HARP Bestiary
HARP Bestiary is a core supplement for the epic fantasy RPG HARP Fantasy, written by Nicholas Caldwell, John Duffield, and Colin Tucker and published by Iron Crown Enterprises.
By Aaron T. Huss
Learn more about HARP Bestiary here
Purchase HARP Bestiary here (paid link)
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HARP Bestiary is a lengthy bestiary for HARP Fantasy. In typical Rolemaster/HARP fashion, the folks at Iron Crown Enterprises has presented a collection of mundane and fantastical creatures for really any situation you can think of in a traditional epic fantasy game. The mundane entries cover non-dangerous, dangerous, avian, reptile, amphibian, and water. The fantastical entries cover land creatures, sea monsters, air creatures, weres, dragons, undead, elementals, and demons. Each entry is allotted a roughly 1 1/2-page write-up that includes description, lifestyle, abilities and combat, background, and adventure notes along with the a detailed stat block.
I’m not going to count the number of stat blocks within, but the entire book is around 470 pages and literally jam-packed with content. There is very little white space and the content flows from one entry to the next (as opposed to using white space to make each entry consume 2 full pages). Fantasy bestiaries are often filled with similar entries across all game systems, and you will find the majority of this collection fits that mold. But there are also less-common and possibly unique entries scattered throughout to keep the game that much more interesting. That means you don’t need multiple bestiaries to get unique entries or to fill your campaigns; you only need this one book with the entries in the core rulebook supplementing what’s listed herein.
The book itself looks good. The layout has several areas that could use improvement, but I feel as though page count was on the forefront of the development team’s mind to keep the count down. You could easily change the layout and end up adding over 30 pages.
There’s a couple added bonuses… first, you get a nice table that shows all the entries in a given section within a single table. That means you don’t have to thumb through numerous pages to grab those stats quickly. Second, some of the entries have scaling stats allowing you to adjust the adversary based on the party’s strength.
You are definitely getting your money’s worth with HARP Bestiary!
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