Warlock! is a fantastic game, easy to learn, easy to run, easy to play. I'm pretty sure I've already reviewed it in the original edition so for more thoughts definitely go check out the reviews there.

This Traitor's Edition then is a considerable facelift from the original with all updated layout, art, and design. As much as I like the look and feel of the original I get that it wouldn't appeal to all audiences which I think this edition largely addresses. So to all those that are wondering if they have the original and are unsure about whether to get this version as well, I say... why not!? It's a great game in whatever style and more copies is just more books you can hand out on game night when someone wants to check what are the skills of the rat catcher career. The only caveat I might offer is that there are a couple minor errors that might not be fixed in the print on demand physical copy but that Fire Ruby Designs is quick to correct and update in the pdf.

Fantastic little hack of The Black Hack. If I wanted to play Fallout as a tabletop RPG this is what I'd use. Absolutely great vibe here for playing in a wasteland that is horrible but still hasn't lost its sense of humor. The class options are all dripping in flavor and feel totally unique to each other, not just in character but mechanically as the theme even influences how they roll for their attributes as an example. Get it, it's great.

Black Sword Hack is yet another great example of the family of Black Hack games delivering excellent experiences around an easy and fun core. Black Sword Hack utilizes an excellent Doom mechanic that is built around TBH's usage dice system that measures how the characters are tempting fate. In effect it's a blackjack system where players will always be tempted to draw one more time but at the risk of going bust, becoming doomed, and being put in real jeopardy. This is just one example of an evocative and thematic mechanic in Black Sword Hack that is also fun for its game implications. Additionally, this book does a great job of giving instructions for building your own world imperiled by the loss of balance and a drift toward a doom by Law or Chaos for campaign play which is both thematically interesting and useful for getting playing almost immediately.

I love what Golgotha is doing. It’s “dungeons” but not dungeon crawl with a focus not room by room but narratively interesting choices or challenges, you have a specific over-arching objective and a limitation (usage dice clock) on how long you can take to do it. It’s all about evocative wonders, unexplainable technologies, complications, and hurdles - with a bit of transhumanism. Driven by simplicity of TBH.

Had this run for me as a player and had a lot of fun. Great way to get a good feel for the game and experience a number of its systems. It felt very setting-appropriate. Hoping to run it soon for others as well.

Warpstar! is the eagerly awaited (certainly by me) Sci-fi take on Warlock!. Quite simply, if you liked Warlock!, and you want a Sci-fi game to add to your repertoire then Warpstar! should be an immediate buy. If you haven't already played Warlock! (you should) then Warpstar! is a rules-light Sci-fi game with an implied setting that gives you just enough to work with but doesn't hem you in by being overly detailed. The Chorus of a Million worlds has all the space you need to tell the stories you want to tell and the easy to hack and understand mechanics mean the rules aren't going to get in your way either while still having some fun and clever mechanics to play around with as you explore space... And hopefully not get twisted by Warpspace, though that can be fun too!

If I had to choose among the supporting books for Warlock! which to buy first, I'm feeling like Compendium 2 would be my prime candidate. It does a lot to give tools to contextualize characters and bring them to life for those who felt that the default system may have been able to do more in that regard. Talents, the incredible introduction of Pluck (an inverse of Luck from Warlock! and tied into a mental stress/horror system), and lovely easy-peasy guidelines for making NPCs (on the fly or beforehand) are some of my favorite tools that Compendium 2 brings to your Warlock! toolbox. Oh, did I mention bombs?

Beautiful little game using an open game engine coming from the old WEG Star Wars which held immediate nostalgia value for me. The setting is evocative and the world asks to be brought to life at the gaming table, the artwork throughout gives plenty of fodder to do just that.

It does exactly what it says on the tin! A good example of how easy it is to create a perfectly playable game in a very short space.

Warlock! Compendium adds quite a lot of themed flavor to the mechanics of Warlock! If you felt that the standard set of careers in Warlock! lacked choices that really made your Halfling feel like a Halfling, never fear, compendium has your back. Ever wonder what the effects of chaos on The Kingdom (Warlock!'s implied setting) might be or where it comes from? Oh yeah, Compendium has you covered. Have you thought about having your party tangle with a nasty old necromancer but didn't feel the base spells in Warlock! were getting you there, well... yeah, compendium has you covered. Like options? Well... you get the point. Get Compendium.

Warlock! comes with its implied setting and it's great for what it is. It seems as though each career has some little element somewhere that you can use to start hanging a story from. But maybe you want a little more? Who's the King of the Kingdom anyway? Kingdom gets you there, it's a great example of giving you a ton more details, hooks to hang your scenarios and adventures from but doesn't make the mistake of being too detailed or thurough. I think this is the perfect mix that keeps you with almost all the freedom you could want but also lots of bits and pieces ready to get seized upon and made into fun play sessions. The map of the Kingdom itself, included in Kingdom, is drawn to not be overly precise - and this is a fantastic design choice. Kingdom just continues to do what Warlock! does so well, it gives you the tools you need and many you might want and then it gets out of your way. Finally, included in this setting expansion is a full deep-dive on one city in the Kingdom which is chockablock full of scenario hooks and tables if you want a place to start running adventures tomorrow with very little setting work. If you like Warlock! and want more Kingdom, here it is, get it.

Warlock! is a fantastic little game that, pretty remarkably for an indie title, could make a great entrypoint into the hobby. Warlock! is inspired by the early days of fantasy role-play gaming but divorced from a lot of the vestigial wargame nonsense that continue to burden some of the larger old IPs in the genre. Warlock!'s rules are simple but not to the point of removing interesting choices and are also largely not interconnected such that you can modify bits and pieces without a million unintended consequences in some other subsystem. My players are really enjoying it and I'm enjoying running it.