Savage North The Director’s Cut by Jon Hodgson
All Hail The Return of the Conquering King of the North,
The Savage North Director’s Cut is available via DriveThru in both pdf and print.
If you bought a pdf via DriveThru in the past, just go to your library and redownload it to get this cleaned up version with 26 new pages of content.
This is our old school swords and sorcery setting/adventure for OpenQuest broadly compatible with other D100 games.
Crucible of the Dragons cover by Jon Hodgson
The long awaited Crucible of the Dragons for OpenQuest is now available via DrivethruRpg.com
A 260 page sandbox setting/adventure book for OpenQuest, but broadly compatible with other D100 rpgs, inspired by Ancient Greece, Clark Ashton Smith and Ray Harryhausen monster movies!
This is for OpenQuest and is in the upcoming, updated version of Life & Death.
A rag tag group of tomb raiders, thugs for hire, dubious sorcerers and all manner of social misfits who would rather go down a long abandoned underground complex risking danger and death in search of fame and fortune than do an honest days work. Early on in the days of the profession someone thought it best to create a Guild to manage its members, provide some sort of ethical backbone and curb some of the worst excesses of its members in civilised areas (outright theft, banditry, kidnapping, murder etc).
The lower ranks of the Guild, affectionately known as the Rabble, are sent on quests alongside more experienced members into long lost ruins of the Lion Empire and other civilisations that came before it. Their rewards are mainly the material: the Gold and Gems that make up the majority of the loot. The more experienced members take their share as the exotic items rumoured to be imbued with ancient magics.
OK so at some point I’ll stop twittering on about product updates or Kickstarter updates, but today here’s two important ones.
This fantastic full colour map by Simon Bray will grace the back cover of the upcoming Here Be Dragons setting/adventure book, due out in March.
Here Be Dragons Map by Simon Bray
Hey you know I like River of Heaven, but read what a backer has to say.
By Loren Millar this “Almost Fully-Compatible RuneQuest Variant of” was a big inspiration behind OpenQuest, the difficulty modifiers and skill rankings by experience are directly lifted from it. When I played RQ back in the 90s, and it gradually mutated into OpenQuest, I even had an index file of NPCS 🙂
Well just over a month ago OpenQuest 2 went on general release.
If you want to know how its getting on and what’s happening with the rest of the Pre-order campaign’s deliverables, head on over to OpenQuestRpg.com
Bit of shameless self-promotion here about the upcoming “Crucible of Dragons” setting/adventure book (or “A Manual of Exploration of the Island of Pherae” as I’m calling it). If I don’t do it no one else will (OQ2 reviews anyone 😉 ) and its a product that I’m damn excited about getting finished and out to the gaming masses.
“Sandbox” gaming is a hip term in Old School Renaissance circles, almost a holy grail in fact. Amongst D100/RQ fans you mention the term and I will guarantee they will shoot back “Griffin Mountain“. This is the classic RuneQuest2 setting were you wandered around a bleak wilderness inhabited by stone age hunters, dinosaurs and chaos monsters and took your rest in one of three citadels riddled with intrigue. I’ve played it briefly in its Games Workshop published hardcover of the watered down Avalon Hill version which was moved to an island called “Griffin Island”, and as a 40+ player freeform at Tentacles 2006 written and run by Simon Bray (one of the Co-authors of HBD). Its on my list of things to run again before I die. Its a classic go check out its Moon Design reprint.
Now Crucible of Dragons, pulls from the creative well that is Griffin Mtn but brings its own take.
The basic concept of the book is “Fantasy Pseudo-Hellenic Greeks on a monster infested island” or if you are more culture hip “Clark Ashton Smith meets Ray Harryhausen” 🙂
Its incredibly detailed and rich setting. It has a full Gazetteer, a complete city guide, details both VIP and everyday NPCs, sixteen new cults, ten organisations/factions. The game’s page on D101games.com gives a run down of all the content.
One of the things that really impressed me when the first draft hit my inbox, its not your typical “Elves n Orcs” fantasy. In fact there isn’t an Elf or Orc on the island. Dwarfs are there , for secret reasons I won’t go into here, but are re-skinned to a large degree to fit in with the culture and habitat of the island.
A race of evil reptilians know as the Dracorians fill the niche of orcs/goblins in a fearsome manner. Simon Bray has done a fine job here creating a truly nasty group of monsters.
Demons are also common in the Ancient and deserted ruins of civilisations prior to the current one. If you are looking for a comprehensive set of rules for demon creation for OpenQuest, Here be Dragons has them.
The humans on the island definitely have a culture that is loosely based on Hellenic Greek, but they are ruled by a great Dragon called “Flames of Purity”. You see the island’s creation myth has it being created from the skull of the Great World Dragon and Flames of Purity is its daughter, and after she defeated the Iron Colossus of the previous rulers of the capital city of Draxa (as depicted on the cover, see below) no one is arguing with her 😉
Its scalable and there’s enough going on to occupy Dirtcrawling starting characters looking for a gold piece or two, intrigue for wannabe movers and shakers and enough BIG challenges such as removing Flames of Purity from her throne to occupy characters who have grown to Epic status. A good 40 pages of the book is dedicated to full set piece adventures, detailed adventure locations and a campaign outline. This is the final piece of the puzzle that introduces new players and Games Masters to the setting and gets you up and running with the island as a Sandbox. Far too many supplements that say they are Sandbox, miss out this bit, and leave you scratching your head looking for an obvious starting point.
Overall its Densely packed book full of MGF (MEGA GAMING FUN!) that will give you years of enjoyment. If I had unlimited time and resources I’d do it as a big boxed game. Instead the authors have done a dam fine job of keeping the book within a manageable 140-150 page limit that I set them.
Its in it final stages of layout and I’m looking year end/beginning of Jan to get this one released.
Here’s Jon Hodgson’s fine cover if your imagination isn’t already flowing on this one:
Crucible of Dragons cover by Jon Hodgson
From the upcoming Here Be Dragons for OpenQuest by Simon Bray and Paul Mitchener, here is the setting’s Other World overview.
To the faithful of Pherae the gods exist both in their own world and in the mundane world at once. When gods manifest in the world of men they appear as thunderous voices, burning figures in the night, strange omens, maddening visions and creeping shadows. It is not unknown for gods to seek the companionship or even love of certain special mortals, the nymphs and demons of Pherae attest to these unions. The gods once relished in meddling in the affairs of mortals, but their powers are chained and weakened by humanity’s loss of faith.
Each god controls their own realms, Tyria rules her sky realm from a blinding golden palace, Gorga broods on her writhing throne in the underworld and Arton hunts the Wild Things in a forest beyond the edge of the world. Mortals can visit these places, either through invitation by the gods or through their own magic. These realms are dangerous and present challenges beyond the scope of all but the greatest heroes. There are sacred places, ancient temples, hidden caves and blessed grottos where the divide between the divine and mortal are thin. Sometimes people go in and are never seen again,but worse, sometimes things come out.
Many do not know that beyond the realm of myth and legend, beyond the gods and dragons themselves is a cold dark, lonely place, where hateful things watch the world with envy. Some know that these are the forgotten gods of the Ancients, waiting to return. Some call these things demons, they summon them for power, and these things are beyond the pale, monsters more fearful than the spawn of Hallucious and Gorga. These are the beings that Khata tried to train to dance to his merry tune, they are monstrous things which overthrew his Empire and devoured his very soul.
Aiming for a Dec/Jan release of Here Be Dragons, which I’m currently polishing up in layout 🙂
Sorcerer Under Mountain 