Note: I picked the item up on sale at $.50, despite the earlier reviewer's remarks. Figured for $.50, it wouldn't hurt any, and I was right, at $.50 it wasn't too bad. A couple pieces in here, if touched up and finished, could work nicely as a product similar to the "Clipart Critters" we have floating around here on RPGN. The first reviewer was correct in that use of the .gif format, as opposed to .tiff, .jpg, or even .bmp was a determent to the illustrations. Second, I was very disappointed in the resolution of much of the collection. The occasional image is large enough to be of good use, but many of the items are suitable only as web-graphics, their resolution being that low. Quality is about middle of the road; like I said, some pieces are decent and cleaned up could be worthwhile. Interestingly, perusing the collection I see that the cover image is no where to be found within the collection itself. Beyond that, a large assortment of images, people and monsters. Some useful, minor decorative pieces. Not bad for $.50, but glad I didn't pay more.

The art in this product is of very mixed quality. Some images are nicely done, while others are not so great. Most of the images seemed to be pencil drawings, scanned in black & white; a small selection of color images, generally not quite as well executed as the black-and-white images, are also included. Overall, I'd frankly rate the set as "mediocre," though the fact that the images are provided as GIF files (rather than JPG or PNG) and come without a PDF catalog reduces their usefulness still further. Had I known exactly what I would get before purchasing the product, I probably would have passed. Three stars for the illustration quality, reduced to two stars for distribution as GIF and with no index or catalog.

Nice artwork but very short. 2 encounters 1 trap. The trap is a bit brutal for a low level dungeon with not many clues to the correct solution. I did like the fact that they provide a screen readable version, as well as a printer friendly version. Since they are both in one pdf you may want to flip to the printer friendly section and just print that.

This is an excellent product, that will help you organize a PBEM. It is not a rules system, though, - instead you are supposed to play with D&D or whatever system you already have. It is evident that the authors have quite a lot of experience under their belts.

This product deserves a whole new section at any RPG store and it's SO amazing that we'd better invent a new name to categorize it.

As it's told at its description, it's not a ruleset nor a software, it's totaly awesome and different thing!

It's, to PBEM gaming, like play some RPG on table-top and someone gives you to test a complete set of new RPG tools like, say, a table which some device that makes your dice never fall to the floor, e-books devices for your PC sheet, etc. All things that would change your games forever but without changing a single bit of your gaming setting or rules.

If your concept of "online RPG" is just World of Warcraft, this is not your PDF to buy. If you are just happy with all these PBEM games you find anywhere, it's at least something VERY interesting to read. Because there are a LOT of places to teach you how to format your PBEM emails (***) but Quest gives you just the beef about how to write RPG posts or emails and let them completely readable.

And, finally, if you get too confused any time you try to read a PBP thread, if you find that all these cool PBP sites have TOO hard learning curve but you WANT to play some different online RPG you MUST buy Quest. Because playing RPG through Quest you not only get fun, but end each turn (tell it "act") perfectly written in a way that you'd even use it as a serial of short stories of your PCs.

Because every act ends like a shared-writing exercise, but it's built as the best PBEM RPG you'd ever imagine.

AHHHhhh!!! I just spent 40 minutes writing a review only to have it fail to publish! For those of you that are planning to write a detailed review I suggest you do so in your own text editor and then copy paste it into this box when you are finished.

Now on to an shorter but still to the point rewrite:

Quest is essentially a scripting language for formating your PBEM games to make it very easy and clear to follow. By using this method I feel you will be able to actually run a game with more than one or two players. As I read it I got VERY excited, and now believe I CAN actually run a game.

There really isn't much more to say about the system without covering the things that the book itself covers. The illustrations are nice, and the examples are adequate.

Value as is: Good (3 stars)

Now the following is directed at to the authors. In reading this you may have the feeling that I didn't like the game, or that it isn't very good. So I want to state this: If I had to do it all over again, I WOULD DEFINITELY purchase this product again. In its current state it is quite GOOD.

My hope is that if the authors intend to improve this product, I will be able to provide them with some ideas that will help. So what may sound like a whining session isn't intended that way, it is intended as creative feedback, because the stuff that is there is good. The problem is what isn't there that would be nice to have.

The examples given are good, I understand the concepts and feel you the system would work nicely. There is a point at which you sort of fast forward, and I would have liked to see how it played out, to get a real idea of who said what, and when, so when the GM edits are shown I would understand the process. Through clever role-playing in the example you avoided combat. Which is fine, but to see how a combat actually plays out would have been nice.

I don't completely understand how to transition between the Chapter Schedule and individual Acts. Granted I can learn this from play but it seem that when one player goes into an individual Act, especially if they get involved in combat. Which I feel, though do not know from experience, will slow down the game. I can see the other players waiting a week or even a month for a combat to be played out before their time lines would get back in sync again. Maybe I am missing something here.

A solution to the above would be to add an appendix or addendum that shows a longer detailed game being played. This could be quite basic, plain text, that lists every e-mail in an actual game session. It would show the actual problems as they showed up, how rolls were really handled, and SPECIFICALLY an example of combat. It would show how transitioning occurs between the various types of play.

It could even be indexed with a "What if...?" style index so that when a problem occurs the GM can look and read a real life example, even if the example was poorly handled it would serve as a way for GMs to see 'a way' it was handled, though without this index it would still be quite useful.

The great thing is that creating this would not be terribly difficult, that is if you actually play PBEM games or know some people that do.

I understand this addition would probably not handle all of the situations that are bound to arise during actual play, but would definitely be valuable to the potential GM or player using your system, as it would allow them to see examples of the very common ones that are not fully covered by the current product. I feel it would really give the GM courage to go out and run a game, because in essence he has played in one vicariously.

I understand your time is valuable so there is an investment that would need to be made, but the great thing about your products medium (PDF) is that there wouldn't be a material increase in cost (such higher cost of printing with a book) but there would definitely be an increase in value to the consumer.

With the addition of the above, I think your product would be Excellent (5 stars) Thanks again for a good solid product!

After downloading I printed out a sheet and assembled one of the models. It was very easy. The main challange was making sure the cuts were done correctly (I was using a farily large scissors).

After cutting the model out, I follwed the instructions step by step. I was slightly confused by the instructions for folding the shoulder sections, although I managed by fiddling around.

If I was to make a suggestion in the future it would be to add some 3-D ness to the weapon(s), so to make them stand out when viewing from the side (the sword is mostly flat and so is hard to see from the right side).

To improvise and solve this, I added a fold along the middle of the sword-blade, folding each edge slightly back. This makes the sword pop-out more, and makes it visible from the side.

One other suggestion for other users, the base would hold a coin easily, which might help with the breeze issue that sometimes interferes with using paper stand ups.

Over all the model looks pretty good for what it is. It stands out betterfrom a distance than a flat 2D paper mini.

Glad to see these steps forward in paper models!

Wilderness Encounters 5: Inner City Encounters for a City Environment is part of the Wilderness Encounter series that provides scenario idea for fantasy campaigns, written by David Sharrock and published by Forever People Digital Press. It is a one hundred and four-page product with considerable digital art by Wyn F Dawkins, most in full color, however the product also contains a fair amount of white space.

The main part of the product is fifteen short scenario ideas that take place, naturally, in a city. The majority adventures are designed with a high magic setting in mind (so they are well suited to D&D) but would be out of place in a low magic campaign. A wide range of scenario types, combat, thinking and simply unusual are included. A few of the scenarios come with maps. However, there are entirely too many gnomes for this reviewer?s tastes.

An ?Instant City? section follows with random tables for stores (one hundred of them) and general locations (thirty nine of them), each keyed to a short (one to three paragraphs) description of the place mentioned. A useful tool for fleshing out a city on the fly, but, these too, have a high magic tone to them.

The product concludes with two full page city maps. Not the most brilliant of maps but they will do in a pinch, one is a city on a river while the other has a castle.

Inner City Encounters is a useful product for inspiring adventures and in-game tangents for the urban environment, often a difficult part of a campaign to run. However, the lack of game statistics means that many of the adventures cannot be easily used without some preparation on behalf of the GM.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Acceptable<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

In an RPG world where the next ?innovative? system is around the corner, some publishers are finding it difficult to choose which system to write for. Do they make a product for the ole? tried and true d20 or venture out into newer systems like True 20 or Castles and Crusades. Forever People RPG said to heck with choosing and began their Wilderness Encounters adventure scenario books, which feature systemless encounters.

Despite the irony of the name and bouts with the type of chunkiness that a systemless PDF can bring, Inner City is a pretty straight forward s supplement of adventure tidbits for your campaign world.

At a 101 pages, you receive 15 mini adventures and a section to help make your own city. The adventures are well written but inconsistent. Some seem to have had a good deal of detail put into the nuts and crannies whereas others seem to be a description of a situation and an expectation for the PCs to figure out the rest. Because the book features no stats at all, this may be frustrating. I have seen other books use descriptive words like low level or a class archetype to describe NPCs and wish it would have utilized a bit more here.

The water painting style artwork throughout the book is a nice touch and makes for some neat player handouts for some of the scenarios, though the art selection could have been better. The Create your own City section contains a table of location descriptions that you can randomly create or pick and choose. This allows you to build an adventure as you go. A black and white blank city map is included with the PDF that allows you to write in the number of locations you choose. With the other nice cartography in the PDF, it feels like there should have been a rendered city version with it.

For the Dungeon Master There is some very talented writing in City Life. Both Horrorscope and Day of the Dead have the feeling of a full length adventure and do a nice job of horror theming in a fantasy world. Of course, the book contains a variety of adventures but these two horror gems attracted the George Romero in me.

The Iron Word Whether you play one or multiple systems, the wilderness encounters line is a safe bet, though plan on doing a lot of work. The book is unbookmarked which also makes it difficult to navigate.
<br><br> <b>LIKED</b>: - Tight writing, very engaging

• systemless makes it easy to adapt everywhere
• good artwork<br><br><b>DISLIKED</b>: - the quality of the adventures are not consistent throughout
• no bookmarking or navigating <br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

Exactly as described, a system for running PBEM campaigns.<br><br> <b>LIKED</b>: Matched product description exactly; some interesting ideas.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Acceptable<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

Wilderness Encounters and Scenarios: In the Mountains is part 2 of the Wilderness Encounter series that provides scenario idea for fantasy campaigns, written by Steve Dean and published by Forever People Digital Press. It is a thirty six-page product with considerable digital art by Wyn F Dawkins, most of it in full color but the product also contains a fair amount of white space.

The main part of the product is seventeen short scenarios mostly involving mountainous terrain, passes, volcanos and other such trappings of travel between the hills and mountains. The majority (just) of the scenarios are two or more pages, some with maps, all with illustrations. The adventures are designed with a high fantasy setting in mind (i.e., more D&D than Runequest), several involved dragons and two involving world/dimensional transit. A wide range of scenario types, combat, thinking and just simply strange are included. A few of the scenarios place the characters at a serious disadvantage as they play out which may very well grate on the nerves of some players

The product concludes with 50 ?What if?? questions to spark adventure. The ideas range from the interesting to the absurd but they certainly could stir up trouble.

Wilderness Encounters and Scenarios: In the Mountains is a useful product for sparking ideas and inspiring adventure tangents. However, the lack of game statistics means that several of the adventures cannot be easily dropped into an ongoing campaign without some preparation.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

This is much better than the orcs ( I like that set too, but these fighters are more easily to assemble )

The graphics are detailed enough to make these fighters look good.

The build - instructions are detailed and easy to understand.

Give me more of your sets...beg<br><br> <b>LIKED</b>: The nice 3D-effect! and the design of the fighters. I did not accomplish my gooal to build one figure in about a minute, but i still keep trying;-)!<br><br><b>DISLIKED</b>: nothing. You get good stuff for the money. I am looking forward to the other sets:-)!<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Satisfied<br>

This is a great take on the desert encounter. This product features several great encounter ideas, which can be linked to form several night's worth of role-playing adventure. Not all of the encounters fit the style of my current campaign, so I've used a couple of them as one-off encounters, while the party travels the desert sands. As a GM, if you know you're going to be taking your group through a desert, I'd spend the cash and take a look at this product. At worst, you'll have a handful of really good ideas, at best, they will have created a couple sessions worth of work for you.<br><br> <b>LIKED</b>: Suitable for a wide range of play styles and easily adaptable. There is a LOT of good information here.<br><br><b>DISLIKED</b>: Not everything fit into my current campaign style, but at this price, there's more than enough here to keep me happy.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Very Good<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Very Satisfied<br>

Most excellent 3-d paper model. Finally have something to battle my Orc Horde. This model was alot easier to build and yet retains alot of depth to the model. I can't wait for more from these guys.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Excellent<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Very Satisfied<br>

Nice idea, don't give up trying, but I was Disappointed, artwork was poor and it was too fiddly to make in a reasonable amount of time.<br><br> <b>LIKED</b>: Nice idea, don't give up trying<br><br><b>DISLIKED</b>: I was Disappointed, artwork was poor and it was too fiddly to make in a reasonable amount of time.<br><br><b>QUALITY</b>: Poor<br><br><b>VALUE</b>: Disappointed<br>