Free Role Playing Game Supplement Review: GM’s Monthly Miscellany: September 2016

GM’s Monthly Miscellany: September 2016 is a free role playing game supplement published by Raging Swan Press. The supplement is primarily intended for use with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, as such, it is covered by the Open Game License and some of it is considered to be Open Game Content as a result. This is the September edition of a monthly series that consists of eleven regular issues and a twelfth compilation issue that is also available as a print on demand softcover.

This is a fifteen page bookmarked PDF. Two pages are Raging Swan’s standard plain front and rear covers, two pages are ads for their Patreon campaign and website, 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 optimised for print and one for screen.

20 Curses to Encounter in a Necropolis, 8 Strange Effects, 20 Minor Hauntings to Encounter in an Ancient Necropolis and 12 Strange Sounds are all articles from the publisher’s site that were combined in 20 Things #6: Ancient Necropolis. These concern themselves with things to find in a necropolis; the curses in particular have a very Egyptian feel to them.

Shroudhaven At a Glance is from Village Backdrop: Shroudhaven. This village is given an overview, demographics, marketplace, notable NPCs and locations, lore and whispers & rumours, as well as a map. The village would appear to be largely occupied by intelligent undead – ghasts and vampires are mentioned – which would appear to be non-hostile.

Godswatch At a Glance is taken from Places of Power: Godswatch. This is a tower that watches over a river crossing and which is full of shrines to many different gods. Some information on the tower, its demographics, lore, notable NPCs and locations, events and whispers & rumours are listed, along with a map of the various levels of the tower.

Flenheim At a Glance is an extract from Subterranean Enclave: Flenheim. This is a subterranean enclave of Derro that gets an unusual amount of traffic and commerce from the surface. An overview as well as its demographics, marketplace, notable NPCs and locations, lore and whispers & rumours are given, as well as a map.

The page is well bookmarked for its length but as is now always the case, there are errors in the bookmarks. The Contents is slightly less thorough. Navigation is as a result not as good as it should be. The text maintains a two column format and all three locations with maps have errors, as the numbers on the map do not correspond to those in the notable locations lists; the latter being wrong. In Shroudhaven, the list number appears to be 8 higher, in Godswatch, it appears to be 18 higher than the map, and in Flenheim 29. Beyond the maps, there are a few pieces of stock art that are common to many supplements in this range.

This is, as always, intended to showcase products from the publisher but, as always, it still has use. Shroudhaven seems interesting, with its apparent dominance by not unfriendly undead; unfortunately not enough is detailed in the extract to really use the village. Enough details on Godswatch and Flenheim are provided to use them, even with the mapping problems. The various Necropolis-related tables can all be used quite easily; some of the curses are quite flavourful, but they aren’t really tied to the Pathfinder game.

With the problems with the maps and the difficulty in using Shroudhaven without more information, GM’s Monthly Miscellany: September 2016 is not the best in the series, but it is still interesting and it can be found for free by clicking here.