The reviewer is writing this review using his own personally bought copy of the product

Adventurer Conqueror King System (or ACKS) came into existence back in 2011. It was right at the height of the OSR's first big boom, where most of the products went from PDF only affairs to offering more traditional dead tree format. While there have been literally well over a hundred different variations of old D&D rules, you would be deceiving yourself to think once you have seen one you have seen them all.

ACKS did not come on to my radar until much later through a Bundle of Holding offer. At the time I was playing 5E and Swords and Wizardry. Swords and Wizardry will always be near and dear to my heart, but I found myself wanting something with a little more teeth. Something that really took the old idea of character progression into something other than just more advanced murder hobo adventures. Sure as a DM I have control over the world my players are in and all the intricacies available therein. But having a mechanics system in place to handle the heavy lifting sure is nice.

I was looking through my DrivethruRPG library and what pops up but this package from Bundle of Holding I purchased a year and a half ago. I began skimming the product and was kind of shocked at what I was seeing. I had assumed (boy never a good thing to do) that it was another B/X clone. Not a bad thing mind you, but not exactly what I was looking for. What I found was something else.

Becoming an Adventurer

First of all, let's discuss or define what a B/X game looks like in comparison to more modern renditions of Dungeons and Dragons. B/X typically only took you to level 14. Levels 1-3 were the basic level of the game chiefly revolving around dungeon crawls. Levels 4-14 were focused on the exploration of wilderness environments, and once characters reached level 9, the idea of ruling a small domain with many servants or followers to assist you. Race and class were one in the same with only humans actually selecting a class type and the others being relegated to racially stereotypical pursuits.

Humans

ACKS keeps the same level scheme of 1-14 but changes several other aspects up quite a bit. First of all, ACKS provides many classes in the core book beyond the standard affair. Humans have the options of being Fighters, Mages, Clerics, Thieves, Assasins, Bards, Bladedancers (clerics that are slightly more functional at fighting and mobility at the cost of wearing certain armor types), and Explorers (rangers of a sort more focused on actual outdoor survival without the spell component).

Non-Humans

Nonhumans instead of being one singular class are divided up into different aspects of their society. Elves can choose from Elven Nightblades (think sorcerer/assassin) or Elven Spellsword (fighter/mage combo). Dwarves have Dwarven Vault guards (typical iconic dwarf), and Dwarven Craft priest (combine cleric and fighter together without the hefty restrictions of a paladin).

No halflings appear in this rulebook (though do not worry they do appear later in another product) and nonhumans do still get restricted on level gain, though this is less of an issue with ACKS leveling system ending at 14 for human classes.

Optimization in droves

ACKS utilizes a proficiency system. While this is not a new idea, the way it is utilized is both efficient and really changes ACKS from being just another retroclone restating the same tired ideas. Within ACKS, Proficiencies fall somewhere in between feats and skills. Couple this with the use of templates and you can really make a customized version of whatever class you decide on that further individualizes without having to make yet another class.

Proficiencies are unique to certain class types. There are of course shared proficiencies, but by and large, this is more within a template (something I will go into more detail about on the Players Companion review). This makes a sword and board fighter operate differently from say a 2 handed fighter. The Mercenary template for instance: you throw in 2 proficiencies, Combat reflexes and Manual of Arms and a customized equipment package flavored to the more iconic mercenary role and voila your fighter is instead a professional soldier for hire.

Magic by the numbers

Magic in ACKS will be both familiar and unique compared to other OSR systems. I realize that is a fairly vague statement. So in most d20 systems wizards have a pool of spells in their spellbook. ACKS is no different in this. Where the differences come in is how those spells are utilized. Normally arcane spellcasters are restricted to only using those spells they have memorized unless we are talking about 3.X era Sorcerers. The problem with Sorcerers is that not everyone wants a spellcaster that does not have to "pay" in the traditional sense for their power. What this did is set what some looked at as an unfair imbalance to the more traditional mindset of spellcasting based around Vancian rules.

ACKS, however, says any spell in your repertoire can be used provided you have the spell slot left to cast it. This might seem like a minor change but in effect what it does is make the magic-user more flexible. Now the spellcaster can safely go into dungeons knowing that not only do they have offensive magic usable but also all those oft unused utility spells that could potentially make or break an encounter. I was skeptical at first until I saw this in practice. It worked very well and was in no way overpowering. The limitation of so many spells cast per day keeps it railed in while giving the benefit of far more utility.

ACKS has little touches inserted all over the place to individualize itself. The author encourages folks playing spellcasters to add little signatures that are aesthetic in name but really help to flavor their caster individually. The example that is given in the book is of a necromancer character that whenever he casts magic missile the magic manifests as a shard of a bone. It is a simple nonmechanical storytelling the device that still helps to further the idea of not relying on a hard mechanic to define your character.

Fantasy economy done right

One of the surprises and delights of Adventurer Conqueror King System is the extensive study of 4th-8th-century history that the authors have done. A great deal of analysis has gone on to properly represent from a socioeconomic point of view the very real financial and labor challenges living in that era would have produced. Your first introduction to this is the equipment section, in which equipment availability by market size, as well as pricing conventions based upon supply and demand. This is not done in a time-consuming fashion. Everything is lined up in easy to follow tables that very quickly let the Judge scan for the market type based on domain size. In a clear manner, this tells the Judge how to price objects, if they are available, and if not if it is possible to get the product in and how long it will take.

A lot of folks hear the word tables, and that turns them off thinking this is going to be a game where they have to nonstop consult table after table. I am here to tell you, the information is oriented in a fashion in which it's easy to find in a time of need without disrupting gameplay for long periods of time. Later when the rulebook begins discussing domain management and creation, the game offers meticulous detail about acreage, production of resources based on peasant morale, population, and natural sustainability. A desert offers different financial and logistical differences than an overgrown forested region. All of this is presented in a fashion that a Judge can find and use with ease.

This land is my land

It was always the intent of Dungeons and Dragons B/X era gaming to guide players from lowly dungeon delver to wilderness explorer, to notable and important heroic figure and eventually to ruler. While a system to do this has been included in just about every iteration of D&D since B/X days, only in the BECMI rendition is the concept actually given real depth in the core rules. Yes, supplements have been offered in one fashion or another, but a supplement makes it more of an optional thing than an actual feature or focus of the game.

ACKS chooses to instead really dial in this oft-neglected aspect of gaming. Sure your adventurers will dive into pits of despair. But around 3rd to 4th level they spread their wings and begin to focus on exploring the wilderness surrounding them. As tales of their heroics spread, so does their notoriety. The movers and shakers of the land begin to take notice, and with this also comes those who will seek the players out.

However, this is just where the fun begins. In order to create a stronghold or a domain, the players must first clear or "conquer" the surrounding hexes from their chosen build site. This is the only way they can hope to attract not just followers, but peasants and commerce to come to their domain. The costs in labor, time, pedigree of hireling required (engineers for instance) is laid out in digestible bits that neither overwhelm nor undersell the reader.

Once the project is complete and the domain established now the mechanics of actually running a realm come into play. With such an eye for historical accuracy and logical population disbursement (you won't find a town of 50,000 people in a medieval desert setting where it would have been impossible to sustain it) you can easily weight the requirements of maintaining and growing your kingdom.

Creation defined

A lot of products shy away from the idea of letting players construct or build things. Specifically, most of this kind of detail did not become available until the 3.x era of gaming, and even then as an afterthought or option without the true details needed to fully convey this process. ACKS however does not shy from tackling this topic.

Complete rules are given for creating magic items, researching and creating new spells, building magical constructs, and necromantic minions and more. What is more interesting is that it also gives rules on how to infuse this into the domain aspect. A mage might have a few apprentices, which instead of just being fluff actually serve the purpose of advancing the mages personal goals and acquisition of power. This is done through harvesting ingredients, researching spells, writing scrolls or a myriad of other various functions. Your retainers, hirelings, and followers are more than mere torch wielders and trap finders.

This idea that a player can create items worthy of the magic item index is not new, but rarely has it been portrayed in the common sense fashion that it is in ACKS. Once again all of this is presented in an easy to follow fashion that is modular, use it or don't use it at your leisure. If you want the total ACKS experience use it, but if you just want it to be basic, the game runs fine without it.

Summary of my thoughts on ACKS

ACKS is not a retroclone as much as it is a reinforcement of the B/X foundation, then a layered approach of adding complexity to this style of gameplay. All this is presented in a very modular format. Meaning you can easily remove this aspect if you dislike it as a gamemaster without breaking anything. I think that is important to folks who look for flexibility in a system. It can be as complex or as clean a B/X inspired game as you want it to be. The foundation has been refined to perfection so that other aspects of ACKS can sit comfortably atop it.

The core rulebook follows a very predictable pattern in how it presents information. Chapters roll into one another in a common sense placement. You can tell time and understanding of gaming has clearly helped the author to conceive a functional layout. Every chapter progresses on the groundwork of the chapter before it in a clear and concise pattern.

The author has constantly worked towards individualizing the product. Attack Throws or To hit numbers are neither the Thac0 system nor the ascending system as it is used in 3.x products. It falls right in the middle still following an ascending pattern and more common sense approach of simply needing to add the respective armor class to a base roll to figure out the number needed. Unarmored foes start as Armor Class 0, and armor increases positively from there.

The artwork is superb with gorgeous color cover art and amazing interior Black & White illustrations. The author's tone is easy to follow and even subject matter that would have put me to sleep in other games is presented in a fashion to keep the reader interested. Most of this is done by using constant examples to make the idea shown click.

Sometimes its not the genre but the way that a book presents the material. In this case The Heroic Fantasy Handbook From Autarch tries its best to heal a nagging ulcer that has existed in the table top role playing game fantasy book fandom since the early days. That is the divide between the fans of High fantasy vs Low fantasy. There's also a similar divide between modern Dark Fantasy fans & pure pulp magazine fans. The sub divisions of hobbies & fandom also spills over in to Sword & Planet vs Heroic Fantasy books & so forth. All of this B.S. spilled over into the Appendix N of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons in the first edition AD&D Dungeon Master's Guide back in '79. Basically its a way for others to turn their nose up at other people who are using the themes, ideas,etc. of any of the above to play adventures, campaigns, & games where the themes & elements of High Fantasy, Low Fantasy, Sword & Planet, Dark Fantasy, Pulp are used & mixed with gusto! Others haven't been playing their own campaigns 'the right way'. Personally I think all of these definitions & divisions are manure! The Heroic Fantasy Handbook From Autarch takes the ideals of all of the above & boils them into a stew that focuses the lens of Heroic Fantasy in a set of actually playable & usable guidelines for the Adventurers, Conqueror, King retroclone system.

How does "The Heroic Fantasy Handbook" do this? Well, let's look at the actual definition of Heroic Fantasy from L. Sprague de Camp's introduction to the 1967 Ace edition of Conan (Robert E. Howard), p. 13.

"The Heroic Fantasy Handbook" does this by giving the players options that are patterned after the stories, novels, etc. of the subgenre itself while keeping the basics patterns & ideas that are found in the ACK's handbook in tact whist adding a set of 16 new character classes inspired by the archetypes of material. This isn't a quick coat of paint & bunch of OGL revamps but a loving & well thought out inspiration of material. "The Heroic Fantasy Handbook" is well laid out & easy on the eye with a professional care toward its magick systems & PC options. This is a two hundred & twenty four page monster of a book with magics that reflect & heighten the ideals of the material presented in the the Adventurers, Conqueror, King retroclone system. The eldritch magic system is a marriage of the magicks of Conan's Mythos with the temptations of hinted at in C.S. Lewis's Lion, The Witch, & the Wardrobe along side the weirdness of Tolkien. And all of this echos back to the world of ACK's.

The ceremonial magicks of "The Heroic Fantasy Handbook" give the magician a far more reaching & subtle mechanism for game play enabling players to give a heavy hand during play on monsters, rulers, and other enemies. This magick turns the wizard in question into a power to be reckoned with not only in life but in economics & during adventures. There's more weirdness here with the implementation of spellsinging which is directly related to ACK's elves & it works to give the Elven enchanters more arcane muscle which they sorely need. There are over a hundred & fifty five spells here & this doesn't mean that "The Heroic Fantasy Handbook" is another padded 'splat book'. "The Heroic Fantasy Handbook" is designed as an add on book for characters looking to be flesh out for play in a more complete campaign setting. There's lots of options here and all of them are actually usable. This isn't a bull crap book trying to take your money. This is a book for adding more dimension to your ACK's characters & NPC's. This book is as much for the dungeon master as its for the players. Was the "The Heroic Fantasy Handbook" worth the wait? Yes it was! This is a five out of five book and no I'm not kidding. This is the book that I wish I had when I started my ACK's & OSR campaigns. Why because it works at what it does and that's kick ass & take names! Why do I say this? Because if you want to run a down & dirty campaign with all of the elements of ACK's Sword & Sorcery mixed with a healthy dose of Tolkein then this is the book for you! If you want to run a straight up balls to the walls Sword & Planet campaign then your going to want the ACK's rule book & Barbarian Conquerors of Kanahu. But you'll want "The Heroic Fantasy Handbook"to bring the thunder & lightning to the whole campaign affair. While not necessary the ACKS Player's Companionhas several kick ass NPC options that can still kick the crap out the player's PC's such as the Anti paladin, dwarven fury, & a few others to put those Heroic types down! Sorry but I'm going to give the "The Heroic Fantasy Handbook" a five out of five because its just that good!

Eric Fabiaschi Swords & Stitchery Want more OSR original content & more for this and other OSR games? Subscribe now to https://swordsandstitchery.blogspot.com/

Over the course of a couple of days I've been doing a lot of hard thinking about old school systems & Pulp Era campaigns. I've also been doing revamps & rewrites on much of the current Pulp Era campaign. To that end I began to look into Barbarian Conquerors of Kanahu . This book is right in my wheel house leaning close to the edge of both Sword & Planet with a huge foot hold in the Sword & Sorcery end of the prehistoric ocean. Alexander Macris & Omer Joel,are no strangers to the science fantasy genre & this book proves it. So what is the book & setting like? Well imagine if the creators of Buck Rogers & Flash Gordon got together with H.P. Lovecraft & Robert Howard to create an episode of Seventies Battle Star Galactica set on a lost planet. This planet would be Kanahu. Forget Eternia, Kanahu is a place where He Man or Thundarr would feel right at home. The world of Kanahu used to be a Grey outpost work & there is a lot of their artifacts still hanging around because human slaves were toiling away & mining the planet for valuable materials. The Greys are on the wane but the alien slave races including humans are on their way back! You've seen this plot & what not a thousand times but this is Bak baby! Swords & barbarians are everywhere. Whole setting is geared for gonzo Eighties action! And the Greys are still taking slaves for the mines so your old school characters better watch out. The world of Kanahu has lots of racial classes suited for the setting that deal the players into the vibe & science fantasy groove of Kanahu setting. "A set of 15 new character classes from the world of Kanahu, including the scurrying roach-like bugman, the dreaded cultist, the inhuman deep one hybrid, the mighty dragon incarnate, the stealthy geckoman stalker, the savagely sorcerous lizardman witch-doctor, and the mysterious alien Nephil. " There are these & more with lizard men & insect bugmen taking center stage as the former servants of the Serpent men & Greys respectively. Kanahu is a world in deep trouble with the forces of Chaos having raged across it in ages past and now the science fantasy races are having to deal with centuries of fallout. Robots, cybernetic horrors, and worse lay in wait for players whilst worse Lovecraftian horrors from across the Outer Darkness crawls up from the depths of the planet once held in check by the Greys. This is a world where dungeon dwellers & ruin seekers are going to feel right at home & the consequences can be devastating to the players. The world of Kanahu has plasma weaponry in its artifact tables and their rather nasty. The writing is excellent as well as the layout & formatting which is easy on the eyes. There is a lot going on in Barbarian Conquerors of Kanahu meaning that much of the science fantasy setting material adapts itself to both Sword & Sorcery as well as Science Fantasy role playing. The theme running through Barbarian Conquerors of Kanahu is one of both tool kit & planetary sandbox. There are lots of options presented & placed on the table here. These themes are packed & paced into the book which complements & expands upon what's been presented in the Heroic Fantasy Handbook. While its not necessary to have the ACK's the Heroic Fantasy Handbook on hand I can see why the dungeon master & players would want it on hand. The ideas present in the book are highlighted with skill packages,proficiencies ,and other PC kits geared around through out the whole affair of Barbarian Conquerors of Kanahu. This adds into the sandbox nature of Kanahu as a setting for PC's to explore & get lost in on their way to getting killed in one of the planet's innumerable dungeons.
So let's talk about the expansions of ACK's with new takes on existing monsters such as the nasty versions of shambling mounds, terror birds, even the humble toadmen get a Lovecraft make over and its not a pretty one. These monsters all have ties to a variation of Lovecraftian Chaos & its something that PC's should avoid at all costs. This ties back into the revamp of the spells of Kanahu whose magick had a hand in the downfall of the planet. Seriously, there are some nasty business in these spells that you don't want PC's using. All together I'm rather pleased on the whole with the magic section because it really captures the flavor of what the writers & designers were going for. But how does one use Barbarian Conquerors of Kanahu? This is the exact sort of setting book/science fantasy tool kit that I wish I had some months ago. For OSR science fantasy OSR games this is a God sent, no really. Take out the science fantasy planetary sandbox setting with lots of detail and your left with a tool kit perfectly suited for creating all kinds of extra solar system goodness. There are numerous hooks, tags & adventure fodder for doing exactly that built right into the back bone of Barbarian Conquerors of Kanahu. There's already enough maps, ruins, etc. in the book to keep a group of players going for at least a year or more. But with a bit of clever slight of hand a DM could keep a group of players in his or her own setting going for years! I give Barbarian Conquerors of Kanahu a five out of five for a really well thought out system and ACK's base for creating & maintaining a Sword & Planet, Sword & Sorcery or Dark Fantasy campaign. In my opinion grab this one! Eric Fabiaschi Sword & Stitchery blog Want more OSR content & original old school gaming stuff? Subscribe to http://swordsandstitchery.blogspot.com/

Beware! Axioms has stopped updating. No new issues have been released since March of 2017, which for a supposedly-quarterly magazine is pretty damning.

The artlcles in Axioms are interesting and provide fascinating options to anyone running a campaign using the Adventurer Conquerer King System, but spending money on future issues that don't actually eventuate is a waste. Buy the back issues, instead.

I'm currently 7 sessions in to a Dwimmermount campaign. While the dungeon itself is remarkable, I would say the same of Barrowmaze, in which I've also run a campaign. What has set this experience apart is the Dungeon Tracker. I have a copy printed and laminated, and I keep behind my screen the two sheets appropriate to the level that the characters are exploring. Being laminated, I'm able to use wet erase markers to easily make notes and track time while having all of the most necessary details of the level right in front of me.

While I still keep a copy of Dwimmermount open on a small table to my side so that I have access to detailed room descriptions, the Dungeon Tracker seriously reduces the amount of page flipping I have to do during a game. That has translated into a tighter game and a more enjoyable experience for the entire table. The Tracker has also allowed me to keep my notes on the dungeon much better organized. With Barrowmaze, my copy of the book was littered with Post-It Notes, one per room that the PCs had explored, on which I had written what PCs had taken and defeated, what was left behind, and what may have moved in afterwards. Using the Dungeon Tracker with Dwimmermount, I can do a better job of maintaining a living dungeon environment while spending less time doing so.

I don't know how much value the Dungeon Tracker would have in purely electronic format, but printed, laminated, and perhaps bound using coil stock, I've encountered few game aids that come close to providing this much utility. For a referee running a game in Dwimmermount, or for anyone interested in tools for helping games play as easily as possible, I'd give this a very strong recommendation.

I had a more detailed review, but DTRPG decided to let me timeout while writing up so you'll have to settle for the cliffs notes version.

Note: I am a subscribed to Autarch's Patreon, and got this issue as part of my ongoing support.

Beyond Arcane and Divine: These work best with the ACKs Player's companion rules, where you can combine new modifiers with the rules for making new spells. That being said, any B/X style D&D can use these rules along with the numbers that arcane and divine casters have to put existing spells at new levels. (For Example: if you make a magic source with healing at x2 when divine has it at x1, you can put cure light wounds as a level 2 spell).

The Shades of Magic: unlike other attempts at corruption systems I have seen, this breaks down an all-encompasing way to place all existing spells into either black, gray, or white magic. It provides a nicely balanced corruption table, and includes ways to further modify the system in pursuit of Howardian and Lovecraftian play.

Introducing the Wizard: this is an arcane spellcaster subject to shaded magic with several variants reminiscent of the wizards from Lord of The Rings. Because of the added abilities canceling out shaded magic, these variants are balanced with the core ACKs mage and therefore with any magic-user in a B/X system.

The Art of Arcanogenesis: this will make the most sense to people who have read the other kinds of Magical Research descrbied in Core ACKs, but the rules are so detailed that even someone unfamiliar should be able to follow along. This is about creating new monstrosities whole cloth. the example included is a non-copyright-infringing version of a certain eye-stalked floating orb.

Overcasting: this brings systems for getting to cast more spells in a day, like those in Dungeon Crawl Classics, to ACKs

This game was my introduction to the OSR, but it's much more than that.

Adventurer Conqueror King not only gives you an updated and clever reconfiguring of the original B/X Dungeons & Dragons rules, it delivers on the promise of high level play.

So many D&D games make reference to "gaining a stronghold and followers" at level 9, but they offer no interpretation of what that means, what that would be like. It's often relegated to story dressing, and doesn't get the attention that, say, combat does. ACKs fills in this sorely needed gap in a way that is largely compatible with most fantasy medieval games.

They say that what you give experience for in an RPG determines the kind of play you encourage. In this way, ACKs encourages ruling kingdoms, engaging in magical research, founding religions, running a thieves guild, or embarking on mercantile ventures as well as it does things like killing foes and stealing their treasure. Not only this, but it encourages doing these things boldly: timid rulers satisfied with their holds won't gain XP, but ambitious conquerors who expand their realm will.

Of course, these rules alone are worth the price of entry, and are easily ported to your game of choice, as the economic ideas underpinning the XP rewards are consistent enough to survive translation as long as you properly anchor to common worths. But the actual rules for playing adventurers are good too. You get a servicable expansion of available classes that simultaneously preserves the feel of "race as class" while giving people playing demihumans more options than usual.

And as if that wasn't enough: this system is well supported. If you find that you like this, you will be amazed at the supplements available that can further expand your games into anything you've ever wanted to run.

"Over a millennium ago, when the borderlands were in the dark grip of the Zaharan Empire, the empire’s sorcerer-priests erected a profane temple to house the terrible artifact known as the Stone of Sakkara. Using the Stone, the sorcerer-priests could birth monsters and abominations with frightening ease and magically command the loyalty of chaotic creatures. The Stone brought its evil masters great power throughout the fell empire. "

Clocking in at eighty pages AX1 The Sinister Stone of Sakkara is an introductory adventure for the Adventurer,Conqueror, King system hearkening back to classic TSR era B/X adventures such as Keep of The Borderlands. By that I mean that it takes all of the existing ACK's products within the Autarch lines and puts them into play as a homage to adventures of a bygone era. The idea of the lone Auran/Roman style keep on an Ancient Egyptian/Mesopotamian border that they have conquered is used as the backdrop for a very well thought out adventure. Here the action is centered on the factions of the dungeon & the PC's must deal with the fall out of the evil that slumbers here. There is a bit of everything in this adventure as its meant to do exactly what the Adventurer, Conqueror, King rule book lays out. That is to explore, deal with, get hired, hex crawl, fight, battle, & play while getting an entire feel for the ACK's system with both the players and the dungeon master cutting their teeth on the The Sinister Stone of Sakkara . Everything has a pseudo Lovecraftinan sword & sorcery vibe mixed in with the Auran empire setting. Monsters & encounters have that late night Saturday matinee mixed with a Mountain Dew war game feel. There are actual motivations, as well as reasons why the PC's are here in this part of Türos Tem the place is presented as the stronghold of a realm controlled by a high-level NPC, with its maps, buildings, population, revenues, costs, and morale score all detailed and provided. This makes modifying and adding it into your own home game campaigns a snap. Many of your standard ACK's humanoids are present but there are far more sinister things lurking as lots of slimes, molds, jellies, fungus, & worse crawl through the AX1. If the players are stupid & make poor decisions their going to have their PC's killed in no time flat, this is a great module but parts of it can be very unforgiving as the writing and design is very tight. Its well done and easily modified but you're going to have to think on your feet. Yes your PC's might end up with their own domain but they might end up a victim of the very evils that they're investigating or being killed by one of the multiple factions of this realm. Action is fast, reactive, and the plot moves along. There is a sense and story to the history of the region that echoes bits of Robert Howard, Michael Moorcock, with a blend of Caesar and Rome thrown into the blender of this module. NPC's function as movers, shakers, possible patrons, or flat out enenmies of the PC's & the ambitions that they bring to the region & your table. This is a place of sand,blood, evil, & flat out mayhem. Expect no quarter if crossing the wrong person or their hidden agendas. The powers that use this region do so with intent and guile. This is because the whole adventure of AX1: The Sinister Stone of Sakkara is a guide as well as adventure intended to take the PC's through the whole of the ACK's system in miniature. Once again we've got that classic collapsing empires of earth’s Late Antiquity (250 – 750 AD) as the mirror of the age of Auran that AX1 is set. A turbulent era in which ancient glories were drowned in a torrent of violence & murder. So this is a perfect place for the PC's to make their mark as they come to explore the dungeons & environs of The Sinister Stone of Sakkara. I was somewhat shocked by how underpowered the NPC's are in this adventure, well not really. This adventure's NPC's reminded me of Dark Albion's 'anyone can be killed' in the Rose War attitude. Because there's also an almost boom town/end of empires set of circumstance that surrounds the setting of the Sinister Stone of Sakkara. This is so that the PC's can not only make their mark but possibly take over the local domain if their very lucky. Certain things about this adventure stand out such as the fact that it intergrates & plays around with Adventurer,Conqueror, King's Domains of War. The aspects of military & trade details is fitted in seamlessly within the adventure but its a weird fit in some respects unless of course you're used to war games being a part of your old school systems. The aspect of the war game as a part of the dungeon crawl hearkens back to the old school roots of OD&D when empire building was part and parcel of the gaming experience. Many independent companies kept this style of table top adventure going even as AD&D took another twist. AX1: The Sinister Stone of Sakkara builds upon & to some degree advances this concept on paper. How? By making the players take their PC's center stage or dying in the attempt. Even the description has this conceit built right in, "AX1 includes a two-level dungeon filled with chthonic horror along with a friendly stronghold from which your adventurers can explore the region." AX1: The Sinister Stone of Sakkara isn't Dwimmermount & for that I'm thankful. Even though I'm an experienced dungeon master there are several systems that Adventurer, Conqueror,King brings to the table that I need a bit of hand holding with. There is also the fact that introducing new players to this system is an added stress but reading through AX1: The Sinister Stone of Sakkara the experience doesn't seem so bad. I really like the Character Motivations table, which adds an interesting twist to the 'reason a PC is this way' and the motive for adventure.
The motives for the adventure in part are the war bands of beast men looting, sacking, pillaging throughout the countryside to gather sacrifices to power the Stone’s birthing pools again. Local farms and hamlets have been laid low and destroyed. This sets up everything for the PC's to get into the deep end of this adventure & perhaps become entangled in the adventure's plot and weird horror that echoes through out. All in all I did enjoy looking through & reading AX1: The Sinister Stone of Sakkara. I think its a four out of five for the style, utility of use at the table, an economical use of writing and some fine gaming designing in the old school traditions. All in all I think that X1: The Sinister Stone of Sakkara does a fantastic job of presenting not only a great quality introductory adventure for Adventurer,Conqueror, King. But a great set up for a possible domain and base for the PC's all the while bringing the high quality Autarach standards we've come to expect.

Eric Fabiaschi Sword & Stitchery blog Dark Corners of Role Playing Blog Want to see more OSR action subscribe to http://swords- andstitchery.blogspot.com/ Or http://darkc- ornersofrpging.blogspot.com/

There are times when I need to know facts about monsters such as background, where the monster is dwelling, how long the horror has been in its location, the social background of the beast, are there others of its species within a certain number of square miles, & more. All of this material sometimes needs to be joined together in a concise & coherent way. Well that's where Adventurer Conqueror King System: Lairs & Encounters comes in. This book breaks down all of these details & more. This book continues the high caliber standard set by the other Autarch titles. The physical book isn't out quite yet but the pdf sells for around ten dollars. Everything in this book is geared toward creating monsters that can deal with PC's on an even footing & then come back for more. Some of the highlights of this include the following:

There are samples throughout the book presenting the types of details on monsters that I haven't seen since the days of the 'ecology of' Dragon magazine articles. There are samples of monster lairs and the details that go with them. There are lots of uses for all of this material and I have to say that it back ties into the Adventurer, Conqueror, King main rule book. This is a welcome and wise decision to the DM who wants to bring the monster goodness to their tables. Here's a good example of the level of detail that I'm talking about that appears in the Lairs & Encounters book:"

MEN, BRIGANDS

A fortified camp, with barracks, tents, and a large command pavilion, surrounded by a log palisade, is home to renegade mercenaries from the Company of the Black Thorn. They survive by raiding towns and robbing caravans and travelers. There are 100 Brigands (AC 3, Move 120’, HD 1, hp 5 each, #AT 1 weapon, Dmg by weapon, Save F1, ML +1, AL C) equipped with leather armor, shield, sword, and shortbow, and another 100 mounted Brigands (AC 5, Move 120’, HD 1, hp 5 each, #AT 1 weapon, Dmg by weapon, Save F1, ML 0, AL C) with chain mail, shield, sword, and riding horses.

They are led by Inthorn, their captain (AC 7, Move 60’, F9, hp 45, #AT 1 weapon, Dmg by weapon +6, Save F9, ML 0, AL L/C), equipped with spear +2, sword +2, plate armor, shield, and a plate-barded medium warhorse. He wears a red-plumed bronze helm of alignment change, which has turned him chaotic and led to his band going rogue, as well as a dragon-hide sword belt studded with hematite (900gp) and a wrought gold necklace set with thorn-shaped hematite (1,200gp).

Inthorn keeps a war-chest of 7,000gp, which is about one month’s operating expenses for the band. In a small locked coffer, trapped with a poison needle, he keeps 7 bloodstones (50gp each), 5 amethysts (100gp each), 6 amber (100gp each), 3 topaz (500gp each), and 1 sapphire (1000gp each). He keeps 3 wrought gold goblets (700gp), a gold decanter (800gp), and gold bowl (500gp) in the command tent.

Inthorn has 4 lieutenants (AC 6, Move 60’, F5, hp 25 each, #AT 1 weapon, Dmg by weapon +2, Save F5, ML 0), 5 sergeants (AC 6, Move 60’, F4, hp 20 each, #AT 1 weapon, Dmg by weapon +2, Save F4, ML 0, AL C), and 10 corporals (AC 6, F2, hp 10 each, Move 60’, #AT 1 weapon, Dmg by weapon +1, Save F2, ML 0, AL C), all equipped with plate armor, sword, lance, and warhorse.

Accompanying the mercenaries-turned-brigands is Dairin, a powerful chaotic wizard (AC 0, Move 120’, M11, hp 22, #AT 1 weapon or spell, Dmg by weapon or spell, Save M11, ML 0, AL C). Dairin wears elven cloak and boots and carries a wand of enemy detection (20 charges) and a scroll of cloudkill and conjure elemental. His spellbook has the following spells: burning hands, charm person, detect magic, magic missile, shield, sleep; detect invisibility, invisibility, knock, mirror image, web; dispel magic, fireball, fly, invisibility 10’ radius, protection from normal missiles; conjure elemental, cloudkill; death spell.

Inthorn’s new lover is Olyma, a priestess of Nasga (AC 8, Move 90’, C8, hp 28, #AT 1 weapon or spell, Dmg by weapon or spell, Save C8, ML 0, AL C). Olyma is equipped with polished black plate armor +1, a whip, a spiked mace, a shield, an unholy symbol (a silver statuette of a bat-winged woman with a whip), and a potion of poison. She wears a pair of engraved silver armlets (600gp each) and a platinum tiara set with a ruby (1,300gp)." Needless to say that this sort of work is scattered across the board in Lairs & Encounters. This makes Lairs & Encounters a monster path book, that is not simply a source book but a source book that creates within its wake a way of detailing a monster as much as the setting within the context of an adventure or campaign.

Where ACK's is designed expressly for the purpose of providing interesting domain-level play, putting the "game" back into the endgame; Lairs & Encounters takes the domain level game applies that concept into the background of the monster. This means that the concept of the monster becomes two things one it becomes the competition, the horror, the mythological concept and antithesis to the PC's within their domains. The second thing it does is makes the animal or being that is being used within a game as much of a resource as any of the other natural game elements to be exploited by the DM. It means that those within your domains are going to be far more eager to seek the protection of those more powerful than themselves. This gives a whole other aspect to monsters as protection, rulers, etc. within those hexes that parties seem to continue to crawl through.

Another thing about Lairs & Encounters that's the 'encounter' part there is the gravity of history in many of the encounters that are created within this book. Many plug into the 'official' ACK's setting but they can easily be applied to your own campaigns for example:"

SKELETON

The ground here is torn up by the remains of nine ancient Zaharan scythed chariots, broken and partially covered by webs, dust, and sand. Here and there the jagged blades stick up from the scattered chariot wheels. Each character passing through or searching the area has a 1 in 6 chance of stepping on one of these partly-buried blades and suffering 1d3 points of damage. 18 skeletons (AC 2, Move 120’, HD 1*, hp 4 each, #AT 1 weapon, Dmg 1d6, Save F1, ML N/A, AL C), with rusted mail and jagged, broken scimitars, litter the ancient battlefield in clusters near the chariots. They will rise to attack if blood is shed. " This is something to keep in mind when designing your own encounters and this book has the tools, guidelines, and more to help you out with that. Something else to keep in mind is that Lairs & Encounters plugs into Domains at War, ACKS' expansion focusing on mass combat and how it relates to all other aspects of the game, from monsters in domain management to mercenary wages to mercantile supply and demand all centered around the aspects of the monster. By popular demand, they have distilled just the mass combat system itself to an ~8 page kernel which they are planning to add as an expansion but Lairs & Encounters slides right into the backside of this material. That means that all of those battle grounds, war fields, places of violence, ancient war sights and more have the real potential to turn into adventure locations unto themselves. This is something to keep in mind when running games after a party has passed through hex '5671' and they're entirely done with looting the bodies and the bandits, mercenaries are dead. Their foes can rise again to cause problems for the locals and you might have to back to clean up your messes. There are several reasons to really get into Adventurer Conqueror King System: Lairs & Encounters:

Adventurer Conqueror King System: Lairs & Encounters is a very useful book with lots of utility at the table the mechanics to create balanced new monsters, new spell powers, and other enhancements for foes itself is worth the price of admission because it can be applied for any OSR retroclone game with B/X D&D at its heart. Is it worth the ten dollar price of admission? Well in a word yes if you're used to creating your own adventures with in the confines of your campaign world and you want a book with the right tools for the job. Adventurer Conqueror King System: Lairs & Encounters ties directly back into the Adventurer, Conqueror, King main rule book making this one very thought out monster & encounters book. Do I think its worth the money for this book? In a word yes! Go buy it and will I be using it! Eric Fabiaschi Sword & Stitchery blog Dark Corners of Role Playing Blog Want to see more OSR action subscribe to http://swords- andstitchery.blogspot.com/ Or http://darkc- ornersofrpging.blogspot.com/

So I've been gone a good portion of the day & how this review came about is a bit tangled. I've been rummaging around the a great many Adventurer, Conqueror, King titles for the better of a year now. Yes, I have friends of mine who feed my OSR habit quite regularly & I've been off the ranch for a long time now. This means I review what I want when I want as well as how I want. Still there are titles that I don't have access to so I hit up Alexander Macris with an email. Well the gentleman is a very busy guy and all, so I don't like bothering him. At least that's what I thought. Wham two nights later I had a bunch of titles from the ACK's line up sitting in my inbox!? Among them was 'Guns of War', yeah great another 'fire arms' set of rules rattled through my head at about two A.M. Wait?! There's a whole supplement on black powder weaponry that could be used with both ACK's & Lamentations? Given my obsession of wheel lock weaponry & my love of all things Lamentations colour me interested folks. So what does 'Guns of War' bring to the table? Well its a supplement that brings the timeline for ACK's up to the age of black powder weaponry not simply for the humans but most of the major races of the Adventurer,Conqueror, King & Lamentations of the Flame Princess. This adds an entirely new dimension to these OSR games themselves. This brings that setting dynamic into a new light entirely.

"Guns of War brings you all the rules you need to add the gunpowder, firearms, and artillery of the Age of Pike and Shot into your fantasy role-playing game. This century-and-a-half period was an age of war more terrible than any that had come before, as the technology of battle changed more rapidly than it had in any time in the preceding 3,500 years of human history. It was also an age of apparent anachronism made real, as plate-clad knights battled rifle-armed soldiery, field artillery fired on pikeman, and swords hung alongside pistols on the belts of cavalry.

Guns of War is designed for use with Autarch’s Domains at War (D@W) rules for military campaigns and battles. You will also need a copy of Adventurer Conqueror King System (ACKS), Lamentations of the Flame Princess (LOFTP), or a similar D20-based fantasy role-playing game to use this book."

But is it worth getting into? Well from a dollar stand point my answer is 'yes' it adds whole new aesthetic to these games and it could be used with Dark Albion as well because its going to change events across the board in broad gun powder clouded strokes. The age of powder & shot becomes an entirely new set of dynamics & history stalking changes to the set up of games. This means that the material has a has a vaguely 13th-15th century feel to it in equal measure. Guns of War manages to do all of this in fifty eight pages of jammed black powder packed book. Does this really make a difference in the dungeon? Not really when your wearing twelve hand grenades packed with black powder called the 'twelve apostles'. Because your going to be facing down things like this Ifreet in some God forsaken megadungeon. Guns of War does the job of taking ACK's from the dungeon into other realms of adventure into things like the a fantasy age of piracy, full on full city siege warfare with cannons, mixing up with the forces of darkness with powder, and much more. I make this book sound like one of the essentials for ACK's don't I? Well that's because technically in my estimation it is! When you have chain mail clad warriors fighting with pistols & swords then you've got a different mix of a game setting happening. Guns of War presents its material concise and well laid out details with the rules, tables, & descriptions being very easy to read as well as the content presented in a way that's easy on the eyes. The artwork is public domain with an eye towards the real world history whist keeping the book grounded in the ACK's setting (sort of). Because it moves the technological time table up there is a sense that Guns of War has at its core the OSR with an eye towards taking systems to the next level or at the very least the next time period. This book has lots of potential because of its use in ACKS Domains at War but that's a blog entry for another time. What it also means is that I can now run Lamentations of the Flame Princess rpg materials within the ACK's system quite well. Things are not seamless but they work quite well so that suddenly that mini wall of Lamentations of the Flame Princes books has lots of potential in the ACK's system. This is another mark of the ulitity of the ACK's material at the gaming table. All in all I really enjoyed Guns of War so much so that I called the print shop today to get myself a copy of this pdf spiral bound. I give it four out of five because not only was I pleasantly surprised by Guns of War. Eric Fabiaschi Sword & Stitchery blog Dark Corners of Role Playing Blog Want to see more OSR action subscribe to http://swords- andstitchery.blogspot.com/ Or http://darkc- ornersofrpging.blogspot.com/

I went into the Auran Empire Primer with open eyes not expecting that much, this is the implied & now fully fleshed out OSR setting for the Adventurer, Conqueror, King rpg system. The whole setting implies not so much the usual Sword & Sorcery of D&D but Late Antiquity, around 250 - 750 AD."Late Antiquity is a periodization used by historians to describe the time of transition from classical antiquity to the Middle Ages in mainland Europe, the Mediterranean world, and the Middle East. " . This is the time period that saw the Roman Empire split in two, with the western half eventually dying while the eastern half of the empire continuing until 1453.Auran isn't the Roman Empire, there are some really interesting marked differences right off the bat. The fact that Auran is an empire with its cracks beginning to really taking its toll on many fronts means that there are lots of places for adventurers to make a difference. The setting is close to a Constantinople of the era of Antiquity in many respects including a reaming cross section of peoples, religions,and weirdness of a world on the edge. This is a place of forbidden black magic, the blackest magic that cracks peoples souls & beastmen capable of rending an empire in half. This book presents in twenty five pages an overview of places, things, religions, cultures, and other elements that we've heard in other ACK's products such as ACKS Player's Companion, The Sinister Stone of Sakkara, & Axioms digital magazine. That's pretty much only half of the material though. What this book actually is a showcase of the elements from Adventurer, Conqueror, King & a kit for creating your own world if you want to look past the usual set pieces & system place holders which one finds in other OSR games. This system has a good grounding in real world as its inspiration & that to me seems to make a solid difference;"The ancient civilizations that precede the campaign’s era have realworld cultural analogues as well. The ancient Argollëan elven civilization resembles a sort of Proto-Helleno-Celtic culture; imagine if the Danaans of Ancient Greece and the Danaans of Ancient Ireland were actually the same people, part of a single, more advanced civilization. The ancient Thrassian civilization is inspired by Sumerian civilization with an Aztec aesthetic, while the subsequent Zaharan civilization is inspired by pre-Hellenistic Akkadian civilization with some Egyptian flavoring. The early Auran “Empyrean era” civilization draws on elements of the Minoans, Mycenaeans, and Sea Peoples, with extensive Heroic Age Greco-Roman (Illiad, Aeneid) inspirations." This is a case of heavy is the head that wears the crown and that head just might be your PC, if their very lucky & the players might think outside the box. So what does the Auran Empire Primer bring to the table that's different then say Greyhawk or some other old school rpg setting book? Not much & that's fine with me! Let me explain here, the book presents a brief bite sized overview of the Auran world setting & it does it with a nice level of presentation along with some really well done artwork, cartography, and ideas. The overview is brief, to the point, and gives me exactly the level of detail that I want without overwhelming me with lots of filler BS that I don't need. In other words this is a place that I want to set adventures in.Its not a world that is so on fire that I as a DM don't have room or a elbow space to set up my own political or world events in. This is often one of the problems that I've had with other RPG products, the world events are happening right now! There's no time to get to know anything or do great deeds, your characters have to be heroes now! Well they do but in a system such as Adventurer, Conqueror, King they're going to need to build PC in roads into the world. This book helps to fill in the colour and setting material that you need. Did I mention that the book sells for only two dollars and fifty cents? All in all I think that the Auran Empire Primer does a really killer job of presenting the world of the empire and its very well done product.

Eric Fabiaschi Sword & Stitchery blog Dark Corners of Role Playing Blog Want to see more OSR action subscribe to http://swordsandstitchery.blogspot.com/ Or http://darkcornersofrpging.blogspot.com/

If I was asked to describe Dwimmermount in three letters, this would be - WOW. The amount of thought, creativity and effort put into this product is staggering. It offers a complete setting, with a detailed and interesting history - as well as a secret history to be pieced together from clues and hints left in the dungeon. It details a large area of land, several settlements, its own very interesting interpretation of player-character races - and a megadungeon. This is, mind you, a REAL megadungeon - with ten large levels, all interconnected and well-fitting into the overall concept, many artifacts and dungeon systems to interact with, and multiple factions vaying for control of the dunegon.

This is a campaign in one book. You can simply take this book, and have months - if not years - of gaming fun. It is choke-full of material, little of which is generic or drab - careful thought was put into everything.

Highly recommended, if only for all the stuff you can easily "steal" from this for your own home campaign.

Very well done homage to Keep on the Borderlands, this time in a pseudo-Roman empire keep in an Ancient Egyptian/Mesopotamian culture that they have conquered.

Very high production values (other than some use of very common stock art) with a lot of original art, including some color pieces. The keep is meticulously detailed.

The adventure is very much like Keep on the Borderlands, with a dungeon complex ruled by different factions, but the map is very much historical looking, like a real temple.

On the down side, most the dungeon is full of bog standard D&D monsters (the regular humanoids) with only a few new monsters. But as it's an homage to Keep on the Borderlands, this isn't necessarily a bad thing.

I really like the basic idea but...no examples, no ready-made factions/characters, no scenario. Any questions of depth get referred to some other core book. In sum, I can't see how to use this book to start anything. It's just not a quickstart. I want to like it, but after several read-throughs, I simply can't use it.

I was disappointed with this product. Not due to the art, which ranged from average to very good. My criticism is that virtually all, if not all, of the images also exist in the main book. Now if you only had the hard copy version of main book, I can see how this illustration book could be handy. However, I have the PDF version. I could simply copy and paste each image in order to show my players.

I was also disappointed that there was no identifications for the images. Most are obvious but some I have no idea what in the adventure they are supposed to represent.