Slumbering Ursine Dunes by Chris Kutalik is a role playing game supplement published by Hydra Cooperative for use with Labyrinth Lord. As such it is covered by the Open Game License and some parts are considered to be Open Game Content as a result.
The supplement is available from DriveThruRPG as a PDF for $9, as a softcover print on demand book for $14 or as both PDF and book for $14. The PDF is the version reviewed although it was purchased at the reduced price of $3.60. The PDF has 68 pages, two being the front and rear covers and one the front matter.
Welcome to the Dunes is the first section. It starts with explaining that experience in the region has found that 4-7 PCs with combines levels of around 12-18 works best, and that there are hireling NPCs available for backup. This also mentions that there are areas of the Dunes that are intentionally dangerous for low-level characters, and that GMs should flag these areas in advance. If they want to.
First Appearances describes the Dunes, which are a small coastal region dominated by massive red-sand beach dunes, that have an annual Yambor pilgrimage of the soldier-bears and for Medved, the godling that sort-of rules the area. The dunes are high and extremely difficult to climb and the inner plateau of the Dunes is always spring and known as the Weird.
A sidebar, How the Dunes to Be, gives the origin of them as a sort of myth, how Mirko entered the region and was attacked by Old Bear, who he slew and ate. Then regretted eating and he became Medved, a combination of both.
Factions and Personalities is the next major section. There are four major factions, which are given an overview, as well as their relationship with other factions and the party. Lawful good Jaromir the Old Smith is an 8th level NPC (unusual for the setting) whose hamlet of Kugelberg may be a safe refuge. Medved the Master is the chaotic good godling of the region who may also prove helpful. The Eld are extradimenional lawful evil elves. They will stick to the letter of any agreement they make and are attempting to tear a hole in reality. Ondrj the Reaver is a chaotic evil wereshark related to Medved. He has a crew of corsairs and primarily wants destruction and will find it difficult to overcome his natural tendency to attack the party. There is a sidebar on how the various names are pronounced and another sidebar gives examples of how various NPCs will talk.
There is a d20 table of rumours, of various veracity (including one that states the pirates of the region take violent umbrage to being spoken to in the hoary clichéd tongues of otherworlds; i.e., if you talk like a pirate – namely Robert Newton‘s portrayal of Long John Silver – they will likely attack). A d12 table has wandering monsters.
Using the Map explains that when this was originally run a hex map was used but it has been released as a pointcrawl, not a hex crawl. The author believes that a pointcrawl better represents the funnelling nature of the nearly unclimbable dunes. The map is comprised of a series of nodes with connections between them. These nodes represent interesting places to adventure sites such as dungeons, places for encounters or unusual geography. This is followed by the map itself.
Pointcrawl Locales is the various points on the map. There are 25 numbered locations as well as the unnumbered farmstead that serve as the major entrance to the dunes. There are about eight pages of locales, some of which are potentially very dangerous for low-level characters. Two of the locations are full-on adventure sites.
Adventure Site 1: The Golden Barge is partially buried in the dunes and partially damaged. It has a technological and magical feel to it, and is primarily occupied by Ghuls, who believe they are followers of a religion that espouses the cleansing of people’s sins by eating them. They are actually a defence mechanism of the barge. There are other occupants, including some Eld and a four-armed white ape that waits at the top of some stairs with some stainless steel water barrels that he throws down at the characters, trying to knock them to the bottom (in other words, Donkey Kong).
Adventure Site 2: The Glittering Tower is the home of the godling Medved in the upper region. Parts of the tower are under the control of the Eld and the dungeon area is dominated by the wereshark Ondrj.
Following this section is the Optional Chaos Event Index. The Index alters randomly to indicate the influence the different factions have and characters’ actions can also have an effect, with definite changes. As the Chaos Index number increases, increasingly weird – and often hazardous – events can occur. This may be optional, but it really should be used.
Appendix A: Bestiary describes the new monsters found in the region.
Appendix B: Unique Spells has two new spells.
Appendix C: New Classes has two new classes for characters.
Appendix D: Pre-Gen Hirelings has a d10 and a d12 table of briefly detailed, yet with their own oddities, NPCs to hire.
Finally, there are maps of the Golden Barge and the Glittering Tower.
Slumbering Ursine Dunes in Review
The PDF lacks bookmarks or a table of contents; navigation is, as a result, extremely poor. The text maintains a single column format and appeared to be free of errors. There are a variety of black and white illustrations inside, up to a full page in size, all of which appear to be custom. Presentation is good.
In the text, there are occasional notes from the author about how this region was originally played; these are interesting and can spark ideas. Also mentioned are where some places led to in the original game (Tekumel, Sigil, the “Summer Country,” the Cerulean Vaults). Some of these are pretty familiar names but none are elaborated on. There are also a few references to upcoming products, none of which appear to have been released, at least not by the names used in this supplement, as there are several others in this series and some related ones.
This is a weird region, but in a good way. There is a lot of flavour and spells and magic items can be far more interesting than normal and the characters are definitely odd. The pointcrawl itself is not very large, but there are a lot of oddities to encounter, and oddities include intelligent “people.” The Chaos Event Index should definitely be used; it adds an extra level of weirdness to the region, and this is intended to be a weird region – it’s even called the Weird in places.
Slumbering Ursine Dunes is a very nice, different supplement. Perhaps not for everyone, but for those who like an element of the bizarre in their OSR experiences, it definitely stands up. The lack of any means of navigation in the PDF really lets it down though; this is long enough, and with enough different locations and sections, that bookmarks at the very least are needed. Unlabelled player maps of the two primary adventure locations would have been a nice addition too. Slumbering Ursine Dunes is definitely different and it can be found by clicking here.
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