A Review of the Role Playing Game Supplement The Gangs of Vadashar – Rogues Gallery III

The Gangs of Vadashar – Rogues Gallery III by Cliff Dunn is a role playing game supplement published by ZealZaddy for use with Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition. 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 as a 28-page PDF for $2.99 from DriveThruRPG. One page is the front cover, one the front matter, one the Contents and one the Open Game License.

The first two pages of content are taken up by some links to Free City of Vadashar material, a sidebar, Welcome to the Free City of Vadashar, that is duplicated from other supplements and gives background and history of the city, its present and future and some details on using the gangs in Vadashar or in another setting.

Conceal Your Valuables covers reasons why people can turn to crime and overviews of the gangs in this edition.

The Sons of Discord covers a band of half-orcs that are a combination of mercenary company, criminal gang, specialising in wholesaling narcotics, and nomads. They spend part of the year near the Free City and there’s recently been a change of leadership. Much of the details on the gang details the origins of the Orcs as creations of one of the Giant Kings as troops to use in the wars against the Yuan Ti, then adding genetic material from humans to create half-orcs. When the wars ended, the Orcs were slaughtered, but many half-orcs escaped. This particular group originated as members of the now-disbanded Imperial Servile Legion. The current captain outmanoeuvred the previous one to gain control of the band, but the previous captain is after revenge. There are stats for many of the important half-orcs, which as with other NPC stats in these products are created in the same way as PCs, not monster stats.

The Lakeview Darters are a group of pirates that operate in the land-locked Vadashar; there is still a network of various waterways in the city. Again, there are stats for some important NPCs.

The Emissaries of the Gathering is a cult of devoted followers of the Gathering, which in truth is a scam concocted by the three leaders of the cult. Members commit various criminal acts for the cult, but over time attempts to eventually make the followers decide the cult is fake and move on have failed as the members are now true believers. There are stats for the three leaders.

The Gangs of Vadashar – Rogues Gallery III in Review

The PDF is bookmarked with major and minor sections linked. The Contents is to a similar level of depth and is hyperlinked. Navigation is good. The text maintains a two-column format and appeared to be free of error. There are a number of colour stock art pieces, up to full page in size. Presentation is good.

The three gangs in this supplement are a bit different. There are the half-orcs, which are not entirely criminal and will have internal problems between the new leader and the exiled old one; this gang in particular has a lot of background information for the setting in it. Then there’s the city pirates, who are acting as a motivation for others to do the same. Finally, there’s the cult that is as many real ones are, a criminal con. Using these in other settings should not be too difficult, though the background information from the half-orcs will definitely need changing. The Gangs of Vadashar – Rogues Gallery III is an interesting collection of gangs and it can be found by clicking here.