At the end of the fourth and most recent campaign and campaign set in Free League Publishing’s Mutant: Year Zero post-apocalyptic future, there remained one big question, “What happens next?” Since 2014, the publisher has been exploring the place of mutants with Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days, anthropomorphic animals with Mutant: Genlab Alpha, robots with Mechatron – Rise of the Robots Roleplaying, and Mutant: Year Zero – Elysium, and by with each release revealing a bit more the world and the disaster which brought it to its current state. Each release also saw the four different groups encountering one or more of the other groups for the first time, if only fleetingly, in the wake of the events which played out in Mutant: Year Zero – Elysium, all four groups are together and interacting with each other. This is the new world of Mutant: Year Zero presented in a mini-campaign for setting, Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death.

Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death takes place in the Zone, the region first explored in Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days. The default Zone is The Big Smoke—essentially bombed out, flattened, and ravaged London—but it can easily be moved to the Game Master’s own Zone. All that it requires is a long body of water which boats can easily travel up and down. Advice is given on how to run it as a stand-alone adventure, but really Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death is designed to be run as part of campaign, specifically after Mutant: Year Zero – Elysium, and ideally after Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days, Mutant: Genlab Alpha, and Mechatron – Rise of the Robots Roleplaying. In addition, to get the best out of Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death, the Game Master should also have run Mutant: Year Zero Zone Compendium 5: Hotel Imperator. Since the campaign takes place after the events of Mutant: Year Zero – Elysium, there no restrictions on what type of characters the players can roleplay—be mutants, animals, robots, or humans. This is one of the features of the brave new Mutant: Year Zero world.

As Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death opens, the world has changed. There is more trade and interaction between the different groups, there are more boats on the river, and so on, but there are ominous signs. In the depths of a snowy winter, there are disappearances around the Ark, including of people important to the Player Characters, and there are shadows in the sky—vehicles which float in the air and move fast. The Player Characters come across a Zone Rider—one of the couriers who carry messages back and forth across the Zone—under attack by a band of orderly and well-equipped soldiers. If they come to the Zone Rider’s rescue, or from a contact later on if they decide not to intervene, they learn of a mysterious new organisation known as the Army of the Dawn. It has recently taken over a wretched junktown to the west and renamed it Dawnville. The Player Characters are tasked with travelling to Dawnville, which is shortly to stage a wrestling tournament, to find out more information. To prepare themselves for that, it is suggested that the Player Characters visit two other places to conduct some investigation and learn what they can about the Army of Dawn. The first is a trading post run by Oscar Battenburg, an enclave Human from Elysium I known to trade slaves to the Army of Dawn, the second is the Showboat Saga, which travels up and the river putting on entertainments and which recently visited the Dawnville.

The Player Characters are also given a deadline—the wrestling tournament takes place in a week. To get them across the Zone in time, the Player Characters are lent a big-wheeled all-terrain robot vehicle and given some equipment. It is also likely that they will have been able to scavenge the guns and the armour of the Army of Dawn soldiers who attacked the Zone Rider—in particular, the tin helms which give the Army of Dawn soldiers the look of Great War soldiers. In comparison to a normal Mutant: Year Zero campaign, the Player Characters will be able to zip across the Zone, and with initially three locations—or as Mutant: Year Zero terms them, ‘Special Zone Sectors’—there is scope for the Game Master to run random encounters and ‘Special Zone Sectors’ of her own in between these three.

Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death actually consists of five ‘Special Zone Sectors’, not three, although the first three can be run in any order, followed by the fourth and fifth in that order. Each of these locations is nicely detailed and includes full stats for each of the NPCs, clear maps—both full illustrations of the locations and floorplans where needed, and events which play out when the Player Characters visit them. The five ‘Special Zone Sectors’ are all different in scope and theme. So ‘The Showboat Saga’ has a certain extravagance to it with its comparatively lavish performances and restaurant which becomes a mini-murder mystery, whilst ‘Dawnville’ is essentially ‘Bartertown’ from Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome—complete with the equivalent of its own ‘Thunderdome’, which of course is where the wrestling tournament takes place. For the most part, the encounters involve a fair degree of stealth and subterfuge as well as combat. Certainly, the wrestling tournament will appeal to characters and players who like physical combat.

So what is going on in Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death? Well, its events do stem from what happened at the end of Mutant: Year Zero – Elysium and the fact that it involves an army—the ‘Army of Dawn’—points towards a new force wanting to conquer the whole of the Zone. This is a genre staple, a new military arising to threaten the fledgling communities working to survive in the weird world order of the post-apocalyptic planet, but it well handled in Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death. 

Now Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death describes itself as a campaign, but at best it is a mini-campaign. With just five ‘Special Zone Sectors’, this is really more of scenario than a campaign and the first few, ‘The Showboat Saga’ and ‘Battenburg’s Trading Post’ in particular, are short, playable in a single session, two at the very most. The later ‘Special Zone Sectors’ are longer and more involved, and it will probably run to two or three sessions. Fortunately, the fact that the first few ‘Special Zone Sectors’ can be run in any order provides the Game Master with room to add her own content and perhaps bulk up Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death a little.

Physically, Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death is well written, nicely presented in full colour with excellent cinematic-style artwork. Some of the illustrations show scenes that can happen in the campaign and the likelihood is that the Game Master will really want them to happen—such as a gunfight aboard an airship—because they look fun! However, it does need an edit in places and some of the artwork still has Swedish signs and writing on it. The campaign also comes with some good handouts, including newspapers and event posters, both a sign of the growing new civilisation of Mutant: Year Zero. These handouts though, are not collated at the end of the book.

As a campaign—or really a scenario—Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death begins to show what the new world of Mutant: Year Zero is like, the beginnings of new civilisations.  It returns to the openness of Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days after the closed and confined worlds of Mutant: Genlab Alpha, Mechatron – Rise of the Robots Roleplaying, and Mutant: Year Zero – Elysium, and of course, it brings each of the inhabitants of the four campaign settings together much post-apocalyptic roleplaying games of old, such as Gamma World.  In fact, with the new set-up, a Game Master with access to those old post-apocalyptic scenarios written in the early 1980s could actually adapt them to the world of Mutant: Year Zero. Overall, Mutant: Year Zero – The Gray Death shows us what the new world of Mutant: Year Zero is like and has the Player Characters confront the first threat to it in an action-packed scenario. It is though, just the next chapter. 

D-Day was a momentous event at the end of War World 2, marking the major assault by the Allies on a Europe which has been under occupation by the Nazis for four years. This single combined forces action has been the subject of numerous books and memoirs over the years, as well as films such as D-Day and Saving Private Ryan, television series like Band of Brothers, and boardgames such as D-Day and Axis & Allies: D-Day, both from Avalon Hill Games, Inc. Many of the board games which explore D-Day are simulations, typically hex and counter wargames. This means that they will only appeal to a certain type of gamer, the wargamer, and typically, they can only be played by two participants, each of whom commands numerous units, which depending upon the game can be squads, platoons, squadrons, battalions, regiments, and more. Yet modern gaming can and often does approach its subject matters with different mechanics and ways of playing. So it is with D-Day Dice, which combines co-operative play, dice mechanics, and a timing mechanism, all played against the board rather than another player. Originally published by Valley Games, Inc. in 2012 following a successful Kickstarter campaign, in 2019, Word Forge Games published D-Day Dice, Second Edition, again following a successful Kickstarter campaign.

Designed to be played by between one and four players, aged fourteen and over, D-Day Dice, Second Edition can be played in roughly forty-five minutes, or less once the players get used to the mechanics or lose. In the game, each player controls a Unit of soldiers assaulting one of the beaches fortified by the Nazis as part of their Atlantic Wall. These Units come from one of four Allied nations—the USA, the United Kingdom, France, and Canada—and will be represented by a single die on the map and supported by a Reference Card and a Resource Tracker. Each turn the players will roll dice to generate resources and use to be able to survive on the battlefield whilst supporting each other and building up a force strong enough to get up the beach and breach the bunker. All this is against the clock and difficult odds. To win, every Unit must assault the bunker and survive—that is, have at least one soldier alive at the end, but if all of the soldiers in a Unit are killed or a Unit cannot advance up the beach before time runs out, then everyone loses and the Nazis win!

Open up the box for D-Day Dice, Second Edition and you will find an eighteen-page rulebook and a twenty-page scenario book; four Reference Cards and four Resource Trackers—one for each nation; six double-sided map boards providing twelve different scenarios; over one hundred cards, representing Specialist soldiers, items, vehicles, and award; thirty tokens; and thirty-two dice. Each of the map board represents a particular historical target, starting with Exercise Tiger, the Allied rehearsal for D-Day, through Omaha Beach and Pointe Du Hoc, up to Pegasus Bridge. Divided into various Sectors, they are marked with obstacles such as land mines and barriers. Many have certain conditions, such as Sectors where there is just room for a single Unit, have requirements to enter, and certain loses which need to be met—for example a Specialist or an Item—before they can be entered. Matching these conditions and maintaining enough Soldiers to keep going will challenge the players throughout D-Day Dice.

Of the thirty-two dice in D-Day Dice, Second Edition, four are black and are rolled when German weapons inflict damage on a Unit. Four are Unit Markers, used to track each Unit’s movement on the map and how much time the Unit has before it must move—either to an adjacent Sector or forward into a Sector closer to the bunker. These is a Unit Marker for each of the Units in the game. The other twenty-four—six per Unit and player—are ‘RWB’ or ‘Red-White-Blue’ dice and lie at the heart of the game. These dice are red, white, and blue, and each player has two of each colour. Each die is marked with six symbols that represent the resources in the game. Star symbols are used to Rally Specialists to a player’s Unit; Soldier symbols—single and double—add Soldiers to a Unit; medal or Courage symbols are used to draw Awards which grant various bonuses or to advance a Unit up the map; and Tool symbols generate Item Points with which to purchase Items. Lastly, Skull symbols cancel other die results if they appear in a player’s Final Tally.

On a turn, each player will roll his six ‘RWB’ dice. He must keep and lock two of them, but can reroll or keep as many of the other dice as he wishes. After the second roll, he must keep and lock another two, but can keep more if he wishes. After the third roll, all of his dice are locked. This is his Final Tally used to generate the resources for that Turn, which are recorded on the Resource Tracker—which requires a little assembly before first game—and spent in that same Turn. Resources are not kept from Turn to Turn.

This is simple enough, but D-Day Dice adds a couple of twists to the dice mechanic. One is that is if a player rolls a ‘Straight’—one of each symbol on every die, he earns a free Award rather than purchasing it with multiple Award symbols. The other is if he rolls three identical symbols on different dice, so the same symbol on a Red, a White, and a Blue die. This grants a ‘RWB’ bonus. So three Skulls or ‘Dead Man’s Gift’ has a player’s Unit finds equipment on a dead soldier’s gear bag; three single Soldiers grants ‘Reinforcements’ which join a Unit; and three Medals or ‘Battle Cry’ inspires a Unit to go above and beyond the call of duty. Now it is not merely a matter of each triple combination granting a ‘RWB’ bonus, because the actual bonus is different for each nation. So for ‘Battle Cry’ for the USA either grants two Stars or enables a Unit to advance into a new Sector without meeting its requirement, but for the United Kingdom, it grants three Soldiers or it enables a Unit to advance into a new Sector without meeting its requirement. These little variations add flavour and variation to each of the Units.

A Turn consists of six phases. In Phase One, the players roll the dice and then do the Upkeep—recording resources generated in Phase Two. In Phase Three, they adjust Unit Markers, turning the die each Turn until the fifth face shows an arrow indicating that the Unit must move in the next phase. In Phase Four, each player can Rally a Specialist, Find an Item, or Draw an Award, depending the results of the ‘RWB’ dice that Turn. A Specialist adds an ability to a Unit, such a Runner which enables a player to give another Unit resources and Items no matter where they are on the map—otherwise they need to be in the Sector to either give or trade resources. Specialists are also important in the game because some maps require them to be sacrificed in order for a Unit to be able to advance. Such Specialists cannot be rallied again, that is, there are no replacements. Items are single-use items of equipment like the Flamethrower which reduces the Defence value of the bunker or the Despatch Case which lets a player copy the Final Tally of another Unit. Awards are again one-use cards and add a great effect to play, for example, the Bronze Star enables a Unit to stay in a Sector for one Turn longer, whilst the amazing Victoria Cross enables a player to determine every player’s Final Tally that Turn.

In Phase Five, each Unit which wants or to Move must do so. This is to a new Sector—either to the side or forward. A Unit cannot retreat or revisit a Sector. In Phase Six, Combat, each Unit takes damage according to the Defense value of the Sector it is in. Damage reduces the number of Soldiers a Unit has and if reduced to zero means that the Allies have lost. If a Unit can get into the Bunker, it will take a lot of damage, so a Unit will need to find Items which reduce its Defense value sufficiently for the Unit to survive assaulting it and so help win the game. This does not have to be done simultaneously, one Unit can successfully assault the Bunker and its player wait for the others to arrive. Once every Unit has attacked and held the Bunker, then the game is won. 

Physically, D-Day Dice, Second Edition is very well produced. Everything is done in full colour, the card stock is good, everything is readable in the Rule Book and the Scenario Book, and the dice feel good in the hand. Perhaps the map boards are a little small and they do not quite sit as flat as they should, but really, these are minor niggles. A better explanation of how the Bunker is assaulted might have been useful for less experienced players.

The rulebook for D-Day Dice, Second Edition also includes notes for solo play as well as adding Victory Points to the game. It ends with some advice on how to play too. The Scenario Book comes with three training missions on Tiger Beach as well as the other eleven maps. Pleasingly, each scenario comes with a dedication to the men and units who fought there along with the specific details about the map.

The twelve map boards and the four different nationalities—and then the addition of the Victory Point rules—give D-Day Dice, Second Edition a lot of replay value. As does its short playing time. It is also easy to set up again, so if one game is lost, it is not difficult to set up another and start again. Whether playing solo with a single Unit or multiple Units—which will take longer to play, but does keep the game’s co-operative element, D-Day Dice, Second Edition is tense and challenging to play. This is especially so on the later maps as you would expect, but it is not just because the players are relying on random dice rolls to determine how they plan and what they can do.

Throughout the game, the players are forced to think ahead and plan what they need on the route they are going to take up the beach, but this changes from map to map. Get that wrong and the game will be lost. So having learned one set of conditions to advance on one map, the players have to learn to prepare for a whole new set of conditions on another map. This is in addition to the game’s co-operative element which will often force Units to congregate in order to swap the game’s various resources. This may be an issue for the more casual player, but not for the experienced board or wargame player.

The ‘RWB’ dice and mechanics are not only clever, they also add some pleasing theme and variation to the different nationalities, though sometimes you wish that there was a little more of this national flavour and theme. That said, they form the foundation upon which a narrative can be told as D-Day Dice is played, as Specialists are Rallied, Vehicles and Items found, and Awards won, and a Unit makes its assault on the Bunker.

D-Day Dice, Second Edition is a clever implementation of modern game mechanics—dice rolling, co-operative play, timed play, and against the clock—to explore an old theme in a new way. 

By 1980, RuneQuest had begun to mark itself as a roleplaying game and setting in the form of Glorantha, which was very different in comparison to other fantasy roleplaying games. It was skill-focused and emphasised every player characters’ faith and belief system and world view in the context of the world of Glorantha, especially in the form of the superlative Cults of Prax. Then came along Plunder, a supplement detailing some six-hundred-and-forty pre-generated treasure hoards and forty-three magical treasures of Glorantha. Plunder does not add as much to the world of Glorantha, but it does support it, both in terms of the mechanics and the background.

The first half of Plunder consists of ten tables, each an eight-by-eight grid, thus providing sixty-four results in each table. In each space is the listing for a treasure hoard that the player characters might be found in their intrepid adventures in Glorantha. This might be nothing; 38 Clacks; 406 Clacks, 364 Lunars, 30 Wheels, and a single gem or piece of jewellery; or 1068 Clacks, 1383 Lunars, 332 Wheels, four gems or pieces of jewellery, and a special item. When the Game Master needs to determine the contents of a hoard, he turns to a table and rolls two eight-sided dice to get a result. Two further tables enable the Game Master to determine what the gems and jewellery are if there are any and what the special items are if there are any. So the gems and jewellery might be an excellent gemstone worth 900 Lunars or costume jewellery worth 45 Lunars, and special items might be a scroll written in Stormspeech which grants a +5% bonus to the Dagger skill if studied, an eleven-point Power storage crystal, or a wand with the Glamour matrix on it.

Mechanically, this all ties into the use of Treasure Factors from the second edition of RuneQuest, recently republished as RuneQuest Classic. Treasure Factors are are means of determining how much loot a monster or an NPC might. The Treasure Factor for any one creature derived from its Hit Points, combat skills, how many extra dice are rolled when it inflicts damage, armour, combat spells, special powers, any poison used, and any extra attacks. If there is more than one monster or NPC, their individual Treasure Factors are added together, and the final value broken down into groups of a hundred. When it comes to using Plunder, the Treasure Factor is used to determine which table the Game Master will roll on when it comes to generating the hoard for a monster or an NPC. So for a single Trollkin with a Treasure factor of six, the Game Master would roll on the very first table in Plunder, but add a whole lot more Trollkin and mix in a Dark Troll or two, and the Treasure Factor rises rapidly so that the Game Master will be rolling on a table later in the book. In general, if the Game Master knows the Treasure Factor, she can generate a treasure hoard with just a handful of rolls.

The second half is dedicated to just some of the magical devices to be found on Glorantha. These range from the marvellously mundane, such as the Golden Torches which never go out, even underwater or in great darkness or Soup Bones which can always be boiled to provide soup, to amazingly magical, like Tora’s Hammer, a stone Warhammer wielded by a hero during the Dawn Ages who slaughtered untold numbers of Mostali with it and which returns to the hand if thrown, and Glass Butterflies, tireless magical messengers which will deliver a spoken phrase anywhere in the universe! Many are very particular in terms of who can use them, such as Morokanth Thumbs, black lumps of thumb-like flesh which when Power is sacrificed, the thumbs can attach to a Morokanth’s hands and enable him to be as dextrous as any human, whilst others are tied to a particular cult. For example, the Lightning Bands once worn by the bodyguards of a high priest of Orlanth Thunderous, which when imbued with Power, enables the wearer to blast out a bolt of lightning via a spear. There are treasures from the Aldryami and the Mostali, Chalana Arroy, Chaos, Kyger Litor, Dragonewts (and from Dragonewts), Waha, Stormbull, and more. Some have more generic links such as Fire or Sky cults.

Every item follows the format. A description, followed by a listing of the cults associated with the item as well as those friendly, hostile, or enemy to it; a discussion of how common knowledge of the item is, ranging from common to one of a kind or owner only; its history and the procedure required to use it (and sometimes make it); and lastly powers and value. The latter should one come up for sale. For example, Bajora’s Shield is a large iron shield with a glowing Death rune on it. It is associated in friendly fashion with Humakt and knowledge of it is automatically known to Humakt’s cult, though it is a cult secret, it is famous and one of a kind. Its history is that it was originally carried by Bajora, a friend of Humakt who sacrificed his life to save Humakt from a thing of Chaos. All that was left of Bajora was his shield, which Humakt carried for the rest of Godtime in his honour. Humakt refused to use it though and so since time began, none of his followers can either. They do know of the shield’s powers, so anyone wielding it and wanting to use if to its fullest powers needs to be on good terms with Humakt’s cult.

The procedure to use it requires the wielder to be a Rune Lord of a cult not an enemy of Humakt. He must then sacrifice a point of Power. Once attuned it grants a +20% bonus to the wielder’s Shield skill, the same effect as the Shield 4 spell when in melee, Light spells on command with no expenditure of Power, and immunity to Sever Spirits when cast anyone other than a Humakti. The value 120,000 Lunars and selling it would offend any Humakti (although buying it to donate to the temple is fine).

One issue perhaps is that a few of the items are unlikely to come into play, for example, the Aluminium Tridents of various sea cults, and of course there are some treasures which are unlikely to fall into the hands of the player characters—mostly Chaos related. Plenty of the others though will be desired by the player characters and some will certainly be subject of great hero quests. If there is an issue with the selection it is that there are few treasures related to the Air and Earth cults, but that is likely due to the contents of Plunder, like Cults of Prax before it, being set in Prax rather Sartar and its surrounds.

Physically, Plunder is again a book of two halves. The first is tables—large, open, and easy to read tables, but tables nonetheless. The second is more open, with one or two entries per page. Some are illustrated, some not, but the artwork is decent, if a little ‘Swords & Sorcery’ in style in places. If any of the artwork is disappointing, it is the cover, which comes from the ‘chainmail bikini’ school of female depiction in fantasy. The skull panties are a notable feature.

At the time of its release, critics could not agree about Plunder. In Space Gamer Number 33 (November 1980), Forest Johnson said that, “About half this book is not very useful. It consists of a shorthand method for generating treasure. (This does nothing to lighten the real work – adding up all those cursed treasure factors.)”, but ended on a positive note, concluding that, “The lack of exotic magic items has heretofore been a weak point in RuneQuest. These items have authentic Gloranthan flavour, complete with history and cult affinities. The discreet use of these items will add spice to a campaign without reducing it to Monty Haul.” Conversely, writing in The Dungeoneer’s Journal Issue: 25 (February/ March 1981), Clayton Miner said, “The variety of the items, and the detailed information included with the great treasures is sure to make this book very useful to Judges. Of more use to a Runequest Judge is the first section of Plunder, which presents easy to use tables for determining that value of a lesser treasure…” and that, “…[T]his book would make a welcome addition to a Judge’s stock of Runequest items. Plunder is definitely a useful piece of work and shows a great deal of imagination, and the only question I had with the book as a whole is, why so none of the items listed under Treasures of Glorantha have a negative side effect on the user.”

Other reviews were more balanced. Oliver Macdonald, reviewing Plunder in White Dwarf No. 25 (June/July 1981) awarded the supplement just five out of ten, adding that, “All points considered Plunder is an interesting but by no means essential RuneQuest play aid, certainly not worth buying if you have a limited budget.” Plunder was reviewed by John Sapienza, Jr. in Different Worlds Issue 12 (July 1981). Of the first half, he wrote that, “I think that a bit of reflection will let the GM realize just how dull it is putting treasure descriptions together, particularly those that get improvised during gaming. Once you realize this, the usefulness of this play aid makes it attractive.” He was more positive about the second half, saying that, “…[T]he treasures are, by and large, not out of balance, and most of them come complete with cult associations that provide effective limits on their use. Other limits are the tendency of certain races to take offense and kill the wearer, such as a suit of dragonewt skin armor. Use this at your own risk, in other words. Neat.” before concluding that, “Plunder is a useful idea, and well done. I recommend it to all RQ GMs.”

Plunder is a curio from a bygone age and another style of play. That style of play is one in which plunder is important. In Dungeons & Dragons, it was treasure and it would directly count towards the number of Experience Points a character gained in addition to that gained from killing monsters. In RuneQuest and Glorantha, the plunder paid first for any dues you owed to your cult and temple, second any monies owed to a cult, temple, or guild for prior training, and third for any skill or spell training undertaken with your cult, temple, or guild. Certainly in RuneQuest II, all of this would cost a character thousands of Lunars. Not so in the latest iteration, RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha, which presumes that a character’s training has already been paid for, though a character still owes his tithes to his cult and is encouraged to purchase further training. So there is less of an emphasis today on plunder when roleplaying and exploring Glorantha, as evidenced by advice given in the back of the core rulebook to cut the value of the treasure found when playing classic scenarios. 

So, forty years ago in Glorantha, the need for treasure was greater. Player characters had debts. Thus, the Game Master had to seed his scenarios with plunder aplenty—well not too aplenty because the characters had to have a reason to be coming back for plunder and the peril which went with it—and that took time and effort. Forty years ago then, the tables in the first half of Plunder were useful as they helped speed the process. Not so now when they feel redundant. Similarly, the second half of Plunder with its listing of forty-three magical treasures was useful forty years ago because so few of them had been then detailed in the early days of RuneQuest. So the forty three were useful, many of them tying into the cults described in Cults of Prax and so helping to build the world of Glorantha just a little further. 

Conversely, at this point in the history of RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha, the current iteration of the roleplaying game has the same problem—few if any treasures of note have been detailed. There is background and detail to many of these forty-three items that the Game Master could bring them to her Glorantha today and they would still work. Doubtless, new supplements will appear detailing new treasures of Dragon Pass, but the conversion process is anything other than challenging. Until such a supplement is published, Plunder is actually more than a curio.

There can be no doubt that Plunder is no Cults of Prax, for it is very much a curate’s egg. Its dual focus and character—divided equally between the mundane and magical—mean that one half is at best utilitarian, at worst bland, whilst the other by comparison rich in detail and flavour. Conversely, the Game Master is likely to have got more use out of the Treasure Tables than the individual items, even if they are mundane, but nevertheless, the actual treasures in Plunder further showcase the more fantastical nature of Glorantha.

In classic Lovecraftian investigative horror roleplaying, news of the weird and the unnatural is spread by letter, by newspaper, and by word of mouth. Information spreads slowly. Not so in the modern age. Information spreads as fast as social media picks up on it. So when an Internet video of woman, crying and shouting about a community that does terrible things, including taking women and children, whilst society takes its money and looks the other way, before suddenly vanishing, screaming in agony, goes viral, it is sufficient to attract the attention of Delta Green. In response, the highly secret government agency assigns a cell of agents to investigate and establish what happened in the video, but not only investigate. If there are any signs of continuing danger, the agents need to save lives; if there are indications that this was an incursion of the Unnatural, they need to locate its source and stop it; and if this was due to an incursion of the Unnatural, they need to establish a mundane narrative for the video, make sure that nobody suspects Unnatural phenomena to be the cause; but above all, they need to make sure that nobody learns of Delta Green.

This is the set-up for Delta Green: Hourglass, a short investigation for Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game and Lovecraftian investigative horror published by Arc Dream Publishing. It can be played using the roleplaying game’s full rules or those from Delta Green: Need to Know. It also includes notes for running the scenario with agents who members of the Program—and thus members of Delta Green, and those who are Outlaws—thus not members of Delta Green. Like Ex Oblivione before it, Hourglass is another slice of horror which explores the subjugation and corruption of the innocent—though in not quite as brutal or obvious a fashion—and like Ex Oblivione before it, Hourglass also has links back to the very foundation of Delta Green, though not as obvious. In fact, the agents will probably have to dig deep into the scenario in order to find them, but their very presence suggests both a greater framework for both Hourglass and Ex Oblivione—though one that it not necessarily obvious—and the far wider influence of the peoples and things which drew the attention in 1928 of what would one day become Delta Green to the unnatural.

Were it not for the video, the community of Hourglass would be unremarkable. In fact, the only thing of note is the Church of the Twelve Martyrs, a staunchly conservative and insular commune of Christians with grounds just outside the town. A commune which the woman who disappeared belonged to. Could this be the community that woman was raging about before she disappeared? That the woman was a member of the Church of the Twelve Martyrs is easy enough to determine, learning more than this will prove to be a challenge for both the agents and their players. Although insular, the Church of the Twelve Martyrs is an accepted part of the Hourglass community, it pays its taxes, and if its interpretation of Christianity is counter to that of the town’s devout Catholics or evangelical Christians, then it is at least Christian. So the town authorities are reluctant for any agents—if they become aware of their presence—to investigate either the disappearance of the women, believing the video to be a fake, or the Church of the Twelve Martyrs.

Most investigations by Delta Green require a degree of delicacy and so it is here. Agents who jump readily to conclusions or run headlong into examining the Church of the Twelve Martyrs may quickly find their efforts blocked or even themselves reassigned and under investigation. If they take a more systematic approach and dig into the clues and evidence before they approach the church’s compound, they will be better prepared. Even so, getting anything more than hints that there might be something weird going on with the Church of the Twelve Martyrs is going to be difficult for the agents. The compound seems to be normal enough, including a ranch and a farm as well as the church, but there is tension and a sense of paranoia in the air. Hopefully this should be enough to persuade the agents to tread carefully, for if they do not, the members of the Church of the Twelve Martyrs will react in an all too paranoid a fashion. There should be no doubt that its members will go to almost any lengths to protect the church’s secrets—with any luck the agents will have picked up on this after investigating the video. When the members of the Church of the Twelve Martyrs do react, the Handler is given some fun—sorry, I mean nasty—ways in which to mess with and torment the agents. Some of these are quite subtle, but others are enjoyably weird and brutal. These though will need careful staging by the Handler since the players may feel like she is messing with their characters. It is here perhaps that Hourglass could have done with some staging advice on how to handle that. (I would suggest taking the player aside to explain the situation and then letting him roleplay it out.)

Just as it is difficult for the agents to investigate the Church of the Twelve Martyrs, it is equally as difficult for the Handler in two ways. First in maintaining a balance between the paranoia of the various NPCs and their unleashing all hell on the agents, and second, in supporting the investigative efforts of the players and their agents without frustrating them in the face of some very careful and very paranoid NPCs. Another problem with the scenario is that it does have a high number of NPCs for the Handler to deal with. The difficulty of the investigation in Hourglass is really highlighted by the fact that resolution deals more with what could wrong and the subsequent repercussions than with effect of a successful outcome, though of course, the odds are against this. 

Physically, Hourglass is a slim, cleanly presented book. As ever, the artwork is excellent, but the area map feels as if it should have more detail and although there are floorplans of the church on the Church of the Twelve Martyrs, there is no map of the compound itself. It needs a slight edit, but the scenario is otherwise well written.

Delta Green: Hourglass showcases how far the forces of the Unnatural will go to work themselves into society, how far they will go to prey upon the weak, and how willing they are to corrupt the innocent. Coming to this realisation will be undoubtedly be horrifying for the agents and their players, but getting to it is not easy. Delta Green: Hourglass presents a challenging scenario for both Handler and players alike, and with its potential for frustration, is best suited to an experienced gaming group.

It is impossible to ignore the influence of Dungeons & Dragons and the effect that its imprint has had on the gaming hobby. It remains the most popular roleplaying game some forty or more years since it was first published, and it is a design and a set-up which for many was their first experience of roleplaying—and one to which they return again and again. This explains the popularity of the Old School Renaissance and the many retroclones—roleplaying games which seek to emulate the mechanics and play style of previous editions Dungeons & Dragons—which that movement has spawned in the last fifteen years. Just as with the Indie Game movement before it began as an amateur endeavour, so did the Old School Renaissance, and just as with the Indie Game movement before it, many of the aspects of the Old School Renaissance are being adopted by mainstream roleplaying publishers who go on to publish retroclones of their own. Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game, published by Goodman Games is a perfect example of this. Other publishers have been around long enough for them to publish new editions of their games which originally appeared in the first few years of the hobby, whilst still others are taking their new, more contemporary games and mapping them onto the retroclone.

Yet there are other roleplaying games which draw upon the roleplaying games of the 1970s, part of the Old School Renaissance, but which may not necessarily draw directly upon Dungeons & Dragons. Some are new, like Forbidden Lands – Raiders & Rogues in a Cursed World and Classic Fantasy: Dungeoneering Adventures, d100 Style!, but others are almost as old as Dungeons & Dragons. One of these is The Fantasy Trip, published by Metagaming Concepts in 1980. Designed by Steve Jackson, this was a fantasy roleplaying game built around two earlier microgames, also designed by Steve Jackson, MicroGame #3: Melee in 1977 and  MicroGame #6: Wizard in 1978. With the closure of Metagaming Concepts in 1983, The Fantasy Trip and its various titles went out of print. Steve Jackson would go on to found Steve Jackson Games and design further titles like Car Wars and Munchkin as well as the detailed, universal roleplaying game, GURPS. Then in December, 2017, Steve Jackson announced that he had got the rights back to The Fantasy Trip and then in April, 2019, following a successful Kickstarter campaign, Steve Jackson Games republished The Fantasy Trip. The mascot version of The Fantasy Trip is of course, The Fantasy Trip: Legacy Edition. 

The Fantasy Trip: Legacy Edition is a big box of things, including the original two microgames. So instead of reviewing the deep box as a whole, it is worth examining the constituent parts of The Fantasy Trip: Legacy Edition one by one, delving ever deeper into its depths bit by bit. The first of these is Melee, quick to set up, quick to play game of man-to-man combat. It is designed to be played by two or more players, aged ten and over, with a game lasting roughly between thirty and sixty minutes. The second is Wizard, which brings in more options in terms of tactical play because it introduces magic to the arena. Although the two integrate well, Wizard is more complex and harder to learn, yet offers more for a player to get into. The third is Death Test.

Death Testactually consists of two adventures—‘Death Test’ and ‘Death Test 2’—both originally published as MicroQuest 1: Death Test and MicroQuest 1: Death Test 2 in 1980. The new, combined edition comes in a box which contains the two adventures and some sixty-six new counters. Both require the map from Melee and can either be played using just Melee or a combination of Melee and Wizard. Both can also be played in a number of ways. They can be played solo, one player or several players against the adventure, instructions being included in the text as to how any monsters or NPCs will react to the player characters. They can be played with a Game Master controlling and rolling for the monsters and NPCs, whether is with just one player or several. They are designed to be played by between one and four characters. Ideally, these should not be beginning characters, but unfortunately ‘Death Test’ does not say how experienced the player characters should be. In addition, although having more characters in play will provide more tactical options—especially if they include a wizard, they do reduce each character’s final score at the end of the test. If they get to the end of the test, that is. In this way, ‘Death Test’ sets its own difficulty. It is easier with more characters, but the rewards will be less.

The background to ‘Death Test’ has the character—or characters—travelling to the city of Ardonirane, which is ruled by the famous and powerful war leader, Dhallak m’Thorsz Carn. He is once again hiring mercenaries, but will accept only those that pass a test—enter the labyrinth beneath his palace and there fight animals, monsters, prisoners, wizards, and rival would-be employees—and survive! Although there is treasure to be found, what matters to Thorsz is the mercenary’s or mercenaries’ performance. The more foes they defeat or kill, the more they will rank in his estimation and the higher position they will attain in his army.
The labyrinth consists of twelve colour coded rooms connected by a series of corridors. There are no doors, but entrances and exits are marked by black curtains, or rather black magical illusions which the player characters can sometimes pass through and others not, but which they can never see through. This means that in order to find out what is in a room, one or more of the player characters must enter said room. Most of the time, they can leave the way they came. Each room then is its own discrete encounter and with just a dozen of them, it allows for variety of denizens and challenges. ‘Death Test’ is not a dungeon in the traditional roleplaying sense though, the focus being more on combat—as the background suggests—than exploring, finding traps, and so on. Nor is it really a roleplaying adventure, a ‘programmed adventure’ certainly, but not a roleplaying adventure as there is very little, if any, roleplaying involved. That said, run ‘Death Test’ with a Game Master and one or more players and then there are opportunities for the Game Master to roleplay and bring some of the NPCs to life and thus for the player characters to interact with them rather than fighting them.
Consisting of one-hundred-and-sixty-seven entries over seventeen or so pages, there is a greater physicality to ‘Death Test’ in comparison to other solo adventure titles. This not surprising though, for Death Test is an expansion for a man-to-man combat game. So instead of sitting down and reading through a book and rolling dice as necessary, this is definitely an at the table affair with the map, the counters, and the dice in front of you. In further comparison with those other solo adventure books, ‘Death Test’ has a greater replayability factor. Only score enough points to get hired as a recruit? Well, why not try again to see if you can attain a better position or try it with a different mix of characters?
‘Death Test 2’ is double the size of ‘Death Test’. Again, it can either be played using just Melee or a combination of Melee and Wizard, but it can also be played using Into the Labyrinth, which covers roleplaying, character creation and experience, and advanced magic and combat rules for Melee and Wizard. Like ‘Death Test’, it can be can be played solo, one player or several players against the adventure, instructions being included in the text as to how any monsters or NPCs will react to the player characters. They can be played with a Game Master controlling and rolling for the monsters and NPCs, whether is with just one player or several. This is certainly the case if ‘Death Test 2’ is run using the rules from Into the Labyrinth. Unlike ‘Death Test’, ‘Death Test 2’ is intended for a party of four characters rather than between one and four, and it includes advice as how experienced the player characters need to be, for like ‘Death Test’, it is not designed for beginning characters. ‘Death Test 2’ can also be run like a traditional dungeon adventure, and this is supported with advice on adding it to a campaign and on expending gained Experience Points.
The background to ‘Death Test 2’ is that Dhallak m’Thorsz Carn is unimpressed with the candidates to join his army who succeeded at getting through the labyrinth in ‘Death Test’. So he has another built, one which is more involving and more challenging. Consisting of some two-hundred-and-eighty-seven entries over thirty-six pages, ‘Death Test 2’ only adds a few more rooms in comparison to ‘Death Test’. The increased number of entries allow for more detail, more things to happen, and more things for the characters to do. There are traps and puzzles, a greater range of monsters to encounter and magical items to find, players will find their characters tested in other ways than combat—‘Death Test 2’ includes the need to make Saving Throws. This is a richer environment for them to explore and no mere complex of arenas to enter and fight in. This does not mean that ‘Death Test 2’ is not a combat focused adventure—it very much is—but it is written far more like a traditional solo roleplaying adventure and presents a richer playing environment, so is far more engaging. 
Physically, both ‘Death Test’ and ‘Death Test 2’ are plain, simple booklets with paper covers. Behind the full colour covers, they are black and white throughout. Each is lightly illustrated, but the artwork is excellent throughout.
Of course, of the two, ‘Death Test 2’ is better than ‘Death Test’. It is more detailed and offers more options than just combat, plus it supports more roleplaying, especially if Into the Labyrinth is being used. On the downside, because it has more secrets to be found, it is not as readily replayable. In other words, there is less of the simple board game to its play than there is in ‘Death Test’. Yet ‘Death Test’ should not be discounted. Its simplicity means that it can more readily be replayed, and it is easier to both set up and play. At its very simplest, ‘Death Test’ provides a reason to play Melee and/or Wizard than just fights in an arena.
Death Test is a good combination boxed set, presenting two solo adventures of differing complexity and detail that offer a great deal of flexibility in terms of their set-up and play options. More so than traditional solo adventures. If you have Melee and/or Wizard, then you should put yourself through the Death Test—both of them.

Since 2007, the 2004 Spiel des Jahres award-winning board game Ticket to Ride from Days of Wonder, has been supported with new maps, beginning with Ticket to Ride: Switzerland. That new map would be collected in the Ticket to Ride Map Collection: Volume 2 – India & Switzerland, the second entry in the Map Collection series begun in Ticket to Ride Map Collection: Volume 1 – Team Asia & Legendary Asia. Both of these have proved to be worthy additions to the Ticket to Ride line, whereas Ticket to Ride Map Collection vol. 3: The Heart of Africa and Ticket to Ride Map Collection: Volume 4 – Nederland have proved to add more challenging game play, but at a cost in terms of engaging game play. Further given that they included just the one map in the third and fourth volumes rather than the two in each of the first two, neither felt as if they provided as much value either. Fortunately, Ticket to Ride Map Collection Vol. 5: United Kingdom + Pennsylvania came with two maps and explored elements more commonly found in traditional train games—stocks and shares in railroad companies and the advance of railway technology. The next map collection in the series, Ticket to Ride Map Collection Vol. 6: France + Old West, explore a common theme, but each offers very different game play.

As is standard with the Map Collection series, both maps in Ticket to Ride Map Collection Vol. 6: France + Old West will require the use of the train pieces and train cards from a Ticket to Ride core set. Designed for between two and five players, it includes fifty-eight Destination Tickets cards, two Bonus cards, and sixty-four Track Pieces. The map board is played vertically rather than horizontally and depicts the rail routes across France. The very first thing that strikes you about the France map is that nearly all of the routes are blank—not grey, but blank. Single routes are coloured as standard, nearly all of them running west from Paris to Nantes on the Alantic coast and from Paris north to Le Havre on the English Channel. Besides the city to city routes, the map has links to four countries—Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, and Spain, and grey ferry routes to the island of Corsica. The routes on the Destination Tickets include the standard city-to-city routes as well as city-to-country and country-to-country routes. The bonus cards are the Globetrotter card for the most Destination Tickets completed and the Longest Route card for the longest continuous route. The Track Pieces come in the standard colours of the Train Tickets from a Ticket to Ride core set and are either two, three, four, or five sections long.

At the start of the game, each player receives eight Train Cards and five Destination Tickets—of which a player must keep three. He also receives forty Train pieces rather than the standard forty-five. On his turn, a player can do one of three things as per Ticket to Ride. Either draw two Train Cards, play Train pieces and claim a route, or draw new Destination Tickets. What prevents a player from claiming most of the routes is that they are blank, so before a player can claim a route, he must lay the track first. After a player draws two Train cards, he also takes one of the Track Pieces and places it on one of the blank routes. That route can now be claimed by anyone, including the player who placed it. When the route is claimed, the player places the requisite Train pieces, claims the points, and removes the Track Piece which goes back into the regular supply from where it can taken on any of the players’ subsequent turns.

There are also routes which cross over other routes. When a Track Piece is laid over one of these, it renders all of the other blank routes it is played inaccessible and means that nobody can claim them. It is possible that when a player does this, he will block shorter routes to cities that another player might want to get to, forcing him to take a longer series of connections that he had originally intended. And in a game where a player has forty Train pieces rather than the standard forty-five, this may well mean that a player will finding himself running out of Trains if this happens too many times.

So, in order to connect the cities or countries on the map, a player has to build the routes first. Fundamentally, what this means is that when a player lays a Track Piece, he is signalling to the other players where he intends to build. Sometimes the other players can use this against him, for example, by claiming the route before him or by placing a Track Piece of a colour on a connecting route which they think he does not have Train Cards for. A player could also place a Track Piece elsewhere on the map completely away from where he actually needs to build as a means of misdirection. As the game progresses, there will be more and more Train Pieces on the board, which will often limit what and where a player can place a Track Piece. In these later stages of the game, the placement of Track Pieces is not always relevant and does feel like an unnecessary step, slowing the flow of the game down.

At its heart, the France map for Ticket to Ride adds another set of choices for the players to make, not just what routes they claim, but what routes to lay first. So, it is more complex whilst at the same time the colour of the routes change from game to game. Overall, the France map is more complex to play and so not quite as light as other Ticket to Ride maps, and longer to play because more decisions need to be made. So the France map is definitely one for Ticket to Ride devotees rather than a family audience.

Designed for between two and five players, it includes fifty-eight Destination Tickets cards, two Bonus cards, and sixty-four Track Pieces. The map board is played vertically rather than horizontally and depicts the rail routes across France. The very first thing that strikes you about the France map is that nearly all of the routes are blank—not grey, but blank. Single routes are coloured as standard, nearly all of them running west from Paris to Nantes on the Alantic coast and from Paris north to Le Havre on the English Channel. Besides the city to city routes, the map has links to four countries—Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, and Spain, and grey ferry routes to the island of Corsica. The routes on the Destination Tickets include the standard city-to-city routes as well as city-to-country and country-to-country routes. The bonus cards are the Globetrotter card for the most Destination Tickets completed and the Longest Route card for the longest continuous route. The Track Pieces come in the standard colours of the Train Tickets from a Ticket to Ride core set and are either two, three, four, or five sections long.

At the start of the game, each player receives eight Train Cards and five Destination Tickets—of which a player must keep three. He also receives forty Train pieces rather than the standard forty-five. On his turn, a player can do one of three things as per Ticket to Ride. Either draw two Train Cards, play Train pieces and claim a route, or draw new Destination Tickets. What prevents a player from claiming most of the routes is that they are blank, so before a player can claim a route, he must lay the track first. After a player draws two Train cards, he also takes one of the Track Pieces and places it on one of the blank routes. That route can now be claimed by anyone, including the player who placed it. When the route is claimed, the player places the requisite Train pieces, claims the points, and removes the Track Piece which goes back into the regular supply from where it can taken on any of the players’ subsequent turns.

There are also routes which cross over other routes. When a Track Piece is laid over one of these, it renders all of the other blank routes it is played inaccessible and means that nobody can claim them. It is possible that when a player does this, he will block shorter routes to cities that another player might want to get to, forcing him to take a longer series of connections that he had originally intended. And in a game where a player has forty Train pieces rather than the standard forty-five, this may well mean that a player will finding himself running out of Trains if this happens too many times.

So, in order to connect the cities or countries on the map, a player has to build the routes first. Fundamentally, what this means is that when a player lays a Track Piece, he is signalling to the other players where he intends to build. Sometimes the other players can use this against him, for example, by claiming the route before him or by placing a Track Piece of a colour on a connecting route which they think he does not have Train Cards for. A player could also place a Track Piece elsewhere on the map completely away from where he actually needs to build as a means of misdirection. As the game progresses, there will be more and more Train Pieces on the board, which will often limit what and where a player can place a Track Piece. In these later stages of the game, the placement of Track Pieces is not always relevant and does feel like an unnecessary step, slowing the flow of the game down.

At its heart, the France map for Ticket to Ride adds another set of choices for the players to make, not just what routes they claim, but what routes to lay first. So, it is more complex whilst at the same time the colour of the routes change from game to game. Overall, the France map is more complex to play and so not quite as light as other Ticket to Ride maps, and longer to play because more decisions need to be made. So the France map is definitely one for Ticket to Ride devotees rather than a family audience.

If the France map from Ticket to Ride Map Collection Vol. 6: France + Old West is different to Ticket to Ride, the Old West map is really different. First, it is designed for two to six players, something that rarely features in a Ticket to Ride game. To support this, an extra set of Train Pieces—in white—is included in Ticket to Ride Map Collection Vol. 6: France + Old West, along with a white scoring marker. It also comes with fifty Destination Tickets, two Bonus cards—Globetrotter and Alvin, eighteen City Markers, and the Alvin the Alien Marker. The map is again played vertically and looks like a standard Ticket to Ride map, that is, a mix of coloured and grey routes (rather the blank ones of France map). It depicts the western half of the United States of America, from Roswell and Wolf Point in the east to Seattle and San Diego in the west on the Pacific coast. A single ferry route runs from Los Angeles to San Francisco.

At the start of the game, each player receives five Destination Cards and must keep three. He also receives three City Markers to match the colour of his Train pieces. As part of the set-up, each player places one of his City Markers in the city of his choice. This is important because when a player begins claiming routes and placing Train pieces, he must start from the city where his City Marker is placed. And then when he next claims a route and places Train pieces, it has to be connected to a route he has already claimed. He cannot claim a route that is not connected to a route he has already claimed. So just like the France map, players on the Old West map are telegraphing where they are building to, if not more so!

When a player claims a route, he can also place one of his City Markers in the city he is building to if the city does not have one already. This costs two extra cards of the same colour as the route just claimed. Or a player can use Locomotive (or wild) Train cards.

The placement of City Markers not only affects what routes a player can claim, it can also affect what points he will score for claiming a route. If the route claimed is connected to a city with a City Marker, the points go to the player who owns the City Marker—even if that is another player! If the route connects two cities which both have City Markers, then the two who own the City Markers score the points score the points. If it happens that the player owns both City Markers at either end of the route being claimed, then he scores twice—one for each for City Marker—even if the route is being claimed by another player!

What is interesting here is that play on the Old West map—like the France map—involves the players signalling to each other where they planning to build next. On the France it is with the Track Pieces and not always quite as obvious, but on the Old West map is more obvious because each player must claim routes which connect to his existing network. The addition of the City Markers brings an element of area control to the game because players will want to avoid connecting to cities which have other players’ City Markers in them as it costs them points to connect to them. Conversely players who have City Markers will want other players to connect to these cities for exactly the same reason. Of course, the likelihood is that the players will have to connect to cities with other players’ City Markers in them in order to complete their Destination Tickets. This is especially so with more players as they compete for the same routes.

The Old West map includes a variant. This involves Alvin the Alien, a character from the Ticket to Ride: Alvin and Dexter expansion released in 2011. Fortunately, that expansion is not required to play this variant as a cardboard counter is provided to represent Alvin the Alien. In this variant, the Alvin the Alien counter is placed—naturally, or unnaturally, enough—in the city of Roswell. The first player to claim a route which connects to Roswell also captures Alvin. This scores him an extra ten points and he has to move the Alvin the Alien counter to a city which he controls, including his starting city. If another player then connects to the new city where Alvin the Alien is now located, then he scores ten points and has to move Alvin the Alien to a city that he controls, and so on, and so on. This can occur multiple times, but the player who has control of Alvin the Alien at the end of the game scores another ten points.

The effect of this variant is to counter the inclination for players to not want to connect to cities already connected to by other players, especially if that city contains a City Marker. This is because connecting to a city with Alvin the Alien in it will score the player points and score him more if one of his cities contains Alvin the Alien at the end of the game.

Thematically, the Alvin the Alien variant does not really suit the Old West map. Of course with the inclusion of Roswell on the map it does, but this is a map of the Old West and not the modern west of the post-Roswell alien saucer crash.

Physically, Ticket to Ride Map Collection Vol. 6: France + Old West is for the most part, the same high-quality product we have come to expect for the Ticket to Ride line. Both maps are large, mounted, and clear and easy to use, both sets of cards are easy to read and orientate to the board, and the rulebooks again, clear and easy to read and understand. The new plastic Train pieces are serviceable, but the cardboard Track Pieces do feel somewhat cheap in comparison. They are not done on thin cardstock, but not thick cardstock either. They are also a little fiddly in play. Thematically both maps and cards match their settings, so there is a richness of colour and style to the France map and cards, whilst those for the Old West are dusty and dry. Certainly the Old West map feels as if you are playing the expanded half of the North America map from the original Ticket to Ride (which leaves one to wonder if there might be the equivalent of an Old East map covering the eastern half of the United States, and if there were, could the Old West and Old East maps be joined and played together?).

So both maps in Ticket to Ride Map Collection Vol. 6: France + Old West are about telegraphing to your fellow players where you intend to claim routes next. Each map presents a different solution though and thus different challenges for the players. Of the two, Old West is the easier, even more direct when it comes to claiming routes and so will be easier to play by the more casual audience, whereas France includes a greater complexity which forces every player think about the routes they need to claim, not once, but twice—once to build and once to claim. Overall, the combination of new mechanics and challenges serve to make Ticket to Ride Map Collection Vol. 6: France + Old West a solid expansion which will definitely appeal to the Ticket to Ride devotee.

17th Century Minimalist from Games Omnivorous is an Old School Renaissance roleplaying game of small-time tricksters, conniving thieves, stalwart ex-soldiers, swashbucklers with panache and gambling debts, and minor physicians, banding together out of necessity and the need for coin (glory optional). The rules-light Class and Level roleplaying game set in the seventeenth century which features firearms, no magic, a task-based experience system, and a fast, deadly combat system, was introduced in 17th Century Minimalist: A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR Rulebook, and whilst it was complete in terms of rules and mechanics, what it lacks is a scenario. One issue with the 17th Century Minimalist: A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR Rulebook is that it lacks an adventure, but fortunately, its setting and its mechanics are compatible with any number of Old School Renaissance scenarios set in the Early Modern period, of which many of those published by Lamentations of the Flame Princess, including the author’s own The Squid, the Cabal, and the Old Man as well as No Better Than Any Man, Scenic Dunnsmouth, or Forgive Us, would be suitable. In addition, 17th Century Minimalist has its anthology of adventures with the 17th Century Minimalist: Mini Adventure Folder.

One of the physical qualities of 17th Century Minimalist: A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR Rulebook is that it feels handmade, or at least, artisanal. This continues with 17th Century Minimalist: Mini Adventure Folder, which comes as a sturdy card folder which contains five separate adventures, each presented in its own folder in an almost postcard format on the same cardstock as the folder for the full set. Each presents a relatively short adventure, more of a detailed outline rather than a full scenario, which can be run as a one-shot or a convention scenario. The format means that each is easy to handle, although in some places, the text is perhaps a little small and cramped to read with ease.

Opening up the 17th Century Minimalist: Mini Adventure Folder, the first adventure is ‘Hedge Death Maze’. As the player characters are passing through remote, but mid-sized town, they learn of a challenge extended to anyone by a local noble. He has grown a fiendishly difficult hedge maze on his estate and promises gold to anyone who can defeat it. After showing off his estate—a zoo of exotic animals, Greek statuary, a gallery of paintings depicting scenes of slaughter, and a library of diverse, often macabre books—and thus his enormous wealth, he blindfolds them, deposits them in the centre of the maze, and challenges them to find their way out.

‘Hedge Death Maze’ has physical component in that each player is given a map of the maze and then thirty seconds to draw his route out of the maze. Then the Game Master collects these and plots each player’s and each group of players’ routes of the maze, placing four or five encounters along the route of each player or group. All of these encounters have a Greco-Romano theme, drawn from both myth and history, and grow in increasing difficulty from the first to the fifth. As the name suggests, this is a ‘death maze’, quite possibly the closest that 17th Century Minimalist will get to an actual dungeon, which throws challenge after challenge at the player characters—singly or in groups, all for the entertainment of the sponsoring noble.

‘Hedge Death Maze’ highlights not just the differences in wealth between the nobility and the peasantry, but also the arrogance of the nobility in what is a lavishly wasteful display of money. It also highlights the place of the player characters somewhere in between, but at the same time at the beck and call of the nobility. This is a theme that 17th Century Minimalist: Mini Adventure Folder will return in later adventures, including the next adventure, ‘Ticking Time Bomb’.

In ‘Ticking Time Bomb’, the player characters are hired by a merchant to transport a locked chest to another merchant in a town roughly a week or so away. This is a more straightforward scenario, an on-the-road adventure of encounters ordinary and odd, capped off with a run-around to try and make the delivery. Nominally set in Italy and parodying the mercantile wars between conflicting city-states of the period. There is scope here for the Game Master to expand this into a mini-campaign, slotting adventures—for example, ‘Hedge Death Maze’—along the route as well as the given encounters.

‘Black Plague Now’ is the first of the five adventures which runs to a six-page folder rather than four and the first to be really player character led rather than the motivation being provided by an NPC. The player characters arrive in a river port struck down by the bubonic plague with the aristocracy having fled, people dying, and no one in charge. With the townsfolk in disarray, this is perfect opportunity for chancers like the player characters—but for what? ‘Black Plague Now’ is sandbox situation which asks the player characters what they will do in the face of a naturally occurring horror and allows them to go where they want and do what they want. Bring aid to the town and its current population? Slaughter everyone just to make sure and take over? Set up a haven for robbers and bandits? The adventure suggests all of these and their possible outcomes, supporting them with a good map of the town marked with places of note and rules for just what happens if one of the player characters happens to come down with the plague…

Similar in length to ‘Black Plague Now’, ‘Cluster Fuck Inn’ is an event driven scenario in which the player characters are hired to rob an inn. This inn is run by a member of the Rosicrucian order who is rumoured to possess an important alchemical formula. Unfortunately, the rumours mean that other parties are interested in obtaining the formula and it just happens that the night on which the player characters execute their planned heist, so does everyone else! Mixing secret societies, science and alchemy, double-cross, and more, as the title suggests, ‘Cluster Fuck Inn’ quickly descends into a fun farce as the Game Master piles event upon event. The scenario’s initial encounter, which turns out to be with a black cape wearing man whose name just happens to be Oliver Reed (!), sets the tone. One issue with ‘Cluster Fuck Inn’ is that the Game Master will need extra dice to add to the Initiative bag used to determine order in 17th Century Minimalist.

‘Wild Witch Chase’ takes place in a town beset by a series of tragedies and odd events, none of which can be put down to nature. And if they cannot be explained by nature, then something unnatural must be responsible. Which means witchcraft! The mayor asks the player characters to investigate. Armed with a map of the town, the player characters will need to investigate and interview the townsfolk if they are to gather clues and evidence—the latter needing to be solid enough to send any accused to be burnt at the stake. This will be against a background of a town rife with paranoia and distrust and continued daily events. Some twenty-five or so NPCs are provided as potential suspects and hooks for the investigation as well as the map, the structure of the scenario being freeform and player character led. One issue with the scenario is that it does not list any of the uncanny events prior to the player characters’ arrival and another is that there are elements from the backgrounds of the NPCs which the Game Master will need to set up prior to the arrival of the player characters, both of which would help her build the sense of moral panic and suddenly fervently religious beliefs that the scenario demands. In general, there is no right way to solve this ‘Wild Witch Chase’ and there is the distinct possibility that the chase may all be for nothing…

Physically, the 17th Century Minimalist: Mini Adventure Folder is very well presented. It is a gorgeous little artefact, employing the same art style as 17th Century Minimalist: A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR Rulebook, so has illustrations suited to a child’s all too dark storybook, as well as solid maps by Dyson Logos. As good as it looks and as good as it feels in the hand, the 17th Century Minimalist: Mini Adventure Folder does need another edit and all too often it feels just a little cramped, as if it is pushing against the limits of the format.

The 17th Century Minimalist: Mini Adventure Folder contains five solid scenarios, each of which explores aspects and themes pertaining to the seventeenth century—alchemy and science, secret societies, witchcraft and paranoia, the effects of disease, and more. The one issue it does not touch upon is the religious schism which runs throughout this period, hopefully that will be explored in a future scenario. The themes also make the scenarios adaptable to other roleplaying games set during the period. The scenarios do require a little more preparation than the format suggests, but once done, the Game Master can run these more or less straight from the folders. Also, with some effort, the five could be strung together to form a campaign, perhaps with ‘Ticking Time Bomb’ as the framing device. The Game Master may want to write an encounter or other small scenario or two to flesh out such a campaign, but the 17th Century Minimalist: Mini Adventure Folder has the potential to support a complete campaign of 17th Century Minimalist, its five adventures matching the five Levels attainable by the player characters.

The high-quality nature of both 17th Century Minimalist: A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR Rulebook and 17th Century Minimalist: Mini Adventure Folder does actually make you wish that they were available together. They deserve a ‘white’ box—or rather a blue box given the eggshell blue of both 17th Century Minimalist: A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR Rulebook and 17th Century Minimalist: Mini Adventure Folder—of their own, along with a set of dice and of course, a 17th Century Minimalist Initiative bag. Which only goes to showcase how much the two go together and if have one, you want the other. Much like 17th Century Minimalist: A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR Rulebook, the 17th Century Minimalist: Mini Adventure Folder is not perfect, but it not only ably supports and matches the brutal charm and flavour suggested in 17th Century Minimalist: A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR Rulebook, but highlights them and enables the Game Master and her players to explore them.

The Touch of the Beast is a low-Level Old School Renaissance scenario published by SoulMuppetPublishing, best known for the retroclone, BestLeft Buried. Inspired by the eighteenth-century French fairy tale, La Belle et la Bête, and the 1991 Walt Disney film, Beauty and the Beast, it is a dark tale of forgotten history and obsessive horror on the eve of the French Revolution. This period setting makes the scenario a little difficult to use in the more traditional fantasy roleplaying of the Old School Renaissance, but there are roleplaying games with which it will work. These include both 17th Century Minimalist and Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplaying, as well as All For One: Régime Diabolique, though with some difficulty. Further, because The Touch of the Beast is stated up for Basic/Expert Dungeons & Dragons, the scenario is relatively easy to adapt to the retroclone of the Game Master’s choice.
The scenario is set in France in 1789 during the Ancien Régime as the peasants and bourgeoisie of the Third Estate drive the nobility of the Second Estate out of their feudal holdings. Thus, castles and chateaus are being left empty, so ripe for plundering! One such chateau lies outside of the village of Alsace, rumoured to be still left untouched by the villagers and by robbers. It is also rumoured to be occupied by some terrible beast, but no one in these enlightened times believes such twaddle. Two occupants of the village take an interest in both the castle. One is an ex-soldier who wants them to confirm the existence of the castle and determine whether it can safely be plundered, the other is a young woman who claims that the castle and the great beast which resides within its walls are cursed, and that this curse is spreading… She wants an end to this curse before foolish bandits or robbers blunder into the castle and inadvertently unleash the curse on first the villagers, then beyond…
Getting to the castle is an arduous trek through increasingly worsening weather; getting into the castle and wandering around its halls and grounds will prove to be less of a challenge. In fact, the adventurers are free to wander around the castle at will, which seems to be uninhabited, but filled with the signs of it having been inhabited. The furnishings and fittings, decorations, gewgaws and nick-nacks are all indicative of the wealth lavished on the castle and its grounds by the ‘former’ occupant of the castle. The castle—consisting of three storeys—harpsichords, fine wallpaper, fancy dresses, porcelain plumbing, paintings, chandelier, and more. There are odd, even weird things to be found in the castle too, such as a room filled with wax, a thick red carpet which seems to sway in a non-existent breeze, and a wardrobe which spews clothing.
All of this is mapped out storey by storey, but then room by room. So The Touch of the Beast includes a map of the grounds, each of the castle’s three floors, plus its cellars. Then accompanying each entry in the room by room description is an excerpt from the main map showing both the room and its adjacent corridors and rooms. These sub-maps are typically on the same page as the room descriptions, although on occasion they only appear on the opposite page. What this means is that although The Touch of the Beast is perhaps a little cramped in places and a little busy, the Game Master has been given an easy means of tracking the progress of the player characters through the castle and its grounds. In effect, this is not just room by room, corridor by corridor, but page by page, and all this without the need for constant reference back to the main storey maps by the Game Master. On the downside, the likelihood is that The Touch of the Beast would be a much shorter book without this admittedly useful map feature.
Now despite appearances, the castle is not uninhabited. Strange creatures lurk in certain rooms—and lurk is important here, because The Touch of the Beast is not a scenario with a random encounter table. Instead, the behaviour of the inhabitants is reactive in nature, responding to the actions of the player characters, and to support this, the scenario includes certain triggers which will cause the inhabitants to act. When this happens, certain of the inhabitants will actively hunt the player characters. For this though, the Game Master will need not one ordinary deck of cards, but four! And from these decks, the Game Master will just use the Jack, Queen, King, and Ace cards to form four separate decks. One of these is the Starter Deck and whenever the player characters make a noise in certain locations in and around the castle, the Game Master will draw a card. If the Ace is drawn, the associated inhabitant of the castle reacts and begins hunting the player characters, certain seemingly random events such as all naked flames flaring or time seeming to skip. Then the next deck is added to the current deck, and so on and so on. Make too much noise, in too many locations, and draw too many cards in the wrong order, and the player characters may themselves being hunted by multiple inhabitants!
Unfortunately, having four separate decks is possibly too much to ask of the Game Master. It is a pity that no other means of handling the inhabitants’ actions is suggested and likewise, it is disappointing that the Game Master is not warned ahead of time of the nature of the set-up which the scenario requires. Also, the grounds of the castle do feel underwritten in comparison to the castle itself, and despite the castle being depicted as having walls and towers, they are not described.
In terms of theme, The Touch of the Beast is based on both the French fairy tale, La Belle et la Bête and the 1991 Walt Disney film, Beauty and the Beast. So yes, there is a curse which can be lifted as per both sources of inspiration, but the main monsters are more inspired by the Walt Disney, being greatly weird and twisted versions. It does seem a pity though that the corridor of grasping arms from 1936 film by Jean Cocteau was not included. In terms of design, The Touch of the Beast echoes a number of classic dungeon designs. Perhaps the earliest is X2 Castle Amber for Expert Dungeons & Dragons with its madhouse feel, but S1 Tomb of Horrors for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition follows as a close second for the design of its touch or interfere at your peril, no Saving Throw, you are dead, nature of its traps. It also feels similar to several scenarios for Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplaying in that devices from other times and places can be found within the walls of the castle.
Physically, The Touch of the Beast is scrappily presented and does need an edit in places. It could also have been better organised—especially at the start—to help the Game Master prepare the scenario. The artwork though, is decent, and the cartography is big and easy to read. It is also clear that some thought has been put into organising the maps and room descriptions to make the scenario easy to run.
The Touch of the Beast is a fairly simple scenario, more weird and creepy rather than out and out horror. The combination of its period setting and use of familiar fairy tale as inspiration serves to make it accessible—though the scenario does lay a trap or two for anyone who is too familiar—but not necessarily easy to use in a campaign or setting. That said, the scenario is relatively easy to adapt to a Game Master’s campaign or setting of her choosing.

Much like the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition, the  Jonstown Compendium is a curated platform for user-made content, but for material set in Greg Stafford's mythic universe of Glorantha. It enables creators to sell their own original content for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and HeroQuest Glorantha (Questworlds). This can include original scenarios, background material, cults, mythology, details of NPCs and monsters, and so on, but none of this content should be considered to be ‘canon’, but rather fall under ‘Your Glorantha Will Vary’. This means that there is still scope for the authors to create interesting and useful content that others can bring to their Glorantha-set campaigns.


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What is it?
Monster of the Month #2: Geiron, Lord of Elephants is a short supplement presenting a great beast akin to a ‘Terror’, but which is not Chaotic, for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha.

It is an eight page, full colour, 2.16 MB PDF.

Monster of the Month #2: Geiron, Lord of Elephants is well presented and decently written.

Where is it set?
Geiron is rarely seen outside of the Spirit World and when he is, it is at one of the oases of Prax and the Wastelands. In particular, the oases of Eiritha’s Print, Greystone Well, and Agape, and once a century for Eiritha’s High Holy Day at the Paps where he joins in the celebrations.

Who do you play?
Geiron, Lord of Elephants, the King of the Elephant Tribe in Genert’s Garden, who sacrificed his tribe at the Battle of Earthfall, so that Genert’s army could flee. Thus, none of the Elephant Tribe survived to swear the Survival Covenant with Waha.
What do you need?
Monster of the Month #2: Geiron, Lord of Elephants requires both RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and RuneQuest – Glorantha Bestiary. 

What do you get?
Behind its excellent cover, Monster of the Month #2: Geiron, Lord of Elephants describes a great spirit beast whose statures is that of a ‘Terror’, but associated with the Earth rather than Chaos. Full stats are provided for him as well a detailed background which explains why and where he appears in the Middle World. Two adventure seeds are provided, one in which the Lord of Elephants can be hunted and the other in which he must be placated. Lastly, the Geiron Spirit Cult is detailed for the Shaman wanting to worship a long lost great beast. This is supported the unique Rune magic and the specialised Spirit magic associated with the cult and a list of sample Elephant spirits.

Although Monster of the Month #2: Geiron, Lord of Elephants falls into the category of ‘Your Glorantha May Vary’, this is a nicely detailed addition. If there is an issue with the supplement, it is that the rewards for completing the adventure could have been discussed or included to help the Game Master out a little more.

Is it worth your time?
Yes. If you are running a campaign or adventure set in Prax, Monster of the Month #2: Geiron, Lord of Elephants is worth your time and interest. Plus in terms of the game mechanics, Monster of the Month #2: Geiron, Lord of Elephants showcases how to create a ‘Terror’ which is not associated with Chaos.
No. If your campaign or adventure is not set on the plains of Prax, then Monster of the Month #2: Geiron, Lord of Elephants is unlikely to be of interest to you.
Maybe. An encounter with Geiron might come about as part of a quest and mastodons, which are part of his domain, may be found elsewhere, plus in terms of the game mechanics, Monster of the Month #2: Geiron, Lord of Elephants showcases how to create a ‘Terror’ which is not associated with Chaos.

Much like the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition, the  Jonstown Compendium is a curated platform for user-made content, but for material set in Greg Stafford's mythic universe of Glorantha. It enables creators to sell their own original content for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and HeroQuest Glorantha (Questworlds). This can include original scenarios, background material, cults, mythology, details of NPCs and monsters, and so on, but none of this content should be considered to be ‘canon’, but rather fall under ‘Your Glorantha Will Vary’. This means that there is still scope for the authors to create interesting and useful content that others can bring to their Glorantha-set campaigns.


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What is it?
Monster of the Month #1: Spirits of Madness is a short supplement presenting a new monster and a means of handling insanity in RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha.

It is a five page, full colour, 2.22 MB PDF.

Monster of the Month #1: Spirits of Madness is well presented and decently written, but it does need another edit.

Where is it set?
Madness spirits can be introduced to anywhere where an insane person can be found or to places strong in the Moon Rune, such as Lunar temples. They may be found in Dragon Pass in the ruins of New Lunar Temple—the site of the Dragonrise—and the ruins of Whitewall, as well as sites where the Lunar Colleges of Magic summoned great powers, for example, at Moonbroth Oasis.

Who do you play?
Madness spirits are a variant of disease spirits which inflict insanity rather than pestilence.

What do you need?
Monster of the Month #1: Spirits of Madness requires both RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and RuneQuest – Glorantha Bestiary. 

What do you get?
Madness spirits work just like disease spirits in that they initiate spirit combat in order to overpower their victims and infect them with insanity rather than pestilence. Notably they are not attracted to victims already infected by other madness spirits and a shaman already twisted by a madness spirit, might actually try and command other madness spirits to infect others.

Once infected by an insanity—and some ten are listed, from Vestiphobia to Chaophilia—the insanity is treated like a Passion, which the Game Master can check to see if the player character will act in accordance with the effects of the insanity. The Passion also represents the acute degree of the illness. Continued resistance to the insanity is handled by Intelligence checks, which if successful will reduce the Passion, if failed will increase it.

Madness spirits have a trap-like quality, lurking in ruins to attack the unwary and this aspect is nicely illustrated with an fully worked example encounter. Unfortunately, Monster of the Month #1: Spirits of Madness does not explore the idea of those already infected with a madness spirit with examples. Nor does it give any scenario hooks which the Game Master could develop for her own campaign. Another issue is that only ten example insanities are given, but to be fair RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha is not a roleplaying game in which insanity plays a major role.

Is it worth your time?
Yes. If you are running a campaign or adventure which involves delving into Lunar ruins or the side effects of the conflict with the Lunar Empire or you want to introduce an intriguing, insidious, and challenging variant of disease spirits, then Monster of the Month #1: Spirits of Madness will be of interest to you.
No. If you do not want to explore or add insanity and its effects to your campaign, then Monster of the Month #1: Spirits of Madness will not be of interest to you.
Maybe. What is included is solid, but unfortunately, Monster of the Month #1: Spirits of Madness does not quite as develop all of the ideas it suggests or support them with an example.

Much like the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition, the  Jonstown Compendium is a curated platform for user-made content, but for material set in Greg Stafford's mythic universe of Glorantha. It enables creators to sell their own original content for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and HeroQuest Glorantha (Questworlds). This can include original scenarios, background material, cults, mythology, details of NPCs and monsters, and so on, but none of this content should be considered to be ‘canon’, but rather fall under ‘Your Glorantha Will Vary’. This means that there is still scope for the authors to create interesting and useful content that others can bring to their Glorantha-set campaigns.


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What is it?
The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 is the second part of campaign set in Sun County in Prax, a sequel to Tales of the Sun County Militia: Sandheart Volume 1. It is an investigative sandbox scenario set on the far eastern edge of Sun County.

It is a forty-five page, full colour, 4.63 MB PDF.

In general, The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 is well presented and decently written. It does need another edit and the artwork is a little rough, but the maps are excellent.

Where is it set?
As with Tales of the Sun County Militia: Sandheart Volume 1 before it, The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 takes place in Sun County, the small, isolated province of Yelmalio-worshipping farmers and soldiers located in the fertile River of Cradles valley of Eastern Prax, south of the city of Pavis, where it is beset by hostile nomads and surrounded by dry desert. Where Tales of the Sun County Militia: Sandheart Volume 1 is specifically it is set in and around the remote hamlet of Sandheart, where the inhabitants are used to dealing and even trading with the nomads who come to worship at the ruins inside Sandheart’s walls, The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 is set in and around Cliffheath, on the eastern edge of the county.

Who do you play?
The player characters are members of the Sun County militia based in Sandheart. Used to dealing with nomads and outsiders and oddities and agitators, the local militia serves as the dumping ground for any militia member who proves too difficult to deal with by the often xenophobic, misogynistic, repressive, and strict culture of both Sun County and the Sun County militia. It also accepts nomads and outsiders, foreigners and non-Yemalions, not necessarily as regular militia-men, but as ‘specials’, better capable of dealing with said foreigners and non-Yemalions.

The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 does not include any pre-generated characters. Six pre-generated members of the Sun County militia in Sandheart can be found in Tales of the Sun County Militia: Sandheart Volume 1, as well as guidelines to create ‘quirky’ members of the Sun County militia in Sandheart.

What do you need?
The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 requires both Tales of the Sun County Militia: Sandheart Volume 1 and RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha. 

Although not absolutely necessary, the Game Master may also find the supplements Cults of Terror, Lords of Terror, Sun County, and The River of Cradles, plus issues of the fanzine Tales of The Reaching Moon issue 14 to be of use in providing deeper background.

What do you get?
The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 is an investigative sandbox in which the members of the Sun County militia based in Sandheart are sent out to a remote area of the county to investigate and purge the area of disease. Infected barley crop has been detected in the annual tithe collected from the ‘out of the way’ farms at Cliffheath. Not only is the presence of detrimental to the health and welfare of the people of Sun County, if taxes are not paid on time then the Sun Dome Temple will be displeased. So the head of the militia at Sandheart wants the mystery solved before calling in their notoriously efficient—or ‘heavy-handed interference’—support.

This being a scenario for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha, the ultimate culprit behind the infection will be obvious. Determining the who, the what, and the how on the Mortal Realm is another matter, for The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 is a complex affair in which everyone has their secrets and the player characters will find themselves crisscrossing back and forth to speak to inhabitants of Cliffheath multiple times. The scenario includes almost fifty NPCs—major and minor—plus ‘monsters’, almost twenty events, and eleven handouts!

In many ways, The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 is not a traditional scenario for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha. Rather it reads and is structured like a scenario for Call of Cthulhu, and like a scenario for Call of Cthulhu, there is a certain insidious nature to its core antagonists. Also like a scenario for Call of Cthulhu and unlike a scenario for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha, there is some research involved as part of the investigation, which in this case means visiting the temple archives. The investigative nature of the scenario also means that there is plenty of opportunity for roleplaying, both for the players and the Game Master, who is given good advice for each of the major NPCs to that end.

Essentially, The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 is a ‘Police Procedural’ in Glorantha, providing four or five sessions of play. Players who charge in or expect a fight straight off or show a lack of respect will probably themselves in some difficulty, socially as well as in terms of the investigation. That said, there are opportunities in the scenario for combat, for heroism, and for the militia members to make a name for themselves as the scenario comes fantastic climax.

Is it worth your time?
Yes. If you ran Tales of the Sun County Militia: Sandheart Volume 1 and are looking for the sequel, The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 is a rich meaty case for your Sun Dome County Militia—even the ‘specials’ of Sandheart.
No. Tales of the Sun County Militia: Sandheart Volume 1 is not worth your time if you are running a campaign or scenarios set elsewhere, especially in Sartar as per ‘The Broken Tower’ from the RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha – QuickStart Rules and Adventure or in in and around Apple Lane as detailed in the RuneQuest Gamemaster Screen Pack. The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 would be a difficult scenario to add to such a campaign.
Maybe. Although it would be difficult to involve outsiders in the events or the investigation of The Corn Dolls: Sandheart Volume 2 or the setting of Sandheart and Sun Dome County, many of the elements of its mystery could be adapted to the edges of the home area where the Game Master’s campaign is set.

At its heart, the Old School Renaissance is about emulating the style of play of Dungeons & Dragons from forty and more years ago, and about exploring the history of Dungeons & Dragons, so it is always fascinating to see what its adherents will find after ferreting around in the archives. The Ruined Tower of Zenopus is a perfect example of something surprisingly brought back to the attention of the Dungeons & Dragons-playing audience. The Ruined Tower of Zenopus is not a new dungeon, having originally appeared in the Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set, published in 1977, and edited by the late Doctor J. Eric Holmes. What Doctor Holmes did was edit earlier example rooms and develop them into a coherent dungeon design, a ‘starter dungeon’ complete with backstory, context, and reasons for the player characters to venture into its depths. The Ruined Tower of Zenopus is however a new title, it only being known as ‘Sample Dungeon’ in the original appearance in the Basic Dungeons & Dragons book. The Zenopus of the title refers to the doomed wizard who built the dungeon under his now ruined tower.

Designed for a party of First and Second Level adventurers, The Ruined Tower of Zenopus is actually an update from Basic Dungeons & Dragons, but not for use with a retroclone as one might expect, but for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, Basic Rules, which are free to download from the Wizards of the Coast website. This means that it is also compatible with, and could be upgraded to, Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, and of course, with some effort, could easily be adapted to the retroclone of the Game Master’s choice. The adventure has been updated by Zach Howard, who has experience with titles from this era, notably the 'B1' Series: In Search of the Unknown Campaign Sourcebook which he hosts on his site. One thing that is missing from The Ruined Tower of Zenopus is a map of the dungeon itself. A map of the Portown, the location for the dungeon is included, but not of the dungeon itself. This map is available in the sample excerpt of the 1977 Basic Dungeons & Dragons book which can be downloaded from Wizards of the Coast.

The Ruined Tower of Zenopus takes place just outside of Portown, an important harbour town on the trade routes from the south, situated on a headland. It is notable for the ruined tower of Zenopus, a wizard who disappeared some time ago and who was rumoured to be digging into the ruins of the ancient city upon which Portown is built. It is now home to another wizard known as the Thaumaturgist. Portown and its environs are nicely mapped out to fit the extent of the dungeons below the headland whilst still allowing some room for the Dungeon Master to add her own content.

The dungeon itself consists of twenty or so locations, running from ‘A’ to ‘S’. The design of the dungeon is one of discrete locations separated by long corridors and empty rooms, so adhering to the design ethos that there should be plenty of empty rooms. The various locations include some classics, such as the room with four doors and a statue which must be rotated to face a door before it can be opened; a cave of smugglers going about their business; and a high vaulted room, its ceiling smothered in spider’s web. Now by modern standards, the design of the dungeon is basic, even a cliché, but remember this is a dungeon from 1977, from the very start of the hobby. And just because they are clichés or classics, it does not mean that they do not work.

The author though, does not simply update ‘Sample Dungeon’ to Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. He also offers options to make the dungeon more challenging and adds a slew of monsters and magical items. The former include the Cleaning Cube—a lesser form of the Gelatinous Cube, the Veteran Smuggler, the aforementioned Thaumaturgist, Monstrous Rat, and Monstrous Sand Crab, whilst the latter includes the  Brazen Head of Zenopus, Verminslayer Longsword, Lesser Wand of Petrification, and Scroll of Stone to Flesh.

The providence of The Ruined Tower of Zenopus means that it is interesting enough, but the author does even more to make the scenario interesting through a quintet of appendices. The first of these suggests some of the fiction—weird and otherwise—which might have inspired the original author, Doctor J. Eric Holmes, in the design of ‘Sample Dungeon’, such as J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Fellowship of the Ring for the inclusion of the Green Dragon Inn in Portown, Robert E. Howard’s The Tower of the Elephant for the Giant Spider in the cobweb filled Spider’s Parlour, and H.P. Lovecraft’s The Case of Charles Dexter Ward for having a strange wizard dwelling near the town. The second develops the occupants of the dungeon's discrete areas into factions, giving them stronger motivations to help the Dungeon Master roleplay their actions, whilst the third gives twenty rumours and then expands upon each and every rumour to great effect. Here the author provides hooks, both false and true, with suggestions as to how to use them, to involve the characters in events in and below Portown.

The penultimate appendix expands upon the place of Portown and thus The Ruined Tower of Zenopus in the Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition campaign, Ghosts of Saltmarsh, itself based on the U Series of scenarios for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition which began with U1 The Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh. The dungeon at least is mentioned as a possible adventure site, but not expanded upon. The Ruined Tower of Zenopus does that, suggesting how the scenario would work in and around Saltmarsh. This is very well thought out section and if a Dungeon Master has not yet run Ghosts of Saltmarsh, this is a really good addition to the start of the campaign. The last appendix contains four pre-generated characters. These have been created using the Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, Basic Rules, and so include a Cleric, a Fighter, a Magic-User, and a Rogue. They are decent enough, but they are all Human, rather offering a more diverse set of options.

Physically, The Ruined Tower of Zenopus is 1.83 MB, eighteen page, full-colour PDF. The layout is neat, clean, and tidy. It is perhaps a little oddly presented, in that the town and dungeon come first before the hooks that would get the player characters involved, but that makes sense in that they are an addition to the original rather than what included then.

By modern standards The Ruined Tower of Zenopus feels a little too basic and underdeveloped, so initially it comes across as something of a quaint artefact. Which is not to say that it is a poor dungeon design, but rather that tastes and gaming mores have changed. Of course, there is nothing to stop a Dungeon Master running as is, but the author has provided the means to make something more of it, whether that is the use of the rumours to provide flavour and motivation or developing its place as part of Ghosts of Saltmarsh. It also means that the Dungeon Master could run The Ruined Tower of Zenopus as a Old School Renaissance style dungeon and adventure for a group which is familiar with Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition or for a group which prefers Old School Renaissance style play who want to try Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. So what you have in The Ruined Tower of Zenopus is a simple dungeon whose update empowers it with a lot of flexibility, but not just that, you also have a fascinating exploration of an early , ‘Sample Dungeon’.

Before Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay with its grim and perilous world of adventure, there was the grim, but humorous world of Law Enforcement in the near future with Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game. Both were published by Games Workshop, the former in 1986, the latter in 1985, and since they shared one of the same designers, Rick Priestley, there are a number of parallels between the two roleplaying games. Now Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game was not the first homegrown roleplaying game to be published by Games Workshop—that honour would go to the highly regarded Golden Heroes: The Roleplaying Game of Super-Heroes in 1984—but it would be the first roleplaying game based on a British licence. In the years since, it has been revisited three more times with two editions—The Judge Dredd Roleplaying Game for both the d20 System and the Traveller, First Edition mechanics—from Mongoose Publishing and more recently, with the Judge Dredd & The Worlds of 2000 AD RPG Core Rulebook from EN Publishing. This is because with its ’punk attitude, its brutal setting and depiction of comic book violence, and its often dark, but definitely satirical humour, it has been seen as the quintessentially British roleplaying game (along with Doctor Who). 

Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game is based upon the Judge Dredd comic strip in 2000AD, the long-running comic which has been published weekly since 1977. It is set in the early twenty-second century after a nuclear war which irradiated much of the Earth and most of the world’s population is living in a number of megalopolises—or supercities. Each is home to millions and millions living in great city-blocks, most of whom are unemployed and turn to hobbies, brand new trends or crazes, or even crime to keep themselves sane. The teeming masses are difficult to police and it takes a special dedicated individual, one who has trained for nearly all of his or her childhood to patrol and enforce the law in these great cities. These are the Judges, trained to be the best, armed with the best equipment, and ready to patrol the streets as combined policeman, judge, jury, and executioner. They enforce the law and do so fairly—and none no more fairly than Judge Dredd himself, a figure who is both authoritarian and an anti-hero, the most well known and feared Judge in Mega-City One on the eastern seaboard of what was once the United States of America. On a daily basis, Judge Dredd has to deal with litterers and jaywalkers, slowsters and sponts, robbers and murders, smokers and boingers, illegal comic book dealers and gangster apes, and even Judge Death from a parallel earth. Over the years, the Judge Dredd comic has presented a carnival of crazy crimes and criminals, certainly more than enough to provide a rich, bonkers background for Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game when it was published in 1985.

Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game was published, like all good roleplaying games of its day, as a boxed set. Inside which could be found the seventy-two page Judge’s Manual, the one-hundred-and twenty-eight Game Master’s Book, a sixteen by twenty-two inch double-sided map sheet, a sheet of character cutouts, and four dice. The Judge’s Manual is the players’ book and explains how to create characters as well as the mechanics, whilst the Game Master covers background and running the game. Both the cutout characters and the double-sided map sheet are done in full colour, in 25 mm scale, one side of the map depicting an entrance to a stretch of underpass, the other the floorplans of a Shuggy (3D Pool) Hall. Each is used in the two scenarios in the Game Master’s Book. Notably, both the Judge’s Manual and the Game Master’s Book are liberally illustrated with both art and comic strips from Judge Dredd. All of which is superb. The artwork might be black and white, but it all comes from the comic strip which is also done in black and white. Remember that at this time, colour artwork really was a luxury! Nevertheless, the illustrations in Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game are very, very good.

Of course, what each player roleplays in Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game is a Judge. Relatively fresh out of the Academy, beginning characters are fairly bland,and mechanically at this point, there is little to distinguish one Judge from another. This extends to roleplaying too, since a Judge is not meant to express any emotion and his life is entirely focused on executing the Law, and certainly straight out of the Academy will not have any time for a private life. Now there is scope for a Judge to specialise as a Med-Judge, Tech-Judge, or even a PSI-Judge, but being able to do so straight out of the Academy is unlikely. This is not to say that roleplaying a Judge is akin to roleplaying an automaton, rather than thinking of playing robot, think of it as a Judge being highly dedicated. How he or she will react to the bizarre everyday life in Mega-City One is where there is scope for roleplaying as well his somewhat repressed personality.

Mechanically, a Judge is defined by eight attributes. These are Strength, Initiative, Combat Skill, Drive Skill, Street Skill, Technical Skill, Medical Skill and Psi Skill. Strength is used in hand-to-hand combat and measures how damage a Judge can do as well as how many Wounds he can take. Initiative represents a Judge’s agility and when he can act in combat; all combat actions are handled by Combat Skill; the Drive Skill enables a Judge to drive any vehicle, from his Lawmaster motorbike to a spaceship; the Street Skill represents his area knowledge as well as authoritarian presence and being able to spot lies; Technical Skill is ability to use and fix devices and machinery of all types, including computer use, picking locks, and defusing bombs; Medical Skill covers first aid, trauma surgery, diseases, and related knowledge; and Psi Skill, a Judge’s skill with psychic powers if he has any or resisting them. All of these are rated as percentiles, except for Strength which ranges between one and three.

Creating a Judge is simple enough. A four-sided die is rolled and one deducted for Strength. Everything else is determined by rolling two ten-sided dice and adding twenty to the total. If any Attribute is equal to forty or more, then the player can choose an Ability. For example, Agile and Instant Reactions for Initiative, Crack Shot and Knock Out for the Combat Skill, Avoid Collision or Lawmaster Leap for the Drive Skill, Analyse Chemical or Use Date for the Technical Skill, Aura of Cool or Sense Crime for the Street Crime, and Detect Intent or Psychic Block for the Psi Skill. (As an aside this combination of attributes as skills plus abilities does feel reminiscent of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.) If this is for the Technical Skill, Medical Skill, or Psi Skill, then the Judge can become a Specialist Judge like a Tech-Judge, Med-Judge, or Psi-Judge respectively. Judges who start with a Strength of one do get a bonus to the Psi Skill, but nevertheless, becoming either a Tech-Judge, Med-Judge, or Psi-Judge is unlikely but possible during character creation, being more likely as a Judge gains Experience Points, improves his attributes to first forty, then fifty, sixty, seventy, and so on. 

Judge Smith
Strength 2
Initiative 27
Combat Skill 34
Drive Skill 31
Street Skill 30
Technical Skill 34
Medical Skill 34
Psi Skill 31

Unless a player has to select an ability, character generation is quick and easy. Indeed, more attention is paid to the equipment carried by a Judge than to character generation! This is understandable, since this equipment plays a vital role in a Judge’s day-to-day duties, whether it is a Birdie Lie Detector, Pollution Meter, or his infamous Lawgiver handgun with its multiple ammunition types. Both Lawgiver and its multiple ammunition types—General Purpose, High Explosive, Armour Piercing, Incendiary, Rubber Ricochet, and so on—along with the equipment takes up a fair portion of the character sheet. Further, each Judge’s Lawmaster, a self-driving motorbike equipped with  twin 20 mm cannons and a Cyclops laser has its own character (bike?) sheet. It should also be noted that the Lawmaster is as good as any starting Judge in combat and when dealing with technical matters, and as is twice as capable as the average Judge when it comes to the Drive Skill. So in general, unless a starting Judge is brilliant and begins play with a high Drive Skill of forty and a Drive Skill-related Ability, it is definitely better that the driving be left to the bike!

Mechanically, Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game is simple and straightforward. It is a percentile system, a player rolling the dice to get equal to, or under the appropriate attribute, for example, Combat Skill in a fight or Technical Skill to access a computer. This can be modified by the situation or by equipment, such as the Birdie Lie Detector which adds a 50% bonus to a Judge’s Street Skill when attempting to determine whether a perp is telling the truth or not. Combat is more complex in that each combat round is divided into ten phases and when a Judge or perp can act and how many actions he has depends on his Initiative. For every ten points of Initiative—rounded up—a character has an action. So a starting Judge will have either three or four actions, acting on phases three, six, and nine or two, four, six, and eight respectively. Actions themselves are discrete in that a character can do just the one thing, so that might be to after a perp, crouch, use an object, aim a weapon, fire, dismount a vehicle, and so on.

The rules cover most situations, whether that is weapon malfunctions, breaking down doors, or vehicle combat and chases. What is notable is that a Judge only wears armour on his head, arms, and legs, and it only provides a 25% chance of protecting him. Then when he does take damage, it is rolled for on the personal damage table, the roll modified by the attack or ammunition type, such as +1 for High Explosive ammunition. Now Judges typically have between one, two, or three wounds, and whilst it is possible to lose one or two wounds when suffering damage, most of the time, a Judge will suffer Stun effects, which will lose him actions as well as temporary points from his Initiative attribute. What this means is that a Judge is actually stronger than he looks on paper, not by much, but this certainly emulates the brutal comic book violence of the source material.

The other notable thing about combat in Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game is that it is rarely initiated by a Judge. He is duty bound to issue a challenge for the perps to surrender first before taking direct action, and this takes an action. Similarly, aiming takes an action and a Judge is expected to aim unless he wants to shoot an innocent bystander by mistake. Further, he likely to issue another challenge later in the combat. The point is that as much as the mechanics in Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game focus on combat, combat, at least not to kill, is not the point of the game. This is supported by a solid example of play and an arrest. Further help in the Judge’s Manual for the player comes with sentencing—the next step after making an arrest, calling for backup, Justice Department organisation, and a guide to both Mega-City One and Mega-City One slang.

In comparison, the Game Master’s Book is almost rules light, nearly all of the rules to Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game being in the Judge’s Manual. Instead of rules, Game Master’s Book expands greatly on the setting of Mega-City One and running the game. There is excellent advice to that end as well as on how to write scenarios, before examining how to handle character generation, combat, making arrests, getting around Mega-City One, and running campaigns. Stats and background are provided for NPC Judges and the Sector Houses, out which the Judges will operate, plus all of the perps, criminals, punks, dunks, pongos, futsies, heisters, mobsters, psykers, and more to be found on the streets of Mega-City One. There are also rules for aliens and muties, and the city-blocks where most of Mega-City One’s citizenry lives, as well as stats and backgrounds for some of the most notable perps to appear in the comic strip, from the meaner than mean Angel Gang and the mobster Uggie Apelino and the Ape Gang to the vigilante Blanche Tatum and the infamous Judge murderer, Whitey. The Dark Judges—led by Judge Death—are listed under famous and infamous Judges along with Judge Dredd and Psi-Judge Anderson.

The Game Master’s Book also includes two scenarios—one short, one long. The first is ‘Firefight – On a Hot Summer’s Night’, a short encounter with car wreckers designed to teach the players how the game’s rules work. It is easy to run as a first encounter before the Game Master runs, the second, longer scenario, ‘The Ultimate Crime of Tony Thermo’. This is a fully detailed scenario, designed as a proper introduction to playing Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game, and sees the Judges attend a briefing, go out on patrol, deal with an issue or two before evidence of a crime in progress and having to thwart that. Where ‘Firefight – On a Hot Summer’s Night’ will last a single session, ‘The Ultimate Crime of Tony Thermo’ will probably last two. Overall, it is a solid starting adventure.

If there is an issue with the Game Master’s Book, it is twofold. One is that it feels jumbled in its organisation of its subject matters, so that stats and backgrounds for generic perps are one section, famous and infamous Judges in another, that of notable perps in another, and so on, interspersed sections on other subject matters. As a result it makes it a little difficult to find things in the book. The other is that it actually has one section which the players will find useful—an expanded section on sentencing, much more nuanced than that given in the Judges’ Manual. For the most part though, the Game Master will not be needing to consult the Game Master’s Book during play.

Physically, Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game is solidly produced. The books are well written and it is clear that the authors have done their research. Plus with access to hundreds of issues of 2000AD, both books make great use of the comic strip. What is clear from the examples and the scenarios is the successful efforts of the designers to match the humour of the comic, much of which poked fun at the gaming industry of the time. The maps and cutouts are excellent, the maps of course being designed to work with the range of miniatures that of course, Games Workshop produced for the roleplaying game. The dice though, are cheap, and well, nasty.

Reviews at the time of the publication of Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game were polar opposites and reflected the then divided camps of British roleplaying magazines. In the one corner was Games Workshop’s White Dwarf, in the other was GameMaster Publications, the spiritual successor to TSR (UK), Inc.’s Imagine magazine. The review in GameMaster Publications Issue 2 (December, 1985) concluded that, “It is a good interpretation of the strip in game form, and the books are lavishly illustrated with panels from the comics. Most importantly, the designers have researched the subject in meticulous detail, trying to capture all the bizarre sides of life in Mega-City One. Stats for all the Perps that have appeared in the strips are presented — which may or may not strike you as odd given the way most of them have been blasted to atoms by Dredd — and several tables provide methods for creating new mutants and other potential opponents. But everything is going to depend on your ability to think up new and fitting perps, crimes and city events if you are going to progress beyond see ’em and blast ’em over and over again.” Unsurprisingly, Jason Kingsley, reviewing Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game in White Dwarf Issue 73 (January, 1986), was far more positive. Awarding the roleplaying an overall score of ten out of ten, he concluded, “All in all, Judge Dredd - The Role-Playing Game is an excellent product, for detail, value and content. Dredd fans will be pleased with it.”

The retrospectives would begin in 1996 with Arcane #3 (February, 1996), shortly after the licence for the Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game expired. In the Despatches section, Paul Pettengale said of it, “It’s fast, it's frenetic, and it’s more than a little fraught; but above all Judge Dredd, The Roleplaying Game is - or at least was - damned good fun.” and that, “The two rule-books - one each for the player and the ref - flesh out the campaign setting, giving a brief history of Mega City One, its peoples and its many quirks. Both are enjoyable and, like the game itself, they last forever.” This was followed up later in Arcane #14 (December, 1996) when it was included in ‘Arcane Presents the Top 50 Roleplaying Games 1996’ in the twenty-first slot, stating that, “This is one of the best roleplaying systems ever created. It oozes atmosphere and spits out gritting violence and playability, and generally makes for a very good time indeed. The excellent way in which the rules are laid out (and written), helps referees to start running the game almost straight out of the box. In our eyes, it should have featured in the top ten.” More recently, The Grognard Files—rated the number one Roleplaying Game Talk Podcast of 2019—discussed Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game and interviewed Marc Gascoigne in Episode 18 (Part 1) and Episode 18 (Part 2) of the podcast.

Right out of the box, Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game is complete and relatively easy to learn and start playing. The rules are simple, and really covered in just a few pages, leaving the rest of books to detail and explore the maniacally rich and complex world of Judge Dredd and Mega-City One, which it does in meticulous detail. There is something to be said of the suggestion that Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game is more of a ‘roll-playing’ game rather than a ‘roleplaying game’, and yes, whilst there is an emphasis upon combat in the rules, apprehending suspects is the point of the game and that often does involve combat. Yet, there is roleplaying to be had in investigating crimes, interrogating suspects, and in general, dealing with the citizenry of Mega-City One. So in some ways, Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game should be thought of an action roleplaying game—a police action roleplaying game (rather than as a superhero game as it is sometimes categorised). Then there is the rich detail of Mega-City One to dig onto, whether as a Judge to patrol and explore, or as the Game Master to develop crimes and investigations.

By modern standards, Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game is perhaps a little one-note in what characters the players roleplay and somewhat limited at the start of play. So yes, it can be hard to distinguish between player characters and they are often less than competent as you might wish, but the setting and its humour is worth it. And that is even before a campaign escapes Mega-City One into the Cursed Earth or other Mega-Cities. Plus, the Judges will begin to diverge as their players choose different abilities and perhaps become Specialist Judges. For the Game Master though, Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game is not so one note, for it comes with  an incredibly rich background with which to work and develop her own cases, which only really covers the first decade of Judge Dredd and 2000AD.

A combination of simple mechanics and background rife with humour and grit, Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game is still very playable. Those mechanics, and that grit and humour would undoubtedly influence Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay the following year, but it is here that they were first seen. 

17th Century Minimalist: A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR Rulebook is the core rulebook for 17th Century Minimalist, an Old School Renaissance roleplaying game of smalltime tricksters, conniving thieves, stalwart ex-soldiers, swashbucklers with panche and gambling debts, and minor physicians, banding together out of necessity and the need for coin (glory optional). Published by Games Omnivorous and designed by the author of The Squid, the Cabal, and the Old Man for use with Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplaying, it is a rules-light Class and Level roleplaying game set in the seventeenth century which features firearms, no magic, a task-based experience system, and a fast, deadly combat system. Flintlocks are easy to use, but have a chance of misfire and take time to reload. Instead of magic, Illusionists use tricks and misdirection, whilst Plague Doctors apply treatments which might be interpreted as miracles or witchcraft. Cuthroats gain Experience Points for backstabbing, stealing rare items, disarming hard traps, and so on; Illusionists for entertaining crowds, doing tricks, wooing persons of note, et cetera; Plague Doctors for curing the Plague and other diseases and for discovering new flora; Soldiers for killing strong foes, doing mercenary work, and going to war; and Swashbucklers for dueling and doing bold stunts in combat. Lastly, whilst characters acquire Levels, they never increase their Hit Points, so combat is deadly. 

Characters in 17th Century Minimalist are defined by five abilities—Charisma, Dexterity, Strength, Intelligence, and Luck; Class (as above) and Level—up to Fifth Level as campaigns are intended to be short in 17th Century Minimalist; and Reputation. Character creation is quick and easy. A player rolls three four-sided dice for the five abilities and then rolls three four-sided dice and add two to replace the values of any ability with a value less than five. Then he chooses one of the roleplaying game’s five Classes, rolling a background from the table given for each Class. The process is quick and easy, and helped by the fact that each Class has its own character sheet for ease of play.

Our sample character is a Laid-off Infantryman, a Scots mercenary and Protestant fighting in the Thirty Years War. Currently there is a lull in the fighting and he is seeking his fortune elsewhere, or least the means to pay for his keep and wine, women, and song.

Name: James McTavish
Class: Soldier Level: 1
Background: Laid-off Infantryman
Charisma 08 Intelligence 06 
Dexterity 10 Luck 09 
Strength 13 Current Luck 09

Reputation: 6
Hit Points: 12
Armour: Leather Armour, steel helm
Main Weapon: Claymore, musket & ammunition (d10)

Special Abilities: Military Training (no disadvantage with large weapons, advantage with musket), Scars of War (advantage on reisting disease, drugs, alcohol), Combat Prowess (extra action if exact Strength rolled), Merciless (critical hit range equals Level, plus own Critical Hit table)

Mechanically, 17th Century Minimalist is fairly simple. Whenever a character wants to undertake an action, his player rolls a twenty-sided die against the appropriate ability, aiming to roll equal to or under it. Rolls of one count as criticals and of twenty as fumbles. Luck can be spent to reroll anything other than fumbles and between one and three points of Luck is regained at the end of each adventure. 17th Century Minimalist uses the Advantage and Disadvantage rules as per Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition and the Useage Die mechanic as per The Black Hack.

Combat in 17th Century Minimalist is brutal—and not just because player characters have static Hit Points. To begin with, initiative is handled not by die rolls. Instead, each player puts a recognisable die into a bag, into which the Game Master adds one die for the opposition and one as a neutral die. When a player’s die is drawn from the bag, his character can act, when the opposition’s die is drawn, they can act, and when the neutral die is drawn, the round ends, all of the dice are placed back in the bag, and a new round begins. Rather than the back and forth of traditional initiative mechanics, initiative is a wild affair—the opposition might get to act, but not the player characters before the round ends, or vice versa, some or even none of the player characters might get to act before the round ends, and so on. It is wild, but it is brutal.

Fumbles mean that the attacker has hit an ally or that his weapon has broken, whilst Criticals simply add damage. When an attacker fails to land a blow in melee combat, the defendant can riposte, although with Disadvantage. Armour blocks damage a number of times equal to its Armour Value, from the one of Leather to the four of Full Plate, and be fixed, either by the player character or a craftsman. Weapon damage is determined by size—a four-sided die for small weapons, a six-sided die for medium weapons, and an eight-sided die for big weapons. Being reduced to zero Hit Points does not necessarily mean that a character is dead, though there is a chance of that along with maiming and scarring.

Firearms get their own section. The default type—muskets and pistols—is the flintlock. Inflicting damage equal to big weapons, they take time to reload and there is the chance that they might misfire or backfire. Rules for grenades are also given as is a table of rare firearms, such as the axe-pistol and Duck-feet pistol.
So for example, James Mactavish has signed as a guard for a caravan of refugees going to a region where their faith is accepted. It is attacked by mercenaries. They ride in on horseback, their sabres ready to strike. James’ player puts in a blue die into the initiative bag and the Game Master puts a red one in for the opposition and a white one as the neutral die. On the first round, she pulls the red die out first—a mercenary is going to attack James. His player rolls a twenty-sided die and gets a nine. This is under James’ Dexterity so he ducks the sword strike from the horse-mounted mercenary. Since the mercenary missed, James is allowed a riposte with a melee weapon, though it is rolled with disadvantage. He states that he is going to swing his halberd. His player rolls two twenty-sided dice, but with rolls of fifteen and nineteen, he misses. Next the Game Master draws another die out of the bag. It is the neutral die, so the round has ended. Both the red and the white dice go back in the bag and the next round begins.
On the second round, the first die out is a blue die, which means that James acts first. His player decides that James will ready his halberd and strike as soon as the mercenary, who has ridden away and wheeled around to come back for another attack, comes into reach. He rolls a nineteen, which is obviously not good enough, so he burns a point of Luck to reroll. This time, he rolls a one, which is a critical success. As a critical hit, it ignores Armour, so the Game Master cannot block the damage. In addition to the damage die of an eight-sided die, plus the standard bonus of a four-sided die rolled for more damage, because James is a Soldier, his player gets to roll on the Class’ own Critical Hit table. So rolls six on the eight-sided die and three on the four-sided die for a total of nine damage. Then on the Soldier Class Critical Hit table, he rolls a five, which means that he disarms the mercenary, smashing his sabre from his hand.Being ‘A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR’ roleplaying game, 17th Century Minimalist  does not include magic. It does however include abilities which to the uneducated might appear to be indistinguishable from magic. In particular, two of the Classes, the Illusionist and the Plague Doctor have such abilities. Thus, the Illusionist has a ‘Bag of Tricks’ with which he can create a ‘Fake Sound’ or perform a ‘Card Swap’ which enables him to make a character friendly to him, whilst the Plague Doctor can perform Treatments, such as ‘Send Rats’ to attack a target or ‘Apply Light Leeches’ to provide minor healing.

In terms of character progress, two other factors are tracked in 17th Century Minimalist. One is Experience, as in any other retroclone, but instead of tracking hundreds and thousands of Experience Points, in 17th Century Minimalist, a character receives single points. For every ten of these, a character can go up a Level, up to a maximum of five. They are received though, one at a time, for undertaking tasks particular to their Class as described above. The other factor is Reputation. This starts at six and rises and falls depending upon whether a character commits Virtuous—such as rescuing someone of note or slaying a witch—or Vicious—killing innocent folk or desecrating tombs—actions. Should a character’s reputation drop to one, he becomes Infamous and can Infamy tokens which can be spent to contact the criminal underworld or hire a retainer for free—a vile, vicious retainer. On the other hand, should it rise to twelve and the character becomes Famous and receives Famous tokens which can be spent to gain access to the local authorities or to receive an exotic gift. A character’s Reputation must remain at either one or twelve to continue receiving the Infamous or Famous tokens and will continue to remain Famous or Infamous until his Reputation rises or drops to six respectively. What you have in this Reputation mechanic is both a means of measuring what the populace at large think of a character and the nature of the character’s actions and their ramifications, basically a simple, binary Alignment system.

Besides rules for commerce, equipment, pets, and retainers, as well as alcohol, drugs, disease, and poison, there is very little in the way of world information in 17th Century Minimalist. It is assumed that Game Master and players alike will at least know something of the period, given that there is no bibliography. Similarly, it is expected that the Game Master has some experience in running roleplaying games, since there is scant advice given bar handling of supernatural monsters and their damage, and converting Armour Class and monsters from the Old School Renaissance roleplaying game of the Game Master’s choice. In fact, the one real issue with 17th Century Minimalist is the lack of advice when it comes to the creation and handling of NPCs.

The second half of 17th Century Minimalist is dedicated to describing its five Classes. The Cutthroat is a Hired Assassin, Former King’s Spy, or Nomadic Ninja who receives Luck Tokens to avoid death outside of combat, to reroll fumbles, and perform sneak attacks; and gain Advantage when climbing, wearing a disguise, sneaking, and so on. A Court Jester, Foreign-Fire Breather, or Apprentice of Magic, the Illusionist also has a sense of Déjà vu and so adds an extra die to the initiative bag, can earn money entertaining the crowds, and can perform various Tricks pulled literally from his Bag of Tricks’. The Plague Doctor, possibly a Aspirin Alchemist, Survivor of Leprosy, or Botanical Cataloguer, is educated and knows more Exotic and Dead languages, when wearing their beak-like masks they are immune to disease and can instil fear, know how to fight off the diseased—vermin and human alike, and can perform Treatments. The Soldier, possibly an Outlaw Traitor, Uncredited War Hero, or Disgraced General, can wield big weapons without Disadvantage and muskets with Advantage, make Strength checks with Advantage to resist the effects of alcohol, drugs, and disease, gain an extra action when their exact Strength is rolled with Strength tests in combat, and gain a wider Critical Range as well as having his own Critical Hit table. Possibly a Former King’s Musketeer, Self-Proclaimed Poet, or Duelling Artiste, the Swashbuckler gains extra Luck, can perform Swashbuckling Deeds such as shooting a firearm with double Advantage or inflict an extra die of damage, can use their Luck to test any situation, and cannot refuse a duel, and will either fight with a sense of Superiority, Egotism, Vanity, or Arrogance.

All five of these Classes are fun and flavoursome. All five also counter some of the brutality and deadliness of the setting, especially for the Soldier and the Swashbuckler Classes. Further, being reduced to zero Hit Points does not mean that the character dies. His player still has to roll on the Zero Hit Points table and that only grants a one in six chance of instant death—unlike NPCs!

Physically, 17th Century Minimalist: A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR Rulebook is a full colour, well written, charmingly presented digest-sized booklet. The artwork manages to fit the setting, despite being almost suited to a child’s storybook. As an artefact though, it has the feel of being handmade and it really does feel good in the hand.

The most obvious thing missing from 17th Century Minimalist is an adventure. There is however the 17th Century Minimalist ‘Mini Adventure Folder’ which includes five mini-adventures. There is also any number of Old School Renaissance scenarios, of which many of those published by Lamentations of the Flame Princess, including the author’s own The Squid, the Cabal, and the Old Man as well as No Better Than Any Man, Scenic Dunnsmouth, or Forgive Us, would be suitable as they share the same setting. That said, the more fantastical the nature of the setting, the less useful a scenario may be, depending to what degree the Game Master wants her 17th Century Minimalist game to involve the fantastic or the supernatural.

Yet as good and as charming as 17th Century Minimalist is, it is not perfect. First, it does not explain its core mechanic clearly enough, if at all, so it does not state clearly if the players are doing all of the rolls or both players and the Game Master are. Second, it does not tell the Game Master how to create or handle NPCs. Third, there is no background to the game. Now all of this can be overcome by the Game Master, who needs to decide how to handle the first two problems and possibly do a little research for the third. Or the author could publish a 17th Century Minimalist Game Master’s Guide and address all three issues.

Now despite its problems—all three of which can be overcome by the Game Master—there is a great deal to like about 17th Century Minimalist. The rules are simple, the Classes are both flavoursome and fun to play, and the system is deadly enough to make players think twice about fighting, but provides the means to ameliorate that deadliness by playing to their Classes. (As an aside, these Classes and the mechanics could be used to model a fantastic, gritty 19th Century Minimalist Wild West roleplaying game too.) Although, 17th Century Minimalist: A Historical Low-Fantasy OSR Rulebook does leave the Game Master with a few decisions to make that it really should not have done—though they are relatively simple fixes—there is no denying its brutal charm and flavour.

The Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns is overwritten, underdeveloped, unedited, contradictory, and repetitive. The Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns is a frustrating book to read and therefore likely a frustrating book to use. These are not good words with which to start a review and these are not good words which as a reviewer that I want to write, but they have to be written. And as frustrating as it is to have to write them, they have to be written at the top of the review because they are the primary impression of the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns after having read it. It is also frustrating because it is very obvious what the authors of the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns were trying to do and it very obvious that the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns is full of ideas, and it is just about obvious that the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns is not without potential. Lastly it is frustrating that as a professional editor that there was nobody involved in the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns to help its authors reach that potential.

So what is the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns? Published by Wisdom Save Media, following a successful Kickstarter campaign, the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns is the second in the publisher’s series of ‘Pocket Companion’ supplements. The first, the Pocket Companion: A Tavern Guide, presented a plethora of inns and taverns, from highest of high-class establishments to the lowest of dives, from forests to mountains, villages to cities, and more. As its title suggests, the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns, widens the scope of the series to cover long established settlements large and well, larger. From mountains to swamps, jungles to deserts, the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns details some twelve cities which the Game Master—or Dungeon Master—can add to her campaign world.

Each of the twelve entries follows the same format. This begins with a listing of the settlement’s ‘Points of Interest’, ‘In a Nutshell’ gives a basic description of it, ‘Location’, ‘The People of …’ the settlement describes its inhabitants, ‘Trading and Taverns’ describes drinking establishments and the settlement’s trade, ‘Popular Establishments’ presents more taverns, blacksmiths, and other shops, ‘Locations, Shops and Sights’ describes particular districts, ‘Tourist Traps’ are more detailed descriptions of the settlement’s ‘Points of Interest’, and lastly ‘NPC’s’ details unique and individual characters.  Each entry is also accompanied by two tables, one of popular establishments and the other of important NPCs. In general, the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns is well organised and it is easy to pick things off the page.

The twelve towns and cities include Barrelside, a city divided between the rich north and heavily-taxed poor south, almost at war with each other, but renowned for its bards’ college; Greywater stands on stilts in a swamp, a known haunt of both pirates and smugglers; and Zha’rath is an island city which caters to pirates. So there is a fair degree of variety in the types of city presented in the supplement, but drill down and oddities appear. So the inhabitants of some cities have particular customs and do not like them being broken, even by outsiders, but not once is the reader told what these customs are. Everything seems to be local (except when it is not), there are always taverns and blacksmiths, and it seems that there is always one little shop hidden away, waiting to be discovered. Cities are never located by a river, they are always divided by it. Then there are the inconsistencies, such as the city which might be on the edge of a desert or in the middle of a vast expanse of desert or that a city has docks for the trade ships which use the river that the city straddles to reach the sea, a route which runs through treacherous gorges and over imposing cliffs. How exactly do the ships get to the sea?

Again and again, the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns leaves the reader—the potential user as Game Master—to decide on such matters. To literally do the development work that the book is so clearly crying out for. Perhaps the descriptions might have been helped by maps, but there is only one and that feels more like a wilderness map than city map. 

However, the dozen city descriptions are not the only content in the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns. It starts with four plot hooks, such as an empty city in sky and a series of bangs which come from a number of robed spellcasters lobbing spells at a tower and the guards attempting to stop them—sadly neither of the twelve detailed later on, and it ends with a set of tables for Urban Encounters and for developing the Underbelly—the city’s criminal underworld, and then spaces for the Game Master to write up her own. The tables are basic enough, but they are simple, clear, and easy to use as prompts for developing aspects of a settlement by the Game Master.

Physically, the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns looks clean and simple. The artwork is adequate, although it does not always seem quite relevant, such as stone bridge in a swamp town where everything is built on stilts.

In any book there has to be some merit, something worth the time of the reader or potential Game Master or Dungeon Master, but truthfully the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns is almost bereft. All for the want of an editor and somebody asking, in too many instances, if that was what the authors meant. What merit there is, is as a source of ideas perhaps, details to spur the reader’s imagination, because that is what he will have to work in order to make use of the contents of the Pocket Companion: A Guide to Cities and Towns.

Between October 2003 and October 2013, Chaosium, Inc. published a series of books for Call of Cthulhu under the Miskatonic University Library Association brand. Whether a sourcebook, scenario, anthology, or campaign, each was a showcase for their authors—amateur rather than professional, but fans of Call of Cthulhu nonetheless—to put forward their ideas and share with others. The programme was notable for having launched the writing careers of several authors, but for every Cthulhu Invictus, The Pastores, Primal State, Ripples from Carcosa, and Halloween Horror, there was a Five Go Mad in Egypt, Return of the Ripper, Rise of the Dead, Rise of the Dead II: The Raid, and more...

The Miskatonic University Library Association brand is no more, alas, but what we have in its stead is the Miskatonic Repository, based on the same format as the DM’s Guild for Dungeons & Dragons. It is thus, “...a new way for creators to publish and distribute their own original Call of Cthulhu content including scenarios, settings, spells and more…” To support the endeavours of their creators, Chaosium has provided templates and art packs, both free to use, so that the resulting releases can look and feel as professional as possible. To support the efforts of these contributors, Miskatonic Monday is an occasional series of reviews which will in turn examine an item drawn from the depths of the Miskatonic Repository.

—oOo—
Name: Lost Symmetry

Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Benjamin Schäfer

Setting: Lovecraft Country in the Jazz Age of the 1920s

Product: Scenario
What You Get: 1.65 MB twelve-page, full colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: Sometimes the numbers add up to more than they should. 
Plot Hook: A missing brilliant mathematics student would never miss an exam, would he?
Plot Development: A missing friend, grumpy faculty staff,something for the bookhound in your life, sir?, and the Mythos comes home.
Plot Support: A new Mythos tome, two handouts, and a set of floorplans.

Pros
# Simple set-up
# Easily adapted to other times and periods
# One-shot or one-session scenario
# Potential addition to a Lovecraft Country campaign
# Nicely curmudgeonly NPCs
# Easy to run with little preparation
# Potential investigator introduction to the Mythos
# Could be played one-on-one
# Cinematic feel to a fun climax
# Possible sequel to Spark of Life

Cons# Needs editing
# Underdeveloped in places
# Why do the police turn up?
# No Sanity rewards

Conclusion
# Needs editing
# Simple, straightforward scenario with a cinematic climax 
# Decent one-shot or introduction to Lovecrafian investigative roleplaying

Between October 2003 and October 2013, Chaosium, Inc. published a series of books for Call of Cthulhu under the Miskatonic University Library Association brand. Whether a sourcebook, scenario, anthology, or campaign, each was a showcase for their authors—amateur rather than professional, but fans of Call of Cthulhu nonetheless—to put forward their ideas and share with others. The programme was notable for having launched the writing careers of several authors, but for every Cthulhu Invictus, The Pastores, Primal State, Ripples from Carcosa, and Halloween Horror, there was a Five Go Mad in Egypt, Return of the Ripper, Rise of the Dead, Rise of the Dead II: The Raid, and more...

The Miskatonic University Library Association brand is no more, alas, but what we have in its stead is the Miskatonic Repository, based on the same format as the DM’s Guild for Dungeons & Dragons. It is thus, “...a new way for creators to publish and distribute their own original Call of Cthulhu content including scenarios, settings, spells and more…” To support the endeavours of their creators, Chaosium has provided templates and art packs, both free to use, so that the resulting releases can look and feel as professional as possible. To support the efforts of these contributors, Miskatonic Monday is an occasional series of reviews which will in turn examine an item drawn from the depths of the Miskatonic Repository.

—oOo—
Name: Church of Chiropteran Wisdom

Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Sal North

Setting: England Jazz Age of the 1920s

Product: Scenario
What You Get: 733.72 Kb seven-page, full colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: Shopping for sacrifices? 
Plot Hook: A missing person case points to a jewel on the English coast.
Plot Development: Several missing persons and a batty old shop.
Plot Support: Two NPCs, a new monster, and a Mask of the Crawling Chaos.

Pros
# Simple, location based scenario
# Easily adapted to other times and periods 
# One-shot or side-quest scenario
# Potential addition to Masks of Nyarlathotep

Cons# Unedited
# Underdeveloped plot
# Paucity of clues
# Underwhelming hook
# Tamworth, ‘Surrey’?

Conclusion
# Underdeveloped 
# Needs editing
# A Keeper project to improve?

1974 is an important year for the gaming hobby. It is the year that Dungeons & Dragons was introduced, the original RPG from which all other RPGs would ultimately be derived and the original RPG from which so many computer games would draw for their inspiration. It is fitting that the current owner of the game, Wizards of the Coast, released the new version, Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, in the year of the game’s fortieth anniversary. To celebrate this, Reviews from R’lyeh will be running a series of reviews from the hobby’s anniversary years, thus there will be reviews from 1974, from 1984, from 1994, and from 2004—the thirtieth, twentieth, and tenth anniversaries of the titles—and so on, as the anniversaries come up. These will be retrospectives, in each case an opportunity to re-appraise interesting titles and true classics decades on from the year of their original release.

—oOo—
The year 2000 is significant in the gaming hobby because it marked the beginning of the ‘d20 Era’, a period of unparalleled creativity by publishers large and small—and tiny, as they used the d20 System to power game after game, scenario after scenario, supplement after supplement, genre after genre. Some new, some old, some simple reskins. And there are publishers twenty or so years later who are still writing using the d20 System. As much as publishers explored different worlds and settings using the d20 System and its System Reference Document, at its heart was one roleplaying game, launched in the year 2000—Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition. Just as Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition is the top roleplaying game today, Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition was the top roleplaying game of its day, and the advent of the d20 System let other publishers play in the Dungeons & Dragons sandpit, just as many had back in the early days of the hobby. The aim of this series of reviews is not to review Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition itself, for that would not necessarily make for an interesting review. Rather it is to look at some of the interesting titles which came out of the d20 System boom that started twenty years ago.

From the off, the d20 System allowed publishers to ride the wave of popularity that was Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition, and that started at Gen Con 2000 with adventures from publishers such as Atlas Games. Better known for roleplaying games such as Over the Edge and Feng Shui: Action Movie Roleplaying, Atlas Games would launch its Penumbra line of d20 System supplements with one of the very first adventures for Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition—Three Days to Kill. What is notable about Three Days to Kill—beyond the fact that it was the first scenario published for Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition, it that it was written by John Tynes, then better known as co-designer of Unknown Armies and the Delta Green setting for Call of Cthulhu. So what you had was a horror writer designing a fantasy adventure and that is evident in certain ‘Grim Dark’ tone to Three Days to Kill. The other notable fact about Three Days to Kill is that it sees me as a reviewer returning to where I started, having reviewed the scenario in 2001 at RPG.net. Of course this will be a more likely occurrence as we proceed into the next decade, but this does not mean that such titles are not worth reviewing or revisiting.

Designed for a party of player characters of First Level to Third Level, Three Days to Kill takes place in what is intended to be an isolated area in the Dungeon Master’s campaign. This is in and around the valley known as the Deeps, at the heart of which is Deeptown, a major stop along a long east-west trade route through a range of  mountains. The town’s primary interest is trade and supporting the constant movement of caravans which travel east and west along the trade road. The town council—as well as the Trade Circle, made up of Deeptown’s most important businessmen and which has a strong, if subtle grip on the town—are particularly concerned about maintaining the flow of goods and money through Deeptown. This includes accepting the presence of religions and faiths which would not be accepted elsewhere, such as the Sect of Sixty, which seeks to deceive and seduce through pleasure and hedonism. As long as no one temple or faith upsets the balance of trade through the town, they are allowed to continue ministering to their flocks. Upset or threaten that balance and the Town Council will see to it that the priests are driven from the town, the faith’s temple burned to the ground, and the faith banned in Deep Town. That is until the faith can renegotiate terms more favourable to the Town Council for the return of their priests to Deep Town.

Whilst there is an obvious balance being maintained in Deeptown, there is a more subtle counterpart beyond the earthen ramparts of the town. This is not maintained by the town council or the Trade Circle, but by a half dozen bandit ‘lords’ who prey upon the merchant caravans travelling in and out of Deeptown and the Deeps. They have learned to carry out well-executed assaults on the richer caravans, perhaps killing a few guards, but leaving travellers and merchants alive, in the case of the latter, perhaps to target them again on the way out of the valley or on a return journey. What they avoid is committing massacres. That only attracts the attention of the authorities in Deeptown and increases the likelihood of their retaliating.

As Three Days to Kill opens, neither of the top two bandit lords are happy with this balance of power. One has learned that his rival is seeking an alliance with outsiders to crush his forces and so take control of bandit operations in the valley. In order to counter this, he plans to hire a team of outside thugs, equip them, and have them assault the location where the rival is meeting his potential new allies. Not necessarily to kill, but to disrupt the meeting and in the process, undermine the alliance before it gets off the ground. Enter the player characters…

The player characters arrive in Deeptown almost like everyone else—accompanying or guarding a merchant caravan. They arrive just in time for the Festival of Plenty, an annual event put on by the Sect of Sixty. This is a pageant of wine, song, and ribald debauchery culminating in a performance of Passion of Arimbo, a popular folk tale about a farmer who follows a jolly devil into the rings of Hell. The player characters are free to participate in the festival or even work it as guards, and the scenario caters for either option. There is opportunity here for plenty of roleplaying for both the Dungeon Master and her players, enough for a session before the main plot comes into play. Alternatively, if the Dungeon Master wanted to run a shorter session, she could ignore the Festival of Plenty entirely and cut to the main plot. That though would be to miss a certain plot payoff if any of the player characters do get involved in the event’s debauchery, especially given who and what the Sect of Sixty actually worship.

The main plot to Three Days to Kill sees the player characters armed and equipped by one bandit lord to strike at another. The arming and equipping includes magical items as well as mundane ones, but the magical ones are very specific and for a specific purpose, all to be used during the assault. They consist of a Wand of Fireballs—with a single charge; an Orb of Sight—which provides low light, telescopic, and even X-ray vision; twenty Flare Pebbles; and a Sleep Arrow. A Wand of Fireballs with one charge rather than a Fireball Scroll because it models a rocket launcher; the Orb of Sight because it models low-light or IR Goggles; the Flare Pebbles because they model flashbang grenades; and the Sleep Arrow because it models a stun grenade or knockout dart. What this all models and what the climax of Three Days to Kill models—as it clearly states—is a Tom Clancy-style special ops mission in a fantasy setting. So the player characters will need to reconnoitre the villa where the meeting is taking place and plan how to carry out the assault. To that end the author includes advice on the strategies the player characters can use and their players can make skill rolls for their preparations as necessary.

Only on the journey to the villa will the player characters begin to learn that there is something amiss. There are others, priests of the Temple of the Holy Order from Deeptown, who were aware of the meeting between the bandit lord and his prospective allies—and they paid for it with their lives. However, this should not stop the party from continuing with its mission. And ideally, this mission should go as clockwork up until the point where it does not and all hell breaks loose—literally. For the truth of the matter is that the bandit lord is seeking an alliance with diabalists and when the player characters attack, they bring allies of their own. Ones that the player characters will not be expecting and are probably ill-equipped to deal with. And then there is the issue of just who killed the priests of the Temple of the Holy Order from Deeptown…

As written, Three Days to Kill consists of a simple background and a straightforward plot—at least as far as the player characters are concerned. In fact, the plot is quite complex and this will come out in play as it complications will disrupt the plans of the player characters, the bandit lord, and the Sect of Sixty. The background is detailed, covering the Deeptown and some of the surrounding Deeps valley, but is not specific, which has a couple of ramifications. One ramification is that Three Days to Kill is easily adapted to the setting of the Dungeon Master’s choice, or indeed the fantasy roleplaying game of the Game Master’s choice. This is because the author leaves plenty of scope for the Dungeon Master to supply that flavour, whether that is renaming the Sect of Sixty and the Temple of the Holy Order or relocating Deeptown to fit her own campaign world. The other ramification is that beyond a certain grim tone to the situation and plot, Three Days to Kill is lacking in flavour.

For the players, Three Days to Kill presents an interesting challenge, especially with low Level player characters. The instinct for players and thus their characters is to kill, after all, it goes to the heart of dungeoneering and thus Dungeons & Dragons. Now should the player characters decide not to obey their instructions and rush in, events are likely to backfire on them. Once they attack and events escalate, should they stay and fight, then again events are likely to backfire on them. Three Days to Kill is very much a get in, perform the strike, and get out again mission, just like the special forces missions it is modelling.

Physically, Three Days to Kill is well written and nicely illustrated. The artwork of  Toren Atkinson, Scott Reeves, and David White gives the book a gritty, grainy feel which hints at the dirty nature of the situation in and around Deeptown. Yet the layout does feel cramped and the maps—obviously done using Pro Fantasy Software’s Campaign Cartographer 2—do not match that style. Some of them do feel too clean and unfussy in comparison to the artwork and sometimes feel too big for what they are depicting. The rest of the maps are more detailed and convey more information.

At the time of its release, Three Days to Kill, looked rather sparse in comparison to other adventures. After all, there is not a lot of plot and what there is takes up barely a third of the scenario. Nor is there much in the way of flavour beyond the grim, dark tone. And yet there is both adaptability and utility in Three Days to Kill, it is easier to use because of it, and not only is both plot and assault on the summit well-handled, they are supported with further plot hooks and consequences which make the setting of Deeptown and the Deeps  easier to add to a campaign. Although Three Days to Kill might be more memorable for being the first scenario published for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition, than for its adventure, it does mean that adventure is not handily serviceable.

Far out beyond the Humanity Sphere lie the Glogotha. Located deep in the Dust Spheres, the remnants of alien civilisations ground up in the vast and ancient Everwar between the mysterious Erix Absolution and the powerful Concordant of Shelz, their names conjure up  images of wonder and great danger—the Paradox Spire, the Grove, the Resurrection Hive, the Delphia, the Glass Labyrinth… They are tombs of fallen cultures—mortuaries, amouries, data centres, research bases, and more. They can be surface facilities, or underground or under deep oceans of liquids other than water, orbital bases, ringworlds, or even dyson spheres. Many hold great secrets and ancient technologies which the Overseers, the caretakers of the Human Sphere, mysteriously covet. Recovering such technologies—fragments, baubles, and mechanisms—is the province of Scavengers.

Getting to the Golgotha requires permission from the Overseers as well as a Star Map. This is because they control access to the esoteric subspace fractures which enable Portal Ships to travel between worlds at faster than light speed—a science that along with true A.I. that mankind was unable to discover or develop before the Overseers made contact. Armed with a contract and a Star Map, the Overseers will plot a Scavenger team a course down the Fractureways out from inner machine planets, past the verdant pleasure worlds, sanctioned war worlds, and separatist fringe worlds to the dead empires of long ago where both the Erix Absolution and the Concordant of Shelz have forbidden humanity to go. Once they reach their target they have limited amount of time before either the Erix Absolution or the Concordant of Shelz becomes aware of their presence. Neither may notice every time a Scavenger team lurks on the fringes of their war, but when they do, the only thing the team can do is run. The technology of the Erix Absolution and the Concordant of Shelz is highly advanced and there is little that Humanity can do in the face of it. This is a danger that the Scavengers are likely to encounter as they are fleeing the Golgotha. There are other dangers they may face before then—the dangerous environments of each and every Golgotha, internal countermeasures and guardians of the facility where the desired mechanism is believed to be located, rival Scavenger teams, pirates, and other aliens with an interest in the Golgotha. And then there is the question of why a Scavenger team would go to such lengths and face such dangers to recover ancient technology for an incredibly advanced race? In the post-scarcity Human Sphere, simply enhancements to the personal genome—modifications, adjustments, and boosts—beyond human technology. The question is why? What does each Scavenger want from these enhancements? Who does he need to be better than?

This is the set-up for Golgotha: A Science Fiction Game of Exploration and Discovery at the Edge of Known Space published by Fire Ruby Designs following a successful Kickstarter campaign. It is a standalone Science Fiction humanocentric roleplaying game which uses The Black Hack for its mechanics. So it is an Old School Renaissance roleplaying game which uses simple, player-facing rules—that is, the players roll, but the Game Master never does—for faster play. Humans are the only player character species and the players have four Classes to choose from. These are Blade or warriors; Ghosts, adjusted by the Overseers to be capable of manipulating Glimmers, the remnants of Golgotha control architecture (this leaves them weak though); Pathfinders are scouts, navigators, pilots, and reconnaissance specialist able to spot ambushes and deal with Golgotha countermeasures; and Operators, who handle negotiations and similar situations, but also know how to make their escape. To create a character, a player decides on a concept, name, and past, and rolls three six-sided dice in order for the traditional six attributes—Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma—with any roll of fourteen or more meaning that the next attribute value is set at seven. A character also starts play with a Talent from his selected Class, a unique piece of gear, and a Drive. The latter is his motivation for becoming a Scavenger and once per session grants his player a reroll if he can persuade the Game Master that the Drive is relevant.

Name: Earond Jackson
Class: Ghost Level: 1
Drive: To discover the secrets of the Golgotha
Hit Points: 5

Strength 13, Dexterity 13, Constitution 13, Intelligence 16, Wisdom 7, Charisma 16

Ability: Use Glints (Advantage)
Talents: Decipher (+1)
Weapon Proficiencies: Small Weapons (d3)
Equipment: Condensed Needle Pistol, a couple of interesting hats

To the player-facing rules of The Black Hack, the rules in Golgotha add rules for Portal Ships—ships are treated the same way as player characters—and the dangers of both space and of Golgotha, such as Countermeasures, the traps left behind by the original builders or occupiers of the now sepulchral planets. When exploring Golgotha, the Ghost Class has some advantage in that he has been given the ability by the Overseers to access remnants of Golgotha technology known as Glimmers. These being able to observe other parts of a Golgotha, hide the presence of a Scavenger party, illuminate an area, and so on. In mechanical terms these are simple attribute tests as per The Black Hack, often at varying degrees of difficulty for different effects. So the Access Glimmer is a Wisdom check which lets a Ghost open any door he touches, but at a +3 penalty to remotely open any door he has passed through in a Golgotha, and at a +5 penalty to open any door he knows about in a Golgotha. 

Additional threats come in the form of fellow scavengers like the Octos, who always operate in the armoured environment suits which contain the liquid atmosphere they need to survive and who strip and break down Golgotha to rebuild shell-like installations; Sharks, another aquatic species which needs breather masks to survive and goggles to protect their delicate eyes, which take any species it can as slaves; and the Goblin-like pirates with their multifaceted eyes and weird gait. Although the Scavengers are unlikely to encounter either the Erix or the Shelz, they may well encounter their client species. The Erix client species have an insectoid look to them and are typically led by the diamond-hard Erix machines, whilst the Shelz client species have a demonic cast to them. Whilst the client species are easy enough to use, the independent races are more difficult to bring into play, primarily because their motivations are not really developed. For example, the Goblins are described as pirates, but pirates for whom, why are they pirates, and what do they do with the captives and plunder they take?

The point of visiting the Golgotha is of course to find ancient, alien technology. Here Arthur C. Clarke’s Third Law which states that ‘Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.’ comes into play, the Game Master being advised to handle the various fragments, baubles, and mechanisms hopefully waiting to be found in the Golgotha as flavour  and as mystery rather than something quantifiable. This might not work in other Science Fiction roleplaying games, but in Golgotha the point is that such technology is not intended to be used by the player characters as in those other roleplaying games, but handed over to their Overseer patrons in return for upgrades. 

A typical Scavenger mission follows a three act structure. Taking up the contract and getting to the Golgotha, exploring the Golgotha itself, and then escaping before either the Erix or the Shelz become aware of the Scavenger’s presence. The design of Golgotha, much like the Scavengers’ exploration to find particular artefacts—or magical items—shows all of the hallmarks of the dungeoneering style of play and design of the ruleset the roleplaying game uses and inherited from the very first roleplaying game. Yet it differs in that obtaining the artefacts is for their use as currency with which to purchase upgrades—as opposed to straight Experience Points—and in that the design of Golgotha is done more by node than by room after connected room. This does not mean that travel between locations is necessarily ignored, but rather that it can be used for purposes of drama or flavour, and further, that Golgotha can be designed without needing to draw maps. Golgotha does include a few tables to help the Game Master design her own in terms of architecture and location, but these are more spurs for the imagination. Once a delve into a Golgotha is complete, it is time for the Scavengers to make their escape to the nearest fracture in space in the last act, and this is made all the more dramatic by the possibility that the Erix or the Shelz might appear. This is handled with a timing die, rolled as  a Usage die—beginning with a twenty-sided die and reduced to the next smaller die type on a roll of a one or two down to a four-sided die—which the Game Master has been rolling since the start of the mission whenever seems appropriate. Once one or two is rolled on the last die one or both of the combatants in the Everwar comes to investigate the intrusion in what it regards is its territory. 

If the Scavengers are successful, the Overseers will reward them with upgrades and genetic augmentations. In game terms, this is essentially a player character going up a Level, but thematically it is a nice explanation. However, it is not without its problems, and Scavengers may be left with genetic quirks as well as upgrades.

Rounding out Golgotha is a selection of example Golgotha, including the Hall of Whispers, a series of blisters on the wall of a chasm of the third moon of the gas giant Pellos, where physically dense memory core may be found, and the Inseminator, an industrial complex buried under acidic, toxic sludge in the crust of a greenhouse planet in the Suul system where an A.I. which controlled a massive breeding programme is believed to be found. Each of the twelve Golgotha, all written by Kickstarter backers, includes a summary, a description of its structure, function, quirks, guardians and other dangers, example encounters, and what might be found there. All are ready to run with some preparation upon the part of the Game Master, but all together, the dozen can serve as the basis for a campaign.

At its heart, Golgotha is an excuse to do dungeon bashes or delves in space. After all, it is a Class and Level system and the Golgotha are abandoned tombs or crypts—but with an advanced technological look and feel. Golgotha does not go out of its way to hide this, but instead presents a compelling set-up and thus the reasons why for its playing style. Apart from the Golgotha, the setting is only given cursory detail, leaving the Game Master to develop that herself. In fact, she has carte blanche and scope to develop the universe of Golgotha as she wants. Yet if there is anything really missing from Golgotha it is inspiration for player character motivation. There is mechanical motivation provided—that is, get artefacts, get augmented, go up a Level, but not personal motivation in the context of the setting. Instead it leaves it up to the player and the Game Master to decide what such motivations might be, and whilst that is obviously possible, it does feel as if both are coming to the decision cold. Thus some examples, some context, could have made the process easier. Similarly, some of the motivations of the various independent races could have been better developed and given context. 

Physically, Golgotha is a well presented book. It is well written and comes with a lot good full colour artwork that captures the feel of exploring and plundering the abandoned worlds of ancient civilisations. Overall, Golgotha: A Science Fiction Game of Exploration and Discovery at the Edge of Known Space combines the simple mechanics of The Black Hack with a compelling set-up which brings classic dungeon delving style of play—with its mysteries and dangers—to a high Science Fiction setting.

In Call of Cthulhu, sea voyages are never the restful trips that a sea cruise would suggest. Ever since ‘The Mauretania’ from Asylum & Other Tales, passenger liners have been hotbeds of Mythos activity, whether a passenger is inadvertently transporting an artefact of great importance and cultists want it back, the passengers are being prepared as a sacrifice to the Elder God of a madman’s choice, or the ship comes across some strange island or ship which just should be there. Simply put, in Call of Cthulhu, sea travel is never safe. Especially not sea cruises. But what if the investigators had to get aboard a vessel which had already suffered such a disaster? What if it was already in port and under quarantine and they just had to get aboard? This is the situation at the start of Autophagia: Fear & Infection in from the High Seas.

Published by Stygian Fox, Autophagia is essentially a mash-up between The Poseidon Adventure and The Thing From Another World. It is set in the roleplaying game’s classic era of the Jazz Age and does deal with mature themes—often in interesting historical context—which will require players to take an equally mature attitude when playing through the scenario. Its story and events are all confined to the middle of the New York harbour. Here the Essexia, sister ship to the Mauretania and Lusitania, has been placed under quarantine and ordered to anchor offshore, following reports of an outbreak aboard ship of a disease which has already caused the deaths of several passengers. It is designed to be run as a single session of claustrophobic horror aboard an oddly deserted vessel. The first problem for the investigators is getting aboard, but the scenario more or less handwaves this. Similarly, it all but handwaves anything that the investigators do before anyone aboard—crew or passengers—spots them, reports their presence, and they find themselves being interviewed by the ship’s captain in his cabin. The question is why bother spending so much time discussing either, even in such a cursory manner before dismissing both, if the point of the set-up is to get the investigators to the actual start of the scenario in the captain’s cabin? 

Alternatively, why not include some hooks and thus sufficient reasons for the investigators to want to commit an act which would break international law—that is, break a quarantine almost on the high seas? Then, why not follow it up with some challenges for getting aboard ship and once aboard, for getting around unnoticed—for a time—trying to achieve something related to their reason for being aboard? Not necessarily for the investigators to fail, but rather to add drama and tension to what is a dramatic and tense situation. In fact, what is actually a clever and interesting, even novel set-up, but one that is completely, utterly, disappointingly ignored by the scenario.

Once aboard though, the captain—who is more than a little reminiscent of the captain of the Golgafrinchan Ark Fleet Ship B from The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, though he has a cat rather than a rubber duck—will more or less gives his permission for the investigators to help the ship’s doctor, who has been overwhelmed by outbreak of the strange disease and subsequent events. What they discover is a ship almost in lockdown, the ‘almost’ being determined, naturally, by social class, and then by whether or not the passenger is suffering from the strange illness which has beset the ship. Thus the ill of First and Second Class, along with everyone of Third Class have been confined to Third Class cabins. This gives the Essexia a strange, even unnerving deserted feel when normally its halls and desks would throng and bustle with passengers. 

The unaffected of First and Second have greater freedom of movement, including spending time and eating in the dining hall. This presents the opportunity to investigate and interact with a number of the passengers and so learn more of what has been happening aboard. It also gives the Keeper a few nicely done and each very different NPCs to portray and roleplay. Of course, as the investigators proceed apace with their enquiries, there is a countdown ticking away in the background, the likelihood of even more passengers coming down with the strange sickness aboard the Essexia, which exhibits as a strange desire to gnaw and pick at your own flesh. And of course, the possibility that the investigators might come down with it themselves...

Autophagia is decently presented, a slim full colour book illustrated with a mix of period photographs and the occasional piece of artwork. Period deck plans are also included, alongside floor plans of various cabin classes. A menu adds an element of verisimilitude, since the investigators are likely to be spending time in the First Class Dining Hall. Unfortunately, the editing feels rushed and underwhelming.

Autophagia is not a scenario for the inexperienced Keeper, for whilst there are only three acts, once the investigators have been let loose by the ship’s captain, it is fairly freeform in nature. As a one-night mystery, the Keeper may need to rush things towards the scenario’s climax, but run over more sessions than just the one and she will have to improvise a little more. Despite the disappointing failure to initially capitalise on the novelty and challenging nature of its set-up, Autophagia: Fear & Infection in from the High Seas is a decent scenario, delivering a vile dose of masticating horror.