Hello there! I'm also craving for some more activity here. I'm running Forbidden Lands for the first time next week!
Yeah, I agree that mixing up groups and turn them into motley crews can make them more interesting. I'll leave that to my players, but looking forward to hear what they are coming up with!
Beasts are a different story. As opposed to your preferences, I personally like my fantasy worlds to be as less Walt Disney-like as possible, and mallards are definitely something I would not enjoy. 😀
I'm also not a fan of magical communication in this case, I'd say I'm going with the different head/ throat physiology for Wolfkin to make them able to speak with a degree of verisimilitude. And I'll probably add the more feral wolfkin, who will be mostly hostile and unable/ unwilling to speak!
Thanks! Yes, I thought about it, and that's definitely something I'm willing to do. The art in the book doesn't really match it, but I can always assume that there are Wolfkin that are more feral than others.
I played solo twice, and I think the game is good solo. But to be honest I mostly ignored the solo rules, and made my own version with Mythic GM Emulator. I also made my map on the fly with a personal randomiser, and I ignored the lore and almost everything about the setting of Ravenland.
I never made it far because between running games, painting miniatures, prepping and finding time to play solo has been hard. Plus, I'd really like to try The Walking Dead RPG solo at some point.
My recommendation is, play with one character and two or three npc companions, flip one of them to PC if your main character dies. Be kind to yourself. That should get you going, I'd say.