I've run two Iron Kingdoms RPG campaigns, and "guest-GMed" in a third, and I found this to be an invaluable resource either for more conventional adventures based in the "Iron Kingdoms," OR for those focused on the "wild folk" as seems to be intended by the rebranding of this as "Unleashed." It still leaves a few gaps, however, and I would strongly recommend that anyone getting this book also pick up the "Wild Adventure" supplement (which goes a long way toward filling those conspicuous gaps).

PRO:

• This provides a greatly expanded bestiary, larger and more impressive than the "Monsternomicon." A great many archetypes are filled in here for Iron Kingdoms GMs who want to run wilderness encounters against various of the denizens made familiar in the miniatures wargame.

• Related to the above, the new PC races, archetypes/professions, and branches of magic could be used to greatly expand what sorts of adversaries a more "traditional" Iron Kingdoms party might run up against.

• "Unleashed" arguably has better support as an RPG setting than the more traditional Iron Kingdoms. (If you want to play any of the major Unleashed races -- or as a GM you want to have them as fleshed-out adversaries -- you either have what you need in this book, or else in the Skorne supplement, or about 5 issues of "No Quarter" to provide most of what you need for Everblight. If, however, you wanted to play (or play against) the Retribution of Scyrah, Rhulic Mercenaries, or Cryx, you're just going to have to make do with the 2nd edition "Forces" books from Warmachine, and hand-wave all the missing RPG elements.)

CON:

• There are some issues with balance between the races. Gatormen can be pretty much placed side-by-side against the Ogrun from the core IKRPG, and in virtually all respects (except for POI, or the likelihood to be allowed to walk around freely in a city) are just plain BETTER than them. (The "hunger" disadvantage for gatormen isn't really as big a deal as the fluff makes it sound.) Over the course of our Unleashed campaign, more players ended up changing over to Gatorman if they wanted to be all-around awesome. Gatormen ARE fun to play, but when you're on the GM side of the screen, it's hard to balance encounters that will challenge the Gatormen without simply creaming all the non-Gatormen in the party.

• Warlocks need a LOT of work, and are poorly adapted to RPG use, at least over the scope of a long-running campaign. (These problems are not so evident if just running a "one-shot" or short-run campaign with beginning characters.)

  Depending upon how the GM runs it (and there are so many grey areas in regards to just how the GM should walk the line on this), they could dominate the campaign, or be utterly unplayable. No guidelines are provided for the GM as to how difficult it should be for a warlock to acquire a new Warbeast (with the possible exception of a Swamp Warlock, who has his work cut out for him in that he has to find a monster and "subjugate" it). Unlike the rules for Warcasters and Warjacks, there's no provision for "buying" a Warbeast, whether with money or some other resource -- it seems to depend upon the GM to determine when some benefactor (the Circle Orboros, etc.) is going to simply provide your Warlock with a new beast, or whether you can happen upon it in the wild on your own.

  Once a warlock starts advancing to the point where he can devote additional "slots" to additional warbeasts, things can really spiral out of control. Whereas a Warcaster's ambitions to start his own "battlegroup" might be tempered by a lack of funds, or because spreading his Focus around means he isn't personally so much of a combat powerhouse anymore, each additional Warbeast in a Warlock's retinue can be a potent force all its own (many have three decent attacks without having to be "Forced" at all), AND provides additional insurance for the Warlock's steady supply of Fury even if another Warbeast is downed in combat. Unlike the care and maintenance required for damaged Warjacks, Warbeasts have a number of options for recovering health even in the middle of combat. And, even though there's the "threat" of a Warbeast getting out of control if a Warlock pushes it too much and fails to bleed off all its excess Fury, the consequences (the Warbeast makes a single enraged attack that MIGHT be against an ally if no enemies are in reach, then returns to normal the next round) aren't really all that scary in practice. (A GM could of course just wing it, and play it as something far more dramatic than the rules-as-written, but that's true of any system, so for reviewing purposes I'm focusing on "as-written.")

  If the GM should try to temper this and allow other players to shine more by contriving to put the party in a smallish dungeon where large Warbeasts and Warjacks simply won't fit, the Warcaster can still be personally awesome through alternative use of Focus ... whereas the Warlock, sans Warbeast (and his supply of Fury) is suddenly hobbled. (Either that, or you had a "Light" Warbeast, which is technically no bigger than half the PCs in a typical Unleashed party. The medium-base "Brute Boar" is arguably a better deal for a Farrow Warlock than a large-base "War Hog" anyway.)

• As with the 2nd edition Monsternomicon, this bestiary still lacks stats for a number of basic wilderness creatures. (This oversight is addressed in "Wild Adventure.")

• A lot of your adversaries in Unleashed campaigns are likely to be others of the "Unleashed" races -- gatormen, bog trogs, farrow, tharn, trollkin, etc. -- but since those are all PLAYER races, it's mostly left to the GM to try to build them up as characters, rather than having quick encounter stats handy. The Iron Kingdoms RPG core book rather nicely included a section on "humans" that had ready-made profiles for a bandit, thief, alchemist, town guard, etc., in convenient blocks, ready to go. It would have been nice to have something similar for a "Gatorman Posse," "Bog Trog Ambushers," "Farrow Brigands," "Tharn Ravagers," etc., ready to go. The Unleashed Adventure Kit handily settles this for the Farrow; for the rest, you might see about getting a copy of "Forces of War: Minions" to get stat blocks for the last edition of the miniatures wargame, which ALMOST cover everything you'd need for the RPG.

...

(Disclaimer: Just because I spent more space explaining the "con" doesn't mean it outweighs the "pro" -- but I still think it's worth considering.)

Overall, if you are a GM running a conventional Iron Kingdoms (Full Metal Fantasy) campaign, this is a very useful resource to fill in a great number of gaps in the world. This will provide you with a great number of interesting new adversaries.

If, however, you actually want to run an "Unleashed" campaign, as is clearly intended here, the game design over the course of a longer campaign suffers from some pretty severe play-balance issues that I haven't managed to find any satisfactory solutions to via "house rules." You could do away with a large number of the headaches by not allowing PCs to be warlocks, but that would be like running Iron Kingdoms and prohibiting steamjacks.

IMHO, the best bet for a GM is restrict any Warlock to only having one Warbeast as a Hero, up to two at Veteran, and then not worry about the cap upon reaching Epic (at which point we'd hope everyone is kind of awesome already) -- and then, make it clear that a non-wold warbeast is a living creature, and the GM reserves the right to play fast and loose with what exactly happens when the warlock loses control of it. If the danger of getting munched by your own warbeast is a real threat, it makes things a lot more "interesting," in my opinion.

This is a great add on to the regular IK rpg or great as a stand alone. It provides great rules for playing the wilder side of civilization in the Iron Kingdoms.

For those who do not know the IKRPG system. It is a 2d6 model with a more abstract progression system that mimics but is unlike leveling. Unlike other systems players are larger than life and truly Heroic. If D20 is like lord of the Rings, this is a Marvel Movie. Both GREAT but for very different reasons.

The rules are much the same as IKRPG (as is expected) and they do a very good job of fleshing out the cults and tribes that you can play as.

Though just like its Predecessor, IKRPG, there will be quite a bit of house ruling needing to be done. Some entries are written with errors or vague enough that for the wargame are sufficient, but in an area that requires imagination this book gives very little to assist.

Also another area that needs house ruling is the classes. Why are some race restricted? Slaughter houser is really just a Halberdier, why is it farrow only? Fennblade is just Greatweapon Specialist, why Trollkin only. Long rider, raptor, and Wolf rider could respectively be Heavy Cavaltry, Mounted archer(ranged Cavalry) and Cavalry Scout. There is no need for them to be race specific.

Otherwise I think they have added Much more good than bad to this RPG world. Warlocks and beats are explained and implemented wonderfully.

So if you want a system that is simple, does not have everything explained to the smallest detail, and fights are quick and dynamic, this is for you.

WARNING for those coming from other more established systems. The lack of definition will be very off putting at first, things are not spelled out to the letter, and the spells are described visually. Also character creation can literally take minutes. So if you or your group are not very imaginative and cant come to decision on how a rule should work, stay clear of this system.

Iron Kingdoms Unleashed Review

A little background for you, I play Warmachine and Hordes, which are the table top miniature games that this RPG is based on. In particular my main faction is the Trollbloods so it was almost written in the stars that I would like this book. I’ll try to give you an objective review, but if my love of the setting gets away with me you will know why.



Iron Kingdoms Unleashed is the RPG of the Hordes table top game. Which is about the monster races of the Iron Kingdoms. The original book in the line Iron Kingdoms Full Metal Fantasy covers the Humans, Elves, and Dwarven kingdoms of the setting.



Fluff



This game is interesting, I’ve been playing a lot of D&D 5th edition since it’s release. So seeing a game that lets you play a monster was refreshing. Especially because the setting gives you the sense that these monsters are on some what equal footing with the civilized Dwarves, Elves, and Humans. Your not a cowering tribe of Goblins fearing the day when a high level Adventurer will sweep through your tribe. The major monster races are scary, and should be respected.

Iron Kingdoms Unleashed takes place in the “Wilds” of Immoren. While I really enjoyed the chapter setting up the history of all the factions. Knowing the other side of the coin, specifically what is going on in the human kingdoms from the Full Metal Fantasy book, really helped flesh out the setting. I’m not sure if they give you enough of a picture of what the countries on the map actually mean by themselves. Given you are playing monsters, so whatever those soft squishy humans print on maps doesn’t mean much, as they are weak and cower behind the walls.

There are a lot of monster races to pick from in the book, they are basically split into four “factions” of critters. The Bog Trogs (fishmen) and Gatormen make up the swamp races. The Trollkin and Pygmy Trolls make up the Troll Kriels. Tharn and Human druids make up the Circle of Oroboros. The Farrow are well… the Farrow. Lastly you have the Nyss who are a species of Elf that have lost there lands to mutant dragons (it’s a long story). Of course there are Humans who live in the wilds as well. The races seem fairly well balanced, and mixing races from Full Metal Fantasy should not be a problem.



The Trolls have 4 species that live in the wilds. There are the Pygmy Trolls, who are small (by troll standards) clever people who are not quite as smart or civilized as the Trollkin. I like to think of them like Jawa’s personally. Where Trollkin are large and strong, Pygmy Trolls are more agile and cunning. Trollkin are the next size up, they are of human intelligence, and the race appears in Full Metal Fantasy as there are Trolls that live and work in Human settings. Trollkin have a scottish flair, liking big weapons and wearing kilts, but have an odd tendency to have vaguely Nordic names, and they drink heavily. Trollkins are 7 to 8 feet tall, and in the setting probably fill the same niche as World of Warcraft Orcs. There are also Full Blooded Trolls, which are monsters, but can be reasoned with. Sometimes Full Blooded Trolls live with there smaller kin, trading labor and strength for easy food. Lastly there are the Dire Trolls, Mountains of muscle and basically the fury of nature given form, they are hard to reason with.



Farrow are my other favorite race from the book, they don’t get a lot of pages but what they get is just packed with flavor. They are probably the D&D Orc race in the setting, Tribes of pig headed savages. In this book I found out that they are cannibals, which makes sense several Farrow units in the table top game have the “Bacon” rule. Basically in the setting Farrow are often prayed upon by other races because they are tasty to eat. The Farrow themselves acknowledge this which is why they eat their own as well, and consider it an insult if you don’t join them.



The Circle of Orboros has humans in there number and Tharn. Tharn are kind of like shifters from Eberron. They are a race that are touched by the Devouring Wyrm and have a human like form, and can shift into a more bestial form. Tharn Men become larger and vaguely wolfish, where the tharn women become agile and hard to spot. The Druids of the Circle are old school D&D Druids, wanting to return to nature at any cost, which means they want to destroy civilization. The problem is civilization is not destroyed, the Full Metal Fantasy kingdoms are at late 19th century technology, which means you get to read about the Circle having all these cool plans to destroy the world, and then ultimately fail.



Bog Trogs are walking humanoid fish that are easy to track because they smell. They are cowardly and are often beaten into submission by the other race they share the swamps with, the Gatormen. Gators in the Iron Kingdoms setting all appear to have the ability to walk on two legs. The Gatormen are 7 foot tall, walking gators, that normally practice in magic that involves the stealing souls and then using them as a resource. They can also command the larger gators of the swamp, along with giant snapping turtle, swamp squids, and other nasty beasts.



In short you are playing monsters, which has it’s own problems. Being neck deep in the lore of the game it’s hard for me to imagine a reason why some of these races would work together. But then again I’m a lore snob and probably should relax and enjoy things more.



The Rules



Making a character is pretty easy in the game because you don’t roll for stats, and honestly during creation you don’t make a lot of choices. Which is good and bad, but the ease of which you gain your first few “levels” means the early part of the game is an extended tutorial. Once you get about 12 XP (which you can get in 4 to 6 play sessions) your character has taken on a lot of new abilities and choices, and really fleshed out.



Step 1 is you pick your race, which determines your basic stats.
 Step 2 is you pick your Archetype which is basically a mini class. You have four choices, Mighty (which raises your damage and makes you harder to kill), Skilled (which raises the number of attacks you get, and can make you more skilled), Cunning (party buffs essentially, gives you the ability to assist the other characters), and Gifted (aka your any form of Magic User).
 Step 3 you pick two Careers. Careers come pre built with what Abilities, Skills, and even gear they start with. You pick two, mash them together, and you have your character.
 Step 4 Customize. You can add 3 points into any of your stats, also you can trade out any spell or ability you get with another one available on your list. Which is good if you have something you really don’t need because of your class selection, you can pick up something more immediately useful. 
Step 5 Play.




The System



Iron Kingdoms uses d6’s, typically you roll 2d6 add your modifier and try to beat a difficulty number. So it’s kinda like d20 in that regard, it also means the average roll is 6 or 7. There are several ways of adding dice to the roll that exist in the game. For example, picking the Mighty Archetype gives you an extra dice of damage on melee attacks. Or charging into combat also gives you an extra dice. So if you find yourself in a situation where you need a high number that is hard to roll there are typically ways to change the math, the trick is finding them.



All characters also get 3 feat points which can do a number of awesome things, which is good because there is little to no magical healing in the game. So if you didn’t have the ability to heal with feat points, or halve the damage you take from an attack with them, the game would be extremely deadly.



The game itself is primarily a combat system as it’s built on a wargame. Which means the combat is also extremely fiddly. While I can in theory imagine not playing with miniatures, I wouldn’t recommend it. This is probably the biggest downfall of the game honestly, the combat system is deep and complex. The problem is it has a fairly steep learning curve. Now if you are used to the tabletop game picking it up is easy, it’s the same system with a few wrinkles.



Overall

As I said I play the table top game, I’m already invested in the system. So I like it a lot. The World is interesting, there is a lot of good stories you can read. I play Trolls, they are in this book a lot, it's awesome. It’s not a game for everybody, again the rules are very fiddly, and while the combat is engaging and very dynamic the game does shine with it’s combat system. If your not a deep combat nut it’s probably not a great game for you. The system reminds me a lot of Final Fantasy Tactics, where you take jobs, and get stuff, to really make the character you want. If any of this sounds interesting to you, take a gander, it’s a lot of fun.

This book is at best is an expansion book, and not a stand alone book. It have to few careers without race requirements to really support mixed games on it's own. As well there are major problems with some careers like warlocks not being able to to empower ranged weapons, being over all weaker, and has less player options then there counter part the warcaster. It also does not help Unleashed that we are still waiting for the errata to fix the problems of the book before it.

If you like Iron Kingdoms, you will love this. You will have the chance to play the monster without or within "civilazation" as feral humans and Another view of the Creation of the World and harness its Powers ...

Unleashed is a fabulously large book with an interesting play system that is truly unique in the RPG world. Play as denizens of the wilds of the Iron Kingdoms, whether you are a Mysterious Blackclad sorcerer, Trollkin Warrior, or Ferocious Gatorman.

This book has large amounts of information from character building to setting history to monster encounters and GM information. A few minor typos does not detract from a plethora of content.

This book is great! 480-some pages of IKRPG in the wilds of Immoren.

Delicious, tasty, filling, meaty, something to dig your teeth into, but also a familiar flavour throughout.

Oh yeah, we’re talking about the new IKRPG Unleashed book. Not some meaty dish!

So previously I have reviewed the IKRPG Unleashed Abridged rulebook that comes in the new starter adventures kit. That basically covered what we are familiar with - primarily the core rules, and magic for Willweavers. But, we also got a taste of the new things. Harnessers, Warbeasts, and Blood Magic.

The main core book builds on that familiarity. It assumes that the reader is essentially new to the world of Caern and the Iron Kingdoms, or of course is a Hordes player. Thus we get the entire history of the setting all over again, but with certain events and characters and myths explored in more depth that they were in the IKRPG core book. These of course bring life in the wilderness into focus over life in the cities. Also, where IKRPG assumes the in game date is 605 AR as Llael has fallen to Khador, Unleashed assumes the in game date is 608 AR, and thus assumes that the events surrounding the war in the Thornwood between Cryx, Khador and Cygnar and others, have passed.

While IKRPG explored the nuances between the different ethnic groups that make up the Iron Kingdoms, Unleashed looks at the each of the main wilderness factions (Orboros, Trollkin Kriels, Farrow, Gatormen), plus the various other human tribes, and explores where their territories lie, what life is like in these societies, and their relationships with the other factions of Western Immoren. The amount of detail is excellent, and really allows you to delve into just one of these groups and use that as a basis for an adventuring party.

What is really excellent is that we get a healthy dollop of information about the Nyss, and their life that borders the wilds and the cities, and so builds upon the little information we had in the IKRPG core book.

Let’s not forget we have information on the Tharn and their tribes. They are presented then as a separate group, while also being allies to the Orboros. Perhaps not to a similar level of detail, we also get information on the Bog Trogs, who again are allies to the Gatormen, but are their own race.

What is important with all these sections, is that we are presented these groups so that while we get a sense of their communities and lives, but also these groups are not presented as monolithic entities. We get a sense of how diverse even Gatormen societies can be depending on the bayous they hail from.

Following the section on the different societies we get a section that explains the differences between different geographical regions, the way of life in those places, the hazards that they present, and the animals and plants that exist there. Each major forest, desert, mountain region etc are detail individually. This is all important for a GM who then has a reference text to help them paint an evocative picture of the landscapes that the adventuring party is travelling through.

With the setting out of the way, we get the familiar again. Character creation and stats. We have a number of races to choose in this book. Bog Trogs, Farrow (whose Warbeasts I learnt are just malformed Farrow births!), Gatormen (I really need to play one!), Humans Nyss, Pygmy Trolls, Tharn, and Trollkin. We have 4 archetypes are normal, but for the wilds, Intelligence is replaced by Cunning. Of course we then have the list and details on careers. Of course how these are used in character creation is the same as for IKRPG, but the options is quite interesting. Highlights are the Bokor, the Bone Grinder, the Bloodweaver (basically a close combat Gun Mage), a variety of mounted careers. Ugh… guess I will be getting some mounted troops for my armies!

The familiar continues, as we wade through abilities and skills, and the combat rules. Of course there are new entries that are more befitting the wilderness based games. Perhaps something that has a lot more options is the section on environmental hazards.

Magic. That most mysterious of arts. Is again… familiar. Character can be will weavers (just as in IKRPG) or harnessers, who are able to control beasts and channel fury, and thus be Warlocks. Much like Gun Mages, Blood Mages can be willweavers or harnessers, depending on career combinations.

Harnessers, as I explained in the previous review, are exactly what you expect. They use rules identical to how warlocks work in Hordes, and are able to rile beasts, force them, and channel fury from them.

Wolds, the construct monsters of the Orboros get their own section in the chapter on magic. We get details on their construction of Wolds, the golems made of wood and carved stones. While these creatures do generate Fury and so act as warbeasts, they differ in that they must be repaired rather than healed, and do not frenzy. This makes Wolds in the rpg rather like a cross between a warbeast and a warjack.

That all of course brings us to the next major chapter, Warbeasts.

Essentially as we already know from the abridged rulebook, that the rules for them are the same as they are in Hordes. Of course we do get some more information on the nature of the warbeast/warlock relationship, the dangers of an ill fed beast, the way such creatures frenzy when their warlock dies, and more. For every beast within the book, we get information on the rules for training, arming, and animi, that beasts can learn and be equipped with. The actual stats for the beasts are given later in the book, and so this saves space by separating the Warbeast specific rules from the Warbeast stats.

The chapter on gear is as expected, featuring the tools of the trade for many of these races. But we also get a whole load of items and ingredients for wilderness alchemy, which are great additions for even regular IKRPG alchemist characters. But Bone Grinders (who are not just farrow, but any race) are more like specialist cooks, who know the brews and broths to create. Bone Grinders can also fabricate magical fetishes from the body parts they harvest from creatures and fallen foes.

The penultimate chapter, preceding the GM section, is the bestiary, which serves both as a list of opponents for characters, and the selection of creatures for warlocks to control. Many of these will be familiar both from the wargame, or from the pages of No Quarter and the Monsternomicon. Creatures get the standard style of information we have become used to, plus the templates (given in the appendix and in No Quarter and the Monsternomicon) than allow us to present variations on the same creature (so a juvenile Argus, or a Argus Alpha, or a trained Argus etc). There are some new beasts in the pages here, like the different types of Drakes, and the Feral Geist.

So, how do I feel about this book?

If you are new to Iron Kingdoms, and start here rather than the IKRPG book, then it is an excellent, massive, and well presented book, filled with the art and lore that we have come to expect from Privateer Press.

However, if you are like me, and already play the war games, or play the IKRPG, then there is a lot that is familiar, or duplicated wholesale. Is that a bad thing? Perhaps. But then Privateer Press has two core books for two player bases for two different settings, which are bound together by a greater setting. In that respect, it is similar to the scenario FFG has with the Warhammer 40k rpgs. So if you really want the content of Unleashed, but don’t want to buy a book you already have half of, then go get the pdf is my suggestion.

Lastly, right at the back of the book are two pages of conversions done by the Privateer Press studio. Lots of cool ideas here and I hope PP will make models available in some manner to make getting bits easier for such things.

Oh and the hard copy version of this book is excellent. I guess with the IKRPG core book, I now have two core books for my group when basic rules need referencing. But then the abridged rulebook is great for that too.

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