Tales of Argosa Public Playtest

FREE Playtest PDF: 

https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/465681/tales-of-argosa-public-playtest

Kickstarter Link (Feb 2024):

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lowfantasygaming/tales-of-argosa

Wow, this one took me by surprise. The Low Fantasy Gaming team is rewriting LFG into Tales of Argosa and rebuilding the concept around a Shadowdark-like experience with a unique art style, presentation, and gritty theme.

How is this different from Shadowdark? LFG was always closer to a 5E-like experience than OSR, though it takes a lot of inspiration from the OSR. This is more Warhammer FRPG and Conan than old-school D&D, and there is cinematic flare here, where Shadowdark is more square-by-square grim-and-gritty. ToA also pulls in ideas from Dungeon Crawl Classics, like dangerous magic, and revamps the martial-caster power divide.

They also may go Creative Commons with this version, breaking away from the OGL and standing on their own. More games need to do this, embrace that Shadowdark energy, express their creativity, and go their own way from B/X, the OSR, and D&D - and make something more than someone else's stuff.

It is great seeing this team spread their wings and fly, taking inspiration from Shadowdark, but keeping most of what made Low Fantasy Gaming fantastic. There are tons of minor, mechanical tweaks in here to refine the experience from the first version and to pare down the cheese and exploits.

And the Kickstarter is next month.

This is another I am all in on.