Epic Encounters: Local Legends – Tavern Kit Is So Good Your Adventurers Won’t Want To Leave
The folks have Steamforged Games have outdone themselves with this new Tavern Kit. And I don’t say that lightly.
Long time readers will know that I’m a huge fan of the Epic Encounters series from Steamforged Games. They are fantastic kits with miniatures and everything you need to run their respective encounters. So, over the weekend while I was at my FLGS helping to facilitate one of our local GTs, I spotted the new Epic Encounters: Local Legends boxes. I was thinking about picking them up but, as one does during a GT, I got a little distracted. But then on Monday I got a message from the boss that there were some new products that I might want to check out. Lo and behold, Steamforged Games had sent us review copies of the very products that caught my eye.
Today, I want to focus on the Local Legends: Tavern Kit. I’m not being hyperbolic when I say this kit impressed the hell outta me. After I saw the contents, I then saw the price and laughed with glee. This is absolutely a steal of a deal. Let’s get into this one.
Local Legends Tavern Kit – Get Ready For An Epic Inncounter
So at the very basics high-level what’s in the box? Here’s what you’re looking at from the manufacturer:
- Inncounter book, featuring a complete guide to running epic tavern inncounters
- Tavern book including 10 amazing and unique fantasy taverns, bursting with plot hooks
- NPC book and cards featuring 60 fully-statted NPC’s with portraits, backstory, and adventure hooks
- 10 detailed tavern maps, beautifully illustrated inside and out
- 10 illustrated play mats for riotous tavern games — a unique game for every pub!
Okay, sure, that sounds fine…but looking at the actual contents is way more impressive. Let’s just start with the Tavern Game play mats:
Without going full spoilery, these play mats are impressive. They are full color and about the size of a standard sheet of paper. Wonderfully illustrated and featuring some really cool looking art, these are games that I know your players are going to love. I’m getting a little meta here but these “games within the games” are going to suck your players in — you’re going to spend entire sessions just hanging out at the Inn and your players won’t be mad about it.
There’s also the deck of cards that has the rules for these games as well as all the NPCs for quick access. And while these are designed to work with 5e, realistically, you could use these for any RPG setting if you wanted. These are just designed to make the life of the DM/GM easier. Would you like a roster of 60 NPCs to just whip out and drop into whatever game you’re running? Because that’s included here.
Again, without getting super spoilery, the NPC book has all the info you could need to play with these NPCs in your games. You could fight them, you could romance them, you could recruit them — use these NPCs as you see fit in your games! This book alone is worth the price of admission. And then there’s the OTHER awesome additional books.
The Inncounters book and the Tavern book combine to make for two books full of hours of fun. The Tavern book details the various Taverns you can drop in to your world. The Inncounters book details the various encounters your adventuring party might run into during their travels. While there are recommended combinations, you can absolutely mix-and-match as you see fit. It’s your game world and these GM aides should be used as such. And speaking of the game world, the tavern maps are freaking amazing.
I was hesitant to take photos because of spoiling these…so trust me, these could be framed and mounted. Each tavern map has a picture of the respective building’s outside and when you flip the pictures over, the other side is the inside of the tavern. This feels like a real “duh” move but it’s genius. These “maps” aren’t a battle map per se, but highly detailed images of what the taverns look like inside. Here’s one of the art pieces I pulled from Steamforged Games’ website:
If you really want a good look, here’s a link to the hi-rez version. Wow. Just freakin’ wow.
I really can’t hype this product much more. And yeah, they did send this one to us for a review. That said, I literally almost bought this at the game store and would have if I wasn’t helping to run a GT. But now you can pick one up for yourself, too. Are you ready for the price now?
Epic Encounters: Local Legends – Tavern Kit $39.99
Yeah. For $40 you get one of the best campaign aides I’ve ever seen. That’s a freakin’ deal. If you pick this one up, you’re going to be using it over and over again in your campaigns. Every RPG group playing in a fantasy setting could use this box so do your group a favor and snag one. Your players/GM/DM will thank you.
Make your Inns as epic as the encounters the adventurers face!
