their time they had no choice but to stay. Time has passed and it is now the gathering place for many a strange group of people and humanoids. If I had to give it a feel from a video game, I might suggest Bioshock.

        There is an overall thread/plot happening in the dungeon, in fact, besides the main plot there are a bunch of mini-plots that can be latched onto as well. The players can slowly over time see the danger Stonehell presents and choose to stop it, or just steal its riches and run far away. I find the plot to be interesting and quite fun, but I am not going to spoil it here, buy the books and find out. 

This section would be 1/4th of a level in a dungeon.

Good and the Bad

I think the biggest feature you receive with Stonehell is a lot of bang for your buck. For people that were turned off at the price tag of Barrowmaze, this is a much easier pill to swallow. The first book, Down Night-Haunted Halls, is $13 for a printed copy. The second book, Into the Heart of Hell, will run you $18 for a printed copy. You get roughly 40 dungeons for $31 which is an amazing deal. The print quality is good for the price and comes in a black and white paperback format. I love the fact that I can just take a small chunk out of these books and make my own dungeon out of it. In fact, you do not need to run Stonehell itself for this to be useful. Want to throw your players into a snake cults ancient temple? There is a dungeon for that. Want to have a dungeon out-of-time? There is a dungeon for that. Want to have a lair of trolls? There is a dungeon for that. It is a grab bag full of goodness.

The thing people might not like about this dungeon is that there are not a lot of bells and whistles as far as production value. The book is straight forward and does not have a lot of amazing art or a town with which to venture from into Stonehell. You get a basic background and a plot thread, then it is straight into the meat of the project. Not a lot of frills to go with it, but in general it is not needed for many DMs. I connected this adventure to Barrowmaze and now Bogtown is the base of operations for going into Stonehell, simple and effective. We all have a “base camp town” in our back pocket we can use for an adventure like this. Whether is a Keep on the Borderlands or a Village named Hommlet, it is easy to get around this perceived negative. 

Conclusion

Overall, you are not going to get a much better dungeon for the price. This product is for the thrifty DM, that does not want a lot of extras, but a lot of meat. I think comparing it to Barrowmaze is fair and to say they are similar products. Some people will want the car with a lot of extras and a shiny coat of paint. Some people will want an affordable car that certainly gets the job done. Let’s face it, many of us will want them both! 

Are you lacking a town to run Stonehell out of? Try Niklas Wistedt's free town HERE.

You can check out my full review of Barrowmaze by clicking HERE.

You can purchase Stonehell HERE.

Like my work? Follow me on Facebook here.

A Review For The Adventurer’s Guide to The Yol’Najj Forest

 

          Zine Quest 2 was a few months ago and many of the products are starting to reach the public. This week I received The Adventure’s Guide to the Yol’Najj Forest by Zeshio. I was not familiar with Zeshio before this project, but I was pulled in by the evocative art that many have mentioned has a Mike Mignola feel. I also knew going in that it would be a micro-setting that would be system agnostic. Other than that, I was just taking a $10 chance on a product. I am happy that I took that chance, because dollar for dollar, this was one of the best products I have purchased in a while.   

What You Get In The Book

-          37 pages including the interior of the back cover

-          3 maps (1 valley, 1 city, 1 fortress)

-          10 new pieces of gear/magic items

-          9 factions

-          15 NPC character descriptions

-          Lots of new creatures and plants

-          Plenty of lovely art

-          A ton of random charts

-          More stuff I did not mention

As you can see quite a bit is crammed into 37 pages of content. The one thing you cannot blame Zeshio for is not giving you plenty for the price of admission.

 

The Concept

                The setting for the book is about a magical forest and the surrounding areas. Besides the forrest itself there is the Cutting Fields, the Mycon Swamp, the Yol’Najj Jungle, the Votari Vertical Caverns, the Oldwood, Volax – The Crystal City, and the Crystal Crevice. Each location has a section in the book and gets a few pages of description, factions, monsters, and interesting inhabitants. The magic forest also sits on an ancient ley line that gives it power. The ley line is corrupted and causes an explosion in the mountain nearby raining magical crystals all over the area. These crystals are influencing the local flora and fauna in various ways. There are several factions in the area, and each are reacting to the magical crystals and the disease it creates, in different ways. As time goes on you can form relationships with different factions and completing missions for the factions will help in shaping the world around them.

 

Stuff I Like

                I have other articles that I talk about my love of “plug and play” mini-settings and this is just that. I could easily plug in all or part of this book into a larger campaign like Barrowmaze. If you are a reader of mine, you might have seen me compliment Thunder Rift as a product, and this is a smaller version of that. I also like that the art truly gives you a feel for the setting. Zeshio seems to have on their website different art projects and seems to be quite proficient in their craft. It would be easy to snip pictures from the PDF to create an art book for the players to look at during game or make tokens for Roll20 and the like.

                The game is completely system agnostic and I do mean completely. There is not a stat in the entire book, just suggestions on powers or effects that should happen. I find myself automatically figuring out how I would make this magic item in Old School Essentials, 5e, or even Savage Worlds. This can literally be used with any system and is like Rocketship Empires in that respect if you are familiar with that game. Here is an example of a magic effect from an item in the book.

“Those hit with the bow are stunned briefly and take decay damage. Shadowy, ethereal tendrils cover the bow.”

                In OSE, because OSR rules are a bit brutal, I would have it be a +1-bow doing d6 damage, plus a save vs paralysis or suffer an additional d6 damage from dark energies.  If I were running it in 5e, I would have the have the bow be a +2 and do D8+2 damage plus a Constitution saving throw. On a fail, the victim is slowed the next turn and takes an additional 2d8 necrotic damage. As you can see it is completely flexible with whatever system you are planning to use and since I run a host of different games it is useful in my entire collection. 

What You Might Not Like About It

                I can see that some people might not like the fact that the game is completely game agnostic. There are suggestions on how monsters and items should be, but if you really want stats, this is not the supplement for you. I have been playing RPGs and especially D&D for 30 years and coming up with things on the fly are not difficult for me, but I know some people do not want to put work into a product for which they are paying money. I understand that feeling.

                The game has a subsystem in it that needs to be tracked if the setting is to be used fully. There is a mechanic that tracks Order, Health, Chaos, and Death. The actions that players take need to be tracked and they effect how the forest and the area react. Over time the meters will build, and the forest changes and different factions will take different actions. It is a bit of a clock mechanic that allows actions to happen in the background and make the world feel more alive. To be completely fair and honest, the mechanic is not that difficult to track, but I know some people do not want to have anything extra to do when running a game.

 

Where Can You Get It

                I do not think that it is currently available in print format, outside of the people who backed the Kickstarter. It is available in PDF format for $7.99 from here. For the price I do not think you can beat it. Possibly if there is enough demand another run of the physical product can be done.

Like my work? Follow me on Facebook here.