Commentary On OSR The Ice Kingdoms Source Book From Mad Martian Games & The Ice Kingdoms Map For Your Old School Games

No I'm not being bribed by Mad Martian Games but they did send me a really nice gift a huge color map of the Ice Kingdoms setting on heavy poster material suitable for actual play at the table. This piece of cartographic awesomeness is massive and works on a grand scale, it covers 24x36 inches and its available right over here. Now let me give you the scale of this map, I'm standing on a chair to get the whole thing in the frame!


The detail is very well done & Mad Martian is making it very difficult for me not to want to use their setting at the table. I believe that this is a part of some diabolical plan on the part of writer/designer  Christopher Barnhart

The Thanelands is very well detailed here and the whole thing resonates with me for a sword & sorcery style adventure setting. Even though the game setting is keyed for either second edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons or For Gold & Glory a second edition retroclone system. Neither of these options really clicks my switches but not because I don't like second edition AD&D but because I'm in a different place with my sword & sorcery gaming itch. Let me explain, The Ice Kingdoms hits the same sword & sorcery buttons that Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea trips. Congrats to all of the kickstarter backers who have gotten their books. They look from what I've seen fantastic & the setting resonates with a very different feel from other stuff on the market including some of the OSR Viking material. But what I like is the ease of use, there are several different pages of conversion tables that make The Ice Kingdoms very accessible to Ninety percent of the OSR retroclones currently on the market.
This book has all of the tools to take PC's into a home sword & sorcery Thanelands  based game campaign. Several reasons why this works is:

• New racial variants for Humans based on a humancentric outlook &  culture.
• New rules for class modifications which are actually usable in my opinion with current OSR systems including AS&SH or ACK's. 
• Detailed gods & pantheons as well as rules for priests of every deity because these deities fit the setting in the heavy mythological OSR sword & sorcery
• Monsters are Thaneland variations on many of the classic D&D monsters with a mythological Viking twist drawing heavily from such sources as Russian, Norse, Celtic, and deep Arthurian legends 
• The history of the Thanesland ties directly into its actual game setting location while drawing deeply from its own internal material but leaving plenty of room for DIY D&D hi jinks.
  
  
  The detail is incredible and well worth the price of admission & can't believe my good fortune to have this sent to me. The Ice Kingdoms is one of those settings that works on a multiple series of levels as a home campaign as an adventuring backdrop & as a point for more familiar D&D classic adventurers to grab a series of vacation adventures upon.
  
  
  For use at the table I can see several uses for the map as a way of keeping track of the adventurers progress across the world of the Ice Kingdsoms. This is the most obvious application as a visual reference for the dungeon master & players. The second way is for use by the DM to chart out his own machinations for adventures for his players which makes sense especially for placement of artifacts, adventure locations, important NPC's, PC families & dependents, home bases, etc. The third use is for domain & military campaign action within the game. Make no mistake this is a solid cartographic resource for both the Ice Kingdoms setting & for actual on the ground table top action.
  
  If your interested in finding out more about the Ice Kingdoms & the Thanelands there's a twenty five page pdf preview available here!
  
  There is also a facebook group for the Ice Kingdoms here. With lots of constantly updated news & Ice Kingdoms related stuff.
  
  If your interested in purchasing the Mad Martian Ice Kingdoms source book & their latest adventures in print they've got a Lulu store here!
  The giant Ice Kingdoms Map is available right over here.