The Player Guides presented here are for the Shadow World, a Rolemaster (or any RPG) game world setting from the mind (mostly) of Terry Amthor and published by Iron Crown Enterprises (ICE). The Shadow World was first presented in the 1980’s and many sourcebooks were printed by a wide variety of freelance authors in addition to those written by Terry. After a long hiatus, Terry started writing SW books again, that ICE now publishes.

The Shadow World is a very rich and detailed world, and it is difficult sometime for Gamemasters to convey the amount of information to players that illustrate the intricacies and flavor of the world. Thus the Shadow World Player Guides were born. The guides presented are intended to give players the most common and basic understanding of the Shadow World.

I have been very careful to include only the most basic information required. While most of it is intended to provide players with what ordinary characters would know, there is also some material presented in order to give flavor to the world. This allows the players to find out some of the details that doesn’t affect gameplay, but is something they might never otherwise find out (e.g. about the planet’s Magnetosphere). Where timelines are mentioned I only included up to Summer of 6050 Third Era in case some Gamemasters are running games in the past.

These guides are in no way a replacement for the sourcebooks, which contain vital information for gamemasters.

All information, unless noted otherwise, contained in the Player Guides is Shadow World canon which means that it comes from sourcebooks written by Terry Amthor. This includes the Master Atlas in all it’s incarnations including the 1st edition Addendum, Jaiman, Emer, Haalkitaine, Emer I, Emer II, and Eidolon: City in the Sky. Some sections have been added for use in my own campaign. This includes the inclusion of Tier levels on Languages which is used for Nomenist casters with the Essence Companion rules (RMSS).

The images used in these guides are either royalty free images from the internet, or I have gotten permission from the artist to use them here. Many are from Terry. Please do not copy and use the images from this site unless you are sure they are royalty free or have gotten permission to use them.