Cold Mountain is a 47-page PDF that starts off a new line of plug-ins meant for use with the Kingmaker AP. It has four full-color maps, one page for the cover, one for credits, and a back cover that lists some of Legendary Games' other products. That leaves roughly 40 pages for the adventure itself, so here goes.
The adventure is for 4th level characters and meant as a way of injecting some straightforward adventuring into the early exploration of their new kingdom. The PCs' land has been having trouble with weird and brutal killings by... something, that cannot be identified. Some believe that the nearby Ughar hillfolk might be involved -- and then they approach you to beg for help with the exact same problem! If it's not them, then who or what is responsible? This leads into a mixture of combat, investigation, exploration, and diplomacy in an adventure that deals with grief, loss, supernatural revenge, the immortal jealousy of the fey and the wrath of the windigo.
The adventure has a nice mix of roleplay, combat, skill use and exploring, and it presents some cool new monsters as well as a template that does a great job of presenting an infectious and terrible curse to deal with. The rewards if you do well and pretty good, involving some new allies both human and inhuman as well as some new resources for your kingdom. And it plays into the themes of the larger campaign as well. Really a good piece of work and a great start for what promises to be a exceptional line of Campaign Plug-Ins. Five stars.
The latest PDF from Legendary Games, Beyond the Void is a 15 page PDF. It has a cover page, back cover (listing their other available PDFs), two pages for credits, leaving eleven pages for eldritch weirdness, so here we go!
This PDF is meant for characters of all sorts who wish to investigate, contact, and summon alien entities of mind-bending horror. As such it works very well with most of the 'Gothic Grimoire' PDFs LG sells, as well as their 'Gothic Campaign' line. The PDF proper starts off with several new character archetypes -- the alienist for summoners, who gains a be-tentacled alien eidolon. The alienist also gets some new spells and a few variations on their usual class abilities to better reflect someone who spends their time communing with Lovecraftian horrors. Maybe the best is the replacement for gate at 19th level that lets you summon such cuddly things as shoggoths and neothelids.
Next is the deep-sea diving bathynaut for anyone who wanted to play an alchemist version of Jacques Costeau diving off R'lyeh. I REALLY like this idea, simply for the new discoveries and class abilities revolving around exploring underwater. Not to mention mutagens that basically briefly turn you into a Deep One. Oh, and you learn how to make devices that allow your friends to join you under the waves as well. For some campaigns this will be a truly awesome archetype.
Last is one for wizards, the ocular-obssessed Iridic Mage that allows for you to take increasingly potent and bizarre eye-related talents as you gain in power It also makes you a more potent foe of Mythos creatures and aberrations, making you into a stronger foe of Mythos horrors even as your sanity crumbles. Very nicely done!
It then gives us some new alchemical discoveries for the bathynaut, new feats including one, Summon Star-spawn, that allows you to summon alien horrors in place of the usual beasts for summon monster, and some new spells for anyone who wants to conjure an eldritch abomination of their very own. Best(?) of the lot is embryonic implantation, which allows you to turn someone into an unsuspecting brood mare for baby aberrations. It grows to maturity and devours them as it does before bursting forth to attack your enemies. Nasty.
Lastly we get two templates, 'alien' for use with the new Star-spawn feat and 'embryonic' for use with the new spell mentioned above. With the latter we also get four monsters adapted with the template so you can immediately start implanting your own nameless abominations in unsuspecting innocents.
If I'm rating this four stars, it's only because it's not quite as amazing as some of Legendary Games other PDFs. It's still easily among the very best takes on Lovecraftian horror done for the Pathfinder game. If you like Lovecraftiana in your game, you want this one.
Cultic Cryptomancia is the latest PDF from Legendary Games, covering, you guessed it, cults in gaming. It's 14 pages long, with one page for the title, one for the credits, one explaining what you can expect inside, and one for the back cover (listing various of their other products for sale). This leaves ten pages for the meat so let's get started.
First comes a section on character options, listing various classes and archetypes that would probably work best with a cult-related adventure. It's rather heavy on clerics, inquisitors (both hunting and serving a cult), oracles, and bards for phony cults, and has hyperlinks to all archetypes listed. It also has a brief section on just what different cults can be like, ranging from benevolent if secretive good-guys to the vilest of villains.
After that we get the new archetypes. There's the apostate for formerly-faithful inquisitors who've turned against their fellow believers, with altered abilities and a spell list centered around deception. This is a great archetype for either tales of internal corruption or playing a character out to change his faith regardless of the cost. There's the sublime bard for would-be cult leaders and master manipulators, which it's recommended you combine with the demagogue for even nastier effect.
Lastly we get one of the real prizes of this PDF, the Eldritch mystery for oracles. What can this one do? What can't it do? Revelations included can grant witch hexes, various bardic performances, the ability to transform into an aberration, and a multitude of cult-creating and controlling abilities. If you want to buy this PDF for any one thing, get it for this mystery.
Next come some fine cultic feats, nearly all of them with a well-done sinister air. You can make mind-altering drugs work better on yourself, cast bane spells, get a morale bonus from coupling with fey, outsiders, or (ugh!) aberrations, become a flagellant, or learn how to punch an enemy's heart out, literally.
But the best here are two feats revolving around the offering of sacrifices for enhanced magical power. Really, why DO those cults keep slicing up nosy locals and meddling tourists? When you read sacrificial power and sacrificial summons, you'll know why. Really, these are feats that Pathfinder villains should have had long ago.
And then we get the spells. First come the various aberrant form spells, which work like beast shape or monstrous form and again, they're something I've long wanted to see done for the game. There are the angry mob and torch-wielding mob spells, good for any spellcaster who wants to have some backup when they go to confront the local witch's coven or deranged mythos cult; fire charm to enthrall budding pyromaniacs; fearful rapture to both enhance your allies and terrorize your foes; demand offering to force someone to hand over whatever they have in hand, and foster hatred to get some intergroup strife going. There's the inscrutable grimoire to keep people out of your occult tomes, and orgiastic rite to, ahem, keep groups of opponents 'occupied' while you make an escape.
The two most stunning in description spells would, however, have to be avasculate and exsanguinate. The latter causes an already wounded opponent to bleed out with horrifying speed, but the former? It rips the opponent's blood vessels out and entangles both them and nearby targets with them! Now that's the kind of inventively sick spellcasting evil cults should be doing!
Really, a great PDF with lost of good and some amazing ideas within. Get it today and start making some truly horrible cults for your PCs to defeat -- or control.
The Mad Doctor's Formulary is the latest release from Legendary Games. This PDF is sixteen pages long, with 1 page for the front cover, 1 for the credits, one explaining just what this product is and how it came to be, one for the back cover (lifting other fine PDFs from Legendary Games), and three lovely full-color plates. One is of the book many of the... procedures, can be found within, and two are of a pair of creatures that no mad surgeon should be without. That leaves nine pages for the new goodies, so here we go!
The core of the product is a listing of new and nasty ways to use skills such as Heal and Craft (alchemy) to enhance and alter people in ways that would bring a warm glow to Doctor Frankenstein's eyes. The procedures listed have to be learned somewhat like spells, though there's nothing especially magical about them. Indeed, many of them either were or are practiced in the real world, which only makes them even creepier.
And oh, such procedures your character or villain can learn! How to alter appearances, or warp their personality, with everything from instilling manias to lobotomies available. You can graft new body parts onto someone, or remove disagreeable memories. You can implant reservoirs of drugs in them or give them a new personality (along with a side order of raving insanity), implant a Kill switch to help stimulate their loyalty, stimulate their adrenal cortex for some extra oomph in a fight, or heck, even perform actual mundane surgery. None of these procedures is easy, but they're a lot of fun (for the mad doctor, that is).
We then get some information on a book containing all this information and so much more: Regarding the Clockwork of Capillaries, a classic work of mad surgery. Sure, it might turn you into Doctor Frankenstein if your sanity takes a few hard dings, but what's a little madness between friends? New uses for skills aside, it also provides bonuses on several others related to medicine, surgery, and the human body. Not to mention two new feats!
Anatomical Precision: How to use your medical skill to more effectively slice up those meddlesome heroes who seek to thwart the progress of mad science.
Anesthetist: You get better at using poisons and drugs to knock people out.
It also provides information on how to create surgical abominations from any leftovers such as flesh golems, the morgechs from their Construct Codex, and cranial dissectibots and cyberphrenic tadpoles.
Oh, yes, we also get two new constructs complete with a page of lovingly-illustrated full-color art devoted to each. The cyberphrenic tadpole is the classic mind control implant. The cranial dissectibot will not only defend you, it helps perform surgeries without flinching and can even remove a few spare chunks of someone's brain. Send Igor back to the bell tower; the Age of Science is here!
All in all, this is an amazing piece of work, and a truly unique 'grimoire'. Really, this one deserves to be called The Vivisectionist Alchemist's Essential Sourcebook. Admittedly, it's a bit annoying that it doesn't list information on the morgechs, but it's easy to rectify that with one more purchase. Since not everyone might be thrilled with that, I'll go with 4.5 stars, rounded up to 5.
If you love mad medicos and demented doctors of all sorts, then you want this book!
Urban Dressing: Traders & Craftsmen is another PDF from Raging Swan covering a variety of people your PCs can meet in town, willing to buy and sell whatever they might need. It's 13 pages long, with 1 page for the cover, 1 for the back cover, 1 for contents, 1 for credits, 1 for other products available from Raging Swan, and 1 briefly detailing this PDF and the Urban Dressing line. That leaves seven for the contents, so here goes.
First of all, it should be said that I was given this PDF for free by Raging Swan in exchange for a review. That said, it's got some very good stuff in it. The first two pages go into detail about 100 different shops your PCs can enter, ranging from rather nice places to the sort of shops people probably hire murderers in. Many of them are described in such a way as to make it obvious that they've had prior owners, and who knows what they could have left behind?
The next page covers a variety of different goods and services that can be offered. It's rather plain, but still very convenient. The next page lists twenty different odd events that can be occurring in a shop when PCs visit. They can be anything from local color to a combat or social encounter to the lead-in for an adventure. The last two pages cover any potential NPC you might meet in the shop. None of the information covers potential character levels or classes, but it does give some quick ideas for their appearance, rumors about them, and their purpose in visiting the shop among other things.
The PDF gives you exactly what it promises, and it does so effectively. I would have liked a trifle more information about the owners of the shops and any more unusual trades, but it still does a great job. I'll go with 4 stars. Definitely worth the price.
