The Battlepits of Krarth (Blood Sword)

This is a lot of fun too play. Level up from just normal choose your own adventure style books

The best gamebook series ever! Great to see if back in print. It can be played multiplayer with each player controlling a character or solo. Or one person can control all four characters - warrior, sage, trickster and enchanted. Combat is enhanced by tactical maps, which in these revised editions are much easier to use than the originals from the 1980s.Overall great fun if you are looking for something closer to an RPG than a straightforward gamebook. Even if you don't want to geek out on the gameplay the story is epic, which develops over the five book series. First four books are all available. You are going to want to buy them all.

I highly recommend this to any fan of the genre. One of my new favorite games.

Don't get me wrong, the content of this book is out-of-this-WORLD!! It's has an incredible game and story - exactly what I remembered many years ago. However, sadly, I lost my originals over the years and this reprint isn't what it is before. The paper quality isn't up to par and when you line up the books (current volume 1 to 4), you'll notice that the cut of the books are not consistent. Some books are taller whereas some others are broader. Most definitely it isn't the copies I have as I had bought 2 sets of each :)

I've just recently discovered the many Adventure Book reprints and find them worthwhile exploring them. Based on early playthroughs I'm enjoying Dave Morris' Blood Sword series more than his better-known Fabled Land books. Blood Sword lets you come to grips with adventure fairly directly, creating a party and moving from destination to destination with real purpose.By contrast, Fabled Lands is much more an open world but one where you can sometimes wander with less direction or purpose. For contemporary players used to the more clear cut direction of computer rpgs I believe the Blood Sword adventures will be more compelling.Further the Sword book entries have generally richer writing and descriptions, to my taste.Finally, a nod to the wonderful and evocative "old school" fantasy art in both series. It helps transport you to the world of adventure - and danger - in the books.(I particularly recommend playing ambient music as you read and dice your way through your perils.)

I took a gamble and ordered all 5 books on a whim, and book 1 is very satisfying. Combat did feel tedious at first but that's because I hadn't figured out the way Bloodsword works. You virtually never die unexpectedly, actually only 1 of my group of 4 died from a trap across all of my runs, but if you don't make the correct choices leading up to the battles then you'll probably die in battle. I only had about 5 or 6 encounters to complete the book so draw out the maps the first time you enter an encounter and reuse it when you inevitably die later on. Now I really enjoy the combat, the randomness can be brutal at times but it's where the challenge is. The scenario is basically Death Trap Dungeon so don't expect anything ground breaking from the setting, but it still has interesting encounters. One odd thing I found was the option of taking up to 9 magic scrolls in a scrollatorium. You can take 9 scrolls that permanently alter your stats (+1 to a stat of your choice at the cost of -1 to a stat of your choice) which seemed way too lenient. However this is book 1 of a series of 5 so having such an option at the beginning could be really interesting.I've moved my guys into book 2 which is already more impressive. Book 1 has no connection to the overarching plot that the rest of the series has but it's still a great read. If you plan on doing the series definitely start here I say, I came across heaps of awesome loot in book 1, you'll want that for the next book.

Blood Sword is considered one of the best Gamebook series. You can play as a solitary hero or as a party of adventurers. The story is FANTASTIC, an epic that truly starts at the beginning of the second gamebook in the series, and the quality of writing is exceptional in chapters 2, 3 and 4.This new edition is a faithful reprint of the original with a few errata and a new cover (the old covers didn't make any sense), and the author considers this one the "classic edition".I personally bought the volumes out of nostalgia and the fact that the old edition volumes command high prices on the secondary market. I'm happy with my order.

As a kid in the 80s I had this series along with fighting fantasy. It seems like everyone, my self & even the authors, forgot about gamebooks when computer gaming took off in the 90s. However the gamebook format, for its fiddly faults, does leave a lot to your own imagination; something computer games generally cant do. With these Bloodsword re-prints I was hoping to get my kids interested. No joy there sadly, but I found the BloodSword series still enjoyable as a adult due to the quality of the writing and the development of the story as the series progresses. Battlepits is more of a prequel for the series as a whole but is full of memorable characters. Top tip: even though I play solo, I set up the 4 characters and play them all - gives a better experience. Also I give them a higher rank than the rules suggest - 5th or above to start. 2nd top tip: I played this using the free Astral virtual table top which allows you to set up the characters & battles on your internet browser & was pretty easy to use.

The Battlepits of Krarth is the first in the Bloodsword gamebook collection. As with most gamebook series, the first isn't necessary the best. However, whilst it's a little derivative, it does set the scene for the rest of the series and is still very well written and avoids the clichés and problems that besets most gamebook series. The only drawback from the series was the complex combat system. But that is easily solvable, just don't bother with it. The book stands up on the quality of the writing alone.I owned many gamebook series back in the day but culled most of them from my collection. Bloodsword is the collection I regret getting rid of the most, hence me purchasing it again. On a more positive note, at least the authors got paid twice over. There are probably around ten stand out gamebook series in total, this being one of them. One or both of the authors being involved in three or four of the others (more if you allow for Jamie Thomson's cameo role in book 5). But then you probably know that already if you're reading this.