Shadow World Player Guide – The World by Terry K. Amthor

Shadow World Player Guide – The World by Terry K. Amthor is the first RPG supplement in a planned series of guides covering the Rolemaster world of Kulthea, with both player and gamemaster guides planned.

The supplement is available as a PDF and as a softcover print on demand book, with premium and standard full colour editions, from RPGNow.com.

This guide is designed from a player’s point of view and does not give out information that a player would not be expected to be able to easily know. Consequently, some of the information is technically “wrong” – hidden and secret information is not included, and it may differ from the truth.

The book is broken into different sections by areas of knowledge, which are as follows:

Introduction, which covers how the knowledge tables are handled that are in each section.

Overview, which covers the calendar and timekeeping.

The Heavens, which covers astronomical features.

The Essænce, the magical system of Kulthea.

Geography, including climate and ecology.

Gods & Religion, describing some of the major religions.

Races, the non-human, human and immortal races.

History, a player specific knowledge of the history of Kulthea.

Powers of Note, the most well-known organisations.

Languages, which includes two dictionaries.

Appendixes, which contain information that is planned to be used in the continent-specific guides when they are released.

The actual Rolemaster specific information is very limited, as it largely consists of a table explaining what level of detail a player would know about a subject at a specific skill level, and the appropriate skills in each section. Consequently, this is practically system-neutral and should be easily convertible to other rules systems.

Although print on demand is undoubtedly more expensive than a normal print run, the softcover version – this may have been this standard version rather than the premium, but I’m uncertain on that – is very good, much better than had been expected and is in fact better quality than many older mass print run supplements. It is beautifully illustrated in full colour.

This is a useful guide for those wanting to play in Kulthea without having access to the more “spoiler” based knowledge. Click here to buy a copy of the book from RPGNow.