Joe McCullough and Osprey Games have made their First Edition rules for Frostgrave available for FREE, including a couple of expansions featuring several scenarios created for solo gaming. Frostgrave is a tabletop miniatures wargame in which you play as powerful wizards leading small warbands into the frozen ruins of the city of Felstad, in search of lost treasure, enchanted artefacts, and forgotten secrets of magic.
Amidst the frozen ruins of an ancient city, wizards battle in the hope of discovering the treasures of a fallen empire. In this fantasy skirmish wargame, each player takes on the role of a wizard from one of ten schools of magic, and builds his band of followers. The wizard’s apprentice will usually accompany his master, and more than a dozen other henchman types are available for hire, from lowly thugs to heavily armoured knights and stealthy thieves. Wizards can expand their magical knowledge by unlocking ancient secrets and may learn up to 80 different spells.
The offer includes PDF copies of the 136-page Frostgrave rulebook; the 15-page mini-supplement Dark Alchemy, containing three solo scenarios designed for either a solo player or two people playing cooperatively; and a 33-page sample section of Frostgrave: Perilous Dark, which includes three more solo scenarios, as well as advice on how to create your own solos.
Games of Frostgrave are generally quick, and once you have learned the rules you should have no problem completing a game in an hour or two. Frostgrave is designed to be a competitive game between two or more players, but most importantly it is intended to be fun.
To play Frostgrave you will need a table, 28mm miniature figures, a tape measure or ruler in inches, two d20, a copy of the Wizard Sheet, and a pencil. Ideally, you will also have a selection of terrain pieces to recreate the ruins of the city on your tabletop. If you’re new to the world of tabletop wargaming, some of these items might not be immediately available.
Frostgrave can be played on most household tables. In general, square tables work best, with 3’ x 3’ being the optimum size for most games. To get the full effect of Frostgrave it is necessary to cover a large portion of the table with terrain to represent the ruins of the city. Ideal terrain pieces would be ruined model buildings, which can either be constructed out of cardboard, balsa wood and the like, or bought from hobby retailers as kits or ready-made pieces. Of course, if you’re just starting out in tabletop wargaming, you might not have any terrain. Instead, just grab some wooden blocks, books and whatever else you’ve got laying around to serve as terrain.
Visit the Osprey Publishing website and download both the Frostgrave Rulebook and Dark Alchemy as FREE PDFs using the code FGV2020 – remember to click on the ‘No Payment Information Required’ button in the Payment Information section once in the Checkout.
Frostgrave: Perilous Dark can be directly downloaded in PDF via this link. Note that Perilous Dark is much tougher than the scenarios found in Dark Alchemy, so you are advised to attempt the latter first.
Visit the Frostgrave page at Osprey’s website to discover more products in the full Frostgrave range.