Sunday, September 27, 2020

OSR Reflections on The James Mishler Castles & Crusades Wilderlands of High Fantasy Materials For Castles & Crusades Campaign Construction


 There are times when the Wilderlands of High Fantasy seems to smack me in the face. Tonight's Victorious rpg game was that kick in the face in spades after today's game. There are players with Castles & Crusades characters from the Mishler C&C  Wilderlands material & Victorious rpg characters all tropping around together. Its not as much of a problem as it might seem.



 The players get along & I've inherited this group back from DM Steve who seems to be on the mend for a week or more. He seems to be leaning towards the more part. He's added into our Victorious New York a planar door straight out of Judge's Guild's Portals of Torsh. This is going to be its own headache but so far there hasn't been a need to point this out for our campaign. 





A counter-factual cover to Wilderlands of High Fantasy
with art by Esteban Maroto came across this one on Pin Interest.

So lately its come to my attention that there's a glut of Mishler  material still on my hard drive for Castles & Crusades rpg from the Wilderlands of High Fantasy campaign setting. Most of this was given to me by James Mishler for review on this very blog. Time got away from me. 


 The Indie Go Go for the Of the Horned Gods Winter campaign has been on going for a while now. And while its peeked my interest my pocket book is a bit lonely right now with car repairs & other real world concerns.But it looks really well done & it has funded so possibly it might be something that I'll pick up later on. Is the campaign worth getting on the action? Heck yeah it is! 



The fact that the Judge's Guild people won't make a dime off my hard drive material is heartening to me. There are far too many problems with the people who inherited the Wilderlands of High Fantasy IP. Screw em, this material is for my personal campaigns that have been running for years now. But DM Steve is sorta of the expert on the Mishler material some of which came out in '08. Let's start with Barbarians of the Wilderlands by James Mishler shall we? There's a lot going on here; "Barbarians of the Wilderlands 1 features an alternative barbarian class for Castles & Crusades; tips on how to work both the original barbarian class (renamed "Savage warrior") and the barbarian in together in urban and rural civilizations; plus listing and details on the major barbarian nations of the Wilderlands. If you prefer a barbarian class based on classic pulp Sword & Sorcery themes, this is the class you have been looking for..." 


Barbarians of the Wilderlands by James Mishler  feels like a Sword & Sorcery Castles & Crusades adaptation of the classic Barbarian classes with an OSR coat of paint. This isn't a bad thing at all, it nods to the classic JG material while paying attention to the classic Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st edition roots. 
Another book that comes through with the thick eldritch lotus blosoom's smoke  has to be Aendryth's Eldritch Compendium this book clocks in at only about twelve pages. But it kicks wizard's spell lists into high gear. This is the true hard sorcery of the Sword & Sorcery adding a ton of magick & ideas into those pages. 


The other essential  book that I've been able to print out is the Tharbrian Horse-Lords which is one of the essential booklets from James Mishler. Why?! Because it complements Judge's Guild's Barbarians of the Wilderlands 1 and it does it with style. These are Celtic Mongels at thier finest & very dangerous to boot!  For me Tharbrian Horse-Lords  is one of the essential Horse Lord books for the Wilderlands of High Fantasy. 


 

The benefits for Castles & Crusades rpg is that the Mishler material fits seamlessly into the C&C system without a hitch. This makes the whole cloth of Castles & Crusades a bit more OSR & there's a very nice bridge gap over to the original Judge's Guild material. 

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