GURPS DF: Mirror of The Fire Demon

[Argyle King]

I had originally mentioned GURPS Dungeon Fantasy adventure modules being in the works here in this thread: http://www.enworld.org/forum/genera...9-gurps-dungeon-fantasy-adventure-module.html


Now, the first adventure -Mirror of The Fire Demon- is officially available via pdf. It can be found here: e23: GURPS Dungeon Fantasy Adventure 1: Mirror of the Fire Demon


I have not yet had a chance to play through it, so I do not yet have a review. However, I can tell you that -in my opinion- the value is pretty good; I feel the price ($9.99) is more than reasonable. It is 51 pages long, contains some pre-made characters, has pre-made monsters*, maps, and more.

"In addition to a complete adventure (with a drool-inspiring treasure table), you also get:

• Twelve adventurers, each with full GURPS Dungeon Fantasy stats and gear. Designed as rivals for this tale, each is also suitable as a ready-to-use PC . . . or for any other nefarious purpose!
• Eleven "henchthings" -- followers and henchmen of the loot-seekers herein. Even after the adventure is over, you'll be prepared with GURPS stats for artillery mages, pixie thieves, karatekas, and more.
• Monsters, monsters, monsters! Over a dozen new creatures waiting to kill headstrong heroes in this epic tale . . . or afterward!
• Seven wilderness maps that can form the basis for countless outdoor encounters, whether used individually or combined into a mega battle map! Each is divided into hexes, for compatibility with basic or tactical combat."

- quoted from the website


*I mention this because one of the complaints I hear most about GURPS is a lack of monster books (despite there being creatures included in many of the books.) On that note, I'll also mention that there is also a monster book available for the Dungeon Fantasy series. http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/books/dungeonfantasymonsters1/

 

[darjr]

that's awesome, thanks for the heads up

 

[avin]

Need to spread XP before thank you for bringing this up...

 

[Argyle King]

that's awesome, thanks for the heads up

Need to spread XP before thank you for bringing this up...

No problem. If either of you pick it up, would you mind posting some feedback? I probably won't have a chance to run it for a little while. I'm still in the middle of wrapping up my current D&D game.

 

[Argyle King]

I finally picked this up. I've only had a chance to give the adventure (Mirror of The Fire Demon) a very brief look, but it seems good so far.

One of the first things I noticed was the size of the adventure. I was aware of the page count before my purchase, but I am still surprised by how much information is packed into it. In chapter 6, there are around 12 pages detailing rivals, henchthings, and monsters.

Rivals are premade adventurers; they are meant to be -as their name suggests- rivals for the PCs. However, they could also be used as pregen characters for players. There's a lot of variety in the choices.

Henchthings are sidekicks for Rivals; they are written up in the Dungeon Fantasy monster format and given brief statblocks rather than full PC-style stats. Henchthings have a lot of potential for a lot of different uses beyond their use in the adventure. They could very easily be used as simple templates for allies*, enemies*, patrons*, and various things of that nature. They also serve as good templates for basic 'monsters' in the vein of town guards and various other 'monsters' who are humans, dwarves, elves, and etc.

*I am referring to the advantages/disadvantages available to a GURPS character.

Monsters are -obviously enough- monsters. I'm quite fond of a monstrous turtle which is included in this section; it's quite different from what I'd expect, and it's an interesting idea. There are also quite a few varieties of orc which are extremely helpful as a resource. There are orc warriors, orc shamans, orc barbarians, and etc. Overall, I feel it's a superb resource for monsters -an area where GURPS is most often criticized.

Overall, I'd say Chapter 6 is extremely useful; even if you don't plan to run the adventure. As I said a few times already, there is a lot of premade content. There are a lot of good resources which are easy to use and clear to understand.

The art style is pretty basic. That's not something which bothers me. I know that a lot of people are more picky about art than I am though. That might be something which has the potential to bother people who are more picky about art than I am. Personally -as I said- it doesn't bother me. I feel the pictures spice things up so as to not have huge walls of text, but -at the same time- is basic and sparse enough to allow fitting a rather large amount of information into the pdf.

The only thing which really bugs me is that the pdf being black and white also means some of the map tiles are black and white. I suppose that's actually kind of a good thing though. It means that even the most basic of printers can easily handle printing a lot of tiles to make large maps. It also doesn't lock me into one color. I could very easily print some of the tiles out and color them to suit a variety of terrain types.

There is a lot of advice on how to run the module; the advice addresses tweaks which may need to be made depending upon what the PCs have available and a variety of other considerations. There is also some advice on how to run the adventure in a few different ways; one of the different ways touched upon is running it with the players as a group of monsters instead of as a typical group of adventurer's. Some nice advice on how to plug the module into your own setting (if you have a game which differs from some of the assumptions held by the adventure) as well as advice on how to spin this adventurer off into future quests. Overall, a lot of good information, and it's information which is valuable not only for those experienced with the system, but also for those who don't know the system very well.

This is all from a very brief glance at the product. I'm very happy with my purchase so far -even just going by quickly browsing it. Once the D&D game I'm running wraps up, I plan to run some people through Mirror of The Fire Demon. After that, I'll provide a more in depth review based one how I felt things played out as well as feedback from the players.