Osprey Games - Frostgrave: Mortal Enemies review If there’s one thing every good hero needs, it’s a great enemy. Would anyone care about grumpy ol’ Batman without the Joker? Would John McClane have done much beyond making fists with his toes if it wasn’t for Hans Gruber? Who would care about a cupboarded kid with a scar on his head if it wasn’t for a camp, noseless Ralph Fiennes opposing him? The wizarding heroes of Frostgrave’s world have faced innumerable dangers, but they’ve never been pitted against a true arch-nemesis... until now! Mortal Enemies is a new expansion that is primarily based on robust creation and advancement systems for the titular baddies. As with the other Frostgrave expansions, that’s not the only new feature, but the whole first half of the book is devoted to an in-depth examination of it. The process of their creation begins with the basics - deciding a name, matching them to your wizard’s level, and determining their ‘template’. This template is chosen by rolling a D20 and consulting a table. There’s a 50% chance of a humanoid big bad but they could be a Construct, Werewolf, Wraith, Fire Giant, or something else. This is the first of many tables provided and, while it may sound incredibly reductive (perhaps negative) to describe much of Mortal Enemies’ content as ‘exiting tables’, we suspect that Frostgrave fans will instantly understand what we mean! The artwork in the book is splendid, with some beautifully or grotesquely evocative scenes depicting arch-enemies in varied forms. Making a Mortal Enemy Author Joe McCullough’s gaming past is steeped in RPG and skirmish tabletop gaming, focused on individuals and story; so too are his own games. Long tables of interesting physical and mental traits, degrading injuries, humorous quirks, game-changing skills, and more, help players bring characters into Frostgrave’s world of unending cold just as they played an important part in Joe’s early gaming. By going into great depth on ‘baddie’ creation in Mortal Enemies, the author offers an unfathomable variety of rivals to stymie your wizard’s plans. As the Mortal Enemies are all magic-based, they will be up to the task of taking on your spell-slinging wizard and apprentice quite capably too. Each Mortal Enemy has altered stats (determined on another table), two ranged attacks (another table), and two utility spells (yet another table). This will form an already formidable foe but there’s also the matter of what they get up to between games. An out of game spell table gives more options here, some of which are new. Affliction Doll is a necromancer spell, where an enemy soldier suffers -1 on all rolls; Rat Scent is a witch spell, that plonks a giant
