Original Roleplaying Concepts
Reviewing Twilight Fables the other day has put me more into the mood for more OSR material. So Given I am spending my 100 Days of Halloween talking about witches, lets go with some other OSR witch material.As always I will be following my rules for these reviews.
Jeremy Reaban has published a good number of OSR Classes. While they say OSR on the cover they do have advancement tables for "Original," "First Edition," and "Basic/Expert" editions. So they are really quite flexible. I do note that the "Basic/Expert" table does go to level 20, so great for Labyrinth Lord and Basic Fantasy, but you will need to cut off at 14th level for Old School Essentials. Keep in mind these classes all predate OSE in publication.
All his classes, and indeed all his publications, are Pay What You Want. I like that. Given he is buying art for all of these at least pay him a couple of bucks.
Here are his classes that I think work well with the witch concept.
PDF. 15 pages. Color cover.
Covers the basics of the class including requirements, alignment, and all the other expected details. There is a section on the special abilities of the class, in this case abilities all witches get. Each witch also gets a "Focus" or what I have called a "Tradition" but could be read as archetype or even sub-class. These include Black Witch, Fire Witch, Frost Witch, Light Witch, Mind Witch, Storm Witch, Wander Witch, Water Witch, White Witch, Weather Witch, and Wood Witch for a total of 11 (two more would have been great). Each gets some powers and a selection of spells unique to that Focus.
This is followed by the advancement tables. Witches get bonus spells for high Charisma. And the selection of spell common to all witches.
There are 9 NPC witches of various levels and alignments.
There are some design notes that talk about the lack of an official witch class and how most of the OSR ones are all done by "one guy" (no idea who that could be).
We end with the OGL statement.
All in all a really fun class. If this one works for you then by all means go with it. There are a lot of great ideas here.
PDF. 14 pages. Black & White cover.
This is the "new" warlock from Reaban. I'll get to the "old" one in a bit.
Essentially this is a conversion of the 5.1 SRD warlock and I am totally happy with that. You get a Pact boon and a bunch of Eldritch Invocations.
Listed are various Patrons the warlock can take. We get the Fiend, the Great Nature Spirit (this one is new), Faerie Queen (or King), the Great Old One, Elemental Prince, and the Celestial. Each gives the warlock powers and a collection of spells.
This is followed by the advancement tables (with level titles!). Warlocks get bonus damage on their Eldritch Blast for high Charisma. And the selection of spells common to all warlocks.
There are 7 NPC warlocks and some design notes. The design notes in particular discuss why this is the second Warlock Reaban has done and how the old warlock is now the Kineticist.
PDF. 8 pages. Color cover.
This was the first OSR class done by Reaban and was originally called The Warlock. This class is a bit different. It is like a sorcerer in that has innate magic, but this is not due to bloodline. It has some blasty-like warlock powers, and some others making the class fairly unique.
There are the advancement tables (with level titles!). Kineticist get bonus damage on their Arcane Bolts for high Charisma.
It is a new idea and I really like it. This one is so early that there are no NPCs.
PDF. 6 pages. Black & White cover.
Ah. Now here is a class that is not all that witchy, but one that is likely to come up in any game where there are a lot of witches and demons. I have also played around with an exorcist class in the past and this one works so well for me I really don't think I need to do one now.
Exorcists are a bit warrior, bit cleric.
There are the advancement tables (with level titles!) but no NPCs yet in this one.
The class does exactly what is should do and does it well.
PC3 - The OSR Witch HunterPDF. 7 pages. Color cover.
Can't have witches and not expect a few witch hunters. Like many of the "witch hunter" classes you can find this one is not limited to hunting witches alone but any supernatural evil. Like the Exorcist this one is a combination of fighter and cleric, though more leaning on the fighter side (they are considered a sub-class of the fighter). They get a number of abilities to allow it to hunt down their prey and vanquish them.
The witch hunter also gets a Bard-like Lore ability and the ability to read magic. They can even turn undead at 3rd level.
There are the advancement tables (with level titles) for First Edition, Original Edition, Basic/Expert Edition, and Cyclopedic Edition (to 36th level).
PDF. 9 pages. Color cover.
This might be stretching my "witch" idea, but I did do a book, the Cult of Diana: The Amazon Witch, and I like to use this book with that one.
This one gives us the Amazon Warrior class. It is a fighter, but with a more athletic bend to it. The have to have minimum scores of 15 in Strength, Dexerity, AND Constitution. The Amazon Warrior can't use magic items unless that magic item is a weapon and provided to them by a god.
There are the advancement tables (with level titles) for First Edition, Original Edition, Basic/Expert Edition, and Cyclopedic Edition (to 36th level).
There are 10 NPCs including a Red Martian (nice!), Zenia, and "Crimson Sonia" who is 25th level.
There is also a section on the daughters of the gods and how they can generate ability scores. There are also role-playing notes on the children of gods.
All in all a really fun additional class.
PDF. 15 pages. Color cover.
A related class, this one has also been called the houri, the courtesan, the temptress, or the hetaera. It is a Charisma based class that uses charms. She is also a poisoner along with her other skills, so in many ways she is closer in nature to the thief or assassin.
There are the advancement tables (with level titles) for First Edition, Original Edition, and Basic/Expert Edition.
This one also has some new magic items. There are 19 NPCs.
PDF. 15 pages. Color cover.This class is another spellcasting class, this time ismanipulates the emotions of others. This class is a magic-user sub-class.
There are the advancement tables (with level titles) for First Edition, Original Edition, and Basic/Expert Edition. There is also spell advancement to the 7th level.
The best part of this class, at least for me, are the new spells. There 33 in total. Some come from the d20 SRD, but that is fine. They work great here.
There are only 2 new NPCs here.
And finally there are two new Witch Focuses for the Witch Class; a Desire Witch and a Dream Witch.
Works great for me to be honest.
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Lots of great classes here and I didn't even review them all.
.jpg "Witch (3pp+PRD)")
Back in August, I reviewed the Echelon Reference Series: Witch Spells which covers every witch spell for Pathfinder. It is a great series that represents a near Sisyphean effort to track all these spells. An effort that is only apparent once you dig into it. Tonight I thought I might go for their collection of witch class material. Basically, everything for the witch but the spells.As always I will be following my rules for these reviews.
Echelon Reference Series: Witch (3pp+PRD)
Again this one comes as two PDFs. One for Pathfinder and one for Pathfinder and all other Third Party material. The author points out that these are "living" documents as the material will be updated periodically.
Presently the Pathfinder book is 78 pages and the Pathfinder + 3PP book is 196 pages.
Both books follow the same format.
About the Echelon Reference Series
This give you an overview of not just these two books but the series as a whole. Explains the differences between the PRD (Pathfinder SRD) and PRD+3PP (Pathfinder SRD plus Third Party Publishers) and the multiple versions of various books.
This section also covers the issue of duplicate names; that is when one publisher calls something "X" and another publisher calls something "X" as well but they do different things. Also some things may have different names but do remarkably similar things. In both cases everything is here.
Classes and Archetypes
Covers the basic witch class and the published (and Open) archtypes. The PRD covers just material that is open from Paizo and can be found (for the most part) in the Pathfinder SRD. The PRD+3PP covers the same but also all of the Open 3PP material.
Class Features
For the witch, this covers all her Patrons and all the various Hexes she can take. This might be one of the more useful chapters in the book.
Other Options
Here we get favored class options, feats specifically for witches, and spell casting options. No spells since those are covered in multiple other Echelon books.
NPCs
What it says on the tin. The PRD has five and the PRD+3PP has the same five plus five more
Appendices
Not much here yet save for the Index and the OGL.
There is no art, nor is art required. This is a massive data dump designed for people that want only the crunch and none of the fluff.
This does not replace the products it gets its OGC from. The "source" products may have in-world examples or other materials that situate all of this to give proper perspective. This is the RAW OGC as is. For me? I use Section 15 of the OGL statement here as a shopping list. I use the original books/sources as my inspiration, but I sue this as my quick reference.
Looking forward to seeing what else is added!
Oh good another Mail Call Tuesday! They say great things come in small packages, so let's see what these small packages have for me today?
Up first I finally decided to do myself in Mini form from HeroForge. So here is DM Tim in 25 mm scale. Complete with a laptop, a stack of books, and my always-present giant ass mug of coffee. The only detail missing is the pencil behind my right ear.
I didn't care for their sneakers options so I am wearing my Gen X-mandated Doc Martens with yellow laces.
Might need to use this as "The Editor" in my Weirdly World News games.
I also grabbed my next to last 21st Century miniature reprint of the AD&D 1st Edition hardcovers. And this one is from the personal collection of Heidi Gygax.
Now I am just a Dungeoneers Survival Guide away from completing my set of the mini AD&D hardcover books. Though I doubt it will have the pedigree of my Dragonlance book.
We are getting much closer to Halloween now! It is cooler here in Chicago and I am ready for the seasons to change. Here at the Other Side, I am kicking up the witch topics hitting on products I have had for a while but have not reviewed or talked about.Tonight is a good case in point. I have had this particular product in both the OGL and Pathfinder versions for years. I have not found a group that it would work well for, however. There is a lot of material here that I can use in my witch worlds. But, well. Let me get into the products and you decide.
As always I will be following my rules for these reviews.
OGL (d20 3.5) and Pathfinder versions.
PDFs, both 72 pages of content (76 and 74 total respectively). Color covers and interior art.
For Mature Readers. Let's approach this one upfront. The art featured on the cover is a rather tame example of the art that can be found inside. Point blank, there is a lot of nudity here and lot of sexual situations. The entire idea of the Sisters of Rapture is a class of semi-divine spellcasters centered around love and sacred sex. If this is not your thing then best to back out now. Again I have struggled with how to use some of these concepts in my games.
We know that history has had temple prostitutes, sacred sex, and many pagan rituals involving fertility. There are historical examples to fit this book more so than say the martial arts monk side by side with a horse-riding paladin in a quasi-European Medieval setting.
Plus, and I want to be truthful here, there is a lot a great and well-written material here that begs to be used. So let's get to it. Also, why am I doing these along with witches?
Unless mentioned the OGL and Pathfinder sections are largely similar. They are not 100% the same, more like 90% but both deal with their source game where they need too.
Introduction
Here we are introduced to the central concept of this book. That of the power of love. We learn of the Sisters of Rapture, a "close-knit organization of warrior-priestesses, dedicated to preserving and protecting the ideals of the various goddesses of love, beauty, sex, passion and other related concepts."
In terms of RPG applications the author (and artist) T. Catt, points to the various artists of fantasy art.
Chapter One: Love's Blessed
Here we are introduced to the Sisters of Rapture base class, also known as the Rapturous. They are a bit of a fighter, a bit of divine spellcaster, and maybe some rogue added in. They are dedicated to the various goddess of love. Their raison d'être is to spread pleasure and love around their worlds.
Here we also get our first look at the art of T. Catt; mostly nude women. Now I just finished watching HBO's hits Rome and Game of Thrones, so this fits that aesthetic, but like I said it is not going to be for everyone.
In terms of 3.x OGL/Pathfinder classes, they have somewhat medium combat abilities, good Fort and Will saves, with low Reflex saves. They can cast spells up to the 9th level, same as all full casters. They also get a power every other level. Their spells are known as "Carnal Domain" Divine spells. They get d8 HD and can only be women of any species.
There is a limit on the number of spells they know like sorcerers. Their powers largely focus on and around their sex and sexuality. There are several "kiss" powers for example. I actually rather like the Kiss powers, I have used something similar and lets be honest history is repleat with various sorts of powerful or significant kisses.
Depending on the Goddess they follow they can gain different powers. So Aphrodite grants her Rapturous different powers than Freya. Freya in particular grants her Rapturous a "Righteous Rage" ability to Rage like a barbarian of half her level.
What does this sound like? Yeah. Witches and their patrons.
Chapter Two: Love's Chosen
This covers the various Prestige Classes. I mentioned before that I like Prestige Classes, I always have. These classes work well with this base class. Though I will point out that other classes should be able to qualify for these to be within the spirit of the d20 rules; these don't really do that.
The Inamorare is something like a muse. They get some Bard-like abilities (mostly inspiration) and of the five levels they advance in spell casting in three of them. The Patron Mother takes on the role of training the next generation by taking on a Rapturous apprentice. In this respect, she more similar to a cleric. The Spellswinger (and I admit I like that name) swings both ways, Divine and Arcane magic. NOW this Prestige Class does require that character be able to cast Rapturous and Arcane spells.Yes, they are all about sex magic. My favorite though might be the Stormsister. These Rapturous are the strong arm of the Sisters and they punish anyone that harms women or stops love.
The Pathfinder version also includes various archetypes for the base class. These include the Abbess (closer to her Goddess and church), Divine Virgin (celebrates the pure divine love and refrain from sex), and the Sacred Prostitute (think of the Epic of Gilgamesh),
Chapter Three: Love's Method
This covers skills and feats. For skills there is Knowledge (Carnal). I can't help but wonder if the author was familiar with the old AD&D Netbook Book of Unlawful Carnal Knowledge. No, don't go dig it up, it's not worth it. There is also Perform (Sexual Techniques) and various Professions.
Feats are an interesting lot and could have a lot of interesting applications. Blown Kiss, for example, allows the Rapturous to "blow a kiss" or deliver a touch spell/power attack at range.
The Pathfinder also covers various traits.
The next portion of this chapter covers the Carnal Domain Spells. There are only nine, but since the publication of this book there have been plenty of others that would work.
There are some magic items. The Rings of Faithfulness are certainly interesting.
Chapter Four: Love's Divinity
This chapter covers the various goddess of love, beauty, and sex. These include the expected Aphrodite/Venus, Isis, and Freya. Others are briefly mentioned. Shout outs to my favorites Astarte and Brigit. Additionally, we are presented with a "new" Goddess, Parvati.
The Pathfinder version is largely the same but I think a mention of the Goddess of Love Shelyn and her lovers Desna and Sarenrae should be in order here. I feel that their combined faiths would be perfect for the Sisters of Rapture. (I know these goddesses are not "open" in terms of the OGL so they could not be included in this book).
Chapter Five: Love's Order
This details the society and church organization of the Sisters of Rapture. This includes the religious practices of the Sisters and the roles they are play within the church organizations.
Chapter Six Love's Relations
It seems odd to call these creatures monsters, but they are creatures/people that are associated with or related too the Sisters of Rapture. There are the Theliel, the Archons (Angels) of Passion. The Beloved, undead victims of the Succubus. The Congress of the Wolf, an all-male group in opposition to the Sisters. We just call them the Patriarchy. There is Lileetha the Queen of the Succubi. The Half-Nymph and Huldra. The Pleasure Ooze looks like a woman but is really an ooze that wants to eat you. As does the Venus Mantrap.
I will say this for Pathfinder. The "Evolved" monster stat block makes it a lot easier to read than the base D&D 3.x one.
Appendix 1: Who's Who
This covers various Raprurous NPCs. Theophania Leandros the current Overmother, Althea Acarides a half-nymph Sister of Aphrodite, Saereid an elven Sister of Freya, Ninythys a human Sister of Isis, and Kamala Siddah a humanSister of Parvati.
Appendix 2: Modern Rapturous (OGL)
Here the books differ quite a bit. The OGL version covers the Modern d20 book and how the Sisters of Rapture exist in the modern age.
The OGL book ends with one of the most attractive-looking character sheets I have ever seen.
Appendix 2: The Nefer-Sefet (Pathfinder)
This is a special sect of Isis-worshiping Sisters of Rapture that attach themselves to an Arcane spell caster and bolster their powers. Essentially they are a living Meta-magic battery for these arcane spell casters.
Both the required OGL pages.
So. What to make of all of this.
Well, there is a lot of great mechanics here. The class is solid and even if you toned down the sexual aspect of it there is a lot her that is good to play. You have to ask though what is here that a cleric could not do or even should be able to do. This is a divine spellcaster. There are some powers, but I think a cleric could cover similar ground. I guess at some level the differences are the same between a cleric and this class and a wizard and a witch.
I also can't but help but admire the complete level of detail the creator has gone in on this. While others might scratching their head about where to use this class you know that T. Catt has thought about all of these things and more. It's obvious from the level of detail here.
Among other things, the half-nymph is a great idea, the various feats have some wonderful uses, and the creature section has some surprise hits.
For me there is a lot here that could be used with my various witches. I have reviewed Swine Witches and Worm Witches already in the last week. I have Green, Winter, Pagan, Hedge, evil and more witches in my own catalog, a sex(y) witch is not too far from any of those. Hell. Some of the material here would have worked just fine in my Pumpkin Spice Witch book.
I guess each Game Master has to decide on their own how to best use this sort of book.
Taking a break from Pathfinder for a bit on this first Monstrous Monday of Fall 2022 to do something a little darker. There is a chill in the air here in Chicago. I have a flannel shirt on and my mood ever shifts more and more to Halloween. A Halloween bestiary would be nice and thankfully Izegrim Creations has just the thing I need.
I swear the Kickstarter for this had just ended and I got my DriveThruRPG notification that the hardcovers were available.
So for this I Monstrous Monday, I want to talk about both the 5e and OSR versions of this book, the Print on Demand and PDF versions, plus all the other material that makes up this line.
Overview
Both books are huge volumes at 336 pages (5e) and 326 pages (OSR) each. The covers are full color as is all the interior art. And the art is fantastic.
Both books have a solid 5e aesthetic to them; colorful art and backgrounds, text describing the creature and its place in the environment/land/myths, and followed by a stat block.
The 5e book features a standard-looking 5e stat block, the OSR one is largely a modified Basic-era stat block. It includes everything you would expect along with descending and ascending AC, an entry for THAC0, and XP. The art for both books is the same. There is a good reason for this, the OSR version was added on a little bit later in the Kickstarter. The 5e version, with art, was done before the kickstart began (minus some edits I am told) so adding on the OSR version was a matter of adding the new stat blocks. One nitpick there are listings for "DCs" in the OSR version for magic item creation (more on that later). I would have preferred something that felt a little more pre-2000.
Now in most situations, I would fear translation errors, but the author Roderic Waibel had already developed that very successful Chromatic Dungeons RPG (reviewed here) which is solid OSR. So I know he knows OSR. My only gripe is kinda wanted the OSR stat blocks to look as nice as the 5e ones! But that is only a gripe for people that own both.
Like many of Waibel's publications we get nice sidebar discussions from the intelligent and rather civilized Gnoll "Fleabag." It is a very nice touch (I have done something similar with my 'From the Journal of Larina Nix') and it gives these (and his other books) character.
Regardless of which one you get (get both!) you are in for a treat.
I grabbed both and will be using the OSR version in my Old-School Essentials game. My oldest grabbed the 5e version and is using it in his weekly 5e game. So far he says it is great and he loves all the different sorts of monsters it offers.
The Fables
The name of the book is Twilight Fables. So you can expect that these are monsters from various myths, legends, and tales. And you would be 100% correct. Waibel has done his reading and there are a lot of great creatures here. Even ones that might be familiar get new life and feel "new."
For example, I mentioned one of my favorites, the Basajaun who appears in three different monster books.
Each one is a little different and yet each one 'feels' right. Perfect for DMs that want a familiar, yet different creature.
The creatures largely come from the myths, legends, and folklore of Europe. This is also what is advertised and leads to the logical assumption of Twilight Fables of other lands for future volumes. One for Africa, one for Asia, one for the Americas, all are possible.
In addition to the monsters, there are various legendary NPCs like Baba Yaga, Beowulf, Cailleach Beira, Cú Chulainn, Guy of Warwick, King Arthur, Little Red Riding Hood, Merlin, Morgan Le Fay, Robin Hood, Scáthach, Queen Úna of Faerie, and Väinämöinen. So yeah. Lots.
There is a section on Mythological Treasures and Magic items. This includes some rules on how to make magic items as well. It is a very nice value add. You saw this sort of thing with the old Mayfair "Fantastic Treasures" and something you see Troll Lord Games do with their Monster and Treasure books.
Both books also have rules for new character species (wanna play a Pech? You can!) and for 5e there are class options such as Warlock patrons and cleric domains.
There is even a small adventure (20 pages) to introduce these new monsters.
The Monsters
All that is gravy. The real meat here are the monsters.
In both cases, the monsters take up full pages. This includes the background and descriptions, the stat blocks, and whatever else is involved with this particular creature such as "Lore & Rumors", any special treasures, habitat, behaviors, and more. In some cases, the material bleeds over to another entry, but not so much as to be an issue.
There are, by my count, nearly 220 monsters here ranging in HD from 1-1 to 30+ (OSR) and CR 1/8 to 30 (5e). So plenty of creatures to challenge any level of characters.
I have to say these are great books and well worth grabbing for your games, 5e or OSR, or both. There is a lot of material here and plenty to keep many groups engaged for some time.
Extras
When you get the digital copy from DriveThruRPG you also get a bunch of tokens that can be printed and used in f2f table games or digitally online. It is another value add this game offers. There is also an RTF version of the book, a printer-friendly/no background version, and maps for the included adventure.
If you love monsters like I do then this is a must-buy.
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 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.
Name: Fork in the RoadPublisher: Chaosium, Inc.James Higgins / September 26, 2022
In the summer of 1970, the launch of the humor magazine National Lampoon was not going well. In his memoir of his time as publisher of the Lampoon, Matty Simmons observed that the first six months of the magazine’s existence were troubled ones: “By the fifth issue, the magazine was floundering. It was funny but haphazard. Circulation, after a first issue [i.e., March 1970] sale of 225,000, was now lingering around the 175,000 mark. Advertising was minimal. But some interesting things were happening.” (To put these numbers in perspective, Esquire‘s monthly circulation rate in summer 1970 was nearly 1.2 million.)
Those interesting things included increasing orders from college bookstores, a signal that the magazine was gaining popularity with young people. Dissatisfied with what he felt was artwork that failed to make the magazine stand out on newsstands, Simmons took charge of the cover for the September 1970 issue, commissioning Sagebrush Studios to create a garish red-and-yellow color scheme that promised (among other things) “Raquel Welch Undressed.” The cover showcased Minnie Mouse in disarray: “Minnie flashed tiny little titties covered somewhat discreetly by flowery pasties.”
Two days after the September issue went on sale, Walt Disney sued the Lampoon for $8 million (eventually dropping the suit in exchange for a promise by the magazine to never again misappropriate Disney characters). But the September issue was a turning point, as circulation thereafter began to rise. A standout feature was “College Concert Cut-Ups,” a parody of Archie Comics created by Michel Choquette, a Canadian from Montreal who ultimately would spend three years at the magazine and contribute some of its most celebrated comic book parodies.
32-years-old in 1970, Choquette was knowledgeable about the rock ‘n’ roll music scene, including one of the most idiosyncratic bands then performing, Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention. In 1970, the group released two albums, Burnt Weeny Sandwich and Weasels Ripped My Flesh. Both relied on freeform, avant-garde-flavored compositions that were the antithesis of the songs then appearing on the Top 40 singles charts. Along with poking fun at the idea of wholesome, Midwestern college kids being subjected to Zappa’s anything-goes approach to music (and life), “College Concert” found humor in the vagaries of life on the road for a rock band, a theme that Zappa was to cover in-depth in his 1971 movie 200 Motels.
The lead artist for “College Concert” was Joe Orlando, a veteran of the comic book industry who, in 1985, would be made the Vice President of DC Comics. Assisting with the art was Henry Scarpelli, who in fact went on to work for Archie Comic Publications, and Peter Bramley, the Lampoon’s Art Director.
Alas, there is no record of what Zappa thought of “College Concert,” but he must have liked it to some degree, as he contributed to Choquette’s comic book history of the 1960s, the Someday Funnies (which, unfortunately, didn’t see print until 2011).
James Higgins grew up in upstate New York and, like many baby boomers, thrived on a steady diet of sci-fi, fantasy, and horror content in movies, TV, and print media. Now retired, he devotes his days to excavating and examining pop culture artifacts from the Cold War era, both to generate nostalgia among his peers and to ensure that newer generations of young minds are themselves irreparably warped.
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 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.
Name: ContactPublisher: Chaosium, Inc.
A couple of nights ago I reviewed a Worm Witch. Tonight, why not a swine witch?This preview for the Runewild Setting is worth the time to download.
As always I will be following my rules for these reviews.
Runewild Preview 1: Missus Switch, Swine Witch
PDF. 8 pages. Color cover and interior art. Price: Free.
This small 8-page book (1 cover, 1 ad, 1 page of OGL) introduces us to the Ruenwild setting I reviewed last year.
We are given a little bit of background on the Runewild (coming soon to Kickstarter!) and the witches of the Runewild.
We are also introduced to the titular Missus Switch, something known as a "Swine Hag" (yes there are stats) and a small background "Adventure," actually an adventure location. Runewild is a hex crawl-friendly setting for 5e.
For free we get a good introduction to the Runewild and Missus Switch.
It would play well with the Worm Witch and Wickerpunk books.
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. 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.
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Pokémon is one of those huge intellectual properties and franchises that has never had a roleplaying game. Arguably it is too big to have something as small as a roleplaying game and arguably a roleplaying game is too small a vehicle to really push the brand or really expand its reach. Yet, whilst Pokémon has never had a roleplaying devoted to its world of Pokémon Trainers catching and training Pokémon to battle other Pokémon for sport, it has had a storytelling game designed to be played by children aged between six and eight and run by their parents. Published in 1999, the Pokémon Jr. Adventure Game was designed by Wizards of the Coast with the publisher planning to release twelve titles in the series. Unfortunately, despite it be a big seller for the publisher, only the first entry in the series, Pokémon Jr. Adventure Game #1: Pokémon Emergency was released.
Time to move to 5e for something a little more flavorful. One of my favorite themes is the struggle of paganism vs the rise of monotheism. The dark twisted child of this struggle is Folk Horror. This new book looks like covers a little bit of all the above.As always I will be following my rules for these reviews.
PDF. 276 pages. Color cover. Black & White (as appropriate) interior art.
First things first. I love this name. I am kicking myself for not coming up with it first.
We get an introduction that, "Wickerpunk is where heroic fantasy and folk horror meet." Interesting premise.
Chapter 1: What is Wickerpunk
Here we learn how a "Wickerpunk" game differs from your normal heroic fantasy. It is not grim-dark, but it is dark. Nature is more dangerous, strange pagan gods still roam the land, and the locals still practice forgotten rites and ceremonies.
The author also lets us know that "wickerpunk" could be called "wyrdpunk" due to horror elements added to the game. This is not quite a gothic horror, but we can see that genre from here. The author is careful to let us know this is not horror and that horror-fiction and wickerpunk are cousins, not siblings. But kissing cousins to be sure.
Like my fascination with Pagans vs. Monotheists, this book covers the Wyld vs. Industry. The extension of this is Arcane vs. Divine magic. Where one is wrong and the other is a gift. My "old-faith vs. new-faith" is even covered later on.
There is a lot here, more than I will detail in this review, but suffice to say there is a lot of great ideas here on setting up your games.
Just under 25 pages I am now wanting to rip out the roots of my "War of the Witch Queens" campaign to add more of these ideas.
Chapter 2: Campaign Elements
This chapter details how a wickerpunk campaign affects your rules. up first is alignment. Law and Chaos are replaced by Industry and Wyld. Good and evil are replaced by Benevolence and Malice. Again...I want to use this instead of what I am using now.
Planes of existence have little use here since all that matters is the struggle of Industry and Wyld in the world of humans.
This chapter also covers various time periods from Stone Age to Victorian. And adventures from Mysteries, Treasure Seeking, and exploration among the eight presented.
There are some encounter tables which include types, places and motivations.
Chapter 3: Players and Characters
This chapter covers the 5e base classes and how they are altered in a wickerpunk game; both in terms of Wyld and Industry. These changes are not really mechanical, but rather thematic. They also include player hooks, example adventures, enemy hooks and NPC hooks. Throughout the book, inspirational reading or viewing is presented in a sidebar.
The same is done for the main PC species.
Chapter 4: Monsters
This chapter takes the types of monsters and discusses how they can be used in a wickerpunk game. There are more details on fey, fiends and undead as expected, but nearly every type of monster is considered. It is very flavorful. There is not much or anything in the way of "crunch" or game mechanics, but honestly, it is not needed here since the material is so good. It reminds me a bit of the old Ravenloft materials.
Chapter 5: Enemy Organisations
What is "The Wicker Man" without Lord Summerisle and his cult? Or "Children of the Corn" without the children? Not much really. This chapter covers the various organizations, or Cults and Cult Hunters. The PCs find themselves between the Wyld Cults (and Gods) and the Industry Inquisition.
Yes, this chapter also includes ideas for witches (even though 5e does not have a real witch class).
Chapter 6: Magic and Technology
The tools of the Wyld and Industry. There are some new ideas for magic items and spells, but only one spell is presented, "The Evil Eye."
Chapter 7: Sample Campaigns
There is a sample campaign here, the Island of Eye. Which looks a lot like England. Detailed here are what the humans and the older inhabitants of the land are doing. Plenty of locations and adventure hooks are detailed here. As well as plenty of interesting NPCs
Chapter 8: Appendix N
A nod to the famous Appendix N in the 1st Ed AD&D DMG. This covers various campaign periods. Each section includes movies, novels, television, comics, and video games. With commentary.
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There is very, very little game-specific information here. If you are looking for mechanics or "crunch" then you are likely to be disappointed. But if you are looking for something more thematic or "fluff" then this is fantastic.
This is also this book's greatest unadvertised strength. It can be used with any version of D&D you like. While reading I kept thinking about how can I use this with say Old-School Essentials or even B/X D&D and the answer is "Easy." In fact one of the few actual bits of game material, the Evil Eye spell, is something I did years ago in my first witch book. But even then the conversion is super simple.
There are a lot of things I can use here for my War of the Witch Queens campaign, but I would also suspect that any D&D 5e DM could use these ideas for their Ravenloft or the Wild Beyond the Witchlight campaigns.
In any case, there is so much here to love.
Head back to not only just the OSR but to Old-School Essentials. This one is from Knight Owl Publishing who has been putting out some really great stuff lately.As always I will be following my rules for these reviews.
Worm Witch: The Life and Death of Belinda Blood
PDF. 73 pages. Color cover, black & white interior art.
This book is a sequel and elaboration on The Chaos Gods Come to Meatlandia. I don't know much about that other product save that it seems to be a wild "anything goes" sort of setting. This has a similar feel.
This product includes both the Worm Witch and Worm Warden, classes. Witches and Wardens are classes I have also explored in my various book so I am quite excited to see these.
The Worm Warden is like a paladin, ranger, or guardian for the witch cult. They are fighter types. Their primes are Strength and Charisma.
The Worm Witch is a witch class and it shares many similarities with other witch classes. This is largely due to books we all read and the various means we all use to make classes. Personally, I find this great. The Worm Witch could fit in well with all the witches I have played and still have enough unique features to make her special. What makes her special of course is her connection to worms. Even the worm witch's special abilities could be mapped on to my Occult Powers.
Both the Warden and the Witch share a secret language.
The Worm Witch also gains witch spells. And there are some great ones here. There is the expected ones like Animal Friendship and Charm Animal, and some really interesting ones like Infect with Worms, Mass of Maggots, Wave of Worms, and more. Yeah, they do pretty much what you expect.
This is all about one-third of the book. And this was all then I would be really happy. I am glad someone wrote this book. This is a needed sort of witch that I would not likely write. Ok. I would have never done this one. Worms are great for my wife's garden, and that is about all the use I have for them. So kudos to Wind Lothamer and Ahimsa Kerp for doing this.
We still have the rest of the book.
The next section covers the land of Annalida, a land near Meatlandia. This is another third of the book and it is interesting, but I have no context for it. Still, the Witch Wood is very cool. The last third (or so) covers the monsters of the land, which as you can imagine, is full of worms.
The NPC witch, Belinda Blood, is also presented. She was a very powerful Worm Witch and could fit the bill as a Witch Queen for my War of the Witch Queen Campaign. It is also all written for Old School Essentials so that is another good fit. Alive or dead she would be a great Witch Queen.
As I mentioned this book is written for OSE and fits well.
So I bought this hoping for a class and a few new spells. I got that. I also got another class, a campaign setting, some monsters, AND a new Witch Queen to add to my Old-School Essentials campaign.
That's pretty nice if you ask me.
Imagine if a giant monster, a Kaiju, attacked the city where you lived? Stormed ashore and began stomping across one neighbourhood to the next, one district to the next? Crushing cars underfoot, smashing buildings, driving thousands upon thousands out of the city to flee to safety? Do you have friends and family in the city, and can you ensure their safety, let alone your own? As you move back and forth across the city, you will see the Kaiju again and again, and perhaps discern its weakness. Armed with that knowledge there are those who bring it to bear—the military, whose forces can drive the Kaiju from the city and back into the sea! It sounds like a film starring Godzilla, or Gojira, but is in fact the set-up and play for Caltrop Kaiju: A Monstrously fun and fast-paced TTRPG published by Button Kin Games. This is a small game which can be played in two ways, both of which are in solo mode. The first is as a mini-board game, whilst the second is as a solo roleplaying game in which the player keeps a diary of both his character’s actions and those of the Kaiju, much like other solo journaling game such as Thousand-Year-Old Vampire.
The very latest entry in the Ticket to Ride franchise is Ticket to Ride: San Francisco. Like those other Ticket to Ride games, it is another card-drawing, route-claiming board game based around transport links and like those other Ticket to Ride games, it uses the same mechanics. Thus the players will draw Transportation cards and then use them to claim Routes and by claiming Routes, link the two locations marked on Destination Tickets, the aim being to gain as many points as possible by claiming Routes and completing Destination Tickets, whilst avoiding losing by failing to complete Destination Tickets. Yet rather than being another big box game like the original Ticket to Ride, Ticket to Ride: Europe, or Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries, it takes its cue from Ticket to Ride: New York, Ticket to Ride: London, and Ticket to Ride: Amsterdam. Part of the cities series for Ticket to Ride, it is thus a smaller game designed for fewer players with a shorter playing time, a game based around a city rather than a country or a continent. It is also notably different in terms of theme and period.Inside the small box can be found a small board which depicts the centre of San Francisco, from the Golden Gate Bridge in the northwest to Potrero Hill in the southeast and Sunset in the southwest to Alcatraz in the northeast. Notably, several of the destinations are marked in red, including Alcatraz, Golden Gate Bridge, Potrero Hill, Sunset, and The Embarcadero. This is where the Tourist Tokens—representing the souvenirs collected by the players when they connect to those destinations—are placed at the start of play. There are also the expected Cable Car pieces (as opposed to the trains of standard Ticket to Ride), the Transportation cards drawn and used to claim routes between destinations, and the Destination Tickets indicating which two Destinations need to be connected to be completed. The Cable Car pieces are nicely sculpted and can actually be seen through from one side to the other. Each player has twenty of these at the start of the game. The Transportation cards come in the standard colours for Ticket to Ride, but are illustrated with a different form of transport for each colour. So black is illustrated with a bus, blue with a tram, green with a car not unlike the Ford Mustang as driven by Steve McQueen in the film Bullitt (which of course is set in the city), purple with a Volkswagen Camper, and so on. This really makes the cards stand out and easier to view for anyone who suffers from colour blindness. Similarly, the Destination Tickets are bright, colourful, and easy to read. As expected, the rules leaflet is clearly written, easy to understand, and the opening pages show how to set up the game. It can be read through in mere minutes and play started all but immediately.
The board itself is also bright and colourful. The scoring track round the edge of the board is done as a series of cable car tickets in keeping with the form of transport used in Ticket to Ride: San Francisco. Most routes are one, two, or three spaces in length, and there is one five-space route. One difference with the previous titles in the series is that it includes ferries, the slightly more complex routes first seen in Ticket to Ride: Europe, though only three of them, two of which go to Alcatraz. There is a very knowing joke on the board. Play in Ticket to Ride: San Francisco is the same as standard Ticket to Ride. Each player starts the game with some Destination Tickets and some Transportation cards. On his turn, a player can take one of three actions. Either draw two Transportation cards; draw two Destination Tickets and either keep one or two, but must keep one; or claim a route between two connected Locations. To claim a route, a player must expend a number of cards equal to its length, either matching the colour of the route or a mix of matching colour cards and the multi-coloured cards, which essentially act as wild cards. Some routes are marked in grey and so can use any set of colours or multi-coloured cards. Three routes are ferry routes and require a Ferry or multicolour Transportation card and the indicated number of Transportation cards in the right colour to claim.
When a player claims a route connected with one of the cities with the Tourist Tokens on it, he takes one Tourist Token. At the end of the game, each player will be awarded a number of points depending on how many Tourist Tokens he has collected. This is reminiscent of, is the Stock Share cards of the Pennsylvania map from Ticket to Ride Map Collection Vol. 5: United Kingdom + Pennsylvania. In that expansion, every time a player claimed a route, he could in most cases, also claim a Stock Share card in a particular company. At the end of the game, a player would score bonus points depending upon the number of Stock Share cards he held in the various companies in the expansion. In that expansion though, all routes had a Stock Share reward, but in Ticket to Ride: San Francisco, they can only be gained from five Destinations on the outer edge of the map and two other locations. These other locations can be anywhere on the map and are chosen by the two players who go last in the turn order.
The number of Tourist Tokens each player has at the end of the game can tip the balance and potentially help a player win the game. However, their limited location limits access to them, as can the Destination Tickets each player draws and completes over the course of the game. Only half of the Destination Tickets in the game have Destinations with Tourist Tokens. This means that a player should take this into account when drawing and discarding Destination Tickets as it will alter his score at the end of the game. This can be offset by the placement of the Tourist Tokens by the last two players in the turn order during the set-up of the game, which adds an element of randomness. Connecting to Destinations with Tourist Tokens can counter one issue with Ticket to Ride: San Francisco and that is it is possible to draw Destination Tickets it is impossible to complete because a player can only draw two and must keep one. So a possible strategy might be to complete a fewer number of Destination Tickets and try to get more Tourist Tokens instead.
Physically, Ticket to Ride: San Francisco is very nicely produced. It is bright and breezy and has a very sunny disposition. Everything is produced to the high standard you would expect for a Ticket to Ride game.
Like Ticket to Ride: New York, Ticket to Ride: London, and Ticket to Ride: Amsterdam, what Ticket to Ride: San Francisco offers is all of the play of Ticket to Ride in a smaller, faster playing version, that is easy to learn and easy to transport. In comparison to those games, it is tighter with players needing to more carefully balance the number of Destination Tickets they attempt to complete versus the number of Tourist Tokens they can grab. Ticket to Ride: San Francisco is a great addition to the Ticket to Ride family, offering fast, competitive play, and tactical choice in an attractive, thematic box.
