Shadow & Fae

    Beware what you wake in the dark... At some point last year I bought Mothership, and after reading through the player's survival guide I decided to give it a shot. I ran some friends on the GLoG server through a space station as they tried to rescue... someone. There were lots of laughs along the way (My ma' was a robot!), but I'd hardly call it horror. A little disappointed, I put it back on the shelf. Still, I've been meaning to come back and read through the Warden's Manual for some time, especially as I keep hearing it called one of the best referee books in the Old School vein. Friends and foes, I was not lied to. The Warden's Manual is punchy, blunt, and full of hands-on guidance about how to create situations that are already bad, and destined to get  really bad  before the get better (and some day even worse). The usefulness of the manual extends beyond sci-fi into the realms of all role-playing games. A few items that I found especially good were: T...

  Trespasser As my current campaign is on a short hiatus, I've had ample opportunity to peek around and see what other folks are doing in the indie TTRPG arena. One work of heart that I've come across is called "Trespasser", available on itch here . It's written by Tundalus, and is an excellent Old-school system inspired by 4th Edition D&D's tactical combat. A few highlights from the rules include: The "Potency Die" a scaling dice used for all kinds of abilities, especially magical damage. Tight grid-based tactical combat. "Recovery Dice" which fuel healing and are regained via long rests. Slow/quick initiative, determining whether characters act before or after foes. "Main Action / Minor Action / Move" Action Economy, with well thought out options for Main and Minor Actions. Special moves are granted by combat "themes". Which determine how characters act in combat. Characters start with 1 theme chosen from their cla...