By Simon Miles Dunromin University Press OSRIC
[…] These days there are few that have ever heard of the Great Old Ones, fewer still that have heard of the Rakuli. Learned scribes argue over the legitimacy of any trace of their ancient culture. Their artistic relics and magical items are often misappropriated by lesser species. They have passed into the mists of irrelevance. So what were they? What happened to them?
And why are adventurers returning from the deep Darkworld telling tales of powerful entities and carrying strange and powerful items they have stolen from these new foes?
This 52 page supplement is not an adventure. It just details the history and culture of some evil ancient race.
Note that it is in the Adventure section of DriveThru. Note that the blurb talks about adventurers returning. Note that the blurb says “there are adventure hooks …” implying that there is an adventure.
There is not any sort of adventure in this.
I am NOT amused.
I am VERY MUCH not amused.
This is an ongoing issue with DriveThru. Not only is poetic license taken with putting non-D&D in the OSR category, but the publishers/designers seem to revel in placing non-adventures in the adventure category. I’m guessing this is some kind of cross-listing ploy, in order to maximize the visibility of a product?
Whatever it is, it sucks. Now I’m stuck with this thing. Frankly, I’m surprised this doesn’t happen to me more often, given the frequency with which I buy. I guess I’m getting better at figuring out from the descriptions that things are not D&D and/or not adventures/cross-posted crap. (And to be clear, it’s crap because of the trickery, regardless of the quality.) It seems amazing to me that you can’t actually buy what you intend to buy anymore. I ordered a power supply for my kids computer last night … and the same thing popped up. Right size? Right rating? Right format? Who knows.
I’m convinced that the key is a generous return policy. In this case it’s Pay What You Want, but I wish DriveThru had a more substantial return policy.
This is Pay What you Want at DriveThru with a suggested price of $4.
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/325933/SM14-Of-the-Rakuli?1892600
The preview contains the whole product. Shame on the buyer for not taking advantage of that fact.
You are not wrong
Presumably it’s not even a new or novel “ancient evil race”? Tell us which Lovecraft story these Rakuli are swiped from? Alternatively what bad Sci-Fi show, or worse what misunderstanding of actual historical people has the author decided to use as the dressing for that old trope of cosmic evil? What about ancient medioctities. Ancient races who were nuanced, maybe even on the whole ok? No. It’s always “Ancient space squids/apes/crabs/bugs/elves with Aztec/Chinese/Sumerian style who are (they slumber) wholly evil!”
Whatever the questions are Drive Thru’s labelling might be, I’m more chagrined by the impression that this is a paragraph worth of pseudo-Lovecraftian fluff stretched to over 50 pages?
Interesting name – Swiped from somewhere perhaps? We’re sorry you’re not impressed by the publication but I’m afraid your take is not entirely correct. The Rakuli ARE a nuanced species, representing the full range of alignments and very much intended as a rival to the Human race for higher-level parties. If you read this supplement you’ll see there’s a lot more to them.
You are correct that there is a Loftcraftian influence, but there is also a Silurian feel (from Dr Who). After all, an ancient race sleeping beneath the world surface waiting for a time to awaken is hardly unique to old HP or his mates Mr Derleth and Mr Smith. And they are not really sleeping, but you can find out more about that if you read it.
Seriously though, it’s a resource. It’s priced low and we think it is pretty good value for money in terms of the breadth with lots of interesting ideas, locations and powers to consider.
Dunromin University Press is a publisher based around interesting, useful and fun products at maximum value for money. You can get even more if you go for the Barnaynian Bundle.
I get the distinct impression that the author, as a twelve year old killer DM, took one look at the Fiend Folio entry for the githyanki and thought, “These guys are underpowered.” Of course, young Charles Stross, constrained by editors, didn’t bequeath fifty pages of fluff to us.
Twelve year old me would have loved this. Scanning through the PDF, I was surprised that Neutral Good was one of the possible alignments, which immediately made me suspect that the author has a NG DMPC, probably a fighter/M-U with a flumph familiar. Inject that right into my veins!!!!
The people that put everything in the OSR section are the spiritual successors to the ebay sellers with listings like “L@@K! Gothic/Industrial/Steampunk pink terrycloth bathrobe”.
LOL
Hi All,
Just a quick update on the product reviewed here.
Since we re-developed the whole Dunromin product range for Print on Demand we don’t offer the products on Pay What You Want any more, but we have reduced the prices as well, so this product is now less that $2 but you also have print options (softback and hardback).
We’d also like to clarify that it is advertised and labled as a Supplement, not an adventure. We do have a range of excellent adventures as well though, all priced at bargainous levels.
Dunromin University Press is a very small Publisher producing the best quality products we can maange for the love of the game, fun and amusement rather than making shedloads of cash. That said, our operating costs are increasing so we have had to abandon our “Pay What You Want” policy of the past. Sorry about that.