Review follow-ups: Blades in the Dark (the back half) and Life and Death, Zarth Edition (for the Crypts and Things system)

I've been trying to make a dent in my backlog of quality RPG content without purchasing more.  So far, it's an exercise in willpower, but the alternative is the pathetic existence of a digital hoarder.  My role-playing backlog is the equivalent of a crawlspace full of unread issues of National Geographic.  It's nowhere near as messy, but I have nothing to show for it.

He probably actually read these

Anyway, I just caught up on two interesting projects that, for different reasons, return me to past reviews.  I recently completed my entire read-through of John Harper's Blades in the Dark; when I wrote my pre-review, I had only completed a read-through of the mechanics.  

I still haven't played the damn thing, but who knows when that will happen?  I want to review the rest of the text while we're still alive.

As for Life and Death, Zarth Edition, which is a recent conversion of one of the author's (Newt Newport) older adventures to his most recent rule-set i.e. Crypts and Things. I previously reviewed C&T very favorably, and this new adventure is worthy of the system.

First up: Blades in the Dark, part II:

An RPG review: Crypts and Things Remastered

It's been a while since I've posted anything here; that's mainly because I'm still working on some new content (the DCC adventure I mentioned in an earlier post, as well as a completely novel DCC class...more on this another time).  I've also absorbed even more tabletop RPG content.  It's really getting out of hand.

Anyway, I've been running out of DCC materials that catch my attention, and I promised Stan that I wouldn't look too closely at Purple Sorcerer Games - this because he's thinking of running one of their DCC adventures!  But there's still plenty of other stuff, and I can't really help myself.  

Just the other day I was re-reading the excellent The Black Hack.  I am intrigued by an OSR game that requires players to make all the dice rolls.  Attacking?  Roll to hit.  Being attacked?  Roll to avoid.  TBH also introduces a unique mechanic to simplify and abstract bookkeeping for supplies: resource dice.  Quantities of identical items are roughly measured by a die of a certain size (d20 for "a lot," d12 for "a bunch," and so-on until d4).  When a character uses one of these items, roll the resource die - on a 1-2, drop the die size by one (e.g. a d12 becomes a d10).  If the resource die was a d4, rolling 1-2 means that it's depleted.

Anyway, something I picked up recently was the very intriguing Crypts and Things Remastered. Written by Newt Newport and published by d101 Games, available on DriveThruRPG in hardcover, softcover and PDF forms.  Like TBH, it's a (relatively) simple OSR game with a number of unique mechanics.  The rules are tightly bound to the setting, which is a very specific swords-and-sorcery world that draws heavily from Appendix N literature.

See, I'm getting better at this!

So let's get into some specifics.  What's to love about C&T?