New OSR Products at RPGNow/DTRPG — May 29th, 2016

Not too busy this week, a couple of LoFP adventures, though one is a re-tread.

Official

G2 The Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl -  Monochrome version. 16 pages, $4.99

PC2 Top Ballista - Perhaps the most gonzo (or silly) supplement for D&D, this is about a flying city of gnomes, complete with magical bi-planes. 96 pages, $4.99

S3 Expedition to the Barrier Peaks - The often imitated, never duplicated idea of a crashed spaceship in a fantasy planet.  68 pages, $4.99

Adventures

England Upturned -  Adventure based on the English Civil War (I guess that's Cromwell vs the Royalty) for Lamentations of the Flame Princess. 132 pages, $7.50

One Page Dungeon - Khem's Order - PWYW One page dungeon which I liked.

The Cursed Chateau -  James Malizewski's (sp) "Screw You" house adventure appropriately converted to Lamentations of the Flame Princess. $7.50. Hope it's better than the old version, though presumably it now has an entry on the random encounter/event table that destroys the universe.

WK3 Revenge of the OverKobold -  Sword & Wizardry version of the third module in the Kobolds series.

Rules

Dueling Rules for Old School Roleplaying Games -  15 pages on dueling for OD&D. Can't you just use the normal combat system and say the hit points are only subduing damage, like in Unearthed Arcana? I guess that's not old school enough.  PWYW at least.

Potions 1 - 9 new potions. 99 cents.

Tabletop Library potentially giving away free stuff to registers users

Tabletop Library is a new-ish publishing platform apparently owned by the S&W Guy. As such, he may be giving away some free items if their most recent Kickstarter (for Bard's Gate, yet another 3e to 5e/PF/S&W conversion) goes well.

Honestly, it's a bid odd, because it's just two maps and an adventure that is currently free on DTRPG, Rogues in Remballo.

But eh, doesn't take much effort to register there.

Khem's Order — New PWYW One Page Dungeon

A lot of them are pretty meh, but I found this one to be pretty neat. It's actually a three level dungeon, about 30 rooms.

At some point though, I think the one page dungeon format gets in the way of being effective. So much information is crammed into such a tiny space that a) it's hard to read and b) just seems pointless, just sticking to a format for the sake of being a gimmick.

Anyway, despite the drawbacks of the format, it's nice adventure. The author is apparently French so there are some oddities in the text, but nothing too bad.

New OSR Products at RPGNow/DTRPG — May 22nd, 2016

Not real busy this week.

Official

MC1 - This is the monster book for 2e. Or one of them. $4.99, 144 pages. I ran 2e some, but I used 1e monsters, which was probably a mistake since 2e ones are often much tougher.

MC2 - The second volume.  Also 144 pages and $4.99

Adventures

The Invasive Invertebrates -  Something from the Frugal GM. PWYW

Rules

The OSR Summoner - Essentially a combination of the Pathfinder class and the 2e's Sha'ir . PWYW or get it here free

The Price of Rebirth -  Rules for returning from the dead for White Box, because I guess going to the Temple of Law isn't old school enough.  $2.99, 15 pages.

Misc

25 Knight Illustrations -  Public Domain art by N.C. Wyeth. PWYW

Monolith Tower - Neat 7 maps tower by Paratime Design. $5.50

Mountains - A generic guide to mountains. Free.

The Crystal Cave - Neat map of a cave. 99 cents

The Forbidden Sanctuary - Not sure what this is a map of, looks more like a truck stop or something. 99 cents.

Great new dungeon (well, tower) map from Paratime Design

If you are one of the dozen or so readers of my blog, you might know that Tim Hartin of Paratime Design is my favorite cartographer. Not just the style of the drawing of the map, but the design of his maps are always excellent and a great inspiration for making an adventure.

He's just released a new set of maps, Monolith Tower, which as it sounds, is a series of maps depicting a large tower (six stories and a roof), for only $5.50.

New OSR Products at RPGNow/DTRPG — May 15th, 2016

Fairly quiet week, a couple of adventures and monster books that are worth a look.

Official

A1 Slave Pites of the Undercity -  You know, it wasn't until a few months ago when I took a close look at the cover of this and realized that the bearded dwarf on the cover is female. $4.99, 32 pages.

Atlas of the Dragonlance World - For people who didn't know it was Krynn. $4.99 and 168 pages.

Battlesystem 2e - I only had the first one with all the counters. I remember once setting up a battle and then sneezing, literally blowing my army away. Supposedly this is simpler. $4.99 and 128 pages.

Adventures

HS3 Incursion of the Chain Devils -  20 room/10 encounter adventures for characters 5th to 7th level, featuring a bunch of converted 3e/Pathfinder monsters. 16 pages, PWYW, or get it here for free

Mechanized Men of Mars -  An adventure for Warriors of Mars. $2.99 and 32 pages

The Lost Temple of Forgotten Evil - Sidequests - Basically a short free teaser module (7 pages, total, just a fight, really) for their (somewhat pricey) Lost Temple of Forgotten Evil adventure

Rules

Beast Folio Volume 2 -  4 new creatures for Labyrinth Lord and rules for radiation. 14 pages, PWYW

Beasties - New monsters, traps, NPCs and so forth from Night Owl Games, makers of the excellent Warriors of the Red Planet and the crappy Colonial Troopers. Hopefully it's more like the former than the latter.  84 pages, $4.99 

Character Options - Compatible with Stars Without Number -  10 pages, $1

Misc

COA04: Guidebook to the Duchy of Valnwall (PDF/ART) - This city sourcebook for LL is available free/PWYW, but if you want art, it will cost you $4.99

BF1 Tower of Skulls Review

BF1 Tower of Skulls is a high level (10th to 12th) adventure from Cut to the Chase Games for Swords & Wizardry. It's actually been released for several different systems (Pathfinder, 5e, and even Savage Worlds) but is pretty strictly an old school dungeon crawl. It does seem to have been written with 5e in mind and then back converted, so there are a few oddities and problems arising from such a conversion.

The Tower of Skulls has something of a lengthy backstory, but essentially a rival demon prince of Orcus, a demon prince of undead plants, ended up on the losing end of a war and Orcus imprisoned him in the Tower of Skulls. But the PCs probably don't know this and simply go to the tower for other reasons. Several ideas are presented, but not are particularly compelling, other than the lure of loot.

New OSR Products at DTRPG/RPGNow — May 8th, 2016

Not too busy this week. Some character classes and a couple of 'zines

Official

The Rogues Gallery - I always found this more interesting for the TSR characters than the random characters. 48 pages, $4.99

Adventures

The Wizard's Tomb -  Although it says system neutral, it seems geared for any flavor of D&D, including old school. 12 pages< $2.99

Rules

Eastern Expeditions: The Ninja -  Ninja class for Delving Deeper/0e. Nin nin nin. PWYW.

Eastern Expeditions: The Samurai - Samurai class for Delving Deeper/0e. PWYW

The OSR Android - Rules for playing an android, which is something that came up in my game. PWYW or get it here for free

Misc

Adventures in the East Mark -  East Mark Area Map - Nocturnal Media's first attempt at providing content for the English version of the Spanish BECM retro clone. Free

Dungeon Maps! Fantasy Stock Art - 10 hand drawn old school maps for use with publishing projects. $9.95

Nod 29 - John Stater's magazine continues. Does anyone put out more stuff, much less maintaining a high level of quality? 72 pages, $4.99

The Peridot, Issue #1 - A 'zine from the creator of Yoon-Suin. Features a Mesopotamian setting. 80 pages and $4.35 (probably will fluctuate since I think the creator uses some other currency)

New OSR Products at RPGNow/DTRPG — May 1st, 2016

Woops, almost forgot this week.

Official

CM7 The Tree of Life - Companion adventure from Mr. Mystara, Bruce Heard. 46 pages, $4.99

M1 Into the Maelstrom - Master level adventure involving flying ships, also by Bruce Heard. $4.99

Adventures

The Danger at Darkwater - One dollar,  one page adventure

Rules

Dungeon Questing - What if Swords & Wizardry only used d6s? Here you go. 160 pages and $2.50

The Beast Within - Basic Werewolves - There was a whole official supplement for this stuff, Night Howlers, but if you want something different, well, you're covered. $1 and 8 pages

Wolf-packs and Winter Snow - This is an OSR game set in the ice age. Looks pretty neat. 156 pages, PWYW

Misc

Fantasy Clip Inks - Spot Art Set 7 -  Outlands Art stock art is probably the most widely used in OSR products, even in Sine Nomine's stuff. Partly because you get a lot of pics in each set. $12, lots of pictures.

Free! Fantasy Stock Art - PWYW art collection of various weapons.

Grimtooth's Ultimate Traps Collection - I never found these to be particularly funny. $29.99 and a whopping 627 pages.