Shadowdark RPG Review

Sep 04, 2024    

Running a very successful kickstarter right as the 2023 OGL fiasco hit a fever pitch, Shadowdark went on to win multiple Golden Ennies at Gen Con 2024. I’ve had the chance to read a good amount of the official material, play in the game once, and run a half dozen games at lower level as part of our Open Table group. I may revisit or revise this review as we get to higher levels or after running a longer campaign, but here are my initial impressions.

Site: Arcane Library
Character Builder: Shadowdarklings (3rd party)
Pages: ~320 hardback
Release: 2023
My Familiarity: Read; Played; Run at 1st and 2nd level multiple times

What this game is ‘about’

Reviewer’s note: Games need to know what they are about. The market is crowded and few games have the luxury of being middle of the road. What is the appeal of a game to the players, including the game master?

Shadowdark does not claim to be a revolution in game design. It explains some components of OSR play style in 5e adjacent language.

Above all Shadowdark is an accessible Old School Renaissance RPG. In early 2023 while others were flooding the market with promises of 5e clones without much to distinguish them, Kelsey Dionne had the foresight and luck to already be deep into the play test and production timeline of a new game. This game was both authentically old school and familiar enough to 5e players to be easy to pick up.

The official tagline: “Shadowdark RPG is what old-school fantasy gaming would look like after being redesigned with 50 years of innovation,” and that is accurate.

Timing, Community, and Marketing

Capitalizing on the OGL fiasco, Dionne’s Arcane Library made excellent use of YouTuber paid promotion. For a moment, Shadowdark was the ‘it’ game to switch to other than Pathfinder. Given how many D&D alternatives there are that’s quite the marketing accomplishment. Kickstarter made the game’s popularity quantifiable right in the middle of the OGL crisis - right when many were looking to jump for the first time.

Kelsey has made a core product and is supporting both the game and the community but on her terms. Tools, expansions, VTT extensions, etc are all popping up in a mostly uncontrolled ecosystem. From the outside, it appears the author has hit their goal and isn’t trying to turn this into a brand larger than what they can manage on their own. So in a way, despite Shadowdark’s success, it feels like a fresh indie game with an open ecosystem rather than a purely commercial project. That may be an illusion, but I failed my saving throw and no longer care.

Streamlined Mechanics

Shadowdark uses its limited pages of rules to prioritize a quick-playing, rules-light system that emphasizes a low-power game of dungeon crawling where light sources, limited hit points, and inventory matter.

Shadowdark’s rules resemble Basic D&D, the parallel version of D&D that ran alongside AD&D. However the core mechanics are a combination of more recent rules expectations and advancements like:

• a core d20 mechanic (D&D 3e+)
• ascending armor class (D&D 3e+)
• advantage and disadvantage (D&D 5e+)
• Slot-based inventory (Knave)
• luck token rewards that allow re-rolls (Savage Worlds?)
• a roll-to-cast magic system (Dungeon Crawl Classics)

Reduced Mechanics

However, this game refrains from including features common to D&D systems since AD&D, knowing that GMs will happily add them back in as house rules if needed or preferred. Shadowdark intentionally removes:

• standard ability scores or point-buy stats
• linear character bonus advancement, rolls stay low
• a skill system, skill checks, or even saving throws (which predate D&D)
• reactions, opportunity attacks, flanking

It is worth noting this game isn’t for those who want character creation options and the combinatorial creativity of character crafting introduced in D&D 3rd edition. Generally, OSR characters are rolled and played, not crafted.

Character advancement is level-based, but comes with every-other-level rolls on a talents table that serves the role of feats, ability score adjustments, and hit adjustments. Ideally, characters will have infinite choices and opportunities for creativity during gameplay, because there are very few to be made away from the table as a player.

I found that I missed very little of the rules that had been removed and appreciated all the superior 5e mechanics that were included. I’ve run some Dungeon Crawl Classics recently, and find that Shadowdark simply runs more smoothly. I rarely have to refer to rules while playing, while in DCC there are more exceptions and side systems to keep in my head or something quirky to look up.

Shadowdarklings

While most OSR games are easy to play 100% on paper as a player, for me having a digital character creator is now essential to running games. I find myself pumping out pre-gen characters for conventions and having to do this manually isn’t fun.

Only some of the players of my open table group have purchased copies of the book. Shadowdarklings helps make the game more accessible to those players and helps players not to feel left out if they don’t have the 3 official Zines with additional character options.

Torch Timers

Every game needs a quirky mechanic to get attention of readers seeking a new game and this is Shadowdark’s.

Torches last a real-world clock time, often running on a smartphone timer app or an hourglass. Shadowdark didn’t invent real time mechanics and they aren’t essential to the game working, but they certainly help players immediately recognize they are playing a different game than D&D 3e or 5e.

I opt for Sly Flourish’s house rule setting torch timers to 60 minutes minus 1d12 to keep players on their toes. I am also experimenting with using battery powered votive candles to indicate who has a lit torch around the table. They are a new addition to my Shadowdark go-bag.

At first I didn’t get the point. If a torch runs out, the next player in the initiative lights a torch. There was no real danger. However, after conferring with longer-time players in the Shadowdark Facebook group I was reminded of two things. First: it’s okay if there is no impact. It makes the chaotic light moments more memorable if they don’t happen every time. Second: in the dark all rolls have disadvantage and the Shadowdark action economy is limited. Casting light in the dark with disadvantage isn’t a sure thing. I now make lighting a torch in hand a full action if you don’t have a source of fire. Pulling a torch from a bag and lighting it in the same round is difficult. Additionally, inventory limitations and limited gold will make spare torches less common.

With this in mind, my next game had a chaotic torch moment amid Zombies moment I think the players will remember. However, this might be a mechanic that I stop using over time if it’s dramatic value reduces over time.

Carousing is fantastic, moar please

My first game of Shadowdark was as a player and my favorite part was the random roll on the carousing table that gave me XP and plot hooks for the next dungeon crawl which I would be running for a rotating GM game. We met a bard who had a mutual dislike of the town’s nobility.

I immediately wanted larger carousing tables. There is so much that can be done with this system I feel like Shadowdark barely scratches the surface of it.

Downsides and criticisms

Taken out of context, the game leaves a lot of holes to be filled in by the players. This game still requires creativity from the GM and Players to be complete. In the words of Dungeon World, it draws a map and leaves spaces to be filled in. Run strictly as is, the book presents a game not much more complicated or rich than Milton Bradley’s Hero Quest. It depends on the accumulated culture of OSR and emulating legends of the 70’s and 80’s play style to be a full game. I started with Basic D&D in the early 90’s, which was very much this way, so this is nostalgic for me. However, this might not be for everyone

The core rule book has only four classes. The Paladin is not needed in such an intentionally grim setting, but many will dislike the absence of other expected classes and character options compared to the relatively rich Old School Essentials. Ranger, Bard, and Kobold have official Arcane Library supplements, and the official Cursed Scroll zine gives a template for how setting specific classes can be made available. The game is bare bones, but I would have liked more classes.

Most other criticisms I’ve seen are more criticisms of the game’s relative hype and popularity. There are other good games, there isn’t anything magical about this one. However, Shadowdark is accessible and that counts for a lot.

The Challenge of Community Expansions

The custom-class crowd are going wild making every possible permutation, and I choose to ignore that. Fewer expressive classes make for a cohesive game where characters have a role in the world. I grew up with Dark Sun, where all the races and classes fit in perfectly with the setting. A tight six or eight classes make for a great game.

The barrier to entry for making Shadowdark expansions is low. There are publishing layout templates circulating that mimic the Arcane Library and Cursed Scroll style and I am worried the Shadowdark scene will become cluttered bloat much like the 1983 Atari cartridge crash. The self-published stuff is not hard to ignore or keep out of games I run, so I should probably not criticize something that does not affect me as long as it doesn’t impact the ability of the talented supplement makers from being able to make products I will enjoy and consume.

Read, Play, or Skip?

This is a definite play, but make sure to play the core book as is with all the procedures and randomness. It’s so easy to use this game as a platform for your own highly adapted style of D&D, and there’s nothing wrong with that later. For your first play of Shadowdark, do your self a favor and run it as written to experience something that may be different