Rolling the Bones: A Graveyard Supplement is a pdf product from 93 Games Studio. It's written by Donna Fitch and details graveyards, their descriptions and their uses in a d20 Modern game. The pdf is 41 pages long, 2 which are used for OGL declarations and further reading material suggestions, 3 for cover, credits and table of contents, leaving 36 pages of graveyard content. This pdf normally retails on RPGNow.com for $5. This review was done as part of Crothian's Review Project.
Initial Impressions:
As the title suggests, this pdf is about graveyards. It comes in a zip file with two pdf files included, one detailing graveyards and the other containing a random graveyard generator. The layout is well done, the pdfs are fully bookmarked, and there is some appropriate art, mainly in the form of photographs of a variety of graveyards, gravestones and the like. This is a supplement for the d20 Modern game, and while it attempts to avoid, by stating so much in the pdf itself, fantasy horror and the like, I think there is still some useful information in this pdf that can be applied to that kind of genre as well, although more in ideas than actual mechanics.
Rolling the Bones is all about graveyards - what types there are, understanding the various symbols and inscriptions in graveyards, typical encounters that can be had in graveyards, using graveyards in your Modern games, and a lot more useful information. By its nature, it's a niche product, detailing only graveyards, but having said that graveyards are found in almost any place imaginable - people die, people get buried, and so this has more utility than I would've originally thought.
The Details:
The pdf is divided into a number of chapters, each describing a different aspects of graveyards and giving useful descriptive and roleplaying information regarding them. This pdf is almost entirely 'fluff', although some of the example encounters do contain some crunchy bits in the form of stat blocks, but if you want to add a more investigative game relating to family lineage or just spice up your graveyard, then this contains a lot of useful information. It is very much a western style approach to graveyards as wound be found in America, and it would've been nice to see some additional details on, for example, other cultures' responses to death, or just detailing various people's attitudes to death as reflected in their graves, something only touched upon.
Chapter 1: An introduction, giving a breakdown on the contents of each chapter and describing the nature of the pdf - presenting graveyards in a manner different to that typically found in fantasy and horror, and for that reason quite refreshing.
Chapter 2: This chapter looks at different kinds of cemeteries, from the sprawling urban graveyard in the city suburbs to the restive family graveyard on land about to be taken over by mass-marketing retail outlets. It's well-written, detailed, and useful. Different types of graveyards are even divided into subsections where appropriate, and information includes such things are security in graveyards, age, types of gravestones, history of those types of graveyards, where to find them, what they might contain in the form of useful information and lots more.
Chapter 3: This chapter takes a look at the different uses that a graveyard can have in a d20 Modern game. Uses include locations for secret meetings, storage of items that need to be remain hidden. and obviously gathering information on local people and sometimes history, culture, and legend in the form of various inscriptions on the gravestones and in graveyard archives.
Chapter 4: A meaty chapter in the pdf, this one looks at the meaning of scores of different symbols and inscriptions typically found in graveyards. It's very useful, providing game related information on each in the form of skill checks, and providing general meanings for each symbol. It's a useful chapter to give your graveyard some more meaning, spice it up a bit, and add some more descriptive detail to any particular grave.
Chapter 5: This chapter gives some sample encounters with descriptive text that can be used within an graveyard environment. Gravediggers, mourners and other types of people often frequent graveyards, and can provide some useful information, a plot hook, a dangerous encounter etc. This is a useful chapter to get you started, and enough information is provided to even get you started on something bigger, or a grander plot.
Chapters 6 and 7: The last two chapters of the pdf provide descriptive detail on two cemeteries, one rural and one urban. Both are very well written, providing plenty of ambience, lots of information on the gravestones contained, and the environment in which the graveyards find themselves and where they are located. Everything contained in the pdf is tied together nicely in these last two descriptive chapters, bringing the fluff and flavor to practical life.
The second pdf in this product contains a detailed look at generating random graveyards. Everything is considered, from size, to location, to type, to maintenance, to number of graves, to care for graves and much more. A handy sheet is included to aid you in the design of the graveyard, upon which you can write all the details as you take this step-by-step approach to graveyard design. Each step in accompanied by an example design which gives you a good idea of how everything is supposed to work and what the final product of your random generation may look like. This is a good addition to the pdf, and those playing d20 Modern games will certainly find a use for this pdf in their libraries.
Conclusions:
Rolling the Bones: A Graveyard Supplement is a d20 Modern supplement detailing graveyards. It's well detailed, well-written, with good layout and art, providing a complete package on graveyards for your game, and, even for those non-Modern games that wish to add more detail to their graveyard encounters. This is almost entirely a descriptive pdf, providing lots of useful information to enhance your games, something you don't see all that frequently in the mechanics heavy market, and it makes for a refreshing change. Sometimes you don't want more rules, just more information, and that's exactly what this pdf provides. While not earth-shattering exciting and specifically niche in its American background (although a lot of this is equally applicable to graveyards around the world), it's a useful product with no glaring aspects that are poor or wrong, so based on solid descriptive flavor, utility and content, I'd grade this with three and a half stars, rounding up to four stars.