Thulsa presents: The Spider-God's Bride and Other Tales

T

thulsa

Mongoose
Well guys, here it is, "The Spider-God’s Bride and Other Tales”, a collection of ten blood-red sword and sorcery adventures, written by yours truly, inspired by the pulp era tales of Robert E. Howard and Clark Ashton Smith. Venture in the footsteps of Conan the Cimmerian, Satampra Zeiros of Uzuldaroum, Imaro of Nyumbani, and other fabled thieves, reavers and slayers!

The book is 200 pages and contains 10 stand-alone adventures that takes the player characters through grey mountains, steamy jungles and bleak deserts, to lost islands, ancient temples, great castles, sinister catacombs and forbidden vaults. There are more than 40 dungeon and city maps, and a separate 66-page booklet filled with NPC and monster statistics for the Conan RPG.

The book is available both as a PDF and in print. Check out this page for more information, including a preview:

http://xoth.net/publishing/xp1/index.htm

Enjoy!

- thulsa
 
Consider it bought. =) I'm just trying to make up my mind whether I should get it as PDF or Softcover. Haven't tried Lulu before.

EDIT: Ah, I want to have it now. Paypal munnies sent. =)
 
I originally had my doubts and didn't think I'd be interested in this... But, after looking at the preview material, I think I can damn sure use this in my Conan game.

We're starting to see more and more adventures with that certain "Conan" feel from Mongoose, and I'm damn glad for that. These look like they'll be a snap to convert, especially with the Conan conversion guide to help (complete with stats).

I'm almost ready to buy this. I'd like to see some reviews from people who've purchased and read it first, though.
 
Well, the PDF arrived very quickly, so I'm already flipping through the book, and writing this as I go.

First off: the book is generally written for D&D 3.5 rules, or rather, 3.5 players. The first section of the book gives an introduction to the Sword & Sorcery genre and how it is different from a typical D&D-esque fantasy game. Consequently, it presents alternative rules to adapt D&D 3.5 to a suitable S&S system.
For instance, it offers new human subraces (since nonhuman races are barred), a few new character classes (Nomad, Sorcerer), magic conversion and so forth. That's all well and good for the D&D gamer, whereas you can simply skip this section if you use the Conan RPG, let alone a different system such as Savage Worlds.
All in all, this section takes up 36 pages of the book.

The accompanying PDF for conversion to the Conan RPG is available for free download at thulsa's site, and includes the necessary stat blocks for all featured NPCs and critters.

Also, the maps for the adventures are not included in the book, and also can be downloaded at the website for free. At this point, I'd like to ask thulsa to zip all the maps into one archive for more convenient download.

There's also a small section with new equipment, nothing too fancy, just a few items that match the style of particular races/regions.
A small tidbit I particularly like is that, for this campaign setting, the standard weapons are defined as bronze or iron, whereas steel weapons cost more and give bonuses to attack and damage, while more primitive weapons (such as copper, wood etc.) also exist. Very appropriate.

The rest of the book - about 160 pages - is dedicated to the 10 adventures, my prime reason for buying the book, because my hastily self-written adventures tend to be lacking in the originality department.
Just flipping through the pages, I get the impression that most if not all of these adventures are placed in an oriental setting, ranging from (equivelantly) central Africa to east India, but not directly connected to each other. They are sorted by difficulty (from Level 1 to 10), and it looks like you can perfectly well run them in this sequence, in order to get an episodic campaign going.

It's still too early to give a final verdict, but this is my first impression and I am quite pleased. At 10 bucks for the PDF, getting this is a no-brainer. Thank you very much for bringing this to us, thulsa, and keep up the good work!
 
Clovenhoof said:
At this point, I'd like to ask thulsa to zip all the maps into one archive for more convenient download.
Click to expand...

Good idea. I've put up a zip file that contains all the maps, there is a link to it on the product page.


Clovenhoof said:
At 10 bucks for the PDF, getting this is a no-brainer.
Click to expand...

Yeah, it's basically $1 per adventure... and this should keep you busy around the gaming-table for months and months ahead.

- thulsa
 
Purchased the print version. I had no reservations ordering this one sight unseen.

For those still undecided: Thulsa is an awesome adventure and game writer. His Mesopotamia source book was a trove of great S&S ideas and scenarios.

For those wondering about Lulu: print quality is top-notch and they are quick shippers.
 
So you did it in the end. Congratulations. 8)
Who knows, may be you'll do a job out of this.

If I may add, you should propose it to DriveThruRPG, RPG.net and the like.
 
Got mine too, PdF version. I'll get the Print too but just couldn't wait.
Come on guys, this is really hot stuff for the price and your money goes to good ol'Thulsa, so you don't have any excuses for not buying it!
 
Hot damn dude! This looks tasty!
I'm going for the print version. I'd heard a rumour that Lulu had raised their international shipping costs to ridiculous amounts, but it looks like this one will cost me 17 Euros for the book and another 5 Euros for shipping to Sweden, which I think is fair.

Oh, and for those who haven't tried Lulu, I can attest to their printing and binding quality. Well, I have actually only bought once from them before (Iron Heroes Revised Edition), but it is a solid and fine-looking book.

So, thulsa, what's your next project? More adventures is my vote. :D
 
Trodax said:
I'd heard a rumour that Lulu had raised their international shipping costs to ridiculous amounts, but it looks like this one will cost me 17 Euros for the book and another 5 Euros for shipping to Sweden, which I think is fair.

Oh, and for those who haven't tried Lulu, I can attest to their printing and binding quality. Well, I have actually only bought once from them before (Iron Heroes Revised Edition), but it is a solid and fine-looking book.
Click to expand...

Lulu's shipping for softcover outside the US has only gone up slightly...it's shipping for hardcover that has become ridiculous! But the quality of their books is great for both hardback and softcover...absolutely no different to the quality of Mongoose's own stuff (post-problems, of course!).
 
Awesome work Thulsa! I like the layout, and the use of Gustave Doré's art is just brilliant! To create not just a set of pulp-styled Sword & Sorcery adventures, but to also provide a vital toolkit for S&S adventures for a broad audience unfamiliar with the genre makes it quit significant.

I hear a lot of great feedback about Lulu at the Goblinoid Games forums, as all their "retro-clone" games are published with Lulu. Not just they have good quality prints, they produce each book each time it gets ordered, and they deliver in about a week - not bad! The only problems I hear, are the high international shipping costs. I have never ordered anything from them yet, but I did receive such a book as payment for an art commission, and it arrived in 4 days.

I hope this book is successful enough to warrant an ISBN number, as it would be cool to see it available at bookstores.
 
aethelwulf22 said:
Lulu's shipping for softcover outside the US has only gone up slightly...it's shipping for hardcover that has become ridiculous!
Click to expand...
OK, I see; the raise was only for hardcovers. Isn't that kind of odd? A hardcover can't weigh that much more than a softcover I mean. Ah, well, forget about it, this is off-topic; thulsa's book is softcover and all is well in the world. :)
 
Trodax said:
OK, I see; the raise was only for hardcovers. Isn't that kind of odd? A hardcover can't weigh that much more than a softcover I mean. Ah, well, forget about it, this is off-topic; thulsa's book is softcover and all is well in the world. :)
Click to expand...

As someone would proceed to explain it anyway, I might as well do it now and get it over with:
Lulu hardcovers are printed in the US, and since Lulu hs changed their shipper, overseas prices have gone up. Softcovers for the European market are printed in Spain or so, hence the more civil shipping cost.

End offtopic.
 
Trodax said:
So, thulsa, what's your next project? More adventures is my vote. :D
Click to expand...

Actually, I am working on something right now, but it will take a while before it sees publication. Whereas "The Spider-God's Bride" is a collection of stand-alone adventures, the stuff I'm working on now is more of a mini-campaign setting (like Ancient Kingdoms: Mesopotamia), where the players are free to roam a large area, and there is a background story to tie together the various locations.

- thulsa
 
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