A Review of the Role Playing Game Supplement LORDS OF OLDSKULL – Book I – Krampus

LORDS OF OLDSKULL – Book I – Krampus is a role playing game supplement written and published by Kent David Kelly. The supplement details a single creature and associated material and is covered by the Open Game License with some parts considered to be Open Game Content as a result. Going by the OGL, this is designed particularly for Labyrinth Lord.

This is a 43 page PDF that is available from RPGNow for $1.59 but which was purchased at the reduced price of $0.99 during a sale. Two pages are the front and back covers, three pages are the front matter and two pages are the Open Game License.

This supplement describes a single creature, the exiled demon lord Krampus, the Lord of Bloodwinter. It is intended to be the first in a series of supplements, but it is currently the only one at the time of writing.

First Krampus himself is described starting with his stats. Krampus is dangerous, but does not appear extremely so to high level characters. Following the stats are some details on how Krampus behaves, including that he doesn’t behave in the manner of most demon lords, and prefers the company of saints, not demons.

The Phantasmagoric Rituals of Krampus explains how Krampus is summoned and that he has different powers every year, which need rolling randomly. These are a number of spell-like powers, many of which are themed variations on standard spells.

The Draining of the Prey covers how Krampus attacks his victims and what happens to victims who are drained by the demon lord. What happens depends on the victim’s alignment; the three old alignments of Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic are used.

The Weaknesses of Krampus describes what Krampus is susceptible to.

The Relics of Krampus are the demon’s possessions, weapons and what he often leaves behind.

Finally, the last things to directly deal with the demon lord are The Departure – what he leaves behind – and The Adorers of Krampus, his cultists. As Krampus generally doesn’t directly attack people, he has more of a following than might be expected.

New Character Class: The Winterbringer details the class for Krampus cultists. This is laid out in a typical manner for a character class. It is rather similar to a cleric, but with some different powers, and some new spells. The new spells are those detailed earlier as Krampus’ own abilities.

Finally, there is the Lament, essentially a pieces of verse related to Krampus.

LORDS OF OLDSKULL – Book I – Krampus in Review

The PDF has the major and some of the minor sections bookmarked but they could perhaps go a little deeper. Navigation is okay. The text maintains a single column forma and appeared to be free of errors. There are a number of public domain illustrations, up to a full page in size, which have, as usual, been placed in a fairly random manner. Presentation could be better.

Krampus is described in detail, including his adherents, more detail than is often found for such a creature. He is also a bit unusual for a demon lord – perhaps that’s why he’s in exile – in that he doesn’t particularly like demons, has random powers every year and typically only kills in self-defence. This makes him more interesting than many demon lords. Krampus looks to be ready to drop into a campaign as-is; unusual for the Castle Oldskull series. LORDS OF OLDSKULL – Book I – Krampus describes an interesting foe and it can be found by clicking here.