The World Of Broadsword - More Old School Goodness!

In the last few years I've noticed an increasing enthusiasm for a return to 'old school' roleplaying; a wonderful, back-to-basics attitude personified by my good friend Jeff Mejia of The Lair of The Evil DM and, more recently, Evil DM Productions.

With his goal of recreating the magic - and innocence - of the golden age of gaming, Jeff also draws his inspiration from the media of that age - films such as Hawk The Slayer and Deathstalker, the Conan books etc.

The popularity of Jeff's previous work, Broadsword, for Deep 7, has led to the creation of the game's first supplement - the equally dynamic World Of Broadsword (WoB)

Setting his stall out from the off, Jeff opens with a tribute and dedication to the late Lana Clarkson, who played the warrior-woman Kaira in Deathstalker.

With the original game using the innovative 1PG system (where all the core rules are condensed to a single page, the rules summary and character sheet take another page, the referee gets a page and supplementary rules get a page each), brevity is again the key word with WoB (something the 'big guns' should take a look at!).

Six new 'advantages' for player-characters take half a page, then it's into a seven-page, profusely-illustrated bestiary of more than 40 creatures - split into 'common animals' and 'monsters'.

Each of the beasties gets four lines of statistics (how tough it is to kill and how much damage it can do to you) and a paragraph to describe it... and that's all you need; although some basic familiarity with the fantasy oeuvre is assumed. There is no padding in Broadsword.

While the original Broadsword and the 1PG games in general were designed for quick and easy play, with no need for a highly complex, multi-volume background, in WoB Jeff has provided a gazetteer of a 'typical' swords and sorcery setting (complete with a full-page hex map of the continent, the likes of which I haven't seen since the glorious days of TSR Dungeons & Dragons).

Each country is given a one-page description that includes an inspirational taste of what it would be like to visit there as well as plot hooks, political issues, known allies and enemies etc then we get a page of general 'locations' with such genre staples as the Deathlands Swamp, Desert of Skulls, Moors of The Witch-Queen etc.

If you've read this far through the booklet already and your head isn't bursting with ideas for adventures and characters then swords and sorcery possibly isn't the right style for you... someone must produce a My Little Pony roleplaying game...

One final page is given over to listing the gods of this world, but these are vague and mysterious - their actual impact on any particular game really up to the individual gamesmaster and his chosen style of play.

The book ends with a five-page scenario, dripping with the testosterone smell of a Robert E Howard Conan yarn. River Pirates Of The Belsa has the heroes trying to infiltrate a notorious pirate gang to bring its leader to justice.

Jeff has a jaunty, two-fisted style that makes this supplement a breeze to read and, more importantly, keeps you in the right frame of mind for gaming in this very specific, tough-and-dirty, low-magic style of world.

I don't believe it was ever Jeff's intention to try and create the 'ultimate roleplaying game' but rather provide a simple pick-up-and-play game, that required little prep work by the gamesmaster, and allowed players to jump straight into the adventure, without hours of character creation and heavy math.

With the publication of supplements like this, I can only see Broadsword going from strength-to-strength.

World of Broadsword, a 31-page PDF download, is available from RPGnow.com and Precis Intermedia Games for only $3.95 (that's around £2 in real money).