A Review of the Role Playing Game Supplement Animals of the Frontiers of Space Volume One

Animals of the Frontiers of Space Volume One by Joseph Mohr is a role playing game supplement published by Old School Role Playing for use with Cepheus Engine. As such, it is covered by the Open Game License and some parts are considered to be Open Game Content as a result.

The supplement is available as a 41 page Pay What You Want PDF from DriveThruRPG. Two pages are the front and rear covers, three the front matter and three the Open Game License.

The opening paragraphs have a brief bit of fiction, then explain that animals in both Cepheus Engine and Traveller are a neglected area, just having tables and list of beast types. It states that the purpose of this supplement is to make animals that are more interesting to fit the various Cepheus Engine categories, some original, some based on those from science fiction films and television series. An animal is also defined as a non-intelligent or semi-intelligent creature that is not capable of star travel. Some of the species are specific to certain planets and will almost never be encountered elsewhere.

The Creatures takes up the majority of the supplement, being details on the various animals. Each is given a name, number appearing, classification, weight, stats, damage inflicted, weapons and psionic abilities, if any, as well as a description of it and where it might be encountered. Some animals come in various sort-of related kinds.

Animals of the Frontiers of Space Volume One in Review

The PDF lacks bookmarks and has enough animals listed that these would have been useful. Navigation is poor. The text maintains a single column format and some minor errors were noticed. There are no illustrations bar the covers. Presentation is poor.

This does what it says it does; has more interesting creatures rather than the standard Cepheus Engine broad categories. Some of them are singular, some of them can be found in space and rather a lot of them are the result of mutation from exposure to radiation. Though some do have specific planets mentioned, it will not be difficult to ignore that and drop the animals into another setting. Even the singular creatures do not need to be singular. Animals of the Frontiers of Space Volume One is a useful supplement for making animals more interesting in Cepheus Engine and it can be found by clicking here.