[Fanzine Focus XXXIX] Scout Magazine #III

On the tail of the Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a non-professional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed how another Dungeon Master and her group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will be compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord, Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay, and Swords & Wizardry have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, as has Old School Essentials.

Scout Magazine is a fanzine that comes packed with content that the Game Master can add to her Old School Essentials or change how it is played. This is no matter whether she uses the basic rules of Old School Essentials Classic Fantasy or the advanced options of Old School Essentials: Advanced Fantasy. Although specially written for use with Old School Essentials, it is easily adapted to the retroclone of Game Master’s choice or even added to Dolmenwood, the setting and retroclone also published by Necrotic Gnome.

Scout Magazine #IIIwas published in November, 2024 by PBenardo. Unlike Scout Magazine #I and Scout #II before it, it only includes two new Classes, but it includes as normal, both new monsters and articles that add new rules and mechanics to the play of Old School Essentials. Unlike the first issue, Scout Magazine #III does not possess anything in the way of a theme, but the monsters do!

Instead of new character Classes, Scout Magazine Issue #III begins with a list of ‘Backgrounds’. Each Background represents a skill or trait that the Player Character gained prior to becoming an adventurer. Some are quite mundane like the Farmer, who can predict the weather, but others are a little odd. For example, ‘Iron Dome’ means that the Player Character has an iron plaque in his head, which grants a bonus on Saving Throws versus charm or suggestion or ‘Graveyard Caretaker’, which enables the Player Character to detect the undead with a successful Listen check! Many are useful, such as ‘Surgeon’ which enables the Player Character to restore a single Hit Point to a wounded creature. There is decent selection, but at just fourteen, there is not a lot of variety to choose from.

One Background from ‘Backgrounds’ is given as optional, but it is actually supported with a whole article of its own. The Background in question is the ‘Psion’ and the article is ‘Psionics’. At the start of every day, the Psion’s player rolls for how many different types of psionic powers the character can use that day. So, the powers are random and the number of times the Psion can use them per day is equal to his Level divided by five. However, bearing magical items prevents the use of psionics and interrupting the use of psionic powers inflicts damage on the user due to psychic backlash. The powers include Astral Projection, Mental Shield, Precognition, Psi Cloak, 15’ Radius, Telekinesis, Telepathy, and more. The stranger ones include ‘Brain Bruise’ which inflicts damage on the nervous system of a creature, whilst ‘Preternatural Hearing’ enables the Psion to listen through solid objects. Of course, ‘Preternatural Hearing’ should really be called ‘Clairaudience’. Overall, the article is serviceable treatment of psionics for Old School Essentials, but its inclusion points to the fact that much of Scout Magazine is going over old new ground for a relatively new rules system—or in the case of Old School Essentials, a relatively new version of an old rules system. Nor indeed are psionics new to Old School Essentials, as for example, the Planar Compass Player’s Booklet for the Planar Compass fanzine has already presented a version.

The first of the two new Classes in Scout Magazine Issue #III is the ‘Wildling Warrior’. This is a tribal warrior with a distrust of anything different who inflicts double damage when he charges in combat with a two-handed weapon, is immune to fear, can forage and hunt, and will refuse to use magical items, though he will accept the use of divine magic. He will learn to strike invulnerable monsters and gains an increasing bonus to hit when wearing no armour. His War Cry can force a Morale Check on creatures of lower Hit Dice. It is difficult to really distinguish the ‘Wildling Warrior’ from the Barbarian Class and thus understand quite what this offers.

The same initially can be said of the ‘Zealot’, effectively a holy warrior or a version of the Paladin. Here the version can be either Lawful, Neutral, or Chaotic in alignment. The Lawful Zealot focuses on life-giving magic, repelling undead, and boosting their allies’ abilities on the battlefield; the Neutral Zealot on nature-related magics, interacting with animals, and shapeshifting; and the Chaotic Zealots on controlling the undead and life-draining magic. The Zealot has to use blunt weapons, is immune to disease, and each hour can call upon his deity to cast a spell. The Lawful Zealot can Lay on Hands and at Eighth Level restore life or destroy undead; the Neutral Zealot gains animal form and at Eighth Level, full lycanthropy; and the Chaotic Zealot can drain life and at Eighth Level, can animate the dead. Each type of the Zealot has its own short spell list. The Zealot is three Classes in one, with the Lawful and Chaotic versions being akin to the Paladin and Anti-Paladin with the Neutral Zealot being a Druidic version. This is an intriguing option and something really different.

‘Drow Spells’ provides a spell list for the version of the Drow in Old School Essentials Advanced Fantasy: Genre Rules. Many like Spidercloak Armour, Spider Bite, and Summon Spiders are appropriately thematic. The last quarter of Scout Magazine Issue #III is devoted to ‘Monsters’, all of which are inspired by the Cthulhu Mythos. Creatures taken from Lovecraft’s writings (and those of others in the same milieu) have a long history of appearing in Dungeons & Dragons-style roleplaying games, going all the way back to the Deities & Demigods sourcebook for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition—and indeed, this is not the first time that the Old School Renaissance has pulled a tentacle out of the Cthulhu Mythos, such as Realms of Crawling Chaos: Lovecraftian Dark Fantasy. Here the author gives stats and a little detail on Azathoth, B’yakhee, Cthugah, Cthulhu, Deep Ones, members of the Great Race, I’thaqua, Mi-Go, Nyarlathotep, Shoggoths, and many more. There are some more generic Lovecraftian creatures alongside the well-known ones. These are all serviceable enough and the author promises the reader a supplement to go with them to cover the rituals and spells too.

Physically, Scout Magazine #III is tidily presented. It is very lightly illustrated.

Scout Magazine #III provides the Game Master and her players with a mixture of options old and new—or rather retreads of old worn paths and new. There is some good content in the issue, but just a little too much feels too similar to what has gone on before. That said, these are just the author’s suggestions and if the content of the issue does feel familiar, it is at least giving the Game Master more choice. Of the new, the Zealot Class is interesting, especially the Neutral variant, and the Backgrounds can add a nice bit of detail to any Player Character.

[Fanzine Focus XXXVIII] Scout Magazine #II

On the tail of the Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a non-professional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed how another Dungeon Master and her group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will be compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord, Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay, and Swords & Wizardry have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, as has Old School Essentials.

Scout Magazine is a fanzine that comes packed with content that the Game Master can add to her Old School Essentials or change how it is played. This is no matter whether she uses the basic rules of Old School Essentials Classic Fantasy or the advanced options of Old School Essentials: Advanced Fantasy. Although specially written for use with Old School Essentials, it is easily adapted to the retroclone of Game Master’s choice or even added to Dolmenwood, the setting and retroclone also published by Necrotic Gnome.

Scout Magazine #II was published in January, 2024 by PBenardo. Like Scout Magazine #I before it, it includes four new Classes, a host of new magical items, monsters, and articles that add new rules and mechanics to the play of Old School Essentials. Unlike the previous issue, Scout Magazine #II does not possess anything in the way of a theme.

The new Classes begin with the ‘Transmuter’. This is a variation of the Magic-User, one which specialises in one of the classic Dungeons & Dragons schools of magic, in this case, ‘Transmutation’. Thus, the Class is all about the alteration of matter, including the transformation of objects and creatures. The Class is also supported with a complete spell list of twelve spells per spell level, for a total of seventy-two spells! Some two fifths—twenty pages—of the fanzine are devoted to this spell list. The spells range from the simple Camouflage, which hides the subject of the spell, and Darksteel, which makes a weapon dark, silent, and causes any blood it spills to adhere to it, both at First Level, to Convert Potion, which changes one potion or poison into another and Corrosion Wave, which degrades all items of metal within an area into uselessness, both at Sixth Level. Included in the list are some classic Magic-User spells appropriate to the Transmuter, like Mending or Heat Metal, but these are joined by some interesting and useful spells, such as Lighten Load, a First Level spell that makes the encumbered unencumbered or the Second Level Breathe Noxious Gases. The spell list gives the Class a lot of options and especially, utility, in comparison to the standard Magic-User.

The second of the new Classes is the ‘Mystic’. This is the Monk for Old School Essentials, a Class that was surprisingly omitted from Old School Essentials: Advanced Fantasy. The ‘Shadowborn’ employs the shadows and the magic of the Shadow Realm when he goes adventuring. The Class cannot wear any armour, but gains a bonus to Armour Class when not fighting in daylight or magical light, is better at hiding shadows than the Thief Class, and gains Infravision that increases in range as his Level increases. The ‘Shadowphase’ enables the Class to step into the shadow realm and exit from the shadows at another nearby location, though this requires a Move Silently skill roll. When Hidden in Shadows, the Shadowborn receives a bonus to attack and damage, including against those who can only be hit by magical weapons, and lastly, at Ninth Level, the Shadowborn can build a monastery and summon denizens of the Shadow Realm. The Class is effectively a Fighter, but one that emphasises stealth rather than direct conflict. As does the ‘Stalker’, the fourth Class in Scout Magazine #II. However, the Stalker is also an expert tracker and ambusher, gaining bonuses against favoured enemies—the Backstab ability in particular—and in the terrain it specialises in. Effectively, this is a specialised version of the Ranger.

Bar the Mystic which adds a Class that is not officially in Old School Essentials, the Classes in Scout Magazine #II are all about specialisation. This means that they may not suit all campaigns or settings and their abilities are very much situational, limiting their effectiveness. However, the one Class of the four that is specialised and actually provides wider and more interesting options is the Transmuter as the Class has more options to chose from in terms of spells.

The utility of the Transmuter Class—and all spellcasting Classes—is expanded with ‘Mana-Point Spellcasting’. Instead of spell slots per Level, a caster has Mana Points and it costs one Mana Point per Spell Level to cast a spell. Spell point systems are designed to replace the Vancian system of memorise, cast, and forget, enabling a caster to cast the same or different spells as long as he has the points to power them. This system does that, but with some interesting tweaks. The number of Mana Points is equal to his Intelligence plus Level, but that is the maximum amount and the Player Character does not get all of that back with a full night’s rest. It will take several nights’ rest to fully restore his Mana Points. This means that any caster will still need to husband his Mana Points, but the system gives some flexibility. It is possible to regain Mana Points in play for undertaking certain Class actions. For example, the Druid gains them for entering a new wilderness hex and taking a full night’s rest in the wilderness, whilst the Illusionist gains them for uncovering an illusion and making a Saving Throw versus mind-altering magic. This adds further flexibility, whilst also encouraging Class specific activities. Lastly, repeatedly casting the same spell increases its Mana Point cost, and divine spellcasters such as the Cleric and Paladin are included here as well. The Game Master may want to change the attribute which determines the number of Mana Points they receive from Intelligence to Wisdom. Otherwise, though, this is a very serviceable option.

‘Expanded Potions’ offers up twenty-two new potions, like the Potion Of Alignment Reveal, Potion of Non-Detection, Oil of Quicksand, and Potion of Wraithform. These add to the potions given in the previous issue of the fanzine, but the article handily provides a new table of magic potions which includes its new potions and those from the core rulebook for Old School Essentials. There are rules too for mixing potions. They are quick and dirty, typically disabling the imbiber temporarily. There is scope there for a whole article here exploring the possibility of what happens when specific potions are mixed and consumed, but these guidelines will do in the meantime.

‘Skirmishes’ gives rules for handling combat between small squads of between eleven and twenty combatants. A squad is abstracted down to ‘Hit Value’, ‘Attack Value’, ‘Defence Value’, and ‘Morale Value’, rather than designed like a Player Character or a monster, and rolls are made using a ten-sided die rather than a twenty-sided die. The result is a subsystem that is perfectly playable, but does not mechanically feel like Old School Essentials.

‘Politics’ provides the means for the Player Characters to interact with the community and factions and organisations on a wider scale. It is intended to allow the Player Characters to gain influence and reputation beyond simply dungeon delving and so build towards and beyond the Domain tier style of play as they acquire Ninth and Tenth Level and beyond. The Player Characters gain a ‘Notoriety’ value to represent how well known they are, a ‘Faction Standing’ and ‘Ranks’ with different groups, and ‘Influence’ that can then be expended on ‘Moves’ like pinning a crime on someone, purchasing a property, owning a trading vessel, hiring spies or hitmen, and requesting military aid. All of these moves take time, meaning that the Moves play out over the course of a campaign, even whilst the Player Characters are adventuring, whilst still allowing the action to switch to the consequences of those Moves or scenes within them. This is a great addition if the players and their characters are looking to do more than adventure into dungeons and have a wider influence upon the campaign world.

Lastly, Scout Magazine #II gives nine ‘Monsters’. They include both the ‘Green Hag’ and the ‘Night Hag’, variations upon the crone as the monster; the golden-furred cat that is the ‘Luck Eater’, which charms people and grants both a bonus on all rolls and the worst result on all secret rolls made by the Game Master; and the ‘Saw Beast’, a mechanical monster of spiked circular wheels and sawblades. These are serviceable enough.

Physically, Scout Magazine #II is tidily presented. It is very lightly illustrated.

Scout Magazine #II provides the Game Master and her players with yet more new content. The inclusion of the ‘Transmuter’ Class and the ‘Mana-Point Spellcasting’ are well trod paths for Dungeons & Dragons-style roleplaying games, offering options that are not in the core rules almost as if it was 1978. This does not mean that they are bad, by any means. In fact, the ‘Transmuter’ Class along with its extensive spell list is a decent addition, whilst ‘Mana-Point Spellcasting’ has tweaks enough to make it more than simply turning spellcasters into walking spell batteries. All of this does come at the cost of adding further complexity to Old School Essentials, but there really some good options in Scout Magazine #II for the Game Master who wants to expand her campaign.

[Fanzine Focus XXXVII] Scout Magazine #I

On the tail of the Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a non-professional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed how another Dungeon Master and her group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will be compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord, Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay, and Swords & Wizardry have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, as has Old School Essentials.

Scout Magazine is a fanzine that comes packed with content that the Game Master can add to her Old School Essentials or change how it is played. This is no matter whether she uses the basic rules of Old School Essentials Classic Fantasy or the advanced options of Old School Essentials: Advanced Fantasy. Although specially written for use with Old School Essentials, it is easily adapted to the retroclone of Game Master’s choice or even added to Dolmenwood, the setting and retroclone also published by Necrotic Gnome.

Scout Magazine #I was published in July, 2023 by PBenardo. It includes four new Classes, over thirty new magical items, an array of new rules, and articles that explore crime, criminal activities, and punishment. The four Classes start with the Necrourge, something somewhere between the living and the dead, able to walk silently through crypts, strike enemies for an Energy Drain attack that increases the Necrourge’s Strength, hold its breath for an hour, pass as Undead with other Undead, use necromantic scrolls, and possesses all of the resistances and susceptibilities of the Undead, whilst retainers and mercenaries are reluctant to enter its employment. It is an underwhelming start for the fanzine, as the new Class is not that interesting and does not offer a great deal of game play except possibly in campaigns where darker and more evil characters are the norm. The same is true of the second Class, the Crone, but it has more game play to it. The Crone can give herself an illusory appearance once per day, but to do anything else, she must gorge on the fresh remains of humanoid creatures daily in a ‘Cursed Feast’. This is a disturbing sight for anyone watching, including humans, demihumans, and humanoid monsters, and retainers who witness it, have to make a Loyalty check. The ‘Cursed Feast’ restores the Crone’s ‘Bag of Souls’, from which she can cast reversed versions of the Divine spells from the Cleric’s list. Each spell Level cast costs a number of points from the ‘Bag of Souls’. The total number of points in the ‘Bag of Souls’ is equal to the Crone’s Level. Effectively then, the ‘Bag of Souls’ acts as a spell point mechanic for the Crone. Add the Crone’s ability to temporarily enchant items and create a Coven at Ninth Level and whilst a dark, chaotic Class, there is flavour to it that enhances the game play. The Crone also lends itself as the basis for good NPCs.

There have been many variants of the Merchant as a Class, but the version in Scout Magazine #I is all about people. The Merchant gains more rumours than other Classes, learns extra languages, and as a salesman, gains a bonus when bargaining, buying, and selling. He also has the Appraise skill and can join a merchant guild network and eventually open a branch of the guild. Hiring and shipping is cheaper and easier as a guild member. The interesting element of the Class is that the Merchant can build long term relationships with his retainers. The more Levels a retainer gains in a Merchant’s employ, the more his morale improves and beyond that, his Hit Points! This version of the Class does a good job of widening the gaming potential of the role.

Similarly, the Swashbuckler is not a new Class, although this version is. The Swashbuckler can retreat without incurring an Armour Class penalty and replaces his Strength with his Dexterity as you would expect for attack rolls and damage. Thieves tends to be loyal to the Swashbuckler more so than other retainers and if the Game Master is using the optional parrying rule for Old School Essentials, the Swashbuckler doubles his Dexterity bonus for to parry. If an attack against a Swashbuckler misses, he can riposte, though this is at a increasing penalty for each failed attack in a Round. Swashbuckler skills include Climb Sheer Surfaces, Hear Noise, Move Silently, and Pick Pockets. This version of the Swashbuckler is decent enough, more thief or pirate than musketeer.

The ‘Magic Items’ section does a nice line in named and interesting weapons. For example, Sword +1, Lifegiver is a cursed weapon sword said to have belonged to a selfless saint that is a -2 weapons versus humanoids, but increases its damage die against undead, and can revive someone if they have not been dead for more than a single Turn, but this costs the wielder permanent points of Constitution. There are not just swords described, but also daggers and longbows, and more, as well as miscellaneous items like the Crown Of Spell Absorption which has an empty slot for a gem and when there is a gem placed in the slot, it absorbs spells, the more valuable the gem, the more Levels of spells it can absorb, or the Scoundrel’s Rabbit Foot, said to have belonged to a disreputable outlaw, which enables the owner’s player to ask for a single dice roll to be made again once per day, but also gives the entire party of Player Characters a foul presence, makes them look like criminals to non-Chaotic retainers, and secretly, shift’s the owner’s Alignment to Chaotic. Many of these items are more complex than the average magical item, but then there is more depth and detail to what they can do and how they can make play interesting.

The ‘Optional Rules’ offer a wide range of additions to standard play of Old School Essentials. They start with ‘New Class Abilities’. These are for Classes for both Old School Essentials Classic Fantasy and Old School Essentials: Advanced Fantasy, so ‘Race as Class’ and ‘Race and Class’. For the Barbarian Class, the ‘Berserker’ ability adds the Constitution bonus to Armour Class, whilst also adding a movement bonus, can inflict ‘Brutal Blows’ at a cost of Armour Class reduction, and ‘War Cry’ forces a Morale check on the enemy when committing a charge attack. For the Ranger, ‘Ambusher’ grants an attack and damage bonus on surprised creatures, ‘Pass Without Trace’ removes movement penalties in difficult terrain and means a Ranger leaves no trace of his movement, and the alternative ‘Tracking’ rule accounts for both the Ranger’s Level and the age of the tracks. Not every Class is given new options, but what is given here expands the Classes in interesting ways.

‘Useful Rulings’ provides quick solutions to common situations, such as clearing a jump, curses, diseases, ability drain, hunger and thirst, and more. There is even a quick and dirty guide to handling insanity for settings influenced by the Cthulhu Mythos. In such a setting, a Player Character who fails a saving throw against madness is forever touched by the mythos. If failed, the Player Character suffers nightmares and sleep deprivation, but gains the capacity to better understand and even use knowledge and powers related to the Mythos. The number of times a Player Character can fail a saving throw versus madness is equal to his Wisdom bonus. Unfortunately, the rules do not clearly explain if a Player Character can go insane, so they are a bit too quick and dirty.

‘Dirty Deeds’ takes the Player Characters to the black market where they can buy goods from shady dealers. The latter have to be found first and the effort runs the risk of the Player Characters being ratted out to the authorities. It includes a list of dusts, oils, and tinctures, hemlock dust, peace lily compound oil, and rainbow cactus tincture, some of which a shady dealer might have for sale and if not, another shady dealer might have others. The list restricts itself to poisons and drugs, so it is limited in scope and there is no discussion of possible other goods or even services that a shady dealer might have for sale. Nevertheless, useful for the Thief and the Assassin Classes—and other ne’er-do-wells, as well developing the seamier side of towns and cities in the Game Master’s campaign. The last article in the issue complements this one. ‘Designing Poisons’ enables the Game Master to expand or design the range of poisons available in her campaign. It uses a pair of templates to help the Game Master to create deadly poisons and paralytic agents. It is fairly simple to use and all the Game Master has to do is add colour and detail to the various concoctions.

Should such ne’er-do-wells, though, get arrested and thrown in gaol, ‘Crime And Punishment’ is there to settle the matter. Determining the judgement is a simple matter of rolling two six-sided dice, the lower the result the more severe the punishment and if the player rolls nine or more, his character goes free. The roll is modified by the severity of the crime—the article includes a long list of them under its ‘Code Legal’, plus bribes and skill of the legal representation. The roll determines the judgement and there are suggested sentences for every number, from eight down to minus one. The former may result in a fine, short sentence, or confiscation of arms, whilst the later definitely results in execution. The system is short and dirty, but serviceable.

Physically, Scout Magazine #I is tidily presented. It is very lightly illustrated.

Scout Magazine #I provides the Game Master and her players with a lot of new content. Some of it, such as the Necrourge and Crone Classes have limited use, whilst all of it is optional. Much of it will add detail to a campaign, but some cases, such as the new and alternative Class abilities and the ‘Useful Rulings’, this means adding extra complexity to game play. Overall, a decent collection of new options for Old School Essentials, but the Game Master will want to pick and chose what she does want to use.