OSR The Monster Overhaul

Thondor said:

The 2nd printing just arrived with us (Compose Dream Games) and our pre-orders are already out the door.

As noted before, we get them first because they are printed here in Canada. I should really make sure to get one for myself this time around . . .

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Yes, yes you should. It is SO GOOD.

And I'm not saying that because my maps are in it. The reason my maps are in it is because I saw it forming up and was amazed, and volunteered a bunch of my work for it because it is sooooo awesome.

Still working my way through this. (Life is busy and this is a big book.) I gotta say, as opposed to certain premade adventures I'm prepping to run next week, every entry in this sparks joy. There are five pages (!) on goblins, including a two-page spread of d100 goblins with names and quirks, but also a page of goblin war machines, tables of what a given band of goblins looks like, what they're doing when players encounter them, and more.

It would be exceptionally easy to grab a map (hi, @Dyson Logos!), open this book to Goblin and just run an adventure on the fly using six pages of this book and whatever RPG engine you're using.

Even the less exciting entries (like Giant Spider, immediately preceding Goblin) is full of interesting ideas that include classic staples, like the phase spider, but also multiple variants. One could take a barebones adventure from TSR or a random generator, run it using this book and, on the fly, create something with lots of personality and humor, while still being exciting and dangerous. (Everyone laughs at the goblin warmachines until they're sprayed with enraged rats from a nozzle, and then beheaded with a giant rusty saw blade.)

So, so happy with this purchase. Very excited to finally get the physical copy of Shadowdark here so I can combine the two and just go nuts with randomly generated adventures.

Also, the first section of the book, People, basically has you set for peasants and merchants, towns and villages, along with mercenaries and wizards, more or less forever. There are whole books people want to sell you that don't do as much as just the People section of the Monster Overhaul does. Fan. Tas. Tic.

Whizbang Dustyboots said:

Even the less exciting entries (like Giant Spider, immediately preceding Goblin) is full of interesting ideas that include classic staples, like the phase spider, but also multiple variants. One could take a barebones adventure from TSR or a random generator, run it using this book and, on the fly, create something with lots of personality and humor, while still being exciting and dangerous. (Everyone laughs at the goblin warmachines until they're sprayed with enraged rats from a nozzle, and then beheaded with a giant rusty saw blade.)

So, so happy with this purchase. Very excited to finally get the physical copy of Shadowdark here so I can combine the two and just go nuts with randomly generated adventures.

Also, the first section of the book, People, basically has you set for peasants and merchants, towns and villages, along with mercenaries and wizards, more or less forever. There are whole books people want to sell you that don't do as much as just the People section of the Monster Overhaul does. Fan. Tas. Tic.

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Ugh. I gotta actually crack this thing open and read it.

Distracted DM said:

Ugh. I gotta actually crack this thing open and read it.

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I actually backed another project after this that costs almost as much, does much the same thing, and will only tackle about 20 monsters. I really wish I had made more of a dent in this book before backing that one (which I'm sure will be fine). This is really an exceptional book for those looking for at-the-table utility, especially for OSR games. (I think one would have to sit down and figure out a conversion doc to have on a 3x5 card before using this with Mork Borg or Cairn, though.)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:

I've got no dog in this fight, as I'm not currently running an OSR game, and I'm not in any way connected with this campaign, but this Kickstarter monster book leapt out at me as an incredibly usable work for OSR DMs: The Monster Overhaul.

I'm at the stage of my DMing career -- in the neighborhood of 40 years, yikes -- where I want things to be immediately useful at the table. (I have inspiration for days at this point, thanks.) A book that instantly gives me a list of names for NPCs when my players would rather talk than fight, a random table of colorful descriptions, other things that answer the needs of an actual DM playing the actual game? Yes, please.

Too many books seem to have never been playtested and, moreover, have little to no connection to how they will be used in actual play. This is the exact opposite of that, and I love it. It tempts me to pick up Advanced Fantasy OSE go back to Castles & Crusades just to use it.

(Skerples also created Magical Industrial Revolution, about rapid "technological" magical innovation changing the world -- and almost certainly dooming it. It's a great fantasy city that makes preventing multiple apocalypses fun and even funny. If I didn't already have an ongoing Ptolus campaign, I'd start a campaign in Endon tomorrow. It's also designed to be incredibly useful at the table, so this is just a thing Skerples is into. God bless.)

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I went ahead and ordered one (hard copy and pdf). Not gaming anything OSR at the moment, but have talked about it with my group and we'll probably use this with Castles and Crusades when we do. Thanks for posting about this here. I'm reading the PDF now and it's great.

I'm up through the section on the Divine and I'm getting so many ideas I never would otherwise. The book has random generators for creating a demigod on the fly, some notes about typical D&D "polytheism," and lets you generate domains, shrines and more in a few seconds.

Wandering around in a desert hexcrawl for way too long and seeking shelter, the PCs stumble on a shallow cave with faded mosaics and dried offerings. Inside, they find a supernaturally beautiful man, patiently resting, a dim lantern by his side. He is Roo-Hee, the demigod of those lost in the desert.

Not something I would have ever come up with on my own, but an instantly compelling encounter and probably an NPC we'll be talking about for years.

This is also a low-key very funny book:

The Monster Overhaul said:

A Visionary’s followers will flee at the first sign of trouble, then take contradictory notes from a safe distance.

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The Visionary entry includes roll tables for the local attitude toward this crazed prophet, what the community accuses the Visionary of being, names for Visionaries, Visionary appearances and a table of 100 prophecy elements.

Again, not something I would normally think of using in my games, but this seems like just the sort of complication to bedevil a party with, particularly if there's a cleric type who's had it too easy so far.

Whizbang Dustyboots said:

I'm up through the section on the Divine and I'm getting so many ideas I never would otherwise. The book has random generators for creating a demigod on the fly, some notes about typical D&D "polytheism," and lets you generate domains, shrines and more in a few seconds.

Wandering around in a desert hexcrawl for way too long and seeking shelter, the PCs stumble on a shallow cave with faded mosaics and dried offerings. Inside, they find a supernaturally beautiful man, patiently resting, a dim lantern by his side. He is Roo-Hee, the demigod of those lost in the desert.

Not something I would have ever come up with on my own, but an instantly compelling encounter and probably an NPC we'll be talking about for years.

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I read that section on Divine recently as well and found it really solid.

I also like how pretty much all the giants you could want are compressed into two entries (Giant and Giant, Noble -- on facing pages no less!)

Does something similar with the Orge entry, where Bugbears, Lesser Ettins, Orgre Magi etc all on one page. Good stuff.

In many ways it's the opposite of Kenzerco's Hacklopedia of Beasts v2 for Hackmaster 5e which I just got . . . contrasting them is interesting (detailed writeup "ecology, tactics, a in world story, tracts, whether they are edible etc).

Thondor said:

I read that section on Diving recently as well and found it really solid.

I also like how pretty much all the giants you could want are compressed into two entries (Giant and Giant, Noble -- on facing pages no less!)

Does something similar with the Orge entry, where Bugbears, Lesser Ettins, Orgre Magi etc all on one page. Good stuff.

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Yeah, the number of monsters in this book is much, much higher than it appears to be. Skerples is just good about realizing that we don't need 20 nearly identical dragon entries: We need one really good dragon entry with a few tables to randomize that base.

If WotC created an iron dragon that breathed out swords, it would take multiple pages to give us those stats. Here, it's just a few lines modifying the base creature.

Thondor said:

In many ways it's the opposite of Kenzerco's Hacklopedia of Beasts v2 for Hackmaster 5e which I just got . . . contrasting them is interesting (detailed writeup "ecology, tactics, a in world story, tracts, whether they are edible etc).

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There's more world building in this book than I anticipated -- chimera are all sewn together using magical string, which can be recovered off a corpse and sold -- but yeah, it's relatively light and I'm sure that would be a turn-off for DMs who want more of it in their monster books.

Skerples is in the first stages of thinking about creating a comparable book of treasure and magic items. In the meantime, he's released a free six-page PDF of treasure tables.