If I Owned D&D what would I do? Part 2

I'd revive Oriental Adventures and expand it to include not just Japanese tropes with a handful of Chinese but Indian and Arabian Knights adventures. The Orient as a compliment to the Occident as represented in the main game. I'm not sure what the name would be but Oriental doesn't have to be offensive if the term is used correctly, it just means East. Also we're not creating accurate stuff here, this isn't RuneQuest or GURPS trying to play in the real-world setting, this is D&D which melded a thousand years of European and Near East history and myth with fantasy stories in a big pot. That's what we're going for, the feel, not the reality. Such a book would be a stand-alone (but very compatible) game like the original 1E Oriental Adventures except this time with its own Monster Manual & DM's Guide and a setting that blends Kara Tur with the Al-Qadim (Zakhara) and a new India setting.

This would mean moving some of the Near East and Eastern beasts out of the D&D Monster Manual (by Mantacores and Efreeti, I do love you) and putting them in the Oriental Adventures Monster Manual.

I'd do the same thing with Gamma World. 

Whale Roads Zine

I haven't read the Zine yet, but I love the concept. Play reports bundled together into an illustrated Zine (released for free). In this case it was a west marches campaign with three DMs. Link here. Imagine if Gary Gygax and others did this sort of thing back ub the day and we had play reports of their different campaigns. Imagine if TSR/WotC had a library of such things for people to read looking for ideas or just entertainment. I think that would be pretty cool.

I re-read the few surviving notes from my old campaigns in the 80s and wish I'd kept better records and that I'd preserved such records. Especially if the reports weren't just dry in game reports but included asides of player interactions (then they went into a 10 minute discussion of Dar from Beastmaster versus Talon from Sword and the Sorcerer...) I think the nostalgia jolt would be a lot of fun.

Cults of Shadow for sale on Drivethru

Cults of Shadow. 

The book provides a lot of background detail to bring cults to life. It's written for the 7 deities of Shadowdark but beyond that there are no mechanics and no reason it couldn't be used, adapted, torn apart to fit any OSR cults. For each of the 7 I've written up:

• Overview
• Scripture
• Penitence & Funeral Practices
• Rituals & Festivals
• Cult Ranks
• Sects & Orders
• Saints & Heroes
• Common temple layouts/features.

I've also spattered fun bits Lore in the ugly little empty spaces that appear when you try to have 2-page spreads. Currently only the pdf is available, I'm still waiting on proofs from the softcover.

Village - All 7 Villages and 21 NPCs Bundled together into a PDF

 This is probably not the final format, I expect I'll bundle them with the city-states and campaign setting,  but anyone that wants 7villages and 21 NPCs for Free here is the Link.

Village - Ginswallop

The last of the recycled villages. I might create more at some point as It's kind of fun, but I've noticed these old ones are a bit repetitive so it might be a while before I have something more creative to say. I'd like to add a bunch of interior maps but my own interior maps (at least of buildings) need a lot of practice and AI attempts at interiors suck so far. I might punt and just rename the different locations to match maps Dyson Logos has drawn, he does very  nice work. 

Village - Ferryham

 

Village - Cumber Upon Lud

I went for the most British sounding names I could find. The names don't really match with the mediterranean look of the villages but I don't care.