The first big theatrical release of 2024 is here. Fans have been waiting for Dune: Part Two to continue the story of the fall of House Atredies and the rise of Paul as the Muad’Dib on the big screen for three years. Filmmaker Denis Villeneuve has been on a roll and hopefully gets a chance to finish the film trilogy with Dune: Messiah in a few years.
Tabletop gamers have plenty of great options to battle for the fate of the desert planet Arrakis. Gale Force Nine features a line of Dune board games that range from the re-release of the classic strategy game to modern updates and takes on popular styles of games as social deduction.
Fans of role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons also have a great adaptation in Dune: Adventures In The Imperium from Modiphius Entertainment. Right now there’s a Humble Bundle featuring several titles in the line including the core book, expansions and adventures. For fans looking to return to Arrakis as soon as they leave the theater, it’s a great deal.
Dune: Adventures In The Imperium Core Book
Dune: Adventures In The Imperium uses a version of the 2d20 rules that power many of the games released by Modiphius. Characters combine two traits to roll equal to or under to gain levels of success.Characters are built from three major components: Skills, Values and Truths.
Skills define what a character is capable of doing. They exist in five broad categories: Battle, Communicate, Discipline, Move, and Understand. Focuses and Talents further specialize the character’s strengths.
In this setting, why a character does something is often as important as how skilled they are. That’s reflected in the Values each character possesses: Duty, Faith, Justice, Power and Truth. A character is likely to use their highest Value but doing so can make them predictable and let enemies counteract their plans.
Truths are traits that can be used as bonuses or penalties depending on the context of the roll. A character with the Fremen trait, for example, would be abe to use it to make surviving an ornithopter crash in the deserts of Arrakis easier. It might work against the character in a social situation where an arrogant noble they need to impress was insulting the inhabitants of the desert planet.
Players also create their own Houses, complete with assets, interests and rivals. It’s up to the group how powerful this House is, though larger Houses begin with more pressing issues to solve to balance the extra resources. The players house could be a small affair caught up in larger intrigues or they could be a rival to the Atredies or Harkonnen in power as they begin play.
Dune: Adventures In The Imperium Expansions
The Agents of Dune boxed set drops tables into an intriguing scenario: what if their newly created house was given the task of running Arrakis instead of Atredies? The set introduces players to the concepts of the game while also offering a spice production minigame that generates plots for a short campaign.
The Great Game: Houses of the Landsraad gives players a chance to dive into greater detail on their Houses. It details sixteen houses that can be used as allies, rivals and everything in between. There is also additional rules for players who want to make characters hailing from other factions such as CHOAM and the Spacing Guild.
Arrakis is the main backdrop of Dune stories. Sand and Dust details the desert planet with more information on Fremen characters. It also includes information on the spice melange and why the sustance is so valuable to the Imperium beyond its use in space travel.
If Arrakis is the heart of the Imperiuam, Kaitan is the mind. Powers And Pawns: The Emperor’s Court details the factions and schemes that surround the Golden Lion Throne. The book concludes with an adventure that drops the players’ House rightin the thick of things.
Dune: Adventures In The Imperium Adventures
Masters of Dune extends the campaign that began in Agents of Dune out into the larger universe. This campaign lets the player curry favor with the larger forces in the Imperium such as the Spacing Guild or the Bene Gesserit. For campaigns that began elsewhere, there’s ample advice on how to adapt these stories.
The bundle includes several single adventures that can fit in any campaign. Wormsign can be used as a one shot to learn to play the game as it features a short story where the players must investigate a spice smuggling operation and survive the many dangers of life outside the shield wall. It can lead directly into Desertfall as the players must prepare a permanent residence on Arrakis by rooting out spies and assassins.
The Gamemaster Toolkit doesn’t contain pre-built adventures but it does contain vital advice on the themes of Dune stories. It also contains an adventure generator section were some quick rolls on a few charts can inspire the next session.
The Dune Humble Bundle runs until March 21, 2024. Physical copies of Dune materials are also on sale directly from Modiphius through March 25th, 2024.
