When I attended GenCon in 2023, there was only one game that stood out to me at that convention that immediately hooked me: Dragonbane from Free League Publishing. And I’ve been honest with what drew me into getting that game: The cover art of the rulebook that looked like a dark fantasy assassin version of Darkwing Duck.

After purchasing it at GenCon, I found a group of people at my local gaming store who also wanted to learn how to play the Swedish-based tabletop roleplaying game (TTRPG), and we were hooked. We played the pre-generated characters that came with the box (I played the Wolfkin Fighter, Bastonn), and it became our weekly game for almost a year (the dreaded BBEG of TTRPGs hit me – scheduling).

Dragonbane quickly became one of my top favorite TTRPGs to play (I created a number of articles and videos about the game), so I was really excited when I heard that Free League Publishing announced the upcoming release of a new adventure book, Path Of Glory. The book is set to release on November 12th, but they’ve also have started shipping orders in the last couple of weeks so many people may have already received their copy.

Path of Glory is an updated version of the first campaign for Drakar och Demoner (the name of the TTRPG that Dragonbane is based on) that released in 1985-1986. The original version was written by Roger Undhagen, who was also involved with updating the adventures for the upcoming campaign book. He also wrote the foreword for the book, reflecting on the 40 years since the original release of the campaign adventures, and ended it with “To roleplay is to live!” which was very heartwarming to read.

Free League Publishing sent me a copy of Path Of Glory ahead of time (I was not paid nor expected to give a review of any kind for this). When I read this book, I thought about how a lot of these elements could easily be adapted to other fantasy TTRPGs, and I absolutely love that feeling.

Here are some of my favorite things from the campaign book that I think players and game masters alike will enjoy.

SPOILER WARNING

The remaining article will spoil elements of the campaign. If you plan to play this campaign in the future, you may want to stop reading.

VIDEO VERSION

Rather watch a video of this article instead of reading? Check out the video below.

The Elemental Traps In Stormhand’s Lair

One of the NPCs and adversaries in this campaign is a mage named Stormhand that is integral to the plot of the adventure. And of course, the mage needs to have a lair of some sort, right?

In certain parts of his lair, Stormhand set elemental traps for intruders. So when a player character enters that area, an elemental will appear and attack the party. The three elementals they use are Gnome (earth elemental), Salamander (fire), and Undine (water). As a GM, you could also get creative and use Sylph (wind) or change the elemental type to whatever kind of flavor you’d like to fit the theme that you are going for. Imagine re-theming it to be more horror or nightmare related, and roleplay it so that the characters have to face a fear of theirs.

Usually when I’ve played TTRPGs, a lot of traps are more manual and mechanical in nature. I know that magical traps are not unique but including these traps are definitely challenging for the party and forces them to think more strategically and think more about how magic could be used in the world you’re exploring.

Unleash The Cave Trolls!

(This is not the first time we see information about cave trolls; they are listed in the Dragonbane Bestiary.)

One of the appeals with Dragonbane is that it’s a grim fantasy TTRPG. Everything about the game reflects this: the artwork, the adventures, the world, and especially the creatures that exist in the Misty Vale and the mountain range of Heaven’s Rim (where Path of Glory takes place).

In the adventure “The Dead Forest,” the party will encounter a pair of cave trolls named Obald and Stoka. The artwork on this page is so wonderfully riveting of the game with its colors and creature design of the trolls. They make it clear that these trolls can be deadly by the artwork and design.

The description of the cave trolls alone is to be commended. From their sensitivity to sunlight and the mechanical effects of it, to their regeneration properties, and their trait for eating gold coins as a way for the party to gain more treasures by dissecting a dead cave troll is such a fascinating way to give a creature such an authentic feel to the game.

But what I love about the cave trolls here are their monster attacks, specifically Rolling Attack and Golden Spit. There’s a lot of great storytelling descriptions and visuals that you can do as a GM to really lean into those attacks to have fun with your group that will be memorable about their epic adventure. Imagine having to tell others that you got knocked down from a large troll that curled up and rolled down towards you like a boulder (think of “Thud Butt” from the movie Hook). Or explaining you got a bruise on your face because a cave troll didn’t respect you enough to properly attack you so they spit a gold coin at you. Truly magnificent!

Some of the attack descriptions in Dragonbane are written so that you can add more narrative descriptors to the attack instead of just listing what it mechanically does, and this is one great example of this.

Tefalas’ Dagger Is More Than Just A Magical Weapon

It’s not a fantasy TTRPG if there aren’t magical weapons involved, right? How about one that’s not only magical, but it also acts as a ghost trap AND borderline cursed?

Tefalas is an important NPC in the campaign who is a devoted monk and a follower of the Dragon Emperor, Eledain. He asks the party to help him destroy Mogdath, a death wight servant of the necromancer Dakoth. To destroy it, the party needs to trap it inside the magical dagger that can bind an undead. Mechanically the dagger also grants a boon on attacks against the undead and also gives the wielder immunity to fear attacks and magical attacks from the undead.

The catch? It takes a lot of cognitive capacity from the player in the form of losing Willpower Points. The longer the wielder holds onto the dagger with the trapped spirit, the more they lose Willpower Points. Now – the party can pass the dagger around so that it doesn’t fall onto a single player having to survive the reduction of Willpower Points (and would ultimately free the wight if they run out of Willpower points), but the party would have to learn and figure out this strategy and it can impact them in multiple encounters until they take the dagger to Otag, Tefalas’ stronghold.

Having a powerful weapon that impacts not only mechanics but roleplay and strategy is a great way to create interesting gameplay for the players and the game master.

A Drink For The Brandy Dragon

It’s not Dragonbane or a fantasy game unless there’s a dragon somewhere, right? Well, what about a dragon that grew up inside a brewery?

The Brandy Dragon is a creature that the party can run into while exploring The Halls of Council in The Dwarven Realm. This is a small green dragon that likes to lap up brandy and has an affinity to fire. Other than being inside a brewing hall and drinking brandy from time to time, the Brandy Dragon doesn’t have anything else about it that makes it an alcohol-themed dragon.

Their attacks are the usual slashing, tail striking, fire breath that you see with most other dragons. So this is a great opportunity to reflavor the dragon a bit for your game if you like. Instead of fire breath, maybe the dragon has Brandy Breath and its in the form of a gold or brown gas and it deals poison damage that makes everyone instantaneously drunk. This can also be a cute small dragon that the party can befriend and have a lot of fun roleplay opportunities as well.

“There’s A Latrine On The Right…”

Look, I know this might be an odd thing to say, but having latrines in your game is actually really cool and genius. How often have played a TTRPG where the locations provided bathrooms? I mean, our characters realistically need to do this on a daily basis, right?

The latrines (#48 on the map) itself aren’t anything special. It really only serves as a possibly entry way to enter The Forge if the characters spot it, and that’s it. But there will be players who will roleplay the shit out of this (literally and metaphorically), and for those of you who are Harry Potter fans, having a spirit that’s the equivalent of Moaning Myrtle could be a lot of fun as well as a helpful guide if the party isn’t sure what to do next. Imagine going into the latrines and a dwarven spirit appears and introduces themselves as “Konrin The Constipated”.

All jokes aside, having latrines on the map in a campaign makes the world more real and authentic when it includes practical places and items like this that we don’t typically think about or include in our games. So extra points to Undhagen and Free League for adding this!

Let’s Get Dangerous With Ankh-Tah-Leh

After waiting for more than a year to get the wildly popular, Darkwing Duck-like figure on the cover art of the core rulebook, Free League Publishing finally delivers it to the fans in Path Of Glory. Originally, we thought that this character was Gizma from the popular 2023 Drakar och Demoner Swedish novel, Uppvanknandet by E.P. Uggla and illustrated by Johan Egerkrans (not available in English, by the way). But in Path Of Glory, the character is an NPC named Ankh-Tah-Leh, the mallard assassin that was captured and imprisoned by orcs during the revolt of Stonemouth. The players will be able to interact with her during the campaign and can either become a friendly to them or an adversary.

What the players won’t know is that she is also looking for the Heart of Darkness for her own personal reasons to use in her land in the realm beyond the sea. So she will appear at the end and could result in a final confrontation with her.

Although this character doesn’t bear the name Gizma in the game, one has to wonder if Free League Publishing is setting up a future adventure where Ankh-Tah-Leh does return and reveals herself (or that her real name) as Gizma. After all, the artwork in this book and on the cover of the novel are essentially the exact same (see images below at the end of the article). Either way, I’m excited that they finally gave us this character. Although she is an NPC, I can imagine someone is already working on a playable character sheet for her using the information we have here (or I just may do it myself).

Final Thoughts

Path Of Glory pays homage to the first adventure series of Drakar och Demoner by providing an updated version for their first official campaign book of Dragonbane. Not only will this book be a lot of fun for Dragonbane players, but a lot of material in this book can serve as inspiration to include in your other fantasy TTRPGs like Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, the upcoming game Daggerheart, Shadowdark, etc.

Many people who have pre-ordered the book have already received it but it officially releases on November 12th, 2024.