Role-Playing Game Reviews

RPG Reviews Roundup, September 2012

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One of the good things about Dungeons & Dragons next-generation inspired publishing hiatus is that it gives other games a chance to shine. While I doubt gamers are suddenly diverting all of their D&D 4th Edition buying power toward other games, I do hope (and anecdotally this seems to be the case) that it gives folks a chance to try something new.

One of those new thing’s that’s generated a fair amount of buzz has been Margaret Weis Production’s Marvel Heroic Role-Playing, which is a Cortex-infused take on the superhero genere. I bought the core rulebook early in the summer and paged through it. Based on that initial glance, I liked what I saw, particularly with how it handled the superhero tropes of particularly solo vs. duo vs. team match-ups, but I give it a more through read-through.

The Unknown Regions

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An assortment of aliens in the foreground; U-shaped spacecraft in the background.

The Unknown Regions is the final sourcebook for Wizards of the Coast’s Star Wars: Saga Edition Role-Playing Game. The book serves as a placeholder for all the books left unpublished, and promises to carry players to the unexplored corners of the Star Wars galaxy. It does this by venturing into The Unknown Regions to explore what fans know — the Chiss, the Rakata and the Sorcerers of Rhand — and plenty that they don’t.

The Unknown Regions details eight worlds created just for the book, introduces a planet generator that game masters can use to make their own, and debuts creature generation rules to populate them. Since Scouts are essential to exploring these brave new worlds, they get a variety of feats and talents, and because no final frontier should be without its dangerous challenges, the book re-envisions “Hazards” as Dungeons & Dragons Fourth Edition-style threats that require a combination of brawn and skill to defeat. The end result is a toolkit that gives players everything they need to continue their adventures beyond the last book in the Star Wars Saga Editions line.

Galaxy of Intrigue

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Skill challenges were the best thing to emerge from our Dungeons Dragons 4th Edition mini-campaign, and when we started playing Star Wars: Saga Edition, we pieced together our own version of the rules. We based them on 4E’s examples, the skill DCs established in Scum and Villainy, and personal experience. The end result created some of the most memorable moments in our campaign, including the heroes’ disastrous attempt to escape a proto-star nebula.

Galaxy of Intrigue formalizes these ad hoc rules by creating a Skill Challenge system for Saga Edition that improves the 4E iteration in every way. The source book introduces new feat and talent options for skillful characters, nine new species (including the Bith, Defel and Neimodian), an entire world dedicated to intrigue, eight mini-adventures, and the “The Perfect Storm” campaign.

Get lost in a new reality with the Inner Sea World Guide

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The Inner Sea World Guide is Paizo’s third iteration of its Golarion campaign guide. The first was released when D&D 3.5 was still Wizard of the Coast’s flagship fantasy game; the second came with the release of Paizo’s own 3.5-derived Pathfinder RPG. The latest iteration reflects the growing maturity of the Pathfinder product line. Within its pages players will find that redundant material – such as class write-ups now included in the Pathfinder core rulebook – removed in favor of extended write-ups on the world itself.

And what a world it is. While evoking spirit of World of Greyhawk, Golarion excels at tweaking standard fantasy formula. Within its pages – including 64 pages of new content – you’ll find Cheliax, a kingdom that embraced devil worship in order to save its empire, as well as Galt, a country that threw off its imperial Cheliax masters and descended into a never-ending bloodthirsty revolution. There are the mountaintop citadels constructed after the dwarves completed their quest for the sky, and a frozen kingdom ruled by the daughters of Baba Yaga. It’s a setting that feels familiar and new at the same time, and like Pathfinder itself, it’s a worthy successor to the worlds of Dungeons & Dragons.

Dark Sun Creature Catalog

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A dragon king stands on a stone ruin.

The sun-blasted, magic-scarred campaign setting of Dark Sun is unlike any other published for Dungeons & Dragons. It inverts or eliminates many of the core concepts of D&D: arcane power is rare, psionic abilities are rampant; Halflings are cannibals, dwarves are slaves, and elves are opportunistic, lying traders. The world itself – known as Athas … Read more

Can you survive arcane wastelands of the Dark Sun Campaign Setting?

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A female warrior with a crude sword and shield stands against an orange-yellow desert background.

The Dark Sun has risen again on the parched, magically devastated world of Athas, bringing with it the new rules and mindset of Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition. First introduced in the early 1990s during D&D 2nd Edition, Dark Sun was meant to be a brutal, unforgiving dark fantasy setting unlike anything the game had … Read more

Gnome Stew’s Eureka Offers a Multiverse of Plot Lines

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As a thirty-something game master, I find myself torn. As a storyteller I love hand-crafting plots and storylines for my weekly role-playing game sessions. But as a husband and dad with a full-time job, extracurricular activities, and household chores to deal with, finding the time to tell those stories is challenge.

My Three-Page Manifesto helps keep my prep times reasonable, but I can still find myself scrambling for ideas the night before the game. That’s why I’ve found the mini adventures in Star Wars: Scum and Villainy and the random adventure creation tables in The Day After Ragnarok so useful, and why I was happy to see Gnome Stew’s Eureka: 501 Adventure Plots to Inspire Game Masters arrive in my inbox.

Star Wars: Scum and Villainy

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Han Solo and Chewbacca

Scum and Villainy is an essential source book for those running a Star Wars: Saga Edition game on the fringes of galactic society, whether that’s trolling for would-be passengers in a Mos Eisley cantina, smuggling spice out of Kessel, or engaging in piracy against the Galactic Empire.

The book does for crime what the earlier Starships of the Galaxy did for starships and space combat, providing scoundrels, bounty hunters and outright criminals with a host of new game rules and options for running a campaign that interacts with the galaxy’s dark underbelly.

Harrowing Halls: Taking Dungeon Tiles to the 3rd Dimension

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Star Wars miniatures make their way up a tile-based staircase.

Harrowing Halls is a Dungeon Tiles set for Dungeons & Dragons that takes the long-running line to new heights. That’s because they’re not just dungeon tiles … they’re three dimensional dungeon tiles that can be used to build a staircase, raised platforms, tables, and pedestals, all of which player characters can jump on, leap off … Read more

Explore Your Draconic Side with PHB Races: Dragonborn

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For decades Dungeons & Dragons players have wanted the ability to play as a dragon. Any DM worth his screen knew that it was a bad idea to give a player that kind of power. Dragons were monsters after all. So other alternatives were created. The half-dragon, the dragon blooded, even the sorcerer class was … Read more