Men & Monsters of Polynesia Review

Men & Monsters of Polynesia is a monster source book by Skirmisher Games. The pdf is 22 pages, though only about 15 are actual game content or background information behind the design. Illustrations were created by by Travis Hanson and they are phenomenal! The book is OSR and the stats are provided for 1e D&D, though could be easily adapted to other editions. Obviously, the creatures included are based on legends and things from the islands of Polynesia, specifically Oahu, Hawaii, Kauai, Bora Bora, Moorea, Tahiti, and both the main islands of New Zealand.

Before proper stats are given to the new creatures, there's discussion of guardian animals and divine creatures, important concepts in many Polynesian cultures. There's also discussion about how to make them using existing animals and such. This is followed by a random encounters table (because every old school monster book has one, right?) and then the "monster manual" proper. In addition to the new monsters presented here, existing MM monsters that are fitting to the setting are mentioned.

Here's a quick run down of the new monsters:

• Boar, Monstrous - gigantic destructive beast touched by the divine
• Green Lady - an evil undead spirit of a mother that's lost or even slain their own children
•  Kawekaweau and Kawekaweau, Giant - island geckos, the smaller aren't normally aggressive but the giant variety can be
• Kupua E'epa - were sharks
• Kumi - large monitor lizards bites that can cause awful infections
• Maero - man-size woodland troll-kin (these are the creatures on the cover
• Menehune - island demihumans who were the original inhabitants of Lemuria
• Mo'o - female guardian creatures of natural sites, their natural form is a man-sized lizard
• Night Marcher - undead warriors who rise from the graves at certain times of their year and can draw others into their marches
• Tiki Statues (Wood and Stone) - Tiki are spirits that serve the gods and can be drawn into statues of stone or wood to protect sacred sites.
• Weta, Monstrous - heavily armored spikey giant crickets
• Weta, Workshop - intelligent spell casting giant crickets and a nice joke

The monsters are well designed and if you want to include some non-standard European inspired monsters you can't go wrong with this one. If you're running a pirate game such as Freeport, Skull & Shackles, or Razor Coast, this would be really good to have.

Normally a 1.99, its currently only .99 because of the Christmas in July sale.

International Talk Like A Pirate Day

Today is International Talk Like A Pirate Day. Celebrate by checking out some nautical themed gaming materials. There is a new edition of 7th Sea (and it looks beautiful). Skull and Shackles is an entertaining Pathfinder adventure path. Razor Coast is a great setting/campaign for Swords & Wizardry and Pathfinder. Use the code RC50 at on the Frog God Games website until Midnight tonight to pick up the Razor Coast books for 50% of the cover price. Finally, you can check out the grand daddy of pirate settings, Green Ronin's Freeport.

If you want to learn to speak pirate, check out Mango Languages. It is an online language learning website that has pirate courses (as well as many actual languages). Many libraries subscribe, so you might have free access to it.

Finally, you can celebrate by listening to some pirate-y music.

Pathfinder: Pirates of the Inner Sea

Today I'd like to briefly talk about  Pathfinder Player's Companion: Pirates of the Inner Sea.

The Basics: Pirates of the Inner Sea is a full-color 32 page Pathfinder book. The retail price is 10.99. The book gives an overview of piracy on Golarion. The book starts three page overview, then goes into six different pirate regions. Each region gets a two page spread which includes character traits. We then get four pages of equipment, four class archetypes, one prestige class, and two page discussion of the faith of Besmara (the Pirate goddess), and six spells. The book ends with a discussion the social aspects of pirate life.

The Good: I love the discussion of Andoran pirates. Essentially Andoran is colonial America and their pirates are actually pirate hunters. My other favorite is the discussion of the pirates of the River Kingdoms. These pirates use rafts and barges to ply the waterways. I plan on using this info when I finally get around to running Kingmaker. The archetypes are really cool. My favorite is the buccaneer bard. They get songs of surrender, which is great when you're trying to take over a ship. The prestige class is cool too. The Inner Sea pirate prestige class is very rogue-y. It gets sneak attack and pirate tricks.

The Bad: I can't point to anything in this book that I don't like, but then again, I LOVE pirates.

Final Thoughts: If you want some pirate goodness in your Pathfinder game, pick this one up.

Pathfinder Adventure Paths

I don't have much personal play experience with Pathfinder's Adventure Path's. I own all of Skull and Shackles and Shattered Star. I just picked up the Rise of the Rune Lords Anniversary edition last week (for only 30 bucks at Half-Price Books... woot woot). I also have random parts ofCouncil of Thieves, Reign of Winter, and Giant Slayer. When all is said and done though, I've only actually played a session of Curse of the Crimson Throne and Serpent's Skull and ran one session of Kingmaker.

My friend Stew has ran several, though I believe Rise of the Rune Lords and Carrion Crown are the only ones he's finished. He and I have discussed them on several occasions. Honestly, the idea of the adventure paths appeal to me, but in execution they just tend to fall flat in my eyes. In particular one issue I see with several of them is that they're extended chase scenes in which the party has to constantly be on the move to stop the foe (Serpent's Skull and Carrion Crown are guilty of this). And then there's Jade Regent, the AP that should have been awesome, but ultimately turned into one giant escort mission (ugh, wait make that a double ugh).

While I wouldn't mind playing in any of the adventure paths, I think the ones that most interest me are the ones that include more sandbox elements, namely Skull and Shackles and Kingmaker.

I'm in love with 5E and I don't see that love affair ending anytime soon. I have two regular 5E games (and a pick-up one). That being said, once one of the games ends, I think Kingmaker will be my triumphant return to Pathfinder.

I'll run these bad boys someday...

Pathfinder Adventure Card Game and the Owlbeartross

Recently I've become pretty interested in the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game. The base sets are for 1-4 players. While gaming alone isn't the most fun, my groups rarely meet. This would give me a chance to do something (other than video games) by myself.

To play the game you buy one of the base sets (based on Pathfinder Adventure Paths) and the bi-monthly expansions. Cards can be mixed and matched if you want. The current sets are Rise of the Rune Lords, and Skull & Shackles. Wrath of the Righteous releases later this year.

I currently have a few promo cards. I bought a Game Trade Magazine earlier this week because it had a Dance with Squeelly Nord promotional card. I also grabbed the Ranzak (goblin pirate) character card from last Free RPG Day. I hope to pick up the Ekkie one this year. I think I'm going to pick up the Skull & Shackles base set for my birthday.

As a side note, I found this while researching the game. I don't remember if it's in the AP (I'll have to check when I get home), but I have to use an owlbeartross the next time I have a nautical game.