RPG Retro Review: The Orcs of Thar 

Mystara needs more love. Come on Wizard! Open up the DM's Guild to Mystara!

LOL the map refers to elf territory as "tree Scum" . priceless!

Well deserved. As a matter of fact, it really resembles more modern products because of its clarity, completeness and humor.

I love how lighthearted this module is. And we played quite a bit of Orc Wars, too, back in the day, I'd say that that game alone may have been worth the buying price, it's really good fun!

1:46 The city of Nice, France is pronounced like "niece".

I like to think most orcs in D&D would get along with humans if they were from a culture that hates elves. The most diverse faction in the Elder Scrolls series which shares a hate of elves. The Elder Scrolls' diversity means cat and lizard people working and living together to keep away elves with human friends from cultures inspired by Vikings and Northern Africa, Aka the Nords and red guards. It’s beautiful.

Nice is pronounced Niece. Lots of us Navy brats played D&D. I remember an on-going game in Gaeta, Italy. It went through seven DMs and something like 90 players over the years. Nobody played for more than 3 years or so.

Been using this one a lot lately as I convert classic MERP adventures over to OSE for my homebrew campaign. I ignored the goofy stuff but just gave the humanoids extra levels.

I finally finished all your video on Mystara and the Basic D&D sets and it’s gotten me to think how how I want to run it and I’m glad you’ve introduced me to it. I def find it more interesting then Greyhawk. I love these videos on Mystara.

I loved this review! I bet your gaming group has a blast with you DMing.

I had this when I was a kid. Just ordered the POD from drivethrurpg.

awesome video, we need more of this in D&D!!! all around fun and fantasy!

Live long and prosper, from your fan in Brazil!

commenting for the algorithm

I had 3 or 4 of these Gaz series and this one was my favorite.

I love your content! Thank you so much for the years of enrichment and entertainment!

You and Mr Welch have really got to exchange notes.

Great review - I never had Orcs of Thar, but I played Orcwars a few times since I bought DM 132. The wonderful map is framed and hanging in my game room!

Enjoyed the review . You should get ahold of Mr. Welch and see what he has done for Mystara

Yes! I love the Orcs of Thar!

Keep em coming.. older the better.. the newer the better too, so... jeepnut up bro!

Orcs of Thar seems pretty good, It got me thinking of a game suppliment I own called "Auror's Whole Realms Catalogue", for me it added a lot to my gaming, alot like how the Orcs of Thar added a lot to my gaming by making humanoids like my favorite - the Alaghi - possible to play. Consider, if you can, doing a review of the catalogue in a future review, I think they have a few on Amazon if you don't have one.

To think that in the original ADnD gamemaster guide, players wanting to play humanoids were considered problem players, either wanting to dominate their fellow players or too dumb to know better.

Commenting for the algorithm and subscribing for the content! :)

looking forward to that 10k!!!

This particular Gazetteer is almost completely tongue-and-cheek. There seems to be a lot of that throughout the Gazetteers and I find them a bit less than useful because of it.

It’s curious to me that in the boxed set for AD&D 2nd Edition: The Forgotten Realms there is a predominantly humanoid land called Thar north of the Moonsea region. I’d be very curious to learn if TSR repurposed this realm, with some modifications from Mystara to Tori’s.

Not the first time you could play monsters in D&D.

Thanks man, great job. 😎🍻🤘

This was cool. Would also love to see you do a review of 'the new easy to master' dungeons and dragons core game (1991) and its expansions : The Dragon's Den, The Haunted Tower and Goblin's Lair.

Almost to 10K subs!! Woot!

Cohesive... Best setting ever yes... but it does suffer some serious continuity issues... Not Bruce's fault

Makes me want to break out my old copy and re-read it. :-)

The intro music is great and definitely not Final fantasy Tactics XD

"The other hand is to fool the enemy." Good times.

Damn I forgot about this channel, got a lot of videos to catch up on.

I'm stoked enough on this to watch this review again while I get the PDF Edit: yes my computer is so slow that I need to watch something while waiting for it to load. What of it? Lolol

40 more to 10K subscribers!

A great supplement.

The art in this reminds me of Mr Halloway's art in Paranoia.

One of the better Gazateers

If you're going to go through all of the Gazetteers, I'll look forward to the Shadow Elf one. :)

Gnolls were playable back in BECMI, and not in 5e?!

dope

I have this but I have lost the counters for the Orc Wars-game. :(

It seems pretty obvious to me that this was the biggest influence on Games Workshops Orcs/Orks

Excelent!

Nice is pronounced "niece" btw...

17:48 You put stars on Good, but you meant to put them on Very Good.

"Green iz best!"

Me too ;)

according to WOTC orcs and drow represent racism... old school is now more relevant than ever.

Oh fine, I'll subscribe instead of just following the link from Questing Beast's station. :)

11:18 why did they make Thar such a high level? Isn’t that max level?

I would seriously reconsider playing with anyone who pronounced BECMI as "bessimi"

What's the difference between hit dice and level?

Very thorough and interesting review of this product which I was very unfamiliar with. However, it's pronounced guh-zet-er

Hey Capt. can i say Im first, lol.

Add a public comment.:.

I really dislike this Gazetteer. Bruce's attempts at humor and his awkward punny names for locations completely ruin my ability to get invested in his version of the Broken Lands. I had similar issues with the parts of GAZ 3 where he attempted to be funny, but at least there was a solid enough chunk of content to run it as a setting that wasn't based around dad jokes. But in GAZ 10 he went into overdrive, and the result is, in my opinion, a bad product. It's not a bad product because it contains a style of humor that isn't mine; rather it's a bad product because it's usefulness hinges almost entirely on whether or not you enjoy Bruce's style of humor and silliness, and unlike GAZ 3 it doesn't leave much that is of use to anyone who wants to run a version of the Broken Lands that isn't silly, centered around dad jokes and awful puns. I occasionally use the sections on character creation whenever they're relevant in my Mystara games (which doesn't happen all that often), and the sections on immortals, but that's about it - and that's a pretty small section of this product. Along with the rushed and half-finished GAZ 14, this is easily my least used Gazetteer. Even Ierendi sees more use at my table than this one.

Should be reprinted.

When you do stupid voices, I immediately stop the video. You're reviewing a product, not being a DM. I want your thoughts on the product, not attempts at voice acting. Keep practicing the voices for your games, but please stop doing them in reviews. It's not funny it doesn't add anything and you're not very good at it.