This is my review for the Rappan Athuk Book and PDF by Frog God Games.
What is Rappan Athuk?
Apparently, in the 3rd edition era (this is when I was out of the RPG gaming, as i played 2nd edition and then came back with old school gaming) one of the best 3rd party products was a mega-dungeon known simply as Rappan Athuk. Then they decided to redo it, using the S&W and Pathfinder systems. I decided to bite the bullet and bought into the kickstarter. And only now can I really review it.
First things first.
This thing is huge. I am not talking Temple of Elemental Evil huge, it even bigger. as a example, it takes 38 pages just to do the introduction and overland encounters. Much of the writing is not fluff, but just endless material. The book itself is close to 500 pages, with 50 subsections explored. However this is not just random maps sliced together, each section has its own theme, there is more then one exit or entrance, With many sub levels. Most of these subsections are large, so that over the table even a single session might not be able to clear out a sub-section.
Also, the encounters are varied and vivid. And some of them are very old school. Including a low brow humor (A mimic who turned into a unbeatable crap-monster), to much more vivid encounters, including that of a undead fallen knight, a oracle out of time and place, A great encounter with a Rakshasa, a goblin city, Mazes, and much more. The creatures range from old standards to obscure (including a few near joke races from the Folio), to brand new creatures.
The kickstarter came with a lot of extras, the nicest being some speicial dice (dice is always good) and a nice large poster map that shows the interconnections between all the subsections. It can be quite complicated.
As for feel, it has a old school vibe. PC deaths are to be expected, and its it quite easy to do a TPK in some of the encounters. This place is deadly. To a old school player it might be best to say "Imagine if you took the Temple of Elemental Evil, then made it almost as deadly in spots and the Tomb of Horrors....And S&W gives it that old school rules to match the old school feel.
Artwork - the artwork is of top quality, and has a old school feel, except that perhaps it is of too high quality for most early stuff.
A+
Book quality: This tome is well bound and is of the highest quality.
A+
Overall first impressions:
This thing is massive, in fact, even the most dedicated dungeon crawler might tire of the huge size of this place. One could most likely have a weekly game and play for a year and still be exploring new areas.
A+ rating, but it IS expensive at $100 for the book, or $40 for the PDF.
What is Rappan Athuk?
Apparently, in the 3rd edition era (this is when I was out of the RPG gaming, as i played 2nd edition and then came back with old school gaming) one of the best 3rd party products was a mega-dungeon known simply as Rappan Athuk. Then they decided to redo it, using the S&W and Pathfinder systems. I decided to bite the bullet and bought into the kickstarter. And only now can I really review it.
First things first.
This thing is huge. I am not talking Temple of Elemental Evil huge, it even bigger. as a example, it takes 38 pages just to do the introduction and overland encounters. Much of the writing is not fluff, but just endless material. The book itself is close to 500 pages, with 50 subsections explored. However this is not just random maps sliced together, each section has its own theme, there is more then one exit or entrance, With many sub levels. Most of these subsections are large, so that over the table even a single session might not be able to clear out a sub-section.
Also, the encounters are varied and vivid. And some of them are very old school. Including a low brow humor (A mimic who turned into a unbeatable crap-monster), to much more vivid encounters, including that of a undead fallen knight, a oracle out of time and place, A great encounter with a Rakshasa, a goblin city, Mazes, and much more. The creatures range from old standards to obscure (including a few near joke races from the Folio), to brand new creatures.
The kickstarter came with a lot of extras, the nicest being some speicial dice (dice is always good) and a nice large poster map that shows the interconnections between all the subsections. It can be quite complicated.
As for feel, it has a old school vibe. PC deaths are to be expected, and its it quite easy to do a TPK in some of the encounters. This place is deadly. To a old school player it might be best to say "Imagine if you took the Temple of Elemental Evil, then made it almost as deadly in spots and the Tomb of Horrors....And S&W gives it that old school rules to match the old school feel.
Artwork - the artwork is of top quality, and has a old school feel, except that perhaps it is of too high quality for most early stuff.
A+
Book quality: This tome is well bound and is of the highest quality.
A+
Overall first impressions:
This thing is massive, in fact, even the most dedicated dungeon crawler might tire of the huge size of this place. One could most likely have a weekly game and play for a year and still be exploring new areas.
A+ rating, but it IS expensive at $100 for the book, or $40 for the PDF.
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