Reaper Minis debuts its own OGL-based RPG system: Dungeon Delvers

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

An OGL-based game? In this economy?

The beta is out now and a Kickstarter campaign is apparently coming soon. They've already got a number of adventures ready for it. You will not be shocked to learn that they are not theater of the mind.

One of the adventure modules is an extremely detailed fantasy inn, the Green Griffin, for those in the market (it's free) for such a thing.

I'm a little surprised that they're going with an OGL game, since the biggest advantage I could see to them having their own game would be to have a game that would support their miniatures sales, even if WotC went insane and made everything in the sixth edition of D&D circus clowns or set it all in the My Little Pony land of Equestria. Maybe this is just them making sure there will be a tactical minis D&D-style game out there.

 

[Parmandur]

I'm a little surprised that they're going with an OGL game, since the biggest advantage I could see to them having their own game would be to have a game that would support their miniatures sales, even if WotC went insane and made everything in the sixth edition of D&D circus clowns or set it all in the My Little Pony land of Equestria. Maybe this is just them making sure there will be a tactical minis D&D-style game out there.

Maybe they are hybridizing some 3.X rules for minis combat.

 

[aco175]

One of the adventure modules is an extremely detailed fantasy inn, the Green Griffin, for those in the market (it's free) for such a thing.

This is a fantastic 16 page supplement. No adventure in it, but is a very detailed inn and series of taverns to place in a campaign. There is a lot of surrounding lore for the world that can be changed but looks like a great place to stage several adventures from. I found it to be a good read for the sections that I just read.

The best part is that the link just opens to the PDF and you do not need to sign up for anything. Kudos to them.

 

[TwoSix]

It's an interesting approach. It obviously has predominantly 5e DNA to it, but the fact that Proficiency Bonus scales at +1/level means that 5e monsters past tier 1 won't really be usable.

Other than that, core 4, 3 levels only, no subclasses at all. Not even subclass features baked in, the class is just mechanically lighter than the 5e version.

Folk, not races, and the races DO have ability score adjustments.

 

[Aldarc]

Looking at the attribute bonuses of the folk, I'm getting very 3e/PF1 vibes from this as well.

 

[Alzrius]

I'm a little surprised that they're going with an OGL game, since the biggest advantage I could see to them having their own game would be to have a game that would support their miniatures sales, even if WotC went insane and made everything in the sixth edition of D&D [...] set it all in the My Little Pony land of Equestria.

They won't.

I know, because I'm not that lucky.

 

[Reynard]

It appears that all the adventures are from prior to the OGL implosion. The first one is for Castles and Crusades, in fact. Also, weirdly, there is no 1st level adventure in the book and the ones they point to on the website are not for this game system and not for 1st level characters. Very strange.

 

[ninjayeti]

The rules and adventures have been up on the Reaper Minis website for quite some time (beta rules say they were posted Dec. 2022) - only the Kickstarter is new. So this may just be to do a print version of the game.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The rules and adventures have been up on the Reaper Minis website for quite some time (beta rules say they were posted Dec. 2022) - only the Kickstarter is new. So this may just be to do a print version of the game.

Thanks. It was new to me.

I suspect they will probably standardize and clean-up their previous content as part of the game. It would also be an ideal time to de-OGL it, although that may not be a priority for them.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The Kickstarter campaign is now live.

It's interesting that the races folk include "Proudfoot halfling," "wood elf" and "hill dwarf." Why specify the variant if they're not planning on other sorts of halflings, wood elves and dwarves in future?

The system, as described on the Kickstarter page, sounds like a 5E/OSR hybrid (more 5E than OSR), which makes sense. I'm mildly surprised they're going with three core books, which is a big ask for a new system.

I had been hoping they would make a big deal of having all the Reaper versions of monsters in their monster book (they often have different names and very often some interesting variant designs compared to other companies' take on the monsters). While that seems logical, I don't see where they've stated that yet. I do like they explicitly mention scalable versions of monsters, which seems like a good idea that is finally spreading like wildfire through gaming.