Join Rediscovered Realms on our quest to reveal myriad magical items for RPGs drawn from mythology & folklore in Mayfair Games Role Aids 2-volume “Fantastic Treasures” visual encyclopedia!
Considering all Fantasy and all role-playing games stem from our imagination, what could be cooler than translating mythical items like Athena’s Shield, Siegfried’s Sword and Pan’s Pipes from literature, folklore and mythology into RPG terms!
That’s exactly what Mayfair Games did back in 1984 and 1985 through their Role Aids line of RPG supplements.
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With hundreds of unique items, covers by the incomparable Boris Vallejo and internal illustrations for most of the items, these tomes really ignite the imagination.
I love the introductions by the author, Allen Hammack. He really gets it and feels like a kindred spirit in his love & application of mythological fantasy.
“The point is that the areas of history, mythology, folklore, and religion overlap and are inextricably entwined. One man’s religion is another man’s mythology, and every story that is now found in the library under “Mythology” was once (or still is) accepted as literal truth by a large number of people.” -Allen Hammack
Introduction to Fantastic Treasures I
Introduction to Fantastic Treasures II
Allen obviously did a ton of research on all these magical treasures and provided bibliographies for the sources of his inspiration.
And here’s the list of magical items you’ll find inside!
The internal art was done by Gerald O’Malley, Hagins Fugate, and Teanna Lee Byerts.
I love this style of illustration for encyclopedic tomes. It adds so much but still allows room for your imagination. (It also makes these books great bathroom reading material when I’m sitting on my Hlidskajalf)
Volume 1 covered magical items from A - L
and Volume 2 covered the rest of the treasures from M - Z
The item descriptions are short but packed with the “practical” details you need to adapt these items to original AD&D - though they could be very easily modified to other systems with minor tweaks.
Some of the items are a bit goofy, but hey, for anyone who’s read folklore, we know there are MANY weird things that show up in those old stories. Besides, with creativity, a GM/DM could incorporate some fun scenarios - even with something like “Fakir’s Butter Jar” which never runs out of butter!
Mmmm, I love me some butter!
A handy cross-index and weighted random treasure table (d1000!) in the back of Volume II rounds out this work and verily makes these supplements useful and practical as a gaming aid.
These books feel like extensive care was put into them and I can’t help but be impressed with the result. Well done!
The year is fresh, and opportunity abounds - go forth Fellow Adventurers and may you discover heaps of your own Fantastic Treasures!
“I’m an adventurer, looking for treasure.” - Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
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Beautiful cover art. I've toyed around with the idea of padding my campaigns ith these supplements....
Boris covers? How the heck did a small magazine afford those?