Its more an outline than a developed campaign, but its free, so give it a try!

Bad, lame, stupid, and dumb. Basically, this tries to make unarmed combat viable in a system with ranged weapons, and unsurprisingly it fails miserably. Why each culture/race/large group would evolve a unique version of unarmed combat without any technological or social imperative is ignored by the writers.

Worst of all, even if you decide to run Jackie Chan Meets Mutants, the mechanics themselves are incredibly clumsy.

Don't waste your money.

Just some NPC stats and other support stuff, but at least it was free. Don't bother unless you bought the supp it supports.

Nice assortment of small arms weapons for d20 WWII buffs. Could also be used for people who use a pulp d20 or other similar time setting from the first half of the 20th century. Some gun afficionados will likely quibble with the amount of damage a particular gun does, or its range, but that is for them to decide. Not a lot of meat, but no faults as a resource.

Though not as detailed a ship design system as others (CORPS VDS, Traveller FFS), Blood and Space 2: Starship Construction Manual has some interesting notes on the process of designing a ship, and adds a few skills and character classes to help this. That said, the actual options it enumerates for designing a ship are somewhat limited.

Excellent addition to the mod D20 system. Excellent for fleshing out dark shady corners of your city.

Free, useful, and Zombies. Pretty much says it all.

Free, useful, and Zombies. Pretty much says it all.

A decent enough product, but it is handicapped by a single undetailed map of the super-fortress. This makes using the physicval facility difficult, and is rather surprising since the detailed layout of factions within the fortress suggests a PC involvement in an uprising, or preventing same.

Art was OK, but it was just a bunch of orcs basically. But they're good for an instant horde, and they're free.

This review originally appeared in The Digital Front Podcast - Episode 05 and Purple Duck Productions. http://thedigitalfront.com/2007/10/18/tdf_05/ http://purpleduckcreations.blogspot.com/2007/10/digital-front-review-corner-wizards-and.html

Review - Wizards and Wiseguys by Mark Gedak

Wizards and Wiseguys is a 23 page PDF from Rpgobjects written by Mike Lafferty. It is an alternate history setting based on the modern and fantasy SRDs. It is available from rpgobjects.com, rpgnow.com and drivethrurpg.com for $3.95. The download has both a print-friendly (portrait) and screen version (in landscape with colour elements) and both are extensively bookmarked.

This product is divided into two main section; the first 17 or so pages look at the changes to the world's history as well as providing a number of adventure hooks, and the last 6 or so pages of mechanics suggestions and non-player characters. The main premise of the product is that the 1908 Tunguska event/explosion was actually the result a magical explosion that exposed the real world to the world of Shadow (as similar in Urban Arcana). Magic is reborn into the modern world and the product looks at how it effects events during 1908-1912 (pre-WWI), 1912-1928 (WWI), 1918-1920 (the Dragon war), 1920's (roaring 20's and prohibition). The influence of magic across these times is gradual so that major events still occur but they are flavoured by the magic that now exists. Each section of time has a couple pages of history, GM notes on running that section and three or four adventure hooks.

During the emergence of magic has profound effects on the political climate of the world with China collapsing into anarchy, Britain repelled form some of its colonies and several areas that have long sought independence achieve it with magic. The use of magic is criminalized in several areas as magic is seen as the work of devils or used by criminals. During the great war, German mystics manipulate Mexican officials into invading America to keep them out of the European theatre. Allies and Axis powers are divided on the sorts of magic they wield. Griffins and wyvern are employed as mounts in the war and clay golems are used to assist the allied ground troops. As the Kaiser's army began to fall, he negotiated with 4 red dragons to lend combat support. During the dragon war era, warfare focus on man versus the creatures of shadow. With the dragons defeated, society enters the 20s and America enters prohibition. Overall the history is imaginative yet plausible so that all of history veers of the tracks.

The rule section is kind of a mixed bag. This campaign is in someways similar to Urban Arcana but instead of using the Modern SRD for magic and monsters it uses the Fantasy SRD. Much of the rules information is done in the form of a suggested list of changes. It lists classes and skills to exclude from the modern ruleset and suggests changes to some of the modern spells. I like the inclusion of rune charms (to resist magical attacks) and rune slugs (to harm creatures of magic). I really dislike that the fantasy spell list is being used instead of the modern one. I really liked the concept that all high magic could only be accomplished through ritual in modern. As this is written, a 12th level character (3rd/9th mage) has access to 9th level DnD spells; this significantly ramps up the power available in a d20 modern campaign (this also would be 5 levels before a wizard in a magic-rich fantasy world would achieve such skill). There are a number of caveats about spell level and campaign year and school availability. The product closes with npc stats for main characters from the history.

There are a couple of issues of consistency in the text such as where both the allies and axis have the upper hand when it comes to transmutation magic. The setting is really interesting but I'm not comfortable with how the mechanics are developed. By providing a short list of changes, not providing advanced classes for the many organizations listed in the history and trying to integrate the fantasy SRD it just seems like the product leaves all the heavy lifting to the GM. I think if I choose to run a Wizards and Wiseguys campaign I would drop all reference to the fantasy SRD and still with the rules for magic and magic items in the Modern Arcana book or SRD.

Legends of Excalibur – Thumbs up!

King Arthur is the center of one of the most powerful stories in literature. The tale has powerful elements of magic, knights, ladies, monsters etc and a great deal of atmosphere. It resounds through our culture for gamers and non gamers in a way that is denied to 'modern' settings. If you or your players have a wish to explore Arthurian Britain in chivalric 13th century Europe this is a good place to start. I have had a deep interest in this product both for D20 and True20. Its first edition was, for me, one of the big settings for D20. Who doesn't want to have a knight of the table round? I've read a couple of versions of the Arthur story but I always sort of got lost in the size of the tale. By the time I reached the gaming table my head was full of ideas. Yet there was always so much that the players wanted that I hadn't thought through. Legends of Excalibur has really beefed up the material available to me. Charles Rice has done the monumental job of converting the setting and central characters to gaming.

The True20 pdf has 84 pages of material with a clear view of Chivalric 13 century life. It has great maps, historic artwork, and a lot of crunch for True20. I like crunch.

6 social classes – think background feats etc 13 Archetypes Adept – Druid, Enchantress, Hedge Mage, Hermit, Priest Expert – Fool, Minstrel, Noble, Robber Baron, Skald Warrior – Crusader, Knight Marauder – Yeoman

(For more descriptions of the various components, I recommend the review by Treebore)

If you have any experience with the tales of Camelot, the archetypes jump out at you, as does the societal tension in the setting. The struggle between paganism and Christianity is central – this is not necessarily a 'religion light' story. Of course you can always water down elements to suit your game table but Charles has given you something to work with if you want to play a more edgy, historic game. The conflict makes it very interesting to role play. Motives and beliefs for Druid's and Priests, Hermits and Hedge Mages are not the same. The tales of Arthur were complicated by the biases and experience of real life. Tensions heighten the realism and give the DM material to twist game plots. True20 is a wonderful fit for the setting. The D20 version has a supplementary honour system but here conviction points can tie effortlessly to chivalric faith. Character motivation and rewards are really well suited for True20. If you have experienced a level of confusion with some of the free form True20 rules, the strength of setting is a welcome structure.

I most liked the close fit of this setting to rule system.

The artwork is very nice and the sample maps are very evocative and solid. They have the authenticity of being real world settings and will improve any historic game. The pdf has a Town, City, and Henge – good examples for your own work. The writing is well done and the author has a lot to draw from. If you like King Arthur you might have differences of opinion on some of the details but Charles will save you a boatload of work.

My chief criticism is probably in the number of stated out monsters. There are 35 monster descriptions with a good variety but they don't have stat blocks. Most are available in standard monster collections but it would have been nice to see more fully printed. Only the 2 new and original monsters have statistics.

I'd recommend this to anyone interested in an historic setting from the 13th century onwards. It is a tasteful, broad survey with a great framework for you to develop. Both D20 and True20 versions are, of course, very similar. The True20 version is a little shorter because it fits so well. If you want the magic, romance and intrigue of Arthurian Britain this is a good choice.

A good springboard for creativity. This generator has helped me with quick missions for one-night games as well as giving me ideas for ongoing campaigns. For a buck twenty-five, I'd say it's worth it.

While I do not use d20, this product is rather good.

They have a huge area to work with, and unlike the usually disjointed efforts in this area, this product actually ties things together. While $20 is a lot for a pdf, this one delivers fair value.

With owning so many of the eAdventure tilesets now, it has become a nightmare to set the tiles out on a table/floor to design a floorplan. This set helps me immensely for several reasons

1) I don't have to look through several hundred tiles for the right one 2) I am not limiting my adventure are to the table/floor I am designing on, so I am inadvertantly making bigger grander maps, which I think is good 3) The printout gives a grid with the floorplan required in the position on the grid it lays - this feature alone is priceless, as I was getting sick of making my own grid and laboriously filling it in with the tile ref number 4) You can make dungeon handout maps (suitably doctored to be incorrect as well for the players to get lost/ambushed ! ) and save them, make subtle changes etc etc 5) The eFuture Icebase is also supported on here, which was an unexpected welcome addition.

I would like to have seen the option of making the map slightly smaller, then the small size( to view an overall huge map more easily), and slightly larger than the large size as particularly with a 'Details' set it is often hard to make out what the 'detail' in question actually is.

I still haven?t worked out how to print the report in landscape mode which is slightly annoying.

I also own a lot of the Wilderness Tiles which are not supported here ( not even the 6x 6 entrances which would at least be a nice interim quickfix for now ?), also all of the spaceship type-eFuture Tiles, of which none of the latters starship floorplans are on here.

Reading reviews of a year ago, this is supposedly being worked around, but wow ? that was a YEAR ago ! Any news on this ? <br><br> <b>LIKED</b>: Easy to use tool, with a printout of what tiles you need, and where they all fit, as well as the professional looking final map<br><br><b>DISLIKED</b>: If you make the map too wide it gets cut off during printing. Also still no update on the Wilderness and Spaceship tiles being incorporated, after a year of waiting.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Excellent<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Very Satisfied<br>