Digital Orc: Verloren (Review)

I have a whole slew of potential posts that are bouncing around in my head, including a recap of Free RPG Day loot-gathering. Unfortunately, my personal and professional life was turned topsy-turvy last Friday when my boss decreed that, in two weeks, he was shutting down the law firm and I'd be "self-employed."

My head hasn't been in the game since then, although I'm getting a bit more emotionally stable with the passing days.

But I was heartened this morning when I slipped over to the Digital Orc's blog to see what Dylan had in store. Lo and behold! Dylan's newest offering for Labyrinth Lord is up for sale!

(Disclaimer: I was an editor/proofreader on this project. I am not being compensated for this review, but will receive a copy of the final product for my proofreading services.)

I have not yet seen the final, finished product, but based off of the preview copy I saw as part of my proofreading? Wow. I should say up front that I do not play Labyrinth Lord, but all of Dylan's stuff has been fairly easy to port over to my 3.x campaign(s). My players have been known to recoil over some of his monsters. (Hello, backpack spider! I'm looking right at you, buddy!) This is more of the same.... From the evocative settings to the weird mutants, from the death-gamblers to the manipulative alien beings, from the sexy werewolf sirens to the hive-mind giant rodents....

Well, Dylan has done it again. This is some great stuff. He self-described this one to me as "weird" and it is. But that's not a criticism. It's weird stuff, but a cool weird. I liked what I saw and I think you will too. I can't wait to hold Verloren in my hands and let the ideas germinate for my own campaign.

You can buy the PDF on RPGNow.com for $3.99 or the limited run print version for $4.99. That's a small price to pay for 32 pages of cool gaming content. In fact, the only page I saw that was of little-to-no-use was the OGL page. Everything else had great content, maps, hooks, or images for in-game use.

From his own ad copy:

Verloren is a city hanging in the balance. Either it will fall to an ancient evil or triumph based on your actions. Enclosed are city details, maps, nine original monsters, and interesting non-player characters for encounters in and out of Verloren. In this fantasy supplement, players will face powerful monsters and explore a decaying city to discover the secret of The Change and save the thousands of inhabitants.

• 9 Original Monsters
  
• Over 20 Original Illustrations
  
• 3 New Spells
  
• Lots of NPCs and Story Hooks
  
• 2 Maps

So take a moment if you would and jump on over to the Digital Orc: he's got purchase links for each option there. Verloren--GET IT NOW!

I WON!

Thanks to Stelios over at d20 Dark Ages blog, I am the proud owner of a new miniature for my collection: Reaper's Angel of Death!

In honor of his 200th blog post, Stelios ran a give-away. A random drawing (ok, only a d6 roll, apparently...but still....) resulted in a win for yours truly.

And believe it or not, despite my love of Reaper miniatures, the Angel of Death is one I never had the chance to pick up for myself. And now it's winging its way toward me. I can't wait to start picking a color scheme for him.

Thanks again, Stelios!

And to all you who haven't had a chance to check out his blog, he's got some great stuff: reviews, gaming philosophies, soundtracks, and more!