Fourth Edition
Whitehack Fourth Edition, by Daniel Grady at Lulu.com
“A wonderful example of a beautifully simple book design and layout. It’s rare to see authors take as much care as Mehrstam does with the layout and positioning of text on the page; there are many example of paragraphs that must have been re-written multiple times, so that all information related to a class, for example, stays together on a spread.”
“This unique character creation model fosters creativity and collaboration among players, as they can adapt and evolve their characters based on the direction of the story. Furthermore, Whitehack’s emphasis on simplicity, versatility, and customization ensures a memorable gaming experience, permitting players to navigate their adventures with both ease and depth. […] Whitehack is designed for a broad audience, appealing to both newcomers and veteran tabletop gamers.”
Whitehack Fourth Edition, by Stefan
“One of my favorite RPGs ever. The system is OSR-ish but with freeform elements. It provides incredible flexibility for the GM and the players. It feels easy to run and play while not being too minimalist, and providing actual rules support for a lot of situations (like tactical combat). It also packs excellent GM advice.”
Whitehack: Far More Than a Retro-Clone, by Fumble Table
“Whitehack. This is awesome! It does classes differently to anything you’ve probably played, and it has loads of cool mechanics. It doesn’t even need to be played in fantasy — in fact the author also has a sci-fi setup. You could play any setting of your imagination using this system. And it almost takes a step toward story-games. It’s got that element as well as well as the old school structure. I adore this!”
Ultimate Fantasy Tabletop RPG Tier List PART 1, by Culinary Gaming
“S-tier, like definitely, definitely! If you are a person who wants to create your own supplements or rules systems, have at least a read. It’s a master class of game design.”
Whitehack Fourth Edition, by Ian Carr at Lulu.com
“The PDFs of Whitehack 3e and 4e are some of the best I’ve ever used. The printed book of Whitehack 3e is good, but this 4e printing blows them all away. Seriously. Whitehack 4e is a very well-laid-out book. As someone who has worked in design and studied typography, I can say that this book is wonderfully assembled. Every two-page spread is carefully arranged to maximize ease of use and legibility. The ordering of sections has been improved compared to 3e, resulting in a much better flow. The excellent index, table of contents, and well-designed hierarchy of headings, bold text, etc., make flipping to, navigating, and cross-referencing material easy and fluid. Interestingly, while I found myself preferring the 3e PDF to the 3e book during gameplay, it’s the opposite with 4e. Despite the PDF of 4e being better than 3e, the 4e book is clearly the ideal form for experiencing this game.”
Whitehack Fourth Edition, by Leo V. at DriveThruRPG
“Whitehack 4e is both a light system and a complex one. The lightness of it allows players and DM/GM/Referee the freedom to create setting, magick, and lore seamlessly during gameplay, while the complexity lies subtly underneath it all, resisting exploitation and rewarding creativity and careful reading. […] Perhaps the best way for me to finally convince you to try it is this: my group of five players and myself, the GM, have been playing a campaign with Whitehack for over a year now, meeting weekly. We started with 3e and transferred to 4e as soon as the PDF dropped. We don’t plan on stopping anytime soon.”
Whitehack Fourth Edition, by Ian C. at DriveThruRPG
“Whitehack 4th edition is a must-have for those who are already fans of the system or those who are looking to get into it. As someone who owned and played the 3rd edition, I was curious about what new features the 4th edition had to offer. After spending some time with it, I can confidently say that the 4th edition is a vast improvement over its predecessor.”
Whitehack, Two Hack, Three Hack, Four! by Derek Bizier at The Halfling’s Hoard
“This is a great book for bringing in people to the hobby. There is plenty of advice and examples to help a new person play. I would even offer this as a book that a referee could use early on in their career. There is enough stuff to help advise on creating a world, and running a campaign.”
Whitehack Fourth Edition, by ypikaye y. at DriveThruRPG
“Une quatrième version dont les règlages et les petites nouveautés montent la qualité du produit d’un cran encore, facilitant son adaptation à d’autres styles que la fantasy ou l’esprit OSR. Le nouvelle classe rare “the clever” est bienvenue. Mais ce sont les trois classes de base qui font le sel de cette ensemble de règles. Pas de limite à l’imaginaire. J’utilise ce Whitehack notamment pour faire du Cthulhu, mais aussi du sand box med-fan. Une version 4 affinée mais avec encore plus de tout. Un must pour moi surtout pour la création de personnages.”
Third Edition
Whitehack Third Edition, by Ian C. at DriveThruRPG
“What really excites me are the games system it calls ‘Bases’. ‘Bases’ are ways for a party to have a shared asset: like a mentor, a vehicle (ship, car, etc.), or a magical pet. Using a Base is an incredibly flexible way to add so much to the game. It makes me excited at the many possibilites of interesting game scenarios this opens up.”
Whitehack Third Edition, by ferdinand g. at DriveThruRPG
“This is the only OSR system you’ll ever need. Really.”
Whitehack Third Edition Softcover, by Alexander Bardelmeier.
“This is an amazing book, the writing is concise and the rules are very well thought out and easy to understand. This system is extremely flexible which I love the most about it. It’s the only rulebook I find myself reading over and over, still enjoying every read through. I would highly recommend that you buy this book!”
Whitehack Third Edition, by Brian Ashford.
“This is my favourite RPG. Everything you need to run a game is in this one book, including character generation, simple tactical combat, magic, monsters, GM advice. Players are free to invent any character they can imagine, Magic is freeform and yet isn’t a maths exercise. Basically any fantasy RPG adventure will convert to Whitehack without any trouble. I especially love that PCs in Whitehack are powerful yet still vulnerable, making for exciting but tense games.”
The Old-School RPG that Lets You Play Anything, by Dungeon Dandy on Youtube.
“Even if you’re new to the RPG space, this book explains how to set up quests, how to design monsters, it tells you how the mechanics work, so really—you only need this. […] I love it. This is my go to system for really putting out anything that I want to, just because how useful it is and how easy it is to understand and recommend to other people.”
Whitehack 3rd Edition by Paul Jennings in Wyrd Science #2
“The core rules are lean. There’s enough [famous trademark] DNA in here to remind us where we are, combined with powerful and subtle design concepts that you wouldn’t find in a straight retro-clone. We have player authorial control, bases, corruption, faction rules, crossing genres, campaign and adventure planning advice, and using random tables and ‘modus’ rolls to shape GM input rather than just dumb output.
These sharp, minimalist rules bring to life a conversation between referee and other players with the flavour of the oldest RPGs; they’re versatile. Just add imagination.”
Whitehackers by Stefan Mjucic at White Tower
“One particular chapter stands out the most in my opinion – the fifth chapter titled “How to Run the Game”. It serves as a Referee guide (DM’s guide) of sorts, but I would say it is much more than that. The whole chapter is actually giving some great tips on how to be a Referee, and how to create impressive dungeons, adventures, campaigns and stories. It can serve as an abstract and encapsulated tool for worldbuilding, regardless of whether you’re into RPGs or not. This sole chapter is a good enough purchase reason if you are into game design, worldbuilding or fiction writing.”
Whitehack Third Edition Review by Jason Wardell on goodreads.com
“Whitehack 3e is perhaps the most valuable TTRPG supplement I’ve purchased in years. Not only does it provide a quality ruleset for facilitating a wide range of OSR-style games, it is chock-full with meditations on the hobby and well thought-out optional mechanics that can be dropped into any system. By expressing the notion of ‘hacking’ your favorite setting or system, Whitehack blows the TTRPG world wide open and has immediately become a title I will recommend without hesitation to any fan of the genre, regardless of their interest in the OSR.“
Let’s Read! Whitehack 3E by vestige on rpggeek.com
“The Base part is certainly my favorite new element, and is worth the price of admission. […] This is still a super-slick OSR game. I think it will shine most as a long-term campaign game, not necessarily for one shots, because the rules for precedents, bases, and advancement won’t matter as much in a one-shot. — I still highly recommend it!”
Whitehack Third Edition by Brett M. on DriveThru RPG
“It’s amazing to me that Whitehack achieves all of the above while also innovating other brilliant mechanics like its Auction system (which helps simplify macro-level scenes like chases, large scale battles, etc). And it does all of this in so few pages. […] Whitehack 3rd Edition is well worth your money. It’s my go-to system of choice, and even if your goal is to make your own OSR hack, you will almost assuredly be inspired by the mechanics Whitehack has to offer. Also, if you find yourself loving this game, I strongly encourage you to check out the desginer’s other work; I recently purchased his fascinating sci-fi game called Suldokar’s Wake and it’s dense in the best of ways.”
RPG REVIEW: Whitehack Third Edition by Imp Familiar on Imp Familiar
“I got the PDF on DriveThruRPG and the hardcover via Lulu. The digest-size book is beautifully printed and bound, with a dust jacket. […] Whitehack made me think: I want to try this now—my mark for an excellent game. It’s definitely worth the money. I’ll write more when I get a chance to play it, but for now Whitehack gets 5 stars.”
Whitehack Third Edition by Travis C. on DriveThru RPG
“For years now I’ve been digging through the OSR picking up some great games and playing them, but this game hit me different. Recently if found I wanted to play an old setting but hacking new races and rules into my game seemed like too much work so I went looking and found Whitehack. This game can play just about any fantasy game idea you have and play it well. The characters feel refreshingly open allowing for a wide range of concept and the free form magic makes spell casting feel unpredictable but extremely useful. And the rules are a life saver for GM’s with not much time to prep with small monster stat blocks and loose limits. I think that if you are interested in a lighter yet deeper fantasy system to play your ideal game you couldn’t do much better than Whitehack.”
My Verdict by Prismatic Wasteland at Twitter.com
“3e is great! It strikes the difficult balance of being both reference material and something you can read cover-to-cover. If you are familiar with previous editions, it is very similar but with some new bits that built on what came before, e.g., ‘Bases.’ […] The rules are highly flexible and encourage conversation and collaboration (very much my style of play).”
Whitehack Third Edition by ypikaye y. on DriveThru RPG
“Je redécouvre WhiteHack avec cette version 3 alors que la V2 m’avait laissé une trés bonne lecture et impression. La V3 est tout simplement excellente. Trés freeform mais tellement élégant et subtil.”
Whitehack Third Edition by George J. on DriveThru RPG
“This was the OSR ruleset that clicked for me, and will facilitate my table’s conversion […] to running things more OSR style. As a DM I can now easily port almost anything and any adventure/module into my setting with minimal fiddling and the emergent character creation rewards creativity in a way I haven’t seen before. Combat is fast while remaining tactical and as a GM/referee, I’m more empowered to say YES to player character concepts rather than steering them towards a concept that’s more viable. I look forward to seeing what my table does with their new freedom.”
Whitehack Third Edition by Sean C. on DriveThru RPG
“As someone who desperately wants to play old OSR modules and campaigns but doesn’t really want to go quite all the way back to pure (or even slightly greased-up) old-school mechanics, this is an excellent, more modern feeling system. […] Overall this is a really nice book, and one that made me think: I want to try this RIGHT NOW, which is my mark for a 5 star game. Definitely worth the purchase. I also ordered the POD from the author’s site (via Lulu).”
Whitehack Third Edition by Jordan R. on DriveThru RPG
“This is a great ruleset: rules-light yet peppered with some simple modifiers and special rules, free-form yet not boundless. It is traditionalist and not storygamey in the sense that players are playing their character without having directorial or GM-like authority. This 3rd edition is very well laid-out, the PDF is full of cross-references, which is a boon (if a rule is referenced in the text, a hyperlink will lead you to the referenced page), and the random tables and other examples really help to understand how to use the ruleset and what this is all about.”
Second Edition
Book Review: Whitehack (video review) by Questing Beast on youtube
“All in all, a really fascinating game with a lot of great ideas that seem unique, which I’ve not seen replicated in other games. Things like the auction mechanic especially is a great thing that you can add to any other game to really spice it up!”
March’s Game of the Month is Whitehack 2nd Edition! by tidfisk at Reddit r/rpg
“I know it’s been out for a while now but it is really such a cool little retro-clone. It’s well written and crazy hackable. I think my favorite part is that it easily presents four different armor class options for use in one simple table. The whole book is also presented and designed really well.”
Freeing the Old School Renaissance by Pookie on Reviews from R’lyeh
“Whitehack is a great retroclone for giving player and Referee design freedom alike—and then showcasing how it can be done.”
The Saga of Unboxing Continues by Jason G on Youtube
“Whitehack! Are you kidding me? That is worth every penny of the 20 dollars I paid for it. Just the quality of that—it’s so old-school, man. Jeez, I love that!”
First Time Playing: Whitehack by Brian V Molina at Laughing Leviathan
“Its minimalism and straightforwardness makes for a great experience for both GMs and players. It also features a great toolset for GMs and referees in general that cover setting and adventure design, as well as a variety of other topics that you would need for tabletop gaming.”
Whitehack 2e Standard Review by Patrik Olsson at Lulu.com
“The only old school rules set you´ll ever need. Takes the very best from the original game and tweaks the not so good parts, creating a complete game. Rooted in old school, but with great playability and potential for the creative DM.”
Whitehack Comparison by JC at Hobgoblinry
“Whitehack’s been my go-to RPG for some time now. I use it for regular games with the kids and their friends, for family sessions (my wife can occasionally be persuaded to play) and for occasional games with my old RPG muckers. It’s great – sleek and elegant, and with nice, intuitive mechanics.”
Whitehack Second Edition Review by Brett Maack at Lulu.com
“Overall, I’m really impressed with this product. The OSR has a lot of content, and if you’re someone like me who needs a “go-to” game, I think Whitehack has the right balance of freeform and structure that makes it worth committing to.”
Whitehack 2e Notebook Review by Morris Harrell at Lulu.com
“When the world freezes over, poisoned by cursed blood, there will come an awakening of evil — something that the Whitecloaks and Twisted, the Bleedists and Watchers, the Giants and Witch Cultists are ill-prepared for. This setting is just a small portion of the book, and ripe for opportunities to adventure. […] The Notebook edition adds a most helpful section for penciling or inking in your own house rules, illustrations, maps, additional character sheets and other scribblings.”
Doubled in size! Same slick system (mostly), same impressive old-school game by vestige at boardgamegeek.com
“Whitehack remains one of my favorite of the rules-light OSR games. It’s probably the most elegant iteration of [famous trademark] I’ve seen, which counts for a lot in my book. […] The additional page count offers some additional options and more GM support. It’s still a great game, which I highly recommend to anyone looking for a deep and rich OSR experience.”
Whitehack 2nd Edition by Brian Ashford at Ominosity
“I have never run another game which can so easily surprise me, it’s very satisfying to sit down to my own session without any real idea what to expect and yet confident that the system will handle it.”
Whitehack 2e Booklet Review by Tristan McDonald at Lulu.com
“There’s an incredible amount in these 64 pages, and the fantastic typography and layout saves things from becoming too crowded. This is a brilliantly conceived fantasy RPG, with plenty of flavour and sensible, easy-to-remember mechanics. It’ll take reading through it a few times before things really click, but when they do you’ll have a complete game which you can use with 40 years of old-school role-playing materials.”
Densely Packed with Gaming Goodness by Fred Daniel at Whitebox and Beyond
“Whitehack packs a lot into it’s 64 pages and is a complete game with bestiary, world setting and two adventures.”
Reseña Whitehack & Symbaorum (in Spanish) at Star Dungeon
“Reglas muy sencillas, pero con mucho ambiente, hechas con el espíritu de la OSR, En el manual se incluyen reglas de creación de personaje, magia, reglas para el master e incluso una campaña. Me ha encantado lo sencillo que se hace.”
Look On The Light Side Of Life (And Fantasy Gaming) at enworld.org
“If you’re looking for a game with the simplicity of the old school (and that can use a lot of older modules and adventures with little effort) but that is reworked with a more modern sensibility, then Whitehack might be the game that you’re looking for. I think that it is a cleanly designed system that is robust, and manages to bring across that robustness in a simple manner.”
RPG First Look: Whitehack at Department V
“If you have a reason for buying something from Lulu and you’re even remotely interested, I would recommend Whitehack. In many ways it’s a deconstruction and reconfiguration of OSR mechanisms that empower both the GM and the players in owning their setting and exploring it in emergent fashion.”
Reseñas: Whitehack 2ª Edición (in Spanish) at El Rincón del Cabo Hicks
“… un gran ejemplo de esa máxima de ‘menos es más’. Whitehack me parece un trabajo tremendamente elegante …”
Vestige’s Fantasy RPG Recommendations at rpggeek.com
“Whitehack is a slim game that nevertheless packs quite a punch. It is rules-light in many ways but also very sophisticated in others. It’s also one of the shortest ‘complete’ games out there.”
Whitehack – Tiempo de dados 141 (in Spanish (I think!)) at Turbiales
“Hoy en tiempo de dados nos encontramos frente a otro retroclon, aunque uno bastante especial.“
[Let’s Study Whitehack 2e] Part 7 – Odds & Ends, Conclusion at dieheart.net
“Whitehack is a brilliant neo OSR game.”
[Let’s Study: Whitehack 2nd Edition] Part 6 – The Setting at dieheart.net
“Lots of character concepts and play styles fit into the White Curse, so players and Game Masters alike should find something to their liking if you are on board with the premise of the world.”
[Let’s Study: Whitehack 2nd Edition] Part 5 – Monsters & Magic Artifacts at dieheart.net
“Boss Monsters. There are some cool mechanical twists to them, i.e. boss stages. Basically, the monster is several separate monsters with own entries and you need to defeat one of the stages to enter the next one. Boss Monsters have some more distinctive features, but I don’t want to spell out the whole rulebook here.”
[Let’s Study Whitehack 2nd Edition] Part 4 – Running the game at dieheart.net
“The Marionette is a puppet creature, created from the souls of dead humanoids. Marionettes wear an intricate face mask with a ghost box which allows them to speak to others. […] Altogether a very appealing class that shows the evocative feel of the White Curse setting.”
[Let’s Study Whitehack 2nd Edition] Part 3 – Combat & Magic at dieheart.net
“I really like the free-form magic system as it allows me to create any kind of ‘spell user’ that I like.”
[Let’s Study Whitehack 2nd edition] Part 2 – Game Mechanics at dieheart.net
“There are some instances when a task would require training, experience or special knowledge. In this case, you need to check your groups. […] This idea is pretty neat as it allows for some clever use of your groups, ties into your character concept and uses the free-form groups for mechanical benefits.”
[Let’s Study Whitehack 2nd Edition] Part 1 – Character Creation at dieheart.net
“Furthermore, as a player I have some control over the game world when choosing groups as I can easily introduce new affiliation groups or new species. In this regard, the game can help with world-building and offers something unique compared to most other OSR games and [TM] clones.”
Let’s Read Whitehack (ongoing) by Jonas Ferry at rpg.net
“Whitehack is a complete game in itself and works perfectly fine to just start running, but it’s designed as a set of firm structures with squishy free-form parts in-between.”
“Whitehack ist ein etwas anderer OSR-[TM]-Klon …” (in German) at the Rollenspieler G+ community.
“Dennoch ist das einfaches System, das in der Regel gut funktioniert und die Kreativität fördert bzw. belohnt.”
Whitehack (in Hungarian) at Kockák és Koboldok
“A szörnyek listája két oldalon elfér, ez remek dolog, áttekinthető az egész, plusz hasznos tanácsokkal lát el boss szörnyek elkészítésére. Végül meg van benne kaland.”
Wir hacken uns durch Whitehack (in German) at bucheibon.wordpress.com
“Alles in allem eine tolle Sache. Ich spiele auf jeden Fall wieder Whitehack.”
Weekend R&R: Whitehack at arcanacreations.blogspot.com
“The cover of the book is fantastic as it looks like a regular oldschool notebook and even reminds me of the sort I had in elementary school and high school. I really like the look. The writing is clear, concise, and very readable too and, given that the main rules (the player’s section) occupies all of 18 pages, quite an accomplishment.”
Review: Whitehack 2e (video) at Doc Eon
“If you have an interest in old school role-playing, this is definitely a ruleset you should pick up.”
Whitehack – recension (in Swedish) at Sveriges största slacker
“We get a campaign environment and two adventures as well. They have a rather ‘grimdark’ atmosphere, which seems to be the designer’s preference. In any case, they are well designed, and I like the fact that they are not over detailed.”
Favorite Game of the last 12 months at dieheart.net
“Whitehack is one of my favorite OSR games (along with Scarlet Heroes) so I can totally recommend this game.”
Nils thinks: Whitehack 2ed (in Swedish) at Pod-Con
“You can easily see Whitehack providing the basis of a campaign that would grow from a single seed to unlimited size, and I think the rules would last the whole way and reveal more of their splendor the more they were used.”
Quick Looks at Whitehack and The Complete Vivimancer at Dorkland!
“Whitehack would be a good game for people who are looking for some more modern approaches to the workings of games, while keeping the simplicity and abstraction of old school [trademark].”
Whispers from the Role-Playing Club (in Swedish), a joint venture from viskningarfrankryptan.wordpress.com and icarusdream.se
“I am very fond of Whitehack, which is a swedish game in English that has quite a few cool rules solutions.”
Dancing About Architecture at UK Role Players
“The most recent thing that I’ve picked up which I think has got the bravest art decision that I’ve seen in a long time, is called Whitehack.”
Whitehack (Game Mechanics) at Something Awful
“The actual mechanics of the game are reasonably simple, as befits an OSR game that’s drawing heavily on 0e. […] There’s a nod to ‘rulings not rules’ and an explicit inclusion of narrative power for all players.”
Whitehack (Character Creation) at Something Awful
“It’s got a lot of ‘storygame’ influence, and the result is a compact, playable, and flexible game that should be on your game shelf.”
Whitehack Review Part the First at Game Stank
“The rules are actually quite lite and intuitive […] Really want to use this for solo and group both!”
First Edition
Free RPG Day with Whitehack by Paul Baldowski at boreders.com
“I had fun – and I’d certainly use the system again.”
OD&D, distilled, remixed, and garnished with a modern twist by vestige at boardgamegeek.com
“That it packs all this into such a small package – all the rules you need, plus a campaign arc, in just 32 digest-sized pages – is a remarkable achievement.”
Dungeon Talk — Episode 38 at dndacademy.com
“It’s very cool—for ten bucks I can’t recommend it enough!”
Two OSR Reviews by Ian Fletcher at Purple Bags of Dice
“You will feel inspired by the simplicity, and delighted by how ‘non-simplistic’ it feels. […] It is not just a “clone” game, but rather a new entry that evolves the art, rather than replicating it.”
Slam Poetic Review by Teo Tayobobayo
“For me, it’s like
that crazy lovable
family member who
finally went to rehab,
and got their shit together.
They are still all those
quirky things I loved,
minus the lying, stealing,
vomiting, and psychosis.”
A look at Whitehack (Part 2) at dieheart.net
“The physical book gives you lots of material on just 32 pages: a great package. A must-buy for OSR gamers with an affinity for new-school mechanics and rules-lite lovers.”
Whitehack, first pass … by Judd Karlman at The Githyanki Diaspora
“The auction mechanic is really slick and it is nice that they give examples of when they’d use that in the example adventures in the back.”
A look at Whitehack (Part 1) at dieheart.net
“I like the grim tone and I think everyone can find his/her niche in this fantasy world.”
WHITEHACK by Youseph Tanha at Stargazer’s World
“WHITEHACK is filled with other little gems that make it stand out as a unique RPG and I think people checking it out will be pleasantly surprised by them.”
“In just 33 pages, Christian has put together a fantastic minimalist RPG that evokes white box [Trademark] but with elements of the [Trademark] System and storygaming included.”
Golden Gnome Nomination (In Swedish) at Boningen
“Rarely has a Swedish role-playing game presented such well-made rules, the thirty-four pages providing more useful information than many three hundred page games: Three classes, eighty monsters, introductory adventures, example characters. And then the game system, of course. Impressive.”
RECENSION: White Hack (In Swedish) by Magnus Seter at rollspel.nu
“For me, White Hack is both a glance back in the history of role-playing games and a glimpse of the future.”
Recension – Whitehack (in Swedish) by Marco Behrmann at rollspel.nu
“I’m somewhat in love with this game.”
Whitehack vid första anblicken (in Swedish) at http://www.boningen.org
“All in all, Whitehack is a small and elegant game, with neat rules which will surely be used in other games.”
Whitehack, recension (in Swedish) by Åsa Roos in Fenix 5/2013
“Reading Whitehack is fun, because in my opinion, it is a masterfully stripped down role-playing game that provides a good framework in which to start playing.”
Recension: Whitehack (Twitter review in Swedish) by Anders Lekberg
“5 out of 5.”
Suldokar’s Wake Reviews
Suldokar’s Wake part 2 by Hexaèdre
“Suldokar’s Wake comes with twenty archetypes: premade complete characters that you can use instead of doing a character “from scratch,” something that can be hard for a player unfamiliar with the rules. I think it’s a great idea and they have a lot of flavor. You can also combine rolling the stacks and then picking an archetype that those rolls allow for.”
Suldokar’s Wake by Hexaèdre
“Suldokar’s Wake is so interesting! I’m fascinated by it for many reasons. The first reason is that it is so different than other RPGs I’ve seen, and different in so many ways. You might think that it’s just that I usually only look at similar RPGs, but I don’t think so […] Almost every aspect of this game is surprising, from the dice rolls to the namespace it uses. Suldokar’s Wake is published as a periodical, with five issues at the time of this writing. The Core Arc (issues #1 through #4) has also been collected in a single omnibus volume.“
Suldokar’s Wake Core Arc Omnibus by Verified Purchaser at DTRPG
“Such a great book. There are so many aspects to this game that make it completely unique and compelling. The setting is rich and fleshed out. The mechanics are well thought out and highly flexible. The language of the book is very concise, measured, and unambiguous. Reading this book is not a chore, it’s a delight. I will certainly be buying the hardback edition. I would recommend that you buy this book.”
#StayAtHome: Suldokar’s Wake, Periodical Release Issue #1 by Tallgeese at Fate SF
“The setting is interesting. […] Post-scarcity, long-gone ancient civilizations, and recently fallen starfaring civilizations. Human(ish) people, aliens, droids, solid-light holograms. An isolated planet, stargates no longer functioning. Crashed starships and generation ships. A planetary holointelligence. Pervasive nanotechnology, much of it gone wild. A subterranean world, with another planetary intelligence, this time fungal. Ruins to explore and pillage. Makers (replicators) no longer very programmable, with reproduction templates that can manufacture many goods while rendering the land around them barren: the makers strip resources from their immediate environment to construct their valuable products. There is a lot to work with here!”
Depths of Devnull first impressions by KMC1977 at r/suldokarswake
“Much of RPG design from the past 20 years has been a reaction against the setting rich, meta plot heavy RPGs of the 90s, which at their worst treated player agency as an obstacle to be overcome on the road to story. The indie scene and the OSR gave players agency but often treated richly prepared settings and player railroading as going hand in hand and thus too much prepared setting was to be avoided, which deprived players of the experience of exploring a well imagined world. Devnull is in large part an attept attempt to reconcile a rich setting and meta plot with player agency. […] Overall I’m very impressed!”
#2: Anatomy of a Zira-Kaan Character by Ryan Bouton at Ryan Bouton’s Reviews
“I’ve never seen a system quite like this – again, Mehrstam challenges some of the core conventions of many rpgs by allowing the setting to impact the mechanics of the game.”
#1: Æonic Evil Returns by Ryan Bouton at Ryan Bouton’s Reviews
“In the background hovers the threat of the ancient, aeonic evil defeated by the makers on the nanites long ago, and the titular droid Suldokar has carried the warning of this darkspace evil throughout the known history of Zira-Ka, unheeded. Strange forces are on the move, with dangerous and dramatic adventures taking form.” (Five stars!)
#2: Anatomy of a Zira-Kaan Character by Ryan at Ryan’s Reviews
“Suldokar’s Wake feels incredibly fresh and interesting. You can tell Mehrstam put a lot of thought into this and I’m looking forward to the next release.” (Five stars!)
#1: Æonic Evil Returns by J. Ryan Buller at Lulu.com
“Some fantastic world-building complete with innovative rules and hacks. Christian Mehrstam’s writing never disappoints. If you want a unique Sci-Fi setting or just some ideas to inspire your own you can’t go wrong with picking this up.”
#1: Æonic Evil Returns by Ryan at Ryan’s Reviews
“If you’re a fan of the OSR and looking for a unique science fiction setting, I believe this will aptly whet your appetite.”
Suldokar’s Wake First Impressions by acodispo at Werdna World
“This game system is tight … As with Whitehack, this is a game book I’ll be reading over & over again.”
Episode 61, September (Swedish podcast) at Nordnordost.se
“There is even some machine language in it, because Suldokar’s is a robot or android bard. Very consistently executed! […] When you level you change your position in a grid, and at different nodes you get new abilities. It is very special in that way, but really nice to read!”
Whitehack 