itch.io

Rot Barrow is a deadly one-page fantasy tabletop role-playing game for one or more players.

Create a party of four doomed adventurers and enter an endless barrow filled with foul beasts, hidden chambers, traps, and treasure. Murder. Pillage. Gloat.

Designed for both solo and group play, Rot Barrow features fast character creation, deadly combat, procedural dungeon generation, and simple oracles for playing without a referee.

There is no final room. The barrow continues as long as you dare to explore it.

All you need to play is one six-sided die, a pencil, and paper.

I've completed the new Kingship system and included it in the latest Beyond the Black Gates 1.2 playtest PDF.

Kingship allows Level 5 characters to purchase or claim strongholds, raise armies, and defend their realm using a simple mass combat system that fits on a single page.

I've also added an invasion generator to create seasonal threats, from goblin raids and orc warbands to Tier 3 monsters that threaten the realm.

I hope this gives your party something new to spend all that gold on!

Thanks for clarifying; that makes perfect sense.

It's a fair point, and I can definitely see what you mean. In Fatal Tomb, characters can acquire the best mundane equipment relatively quickly, and that was intentional. My goal was never for progression to come from increasingly powerful gear. My design philosophy was that a man in the finest armour is still a mortal man. The adventure should make the hero, not the equipment.

Instead, I wanted progression to come from the adventures themselves: exploring stranger places, facing more dangerous foes, uncovering relics, and, potentially, commanding fortresses and armies. Those feel more in keeping with the kind of sword and sorcery stories that inspired the game.

I think fortresses and mass combat are probably the direction I'll explore, rather than full domain play. I'd like gold to open up bigger adventures rather than more bookkeeping.

Thanks again for the kind words and for taking the time to share your thoughts. Feedback like this genuinely helps shape the game.

Thanks! I'm really glad you're enjoying it, and I appreciate the thoughtful feedback.

You're right that characters reach their equipment limit fairly quickly. That was an intentional design decision. Fatal Tomb has a very small inventory and equipment list because I wanted the focus to stay on exploration and adventure, rather than accumulating increasingly powerful gear.

I'm also a firm believer in rulings over rules. If the inventory limit hinders your enjoyment, you can absolutely choose not to use it in your game.

I've considered things like magical items and domain play, but I'm cautious about adding systems that move the game away from its simple, fast-paced design. If I expand the game, I'd rather do it through adventures, relics, and optional material.

That said, the separate Beyond the Black Gates playtest PDF already contains new magic items, foes, classes, and Dark Sorcery. I'm also considering adding rules for building fortresses and mass combat over the coming weeks, though I don't think it will grow into full domain play.

Thanks again for taking the time to play and leave your thoughts; it means a lot.

Just an update for you. Printable A5 booklet version now available in Downloads.

Turns out it was ready a lot sooner. Enjoy.

Thank you.

It is the core rulebook at this moment. In a month or so I'm releasing a PDF with everything re-organised as Fatal Tomb 1e. Then at that point it'll be completely finalised.

Thanks for the interest, I appreciate it. I’m planning to self-publish a print version in the future. I’ve got more add-ons in the pipeline, so I want to build that out before compiling everything into print. Glad to hear you're enjoying it.

I'm designing mine for my medieval fantasy system Fatal Tomb, but it should drop straight into most fantasy TTRPGs without any changes.

Thank you for taking the time to leave this feedback, I appreciate it.

Fatal Tomb was inspired by the Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set, Four Against Darkness, One-Shot Dungeon, and the Middle-earth and Conan films.

Yes, in that example both goblins are slain because they are Tier 1 foes with 1 Life Point each. I have now updated that example to include their Tier and Life Point value so this is clearer when it first appears.

I have also added “see Luck Trait” in the Raging Sixes section to clear up that point.

The Bestiary is there to support creating your own encounter tables, and I have now added clarification in that section to make this clearer.

The example encounter table is intended as a starting point for Level 1 characters, which is why Tier 3 foes are not included. Tier 3 foes are designed to be introduced by the referee when appropriate, rather than appearing in the starter example.

Thanks again for reading it and for the feedback. I’m glad it came across as easy to read and run.