Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/monstrous-mondays-ad-2nd-ed-monstrous_28.html

There is no doubt that the biggest game world for AD&D 2nd Edition was the Forgotten Realms. I was fairly anti-Realms back then. I felt it was a cheap imitation of Greyhawk and I was a little irritated that Greyhawk got pushed to the side. The 3rd Edition Forgotten Realms setting book did a lot to change that for me and now, especially with my investigations around my This Old Dragon posts, I have come to better appreciate the Realms for what they really are, not for what I thought they were.

That all being said I still bought Realms-related products like these because, well, I love monsters.

MC6 Monstrous Compendium, Kara-Tur Appendix

Kara-Tur did not begin as a Forgotten Realms land. Quite the contrary it was designed to be used as part of Oerth in the 1st Edition Oriental Adventures. This Monstrous Compendium brings the creatures listed in the 1st ed book, and more, into the 2nd Edition game.

This PDF is listed at 64 pages (more with binder dividers) and a price tag of $4.99. The cover and dividers are full color (including Easley's Oriental Adventure cover) and the interior art is Black & White. There are 76 monsters from Bajang to the Yuki-on-na.

Interestingly enough the Eastern Dragons from the Original Fiend Folio are not here. They appeared in the MC3 Forgotten Realms one, but I thought they should appear here instead. Likely to solidify the claim of Kara-Tur in the Forgotten Realms or maybe to give the 3rd MC some popular dragons.

There are some very unique monsters here. This is one of the few that I keep separate and do not integrate into my larger monster sets.

The scans for all are pretty crisp and clear. I certainly can see printed out a couple of pages and using them in a smaller binder for a specific AD&D 2nd Ed campaign. Like I have said before, these PDF are fulfilling the promises made by the Monstrous Compendiums in the 1990s.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/monstrous-mondays-ad-2nd-ed-monstrous_21.html

I am continuing my dive into the AD&D 2nd Edition Monstrous Compendiums. Today I want to talk about the next three that were important to me in terms of what I call the "core" of the AD&D 2nd Ed monsters.

It is a commonly held belief that during the AD&D 2nd Ed era that settings were at their height. The remaining Monstrous Compendiums focused on these settings. For me it was a perfect systems really. I could keep monsters in with my core rules, like I did with Greyhawk, Dragonlance and Mystara. Or keep them with my boxed sets of campaigns, like I did with all my Ravenloft stuff. So let's go with the ones I integrated (to the best I could) into my core set.

MC5 Monstrous Compendium Greyhawk Adventures Appendix

Personally I always felt that Greyhawk should have had a Monstrous Compendium long before the others, but I can see why it came out when it did, given all that history. The Greyhawk Adventures book for 1st Edition had a "preview" of monsters in 2nd Edition format. I remember being quite excited about this and really liking the new stat block even though it was much larger than before.

More so than the other MC Appendices, I tried to integrate these monsters as much as I could into my "core" Monstrous Compendium. To me Greyhawk was the "home world" of D&D.

The PDF from DriveThruRPG is 64 pages, runs $4.99, and includes 63 monsters; Beastman to Zygom.

Many of these monsters have their origins in the AD&D 1st ed modules and Fiend Folio, but there are few others here from the Monster Manaual II. The only creatures here that really saw "Greyhawk" to me are the Grell, Greyhawk Dragon, the Sword Wraiths and the Drowned Zombies.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/monstrous-mondays-ad-2nd-ed-monstrous_21.html

I am continuing my dive into the AD&D 2nd Edition Monstrous Compendiums. Today I want to talk about the next three that were important to me in terms of what I call the "core" of the AD&D 2nd Ed monsters.

It is a commonly held belief that during the AD&D 2nd Ed era that settings were at their height. The remaining Monstrous Compendiums focused on these settings. For me it was a perfect systems really. I could keep monsters in with my core rules, like I did with Greyhawk, Dragonlance and Mystara. Or keep them with my boxed sets of campaigns, like I did with all my Ravenloft stuff. So let's go with the ones I integrated (to the best I could) into my core set.

MC4 Monstrous Compendium Dragonlance Appendix

Ok, this one bugged me at first. I bought it and it said Draonlance Appendix on the front even though it was the second two-ring binder. I didn't play Dragonlance, I was doing Greyhawk and would soon be eyeballs deep in Ravenloft. My irritations were put to rest when I opened and the cover, while having the same art, just said Monstrous Compendium Vol. 2. For a while I used both alphabetically, vol 1 with A through M and vol 2 holding N to Z and the tables and blank forms. Today I use vol 1 for my core monsters and vol 2 for everything else.

Dragonlance falls into "everything else" for me. The monsters are good, and many that have made their way back into my core monsters.

The PDF from DriveThruRPG is 96 pages, 82 monsters and at a price of $4.99. The monsters range from "Anemone, Giant" to "Yeti-kin, Saqualaminoi." It covers all the various races of Krynn including the various types of dwarves, all the different kinds of elves, the kender and Dragonlance's lizard men and minotaurs. It was the first to include the Death Knight and Skeleton Warriors, though I always felt they belonged in Greyhawk. Certainly worth it for the Draconians and tips on Dragonlance's dragons which help redefine dragons in D&D in the first place.

The cover of the PDF is a little dark, but the pages inside are sharp and clear.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/monstrous-mondays-ad-2nd-ed-monstrous_21.html

I am continuing my dive into the AD&D 2nd Edition Monstrous Compendiums. Today I want to talk about the next three that were important to me in terms of what I call the "core" of the AD&D 2nd Ed monsters.

It is a commonly held belief that during the AD&D 2nd Ed era that settings were at their height. The remaining Monstrous Compendiums focused on these settings. For me it was a perfect systems really. I could keep monsters in with my core rules, like I did with Greyhawk, Dragonlance and Mystara. Or keep them with my boxed sets of campaigns, like I did with all my Ravenloft stuff. So let's go with the ones I integrated (to the best I could) into my core set.

Monstrous Compendium - Mystara Appendix

First Edition was all about Greyhawk. Second edition was synomous with Ravenloft for me. But Mystara, or before that name, the Known World was where my gaming began. So the Mystara Appendix for the Monstrous Compendium was one of my "core" core sets.

The Mystara appendix take a few diversions from the other core world sets. For starters this one is 128 pages and $9.99 on DriveThruRPG now. It is also full color, a indication of the change of publishing style at TSR. This book was also published as a standalone softcover, perfect bound, book. It seems that by 1994 the loose-leaf era was indeed over.

The PDF though does allow you to go back to that era and print the monsters out as you like.

This set has 174 monsters from Actaeon to Zombie, Lightning. Many of the old favorites from the B/X and BECMI days are here too. Living Statues, Kopru, Decapus and the Thoul are all here in their 2nd Edition glory as well as many of the Gem Stone Dragons.

If you were/are a fan of the D&D Creature Catalogs then this really is a must buy. I find it interesting that this Compendium came out just a year after the DMR2 Creature Catalog. I'd have to go through them page by page to see if there are any differences in the monsters presented, but they feel very much alike.

The DriveThruRPG scanned PDF is very bright and clear. I would love to see this as a print-on-demand some day.

The full review, with pictures, can be read here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/monstrous-mondays-ad-2nd-ed-monstrous.html

In the waning years of the 80s, AD&D took a new turn. Much of the original guard was gone from TSR and a new edition of its flagship game was on the way. I was at University at the time, so for me, it was easy enough to move over to AD&D 2nd Ed. I was not playing with my normal group anymore (they were 200+ miles away) and it seemed like a good place to move on.

It was June 1989 and I was on what was to be my last family vacation to Harrisburg, PA. We were doing a big Civil War tour and my dad was meeting up with a bunch of guys he served with during the Korean War. I remember being on my own for a bit and I found a game and comic store not far from Gettysburg. I went in looking for anything new and anything to entertain myself. Much to my shock they had copies, released that week, of the new AD&D 2nd Monstrous Manual. I remember talking to them asking how business was for AD&D 2nd ed and they had said terrible that no one was buying yet. I am quite certain that changed later on. But that was also my first hint at anything like an "Edition War."

I got it back to my hotel room and I read that book cover to cover. I loved the idea of the 3-Ring binder and I loved how the monsters were all expanded to include the Habitats and Ecology. My first RPG love was the AD&D Monster Manual. This did not fill me with as much excitement (you never forget your first time) but it was close.

As time went on and I bought more of the Monstrous Compendiums the weakness of the format began to show itself. For starters you could never properly alphabetize the pages. One monster per page is great, unless the monster on the back of the page is more letters down the line. Also in normal use, the pages became tattered and torn; and that is if you removed the perforations right the first time.

Still, I loved the idea and still do it today.

MC1 Monstrous Compendium Volume One

This was the first Monstrous Compendium to hit the market but not the first time seeing the new monster format. That was published in the (then) new Greyhawk Adventures hardcover. Originally this came with the monsters on printed, perforated sheets, cardstock color dividers, and the three-ring binder to put them all in.

This product covered some 130 monsters from Aerial Servant to Zombie. It had most of the "usual suspects" including orcs, all the PC races, goblins, and the greatly expanded dragons. The Dragons were the big star of this particular package. They were bigger, meaner, and a whole lot scarier.

The PDF from DriveThru helps this book live up to its promised potential. You can print the entries you want and organize them how you want. The scans are of the original books/pages so you don't have to worry about a lot of color (you will burn through the cyan/blue though).

A note, like the original Monstrous Compendium this one still has the error on the Vampire page, with side 1 printed on both sides. The correction can be found in the October 1989 issue of Dragon magazine or the full Monstrous Manual.

Final Thoughts

The PDFs from DriveThru are a fraction of the cost of the original and I can also buy a very sturdy binder to put them all in. The big issue is of course my own printer ink. But if I ever plan on running an AD&D game again I'll be using these and finally have them live up to the full potential that was promised to me back in Gettysburg, PA in 1989.

The full review, with pictures, can be read here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/monstrous-mondays-ad-2nd-ed-monstrous.html

In the waning years of the 80s, AD&D took a new turn. Much of the original guard was gone from TSR and a new edition of its flagship game was on the way. I was at University at the time, so for me, it was easy enough to move over to AD&D 2nd Ed. I was not playing with my normal group anymore (they were 200+ miles away) and it seemed like a good place to move on.

It was June 1989 and I was on what was to be my last family vacation to Harrisburg, PA. We were doing a big Civil War tour and my dad was meeting up with a bunch of guys he served with during the Korean War. I remember being on my own for a bit and I found a game and comic store not far from Gettysburg. I went in looking for anything new and anything to entertain myself. Much to my shock they had copies, released that week, of the new AD&D 2nd Monstrous Manual. I remember talking to them asking how business was for AD&D 2nd ed and they had said terrible that no one was buying yet. I am quite certain that changed later on. But that was also my first hint at anything like an "Edition War."

I got it back to my hotel room and I read that book cover to cover. I loved the idea of the 3-Ring binder and I loved how the monsters were all expanded to include the Habitats and Ecology. My first RPG love was the AD&D Monster Manual. This did not fill me with as much excitement (you never forget your first time) but it was close.

As time went on and I bought more of the Monstrous Compendiums the weakness of the format began to show itself. For starters you could never properly alphabetize the pages. One monster per page is great, unless the monster on the back of the page is more letters down the line. Also in normal use, the pages became tattered and torn; and that is if you removed the perforations right the first time.

Still, I loved the idea and still do it today.

MC2 Monstrous Compendium Volume Two

The second Monstrous Compendium package was released that to the horror of OCD Dungeon Master's everywhere, you could not properly alphabetize all the entries. This one covers more monsters, the second tier ones, Aarakocra to Yellow Musk Creeper and Zombie. It had a solid Fiend Folio vibe to it.

Any hopes the rumors were false were soon dashed as this set also did not include the Demons and Devils of old. We would get them, eventually, but not for a bit.

The weakness of the printed copy of 1989 is no longer an issue with the PDF of today. Now you can reprint the monsters you want AND keep them to one page for fully proper alphabetizing. You just a need a new binder that will hold 500 some odd pages.

Like the MC1 this PDF includes the dividers you can print. For my use? I print them out, put them in a page protector and then put some card stock in with them.

Final Thoughts

The PDFs from DriveThru are a fraction of the cost of the original and I can also buy a very sturdy binder to put them all in. The big issue is of course my own printer ink. But if I ever plan on running an AD&D game again I'll be using these and finally have them live up to the full potential that was promised to me back in Gettysburg, PA in 1989.

The full review, with pictures, can be read here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/monstrous-mondays-ad-2nd-ed-monstrous.html

In the waning years of the 80s, AD&D took a new turn. Much of the original guard was gone from TSR and a new edition of its flagship game was on the way. I was at University at the time, so for me, it was easy enough to move over to AD&D 2nd Ed. I was not playing with my normal group anymore (they were 200+ miles away) and it seemed like a good place to move on.

It was June 1989 and I was on what was to be my last family vacation to Harrisburg, PA. We were doing a big Civil War tour and my dad was meeting up with a bunch of guys he served with during the Korean War. I remember being on my own for a bit and I found a game and comic store not far from Gettysburg. I went in looking for anything new and anything to entertain myself. Much to my shock they had copies, released that week, of the new AD&D 2nd Monstrous Manual. I remember talking to them asking how business was for AD&D 2nd ed and they had said terrible that no one was buying yet. I am quite certain that changed later on. But that was also my first hint at anything like an "Edition War."

I got it back to my hotel room and I read that book cover to cover. I loved the idea of the 3-Ring binder and I loved how the monsters were all expanded to include the Habitats and Ecology. My first RPG love was the AD&D Monster Manual. This did not fill me with as much excitement (you never forget your first time) but it was close.

As time went on and I bought more of the Monstrous Compendiums the weakness of the format began to show itself. For starters you could never properly alphabetize the pages. One monster per page is great, unless the monster on the back of the page is more letters down the line. Also in normal use, the pages became tattered and torn; and that is if you removed the perforations right the first time.

Still, I loved the idea and still do it today.

MC3 Monstrous Compendium Forgotten Realms Appendix

For me, and many others I feel, AD&D 2nd Ed was synonymous with the Forgotten Realms. It was Ed Greenwood's "Ecology of..." articles in Dragon that gave us these expanded monster listings so the Realms and 2nd Ed are a perfect fit in my mind. Even if 90% of my own 2nd ed gaming was in Ravenloft.

This gives us monsters from Ascallion to Wemic. Some old favorites like the Eastern Dragons are here and lots of monsters appeared in the pages of Dragon and Forgotten Realms books, many as 1st Edition versions first.

The PDF makes good on the promises to allow you to organize things as your wish. This is particularly nice for me since I took some of these monsters and placed them in with the ones above in one binder as all the "common" monsters and then mixed the remaining with the other Forgotten Realms MC (MC 11) for "Realms unique" monsters.

The scan on this one is a little light, so printing might make some of the pages look washed out. BUT you can turn up your printer's settings a notch to make it darker. Not too much or the scanned paper will also show up as "background noise." But you can also print them out and touch up what you like with a pencil and not worry about marking up a 30-year-old book from your collection.

Final Thoughts

The PDFs from DriveThru are a fraction of the cost of the original and I can also buy a very sturdy binder to put them all in. The big issue is of course my own printer ink. But if I ever plan on running an AD&D game again I'll be using these and finally have them live up to the full potential that was promised to me back in Gettysburg, PA in 1989.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/review-old-school-essentials-advanced.html

Arguably one of the biggest success stories of the late OSR movement has been the publication of Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy (2019) and Old-School Essentials Advanced Fantasy (2021). Indeed I feel that OSE has supplanted Swords & Wizardry, the darling of the middle OSR movement as the old-school game of choice. It is the old-school game of choice here in my home game, alternating between it and D&D 5e, and seems to be the most talked-about game in the old-school discussion areas.

This is all with good reason. OSE is well designed, superbly organized, and has wonderful art. There is a minimalist approach to the rules and presentation that does not detract from the experience, instead, it rather enhances it. You can see my enthusiasm in my review of the Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy Boxed set back in 2020. So imagine my surprise when I learned I had not given OSE Advanced a proper review yet.

I have detailed my introduction to D&D many times here. But briefly, my "first" D&D was a poorly copied version of Holmes Basic with an AD&D Monster Manual. My first "true" D&D, the one I could properly call my own was Moldvay Basic/Cook & MArsh Expert (commonly referred to as "B/X"). I would over the course of a year or so add in elements of AD&D. Most importantly the Deities & Demigods, the Fiend Folio, and a copy of Eldritch Wizardry. My D&D was always a mish-mash of Basic D&D and AD&D. I later discovered that my playstyle was not at all unique.

Old School Essentials Advanced Fantasy Edition really strikes at the heart of what this sort of play was like. The familiar and easy Basic/Expert rules with AD&D layered on top. Layered is the right word, AD&D had a lot of situational rules and rules used in tournaments and rules designed to cover what looked like medieval realism. As real that is in a world where half-elves fought dragons with magic. OSE-AF strips this down back to the B/X style rules found in OSE-CF and then adds in what people used the most from AD&D. No weapon speed factors, no tournament scoring, just D&D-style play.

OSE-AF is divided into two books, the Player's Tome and the Referee's Tome.

For this review, I am considering the hardcover books I got via the Kickstarter, the PDFs from DriveThruRPG, and extra copies of the Player's Tome I picked up at my FLGS. All books were purchased by me and none were submitted for review purposes.

OSE-AF Player's Tome

Hardcover. Black and White and color interior art and covers. 248 pages. Bookmarked PDF with hyperlinked table of contents and index. $40.00 for the hardcover print (retail). $15.00 for the PDF.

The Player's Tome covers everything an OSE-AF player needs to know. The book details a lot of the same rules that are found in the OSE-Classic Fantasy (or read: Basic) rules. This new book though integrates the "Basic" and "Advanced" material together with some notes on the "Advanced Fantasy" sections. One might be tempted to say that this book is not needed if you have the OSE-CF book, but that is not really the case. While there are certainly more classes, and more monsters in the case of the Referee Tome, there is still quite a lot of new material here. Enough to make AF twice as large content-wise as CF.

The main feature of this book, and indeed all of the OSE line, is the layout. All material is laid out so that everything you need to read is on facing pages. So a character class always takes up two pages (even and odd) so that when laid flat everything can be read at once and easily. There are very few exceptions to this rule and it gives OSE it's unique look and feel. Add in the art, sparingly but effectively used, the feel is elegant, if minimalist, efficiency. This is the same design that made D&D 4e a joy to read. The same feeling is here.

Advanced Fantasy follows its Advanced namesake and splits character race and character class into two separate things. Basic combined race and class so you got Clerics (always human) and Dwarves (always fighters). Here is the option that most folks want in the "Advanced" game. In addition to the four classes and the four races of Basic, this book introduces six more races and nine more classes.

In the OSE-AF book, we get: Acrobat, Assassin, Barbarian, Bard, Cleric, Druid, Fighter, Illusionist, Knight, Magic-user, Paladin, Ranger, and Thief.

There are also the "race as class" variants of: Drow, Duergar, Dwarf, Elf, Gnome, Half-elf, Halfling, Half-orc, Human, and Svirfneblin. The level maximum is 14 for humans and variable for others. All race/class combinations are detailed. This covers our first 80 some odd pages.

What follows next are guides for character advancement, equipment, animals of burden, transportation, and crews.

The next biggest section is Magic and this covers all the spells for the magic-using classes. Since the max level for any human is 14, spells are limited. Divine spellcasters are limited to the 5th level of casting and Arcane to the 6th level. The advantage here is the clerics and druids are on more equal footing with each other and so are magic-users and illusionists. Unlike their Advanced namesake, this book does not require spell components nor are their other details given. The spells are firmly in the Basic format.

The book wraps up with Adventuring, Hirelings, and building strongholds.

The feel is solid B/X Basic with enough "Advanced" added in to make it feel just a little different. Or in other words, exactly how we used to play it from 1980 to 1983.

Throughout all these books and the entire OSE line, the art is both evocative of the old-school style and still modern enough to please new audiences.

This is the game of choice for me to introduce old-school style play to players of modern games. My regular 5e group took to it like ducks to water. They love it. They still love their 5e games, but they also like to do this one. None of them had ever played B/X prior to this and it was a huge success.

I know that Gavin Norman and Necrotic Gnome have more material to give us for this, I hope it all lives up this new gold standard I set my OSR book to.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/review-old-school-essentials-advanced.html

Arguably one of the biggest success stories of the late OSR movement has been the publication of Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy (2019) and Old-School Essentials Advanced Fantasy (2021). Indeed I feel that OSE has supplanted Swords & Wizardry, the darling of the middle OSR movement as the old-school game of choice. It is the old-school game of choice here in my home game, alternating between it and D&D 5e, and seems to be the most talked-about game in the old-school discussion areas.

This is all with good reason. OSE is well designed, superbly organized, and has wonderful art. There is a minimalist approach to the rules and presentation that does not detract from the experience, instead, it rather enhances it. You can see my enthusiasm in my review of the Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy Boxed set back in 2020. So imagine my surprise when I learned I had not given OSE Advanced a proper review yet.

I have detailed my introduction to D&D many times here. But briefly, my "first" D&D was a poorly copied version of Holmes Basic with an AD&D Monster Manual. My first "true" D&D, the one I could properly call my own was Moldvay Basic/Cook & MArsh Expert (commonly referred to as "B/X"). I would over the course of a year or so add in elements of AD&D. Most importantly the Deities & Demigods, the Fiend Folio, and a copy of Eldritch Wizardry. My D&D was always a mish-mash of Basic D&D and AD&D. I later discovered that my playstyle was not at all unique.

Old School Essentials Advanced Fantasy Edition really strikes at the heart of what this sort of play was like. The familiar and easy Basic/Expert rules with AD&D layered on top. Layered is the right word, AD&D had a lot of situational rules and rules used in tournaments and rules designed to cover what looked like medieval realism. As real that is in a world where half-elves fought dragons with magic. OSE-AF strips this down back to the B/X style rules found in OSE-CF and then adds in what people used the most from AD&D. No weapon speed factors, no tournament scoring, just D&D-style play.

OSE-AF is divided into two books, the Player's Tome and the Referee's Tome.

For this review, I am considering the hardcover books I got via the Kickstarter, the PDFs from DriveThruRPG, and extra copies of the Player's Tome I picked up at my FLGS. All books were purchased by me and none were submitted for review purposes.

OSE-AF Referee's Tome

Hardcover. Black and White and color interior art and covers. 248 pages. Bookmarked PDF with hyperlinked table of contents and index. $40.00 for the hardcover print (retail). $15.00 for the PDF.

This book covers how to run an OSE-AF game. Some of the details here are the same as OSE-CF but there are enough rules additions and clarification to make it worthwhile to anyone that has OSE-CF.

The first part covers running the game and adventures along with designing a dungeon and wilderness areas.

The next section, Monsters, makes up the bulk of the book. All the old OSE-CF favorites are here and most of the Advanced era monsters. In 107 or so pages we get over 320 monsters. Again the art is light, but it is there. We do not get any Demons or Devils, those are coming in a future book from my understanding, but it is still plenty.

The next largest section is Treasure which includes intelligent swords.

We also get sections on monster tables by terrain, strongholds, and NPCs.

The main feature of this book, and indeed all of the OSE line, is the layout. All material is laid out so that everything you need to read is on facing pages. This is less obvious here as in the Player's Tome, but it is still a solid feature.

The two-volume set might just be the ultimate in expression of the time period in which I was doing my earliest D&D play. There are other Basic/Advanced hybrid games out there and they all provide a good mix of their sources, but it is OSE-AF that is the closest to what I was playing then. All of the fun of Basic with the options in Advanced I loved. The modularity of OSE also allows for expansion. While the 1 to 14 level range covers most of what people will play there is no reason why there can't be an OSE-Companion to cover higher levels.

Throughout all these books and the entire OSE line, the art is both evocative of the old-school style and still modern enough to please new audiences.

This is the game of choice for me to introduce old-school style play to players of modern games. My regular 5e group took to it like ducks to water. They love it. They still love their 5e games, but they also like to do this one. None of them had ever played B/X prior to this and it was a huge success.

I know that Gavin Norman and Necrotic Gnome have more material to give us for this, I hope it all lives up this new gold standard I set my OSR book to.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/review-old-school-essentials-advanced.html

Arguably one of the biggest success stories of the late OSR movement has been the publication of Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy (2019) and Old-School Essentials Advanced Fantasy (2021). Indeed I feel that OSE has supplanted Swords & Wizardry, the darling of the middle OSR movement as the old-school game of choice. It is the old-school game of choice here in my home game, alternating between it and D&D 5e, and seems to be the most talked-about game in the old-school discussion areas.

This is all with good reason. OSE is well designed, superbly organized, and has wonderful art. There is a minimalist approach to the rules and presentation that does not detract from the experience, instead, it rather enhances it. You can see my enthusiasm in my review of the Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy Boxed set back in 2020.

I have detailed my introduction to D&D many times here. But briefly, my "first" D&D was a poorly copied version of Holmes Basic with an AD&D Monster Manual. My first "true" D&D, the one I could properly call my own was Moldvay Basic/Cook & MArsh Expert (commonly referred to as "B/X"). I would over the course of a year or so add in elements of AD&D. Most importantly the Deities & Demigods, the Fiend Folio, and a copy of Eldritch Wizardry. My D&D was always a mish-mash of Basic D&D and AD&D. I later discovered that my playstyle was not at all unique.

Old School Essentials Advanced Fantasy Edition really strikes at the heart of what this sort of play was like. The familiar and easy Basic/Expert rules with AD&D layered on top. Layered is the right word, AD&D had a lot of situational rules and rules used in tournaments and rules designed to cover what looked like medieval realism. As real that is in a world where half-elves fought dragons with magic. OSE-AF strips this down back to the B/X style rules found in OSE-CF and then adds in what people used the most from AD&D. No weapon speed factors, no tournament scoring, just D&D-style play.

OSE-AF Carcass Crawler #1

PDF only, 32 pages. Color covers, black & white interior art. $7.50 PDF.

The sometimes zine for OSE and named for the OGC version of the infamous carrion crawler.

This issue adds the new races to the Advanced Fantasy line, the gargantuan (like Goliaths), the goblin, and the hephaestan (logical, elf-like beings). I am particularly happy with the Goblin.

New classes for Classic and Advanced fantasy are the acolyte (a type of spell-less cleric with healing), the gargantuan (race-class), the goblin (race-class), the hephaestan (race-class), the kineticist (psychics), and the mage (a spell-less magic-user with magical abilities).

There are new rules for fighters and thieves as well as black powder guns. I like the fighter talents, help give it a bit more to do really. They are at every 5 levels, but I might make them every 4 instead.

Throughout all these books and the entire OSE line, the art is both evocative of the old-school style and still modern enough to please new audiences.

This is the game of choice for me to introduce old-school style play to players of modern games. My regular 5e group took to it like ducks to water. They love it. They still love their 5e games, but they also like to do this one. None of them had ever played B/X prior to this and it was a huge success.

I know that Gavin Norman and Necrotic Gnome have more material to give us for this, I hope it all lives up this new gold standard I set my OSR book to.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/review-old-school-essentials-advanced.html

Arguably one of the biggest success stories of the late OSR movement has been the publication of Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy (2019) and Old-School Essentials Advanced Fantasy (2021). Indeed I feel that OSE has supplanted Swords & Wizardry, the darling of the middle OSR movement as the old-school game of choice. It is the old-school game of choice here in my home game, alternating between it and D&D 5e, and seems to be the most talked-about game in the old-school discussion areas.

This is all with good reason. OSE is well designed, superbly organized, and has wonderful art. There is a minimalist approach to the rules and presentation that does not detract from the experience, instead, it rather enhances it. You can see my enthusiasm in my review of the Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy Boxed set back in 2020.

I have detailed my introduction to D&D many times here. But briefly, my "first" D&D was a poorly copied version of Holmes Basic with an AD&D Monster Manual. My first "true" D&D, the one I could properly call my own was Moldvay Basic/Cook & MArsh Expert (commonly referred to as "B/X"). I would over the course of a year or so add in elements of AD&D. Most importantly the Deities & Demigods, the Fiend Folio, and a copy of Eldritch Wizardry. My D&D was always a mish-mash of Basic D&D and AD&D. I later discovered that my playstyle was not at all unique.

Old School Essentials Advanced Fantasy Edition really strikes at the heart of what this sort of play was like. The familiar and easy Basic/Expert rules with AD&D layered on top. Layered is the right word, AD&D had a lot of situational rules and rules used in tournaments and rules designed to cover what looked like medieval realism. As real that is in a world where half-elves fought dragons with magic. OSE-AF strips this down back to the B/X style rules found in OSE-CF and then adds in what people used the most from AD&D. No weapon speed factors, no tournament scoring, just D&D-style play.

OSE-AF Fantasy Reference Booklet PDF only, 32 pages. Color covers, black & white interior art. $4.00 PDF.

This handy guide covers all the major tables found in the OSE Advanced Fantasy line. For $4 it is a great little reference.

Throughout all these books and the entire OSE line, the art is both evocative of the old-school style and still modern enough to please new audiences.

This is the game of choice for me to introduce old-school style play to players of modern games. My regular 5e group took to it like ducks to water. They love it. They still love their 5e games, but they also like to do this one. None of them had ever played B/X prior to this and it was a huge success.

I know that Gavin Norman and Necrotic Gnome have more material to give us for this, I hope it all lives up this new gold standard I set my OSR book to.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2022/02/review-comes-chaos.html

I am a complete sucker for anything B/X. While I have many games I love, it is B/X era D&D that really gets my nostalgia going. So anything made for it gets my attention. While the products, both official and fan-made, can vary in quality, I am rarely disappointed.

One publisher that has delivered well on the nostalgia factor is Jonathan Becker of Running Beagle Games. Becker, known for his B/X Blackrazor blog, "gets" B/X D&D. He has demonstrated time and again that he gets how B/X is different that AD&D and indeed other Basic-era clones. His B/X Companion remains one of my top 10 favorite books of the published OSR books. So when he came out with a new book I jumped on it!

And...promptly forgot about it! Ok, in my defense October is like my high holy month and I had a lot going on. So now it is February and I figure I should come back to this one.

Comes Chaos by Jonathan Becker. 64 pages, black & white art by Kelvin Green.

Comes Chaos is a combination rules addition/setting for use with B/X era D&D. It can be used with other versions of Basic D&D and the various clones, but there is a focus here. That is appropriate for a few reasons I will touch on in a bit.

Like the Basic and Expert books of old, and his own Companion book, this is a 64 page book. Printed with it's black and red cover it would look rather nice sitting next to the other books. At this point Becker has enough material (Companion, Complete B/X Adventurer, and this one) for a reasonable boxed set. Maybe one with a "3" in the corner.

PART 1: INTRODUCTION

Comes Chaos deals, naturally, with the forces of Chaos (capital C) and how to use them in your game. There is an implied setting that can be used as-is or elements can be used in any game.

The book is formated like that of the Basic and Expert (and Companion) books, so following the flow of information is straightforward. The difference here is that these are alternate and additional rules.

This section also introduces the "Four Great Powers" the Demon Lords ArjaDem, MorSolahn, SeiAhsk, and TeeGal.

PART 2: RUINED PLAYER CHARACTERS

Here we get alterations to the seven player characters classes. Clerics of gods of Law, for example, cannot use reversed versions of their spells. But their "Turning Undead" chart is not extended to include the demons of this game. There is a new Magic-User "sub-class" (that word is not used) in the Chaos Sorcerer. This class works a bit like the Sorcerer or Warlock of other D&D games. It uses Intelligence as a Prime, but I am going to change it to Charisma.

The next part of this section deals with Corrupted characters and Chaos Champions. Corrupted characters are ones that started out "good" and then fell into chaos. Chaos Champions start out chaotic. These characters also gain the favor of one of the four powers.

The four powers and their gifts are covered last. The four masters are unique to this book but remind a bit of the sort of creatures one might find in the writings of Moorcock. Not quite demons, not quite Lovecraftian horrors, but a little bit of both. There is also a desire, and this might just be me, to link them up with the old AD&D Elemental Princes. Maybe because there are four.

PART 3: TAINTED MAGIC

Magic gets some changes in Comes Chaos. Both Clerics and Magic-users now have some restrictions on what spells they can normally cast. We also get some new Dark Sorcery spells used by Chaos Sorcerers, Demons, and Chaos Champions. Additionally, some spells are "patron" spells for three of the four Chaos Masters. The other Master, ArjaDem, forbids their followers from using magic.

The spells are in B/X format and there are eight per level for levels 1 to 6. Some are repeats of other B/X spells. There are enough new spells to keep players on their toes when dealing with a minion of chaos.

PART 4: EXPLORING THE WASTES

The Wastelands are areas that are corrupted by Chaos. Spending time in these lands also leads to corruption and mutations in the living creatures here. This section also has other hazards such as how long food and water will last, how much movement and time is changed, and what sorts of strange occurrences and creatures that can be encountered. The section has a whole Colour out of Space feel to it.

PART 5: BLOOD AND SOULS

This section deals with encounters and combat. Alterations are given for Champions of Chaos and demons as well as others dealing with these threats.

PART 6: BEASTS AND DEMONS

This is our monster section and it has 37 new monsters. As expected 19 of them are demons and 4 are undead. There are also corrupted versions of other monster types (elves, dwarves, etc) that can be used as guidelines for other corrupted monsters not listed.

The demons depicted here are not the Demons of the AD&D monster manual. Nor are they the demons of Earth myth and legends. These are new creatures unique to this book. There are some interesting ones here and again the feeling is not quite demons and not quite Lovecraftian horrors, but a combination of the two.

PART 7: UNHOLY TREASURES

This section covers the treasures you can find with these creatures or in the wastelands.

PART 8: DEMON MASTER INFORMATION

The person running these games is called the "Demon Masters" which is just a way really to use "DM." This section covers how to deal with corruption, magical research and chaos magic, and how to design a wasteland.

There is another class presented here, the Witch Hunter, from the Complete B/X Adventurer. Despite the success and dare I say universal approval of his own Companion Rules, this class only goes to level 14. Though it is mentioned that levels 15-36 can be found in the Adventurer book.

In fact the next section covers using this book with the Complete B/X Adventurer and the B/X Companion.

PART 9: SLAVE-LORDS OF CHAOS

This section covers how to run an "evil" game including unique experience point rewards.

Comes Chaos is a great extension to any B/X style game. Especially ones where "Chaos" is more of a factor than say "Evil."

Chaos in Comes Chaos follows the implicit guidelines originally set up in Moldvay Basic. Chaos is not just a philosophy or moral outlook, it is a force and "thing" that must be dealt with. I feel this book does a good job in trying to expand on this notion and make it something to use in your games.

The ideas presented here are not all unique; Lamentations of the Flame Princess and Dungeon Crawl Classics cover similar ground in terms of Chaos as a Force to Fight and Realms of Crawling Chaos for the Lovecraftian Chaos is a Force. Comes Chaos though combines these ideas into something that is uniquely B/X. Yes both LotFP and Realms of Crawling Chaos have strong B/X roots, but this is explicitly B/X.

Given this, Comes Chaos should work well with Old School Essentials as well. Though one gets the feeling that OSE is more like "The Hobbit" than it is "Colour Out of Space." Though I am not sure it would feel the same for Advanced versions of the Old-School games since there is a focus on Good vs. Evil there as well.

The art by Kelvin Green is great and having one artist to do all the work gives the book a united vision.

It is available at DriveThruRPG where it is currently just under $14. The rule of thumb I have adopted over the years is 10¢ per page, which would place this at $6.40. The price is twice that, but I still feel it is worthwhile. Again this is a rule of thumb, not a hard and fast rule.

There is no print-on-demand option on DriveThru for this. Though none of Running Beagle's books have this. You can though get print copies of this and all their other books from their website. Print copies of Comes Chaos are $27.99 and handled via PayPal.

Comes Chaos also is not released through the Open Gaming License. Not an issue to be honest, but I look at it as a way the creator/publisher "gives back" to the community. Generally speaking, OGL products sell better than their non-OGL contemporaries/counterparts.

Comes Chaos is a fun supplement. I used similar ideas when running my B/X games in the past I will adopt some of these ideas to use in my current OSE game. I am not likely to use the four demonic princes, my game has a solid cosmology, but I might adopt them for a 5e game I am running that could use Chaotic Evil figures like these.

Who should get this? DMs that want to add a little chaos effects to their games but do not want to go the full Dungeon Crawl Classics route. DMs that play/run B/X and/or OSE in particular.

This is also for DMs that enjoy the classical roots of the game but whose interests lean more towards Moorcock rather than Lovecraft.

For me, the price and the lack of the OGL keep it from being a perfect addition to my games.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2021/11/review-man-myth-magic-1982.html

I am going to be spending some quality time with the classic game Man, Myth & Magic by Herbert "Herbie" Brennan and J. Stephen Peek and published originally byYaquinto Publications in 1982, and now published (in PDF and single softcover formats) by Precis Intermedia.
I was always kind of fascinated by this game. The name of course grabbed me for two reasons. There was the whole "Myth and Magic" side to it all which in 1982 was a big draw for me. Also, there was the magazine and encyclopedia series also called Man, Myth & Magic that dealt with all sorts of occult-related topics.

I read reviews for it in Dragon Magazine (#80) and White Dwarf (#41) and was actually quite curious about it. The reviews really ripped into the game and I needed to know if it was as bad as they made it sound. Sadly I never found a copy near me and a mail-order of $19.00 + tax and shipping and handling made it a little more out of reach when it was new.

But I was always drawn to historical games. I felt if I could play or run a game and learn something about history at the same time then it was time well spent really. A few I have enjoyed quite a lot, mostly Victorian-era ones, and others I ripped online so much I promised I wasn't going to rip on them anymore.

Man, Myth, & Magic sadly belongs to the camp of a historical mishmash, that is to say, it is about as historically accurate as an episode of Xena: Warrior Princess. Don't get me wrong, I love me some Xena and it is very entertaining in the right frame of mind. The same is true for this game. Great, in the right frame of mind. In fact, I think that now, living in a post-Xena world, there is a place for this game that did not exist in 1982.

Man, Myth & Magic

For this review, I am going to consider my original boxed set from 1982 (now minus the dice) and the newer PDF versions found on DriveThruRPG published by Precis Intermedia. In both cases, the material is the same minus some of the extras that came in the boxed set like the dice and a pad of character sheets.

Man, Myth, & Magic was published in a boxed set of three books (same covers), with a pad of character sheets, some maps, and dice. The PDF combines the three books into one 132 page volume. The original boxed set retailed for $19.00 in 1982 ($55 in today's buying power) and the PDFs sell for $7.95 today. The books feature color covers and black & white interiors.

Book 1

Book 1 is 24 pages and covers the "Basic Game" and the game most like the one as originally conceived of by Herbie Brennan. In this game, the players play gladiators in the time of the Roman Emperors. Which one? That is up to a random dice roll unless of course, the players want something different.

Who's in charge around here? It's an interesting idea, but...well there are some problems here. According to the back of the box, it is the Summer of 41 CE. Cool. But Caligula was assassinated in January of 41 CE. Tiberius ruled 14 to 37 CE and Nero was Emperor from 54 to 68 CE. The only Emperor in the Summer of 41 was Claudius. Adding dates in parentheses would have been a nice touch. Let's not even get into the fact that Cleopatra VII, the last of the Egyptian Pharaohs, had died back in 30 BCE, 71 years before the events of this game, but that looks like her on the cover. I'll talk more about this later. In theory you can tun this game from 4000 BCE to 500 (or 1000) CE.

You begin with your Roman Gladiator and your two percentile d20s and roll up your characteristics. The characteristics in the Basic Game are Strength, Speed, Skill (not used just yet), Endurance, Intelligence, and Courage. The scores range from 1 to 100. You add all these up for your Life Points (so 5 to 500), you fall unconscious at 20 or below and dead at 0 or below.

The Basic rules take your gladiator from start to a bit of combat and adventure with the maxim that the best way to learn is to do. This is a tactic that the rest of the game uses. At the end of this, your character is ready for new adventures.

The neat bit, and one I want to revisit, is the idea of reincarnation. That is if your character dies they can be reincarnated.

Book 2

Book 2 covers the "Advanced Game" and includes 40 pages. Here we learn more about skills, the Power score, and the different Nationalities (10) and Classes associated with each (2-5 each). All are completely random and no real attempt is made to explain why say an Egyptian Sorcerer, a Gaulish Barbarian, a Roman Gladiator, and a Hibernian Leprechaun would all be part of the same adventuring party. Ok. That's not entirely true, but the explanation takes some digging.

Up first is determining your Nationality. Again a random roll gives you African, Briton, Egyptian, Gaul, Greek, Hebrew, Hibernian, Visigoth, Roman, and Oriental. Each at 10% chance. Within each nationality, there are character classes. Regardless of how many there is an equal chance for any given class. Most nationalities have a sort of "fighter" like class and all have merchant. There are two classes open to women characters only, Wisewoman (African) and Sybil (Greek). Details are given for all the classes, 20 in total, but not a lot of information. In most cases only a paragraph here and some more details later on. This brings up a persistent issue, the rules are a bit scattered everywhere throughout the book.

Additionally, there are two "Special Categories" of players (not characters) of "Orator" and "Sage" or essentially a storyteller and a record keeper. Much in the same way Basic D&D has a "Caller." Not much else is mentioned about these roles however.

This character is considered to be your first incarnation. Anytime your character dies, you can then reincarnate. This allows you to change your nationality, class, and gender and retain a little bit of the Skill from a previous incarnation. It is an interesting idea, I am not 100% certain though that it works. Knowing gamers I see a situation where players would play a character only to get them to die for a chance at a better character next time.

There is a fun chart on inheritance that would be fun to port over to other games. Related there are our ubiquitous tables of equipment.

Some of the other secondary "Optional" characteristics are also detailed. These include Agility, Charm, Dexterity, Drinking, and so on. These are really more akin to "skills." The trouble is that some of these you have to roll higher, some you have to roll lower and others you don't roll at all. There is no rhyme or reason here.

Combat rules follow and they remind me a bit of Runequest. Nothing really special really. Strength points over 50 can add to your damage, Skill points over 50 can add to your "To hit" chance. Combat, like all the rolls here, start with a basic 50% chance to hit. The Basic game just has you roll. The Advanced game has you make called shots. Classes with Combat as their "Prime Ability" can improve their ability to hit even more. All classes can spend Power to also increase their to-hit bonus; 10 points of Power to increase your chance by 1%. Interestingly armor does not stop you from being hit, it does reduce damage taken.

The goal of the game though is the accumulation of Power. Power advances your character and can overcome that 50% failure rate. Power also is the, well, power behind Magic.

The last third or so of the book covers all sorts of additional rules. Some seem tossed in, to be honest. Poisons are covered as are spells.

Magic, as expected, is given some special attention, though not as much as I was expecting. Magic is assumed to be real and work, at least part of the time. Magic is described as "Coincidence," a spell is uttered and something happens whether it caused it or not. "Science," Damascus steel is given an example. The superior technology was seen as magic. "Psychic Phenomena" which not really an explanation at all, likewise "Trance State" and as "Lost Knowledge." Though no explanation is really given as to how magic works.

Book 3

The adventures take up Book 3 and is 64 pages. This book is for the Lore Master (Game Master) only and is also one of the weaker parts of the game. The Adventures, while interesting, are a bit of a railroad. In order to succeed the players have to hit all the parts in order and then move on to the next adventure.

The adventures include the following:

• The Dragon Loose in Rome. Not a dragon rally, but a rogue T-Rex. Not that this makes any more sense, but ok, points for effort.
• Apollo's Temple. Emperor Caligula sends the characters to the Temple of Apollo aka Stonehenge.
• The Witches of Lolag Shlige. The characters then have to go to Ireland (Hibernia) and rescue a child from some witches.
• The Great Pyramid Revealed. Caligula has issued a death warrant for the characters. They find themselves in the Great Pyramid of Giza.

These adventures are a prelude to the published adventures. There are some neat ideas here, but the adventures lack something for me. Actually, it lacks a lot of things for me, but I could make some changes to make them work.

There are some encounter tables, but they only cover the areas that the adventures are detailed here. I also have to note there are no monsters here. Just humans.

One of the bigger criticisms of this game at the time was the then $19.00 price tag, about $55 in today's buying power. Now $20 for a boxed set of three books, character sheets, and dice sounds like a steal. With the PDF at just $7.95 it is at a price I think should attract anyone that might have been interested in this game.

The art is in black & white, which is expected and welcome, but there is not a lot of it and some of it is repeated throughout the books.

Man, Myth, & Magic at times feels like two different games, or rather two different ideas merged into one game. I feel that the classic Roman Gladiator/Basic Game was Herbie Brennan's idea and the worldwide game of various nations and types or the Advanced Game was Steve Peek's. Given that Brennan started working on a game called "Arena" which was a Gladitorial RPG.

About Reincarnation

Reincarnation is quite a big deal in this game. This is not a huge surprise given Herbert Brennan's publication history. His book "The Reincarnation Workbook: A Complete Course in Recalling Past Lives" could work as a guide for this game. Personally, I would like to use the reincarnation idea to help smooth out some of the issues with different times. So adventurers from Cleopatra VII's Egypt, can then deal with Tiberius, and then help in Boudicea's raid on Londinium. Something similar to the Old Soul quality in Unisystem.

Somehow using the idea of the Distant Memory which, like Old Soul, allows the characters to draw on past life knowledge and skill. That is easy to do in Unisystem, not so easy to do in D&D like games with very rigidly defined classes. Maybe taking a level in another class might do it.

I am sure there is more in the expansion, The Egyptian Campaign, but I don't have access to that set right now.

There is an interesting game here but I think the concept of it is greater than the rules as presented actually allow. It never quite lives up to what the box claims. Nor is it the abomination that earlier reviews made it out to be. I think most reviewers balked at the price tag and the fact that the game did not offer anything new; at least not anything that meant going through the rather clunky rules.

It is most certainly not a historically accurate game. Historically inspired to be sure, but not by any means accurate.

The bottom line is that the game really isn't good, in fact, it is rather bad in many respects. That is not to say that someone won't find this game interesting or fun. I just think that there are far, far better games out there.

Should you buy it?

I would say the PDF at just under $8 makes it worthwhile for the very, very curious. I have my boxed set and I am happy with it, but my expectations were low and my curiosity was really high.

The game itself is only worth about 2 stars. My curiosity about it and my desire to have pushed it closer to 4 stars. In the end I am going to give 3 stars since I don't want to unduly affect Precis Intermedia games' overall rating. But don't grab this unless you are really curious (which is a good reason) or want to see how not to design a game.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2021/11/review-adventures-dark-deep-book-of.html

Today I want to review the companion book from the same Kickstarter, Book of Lost Lore. I went into this one less excited than I did with the Book of Lost Beasts, but not due to anything on the part of this book. I am always more enthusiastic about monster books. I just have to make sure that I am not making unfair comparisons. I will be making a lot of comparisons with this book and others, however.

Adventures Dark & Deep Book of Lost Lore

For this review, I am considering the Hardcover I received as a Kickstarter backer and the PDF from DriveThruRPG. BRW does their print fulfillment via DriveThru, so I conveniently have my PDFs where I expect them and I know what sort of product I am getting in terms of Print on Demand.

The book itself is 134 pages, full-color cover, and has black and white interior art. The layout and art are a tribute to the "2nd covers" of the AD&D 1st Edition line. So it looks nice with your original books and other OSR books designed the same way.

Like the Book of Lost Beasts, this book carries the Adventures Dark & Deep banner, but it is not made for that game. It is material from that game ported "Backwards" to the AD&D 1st Edition rules. So again like Book of Beasts, some of this material has been seen before, though not all in 1st Edition format/rules.

Much of the material does come from Bloch's "What If" game, Adventures Dark & Deep, and in particular, the Players Manual which itself was derived from BRW Games' very first product A Curious Volume of Forgotten Lore (now discontinued). This is all acknowledged in the Preface of the book. The selling point of this book is that it is all revised and edited for the "First Edition of the world's most popular RPG." Not to mention the layout now favors the 1st ed feel rather than the Adventures Dark & Deep feel.

Though as we move on you will see that the biggest comparison that needs to be made is this book to the AD&D Unearthed Arcana.

On to the book proper now.

This book is split between a Players' Section (close to 98 pages) and GMs' section (36 or so pages).

Players' Section

This section covers new races, classes, and spells among other topics that I will discuss.

Up first, the new races. Here we are given three "new" races for player characters. These are the Centaur, the Forrest Gnome, and the Half-Drow, of which we get Human-Drow and Elf-Drow. Those unfamiliar with AD&D 1st ed might be surprised to see level limits and ability limits for the races. Some are pretty obvious, centaurs tend to be stronger but can't climb walls as a thief. Others are culture-based, drow women can advance more in most classes than their male counterparts due to their matriarchal society, but not as much as wizards since that class is not valued. While back in the day we really ignored all these rules in AD&D (and they do not exist in 21st Century D&D) they are consistent with the rules and anyone who plays AD&D 1st ed exclusively will take to these easy.

The races seem balanced enough. The centaur is a nice addition and one that really could go into AD&D well enough. I personally have never had a desire to play one, but they do seem to work. The forest gnome is also a good choice and a good option for people more familiar with 21st century D&D gnomes. The coverage of the half-drow is very interesting and the stand-out of the three. Given some other things I have crossed my awareness this past week or so I am wanting to try out a half-drow now. I will need to come back to this one later on.

Classes are likely the top feature of this book. They are also the ones that we have seen before. There are Bards, Jesters, Skalds, Blackguards, Mystics, Savants, and Mountebanks. Let me repeat. While we have seen these before in other BRW products they are presented here as 1st Edition characters classes and as subclasses of existing 1st Ed classes. Except the Bard, the Bard is it's own class with the Jester and Skald as sub-classes of the Bard. The Blackguard (or Anti-Paladin) is a subclass of the Cavalier to give you an idea where this book would "fit" into the AD&D 1st Ed lineup.

It should be noted is a usable single Bard class. No more advancing as a thief, fighter, and then druid to get to the bard, this is a straight out bard class. The bard also has some nice powers too. The mystic class seems closer to the BECMI/RC version than it does to the monk. It was also the focus of one of my very first "Class Struggles" features. I am a little surprised we didn't see versions of BRW Games' Necromancer, Witch, or Demonolater classes. Likey to keep these with the Adventures Dark & Deep game.

From Classes, we move on to Secondary Skills. AD&D 1st Ed has never really been about skills outside of what your character class can do. While back then I saw this as a problem, I am less inclined to think so now. Still, a good selection of secondary skills are listed here and how they can be used.

The next 35 or so pages are dedicated to new spells. Mostly these support the new magic-using classes, though some spells are cross-listed for other classes.

The last part of the player's section is given over to combat and new weapons and armor. The arms and armor described here do show an appreciated level of research. One that would have made Gary and his 6 pages of pole-arms very happy.

Game Masters' Section

This section is not as large but still has gems; figurative and literal.

Up first are some guidelines for social encounters including reactions. There are some alternate treasure rules that uses the same Treasure Type classification but breaks it down into different categories. Both the original system and this system can be used interchangeably, even within the same game, with the Game Master deciding what works better at the time.

There are some new magic items, with updated tables to include them.

Finally some discussion on the game environment including ability checks.

Honestly, the only thing it is missing to be "Unearthed Arcana II" is an appendix on the gods of the Centaurs.

Some art has appeared before in other BRW books but all of it captures the Old-School gaming feel.

So. Who is this book for?

The obvious answer is for anyone that plays First Edition AD&D. It should work fine with OSRIC, since that cleaves so close to AD&D, but not sure if players of Advanced Labyrinth Lord or Old School Essentials Advanced will get the same benefits. For example, both of those other games have a Bard class that works about the same. That is not to say they would not get benefits from this book, it's just the base design principles are not 100% the same.

If you are a player of Adventures Dark & Deep then there is likely nothing new here for you. But if you have those books and still play Advanced Dungeons & Dragons first ed. then there is enough here for you even if you can convert easily between the two games.

If you play AD&D 1st ed then this is a great book and it will sit nicely on your shelf or on your table next to your other AD&D books.

One minor point, the book was not released under the OGL. Doesn't matter for play or use only if you wanted to reuse a class or spell elsewhere. Though given the use I have seen of the OGL over the last 20+ years this is also likely not an issue.

Originally posted here: https://theotherside.timsbrannan.com/2021/11/review-dark-streets-darker-secrets.html

Dark Streets & Darker Secrets has been on my "To Be Reviewed" pile for a very long time. I grabbed the PDF when it came out, but set it aside for the longest time because I was working on a bunch of other things and didn't get the chance. I picked it back up and really enjoyed it. So much so I also picked it up in hardcover Print on Demand.

So let's get to it.

Dark Streets & Darker Secrets

by Diogo Nogueira. 222 pages, hardcover. Color cover with black and white interior art. For this review, I am considering both the PDF and the Print on Demand hardcovers from DriveThruRPG.

Dark Streets & Darker Secrets (DS&DS) is a modern occult horror game from ENnie Award winner Diogo Nogueira. The book is digest size so it fit well with many "old school" style books of the last 10 years. It not only fits on the shelf physically but thematically as well. The game is based on Nogueira's earlier works Sharp Swords & Sinister Spells and Solar Blades & Cosmic Spells, so out of the gate there are more resources for this game if you desire.

The game itself is a gritty, modern occult/supernatural horror game. The normal humans are just slightly above average for the most part and the monsters are way more powerful. Immediately I thought of it as a bit of Chill mixed in with Kult. The feel is very much "humanity alone against the darkness."

The book is laid out in eight chapters with some appendices.

Chapter 1: Introduction

This chapter covers the basics of what is in the book.

Chapter 2: Character Creation

If you have played any old-school-like game in the last 45+ years you have an idea what this chapter is about. The differences here fit the tone of the game. Character attributes are rolled using a 2d6+3 (not a 3d6 or even 4d6 drop the lowest), this creates a narrower band of character attributes, 5-15 but still on the same human range of 3-18. There is a chance to increase these later on. The attribute themselves are a simplified version of the Basic 6; Physique (combining Strength and Constitution), Agility (Dexterity), Intellect (Intelligence), and Willpower (Wisdom and Charisma). Once those are done you create a character concept which is a basic couple word description and not a backstory.

After this, it is time to choose the Archetype or essentially the class of the character. They are The Tough, The Nimble, The Smart, and The Gifted. These align with the attributes above. The Gifted is special in that you can be a spell-caster or even a supernatural creature like a vampire, werewolf, or even an alien. Each archetype also gets a "recovery roll" which decides how quick they can bounce back from injury.

Since this is a gritty sort of universe all characters have a complication. These can come into play in the game to keep things "difficult and exciting" for the characters. It includes a d66 table (roll 2d6 and use the rolls like d%. Traveller people know this one well).

Then you pick out some gear. If it is mundane gear you have it. You also get some weapons and "weird" gear. These are detailed in the next chapter.

Finally, we have derived scores. Vitality (Physique + Level) are your "hit points." Sanity, or mental stability, is equal to your Intellect. Now I have mentioned before I do not like how many games handle insanity or madness. Sadly this game is not an exception. I spent a few years working in a mental health facility back when I was in grad school. There is no relationship between intelligence and mental health. In fact, I had one guy who was schizophrenic and could speak 3 or 4 languages including German and Swahili. He learned I also spoke German and would use that when he wanted to talk about the other clients "in secret" to me. So yeah. I am not really a fan of this one. I'd rather roll a 2d6 and then add a bonus from Willpower (and maybe Intellect) to get my Sanity score. There is also Luck points which are like fate points or drama points (everyone starts with 3) and Money.

Chapter 3: Gear

Covers mundane gear, expendable gear (like ammunition and things that wear out) and even some weird gear. Weird items are the best part. Every character has one weird item they start off with. This is easily explainable either they found it and thus introduced to the weirder world OR they have always had it and the world is waiting for them. There is a d100 table that covers a bunch of different sorts of items. Note, we just get the names of the items, what they do will be discovered in-game.

Additionally, drugs, services, illegal goods, and money points (abstraction of money carried) are also dealt with.

Chapter 4: Rules of the City

Here are our basic rules for the game. Everything is an attribute check (roll under your attribute modified by level and difficulty). There are some neat quirks. There is an advantage/disadvantage system here called Positive and Negative rolls. Rolling on your attribute is considered a critical success. You roll lower than your attribute to succeed, BUT higher than the difficulty. So if something has a difficulty of 8 and my attribute is 12 I have to roll a 12 or lower BUT also higher than an 8. So only rolls of 9, 10, 11, and 12 will get me a success.

Players can add a Luck roll to their challenges. This is not a matter of just adding points. You have to roll a d6. If it is equal to or lower than their luck score then you get to make a situation more favorable.

This chapter also covers sanity and madness. You lose Sanity if you encounter something strange and fail a Willpower test. Difficulty set by the situation. Points lost also can vary. When the character's Sanit score reaches 0 then they get a Madness. Thankfully there is no list of "madnesses" here. Most game designers get these horribly wrong anyways. In game you get a minor "quirk" on your first loss. If you suffer 4 losses then the character has succumbed to madness and can't be played.

Level advancement is a form of Milestone advancement that looks like it should work rather well. Again individual GMs can (and should) alter this to fit their needs.

Chapter 5: Combat

Like many RPGs combat gets a special chapter even if it is just a particular form of the rules stated above. But if one is going to fight the armies of darkness then one is expected to actually fight. Reading through this you get the idea that yes the characters can be tough. You also get the idea that the things they are fighting are a lot tougher. While there are a few ways the players can save their character's bacon, there are still a lot of grisly ways to die in this game.

Chapter 6: Sorcery and Psychic Powers

Ah, now this is the meat of the game in my mind. A Gifted character can be a sorcerer, a witch, a psychic or some other type of creature. Their powers and how to use them are detailed here. Regardless of the origin or the nature of the powers, game-wise they are treated in similar manners, the difference largely being different Backlash tables. How they are played can vary wildly. I mentioned that this is grittier game than one would see in say a Buffy-like game. The previously mentioned Backlash is one and Corruption is another. These include simple things like a "witch's mark" to changes to one's body and mind or just getting pulled right into the Abyss. Pro-tip, don't botch your rolls.

A very nice (and long) list of powers is given with their effects. While the list is long (60 entries) it is not exhaustive.

Additionally, Arcane artifacts are covered. How they are made, what they do, powers, cost (to make AND to use), and some samples.

Chapter 7: Running the Game

This covers the world of DS&DS. There is a bias (is that the right word? Preference is better) to an urbane game. Thus the title really. Outside of this there is no set theme or even setting. This would be a sandbox game if it were a FRPG. What we do get here is a ton of tables full of ideas for a a game, campaign, or an entire world.

Chapter 8: Monsters

Our Monster chapter differs from other games in that there is not a bestiary here per se, but example creatures and the means to make others of a similar nature. So for example there is a Cultis section that covers some sample cultists from 1-3 HD to demon-possessed leaders of 4-8 HD. This includes a table of "What are They Doing?" and "What do They Want?" A very effective means of repurposing content. The more powerful the creature the more detail they need obviously, but there is not a lot of detail in most cases. This works well here since the players (mostly the GM) provide all the details. There are powers listed for random creatures as well.

Appendix O: Optional Rules

Here are a group of optional rules you can add to your game. Things like Drunken Luck, Daring Points, Single Hero games and Multi-Archetype (Multi-Class) Characters.

Appendix I: Inspirational Materials

Covers the various books, movies, TV Shows, and other RPGs for inspiration.

Appendix S: Simple Scenario Structure

This discusses how to build a quick scenario and an example.

We end with a Character Sheet (and a Form Fillable one is provided with the PDF) and the OGL statement. I do feel the need to point out that Nogueira has released this game as 100% Open Gaming Content.

Dark Streets & Darker Secrets certainly lives up to the hype and has a lot going for it. If you have a world already in your mind and just need a system to flesh it out then this is a great choice for you. In this respect, it is very similar to old-school D&D. No default world type, just the tools to play in the world of your imagination with some assumptions built-in.

If you are looking for huge meta-plotting like the World of Darkness or even the baked-in mythology of Buffy the Vampire Slayer you find that here, which is refreshing. The players all have maximum flexibility to do what they want and that is the key strength of this game.