Free Role Playing Game Supplement Review: GM’s Monthly Miscellany: July 2015

GM’s Monthly Miscellany: July 2015 is a free role playing game supplement from Raging Swan Press. The supplement is primarily intended for use with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and is therefore covered by the Open Game License with some of it being considered Open Game Content. This is one in a monthly series that consists of eleven regular issues and a twelfth, compilation, issue which is also available as a print on demand softcover.

This is a fourteen page bookmarked PDF. Two pages are Raging Swan’s standard plain front and rear covers, one page is an advert for their Patreon campaign, one page is the Contents and front matter, one page is the Open Game License and one page is the Foreword. The supplement comes in two formats, one of which is optimised for screen, the other for print.

How Evernote Helps Me Organise My Campaign is an article from the publisher’s site about using the free, and paid, note taking platform.

Hopespyre At a Glance is from Village Backdrop: Hopespyre and gives an overview of the settlement; history, demographics, marketplace, notable NPCs and locations, village lore and rumours and has a map of the village.

The Fragrant Tower At a Glance is an extract from Places of Power: The Fragrant Tower, the first in a new line of supplements covering individual locations. This is an overview of a single building, with some details on its history, notable NPCs, lore, demographics, marketplace, notable locations and a map of the tower – the locations are all inside the tower.

Masquerade Ball: Mundane Masks and Masquerade Ball: Magical Masks are both taken from Campaign Events: Masquerade Ball, the first in another new line of supplements, this time campaign events. These are two d100 tables each of which has 50 results for masks that could be seen at such an event. The magical masks don’t possess any powers; they simply have various, non-harmful, effects.

20 Things to Find in a Pit is a simple article describing 20 different things to find in a pit trap.

The PDF is well bookmarked for its length although there were a couple of errors in these, decreasing their utility. However the supplement is short enough that this isn’t a serious problem. The text maintains a two column format and seemed error-free. There are a few black and white illustrations but these would appear to be stock or from other supplements.

This is the type of supplement intended to promote others from the publisher, and it does that and more, for it has utility in itself. There are enough details provided on both Hopespyre and the Fragrant Tower that they could be dropped into a campaign as-is. The two tables from Masquerade Ball are a bit harder to use; such balls aren’t that common an event. A couple of potential uses for them are in horror games, such as the Ravenloft supplement Masque of the Red Death, or some Call of Cthulhu scenarios, as such balls do crop up in them.

GM’s Monthly Miscellany: July 2015 is another useful edition in this line, and it’s free, so click here to get it.