Overview: The Arenmist Forest, a Riftbreakers 2e Expansion
The first expansion for Riftbreakers 2e is out for Blackoath Patrons!
Edit: It's out for everyone! The Arenmist Forest is now officially released. Get it on on Itch, DTRPG, and as POD on Amazon.
The Arenmist Forest is a deep dive into the wider world beyond the walls of Kar Helos. It’s the first planned supplement that brings to life the different regions of Kaethor.
Arenmist expands the sandbox with a whole new world. There are several new opportunities for emergent storytelling, exploration, and different types of quests and missions.
The most obvious change is right in the map. This is the original Kaethor:
This is the Arenmist Forest with the expansion:
There are tons of new locations with descriptions and fresh lore. Each one of them has multiple tables for adventure seeds, NPCs, events, rumors, and encounters. Speaking of encounters, the original Combat Encounter Table for the forest has been revamped!
Encounters can also be modified by the location. For instance, in Gryphonrut, we roll an extra d6. On a 1-3, we find an Arenmist Griffin instead.
The MMOTTRPG grows!
The expansion has three main sections: Points of Interest, Random Tables & Activities, and Premier Quest. Let’s check each one.
Points of Interest
I think this is the meat of the expansion. The different places support multiple expeditions into the forest, with a ton of possible storylines, quests (especially when generating them via word oracles), and activities.
The concepts of the PoIs are usually related to environmental hooks. There are foggy clearings, ancient ruins overgrown with roots, strange fungal growths, and, of course, Rift-scarred glades. There’s a theme of conflict between Strangers trying to reclaim the land and nature fighting back against intrusion.
PoIs present new kinds of scenarios to use skills, like Literacy for old markers, Agility in unstable terrain, etc, introduce mysteries, opportunities for social interactions and moral choices, and also offer as much reward as threats.
A large component of exploration is narrative-based, but like in the core book (and in most Blackoath games), it’s also tied to mechanics.
Take the first PoI, the Acorn Point Trading Camp:
You can see how modular the PoIs are. Here are a few ideas of how to use them:
- Creating structured quests and complete story arcs with them, either using a GM emulator or the tools provided in the core book.
- Going hex crawling in the forest and interacting with what sounds more fun at the moment.
- Playing a laid-back session gathering materials, fighting new enemies, and looting new items.
There’s a lot of flexibility to the PoIs, which I think is what they should provide. Lots of options for all kinds of players.
Random Tables and Activities
They build on the Points of Interest and on the original tables from the core book. We can generate events, environmental shifts, unsettling discoveries, activity prompts (like foraging), strange encounters (like faces in the fog), and more.
All results are full of flavor and atmosphere. They don’t hand us fully formed outcomes, but are open to interpretation instead. A shifting mist might conceal a resource or an ambush, and a trail might lead to prey or to something hunting you.
The ambiguity in the tables also apply to how characters deal with an activity mechanically. The Arenmist will often require skill checks, and different builds and archetypes will have distinct experiences navigating the forest.
We can also find Enchanted Pools in the Arenmist. Bathing in them grants temporary and permanent bonuses, but also shocking side effects, like changes to physical appearance and even personality!
There is new gear, new alchemical creations and blueprints, new weapons, shields, armors, and, best of all, the brand new NATURE HEART!
The non-combat abilities from this Heart are awesome.
Finally, this section has two features that are basically new modes of play: Going Caving and Storylocked Chests.
Going Caving
We can spend a day looking for caves and recesses in the forest. Once found, they can be explored like Rifts.
Navigating these randomly generated places and dealing with its dangers and strange formations may prove difficult, requiring different skill checks.
However, one of the main appeals of “going caving” is the unique loot found inside. One of those is the Storylocked chest.
Storylocked Chests
This is a cool new mechanic that turns opening a chest into a minigame.
To open Storylocked Chests, you have to solve one of 20 unique word puzzles. There’s also a secondary method to do it, and the table can have you sacrificing a Companion in exchange for double the loot, or simply telling a story:
Clever, right?
Premier Quest
Remember Through Twisting Paths, the starting adventure that takes place at character creation? Did you love it as much as me? Well, you’re in luck, because we got another one!
I’m not going to spoil details, but it ties directly into the forest’s instability and escalates through exploration, just like the previous adventure.
It branches depending on player choices, and it might not be solved cleanly. We can actually make the quest’s problem worse. This is a great feature that gives the quest narrative weight. The consequences of our actions can even affect Kar Helos.
I love these kinds of quests. They’re well written and structured, and a lot of fun to go through. I’d easily buy an entire book of them.
That’s it for this overview. The Arenmist Forest deepens the world of Riftbreakers 2e with new mechanics and tons of additional content brimming with opportunities for more roleplaying, exploration, combat, looting, and adventures.
The future of the game looks incredible. Can’t wait for more.
The Arenmist Forest expansion is available on Itch, DTRPG, and as POD on Amazon.
Riftbreakers 2e is available on Itch, DTRPG, and as POD on Amazon.