Forbidden Lands Player’s Handbook: It gets gnarly and dangerous ⚔️ RPG Review & Mechanics

Forbidden Lands is an original fantasy tabletop RPG by Free League. The core ruleset comes in two books: a gamemaster’s guide, and a player’s handbook. The theme is old-school fantasy, which makes this Free League’s answer to the Old School Renaissance or OSR movement. I cover the Player’s Handbook in this video. And I cover the Gamemaster’s Guide in a separate video.
My video on the Forbidden Lands Gamemaster’s Guide: • Forbidden Lands GM’s G...
---------------------------------------------------------------------
▶️ BUY THE CORE BOOKS ON PDF AT DRIVETHRURPG
Purchases support the channel at no additional cost to you.
bit.ly/ForbiddenLands
📦My Amazon Shop📦
(purchases help the channel!)
www.amazon.com/shop/davethaum...
⚔️ Get Forbidden Lands at the Free League site: frialigan.se/en/games/forbidde...
---------------------------------------------------------------------
❄️All free Free League resources (sheets, quickstarts, communities):
frialigan.se/en/general-resou...
-------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------ .
Support the channel
Patreon: / thaumavore
.
Thaumavore Community
Newsletter sign-up: bit.ly/ThaumavoreNewsletter
.
Dave’s Publications
Fluxfall Horizon, a parallel Earths RPG bit.ly/Fluxfall
Age of Snakes, an Index Card RPG expansion bit.ly/AgeOfSnakes
The Turnip Knights, a D&D 5e and Index Card RPG one-shot bit.ly/TurnipKnights
A Book of Witches, a rules-agnostic guide to all things witches bit.ly/ABookOfWitches

[@leodegrance]

a concise, 12 minute review that tells you how the game works. Congrats, you are pretty much alone in this, much appreciated.

[@TheManyVoicesVA]

This guy's videos are great for this reason. I strive for the same.

[@tylerh2548]

"HASBRO flagship RPG..." shade noticed and appreciated

[@Curraghchase]

The pictures are much better than the ones seen a half-century ago. Listen, you whipper-snapper, back in my day, we played AD&D with cave drawings by firelight! We couldn't play during the day because we had to fight off dinosaurs with bone spears! Dungeons and Dragons were science fiction in my day! Now get off my lawn. An outstanding review. I look forward to my first game tonight. This was very helpful, even if I am old as hell.

[@pnilsson7446]

The illustrations, if that’s what you mean, were mostly made by Nils Gulliksson in the mid 80s for the early editions of Drakar och Demoner (Dragonbane), for which Free League now own the license (and will release a game later this year). So about 40 years ago. Forbidden Lands was initially promoted as the ”Nils Gulliksson” RPG. Very nostalgic for lots of swedes.

[@CraftNicks]

Dave.. Im truely enjoying your reviews and appreciate your style of video.. engaging, informative and get to learn about new material... awesome

[@DaveThaumavore]

Craft Nicks Thanks, dude. I’m trying.

[@goldengriffon]

Your summaries are exquisite! I learned more about the game in these 12 minutes than in over 4 hours of other channels' videos. Bravo!

[@kosterix123]

These adventure books are a nice read but when I look around to see no friends interested, it's always such a letdown. The idea of playing and exploring the world is nice. Reality is different.

[@duggygee6387]

What a fantastic presentation! It looks like Forbidden Lands is heavily inspired by 'Earth Dawn' (setting) and 'The One Ring' (jobs while hex crawling). Both were the elements that I enjoyed the most in each of those rpgs. I'm also a fan of OSR with modern game mechanics. FL just checks off all the right boxes for me. I can't wait to play this!

[@jennythebean9117]

You know free league owns the lord of the rings license, also there’s possible plan for The One Ring 2th edition

[@duggygee6387]

@@jennythebean9117 - Good to know. :)

[@tribunoarcano8259]

I love these rules breakdown. As everybody is saying, it so instructive and well done.

[@rushthewash]

Best and most comprehensive review of this system. Great video!

[@markporter3522]

Just started GM’ing the Hollows. I love that PC’s can’t combat their way out of every situation, that magic isn’t so easy and that players aren’t ridiculously powerful after 3 campaigns. It feels more real. I also love the legends and lore and the plots/sub-plots that can be created with the NPC’s.

[@OldPaw]

Well done review. Subscribed based on the quality of this video.

[@CapeCodWargameCommission]

Excellent. Thank you very much for this overview.

[@lostsanityreturned]

Great video, organised overview. I actually think I will be sharing this video to help explain the system to people. I would love to see you cover Conan 2d20 / Startrek Adventures or Symbaroum.

[@bergenbx]

Excellent video! I like the way you handle it. Nice job!

[@ejsmith7626]

Thanks for always making these videos

[@craftsmenMC]

This reminds me of the Alien RPG which I LOVE.

[@johnberry5296]

Very good overview! Many thanks.

[@ThePandionknight]

Excellent presentation!

[@PeterKoperdan]

Really good review. Thanks.

[@concathedrifter2278]

just started playing this while its not my first TT RPG my experience with TT games is only 5 sessions. this game is mad fun so far and im hyped to continue playing! thank you so much for the video. not much out there for people who want to play this

[@DaveThaumavore]

No prob! Glad I could help.

[@pugbuddykachoo]

I don't care much for the system but I do admit that there are some nice points to it. The hex crawl rules are handy and, generally speaking, the strategic rules are nicely done. I just don't care much for the character generation and combat rules. That doesn't make it a bad system, but it's not to my liking.

[@ryancrowe3475]

Hi Dave. Great reviews on your channel. Well done!

[@DaveThaumavore]

Ryan Crowe Thanks, Ryan!

[@mateusz3394]

Admirable review!

[@sandkiller]

Great review. Won yourself a new subscriber

[@DaveThaumavore]

Support the channel by joining my Patreon! www.patreon.com/thaumavore Newsletter sign-up: bit.ly/ThaumavoreNewsletter

[@oldiesmusiclover22]

I love this review it is really great :)

[@luziankrieger8370]

Great video!

[@Lawpsided]

These are so great! You’re the next Watch It Played / Rodney Smith of RPG’s.

[@DaveThaumavore]

J. Berriman Thanks, man! That’s on my list of things to review. FL is pretty amazing.

[@NefariousKoel]

MYZ is great. I was surprised it didn't get more buzz back when it came out.

[@Lawpsided]

NefariousKoel - totally agree.

[@zonegamma8197]

very nice presentation. thanks a lot

[@MatteoCampinoti94]

Your videos are wonderful, incredibly informative and detailed and really well done.

[@DaveThaumavore]

Thanks, Matteo. That's very nice of you to say.

[@paavohirn3728]

Just placed the order 😀

[@zebedeetotty]

I'm going to try and run my first session with a few of my friends next week we are all complete beginners and I'm the GM, were going to try a dark sun conversion using forbidden lands rule system, it seems like a good fit since hunger and thirst are allready baked into forbidden lands

[@DaveThaumavore]

Good luck! Don’t let the rules get in the way of fun moments!

[@vargawolf9161]

Hi! your rpg reviews are outstanding! could you please review "mongoose Traveller second edition" and "Mutant year zero" thank you, keep up the great work its much appreciated.

[@DaveThaumavore]

Yes! MYZ is on the list. Traveler I'm not familiar with but I'll look into it. Thanks!

[@shufflerdom09]

This game actually looks a little better then D&D 5th

[@vesperschake6241]

Low bar lol

[@WhenCanWePlay]

I've described it as "imagine if 5e's travel, exploration and resource-management rules were fun and less book-keeping"

[@kosterix123]

Everything is better than 5e

[@RottenMechGaming]

I like the look of it and agree, so I just bought it. I buy a lot of games and force them on my players to suffer. I must admit the group favour D20 based games so this will be a harder sell. I don't mind D6 dice pool, although I prefer to avoid the games workshop fantasy battle type of rolling pools. However, I will certainly give it a go and see how well the D6 pool works. The funny thing is with dice that it's not always just the probability, sometimes a very good mechanic just does not feel as easy to succeed with on the roll, so it's also how it feels. If it's always too hard (feeling) it can get quickly dissatisfying for players, so I will be checking out how well people pick it up and if they feel like actions are crunchy and probable.

[@jesusperez-os8nd]

A little?

[@FaerlinaF]

Hey! Great review! FL is one kind of a game, all the concept is beautiful! What music did you use at the beggining if I may? Is so mysterious and magical!

[@DaveThaumavore]

I can't recall. It's been a few years.

[@Kindlesmith70]

For a while I had this confused with Fabled Lands.

[@b.k.8515]

Please can someone tell me what the title of the music that plays in the background is? It sounds too good

[@captainnolan5062]

I have to disagree with a point you made regarding "original-ism." Nearly half a century ago folks were playing as goblins and orcs. Take a look at the Tunnels and Trolls variant, Monsters Monsters published in 1976: "The classic Tunnels & Trolls supplement that lets the players play the monsters, defending their dungeon dwellings and other holdings from marauding adventurers! This is actually a complete set of rules that allows you to play T&T as a monster instead of a "hero"."

[@DaveThaumavore]

That's very interesting. I was not aware of the Tunnels and Trolls RPG. Sounds like it was way ahead of its time.

[@Sanguivore]

@@DaveThaumavore I know I'm 2 years late to comment on this, but I figured you may have been interested in knowing that players were playing as the monstrous races (such as Orcs, Goblins, etc.) all the way back in Dave Arneson's original "Blackmoor" campaign, pre-D&D. The idea that characters playing as monsters is a modern idea, itself is very much a presentism. That aside, this is a *fantastic* video and I can't wait to learn more about Forbidden Lands! There's a whole heap of inspiration here that I'm going to draw on for my own future games.

[@NefariousKoel]

I like most I've seen of Forbidden Lands except the Willpower point related Magic system. Specifically requiring you to accidentally injure yourself beforehand in order to be able to cast spells. It's thematically unintuitive to me as any magic system economy I've seen. Many of the spell effects aren't terribly overpowering, notably the combat ones which cost a lot of Willpower Points to equal or exceed the potential damage of regular weapons. Quite a few spells also specifically, "do not work on monsters". While I'd rate FL pretty high, I think that comes with the caveat that I'd modify the spellcasting rules. I'd probably either give spellcasters some kind of channeling item which regularly produces a point of Willpower to be used for spellcasting only, or implement consumable spellcasting components which give similar results, to varying degrees of WP each depending on rarity. Although I never really liked tracking components, so the first is most likely. Note that I really enjoy magic systems with potentially dangerous side effects, etc. I'm not a fan of Vancian magic, as in D&D, so the preference of style didn't factor into this aversion so much. It's more about fitting logically.. or the lack of.

[@DaveThaumavore]

NefariousKoel Excellent observation. I’m sure the game designers were aiming to make magic rare and costly, but perhaps went too far by also making many of the spells underpowered. I like the notion of a low-magic setting, but perhaps the spells should just have more punch.

[@NefariousKoel]

@@DaveThaumavore Agreed! I shouldn't give the magic system a final judgement until seeing it in regular operation, but it really stood out as a mechanical oddity too difficult to explain. Fortunately it looks easy to adjust to taste. Great reviews, btw!

[@goblinrat6119]

After a couple of sessions, this doesn't seem to be a real problem in my experience. Characters are meant to be pushing ofter, and in practice it seems to happen without prompting or forcing. Our druid tends to have enough WP for his spells. Of course, it also feels a lot like spellcasters aren't supposed to be solely dedicated spellcasters. Our aforementioned druid, for example, uses a bow and contributes at least as much as an archer, probably more. Spells are dangerous (due to mishaps) and are supposed to be used in decisive, critical points, not as your main arsenal (until maybe later, when you've advanced your spellcasting talents so much you can cast lower rank spells without fear of repercussions. So, in my experience, requiring WP for spells is not nearly as much of an issue as you might think. Pushing happens often, and you're going to get those 1s plenty of time. Some of our characters who have less ways to use WP have literally ended sessions capped at the maximum 10. There hasn't yet been a moment where our caster really needed to get a spell off and couldn't. It works. However, it's definitely true that many of the spells are more utility than big and decisive effects. In practice, it seems to work well with the mindset that there are no dedicated, solely spellcasting-focused characters. Your spellcaster is definitely going to have to pick up a weapon or otherwise find other ways to be relevant, as well. Although, even if some of the effects feel small at a glance, a lot of them are surprisingly powerful. Being able to basically automatically succeed at a stealth check, to determine without error if someone is lying, getting your warrior back up without having to rest 6 hours or the like can be really critical. I guess I'd say that spellcasting characters are more or less equal to non-casters. The non-caster professional talents can achieve similar effects, and I think this is what they aimed for, considering the spells are all the casters get for professional talents. The other professional talents also require similar amounts of WP, so this is in line as well.

[@DaveThaumavore]

Goblin Rat Excellent. Thank you for that feedback. Magic appears to be a truly nuanced element of this game.

[@NefariousKoel]

@@goblinrat6119 I'm glad it works in practice. I could see they were going for a relatively low-magic theme, forcing spellcasters to rely less often on spells. Which is kinda refreshing. Even though the accidental self-damage-to-spellcasting-fuel sounded rather odd to me, it just goes to show that I should always try running the rules as written before tinkering, as it often works out.

[@patkelley8293]

I'm going to need more shelf space and any reason to buy more dice is a good reason!

[@hexchad765]

I want your slides ;)

[@DarknessLight77]

Are the close quarters combat rules optional, or baked into combat? That's the only thing here that in kinda ehhh on.

[@Steasyyyy]

This might come way out of the blue but ... I've been DIEING to know what music you used from <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="190">3:10</a> until <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="445">7:25</a>. I KNOW i heard it somewhere before but i can't find it.

[@aaronmcgowan5769]

This is a wonderful review, I'm coming to it after your GM guide review of the same system. I do have a question though, how much is combat impacted without having the cards? I'm off to see what other videos you have and am hopeful to see some warhammer in there :)

[@schwarzesonne6529]

I'm new to the game but I got them sailing the high seas printed them and glued them to a set of cheap playing cards that might be a solution for you if it's still not solved

[@JDkn]

Me hoping this was related to shadow of the colossus

[@starbugmechanic5236]

Can magic attacks be dodged?

[@DaveThaumavore]

Starbug Mechanic My interpretation of the rules is that magic attacks are not dodged generally due to the fact that casts are always successful.

[@xavierdoesntmatter]

"Strongholds are coming into vogue". I'm old enough to have played AD&D and AD&D 2nd Ed. Strongholds have always been my thing. Older systems had them as a reward for high level fighters and thieves since back then mages kept gaining new spells and powers as they leveled up to where they could eliminate entire cities but a fighter just swung a sword. Give them followers and a castle instead.

[@jasonarthur5487]

Invested in the game? Sounds more like a commercial then a review.

[@malcomalexander9437]

Have you ever heard of being emotionally invested in something? Invested doesn't just refer to money, can also refer to time as well.