Basic Fantasy Role-Playing Game is one of the many OSR games out there.  It is meant to recreate and modernize the so-called B/X version of Dungeons & Dragons.  As I’ve rambled about at length, D&D in all its forms is not my bag.  However, I’m finding compatible modules to be a handy addition to my Dungeon Crawl Classics arsenal.  Morgansfort: The Western Lands Campaign is essentially the BFRP version of the venerable Keep on the Borderlands module for D&D, much like Monkey Isle was a reimagining of Isle of Dread.

The premise is similar.  Characters arrive at a keep that is close to a wilderness packed with dangers.  Morgansfort is the keep, and it’s pretty well laid out and stocked with NPCs for your PCs to interact with.  The keep and the small community within should serve as a good place for PCs to fall back, rest, heal, and trade.  There are three nearby locations for PCs to explore and “clear out,” The Old Island Fortress, The Nameless Dungeon, and The Cave of the Unknown.  Those locations are a mixed bag.

The first two are sort of the worst of old school module design.  There is very little history or background.  Worse, there is no logic or sense of “ecology” in how the rooms are stocked with monsters and antagonists.  If you told me the author(s) had a spinning wheel with the names of a bunch of monsters on it, and just gave it a spin for each room, I would not be surprised.  One room might have a band of goblins just hanging out, while the next has a giant spider, and the next a nest of killer bees, and the next an ogre.  All just waiting around, twiddling their thumbs for all eternity.  Never opening a door to find the monster in the next room.  Never leaving to find food.  Just sitting there, waiting for adventurers to open the door.  It’s one of the reasons I think so many video games seem to be based off of D&D in so many ways.  It’s like video game logic.  And it’s the kind of thing you don’t think about if you’re playing a first person shooter or a tactical combat game or something.  But if you’re playing a roleplaying game, where you’re expecting the imaginary world to work in some sort of sensical way, it just doesn’t.

The third dungeon, The Cave of the Unknown, actually has a theme and monsters that make much more sense together.  It also has enough of a story to go on.  There are some orc raiders who’ve kidnapped a couple people.  There’s a magic user who’s up to no good and is sort of working with the orcs.  Most of the monsters in the place are directly connected to those two factions.  Great.  That works.

The thing about BFRP is that all the books are quite cheap.  Free if you want the PDF, and pretty much the price of printing if you want physical copies.  At a price like that, any problems with the book seem trivial.  Even though I’m never going to run those first two dungeons as written, the maps alone are worth it.  Morgansfort and the third dungeon might actually make it into my games.  If I ever get around to running Keep on the Borderland, I might weave elements of Morgansfort, particularly the NPCs into it.  And again, for the price, the maps alone make it well worth it, even if you’re going to replace everything keyed to them.

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