They did their time in Iraq, hold regular jobs, and spend some of their free time playing RPGs on their game platforms and at the table. Until the day they wake up in a different world, caught up in a half-understood web of events and personalities, hatreds and loyalties that goes back millennia. All wrapped up in a place where magic is real and far too many concepts of the role-playing game are not just real, but also a deadly serious business. Dropped into a world with little in the way of personal resources and a surplus of powerful enemies and dangerous strangers, the four must find their way home while learning all too well the concept of ‘first-level abilities’. Very little is certain in their new environment save that death is very real and the opportunities to meet it are commonplace. Four gamers with military backgrounds are thrust into a world where magic is real and the five toughest individuals on the planet want them dead: it is the worst campaign hook imaginable.

    Will you delve for lost artifacts in the ruins of alien temples? Strap on rune-enhanced armor and a laser rifle to battle undead empires in fleets of bone ships, or defend colonists from a swarm of ravenous monsters? Maybe you'll hack into the mainframe of a god-run corporation, or search the stars for clues to the secret history of the universe or brand new planets to explore. Whether you're making first contact with new cultures on uncharted worlds or fighting to survive in the neon-lit back alleys of Absalom Station, you and your team will need all your wits, combat skill, and magic to make it through. But most of all, you'll need each other.This massive 528-page hardcover rulebook is the essential centerpiece of the Starfinder Roleplaying Game, with rules for character creation, magic, gear, and more—everything you need to play Starfinder as either a player or Game Master! The next great adventure in science-fantasy roleplaying takes off here, and the Starfinder Core Rulebook is your ticket to a lifetime of adventure amid the stars!Inside this book, you'll find:- All of the rules you need to play or run a game of Starfinder.- Seven character classes, from the elite soldier and stealthy operative to the physics-hacking technomancer and mind-bending mystic.- Character races both new and classic, from androids, insectile shirrens, ratlike ysoki, and reptilian vesk to the dwarves and elves of the distant future.- An in-depth exploration of the Starfinder setting, including its planets, gods, factions, and threats.- Hundreds of weapons, spells, technological gadgets, magic items, and other options to outfit any character.- Complete rules for starships, including customization and starship combat.- Rules and tips on using Pathfinder RPG content with Starfinder.Cover art by Remko Troost

    A hybrid of games—such as Dungeons & Dragons, historical reenactment, fandom, and good old-fashioned pretend—larp is thriving, and this book explores its multifaceted communities and related phenomena, including the Society for Creative Anachronism, a medieval reenactment group that boasts more than 32,000 members. Author Lizzie Stark looks at the hobby from a variety of angles, from its history in the pageantry of Tudor England to its present use as a training tool for the US military. Along the way, she duels foes with foam-padded weapons, lets the great elder god Cthulhu destroy her parents’ beach house, and endures an existential awakening in the high-art larp scene of Scandinavia.

    I wish you joy o'th' Worm!"We are the small voice that whispers to you in the lonely hours of the night. We call to the darkness within all of you. We came from the dark, and to the dark we shall all return..."Called the corrupt by even the most crooked Ventrue, the Setites are almost universally mistrusted and feared by the clans of the Camarilla, and scorned by the Sabbat for their unwillingness to share in the Vaudalrie.Clanbook: Setites includes:* Extensive history of the followers of Set* All new Merits and Flaws for Setite characters* Ten complete character templates!

    The samurai is an unstoppable armored warrior who lives by a strong code of honor—with or without a master. The gunslinger combines the fighter’s martial prowess with a new grit mechanic that allows her to pull off fantastic acts with a pistol or rifle. All this plus tons of new armor and weapons, a complete treatment of firearms in the Pathfinder RPG, a vast array of martial arts, finishing moves, vehicle combat, duels, and new combat-oriented spells for every spellcasting class in the game!Ultimate Combat includes:- New player character options for 14 Pathfinder RPG base classes, including alchemist discoveries, barbarian rage powers, cavalier orders, combat-cleric archetypes, animal shaman druids, new fighter archetypes like gladiator and armor master, inquisitor archetypes like witch-hunter or spellbreaker, combat-themed magus arcana, monk archetypes based on mastery of martial arts, new paladin archetypes like angelic warrior, ranger archetypes like big game hunter and trapper, new rogue tricks, and wizard archetypes like the gunmage.- The ninja, samurai, and gunslinger, brand-new 20-level alternate classes specially designed to get the most out of combat.- Hundreds of new combat-oriented feats including martial arts feat trees, finishing moves, and combination feats.- In-depth overviews on a variety of combat-related topics, such as armor, Asian weapons, duels, fighting schools, guns, siege weapons, and more.- A complete system covering vehicle combat, including wagons, boats, airships, and more.- Tons of optional combat rules like called shots, armor as damage reduction, and new ways to track character health.…and much, much more!Cover art by Wayne Reynolds

    Catch 'Em All Over Again -Extensive strategy for new and veteran Pokemaniacs -Massive walkthrough with stats on every enemy -Exclusive maps to help you navigate each area -Detailed battle tactics for dominating your "Pokemon(R) Ruby & Sapphire"--playing friends -Essential PokeDex, featuring stats and how to catch them

    The book is open-ended and provides an almost unlimited number of plot lines. You can be a warrior, explorer, priest, wizard, thief or bard. The books in the series are inter-connected, allowing you to travel all across the Fabled Lands.

    Roll up your character and get ready! THE GREATEST GAMER ON EARTH At the University of California, Escondido, no one would guess that freshman Shesh Maccabee is a hard-core gamer—and in recovery to boot, following a court order, a wireless ban, and months of therapy (all because of one little seven-day Internet café episode). His friend Mike—who personally prefers Japanese-console RPGs—is tasked with keeping Shesh far away from any computer with access to World of Warfare.      Everything's going according to plan—until a Ren Faire fangirl introduces them to the campus gaming club, where they meet Theodore, a fanatical tabletop game master whose single goal in life is to run the greatest Mages & Monsters game in the world. And there just happens to be room for two more players. Soon Shesh and Mike are dragged into the dungeon of hard-core gaming—and cops, baboon men, Sri Lankan cave roaches, and Gothémon card collectors converge in the zaniest adventure that ever involved twenty-sided dice!

    Once assumed to be mere assassins, the Assamites have thrown off the Camarillas debilitating curse and their mantle of silence. A diverse clan of noble warriors, erudite scholars, learned sorcerers and murderous diablerists, the Assamites have stepped forth to claim their legacy in the Final Nights.The High Price of UndeathAs part of the revised lineup of clanbooks, Assamite takes one of the classic sourcebooks for the game and brings it into a modern context. All-new information accompanies a re-examination of earlier concepts, allowing you to add as much depth to your character as you like. The sheer volume of information contained in the new clanbooks (each 32 pages longer than the first-edition series) permits Storytellers to round out their chronicles.

    Traveling alongside other intrepid characters, these heroic creatures carve their places in legend with sword, spell, tooth, and claw.This supplement for the D&D game provides everything you need to play a monster as a character or to make the monsters your heroes fight even more formidable. Inside are over 50 all-new monster classes that show how creatures develop their characteristics and abilities as they gain levels. Along with new prestige classes and monster templates, Savage Species also features new feats, spells, magic items, and more.To use this supplement, a Dungeon Master also needs the Player's Handbook, the Dungeon Master's Guide, and the Monster Manual. A player needs only the Player's Handbook and the Monster Manual.

    Design alien races and monsters.Create campaigns of every style, from science fantasy to space opera to star merchants. Build worlds, from asteroids to Dyson spheres.With this book, you can create anything from a single alien beast to a whole galaxy of civilizations and star systems... quickly and randomly, or with a detailed step-by-step process that's true to biology and astrophysics as we understand them today.

    Crafted by the scribes at Green Ronin in conjunction with the Dungeons & Dragons team at Wizards of the Coast, the Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide provides D&D fans with a wealth of detail on the places, cultures, and deities of northwestern Faerûn.   The Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide is also a great way to catch up on recent events in the Forgotten Realms, to get background on locations featured in the Rage of Demons storyline coming in September, and to learn the lore behind video games like Neverwinter and Sword Coast Legends.   Here are just a few of the features you’ll find in the Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide:   · Immersive Adventuring: This campaign sourcebook provides players and Dungeon Masters material for creating vibrant fantasy stories along the Sword Coast.   · New Character Options: The book offers new subclass options, such as the Purple Dragon Knight and the Swashbuckler, for many of the classes presented in the Player’s Handbook, as well as new subraces and backgrounds specific to the Forgotten Realms.  · Adventure in the Forgotten Realms: Discover the current state of the Forgotten Realms and its deities after the Spellplague and the second Sundering. You’ll also get updated maps of this area of the Realms.· Compatible with Rage of Demons storyline: Make characters for use with the Out of the Abyss adventure and fight back the influence of the demon lords in the Underdark below the Sword Coast.   · Insider Information: Learn the background behind locations, such as Luskan and Gracklstugh, featured in the upcoming digital RPG, Sword Coast Legends, from n-Space.   With new character backgrounds and class options, players will love the storytelling possibilities of playing a noble of Waterdeep, an elf bladesinger, or one of the other new options, while Dungeon Masters will relish a book full of mysterious locations and story hooks to keep players adventuring on the Sword Coast for years to come. Look for Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide to be available on November 3.

    Their world is a xenophobic nightmare, populated by tyrannical despots, wildeyed heretics, bloodthirsty rogues and scheming manipulators, all unified by the mysterious curse of vampirism. And you would join them? You would live forever? To play the lusts of mortals like a violinist plays the strings? Then beware, the price is steep to enter the neofeudal hell that the Damned have wrought.Welcome to Undeath Join the revival of the Storytelling tradition. Vampire: The Requiem invites you to tell your own stories set within the world of the Kindred. This book includes rules for using vampires in World of Darkness chronicles, covering everything from the five clans to covenants to Disciplines, bloodlines, storytelling advice and a complete spread of game systems governing the undead. Hardcover. Requires the World of Darkness rulebook for play.

    Within this collection of creatures you'll find undead dragons and mischievous gremlins, shrieking banshees and unstoppable titans, the infamous jabberwock, and so much more! Yet not all these monsters need to be foes, as new breeds of otherworldly guardians, living shadows, and vampires all might take up adventure's call. In addition, new rules for customizing and advancing monsters and an expanded glossary of creature abilities ensure that you'll be prepared to challenge your heroes wherever adventure takes them!The Pathfinder RPG Bestiary 2 is the second indispensable volume of monsters for use with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and serves as a companion to the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook and Pathfinder RPG Bestiary. This imaginative tabletop game builds upon more than 10 years of system development and an Open Playtest featuring more than 50,000 gamers to create a cutting-edge RPG experience that brings the all-time best-selling set of fantasy rules into the new millennium.The 320-page Pathfinder RPG Bestiary 2 includes:- More than 300 different monsters.- Creatures both new and familiar, drawing upon the best-known beasts of legend, literature, and Pathfinder RPG adventures.- Challenges for any adventure and every level of play.- Hosts of new templates and variants, including simple templates for on-the-fly creature customization.- Numerous lists of monsters to aid in navigation, including lists by Challenge Rating, monster type, and habitat.- New rules for creating and running high-level menaces.- Expanded universal monster rules to simplify special attacks, defenses, and qualities.- New familiars, animal companions, and other allies.... and much, much more!Cover art by Wayne Reynolds

    Your ship will take you to new worlds and uncharted reaches of the void, where you will encounter rivals, pirates, aliens, and possibly even creatures of the warp. You will acquire and spend great wealth and riches, and fame or infamy will follow. You will discover ancient and forgotten mysteries and search out the unknown to find lost human worlds or never-before-seen celestial phenomena. You must survive the dangers of space, for beyond the threat of vacuum and deadly radiation lurk things Man was never meant to find... To be part of a Rogue Trader's crew is to stand on the threshold of nearly unlimited opportunity. Vast profits await for you and your fellow Explorers to find and claim. Fame and fortune reward the bold, but the unwary find only an anonymous death. Begin your players' path to wealth and glory with a complete starting adventure that puts the Explorers right into the middle of the action. The Rogue Trader core rulebook contains everything you need to start your adventure in the Warhammer 40,000 universe.