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.

Another Pirate Post

Goutte d’Or (Drop of Gold) is a delightful stop-motion short film featuring an undead pirate trying to gain the affection of an octopus queen of the dead. To watch the film, click the picture above.

I really enjoyed it. How about you?

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.

Monstrous Monday - Owlbeartross (S&W)

I wanted to post something for #monstrousmonday. Honestly, this is just the Swords & Wizardry Complete owlbear stats with a few modification to make it nautical. I will use this in my Razor Coast game.

Owlbeartross

Hit Dice: 5

Armor Class: 5 [14]

Attacks: 2 webbed claws (1d6), 1 peck (1d6)

Saving Throw: 12

Special: Hug for additional 2d8 if to-hit roll is 18+

Move: 6/12 (Swimming)

Alignment: Neutrality

Challenge: 5/240

Owlbeartosses are the aquatic cousins of the common owlbear. They have the body of a bear with webbed claws and the beak of an albatross, with some feathers on the head and other places. One an attack roll of 18 (natural roll) with it's claws, the owlbear grabs its victim and hugs it for an addition 2d8 points of damage. This can be quite deadly and cause a risk of drowning considering they often attack from the waves.

The owlbeartross is a promotion card for the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game.

Setting Sail For The Razor Coast

Recently the Swords & Wizardry bug has bit me. I've looked at various books and things and decided that I had to get Razor Coast. Well as luck would have it, I found a really cheap copies of the main book and the Freebooter's Guide on Ebay. Both hardcovers only set me back 60 or so dollars. 

I've started talking with some folks back home and I think I'm going to run this every other Friday. I'm definitely allowing all of the race options from the Freebooter's Guide as well as the Witchfinder. In addition, I might sprinkle in some of the spells from Space-Age Sorcery. I'm still recruiting players, but I'm pretty pumped. My only problem is I'm trying to decide if I should just have players create level 5 characters (since that's the starting point of Razor Coast) or if I want to come up with other nautical adventures to get them to level 5. What do you folks think?

Decisions, decisions...

This will probably be my first D&D game with guns. We'll see how that turns out.
I'm going to take a look at Hack! Firearms! to potentially supplement the firearms presented in the Freebooter's Guide.

Harthagoa looks terrifying!