Into the Forest Dark is a fun adventure which is included in the RPG Abstract Dungeon (148 pages at DriveThruRPG, uses a large pool of six-sided dice). To create my solo engine, I changed seven lines in table #54 in the Tales From the Sorcerer Under the Mountain (248 pages at DriveThruRPG). I created a warrior, a druid, a cleric and a rogue.

The PCs picked up the quest from Sylvist in Greenport. They were required to escort her and her wagon to Morgan’s Hollow and make the woods safe again. The spent the rest of the evening questioning travelers and they did hear about a wolf in the woods acting weird (rabies?). The next morning they started their quest. In the woods they found an abandoned/attacked caravan. The PCs moved some of the contents to Sylvist’s wagon. A bit later they ran into four wolves and a bear attacking as a team. They won that battle, but then they had to deal with four thornlings and two animated stones. They were victorious again, and a few hours later they found a tomb. They killed a golem in the first room and then discovered the ghost of a druid. The cleric attempted his Rest In Peace spell on the ghost two times and failed each time. Michelle the warrior threw her magic white star at it, but nothing happened. The druid tried to turn the ghost into a mouse, but that failed too. At this point, the rogued noticed that the ghost was now casting a shadow. He killed it with his dagger. All of the PCs were wounded/weakened. The loot was a staff of fire. So, they completed the two parts of the quest and were able to rest up in the town of Morgan’s Hollow. Give this creative RPG system a try!

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/09/100-days-of-halloween-runewild-preview.html

This preview for the Runewild Setting is worth the time to download.

Runewild Preview 1: Missus Switch, Swine Witch

PDF. 8 pages. Color cover and interior art. Price: Free.

This small 8-page book (1 cover, 1 ad, 1 page of OGL) introduces us to the Ruenwild setting I reviewed last year.

We are given a little bit of background on the Runewild (coming soon to Kickstarter!) and the witches of the Runewild.

We are also introduced to the titular Missus Switch, something known as a "Swine Hag" (yes there are stats) and a small background "Adventure," actually an adventure location. Runewild is a hex crawl-friendly setting for 5e.

For free we get a good introduction to the Runewild and Missus Switch.

This was a fun mini adventure. The visions that you had the players act out or see were a nice touch.

This is a fantastic product. It is everything that I wish Storm King's Thunder would have been. It is a hexcrawl sandbox campaign that gives just the right amount of detail to each location and significant encounter so that they can be run easily. Random encounters are very creative and well-thought-out to fit with the campaign world. Probably the best 5e Sandbox style hexcrawl game that I've seen.

Loving the content. My players are loving it as well.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2021/06/review-runewild-campaign-setting.html

Putting the Hex into hex crawls. A while back I mentioned the Runewild Campaign Setting Kickstarter. I was quite excited about it and happily backed it. I got my books and my PDFs, but it was in the middle of my Covid-19 fueled busy summer last year. The book has been sitting on my desk, mostly ignored since then.

That is a damn shame.

With all the fun I have been having with Van Richten Guide to Ravenloft lately I wanted to revisit this book and see what I can add to it from this book. The short answer? A lot. So much in fact that while there are some great ideas in this book for Ravenloft, there is a TON more for my War of the Witch Queens campaign for Basic-era (B/X, BECMI, OSE) D&D.

So for this review, I am going to refer to both the Softcover print and the PDF.

The Runewild Campaign Setting

Published by Sneak Attack Press, written by William Fischer, art by Joyce Maureira, and Cartography by Toy Fayen. 306 pages. Full-color covers and interior art. Available in PDF, Hardcover, and Softcover versions. For 5th Edition, recommended levels are 1 to 10. Available on DriveThruRPG and at your FLGS.

The PDF is fully bookmarked with hyperlinked Table of Contents.

The Runewild Campaign Setting (Runewild) is overtly a "Dark Fantasy fairy tale" campaign sandbox guide and a hex crawl in one volume. That is it in a nutshell but does not really do it justice. Best to break it up a little more.

From the introduction,

This book includes:

• A history of the Runewild and its surrounding settlements
• 150 detailed encounter areas for player characters to explore
• 8 new Backgrounds and a new Feat: Fey-Touched
• 21 unique magic items (like witch embers and the staff of clarity and confusion)
• 32 new monsters (including clockwork dwarves, fey lions, giant forest sloths, and the terrifyingly beautiful Golden Bodach)
• Detailed descriptions of the histories, motivations, and weaknesses of the witches of the Runewild, including the Whitebone Sisters; Missus Switch, the swine hag; Korthsuva, the Witch of Hours; and the Hag Queen Griselda, Mother of Ogres
• New optional rules for exploration and resting
• Advice for running a sandbox campaign
• Dozens of random tables designed to help GMs make a Runewild campaign their own

That is quite a lot. Frankly, I was just happy getting the material on the Witches of the Runewild, the rest is gravy for me. I turn the page and suddenly my "gravy" turns into another dessert course when I am introduced to the "Witch Wars." Oh. This will be fun.

The book is split into four sections, Running the Runewild, Magic of the Runewild, A Runewild Gazeteer, A Runewild Bestiary.

Running the Runewild: This section covers what the Runewild is and a bit of its history. It also introduces the idea of a Sandbox Campaign. While many gamers of a certain age will already be familiar with the idea of a sandbox (and even where the term comes from) this might be new to the majority of younger D&D players. No inditement of their experience; everyone learns something new at different times. This is a good overview of this style of play for the newer generation of players.

The advice given about Sandboxes vs. Adventure Path is solid and there is even something here that warms the cockles of my old-school heart. To quote page 10, "e of the greatest difficulties in running a sandbox-style campaign is balancing encounters. In short, there are no balanced encounters in the Runewild." Players and Characters need to get used to the idea of running away.

While this might be a shift for some 5e players, it is not a hard or difficult one. In fact, it is presented in the light of the characters have the ultimate freedom to do what they want. It is wonderful really and to quote Darkseid from the Synder Cut of Justice League, "we will use the old ways."

The Old Ways describes Runewild to a tee.

Among the "old ways" are plenty of Random Encounter tables with brief descriptions of what is encountered. Adventure Hook tables, Scenery tables, Fey prank tables, general Runewild strangeness, random animals, random NPCs, and more. For new schoolers, this will make the area feel vibrant and alive. For new schoolers, this will feel strangely homelike. Note at this point, 30 pages in, there has been very, very little in the way of stats. An encounter with a Skeleton is listed for example, but where you look up your skeleton is up to you.

We do get into Runewild Backgrounds which are 5e backgrounds. For 5e they are great really, lots of great information here, and none of them feel overpowering (they grant a skill and a tool proficiency and usually a language) for other games, you can use the native skill system (Trained would be the equivalent in 3e, free Proficiency in AD&D 1.5) or wing it. One of my favorites is a Polymorphed Animal. You used to be a normal animal and now thanks to strange magic you are human-ish. Really fun stuff.

Magic of Runewild: This section covers some more game-specific information such as some new feats, curses, and new magic items (lots of these). But the star attraction of this section has to be the Goblin Market. There is so much here and frankly, they could have published this on its own and it would have been a great seller. There are random tables of trinkets, goblin charms, treasures, and of course a list of vendors and encounters.

One thing that I felt was missing from this section? Spells. There are no new spells here.

A Runewild Gazetteer. This starts out with the hex maps of the Runewild. Numbered just like all old-school hex maps too! The hex encounters are then detailed throughout the chapter with a corresponding Challenge Rating. An improvement from older Hex crawls to be sure. So yeah the party of first-level characters can enter a CR 0 hex with no problem and come out ok. They can also enter into a CR 10 hex with the same level of difficulty (that is, none at all) but they are not going to leave it as easily! That's a hex crawl. There are no signs saying "You Must Be Level 5 or higher to Enter" if the player goes there, then their characters will pay the price.

Each hex of course has different levels of detail, but they are all given some quick bullet points to help the DM out. For example:

2. The Last Tower (CR 4)

A ghost haunts the tower Ten giant rats feast on bandit corpses in the tower’s basement The bandits carried stolen treasure

Then more details follow. NPCs are noted ad are monsters. There are maps where needed (even a player's map in a few cases!) and yes more random tables. There are 150 such encounter areas and it covers a little over 200 pages. Some encounters are a paragraph or so, others are multiple pages.

A Runewild Bestiary: Now you know I love this section. There are over 30 new monsters, monster variants, and (and this is my favorite) listings of The Witches of Runewild. This includes a bunch of various witches (mostly hags), new types of hags, and the two major and one minor covens. Again, if they had sold this separately I would have scooped it up the moment it hit DriveThru.

There is no Witch Class. Part of me is disappointed, but another part is happy since I can now do what I want with them.

The chapter and book ends with Monster Variants.

The art in this book is quite great and helps give the proper mood for this dark fairy tale land.

This is a wonderful book and resource and I am very pleased with it. My only regret with it is I wish I had picked up the Hardbound version instead!

A very useful supplement that gives you exactly what it promises. If you were curious enough about Lock and Key to read a review, then it's probably something you can use in your games.

This is one of the richest and most evocative adventure products I’ve ever purchased, overflowing with plot hooks and inventiveness and atmosphere. It's probably the best hexcrawl product I've yet read (and I've read some very good ones).

It perfectly evokes a dark faerie tale feel (but not GRIMdark). Nearly every hex, far more than a hundred of them, has something interesting going on, complete with mysteries, secrets, fascinating characters with competing agendas, etc. A variety of random tables and encounters supplement the text, and there's a bestiary of unique creatures and specific denizens, as well as treasures specific to the Runewild.

It is rich with story potential, practically begging to be played. I had originally thought I would simply mine it for ideas with my long term, ongoing wilderness campaign, but it is so excellent as a complete product I may simply save it and keep it to run mostly as envisioned, which is high praise. I have been game mastering fairly steadily since 1978 or so and it has been decades since I've run something mostly as envisioned -- even really clever writers don't get a tone quite right or make things too challenging, not challenging enough, or make it all aobut combat challenges and not enough about role-playing.

I am incredibly impressed and will be first in line to pick up anything else written by William Fischer.

Runewild is the perfect blend of folklore, fairy-tales, and D&D. All the familiar D&Disms are there, with an otherworldly twist. The magic of the Runewild feels truly magical -- mysterious, dangerous, yet rewarding if you can unravel its hidden rules.

The book itself is excellent, providing a sandbox experience that does a great job of keeping the party moving. For example, many random encounters encourage the PCs to head towards a specific location to explore, and there are quests that take the PCs far and wide. I really, really want to run this campaign.

Another module for Abstract Dungeon system, this one providing a list of common, uncommon, and rare races (along with a description and traits to select!). A great inspirational reference for either rolling for random character creation or to serve as wonderful inspiration so I don't just make myself an elf or human each time.

Thanks for the fun descriptions, I think this will make story-heavy RPGs during 2020 quarantine a lot more interesting!

As a 'light' RPGer, this is a great reference to give me a nudge toward a more creative direction when I think about class and class traits, for Abstract Dungeon system or for any RPGs in general. Provides common, uncommon, and rare classes and traits for each. I can use the rolling tables to randomly create/assign characters... but more likely this will serve as inspiration the next time I have to come up with a character, so I don't end up as "Rianwyn the Wood Elf with a lute and a bow" or "Rianwyn the Fire Mage" like usual.

Another excellent value product from this publisher. Good clear writing, story, characters, and plot hooks. Easily plugged into just about any existing setting.

A beautify crafted book covering a semi-sympathetic band of eco-terrorists, including their motivation, origin and a couple of plot hooks.

An Endzeitgeist.com review

This system neutral city supplement clocks in at 47 pages once you take away the front cover, ToC, etc. My review is based on the 7’’ x 10’’ premium softcover print version, which I received for a fair and unbiased review. The book was consequently moved up in my reviewing-queue.

So, first things first: The title and the vampire lady on the cover notwithstanding, Drakonheim is NO Ravenloft-ish gothic horror supplement or grim-dark setting. But what is it? The answer to that is slightly more complex, but before we dive into the nit and grit there, we should first discuss the formal properties.

5e GMs and Players should feel right at home when opening the book, for the full-color supplement’s formatting adheres to 5e-aesthetics, with bolded and italicized headers. Now, this is still a book that takes its system neutral claim seriously – you will not find references to monks or warlocks in the discussion of the classes of the city. Races referenced and monsters are regular enough to work with pretty much any fantasy game – hobgoblins, goblins, dragons – from 13th Age to OSR, PFRPG and 5e, you should have no issues integrating the city in your game.

Now, there is another component that should be noted: This softcover is gorgeous. I mean it. The layout is nice, but the artwork by Joyce Maureira deserves being applauded. That cover? That’s the same artist and the same quality of artwork you’ll find inside. ALL THE TIME. This is a really art-heavy book, and there are only 4 two-page spreads that don’t at least have one of these original, gorgeous pieces. Moreover, to make up for that, some spreads have multiple artworks. The fact that one talented artist provided these high-quality artworks adds a significant sense of aesthetic cohesion to the book. The cartography of the city and its environments by Tom Fayen is also high-quality, though I wished we got key-less versions in the back of the book. Still, from an aesthetic perspective, this is one damn impressive book, and if you really like good artwork, this may be worth checking out on virtue of that strength alone.

Now, in the beginning, I found myself reminded of some classic tropes: The pdf sports some context for the city of Drakonheim, though it is easily integrated: The idea is that it once was part of an empire that kinda collapsed and now may be in the process of reclaiming its former glory or falling completely apart, depending on your needs. Mythology of the city’s founders quotes dragon teeth and bones to build the city; this mythic hero, echoing in a subtle manner earliest legends, as well as a fabled cadre of heroes defeating a lich king, forfeiting their lives, echoes tropes that are much beloved in the genre.

There is one aspect regarding the backdrop of the city that is not easily ignored: When the empire that once incorporated Drakonheim fell, it took their dwarven allies with them, and to this date, a significant amount of dwarven immigrants, including their own quarter, “Little Grendus” (named after the fallen dwarven nation) resounds with obvious potential for immigrant stories and tales of cultural clash. It is, in a way, one of the smartest decisions of the book, one that connects the per se deliberately conservative age of myth with the potential for new world storytelling, for Americana, if you will – the nomenclature being close to “Little Italy” et al. is no coincidence. Of course, you can also employ the fabled dwarven skill as a twist to how Jews were treated in medieval Europe – issues of religious and cultural clash and segregation are opened in an unobtrusive way that felt plausible and mature to me.

Particularly since these aspects connect with the big selling point, the flashy component responsible for the cover: The Gray Society is a powerful force and undead are a fact of life. Wait, sounds familiar? Yes, this had me flash back, big time, to one of my all-time favorite books from 3.X – the Scarred Land’s Hollowfaust, City of Necromancers. (A book with inspired ideas, and, much like most Scarred Lands books, atrocious crunch.) So, what sets Drakonheim apart?

Well, while the Gray Society has been active for ages, a cabal of tremendous power…they only have gone public six months ago, ostensibly single-handedly saving the city from a horde of hobgoblins with their undead. Sure, more things could have turned the tide, but now, they are the big change to the way in which the city presents itself. Drakonheim is a city built, figuratively and literally, on bones (like all cities, to a degree), but the Gray Society, metaphorically, makes this consumption of life evident. Obvious. Impossible to ignore.

Here’s another smart decision: The necromancers are no altruists, but they are magical scientists; their ideology hearkens close to enlightened ideas we all (hopefully!) cherish, which obviously clash with the traditionalist faiths of the city. The clash of science and religion is interesting when charged thus; science can remain dangerous, but the contrast of faith, even one that is an empirically relevant fact, courtesy of the powers it grants (unlike faith in our world), with the undead makes for an interesting angle that also extends to the NPCs. There is no easy good/evil-dichotomy implied in the NPCs, and while the book makes use of heroic tropes in the background stories told, it ultimately, by virtue of construction of its present as complex as it does, subverts these legends, making them uncertain, the tale of the victors.

When characters coded as paladins in their looks and stories behave like violent murder-hobos and barely get off the hook, courtesy of city watch corruption and an influential family, you can’t help but question whether it’s so easy after all, whether there is not a rot inherent in the very center of such convictions. You can, arguably, ignore these subtle nuances and play Drakonheim significantly more straightforward, but personally, I considered these small notes in-between to be the true catch in the presentation of the city, in its flair. A powerful vampire among the aristocracy subsists on commoner ladies, whom he does not kill – instead, these blood brides from the poorest of stock, lead lives of luxury – so is the literal analogy of the classic, aristocratic vampire as a bloodsucker of the lower classes, here truly hurting them? He could be evil, but he doesn’t have to be. This is one of the strengths of the supplement. The writing manages to maintain this precarious balance throughout, extending even to the goblin “kingdoms” below the city. The notes on the inhabitants of the surrounding territories also are in line with this notion.

The book, thus, by virtue of the uncertainty of the past, by power of being on the verge of a new age, caught in the throes of empires crumbling, manages to employ its, on their own, classic tropes and combines them into a whole that surpasses the sum of their parts. The book also sports several adventure outlines, but compared to the nuanced and top-notch writing, these sketches, perhaps due to their relative brevity, falls behind the quality of the city supplement itself. Don’t get me wrong – the sketches themselves are diverse, and from stocking arenas to demonic killers, they are a diverse lot and usually provide at least a couple of twists, but where the collective of the city supplement aspect grabbed me with its clever totality, the same cannot be said for these. They are good and certainly helpful for the GM looking for an idea, but never reach the level of promise and complex, intriguing stories hard-coded into the city supplement section itself.

The supplement ends with a massive, 100-entry NPC-table, noting names, professions/crafts, distinguishing characteristics, races and mannerisms.

Conclusion:

Editing and formatting are top-notch, I noticed no serious hiccups. Layout adheres to a gorgeous two-column, full-color standard. As noted before, the artworks are phenomenal, and so is the cartography. As always, I suggest getting the premium print version – the gorgeous artwork definitely deserves the better print quality and color-saturation. I can’t comment on the other versions of the book.

Matthew J. Hanson’s Drakonheim is an inspired city that I frankly shouldn’t like as much as I do. I have seen the components of this supplement before, but the vivid prose and nuanced characterization and combination of tropes, the way in which this was crafted, ultimately means that it transcends what it would have been in the hands of a lesser writer. That being said, I couldn’t help but feel somewhat disappointed by the adventure-sketches, which ultimately fail to capitalize properly on the surprisingly complex questions posed by this supplement, falling into a safer terrain, one that hearkens closer to what you usually get to see in fantasy. This remains my one gripe with this otherwise interesting city sourcebook; the book would have deserved better angles there – particularly for GMs not getting the often remarkably subtle, perhaps even unconscious symbolism evoked, this could have added a whole new layer to the supplement. But that may be me. As a whole, I consider this to be well worth getting. My final verdict will hence clock in at 4.5 stars, rounded up for the context of this platform

Endzeitgeist out.

Having bought a printed copy of ‘Advanced Encounters: Terrain Toolbox’ (PFRPG-version), I’m very glad I did so. Although a bit expensive considering it is a black & white book of only 32 pages with 27 pages of content, I can highly recommend this book to any GM who likes to ‘play’ with terrain, bringing it a bit more to the foreground with elements of surprise toward player characters. Surprises that could either benefit player characters or being an added danger or hindrance. Same toward NPC’s.

The Terrain Toolbox allows the GM to make battles more interesting, the terrain becoming a kind of extra character in play. It allows the GM to modify encounters, making it more or less difficult without changing the amount or type of creatures by placing part of terrain with specific abilities.

Flowers that cause magical fatigue, explosive kegs to be used in the heat of battle, holy or unholy altar, magical ballistae, pillars that randomly chainlight electricity, roofs and floors that can collapse, zerogravity zones, etc… This book is just full of interesting ideas to make encounters just more memorable and challenging.

The layout is nice and the random art pictures are nice too. The only thing that could have been worked out better is ‘the shattered glass’ sample terrain, giving the glass an attack roll to hit players where a reflex saving throw on part of the player is way more logical and appropriate (shattered glass being a varation of caltrops).

My final verdict: I attribute 4 stars to this book.