Jonstown Compendium Index 2024 - updated 24 April

[Nick Brooke]

Here is the Jonstown Compendium Index 2024: an index to the new RuneQuest & Glorantha scenarios and sourcebooks (and sundry other releases) available from Chaosium's Jonstown Compendium community content web store on DriveThruRPG. The index includes full details for every product released after 1 October 2023: for details of earlier releases, see my Jonstown Compendium Catalogue 2023.

Detailed listings analyse content (pages split between scenario, stats, maps, etc.), characters, settings, ratings and price per page of content for each major release. Releases are categorised as RuneQuest Scenarios, Gloranthan Sourcebooks and Shorter Releases (including maps, artwork and random stuff). Three Where in the World? maps show every scenario, sourcebook and map's location. There are notes on when each scenarios and campaign is set (by year and season, inc. Chaosium RQG scenarios), and a best-seller chart at the back. 

The index will be regularly updated following major releases in 2024. All updates in 2024 are free; the price of the index may increase each quarter as new content grows, so don't wait too long to get on board! If you bought it earlier, get the current version of the index from your Library (top right menu) or from this product page while you're logged in to DriveThruRPG.

Edited Wednesday at 05:15 PM by Nick Brooke
Seventh update: 24 April 2024

[Nick Brooke]

The major releases so far this year:

• The Tower of the Elder Sorcerer, by David Millians: an abandoned sorcerer’s tower for adventurers to investigate and plunder. As well as the somewhat discombobulated surviving inhabitants of the tower, this adventure includes statblocks for two rival adventuring parties plus a host of suggested political complications that could follow any successful incursion. 70 pages for $5.00 (PDF).
   
• RPG Writer Workshop RuneQuest Adventure Collection, by various authors: a print edition of six scenarios by 2022 graduates of the Storytelling Collective's "Write Your First Adventure" course. Contains The White Upon the Hills, by Sacha Gauthier and Reece Dyer; Died in the Wool, by Braeden Harpool; A Lamp for Esrola, by Sven Lugar; The Indagos Bull, by Rob Marcus; The Lottery, by Robert Stoll; and An Orlanthi Wedding, by Ian Straus. 124 pages for $19.95 (standard softcover).
   
• Vrok Eye Views, Volume I, by Roy Duffy: seven high-quality maps of New Pavis locations, designed for use on Virtual Tabletops: Gimpy’s Tavern (ground floor, upper floor, basement and “Vrok’s Eye View”), Geo’s (basement and ground floor), and Bob’s Bison Burgers (inc. Mostali meat-grinding contraption). Previously published in New Pavis: City on the Edge of Forever (Pavis & Big Rubble Companion,  volume 1), this collection includes high-resolution PNG downloads of every map. Future volumes will include settlements in the Big Rubble and along the River of Cradles. 7 maps for $9.95 (PDF and PNG).
   
• A Glimpse of Pamaltela: Exploring Tarien & Hornilio, by Paul Baker: a campaign setting for adventures set among the Doraddi people of Tarien, on Glorantha’s distant southern continent of Pamaltela. As usual with Paul Baker’s books there’s a grab-bag of useful stuff: adventurer creation, short-form cult writeups for an entire pantheon, a detailed home setting (the lineages of the Sunset River tribe), NPCs, a bestiary, two scenarios, what my aunt and uncle told me, and even a short soloquest at the back. 289 pages for $22.00 (PDF).
   
• Visions of Myth, by Martin Helsdon and Katrin Dirim: a beautiful artbook collecting most of Katrin Dirim’s illustrations for Martin Helsdon’s book Ships & Shores of Southern Genertela: each picture is accompanied by new descriptive text pointing out details and symbolism that would otherwise go over our heads. Due to a bug in the new DriveThruRPG website, you might not have seen this print-only product in the store: don't miss out, it's incredibly lovely! (The digital edition is bundled as free bonus content with Ships & Shores). 52 pages for $19.95 (premium softcover) or $24.95 (premium hardcover). 

Edited February 17 by Nick Brooke

[Nick Brooke]

Updated today with a new release:

• Holiday Dorastor: Risklands, by Simon Phipp & Anders Tönnberg. The latest Holiday Dorastor release massively expands and reimagines the Risklands campaign setting introduced in Dorastor: Land of Doom (RQ3, 1993). As the authors explain, “Talastar is a buffer region between the Lunar Empire and Dorastor, the Kingdom of Bilini is a buffer region between Talastar and Dorastor, and Riskland is a buffer region between Bilini and Dorastor.” The Red Emperor has generously allowed his enemies to resettle this borderland region, free from imperial oversight, and folks from many homelands have availed themselves of the opportunity. The highlights of the book are the exploration of factions and tensions among the Renekot clan, 63 pages of detailed personalities (each with RuneQuest stats and an illustration by Dario Corallo), and 77 pages of scenario outlines, one-page episode seeds and campaign suggestions. Two further campaign expansions are teased: Foulvale and Hahlgrim’s War: one of the last scenarios in Risklands, Exodus, lays the groundwork  for the latter. 203 pages for $20.00 (PDF).

Edited February 19 by Nick Brooke

[Nick Brooke]

Updated again:

• Treasures of Glorantha, Volume Two: Relics of the Second Age, by Austin Conrad & Friends. A second collection of plunder for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha. All of these treasures originated in the fabled Second Age, being creations of the sorcerous Middle Sea Empire, the draconic Empire of the Wyrms Friends, or stranger powers yet: a handful even come from distant Pamaltela. An opening chapter has rules allowing any adventurer to swear mighty vows and gain powerful boons, effectively creating their own gifts and geases or heroquest rewards. After that are thirty new magic items, each described using the classic Plunder format. Every item is woven into Gloranthan myth and history: many are unique (e.g. Alakoring’s sword Dragonbreaker; Tolat’s Red Sword of Victory), some are more common (potions of Liquid Hate, brewed from distilled tears; Mythographic Wheels, running permutations of mythology as they spin), others can vary in power (did you merely inhale the breath of a True Dragon, or the greater Inner Breath of Arangorf?), and most bring as many potential complications as advantages to their users. Reading this collection provides many valuable insights into the wonders of the lost Second Age, the abuses of the God Learners and the perils of Draconic self-mutilation. The book is beautifully illustrated throughout, comparable to Chaosium’s own publications; one picture of the Machine God Zistor is a work in progress sketch, and I can’t wait to see it finished! 71 pages for $19.95 (PDF).

[Nick Brooke]

Updated again with news of two new print releases: Harald Smith’s Nochet: Adventurer’s Guide and Ian Thomson’s Pavis & Big Rubble Companion, Volume 4: The Good, the Bad and the Rowdy.

Plus a bunch of other recent stuff, inc. Vrok Eye Views 2, Skeletons, The Bully Bird and more.

The best-seller charts at the back have been updated to cover the last three months’ sales figures, from 16 December 2023 to 15 March 2024.

Edited March 15 by Nick Brooke

[Nick Brooke]

Updated again:

• Boldhome Blues: The Scripts of Preston Shrader, by Roy Duffy. The unproduced script of a 1989 adaptation by hack author Preston Shrader of the rediscovered Greek tragedy Boldhome (which bears a remarkable similarity to a RuneQuest scenario: go figure!). Name-dropping asides throughout the supporting material give new insights into the history of 20th century dramas (theatrical, filmed and televisual) inspired by Gloranthan sources found in the Vatican Apostolic Archive and elsewhere. The original stage play concerns a reunion and doomed romance between two members of the Orlanthi resistance; this adaptation is a police procedural focusing instead on the bungling Boldhome City Guard. The critics say: "Makes Six Seasons in Sartar look like an epic." (70 pages for $5.95)

[Nick Brooke]

Updated again:

• Draconic Enlightenment, by Leon Kirshtein and Simon Phipp. A grab-bag of suggestions for running Draconic Enlightenment as an alternative version of Nysalor Illumination, plus new plunder items (dragonewt eggs, jade dreamstones) and bestiary entries (cursed serpents, pseudo dragons), followed by a lengthy recap of dragonewt personalities and magic, and three scenario outlines (Serpent’s Schemes, Shipwrecked, Rituals of Cleansing). (32 pages for $4.00)
   
• Lost & Found, by Paul Davies. A collection of Plunder! items in the classic format, several charmingly quirky, and most including adventure seeds suggesting how a game master could use them in their campaign. There are seven small illustrations plus a scrappy map (unlabelled) and some misc. scribbles. (28 pages for $11.37 - unusually, this product is priced in UK pounds (£9.00), and the stated price may wobble as the exchange rate changes)

Best-seller charts have been updated to show the best-selling products in both Q4 2023 and Q1 2024, as well as details for the last three months.

[Nick Brooke]

Updated again:

• An Unofficial Buyer's Guide to RuneQuest & Glorantha, by Brian Duguid. Designed to plug the gap between Rick’s Meints Index to Glorantha III and my own Jonstown Compendium Catalogue, Brian Duguid’s Buyer’s Guide details all the material available for RuneQuest and Glorantha that’s still available from its publishers or manufacturers, including obscure magazines (and indexes), history books, miniatures, dice, coins, print-on-demand merch and online tools. The Buyer’s Guide is lavishly illustrated throughout, festooned with hyperlinks, and comes bundled with discount vouchers for Brian’s earlier works (The Children of Hykim and The Voralans), saving you twice the cost of purchase. Finally, if the Buyer’s Guide sells well, the author says he plans to keep updating it throughout 2024. Welcome to the treadmill, Brian! (61 pages for $2.49)
   
• [Japanese] Money Tree Thrives Again, by Steve Perrin, Greg Stafford & Ken Rolston, translated by Ashinoha. By special agreement with Chaosium, a Japanese translation of RQ3’s starter scenario The Money Tree set in Glorantha has been published via the community content programme. (The Jonstown Compendium’s launch title Yozarian’s Bandit Ducks, which is a sequel of sorts, already existed in Japanese translation, and Frog Games’ new Japanese edition of RuneQuest deserves our support.) Even if you don’t read Japanese, this translation includes gorgeous manga-style artwork by professional  illustrator Akitoki Satou depicting RQG pregens Vasana & Co. (on the cover and one internal full-page piece), plus setting art from Hirotsugu Kaga of Clark & Co. (whose work was previously seen in The Duel at Dangerford). (30 pages for $3.30)

Edited April 8 by Nick Brooke

[Nick Brooke]

Updated again:

• A Rough Guide to Boldhome, by David Hall, Jeff Richard, Greg Stafford and Friends. The sourcebook for 1992’s freeform live action role-playing game Home of the Bold, reissued to support its Chaosium Con 2024 “Director’s Cut.” As with A Rough Guide to Glamour, the original 28-page player booklet (which contained Greg Stafford’s description of the city and recent Sartarite history: the Boldhome Documents) has been massively enhanced, with glorious new full-colour artwork and maps, fiction, a songbook, plus 19 pages of preview material from Chaosium’s forthcoming Sartar Book, making this an essential resource for any RuneQuest campaign set in Sartar. (81 pages for $9.95 in PDF or $15.95 standard colour softcover print-on-demand)
  
  Collector’s Note: two items from previous editions are not in this version: Dan Barker’s black and white cover art, and the short Rough Guide article by David Hall & Kevin Jacklin. Yurek Chodak’s one-page map of Dragon Pass has been replaced with a two-page map detailing Dragon Pass & Prax by Colin Driver, the cartographer of the Guide to Glorantha and Argan Argar Atlas, who also provides new maps of Genertela and the Tribes of Sartar. Walter Moore’s view of Boldhome, map of Boldhome and map of Geo’s Inns have been colourised, and the city description is revised and expanded. The 81-page book contains (inter alia) 26 pages by Greg Stafford (the Boldhome Documents, etc.), 18 pages by Jeff Richard (Sartar Book previews), and 7 pages of front matter.

[jajagappa]

5 minutes ago, Nick Brooke said:

with glorious new full-colour artwork and maps, fiction, a songbook, plus 19 pages of preview material from Chaosium’s forthcoming Sartar Book, making this an essential resource for any RuneQuest campaign set in Sartar.

Not to mention the return of Notes from Nochet with all new content!