Charles Ferguson-Avery

This was amazing! A cool topic that hasn't been explored ad nauseum, great writing, fun, if not amazing, art that really fits the (or maybe sets) the tone of the book, and just tons of great ideas.

When I read books that have 100 spells, I don't usually read all of them, I skim the section to get an idea of what kind of spells there are. In this book I read ALL the spells. Same thing with the monsters section, almost every single monster was super cool and exciting.

This is a book I would be very proud to have written and I think it contributes to fantasy gaming like a rare few have.

I promise I don't know Charles B.F. Avery personally and he has not paid me to write this review, I'm just a guy who reads a lot of RPG books and happened to LOVE this one.… (més)

Very evocative setting. Mostly agnostic of game mechanics; it's clearly intended for use in your favorite flavor of old-school D&D game, but could readily be modified. Here's the premise: The PCs inhabit a vast wasteland in a land that is eternally night. There are great pillars that seem to hold up the sky scattered about, along with gargantuan stone ruins that are sparsely inhabited by bandits, scavengers, and strange creatures. That's a great premise.

I think the zine format/size is what hurts this the most--with just 24 pages of content, there's just no room to fully flesh the setting out. It contains just four unique creatures; though they're awesome, another 8-10 are really needed for an ongoing game. There's also no hint of what's going on here, or what's happened, or why this place exists in the condition it does. A single DM-only page would have helped immensely. And yes, I know, the reader is always welcome to answer these questions, but I buy gaming settings so I don't have to start from scratch myself. A sample adventure would have been extremely useful in demonstrating what the PCs are supposed to do, beyond merely surviving, wandering through vast empty rooms, and slowly losing one's memories.

If this book was twice the length, with a more fleshed-out setting, it could have been one of the greats.… (més)