A Review of the Role Playing Game Supplement Godstones

Godstones by N. Robin Crossby and Tom Dalgliesh is a role playing game supplement published by Columbia Games Inc. for use with HârnMaster.

This is an eight-page PDF that is available from DriveThruRPG for $3.99 but was purchased at a reduced price due to a special discount.

The supplement starts by explaining that Godstones are artefacts of the Earthmasters, a powerful race about whom little is known but who vanished 15,000 years ago. Godstones were once attributed to the gods, but not any longer; the name still remains in common usage.

A map shows the location of Godstones on Hârn, which has apparently the largest concentration of them in the Kethrian family of worlds.

What Godstones look like, how they are made (they are indestructible), how they can be detected and what they do – they are a means of transportation – is covered. The Sindarin and Khuzdul have strong feelings about the stones.

Some have allegedly experimented with Godstones, with perhaps disastrous results, and there are a few artefacts that bear some similarities to them.

Interworld Travel covers the Kethrian Worlds, giving brief details of each. Those who use Godstones to travel between them are changed to appropriate forms on other worlds.

Rules for Godstones has the mechanics on operating them. They are also old and may malfunction, and such malfunctions tend to be permanent. They have different effects on possessions and may be used to link different game worlds together.

Godstones in Review

The PDF lacks bookmarks and, despite being short, has enough different sections that these would have been useful. Navigation could be better. Apart from the first page, the text follows a two-column format and appeared to be free of error. There are a handful of colour illustrations, which if not custom are done for related material. Presentation is decent.

Godstones are powerful and rather incomprehensible artefacts – for characters – that can be introduced into a game. Using them should probably be done with care, especially as they can open up travel to other worlds, one of which is Terra; an unprepared GM could bite off more than they can chew. They are also dangerous, not exactly magical items. Godstones covers an interesting artefact of the Earthmasters and it can be found by clicking here.