Outsiders & Others

Character Creation Challenge: Crystal the Psychic

The Other Side -

Crystal the Psychic I was going to do a week of all evil characters, but Grenda did not have a lot of them. The ones he did have were fun, but they were the exception rather than the rule. Today's character could have been one of mine, but she isn't. Crystal is a Lawful Good Psionist, and she is giving me New Age hippie vibes. 

I mentioned before that Grenda and I made a lot of character classes. Lots. The Psionist was one of his. I hope there is still some more here to find on it because I would love to read a good psionic/psychic-based class. Especially one Grenda created, he was into psychics the same way I was/am into witches. 

Sadly, there is not a lot to tell here about Crystal. She is a teen (so I think some Teen Titans and X-Men influences are at play here), and she is a short (4'11") blonde girl with green eyes, so I also think she is modeled on a girlfriend I had around then. Kinda weird to see her here, to be honest. 

All of the O.G.R.E.S. games (Wasted Lands, NIGHT SHIFT, Thirteen Parsecs) have psychic classes. So, my cup is full of choices.

Crystal the Psychic

Class: Psychic
Level: 8
Species: Human
Alignment: Light Good
Background: Scholarly

Abilities
Strength: 8 (-1) 
Agility: 16 (+2) 
Toughness: 11 (+0) 
Intelligence: 16 (+2)
Wits: 17 (+2)
Persona: 15 (+1)

Fate Points: 1d8
Defense Value: 5
Vitality: 49
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +4/+3/+1
Melee Bonus: +3 (base), -1 (STR)
Ranged Bonus: +3 (base)
Saves: +3 to all Wits Saves

Psychic Abilities
Psychic powers (3), Supernatural Attacks, Sixth Sense, Supernatural power.

Powers
Bio-feedback, ESP, Telepathy, Precognition (S), 

Heroic/Divine Touchstones
1st Level: Psychic power: Empathy
3rd Level: +1 to Persona saves
5th Level: Spirit Guide: Kyri (hawk)
7th Level: Psychic Power: Telemagery

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Mind

Gear
Dagger, bracers of protection

Ok. I like this version. Feels more like a psychic and less like a cleric pretending to be psychic (which is what I think Grenda was doing mechanically). She reminds me of the Psychic Healer class languishing on my "To Do" pile for AGES. I don't think she is in that class, but I am sure that the conversations we had sent me down the path of the class and Grenda to this character. 

Yeah. I would use this class and this character a lot. 

You can get the Wasted Lands RPG and the NIGHT SHIFT RPG at Elf Lair Games.

Character Creation Challenge


Friday Fantasy: Treachery in the Beggar City

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar #13: Treachery in the Beggar City is a scenario for Goodman Games’ Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game and the thirteenth scenario for the Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar Boxed Set. Scenarios for Dungeon Crawl Classics tend be darker, grimmer, and even pulpier than traditional Dungeons & Dragons scenarios, even veering close to the Swords & Sorcery subgenre. Scenarios for the Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar Boxed Set are set in and around the City of the Black Toga, Lankhmar, the home to the adventures of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, the creation of author Fritz Leiber. The city is described as an urban jungle, rife with cutpurses and corruption, guilds and graft, temples and trouble, whores and wonders, and more. Under the cover the frequent fogs and smogs, the streets of the city are home to thieves, pickpockets, burglars, cutpurses, muggers, and anyone else who would skulk in the night! Which includes the Player Characters. And it is these roles which the Player Characters get to be in Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar #13: Treachery in the Beggar City, small time crooks trying to make a living and a name for themselves, but without attracting the attention of either the city constabulary or worse, the Thieves’ Guild!
Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar #13: Treachery in the Beggar City is a scenario for Third Level Player Characters and is both an archetypal scenario for use with the Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar Boxed Set, and like Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar #8: The Land of the Eight Cities before it, also a setting supplement that expands the world of Newhon beyond the walls of Lankhmar. This is the Beggar City of Tovilyis, a once mercantile rival located to the south of Lankhmar that had the temerity to attempt an invasion of the City of the Black Toga. That was a century ago and ever since, Tovilyis has been a vassal state of Lankhmar, forced to purchase half its grain from the merchants of its occupiers and its surviving noble families to pay a ‘tax’ to the occupiers to be allowed to survive and feud between themselves for the right to become relatively recently restored Doge of the city. Given that that the ruler of the city is called the Doge, it no surprise that Tovilyis is based on the city of Venice. The city is cut through by canals, its buildings—many of which are sinking into the marshlands upon which the city is built—and alleys connected by bridges, constructed of either stone or rickety wood. Much like Lankhmar, Tovilyis has a thieves’ guild, but it is not as powerful as the one in Lankhmar, and thus thieves from both Tovilyis and Lankhmar can operate in the city without the thieves’ guild getting involved. Even so, Tovilyis is seen as a place of exile and not just by thieves from Lankhmar, but also nobles from Lankhmar.
Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar #13: Treachery in the Beggar City begins en media res, with the Player Characters already in Tovilyis. Rumours have reached the city of Lankhmar that the scholar Fremma Inkfingers has discovered a map purported to show the location of the treasure vault where the last Dog, the one who launched the failed invasion of Lankhmar, hid his wealth. It is said that a set of scrolls, known as the Scrolls of Night, on which the Doge recorded all of the dark secrets of Tovilyis’ noble families, is also be found amongst this hoard of treasure. Why exactly the Player Characters are in Tovilyis is left up to the players and the Judge to decide. They may have been hired to find the Scrolls of Night or another object from the hoard, to make sure that Lankhmar’s thieves’ guild gets its cut from the retrieval of the treasures, or even Fremma Inkfingers could have hired them.
The scenario opens with the Player Characters going to meet Fremma Inkfingers to purchase her map from her. In almost film noir fashion, she is struck down by assassins, her map is stolen, and a chase ensues! Chases are a feature of Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar, most typically taking place across the rooftops of the city, but in Tovilyis there are canals and boats and crumbling buildings to contend with, so the chase feels excitingly different, almost as if it were out of a James Bond film! (In fact, it feels not too dissimilar to the end chase scene in Casino Royale.) Ideally, the chase will end with the Player Characters getting hold of Fremma Inkfingers’ map, but if not, the scenario provides other means for them to do so. In fact, it is probably better that the Player Characters obtain the map by other means rather than by chasing down the assassins because it makes the second half of the scenario that much more interesting.
Of course, there is another party interested in getting hold of the Scrolls of Night, which is why they had Fremma Inkfingers killed and stole her map. The second half of the scenario details the vault in which it is hidden, not once, but twice. First, as if the Player Characters get to the vault first and second, if the rival party gets to the vault first. If the latter occurs, some of the traps on the way to the vault will already been triggered and others avoided, and this combined with the confrontation with the rival party gives the scenario a shot of dynamism and an interesting NPC for the Judge to portray and the Player Characters to interact with. This is Settilina, the captain of the guards for one of the city’s noble families. Neither the building hiding the vault or the vault itself are large, but they are detailed and they are full of traps and little details that will perplex the players and their characters, and definitely challenge any Thief in the gang. The vault’s construction also used a lot of magic, so the scenario will also test any Wizard in the gang as well.
The scenario does not simply end with the Player Characters looting the vault. The interesting Settilina may still be about and is as ready to negotiate with the Player Characters as she is to kill them and there is also the matter of what to do with the wealth they find in the vault. The final interaction here with the Settilina is nicely handled, whilst the options for what the Player Characters do with their newfound wealth will require some development upon the part of the Judge as they lie slightly outside the scope of the scenario.
Just under half of Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar #13: Treachery in the Beggar City is devoted to describing the city of Tovilyis. This starts with its history, but accompanied by a good map of the city, also describes its districts and landmarks. These though, are really the highlights of the city, which leaves plenty of room for the Judge to add her own content and so enable the Player Characters to revisit a city that is possibly even more corrupt than Lankhmar, but with a very different feel and atmosphere. Rounding out the module is a section on rules for using Tovilyis in play. This includes new Benisons and Dooms for Player Characters who come from Tovilyis, rumours about Tovilyis—not just general rumours, but ones for Thieves, Warriors, and Wizards too, and a table of events should the Player Characters go carousing in Tovilyis! This is a possibility if the Player Characters make off with the loot in the module’s scenario.
Physically, Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar #13: Treachery in the Beggar City is well presented. The artwork and cartography are both good, but it would have been nice if the scenario had included a copy of the map that drives the first part of the scenario to give as a handout to the players.

Dungeon Crawl Classics Lankhmar #13: Treachery in the Beggar City opens up a whole new city to the Player Characters in which to scheme, scam, and steal, one that is rougher and rottener than Lankhmar. It combines solid background to the city with a fast-paced, entertaining vault-breaking scenario that drops the Player Characters into the action and shouts go. Tovilyis is worth revisiting and is just different enough to making playing there an interesting change of tone and style, but familiar enough that the Player Characters’ skills are not out of place.

Friday Filler: Ted Lasso Party Game

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Ted Lasso is facing a big challenge. As an American Football coach recently appointed as manager of AFC Richmond, he has to get both the staff and the players of this soccer—sorry, football team—to ‘Believe to Believe’, despite his lack of knowledge and experience, and so win games. However, apart from Coach Lasso and his best friend, Coach Beard, nobody believes that Ted will succeed and while they are busy believing that, everybody is in need of something. Whether its Coaching, Quality Time, Jokes, or even Inspirational Speeches, Ted Lasso can give them all. And if that does not work, there is always that pink box of perfect biscuits which always makes things right. This then, is the set-up for Ted Lasso Party Game, a game based on the Apple+ comedy series, designed for two to six players, aged ten and up, which can be played in twenty minutes. Notably, it is a co-operative game played in four, very short rounds, and it comes with its own Timer App (although it is very noisy). It is designed by Prospero Hall and published by Funko Games.

The aim of the Ted Lasso Party Game is to score forty-five Morale or more. Do this and the players win. Otherwise, they lose. To do this, the players take it in turns to play Believe Cards on the Trouble Tiles belonging to the various Character Cards. This will score Morale. Believe Cards must also be used to the Coaches to the various Location Mats and to gain bonus Morale if there is nothing else to spend them on!

Ted Lasso Party Game is very well appointed. It includes a football-shaped Game Board, five Location Mats, two Coach pieces, twelve Event Cards, fourteen Character Cards, fifty-four Believe Cards, thirty-two Trouble Tiles, a Biscuit Box, a Football Die, a Scoring Clip, a Reference Card, and a Rules Booklet. The Game Board has spaces for the Event Cards, the Self-Care section, and the Move a Coach option. The Location Mats consist of Rebecca’s Office, Coach’s Office, the Locker Room, the Trainer Pitch, and the Crown & Anchor pub. Each has space for a Character Card and multiple Trouble Tiles and a Coach Piece. The two Coach Pieces consist of Coach Lasso and Coach Beard. Event Cards—of which four are drawn in game, provide a random event at the start of each round, such as ‘Silent Treatment’, which means that the players cannot talk that round or ‘Elaborate Set Pieces’ which if ‘Coaching’ Believe Cards are played on it, will score the players more Morale.
The various Character Cards have a special condition and a bonus to Morale. Most have a score, whilst the footballers have Football symbols indicating that the Morale bonus is rolled randomly on the Football Die. For example, ‘Rebecca Welton’, scores seven Morale and allows the use of the Biscuits Trouble Tiles to remove whole Trouble Tiles. The Believe Cards come in five colours, four of which correspond to the Trouble Tiles. The yellow Coaching Believe Cards deal with Characters who are Sceptical; the red Quality Time Believe Cards deal with Characters who are Angry; the blue Jokes Believe Cards deal with Characters who are Sad; and the purple Inspirational Believe Cards deal with Characters who are Insecure. The fifth Believe Card type is pink and are Biscuits, which act as a Wild Card. The thirty-two Trouble Tiles are each marked with two emojis whose colours correspond to the Believe Cards.

There is a fantastic sense of verisimilitude to Ted Lasso Party Game as it draws heavily from the television series. Thus, the Biscuit Box, which is pink, is used to store the Trouble Tiles and looks like the box which Ted Lasso delivers biscuits to Rebecca Welton every day; the Football Die is a four-sided die shaped like a football; and the base box is designed as a football stadium. The Believe Cards also have quotes from the television series.

Set-up is simple. Four Events cards are drawn and placed on the Game Board and, a random Character Card is placed on each of five Location Mats as are a number of Trouble Tiles as indicated on each Location Mat. The Believe Cards are shuffled and dealt out to the players. This is done at the start of each round, which also includes turning over an Event Card. The players are allowed to look at the combinations of the Character Cards and the Location Mats and are free to discuss plans for the round.

Each round lasts two minutes and the players act in turn. On his turn, a player plays as many Believe Cards as possible of one colour from his hand that he needs too. This is done to undertake three actions. These are ‘Be Kind’, ‘Move a Coach’, and ‘Self-Care’. If a Coach is on a Location Mat, a player can be ‘Be Kind’ and play Believe Cards to the Location to counter the emojis on the Trouble Tiles. A Believe Card can be discarded to the Move a Coach space on the Game Board to move a Coach from one Location Mat to another. ‘Self-Care’ lets a player discard cards to the Self-Care space on the Game Board. Once a player has played all of the Believe Cards, either that he can, his turn is over. Play proceeds like this until everyone has played all of their Believe Cards over multiple turns or the two-minute timer runs out.

At the end of the round, for every five Believe Cards in the Self-Care, the players can remove a single Trouble Tile from any Location Mat. Also, at the end of the round, any Trouble Tiles with matching Believe Cards at the Location Mat are removed. If all of the Trouble Tiles are removed from a Character Card on a Location Mat, he is removed and the players are awarded the Morale bonus—a simple number unless rolled for the Footballers. A new Character Card is added for the next round. Morale will be lost if the timer goes off and the players still have the Believe Cards in their hands.

Play of the Ted Lasso Party Game is frenetic as the players scramble from turn to turn to play all of their Believe Cards to their best advantage. Apart from this pace, it plays a great deal like any other co-operative game. There is some variability to the game in that there are fourteen Character Cards and not all of them are going to come out during play and the combination of Trouble Tiles on a Location Mat is rarely going to be the same. As with any co-operative game there is the danger of play being dominated by an ‘alpha’ player, though the frenetic pace of the game does negate that to some extent. The game does require some planning on the part of the players since they need to decide what Believe Cards they are going to play—and where, since with two minutes of play per round, there is insufficient time for planning. That said, a player will likely be forced to think his action if another player does something unexpected or a Coach Piece cannot be moved.

However, there is not a lot of variability and the game play does not really change. Consequently, there is not a lot of depth to the Ted Lasso Party Game and not a lot of replayability. So, it is going to appeal more to fans of the television series than hobbyist board game players. Yet saying that, the game play is challenging for the casual player and the fact that it is a co-operative game is going to be challenging for some players. The fact that it is a co-operative game and that it actually has a lot of components suggests that it is not, as the title of the game suggests, a ‘party’ game, although the theme and speed of play suggests that it might be. Lastly, that speed of play does hinder the enjoyment of the game’s theme—the game is too fast to read the quotes on the Believe Cards, for example, in play.

Physically, the Ted Lasso Party Game is a really great looking game. Photographs are actually used of the cast from the series, except for Coach Lasso and Coach Beard. Otherwise, everything is themed very much around the television series. Lastly, the game app is more intrusive and then useful.

The Ted Lasso Party Game is another good design from Prospero Hall which fits the theme of the source material. It is only a very light game though and only hardcore fans of Ted Lasso are likely to want to keep playing after a few plays.

Character Creation Challenge: Savalon Blade

The Other Side -

Savalon BladeNow, here is an interesting one. Savalon Blade was a "failed" Riddlemaster. That is, he did not meet the base requirements (Psionics) to join. He would have been a Shadowmaster, but it didn't work out. If I remember right, he initially started out as a hunter of Riddlemasters, but when I used him in my games, he was something different. He hunted Mind Flayers. I based him loosely on Abslom Daak the Dalek Hunter from Doctor Who Weekly.

Neither are "good" characters and they are not around to be liked. I think "Asshole" was used more than once to describe Savalon. But he was good at doing what he wanted to do, and that was to kill Illithids/Mind Flayers.

Savalon Blade in the Wasted Lands

There are no Illithids in the Wasted Lands. There are, however, the Cthulim and other servants of the Deeper Dark. In this world, he would hunt them down for similar reasons. Also his AD&D stats were designed to help him stand up to a similar level of Riddlemaster; so a multiclass of fighter/mage/thief.  That is fine for Wasted Lands, but I think we can do better. 

I was discussing the Shadowmaster yesterday with Jason Vey. He reminded me there was a class perfect for it concept-wise. It is the web-freebie, The Shade. I think this will do rather nicely.

Savalon Blade

Class: Shade
Level: 13
Species: Half-elf
Alignment: Lawful Evil
Background: Hunter/Gatherer

Abilities
Strength: 17 (+2) N
Agility: 18 (+3) A
Toughness: 17 (+2) 
Intelligence: 19 (+3) N
Wits: 19 (+3)
Persona: 16 (+2)

Fate Points: 1d10
Defense Value: 2
Vitality: 89
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +6/+4/+2
Melee Bonus: +2 (base), +2 (STR)
Ranged Bonus: +2 (base)
Saves: +3 to all Agility Saves

Shade Abilities

Assassination, Improved Defense, Ranged Combat, Stealth Skills, Climbing, Tactical Awareness (1d10), Natural Alchemy, Perception, Skilled (4 skills), Subterfuge, Vital Strike x4 (supernatural)

Heroic/Divine Touchstones
1st Level: +1 to melee attacks 
3rd Level: +1 to Wits saves
5th Level: Unique Defence Mode: Psychic Attacks
7th Level: Boost to Defence Mode
9th Level: Luck benefit
11th Level: Reroll
13th Level: Aspect of Sphere: Skilled hunter

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Hunter

Gear
Longsword, dagger, short bow

Not at all bad. He's not too crazy overpowered compared to his AD&D counterpart. I'll have to play around with this on a bit more.

I can also see this guy moving through time (maybe a subtle nod to his origins) and have him show up in NIGHT SHIFT and Thirteen Parsecs as well.

You can get the Wasted Lands RPG and the NIGHT SHIFT RPG at Elf Lair Games.

Character Creation Challenge


Character Creation Challenge: Ander

The Other Side -

Ander the ShadowmasterLet's continue with the evil characters today with another of the Riddlemasters, this time a neutral evil "Shadowmaster." 

I don't know much about Ander. He was one of the Post "Dragon War" characters Grenda created. I don't think I ever saw this one in play, and I am sure I never DMed him. Shadowmasters, though, I do know. This class took features from other classes to make them the ultimate thief-assassin type. Thief skills, assassination abilities, magic to aid them, and, of course, a lot of psionics/psychic powers. Grossly overpowered to the point of silliness. 

Still. They were fun to play.

In a Wasted Lands game, they would be some sort of adept or mystic. A character dedicated to ascetic pursuits of mind and body. Again, with the various Riddlemasters I could rebuild them using the point buy system found in NIGHT SHIFT's Night Companion, or via multiclassing, I do have two other options.

The Mystic Martial Artist from the Night Companion is a good fit here, especially for Shadowmasters. The Mystic Warrior from Thirteen Parsecs is also a great fit, but maybe better for Riddlemasters proper. Mind you, this is the great strength of all the O.G.R.E.S. games; their inter-compatibility.  

After going over both classes I am convinced that Mystical Martial Artists are a perfect, and far more reasonable substitute for Shadowmasters. Sorry Grenda.

You will have to excuse the all "18s" in his abilities. I wasn't there when he rolled this guy up, but I am sure those numbers are legit.

ShadowmastersAnder the Shadowmaster

Class: Mystic Martial Artist
Level: 3
Species: Human
Alignment: Neutral Evil
Background: Warrior 

Abilities
Strength: 18 (+3) N
Agility: 18 (+3) A
Toughness: 18 (+3) 
Intelligence: 18 (+3) N
Wits: 18 (+3)
Persona: 18 (+3)

Fate Points: 1d6
Defense Value: 2
Vitality: 24
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +3/+1/+0
Melee Bonus: +2 (base), +3 (STR)
Ranged Bonus: +2 (base)
Saves: +1 to all Agility and Toughness Saves, +2 to Toughness (Warrior background)

Mystic Martial Artist Abilities
Impossibly Agil, Martial Arts, Martial Arts Mysticism, Lightning Fast, Survivor Skills, 

Mysticism
Enhanced Senses, Innate Magic (Invisibility), Supernatural Attacks (melee)

Heroic/Divine Touchstones
1st Level: Psychic Ability: Bio-feedback
3rd Level: +1 to melee attacks 

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Shadow

Gear
Longsword, dagger, short bow

Damn. I like this. I want to go back and redo ALL my Riddlemasters and Shadowmasters now. I should poke around and see if there are some more Riddlemasters in this stack and stat them as Mystic Warriors.

You can get the Wasted Lands RPG and the NIGHT SHIFT RPG at Elf Lair Games.

Character Creation Challenge


Character Creation Challenge: Queen Talason

The Other Side -

Queen Talason Character SheetEvil ruler? Sure why not. I have to admit this sheet jumped out at me for a number of reasons. First, it is a rare evil woman in Grenda's collection. Secondly, she is a Queen, and finally, this sheet looks OLD. I don't know anything about Queen Talason here. She is a fighter, but she also can turn undead and has some spells. She has psionics, like a lot of Grenda's characters. 

Also, I love her character sketch. Grenda was always a good artist, and this one is just fun.

I am not 100% sure what is going on with her. She looks like an anti-paladin but has no thief or assassin abilities. Plus, anti-paladins were all chaotic evil, and she is lawful evil. Her spells are from the Magic-user list and not the Cleric one. I checked the old "Plethora of Paladins" article from Dragon #106. The Lawful Evil "Illrigger" and they do use Magic-user spells, but her spell progression and XP progression do not match our Queen here. 

This sheet is also much older than Dragon #106's Feb 1986 date. This one looks a lot closer to his sheets from the early 1980s; as in 1981-82.

I think re-crafting her as an Anti-Paladin, or at least an evil Divine Warrior, is a fun idea.

Queen TalasonQueen Talason

Class: Divine Warrior
Level: 8
Species: Human
Alignment: Dark Evil*
Background: Warrior 

Abilities
Strength: 17 (+2) N
Agility: 18 (+3) 
Toughness: 16 (+2) 
Intelligence: 16 (0) 
Wits: 17 (+2) N
Persona: 17 (+2) P

Fate Points: 1d8
Defense Value: -2
Vitality: 53 
Degeneracy: 5
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +4/+3/+1
Melee Bonus: +3 (base), +2 (STR)
Ranged Bonus: +3 (base)
Saves: +3 to all Wits and Persona Saves, +2 to Toughness (Warrior background)

Divine Warrior Abilities
Sixth Sense, Heal Injury and Illness (8d6), Supernatural Attacks, Protection from Evil, Spot Hidden (1-3 on d6).

Heroic/Divine Touchstones
1st Level: Psychic Ability: Telekinesis
3rd Level: +1 to melee attacks 
5th Level: Favored Weapon, Sword
7th Level: 1 level of Sorcerer

Spells
First Level: Arcane Dart

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Death

Gear
Longsword, Mace, Battle Axe, Spear, Crossbow, Full plate armor, Holy symbol

I imagine that Queen Talason here was a warrior princess, cleaving a bloody path between herself and her goal, the throne. As a Queen, she was no less bloody. In Grenda's games, she worshipped Hades, the god of the Dead. In my revised Wasted Lands games, Hüter is not really the same deadly god. No, in my new campaign, she would worship Helga, the Ghost goddess in her aspect as the Battle Crone. This would also explain her level of Sorcerer as a Heroic/Divine Touchstone. 

I think as a nod to her history and her near miss as an Illrigger, I'll make her birthday February 14th. 

Again, I am loving the Divine Warrior class.

You can get the Wasted Lands RPG and the NIGHT SHIFT RPG at Elf Lair Games.

Character Creation Challenge



Miskatonic Monday #333: Bride of the Wilds

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Much like the Jonstown Compendium for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and The Companions of Arthur for material set in Greg Stafford’s masterpiece of Arthurian legend and romance, Pendragon, the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition is a curated platform for user-made content. 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: Bride of the WildsPublisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: H.S. Falkenberry

Setting: Appalachian Mountains, Georgia, 1932Product: One-shot
What You Get: Twenty-eight page, 3.5 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: Sometimes the forest is fulsomely fecund.Plot Hook: Witchcraft in the woods and a missing woman. Could they be connected?Plot Support: Staging advice, four handouts, six NPCs, ten Mythos tomes, and four Mythos monsters.Production Values: Decent
Pros# Detailed missing persons case# Solid investigation# Easy to adjust to other eras for Call of Cthulhu# Will end in a gunfight, but who should the Investigators shoot?# Decent handouts# Nyctohylophobia# Wiccaphobia# Tokophobia
Cons# An abundance of Mythos Tomes# Will end in a gunfight, but who should the Investigators shoot?
Conclusion# Detailed investigation leads to a gunfight with a difficult choice# Solid fear of the forest one-shot

Miskatonic Monday #332: Heart of Horror

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Much like the Jonstown Compendium for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and The Companions of Arthur for material set in Greg Stafford’s masterpiece of Arthurian legend and romance, Pendragon, the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition is a curated platform for user-made content. 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: Heart of HorrorPublisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Wojciech J. Szpytma

Setting: Congo, 1890sProduct: One-shot
What You Get: Twenty-one page, 111.54 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: “Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster...” – Friedrich NietzschePlot Hook: A missing shipment means going up river... into the ‘heart of darkness’.Plot Support: Staging advice, four (five) pre-generated Investigators, two handouts, two NPCs, and one Mythos monster.Production Values: Decent
Pros# Adapts Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness to Call of Cthulhu# Pre-generated Investigators with decent motivations# Xylophobia# Teraphobia# Thalassophobia
Cons# Adapts Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness to Call of Cthulhu# Sanity losses high# No stats for the actual villain of the piece# Linear# Ignores the horrors of the Congo# Underdeveloped conclusion
# No Sanity rewards# Needs an edit

Conclusion# Serviceable if linear adaptation of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness# Lots of trigger warnings, but ignores the horror of the Congo

The Fourth War

Reviews from R'lyeh -

They said the Cold War would end when the Berlin Wall fell in 1989. It didn’t. The Warsaw Pact might have been dissolved and Germany united, but The Gang of Eight restored Communism in Russia. Not only that, but it revived the Soviet economy and retrained the Red Army. We didn’t find out how good it was until 1996 when the USSR decided to reoccupy Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Then Poland a year later to prevent it becoming a Western ally. Within months, even after a sustained bombing campaign, U.S. and NATO forces are fighting a Soviet invasion on the ground all across Europe, from Sweden in the north to Romania in the south, and when the Red Army is forced to retreat, the head of the Soviet Union authorises the use of tactical nuclear weapons on the battlefield. It shatters NATO forces and escalates into a devastating exchange of nuclear missiles that destroy military, industrial, and civilian sites on all sides. Communication networks and transportation routes break down, the food supply chain collapses, and first famine, then disease, hits Europe and elsewhere. By the end of 1999, billions are dead. Even as federal authority crumbles in the USA, NATO launches one last desperate attempt to capture Warsaw and Stockholm, the capitals of Poland and Sweden. Operation Reset is stopped by unexpectedly determined Soviet defence and the last offensive of the war is done. What survivors there are, are told, “Good luck. You’re on your own now.”

This is the situation at the beginning of Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was. It is the classic situation that dates all the way back to the first edition of Twilight 2000, published by Game Designer’s Workshop in 1984. Where the original, written at the height of the Cold War, was set in a much-feared future, the new fourth edition, published by Free League Publishing following a successful Kickstarter campaign, takes place in an alternate past that hinges on the success of the coup d’état against Mikhail Gorbachev in 1991 by the Gang of Eight that saw the restoration of Communism. The result is same. A mixture of U.S. and Allied forces, the last remnants of US 5th Mechanized Infantry Division, struggling to survive in a Europe that has been shattered by war and poisoned by weapons of mass destruction, at the mercy of marauders and petty warlords, the potential hope of survivors who want protection, and in search of a home. That may well be the true home of the US 5th Mechanized Infantry Division, the USA, as it has been in the previous editions of Twilight 2000. However, Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was also offers another starting option and another option for long term play. Traditionally, the last hurrah of the US 5th Mechanized Infantry Division has always been the city of Kalisz in central Poland, but Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was offers the alternative starting point of Sweden, near the central city of Örebro with US 2nd Marine Division. The situation is not much changed otherwise, for whilst the terrain and the people are different, the invaders are not. In both case, they maintain a strong military presence, though not a co-ordinated one. The broken infrastructure and communication links have prevented that.

Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was is more expansive in other ways. It is upfront about what the Player Characters are expected to do. One option is find a way home, but others include surviving, helping others in need, gathering information, finding a safe haven, staking a claim, and even helping to reset the world. With the last three, the roleplaying game gives objectives which will be later supported by the community building rules, these being a common feature to many roleplaying games from Free League Publishing. In many of these objectives, there is a moral imperative, one of making the world a better place despite the damage done to it. How they do it is up to the Player Characters, who can of course, be soldiers as the default set-up, but Twilight 2000 also suggests campaign frameworks involving civilians, members of law enforcement, and even prisoners! These are not explored in any detail, but they are intriguing possibilities. They are, though, presented as options in terms of characters that the players can roleplay.

Like the First Edition, Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was comes as a boxed set. This contains a one-hundred-and-fifty-two page ‘Player’s Manual’, a one-hundred-and-twelve page ‘Referee’s Manual’, a large 864 × 558 mm double-sided full-colour map which depicts central and northern Poland on one side and central and southern Sweden on the other, a set of fifteen dice, eight double-sided battle maps, two double-sided scenario-specific maps, one-hundred-and-eight cardboard counters depicting various figures and vehicles, sixteen dice, ten Initiative cards, fifty-two Encounter cards, five character sheets, and two player handouts. The fifteen dice consist of two sets of Base Dice—six-, eight-, ten-, and twelve-sided dice marked with crosshair symbols for successes and explosion symbols for failure and damage, six six-sided Ammo Dice used to roll for ammunition use and possible damage to a firearm, and a six-sided Hit location die. The two double-sided scenario-specific maps are larger than the eight double-sided battle maps which are designed to be modular and used with the Encounter cards and the counters. The maps depict a variety of urban and rural terrain. The player handouts are briefings for Operation Reset and the default start of play, giving intelligence data on the NATO and Soviet military deployment at the start of the offensive, one for Poland and one for Sweden. The whole set has a sturdy handsomeness to it and a solid physical presence.

A Player Character in Twilight 2000 is defined by his Nationality, Branch of Service, and Military Rank (as much as it holds sway in the post-war collapse). He has four attributes—Strength, Agility, Intelligence, and Empathy—each represented by a letter, with ‘A’ representing the most capable, ‘C’ average, and ‘D’ weak. Each letter also corresponds to a die type. Thus, A to a twelve-sided die, B to a ten-sided die, C to an eight-sided die, and D to a six-sided die. There are also twelve core skills, three per attribute, and these are also by a letter and a die type, from ‘A’ and a twelve-sided die for Elite to ‘D’ and a six-sided die for Novice, with ‘C’ and an eight-sided die for Experienced. A rating of ‘F’ does not have an associated die type and it represents being untrained in a skill. Skills can also have specialities. In addition, a Player Character has a rating for his ‘Coolness Under Fire’, again rated from ‘A’ to ‘D’, as is the Player Characters’ Unit Morale. Whilst ‘Coolness Under Fire’ is important for a Player Character to not panic when the bullets start flying, in the long term it can have detrimental effects upon him, for every time it goes up, there is a chance that the Player Character’s Empathy goes down and thus his ability to interact with others as he becomes hardened to the loss of human life. Which is good balancing factor in play, as the Player Characters try to survive and still keep their humanity.

Beyond the stats, a Player Character will have a Moral Code, such as ‘You have a moral obligation to help those worse off than you.’, which can grant bonuses to skills if the Player Characters acts in accordance with it or cause Stress if acted against; a Big Dream that will give extra Experience Points if the Player Builds towards it; and a Buddy, who will also give a Player Character a bonus to a skill if coming to his aid and Stress if he is injured or killed. Every Player Character has some base equipment and access to starting group equipment, and potentially, a vehicle shared by the group, which could be an ordinary car, a jeep, or even a main battle tank! Important amongst this gear is ammunition, which can be used as a currency as well as in weapons. Lastly, every Player Character begins play with one more points of permanent Radiation damage.

In terms of character creation, Twilight 2000 offers two options. One is to select and modify an Archetype, of which there are nine. These are the Civilian, the Grunt, the Gunner, the Kid, the Mechanic, the Medic, the Officer, the Operator, and the Spook. Of these, the Operator is the Special Forces operative. The other option is to follow a Lifepath. Beginning with the character’s childhood, the player takes him through a series of terms, rolling to see if he gains specialities, is promoted, how many years he ages, and whether or not war breaks out. When this occurs, he receives some military training and experience. Civilian characters will have a wider range of skills, whilst soldiers will have better military skills and are more likely to have been promoted. In terms of background, Twilight 2000 supports Americans, Swedes, Poles, and Soviets, whilst there are tables for various careers, including law enforcement and criminal, education, blue collar and white-collar occupations, as well as the one for a military career and lastly, the ‘At War’ career, which covers both conscripts for Player Characters from nationalities involved in the war and civilians if not.

Nationality: Quinn McConnell
Branch of Service: Infantry
Military Rank: Private
Age: 24
Childhood: Streetkid
Career: Burglar, Prisoner, Conscript
Moral Code: Freedom is everything. No one tells you what to do. Ever.
Big Dream: Find a place to settle down with your friends, and defend it with our life

Coolness Under Fire: C
Hit Capacity: 5
Stress Capacity: 6
Radiation: 2

ATTRIBUTES/SKILLS
Strength: B [Close Combat B (Brawler)]
Agility: B [Ranged Combat D, Mobility D (Mountaineer)]
Intelligence: A [Recon B (Infiltrator), Survival D (Scrounger), Tech D (Electrician, Locksmith)]
Empathy: B

Gear
Assault rifle (1 reload), flak jacket and helmet, knife, personal medkit, basic tools, vehicle tools, backpack

Mechanically, Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was uses the same variant of the Year Zero Engine that has since been seen in the Blade Runner – The Roleplaying Game. To have his character undertake an action, a player rolls one Base Die the Attribute and one Base Die for the Skill. Rolls of six or more count as a Success. Rolls of ten or more grant two Successes, which can grant extra benefits. In general, unless rolls are opposed, only one success is required to succeed at an action. Modifiers, whether from equipment, a skill-related speciality, or the situation will increase, or sometimes in the case of the latter, decrease the size of the die rolled. If the roll is failed and no successes are rolled or the player needs more successes, he can push the roll. This enables him to reroll any dice that do not already show Successes or Explosions, but whilst this means that he might roll Successes to succeed or succeed better, it is not without its dangers. Every result of an Explosion inflicts damage on the Player Character, either physical and deducted from the Player Character’s Hit Capacity if rolled with Strength or Agility, or mental and deducted from the Player Character’s Stress Capacity if rolled with Intelligence or Empathy. Actually, rolling is thus potentially dangerous to the Player Character and the rules advise that the players should not roll too often as a consequence.

Combat uses these basic rules and expands greatly upon them as you would expect for a military-based roleplaying game with an emphasis on combat. Combat in Twilight 2000 is fought on the roleplaying game’s hex maps using its counters. Initiative is handled by drawing cards from a deck of ten cards, numbered one to ten and then counting up. It is possible to swap initiative cards if a Player Character needs to go first. When a Player Character acts, he can conduct one fast and one slow action, or two fast actions. A slow action might be to break free of a grapple, fire a gun, or exit a vehicle, whilst a fast action could be to seek cover, run, aim, or reload. Combat covers a multitude of situations and rules—cover and line of sight, ambushes, overwatch and suppressive fire, close and ranged combat, explosives—both landmines and IEDs, heavy weapons, and more. Notably, when an attack with a firearm is made, a player does not just roll the Base Dice for his character’s Attribute and Skill. He can also roll Ammo Dice, the more shots fired, the more Ammo Dice rolled. These also have Success icons on them, marked by bullet symbols rather than Target symbols, as well as Explosion symbols. Successes on Ammo Dice can be used to increase the damage done beyond the base damage inflicted by the weapon or to inflict a second hit on the same or a second target. An attack roll can fail and the attack miss, but Successes on the Ammo Dice will still have the effect of suppressing the target. When an attack roll is pushed, the Ammo Dice are also rolled and enough Explosion symbols means that the weapon is jammed and possibly damaged. Successes on Ammo Dice also determine to track how much ammunition is used in an attack and a player is expected to track the amount of ammunition used.

The other die rolled with an attack is the Hit Location die. This determines where damage is inflicted, which is important because bodily locations can be protected by both armour and cover. Armour can stop small amounts of damage and it can suffer damage itself (and be repaired), but damage can be deadly. Suffer total damage equal to Hit Capacity and a Player Character is incapacitated, but suffer damage equal to or greater than a weapon’s ‘Crit Threshold’—for example, the Crit Threshold for a Beretta M9 is two and three for the M16A2—and a critical injury is suffered. Critical injuries are determined by location and can be lethal, requiring a player to make Death Saves for his character until someone can render medical help. In addition, there is a chance of infection… Few of the critical injuries are permanent, but they all take time to heal and they do require medical attention. Having access to a doctor or medic is a necessity in Twilight 2000. It also possible to be incapacitated via mental stress.

The devastated world of Twilight 2000 has its own additional dangers—the residue from chemical warfare and of course, the lingering effects of radiation. Each time a Player Character encounters a radiation hotspot, there is a chance he gains a point of Radiation, which can become permanent, and also suffer from radiation sickness. If he does, there is the possibility that unless treated, as with other diseases like dysentery or cholera, that the Player Character will die.

The scale of combat in Twilight 2000 is at the skirmish level and that also applies to vehicle combat. For the most part, due to the lack of fuel, parts, and ammunition, a group of Player Characters will only be operating a vehicle or two, so vehicle combat will often be one-on-one engagements or small and fire and anti-armour weapons be deployed against vehicles of various types. The rules for vehicle combat in Twilight 2000 are quite straightforward and the aim in general is not necessarily to destroy opposing vehicles as much as render them operable so that they are no longer a danger. A good quarter of the ‘Player’s Manual’ is dedicated to the arms, armour, and equipment, that the Player Characters might find and deploy as they make their way across Poland or Sweden. Although there are some weapons and equipment deployed by other NATO forces described, the descriptions are mostly that of jury-rigged and civilian weapons, as well as American, Soviet, Polish, and Swedish gear reflecting the change in location offered by Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was.

One feature of roleplaying games from Free League Publishing is that they include rules for establishing, developing, and protecting a community, and Twilight 2000 is no exception. More so given that doing so is written into what the Player Characters are expected to do in the game. A base of operations provides the Player Characters somewhere to rest without the need to make Survival rolls to make camp, and not only they can make use of existing facilities, but also add to them. These can be as basic as cultivating cropland or building a cow pen, but then facilities like these are going to be a necessity. In comparison to other roleplaying games from Free League Publishing, such where they originated in Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days, the community rules are not as detailed or as expansive, but in providing facilities for the Player Characters to build and protect, they can serve as the basis for storytelling and events. Further, a base-focused campaign means that the area around it becomes the space in which stories and events can be told and developed. The rules for travel also cover foraging and scrounging as well as difficulty of travel in the post-apocalyptic world of Twilight 2000.

Where the ‘Player’s Manual’ presents the rules for Twilight 2000, the ‘Referee’s Manual’ presents the setting. This includes how the world slide into the war and the state of both Poland and Sweden as the primary starting points. There is some background on other countries such as France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the USA, but only in the broadest of details. There is good advice for the Game Master on starting a campaign from the collapse of Operation Reset and beyond, really developing a campaign driven by what the players and their characters want to do, whether that is to try and find a way home back to the USA or establish a base and even a future where they are. To back this up, the Referee is a given details of the remaining factions, forces, and their goals in both countries, as well as fifty-two encounters to add to her campaign. Each of the latter can be drawn from the ‘Encounter Deck’, which can be anything from encountering a band of refugees, a village ready to barter, or a marauder roadblock to a simply the weather getting better, finding an ambushed Soviet vehicle, or a burnt-out bus, ready to be scavenged, but home to a poisonous viper! They are all easily adjusted so that they can be used again. Four specific scenario sites are described in some detail, including a prison, a town that has fallen under the ‘protection’ of American forces, a military academy turned into a fortress by the surviving cadets, and a burnt-out town whose inhabitants are only beginning to come to terms with what happened. All are nice detailed and include rumours and hooks that ideally should get the Player Characters to want to stick around and investigate a little further. Lastly, the ‘Referee’s Manual’ includes solo rules, conversion notes from previous editions of Twilight 2000, and most interestingly, designer’s notes. This explains how and why the new edition came about and some of the design changes made.

Physically, Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was is very well produced. Both books are well written and the illustrations really do capture the look and feel of the desolate and damaged world broken by mankind’s worst fears. The production values of the maps, cards, and counters are also very good.

The Twilight 2000 of 1984 was the military roleplaying game of its day and Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was is the military roleplaying game of the early twenty-first century. As much as this new edition is a fantastic update of the original, retaining all of its scope, it better emphasises its potential as makes explicit that it is as much a military survival game as it is one of rebuilding and resetting the world. Whilst the setting is bleak and the rules often brutal, this gives Twilight 2000: Roleplaying in the World War III That Never Was a sense of hope that makes it worthwhile taking a look at beyond simple nostalgia.

Goodman Games Gen Con Annual X

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Since 2013, Goodman Games, the publisher of the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game and Mutant Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game – Triumph & Technology Won by Mutants & Magic has released a book especially for Gen Con, the largest tabletop hobby gaming event in the world. That book is the Goodman Games Gen Con Program Book, a look back at the previous year, a preview of the year to come, staff biographies, community content, and a whole lot more, including adventures and lots of tidbits and silliness. The first was the Goodman Games Gen Con 2013 Program Book, but not being able to pick up a copy from Goodman Games when they first attended UK Games Expo in 2019, the first to be reviewed was the Goodman Games Gen Con 2014 Program Book. Fortunately, a little patience and a copy of the Goodman Games Gen Con 2013 Program Book was located and reviewed, so since 2021, normal order has been resumed with the Goodman Games Gen Con 2015 Program Guide, the Goodman Games Gen Con 2016 Program Book, the Goodman Games Gen Con 2017 Program Book, and Goodman Games Gen Con 2018 Program Guide: The Black Heart of Thakulon the Undying, and Goodman Games 2019 Yearbook: Riders on the Phlogiston.
With both Goodman Games Gen Con 2018 Program Guide: The Black Heart of Thakulon the Undying, and Goodman Games 2019 Yearbook: Riders on the Phlogiston, the series had begun to chart a new direction. Each volume would contain a mix of support for the various RPGs published by Goodman Games and the content recognising the Goodman Games community, but the major feature of each volume would be a tournament scenario, staged the previous year at Gen Con. Unfortunately, events caught up with the eighth entry in the series, Goodman Games Yearbook #8: The Year That Shall Not be Named, as the Covid-19 pandemic forced the world to adjust, which of course, included Goodman Games. The result was that the traditional Gen Con Program Guide became a ‘Yearbook’ and this trend has continued since with the Goodman Games 2021 Yearbook and the Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook.
The Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook opens with a traditional look back at the previous year, which saw the continued return to Gen Con and the expansion and professionalisation of the company and also company owner, Joseph Goodman’s philosophy of Gen Con as “the full expression of the Goodman Games brand.” and the fun of playing games. This includes the creation of the Ziggurat and the Wizard Van, both of which have become features of the company’s presence at both the Gen Con and Origins gaming conventions. They also have their own features elsewhere in the book. In turn, Joseph Goodman, Michael Curtis, Chris Doyle, and Brendan Lasalle take a look back at the year, highlighting what the publisher put out in the last twelve months and the company’s return to the convention stage, marking what was a return to form with titles as Dungeon Crawl Classics #101: The Veiled Vaults of the Onyx Queen and Dungeon Crawl Classics #100: The Music of the Spheres is Chaos, funding Original Adventures Reincarnated #7: Dark Tower, and organising Dungeon Crawl Classics #104: Return to the Starless Sea as a tournament. ‘Returning To The Community Of Gen Con DCC’ by Harley Stroh follows this strand in celebrating the joy of returning to play at the event.

Art and how they look has always played a big part of the books that Goodman Games publish and highlighting this has always been part of the publisher’s Gen Con Program Guides and the Gen Con Year Books. The Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook is no exception, but there is an element sadness in the fact that it mirrors the artistic content in the previous volume in the series, the Goodman Games 2021 Yearbook, as it both notes the death of an artist who contributed numerous covers to its books and interviews another artist. Thus it says, ‘Goodbye, Ken Kelly’ to the late Ken Kelly and conducts ‘An Interview With Sanjulián’, in both cases showcasing their art and their contribution to the Goodman Games look.

Goodman Games is also well known for the extra dice it uses in both the Dungeon Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game and Mutant Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game – Triumph & Technology Won by Mutants & Magic, as well as the more recent Xcrawl Classics Roleplaying Game. The Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook embraces this as it takes a silly turn and suggests ways in which the eleven-sided die from Impact Miniatures can be used. Thus, in ‘Take It To 11!’ by Michael Curtis gives two new tables, one ‘The Quick And Dirty Foe Description Table’, the other, ‘The Weird Property Of That Thing You Just Found Table’, whilst separately, Chris Doyle offers two further tables in ‘d11 Fates for 5E’. These two include the bonuses to be gained from inserting coins into an altar dedicated to Myna, the Goddess of Luck, with better coins donated increasing the likelihood of a blessing rather than a curse, whilst ‘The Pool of Life’ has table of healing results for a fountain found in ancient ruins. To be fair, all four tables will work with both the Dungeon Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game and Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, though the entries in ‘d11 Fates for 5E’ require a little bit of set-up to use. Of course, four tables dedicated to an eleven-sided die does not seem sufficient. Surely, the number of tables should also have gone up to eleven?
‘When Tolls the Bell of Ruin’ is the first of two adventures in the Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook. It is a scenario for a party of four to six First Level Player Characters for Dungeon Crawl Classics which begins with the Player Characters responding to the ominous tolling of a bell that has rung out across the land and instilled a sense of dread in all. It has been traced to an ancient monastery of muted monks and as the Player Characters investigate this isolated facility, they will potentially trigger the further tolling of the bell. The bell is actually the Bell of Ruin and whenever it rings, the monastery and the surrounding land are beset by a calamity. These begin with a constant chill and greyness enshrouding the land in a permanent twilight and escalate into everyone suffering rashes of boils, flames randomly striking the ground, and so on. The fun here is that the players will be rolling to see when the bell actually tolls. In between the peal of the bell, the adventure has a pleasingly quiet eeriness to it, the monastery silent and monks strangely missing. Inspired by the Conan the Adventurer cartoon, this is a solid adventure that is easy to add to almost any campaign.
The Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook details four monsters, not once but twice. First for the Dungeon Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game and then for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. They include the Humming-Wasp Swarm, a creature actually from the Terra A.D. setting of Mutant Crawl Classics whose drone stupefies enslaves victims into collecting harvests for the insects; the Shroud Ghoul which shoots gobs of caustic bile from its nose; the Shroud Phantom, undead that looks like burial shroud and suffocates it victims; and the Tri-Crystalline, a crystalline humanoid with three faces, each one of a different alignment that performs particular missions according to the alignment of the face that is awake. The Humming-Wasp Swarm is done as a fantasy version for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, but even the Mutant Crawl Classics version can be used in the Dungeon Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game. Otherwise these are very serviceable monsters.
The Goodman Games’ creative efforts at Gen Con in the past have shown us how the famous Ziggurat was created. Here, ‘A Wizard Van Is Summoned...’ shows how the infamous Goodman Games Wizard Van was modified, reupholstered, and fitted with furniture so as to be suitable to host games at the events where it appeared, whilst in ‘The Original Doom Beard’, Dieter Zimmerman not only provides stats for the Wizard Van (as ‘GG Joe Wizard Vandroid’), but also for its creator! This is followed by ‘Interview With The Mask Maker’ by Tim Wadzinski, who talks to professional mask maker Jordyn Boci, the creator of the masks worn at the convention by some of the Goodman Games staff. ‘The Original Doom Beard’ is, of course, another piece of silliness, but together these three pieces show some of the thought and processes that go into the creation of these items that at the show add to Goodman Games’ presence.
The second scenario in the Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook is ‘Secret of the Slayer’s Sword’ by Alex Kurowski. This is designed for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition and a party of four to six, Twelfth Level Player Characters, and it can be run as a sequel to Fifth Edition Fantasy #5 Into the Dragons Maw. However, it does have quite a complicated backstory that the Player Characters will need to be aware of, but what it boils down to is that Dracusa, a half-green Dragon Medusa, in her continued attempt to prove herself worthy of her draconic half, is hunting for a legendary sword, Vritrastrike, capable of delivering a mortal wound to any dragon. The adventure, set in a Mesoamerican style country, quickly gets the Player Characters to the shrine where the sword rests. The shrine consists of two big encounters, one quite a challenging puzzle, the other a big bruising battle with Dracusa. Success will reward the Player Characters with some fantastic treasure. ‘Secret of the Slayer’s Sword’ is a short, one session affair though nicely detailed. Given its detail and setting, it will require some adjustment to fit into a campaign, and although it states that it does not have to be run after Fifth Edition Fantasy #5 Into the Dragons Maw, to get the best out of the scenario, it really should be as it does feel like the second and concluding part.
Goodman Games has always been highly supportive of its community and showcases their activities in every issue of the ‘program guide’ or ‘yearbook’. The Goodman Games 2021 Yearbook is no exception and dotted throughout its pages are numerous photographs from the events at which there was a Goodman Games presence. These include Gary Con 2022, Kublacon 2022, Origins 2022, and others, as well as Gen Con 2022 itself. There is also the results of the ‘2022 Bumper Sticker Design Contest’, ‘Gen Con Signage’, and in ‘Inkburn!’, even shows how Hector Cruz, a fan of regular Goodman Games artist, Doug Kovacs, got him to draw a tattoo for him, and the ‘Twitch Shows Of 2022’, in which Alana Thompson encapsulates some of the best media streams dedicated to Dungeon Crawl Classics. Lastly, ‘The 2022 Goodie Awards’ spotlights the contributors to the Goodman Games community over the course of the previous year around the world. Lastly, the Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook comes to a cozy close with the return of ‘Dear Archmage Abby’ and some gaming advice.
Physically, the Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook is a slim affair, in keeping with the current reduced format of the series. It is well presented, a pleasing read, and full of very good artwork.
With the Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook gone is the uncertainty of the Goodman Games 2021 Yearbook that chronicled Goodman Games’ adjusting to life after the Covid-19 Pandemic and returning to gaming and a convention presence as was before the events of 2019 and 2020. In fact, with the arrival of the Wizard Van, it is as if Goodman Games are screaming, “We’re back and we’re doing bigger and better things!!” Yet in comparison to the grandeur of the earlier Goodman Games Gen Con 2018 Program Guide: The Black Heart of Thakulon the Undying, and Goodman Games 2019 Yearbook: Riders on the Phlogiston, that does not really apply to the Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook, which feels restrained and not quite as adventurous in the slimmer format. Fans of Goodman Games will undoubtedly enjoy the Goodman Games 2022 Yearbook, but perhaps regret that there is not quite as much to enjoy as there once was.

Solitaire: Death in Berlin

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Between 1961 and 1989, the city of Berlin was divided by more than ideology. It was divided by the Berlin Wall, built in August, 1961 by the Deutsche Demoktratische Republik to stem the flow of citizens from the East to the West. It focused the world’s attention upon the divide between East and West Germany, between the capitalism of the West and the Communism of the East, embodied by the permanent border constructed of brick, explosive mines, sentry posts, machine guns, and so on. The ‘Grey City’ had been divided between the four Allied powers since the end of World War 2, but the Berlin Wall extended the Iron Curtain between East and West through the city rather than just around it. Both sides—the Soviet and the Allies—operated networks of spies and conducted operations in each other’s territories in an effort to discover what the other knew and what secrets they held, and in return, attempted to prevent secrets and other assents from falling into the enemy’s hands. This secret conflict between the NATO Allies and the Soviet Union and its proxies in the Warsaw Pact has been ongoing since before World War 2 and it would inspire films and fiction, such as that of Len Deighton and John le Carré, throughout the Cold War—and since. It would also inspire roleplaying games such as Top Secret, Spione, and Project Cassandra: Psychics of the Cold War. One of the aspects of espionage and the Cold War is the loneliness and that is ripe for exploration in solo roleplaying such as Numb3r Stations – A Solo RPG and Death in Berlin: Spy Games During the Cold War 1961-1989.

Death in Berlin: Spy Games During the Cold War 1961-1989 is a solo roleplaying and journalling game published by Critical Kit Ltd., best known for its solo journalling game, Be Like a Crow: A Solo RPG and its scenarios for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, such as A Yuletide Snowball Massacre: A Ridiculously Festive Battle Royale for 5E and The City of a Hundred Ships. In Death in Berlin, the player will be telling the story of a spy in service to of the agencies of either the Western Bloc or the Eastern Bloc. Thus, he can be a member of the Central Intelligence Agency or MI6 as much as he could be a member of the Komitet gosudarstvennoï bezopasnosti or the Ministerium für Staatssicherheit. His role is counter-espionage, uncovering conspiracies and operations conducted by the other side.

Death in Berlin is really divided in two parts. The first part is a source book which describes the setting for the game, Berlin and the Cold War. The latter begins with George Orwell’s first use of the term and runs through the history in brisk fashion, and is accompanied by a guide to city across all four sectors. There are maps too, show the checkpoints through the wall—there were far more than just Checkpoint Charlie—and the city’s various districts. There are cultural elements covered too, such as the Trabant and the symbolic figures known as the Ampelmännnchen on the pedestrian crossing lights. There is discussion too of the various agencies, equipment that the player and his opponents might wield in the field, and the language of spycraft. The discussion of the espionage world is shorter than the coverage of the city though. The author states that is not designed as a sourcebook for the period and even suggests further reading for the benefit of the reader. However, this potentially still leaves a younger player with more work to do to familiarise himself with the period.

In terms of game play, Death in Berlin requires a full set of polyhedral dice and an ordinary deck of playing cards, of which, only cards valued from seven to Ace are used. An Agent is simply defined. He has two stats, Rank and Heat. Rank represents his progress through the agency and starts at one, raises by one for each conspiracy he foils (that involves a Queen, King, or Ace card), up to a maximum of five. Heat is a measure of how many risks the Agent has taken and how much of a liability he is becoming. It ranges in value from zero to six. It rises by one each time the player identifies what connects two members of a conspiracy. Should it rise to six, the Agent’s cover is blown and the game ends. An Agent also has a Motivation, such as Ideology or Ambition.

Death in Berlin uses a set of tables to help set up and run the game. One provides a narrative arc for what is effectively a season, such as the ‘Monitor’ Mode of Operation, ‘An Artist’ as the Target, and ‘Space’ as the Goal. Further tables can provide a yes or no answer to a question—qualified, if necessary, a suspect or two, names for NPCs of various nationalities, as well as places, weather, items, and possible codenames. Some of these will be useful at the start, some of them in play. Either way, the player is free to roll or pick from them as is his wont. The structure of play is formed by a pyramid of the playing cards, representing the whole of the conspiracy with each card representing a Suspect, four wide at the bottom, then three wide, two wide, and lastly the single card at the top. At least one seven is placed on the lowest level and cards are drawn and placed in the pyramid, ensuring that each card’s value is equal to or greater by a few points than its neighbouring cards. Initially, this is only horizontally in the lowest row, but switches to vertical for the upper levels. This creates a triangular of ascending values. The top, most valuable card will be big target or Suspect. The suit for each card, Spade for the military, police, and intelligence, Clubs for politicians and civil service, Diamonds for business and finance, and Hearts for the arts and vice, determines the area in which field, a Suspect works or is employed, whilst the value of the card is his rank. A random roll determines if he works for the West or the East.

Each individual card and thus Suspect is a target for surveillance upon the part of the player. The surveillance is rolled against the value of the card. If the player fails, he is spotted and gains a point of Heat. For each Rank at Rank Two and above, a player has a Silver Bullet—narratively, a disguise, a weapon, a sidekick, and so on—that sets the roll to ten plus the player’s Rank or enables him to succeed, but also increase his Heat. Heat can be lowered, but it has its own consequences.

If he succeeds, the player draws a new card and consults the Narrative Prompt table. This card determines the basics of the connection between this Suspect and another, adjacent one in the scenario. Each successful roll, each drawing of a new card, and consultation of the Narrative Prompt table is what pushes the story of the player’s investigation forward. For example, “The suspect likes gambling. And this often gets them in trouble. Someone is acting around them. Who it is? What is their relationship?” and “The target meets with one of the known suspects in the conspiracy. This takes place in a cinema in (West sector). You manage to get close enough and hear a sentence. What is it?” It is in this space, using the prompts, that the player is writing his journal and telling the story of his investigation.

Physically, Death in Berlin is simply and cleanly presented. The illustrates evoke the stark world of Berlin in the sixties and seventies, giving a feel for the city. The maps are decent too.

Play through of Death in Berlin, from the beginning investigation of the conspiracy through to the unmasking of the mastermind at its heart will take an hour or more, being dependent on the depth and detail that the player wants to work into the story. It has a slightly grubby feel, but how grubby is again dependent on the player and the style of espionage he wants to write about. The default is definitely le Carré rather than Fleming and there is nothing to stop a player from pushing into the territory of Mick Herron—at least in tone rather than period. Similarly, how much a player will get out of Death in Berlin in writing a journal is dependent upon his knowledge and appreciation of both the genre and the period when it is set.

Death in Berlin: Spy Games During the Cold War 1961-1989 is a very serviceable journalling game, one whose enjoyment and creativity that very much depends upon the knowledge and interest of the player in the genre and period.

Character Creation Challenge: The Ravenloft Weekend

The Other Side -

Characters from the The Ravenloft WeekendBack in 1991, Grenda and I ran a weekend-long game of Ravenloft. We ran it as the "Dreams of Barovia" variant that combined adventure modules I6 and I10. He was the DM for I6 Ravenloft and I was the DM for I11 Ravenloft II: House on Gryphon Hill. It was a lot of fun to be honest, the problem was I forgot to tell my roommates and girlfriend where I was! When I crawled back to my apartment at 2D Lewis Park, I got an earful. The game was fun, but kind of a hazy memory to be honest. We played from Friday afternoon to Sunday evening straight. I remember sleeping in my chair and eating a lot of Quatros pizza

I am presenting all the characters now to cover my next few days (1/17 to 1/21). But more importantly to me, can I use Wasted Lands with NIGHT SHIFT to play a Ravenloft-style game? 

The answer is, absolutely.

Ravenloft is quasi-Gothic horror. As I have mentioned in the past, it is not true Gothic Horror because the characters are still hero types. They have power, they have agency. The heroes of Gothic Horror typically do not have the same level of power D&D characters do. Out Hunters in Dracula only succeed because they have each other and make use of the "technology" of the time. The PCs can go toe to toe with most Gothic literature monsters.

Wasted Lands is Post-Apocalyptic Cosmic Horror. NIGHT SHIFT is Urban survival Horror. BUT that is just what they are on the surface. They are both toolkit games to add or subtract what you want or need from them. 

I would still give the characters some power, but make the setting "Gritty."

That means no Heroic Touchstones. 

Heroic Touchstones are a key feature of the Wasted Lands and will be part of Night Shift 2nd Edition. But for a game like Ravenloft? I would take them out. Well...maybe one at first level. I'll work on the characters to see. Thankfully, none of these characters have psionics or other "kewl powerz," and all the classes are normal ones. 

I would use all the fear and terror effects from NIGHT SHIFT. I'd use Degeneracy and Corruption rules from Wasted Lands. That might feel like I am stacking things against the characters. I am.

Unlike D&D (esp. post 2000+ D&D) Gothic Horror is not about balance, it is exactly the opposite of that. The Big Bad Guy has all the power. 

Characters from the Ravenloft Weekend

The Characters

I only have vague recollections of these characters. I was spending a lot of time trying to get into grad school, and my focus then was largely on that. Plus, these are really just one-shot characters. So while they do have some good background attached, they were only used (to my knowledge) for this adventure.

Sir Beyrn SilverhelmSir Beyrn Silverhelm

Class: Divine Warrior (from Night Companion)
Level: 13
Species: Human
Alignment: Light Good
Background: Warrior

Abilities
Strength: 18 (+3) N
Agility: 12 (0) 
Toughness: 18 (+3) 
Intelligence: 12 (0) 
Wits: 15 (+1) N
Persona: 17 (+2) A

Fate Points: 1d10
Defense Value: 0
Vitality: 98 
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +6/+4/+2
Melee Bonus: +5 (base), +3 (STR)
Ranged Bonus: +5 (base)
Saves: +5 to all Wits and Persona Saves, +2 to Toughness (Warrior background)

Divine Warrior Abilities
Sixth Sense, Heal Injury and Illness (13d6), Supernatural Attacks, Protection from Evil

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Protection

Gear
Longsword, Field plate armor, Holy symbol

Sir Beyrn is a quintessential Diving Warrior. His stats on his AD&D sheet look like they might have been cribbed from Johan II to be honest! Which makes sense. Looks like Grenda created all these characters in a couple of weeks while working and going to school.

Hile AugarinHile Augarin

Class: Archer (from Wasted Lands)
Level: 12
Species: Half-elf
Alignment: Twilight Good
Background: Elf (Wasted Lands) 

Abilities
Strength: 18 (+3) N
Agility: 16 (+2) A
Toughness: 16 (+2) N
Intelligence: 11 (0) 
Wits: 15 (+1) 
Persona: 12 (0) 

Fate Points: 1d10
Defense Value: 2
Vitality: 92 
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +6/+4/+2
Melee Bonus: +5 (base)
Ranged Bonus: +5 (base)
Saves: +6 to agility-based saves

Elf Abilities
Night Shifted

Archer Abilities
Improved Defense, Master Archer, Ranged Combat, Supernatural Attack, Improved Range Damage, Eagle Eye, Incapacitating Shot, Multi Attack x4, Careful Aim, Trick Shot

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: hunter

Gear
Longsword, Longbow, elven chain

I have used Renegades and Warriors in the past for Rangers, in this case Archer is the better choice.

Finneous SevinhandFinneous Sevinhand

Class: Renegade (from Wasted Lands)
Level: 12
Species: Half-elf
Alignment: Twilight Good
Background: Elf (Wasted Lands) 

Abilities
Strength: 15 (+1) N
Agility: 17 (+2) A
Toughness: 16 (+2) N
Intelligence: 13 (+1) 
Wits: 11 (0) 
Persona: 10 (0) 

Fate Points: 1d10
Defense Value: 3
Vitality: 87 
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +6/+4/+2
Melee Bonus: +4 (base)
Ranged Bonus: +4 (base)
Saves: +4 vs Death effects

Elf Abilities
Night Shifted

Renegade Abilities
Improved Defence, Ranged Combat, Stealth Skills, Climbing, Danger Sense (1-4 d6), Perception, Vital Strike x4, Read Languages, Stealth Skills

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Thief

Gear
Shortsword, dagger, throwing knife, crossbow

Renegades have a different feel to me than survivors, though both can be used as thieves. 

Meroc TrothgardMeroc Trothgard

Class: Survivor (from NIGHT SHIFT)
Level: 12
Species: Human
Alignment: Night Good
Background: Hunter/Gatherer

Abilities
Strength: 15 (+1) N
Agility: 17 (+2) A
Toughness: 17 (+2) N
Intelligence: 12 (0) 
Wits: 14 (+1) 
Persona: 13 (+1) 

Fate Points: 1d10
Defense Value: 2
Vitality: 90
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +6/+4/+2
Melee Bonus: +4 (base)
Ranged Bonus: +4 (base)
Saves: +4 vs Death effects

Renegade Abilities
Improved Defence, Ranged Combat, Stealth Skills, Climbing, Danger Sense (1-4 d6), Perception, Vital Strike x4, Read Languages, Stealth Skills

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Hunter

Gear
Longsword ("Trollslayer"), dagger, longbow

Mechanically, the Renegade and the Survivor are the same. But in this case, I add in the backgrounds to give them a different feel. With Meroc here, I also decided not to go with their multi-class Ranger/Thief and stuck with the Survivor.

Aristobulous DeclanAristobulous Declan

Class: Sorcerer (from Wasted Lands)
Level: 13
Species: Half-elf
Alignment: Night Good
Background: Scholar

Abilities
Strength: 11 (0) 
Agility: 16 (+2) N
Toughness: 15 (+1) 
Intelligence: 17 (+2) A
Wits: 10 (0) 
Persona: 13 (+1) N

Fate Points: 1d10
Defense Value: 3
Vitality: 72
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +6/+4/+2
Melee Bonus: +4 (base)
Ranged Bonus: +4 (base)
Saves: +4 vs Magic

Elf Abilities
Night Shifted

Sorcerer Abilities
Beguile, Enhanced Senses, Exorcist, Subtle Influence, Telekinesis

Spells
First Level (5): Arcane Darts, Chill Ray, Gout of Flame, Mystical Senses, Sleep, 
Second Level (4): Conjure Flame, Invisibility, Lesser Renewal, See Invisible
Third Level (4): Concussive Blast, Dark Lightning, Dispel Magic, Remove Curse 
Fourth  Level (4): Conjure Fire, Improved Invisibility, Paralyze Undead, Renewal
Fifth Level (3): Banishment, Shadow Armor, Teleport
Sixth Level (2): Destroy Undead, Dispel Evil
Seventh Level (1): Ball of Sunshine

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Magic

Gear
Quarterstaff, Dagger, dart

Mages are Sorcerers. This one has a lot spells to help survive Castle Ravenloft.

Father Ercon ValeranFather Ercon Valeran

Class: Theosophist (from NIGHT SHIFT)
Level: 12
Species: Human
Alignment: Light Good
Background: Warrior

Abilities
Strength: 15 (+1) N
Agility: 18 (+3) 
Toughness: 16 (+1) N
Intelligence: 16 (+2) 
Wits: 20 (+4) A 
Persona: 19 (+3) 

Fate Points: 1d10
Defense Value: 3
Vitality: 87
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +6/+4/+2
Melee Bonus: +2 (base)
Ranged Bonus: +2 (base)
Saves: +5 vs Wits 

Theosophist Abilities
See Dead people, Turn Undead x2, Summon Dead, Channel Dead, Death Knell, Suggestion, Command the Dead

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Hunter of the Dead

Gear
Mace ("Skullcrusher"), Quarterstaff, shortbow, holy symbol.

I can't help but notice that Father Ercon's Patron Deity is St. Werper. Nice touch Grenda!

I should stat up Strahd sometime as well. But I think he deserves his own post really. 


You can get the Wasted Lands RPG and the NIGHT SHIFT RPG at Elf Lair Games.

Character Creation Challenge


Friday Fantasy: Till Death Do Us Part

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part is notable for one particular fact. That it is written and published by Heidi Gygax Garland—yes, the daughter of E. Gary Gygax—and her husband, Erik Gygax Garland. Published by Gaxland Games, it is a module written for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition and Player Characters of First Level. Conversion, of course, to the rules of the Game Master’s choice is far from challenging, but the PDF version of the scenario is accompanied with conversions for both Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition and Castles & Crusades. In addition, the PDF version includes some setting background that the module itself does not. This details Sørholde, a warm, dry, and fortified Dwarven port-city sitting on the island of The Dundel. In Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part, the Player Characters are hired by a famed auctioneer to rescue a local noblewomen, Heiress. She has been kidnapped by Crikpaw and is being held hostage on Governor’s Island, which lies north of Sørholde. In addition to returning with the Lady Heiress, safe and sound, the Player Characters are expected to return with the signet ring from the house of Ukoh An—which Crikpaw is searching for—and ideally with Crikpaw. Dead or alive.

Unfortunately, Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part starts by committing a cardinal sin. It leaps straight into the set-up for the Player Characters with a lot of exposition and absolutely no explanation for what is going on for the Dungeon Master. Nevertheless, it quickly moves to the action with a strange encounter just off Governor’s Island. A Septopus—a seven-tailed Octopus—will approach the boat the Player Characters are on and it will await their reaction. If they attack, the Septopus will respond in kind and then descend into the depths never to return, but if they are receptive to communication, it will tell them some of the secrets about Governor’s Island and give them some keys to doors on the island and some treasure. The treasure is nice enough, but cannot be used in this scenario. It is a nicely done encounter and rewards the Player Characters with a little useful information.

After this first encounter, though? There are some truly pointless encounters in Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part. The second encounter is with a beached pair of adventurers, the last survivors of an encounter with the first encounter, the one with the Septopus that the Player Characters have just survived, either by driving it off or by actually learning something useful from it. Both of them want to leave Governor Island and will negotiate with the Player Characters for help in getting to the ship that the Player Characters arrived on. This, though, is not before both adventurers explain to the Player Characters what happened to the rest of their comrades in what is a detailed splurge of exposition that takes up two pages, and apart from this, neither adventurer has anything useful to tell the Player Characters. The encounter will either show the Player Characters what would have happened if they got the first encounter right or show them that they were not the only ones to get it wrong, but how exactly does this help either them or the story? Logically, perhaps this encounter should have been first, with the adventurers clinging to wreckage rather than washed ashore, thus foreshadowing the encounter with the Septopus, rather than the illogical four pages devoted to it to no purpose.

There is a mad goblin who is dressed as a bridegroom and will beg for news of his bride, and when he does not get it, he will attack the Player Characters. He knows nothing that will be of any help to the Player Characters and although there are the scraps of a torn letter to be found in the same room, there is no explanation as to what contents of the letter actually means. Another room consists of a paddling pool in which floats a rubber duck and which contains surprisingly deep water at the bottom of which is a locked gate. There is nothing else in the room. The adventure states that there is no way to get to the gate and the Dungeon Master is expected to advise her players that, “It becomes obvious that the gate is unreachable at this time”. Which begs the question, when will it be reachable and what does it actually add to the adventure? It is bad enough that the description of the room fails to mention its exits—one obvious, one secret—but having the central feature of a room do nothing and add nothing…? Another has two ‘Apocol-imps’ that walk around in a circle each wearing a sandwich board and declaring the end is nigh and again, there is no explanation as to how this relates to the plot, if at all.

Continuing the pointless encounters with containers of water is a room with the magical artefact known as the Bucket of Fish. Its waters contain visions of ethereal figures swimming in the mist and if a Player Character stares into waters and fails a Saving Throw, he will see the ‘partner of his dreams’, is cursed, and loses points of either Intelligence or Wisdom until the curse is removed. According to legend its appearance is a terrible omen, but an omen of what? If the curse is lifted, and that is a challenge all of its own, the person lifting the curse automatically knows where the Bucket of Fish is and knows that he must return to the Bucket of Fish his to rescue his beloved from the bucket. Further, the Player Character who suffered the curse, will lose half of his wealth, including his possessions and any treasure gained from the adventure. So doubly punished for failing a Saving Throw. Lastly, if a player states that his character is going to ‘kick’ the Bucket of Fish, he has to make a Saving Throw versus Death. He does receive a bonus, because as the adventure states, “[T]he writers of this adventure aren’t complete dicks.” However, if the character does die, the writers do give permission for his player to be teased by his fellow players. Which is fine, because as the adventure states, “[T]he writers of this adventure aren’t complete dicks.”

The encounter ends with further advice that, again, the Dungeon Master is expected to advise her players that, “It becomes obvious that the Bucket of Fish cannot be affected by your actions at this time” as the bucket cannot be moved or damaged by their characters. So again, what is its purpose? The only thing it can do is punish the Player Characters and not only punish the Player Characters, but also a player too, all for asking to do the most obvious thing that you would do with a bucket.

There is another hint as to what is going on some twenty-four pages into Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part. After saving Heiress’ best friend, she will tell them that she came with Heiress to Governor’s Island in order to save her friend, Crikpaw, and she will also explain where the love-besotted Goblin came from. This is from the Bucket of Fish, which begs the question why did it work differently for Heiress and her best friend than for the Player Characters?

The scenario comes to an end with a big fight with a demon, the discovery of a sealed letter that the Player Characters are not expected to read, but give to their employer, and the Player Characters failing to find Heiress, Crikpaw, or the signet ring of the house of Ukoh An. They do see a ship sailing off, presumably with Heiress and Crikpaw aboard, but ultimately, everything is fine, as although the Player Characters’ employer is angry, he will still pay them despite their failure.

Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part is designed as the first part of an eight-part series, so obviously, in later parts, the Player Characters will find Heiress and Crikpaw and presumably find out what is actually going on. This though, does not excuse or stop Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part from being a frustratingly stupid adventure. To begin with, the Dungeon Master does not learn the identity of the actual villain until after the adventure has finished and worse, even if she had known at the start of the adventure, it would not have affected the running of the adventure. It certainly would not have affected the plot, as effectively there is no plot to Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part and even if there were, there is nothing that the Player Characters can do to affect it. So, it almost does not matter that nowhere is there an explanation of the overall plot to the series, let alone this single adventure. Except, of course, such an explanation might have persuaded the Dungeon Master to want to look at the sequels to Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part.

Further, only three encounters matter in the whole of Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part. The first is the encounter with Septopus, which will provide the Player Characters with some useful information as to was they might find in the dungeon; the second is with the Heiress’ best friend, who will tell them a little of what is actually going on; and third, discovering that Heiress and Crikpaw have already left. Between the first and last encounters, it does not matter what the Player Characters do in this linear dungeon. In fact, the best thing that the Player Characters can do is touch nothing and just get to the end as quickly as possible, because almost everything they encounter is either pointless or designed to punish them, if not both. The last thing that these encounters are not designed to do is engage in the plot to Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part, putting aside the fact that there is actually very little plot to Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part.

Physically, Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part is not a bad looking product. It apes the classic booklet in a card folder with a white on blue map on the inside format of many of the modules from TSR, Inc. The map is incredibly large given that it has to depict twelve locations one after another. The scenario needs a slight edit in places, but the artwork is decent and it is tidily laid out.

There are encounters in Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part which are interesting and playable—the encounter with the Septopus and another with some Leaf Spiders. They suggest that the authors can write encounters that are either interesting or playable—or even both, but two interesting and playable encounters out of twelve do not make for a good adventure. The rest really are dreadful, often managing to be just randomly pointless and punishing, taking up time until the Player Characters can discover that all of their efforts have been to naught. To be fair, that is often the way of stories, the protagonists failing to achieve their objectives in this part, but making another attempt in a later part. Yet that failure should be interesting in itself and the protagonists of the story—in this case, the Player Characters—should learn something that will help in the subsequent parts. Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part fails to do this. It also fails to tell the Dungeon Master its own plot, let alone that of the series as a whole. So, it fails to sell the whole series too.

Lastly, Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part costs $35.

Dungeon Module GG1: Till Death Do Us Part does not provide the purchaser with $35’s worth of entertainment. As to the amount’s worth of entertainment it does offer, it is difficult to determine how much this exercise in frustration and pointlessness is actually worth, but $35 it is not by any stretch of the imagination.

The Other OSR: Knave, Second Edition

Reviews from R'lyeh -

There can be no doubt that Knave, Second Edition succeeds at two things. First, it is definitely the prettiest microclones you can buy, and certainly one of the prettiest Old School Renaissance-style roleplaying games you can buy. Second, it is one of the most accessible of microclones you can buy, and certainly one of the most accessible Old School Renaissance-style roleplaying games you can buy. It is pretty because it uses just the one artist and that gives it a look all of its very own. Peter Mullen’s artwork is excellent. It is accessible because the play style of Dungeons & Dragons is incredibly familiar and because the core rules take up two pages and because every aspect of the rules is neatly and concisely presented on a single page. The rules for Ability Checks and Character Creation together take up a single page; for handling Checks, a single page; Delving, a single page; Combat, a single page; and so on. The core of these are even presented in the inside and back covers for easy reference. Barely thirty of the eight pages that make up Knave, Second Edition are dedicated to rules, and that is including the author’s own commentary, advice on play, and an example of play as maps that the Game Master can develop as her own adventure sites. The rest of the book consists of tables. Tables for signs, locations, structures, and place traits, tables for delve shifts, rooms, room details, and room themes, tables for mutations, delusions, disasters, and magic schools. Each of these tables has a hundred entries and each of these tables is designed for two elements of play. One of course, is preparation prior to running the game by the Game Master, the other is to generate content through emergent play, the book itself is slim enough, short enough to make it easy to use at the table.

Knave, Second Edition is a toolkit designed and published by the author of The Waking of Willowby Hall, the earlier Maze Rats, and host of the YouTube channel, Questing Beast, following a successful Kickstarter campaign. The toolkit begins with advice on the duties of both the Game Master and the Player. The tasks of the Game Master are to create locations to explore, flesh out the cast, let the players guide the action, keep the game moving, immerse the players, reveal the world, signpost danger, reward smart plans, and so on. The task of the player are to create and play a character, take initiative and ask questions in driving play forward, apply tactical infinity—that is, treat the world as if it was real and turn any and all aspects of it to his character’s advantage, scheme and fight dirty, but be prepared to die! It is really simple and direct advice, in keeping with the concision of Knave, Second Edition. The advice also fits the play style which has each Player Character as a “tomb-raiding, adventure-seeking ne’er-do-well who wields a spell book just as easily as a blade.” Some of the Game Master’s role, certainly when it comes to the ‘Edit the Rules’ set down at the beginning of the book is expanded upon in the Designer’s Commentary at the end of the book.
A Player Character in Knave, Second Edition has the six standard attributes—Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma—of Dungeons & Dragons and other retroclones. Each is rated in value between one and ten, and each one has a specific role in play and is associated with a specific role, or Class, from Dungeons & Dragons. Strength is the Fighter ability and is used for melee combat checks and physical activity. Agility is the Thief ability and covers any action involving reflexes or dexterity. Constitution is the Adventurer ability and is used to resist poison and diseases, but also determines how many item slots a Player Character has and how much damage a Player Character can suffer before dying. Intelligence is the Magic-User ability and is used for cunning, lockpicking—surprisingly not Dexterity, and spell use. Wisdom is the Ranger ability and is used for ranged combat, perception, and willpower. Charisma is the Cleric ability and is used to determine initiative and persuasion. What this means is that there is some shifting of what traditional Dungeons & Dragons do and are used for in Knave, Second Edition, and that in addition, every attribute is useful. In other words, there is no dump stat! In addition, a Player Character has one or two previous Careers which determine his extra equipment to the standard that every Player Character receives. If his Intelligence is high enough, he can have a random spell book as well.
Character creation is fast and easy. The player distributes three points between the six Attributes (or he can roll), rolls for Hit Points, and two Careers. He also receives some coins with which to buy arms and armour. What he does not do is pick a Race or Class. Knave, Second Edition does not use either. A player is free to decide upon the Race of his character, but there are no mechanical benefits to doing so. Instead of a Class, a player can can choose to have his character specialise in one of his Attributes and its associated role. So, for example, to play a Magic-User type, a player would points into his character’s Intelligence Attribute so that he knows more spells and is better at casting them or to be a Ranger type, he would put points in the character’s Dexterity and Wisdom Attributes. Alternatively, a player does not have to have his character specialise and can mix and match roles. For example, he could increase his Intelligence to cast spells and his Strength to be a better warrior. Although a Player Character only starts with three points to assign to his Attributes, he will be given more as he goes up in Level.

Crispin CromditchLevel 1Careers: Cobbler/CultistHit Points: 1Armour: Gambeson (AP 1) Armour Class: 12Helmet: None Shield: NoneWeapon: dagger (d6)
Personality: DogmaticGoal: Serve the NeedyMannerism: Slow Speech
Strength 1 Dexterity 1 Constitution 1Intelligence 0 Wisdom 0 Charisma 0
Equipment: leather roll, fancy shoes, tacks, dagger, ritual robes, amulet, day’s rations, 50’ rope, gambeson
Mechanically, Knave, Second Edition calls for checks to be made against specific attributes on a twenty-sided die. The base difficulty is eleven and may be as high as twenty-one. In combat the difficulty number is the defender’s Armour Class, which is based on the number of Armour Pieces the defender is wearing. In comparison to other roleplaying games, including Dungeons & Dragons, Advantage and Disadvantage is not handled by rolling extra dice, but applying a flat ‘+5’ bonus or ‘-5’ penalty per modifying factor. Beyond this, checks are used sparingly. There are no Lore check, the Player Characters will know common knowledge and the knowledge granted by their careers, but anything else is waiting to be discovered. Similarly, there are no Search checks, but finding hidden things is handled narratively and through Player Character action.
Initiative in combat is handled by an opposed Charisma check and if the player rolls twenty-one or more on the attack check, his character can perform a manoeuvre such as disarming, blinding, tripping, and so on. Sneak attacks always hit and bypasses Hit Points to Wounds, and power attacks double damage, but break the weapon. Damage is taken from a defender’s Hit Points and then in the case of a Player Character, from his Inventory Slots, which effectively serve as wounds. As his Inventory Slots are filled, his capacity to carry objects is reduced and if they are all filled up, the Player Character is dead.

Spellcasting is not just done spell by spell, but spellbook by spellbook. A spellbook holds a single spell and takes up a single inventory slot. Spells are not taught, but found, so that a spellbook is a treasure all of its own. Spells are automatically cast, but their effects can be saved against to avoid them. The rulebook includes one hundred spells, each consiusting of a short, one or two sentence description. There are some fun spells here, like Astral Prison which temporarily freezes the target in time and space; Catherine, which makes a woman dressed in blue appear and fulfil any polite, safe requests; and Shroud which makes the affected creatures invisible for as long as they hold their breath! In addition, there is a set of tables to create even more spells.
Divine magic is called Relic Magic and is granted by patrons, such as gods, spirits, and saints, through relics. Rather than finding a scroll with a divine blessing on it, a Player Character will visit a shrine to communicate with a patron whose favour he has, and be given both a relic and a quest. Fulfil the terms of the quest and the relic will be imbued with a Blessing which can be performed multiple times per day. Of course, a relic takes up an Inventory Slot just as a spellbook does. The various tables for magic, potions, and powers are intended to provide inspiration for what these blessings might be.
Beyond these basic rules and those for delving, Knave, Second Edition scales up to encompass travel and weather, really simple and easy rules for alchemy, buildings and warfare, and of course, monsters. The bestiary itself, is short, at thirty-five entries, but enough to get started. Their format is close to Dungeons & Dragons, so easy for the Game Master to import and adapt monsters from other sources. Outside of adventuring and delving, there are rules too for downtime. The latter includes carousing and gambling, but also career training for everything from carpenter and hunter to lawyer and assassin. The rare careers take a lot of time and are very expensive.
Knave, Second Edition is round out with an example of play—which probably should have been more up front—and the ‘Designer’s Commentary’. Here the designer explains the decisions he took in redesigning Knave for this new edition. His voice comes through here most obviously—the reader can imagine him actually saying all of this—and pleasingly, he acknowledges the inspirations for each of those decisions. There are some interesting choices made here and the ‘Designer’s Commentary’ brings Knave, Second Edition to a close with a personal touch. Lastly, there is a map of a dungeon and a wilderness area that the Game Master could develop into actual adventuring material.
Physically, Knave, Second Edition is very well presented, the layout done in ‘Command’ style so that everything needed for each aspect of the rules is presented concisely on the one page (two at most). This makes everything accessible and easy to grasp. The artwork is excellent.
From start to finish, Knave, Second Edition has been clearly designed for use and accessibility. The layout is great, the mechanics combine simplicity and brutal Old School Renaissance play with player choice, and the tables provide the Game Master with hundreds of prompts. Knave, Second Edition is the microclone’s microclone, a superb little roleplaying game and toolkit, perfect for playing fast and light in the Old School Renaissance.

Character Creation Challenge: Molley Hachit

The Other Side -

Molley HachitOh, have I got a fun one today! First off, this is not one of Grenda's characters, it actually belongs to my old Jr. High DM Jon Cook. Jon played with us for a while, but he was the first of our group to get a job (he made enough to buy a new car in high school) and the first of us to get a steady girlfriend. Secondly, this isn't the original version of Molley. It is a version I found with versions of a few of my own characters (Phygora, Nigel, Rogue, and Retsam). I seem to recall a "Greatest Hits" game we played in a few years into High School where we played different versions of our favorite characters. This one is special as well because this one of the very few women characters I can remember Jon playing. 

Molley Hachit (and yes that is the proper spelling!) is obviously based on the band Molly Hatchet. In particular their first album. Jon's older sister Mary (who sadly we also lost last year) had EXCELLENT taste in music. She was also a "Killer DM" so I would not be surprised if one version of Molley had not died at her hands. 

Molley is a fighter, and a pretty buff one at that. Of course, she wields a big axe. Hmm, I bet she would have gotten along with Karlach or Hervor. I can't help but think that the song "Bounty Hunter" was the inspiration for her. I can see her jumping into battle screaming "Hell Yeah!"

BUT. I am going to stat her up in Wasted Lands as a Renegade. This fits better with Jon's playstyle, really, and a nod to Mary, who was the biggest Styx fan in the world. 

Molley Hachit

Class: Renegade
Level: 3
Species: Neutral
Alignment: Twilight
Background: Barbarian

Abilities
Strength: 16 (+2) N
Agility: 11 (0) A
Toughness: 15 (+1) N
Intelligence: 12 (0) 
Wits: 13 (+1) 
Persona: 7 (-7)

Fate Points: 1d6
Defense Value: 3
Vitality: 15
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +3/+1/+0
Melee Bonus: +2 (base) 
Ranged Bonus: +2 (base) 
Saves: +3 vs Death effects (Renegade)

Renegade Abilities
Improved Defence, Ranged Combat, Stealth Skills, Climbing, Danger Sense (1-3), Perception, Vital Strike x3, Read Languages, Stealth Skills

Stealth Skills
Open Locks: 25%
Bypass Traps: 20%
Sleight of Hand: 30%
Sneak: 25%

Heroic/Divine Touchstones 
1st Level: +1 to Melee attacks
3rd Level: Luck Benefit 1d6

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Warrior

Gear
Big Axe, Dagger, Chain Armor, thieves tools

Ok, so she is not an optimized Renegade, and this character might be better served as a barbarian-like Warrior. But that is not how Jon used to play characters. The concept was key. And the sacrifice of some combat ability for some "thief skills" was always something he liked to do.

In any case. Damn. It sure was fun to see Molley again.  I should make her a member of the Fearless Five, who would then number seven. The Stalwart Seven, perhaps?


You can get the Wasted Lands RPG and the NIGHT SHIFT RPG at Elf Lair Games.

Character Creation Challenge


Character Creation Challenge: Briana Highstar

The Other Side -

Briana HighstarAfter discovering yesterday's healer, I have to admit I went searching through this large stack of characters looking for a witch. I found one and she was not who I suspected she was going to be. So for this special Witchcraft Wednesday of the Character Creation Challenge, I give you Briana Highstar.

Now that name sticks out. Grenda was very, very careful with his family names. He had (and you have seen here) dynasties of characters. The Addingdales are the prime example. So when he names someone "Highstar" especially at the time when Morgan Highstar was such a prominent character of his, it means something. 

Sadly, there is not much here on Briana Highstar. She is listed as an NPC. She does not show up in our shared timeline, and I have not been able to dig up anything else about her. So, a witch (a class I made) related to his major Riddlemaster (a class he made). There is a story here!

I know she is one of my witches, largely due to the spells. I mean, yeah, he could have been using another witch class and my spells. 1993 is about the time I finished my first big "publication" draft that combined all my notes and handwritten playtest documents. I still have it here, I just printed it out on a "new" type of printer, an inkjet. 

So what can I speculate about Briana Highstar?

Her sheet says that she is a diabolic witch and her patron devil is Mephistopheles. She is Lawful Evil. That's about it.

Given Grenda's frame of mind at the time (2/11/1993) I'll make the following assumptions.

She is the younger half-sister of Morgan Highstar; they share the same father but different mothers.  I'll tear a page from Arthurian legends and have their relationship (at least the antagonism) be the same as Arthur and Morgan le Fey's. The attitude would likely be Briana feels wronged by Morgan and Morgan doesn't even know who she is.

To amp up this antagonism, I'd have Briana look a lot like Morgan; black hair, gray eyes. Hell, she might look a bit like Katie McGrath's Morgana from Merlin. I'll admit it, I am a fan of her's. 

Maybe her motivation is to destroy his School of Riddlemasters. Or maybe she just wants to avenge herself on him. I don't know yet. She is Lawful Evil to his True Neutral, so maybe her plans are more complicated. Maybe "her" plans are not her's but Mephistopheles' instead. Who knows, I would have to put her into play and see what she does.

Briana Highstar, Baldur's Gate 3 version

Briana Highstar

Class: Witch
Level: 8
Species: Human
Alignment: Evil Dark
Background: Cultist

Abilities
Strength: 12 (+0) 
Agility: 16 (+2) 
Toughness: 13 (+1) 
Intelligence: 17 (+2) N
Wits: 17 (+2) A
Persona: 15 (+1) N

Fate Points: 1d10
Defense Value: 1
Vitality: 26
Degeneracy: 32
Corruption: 1 (eyes glow an unnatural way, like a cats)

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +4/+3/+1
Melee Bonus: +1 (base) 
Ranged Bonus: +1 (base)
Saves: +4 vs spells and magical effects

Arcane Abilities
Beguile, Precognition, Shadow Walking

Heroic/Divine Touchstones 
1st Level: Additional 1st level Spell
3rd Level: Favored Weapon, Whip
5th Level: Spirit Guide: Cat Familiar 
7th Level: Magical Recovery

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Domination

Spells
First Level (4+1): Armor of Earth, Black Flames, Chill Ray, Phantom Lights, Read Languages
Second Level (3): Eternal Flame, Invisibility, See Invisible
Third Level (3): Animal Summoning 2, Dark Lightning, Globe of Darkness
Fourth Level (2): Black Tentacles, Kiss of the Succubus

Gear
Whip

Briana has a vendetta against all Riddlemasters. She wants to kill them all, but that is an impossible task, so she will settle on doing as much damage to them as she can. Her Patron, Mephistopheles, is using her to strike a blow to Balance, the force that Riddlemasters represent. 

I will certainly be using Briana more in adventures. Don't worry Grenda, I'll take care of her.

You can get the Wasted Lands RPG and the NIGHT SHIFT RPG at Elf Lair Games.

Character Creation Challenge


Character Creation Challenge: Aura the Elf Healer

The Other Side -

Aura the Elf Healer One of the things I have been looking forward to seeing in this group of characters are the various classes Grenda and I created. You have already seen the various Riddlemasters, but we have not seen a witch at all or one of my classes. Well, today, I change that. Not a witch, but almost as good. Meet Aura, the Elf Healer.

Aura is interesting for a few reasons. First off, her class is "Healer," not a cleric. More on that in a bit. She has no creation date on her sheet, something we always did and I still often do. There is, in fact, very little writing on her sheet at all. This leads me to the conclusion that she was an NPC. 

She is also an elf. Not a half-elf, but a full elf, something Grenda rarely played. He was all about playing humans and maybe the occasional half-elf.  No shock, really, all his characters were part of a large extended family. He later added Cheysuli and Deryni. 

So Aura here is a healer. 

There is not enough detail on this sheet to determine which healer she was. I had made a couple of different attempts at this class. The big clue here is Undead Turning. I went back and forth a lot on whether or not healers could turn undead like a cleric. While I argued that healers could see undead as something like a disease, it is also a key feature of the cleric class. This one is from the time when they could still turn undead. 

OR

Grenda didn't have all my healer class notes (which is possible) and he rolled her up as a cleric and played her like a healer. In any case she also has some of the early weapons choices. I was inspired by the early Dragon magazine article about healers and had healers use only non-damage causing weapons. It made for a difficult class to play in combat.

In any case, it is nice to see one of "my" character classes here. I am still holding out for a proper witch, though.  

How do I know she is one of my healers and not another one? Well, she is from "Glantri," that is the biggest clue. And she is a Lawful Good character who worships Apollo. Most of my healers from this era were followers of Apollo.

Aura

Class: Necromancer (Light)
Level: 15
Species: Elf
Alignment: Light Good
Background: Elf

Abilities
Strength: 13 (0)
Agility: 16 (+2) N
Toughness: 16 (+2) 
Intelligence: 18 (+3) N
Wits: 19 (+3) A
Persona: 15 (+1) 

Fate Points: 1d12
Defense Value: 6
Vitality: 110
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +7/+4/+3
Melee Bonus: +3 (base)
Ranged Bonus: +3 (base)
Saves: +5 to Persona

Necromancer Abilities
Channel the Dead, See Dead people, Turn Undead, Protection from Dead x4, Summon the Dead, Vampiric Augmentation*, Suggestion x4, Command, Vampiric Touch*, Beguile Spirit x2, Call the Reaper.

Heroic Touchstones

1st Level: Psychic Power: Bio-feedback
3rd Level: Light
5th Level: Cure Light Wounds
7th Level:  Psychic Power: Domination
9th Level: Psychic Power: Supernatural Senses
11th Level: Conjure Flame
13th Level: Immunity to disease
15th Level: Cure Disease

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Healer

Gear
Holy symbol, healer's kit

There is not much to Aura's character on her sheets, but this version of her for the Wasted Lands has a lot of potential. What would an elf, with psychic powers, be doing as a healer trained in the temple of Apollo? In my combined mythos she would likely be a follower of Jäger and most likely a wood elf of some type.

OH. And many people have mentioned I should preserve these sheets, I zoomed out when taking a picture of Aura's sheet here so you all can see that she is in a protective sheet for a three-ring binder. All the characters are going into sheets like this.

You can get the Wasted Lands RPG and the NIGHT SHIFT RPG at Elf Lair Games.

Character Creation Challenge

Character Creation Challenge: Morgan Highstar

The Other Side -

Morgan HighstarAh. Now, here was a character. Mogan Highstar was more than Grenda's favorite character, he was in a sense his self-insert. His way of experiencing the world of Dungeons & Dragons as himself. He was more than his version of my Johan. He was Johan, Larina, and "Retsam" all rolled into one for him. 

Finn Danis may have been the first "Starmaster" and eventual head of the school of Riddle Masters, but everything Finn learned, he learned first from Morgan.

Morgan Highstar was born CY 637. He was the first Riddlemaster. His first student, Finn, did not join his school until 659 when finn was only 8. 

Morgan was an accomplished card player and a firm supporter of the Cosmic Balance (in the Michael Moorcock sense). Going over the sheets I have here, he had been a worshiper of  Uller (more examples of our blending of Greek and Norse myths), but when he began his Riddlemaster training, he converted to the worship Xan Yae

Riddlemasters, as I have mentioned off and on, were psychic characters who masked their psychic powers by disguising them as magic. They were influenced by "The Chronicles of the Deryni" by Katherine Kurtz and a lot of B-Grade movies about psychic phenomena. They were a cloistered sect that (retconned) had existed for centuries. Morgan was the first Riddlemaster.

Like Finn, I am happy to make Morgan a Psychic, though I will eventually need to post more about Riddlemasters. 

Morgan Highstar 

Class: Psychic
Level: 14
Species: Human
Alignment: Neutral
Background: Scholar

Abilities
Strength: 18 (+3) N
Agility: 17 (+2) 
Toughness: 16 (+2) 
Intelligence: 18 (+3) N
Wits: 16 (+2) 
Persona: 18 (+3) A

Fate Points: 1d10
Defense Value: 1
Vitality: 95
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 0

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +6/+4/+2
Melee Bonus: +4 (base) 
Ranged Bonus: +4 (base)
Saves: +5 vs Persona (Psychic)

Background
Additional languages.

Psychic Abilities
Psychic powers: 5, Supernatural attacks, Supernatural power: Astral Projection

Psychic Powers
Bio-feedback
Body Control
Empathy
Telepathy
Temporal Sense

Heroic/Divine Touchstones 
1st Level: +1 to melee attacks
3rd Level: Psychic power: Pyrokinesis
5th Level: Level 1 of Renegade (use of stealth skills)
7th Level: Level 2 of Renegade (increased stealth skills)
9th Level: +1/+5% to all attacks, saves, checks and skills
11th Level: Spell resistance 20%
13th Level: Character ceases to age

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Balance

Gear
Sword ("Balancer")

Again, while I am very happy replicating any D&D class in Wasted Lands, Riddlemasters, by their very nature, are a little more difficult. Should I do a "Riddlemaster" class for Wasted Lands/NIGHT SHIFT/13 Parsecs? Well...there is a desire, but I am not sure how practical it would be.  The classes were not very practical for D&D to be honest! I would need to distill them to their essence and build them up from that.

Something other than "how crazy can we get with this?"

You can get the Wasted Lands RPG and the NIGHT SHIFT RPG at Elf Lair Games.

Character Creation Challenge


Character Creation Challenge: Vale Warmark

The Other Side -

Vale Warmark Here is another character I do not know. He looks like he was part of a campaign of all evil characters called The Black Sun, but that is all I know. This is from his time period of 1988 to 1990 when he made a lot of characters. 

Vale Warmark is a Cheysuli, like Finn Danis. In *D&D a different species is harder to detail since bonuses and penalties need to be considered. Wasted Lands, NIGHT SHIFT, and Thirteen Parsecs new species are all baked into the rules and covered by our "Supernatural" type (from NIGHT SHIFT). Also, like many of Grenda's characters, he has psionics.

His class is listed as "Fighter (Special)." I wonder if this was some sort of play-test character. He has fighter abilities as well as cleric spells and undead turning, but he is not a Paladin.

When I originally pulled this sheet I was going to make him a point-buy character using the Night Companion rules for NIGHT SHIFT. But the results were not satisfactory. Especially since the Divine Warrior seems to do the trick very well. But, given his Lawful bent and the fact that he worships Xan Yae from the World of Greyhawk, he has led me down a different path. I think he works best as a Mystic Martial Artist.

While the Mystic Martial Artist is great for monks (AD&D) or say ninjas, or wuxia like warriors, it is also great for any sort of character that makes combat a way of life. 

Vale WarmarkVale Warmark

Class: Mystic Martial Artist
Level: 1
Species: Cheysuli (using the Supernatural type from NIGHT SHIFT and other species rules from Wasted Lands)
Alignment: Dark Evil
Background: Warrior

Abilities
Strength: 17 (+2) N
Agility: 18 (+) A 
Toughness: 17 (+2) N
Intelligence: 16 (+2)  
Wits: 17 (+2) 
Persona: 15 (+1) 

Fate Points: 1d6
Defense Value: 0
Vitality: 5 (d6)
Degeneracy: 0
Corruption: 3

Check Bonus (A/N/D): +2/+1/+0
Melee Bonus: +1 (base) +3 (MMA)
Ranged Bonus: +1 (base) +3 (MMA)
Saves: +1 vs AGL and TOU saves.

Mystic Martial Arts Abilities
+3 to Agility, Add AGL bonus to attacks, Martial Arts: Sword (like Kendo)

Heroic Touchstones
Level 1: Psychic Ability: Bio-feedback

Heroic (Divine) Archetype: Order

Gear
Sword (Mailbite), Dagger, Mace, splint mail armor

Ok. He is only first level here, but looking over his AD&D sheet and the abilities that Mystic Martial Artists get as they level up, I see that this is a great fit.  I am not sure how important the cleric abilities were to this character, so I may add them later on as a Heroic Touchstone or not. 

I do wonder what class Vale was supposed to have been.

You can get the Wasted Lands RPG, the NIGHT SHIFT RPG, and Thirteen Parsecs RPG at Elf Lair Games.


Character Creation Challenge

An Achtung! Cthulhu Anthology I

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Achtung! Cthulhu is the roleplaying game of fast-paced pulp action and Mythos magic published by Modiphius Entertainment. It is pitches the Allied Agents of the Britain’s Section M, the United States’ Majestic, and the brave Resistance into a Secret War against those Nazi Agents and organisations which would command and entreat with the occult and forces beyond the understanding of mankind. They are willing to risk their lives and their sanity against malicious Nazi villains and the unfathomable gods and monsters of the Mythos themselves, each striving for supremacy in mankind’s darkest yet finest hour! Yet even the darkest of drives to take advantage of the Mythos is riven by differing ideologies and approaches pandering to Hitler’s whims. The Black Sun consists of Nazi warrior-sorcerers supreme who use foul magic and summoned creatures from nameless dimensions to dominate the battlefields of men, whilst Nachtwölfe, the Night Wolves, utilise technology, biological enhancements, and wunderwaffen (wonder weapons) to win the war for Germany. Ultimately, both utilise and fall under the malign influence of the Mythos, the forces of which have their own unknowable designs…

Achtung! Cthulhu Mission Dossier Volume One: Behind Enemy Lines brings together the first five scenarios published for Achtung! Cthulhu. They will take the Agents from the White Cliffs of Dover and the coast of east Scotland to the coast of the Netherlands and into the mountains of Romania, as well as to a baseball game in the USA. In addition, there is an extra mission, new to Achtung! Cthulhu, that will involve the Agents conducting a mission that parallels Operation Chariot, the raid on St. Nazaire. All six missions can be run as one-shots, but most of them can be run in chronological order and woven into a Game Master’s ongoing campaign that will take the Agents from the Phony War of 1939 through to the height of Nazi and Axis power occupation around the world. With care, this includes being worked into and around a campaign such as Achtung! Cthulhu: Shadows of Atlantis. Two of the scenarios are not designed for this, the one set on the home front in the USA and the new addition, both being set after the events of the campaign and one of them being designed as a one-shot, suitable for convention use. Both though, offer changes of pace and tone, enabling players to experience the Secret War in other places and with other types of character.
The six missions follow the same format. Each begins with a Synopsis for the Game Master, a Mission Briefing & Goals for the Agents, and some Historical Background to provide context. This is followed by the actual scenario itself, divided into its various acts, and ending for the Agents with a Debriefing. For the Game Master there the stats for the NPCs—both enemies and allies—and monsters that the Agents will encounter over the course of the mission.

The anthology opens with the short, sharp Under the Gun. This is set both atop and in the White Cliffs of Dover, where the army, preparing fortifications against a much-feared German invasion, discover strange stone pillar which seems to make everyone feel at least queasy, if not leave them suffering nightmares… Of course, the pillar is not just of interest to Black Sun, but also the local villagers, who possess a certain goggle-eyed appearance. Effectively, this is a mini-encounter with parallels with The Shadow Over Innsmouth—or at least the 1928 raid on the town—and it is combat focused, more so than other scenarios for Achtung! Cthulhu. Its short length also makes it easy to add to a campaign or to serve as a combat-focused interlude.
The second scenario is Operation Vanguard, which could thematically carry on from ‘Under the Gun’ as the links to Deep Ones are more obvious. The action, more detailed and involving stealth and investigation, as well as combat, switches to the Dutch coast and the Dutch fishing town of Nermegen. Section M has learned of a strange installation being constructed at both St. Olaf’s lighthouse and on the nearby Skellen Island and of the presence in the town of Nachtwölfe. This is a commando-style mission, right down to having to paddle ashore in folboats—or folding canoes, as used in Operation Frankton and made famous by the film, The Cockleshell Heroes. Whether making contact with the local Resistance or investigating Nachtwölfe activities, the emphasis is on stealth and that also goes for getting into both the lighthouse and the Nazi installation on the island. In the latter, the Agents will discover what Nachtwölfe has been up to, which has been experimenting on captured Deep Ones! The scenario will end in a big, bruising battle as the escaped Deep Ones take their revenge on their Nachtwölfe scientist and soldier captors. Throughout, the Deep Ones are kept implacable and mysterious, so although the players will know what they are facing, their Agents will not. One option here is have the players handle the Deep Ones as well as their Agents in combat so that the Game Master is not rolling too many dice, especially when it comes to the monsters of the Mythos versus the Nazis.
Operation Falling Crystal takes place on the east coast of Scotland where an archaeological dig discovered a strange blue crystal in nearby caverns. The archaeologists have no idea what it is, but Section M does! It is Blauer Kristall—or Blue Crystal—much coveted by Nachtwölfe, which uses it to fuel its increasingly weird weapons of war. Section M would very much like to get its hands on some of the strange mineral so that it can study it and perhaps develop a means to counter the strange technology being fielded by Nachtwölfe. With its set-up of something strange being discovered under the ground and it attracting the attention of the Nazis and as well as Section M, this scenario is very similar to the earlier ‘Under the Gun’. However, it does go beyond this, if only a little. There is both scope for investigation beyond the archaeological dig itself and for interaction with the Mythos beyond running away or blasting it to bits. This lifts what is otherwise adequate scenario that the Game Master would not want to run too soon after ‘Under the Gun’.

The Romanian Imperative leans into the Pulp sensibilities of Achtung! Cthulhu by sending the Agents into the unstable situation of the Balkans chasing after a Zeppelin! Jokingly referred to as a “wee holiday” by Section M, the Agents are to reconnoitre the area to determine why Nachtwölfe has sent a Zeppelin to a mining village in the Mures Mountains in Romania, discover what it is doing there, and take action. This entails a flight to Belgrade, in Yugoslavia, via Athens in Greece and from there a lengthy drive across the border into Romania and to the mountains, guided by a friendly smuggler. Dealing with checkpoints—Romanian and German—will be the least of the Agents’ problems, but once they reach the village, they will be able to learn a little about what has happened recently and also in the past. This, when combined with the opportunity to observe the work camp below the nearby castle over in the next valley, gives the players and their Agents all the information they need to make their next move. Ideally, this should start with contacting the locals who have been hired to rework the mine, but can also involve investigating the ruins of the castle, the work camp, and ultimately, getting aboard the Zeppelin itself, stationed, unmoored, and unnaturally immobile above the camp. The Zeppelin, enhanced by Nachtwölfe technology, is fully detailed and comes with a set of deck plans. The scenario should end with a fight aboard the Zeppelin—although a very careful one since nobody wants to set it alight—and with the chance that the Agents capture it and fly it back to Britain. They will be handsomely rewarded for their efforts if they do. This is a fun and exciting adventure that fully plays into the Pulp action of Achtung! Cthulhu.

‘Operation Eastbourne’ is the first of the two scenarios in the anthology intended as a change of pace and the only new scenario. Thematically, it can be run as a sequel to both ‘Under the Gun’ and ‘Operation Vanguard’, but need not be. It is effectively two missions in one. The Agents make up ‘Team Beta’ accompanying ‘Team Alpha’, a unit of commandos who will assault a gun battery as part of Operation Chariot, the raid on the French port of St. Nazaire intended to put its dry dock out of action and so prevent German navy ships like the Bismarck or Tirpitz being repaired there. This means that it is set later than the other missions in the book, so the Game Moderator may want to save it for later in her campaign. However, assaulting the gun battery is not the Agents’ objective. Instead, they will investigate a Black Sun archaeological dig and determine what the Nazis are up to. The players will play through both missions as part of the scenarios, the idea being that not only do they roleplay their Agents, but also the commandos (stats for the latter are provided to enable them to do so). The Agents can stick together or they can mix and match, so the players will be roleplaying mixed group of Agents and commandos for each mission. What this means is that either team could come to the help of the other if it gets into difficulty and since, unnaturally, both missions will involve encounters with the Mythos, roleplaying the commandos will remind the players that not everyone has encountered the Mythos before and will not necessarily be quite so blasé about it.

Although divided into the three traditional acts of an Achtung! Cthulhu scenario, ‘Operation Eastbourne’ need not necessarily be run in linear fashion, but could instead be run with the action in parallel, switching back and forth between the different missions at dramatically appropriate moments. In whatever way it is run, ‘Team Beta’ should meet up with ‘Team Alpha’—or even come to the rescue of—in the third and final act when the Black Sun operatives bring their plans to fruition on the rocky beaches of the Atlantic coast. This sets the stage for a big fight as the Nazis attempt a summoning, the Allies attempt to stop them, and all hell breaks loose! It is another grand finale which plays out more like a miniatures game and which calls for big heroic action. A very classic Achtung! Cthulhu scenario.
The last scenario in Achtung! Cthulhu Mission Dossier Volume One: Behind Enemy Lines is Seventh-Inning Slaughter! This switches the action to the USA and a game in the All-American Girls Baseball League which is being attended by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Unfortunately, so is Jörg Becker, a Nazi sorcerer, determined to prove both himself a capable agent to his Black Sun masters and thus get promoted, and that no-one is safe from the reach of Nazi Germany, not even thousands of miles away on American home soil. This is the second of the two scenarios in the anthology intended to as a change of pace and is probably the best one suited as a one-shot. To that end, it comes with four pre-generated Player Characters, divided between two baseball players, a war correspondent, and a would-be technical genius, and a plot that is played out innings by innings, with weirder and weirder things happening from one innings to the next. Food spoils and writhes with worms, a foul ball hits a member of the crowd, a lightning storm gathers, a dog goes crazy, there is spontaneous vomiting, the same man keep disappearing and reappearing, and so on. Although there is not much that the Player Characters can do to thwart Becker’s efforts until it is almost too late, they will be kept busy dealing with all of the other weird issues as they pop up until then. Effectively, this is a firefighting mission against the Mythos until the Player Characters can root out, and are prepared, to face the cause. This is a different style of scenario to the others in the anthology, offering a change of pace and location that works as a one-shot, a convention scenario, or respite from the main campaign.

Physically, Achtung! Cthulhu Mission Dossier Volume One: Behind Enemy Lines is cleanly and tidily laid out. The illustrations and the maps are excellent, although it does need an edit in places.

Initially, the title of Achtung! Cthulhu Mission Dossier Volume One: Behind Enemy Lines reads like a misnomer. After all, not all of the scenarios take place behind enemy lines—at least not as far as the Allies and Section M are concerned. Once you get Black Sun and Nachtwölfe involved, then three of the scenario do take place behind enemy lines on British and American soil! If there is anything missing from the anthology it is advice on when to run the scenarios in relation with Achtung! Cthulhu: Shadows of Atlantis, as most of its scenarios would work well with the campaign. Otherwise, Achtung! Cthulhu Mission Dossier Volume One: Behind Enemy Lines is a solid collection of scenarios that offers plenty of punching, bullet flying, Pulp-action against the Nazis.

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