THE ULTIMATE guide to getting the most out of Mighty Deeds of Arms in DCC RPG. Your Deeds will never be boring again, and it likely will give you ideas you never considered. Could this reference book be improved? Practically speaking, I don't see how. Everything is extremely well thought-out, with over three dozen types of Deeds (eg Headbutt, Muting Strike, Punch, Sever Arm, Throw Shield) spelled out, each on its own individual page for easy printing. Layout is superb, poetic quotations straight from actual Appendix N fiction to illustrate the Deeds in action are superb, Deed descriptions are superb, and tables per Deed Die roll result (including Deed Fumble and Mighty Critical results!) are superb. What's more, an extraordinarily helpful "Deeds by Weapon" index is included so that players can quickly pick a compatible Deed type based on whatever they're holding. Guaranteed to spice up gameplay with minimal effort. I love it; it's by far the single most useful DCC RPG supplement I've picked up, kind of like if the level of detail in the Wizard and Cleric spell tables in the Core Rules also got expanded to Warrior and Dwarf Deeds. Wonderful, and I keep mine tucked right in the Core Rules. Well done!

Steel and Fury is a perfect add-on to the DCC RPG, specifically for martial characters like the Warrior and Dwarf. Besides the obvious -- adding dozens of new maneuvers to the Mighty Deeds of Action -- this book scores enormous points for including the original Deeds from the DCC RPG, as well as copious lists of weapons that are optimized for specific deeds. By collecting all the Deeds from the rulebook plus the new ones in one resource, it's super easy for players to operate from one of the DCC RPG quickstarts or otherwise not have to flip through two books to reference the rules. The aforementioned lists make this resource doubly useful because it allows for some additional differentiation in regards to weapon choices vs. Deeds characters might gravitate towards. Martial characters don't get as many choices and tactics as spellcasters do in some ways, and this added variety and forethought on the author's part makes this book a solid five stars!

An Endzeitgeist.com review

This massive book clocks in at 57 pages, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page SRD, 1 page back cover, leaving us with 53 pages of content, so let's take a look!

So, basically, this is a system that tackles the caster/martial-discrepancy...but this time, in DCC! The basic idea is that combat, in the hands of capable warriors, ought to be lethal. In DCC's rules, though, much like in most systems that grew out of d20, casters get insta-frys where martial characters have to slowly whittle down the HP.

This book then takes a different approach: First of all, the system here is based on so-called Mighty Deeds: Cutting open your foe and tearing the intestines apart, badass-kicking foe into the huge pit while yelling "This is SPARTAAA!" - you get the idea. However, this also means that there's a risk: On a natural 1 on both attack and deed die, you incur a mighty fumble. On a critical hit and maximum number on the deed die, you score a mighty critical, though! Generally, luck cannot be burned to effect a Mighty Deed and neither can deed rolls be affected by burning luck. However, you may burn luck to add to your attack roll. Of course, the judge has the last word with individual uses of deeds. Got that?

All right, so what this pdf thus does is provide a VAST array of tables - each type of attack is associated with a weapon/fighting style and sports 7 effects, from mighty fumble to mighty critical. Beyond that, a description and sample quote makes sure that you know what the maneuver entails. For convenience's sake, deeds from the core rulebook have been reprinted here - which imho is a great thing. Why? It Prevents annoying book-swapping.

The descriptions are inspired and visceral - to give you an excerpt from the 7+ result of Bone Crusher (which needs a two-handed blunt weapon): "Your blow shatters opponent’s sternum splintering ribs and collapsing a lung. Blow causes 1d8 points of additional damage from internal bleeding. Opponent must make a Fort save against warrior’s damage total (include extra 1d8 in total)..." And yes, the effects continue. Let me geek out for a second here - this is visceral, raw and awesome. I LOVE this! Decapitating strikes, defensive fighting - there are so many options herein I'd bloat this review beyond 10 pages, were I to comment on each individual one. Even options like using Stand your Ground as an unmounted warrior versus a mounted foe are covered.

"But wait", I hear you say, "this will be a horrible flipping mess to sue, right?" No. Such books live by their organization - and here, the book excels as well. The appendices contain handy condition modifiers, options for even grittier games, a handy table of mighty deed modifier by opponent HD, a blank mighty deed sheet for your own custom deeds...and a massive index that lists all mighty deeds by weapon, rendering this pdf easy to use.

Conclusion:

Editing and formatting are very good, though not perfect - I noticed a couple of punctuation glitches, though nothing that impeded my ability to understand the rules as presented herein. Layout adheres to a printer-friendly two-column b/w-standard and the book sports numerous neat original full-color artworks. The pdf comes fully bookmarked, with each deed getting its own bookmark, making use of this book in its electronic version quick and efficient.

To me, this pretty much constitutes a friggin' homerun. I really love DCC's gritty aesthetics and lethality and this pdf adds spice to this: The vastly expanded deeds render playing any fighting class infinitely more compelling. When first reading these rules, I feared they'd increase lethality too much - and they kind of can...but honestly, neither me, nor my players cared. The payoff of "Did you see what I just did there??" versus being off'd (happened once in my playtest) in grisly manner led to an unanimous decision to keep this pdf.

What we have here, is perhaps one of THE absolutely required, must-own pdfs you can get for DCC. It vastly enhances the visceral, awesome flair of combat and makes martials feel more versatile and badass. One piece of advice: You may want to get this in print if that's your preferred medium - this sees a LOT of use in a pretty short time, being pretty much indispensable. A must-have supplement well worth a final verdict of 5 stars + seal of approval - congratulations to author Marzio Muscedere! Oh, one more thing - since I consider this absolutely ESSENTIAL for any DCC-judge, I'll add my EZG-Essential tag to this...if a couple more books of this caliber hit my HD and you, my readers, want to see it, I will provide a full DCC-Essentials-list!

Endzeitgeist out.

Ring Side Report- RPG Review of Steel and Fury: Combat Maneuvers of the Mighty

Product- Steel and Fury: Combat Maneuvers of the Mighty System- Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG Producer- Purple Duck games Price- $7 here http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/147952/Steel-and-Fury-DCC TL; DR-A must have for the Dwarf or Fighter at the crawl! 97%

Basics-Cry havoc and let loose the dogs of war! Steel and Fury is a Fighter and Dwarf supplement for the Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG. This book focuses on the Mighty Deeds of Arms for both of those classes by adding several new deeds that are specific for the type of weapon you are using as well as expanding the deeds by adding mighty criticals and mighty fumbles.

Mechanics or Crunch-Hands down a home run. Every mighty deed gets its own page with descriptions of what happening. Also, the addition of mighty criticals and fumbles really adds to the dice rolling crunch of this system. And, the book has an amazing resource- an end of the book table showing which weapons can do which deed (MORE BOOKS SHOULD DO THIS!). As the cherry on the sundae, even the old deeds get a revisit by adding the critical and fumble rules to them as well. This is well done and slick. 5/5

Theme or Fluff- Again, another home run. Every deed has a ton of story to it. Not only does each deed have a description, but also the deed has a quote from an appendix N fantasy story. That right there is awesome. Also awesome is the art. I honestly didn’t expect much art from a small publisher, but it’s here and well done. You will feel every crunch from this one as Steel and Furry builds on to a solid foundation of carnage. 5/5

Execution-We’ve had two home runs, so it’s time for a foul. I love the book. It’s got great spacing, great writing, text, tables, and great art. What I don’t like is the price tag. This book is $7 bucks for about 60 pages. That’s a bit much as much of this book is pages with tables. $7 isn’t enough to keep me away, but I think this should be around $4 to $5 to keep up with other publishers’ prices. 4.5/5

Summary-This is a great book and addition to the DCC rpg. Purple Duck Games really made a top notch product by supplying quite frankly a ton of new content to the system. Every weapon get some love. At the back is an amazing chart detailing what each weapon can do with the new and old mighty deeds. Even old deeds get new additions with mighty criticals and mighty fumbles. The story this book tells is great proving that a straight crunch book can bring some story and panache to the table. I think the book is a bit over priced. But, if you can stomach the price, this is a necessary book for any fighter and dwarf that hits the table. 97%