Luke Gygax is releasing a new DnD adventure and campaign setting which pays homage to his father, Dungeons and Dragons co-creator Gary Gygax. The Tomb of Gyzaengaxx is made through a partnership between Gygax and 5e third-party publisher Gooeycube and launched on crowdfunding platform Kickstarter late last month.
Launched on February 27, 2024, Gygax’s crowdfunder has reached $456,368 so far, with a week left on the campaign. A self-professed ‘very lampoon-y’ DnD setting stuffed with Easter eggs and references to tabletop RPG history, The Tomb of Gyzaengaxx even has members of the Gygax family starring as NPCs. In fact, Luke himself is in there, as Lukaj Gyzaengaxx, “a strapping, charismatic, and very good looking fellow”, according to the campaign.
The release comes in the form of three 60-page DnD books, with a bunch of other art, item cards, and handouts. The first book details a “mega-adventure” where players of levels 6-8 will explore the keep of a ghostly DnD wizard, Garold Gyzaengaxx (obviously intended to be Gary himself). This is not the first time Gary’s been imagined as a powerful archmage – in his own setting of Greyhawk, the archmage/deity Zagyg is a play on his surname.
The second Gyzaengaxx book is a gamemaster reference book, filled with new monsters, spells, two new DnD races, and two new DnD classes, including the Hatmancer. And the final book, sold in a separate ‘Environs of Gyzaengaxx’ box set, is a 100+ page lore book.
The adventure seems to almost be a parody of traditional DnD, and indeed there are plenty of obvious references, like the front cover which features a very similar demonic idol to the one featured on the 1ed AD&D Player’s Handbook.
It appears the Tomb of Gyzaengaxx is somewhat system neutral – since apparently it’s designed for DnD 5e, Old School Essentials, and other “similar systems”. Presumably it’ll be presented in a pretty rules-lite manner, to make it workable with multiple tabletop RPGs.
There are roughly a billion different pledge tiers and stretch goals on the Kickstarter, with rewards ranging from DnD dice sets, to playing with Luke Gygax at GaryCon, to appearing in the adventure yourself as an NPC. Meanwhile stretch goals include even more DnD 5e spells and races, plus STL files to make DnD miniatures of the key characters.
Source: Wargamer
