How can you say "No" to a FREE collection of Pathfinder Roleplaying Game templates, encounters, and NPCs? All of it bundled together with a new haiku fiction piece by author Matt Banach? If you say no Mike Welham will send his erudite strangler for you.
Rite Publishing brings you Pathways, a free 'zine packed with plenty of Open Game Content for you to take to the table. You'll find articles by T. H. Gulliver (#30 Fleshgrafts), Crieighton Broadhurst (Raging Swan Press), Ron Lundeen (Run Amok Games), David Paul (Pathways editorial), Mike Welham (Pathfinder Adventure Path #52: Forest of Spirits). Also you will find the top 5 star reviews by Endzeitgeist, Megan Robertson and Dark Mistress, and an interview with Jean-Philipe Chapleau! Venture-Captain and game designer extrodinaire!
Cover Image by Eric Quigley
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This installment of RiP's free e-zine is 51 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page ToC, 1 page SRD and 20 pages of advertisements, leaving 28 pages of free, high-quality content, so what exactly do we get?
After an informative an aptly-written 1-page editorial on pushing the boundaries of gaming, we get the by now almost obligatory template by Mihael Welham: The Erudite Strangler creature (CR +2) comes with a CR 3 sample creature, a gnoll and a stunning artwork of said gnoll (that can also been seen on the cover) and is based on a sinister symbiote. The template also uses the Garrote Opponent combat maneuver and comes with 2 Garrote-feats and 1 reflecting deeper study of a certain subset of knowledge of a given subject.
T.H.Gulliver has provided some rather creepy sourcebooks during 2011 and his portrayal of Acheflour Bloodgift, master fleshgrafter (Clr 3/Wiz 3/ Mystic Theurge 8) adds another rather disturbing foe to your arsenal and exemplifies how neat the rules from #30 Fleshgrafts actually work.
Creighton Broadhurst, mastermind of Raging Swan Press presents a ready to drop in encounter featuring dark creepers in the quality we've come to expect from RSP. Nice.
Ron Lundeen, author of e.g. "The Haunting of Soldragonn Academy" and since recently, head of his own company Run Amok Games (review of the first adventure coming soon!) presents us another Fleshgrafter, a rather neutral one - field-medic/anatomy-enthusiast turned summoner/fleshgrafter. Cool idea! Said fleshgrafter has developed a new graft based on leng spider webs and thus is targeted as an agent of said spiders by other dread denizens of leng and their hunting dogs.
Matt Banach provides us with 3 new epic Renkus that make me anticipate Heroes of the Jade Oath even more.
Next up is an interview with J.P. Chapleau, one of the authors and central movers and shakers of the NeoExodus campaign setting. Nice and informative!
After that, we get reviews by Eric Hinkle, Dark_Mistress, Megan Robertson and yours truly.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are top-notch, I didn't notice significant glitches. Layout adheres to the 2-column, full-color standard we know from RiP. The pdf has no bookmarks. The artworks are top-notch and best of all - the content is completely FREE. The only investment you'll have to make is the space on your HD. The content is great and in the end, you have nothing to lose - great free content, resulting in a final verdict of 5 stars.
This one looks cleaner and higher quality than the previous ones.
Also I noticed 3 new Open Design books that I can't find info about on KQ web page. Is that add the first news of these new books or am I just crazy and unable to find them?
The books in question I mean are Journeys to the West, Seven Cities Guide, and Wasted West Guide. From the ad on page 12.
This one looks cleaner and higher quality than the previous ones.
Also I noticed 3 new Open Design books that I can't find info about on KQ web page. Is that add the first news of these new books or am I just crazy and unable to find them?
The books in question I mean are Journeys to the West, Seven Cities Guide, and Wasted West Guide. From the ad on page 12.
Those books aren't released yet. Seven Cities Guide and Wasted West Guide are players guides for the Midgard campaign setting. This thread has an update on their status: To KQ/OD Forum.
Seems they're lined up for editing/layout right behind Dark Deeds in Freeport and maybe something else.
Journeys to the West is the most recent OD project still in the funding stage via Kickstarter. Link: Journeys to the West
Kidding aside, I write Pathways reviews to give the magazine more publicity, offer constructive criticism when due and hopefully make the contributors who work for free on this feel that their efforts are being recognized.
Yeah just about every author gets a uplift from a review (regardless of feedback) because its hard to get feedback sometimes. This why I always say thank you to reviewers.
