To clarify, the below table is a list of original books, and how useful they are for someone who is approaching them from the angle of someone that is more experienced with Dungeon Fantasy RPG than GURPS.
Supplement | Dependencies | Redundant | Comments |
---|---|---|---|
Dungeon Fantasy 1 | GURPS Basic Set, GURPS Magic | Yes | This is mostly subsumed by the content in Dungeon Fantasy Adventurers and Dungeon Fantasy Magic Items |
Dungeon Fantasy 2 | GURPS Basic Set | Yes | This is mostly subsumed by the content in Dungeon Fantasy Exploits and Dungeon Fantasy Monsters |
Dungeon Fantasy 3 | Almost None | Some | The racial templates in Dungeon Fantasy Adventurers come from here, but this book has more races, some cross-training lenses (Multiclassing), and a handful of Power-Ups. It also includes rules for making evil versions of the Cleric and Holy Warrior. |
Dungeon Fantasy 4 | GURPS Basic Set | Very Little | This is a book for two advanced occupational templates. Using the Artificer benefits from (but doesn't absolutely require) having either a large equipment catalog and/or a rules system for pricing out "gadget advantages" which requires mechanics not native to Dungeon Fantasy. One of the Scholar's most important abilities, Book Learned Wisdom is built with a complex application of said mechanics, but it is not necessary to understand them to use them. |
Dungeon Fantasy 5 | GURPS Basic Set, GURPS Magic | No | This is a book of allies, pets, familiars, etc. The Ally advantage is explained in detail in Basic Set, but doesn't exist in Dungeon Fantasy by itself. With a little help from someone with the Basic Set, the book is pretty easy to use. The most complex mechanic here is the Alternate Form and druidic transformation spells, which are covered in the Basic Set and Magic respectively, but are, overall, a minor part of the book's contents... unless you really care a lot for your druid players. |
Dungeon Fantasy 6 | None | No | 40 High tier treasures to scatter about your campaigns |
Dungeon Fantasy 7 | GURPS Basic Set, GURPS Magic, Dungeon Fantasy 3 | No | This book has several variations on the Cleric template with special custom spell lists for clerics that worship gods of specific domains. Some of the included spells are likely to only be included in GURPS Magic (but correct me if I'm wrong) |
Dungeon Fantasy 8 | Dungeon Fantasy 1, 4, 6, 7, GURPS Magic | No | This book has a few callbacks to items in earlier Dungeon Fantasy books, but strictly speaking, the book is usable without them. They are mostly important if you want to roll for random treasure, which (opinion alert) I would never recommend except for giggles and kicks. |
Dungeon Fantasy 9 | GURPS Basic Set, GURPS Magic | No | This is a book of advanced spellcaster occupation templates, built around the theme of having several allies and unusual spell lists. The Ally advantage depends on the Basic Set, and the obscure spell lists (probably) depend on access to GURPS Magic. |
Dungeon Fantasy 10 | None | No | Mostly a guide for making trips to town slightly more engaging; includes a new template for a mundane jack-of-all-trades social character, the Innkeeper which mostly seems to stick to abilities contained in Dungeon Fantasy already. |
Dungeon Fantasy 11 | None | Some | A few of the abilities here are used in Dungeon Fantasy - Adventurers, but a vast majority of these will be new. |
Dungeon Fantasy 12 | None | No | Equipment and ability catalogs for two new templates for rogue-ish characters. |
Dungeon Fantasy 13 | See Notes | No | There is a conversion guide for these already, but the original book is useful if using the extra optional rules from Dungeon Fantasy 3 that have more changes to armor and weapons for very big or small PC races. This book is more useful the more occupational template books you have (DF 1, 4, 7, 9, 12) |
Dungeon Fantasy 14 | See Notes | No | This book includes a new PC occupational template that involves more complex mechanics and customization than Dungeon Fantasy RPG contains by default. It is best served by having at least GURPS Basic Set - Characters and GURPS Powers to have resources to develop lots of new custom abilities. |
Dungeon Fantasy 15 | GURPS Basic Set | No | This book contains allies that can be hired for money, but are also tailored for taking with the Ally advantage. For the most part, that advantage is explained well enough here that you don't need the Basic Set unless you want to do some more complex modifications. The templates are also made to be used for players or GMs who want to play or run lower powered games. |
Dungeon Fantasy 16 | Almost None | A little bit | Mostly a bunch of extra rules for making travelling more interesting and detailed, or guidance for running some mostly outdoors adventures. |
Dungeon Fantasy 17 | GURPS Basic Set | No | This book uses a lot of social advantages that are downplayed in Dungeon Fantasy, but they are mostly repurposed in various ways, and that is explained in this book, such that GURPS Basic Set is probably not critical to using this book. |
Dungeon Fantasy 18 | None | Some | Extra rules for Power Items |
Dungeon Fantasy 19 | None | No | New Occupational Template for a more flexible, advanced magic system. |
Dungeon Fantasy Monsters 1 | None | Mostly | (Almost?) All monsters in this book are included in Dungeon Fantasy - Monsters, but there are a few things here and there that could be useful, particularly, the monster prefixes section which gives some advice for "remixing" monsters, but there's helpful bits here and there like optional allies or racial templates. |
Dungeon Fantasy Monsters 2 | None | Mostly | (Almost?) All monsters in this book are included in Dungeon Fantasy - Monsters. |
Dungeon Fantasy Monsters 3 | None | No | All Unique new monsters |
Dungeon Fantasy Treasure 1 | None | No | |
Dungeon Fantasy Treasure 2 | None | No | |
Dungeon Fantasy Adventure 1 | None | No |
Dungeon Fantasy RPG to GURPS Dungeon Fantasy
The following table are my opinions on how useful the new material might be in a game based mostly on the original GURPS based material.
Book or Supplement | Redundant | Comments |
---|---|---|
Dungeon Fantasy - Adventures | Yes | The templates are slightly streamlined and reorganized, but most of the information is a restatement of Basic Set - Characters, Dungeon Fantasy 1, and parts of Dungeon Fantasy 3 and 11. |
Dungeon Fantasy - Exploits | Mostly | A few of the rules have been simplified, but this is mostly a streamlining of Basic Set - Campaigns, Dungeon Fantasy 2, and a few optional rules from various sources over GURPS 4e's long lifetime. |
Dungeon Fantasy - Monsters | Mostly | For the most part, this is a restatement of the monsters from Dungeon Fantasy 2, Dungeon Fantasy Monsters 1, and Dungeon Fantasy Monsters 2. Some of the advantages and disadvantages that were excluded from Dungeon Fantasy - Adventurers because they were considered irrelevant are instead stated here. There are a few unique monsters. |
Dungeon Fantasy - Spells | Some | This is an optimization of the original GURPS Magic focusing on the spells that are more appropriate for Dungeon Fantasy. Although the spells are mostly familiar, the prereq trees have been streamlined and several have been rebalanced for more appropriate costs. |
Dungeon Fantasy - Dungeon: I Smell a Rat | No | A completely new adventure |
Dungeon Fantasy - Dungeon: Against the Rat-Men | No | A completely new adventure |
Dungeon Fantasy - Magic Items | Some | Most of the items in this catalog can be easily reproduced by using the rules in Dungeon Fantasy 1, and the enchantment energies listed in GURPS Magic. That said, there are a few unique mechanics introduced, and a few special items a la the 40 Artifacts book. Further, the prices are carefully rebalanced, so a few very powerful, very cheap items have a much better price. |
Dungeon Fantasy - Traps | A Little | This catalog of traps is mostly unique, and is similar to the format used in the It's a Trap! Pyramid article. |
Other Thoughts and Conclusion
Whether or not a book or supplement is redundant is not the only thing to consider, however. The publishing and editing of the new books are, for the most part much more user friendly, and if you have an interest in introducing players or GMs to GURPS, the Dungeon Fantasy RPG is a nice way to do it. And, also, I'd like to reiterate that the redundant column is not entirely objective. There is not one book in either set that is completely without unique value.
I'd also like to clarify the Dependencies column is more like a "required prior reading" column. For example, most of the books build on previous installments, and almost all of them technically depend on fundamentals from The GURPS Basic Set, but a lot of them don't in a capacity that matters, in my opinion. Those that do, I called out.
This is a very useful page! I would find it even better if the full titles of each supplement was included in the first column. With so many DF titles, I can't keep the numbers straight. As it is now, I need to open a second window and search up the titles in Google. If you wanted to go over-the-top, you could also link each title to the product page at sjgames.com, but that would be a lot more work.
ReplyDeleteI agree, this is an excellent compilation. If linking is too much, could the name of the books be added? For example: "Dungeon Fantasy 5: Allies".
DeleteAgain, thanks for the compilation!
I could be wrong about this, but doesn't DF1 have extra spells not included in DFRPG ?
ReplyDelete