So Inspiration is key component of BEOWULF: Age of Heroes. Jon and Jacob both love the 5e inspiration mechanic, but find that the core rules don’t make full use of the mechanic. BEOWULF seeks to change that, and provide — ahem — inspiration for new ways to use the mechanic.
The Hero’s Adventure
BEOWULF is primarily designed for duet (one player, one gamemaster) adventuring and we suppose that our Hero is keen to receive omens and wise words before chasing after a nigh-undefeatable Monster. This process creates the Portent, a scrap of Anglo-Saxon poetry that might become important over the course of the adventure. The Portent also fills the Inspiration Pool – there are four components to the Portent and with each component, an Inspiration Token is placed either in the Hero section, the Follower section, or the Monster section of the Pool.
One More Inspiration Token
There are five tokens in the set, four for the Portent and the Inspiration Pool, one for the Hero themselves. In BEOWULF, there are many ways to earn Inspiration and several ways to spend it. One of the most effective ways ties into Advantage. In the game, heroes are either aligned with the Old Ways, the traditional set of gods that are known by many names across the Two Seas of northern Europe and their foretellings of epic wars against the Monsters; or the Church, a new set of beliefs spreading from southern Europe and bringing the promises of freedom, literacy, and personal salvation. When you select your Alignment Die and you’re rolling with Advantage, you receive Inspiration. As long as your faith prevails, you can use this feature over and over.
At the Moment of Need
So what do you do with those Inspiration tokens in the pool? Well, when it’s a dramatically appropriate time, you can use the token to give Inspiration to the appropriate type of character. For example, the player might draw a token from the Follower pool to give a Follower advantage on a check or attack, or to activate a special Gift. The GM might draw a token from the Monster pool to activate a special feature belonging to the Monster or just to give it advantage on an important attack or skill roll.
The three questions we get asked whenever we talk about BEOWULF are why two players, why 5e, why Beowulf?
Let’s talk about it!
So the duet play feature at the heart of BEOWULF Age of Heroes is really the driver behind everything we’ve added to the 5e rules. And the reason we decided to develop a duet play mode is tied up with the other two aspects – looking back it’s a bit of a tangled knot!
So, why 5e? This gets asked even more now we’re also doing a|state with Forged in the Dark. Why are we even in that over-populated, “uncool” 5e space? Primarily, believe it or not, because we just like it! (We like a lot of different stuff!)
Having all worked extensively on Adventures in Middle-earth in our previous jobs, and through that to some degree rediscovered “the world’s favourite roleplaying game”, we wanted to go further and do even more with it, and the team were very keen to get back to that system.
Speaking for myself, I find 5e is a collection of quite clever parts, which can be modded tremendously easily. I love stuff like inspiration and advantage – I think they’re really smart. And sure, game historians out there will know that 5e isn’t the first rules system to use these things. But all wrapped up together with a bunch of core assumptions already dealt with? It’s a really interesting space to play in.
And hey, I get it that for some people there are sacred cows within that game set up which are just too unpalatable. That’s ok! But I think it’s a fun ruleset to play around with, and it’s by and large very easy to play, and very easy to get a game together.
Talking of which, this is one of the big drivers behind the choice to make BEOWULF duet – one player and one GM. The look of delight on so many playtester’s faces when they realised they need only find one other person in order to run a campaign was proof we were onto something good. We’ve all struggled to schedule a game, and being able to call one other person and fix a time to play is really powerful.
There’s also a less obvious benefit – you can run the same adventure for several players. So if you have a group of players, BEOWULF makes an excellent pick up game if you can’t run your usual session. Each time you run it is different, but as GM you get more and more familiar with the material, and it gets better and better. There’s a lower cost to generating those good times, given the ease of re-running BEOWULF adventures.
And of course, BEOWULF also works for group play. Everything we built onto 5e to make duet play simple lifts right out.
So why BEOWULF at all? Right at the beginning of Handiwork Games we sat down and chatted about what we’d like to make. The idea of an early medieval/low fantasy/dark ages setting just kept coming up. It’s an era I find really fascinating, and have been interested it most of my life. There’s detail there if you want to study, and it’s readily available at your local library or bookshop. But equally it works as “dark ages-flavoured” heroic fantasy, without any need to read anything.
I don’t like to harp on too much about other games we’ve worked on and that are clearly other people’s babies, but it’s key to the existence of BEOULF – working on a Tolkien RPG for the best part of a decade, and being a key player in imbuing it with that dark ages flavour, you inevitably find your way to Beowulf, and I wound up having a lot of knowledge that couldn’t easily be used in a Third Age Middle-earth setting. It had to come out somewhere!
I also think my art style which, however weird I feel about saying it, was a big tick in the plus column of things we had to work with at the birth of Handiwork Games. My style, and the style that Scot Purdy brings, work well for these subjects.
And from a different angle, if you cook it down in game terms, the lone hero who seeks out monsters and slays them, fits together with the 5e rules in a really interesting way. Making that inevitable combat a real set piece, and the unashamed climax of an adventure is just cool.
Somewhat surprisingly, the poem prompted us to bring a level of mechanical focus on social interaction and investigation to 5e. The poem has a lot to say about how people and life are affected by interactions with the various monsters, and that was important to bring to the table. I’m really proud of those sections of the game that bring huge mechanical support to interacting with NPCs to unravel the mystery of the Monster.
BEOWULF Age of Heroes for 5e is available now* from selected UK and EU stockists, and from our webstore. It is also available with a range of adventures and additional digital content at DrivethruRPG.
*Please note that BEOWULF stock for US backers is currently being shipped. Once caught up with this process we will have more information about US shops and direct orders.
Character Queue is a new series where we dive deep into our pregenerated characters that we made as part of our introduction to our BEOWULF:Age of Heroes roleplaying game. We were fortunate enough to fund sculpting and casting these characters, so not only do they appear in character sheet form but as professional miniatures as well.
So let’s explore our first character, Cwenhild:
“Cwenhild is a type of character I don’t feel we see a lot of in roleplaying games – a more mature woman of more generous proportions. Whereas in real life I see a lot of people who fit this general mould. It seems a shame that we don’t have many heroes of this broad type. Cwenhild has lived, raised a family, and lost a family. One hopes that through her vengeance-inspired adventures she might find some happiness!” – Jon Hodgson
Cwenhild, the Widow-Matron of the House
When her husband was slain, Cwenhild mourned for a year and then set about putting the affairs of her hall to rights. Ruling wisely and cautiously, she waited for her three sons to come of age and rule her lost husband’s kingdom. Yet, one by one they were taken: as they flowered into men so they were cut down by war or taken away by creatures left over from ancient times. Now she is alone, with no one else to fight the growing abundance of monsters that herald the end of days and the snuffing out of all good things.
But no straw-death for Cwenhil. No longer the spinning wheel nor the pots of the hearth for her. She has bade broken open the barrow and taken up her husband’s mail and his spear. Too long has she spent weeping and awaiting tidings at the edge of the battlefield. Now she will be the bringer of bad tidings to those who take sons and husbands.
Cwenhild is a traditionalist of the old ways. The evidence of the inevitable end of the world is all around her.
Howdy! We’ve got some late-breaking news for you and lots of fun stuff for BEOWULF, Handimonsters and a|state. Let’s get into it!
a|state
The pledge manager for late pledges is closing on 15 December, just a few days away! This is your last chance to get in to the ground floor of The City, after this you’ll be able to preorder the game at retail pricing.
Step inside a baroque urban nightmare, the world of a|state. In The City you’ll fight off threats to your canalside home, trying to make this grim and haunted place safer and better, somehow.
a|state brings a new, hopeful approach to the much-loved Forged in the Dark ruleset. Your ability to Care counts as much as your ability to Fight.
Create Troublemakers such as the deft and deadly Ghostfighter, the caring and curious Lostfinder, the persuasive and passionate Activist, and the striking and stealthy Sneakthief. If they can trust each other they might have a chance.
Defend your corner from selfish authorities, angry gangs and heartless industries, and deal with the spiralling consequences of your own actions as you struggle for a better tomorrow.
Bringing the wine-dark visual vibes of Dark City and The City of Lost Children, a|state delivers Dickensian anti-Thatcher sparks and knives sci fi.
We have just officially announced the Handimonsters Annual! This collects the monsters that we have released over the previous year into a stunning professionally-printed full-colour softcover book! We will soon be opening this up to preorder, with our current plans being to ship from both our UK and US warehouses, in order to give you the best possible rates on shipping.
BEOWULF: Age of Heroes
US shipping has resumed after the Thanksgiving holidays. We expect another week or so of mail processing. Packages are coming from our warehouse in Georgia and travelling via Priority Mail so we hope that almost everyone will receive their packages in short order (some packages, like APO/FPO, necessarily take longer).
For your patience, we will be sending all US Backers a PDF of the BEOWULF Art Book, which features our favourite BEOWULF art pieces, commentary from the artist and notes for including the imagery and situations represented in your BEOWULF games.
This book will also be available in print, at a vastly reduced price to US Backers.
We recently announced a forthcoming Kickstarter project to collect the already-released digital adventures in a printed format. We’re also decided that we will be collecting the material from Digital Packs 1 to 7 in a book format. This project won’t be a Kickstarter, but a preorder that will release very soon.
Links
Sign up for our newsletter and you’ll get extra offers, insights and snippets of info.
Join us on Discord, just point your browser at www.discord.me/handiworkgamers and that will generate you an invite. Sometimes you have to cut and paste for the bot to do its magic. Say hello to everyone and find channels for all your favourite releases.
Here at Handiwork we produce lots of economical products that support our larger offerings. Here’s a few things we offer that make quick and easy gifts for anyone on your holidays list.
Huge Dice
For BEOWULF: Age of Heroes we produced a series of extra-large dice to work with our Wyrd alignment/advantage system. But they’re impressive enough to use for any d20-based game!
Another bonus item we unlocked during the BEOWULF Kickstarter was a series of professionally sculpted miniatures. If you’re looking for unique Migration Era/Viking minis, we’ve got a fabulous set for you! Available in cast white metal and STL files for printing (resin machine highly recommended).
We’ve been hard at work bringing our patrons at Handimonsters.com brand-new 5e monsters every single week of the year. And now, since we have such a horde of wild and wonderful unique beasties, we’re going to publish them in an annual!
It’ll be a handsome, full colour softcover book, in the region of 64 pages, available direct from our webstore, and of course in PDF from DrivethruRPG. Every monster gets its own page, with it’s own unique stat block, abilities and actions, along with its own stunning piece of art. Since we’ve built this horde up over a year, they’re all unique killer, and absolutely no filler!
Our monsters are designed by Jacob Rodgers (Adventures in Middle-earth 5e, The Ruins of Symbaroum 5e, BEOWULF Age of Heroes) and illustrated by Scott Purdy (Pathfinder, Numenera, BEOWULF Age of Heroes)
We’ll have more information on how you can get your hands on one very soon. And be sure to swing by www.Handimonsters.com to check out the free stuff and subscribe!
What a bunch of news we have for you today! There are updates on Forest Dragon games, Handimonsters, a|state, and BEOWULF: Age of Heroes.
BEOWULF: Age of Heroes
Digital Pack 6
We have released our sixth set of digital add-ons for BEOWULF. This is the first one backers are not getting free as part of their pledges. It’s packed with PDF articles, maps, VTT tokens, and music.
Packages continue to wing their way across the country and our warehouse will continue to pack and ship backers’ rewards, with a bit of an interruption for Thanksgiving. We hope to have our shipping done early next month.
a|state
Late pledges for a|state are closing soon! Our kickstarter for this early 2000s British RPG classic smashed all expectations, and there’s a small window left to make a late pledge.
In a|state you’ll band together to try to make a life in your corner of the endless City better, bringing the ability to Care to Forged in the Dark games.
As you’d expect from Handiwork, there’s a host of useful and beautiful accessories available to check out at the late pledge page.
Handimonsters
This week we released our last Dungeon Construct of the year, the Throne Mimic for Handimonsters. Enchanted with the power to draw creatures to itself, it then grabs and devours them. You can get it and over 50 other monsters at www.handimonsters.com!
We are also hard at work at assembling the annual, a print compilation of our first year of Handimonsters that will collect all of our beautiful art and tricky monsters into a physical form. We’ll have more to talk about here soon.
Forest Dragon Games
Let’s take a quick look at the Forest Dragon Farmer. In the game, you collect crops by growing them. This requires a Field, some Seeds, and a Helper. Each of them need to match (for example each of the above cards have a green plant symbol, so this is a matching set). Keep making sets in order to win the game!
Links
Sign up for our newsletter and you’ll get extra offers, insights and snippets of info.
Join us on Discord, just point your browser at www.discord.me/handiworkgamers and that will generate you an invite. Sometimes you have to cut and paste for the bot to do its magic. Say hello to everyone and find channels for all your favourite releases.
Huge Excitement! News on Forest Dragon products, Handimonsters, a|state, and BEOWULF: Age of Heroes!!!
BEOWULF: Age of Heroes
… the curved prow such course had run that sailors now could see the land, sea-cliffs shining, steep high hills, headlands broad. Their haven was found, their journey ended.
BEOWULF: Age of Heroes has landed on the western shore! Fighting valiantly through hordes of ‘customs’ (whatever fell creature they might be), it won its way and arrived in good condition to the House of Wares here in America:
From here, it must be sorted and divided, packaged appropriately, and sent on to each individual’s destination. That process began this week and will continue (with some interruptions next week due to American Thanksgiving) until everyone of our American backers has their rewards! We know you’ve been incredibly patient while this was sorted out and we appreciate the patience.
Other BEOWULF news
With our original BEOWULF project within sight of being completed, let’s talk about what’s coming next. We have dozens of BEOWULF digital releases and many requests to provide their content in a physical format. In order to deliver the highest possible quality product with the best ‘bang for the buck’ we will launch a kickstarter next year for a hardcover book – an adventure anthology of the digital adventure releases. We’ll also take the opportunity to revisit each adventure for opportunities to update, expand, and link them together. And who knows? With an extra successful campaign, we might be able to add new material as well.
The contest to win a copy of the Whale Road poster runs until tomorrow at 14:00 UK time. Learn more here.
a|state news
The new edition of a|state is taking pledges right now, as we finish up work on the core text. Set in a dystopian city of mysteries, it is up to your gang of troublemakers to build up a secure corner in the city where your friends and families can be safe while you poke and prod at the authorities and their cruel and strange agendas.
Pledge today to join us in The City. You’ll never forget what you find there, though you won’t be remembered.
Handimonsters
Wow! Look at that… literally dozens of monsters for your 5e games and you can get all of them, just by signing up for Handimonsters! And that’s not even a complete set!
Sign up today at Handimonsters.com and get this incredible deal now.
We will produce a print release of our first year monsters, the 2021 Handimonsters Annual! It will be available to order very soon.
Forest Dragon products
We are doing final playtesting on two Forest Dragon products: Forest Dragon Farmer and The Pieman’s Apprentice! Forest Dragon Farmer is our game of (slightly) advanced strategy as farmers compete to produce the best crops. But when the harvest is in and the time comes to celebrate, the folk of the lands of the Forest Dragon enjoy their pies.
In the Pie Man’s Apprentice, players try to help the Pie Man bake the best pies. Everyone’s got their own favourites, so win extra points by making your friends and neighbours happy!
More news on both games will be coming very soon!
Links:
Sign up for our newsletter and you’ll get extra offers, insights and snippets of info.
Join us on Discord, just point your browser at www.discord.me/handiworkgamers and that will generate you an invite. Sometimes you have to cut and paste for the bot to do its magic. Say hello to everyone and find channels for all your favourite releases.
Just for fun, here’s a poster that shows off some of the Handimonsters that are currently available. Handimonsters is a weekly Patreon that produces 5e monsters every week. You can sign up for as little as $3 a month. You’ll get access to all the monsters shown above (plus more that didn’t fit) and, as long as you’re subscribed, you’ll get a new monster every week. Sign up at www.handimonsters.com!
Our bonus level included not only the statblocks but transparent images for virtual tabletops, in both a portrait (pog) format and a top-down view of the monster. We include a digital art print so you can show off the monster to your players without accidentally revealing any game info, and we also include a printable paper mini to put out on the table for face-to-face games.
