This book is solely responsible for helping to create the single most successful DnD 5e campaign that I have ever run. My roommate and I were inspired by Matt Colville's video on West Marches-style play (https://youtu.be/oGAC-gBoX9k) and this book has been a huge assist in helping us flesh out survival mechanics and make the exploration pillar of DnD meatier and more fun. The book has been helpful with creating an emergent narrative and a beautiful map and building a solid player base that is hungry to explore our world and uncover the secrets we've hidden. West Marches play pushes DnD games to their absolute limits (in a good way) with encouraging use of items, mechanics, and smart roleplay to solve problems and really conquer a world and learn everything about it. The travel rules are invaluable for exploring both new and old territory. Making players take into account the area where they are resting, the conditions of the weather, their food and water situation, really makes them think more. The tables of weather affecting play are a stroke of genius. The worldbuilding chapter is really valuable for fleshing the starting town. The factions and encounter information and ideas are interesting and help keep the world far more varied from just, "cultists want to take over the world and summon a demon!" All in all, this book is freaking awesome. If you're gonna run a West Marches campaign, this is an essential tool. I bought the PDF and a physical copy and I'm still waiting on my print version to come in. Will update when I get it.

This is such a fantastic book! I got hooked listening to Brandes and Sam talk about it on the Edition Wars podcast. I love what it adds to the exploration pillar of play. I love that it actually offers decent guidance for giving non-combat XP in a way that isn't just "whatever feels good". I love the additional rules about resting in the wilderness and gear. I love the guidance it offers on building lore and using indexical storytelling to communicate that lore.

It's a beautiful and beautifully written book. I got the print-on-demand hardcover and it is worth every penny.

I received this product after the Kickstarter. I think it is simply superb. It is packed with all the tools, advice and options that a GM may need to run a sandbox campaign, or a West Marches campaign more specifically. It is very clear, well-organized, well-written and well-illustrated. There are many optional new systems in this book that can be easily used in non-sandbox games as well; in particular I really liked the crafting rules and using monster parts and scavenged parts - it was crunchy enough to be interesting but wasn't too complex like some other systems I've seen floating around. If I have any (very minor gripes) about this products it's that the DCs for certain survival-based tasks seem inconsistent (too low or too high), and that I almost wish it was a little bit more generic so I could use it more easily with OSR games (like Worlds Without Number does for example). The other very minor gripe is that while I really like the art in the book it didn't particularly invoke in me a sense of a D&D fantasy campaign. It's really good art, but tonally it didn't quite fit. Otherwise this is an amazing product and every DM should get it and use it extensively.

Super well made book on creating and running a campaign inspired by the the West Marches (summarized as a sandboxy, dynamic and dangerous dnd setting). There's an emphasis on survival, emergent storytelling, and cohesive worldbuilding. The book is nicely laid out with tons of beautiful art.

An awesome resource for anyone interested in running a West Marches style campaign, or really for creating any sandboxy campaign in a wild setting.

I love it! It's an in depth, detailed, and overall very well made wilderness guide for D&D 5e which can pretty easily be converted I would imagine. it has the rules and guidelines for anything Wilds, and has examples and walkthroughs as well to help make sure you really know what you're doing! Would recommend to anyone who wants a more detailed look at the dangers of the wilderness in RPGs.