Welcome to the Raging Swan Press blog. Herein you’ll find resource and advice articles to make your game better. From time to time, we’ll also post exciting Raging Swan Press news!
At Raging Swan Press, we believe that games set in a richly detailed, immersive world are better than games that are not. It should come as no surprise that we are huge fans of dungeon dressing, but what exactly is dungeon dressing, and why do we keep going on about it?
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Set sail for adventure on the Picaroon Peninsula! Stretching from the isolated pirate stronghold of Deksport in the west with its three violent, feuding rulers, to the mysterious Forest of Gray Spires in the east, the Picaroon Peninsula is home to ruthless buccaneers, cannibal cults, crumbling tree-choked ruins and pirate curses.
The Baleful Wanderer, Blood Moon, Well House, Tavern Cinderspire and Bibeldoop
Centuries ago, another settlement stood where Dulwich now stands. Much of the area's ancient history has been forgotten—lost to time and memory. However, some buried or lost fragments of the past yet remain…
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Everyone—even the powerful—has enemies, and the Nameless Mage was no exception…
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
We storm into February with a small flock of new resources for your gaming pleasure along with some new pages for our website.
The Duchy of Ashlar is small and constrained. Always, the forces of evil and shadow press inwards upon its borders. If it were not for a stout few, death and darkness would have long ago overwhelmed the land. Dunstone was once Ashlar's northern bulwark. Now…
Successful thieves need a fence—someone willing to buy and sell their ill-gotten gains. Like their customers, such folk must keep their true business secret, and thus, they often openly practise some other legitimate trade.
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Merchants, traders, artisans, and some ordinary folk, need somewhere to store their bulky goods. Some own their own warehouses, while others hire the requisite space on a temporary basis.
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Centuries ago, another settlement stood where Dulwich now stands. Much of the area's ancient history has been forgotten—lost to time and memory. However, some buried or lost fragments of the past yet remain…
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreEveryone—even the powerful—has enemies, and the Nameless Mage was no exception…
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreFamed inn popular with adventurers and their hangers-on
Read MoreThe Duchy of Ashlar is small and constrained. Always, the forces of evil and shadow press inwards upon its borders. If it were not for a stout few, death and darkness would have long ago overwhelmed the land. Dunstone was once Ashlar's northern bulwark. Now…
Read MoreFar below the sunlit surface lie places and things undreamt of by decent commonfolk. Some such things have never seen the light of day, while others have escaped into the Underlands to escape the hated sun.
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreSlaughterford has a foul reputation.
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreThere are always those willing to profit from the most odious of all trades—slaving—and to grow wealthy from other people’s misery. Most of the smugglers lurking in the dismal coastal village of Coldwater are nothing more than smugglers.
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreThe past rarely stays buried forever, and forgotten and forbidden things have a way of finding their way back into the light.
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreOnce the last friendly place in the so-called Valley of Tears the Hall of Nuraduum is now known by a different name of far more sinister demeanour—the Cursed Refuge. Some travellers who pass through its stone door do not emerge again, while others tell terrifying stories of the nameless horrors they encounter in the enduring dark of the old dwarven fastness. Persistent rumours tell of old treasures hidden in the place, and a few old dwarves dream of reclaiming the refuge—so that at least a fragment of long-fallen Vongyth may again be held by dwarves. Will the characters dare the rumour-shrouded refuge, or will they flee the horrors that yet lurk within?
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreFor centuries, the adherents of a strange cult have harvested the skulls of learned folk and interred them in the so-called Halls of the Undying Oracles. Thus, their knowledge is safeguarded for future generations. Now an earthquake has severely damaged the Halls. Was it a natural event, divine punishment for the cult’s blasphemous works, or is something more sinister going on?
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreLost to time and battered by the foulness of its surrounds, the decrepit and mouldering Decaying Citadel of the Fated Warlock slowly sinks into the Salt Mire…
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreSouth of dismal Coldwater, where the land grows wild and untamed, and the endless waves of the Bitter Sea batter Ashlar’s coast, the isolated hamlet of Barrowhurst huddles hard between slick sea cliffs of grey stone and the eastern fringes of the heavily wooded, rugged and steeply-sided but round-topped Ochel hills.
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreStraddling a shallow ford on the Tanu River, Bywater boasts an inn, a toll house and a handful of simple peasant homes. Sometimes, interesting or odd things are washed down the Tanu River and get stuck at the ford. Some of these things are sold at the Weary Traveller Inn.
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreThe House of Yspher sits perched upon a lonely hilltop south of Dunstone. It can be reached only by climbing a narrow, bramble-choked path snaking its way up along the hill’s rugged flanks. Stubborn thickets of holly and hawthorn surround the old manor, and vines of pale ivy crawl across its crumbling face like veins and exposed muscles. Only the sullen, eye-like windows are spared, behind which lurks an utter blackness, even on the brightest day.
Read MoreAn isolated place, perched upon an inhospitable coast at the head of a muddy coastal path, Coldwater is not an easy, or pleasant, place to visit.
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreStanding on the fringes of the vast and noisome Salt Mire, Thornhill is a miserable, hard place.
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreThe small Braalite cult centred on the Crooked House comprises the Ilmarinen family and several of their servants.
A free GM’s Resource for any fantasy roleplaying game.
Read MoreLegends tell of Blackshard Hold—a dwarven redoubt nested far to the south, in the all but impenetrable Forest of Gray Spires. The dwarves of clan Kildare built the hold around a vast monolith of glimmering black onyx
Read MoreDungeon Backdrop: Pit of Unquiet Souls comes in separate releases designed for the fifth edition of the world’s most popular Roleplaying Game involving dungeons and/or dragons, Pathfinder First Edition and Old-School Rules (OSR).
Read MoreSaare’s Pit has another, more lurid, name—and for good reason. The Pit of Unquiet Souls squats at the centre of a nest of macabre tales of madness, horror and death. It is said, those who spend too much time in the abandoned mine often go mad or disappear entirely, and old miners’ tales tell of the pit’s very rocks whispering horrible secrets to those toiling in its bowels. Still, there are those who think treasure yet lurks in the mine and will brave its terrors to retrieve them.
Read More
It’s no secret that at Raging Swan Press, we are big fans of dressed dungeons. A dressed dungeon feels more real than an undressed dungeon. A dressed dungeon engages your players’ imaginations, promotes creative play and helps them immerse themselves in the adventure.