#RPGaDay 7: Free RPG

LotFP is actually a free game - you can get the rules here, but that's not the interesting part.

Usually when a company does a Free RPG Day product it is a 8-16 page sampler with a very basic scenario and/or a quick start set of rules.

Not so with LotFP. Their first free RPG Day offering in 2013 was Better Than Any Man - a 96+ A5 page campaign and mega-adventure set in 17th Century Kstlstadt during the Thirty Year Wars (and you can play an elf, dwarf or halfling in this in theory) and concerns a coven of witches who have decided to take over the region. It's low-level, gritty, and it's fricking huge and the PDF is still free and weighs in at 180 A5 pages with extra material not included in the print version!

If that doesn't float your boat, there's also its successor, LotFP's 2014 Free RPG Day Entry, the module The Doom-Cave of the Crystal-Headed Children, also free as a PDF. Another epic adventure, 58 pages of old school goodness, this adventure was spawned by Mr. Raggi to feck with politically correct puritans who had banned Better Than Any Man from stores as they thought the module was about killing children (which it wasn't, though it's definitely NSFW). So he made sure the cover of the next module clarified the child killing.

Sadly LotFP didn't do anything for Free RPG Day this year, but after these memorable entries I think they deserve a rest - Free RPG Day must be a huge drain on Indie publishers.

I'll leave you with more choice words from Mr. Raggi in BTAM's foreword.

"Welcome to LotFP’s Free RPG Day adventure! It isn’t what it is supposed to be.

We were told “Include quickstarter rules!” We were advised to create a short introductory/teaser adventure. We were warned to make it suitable for all audiences. We didn’t do that. You know why?
 
0.

That is the amount of fucks we give about what we’re supposed to do.
 
What we did do is create an expansive, epic adventure bigger than any we’ve made up to this point. We made it layered and complicated and figured that as a tabletop role-player, you’re an intelligent, creative adult who is capable of working things out. We didn’t avoid “controversial” content because bowdlerizing our content would be dishonest, lame as hell, not to mention it would misrepresent the rest of the LotFP product line. Basically, we wanted to make this the best and most awesome thing we can possible make with no boundaries. This is role-playing. You can do anything! And so can we.
 
Because that’s what we give a fuck about. And for us, Free RPG Day is all about finding the sorts of people who love the same things we do. So here’s a free adventure. If you appreciate it, welcome aboard. If you don’t, well, sucks to be you."