A Review of the Role Playing Game Supplement Doom of the Ice Planet

Doom of the Ice Planet by Graham Bottley is a role playing game supplement published by Arion Games for use with Stellar Adventures.

The supplement is available as a 14-page PDF from DriveThruRPG for $3 but was bought at a reduced price thanks to a special offer. There are also three PNGs, each a version of a map, one printer friendly without labels, one colour without labels and one with both colour and labels.

The opening paragraphs explain that the adventure is aimed at new or fairly new Heroes, and have them stopping at a planet on a journey, though this could be changed. They arrive at an ice-bound planet. At the spaceport, they are approached by a professor known to at least one of them. She wants them to find a colleague who was exploring the planet, having found it used to be lush before the ice age set in, but failed to return from her last field trip. The planet is dangerous and emergency services are not currently available, and the professor wants the characters to set off in an ATV to find the missing colleague.

There’s a hex map of the area to search, with brief descriptions and details of any hazards that might be encountered or clues as to the missing person’s location. When their ice bike is found, it’s in a crevasse. Also in the crevasse is a four-floor ancient technological facility that needs exploring and any threats dealing with. Also detailed here are two species currently battling for control of it, as well as the missing person.

Doom of the Ice Planet in Review

The PDF lacks bookmarks and is long enough with enough different sections that these would have been useful. Navigation is okay. The text maintains a two-column format and some minor errors were noticed. As well as the maps, there are a number of colour images. Presentation is decent.

This adventure does have an issue with it; the facility is going to blow up the planet. How long it takes the characters to find it reduces the time they have available to stop this. A note, however, states that if the characters fail to stop the destruction, the Director may choose to stop it, which reduces the agency the players have in the adventure. They may still rescue the missing person, but the destruction of the planet, and stopping it, may be irrelevant to them. Doom of the Ice Planet can be found by clicking here.