Stormwild Islands is a Gaslamp Fantasy Tabletop Game published on September 1, 2023 by Alexander Kirk.
Set in the Stormwild Islands, a cluster of islands in the middle of a perpetual, continent-sized storm, this game explores the aftermath of a generations-long war and the magical damage done to the world as a result.
Spellcasters are commonplace, and they work alongside new innovations like steam engines to create a world that changes very quickly. Golems - humanoid constructs with minds and wills of their own - have been instrumental in bringing about this new wave of industry, but their use in the war and their newfound push for independence might be even more significant. Alongside all of this is a world of spirits, otherworldly creatures who think and act according to completely different rules, and mixing spirits with humans or golems tends to cause all kinds of clashes.
Available on itch.io
.
Stormwild Islands provides examples of:
- Action Initiative: As part of the Turn-Based Combat, initiative order can be determined in one of two ways. Popcorn initiative has players and enemies alternate turns, while rolled initiative has all combatants make a check at the start of combat.
- All or Nothing: Fittingly, the name of an action available to the Brutalism skill, which maximizes the value of all damage dice on hit but slows down their attacks for an entire turn if they miss.
- Arrow Catch: Available through a feat or a couple of combat skills. Characters learning the Swift skill can eventually turn this into Catch and Return.
- Attack Failure Chance: Most actions have a chance to fail. Attack rolls are made using a twenty-sided die compared against the target's defense stat (Evasion for weapon attacks and Magic Defense for spells). Some actions instead require the target to make a saving throw, reducing or eliminating the action's effects with a good enough roll.
- Bizarre Human Biology: A result of excess magic leaking through from the Fontlands. Humans can be born with unusual features, ranging from unusual skin and hair colors all the way up to wings and tails.
- Boring, but Practical: All characters can make standard attacks, both with weapons and with spellcasting focuses. These have no special properties, but they ensure that all characters can contribute to their team's damage output.
- Carry a Big Stick: The Great Club and Colossal Sword weapons. Despite the name, the latter deals blunt damage, presumably because it's too big for its sharpness to matter.
- Character Customization: A given for the genre. Characters choose combat skills, narrative skills, core abilities, and major and minor feats.
- Charles Atlas Superpower: The non-spellcasting combat skills can still achieve superhuman feats, like Mighty Leap and Impossible Theft. The setting information suggests that such feats are at least partly magical, though most people in-universe do not consider it as such.
- Cold Flames: The Immolator NPC class can change its usual fire damage into ice damage. Player characters can do this as well, using the Elementalist feat.
- Combat Clairvoyance: The Foresight action, available to the Warmastery skill, makes all attacks within the user's sight automatically hit and deal a fixed amount of damage. This removes most randomness from the combat for a time, making planning much easier.
- Counterspell: An action by this name is available to the Disjoiner skill. The Anti-Mage NPC class can use a variant of it as well.
- Extra-Dimensional Shortcut: The Fontlands are a parallel world of magic and spirits. Distances between the material world and the spirit world don't always line up perfectly, so cutting through the Fontlands can speed up a journey.
- Golem: Golems take their name from this, though in practice they behave more like Magitek Mechanical Lifeforms.
- Grappling with Grappling Rules: Grappling is a core combat mechanic, and it fittingly has the longest description of any universal combat action.
- Improbable Aiming Skills: The Finesse combat skill allows feats like this, granting the user the ability to aim at targets behind walls and ignore certain forms of cover.
- Invisibility with Drawbacks: Invisibility is available through various means, though usually with some kind of limitation. For example, the version available to the Illusion skill ends when the target makes any attack or casts any spell.
- Mage Marksman: Thanks to a lack of Fantasy Gun Control, this is a possible playstyle. The Pursuit skill even encourages this, as one of the spellcasting focuses given by this skill is also a ranged weapon, and most of their actions can be performed equally well with either type of implement.
- Magic Staff: A staff is one of the options available for spellcasting focuses, which are required to cast spells. This version is one of the heaviest and highest-damage focuses available, though it requires two hands to wield.
- Magitek: The Stormwild Islands are described as being roughly industrial in terms of technology, but with magic often taking the place of electricity or steam. As an example, travel between major cities is facilitated by both rails and teleportation gates.
- Mechanical Lifeforms: Golems, humanoid constructs, were created by the Grey-Iron Republic to perform basic labor and, eventually, to serve as soldiers. Following the war, they were granted independence.
- Non-Health Damage: Drain is a special type of damage that hits MP instead of HP. Though if the target has no MP to lose, it behaves like normal damage again.
- Playing with Fire: Both the Evocation and Illusion combat skills specialize in fire damage, though Evocation has more ways to use it.
- Point Build System: The game has no character classes, with combat skills serving as the nearest equivalent. Each Character Level grants points in a number of different resources, which are spent to learn new abilities or increase attributes.
- Spell Blade: A viable playstyle, as several actions exist to increase the damage of weapons. Taken literally with the feat of the same name.
- Teleport Spam: The Disjunction combat skill (and the related Disjoiner NPC class) specializes in teleportation.
- Turn-Based Combat: Combat is divided into rounds and further into turns. Most characters take one turn per round, though some difficult enemies can take two or even three.
