Slügs! by James Edward Raggi IV and Kelvin Green is a role playing game supplement published by Lamentations of the Flame Princess for use with Lamentations of the Flame Princess, although it should be compatible with most OSR systems. This is a bestiary of new creatures that was give away as a printed booklet for Free RPG Day 2016.
This is a forty page PDF that is available as a Pay What You Want supplement from DriveThruRPG. It can also be occasionally found as a limited print staple bound supplement from sites such as Amazon. The PDF is the version reviewed. Two pages are the front and rear covers, one page is the front matter, two pages are full page illustrations and two pages are ads for other supplements.
The single page Introduction is slightly odd – it reads like a political stump speech, about how big companies don’t allow the average gamer to win, and that’s what Lamentations of the Flame Princess is there to help with. It states that most Free RPG Day offerings are crippleware quick start offerings or one shot adventures, and that this supplement is aimed to be something different. 2016 was a U.S. presidential election year, so it’s likely deliberate that the Introduction sounds like political speechifying. It may be tongue in cheek.
Next is a brief bit on how the ¨ in Slügs! stands for giant. All of these creatures are giant, and rather odd, slugs.
There are 16 Slügs in total. It starts with the rather innocuous-sounding Acid Slüg, which sounds like a regular giant slug from the name – until the description is read and it becomes clear that the acid is of the trippy type. There are Muscle Slügs, Christmas Slügs, Rock Slügs, Slügatron – which is a Transformer – and the Love Slüg. The latter needs… pleasuring, and will return the favour to those who do so. These Slügs are unique and often pretty dangerous to interact with.
The final page of content is Apologies which kind of explains the company’s philosophy.
Slügs! in Review
The PDF is well bookmarked, with every Slüg and section linked. There isn’t a table of contents though. Navigation is decent. The text maintains a two column format and appeared to be free of errors. The book is extensively illustrated and every single Slüg has its own, black and white, illustration. This is unusual to see, and is definitely appreciated. Presentation is very good for a short supplement of this type.
The promotional text on RPGNow says that the supplement is behind the Adult Content filter, and that this means something. The majority – in fact, all but one – of the Slügs should not be offensive. That one is, naturally, the Love Slüg (the Acid Slüg may be). The description is adult, the monster illustration is adult but, most notably, there is a full page illustration at the back of the Love Slüg… entertaining and being entertained. This has nudity, and if anything is likely to offend you, this is the most likely one.
Having said that, these creatures will not be to everyone’s tastes. They are definitely different, and have the potential to be hugely disruptive in play, perhaps permanently damaging characters or having lasting campaign effects. This is, according to the postscript and comments in other places from the publisher, the entire point of monsters – any monster that doesn’t have the potential to change the campaign is not a monster but filler. Not every GM will agree with this philosophy, and the types of monsters in this will probably not appeal to everyone either. Given that Slügs! is potentially available for free, it is still worth taking a look at, for the creatures are very well done examples of the type. Even if you don’t like the type, it’s good to see monsters that have had quite a bit of – weird – care and attention put into them. Slügs! can be checked out for free by clicking here.
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