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Even if it were not written with the Kingmaker AP in mind (pretty obvious, seeing as I'm GMing it right now!), this is a glorious and beautiful collection of ten well-concieved and thoroughly developed critters suitable for throwing at any adventurer bold enough to venture into a temperate forest.
Each critter comes with a full-colour illustration and a description suitable for reading out to your players when they first catch sight of it. Full stats are given with hyperlinks to the PFSRD should you need reminding of precisely what each obscure ability lets it do, as well as explanations of special abilities laid out clearly. Ecology, combat tactics and more are covered in the copious notes provided here for you to read through, as well as what local lore and other sources may say about the creature in question.
GMs who prefer printed notes will be pleased to find that each monster fills two or three pages, so there are no awkward split pages to contend with. The full-colour illustration is provided on a page by itself, so you can hold them up with a 'this is what you see' - it's nice to be able to avoid giving the creature name (which isn't on that page) on first introduction, or even when it appears again.
As if all this wasn't enough, there are 2-sided 'flat' paper miniatures for each monster provided at the end.
Good innovative monsters, well presented with thoughtful backgrounds - it doesn't matter if you are running Kingmaker or not, if your adventures ever wander through forests this is worth a look.
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I have a secret: I hate the 'number-crunching' aspects of character generation, especially in systems which have pre-conceived ideas of particular groupings into which you have to shoehorn that delightful concept that sprang into your mind when someone proposed the game that's being planned... even more so if it's an unfamiliar ruleset so I don't know how to do half the things that I want my new guy to have or be able to do.
Here's a product which can help. It takes you by the hand and leads you through the process of creating a Wizard character for the Pathfinder RPG, explaining each stage and the ramifications of your choices. The really neat thing is, it doesn't just let you set up your starting character, it takes you through levelling up, level by level right up to level 20. Now, you will probably have figured out how Wizard characters work by then, even so it is very useful in ensuring that you do not miss anything out. No forgetting which levels you gain feats or special abilities, it's all there.
There are also handy worksheets for skills, feats and your familiar, along with a spell list and experience point log - good if you want to track it in detail (although the assumption seems to be that you only ever get experience for killing monsters...). Now I once had a GM who'd only give you experience if you gave him an itemised list of what you reckoned you'd earned it for - this would have been perfect!
One thing I'm not sure about: do I use this online or print it out? It's replete with hyperlinks to the PFSRD where every term is explained, which suggests reading this on my computer, so I can refer to anything that puzzles me or on which I want more information before I make a choice. Yet it has generous spaces in which to make notes... but it's not set up with form fields to type into, so if I want to scribble on it, I'll need to hit the printer. Now, as a confirmed non-writer (longhand is beyond me since a stroke) I do know a sneaky way to make Acrobat let me type on most PDFs anyway - use the 'Comment' button and select Add Text Comment - but you need to be quite precise in positioning your cursor before you begin to type.
Whichever, this is a beautiful and thorough tool to aid particularly new players or those for whom the number-crunching parts of character generation and development are a bit of a chore.
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Waking up to a full-blown riot of brawling hoodlums in what used to be a quiet suburban street, this is a gripping almost stream-of-consciousness story (albeit told in the third party) that sweeps you into the quest to discover just what the heck has happened and why the whole world seems to have gone mad.
Slipping forwards and back between the 'present' and the protagonist's past, the story builds up layer upon layer. The writing is a fast casual style, breathless in places, that gives the feeling of a peep into an individual's life, warts (and bottles of Jim Beam) and all; showing how even someone you might write off as a drunken bum can rise - albeit slowly and at risk of losing his boxers - to the occasion when circumstances demand, a very human and rounded character that you soon find yourself caring about, wanting to survive if not actually make a difference to the mess his world has become.
Role-players seeking a contemporary apocalypse could do worse than draw inspiration from this story - whilst a little fantastical to the scientific mind there's an underlying plausibility that would make it work as a concept upon which to build your plot.
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This is a neat collection of sketches that can be used to denote different sections of your notes, or just to fill in blank space, to give your material a professional look - these days with computer technology at your finger tips, even if you do not intend to publish you can give a professional spin to handouts and other game materials... and who knows, maybe your best adventures and other resources may end up on here - and in my review pile!
The icons are presented in uniform style as roundels, in grey scale, looking like ink over pencil sketches. There are thirteen of them and they are fairly generic - you decide their significance, if any, as suits your needs.
A nice little collection at reasonable cost which will enhance any fantasy materials that you are putting together for your own use or for publication.
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The Introduction contains the usual 'what is role playing?' section, but takes an unusual approach - one I've often used as it happens, comparing role-playing to improvisational drama. Of course role-playing has one significant difference from improv: rules! Even here the approach is civilised, so good it's worth repeating:-
"The rules are only here to litigate scenes in the Episode. Rules do not dictate plot and they never take over the actors."
The roles of Director (GM) and Actors (the players and their characters) are explained, along with the way that the Act Ten Role Playing Network has been constructed as an integral resource for participants in the game. Neat! The terminology for talking about the game draws on the early improv analogy, trending to movie-speak rather than to the stage, and it is used well and consistently throughout.
Straight on to Traits, which begins the character creation process. Traits are used to define the character in terms of the way they act, and to build backstory. Some are positive and cost points, others are negative and give you some instead. Most have in-game mechanical advantages as well as guidelines on how that trait might affect the way the character behaves. In line with the underlying philosophy of this game, there's a reminder that these rules, like all the rest, are guidelines to be used or amended as appropriate: the core thing is to create precisely the character YOU want to play! On the downside, there's a tendency to use terminology and refer to game mechanics that haven't been introduced yet which makes things a bit confusing on the first read-through.
Next comes Stats, again important in defining your character as well as in determining how well he accomplishes tasks. They are divided into physical and mental stats, with a few 'sub-stats' - that is, ones which are derived from other stats. These can be chosen using a point-buy system, or if you prefer you can get the dice out.
We then move on to Skills. Again these go towards defining the character: what they are naturally good at, what they have picked up and what they have learned through formal study or training. There are some core skills that everyone can do to a greater or lesser extent, as well as others that you need to have found out at least something about (i.e. put points into!) before you have a chance of using them. Almost all of the skills are quite generic and so can be shaded depending on the setting you wish to use, although a contemporary/near-future setting is assumed.
Character creation covered, next comes Task Resolution, a detailed look at the mechanics underlying what your character can attempt to do during play. Fundamentally, there are two types of task resolution termed active and inactive. Active task resolution happens when there is an opposed roll - someone is actively hindering you, fighting you or otherwise contesting your attempt to do something. In inactive task resolution your roll is made against an assigned target number, and it is used when you are just doing something that may or may not succeed: baking a cake or climbing a wall. In both cases, the player does the same thing: add the appropriate stat and skill, roll 1d10 and apply any modifiers. In active task resolution, whoever is contesting what the player is doing makes his own roll. Occasionally a percentage roll will be called for instead, this is usually a straight roll without modifiers and is used for a simple succeed/fail - with the more complex task resolutions, an overflow/underflow mechanism is used to determine how well you succeeded (a really tasty cake!) or how badly you failed (you didn't only burn the cake, you set the kitchen alight!). Like many task resolution systems it sounds complex but becomes quite straitforward once you get the dice out and try it - and this one is more intuitive than most.
The rest of this chapter looks at details such as the flow of time in the game, how to determine target numbers and modifiers, and the use of mana and anima - derived stats that can be used to augment your regular capabilities in times of need. This is followed by a chapter on the all-important subject of Combat. This is well-laid out and explains things in detail and clearly with comments to aid Directors in running combat as well as information for players as to what they need to do. Again, complexities in reading become clearer once you try a few sample combats. Whilst basic combat is straightforward, loads of options can be added in to make it more detailed and to permit characters to do, well, just about anything that they want to do. Then the final 'rules' chapter deals with Experience, both the awarding thereof and what you can do with it. Rather neatly, acquiring new skills is done in one of two ways: by figuring it out for yourself or learning it from a teacher. If a character wishes to teach another, there is a teaching skill and associated mechanics to determine how good a job he does, which affects the roll the character learning must make to see if he actually has learned anything - it's not just a case of spending experience points and writing a new skill on the character sheet!
Next comes Creating a Character. You may think that this has already been covered in the preceding 'rules' chapters, but this is a detailed walk-through of the process, very useful when beginning to play the game or when introducing new players to an established group. It also demonstrates something called a 'tuning build' - a system for customising and improving the character throughout the course of the game. This is a fine example of teaching, complete with annotated advice on what to write on the character sheet.
The next chapter is Directing A Series, and is jam-packed with helpful advice for intending Directors (and, for that matter, experienced Game Masters!). This is where the 'improv performance' theme comes into its own, advising Directors to view their game as a TV show and to lift concepts of timing, pace, and flow of events from that medium. An example session of play is used to highlight the points made earlier in the chapter. This section winds up with a collection of useful tables and tips.
Finally there is a sneak-peek into the world of Division, the forthcoming first setting for Act Ten. It is a near-future where technology is all-pervasive and corporations have seemingly replaced democratic government across the world. Psychic powers are on the rise along with augmented reality and other such meldings of humanity and technology. Many are content, but there are always the rebels... The pervading look and feel of this new world is presented in comic-book style, very effectively. There's a time-line from 2008 to the future of 2025, details of life in this brave new world... and also of those who stand against the omipresent corporations and demand the right to be free as well as of the corporations themselves and the major players within them. This rounds out with a look at the world itself and the people you'll find there, including relevant game mechanics to enable you to play them. Then there are details of the devices and equipment available, legally and otherwise. Although this is merely a preview, there's plenty to enable the inventive Director to make a start...
For that is what this is, a start. Good, comprehensive core rules, but generic. You could run pretty any sort of game you like, but are left to get on with devising it for yourself. An excellent beginning and a thoroughly well-considered ruleset - and that's a wrap, for now.
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OK, heavy weapons are not the first things that spring to mind when you think of superheroes (most of them are more lethal than that with their powers!), however when the likes of Godzilla or a supervillain is on the rampage local law enforcement or the military are liable to reach for anything from machine guns to missiles and beyond to nuclear weapons and even planet busting bombs..
We start off with rules for targeting and effect before looking at some more specific weapons: machine guns, artillery, missiles, nuclear weapons and a wonderful catch-all, super-science weapons. For each weapon type there is a fair bit of specific detail to enable you to adjudicate and describe their effects when used.
A lot of this is quite over-the-top, verging on weapons of mass destruction, and may have no place in your game. In a way, it's not really what superheroes are all about. However, it is easy to imagine how panicked governments - particularly if they are unaware of the capabilities of any superheroes contemplating coming to their rescue - might reach for their arsenal of heavy weapons when under threat. Indeed, I can imagine a scenario in which the superheroes are as much engaged in pleading with local authorities not to use them as they are in dealing with the threat that caused their deployment. Certain superpowers also may be employed to nullify or curtail the effects of weapons used by terrified authorities too... hmm. There's more scope here than I thought when I first opened the product, always a good sign.
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In a delightful romp through political intrigue, this adventure proves that politics, Great City style, are not in the least bit boring! An ancient but lapsed custom of calling an open meeting called a tribunal to solve major issues facing the City has been revived to discuss the Sink - as 'experts' the characters (assuming that they have played through at least some of the earlier adventures in the series) are called as witnesses.
Of course, there's much more to it than that, and a heady mix of celebration, assassination and a good chase will keep the characters occupied in ways more fitting to an adventurer that participating in a political talking shop... yet for those who relish a good intrigue or debate, there is plenty of that too, clearly set out with the appropriate mechanics to abstract the process yet enable the characters to have an influence on the outcome if they so wish.
Old acquaintences and new are woven deftly into events, which will increase the feeling of being at the centre of affairs and beginning to wield some real influence over the course of events. Everything is laid out clearly for the GM, with information, maps, stat blocks and other game mechanics provided just where they are needed. It's quite amazing how much is packed into a few pages, and yet the adventure can - and indeed for best effect should - be played out in a single session. A fine addition to the saga of the Great City, and an excellent demonstration of how to weave politics into your plot whilst keeping it exciting.
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In this 'Blueprint' 0one Games's interpretation of the Nautilus, first described by Jules Verne and immortalised in several movies, is presented. Suitable for any steampunk or industrial fantasy game, it's a fine vessel with two main decks and a 'cockpit' deck and a delightful shape - as shown in the side elevation - that is subtly fish-like but complete with a nautilus shell of steel plates clapped on the side!
The cockpit is roomy, with a control room and cabins for senior officers. The main deck is where most of the crew live and work, the captain's quarters and guest rooms are here as well as workshops, a chart room and the like. The lower deck is where the engines and fuel stores are to be found. The Chief Engineer lives here too, there's also a dining room and the torpedoes... There is plenty of scope for some underwater adventure here, whether you choose to give the submarine to the party or to the bad guys they are trying to defeat.
The normal technological artistry is shown, 0one's command of PDF technology allowing various options to be accessed via the 'Control the Dungeon' button... although one might question the need for a compass direction in a vessel that moves around underwater!
As a bonus, you also get a poster map of the Nautilus which you can print out on several A4 sheets and stick together or take the single-page version to a printshop to have a proper poster made. This comes on a parchment-style background, like an old nautical chart, but you can turn that off to have the poster printed in brown/sepia on white instead. You also can choose if you want text displayed or have it plain.
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If you have ever thought that an airship would be a neat place to stage part of an adventure, now's your chance.
This product contains a selection of plans based around a 800ft monster airship, the sort that boded fair to become the transportation of the future in the 1920s... then the Hindenburg burned to a cinder and people switched to aircraft instead. This one, however, can fly on in your imagination and your games.
The plans start with an overview of the entire airship: side view, section, front and rear views. There are struts to enable access to the main body of the airship, primarily intended for inspections of the giant gasbags that provide the airship's lift. These can be seen in the side section view. Passengers never see these in the normal course of events but they can make for exciting chases and combats where it is vital to avoid even a single spark! Then there is more detail on the gondola, where passengers and crew travel. Equipped for 20 people - presumably both crew and passengers as I cannot see any crew quarters separate from the main sleeping chambers and common lounge area - there are limited bathroom facilities and space for pilot and navigator and a kitchen as well as the lounge already mentioned. There are side elevations, and logitudinal and transverse sections of the gondola as well as the more familiar plan view. Particularly wealthy adventurers might even own the airship, others may travel as passengers.
The options available include 'blueprint' or black and white line art, along with gids (hex or square, in feet or metric scale), whether or not you want to see the furniture, a settable north pointer (not much use, airships move!) and so on, controlled via 0one's standard 'Rule the Dungeon' feature. Everything is drawn in vector graphics so can be scaled up or down without image degradation.
An airship may be quite a specialised thing to have a plan for, but when your game calls for one - well, this is a nice one... although budding Indiana Joneses will have to supply their own aircraft, there isn't one here!
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This product is a magnificent resource for any GM who has struggled when devising the lists of loot available to characters, all the more because it is so well organised and focussed on just the soon-to-be-robbed property of Aberrations. Further types of monster are promised for further releases in this series.
Organised by average party level - a good way to ensure that the characters neither get too powerful too fast nor fail to be adequately rewarded for their efforts - suggestions are made for the different amounts of treasure available: incidental (less than standard), standard, double or triple. For each category you can then roll a d6 (or choose from the list) to find out precisely what is in that particular treasure: coins, gems and other items of value. Naturally, if you have a particular item you want to introduce to your game, you can either add it to what's there, or use it to replace an equivalent item in that cache if balance is particularly important for you.
It should be a real boon to anyone who is pressed for time or short on ideas for loot, and this promises to be a series worth collecting by any GM who enjoys creating their own adventures and encounters.
I just have one quibble. Treasure comes in HOARDS not HORDES! Get that right and I shall be tempted to make this a 5-star product, rather than a 4-star one.... and within 24 hours a corrected version was uploaded! Well done, & I am good to my word... have your 5 stars :)
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This is an interesting adventure for low-level characters, managing to involve them in political intrigue that's probably well above their pay grade whilst providing opportunities for a modicum of investigation and an appropriate level of combat. It's set within the Kobold Press campaign world, but could be relocated if you have a suitable town that has developed quite a high level of technology within its fantasy setting.
The introduction to events sweeps the characters into the action pretty much without the option, but ample reasons are provided for them to want to follow up rather than retire to the nearest tavern for a well-earned ale! From there investigation leads them further into the affair...
An interesting aspect of this adventure is the focus on the different races and their diverse attitudes, approaches and interests. At times this can get quite polarised, and more thoughtful characters will be challenged to see beyond stereotypes to view individuals as more than merely 'a kobold' or 'a dwarf' but as people with their own unique views and place within the world.
Various options are provided to aid you in bringing the adventure to a conclusion... and there are several options as to how what the characters do here can be built into further activities within your campaign. You may even wish to use this to start off a whole campaign with beginning characters, or slot it in quite early as you tie them into wider activities within the locale. Neat, and well presented with some delightful illustrations.
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Here is a magnificent Victorian-style house, standing in its own grounds, and presented in exquisite detail. It's up to you whether it is as creepy as the Addams Family home or warm and welcoming...
In this product, 0one Games have taken their customary mastery of PDF technology and used it to present a mapset that is easy to customise to your needs. Working at individual page level or via the 'Rule the Dungeon' feature to customise the entire mapset at one go, there are a lot of things that you can change. There is a choice of hex grid, square grid, metric grid or none at all. You can decide which way is North, and whether or not you want it to be shown. You can have furnished or bare rooms... and of course you can decide whether you want 'blueprints' (white lines on a blue background like a classic technical drawing) or black lines on white.
The house itself is three stories high, and has a driveway leading up to it as well as a quite extensive garden. As well as a view of each level, including extensive cellars and the rooftop, there is a plan view that shows the house in its grounds including an outbuilding (probably, in the terminology of the day, a 'motor-house') and a 'front view' (or 'elevation' in architect's parlance). There are also several pages you can use to make notes about the various locations within the house and grounds. US players will note the European nomenclature: we have a ground floor, first floor and second floor. It's not difficult to see what is what, though.
Overall, it's a delightful house and I'd be happy to live there... until, that is, you populate it with ghosts and other unspeakable things appropriate to a horror game!
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Do you have those annoying sort of players who seemingly have memorised every monster and so as soon as the first few words of description pass your lips they rattle off the name and known weaknesses of the critter before a single die is rolled?
(If not, you've never had me at your table, a side-effect of an eidetic memory & reading a LOT of RPG books means I have to be very careful not to be so annoying...)
A common tactic, especially if you do not have the time or inclination to make up hordes of original opponents for your characters, is the so-called 'reskinning' of monsters - changing enough of a standard monster so that he's mechanically the same but looks and feels like a wholly new critter. Even that can be quite taxing and requires a good understanding of the game mechanics underlying monster design.
So here, nicely ordered by CR, are a host of variant monsters all ready to line up against your characters. Each entry gives the name of the new variant with the original monster in brackets - you'll need to use this book in conjuction with the Bestiaries, because the core statistics are not given here. The rest of the entry covers what is different about the variant monster, but gives you both evocative descriptions to help you paint the scene for your players as well as apposite game mechanics, new abilities and so on.
A valuable resource if you like a bit of variety at your table!
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If you like zombies, you are going to love this one!
It's a fine pen & ink style sketch, coloured discretely in shades of red (on his check flannel shirt and also for flesh showing through a battered pale skin and blood around his mouth from the last meal) which proves remarkably effective and atmospheric.
This would make a fine cover for a zombie game or scenario, an image that grabs the imagination and draws you in to the core theme of ravaging hordes of zombies that have to be defeated at all costs.
Shame about the potty-mouth title, a few coy asterisks do not obscure obscenity. Fortunately the licence terms only require credit in the shape of the artist's name, should you use this picture in a commercial product, you do not need to give the image's title.
It's enough to make me write something zombie-related, just so I can use such a great picture!
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Publisher Reply: |
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The title is a reference to the Pigface album. I couldn't pass up an opportunity like that for wordplay. |
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Whilst like the preceding adventures in the Basic Paths series this one is aimed particularly at beginning players and GMs, this is both aimed at slightly more experienced (4th Level) characters and is set in the same township, with the intention that the characters are beginning to get to know, and hopefully care about, the locals.
The adventure opens with a scream, as a lone orc attacks the settlement of Gafolweed. A single orc is no trouble to a whole party of adventurers, but it soon becomes apparently that there are hordes of orcs out there all on the warpath, and the characters' help will soon be enlisted to deal with the problem. And we're off...
Background is vivid and engaging, be it the backstory to the adventure provided for the GM, the overview of Gafolweed, or the details of locations and individuals encountered along the way. Particularly of note are sidebars designed to highlight and explain features of the rules for novice GMs - even the most experienced will find snippets of mechanics that will enhance their game knowledge - for example, a clear description of the art of 'reskinning' a familiar monster to give it a wholly-new aspect without having to go to the trouble of designing one from the bottom up.
The adventure doesn't shy away from things that novices might find hard, like mass combat, but settles down to explain what needs to be done clearly and concisely. Worth studying in advance, but even a new GM should find it possible to run hordes of orcs and equally-numerous defending cavalry confidently.
As the adventure unfolds, there is plenty to do and a quite surprising route to discovering and combatting the evil that has come to roost in the neighbourhood. Everything is presented clearly, with discussion of the options available and catering for many of the things that players might do that could so easily catch an unprepared or new GM on the hop!
In classic style, this adventure moves smoothly from the initial set-up and a good brawl, through a journey along which information, resources and even allies can be gathered to wind up with a dungeon-delve and climactic showdown. There's a lot to see and do throughout, with interaction and investigation balanced well with combat. The dungeon is no mere backdrop to the climatic fight, either, just getting there provides a good challenge with plenty of the things all good dungeons have (traps, monsters, tricky bits...) even before you get to the final showdown.
Everything is laid out clearly and where you're going to need it, with some flavourful illustrations, delightful maps and battlemaps for the main brawls. There are even paper 'standee' miniatures for the main opposition. Overall a well-presented adventure that is a delight to run... and ought to be fun from the other side of the screen.
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