Posted in: Movies, Video | Tagged: Bundle of Holding, Deadlands, entertainment, gaming bundles, rpg, RPG Gaming, Shane Hensley

Find Deadlands In The Bundle of Holding For The Next Few Days

By Christopher Helton

Some of you may remember Deadlands from the announcement that it was being developed as a possible "television" series to be broadcast via the XBox. Some of you may have played one version or another of the tabletop game. For the next few days the classic version of Deadlands will be available through the Bundle of Holding for next few days.

At the time of this writing, the Deadland bundle had raised $17,383.17, with 10% of that earmarked for it's two charities National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society (SSCS). For just $10.95, you can receive the core collection of the Weird West Player's Guide, the Marshal's Handbook, Rascals, Varmints, & Critters and the Smith & Robards Catalog. If you pay over the threshold ($22.12 at the time of writing) you receive the bonus collection as well.

The one thing that people may want to keep in mind is that these DRM-free PDFs are for the classic version of the game, rather than the current, Savage Worlds-powered version. The two systems have some similarities, and some differences, but are close enough for one set of books to be used with the other games. The reason for this is simple, the version of the game's setting in this edition is the version that will be utilized in the television series (should it be made), so this is a good way for the unfamiliar to familiarize themselves with the setting before the show.

With the Weird West Player's Guide, you get everything that a Deadlands player would need to start play: character creation rules, the basics of the rules of play and combat and an introduction to the world of the game. You also receive, at no extra charge, an introduction from Bruce Campbell. The year is 1876, but the history is not our own. The long Civil War rages on. California is shattered by the Great Quake of '68; a superfuel called ghost rock is revealed in the new channels and cliff faces; and the Great Rail Wars exact a bloody toll in the Union, the Confederacy, the Sioux Nation, the Mormon state of Deseret, and the Independent Commonwealth of California.

The Tombstone Epitaph has always been filled with lurid tales of daring desperadoes and deadly drifters, but lately the frontier's most-read tabloid claims something more sinister stalks the lonely plains. Fortunately, where there are monsters, there are heroes. Squinty-eyed gunfighters, card-chucking hexslingers, savage braves, and righteous padres have all answered the call. And if they fight hard enough, they might meet the mysterious Reckoners.

The Marshal's Handbook gives Game Masters expanded information on the world of Deadlands and how to run the horrors that the players' characters will encounter along the way. It has monsters to bedevil the characters, and creatures both human and non-human that will keep things interesting.

Rascals, Varmints, & Critters is an expanded selection of monsters, supernatural and otherwise, for Game Masters to use against the characters. Created by fans of the Deadlands game. The new monsters are first presented via an "in world" publication that gives the information that characters may know about the creatures, before giving system writeups of them that can be used in Deadlands games. There are also rules for creating animal companions for characters, and a few new bits and pieces for player characters as well.

In the Smith & Robards catalog you will find one of the favorite things of gamers: long, detailed lists of weapons, along with a selection of devices created by mad scientists (and some expanded rules for player character mad scientists to make their own crazy devices).

If you pay over the threshold you will also get a number of bonus PDFs that fill out the world of Deadlands: The Agency: Men in Black Dusters (rules and information about a super secret branch of the U.S. Government tasked with fighting the supernatural), the Book o' the Dead (expanded rules about undead monsters and player characters), Canyon o' Doom (a 128 page adventure), The Collegium (an expansion of the rules dealing with mad scientists), Fire & Brimstone (dealing with those "blessed" by a higher power in the world of Deadlands), Ghost Dancers (expanded rules for Native American shamans and their worlds) and other books as well.

If you haven't experienced the Deadlands game, and you are a fan of steampunk or weird Western stories, this might be the game for you. The system used is not difficult to learn, even for new gamers, and the designers do a good job of explaining how the game works and how to play it. And, with any Bundle of Holding, this bundle gives you everything that you would need for years of gaming at a low price.

Christopher Helton is a blogger, podcaster and tabletop RPG publisher who talks about games and other forms of geekery at the long-running Dorkland! blog. He is also the co-publisher at the ENnie Award winning Battlefield Press, Inc.  You can find him on Twitter at @dorkland and on G+ at https://plus.google.com/+ChristopherHelton/ where he will talk your ear off about gaming and comics.

Christopher has a crowdfunding page to help raise money to defray the costs for going to the Gen Con gaming convention and cover it for his Dorkland! blog and Bleeding Cool. Please click here to go to the page and help out.

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