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Predisposition:

I'm not, as I've stated, a D20 fan; that being given, I am a Lone Wolf fan, not as diehard as some, but I have many enjoyable hours in my past as a Kai Lord or a Magician.

Lone Wolf Books

These were fun little game books that offered what is essentially solo play with a mostly pre-generated character--Lone Wolf, or Greystar. Said characters were tweaked slightly by your choices of their supernatural abilities, then you took them on an adventure by reading passages, facing encounters and deciding what to do, as well as battling foes using either dice or the number selection system in the book. They were far superior to "Choose Your Own Adventure" books. They also, in my opinion, have a bit more style and careful world building, it seemed than the somewhat similar Sorcery books. The books are now available from PROJECT AON, on the web Project Aon These are digital editions made available through the wonderful generosity of their creator, Joe Dever.

Aon is the world of Lone Wolf and Greystar. It is at first what might seem a typical fantasy world with forces of thee Dark, the good guys, ancient magicians, monastic mystic warrior guilds, knights, pirates, dwarves and so on. Though it goes much deeper than that, you see the characters are evocative and unique in many ways, with some very different style choices made that creates a world that is fun, interesting, and worth exploring.

The RPG game book itself is a hardbound 304-page book, with heavy-duty 'cloth' (i.e. cardboard) cover, color cover art, but with black and white interiors. The interior or art is typical for black and white games; sadly, it is apparently not art from the original books that had a rather unique stylistic flavor.

Welcome to Magnamund

Magnamund is the mainland of the world of Aon and is the primary locales where the adventures of Lone Wolf occur, this chapter introduces the world. Perhaps too brief to convey the weight of mega-series like Lone Wolf.

The basics of the game, dice used, attributes all the general information needed to play a D20/OGL game are covered by this chapter, although the finer art of skills and combats are left for a later chapter.

Among these explanations are some of the differences, such as the Endurance die, and its use (as hit points). As well as advice on disallowing multiclassing that while possible in D&D and other D20 games, seems a bit odd for Lone Wolf, almost inconsistent with the tone of the works. Though discouraged here it is still technically allowed.

Since this is an OGL game I find it strange they took relatively few risks with the system--attributes still work the same, classes, levels, hit points, advancement, skills, and armor work mostly the same as D&D--I have to wonder why this is OGL, rather than D20, because so much of the core system was kept. One of the good things here is that magic, at least, is very different, thus making this game take a huge leap forward to me in terms of playability over some of its predecessors.

The lack of feats should also be noted, and yes you read that right--feats do not exist; instead, things that might be considered feats occur as class abilities under the appropriate class. This doesn't bother me one bit, as I am not a fan of what many feats do mechanically and their general inconsistent purpose from various OGL/D20 games (some feats are skill bonuses, others special powers, and in some they are wuxia martial arts abilities. Not having them actually makes this a better product overall, especially since they were not things found in the Lone Wolf works.

This chapter wraps up with an examination of good and evil. It is clear that is because no matter what your profession, you are meant to be GOOD, big G at your core. Regardless of being "nice" or "perfect", you are meant to play a hero in a fantasy epic nothing more, and nothing less.

All of this so far crafts a much simpler version of D20, one which is highly unique in flavor, but also terribly familiar, yet its approach is simple enough that this makes it a very good introduction to role-playing, especially D20 versions of that. (I can think of better games to do that with, but not better D20/OGL ones.) The core is solid and similar enough that one could jump to D&D with little difficulty and very little system shock.

14 out of 20 faces.

Classes

The class chapters beyond specific information unique to each one lists those that would cooperate with each other, their likelihood of accepting outsiders, as well as the chance one can "leave" the profession for another and come back. Since it discourages multi-classing, it may have just said no to the whole idea and saved the space spent here on advising how to "handle" multiclassing.

Who are Lone Wolf and Greystar? Who will you be?
There are 7 classes in the core rulebook

Each class details a profession of the world, but not generic professions; rather these are the heroic, exceptional professions.

The Brother of the Crystal Star is essentially a magic wielder, trained and often of Noble birth because the finest nobility send their sons and daughters to become Brothers (or Sisters) of the Crystal star. The basic concept of magic in the world of AON is different than "core" (or should I say D&D) d20. Magic, while a trained ability, comes in the form of specialized capabilities that can be used and reused, abilities that grow from a basic ability to become powerful and awe-inspiring powers. Rather than expendable spell slots they have tiers of ability that can be accessed as the character grows in play and specific paths of power one can obtain.

Some limitations do exist though; certain spells tire the wizard, costing fatigue in the form of endurance. This limitation is severe as Endurance, in Lone Wolf RPG is also a character's hit points, their ability to avoid a life-ending blow! In addition, spells of higher tiers can only be used a limited number of times a day based on their Intelligence modifier (while the lowest tier can be used as long as they like, and, if costing endurance, have the energy to power it). Crystal Star wizard's magic is based on power words, and essentially requires a skill roll (based on occult) to activate. So while a bit more open in some ways than D&D magic, it is still quite limited. Crystal Star wizards can also counter spell other magics, this being their primary ability to actually combat enemy magical spells. Rather than a duel of pure power, you get a reactive ability to undo magic, but it is not an easy task either.

Spells:

In addition to this, there are for most of these spells multiple tiers of effect, which increase their power significantly.

Once a Brother or Sister reaches a certain level (10th), they can begin selecting mastery of particular power words--this adds an additional set of more powerful effects.

This class is very much a classical wizard, un-proficient in arms and armor except for the quarterstaff, dart, dagger, and spear. Crystal Star wizards are also bound by an Oath not to harm other members of their order which might create some interesting conflicts of ethics in play.

Dwarven Gunner of Bor is the only non-human profession listed, in fact, this is the only truly playable non-human race, as well. Dwarven Gunners are a bit of oddness for me as I don't recall ever running across one playing the Lone Wolf of Greystar characters, but they defiantly fit the world as I've seen. Plus, while they are pretty much stuck in a very limited role mechanically (they have the least flexible abilities of all the professions it seems), they do have guns and can gain significant and quite canny accuracy and lethal prowess with their focus, almost akin to magic.

Though my player who chose this profession had visions of six-gun-like slinging of black powder pistols, it focuses on their being users of large bore rifle-like flintlocks rather than pistols. (I may very well house rule this because it allows some unique flavor to his character.) /p>

Most of their better abilities (speed loading) work only with the rifle, hence the reason why I may make such an alteration for his image to fit. Being less familiar with the Gunners than other classes, I'm not sure if the player's image is acceptable to the setting, but it is to mine. In addition to being able to fashion and use firearms, come a whole host of other abilities as they advance--dealing with explosives. Considering the lack of other users of such technology, it makes them quite a bit more effective even for their lack of ability to tailor that individually.

The Dwarven Gunner gets abilities based on level advancement with a few choices--they start out with Forge Lore, get a rifle and shot to start. (They are proficient with firearms, crossbows, all one-handed melee weapons, and all armors (this is a huge advantage), plus they can use a specialized war-axe one-handed.) As they advance, they gain Secret of the Gun which is a collection of mini skill enhancements dealing with speed-loading, accurate shots, defensive shots (shooting arrows from the air) and so on. They also can learn a variety of other level dependant gun-powder oriented abilities.

Now we get to the whole point to this, the Kai Lord

Fundamentally, at least for me, was that Lone Wolf was cool--he was the kind of PC I longed to play in tabletop RPG--a heroic, wandering hero with a smattering of abilities over the field. At its heart they have much in common with Strider in LOTR, but there is a bit more under the surface.

They are essentially an honorable and noble society of do-gooder rangers, but they differ a great deal in some ways from the typical "D&D" variation of the theme. They are trained in a monastery; they are a skill-heavy class and have fairly balanced saves, but more importantly they have a variety of abilities that stem from mystic skills trained into them as well as decent (but not on par with a Gunner or a Knight) combat capabilities. Want more? Kai Lords are the secret agents of the Kingdom of Sommerlund; they are that world's elite agents. Considering Sommerlund borders the lands controlled by the Dark, you may see why an infiltrative order of do-gooders is useful. They aren't above deception for the greater good. They are masters of a very honorable, if ubiquitous conspiracy to fight evil.

In play, I had a player choose one of these, and felt he might have misunderstood "monastic" as being "ascetic." He played the role well if a bit less kind hearted than I envisioned, but he was not familiar with Lone Wolf, he otherwise still played it well.

Lone Wolf as a character is the last Kai Lord (his order being destroyed, and him forced to run from the Dark).Through trials and tribulations, he manages to do a great bit of good and grows in power to become a Magnakai, an elite, extremely powerful champion of the Kai Lords.

Kai Lords get a choice of discipline paths--similar to the spells of Crystal Star Wizards, but sometimes subtler of effect.

They are proficient with all ranged weapons (except guns and shiel-fa) and light armors and shield. Just examining their capabilities will show you they are not your typical fantasy ranger, though there are similarities (their hunting and animal based abilities)

As it should, this is where a game called "Lone Wolf" should shine the most--lots of options here that allow an entire party of Kai Lords to have different capabilities (and of course fits the original books quite well.)

Magicians of Dessi represent the class of the other, lesser utilized but quite interesting character presented as a player character in the Lone Wolf books bearing his name--Greystar.

The Dessi are descended from the Elder Magi who brought magic to the world of Aon in the first place, and while human, they are a bit different. Magic is something they are born with and it takes a great deal of training to prevent them from destroying themselves with their efforts.

The magic of the Dessians is called the Elder art, and unlike spells of Crystal Star wizards, or the powers of Kai lords they tend to be broader but have less heights of power--having no Tier of increased effect.

However, the Elder Art allows the Magician to access the following abilities:

They can also engage in psychic combat, and as they grow in power, can channel a great deal of increased power through their staff. In general, the role of the Magician of Dessi seems focused on information abilities and less on direct combat, but with their staff they do become quite capable as they learn.

One of the less "noble" of the heroic Aon types, the Shadaki buccaneer is a master sailor, swashbuckler, and, with a touch of pirate, fulfills the closest thing to a "rogue" profession of the lot.

Like the Gunner, this class seems somewhat limited in options, and more limited in actual play, mostly because a lot of thee other adventuring professions tend to be somewhat land-bound. This makes one group or the other likely a bit out of place when they meet. This is not an insurmountable limit, but a limit all the same. Regardless, a GM worth his sea-salt can throw the lot together, but it seems odd to have a limited environment profession such as this one.

Although the later Sommerlunder knight has some similar limitations, a Knight has a far less severe limitation than a water-traveling profession. The buccaneer's limited choices in advancement are problematic, and just don't seem to be the same vein as most of the others. It's a bit of a wide traveled class all the same, and considering their native government, it is likely to find a few having fled to somewhere, even inland to escape a bit of those tyrannies. I suspect that will last only briefly at best. If one wants a civilized, vibrant warrior who is light of feet, this may be the best choice for them.

Sommerlund has a long history of knighthood. This forms the more obvious of their militaristic forces, and fills its ranks with Sommerlund Knights of the Realm and in fact Knights here have numerous capabilities that make them very suitable heroes. A knight's combat- and valor-based traits give them a lot of use, as well as their arms and armor proficiencies. Though somewhat geographically limited, (their recognition is more effective in Sommerlund itself), they are not quite as restricted in terms of travel as the Shadaki buccaneers. The Knight has several advantages, such as wielding a broadsword one handed (not a one-handed weapon in Lone Wolf nominally) as well as the proficient use of heavy armors; added to that, his command and horse talents make this hero quite a bit more useful even for his honor-bound limitations.

The final class presented for use in the core book is the Telchos warrior. The country of Telchos is ruled by a gynarchy, and finds men a precious resource to be protected. Therefore, most Telchos warriors are female.

Fulfilling a barbarian-like role, the Telchos Warrior has access to a rather unique weapons set--a whip like atl-atl (spear thrower) called the shiel-fa, which can fling light javelins called hand-bolts with enough force to make these light shafts deadly. Plus, it can be used as a whip on its own. This warrior isn't proficient in armor, but gains numerous abilities to support survival in the desert land that are native, too, as well as primal screams with mystic effects. Perhaps more than the others, this profession intrigues me because it truly evokes the differences of Magnamund from some a more typical fantasy realm.

12 of 20 faces

Skills

Little to mention here, the basics of the Skill system are covered and not much else. My players had some confusion in understanding what skills were needed for some of their class abilities (did the Gunner need Craft for his firearms?) but most of that was covered in the chapter on the class in question (although it would have been nice to make note of it here again.)

Take 10 and Take 20 is described as well as Skill synergy. Each skill provides the normal information on its uses, as well as providing some sample DC's to give a GM a good idea of how hard to judge certain tasks, over all useable and useful section for an introductory style rpg.

12 of 20 faces

Equipment and Special Items

A chapter of general equipment and special magical and Magnamundian items such as the Wilder Cloak, a Bronin War hammer, or, yes, the fabled Sommersword. One note is that the equipment material carries the classic "item type" from the original game books, meaning some items can only be carried in a Backpack (note capitalization), mostly, I suspect, as nostalgia factor.

15 of 20 faces

Combat

Simplified (and much cleaner) combat chapter than in core D20, no attacks of opportunity, though the system is well detailed including aiding others, mounted combat, dealing with movement and other factors in play. It is still more complex than combat in the original game books, and for that, especially since it is OGL, and not D20, it suffers here. (Admittedly most combats in the books were pretty much roll die, win, lose type affairs with little "round to round" style tactics, but I prefer such items be abstracted and left to player and GM to describe, rather than produce hard codification for such flexibility. Players and GM's make the combat more interesting when given such freedom.

Also detailed are the rules for magical combat, and psychic combat (which actually occurs as a an addenda to the original combat round, taking place outside it). This design makes for an interesting addition to the standard play-by-play blow of the round, especially for the psychic heavy Kai Lords (who, let's face it, are the reason most of us wanted this game.)

Adventuring in Magnamund

A bit misnamed, a chapter such as this deals with challenges, traps, hazards and weather, as opposed to adventures themselves. Turn to page 50 for more review.

The Lone Wolf Games Master

A vital and important chapter those of us who wish to run Lone Wolf (like me). It provides details on what makes Magnamund essentially Magnamund, as well as concepts that some games overlook--shortening travel times to focus on the interesting bits of the story, among other tidbits of sound advice

The advice of this chapter seems geared to less experienced game masters, but that doesn't limit its quality and I suggest it be required reading for anyone running any game, simply because of its focus on flavor of a world.

The only bits that should be excised is the "Lone Wolf Sourcebook" bit about using it to support D&D--did this game really want to be OGL? I mean, honestly? The fact that it keeps drawing back to D&D makes me think it didn't, or wasn't, envisioned as a separate and distinct game. That is one of the truly hideous crimes here, and it's rating suffered again because of that fact.

NPC classes--not much unique here. A lot of it seems to focus on slight variations of the core D&D-style NPC professions varied slightly, I'm not sure how Magnamundian they are however as they stand.

12 of 20 faces

Magnamund Gazetteer

Now this chapter gets its rating right of the bat--19 of 20 faces on the old d20.

The reason for this is that the chapter is that good. It details the timeline and then goes country by country breaking down each one into a quick overview, a bit of history, as well as future events (since the game is set about 50 years prior to the Lone Wolf "Flight from the Dark" book.) Not a perfect chapter, but very useful and useable information on Magnamund. I suspect the only way to get better information is to be a fanatic of Lone Wolf, or find the ill-fated out-of-print Magnamund companion. Otherwise, this chapter is very much a pivotal point in the game that gives us useful, useable information on the world.

Magnamund Bestiary

A basic view of several of the unique beasts of Magnamund and their statistics are contained herein. The only real flaw here is that we don't get the clearest placement scheme (how, when and why to use such creatures) as possible.

15 of 20 faces.

Designer notes

A short bit more bio than anything else; their decisions within the game itself are not addressed.

The remaining pages are a random number table--so reminiscent of the original books, but obviously aimed at d20. I'm not sure how useful it is, but it's nice to have it tucked back there, then we get an index that is serviceable but not perfect (I tried to look up a unique class ability to see if it were mentioned anywhere else and it wasn't listed), and finally the OGL License.

Overall, the game book is a solid piece of work; it isn't, however, groundbreaking. It cleaves close to D&D without truly stepping too far from its roots--while it has the Magnamund spirit, it misses a portion of its body in trying to keep close to the basic rule structure of D&D--this is not a bad thing, as the game books were highly controlled and directed (scripted) in design, and while fun in their own way, role-playing with a live and adaptable GM is very different and a much more evocative and complete experience. Though one should not overlook the quality and fun of the Lone Wolf game books just because they are different.

The adventure I ran was called "Well of Darkness." It began with the heroes being friends of the Kai Lady, Shy Sparrow (on her way to Magnakai status), asking the heroes to deliver four letters, three to various village elders across the edges of Sommerlund, and one to her sister at a farm near the last village. Of course, things went wrong as things commonly do. The hero's first encounter was a pair of Doomwolves, and it looked to be the last, as well, considering their positively abysmal die rolls. This is where my recommendation come from for house rules, or if ever a second edition-add hero points/action points of some kind. For a game about heroes dying because of a bad die roll is boring, and frustrating, and this isn't a Lone Wolf game book where you flip back to before the bad decision and make a good one forewarned. (I didn't do this. I usually started over with a "new" character but it seems I was the only one to do so). Though in time they managed to win out the day, part of their risk was that the gunner spent a round reloading rather than simply switching to a melee weapon and ending the fight much faster.

They made it to the first village and encountered the very friendly villagers, and Alderman Yeor, whose daughters were trotted out in hopes one of the two human heroes, might be smitten. At the dinner meal, one of said beautiful daughters poisoned the lot of them. A rule of the game books mentioned by a die-hard fan, not included in the game, which seems to be "Of two NPC's encountered at a time-one is always an assassin". Though I think, with a party of three players this rule must be minimized as otherwise the assassins will soon outnumber farmers in Magnamund. Penelope (the assassin) didn't wish to get married and so tried to make sure there was no chance, failing (as was the purpose--she isn't a trained assassin, yet, anyway), she was uncovered and fled.

The heroes who were not bed sick from the poison (the Dwarf and the Kai Lord) sought out their assassin and discovered her diary, finding out her fondest desire to become a free woman warrior or assassin without the leash of a husband.

So player's being players, they did the only sensible thing, they decided to recruit her! This was unforeseen, but after a bit of a chase by them and the town's sheriff, they caught her and made her a deal to help her become a warrior. They then made off, as soon as the chirurgeon had seen to their Knightly friend (who now held a grudge knowing who his would-be assassin was.)

The next village was, well, peaceful relatively speaking, though they encountered a barroom brawl made up of all the currently awake town guardsmen (it seems a bad poker hand determines who gets the night shift, and they resend the people who got day shift...oh well.) It took some doing, but after a night's rest, they found the loser of the poker hand, the town alderman, in a near coma from ale consumption in the tavern's basement. They then passed on their letter and made off to the final village.

Where of course, they found everyone dead. Investigating until nightfall, they hadn't located the cause of death. But as soon as the last light of day fled beyond the hills the dead decided to get and make a thorough nuisance of themselves.

Barricading themselves inside the smithy, the heroes waited until dawn when the dead fell back immobile, and then committed heinous crimes against the corpses and the undertaker's guild by dismembering them and burning them on a pyre. Heroes 20, zombies-0, searching a bit more they make it to the well where before nightfall they'd noticed most of the bodies had been clumped-and yes there was something going on at the well.

The Knight, and Penelope, clambered down while the Kai Lord and Dwarven Gunner slept (their players literally slept), the remaining awake player continued the adventure alone with the NPC assassin. This is where evil gm's cackle.

Finding the well was just a shallow pond fed by a water flowing through a cave system, the Knight and lady wandered upstream discovering a man-made wall. With careful searching skills, they discovered an ancient door sealed with a puzzle lock that the Knight promptly solved with little effort.

Following the path around and up, they discovered another door-this one trapped, which triggered and promptly failed to harm anyone. Brushing off poisoned needles from his armor the knight solved yet another puzzle door and entered a crypt antechamber.

Skeletons attacked nearly slaughtering both of them before the knight began using the flat of his broad sword to undo the skeletons with a few quick smashing blows. Inside, beyond the antechamber, the crypt had a sarcophagus which was center stage for the water running down a stalactite into the stone box and through the undead thing inside before pooling in the room and leaking out through a crack in the far wall. Shattering the stalactite the knight discovered a lance or spear that had pinned a shadowy wraithlike form in the sarcophagus. Once removed, the shadow vanished and the water was no longer deadly and tainted.

I give the game broad score of 15 of 20.

Average Score: 14 faces of 20

I really found this game a nice useful OGL product. If I were recommending a game to a d20 fan who wanted "good" but "simpler than D&D", or a Lone-Wolf fan, I would say it's a definite must buy. If I were recommending it out of all possible games, it is a solid "look for yourself at the store." I am very glad to have the book and will be making good use of it to run a continuing campaign.

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