Hello everyone, Darryl here with this week’s gaming news! More previews for Descent into Avernus, Pathfinder 2nd Edition, and Shadowrun 6th Edition, plus a new D&D-inspired video game, D&D for the visually impaired, Fallout RPG released, and more!
I swear, as Pelor as my witness, I thought Abyssal Chickens could fly! I have no idea how many people reading this will get that reference, but abyssal chickens apparently are bad fliers based on the information released by Chris Perkins during a D&D Beyond video previewing Descent into Avernus. In addition to a partial look at the stat block for abyssal chickens (screencaptured for convenience in the link above), we also got a peek at new art for a future product of the Chwingas, a small elemental spirit that originally appeared in Tomb of Annihilation, and a look at a sketch of a Gnome Flayer, a gnome converted into a mind flayer. The adventure, Baldur’s Gate: Descent Into Avernus, will be available on September 17 with a retail price of $49.95.
The National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped at the Library of Congress has partnered with Wizards of the Coast to create accessible versions of the Dungeons & Dragons core rulebooks, starting with the Player’s Handbook. The program, whose tagline is “That all may read”, creates free braille and “talking book” versions of books for the visually impaired. These aren’t just audiobooks, as a talking book specifically describes everything, including artwork, layout elements, and (important for an RPG) tables of information. The Player’s Handbook is available under the code DB91838 now, and the Dungeonmaster’s Guide and Monster Manual are currently in production.
Paizo is teasing more details of the upcoming Pathfinder 2nd Edition. First, we have the first adventure for the new edition, Hellknight Hill, the first in the Age of Ashes Adventure Path. The adventure, for characters 1st through 4th levels, sends the party to investigate the plumes of red smoke rising from the ruined citadel on Hellknight Hill. Is it a call for help, or something more sinister? The hardcover and PDF will be available on August 1st with the launch of Pathfinder 2nd Edition with a retail price of $24.99 and $17.99, respectively.
Mark Seifter posted a blog on the Paizo website featuring an overview of the ten-step process of character creation in Pathfinder 2nd Edition. The blog post goes through the creation of Iakhovas, a human monk. While the process overall isn’t unfamiliar to anyone used to the D20 System, there are just enough differences that a walkthrough like this gives a good look at how the new edition will shake out. It also shows off several new feats, abilities, backgrounds, ancestries, class powers, and more. A full launch line of products for Pathfinder 2nd Edition comes out on August 1st, with the Pathfinder Core Rulebook having a retail price of $59.99.
Tactical Adventures announced a new D&D-inspired video game, Solasta: Crown of the Magister using 5th Edition rules under the OGL. This isn’t the first time a video game company has done this, as many games in the 2000s used the D20 System under the OGL (since the license doesn’t differentiate between tabletop and video games), but it is the first time that a company has announced they are using the 5e ruleset. Little is known about the game itself other than it will be a 3D tactical exploration game of dungeon crawling with a party of four characters and there will be a focus on “verticality” (meaning the maps will include lots of climbing/descending rather than just flat areas). Tactical Adventures is the new company from CEO Matthieu Girard, who was formerly at Amplitude Studios, designs of the Endless Space series of 4X sci-fi games. The game will have a Kickstarter launch later this year, and there is already a Steam page with a little bit more detail along with an animated story trailer.
Pinnacle Entertainment Group announced they will lose the license to the Solomon Kane intellectual property at the end of the year. Effective December 31, 2019, all Solomon Kane products for Savage Worlds will be taken out of print and no longer available for sale with the license reverting back to Cabinet Entertainment. To help fans who may want to complete their collection before the license expires, PEG has a sale on Savage Worlds of Solomon Kane products including a bundle of all four hard book books released for the line for $99.99.
The Fallout Wasteland Warfare RPG Expansion Book is now available, making it the first official roleplaying game licensed on the Fallout video game series after a very long history of teases. For some history, Fallout was originally meant to be Vault 13: A GURPS Post Nuclear Adventure under license with Steve Jackson Games with plans for a tabletop RPG sourcebook based on the setting. Due to creative differences, the license expired and the tabletop version never happened. Later, Interplay licensed the property to Glutton Creeper Games to produce a D20 System OGL version. However, this license got caught in the lawsuit between Interplay and Bethesda over the rights to Fallout and Glutton Creeper were hit by a cease and desist order, eventually retooling the game to Exodus Post Apocalyptic RPG. Meanwhile, Chris Avellone, while developing the abandoned Fallout 3 with the codename Van Buren (which is unrelated to the Fallout 3 released by Bethesda), used a tabletop roleplaying game version of the game during playtesting because it was cheaper than tweaking the numerical values like damage and skills in the game engine.
And now – finally – we have the first tabletop roleplaying game…as an expansion to the Fallout miniature wargame. I have received a review copy of this from Modiphius and, while I haven’t been able to properly read it, this is a solid system to add a storytelling and roleplay element as well as a campaign to the Fallout: Wasteland Warfare miniature game. However, if that doesn’t quite scratch the itch for you, we have another Fallout roleplaying game from Modiphius this year, a more traditional one using the company’s 2d20 System that is due out in 2020.
Catalyst Game Labs posted an overview of the updates to the magic system for Shadowrun Sixth Edition. It goes into the design philosophy of the new spellcasting system and how each of the spells for the new edition are designed to be modular. For example, the Fireball spell is a combination of the modules Combat + Affects living things + Fire + Area effect + Ranged. Though we don’t know the title or release date, the post promises a fully modular system available for GMs and players to create their own unique spells using the same design system. It also discusses the removal of Force, the level ranking of magical abilities in previous editions. With the new modular system, the function that Force used to provide has been replaced by simply ramping up or down the effects within the spell itself, and thus affecting the drain. The core rulebook for Shadowrun Sixth Edition is due on August 1st with a retail price of $59.99 while the Shadowrun Sixth World Beginner Box is due to hit store shelves starting next week.
The 2019 ENnie Award nominees have been announced. There are twenty-two categories and I really can’t fit that in this column, so check out the link to find out what categories your favorites have been nominated for. Voting will run from July 10, 2019, to July 21, 2019, and winners will be announced at the ENnie Awards ceremony at Union Station during Gen Con on August 2, 2019, starting at 8:00 PM Eastern (with a live stream on the YouTube channel).
John Kovalic is in the middle of his annual fundraiser for the FairShare CSA Coalition, where you can make him ride a bicycle marathon with a duck on his head! John Kovalic is best known as the writer/artist of Dork Tower and the artist of almost every single card for Munchkin. For the past six years, he’s done a charity bike ride to raise money for low-income families to receive fresh, organic food directly from local farms in the Midwest. So far, he’s raised over $6000 of a $10,000 goal. And if the joy of giving to the less fortunate isn’t enough motivation for you, there are rewards at different pledge levels including a custom limerick written by Neil Gaiman, signed Munchkin artwork, a custom portrait by John Kovalic, a set of the limited edition plushies from Gamehole Con (including an owlbear backpack, bulette, mimic, otyugh, and displacer beast), and a lot more. The fundraising drive runs for 72 more days, so you’ve got plenty of time to help change someone’s life.
The Fifth Edition Beast of a Bundle is still going with less than a week left. This bundle features over $380 worth of DRM-free PDFs of adventures, sourcebooks, maps, character options, equipment, advice for playing and running games, maps, tokens, and more compatible with D&D 5e, benefiting RAINN – Rape Abuse & Incest National Network. There are over forty books in all available in three tiers from just $1 to a mere $15 for the complete collection.
If you’re looking for something more to inspire your games, the Start a New Series Bundle has DRM-free ebooks from award-winning and bestselling authors in fantasy, urban fantasy, science fiction, and horror, including names like Andre Norton, Barbara Hambly, Octavia E. Butler, Greg Bear, Eric Van Lustbader, Timothy Zahn, and even includes the first Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser novel from Fritz Leiber and the novel that so inspired the World of Darkness that it was retconned as part of that world, Nancy A. Collins’s Sunglasses After Dark. This bundle runs until Wednesday, July 17.
As you know, I’m a bit of a fan of Shadowrun, but I don’t talk nearly as much about its sister game, Earthdawn, the Fourth World to Shadowrun’s Sixth World that takes place in our past. Metahumanity is emerging from generations of hiding from the Scourge, a mass attack on the world by entities of pure evil known as Horrors. FASA Games (it’s…a long story) released a Fourth Edition of Earthdawn several years ago with multiple sourcebooks, but now they’re looking to make a huge expansion with The Adept’s Journey: Mystic Paths, a 400+ page tome offering new rules for players and gamemasters alike to expand the world. The PDF is available for a $20 pledge and the hardcover for $40, with a full list of bundle options and add-ons to pick up any books your collection may be lacking or to start from scratch. This project is fully funded and runs until Wednesday, July 10.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like as the players to create the dungeon and try to protect it from hordes of adventurers trying to steal your treasure? Then Wicked Ones is here for you to scratch that itch of playing Dungeon Keeper using the Blades in the Dark system. Each player takes on the role of one of the overlords of the dungeon (along with their personal collection of minions) and build their enclave together. The PDF (and an at-cost print version) is available for ¥2150 (about US$20) or ¥4300 (about US$40) to add on an at-cost print version of the Toolkit Cards. This project is fully funded and runs until Wednesday, July 10.
That’s all from me for this week! Don’t forget to support our Patreon to bring you more gaming news content. If you have any news to submit, email us at news@enworldnews.com, and you can get more discussion of the week’s news on Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk every week. You can follow me on Twitch where I’ll be streaming several times this weekend including Shadowrun Dragonfall, Star Trek Online, and maybe some more Star Wars: The Old Republic, subscribe to Gamer’s Tavern on YouTube for videos on gaming history, RPG reviews, and gaming Let’s Plays, or you can listen to the archives of the Gamer’s Tavern podcast. Until next time, may all your hits be crits! Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, and/or DriveThru may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
I swear, as Pelor as my witness, I thought Abyssal Chickens could fly! I have no idea how many people reading this will get that reference, but abyssal chickens apparently are bad fliers based on the information released by Chris Perkins during a D&D Beyond video previewing Descent into Avernus. In addition to a partial look at the stat block for abyssal chickens (screencaptured for convenience in the link above), we also got a peek at new art for a future product of the Chwingas, a small elemental spirit that originally appeared in Tomb of Annihilation, and a look at a sketch of a Gnome Flayer, a gnome converted into a mind flayer. The adventure, Baldur’s Gate: Descent Into Avernus, will be available on September 17 with a retail price of $49.95.
The National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped at the Library of Congress has partnered with Wizards of the Coast to create accessible versions of the Dungeons & Dragons core rulebooks, starting with the Player’s Handbook. The program, whose tagline is “That all may read”, creates free braille and “talking book” versions of books for the visually impaired. These aren’t just audiobooks, as a talking book specifically describes everything, including artwork, layout elements, and (important for an RPG) tables of information. The Player’s Handbook is available under the code DB91838 now, and the Dungeonmaster’s Guide and Monster Manual are currently in production.
Paizo is teasing more details of the upcoming Pathfinder 2nd Edition. First, we have the first adventure for the new edition, Hellknight Hill, the first in the Age of Ashes Adventure Path. The adventure, for characters 1st through 4th levels, sends the party to investigate the plumes of red smoke rising from the ruined citadel on Hellknight Hill. Is it a call for help, or something more sinister? The hardcover and PDF will be available on August 1st with the launch of Pathfinder 2nd Edition with a retail price of $24.99 and $17.99, respectively.
Mark Seifter posted a blog on the Paizo website featuring an overview of the ten-step process of character creation in Pathfinder 2nd Edition. The blog post goes through the creation of Iakhovas, a human monk. While the process overall isn’t unfamiliar to anyone used to the D20 System, there are just enough differences that a walkthrough like this gives a good look at how the new edition will shake out. It also shows off several new feats, abilities, backgrounds, ancestries, class powers, and more. A full launch line of products for Pathfinder 2nd Edition comes out on August 1st, with the Pathfinder Core Rulebook having a retail price of $59.99.
Tactical Adventures announced a new D&D-inspired video game, Solasta: Crown of the Magister using 5th Edition rules under the OGL. This isn’t the first time a video game company has done this, as many games in the 2000s used the D20 System under the OGL (since the license doesn’t differentiate between tabletop and video games), but it is the first time that a company has announced they are using the 5e ruleset. Little is known about the game itself other than it will be a 3D tactical exploration game of dungeon crawling with a party of four characters and there will be a focus on “verticality” (meaning the maps will include lots of climbing/descending rather than just flat areas). Tactical Adventures is the new company from CEO Matthieu Girard, who was formerly at Amplitude Studios, designs of the Endless Space series of 4X sci-fi games. The game will have a Kickstarter launch later this year, and there is already a Steam page with a little bit more detail along with an animated story trailer.
Pinnacle Entertainment Group announced they will lose the license to the Solomon Kane intellectual property at the end of the year. Effective December 31, 2019, all Solomon Kane products for Savage Worlds will be taken out of print and no longer available for sale with the license reverting back to Cabinet Entertainment. To help fans who may want to complete their collection before the license expires, PEG has a sale on Savage Worlds of Solomon Kane products including a bundle of all four hard book books released for the line for $99.99.
The Fallout Wasteland Warfare RPG Expansion Book is now available, making it the first official roleplaying game licensed on the Fallout video game series after a very long history of teases. For some history, Fallout was originally meant to be Vault 13: A GURPS Post Nuclear Adventure under license with Steve Jackson Games with plans for a tabletop RPG sourcebook based on the setting. Due to creative differences, the license expired and the tabletop version never happened. Later, Interplay licensed the property to Glutton Creeper Games to produce a D20 System OGL version. However, this license got caught in the lawsuit between Interplay and Bethesda over the rights to Fallout and Glutton Creeper were hit by a cease and desist order, eventually retooling the game to Exodus Post Apocalyptic RPG. Meanwhile, Chris Avellone, while developing the abandoned Fallout 3 with the codename Van Buren (which is unrelated to the Fallout 3 released by Bethesda), used a tabletop roleplaying game version of the game during playtesting because it was cheaper than tweaking the numerical values like damage and skills in the game engine.
And now – finally – we have the first tabletop roleplaying game…as an expansion to the Fallout miniature wargame. I have received a review copy of this from Modiphius and, while I haven’t been able to properly read it, this is a solid system to add a storytelling and roleplay element as well as a campaign to the Fallout: Wasteland Warfare miniature game. However, if that doesn’t quite scratch the itch for you, we have another Fallout roleplaying game from Modiphius this year, a more traditional one using the company’s 2d20 System that is due out in 2020.
Catalyst Game Labs posted an overview of the updates to the magic system for Shadowrun Sixth Edition. It goes into the design philosophy of the new spellcasting system and how each of the spells for the new edition are designed to be modular. For example, the Fireball spell is a combination of the modules Combat + Affects living things + Fire + Area effect + Ranged. Though we don’t know the title or release date, the post promises a fully modular system available for GMs and players to create their own unique spells using the same design system. It also discusses the removal of Force, the level ranking of magical abilities in previous editions. With the new modular system, the function that Force used to provide has been replaced by simply ramping up or down the effects within the spell itself, and thus affecting the drain. The core rulebook for Shadowrun Sixth Edition is due on August 1st with a retail price of $59.99 while the Shadowrun Sixth World Beginner Box is due to hit store shelves starting next week.
The 2019 ENnie Award nominees have been announced. There are twenty-two categories and I really can’t fit that in this column, so check out the link to find out what categories your favorites have been nominated for. Voting will run from July 10, 2019, to July 21, 2019, and winners will be announced at the ENnie Awards ceremony at Union Station during Gen Con on August 2, 2019, starting at 8:00 PM Eastern (with a live stream on the YouTube channel).
John Kovalic is in the middle of his annual fundraiser for the FairShare CSA Coalition, where you can make him ride a bicycle marathon with a duck on his head! John Kovalic is best known as the writer/artist of Dork Tower and the artist of almost every single card for Munchkin. For the past six years, he’s done a charity bike ride to raise money for low-income families to receive fresh, organic food directly from local farms in the Midwest. So far, he’s raised over $6000 of a $10,000 goal. And if the joy of giving to the less fortunate isn’t enough motivation for you, there are rewards at different pledge levels including a custom limerick written by Neil Gaiman, signed Munchkin artwork, a custom portrait by John Kovalic, a set of the limited edition plushies from Gamehole Con (including an owlbear backpack, bulette, mimic, otyugh, and displacer beast), and a lot more. The fundraising drive runs for 72 more days, so you’ve got plenty of time to help change someone’s life.
If you’re looking for something more to inspire your games, the Start a New Series Bundle has DRM-free ebooks from award-winning and bestselling authors in fantasy, urban fantasy, science fiction, and horror, including names like Andre Norton, Barbara Hambly, Octavia E. Butler, Greg Bear, Eric Van Lustbader, Timothy Zahn, and even includes the first Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser novel from Fritz Leiber and the novel that so inspired the World of Darkness that it was retconned as part of that world, Nancy A. Collins’s Sunglasses After Dark. This bundle runs until Wednesday, July 17.
As you know, I’m a bit of a fan of Shadowrun, but I don’t talk nearly as much about its sister game, Earthdawn, the Fourth World to Shadowrun’s Sixth World that takes place in our past. Metahumanity is emerging from generations of hiding from the Scourge, a mass attack on the world by entities of pure evil known as Horrors. FASA Games (it’s…a long story) released a Fourth Edition of Earthdawn several years ago with multiple sourcebooks, but now they’re looking to make a huge expansion with The Adept’s Journey: Mystic Paths, a 400+ page tome offering new rules for players and gamemasters alike to expand the world. The PDF is available for a $20 pledge and the hardcover for $40, with a full list of bundle options and add-ons to pick up any books your collection may be lacking or to start from scratch. This project is fully funded and runs until Wednesday, July 10.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like as the players to create the dungeon and try to protect it from hordes of adventurers trying to steal your treasure? Then Wicked Ones is here for you to scratch that itch of playing Dungeon Keeper using the Blades in the Dark system. Each player takes on the role of one of the overlords of the dungeon (along with their personal collection of minions) and build their enclave together. The PDF (and an at-cost print version) is available for ¥2150 (about US$20) or ¥4300 (about US$40) to add on an at-cost print version of the Toolkit Cards. This project is fully funded and runs until Wednesday, July 10.
That’s all from me for this week! Don’t forget to support our Patreon to bring you more gaming news content. If you have any news to submit, email us at news@enworldnews.com, and you can get more discussion of the week’s news on Morrus’ Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk every week. You can follow me on Twitch where I’ll be streaming several times this weekend including Shadowrun Dragonfall, Star Trek Online, and maybe some more Star Wars: The Old Republic, subscribe to Gamer’s Tavern on YouTube for videos on gaming history, RPG reviews, and gaming Let’s Plays, or you can listen to the archives of the Gamer’s Tavern podcast. Until next time, may all your hits be crits! Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, and/or DriveThru may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
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