Shattered Sky - the adventure continues

For many years, I have been running a campaign that has essentially spanned various ages of the same original world setting. Starting in the Basic Set, the campaign has wound and twisted like a mere trickle of a stream that wears its relentless way through countless strata to form a deep and abiding chasm through the AD&D, D20, and Pathfinder rulesets.

This (hopefully) last incarnation is known as Shattered Sky. It is a setting evolved through about 30 years of gaming and design. It represents all that I find best and most worthy of my various gaming endeavors. It is the game I wish I could run a character of my own in. In the meantime, I try to set it all down so it can be clear to other hapless DMs and players. The latest written incarnation is a setting-specific re-visitation of the Moldvay-Cook Basic-Expert Rules. Why? Because it makes me happy.

I find myself making hard decisions regarding races, classes, magic, and other essentials. Why? Because the Shattered Sky setting was originally conceived for the D20 System and paring down all those options and additions is proving quite a task. Even so, you can expect Basic-Expert, and then some. There are just certain aspects of the later rules that suit my personal style and tickle my fancy. Every class being able to advance as equals, for example. I dislike arbitrary limitations for the sake of metagaming.

Anyway...

What follows is the next bit of tentative text from the "official" Shattered Sky Basic Rulebook. More to come (so much more), I promise.

How To Use This Book

The Shattered Sky Setting Basic Rulebook is a loving re-creation of the Moldvay Basic Rulebook and Cook/Marsh Expert Rulebook - adapted to this writer's own campaign setting. Experienced players will recognize occasional nods to later editions of D&D in the form of house rules and optional rules that reflect the personal preferences and design imperatives of this writer.

In all other ways, this book is structured exactly as the aforementioned Rulebooks and strives to reflect that flavor and view of heroic fantasy roleplaying. What it does not do is attempt to venture far beyond the levels and options from those Basic-Expert Sets.

This book assumes familiarity with the Basic-Expert Sets and is organized into the same eight parts as the originals.

Part One, the INTRODUCTION, is the section you are reading right now that attempts to convey the intent behind this book.

Part Two, PLAYER CHARACTER INFORMATION, details all the rules and options for player to create their player characters (PCs) in the Shattered Sky setting.

Part Three, SPELLS, lists and defines all magic available to clerics, elves, and magic-users for casting.

Part Four, THE ADVENTURE, gives the player an idea of how the adventure works and what to expect.

Part Five, THE ENCOUNTER, outlines the typical structure of meetings between player characters and everything else, focusing on combat of all kinds.

This ends the portion of the book intended for the player and the rest should be read only by the Dungeon Master (DM).

Part Six, MONSTERS, not only lists and details every monster found in the setting, but also explains the monster entries and special traits.

Part Seven, TREASURE, describes the mundane and magical loot acquired by the PCs during the course of the game.

Part Eight, DUNGEON MASTER INFORMATION, contains detailed information about the Shattered Sky setting and suggestions for utilizing the material in this book during the course of a Shattered Sky session or campaign.