Welcome to the Bundles, Freebies, and Sales News, the weekly column at EN World that helps make sure you don’t miss out on big tabletop RPG bundles, charity fundraisers, and sales from around the internet.
Freebies and Pay What You Want
Note: While “Pay What You Want” downloads are available for free, please support the creators if you are able!
With the million-dollar Backerkit project, you may be curious about The Magnus Archives, and Monte Cook Games released a free primer both for the setting based on the podcast series and the Cypher System that powers the upcoming RPG.
I feel old that Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition is now considered old enough to be counted as "OSR", but Ludo’s Games released the Orcus Heroes’ Handbook and the Orcus Game Master’s Guide which includes rules for 10 classes plus 20 kits to expand them covering all 30 levels of play plus over 200 monsters and full rules compatible with the Open Game License.
Sine Nomine Publishing posted Cities Without Number: Free Version, a streamlined version of the sandbox cyberpunk RPG. This 227-page rulebook includes full rules for this near-future sci-fi version of Worlds Without Numbers with options for cyberware, hacking, drones, and more plus a full cyberpunk setting to explore.
Traveller players will be interested in John Gahrmann’s Blockade Runner outlining a number of adventure ideas and frameworks to create a campaign along the front lines of the Final Frontier War as a freelancer taking on dangerous work in hopes of landing a big score.
The Unity of Skovlan from The Logbook Project is an unofficial collection for Blades in the Dark about the impact and aftermath of The Unity War, consisting of a campaign titled The Unity War, a short story titled “The Legacy of Stonetable”, and a rules supplement called Fractured Unity.
Nicholas’ Magical Mercantile released Assault on Klagdon Keep, a 5th-level adventure sending the party into the Keep to assassinate a rogue king who has taken a powerful magical artifact. The module includes maps, tokens, new optional rules, random tables, and more.
Pathfinder players about to take on the Fists of the Ruby Phoenix Adventure Path can get an expansion from Sam Striker featuring new teams from across Golarion to fill out the list of the 32 initial teams, revised spells for each spellcasting NPC that make proper use of heightening, influence statistics for the three remaining patrons, new rules for 3-action classes, full vehicle stats for the Solar Jian II, and more.
Xipe Totic Press has a system-agnostic cosmic horror adventure Trouble with the Piping where you play investigators in your favorite supernatural horror RPG who have found a deal on the estate High Parks with just one problem with this low-cost fixer-upper…there is trouble with the piping.
Over on Dungeonmasters Guild, Foster Cromwell has a set of ancient artifacts, The Weapon Set of Crenix. The supplement includes full stats for the legendary shortsword, longsword, longbow, dwarven axe, and lute.
Zalapa0 released a collection of new spells and a new magic system with Bdello’s Incautious Spellbook including 20 new spells and a roleplay magic system from Boost Bdello.
Zakariah brings us another new setting ready to be dropped into your game with Ironwoodburg, a village perched at the edge of the untamed coastline with a new and magical city of ancient traditions and legendary treasures.
The Artifacts of Antiquity series from Timothy Lopez continues with Artifacts of Antiquity Volume 3 that updates classic 2nd Edition magic items to 5th edition rules with around 100 items available in each volume.
Seb Marziano released The Chronomancer’s Hourglass, a third-level adventure where the players are sent on a time-twisting trip through the threads of history and magic from the Misty Forest to the streets of Waterdeep.
In the first-level adventure The Witch and the Vampire from Betsy Brinkerhoff, the party is sent to find the final ingredient for a local hedgewitch’s potion in the garden of a manor once inhabited by a coven of vampires that have, as far as anyone knows, long ago abandoned it.
Estação RPG released a 24x24 battle map Forest Corridor ready for use in any VTT depicting, as you may guess, a forest path.
PlanarInk Editions also has an arboreal battle map Botanical Park in plain image file format along with VTT-ready files.
If you prefer 3D terrain without the need for a 3D printer, Papersmith Workshop has four varieties of tombstone miniatures you can make yourself with any standard computer printer (the paper type, this does not require a fancy 3D printer), a craft knife or scissors, and a bit of glue.
Over on Storytellers Vault, Elyse Haws released a beginner-friendly one-shot Lunarious for Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition. The Prince has gone missing for almost a month and a power vacuum is forming. The Seneschal requests that the coterie find the Prince before the next gathering in two nights’ time as they get drawn into a dangerous political situation.
This week’s first lightning round features a collection of character creation options for 5e. Each of these products is either free or pay what you want with the price in parentheses.
And the second lightning round is full of monsters for your 5e games. Again, each of these products is either free or pay what you want with the price in parentheses.
Bundles and Sales
Note: I have included end dates when listed for the following sales, but please be warned that those without published end dates may end suddenly so be sure to plan purchases accordingly.
Onyx Path Publishing collected together a bundle of books for the Ancient Rome setting Imperium for the Scion roleplaying game. This bundle includes the core setting book Imperium plus the setting expansion books Vini and Vidi and the mythological sourcebooks for the Theoi Imperium: Amor Non Permisit and the Titans Imperium: Titanus.
If you want some random encounters or prompts for ideas, Chaos Gen collected several random encounter table books into one bundle. Find multiple random tables for different environments including City Streets, Port and Docks, Farmland, Villages, Ruins, and Taverns and Inns.
On Dungeonmasters Guild, Theokyd fills a niche in D&D that’s lacking for high-level adventures by bundling together two 20th-level adventures with Rise of the Umbral God and The Morphing Menace.
Sometimes, it’s nice to add a bit of sci-fi to your fantasy games, and the Sci-Fi and Futuristic Bundle has options for just that with Fire & Fury: Modern Firearms Guide, Gears and Gods: The Clockwork Mysteries, Sci-Fi Monster Manual, and Sci-Fi Pantheon: The Cosmic Deities.
With the upcoming campaign book expanding on the original, Heroic Maps has a useful bundle of DM Resources for the D&D Starter Set adventure Lost Mine of Phandelver featuring maps, set dressings, treasure details, NPCs, and more details to expand on the introductory adventure.
Chaosium released several Roll20 bundles on DriveThruRPG for the Call of Cthulhu RPG that collect various rulebooks and adventures in PDF and in Roll20 VTT-ready formats for 20% off.
Charity Bundles and Sales
Meguey Baker, game designer on Apocalypse World and the system behind Powered by the Apocalypse, was diagnosed with breast cancer and has surgery scheduled at the end of the month. A Meal Train fundraiser has already raised over $25,000 to help the family with household expenses and meals.
John Kovalic, artist for Munchkin and writer/artist of Dork Tower, is doing his annual bike ride for charity. Every year, John rides a marathon bicycle ride with a duck on his head to raise money for FairShareCSA bringing fresh food to low-income families. And each year, there’s a wide selection of rewards for those donating. Every pledge gets a PDF of a limerick collection featuring Neil Gaiman, Patrick Rothfuss, and Gail Simone, while other reward tiers include Munchkin postcards, signed books and prints, original Munchkin card art, becoming a Dork Tower character, designing an original Munchkin card, and more.
Sleepy Sasquatch Games has a fundraiser going on Itch.io for Gizmo, a 12-year-old dog with ongoing medical issues. The bundle includes four solo RPGs, Wandering Dreams for eldritch horror, Courier about a post-apocalyptic delivery person, GLIDE about sci-fi exploration, and the sword and sorcery Wandering Souls.
Bundle of Holding brought back the Atomic Robo bundle from Evil Hat with a collection of books based on the comic series. If you’re not familiar with the series, Atomic Robo is a sci-fi/steampunk inspired series inspired by Ghostbusters, Indiana Jones, Buckaroo Banzai, and The Rocketeer. The Starter Collection includes the core rulebook, three graphic albums, and three Tesladyne manuals while the Bonus Collection adds on the Majestic 12 sourcebook, four more graphic albums, and two Real Science Adventures collections.
There’s a few more days for the two bundles for Shadow of the Demon Lord. The first features a starter collection with the Shadow of the Demon Lord core rules along with the Demon Lord’s Companion GM guide, the religion sourcebook Uncertain Faith, the introductory adventure Dark Deeds in Last Hope, and the Demon Lord Screen. The Bonus Collection adds on six more sourcebooks and adventures.
And if you want to expand your library for Shadows of the Demon Lord, the Demon Lord Legacies Bundle has 5 Legends of Shadow, 4 Paths of Shadow, and 17 Poisoned Pages along with a Bonus Collection featuring 21 Monstrous Pages, the magic sourcebook Occult Philosophe, and the full campaign Queen of Gold.
On Humble, Goodman Games isn’t messing around with the Dungeon Crawl Classics MegaBundle as the “mega” is earned with 75 products valued at over $1000 at the highest tier. The bundle includes dozens of adventures for Dungeon Crawl Classics along with classic 3.x Edition adventures in the Wicked Fantasy Factory series and its newest incarnation for 5e with Fifth Edition Fantasy.
That’s all for this week! If you know of any bundles or sales starting soon, please contact me on the EN World Discord, tag me on Mastodon, or send me a message here on EN World. Discount percentages have been rounded to the nearest whole number and are based on the standard retail price provided by the site. Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, Fantasy Grounds, and/or DriveThruRPG may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
Freebies and Pay What You Want
Note: While “Pay What You Want” downloads are available for free, please support the creators if you are able!
With the million-dollar Backerkit project, you may be curious about The Magnus Archives, and Monte Cook Games released a free primer both for the setting based on the podcast series and the Cypher System that powers the upcoming RPG.
- Price: Free
I feel old that Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition is now considered old enough to be counted as "OSR", but Ludo’s Games released the Orcus Heroes’ Handbook and the Orcus Game Master’s Guide which includes rules for 10 classes plus 20 kits to expand them covering all 30 levels of play plus over 200 monsters and full rules compatible with the Open Game License.
- Price: Free
Sine Nomine Publishing posted Cities Without Number: Free Version, a streamlined version of the sandbox cyberpunk RPG. This 227-page rulebook includes full rules for this near-future sci-fi version of Worlds Without Numbers with options for cyberware, hacking, drones, and more plus a full cyberpunk setting to explore.
- Price: Free
Traveller players will be interested in John Gahrmann’s Blockade Runner outlining a number of adventure ideas and frameworks to create a campaign along the front lines of the Final Frontier War as a freelancer taking on dangerous work in hopes of landing a big score.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $3.99)
The Unity of Skovlan from The Logbook Project is an unofficial collection for Blades in the Dark about the impact and aftermath of The Unity War, consisting of a campaign titled The Unity War, a short story titled “The Legacy of Stonetable”, and a rules supplement called Fractured Unity.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $15.00)
Nicholas’ Magical Mercantile released Assault on Klagdon Keep, a 5th-level adventure sending the party into the Keep to assassinate a rogue king who has taken a powerful magical artifact. The module includes maps, tokens, new optional rules, random tables, and more.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $2.99)
Pathfinder players about to take on the Fists of the Ruby Phoenix Adventure Path can get an expansion from Sam Striker featuring new teams from across Golarion to fill out the list of the 32 initial teams, revised spells for each spellcasting NPC that make proper use of heightening, influence statistics for the three remaining patrons, new rules for 3-action classes, full vehicle stats for the Solar Jian II, and more.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $5.00)
Xipe Totic Press has a system-agnostic cosmic horror adventure Trouble with the Piping where you play investigators in your favorite supernatural horror RPG who have found a deal on the estate High Parks with just one problem with this low-cost fixer-upper…there is trouble with the piping.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $0.50)
Over on Dungeonmasters Guild, Foster Cromwell has a set of ancient artifacts, The Weapon Set of Crenix. The supplement includes full stats for the legendary shortsword, longsword, longbow, dwarven axe, and lute.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $0.00)
Zalapa0 released a collection of new spells and a new magic system with Bdello’s Incautious Spellbook including 20 new spells and a roleplay magic system from Boost Bdello.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $0.00)
Zakariah brings us another new setting ready to be dropped into your game with Ironwoodburg, a village perched at the edge of the untamed coastline with a new and magical city of ancient traditions and legendary treasures.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $0.50)
The Artifacts of Antiquity series from Timothy Lopez continues with Artifacts of Antiquity Volume 3 that updates classic 2nd Edition magic items to 5th edition rules with around 100 items available in each volume.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $1.99)
Seb Marziano released The Chronomancer’s Hourglass, a third-level adventure where the players are sent on a time-twisting trip through the threads of history and magic from the Misty Forest to the streets of Waterdeep.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $1.89)
In the first-level adventure The Witch and the Vampire from Betsy Brinkerhoff, the party is sent to find the final ingredient for a local hedgewitch’s potion in the garden of a manor once inhabited by a coven of vampires that have, as far as anyone knows, long ago abandoned it.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $1.50)
Estação RPG released a 24x24 battle map Forest Corridor ready for use in any VTT depicting, as you may guess, a forest path.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $0.00)
PlanarInk Editions also has an arboreal battle map Botanical Park in plain image file format along with VTT-ready files.
- Price: Free
If you prefer 3D terrain without the need for a 3D printer, Papersmith Workshop has four varieties of tombstone miniatures you can make yourself with any standard computer printer (the paper type, this does not require a fancy 3D printer), a craft knife or scissors, and a bit of glue.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $1.00)
Over on Storytellers Vault, Elyse Haws released a beginner-friendly one-shot Lunarious for Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition. The Prince has gone missing for almost a month and a power vacuum is forming. The Seneschal requests that the coterie find the Prince before the next gathering in two nights’ time as they get drawn into a dangerous political situation.
- Price: Pay What You Want (Suggested: $5.00)
This week’s first lightning round features a collection of character creation options for 5e. Each of these products is either free or pay what you want with the price in parentheses.
- Blacksmith (background) from Quest Weaver Media (free)
- College of Shanties (Bard subclass) from Ashley Turley ($0.00)
- Shepherd (background) from Quest Weaver Media (free)
- Artificer (revised full class) from Dale Kellegrew ($1.00)
- Bloodhunter (revised full class) from Dale Kellegrew ($1.00)
- Farstrider (Ranger subclass) from Andrew Fields ($0.50)
- Spriggan Dual Origin and Runic Feats (race and feats) from Chronicles of Lost Tomes ($1.00)
- More Playable Bugs (Thri-Kreen sublineages) from Beau Gilbert ($1.00)
- Haushi (race) from SlackingSloth ($1.00)
- Farmer (background) from Quest Weaver Media (free)
And the second lightning round is full of monsters for your 5e games. Again, each of these products is either free or pay what you want with the price in parentheses.
- Yeemik (goblin variant) from Sewage Orc ($0.50)
- Pumpkin King (CR8) from Zakariah ($0.50)
- Petitioner of Agathys (CR5) from Gryphon Games (free)
- Cragmaw Goblin (goblin variant) from Sewage Orc ($0.50)
Bundles and Sales
Note: I have included end dates when listed for the following sales, but please be warned that those without published end dates may end suddenly so be sure to plan purchases accordingly.
Onyx Path Publishing collected together a bundle of books for the Ancient Rome setting Imperium for the Scion roleplaying game. This bundle includes the core setting book Imperium plus the setting expansion books Vini and Vidi and the mythological sourcebooks for the Theoi Imperium: Amor Non Permisit and the Titans Imperium: Titanus.
- Price: $21.92 (20% off)
If you want some random encounters or prompts for ideas, Chaos Gen collected several random encounter table books into one bundle. Find multiple random tables for different environments including City Streets, Port and Docks, Farmland, Villages, Ruins, and Taverns and Inns.
- Price: $3.95 (34% off)
On Dungeonmasters Guild, Theokyd fills a niche in D&D that’s lacking for high-level adventures by bundling together two 20th-level adventures with Rise of the Umbral God and The Morphing Menace.
- Price: $8.95 (25% off)
Sometimes, it’s nice to add a bit of sci-fi to your fantasy games, and the Sci-Fi and Futuristic Bundle has options for just that with Fire & Fury: Modern Firearms Guide, Gears and Gods: The Clockwork Mysteries, Sci-Fi Monster Manual, and Sci-Fi Pantheon: The Cosmic Deities.
- Price: $29.10 (34% off)
With the upcoming campaign book expanding on the original, Heroic Maps has a useful bundle of DM Resources for the D&D Starter Set adventure Lost Mine of Phandelver featuring maps, set dressings, treasure details, NPCs, and more details to expand on the introductory adventure.
- Price: $24.99 (34% off)
Chaosium released several Roll20 bundles on DriveThruRPG for the Call of Cthulhu RPG that collect various rulebooks and adventures in PDF and in Roll20 VTT-ready formats for 20% off.
- Call of Cthulhu Starter Set ($20.02)
- Call of Cthulhu Investigator Handbook ($58.35)
- Call of Cthulhu Keeper Rulebook ($62.35)
- Harlem Unbound 2nd Edition ($41.58)
- Malleus Monstrorum ($71.98)
- Mansions of Madness Volume 1 ($20.75)
- Reign of Terror ($34.35)
- Doors to Darkness ($33.18)
- Dead Light and Other Dark Turns ($13.58)
Charity Bundles and Sales
Meguey Baker, game designer on Apocalypse World and the system behind Powered by the Apocalypse, was diagnosed with breast cancer and has surgery scheduled at the end of the month. A Meal Train fundraiser has already raised over $25,000 to help the family with household expenses and meals.
- Charity: Meguey Baker and family (all donations)
John Kovalic, artist for Munchkin and writer/artist of Dork Tower, is doing his annual bike ride for charity. Every year, John rides a marathon bicycle ride with a duck on his head to raise money for FairShareCSA bringing fresh food to low-income families. And each year, there’s a wide selection of rewards for those donating. Every pledge gets a PDF of a limerick collection featuring Neil Gaiman, Patrick Rothfuss, and Gail Simone, while other reward tiers include Munchkin postcards, signed books and prints, original Munchkin card art, becoming a Dork Tower character, designing an original Munchkin card, and more.
- Price: Pledge level rewards from $35 to $4000
- Charity: FairShareCSA (all donations)
- End Date: September 16, 2023
Sleepy Sasquatch Games has a fundraiser going on Itch.io for Gizmo, a 12-year-old dog with ongoing medical issues. The bundle includes four solo RPGs, Wandering Dreams for eldritch horror, Courier about a post-apocalyptic delivery person, GLIDE about sci-fi exploration, and the sword and sorcery Wandering Souls.
- Price: $19.00 (50% off)
- Charity: Medical care for Gizmo
- End Date: September 30, 2023
Bundle of Holding brought back the Atomic Robo bundle from Evil Hat with a collection of books based on the comic series. If you’re not familiar with the series, Atomic Robo is a sci-fi/steampunk inspired series inspired by Ghostbusters, Indiana Jones, Buckaroo Banzai, and The Rocketeer. The Starter Collection includes the core rulebook, three graphic albums, and three Tesladyne manuals while the Bonus Collection adds on the Majestic 12 sourcebook, four more graphic albums, and two Real Science Adventures collections.
- Price: $12.95 (82% off) with variable-cost Level Up option
- Charity: Direct Relief (10%)
- End Date: September 13, 2023
There’s a few more days for the two bundles for Shadow of the Demon Lord. The first features a starter collection with the Shadow of the Demon Lord core rules along with the Demon Lord’s Companion GM guide, the religion sourcebook Uncertain Faith, the introductory adventure Dark Deeds in Last Hope, and the Demon Lord Screen. The Bonus Collection adds on six more sourcebooks and adventures.
- Price: $7.95 (81% off) with variable-cost Level Up option
- Charity: Wildlife Conservation Society (10%)
- End Date: September 6, 2023
And if you want to expand your library for Shadows of the Demon Lord, the Demon Lord Legacies Bundle has 5 Legends of Shadow, 4 Paths of Shadow, and 17 Poisoned Pages along with a Bonus Collection featuring 21 Monstrous Pages, the magic sourcebook Occult Philosophe, and the full campaign Queen of Gold.
- Price: $12.95 (79% off) with variable-cost Level Up option
- Charity: Wildlife Conservation Society (10%)
- End Date: September 6, 2023
On Humble, Goodman Games isn’t messing around with the Dungeon Crawl Classics MegaBundle as the “mega” is earned with 75 products valued at over $1000 at the highest tier. The bundle includes dozens of adventures for Dungeon Crawl Classics along with classic 3.x Edition adventures in the Wicked Fantasy Factory series and its newest incarnation for 5e with Fifth Edition Fantasy.
- Price: $1/$15/$25 (98% off at top tier)
- Charity: World Central Kitchen (user-defined, default 5%)
- End Date: September 14, 2023
That’s all for this week! If you know of any bundles or sales starting soon, please contact me on the EN World Discord, tag me on Mastodon, or send me a message here on EN World. Discount percentages have been rounded to the nearest whole number and are based on the standard retail price provided by the site. Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, Fantasy Grounds, and/or DriveThruRPG may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
