Faraway Fantasy

From the Hintherdale and the North Star Region with their high, rugged mountains in the north, the lands of Easten Faraway stretches over a thousand miles to the south of the untamed frontier of the Buckwild and the lush Silver Woodlands beyond. Underneath, an extensive network of caves and caverns, connected by tunnels and in some places, the extensive mines of iron, gold, and silver—and even of adamantium and mithril, form the Underworld. Dug by Purple Worms, Deep Gnomes, and Duergar, the Underworld is heavily populated by Drow and rife with a variety of fungi. There are strange areas here and there also, known as Otherlands, such as Fey crossings and Shadow crossroads. Over time, going back thousands of years, the surface lands of Easten Faraway are settled by the Jötunn giants, by Dragons, and by High Elves, Mountain Dwarves, and Dragonborn. All left their mark and warred with themselves and each other. The Jötunn by the shattered rocks from other regions and huge thrones built from rocks, and also by the Three Swords, one hundred feet tall blades driven into the ground. The Dragons by the absence of Elemental Dragons, destroyed or driven out during the Second Winter War. The High Elves, Mountain Dwarves, and Dragonborn by numerous magical portals found across the region, some of which still operate today and lead to places far away and far beyond. Their Golden Age ended millennia ago, and in more recent times, following the Second Winter War, the region’s biggest volcano, Ilde Volcano, erupted, reducing its surrounding region to ash, killing over a thousand people, and triggering an earthquake that shattered parts of the Underworld; the Grey Pestilence spread like plague across the lands, only ending with quarantine and the burning of the dead; and the Silver Woodlands were burned by a rare Red Dragon before it was felled by an arrow to the eye. Although the lands of Easten Faraway have been subject to invasions from other lands and across the sea, the most recent threat came from below, when bloodthirsty Drow captured and sacrificed victims from the surface world to their goddess, the Spider Queen. Only with great personal sacrifice by the Winterhold Guards of the town of Winterhold, immolating themselves and the invaders in the town hall. It is an event that is still recognised today.

This setting is presented in The Adventurer’s Guide to Eastern Farraway. Published by Midnight Tower following a successful Kickstarter campaign, it is a campaign setting based on the authors’ homebrew campaign world, influenced by Norse mythology and Scandinavian folklore. Designed for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, it presents the setting, its geography, history, legends and lore, religion and gods, culture, and a whole lot more. Throughout, it is peppered with plot hooks, almost one every two pages or so, but it also covers a lot of information about the setting in a fashion that never threatens to overwhelm the reader. So, it starts off with its calendars and time, geography and climate, flora and fauna, and languages pronunciation. None of these are extensive chapters, but it is enough. The history chapter is much longer and gives a good feel for how the region came to be like it is now. There is a timeline, but a more detailed one might have been helpful. The chapter on legend and lore details three fantastic locations that adventurers would have to quest for to find. They include the Ancient Temple of the Valkyria, only found by the brave and true of heart, most notably by paladins dedicated to her, who must pass the Sacred Trials that test their strength, wisdom, and valour, but which is said to hold treasures donated by faithful paladins over the years, thus attracting the attention of adventurers. Ilde Volcano is a prominent landmark in Eastern Faraway, known for the destruction above and below ground with its last major eruption, including the nearby Ice Dragons Peak and Drakenberg Castle and secret subterranean prophetic carvings, whilst some caverns, like those of the secretive Dragonborn, remained untouched. The Silent Woods are perhaps the strangest location in Eastern Farraway, a maze of tangled, burned trees, brought about by a giant conflagration laid as curse upon two feuding brothers for their greed. These are described in some detail, but the Game Master will need to develop them further to be playable locations.

The influence of Norse mythology and Scandinavian folklore upon the setting primarily shows in the choice of dominant pantheon, which is Norse, with gods such as Odin, Freyr, Hela, Loke, Thor, and Tyr. Their worship is detailed in turn as is that of several other gods not tied to the pantheon. Other links include the creation of Midgård upon Yggsdrisal, which includes the Prime Material Plane along with the Feyworld and the Shadowfell. This is simply part of the background and surprisingly, The Adventurer’s Guide to Eastern Farraway does not emphasise this aspect, whereas another fantasy setting might have done. The result is more a fantasy setting in which the Norse gods are worshipped, but which the peoples of Eastern Farraway are not the Vikings that you might expect. Another way in which it shows is in one of the setting’s two new Player Character species of the Norn. They are statuesque nomads living in the very far north, distant descendants of Val’kÿrian, goddess of battle and mercy, who value truth, honour, and loyalty. They have proficiency with the Survival skill, saving throws versus exhaustion, have advantage on first strikes daily, and wolves and ravens are always friendly to them. In some ways, they are the closest that the setting gets to actual Vikings. The other species is the Mist Elf, who live high in the mountains and are often called Mountain Elves. Curiously, unlike other Elves, they dream and sleep, and tend to be philosophers, poets, and writers. Consequently, they need to sleep at a third (if not half!) of the day, but can see through mist and fog, can communicate with others through their dreams, and if reduced to zero Hit Points, there is a slight chance that they will fade into the Ethereal Plane from whey they will return stabilised.

In addition to the two new species, The Adventurer’s Guide to Eastern Farraway details a new Player Character Background, that of the Messenger, who carries letters and other communiques across the land, whilst new adventure trinkets replace those from the Player’s Handbook for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition with more appropriate to the setting. Magical items are rare in Eastern Faraway, so adventurers and others often wield ‘Expertise Weapons’, whether Clanforged, Moors Birch, Strike Arrows and Bolts, Iron Oak, or Darksteel Blades. They typically grant a bonus to hit and/or damage, whilst the Staff Sling (or Goosegirl Sling) is used by Halflings and Gnomes and can double range or increase damage depending on the type of ammunition used. Darksteel is found in the Underworld and is so light that a two-handed weapon can be used in one hand! Heirloom items are magical and rare, dating back to the Golden Age, like the Belt of Thor’s Might, Horn of Summoning the Fallen, and Khali-Di-Zar’s Hammer. These are wondrous and require attunement and their powers can be unlocked at First, Third, and Fifth Level. For example, the Belt of Thor’s Might has twelve charges that refresh daily and the user can expend them to do a shattering strike, and he also learns the Shocking Grasp cantrip. He can also expend charges to cast spells such as Heroism, Thunderous Smite, and Witch Bolt, increasingly more powerful at tiers one, two, and three.

Chapters also present the nature of magic in Eastern Farraway, the region’s factions and organisations, politics and government, and more. It notes that magic is rare, and in the case of warlocks and sorcerers, deeply mistrusted. As noted above, magic items are rare and most are relics of the Golden Age. The supplement gets down to specific details of specific regions, looking in turn at the North Star Region in the north, Buckwild in the south (the default starting point for any campaign in Eastern Farraway), and then, surprisingly, the Underworld. In every case, there is a short history of each location, its important people and NPCs, and points of interest. For example, the Underworld chapter describes the city of Myl Argoth, the largest Drow settlement in Eastern Farraway, a Drow matriarch and assassin who resides on the surface and is in charge of negotiating mining rights with the surface authorities, and a Drow cultist who worships Selene rather than the Spider Queen. Locations detailed include the Spider Queen’s Bone Cathedral, built from the bones of her enemies (the bones of Drow are incorporated into ceremonial buildings, weapon hilts, jewellery, and the like), whilst the Duskryn Arena, once a religious site, is now where fights, duels, and executions are staged. All three region write-ups give flavour of how each feels content as well that the Dungeon Master can use. New monsters in The Adventurer’s Guide to Eastern Farraway include Gonks, known for their conical felt hats which make them look like mushrooms and for protecting forests and farmsteads, and Jötunn.

The Adventurer’s Guide to Eastern Farraway comes to a close with several pages of adventuring material. This starts with five adventure seeds—in addition to the plot hooks liberally scattered throughout the book. They include being accused of theft by a wily trader, but it is all a scam, investigating a haunted mill and confronting a ghost, and finding out why several people have quietly walked out of their homes in the middle of the night and then disappeared, and more. Some of them are easier to use than other and some will require fleshing out. The ‘The Thieves’ Guild’s Lair’ is a fully detailed and mapped location, ready to use bar a hook for the Player Characters to attempt to infiltrate it. Lastly, ‘Before the Times of Heroes’ is a short starting adventure set in Buckridge, a village in the default starting region of Buckwild. The Player Characters are all teenagers and Commoners, not yet having had the chance to advance to First Level and acquire the details, abilities, and trappings of a Class. They are asked by a local apple farmer to find two barrels that appear to have gone missing on his two-day journey to the village. In the course of their investigation, the Player Characters will come to the aid of a local woodland creature, find the missing barrels, and confront the thieves responsible. As a reward, they will be introduced to several NPCs who each offer them a chance to learn and train in a particular Class. The Player Characters will then return their home village at the start of the Hunter’s Moon Trilogy.

Physically, The Adventurer’s Guide to Eastern Farraway is very well presented. It looks and feels very much like a book for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. It is well written, the maps are good, and the artwork is excellent.

At first glance, it is not easy to identify why play in the setting of Eastern Faraway because The Adventurer’s Guide to Eastern Farraway does not give the potential purchaser and Dungeon Master a strong or immediate selling point have that sets it apart from other settings for Dungeon & Dragons, Fifth Edition or that she can use as a pitch for her players. Yet the setting of Eastern Faraway does have one, and that it is a traditional Dungeons & Dragons-style fantasy setting offering all of the adventure that you would want without being radical or overwhelming either the Dungeon Master or her players with an abundance of lore. From its origins as a homebrew campaign, it is clear that a lot of love has gone into the setting and a lot of work in making the setting of Eastern Farraway engaging with The Adventurer’s Guide to Eastern Farraway.

Ultimately, it is this accessibility that is the selling point to The Adventurer’s Guide to Eastern Farraway. It presents a traditional Dungeons & Dragons-style fantasy setting with some Norse flavour, some mysteries, and some tensions, and makes it easily accessible, effectively uplifting its homebrew origins to professional standard. Overall, The Adventurer’s Guide to Eastern Farraway is a solid introduction to and overview of the Eastern Farraway setting.

[Free RPG Day 2026] Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite

Now in its nineteenth year, Free RPG Day for 2026 took place on Saturday, June 27th. As per usual, Free RPG Day consisted of an array of new and interesting little releases, which are traditionally tasters for forthcoming games to be released at GenCon the following August, but others are support for existing RPGs or pieces of gaming ephemera or a quick-start. This included dice, miniatures, vouchers, and more. Unfortunately, due to vagaries of International Customs, Free RPG Day in the UK did not take place until Saturday, 22nd August.

This review is possible due to the generosity of Waylands Forge in Birmingham.

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Quick-starts are a means of trying out a roleplaying game before you buy. Each should provide a Game Master with sufficient background to introduce and explain the setting to her players, the rules to run the scenario included, and a set of ready-to-play, pre-generated characters that the players can pick up and understand almost as soon as they have sat down to play. The scenario itself should provide an introduction to the setting for the players as well as to the type of adventures that their characters will have and just an idea of some of the things their characters will be doing on said adventures. All of which should be packaged up in an easy-to-understand booklet whose contents, with a minimum of preparation upon the part of the Game Master, can be brought to the table and run for her gaming group in a single evening’s session—or perhaps two. And at the end of it, Game Master and players alike should ideally know whether they want to play the game again, perhaps purchasing another adventure or even the full rules for the roleplaying game.

Alternatively, if the Game Master already has the full rules for the roleplaying game the quick-start is for, then what it provides is a sample scenario that she still run as an introduction or even as part of her campaign for the roleplaying game. The ideal quick-start should entice and intrigue a playing group, but above all effectively introduce and teach the roleplaying game, as well as showcase both rules and setting.

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What is it?
Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite is the quick-start for Fossilized Violence, the roleplaying game of prehistoric warrior cavemen hunt and kill the dinosaurs that are found lurking everywhere across the primeval supercontinent of Pangeon, published by R. Talsorian Games, best known for the roleplaying game, Cyberpunk RED.

Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite is a thirty-two page, full colour booklet.

How long will it take to play?

Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite will take five minutes to set up and about an hour or so to play through.

What else do you need to play?
Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite requires a set of polyhedral dice to play, at minimum (and probably more), whilst the Game Master also needs a plenty of extra twelve-sided dice. In addition, the Game Master will ideally want some terrain and lots of plastic dinosaurs as plastic cavemen. Alternatively, if playing at home, Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite encourages the Game Master to scavage what items she can find about the house to create the arena where the Player Cavemen will fight the dinosaurs.

Who do you play?
Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite includes four pre-generated Player Characters. They are all Cavemen Warriors armed with a variety of weapons.

How is a Player Character defined?

In Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite, a Player Caveman is defined by three stats—Attack, Defence, and Trait. These are defined by a die type, up to maximum of a twelve-sided die. He eight Traits—Brain, Eyes, Mouth, Skin, Arms, Hands, Legs, and Feet. Each has a Difficulty value attached to it, four at Difficulty 6, three at Difficulty 7, and one at Difficulty 8. He will also have some Hit Points, some armour, and some weapons and gear.

How do the mechanics work?

Mechanically, to have his caveman attempt a task a player rolls his caveman’s Trait die plus the four-sided die of Fate and compares the total with value of the associated Trait for the task. If the roll is higher, the Player Caveman succeeds. If the roll is failure, the player can reroll, but loses the ability to roll against that Trait until the next session. The four-sided die of Fate also explodes on a roll of a four and a player can keep rolling and adding as long as the result is four each time.

How does combat work?

Combat in Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite is where it gets exciting! To make an attack, the attacker rolls his Attack Stat die plus the four-sided die of Fate whilst the defender rolls his Defence Stat die plus the four-sided die of Fate. If the result of the Attack roll is higher than the Defence roll, the attack succeeds. If the roll is five or more higher than the Defence roll, the attacker inflicts a Critical, and if it is ten or more higher than the Defence roll, the attacker inflicts a Super Critical. There are critical tables for bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing attacks, plus a Super Modifier table.

A Player Caveman is encouraged to enact ‘Fossilized Moves’ and so fight with style. ‘Battlecry’ will get a Player Caveman and an ally each a Violence Point; ‘Fight Together’ means that a Player Caveman and an ally gain a Violence Point, both temporally roll a twelve-sided for all Stats, and gets an extra Movement when the other moves; and ‘Plunge Your Weapon’, a Player Caveman thrusts his weapon into an enemy, automatically inflicting an Impale piercing Critical, but lose hold of the weapon in the process. Many of have failure conditions too and many can also be used by dinosaurs as well as a Player Caveman.

A Player Cavemen also has access to Violence Points. He starts with one when combat starts and many more can be gained from using Fossilized Moves as well as good roleplaying in and out of combat. They can be spent for a variety of effects, including rerolling incoming damage and taking the lower result; to decrease a Super Critical to a Critical the Player Caveman is about to suffer; to spend the die type rolled by a dinosaur for its Attack Stat; to increase a Critical to a Super Critical when a Player Caveman attacks; and to roll a twenty-sided die instead of a Stat die.

How does magic work?

There is no magic in Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite.

What do you play?

The scenario in Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite is not so much a scenario as an arena battle. The Game Master is encouraged to run round the house and grab a bunch of things—books, bottles, newspapers, and craft supplies—and throw that down as the arena. The Game Master also secretly sets a timer that countdowns until a point when the Player Cavemen can escape the arena. Movement is not handled in squares, and instead uses a player’s hand length or finger length to determine movement and range. If a Player Caveman’s Hit Points are reduced to zero, there is a chance that he will recover, but with one Hit Point. Otherwise, he will die and an ally will gain a Violence Point. Dinosaurs do die when their Hit Points are reduced to zero. The last Player Cavemen standing has his Stats increased to twelve-sided dice for the reminder of the combat.

Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite includes four dinosaur types. These are the Allosaurus, Anzu, Brontosaurus, and Velociraptor. The bigger ones have two attacks and all of them have their own Critical tables.

Is there anything missing?
No. The Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite is complete as is.

Is it easy to prepare?
Yes. The Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite is easy to grasp and prepare.

Is it worth it?
Yes. The Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite includes everything for a solid battle in the world of Pangeon. It showcases the rules more than the setting, but that is good for an hour’s worth of dinosaur battling.

The Fossilized Violence QuickStart – Second Bite is available from the R. Talsorian Games.

2008: Saga of the Rat King

1974 is an important year for the gaming hobby. It is the year that Dungeons & Dragons was introduced, the original RPG from which all other RPGs would ultimately be derived and the original RPG from which so many computer games would draw for their inspiration. It is fitting that the current owner of the game, Wizards of the Coast, released the new version, Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, in the year of the game’s fortieth anniversary. To celebrate this, Reviews from R’lyeh will be running a series of reviews from the hobby’s anniversary years, thus there will be reviews from 1974, from 1984, from 1994, and from 2004—the thirtieth, twentieth, and tenth anniversaries of the titles. These will be retrospectives, in each case an opportunity to re-appraise interesting titles and true classics decades on from the year of their original release.

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In 2003, Goodman Games launched its long running Dungeon Crawl Classics series, which combined old style play with modern rules, with Dungeon Crawl Classics #1: Idylls of the Rat King. In that scenario, the Player Characters’ investigations into raids by Goblin bandits on caravans carrying silver ore lead to the nearby Gannu Silver Mine which turned out to be infested by not just Goblins, but rats and Wererats. The final confrontation in the mine is with Lawrence Gannu, cursed by the villagers of Silverton to be a Wererat after they blamed his father for a dangerous discovery in the mines, returned to take his revenge upon the villagers. This scenario was more recently republished as Fifth Edition Fantasy #31: Idylls of the Rat King, for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. In 2006, the publisher released a sequel, Dungeon Crawl Classics #27: Revenge of the Rat King. The Player Characters have an opportunity to confront Aaron Gannu, father of Lawrence, in this sequel. However, he has other designs on the Player Characters and they are tested sorely as he lures them into his lair, weakens them and depletes their resources, before capturing them. Fortunately, the Player Characters, only armed with luck and wits, do have the opportunity to escape, find their possessions, and fully arm themselves once again before the final showdown. Both Dungeon Crawl Classics #1: Idylls of the Rat King and Dungeon Crawl Classics #27: Revenge of the Rat King were written for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition, rather than the publisher’s own (not yet published) Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game.

Dungeon Crawl Classics: Saga of the Rat King is not written for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition or Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game. Published in 2008 for sale at Gen Con Indy in 2008, it is instead a special module in more ways than one, First, it is written for use with Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition, rare in 2008 as it would be for today. second, it combined both Dungeon Crawl Classics #1: Idylls of the Rat King and Dungeon Crawl Classics #27: Revenge of the Rat King. Third, it not only compiles the previously published scenarios, but includes a third new part, ‘The Scourge of Silverton’. This connects the two scenarios and it means that together, all three parts can be played as a single campaign taking the Player Characters from First Level all the way up to Sixth Level.

The plot to both Dungeon Crawl Classics #1: Idylls of the Rat King and Dungeon Crawl Classics #27: Revenge of the Rat King remain the same. In the former, the Player Characters explored the apparently abandoned Gannu Silver Mine and find it crawling with Goblins and Wererats, one level of the mine being reworked with zombie slaves, and Lawrence Gannu the Wererat overseeing it all as well as something else hidden deep in the bowels of the mine. In the latter, the Player Characters are in the city of Soulgrave tracking down a ring of slavers and are lured in one big dungeon trap by Aaron Gannu, father of Lawrence, who will have his revenge! Divided over three acts, the Player Characters will be tested in each. First, with a series of challenging dungeon encounters designed to wear them down; second by capturing them and stripping them of all their equipment; and third, with dangerous battle against Aaron Gannu’s minions and finally, Aaron Gannu himself. It remains an evil dungeon. However, there are changes to both because, understandably, this is a compilation for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition, not Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition.

The most obvious change is from a roleplaying game with intrinsic rules for skills, skill checks, and other activities to a roleplaying game without those. Here we are in classic ‘rulings not rules’ territory, Dungeon Crawl Classics: Saga of the Rat King leaving it very much up to the Dungeon Master to decide upon the specifics of how resolve a Player Character action. Unfortunately, this is not consistently applied throughout the adventure anthology, giving it slightly unbalanced feel. Without the suggested mechanic solution for each and every situation, it feels authentic to the design and play of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition, but where they are included, they intrude rather than feel natural.

However, the adaptation from Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition has been less consistently applied to the ‘Idylls of the Rat King’ part of the campaign. One of these is narrative in that as a section of boxed text explains whilst Dungeon Crawl Classics #1: Idylls of the Rat King had Goblin Wererats as its main monsters, Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition restricts lycanthropy to Humans only. Thus, there are no Goblin Wererats in Dungeon Crawl Classics: Saga of the Rat King, only Human ones. Neither are there any Goblin Clerics in Dungeon Crawl Classics: Saga of the Rat King, these also having been changed to Human Clerics, though still devoted to the rat gods Narrimunth and Nimlurun. Similarly, the Goblin Wizard of the original has been changed to Human Wizard, but in this his illustration is that of the Goblin in the original, and whilst the bandit chief and his guards are now described as Human, their illustration still shows them to be Goblins. Lastly, Half-Orc slavers have been added to the scenario. These effectively replace the Goblins who would fight to the death to protect the young Goblins in the tribe’s nursery. So now the Half-Orc slavers will fight to the death to protect their slaves, which though ties in with the slave ring theme found in ‘Revenge of the Rat King’, it still does not make sense narratively.

It should be noted that ‘Revenge of the Rat King’ still retains the story element of the Player Characters being captured by the Rat King. As problematic as this in terms of storytelling and player agency, it is very difficult to change this because it is pivotal to the events of the scenario.

In between ‘Idylls of the Rat King’ and ‘Revenge of the Rat King’ is ‘The Scourge of Silverton’. This is designed for Player Characters of Third and Fourth Level. It is designed as a short bridging affair between the two scenarios, but it is not a full enough adventure to provide sufficient Experience Points to take the Player Characters from ‘Idylls of the Rat King’ to ‘Revenge of the Rat King’, so the Dungeon Master will want to run other content before it as ‘The Scourge of Silverton’ is a direct prequel to ‘Revenge of the Rat King’. It provides a specific reason for the Player Characters to travel from Silverton to Soulgrave. The scenario draws the Player Characters back to Silverton, which has been restored to its fortunes with the death of Lawrence Gannu and the driving out of his bandits at their hands. Lawrence’s younger half-brother, Marcus, equally as evil, has heard of his brother’s death and working with their father, has concocted a plan to take revenge upon the Player Characters. This will play out in ‘Revenge of the Rat King’, but to set this up and draw the Player Characters in, Marcus kidnaps several of the villagers from Silverton and holds them to ransom. The villagers of Silverton ask the Player Characters to deliver the ransom to the Deveraux Silver Mine and ensure the safe return of the hostages.

The Player Characters have the choice of handing over the ransom or fighting their way into the mine. Either way, they will have a fight to get to the hostages as the situation is not simply a ransom and hostage exchange, but of course, a trap! Marcus has seeded the mine with traps and groups of his men, who will snipe and harass the Player Characters as they work their way to where the hostages are being held. Ultimately, there will be a confrontation with Marcus, but he and his chief henchman will escape the mine in Indiana and the Temple of Doom style in a mine cart with the Player Characters in hot pursuit.

‘The Scourge of Silverton’ is a set-up and also a set-up to a set-up, that of ‘Revenge of the Rat King’. It is short and serviceable, playable in a single session or so, and primarily combat focused. The addition of Marcus Gannu is the main addition to the trilogy in terms of its storytelling, but the main problem with ‘The Scourge of Silverton’ is that it sets up Marcus Gannu as a villain, but then lets him exit the trilogy of scenarios as he does not appear in the updated version of ‘Revenge of the Rat King’.

Physically, Dungeon Crawl Classics: Saga of the Rat King is done in the then style of the Dungeon Crawl Classics line. The artwork is decent, though not always befitting the text, and the cartography varies in style and quality. This is from the very plain, even dull, maps of ‘Idylls of the Rat King’ to the detailed maps for ‘Revenge of the Rat King’ and ‘The Scourge of Silverton’. Unfortunately, Dungeon Crawl Classics: Saga of the Rat King is not let down by its adaptation to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition, but rather by its lack of consistency when it comes to terminology and phrasing. Errors are strewn throughout the book. Not necessarily to make Dungeon Crawl Classics: Saga of the Rat King unplayable, but more than enough to irk the veteran of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition and potentially confuse the Dungeon Master who has less experience of playing Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition.

Dungeon Crawl Classics: Saga of the Rat King provides three different styes of dungeons. ‘Idylls of the Rat King’ is a dungeon crawl; ‘The Scourge of Silverton’ is an extended combat encounter, a game of cat-and-mouse through the mines; and ‘Revenge of the Rat King’ is a challenging, even evil, obstacle course that will test the players’ lateral thinking and dungeoneering skills perhaps more than those of their characters. This gives it variety that is neatly tied to its theme of revenge that runs through all three parts.

Dungeon Crawl Classics: Saga of the Rat King is really a trilogy in two parts because ‘The Scourge of Silverton’ is not enough to bridge the gap between the events of ‘Idylls of the Rat King’ and ‘Revenge of the Rat King’. It does, however, provide a reason for the Player Characters to play through ‘Revenge of the Rat King’, so very much a mini-prequel. Which means that Dungeon Crawl Classics: Saga of the Rat King is not really a mini-campaign either, since it has a beginning and an end, but no real middle. The Dungeon Master will have to provide that, and perhaps one way of doing it, is to use Dungeon Crawl Classics: Saga of the Rat King as a precursor to the classic campaign, Against the Slave Lords, since there are elements in ‘Revenge of the Rat King’ inspired by that campaign.

[Free RPG Day 2026] The Crooked House

Now in its nineteenth year, Free RPG Day for 2026 took place on Saturday, June 27th. As per usual, Free RPG Day consisted of an array of new and interesting little releases, which are traditionally tasters for forthcoming games to be released at GenCon the following August, but others are support for existing RPGs or pieces of gaming ephemera or a quick-start. This included dice, miniatures, vouchers, and more. Unfortunately, due to vagaries of International Customs, Free RPG Day in the UK did not take place until Saturday, 22nd August.

This review is possible due to the generosity of Waylands Forge in Birmingham.

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The Crooked House is a haunted manifestation of the Crooked Queen, a twisted wooden edifice in the American Gothic edifice that stands on the hill above the village and has many names and owners. Today it is known as Druskenvald Manor, named for the current owners Philip and Adela Druskenvald, given the building and its grounds as gift from the local mayor, eager to have someone own and restore it and perhaps bring some life to the village. In the past, it was Lockwood Estate, but they died or disappeared in a great tragedy, it has stood empty until the Druskenvalds arrived. Now they are in danger, for the building twists all who stay within its walls, playing on their worst fears, the minions of the Crooked Queen driving them to madness and preparing them for sacrifice within its walls! Now Philip and Adela Druskenvald are the next victims of both the house and the Crooked Queen, and the Player Characters have invited to dine with them. Most obviously to celebrate their good fortune, but also because Adela has been suffering from unsettling nightmares…

The Crooked House: Folk Horror Roleplaying for Four 3 Characters is a scenario for The Crooked Moon, the folk horror roleplaying game setting for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition published by Avantris Entertainment. It includes a dark and dangerous mystery and some thoroughly vile monsters and villains, all wrapped up in an atmospherically twisted haunted house.

The first thing that strikes you about The Crooked House are its production values. Against its sepia tones that make it stand out from anything else released for Free RPG Day, the artwork is excellent, especially of the monsters that appear in the scenario. The three dimensional cutaway map of the house is good too, although perhaps a little dark to read proper. The standard maps are really good though, capturing the feel of a lived in house that has gone to seed due to its misuse by the Crooked Queen and her servants, including Vessla Browntooth, the Weasel Hag, and the Crooked Man, Vessla’s minion, who will taunt the Player Characters again and again, before fading away each time.

In fact, the Crooked Man is the first person that the Player Characters will encounter in the adventure, hinting at that the things they will find inside whilst also relishing what might become of them once they are inside. Some of that is also foreshadowed in the paintings that they find in the foyer that in turn unsettlingly depicting the former occupants and the current occupants, and worse, the Player Characters! Even then, the paintings have been cursed and have deleterious effect upon anyone who examines them. They are the first of many things that have been twisted in the crooked house and there is a constant pattern of the familiar features of a family home so twisted and turned to horror. Many of these things are classic haunted house elements, such as the spirit board in the parlour and need to hold a séance, a self-playing harpsichord in the music room, a rich feast that quickly reveals itself to be rotten and then attacks the Player Characters, and so on. Yet there are some little tweaks here and there, like the haunted wooden doll which instead of attacking the Player Characters begs for their help in checking for monsters, and instead of a deluge of blood flowing out of a room and into the hallway a la the film The Shining, the Player Characters are in the bathroom when it fountains up from the plughole! In nearly every instance, the Player Characters need to engage with these in order find a half dozen artefacts connected to the history of the house and its former occupants.

As the Player Characters advance through the house, they are harried by a variety of nasty creatures including a sneak of weasels, which does not give up and they all speak in voice, saying the same phrase over and over, as well as a Boogleswarm, a swarm of fey weasels that covets and collects teeth (like the Tooth Fairy, but without leaving a pound coin under the pillow). In fact, teeth are one of the recurring motifs throughout The Crooked House, the Player Character find them crunched under foot and inserted into nooks and crannies. The weaselly nature of the scenario does not stop there, for eventually, the Player Characters will make their way to the top of the house and manage to open the way to the secret chamber where Vessla Browntooth, the Weasel Hag is performing the ritual she needs to sacrifice the souls of Philip and Adela Druskenvald. Will the Player Characters be able to stop her?

Besides the excellent maps, the Game Master is given full stats for all of the monsters in The Crooked House. Notably, all of them have a ‘secret’, something that a Player Character might know about with an appropriate skill roll. These are suggested, but it would have been nice if there was a way to discover them narratively as part of the playthrough of the scenario. The Treasury details a pair of interesting magical items found the house, but which are actually cursed (of course, they should be). Also included is a quartet of Player Characters. They consist of a Gnarlborn Druid, a Plagueborn Monk, a Stoneborn Cultist, and a Threadborn Reveler. They are not poor example Player Characters, but there is no explanation though how they relate to each other, the scenario, or The Crooked Moon setting. They fit a Gothic horror-fantasy setting, not a modern setting of any kind, and both Philip and Adela Druskenvald are depicted as modern characters, dressed for the Jazz Age of the nineteen twenties. Consequently, they feel out of place alongside the scenario.

Physically, The Crooked House: Folk Horror Roleplaying for Four 3 Characters is very well presented. The artwork and the artwork are both great and the maps excellent.

The Crooked House: Folk Horror Roleplaying for Four 3 Characters is thoroughly enjoyable, Gothic horror, haunted house scenario. What lets it does as a whole are the sample Player Characters which not match the feel of the scenario. That said, there is nothing to stop the Game Master from running the scenario with a slight adjustment using standard Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition or a modern horror treatment such as FiveEvil.

Miskatonic Monday #452: Of Them

uch like the Jonstown Compendium for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and The Companions of Arthur for material set in Greg Stafford’s masterpiece of Arthurian legend and romance, Pendragon, the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition is a curated platform for user-made content. It is thus, “...a new way for creators to publish and distribute their own original Call of Cthulhu content including scenarios, settings, spells and more…” To support the endeavours of their creators, Chaosium has provided templates and art packs, both free to use, so that the resulting releases can look and feel as professional as possible. To support the efforts of these contributors, Miskatonic Monday is an occasional series of reviews which will in turn examine an item drawn from the depths of the Miskatonic Repository.

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Name: Of Them

Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Authors: Aleksi Martikainen, Sean Liddle, Jef Wilkins, Jukka Särkijärvi, and Petri Leinonen

Setting: Minnesota, 1921

Product: One-on-One Scenario

What You Get: Twenty-two page, 3.32 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: How far can a father trust a son when the son is in pain?

Plot Hook: My son is missing!
Plot Support: Staging advice, two NPCs, three handouts, three maps, and one Mythos monster.

Production Values: Good

Pros

# Spiritual sequel to Of Fathers

# One Investigator, one Keeper scenario

# Linear and straightforward to run

# Compartmentalised scenes easy to run

# Explores the consequences of the father’s choice

# Can be used as the background for an Investigator

# Great maps

# Eisoptrophobia

# Dermatophobia

# Capgras Delusion

Cons

# Linear plotting

# No Pre-generated Investigator(s)

Conclusion

# Clearly mapped out

# Underplayed, but desperately personal encounter with the Mythos

[Free RPG Day 2026] Kaguya Protocol

Now in its nineteenth year, Free RPG Day for 2026 took place on Saturday, June 27th. As per usual, Free RPG Day consisted of an array of new and interesting little releases, which are traditionally tasters for forthcoming games to be released at GenCon the following August, but others are support for existing RPGs or pieces of gaming ephemera or a quick-start. This included dice, miniatures, vouchers, and more. Unfortunately, due to vagaries of International Customs, Free RPG Day in the UK did not take place until Saturday, 22nd August.

This review is possible due to the generosity of Waylands Forge in Birmingham.

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CBR+PNK—Cyber plus Punk—is a stripped down Cyberpunk roleplaying game, published by Mythworks, using a streamlined version of Forged In The Dark. The players take the roles of ‘Runners’—mercs, criminals, and activists who live on the edge of society, not legal, but not necessarily illegal, though whether made to earn money or done out of principle, their runs in the shadows always are. CBR+PNK is designed for one-shots and notably, its format consists of a series of four-panel pamphlets.

Kaguya Protocol, subtitled, ‘A Neon-Fantasy Tale of Glitches and Legacy’ is a two-part scenario that shifts the tone and feel of CBR+PNK. In Kaguya Protocol they are descendants of ancient Shinobi guardians in the year 20XX, not ‘cyberpunks’, but ‘cyber-shinobi’. They are descendants of ancient Shinobi guardians who are tasked with infiltrating the fortress island home of a Trillionaire tech-bro off the coast of Japan and recover a Sacred Relic that the Trillionaire has stolen and is exploiting its power to his own ends. Which of course, will unleash more evil into the world. In this case, mining BambooCoin crypto currency through an eldritch code!

The first part of the scenario is the infiltration of the island. This hampered by the implemented Security Protocol Threats which seemingly scramble the Trillonaire’s mansion layout. Once past this, the Runners can confront him-in both Meatspace and Cyberspace and eventually recover the Sacred Relic, which it turns is not an artefact, but a baby—Princess Kaguya! In the second half of the scenario, the Runners race to return her home to the Moon, chased across MegaTokyo to MegaTokyo Spaceport. If the Runners succeed, they will each receive a generous gift and change the world as Princess Kaguya ascends. The Player Characters get to decide what these are. 

Kaguya Protocol is based on the publisher’s forthcoming Onigami roleplaying game and is inspired by Japan’s classic fairy tale, The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter (animated as The Tale of the Princess Kaguya by Studio Ghibli), and when the Runners first find her, Princess Kaguya is a blank slate. During the second half of the scenario, as the Runners literally babysit her, she will witness their behaviour and actions and be influenced by them as she grows from a baby into a child and finally from a child into a teenager. This is tracked by the Game Master which will unlock powers and new aspects of her personality, giving her an interesting and rapidly changing NPC to portray.

The Game Master will still need CBR+PNK to run Kaguya Protocol and the players will need to create standard Runners. However, they have all accepted a deal with the Onigami (their players need to decide why) and instead of Augmentations, they receive an Artefact each. Five are listed, suggesting that Kaguya Protocol is best played with a maximum of five players and each has a power that can be activated and a Wicked Power that can be unleashed if it is pushed past its boundaries. This has its consequences. For example, the ‘Hōrai Tree Tattoo’ enables a Runner to stretch out like the branches of a tree, but its Wicked Power lets him teleport a short distance into concealment, though not without leaving behind an item of importance that he was carrying.

Kaguya Protocol is well presented. The only illustration is on the front cover. Otherwise, the pamphlet compacts a lot of information into a relatively small space. but it is accessible and easy to read.

Kaguya Protocol is decent scenario which neatly combines Japanese folklore with the Cyberpunk genre for a good little one-shot. It has plenty of scope for player input and an interesting NPC for the Game Master to portray as Princess Kaguya grows up.

Above & Below

Underground, Overground: The Case File Collection is an anthology of scenarios—and more, for the roleplaying game based on the Rivers of London novels by Ben Aaronovitch. In this roleplaying game, as magic returns to the world, there is the need to deal with the mysteries, oddness, and secrets of the ‘demi-monde’, as well as investigate crimes committed by those within it and those associated with it. In this urban fantasy game, this need is fulfilled by the London Metropolitan Police Service’s special magic branch, also known as ‘the Folly’, and the Player Characters are its newly recruited members. Magic plays a big role in Rivers of London: the Roleplaying Game and some of the Player Characters are practitioners—Apprentice Newtonian Wizards—who will need their magic to best solve the mysteries that lie at the heart of the mysteries of these four scenarios as well as general investigative abilities, some taught at Police College and some learned on the street. Together, the quartet will do things. First, they will take the Player Characters across London as well as below the city and along the banks of the River Thames, second, they will take the Player Characters through a series of increasingly challenging and more involved cases. In terms of timeframe, the scenarios in the anthology are still set in 2016, but the content does take into account of the events of the novella, What Abigail Did That Summer.

It should be noted that four of the the three scenarios in Underground, Overground: The Case File Collection are not new, having previously been available as PDFs, whilst the first two scenarios are suitable as introductory scenarios as well as convention scenarios. The first of the four scenarios is ‘Going Underground’, a short mystery which takes place in an ‘ghost’ or unused station on the London underground, this being the British Museum station closed in the thirties. The British Museum station is now a ‘ghost station’—and it is this conflation of ‘ghost’ and ‘station’ which the author takes advantage of and should arouse the interest of the players and their characters. The Player Characters are awoken by a telephone call in the night from Sergeant Jaget Kumar, the Falcon Liaison Officer for the British Transport Police, who reports that ghost has been sighted on the station. The Player Characters are able to conduct a little research before making their way to the station entrance (it is quite close to the Folly) before descending to the remanets of the station where most of the action will take place. This is a constrained investigation, focusing upon making contact with the ghost there and finding out about what happened to them. However, this hides a deeper mystery connected to the British Museum next door, which is reputed to have been haunted by its very own ‘Unlucky Mummy’.

If there is an issue with ‘Going Underground’, it is that there is not a lot of action to the scenario, so some players may be disappointed. However, it is written as an investigative and social scenario and it has a gentle, almost cosy feel to it. This is a genuinely lovely scenario very nicely supported with some well-researched background.

The second scenario, ‘Font of Evil’, is much more of traditional investigation—and fact, a murder mystery—and does include an actual threat. Potentially problematically, the scenario is that it set on a specific date—Thursday, 19th May, 2016—as it is tied into the ebb and flow of the Thames tidal estuary. There is advice on moving the date, so it is flexible. The scenario concerns the strange death of Edgar Marsh, a young man whose main activity is ‘mudlarking’, that is the practice of searching the exposed riverbeds of the Thames at low tide for historical artifacts and lost objects. It quickly becomes apparent that he is not the only one obsessed with the activity and some of the things Edgar Marsh found. This will give the Player Characters a prime suspect and the second half of the scenario revolves around confirming his connection to the Edgar Marsh, and then tracking him down and confronting him. Another issue with the scenario is there is information that the Player Characters will probably want to know right at the start of the scenario, but saves it until later in the scenario. So, the scenario needs more attention paid to it during the Game Master’s preparation. The scenario will definitely end in a confrontation with the villain of the piece and what he is trying to bring about, so has a much more physical feel to it.

‘Font of Evil’ is very much a London-inspired scenario and much darker in tone than the previous ‘Going Underground’. Whilst the scenario does explore the consequences of Player Characters’ actions, it does not address what happens if they fail, so the Game Master will have to improvise. Otherwise, ‘Font of Evil’ is a dark and nasty affair.

‘The Goat-Man is Coming!’ is the third scenario in the anthology and is the only not have been published before. When the Folly is alerted by the local police liaison officer about an assault by a supposed ‘Goat-Man’ on the Parkland Walk, a linear green pedestrian and cycle route in north London, Inspector Nightingale asks the Player Characters to investigate as the ‘Goat-Man’ is a figure of local myth and has not been seen since the seventies. Much of the action of the scenario is along the few kilometres of the Parkland Walk as the Player Characters investigate the assault and check the veracity of the ‘Goat-Man’ myth. This is very much a step up in terms of the investigation’s sophistication with numerous NPCs to interact with—some of whom are quite challenging to interview—and multiple leads. The players will definitely need to make notes to keep up with the amount of information their characters can discover and learn. The scenario also presents an opportunity for the Player Characters to interact with members of the demi-monde, including a Len Deighton-inspired fox whom the Game Master will have a lot of fun portraying.

However, this scenario is tinged with sadness and it does involve children around whom the Player Characters will need to work with care and sensitivity. There are dire consequences for the Player Characters if this aspect of the investigation is handled poorly, both within the demi-monde and without. Otherwise, this is an entertaining scenario that should take two or three sessions to complete. If there is a downside, it ignores the question that a player and his character might ask, “What if the ‘Goat-Man’ is a faun or satyr?”

The fourth and final scenario in the anthology is ‘Jimmy’s Last Dance’. Like ‘The Goat-Man is Coming!’ before it, this scenario starts with an assault. However, not by a supposed ‘Goat-Man’, but by a pirate in the borough of Putney south London and when the Player Characters investigate, it is clear that magic was used. What follows is a detailed investigation which involves a lot of standard Police procedure—interviews, surveillance, and so on—mainly confined to Putney, bar the occasional return to the Folly to conduct research. Over the course of the investigation, the Player Characters will be conducting multiple interviews, all of which nicely presented to help the Game Master answer their questions and portray the various NPCs. Beyond the fact that a pirate attacked the operators of a cannabis farm in south London, the investigation will lead the Player Characters to a criminal gang, a solicitor with less than ethical standards, a rotten son-in-law and a barely suspecting daughter, and an old lady with interesting secrets of her own. Their efforts will seem to weave in and out of the movements of the pirate, but eventually they will be able to find him and discover who he is and what he wants.

As with the other scenarios in Underground, Overground, the issue with ‘Jimmy’s Last Dance’ is when it is set, but add to that is its political dimension. It is set in 2016 and it involves a political scandal that was at its height at the time. This is The Windrush Scandal. Of course, the authors advise the Game Master to handle the issue with care and it is certainly not a problem that The Windrush Scandal is part of the scenario—in fact, it is actually woven into the plot of the case file—but rather that the timeframe is quite specific and thus difficult to shift the case file to another year. Elsewhere, there is advice on how to portray a pirate without sounding like Robert Newton. Overall, a very nicely detailed investigation that combines parochially British charm and menace, but like a modern Ealing comedy, can have a cosy ending.

All four scenarios are ably supported by advice and suggestions for the Game Master, whether that is written in the author’s voice or that of Peter Grant or even Ben Aaronovitch. There is advice on what character types that each scenario needs, referring to the pre-generated Player Characters in the core rulebook and, also how to run each scenario using Player Characters who are not affiliated with the Folly. Most of the scenarios have relationship maps and a plot progression charts too, to help the Game Master keep track of their particular investigations. Perhaps the oddest advice is on various pieces of British vernacular, such as the meaning of the term ‘old bag’ when used as a pejorative to describe a woman, old or not. Whilst a British audience will find this amusing, for a non-British Game Master, it explains the vernacular and gives alternatives where necessary. This gives her the choice of enforcing the verisimilitude with the given terms or using less pejorative ones.

Underground, Overground: The Case File Collection comes to a close with a trio of appendices. The first presents ‘New Spells’ from Bortnik, an old Russian peasant spell designed to drive bees away temporarily so that a hive’s honey can be harvested and Trip Trap that ties shoelaces together to Indagare Aliquem which creates a pair of linked metal items each of which knows where the others are (one the examples of its use is by New York Librarians with paired paperclips to track where certain books and items are) and Snow Stove which compacts a mass of snow into a compact cylinder that releases heat for several hours. There is a wide variety of spells here drawn from the novels with some of them amusingly commented upon by Ben Aaronovitch as to what Abigail, Peter Grant’s niece might do with them if she could. The third is a useful ‘Bibliography & Resources’.

However, topping and tailing Underground, Overground—or is that ‘snouting and tailing’?—is a look at Foxes in the Rivers of London setting and Rivers of London: the Roleplaying Game. The anthology opens with ‘The Absolutely True and Accurate Account of How the Foxes Got Their Voices Back’, a new short story by Ben Aaronovitch, which gives the vulpine explanation as to how and why they learned speak. Speaking foxes, larger, longer lived, and more intelligent than their silent brethren, first seen in What Abigail Did That Summer, are going to be a big draw for some players to Underground, Overground as it comes to a close with a complete guide to creating and playing talking Foxes. This adds a new option to playing a member of the demi-monde, but in many ways a much more challenging one, since these are not anthropomorphised Foxes. They can speak, read, but cannot write and do many things because they lack opposable thumbs (not a problem for Talking Raccoons, the option suggested for play in the USA with Rivers of London: In Liberty’s Shadow: A Guide to Case Files in the USA). It is suggested that two Occupations are suitable for a Fox Player Character. One is the ‘Boffin’, the equivalent of a Lecturer, who has to teach the young fox kits, but the other preferred option is the ‘Spy’. Now this can be used to create Human spies, but Fox spies specialise in surveillance, especially in urban environments. Fox spies also think and talk like spies, especially fictional spies, so the roleplaying potential is rife with entertaining clichés and can be huge fun if a player knows his spy lingo. Fortunately, there is plenty of detail to help the Game Master and the player portray a talking Fox as well as creating one with the right skills and advantages. (Of course, it sets up the challenge of writing an all-talking Fox scenario!)

Physically, Underground, Overground: The Case File Collection is very nicely produced. It is well written, the illustrations are excellent, the cartography good, and the handouts decent.

Ultimately, the only issue with Underground, Overground: The Case File Collection is the time frame in which its scenarios are set, often quite tightly bound to 2016. This is not an insurmountable problem, and the individual scenarios do each give advice how to handle this if the Game Master wants to set them else when. This aside, all four scenarios are thoroughly entertaining, whatever their degree of detail and investigation, exploring different parts and aspects of London, as well introducing further elements of the demi-monde. Players will love it for the means to create and roleplaying talking Foxes, but that is just extra to the collection of intriguing investigations and mysteries in Underground, Overground: The Case File Collection that provide great support for the Rivers of London: the Roleplaying Game.