For Gold and Glory by Robert J. Schwalb is a role playing game supplement published by Schwalb Entertainment for use with Shadow of the Demon Lord. This is part of the Victims of the Demon Lord series that examines ancestries in more detail, in this case dwarfs.
This is a 17 page PDF that is available from DriveThruRPG for $2.99 but was purchased at a greatly reduced price as part of a special bundle. Around three quarters of the first page is an illustration and the Credits.
The first page begins with some brief details on dwarfs before going into more detail. It explains how the dwarfs were cursed by the Dark Gods after their pride led them to challenge the gods themselves. Dwarfs, until that point, were tall, handsome creatures; Grimnir squashed them down and made them look downwards into the ground rather than to the skies. This is something the dwarfs keep secret out of fear of shame, and tell stories about how they came to be.
There are description of the general dwarfish appearance and their primary language, Dwarfish. Dwarfs live longer than humans, at around two centuries, and live in kingdoms under the ground. These kingdoms have certain features in common and are all ruled by a king or queen, although the term does not mean the same as it perhaps would amongst human. Many dwarfen kingdoms have had to be abandoned, leading to dwarfen exiles who can be found in every land.
Dwarfs honour their dead, having abandoned their gods when the latter cursed them (more on dwarfen religion can be found in Uncertain Faith). Dwarfs are a prideful people who do not hesitate to criticise other races, especially when it comes to skills the dwarfs excel at. Dwarfs have a lust for precious things – part of their curse – and are generally distrustful. The enter agreements only through contracts and will stand by these to the letter, and expect others to do the same. The dwarfen greed can result in a madness called Gold Lust when they go mad (this section references Unhinge the Mind).
Dwarfs have long memories and hate equally as long. Dwarfen relations with other races are less than ideal; humans are lived among but not generally trusted, orcs, used by the Empire against the dwarfs many times, are actively hated, goblins have a long standing joint animosity and clockworks fascinate dwarfs. Dwarfs have no strong opinion on halflings but can come to respect them, and dwarfs often live with gnomes.
Next up is the main part of the supplement, a more extensive method for creating dwarfs than is found in the core book. This is done through an extended series of development tables, several dozen in all, covering all aspects of appearance, relationships, items, professions and personality.
There are also four new spells, all from the Rune tradition, and a new Expert path, Grudge Bearer, who seek out enemies of their kinds or carry out other revenge.
For Gold and Glory in Review
The PDF lacks bookmarks and, although comparatively short, there are enough options that bookmarks would have been helpful. Navigation could be better. The text maintains a two column full colour format and appeared to be free of errors. There are a few colour illustrations as well; presentation is very good.
Like the other supplements in the Victims of the Demon Lord series, this makes character creation – deliberately – longer and more fuller-featured. Characters can be created perfectly fine using the core rules; this simply expands upon them. Given that Shadow of the Demon Lord can be deadly to characters, this may or may not be a good idea, depending on the player. In addition, this collects much of the background information on dwarfs in one place and expands on it, providing a useful reference for such. For Gold and Glory, like others in the series, is a nice expansion on the dwarfen creation rules and can be found by clicking here.
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