Outsiders & Others

Miskatonic Monday #203: Camp Hollow Lake

Reviews from R'lyeh -

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

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

—oOo—
Name: Camp Hollow LakePublisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Daniel Stephens

Setting: Modern day New EnglandProduct: One-shot
What You Get: Twenty-Eight page, 2.15 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: Summer camp clichéPlot Hook: Sometimes the best thing to do is buy into the clichés and run with them.
Plot Support: Four pre-generated Investigators, seven handouts, two floorplans, one map, and two monsters.Production Values: Reasonable.
Pros# Fully embraces the Summer camp clichés# Multiple inventive mini-scenes of unnamed students getting slashed# Easy to adjust to the nineties, eighties, seventies, or sixties# Scopophobia# Phonophobia# Aichmophobia

Cons# Needs a strong edit# Another summer camp slasher stalker horror# Non-Mythos scenario# Unlikeable pre-generated Investigators# Fully embraces the Summer camp clichés# A runaround until the solution can be found
Conclusion# Another summer camp slasher stalker horror with all the clichés# Unlikeable pre-generated Investigators who deserve to die, but sadly the scenario drags their time to die out until the climax

#Dungeon23 Tomb of the Vampire Queen, Level 7, Room 3

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In Room 2 there are five round passageways that lead out.  They look like old lava tubes and are larger than the one the salamanders came out of.

On the first tube on the left the party will come face to face with the three large mastif-like hounds. They are large, vicious, and on fire.

Hellhound

These are powerful Hellhounds

One has 7 HD, and two have 6 HD. They attack the party.

#Dungeon23 Tomb of the Vampire Queen, Level 7, Room 2

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 The area at the bottom of the stairs is an oval-shaped natural cave. There are small openings in the walls where fires can be seen. In one of the larger holes to the left of the stairs a glow can be seen. The glow, and the heat, grows stronger by the moment.

Fire Salamander

From the hole emerges a large lizard-like creature, a Fire Salamander

There are two in total, they crawl out to attack the party. 

They have Treasure Type F x2 hidden in their lair. 


Triskaidekaphobia

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Lucky for None: A comedy-horror game could almost be said to not be a roleplaying game. This is because its mechanics amount to about three rules. Those rules consist of character generation, which is a single roll, an action mechanic—roll high and add a bonus from the character’s occupation, and then roll for just about everything in the game—mostly bad things and random things. It consists mostly of tables, each with thirteen entries—for good reason—which the players will roll as play progresses. The entries act as prompts, which can be used in two way, either as a group of players, or as a single player, who records his character’s reactions or actions in a journal. The nominal setting for Lucky for None is the village of Grimhaven, which is about to be beset by dark, strange things. In fact, they will be beset by a rash of dark, strange things and bad things to the point where they die or wish they had. Standing between them and the strange events are the Player Characters, residents themselves. The setting for Lucky for None is nominally the village of Grimhaven, located on the coast of Monshire. So it has a quaint British feel to it. That said, it can easily be adapted to other settings.

Published by Beyond Cataclysm Books other notable aspect to Lucky for None is that it uses a thirteen-sided die or ‘d13’ and only a thirteen-sided die. The number thirteen proliferates through the whole roleplaying game. Every table uses the thirteen-sided die, the village has thirteen locations, and events take place every thirteen minutes in real time. The game begins with a roll on the ‘Village Problem table’. This could be ‘sky’ and ‘hunger’ or ‘local government’ and ‘size’. The players develop the actual problem from these prompts, and then create a character. This again, is a simple a roll on ‘The Character Table’. This can be a Labourer, Barkeeper, Child, Mayor, Farmer, or Police Officer, and each has an associated skill. For example, the Mayor has Leading, the Police Officer has Securing, and the Labourer has Building.

To undertake an action, a player rolls the die and consults ‘The Action Table’. The outcome ranges from Absolute Failure to Absolute Success. If a Player Character has a skill related to the action, he can add two to the result. He also has two Luck Points. These can be expended to each add four to the roll, but if used up completely, he is out of luck and all rolls are made at disadvantage.

Of course, rolling a thirteen-sided die means that bad things above and beyond what is normally rolled whenever a player rolls thirteen. On ‘The Character Table’ this means that the character has an occupation and associated skill, and is also personally afflicted by the Village Problem. On ‘The Action Table’, it means that the action has been an ‘Absolute Success’, but also requires that the player roll on the on ‘The Bad Things Table’. This develops a ‘Vibe’, ‘Who It Affects’, and a ‘Severity’. For example, ‘Asphyxiation’, ‘A loved one/another PC’, and ‘Death, explosive’. In addition, Events are rolled or every thirteen minutes of real time on ‘The Events Table’, which give a ‘Location’, ‘Incident type’, and ‘Severity’. For example, ‘Church’, ‘Disease’, and ‘Inconvenient’. In general, the higher the roll, the worse the effect…

Play continues like this until the last and thirteenth Event is rolled and its effects play. The game is then over. The minimalist storytelling rules do intrude upon play, of course, most obviously in ‘The Bad Things Table’ and ‘The Events Table’, but between that, the players are free to discuss and develop the world around their characters, and how first the Village Problem, Events, and then Bad Things affects them, the locations in the village, and the residents. The story of this near constant cavalcade of catastrophes should play out of this as series of disasters and consequences that compounds each other, over and over, building and connecting as it progresses and the Player Characters react to everything around them.

That then is all there is to Lucky for None: A comedy-horror game. At least mechanically. There is an ‘Important and Useful Facts About the Number 13’ table and an ‘Alternative Village Problem Table’, but both are extra additions beyond the core of the game. There is an example of play and tips for the Game Master, both of which are actually useful.

Physically, Lucky for None: A comedy-horror game is a cleanly presented, vibrantly red booklet. It is simply written, very easy to grasp, and thus bring to the table. A combined ‘Character Sheet & Disaster’ is included, which sits in the middle of the table.

Lucky for None: A comedy-horror game is a one-session torrent of terror in which the Player Characters are inundated with issues and deluged with difficulties. It is an impossible situation, a dirty disaster drama of ridiculous proportions, played out in a single session or recorded in a dreadful diary, all good for a refreshingly farcical folly in between playing other roleplaying games. Or just good for getting your hands on a ‘d13’.

#Dungeon23 Tomb of the Vampire Queen, Level 7, Room 1

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 The passageway beyond the opening on level 6 leads to long, long stair going down.

Level 7, Room 1

Giant visages of the soulless damned are carved into the walls on either side of this massive staircase. The detail is phenomenal and you swear it looks like they could reach out and get you. 

The air here is hot and quite fetid. The heat seems to come from everywhere, and even the rocks glow with a soft hellish light.

While on this level humans, elves, forest gnomes, and halflings will suffer a -1 penalty to hit due to the heat. Dwarves, deep gnomes, and others accustomed to the deep caves of the nether dark suffer no penalties.


Friday Night Videos: Songs of the WASTED LANDS

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Nothing gets me in the mood for working on a campaign or writing new material quite like a good playlist.
My memories of old-school gaming are inexorably linked to old-school rock and metal. In fact back in the 1980s we would stop our games if a particular video, mostly Iron Maiden or Judas Priest, came on MTV.
So here is a playlist from Jason Vey, author, and lead designer for the Wasted Lands RPG currently in Kickstarter.

Enjoy!



Friday Fantasy: Halls of the Blood King

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Halls of the Blood King is a scenario published by Necrotic Gnome. It is written for use with Old School Essentials, the Old School Renaissance retroclone based on the version of Basic Dungeons & Dragons designed by Tom Moldvay and published in 1980. It is designed to be played by a party of Third to Fifth Level Player Characters and is a standalone affair, but can be easily added to a campaign by the Referee. What it primarily needs is a world where vampires are known about, either as actual threats or legendary ones, and perhaps an old tale about a vampire hunter having gone missing a century ago. Since it involves the vampires and the undead, if the scenario is run using Old School Essentials Classic Fantasy, then a Cleric will be useful, and possibly a Paladin if it is being run using Old School Essentials: Advanced Fantasy. Unlike the earlier, official scenarios for Old School Essentials, such as The Hole in the Oak and The Incandescent Grottoes, it is not a suitable addition to the publisher’s own Dolmenwood setting. The scenario is also notable for winning the 2021 ENNIE Award for Best Adventure and the 2021 ENNIE Award for Best Cartography.
The Halls of the Blood King appears once a century, on night of a blood moon. It stays for that night and then is gone. It is home to the Blood King, the the first vampire, and on this night, as he does on nights like this on other worlds, he calls all of his children from across the lands to come pay him both homage and what they owe him—blood tax. The appearance of the Blood King and his mansion is a temporary stain upon the land where it appears, its baleful influence spreading fear and terror as every vampire in the land descends upon it and the lands and villages nearby... Several reasons are suggested why the Player Characters might want to break into the mansion. This includes rescuing any villagers who have been kidnapped from nearby, merely wanting to loot the place, or looking for a specific magical item known to be in the possession of the Blood King. Perhaps the most interesting are having the Player Characters seek revenge for a vampire said to have been lost in the halls of the Blood King—whether because one of their number is descended from the vampire hunter or they are hired by a descendant, or because they have been receiving the desperate dreams from a princess imprisoned by the Blood King, imploring them to rescue her. It is also possible to mix and match these hooks too.

The Halls of the Blood King follows the same format as the other scenarios for Old School Essentials. This includes an overview, which covers history, rumours, and a complete list of the adventure’s treasure by location. What sets it apart is two things. One is a time limit. The Blood King’s mansion is only present for one night. If the Player Characters stay too long, who knows what world or plane they will end up on? The other is a single page of vampire details, this included to save space from having to repeat their abilities in every monster entry, but it also makes it a handy reference for the Game Master—especially as it is reprinted on the inside back cover. Included at the end of the long list of their capabilities and unfortunately for the Player Characters, few vulnerabilities, are several alternatives to the Energy Drain ability, which leeches Levels, Experience Points, and Hit Points from an afflicted Player Character. Options include ability damage, permanent Hit Point loss, and a global penalty levied on all actions. Also included is a breakdown of the various factions and their relationships in The Halls of the Blood King, and it is here that the scenario begins to shine.
The factions in the Blood King’s begin with the Blood King himself, bored and disdainful, but under the right circumstances willing to see the Player Characters as more then a food source. Around him is his court and its guests, several of them quite alien, but all wanting something, and in many cases having something to hide. His daughter—who of course, is the one sending dreams to the Player Characters of an imprisoned princess—plots with a desperate vassal and other allies to supplant her father. His mother—or is she?—now a Banshee, lurks, seeking recognition by her son. Below the mansion, the Blood King’s pet, the Blood Spider Queen, grown big and fat on diet of blood, wants her court to be the equal of his. Elsewhere, the vampire hunter, thought lost a century ago, hides out behind a barricade of traps, waiting for an opportunity to strike at the Blood King... All of these factions want something and see the Player Characters as a means to strengthen their hands. Some will prove to be the allies the Player Characters need to survive The Halls of the Blood King, others not.

What this all means is that The Halls of the Blood King is not an adventure at which to go full tilt. Players and their characters wanting to rampage their way through the halls and room of the Blood King’s mansion, will first face guards with flesh-ripping blades and then the vampires themselves. The immunity from mundane weapons, the charming gaze, and the ability to drain Levels combined their numbers means that the vampires are too tough to face directly—and that is for Fifth Level Player Characters, let alone Third Level. Instead, the Player Characters need to find a less direct way to deal with the Blood King and his vampires. The scenario provides several, including gathering information, finding certain important items, and of course, creating alliances. Whilst there are opportunities for combat in the scenario, what this means is that The Halls of the Blood King is much more of a social and roleplaying scenario than it looks at first sight. Whomever the Player Characters decide to ally with, they have a chance to really change the status quo at the Blood King’s court.

Physically, The Halls of the Blood King is as well presented and as organised as previous scenarios for Old School Essentials from Necrotic Gnome. The maps are excellent with excerpts used on every page where individual locations are described. The location descriptions use the same sparse, almost bullet-point style seen in the other other scenarios with key points in bold. There is plenty of rich detail in those descriptions though, such as Shadow Hounds that are as “Dark as night” and “Long and tall but very lean (as if stretched)” and dungeon stairs “Made of rough hewn stone (looks like a stone beast’s gullet).” All of which makes the scenario very easy to use from the page. What really stands out is the artwork. Done in rich blues, purples, and reds with yellow highlights, it echoes the style of Philippe Druillet in his depiction of Michael Moorcock’s Elric of Melniboné, making The Halls of the Blood King have more of a baroque look than a gothic one.
The Halls of the Blood King is not without precedent, all the way back to Palace of the Vampire Queen from 1976. Of course, it would be remiss not to compare The Halls of the Blood King with its more well known precedent, I6 Raveloft. The Halls of the Blood King is a far less grand affair, in every sense, lacking the Gothic romance backstory of I6 Ravenloft’s Count Strahd von Zarovich and the love of his life, his former sister-in-law, Tatyana, and the epic scale of his castle. The lower scale has advantages, the mansion having less room for the seemingly endless swathe of the undead to be found in Ravenloft, making both exploration and accessing the social aspects of The Halls of the Blood King that little bit easier. It also means that The Halls of the Blood King is no mere imitation, possessing an atmosphere and sense of horror that is its own.

More social minefield than gory bloodbath—though it has plenty of potential to end that way—The Halls of the Blood King is a genuinely challenging adventure, presenting a highly detailed and atmospheric vampire lair in which the Player Characters will have to tread very lightly if they are to survive, let alone succeed.

Kickstart Your Weekend: Wasted Lands and Sherwood

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A couple of Kickstarters close to my heart today.

Wasted Lands: The Dreaming Age Role Playing Game

A tabletop RPG of cosmic horror, swords, and sorcery in a savage lost epoch, 1000 years after the Old Ones fell to their eternal sleep.

 The Dreaming Age Core Rules The Dreaming Age Campaign Guide

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jasonvey/wasted-lands-the-dreaming-age-role-playing-game?ref=b0ulif

I have been talking about this Kickstarter all month, and now it is live. Please check it out and give Jason your support.

Sherwood: The Legend of Robin Hood 5E

Sherwood 5e

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/sherwood-the-legend-of-robin-hood-5e#/

Adam Thompson, brother of the late Jonathan Thompson, has taken over Battlefield Press and plans to get Jonathon's unfinished work completed.  And I, for one, could not be happier.

Jonathan was a great guy, and he had such a love for RPGs and everything about them. It is great knowing that there are still guys like Jonathan and Adam for every crappy person in this biz you meet.

I have only gotten to know Adam over the last few days, and he also seems like a great guy.  I can think of nothing more fitting than getting all of BPI's projects out there for gamers to enjoy.

Sherwood, here is something that should have been a no-brainer. Robin Hood, for D&D. Yeah. Let's make this one happen!


Miskatonic Monday #201: The Thing in Tunnel 12

Reviews from R'lyeh -

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

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

—oOo—
Name: The Thing in Tunnel 12Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Alison Cybe

Setting: North of EnglandProduct: Scenario
What You Get: Twenty-Three page, 1.41 KB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: Sometimes locals really do have something to hide...Plot Hook: A body in the mine means murder!
Plot Support: Five pre-generated Investigators, two NPCs, and one Mythos monster.Production Values: Plain.
Pros# One session industrial horror# Easy to adjust to the eighties or twenties
# Nice sense of locals with something to hide# Claustrophobia# Cleithrophobia# Taphephobia# Submechanophobia
Cons# Needs an edit# Not clear who the Investigators are meant to be# Underdeveloped historical background# No maps# Underdeveloped pre-generated Investigators
Conclusion# Underdeveloped historical and Investigator background# Solid one session industrial horror easily adapted to other time periods

Miskatonic Monday #200: The Grindhouse: Ultimate Collection – Vol. 1-3

Reviews from R'lyeh -

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

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

—oOo—
The Grindhouse: Ultimate Collection – Vol. 1-3 is an anthology of seven scenarios within the grindhouse genre of cinema—low-budget horror, splatter, and exploitation films for adults which had their heyday in the seventies. Each one is short, designed to be played in a single session, involves a locked room type of situation—sometimes literally, which keeps the action and the horror focused, and involves desperate, often bloody and brutal horror. Each scenario is presented in full colour, comes with its own set of pre-generated Investigators, and follows the same format. This consists of ‘Prelude’, ‘Objectives’, ‘Secrets’, ‘Cast’, ‘Signs’, ‘Threats’, and ‘Changes’. The ‘Prelude’ sets up and explains the scenario, the ‘Objectives’ the Player Characters’ involvement, ‘Secrets’ reveals what is really going on, ‘Cast’ lists minor NPCs, ‘Signs’ details clues which can be found, ‘Threats’ the dangers both Mythos and mundane, and ‘Changes’ the major events which occur during the scenario. The format does not always though, as in some places there is a lengthy description of the locations where the scenario takes place before the Keeper gets to the ‘Secrets’. In addition, there are Keeper Notes throughout and options, decent maps or floorplans of the location for each scenario, and indications of the type of horror each involves at the start of each scenario. Not all of the scenarios involve the Mythos, but their horror is all strong and bloody.
The Grindhouse: Ultimate Collection – Vol. 1-3 opens in underwhelming fashion with a non-Mythos scenario which involves a literal locked-room situation and little if any real investigation or agency. ‘The Crimson King’ is set in the early eighties and has the Player Characters invited to an exclusive Goth nightclub. Perhaps they want to attend, perhaps they are looking for a missing young woman? Unfortunately, there is very little for them to do or find out before the situation suddenly changes and they suddenly find themselves fighting for their lives and trying to escape. Which would be fine, but there is no other plot than this. The result is underplotted and one-note.
Fortunately, the next and subsequent scenarios are much better. ‘Isle of the Damned’ takes the Player Characters to a small island off the coast of Maine. It is 1974 and they have rented a small holiday home, intending to relax, fish, drink, and spend time away from the grind of modern life. Unfortunately, the island idyll is ruined by multiple somethings which a previous owner left behind after he had to flee following his name being linked to the disappearances of fresh corpses. That name is West, and since this is a Mythos scenario, that means reanimated bodies and body parts. The author has some fun with creating some freshly animated corpses and corpse cuts with which to scare the Player Characters, foreshadowing some of the bloody horror with bumps and knocks from below. Thus, the Player Characters find themselves trapped on an island surviving a zombie-style ‘uprising’ of a different kind.
‘The Dark Brood’ takes place in 1977 at a summer camp in the Appalachian mountains where the Player Characters are camp counsellors. Summer camp horror scenarios are a cliché unto themselves, invariably involving a madman who will stalk the counsellors and students, slashing them, and picking them off, one-by-one. Fortunately, ‘The Dark Brood’ eschews this cliché completely. When the children complain of upset stomachs and nausea, they are given something to settle their stomachs and set to bed early, but later, when the Player Characters suddenly awaken, the children have gone missing. Investigation reveals there is something very sour going on, something similar to that done in other scenarios for Call of Cthulhu, but made all the worse by being inflicted on children. Although they do not know it, the Player Characters are up against a time limit in what is one of the creepier scenarios in the anthology.
‘Jacknife’ is a classic road about to go very, very wrong. When the driver of an eighteen-wheeler picks up hitchhikers, he drives himself into a world of trouble. There is really only the one location for the scenario and that the truck and the flatbed of lumber it is hauling from Colorado to Texas. Anyone who has played the author’s The Highway of Blood will suffer flashbacks as the Player Characters are chased across New Mexico by snake cultists and dustbillies. On the downside, the Keeper will need to acquaint herself with the Chase Rules from the Keeper Rulebook, but on the plus side, a chase sets up plenty of tension and action, and setting the majority of the scenario aboard one moving vehicle adds a sense of claustrophobia to that too. The scenario could be run as part of The Highway of Blood or even a sequel of sorts, but gives too much away to run as a prequel. Otherwise, a great set-up for a horror scenario.
‘Hell Block Five’ casts the Player Characters as inmates of Irongate Penitentiary in Aylesbury, Massachusetts, incarcerated with some of the most infamous criminals in the United States. One night in 1978, the cell doors unlock and slide open in Cell Block Five, but without any alarms going off or sign of any guards. The blood and bodies of other inmates lie everywhere and the cell block seems infested with fungi and insects. The set-up and development has an intentionally nightmarish feel to it as the cell block fluctuates between its current state and something increasingly unreal. One issue is that the Player Characters do need to be driven to a bout of madness in order to discover an important clue and potentially push the story onwards. Another possible issue is that the Player Characters may encounter their worst fears, but none are listed for the pre-generated Player Characters. The players are, of course, free to create their own, but hints would have been useful. Overall, this is a solid prison-set horror scenario.
‘First Night’ takes another horror film cliché and does something interesting with it. It is 1980 and a group of college girls decides to spend the night in the mansion that was recently purchased by their sorority. So, we have a sorority house slumber party which takes a horrifying murderous turn after they find a witch board, which of course, they decide to play around with. Awaking later in the middle of the night to the sound of their bedroom doorknob being turned, something moving about the house, and the house being surrounded by a thick fog. The next few hours consist of the girls being chased round the house by nightmarish, incredibly stealthy monsters which can crawl across the ceilings and simply refuse to die. ‘First Night’ is a spiritual successor to ‘Hell Block Five’, but it apes its inspirations more closely by having the last girl standing receive a bonus to her Luck and a Bonus Die to all her actions. If it comes to this, then the players whose characters did not survive, should definitely control some of the monsters. Like ‘Hell Block Five’, there is the issue of the Player Characters possibly encountering their worst fears, but none being listed for them. The scenario also requires the Player Characters to participate in the use of the witch board, as it does not work without it happening. The players should be encouraged to have their characters do so in order to get this survival horror, monster chase scenario started.
Lastly, ‘The Hoodlums’ is a bonus scenario in The Grindhouse: Ultimate Collection – Vol. 1-3. Set in Worcester, Massachusetts, during the summer of 1983, it begins when a group of high school friends breaks into an abandoned train station to smoke some weed and one of their number suddenly disappears with cry for help! Following the cries leads into the sewers below and what seems to be a buried mansion decades old… The place feels old and macabre and plays out initially in exploratory fashion, which can turn into a deadly hunt depending upon how the young Player Characters interact with the inhabitants. The pre-generated Player Characters are nicely invidualised, they play Dungeons & Dragons, which lends itself to interesting roleplaying possibilities, and there is even a rule given for peer pressure.
Physically, The Grindhouse: Ultimate Collection – Vol. 1-3 is decently presented. Although it needs a slight edit in places, it is well written, and it decently illustrated throughout. In fact, some of the artwork is very good. The cartography is also good throughout.
The Grindhouse: Ultimate Collection – Vol. 1-3 would be an excellent anthology of Grindhouse-style horror one-shots. However, it is let down by the first scenario, ‘The Crimson King’, which is simply not of the same quality as the rest that follow. In fact, had ‘The Crimson King’ been left out or the bonus scenario ‘The Hoodlums’ simply replaced it, The Grindhouse: Ultimate Collection – Vol. 1-3 would be that excellent anthology. Consequently, The Grindhouse: Ultimate Collection – Vol. 1-3 is a good Grindhouse collection, providing the Keeper with a selection of easily prepared, brutal, often bloody, one-shots.

Everyday Endeavours

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Everyday Heroes is the spiritual successor to d20 Modern. What d20 Modern did for Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition in 2002, Everyday Heroes does for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition in 2202. It is designed to facilitate and handle roleplaying in the here and now, in the world we see outside our windows, on our television screens, and at the cinema. It can cover military or mercenary scenarios, police procedurals, urban fantasy and investigating the supernatural, visits to lost worlds, conspiracy thrillers, dinosaur rampages, face-offs against killer robots (whether from the future or not), run or defuse scams, and more. Although it does not delve into any one of these genres or scenarios in any depth, the core rulebook provides all of the rules and the mechanical tools the Game Master will need to run and her players to roleplay them. There are tweaks and adjustments throughout the rules to account for the modern genre, but the core rules remain faithful, and will be familiar, to anyone who has played Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. In keeping with the setting, all of the Player Characters are human, and in keeping with the scale and concept of ‘Everyday Heroes’, are limited to between Levels one and ten. Further, Everyday Heroes provides some twenty character Classes, divided into six Archetypes, modern skills, proficiencies, and feats, rules for modern gun combat, vehicles and chases, hacking, modern environments and hazards, and a bestiary. Essentially, all of the tools the Game Master needs to run a campaign today.

Everyday Heroes is published by Evil Genius Games, following a successful Kickstarter campaign and begins with the Player Character. Everyday Heroes is a Class and Level roleplaying game, so it begins there, along with the six abilities—Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma. A Player Character also has a Background and a Profession, which each provide languages known, Proficiencies, Iconic Equipment, Ability increases, and a Special Feature; and an Archetype and Class. Backgrounds can be Activist, Book Worm, Caregiver, Misfit, Social Butterfly, and more, whilst the professions include Academia, Creative, Law, Trades, and so on. There are six Archetypes—Strong, Agile, Tough, Smart, Wise, and Charisma—corresponding to the six abilities—Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma. These are divided into three or four Classes. So, the Brawler and Heavy Gunner fall into the Strong Archetype, the Scoundrel and the Sharpshooter into the Agile Archetype, the Commando and the Bodyguard into the Tough Archetype, the Engineer and the Hacker into the Smart Archetype, the Hunter and the Sleuth into the Wise Archetype, and the Duellist and the Leader into the Charming Archetype. Together, Archetype and Class provides a Player Character’s Hit Dice, Defence rating, Proficiency Bonus, Talents, and Feats. The latter, Feats, are intrinsic part of Player Character development in Everyday Heroes.

Creating a Player Character in Everyday Heroes is a matter of making choices. A player selects his character’s Background, Profession, Archetype, and Class, and decides on the options they provide. He has the choice of determining his abilities randomly (roll four six-sided dice, discarded the lowest), assigning points, or using an array. The process is relatively straightforward and enables a player a wide range of character types. A player can decide to specialise in his choice of Background, Profession, Archetype, and Class. For example, a hacker could have Gamer as a Background, Information Technology as a Profession, and then the Smart Hero Archetype and the Hacker Class. Or he could mix and match to reflect wider experience. For example, an Ordinary Background could lead to the Emergency Services Profession and then be a Smart Archetype and the Scientist Class or a Tough Archetype and the Bodyguard Class. Notably though, the twenty Classes are also divided by complexity. Thus, the Heavy Gunner is a Simple Class, the Hacker a Complex Class, and the Leader a Medium Class in terms of their relative complexities. This is a useful guide for the players and can influence their choices when it comes to creating characters. Lastly, a player decides on his character’s Motivation, Attachments, Beliefs, Virtues, Flaws, and Quirks. As a Player Character advances in Level, he will improve via new or better Talents, Feats—some general, some specific to the Class and Archetype, Hit Points, and Proficiency Rating, so on.

Name: Henry Brinded III
Archetype: Mastermind Level: 1
Background: Bookworm
Profession: Military
Motivation: Duty Attachment: Family Belief: Not so much a statement of belief as a methodology
Role: Intellectual Virtue: Thoughtful Flaw: Nosy Quirk: Claps when excited

Strength 11 Dexterity 15 (+2) Constitution 15 (+2)
Intelligence 19 (+4) Wisdom 15 (+2) Charisma 16 (+3)
Defence: 14
Hit Points: 8
Passive Perception: 14
Proficiency Bonus: +2
Skills: Athletics +2, Computers +6, Insight +4, Investigation +8, Perception +4, Persuasion +7, Social Sciences +6, Stealth +4
Mental Expertise: Insight, Persuasion
Skill Proficiencies: Athletics, Computers, Insight, Investigation, Perception, Persuasion, Social Sciences, Stealth
Saving Throw Proficiencies: Intelligence, Wisdom
Equipment Proficiencies: Basic Equipment, Advanced Equipment, Military Equipment
Languages: English, Latin, Spanish
Talents: Plans, Genius, Know-It-All, You’re Doing It Wrong
Special Features: Have You Ever Read?, Servicemember

Everyday Heroes includes a lengthy equipment section. Starting equipment is handled via equipment packs, such as a Hacker Pack or a Weekend Warrior Pack, but the extensive list includes weapons of all types—from knives and 9 mm handguns to rocket launchers and tanks, vehicles from bicycles, golf carts, pickup trucks, and bulldozers to tanks, eighteen-wheeler trucks, wingsuits, and bullet trains. The vehicles and weapons are listed by type rather than name and model, but it is easy for the Game Master and player to assign these details if they want them in their game.

Mechanically, the core rules of Everyday Heroes are the same as those of Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. Throw a twenty-sided die and add Ability and Proficiency bonuses as appropriate, the aim being to roll equal to, or higher than, a Difficulty Class, which ranges from ten for Easy, fifteen for Challenging, twenty for Difficult, and so on. The rules for Advantage and Disadvantage also work as they do in Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. Saving throws are based on the six abilities. Combat works the same too, but changes have been made to account for modern conflict. This includes firearms capable of suppressive fire and burst fire, as well as the use of explosive devices. Armour Class is replaced by a Defence value, which represents how hard a target is to hit, and can come from the cover a target is behind or the innate ability of a target to avoid being hit. Personal armour worn has an Armour Value. If the Penetration Value of an attack is higher than the Armour Value, the attack has penetrated the armour without reducing any of the damage, but if the Armour Value is higher than the Penetration Value, than an Armour Saving Throw can be made. A successful saving throw prevents all damage, but damages the armour, reducing its effectiveness, whilst a failed saving throw stops none of the damage.

The rules also cover environmental challenges such as dehydration and underwater combat, using companions—the Hunter Class has animal companions and the Engineer Class robot companions, laying and disabling traps, and of course, chases and vehicles. Vehicles have their own ratings for Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution, Armour Value, and in some cases, special abilities particular to the vehicle. Chases, whether on foot or by vehicle, are played out round by round, with the participants accumulating Chase Points. The aim is acquire more than the other participants before the end of the chase, by overcoming hazards or challenges like dodging around two men carrying a long rolled up carpet or leaping from one building to the next. Success grants a participant Chase Points, failure Chase Points to his opponent. The chase rules scale up to take account of vehicles and combat, including actions such as aiming at tires, ramming, and the like.

For the Game Master, there is advice on handling the rules, including chases—the latter with lots of complications to throw into the path of the Player Character in a wide variety of environments, different types of encounters, computer hacking and security, and more. The advice on hacking is to keep its use in check lest it become too powerful a feature of the game, but the rules handle it in a simple enough fashion, also avoiding it becoming too technical. They make a point that the Security and Deception skills are as equally important as the Computer skill. There is guidance too on common, but often difficult situations in modern set games, such as snipers, standoffs, and calling in the authorities, which is so obvious in its inclusion, but so very helpful. Optional rules cover sudden death, tracking ammunition, poison, injuries above beyond simple Hit Point loss, diseases, and recreational drugs. Advice for the Game Master begins with the basics and builds from there, including ‘Saying, “Yes, and…”’, giving time in the spotlight for each Player Character, and knowing the players and their play styles. It also examines adventure structure and creation and some of the key points of the genres that Everyday Heroes is designed to cover—action, adventure, comedy, drama, horror, mystery, and survival.

Almost a fifth of Everyday Heroes dedicated to opponents and allies, and it is here that Everyday Heroes goes further than suggesting the various genres and settings and types of scenarios which can be run using its rules. There are numerous ordinary NPCs from all walks of life, but these are joined by cultists, crazed maniacs, mad scientists, and slashers. Alongside these, there are robots and animals, including a swarm of piranha, before the selection delves into historic and prehistoric NPCs, Science Fiction aliens and bugs, futuristic robots, mutants, and supernatural creatures from demons and vampires to zombies and werewolves. Variants are included too, so for zombies, there are zombie bloaters, zombie dogs, zombie lickers, and elite zombie warriors. These are all ready for the Game Master to use and build as part of a scenario.

Physically, Everyday Heroes is very well presented. It is well written, easy to read, and comes with a good index. The artwork varies in quality a little, but is all decent enough. Also included is an appendix of the changes between Everyday Heroes and Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. This is useful, but would have been more useful if page references had been included.

There is one final addition to Everyday Heroes which is not included in the core rulebook. This is access to a number of source and scenario supplements all based upon a surprising range of films. In fact, a range of films which nobody expected to see turned into roleplaying material despite their popularity in the hobby. These consist of The Crow™ Cinematic Adventure, Escape From New York™ Cinematic Adventure, Highlander Cinematic Adventure, Kong: Skull Island Cinematic Adventure, Pacific Rim Cinematic Adventure, and Total Recall Cinematic Adventure. These showcase at least, what Everyday Heroes can do and are, equally, six good reasons to play Everyday Heroes. Beyond these of course, there is plenty of scope for supplements which could explore the genres suggested in the Everyday Heroes core rulebook, as well as other support and useable content.

Everyday Heroes takes the bones of the Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition rules and adjusts them with a surprising degree of comfort to fit the modern day. From that basis, the core rules fleshes out the here and now with a wide range of Player Character options and monsters and NPCs which together lend themselves to genres and settings both ordinary and outré. In between there is literally all of the rules, backed up with solid advice, needed to support a modern day set roleplaying campaign. With Everyday Heroes, Evil Genius Games has not so much created the spiritual successor to d20 Modern, as taken on its mantle.

Red Reports

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Tales of the RED: Street Stories is an anthology of missions for Cyberpunk RED, the fourth edition of the classic Cyberpunk roleplaying game. It provides the Game Master with nine—technically eight because the last two in the book make up a two-part adventure—scenarios which take place in and around the Night City of 2045. The scenarios are all easy to add to an ongoing campaign, as well as to mix and match with missions of the Game Master’s own devising or Screamsheets from a supplement such as the Cyberpunk RED Data Pack. Published by R. Talsorian Games, Inc., the nine missions will find the Edgerunners chasing vampires, investigating a kidnapping, working a film set, diving off the coast of Night City, making a delivery run of the best threads in town, hunting down a deadly A.I. program gone rogue, fending off an attacker who is hunting Edgerunner teams, investigating murder on the virtual club floor, and ultimately tracking down the perpetrator of the murder! Whilst offering a wide variety of mission types, they all adhere to the same format as seen in the core rules for Cyberpunk RED. This is the Beat Chart system which breaks a Mission down into a ‘Background’—intended to read aloud to the players, ‘The Rest of Story’ which summarises the Mission for the Game Master, ‘The Opposition’ which describes the threats the Edgerunners will face, and ‘The Hook’, which is what will draws them into the Mission. The remainder is divided into Developments—non-action beats, and Cliffhangers—action beats, before coming to a close with the Mission’s ‘Climax’ and ‘Resolution’. These are all labels as much as beats and of course, the nature of each beat will vary from Mission to Mission.

From the start, there are a couple of issues with the anthology. One is that the Beat Chart system does read a little oddly in that ‘The Hook’, the beat which covers how the Edgerunners get involved in the Mission, comes after several beats. So, the Missions need to be read carefully and their format adjusted to in order for the Game Master to get used to the format. The other issue that a lot of the context and stats for the nine Missions are not placed with the individual Missions, but in a set of three appendices at the back of the book. ‘Mooks and Defences’ provides the stats for the generic threats that can be encountered in the various Missions; ‘Locations’ marks every place and location visited by the nine Missions; and ‘Biographies’ provides thumbnail backgrounds for all of the named NPCs in the nine Missions. This includes the maitre’d at a fancy restaurant in the second scenario! Thankfully each entry also tells the Game Master which of the Missions they appear in or are mentioned in. Not all of them have stat blocks, but they do, it is in the Missions where they appear. Having the biographies all in one place sort of works for easy reference, but separating them from their stats, not as much…

Tales of the RED: Street Stories opens with ‘A Night at the Opera – Darkness and Desire in Night City’. Night City’s University District has been beset by a rash of disappearances of young women over the past four weeks, but to date neither Campus Security nor Night City Police Department have made any progress. So the father of the latest victim hires the Edgerunners to investigate and find his daughters. Canvassing the campus—which involves some fun encounters with members of the student body—points to the involvement of a poser gang, the Philharmonic Vampyres, who embrace the whole vampire aesthetic—fangs, pale skin, Goth-style clothing, and pale skin. The best way to contact the Philharmonic Vampyres is to attend one of their parties. Unfortunately, when the Edgerunners do, the event erupts into a gang-on-gang gunfight! The Edgerunners do need to pay attention to the ordinary events going on around them to get the most out of the scenario, but this is a fairly, direct simple scenario underneath its gothic trappings.

If the first Mission in the anthology looked weird, then the second, ‘Agents Desire – The Case of the Missing Girlfriend’, actually is weird. A fixer—who may be just little impatient for the Edgerunners, if not their players—puts the Edgerunners in touch with a high-ranking corporate whose partner was kidnapped from one of Night City’s top restaurants, La Lune Bleu, and he fears that he will only get her back if he gives up company secrets. The biggest problem for the Edgerunners is actually getting past the restaurant’s snooty maitre’d, and numerous options are suggested, including buying the right quality outfits and booking a table, hiring on as waiting staff, and so on. This presents a great social challenge for the Edgerunners and their players. Once inside, they can get further information and the story takes a turn for the strange, which foreshadows, but is not connected to, the events of Cyberpunk 2077.

The third Mission is different again. ‘A Bucket Full of Popcorn-Flavoured Kibble – Lights, Camera, Drama!’ gives the chance for the Edgerunners to hit the silver screen and be extras in the latest film by one of burgeoning Addis Ababa film studios. Not only do the Edgerunners get to make money from this job, there is opportunity aplenty for them to make money on the side. These include tracking down a supply of actual organic food for the film’s picky star, plant a listening device for a sleazy journalist, provide cybertech support, make a delivery for the film’s other star following his divorce, and so on. The Edgerunners are free to pick and choose which tasks they undertake, but the Mission has a picaresque quality to it, as the Edgerunners bounce from one small task to the next. There are some nice rewards too if the Edgerunners do play it—mostly—straight and promise of extra work too.

The change in the nature and style of the Missions continues with ‘Drummer and the Whale – Treasure Beneath the Sea’, in which the Edgerunners are hired for an easy job in—or under—Night City Bay. Their employer, whose hobby is looking for patterns in in the remnants of the global Net which got shattered during the Fourth Corporate War, and he has detected a patten off the coast of Night City. With limited funds, he hires to locate some washed up cargo container, which means searching the shore, part-shanty town, part-waste dump, all one environmental hazard. It seems that something is operating on the bed of the bay and shipping containers ashore on a regular basis. The question is, what is it, how dangerous is it, and how much will the right people pay for it? The aquatic nature of the Mission is challenging in itself and is in parts more technical than the earlier Missions, which should challenge the Edgerunners’ Tech and Netrunner. Overall, the Mission has a claustrophobic, dated feel to it as traditional rivalries straight out of Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0. surface in Night City Bay and threaten a legal incident!

‘Haven’t Got a Stitch to Wear – A Suit Worth Dying For’ is more straightforward. High-end tailors Torrell and Chiang have proved popular with Night City’s rich and famous and demand for their suits and outfits has grown and grown in recent months. The demand is such that Torrell and Chiang have been forced to out-source minor alterations as their own staff are too busy working on new commissions, but that solution has gone awry when the couriers they normally use stop doing deliveries. With a growing number of impatient clients, the tailors hire the Edgerunners to find out why. The problem is that the couriers have competition. The Mission covers most eventualities, including the Edgerunners dealing with the problem, siding with the competition, or even setting themselves up as the competition. In whatever way the Mission is resolved, the Edgerunners do get to look at how Night City’s small business economy works and potentially make some contacts.

‘Reaping the Reaper – The Call is Coming From Inside Your Head!’ is a classic Cyberpunk scenario. A Night City urban legend tells of a rogue A.I. known as The Reaper, which body-hops Netrunner after Netrunner killing them one by one, only turns out that there is very much a basis of truth to the legend. This is a good scenario to run if the Edgerunners have played through ‘Digital Divas Burn It Down’ and ‘Don’t Fear the Reaper’ Missions from the Cyberpunk RED Data Pack, especially for Tech or Netrunner Edgerunners. However, it is potentially problematic in a number of ways. First, it is combat heavy in comparison to the other scenarios in Tales of the RED: Street Stories. Second, the Edgerunners are accompanied by a pair of NPCs, one a Solo, the other a Tech, which are there to cover the Edgerunners if they fail. Their presence definitely gives the Game Master more to keep track of, potentially undermines the efforts of the Edgerunners, and feels clumsy in terms of storytelling.

‘Staying Vigilant – Three Crews Dead, Will Yours Be Next?’ brings the action to the Edgerunners. It starts with them being invited to the Afterlife, the bar from the computer game, Cyberpunk 2077, as opposed to the Forlorn Hope, where they have been meeting previously. Trace Santiago, the Media and son of famed Nomad Santiago, wants help in investigating the recent deaths of three Edgerunner crews. With his media drone in tow, the Edgerunners need must battle their way past Night City’s Hot Zone to locate the ‘killer’. Like the previous Mission, this is combat orientated, but is more nuanced.

It seems like they are being plagued by vampires when another group of them seems to have committed murder at Delirium, a virtuality club, on the Edgerunners’ night out in ‘Bathed in Red – A Night of Fun or Night of Terror?’. With a body on the dance floor, their night is over and their reputation too when they are framed for the death. This is a murder mystery that builds into a conspiracy, with the vampire posers, who out to be homeless street children, holding some of the initial answers. There is a great contrast here as the story switches from a grubby virtual reality dance club where everyone wears visors to view the night as one of five different environments—Dark Cabaret, Deathpunk, Horrorpunk, Skatepunk, or Synthpunk—to the squalid home of the street children, and then again, as the mother of the murder victim, a rich corporate, gets involved. This is most complex of the Missions in the anthology and the most adult in tone, and that continues in the Mission’s sequel, the last Mission in the anthology. ‘One Red Night – The Final Curtain Falls’ picks up where ‘Bathed in Red – A Night of Fun or Night of Terror?’ left off, involves yet more of the murder victim’s family, and comes to a close in bloody, physical confrontation with the true perpetrator of the murders.

Physically, Tales of the RED: Street Stories is well presented with excellent artwork and cartography. It needs an edit here and there, but the Missions themselves are easy to read and digest.

What is so good about Tales of the RED: Street Stories is the diversity of Missions and stories in the anthology. Yes, there is a Mission involving a rogue killer A.I., which is classic cyberpunk and consequently a cliché, but the majority of the Missions will first surprise the Game Master and then her players with the situations their Edgerunners will find themselves in and having to resolve. Nor do they always focus on combat, though there is plenty of that as well as solutions to the Missions which involve means other than force. Although some are better than others, there is not a single bad Mission in the pages of Tales of the RED: Street Stories, the best including becoming couriers for a tailoring firm, working a film set, diving for salvage, and more. Tales of the RED: Street Stories is an inventive and challenging anthology of scenarios for the Cyberpunk RED which gives the Game Master a great range of choice to choose from. In fact, the choice is so good that she will probably end up running most of them!

Cutlery & Chaos

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Have you ever wondered what would happen if the adventurers from your Monday night Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition game was put in charge of a café? Or the shadowrunners from your Shadowrun campaign decide to open a coffee shack in the Barrens of Seattle? Or the heroes, protectors of Freedom City, from Dave’s Mutants & Masterminds game inherit a bohemian restaurant? Or just for a change in Mel’s Call of Cthulhu game, one of the investigators inherits a tea shop from her uncle rather than a mystery about his disappearance? All of these are possible in the Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game. In fact, not only are these options possible, but they almost do also not matter, because what does matter, is how the Player Characters cope with the ever-changing nature of the day-to-day business of running a café. Published by Cobblepath Games—best known for Locus: A roleplaying game of personal horror (and guilt)—Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game is actually two things. First, it is a standalone storytelling game which can be set up and run without a Game Master, everyone working towards telling a story of a single day, or perhaps more… Second, it is a corollary storytelling game which can be used to explore some of the time that the Player Characters in an ongoing campaign might have in between longer, probably more dangerous activities. In whatever way a playing group decides to use the Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game, they will also need a standard deck of playing cards and a selection of cutlery.
No matter the genre or setting for the café, the first thing that the players decide is where their establishment sits on three scales. These are Fresh/Cosy, Small/Big, and Professional/Friendly. The score in each, which ranges between one and ten determines the number of items the players have in their Cutlery Pool, whether Teaspoons, Forks, or Knives. Each of the three items represents a different way of approaching and solving a situation in the café. Knives are used for a quick decisive approach, Forks for the resourceful, creative approach, and Teaspoons for the considered, well-thought-out approach. Each item of cutlery is also associated with a suit in the card deck—diamonds for Knives, clubs for Forks, and spades for Teaspoons. In addition, each player also creates a character who has two notable methods—and thus two associated items of Cutlery—of dealing with problems. One is his favoured approach, which he can always use even if he runs out of Cutlery, whilst the other he has learned to use through experience. A character begins play with an item of Cutlery associated with his learned approach and a Teaspoon. A Teaspoon can be discarded to allow the character to go on a break and whilst on the break, the character can gain Cutlery based on the learned way of dealing with issues.
If a character is brought into the Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game from another roleplaying game, the rules from that roleplaying game do not come with him. Instead, the Cutlery rules in the Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game are used, but when dealing with a difficult situation or problem, the character is still roleplayed and his stats, skills, abilities, spells, superpowers, cyberware, favourite gear, and so on, can be used to influence how the character resolves a problem at the café. In effect, it is a classic fish out of water situation and the character has do his very best the only way he knows how…
Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game is played in rounds. At the start of a game, a Hitch is drawn. This is a persistent problem that cannot be resolved at all and instead, must be worked around. It is a constant presence throughout the game. At the beginning of the round, the first player draws a single card from the deck. This the Catastrophe for the round and it is resolved immediately by a single player. It is followed by each player drawing a card which indicates the Snafus besetting the café that round. Tables are provided of Catastrophes, Snafus, and Hitches. For example, a Hitch could be a visiting Film Crew, the Catastrophe might be a Power Cut or a Scam Artist, whilst a Snafu could be involve Happy Hour, a Wardrobe Malfunction, a Bad Tipper, or Broken Glass.
To deal with a Snafu, a player wages an item of Cutlery. This can come from their own stock of Cutlery or the general pool of Cutlery. The item of Cutlery waged determines the defending suit. The outcome is determined by comparing the suites of the Cutlery used and a new card drawn. Knives or diamonds beat Spoons, Forks or clubs beat Knives, and Spoons or spaces beat Forks. Hearts beat everything and count as an automatic success. If the player wins, the Snafu is resolved and discarded. If the player loses, the wagered Cutlery is lost, the Snafu remains in play, and worse, an item of Cutlery already dedicated to a Catastrophe is also lost.
A Catastrophe requires Cutlery to be dedicated to it. As long as an item of Cutlery is dedicated to it, it remains resolved. However, if the Cutlery dedicated to it is lost because a player loses a Wager on a Snafu, the Catastrophe reoccurs and becomes a problem for every character until resolved.
A game of Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game begins with everyone possessing an item of Cutlery and there being Cutlery in the café’s pool. It will not be long before any Cutlery is in short supply as play progresses, primarily through failed Wagers on attempts to deal with Snafus and Cutlery having to be dedicated to catastrophes. Lost or discarded Cutlery can be recovered by a player going on a Break. This requires the expenditure of a Teaspoon and is done with another player. A cup of tea is also recommended as is taking the time to reflect and discuss the events of the day so far. This enables the players on the break to recover an item of Cutlery related to their learned means of resolving problems rather than the one they favour. In the meantime, the players still work will continue the round without them, attempting to deal with a new catastrophe and more Snafus as they are drawn. The players on a break are free to return at any time.
There is no set ending for a game of Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game, but perhaps a shift should end when everyone is out of Knives, Forks, and Spoons. It is a game of storytelling in the face of dwindling resources and mounting problems, most temporary, but all too quickly, too many permanent unless a solution—however temporary—is applied to them. Initially, successes will drive the storytelling, but that will change as failures to deal with both the Snafus and the Catastrophes mount. In some ways, this works better when the staff of the café are drawn from other roleplaying games, their inexperience at running a café quickly becoming evident as the failures mount and their methods, invariably useful in the other roleplaying game setting, not being as useful in the ordinary place of work.
Physically, Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game is well presented, coming as a folder containing two trifold pamphlets. They are bright, colourful, and easy to read.
Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game is playable as is, a storytelling game about running a café and coping with the problems that beset its staff and customers almost every day. Its lack of ending and objective, whether as a whole or for individual characters, does leave its purpose hanging, whereas if the Player Characters are drawn in from another game, Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game comes into its own. When that happens, the players get to explore their characters through a slice of life, doing something very ordinary, but often only having the most extraordinary means to do that ordinary thing. That exploration gives Coffee & Chaos – Comedy Café Roleplaying Game its purpose and its comedy as the ordinary and extraordinary clash over coffee and cake.

1982: Judge Dredd: The Game of Crime-Fighting in Mega-City One

Reviews from R'lyeh -

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

—oOo—
Judge Dredd: The Game of Crime-Fighting in Mega-City One is back! Originally designed by Sir Ian Livingstone and published by Games Workshop in 1982, it was the very first board game to be inspired by the Judge Dredd comic strip from the pages of 2000 AD. In the original game, the players control Judges patrolling the streets of Mega-City One, the vast twenty-second century metropolis on the Atlantic coast of North America, home to eight hundred million citizens and all of them potential lawbreakers. Every Judge is trained from the age of five to arrest criminals, pass sentence, and carry out the sentence—even if that means a death sentence!—all in the name of keeping the city and its inhabitants safe. Every turn a player sends his Judge to the scene of a reported crime, perhaps the Palais De Boing—the only place in the city where it is legal to go Boinging, Otto Sump’s Ugly Clinic for the very best in uglification surgery, or the Alien Zoo where wonders and weird creatures from across the universe can be seen— and attempts to arrest the perpetrator. Perhaps Joseph ‘Mad Tooth’ McKill for Tobacco Smoking, Ma Jong for Stookie Glanding, or Dobey Queeg for Robot Smashing. Notoriously, this is the board game where you could be arresting Judge Death for Littering, or Ma ‘Green Fingers’ Mahaffy for Murder. Unfortunately, only one Judge gets be top dog in Mega-City One, and that is Judge Dredd. Which means the player with greatest total strength of Crime and Perp cards in his score pile at the end of the game is the winner and thus next top dog.

Much like the later Block Mania, the good news is that Judge Dredd: The Game of Crime-Fighting in Mega-City One has returned to the fold of 2000 AD and is now published by Rebellion Unplugged. Like Block Mania, it has undergone a redesign and makeover, but not by very much, and the game play remains very much the same. What has been added are clearer rules for ending the game and a simple expansion to make play a little more interesting and worth revisiting. Everything else remains the same. Same game rules, same art style, same set of perps and crimes, and same take that style of play. So, although a classic, Judge Dredd: The Game of Crime-Fighting in Mega-City One is still a game from 1982. What that means is that the game is easy to learn and easy to play, has bags and bags of theme—even if that theme dates back between 1977 and 1982, a degree of players acting against each other, and a high degree of luck. Judge Dredd: The Game of Crime-Fighting in Mega-City One is by any definition, an ‘Ameritrash’ board game. That by no means is necessarily a bad thing as the game can also be funny and silly, and it is playable by anyone—not just those who played it first time around in 1982 and are noshing down on the nostalgia.

Judge Dredd: The Game of Crime-Fighting in Mega-City One is designed to be played by two to six players aged fourteen plus and has a playing time of between an hour and an hour-and-a-half. The board depicts twenty-eight locations in Mega-City One. Over the course of the game, each sector will be seeded with a reported Crime and Perp. The Judges will proceed to the Sectors where these Crimes and Perps have been reported, reveal them, and attempt to arrest the Perp. Failing that, they may be able to stop the Crime in progress. At the end of the game, the player who has scored the most points from Perps arrested and Crimes stopped, wins the game.
Set-up first requires the group to choose a game length—‘Hotdog Run’, ‘Day Shift’, or ‘Night Shift’—and decide whether or not to use the Specialist Judges expansion. Each player receives six Action cards, and the Crime, Perp, and Sector cards are shuffled. Sector cards are drawn and these indicate where reports of crimes have been made, Perp cards and Crime cards being drawn and placed face down in the indicated Sectors. Each round consists of three phases. In the Movement Phase, the Judges move two Sectors in a direction, taking accounting of bridges to cross the river, but primarily to the nearest Sector containing Perp and Crime cards. When a Judge moves into a Sector Perp and Crime cards, both are turned over and revealed. In the Arrest Phase, a Judge attempts to bring a Perp and his Crime to justice. To do this, his player rolls the game’s black Judge die and adds his Judge’s Strength. Another player roll’s the game red Perp die and adds the result to Perp’s Strength, a total of the value on the Perp card plus the value on the Crime card. Highest total wins. If the Judge’s result is higher, he arrests the Perp and his player takes both Perp and Crime cards and adds it to his score pile. If the Judge’s result is lower, the Judge has failed, is knocked out, and has to discard and refresh his hand of Action cards. If the result is a draw, the crime is stopped and the Crime is added to the player’s score pile, but the Perp runs away, ready to be arrested by another Judge! In the third Refill Phase, new Sector cards and Crime and Perp cards are drawn to bring the number in play back up to six, any Judges knocked out go to the Justice Department Hospital, and each player receives a new Action card, more if their Judge is in certain sectors.

Of course, it is not always possible for a Judge to beat a Perp and a Crime on a singe roll. For example, if Fink Angel And Ratty with a Strength of eight was Body Sharking, which has a value of five, the total Strength the player has to roll higher than is thirteen. Which is not possible with the addition of a Judge’s Strength of six plus a die roll. Fortunately, a Judge has access to Action cards. Most are Support cards, which add a bonus to the arresting Judge’s Strength. For example, ‘Judge Hershey is with you today’ adds three and ‘The Perp is Kill Crazy. You send in the Sonic Cannon.’ adds five. Others though, are Sabotage cards, and can be used by a player to make an arrest attempt by another player’s Judge even harder. For example, ‘Your breakfast of plasti-flakes and synthi-lix is giving you chronic indigestion. You are not in tip-top fighting condition’ levies a -2 penalty or ‘The Perp you are fighting is secretly an East-Meg spy. Add an Extra Die to their Strength’. The worst of these cards, of course, the Escape card, which reveals the Perp to be the notorious Edwin Parsey, notorious confessor of other people’s crimes, which forces all Support cards used in the arrest attempt to be discarded and the attempt be treated as a tie. Other Action cards allow extra movement, send the Judge to a particular Sector, grants on the spot healing, and so on.

Judge Dredd: The Game of Crime-Fighting in Mega-City One adds one expansion—Specialist Judges. There are six of these—or seven if the Judge Fish from ‘The Day the Law Died’ storyline promo is included—and each Judge has a different ability. They include Chief Judge, SJS Judge, Psi-Judge, Wally Squad, Cadet, and Mechanismo. For example, the Cadet Judge only has a Strength of four, but begins play with and can hold seven Action cards, and draws an extra card; the SJS Judge can look at another player’s Actions each turn and wins ties in combat; and the Wally Squad Judge can move through Sectors containing revealed Perps, but does not have to arrest them. All six are nicely thematic and give a player a good little edge in play. The mix means that the players can come back to the game, try another Specialist Judge and a slightly style of play.

Physically, Judge Dredd: The Game of Crime-Fighting in Mega-City One is well presented. The artwork on the board is in colour, whilst the cards is black and white, but also is sharply and crisply handled. The rulebook is clearly written, easy to read, and supported with examples of the rules. In addition, the rulebook includes all of the UMPTY CANDY CARDs from the Jack Caldwell’s Old-fashioned Umpty Candy packs. All three series—‘SECTORS of Mega-City One’, ‘CRIMES of Mega-City One’, and ‘PERPS of Mega-City One’ explain the three sets of cards in the game, giving background for each of them.

Judge Dredd: The Game of Crime-Fighting in Mega-City One is not a perfect game by modern standards. It is too luck driven, the game allows one player to directly hamper another with the Sabotage cards, and towards the end of play, players can congregate around the remaining Sectors that have not yet been drawn if they have been keeping an eye on the cards that have been drawn to date. That said, they were part of the game’s design in 1982 and they should be there also in 2022 because the new edition is intended as a nostalgia piece and to change the game’s design too radically would break from that. Another issue is that the game only draws from the first five or so years of the Judge Dredd strips in 2000 AD—1977 to 1982—so that means forty-year-old stories which may not be as familiar to younger players. Perhaps yet, there is room for further expansions involving the more recent stories and thus more Crimes and Perp cards?
Judge Dredd: The Game of Crime-Fighting in Mega-City One is a fun game, easy to play and all the more enjoyable if the players know the lore, know the crimes, and know the Perps. Rebellion Unplugged have done a fantastic job of updating the quality of the game whilst both retaining the same game play and adding an expansion for more varied play. Judge Dredd: The Game of Crime-Fighting in Mega-City One marks the welcome return of a beloved classic, British in both design and inspiration, in turns funny, frustrating, and evocative of our gaming youth and another age.

Friday Fantasy: The Curious Conundrum of the Conflagrated Condottiero

Reviews from R'lyeh -

Konrad Spiegel is dead. Burned to a crisp, a gold coin in his mouth. It is the strangest thing to have occurred in the village for Schwarzfuß for many years. Jakob Falkenartig was a friend of Konrad Spiegel and fears he will be next, so he wants to hire some bodyguards. The otherwise feckless Bürgermeister Lorenz Künstler wants something done about the situation, as long as it does not involve him, and so hires an errant band of adventurers to do the job for him. Then, of course, there is the matter of the gold. Who has enough gold to leave in the mouths of dead, burned bodies? These are all reasons for the Player Characters to get involved in the events in and around Schwarzfuß. What they will find is a village fearful of what will happen next and who the next victim will be and who the perpetrator is of this terrible crime is. This is the set-up for The Curious Conundrum of the Conflagrated Condottiero, a short scenario for Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay. Like other scenarios published by Lamentations of the Flame Princess it is set in the game’s default early Modern Period, this time following a war, the suggested year being 1630 and the war being the Thirty Years’ War. Written by Kevin Green, it is another of his ‘village in peril, but only the Player Characters can save the day’ scenarios, but on a much smaller scale.

The Curious Conundrum of the Conflagrated Condottiero is essentially Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Sign of the Four adapted to the seventeenth century, a fantasy roleplaying game, Germany, but with added flames and less monkey and more The Terminator. Not literally, but the antagonist is an unstoppable killing machine. Actually, the author actually states that the scenario’s inspiration lies in John Carpenter’s The Fog and Kelly’s Heroes, which is all well and good, but since his opinions and tastes in films have proven to be suspect with previous scenarios for Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay, he may not be entirely, or indeed, at all, accurate. The author’s taste and opinion with regard to films aside, its set-up is simple, flexible, and easy to use, whether that is the retroclone of the Referee’s choice or another setting or even another roleplaying game. The most obvious of which would be Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.

The village of Schwarzfuß is not described in any great detail and instead, the scenario focuses on the victims and where they live, the antagonist, and the few NPCs of any note in the village. Most of the NPCs receive a half page of description each, whilst the three remaining victims several pages each, being accompanied by details of where they live, including very nicely done floorplans of their homes. Each of the three remaining victims is very different in personality and the Referee will enjoy portraying each one of them as well as the other NPCs. The venerable, but crotchety old monster hunter stands out as the most fun to roleplay.

Much of the scenario is dedicated to suggested ways and means of dealing with the nigh on unstoppable monster threatening the three victims. It includes faking the deaths of the victims as well as actually cutting to the chase and the Player Characters killing them themselves, and everything in between. There are lots of options discussed here, essentially covering most of the solutions that the players will think of and there is even a suggestion for the Referee to substitute a non-supernatural option if she does not necessarily want her Player Characters facing an unstoppable flaming monster or she wants to run a Scooby Doo-style scenario.

Physically, The Curious Conundrum of the Conflagrated Condottiero is very well presented and written. The artwork is decent, but the maps are excellent.

The Curious Conundrum of the Conflagrated Condottiero is a short scenario. In fact, it could be run in a single session and even as a convention scenario, though it would be unlikely to last more than two sessions. Its set-up is simple and its plot, well, not exactly original, so what matters is how well the plot is done and how well the plot is supported, and to be fair, The Curious Conundrum of the Conflagrated Condottiero does a good job of handling both. The result is that The Curious Conundrum of the Conflagrated Condottiero is a decently presented, well explored, if familiar scenario that is easy to prepare, easy to run, and easy to adapt.

Cyclopedia Ornrium Entry; Etrulia.

Jeu de guerre de Ornria — Postings from the Ornrian Wars -



Etrulia (E-troo-lia), OFFICIALLY The Ancient and Perfect Etrulian Empire.

GEOGRAPHIC LOCATION.



Etrulia is located on the Dragaloon Continent, South of Buslopia, East of Guerat, West of Bertwood. It has a long Eastern coastline along the Windy Wavewash, and a short stretch of Pearlfoam Abyss coastline in the West.

Etrulia’s last census recorded 3840 Citizens

It’s Capitol city is the lovely Pizzalatzio in the Achellision Hills.

Etrulia’s largest city is Pizzalatzio with 897 residents, but Piastre is a close second with 729 inhabitants.

It’s main port is Piastre, but Vitapotata is also an important harbor city.

General Overview

Etrulia was inhabited very early in prehistory, Villages gave way to towns quickly and by late Antiquity Etrulia was the center of a great empire that stretched North into Bertwood, West up into the Buslopbian highlands, and to the South, all of Guerat, Oppressorbad, and into Mantz as far as Buderball and Batterbol, and even Shrudle in Gros Montaine. This empire was never completely stable and civil wars rocked it frequently through the early Middle Ages. In modern times it has become a shell of it’s former glorious self.

The nation is still notionally an Empire. The current Emperor; Joanna Jojosephat Jojohnjerryjosephjakes XXV is a 30 year old man with the mind and attention span of a 4 year old. His Vickers control him, and through his seals, the state. The most active is Vestarch Manfrid Smeed, Count of Gelatuna. Smeed is only one power behind the throne however, and the various Vestarch families are engaged in an endless round of backstabbing, poisoning, and chicanery to promote scions to the Vickeracy, and control the edicts released from the Palace. At this time there are 15 Vickers in the Palace, though that number can vary on a weekly, and in crisis, hourly, basis.

Though teeming with citizens, it is among the poorest countries, it’s crops are meager and easily fail in the overworked soils. It’s industry is small scale, with limited investment, and it’s military, though big enough, is weak in support weapons, armor, and the other necessities of modern war. This reality is masked by it’s ancient pride, and one would not know it’s empire is a tattered rump of itself except by a close look at it’s pomp and circumstance, where one sees threadbare red carpets, military parades whose soldiers are armed with broomstick guns and march in paper boots. At a ball one finds courtiers whose dress is antique not only in style, but in actual fact, not infrequently even the wealthiest of Grandees make appearances in finery of their grandparents, carefully hand patched to hide the moth holes.

Etrulia signed on to the Goshtane Accords last year. The Goshtane Accords are an agreement between the 2PFS, Etrulia, Buslopbia, Agog, and Dundoon intended to make the seas safer for fishermen. Signers agree to provide assistance to mariners of all nations, and the Accord sets standards of international law with regards to salvage, fishing rights and other matters in the Pearlfoam Abyss, Windy Wavewash, and Dampgyre Waste. The ability of Abassador Fra Frangifrancis Ferryfertle Count of CantaElopia to manipulate the court into obtaining the two seals required was either the most incredible example of luck in modern times, or the result of shrewed and brilliant domestic politicking, Ambassador Ferryfertle is either worrisomely lucky, or dangerously brilliant.

Etrulia has been chary of allying itself with any nation since the Guerat Swamp Wars ended disastrously with Mantz, it’s last ally, signing a separate peace with Opressorbad. At this time pushing an agreement home through the obfuscation of the squabbling and myopic court would be more challenging than flying to the moon by waving featherdusters on the end of ones arms.

Languages

The Official Language of Etrulia is called, unsurprisingly, Etrulian. Surprisingly, no one can speak it outside a few dusty court scribes who keep it from being forgotten entirely by continuing to write copies of all court documents in the dead language, where they are uselessly archived until eaten by time and bookworms in the Imperial Library. All Actual functional documents are recorded in Frangfursh, a descendant of the form of Etrulian once spoken in the Hamhome region of Mantz 13 centuries ago, and now a (very) close relative of the Frankfurtish spoken in Guerat. (indeed, they are indistinguishable though the two nations take great pains pretending they are distinct). Frangfursh is the tongue of the middle and upper class, all books and newspapers one encounters are invariably written in it.

In addition, the lower classes of Etrulia have created a creole form called Furgish, a difficult slang filled degenerate used by the lowest echelons of society, and a form so barbarized and cacophonous that only a linguist could see it’s Ancient Etrulian ancestry.



ORIGIN OF NAME (ETYMOLOGY)

Etrulia is believed to derive from the exonym Yuriarte, (Onion Eaters), the designation ancient Agogite sources give to a people that once inhabited the Montcalifer area in deep antiquity. Dr. Nosysyr of the Pizzalatzio University disagrees, and prefers to see the origin in Etter Hitrula, meaning “Land of Enduring Peace” in early Etrulian. History



HISTORY. Pre-history.

Fossils are found in Rhuinridgia along the Bentborder that show early life in Etrulia was a swampy cycad jungle of giant bugs and heavy bodied predatory amphibians. The fossilized wood of this period has long been a favorite of Etrulian stone workers and jewelers for it’s vivid sunset pinks and purples. Later at least the flat lands of mudopolia and ercule were inundated by tropical seas, since fossil shell and coral has been found in some abundance, and Brazorbia has long been a source of brilliantly colored stone formed of fossilized coral reef. Volcanic activity rasied the land above the seas at some distant deep past time, and the strange razor edged sculpted stones of Rhuinridgia are the remains of the basalt cores of those ancient fumeroles. Later volcanic activity created lava f ows that built up into the fertile Achillesian Hills. Indeed Vulcanism has long been a shaper of the Etrulian country and even today Titesian and Oilypannier volcanoes pose a risk of violent eruption.

Perhaps the volcanoes were a source of warmth, for while Bertwood and much of the North were under sheets of ice, it seems Etrulia was a bit of paradise, fossils of huge sycamores, oaks, spruce, fir, and other large trees indicate a boreal rainforest environment inhabited by giant deer, Gompotheric Elephants, and dwarf hippos, and even lions and rhinoceros. These large animals must have drawn humans into the region, for the first evidence of man one finds in the archaeological record is stone tools and butchered animals finds. A famous dig at Spumoghetti revealed 3 Gompothere elephants seemingly butchered with the primitive stone tools found all about them,

Over time the landscape changed, perhaps people hunted away all the large animals, but in more recent layers we find that the beautiful forests are gone, replaced in the lowland basins by scrubby grasses and even cacti, showing that perhaps the rains stopped, or the soil became unable to hold water, and humans began to gather into villages of adobe. These people were no longer eating big game, but instead reliant upon hares, tortoises, lizards, and beginning to make the first forays into agriculture. We find early forms of wheat and millet, and soon pottery begins to replace carefully carved and polished vessels of stone. Not long after this strata, we see the rise of identifiable city states. Gelatuna, Beenoween, Bedzore, and Cantanasta especially have revealed ancient cemeteries that yield an impressive array of artifacts from which we can deduce the stratification of society, with high status graves giving up stunning examples of chalcolithic technologies, armor composed of llaminated plates, metal clad weapons, and of course the famous “Helmet of Alkerbalony” the beautiful boar’s tooth and seashell composite headgear finished with fine clad plates in hammered relief of tiny scenes of hunting and warfare and mythology. No recognizable writing exists from this era but mythological motifs with continuity into the historical period decorate pottery and metal work and even bone, and presumably wood was also used for carving and decorating as well, though none survives. The team from Polyesterdelphia Polytechnic excavating the Ceeweedo site claim to have found evidence of some sort of potential early script in some rather unusual deep scratching on objects they recovered, but this is controversial at best. Nonetheless it shows that individuals were marking objects on the eve of the dawn of writing.

The first unequivocal writing shows up in the burned ruins of the Oleofogo “palace of Pepsin” site, where small bronze plates with a very early form of Etrulian has been written in characters quite clearly derived from Agogian pattern, though difficult in the extreme, tentative readings indicate that these plates record counts of livestock and produce , theorized to be a record of sacrifices in honor of deceased members of the Pepsin household, intended for a public mortuary display.

Historical Antiquity.

With the rise of writing we begin to learn about the world of ancient Etrulia as witnessed by the eyes of it’s own people. Among the first personages we learn of is a Thunder Lord Bufobu who lead a successful campaign from Montcalifler into the Plum Valley and up on to the Achellesian Hills to attack the settlement that we know as Pizzaltzio today. Quickly there seems to rise a number of rival confederations under religious priest-kings. Three principle centers sharing a language, writing form and cultural complex can be discerned; Montcalifler, Vitapotata, and Aggadi, while in the south a culturally separate people appear at Piastre with markedly unique forms of material goods, a cremation burial pattern, pottery and metal work has a marked similarity to contemporaneous finds at Oltanufaful and Bumrussy on the Mimeograph Valley of Guapamolotl. Though if there is an actual connection is anyone’s guess at this time. For some 300 years the Western city states squabble and raid one another, while trade and cultural dissemination changes the people of Piastre who adopt the Etrulian writing system and adapt it to the Piastre tongue just as that language begins to give way to Etrulian, leaving us with just enough scraps to see that it’s probably a language isolate and leaving us stumped for the rest.

Glutcleus the 17th ,or possibly 19th ,son of Testocleus Drupus of Piastre first comes to our attention via a letter from the philosopher Sophsopes in which he makes a famous if unprintable pun on the Princes name and then requests a slave skilled at beating and three cartloads of whithy switches “no larger around than a boys finger”. Later we see the young prince as a war leader in his fathers siege of Jeendy where he famously leads an attack of bravos over the city wall and opens the gates for his father to sack the city. When Testocleus dies in the famous charge on the wall of Puth, it seems Glutcleus was raiding for supplies somewhere near Sauvequputh as he encounters his brother Burpogones at Hob, here we are unsure quite what happens, but Burpogones seems to have been given rule over Puthpoint in exchange for support, as the two of them rapidly consolidate his fathers Army and march back North almost before news of the disaster had reached his many brothers. Azineus, Drupus Minor, and Grittypeasian, his three most powerful and oldest brothers were swift to meet him in arms near Vitapotata, the battle at first did not go well for Glutcleus, Drupus Minor personally killed Glutcleus favorite, one Silquepanteus, before being killed himself. In this tight spot , near to losing everything, entered Nasalonginus and Laziliabedes his half brothers by his Aunt Unclia, These two had marched from Bertwood with an army of spearmen, and hitting Azineus and Grittypeasian’s phalanx in the flank, crushed them, capturing Grittypeasian, who suffered the horrible punishment of being buried alive with the dead of the field.

Now all greater Etrulia was in full civil war, Glutcleus had about 6 brothers in support, and the remaining 12 vying for power soon were reduced to four alliances. Glutcleus, Nasalonginus, Laziliabedes, Burpogones, Testocleanderades, and Bosphartes held the largest force of long hardened men in three strong phalanxes with a contingent of wild deer-riding barbarians from Guerat. And a solid base in Jeendy, Piastre, and Sauvequeputh. His brothers Albatiteus, Capricoprates, and Coclepituetes were in possession of the Bedzore-Aggadi region and well supplied with Bertwood archers. Pituetephagius, Neeplolacader, Urinopedes, Tupuarseus, and Askimogorio held Pizzalatzio with two phalanges of Achillesian spearmen and a turmae of Guerat terrorbird riders, as well as a small handful of war Gompotheres (elephants). In the North Denydikomeus and Porcodemenseus held the island city of Sandyanna with a garrison made of the Geroisenes Phalanx, a reserve formation of old men and wounded, and in addition had some mercenaries from Agog.

In Chillember the Piastrian army marched up the Gelatuna road, Here Bosphartes was detailed to invest the town with a small force, while the remainder continued north seeking battle. At Vitapotata they encountered Capricoprates with a single phalanx attempting to gather supplies, his force being largely dispersed over the countryside, he was in no position to resist, but his retreat was swiftly cut off, his force, beaten in detail, and he himself thrown into the Bentborder and eaten by Sarcodiles. Glutcleus then turned South to Pizzalatzio. After two or three days being harrassed by the Terrorbird riders of Guerat, he met his brothers Tupuarses and Urinopedes defeating them handily at Cantanasta, the Gompotheres doing more harm to their own force than to the Piastrians. Urinopedes then pleaded for mercy and was forgiven, after swearing an oath and renouncing all arms he was allowed to retire to a villa and we hear of him no more. Tupuarses fled with remnants of the Geurat riders and remnants of his hoplites towards Pizzalatzio.

Rather than press on to Pizzalatzio, Glutcleus force marched again, as Albatitues was said to be between Bedzore and Piastre burning his way to that city. Before he could invest Piastre however Albatitues died, having eaten, it is said, what his soldiers were eating, in this case a particularly bad bit of pickled fish, He would be buried in Bedzore with 20 of his poisoned men. His army devolved onto his son, Albatitudidies, but it was short lived. After a late afternoon scrum with Glutcleus leading light infantry, the Aggadian infantry defected to Glutcleus, captured Albatitudidies, and delivered him and many Bedzorians to Glutcleus. Offered clemency Albatitudidies is said to have spat out his tongue. But Glutcleus refused to have him killed. Instead he was taken home under guard, and fixed with golden chains, living the life of prince under house arrest, because, some said, Glutcleus liked his looks, but others that it was because he would not be baited.

At this stage, Glutcleus clearly had the upper hand, but it would be nearly 10 years before his new won empire was fully under control. His brothers were brought to heel roughly. Those who he trusted were watched, those he distrusted, were watched by the worms of the grave.

With the Eturlian heartland in order, and his ranks renewed and retrained, he took the field again, South, bringing the wild men of Geurat under heel, and without pause, as if all Geurat were just an inconvenient bit of tidying up before a job of work, he set upon Muckrump, and had it in a week. Then North to Polkot, Snogthug, a hard fight followed at Muckwarp with the Zuzran of Dogchiewygrad, two long days of blood, but the Zuzran’s chariots were crushed, his elephants killed, his army routed, his person captured, and the short remaining years left him spent in abject debasement as a living furniture for the Emperor’s comfort. Wipikkle welcomed him warmly as they had hated the Dogchiewygradians, and his army grew, Sprucitup too added forces and willingly took him as king.

At Vaddogg the Emperor celebrated his heir, the birth of Princess Aroma, not his first child, but the first he would claim. It is said that Ghlyumn the Soothsayer of Gluepin, and Myuscrys of Puth, and Gnositides of Trombony, the three wisest men of the day, all joined as one to convince the Emperor to raise her to the Purple having seen in the stars, the wind, and the waves prognostications of greatness. They were not wrong, though it was a terrible greatness. Two years later, still on campaign, besieging Shrudle the last hold of the Grozytes, he passed. It isn’t known how, but what is known is that his brother Laziliabedes, raised Aroma upon his shoulder, acclaimed her the Empress, and made himself the Imperial Regent, and the royal mother, Armaroma, was swiftly married to Laziliabedes, and just as swiftly executed. A mistake that would haunt Laziliabedes in the year of Aroma’s succession. She showed mercy to his services on her behalf, by not killing him, and took her revenge for his crime by torturing him slowly over a decade.

The Empress Aroma took the throne like a blacksmith’s forge, with fire and tongs and brutal hammer blows. She welded the towns conquered by her father into a single state, a true Empire. She chained her vassals, shackling them with fear and reward, she taxed the wealthy to keep them weak, and spent on the poor to gain their trust. And she built. Tearing down city walls she made public spaces, baths, theaters, racetracks, and public housing.

She redistributed lands to her soldiers and set them to work making better fields and building granaries. And she raised the Horse Mother above the other gods, building her temples in every town. Temples that were symbols, that were armories, that were banks, that were a foundation of public order. And when the Goorsi barbarians rose against her, her legions beat them hard against the mountains, and only those who joined the wild-men of the peaks to become the Peakoshi of Gross Montaine survived, survived to harbor and nourish the old grudge. Even today in the old rural places of Gros Montaine, the stories of the Ogress Armro are told to frighten children into behaving.

Thus while Bentwood was still a tribal swamp, and the buslopbian highlands just the wandering grounds of stone age barbarians, the Eturlians had fashioned an empire with all the benefits of government; roads, sanitation, taxation, and rule of law. Their polity stretched over a good quarter of the Dragaloon continent, and would shape Civilization in the Northern half of Ornria for centuries.

By the middle ages the empire had undergone many changes. The Emperors powers had waxed and waned, civil wars and power struggles wracked the landscape. To gain temporary ascendancy Emperors traded their power, bargaining with their followers , making them into war lords in their own right. Taxation to the throne dwindled. With it, the ability of the Throne to pay it’s legions grew ever smaller, while contenders took even more revenue away.

The Mantzes, a tribe of modern Mantz, raised a rival emperor in Hamhome, Zawzaj the Fat. Zawzaj fought the Etrulian Geneneral Fizzic for 20 years, driving the Etrulians out of Mantz, Gros Montaine and Southern Oppressorbad as far as Badxi. Fizzic’s death left the Imperial legion to winter in Wippikle, with no pay. The Themearch of Balsabad threw off his allegiance to the Empire and crowned himself Balza I, with no General the Imperial army disbanded and many of the legion joined Balza, turning all the eastern regions into a Guntish Kingdom. Not to be outdone the Countarch of Butterburg declared himself King of the Specific Coast, claiming the Western lands of Opressorbad, and driving the Gunts and Etrulians out of all his holdings.

The rump of the Southern Legion straggled into the Guerat Moolaunds, defeated, weak, unpaid, hungry. They met a new General there; Nukle Velocipedes, who spent a year reforming. It was too late. That year would see an outbreak of terrible plague. It began in Moopighafen, brought, it is said, in a ship from Kinalabash, in two months it was in Puth, 5 months later a courtier records the bodies filling the streets unburied in Piastre, even dogs and pigs were dying of it, and the rats growing bigger than cats, eating the old, and the sick. Perhaps as many as 70 percent of the population was exterminated throughout Guerat and Etrulia in the next two years. And sporadic returns ravaged towns and cities for another 20. with no workers, the fields untended, the food supplies dwindled, irrigation failed. And the survivors, gathered into small castles under Imperial Wardens, were Imperial more in name than reality. Though the Empire lived on, it would fall to Polydentian I to revive the state.

Early Modern Period.

Polydentian I had an advantage, a new kind of legion. Archemandeus the brilliant philosopher, and advisor of Polydentian, introduced gunpowder, cannon, and the harqebutt, and with the General called Kevaliprovides (Sheeps Head), the independence of the Etrulian hills was curtailed, and the empire re-united north of Jeendy. The great Reorganization recognized the importance of the Counts, but subordinated them to the Vestarchs. Archemandeus met a mysterious death, and Kevaliprovides was created the first Vicker. The new Etrulian Empire became insular and weakly carried on, peasants surviving on the barest margins, the Mayors of towns, and the great Counts, all nearly penniless. The Army, a shell, making a bold parade, with finery and plume...but never again equal to conquering and invading.

Present day.

The modern Etrulian Empire is now rich only in people. Food is guaranteed by the government, but it’s expense is ruinous to the throne, although it’s almost nothing at all to the people at best a diet of ,pasta, tomato, herbs, bread, vinegar and bad wine. \

The army has perhaps the worst quality of equipment in all Ornria. Tourism is perhaps it’s greatest income generator, with the antiquities being sold off to the wealthy, and fees levied on archaeological digs. The Imperial Palace itself is tantamount to a hotel, with stays in it’s frayed luxury easily bought for hard cash. Indeed, a pocket of money can buy nearly anything in Etrulia. The Polyestrine Actress Osavinia Oglavine added to her infamy buy purchasing a county, a castle, and opening her own film studio in Beenoween to ridiculous expense. Her only film, Dust and Disaster, was not well received, but has not seemed to hurt her pretensions in the least, though she has returned to Polyesterdelphia to open an Atelier called Countedbeans.

Geography

Etrulia is Triangluar in shape; about 37 Ornrian feet long by 15 North to South. It’s landscape is dominated by two volcanic peaks; Titesian and Oilypanier, a volcanic cladera at Poona Pot, and the hard plaster pan called the Ercul Plain, stretching north to Rhunridgia,, and the Brazorbia Peninsula. Nothing grows on the Ercul Plain and Brazorbia. The Mudoplia Flats are as the name implies the site of ancient mudflows, and today the hardpacked clay has little growing on it, but is instead a cracked tesseract of useless land with just enough sparse scrub to keep lizards, donkeys and small goats barely alive. Rising to the Ooups Plateau, here the volcanic soil and rains from the Ghargle Coast allow the growing of Olives and Grapes, and Millet, but the returns are poor for the effort. The Achellisian Hills are the garden of Etrulia. Here rains water the soil, marine breezes cool the land, and the soils produce better than anywhere else, save Plumb Valley, where the Emperor’s own farms and cattle are and his greatest treasure the Galish Lead mine.

The rough land of Dongladia is the rocky barren home of poor fishermen, most of whom push out into Garum Bight seated on bladders or reed bundle boats. The fish they catch is important to the poor of Piastre, as fish is perhaps the main protein most etrulians eat.

Climate.

The Climate of Etrulia is best divided into four regions. The Ercul Plain is tropical pan desert, high pressures keep the air motionless, and relentless sunshine bakes the shadeless landscape. the Ooups Plateau is hot and tropical, but winters can be dry. The Achellisian Hills and Plumb Valley, are the most temperate, the sun balanced by cool breezes, frequent light rains, and no more than occasional storms. And Mt. Oilypanier, once completely orested with rosemary, olive, cork, and other fragrant shrubs, still has some of this Mediterranean woodland left, though much of the mountainside has reduced to tough grasses by the grazing of dwarf goats, and hares.

Fauna

Animals most likely to be seen in Etrulia are the Ass, which replaces other beasts of burden here, the dwarf goat, the hare, lizards, scorpions, spiders, beetles, and wasps and flies in plenty, the air sports hawks, sea eagles, songbirds, and flies, flies, everywhere the clouds of pestering flies. Big Sarcodiles still inhabit the Bentborder River. And the seas teem with fish,

Government and politics FORM OF GOVERNMENT. Etrulia is an Empire. The current Emperor, Joanna Jojosephat Jojohnjerryjosephjakes XXV is by law, the Chief justice, chief executive, Head of the Armed Forces, Head of the Cult of the Horse Mother, Head of the Council of Vickers (ergo the chief of what passes for legislature) Master of the Imperial Engineers, Prefect of the Schools, and Quartermaster General of the State . He is also a non entity. The Actual leaders of Etrulia are the Vickers, and the Vestarchs. The Vestarchs are the high nobility of Etrulia, the Oligarchic families that both hate one another, and simultaneously close ranks to protect their privileges, the chiefmost of which is the right to recommend to the emperor candidatess for the Vickerage. These are the real lords of Etrulia. The Vicker has unlimited authority over his sphere. And that sphere is given at the whim of the Emperor. The vicker is a dictator unto themselves, though rivalries between them can cause chaos, the Vestarchs have preserved a balance of power for decades. LEADERS. FACTIONS.

The Emperor; Joanna XXV

Jojosephat Jojohnjerryjosephjakes.

The emperor is, to be frank, a severely mentally disabled person. He has the intellect of a child, cannot speak beyond a child’s mumbles and gestures. He is confined to the Palace where his caretakers carefully stage manage his few public appearances. He is seen by his ministers as a pet more than a person. Perhaps even as a bit of jewelry, to be brought out to impress the subjects, then carefully placed back in it’s velvet case. Even in his presence the veiled nearly amused disrespect of his Vickers can be read through the formal obeisances. The treat him as one would a trained orangutan.



Vestarch Manfrid Smeed, Count of Gelatuna

Of the current 7 Vestarchs,; Manfrid is certainly the most ruthless, cunning, intelligent, manipulative, and careful. He has survived more than 20 years in the Office of Vestarch, which may be a record. Unfailingly correct in his manners, Smeed is unafflicted with a conscience, and his control of the intelligence organs of the state is only second to his private organs of information gathering. It’s difficult to know what his true ambitions or aims are. In fact, impossible is a better word. After many years of observation it’s hard to say if Manfrid is expansionist, or reformist, or conservative, or simply interested in survival through power. We can say he will brook no rival that he does not control, and that he dominates the Emperor completely. He is the true dictator of Etrulia.

Arrayed against the Vestarch Manfrid are many forces, None of the other Vestarchs would spare a tear if they could find an opening to stab him in the back... His greatest rival for power and control is certainly the Buprovers of Vitapotata,

Military

The Etrulian military is composed of the Army, The Comitat, the Marine Army (Navy), and the Air Army, and the Public Police. All arms are rife with division, with Vestarch and Vickers all having factions, many overlapping. The wasteful infighting is a bewildering forest to untangle, and corruption is rife. Contracts for military supplies are supposed to be controlled by the Grand Imperial Military Commandry. However a grapevine of interests ensures that particular body is tied in red tape and infighting and in consequence generals often supply their own units out of pocket. This of course has become a fabulous opportunity for making money, as does the buying of ranks. 4 year old Company Commanders, 9 year old Generals, 78 year old company sergeants are all distressingly common. Supply has become a fiefdom of the Imperial Comestabulary, controlled by Vicker Allesandro Lopets, who is incidentally among the richest men in Pizzalatzio, and owns a great many of the various factories that on paper supply the military. He is also Inspector General of the Army , though not the Comitat or Public Police, and the Air Army tends to ignore his legal control as it’s the private fiefdom of Vicker Izdolp Yikkersatzer., who has his own supply arrangements. Vestarch Manfried handles the comitat and the Public Police himself, through a dummy company and a “commitee of efficiency in rationing”.

The Army itself is believed to possess 12 understrength foot infantry regiments, though only 5 are on paper as operational, at least 5 others are shadow battalions privately controlled by various houses or interests. The individual soldier is poorly equipped at best. Ersatz gear is the norm, at least where gear exists. Guns are usually dummies. Domestic rifles more dangerous to the firer than the enemy, canteens of waxed paper, boots of heaven knows what sort of laquered dryer lint...the list is extensive. Bullets of compressed chalk with sawdust powder....

The army also has an armored regiment, the Phalangia Primatine . Though “armored” might out to be in quotes. It’s believed only one platoon is truly operational. The Prime Company of the PP is currently armed with home built copies of the Mantzian medium tank, but the first platoon operates the much superior PDSR exported T55. It’s observed that for parades a variety of dummy vehicles are used to hide the paucity of functional armor.

The Imperial Comitat is an Army to itself, complete with a miniature navy and airforce. It’s commander is the Vestarch Manfrid Smeed of course. It’s the best supplied formation, and the only adequately trained one. It’s notionally the Imperial Guard du Corps. But operates more as a combination political police in Pizzalatzio, and a private strike force of the Vestarch.

On paper the Air Army has 3 Wings. In actual fact it is a half a wing of flyable fighting planes, and another one of transports and 2 flying boats that can and have been pressed into tactical service as bombers. Vicker Yitzersattzer runs the force as his own private army, including a “security platoon” of near battalion size as his bully boys. His aircraft are more often seen flying luxury goods in and out of his base; the Splatzencraken Military Airfield, than anything resembling a military operation. He does have a small squadron of acrobatic flyers, the Etrulian White Eagles, that puts on airshows and impress the peasants at the Imperial Birthday Review.

Vikker Lobert’s Imperial Global Marine Army, as the Etrulian Navy styles itself, is in theory composed of two Fleet Commands, the North Fleet and the West Fleet. The North fleet is tiny, 2 destroyes, 1 conversion cruiser, 1 tub that might have been a heavy cruiser 40 years ago in another navy, but is styled a Battleship in this one. The West Fleet is Lobent’s favorite, as his son is the Fleet Admiral. It has two Old steel predreadnoughts; Emperor Gluteus, and Empress Hamilcappy, and three antique cruisers, one newish Polyestrine built light cruiser, and 6 destroyers. In addition a Guerat Seaplane tender and a converted iron passenger liner, as well as a Guerat built sub force of two harbor subs completes this mighty imperial armada. These ships are barely seaworthy it must be said, coal is lacking, the fleet maneuvers haven’t seen a gun fired in 5 years. (10 years ago a cruiser was accidently sunk during a live fire exercise) and the last division maneuvers saw a collision of the flagship with a pier that put it in drydock for 4 years. It is hard to see this as a formidable fleet. Lobent does have a fairly competent company of Marine Infantry however, who are smart, and well supplied and even armed with sub machine guns and other modern gear. Including, it’s said, two modern Polyestrine export tanks. He also has a flight of seaplane fighter bombers and two flying boats under his command.



Economics

Etrulia’s Economy is a uniquely chaotic form of corruption ridden laissez faire capitalism. The principle currency is the Aelbo, but the aelbo is officially minted in three locations and numerous families have counterfeited them over the centuries to pay their Dependants, private armies, or workers. Thus Aelbos may be found in many sizes, a variety of metals, though by Imperial Decree, they only have one denomination; the 1 Aelbo piece (in antiquity called a Vaekht as a unit of weight). Each Vickerate family has at least one or two industrial concerns under it’s control, most have many workshops and factories of the evilist quality imaginable. Etrulian made goods are almost worthless on the export market. Etrulian processed food is disgusting when it’s not deadly. Perhaps the best known is Spasagem, the famous tinned sausage from Piastre. The Lobert family runs the plant and it has of recent years just managed to pass food inspections in the Iind Polyester Freestate, where it’s now a common protein for the poor. In fact the only useful article of export is Wine, of which Etrulia does produce a bewildering number and types, though of tiny vintages, from admirable Tokay to undrinkable Vinegar.

Agriculture

Etrulian Agriculture is essentially feudal, the farmers who produce are peasants, though what they produce is little enough. Abyssmal over farming destroyed the low lying plains in ancient times, leaving it unable to support a blade of grass, as a consequence really the only well managed farms are the Wineries on the volcanic hillsides. Garum is perhaps the most recognizably National agricultural product, a fermented liqour of fish guts. The nation imports food and cannot feed it’s population with it’s domestic produce. Dried smoked fish plank, cabbage, a little millet, and vinegar are the main staples of all but the wealthy, usually made into Grum, the national dish; a smoky sour soup of smoked fish, cabbage, Garum, and vinegar,

Industry and manufacturing

As previously mentioned, the many workshops and factories struggle to produce salable goods. Raw materials are at a premium, so factories often run on a boom and bust cycle with labor being paid by the piece in most factories. Workers consider themselves fortunate to work 20 hours a day, every day, until they drop, are laid off, or meet the inevitable industrial accident. Most factories have filthy little cots on which the laborers sleep, when lucky, 3, or 4 hours a day. Every factory has a Union, and the workers are required to belong, but it’s a sham, the Union is more a propaganda machine than a collective bargaining tool, and completely stage managed by the factory owners. A few holidays give their lives the only bright semblance of relief, but these are few, and generally spent in a carefully managed round of activities planned by the local authorities to ensure control of the crowd and keep it docile. It’s often the only time a laborer sees fruits, vegetables, or any food besides the daily fish soup and vinegar.

Infrastructure and Transportation

The Imperial Raiload and the Imperial National Roads are perhaps the single best institution of the Etrulian state. These are products of the Imperial National Penal Construction Directorate, and prisoner slave labor has engineered, constructed and maintained the system for many centuries now. A divisioin of the Imperial Household, the INPCD is currently run by it’s Commisioner; Vestarch Manfrid, with uncommon efficiency. The railroad is almost profitable, surprisingly, and provides a luxury passenger service that is world class, if staffed entirely by convict labor.

Energy

There is no national electric grid. Pizzalatzio, Montcalifler, and Vitapotata have rival electric firms, but power is expensive and poorly supplied. Montcalifler and Vitapotata firms use DC, Pizzalatzio has DC and AC firms. Most electric appliance have to be rented from the electric supplier. There is no Telephone service except those privately installed and managed. Cities have rival firms that are literally cut throat. Neighborhoods often see wars, and many residents have three or four telephones, each usable only by a particular companies network.

Demographics

Population

With 19560 residents, the country could be called “teeming”. The majority live in tenement style blocks, or peasant hovels near their masters. The great family concerns often build warehouses, factories, etc as virtual compounds, so many workers never travel at all, and rarely see beyond the horizon of work and sleep.

Culture

Music

Etrulians have a wonderful history of court music of the finest quality. Ballads extending back to medieval times, and a folk music tradition to be proud of. There is the Imperial Opera house, in Pizzalatizo that is a wonder to behold. And the Piastre Symphonic Amphitheater is a delight. Even the poor attend though limited to the “Stand” open platforms far removed and often screened from their betters.

Arts

Etrulians do not have a great tradition of cinema, nor is painting particularly noteworthy. Plastic arts fare better though, Etrulian ceramics are widely admired, and the workmen stonecarvers of Cantelopia though unlettered in the main, under a competent master produce very excellent plaster and marble statuary.

Cuisine

It’s difficult to write much of the Cuisine of Etrulia, food is so limited and scare for the majority of the nation, and proximity to the sea, or the farm tends to limit the low cuisine to Grum soup. The wealthy of course, generally have chefs of international repute, and there are a few fancy dishes a visitor might encounter; the Zippata, a flavorful meat pie made famous by the Zippata Grand Hotel in Pizzalazio, and the delightful Smorginsup of Piastre’s Smorgin Hotel are examples.

Sport

Among the lower class Wrassel is the favored sport, this is an antique form of wrestling, and quite violent. The wealthy prefer the Dogcart Races, another leftover from antiquity, in which drivers routinely smash themselves and their dog teams into bloody masses.





 

Miskatonic Monday #199: Dossier No. I – The Maw

Reviews from R'lyeh -

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

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

—oOo—
Name: Dossier No. I – The MawPublisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Matthias Sperling & Björn Soentgerath

Setting: Jazz Age Germany & EgyptProduct: Scenario
What You Get: Ninety-Three page, 93.71 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: The ancient horrors of Egypt have a long reach... a very long reach.Plot Hook: Employees of the ‘Obscuriat’ are directed to locate an expected artefact because of Harry Houdini.Plot Support: Staging advice, two pre-generated Investigators, twelve NPCs, nine handouts, one Mythos artefact, and six Mythos monsters.Production Values: Plain.
Pros# Dense, highly detailed investigation# Excellent end of scene summaries# Designed for two players and Keeper# Physical props also available
# Enjoyable small town, Weimar Republic period feel
# Nice sense of environment# Inspired by ‘Imprisoned with the Pharaohs’ by H.P. Lovecraft and Harry Houdini# Taphophobia# Anthropomorphobia# Necrophobia# Pharaohphobia
Cons# Needs a strong edit# Densely plotted# No clear summation of the scenario# No historical context# Designed for two players and Keeper
Conclusion# Densely plotted, heavily backgrounded scenario needs a lot of unpacking by the Keeper to run properly# Really needs historical Jazz Age context explained# Enjoyable period investigation which surprisingly turns tomb trawl

Miskatonic Monday #198: 52 Hz

Reviews from R'lyeh -

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

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

—oOo—
Name: 52 HzPublisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Michał Pietrzak

Setting: Modern Day PacificProduct: Scenario
What You Get: Fifteen page, 380.02 KB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: The song of the loneliest whale reveals horrors out of time.Plot Hook: A Miskatonic University research expedition reveals horrors in the most unexpected of places.
Plot Support: One handout, five (forty) NPCs, one map, and seventeen Mythos monsters.Production Values: Plain.
Pros# One session Scientific Action one-shot# Suitable for two to three Investigators
# Mythos on Mythos action
# Nice sense of environment# Literally ends with a big bang# Thalassophobia# Aquaphobia# Megalohydrothalassophobia# Nucleomituphobia
Cons# Needs a slight edit# Tightly plotted# Bland layout# Bland maps# No pre-generated Investigators
Conclusion# Exciting one session scientific action aquatic one-shot let down by a lack of pre-generated Investigators# Horrors out of the past drive a Mythos conflict with everyone else caught up in the Mythos on Mythos action

A Gamma Guide

Reviews from R'lyeh -

The Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook is the third setting supplement for Modiphius Entertainment’s Star Trek Adventures roleplaying game following on from the Beta Quadrant Sourcebook and the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook. Effectively, it lies at the far end of the Bajoran Wormhole which connects the Gamma Quadrant to the Alpha Quadrant and it is what comes through the Bajoran Wormhole which is the primary focus of the Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook. For the supplement is as much a setting update as much a setting sourcebook and as much a companion to the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook. What the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook did was to examine the world of Bajor, and the major polities of the region, including the Cardassian Union, the Ferengi Alliance, the Tzenkethi Coalition, the Breen Confederacy, and the Tholian Assembly. It also looked at the Bajoran Wormhole and explored its ramifications of upon the quadrant, in the process, updating the default starting year for Star Trek Adventures of 2371 to 2372 as the early years of Deep Space 9 was explored. The Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook goes further. Not only does it update the default starting year from 2372 to 2375, but it also examines the whole of the Dominion War, looks at the major factions and events involved, supporting with details of new species, ways to involve the Player Characters and run campaigns set during the war, and more. What this means is that the Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook is really only a book for one of the period settings in Star Trek Adventures, that of Star Trek: The Next Generation rather than the earlier Star Trek: The Original Series or Enterprise.

What the Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook does not include is a map of the Gamma Quadrant. As with the television series, Deep Space 9, it remains for the most part, a great unknown, its exploration and possible contact with worlds there made all the challenging by the presence—both implied and actually present—of the Dominion. Nevertheless, there is plenty of scope for the crew of a starship to explore beyond the Bajoran Wormhole, make contact with the various species there, begin to learn hints of the Dominion, its masters and subject species, and wonder at its strangeness. In fact, almost a half of the supplement is dedicated to examining the Dominion and the Dominion war itself. The former starts with the history of the Changelings, how they fled, hounded by the ‘solids’—as they call most other species, to eventually find a world where they could be safe their Great Link, the world-spanning gestalt formed of their combined bodies and minds. It examines their politics, best described as a ‘fascist theocracy’ in which they are worshipped by their subjects upon whom they impose a strict order through their agents, the manipulative Vorta and the feared Jem’Hadar. Numerous worlds and species both within Dominion space and adjacent to it, are also detailed, such as the Drai, who serve as the Dominion’s geneticists and are thus regarded as a privileged member of the Dominion, and the T-Rogorans, a warlike species that aggressively expanding from its homeworld before encountering the Jem’Hadar and being almost wiped out… Notable worlds include the Founders’ Homeworld, essentially rock with little more than an atmosphere and the Great Link as a singular ocean; an Hur’q Outpost, an archaeological treasure house for anyone interested in Klingon history, the Hur’q having fled the Klingon homeworld thousands of years ago; and the Cursed Penal Moon, where the incarcerated are forced to fight in an ongoing war between two factions again and again as they find themselves resurrected each time they are killed. None can leave lest they die. All of these worlds and many of the species are ripe for visit by the Player Characters, whether as members of Starfleet or another faction.

Besides examining various species in the Gamma Quadrant, the supplement also looks at the various species in the Alpha Quadrant and their relationship with the Dominion. This includes the Breen, Cardassians, the Son’a, and the Orions, as well as potential allies like the Tholian Assembly, the Gorn, and the Nausicaans. The consequences of these potential alliances are also explored. Perhaps the most interesting inclusion here is that of the Kzin, a species rarely mentioned by Star Trek. Originally appearing in ‘The Slaver Weapon’, an episode of Star Trek: The Animated Series adapted by Larry Niven from his Known Space setting stories. However, they have been reintroduced into Star Trek in passing, or at least in mention. No stats are provided for them though in the Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook.

A detailed timeline of the Dominion War is also provided. It provides a background to the conflict as well as a look at the Cold War in which the Dominion began to infiltrate the Alpha Quadrant, secure allies, and foment conflict. This would lead to wars between the Klingons and Cardassians and then the Klingons and the Federation. Options are discussed for roleplaying in this Cold War period, before moving on to the loss and recapture of Deep Space 9, and coming to close with the current state of the war in 2374. Fortunately, supplement does not leave it there. Rather, it both gives 2374 as a default starting, ready for the Player Characters and their starship to become involved in the final operations against the Dominion, and then outlines the events of 2375 ready for the Game Master to run a campaign through this period.

To go with the numerous species discussed earlier, some twelve new species are given stats and details to make playable as both NPCs and Player Characters. This includes the Changelings! Their inclusion, of course, allows a player to roleplay a character similar to Constable Odo from Deep Space 9, and to that end, there is a discussion of how to include ‘Non-Starfleet, Unusual, Or Unique Characters’ in a Star Trek Adventures campaign. This is not confined to Changelings, of course, and there are plenty of species in the Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook, such as Lurians, Rakhari, or Wadi, which could be added as an unusual character to a campaign, let alone those in other supplements. A campaign based in a starbase, whether on a planet or in space, would more readily support this option than perhaps aboard a starship, but there are plenty of examples of such characters aboard a starship seen in Star Trek. Another option for a Changeling Player Character is to have them as infiltrators, undermining the efforts of Starfleet, the Federation, and its allies from within. Such an option does need careful handling, by both player and Game Master, with potential for redemption once the Changeling has been revealed and perhaps the person it was impersonating rescued from imprisonment. Notably, neither the Vorta nor the Jem’Hadar are included here. Instead, they remain adversaries, and are fully detailed in the core rulebook for Star Trek Adventures.

Numerous starships of the Gamma Quadrant are also described. These start with those vessels of the Dominion and its allies. Thus, the Jem’Hadar battleship and the Vorta Explorer, and the Son’a flagship and battlecruiser. The majority of the vessels are those of the Dominion War, all of them notable vessels. Amongst them are the U.S.S. Prometheus, the first vessel capable of Multi-Vector Assault Mode and the U.S.S. Valiant, the Defiant Class operated by members of Red Squadron from Starfleet Academy. An interesting option given is the vessels from the so-called ‘Frankenstein Fleet’, which saw starship frames previously mothballed by Starfleet upgraded with more advanced equipment and technologies. This would result in a radically different and genuinely unique vessel, a mixture of the old with the new.

Lastly, the Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook includes a wide selection of encounters and adversaries. Alongside a handful of encounter seeds for the Gamma Quadrant, there is a discussion of the Bajoran Wormhole and the role of the Prophets, and the nature of exploring the Gamma Quadrant. There is discussion too, of the types of campaigns that can be played throughout the period of the Dominion War, accompanied by several mission seeds and encounter types. Major NPCs given include General Martok of the Klingon Empire, Kai Winna Bajoran Vedek, the Cardassian leader, Gul Dukat, and the leading member of the Vorta species, Weyoun. Their inclusion enables the Player Characters to encounter and interact with some of the major adversaries of the Dominion War.

Physically, the Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook is a decent looking book. There are some inconsistencies in the layout, but otherwise the book is generally well-written and decently illustrated—though not always effectively—with a fully painted images. It does need a slight edit in places. The layout is done in the style of the LCARS—Library Computer Access/Retrieval System—operating system used by Starfleet. So, everything is laid out over a rich black background with the text done in soft colours. This is very in keeping with the theme and period setting of Star Trek Adventures, but it is imposing, even intimidating in its look, and it is not always easy to find things on the page because of the book’s look. The other issue is that the none-more black pages are easy to mark with fingerprints.

Throughout the supplement, the descriptions and game content are supported by a series of in-game documents, reports, diary excerpts, and the like. These typically reflect the mysterious nature of the Dominion and then the fraught nature of facing them and their agents in war, adding a sense of desperation in terms of its flavour and feel.

The Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook is three books in one, covering the Dominion, the worlds in and around Dominion space, and the Dominion War. It is also a companion volume, that to the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook, which will provide the setting material for the Bajoran end of the Wormhole—Bajor, the Cardassian Union, the Ferengi Alliance, the Badlands, and the Demilitarised Zone. Like the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook, the Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook sort of tiptoes around the subject of Deep Space 9. Yet despite this omission, the Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook is actually the most enjoyable and the most useful of the three sourcebooks dedicated to Star Trek’s quadrants to date. This is because it does not spread itself as thin as they do, its focus being firmly on the Dominion and their allies, the Dominion War, the consequences of the war, and involving the Player Characters. All of which is backed up by solid advice on running a campaign during just four or five years of Star Trek’s history.

To get the best out of the Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook, the Game Master will want access to the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook, as that will anchor one end of the Bajoran Wormhole and Dominion War. Nevertheless, the Gamma Quadrant Sourcebook is the definite guide to the Dominion and the Dominion War for Star Trek Adventures, as well as the other end of the Bajoran Wormhole.

A Hostile Setting

Reviews from R'lyeh -

The year is 2225. For the last seventy-five years, hyperdrive starships have enabled mankind to colonise, settle, explore, and most importantly, exploit the more than three hundred planets in the interstellar space surrounding the Earth. Three arms of exploration and settlement have been developed—American, German, and Japanese. The majority of settled worlds lie within a four to six Parsec radius of Earth, but there are worked, settled, and visited worlds out to a radius of forty Parsecs. It turned out that none of them are true garden worlds. Many of them are tidally locked worlds and all have environmental conditions which make survival difficult if not outright challenging or dangerous. None have been found to be home to intelligent alien species, although many are home to indigenous species deadly, or at least a danger, to man. Even the Earth is no longer safe having suffered partial environmental collapse. Billions reside on the planet, but many make the long journey in hypersleep to make a new life on another world or to work contracts on resource worlds, for in the main, deep space is a place to work. Metals and rare earths, but above all petrochemicals for the plastics industry, remain in great demand.
The need for these resources has led to the rise of several South Korean chaebol and Japanese keiretsu-like corporations whose reach extends to the far edge of explored space, greater than that of any nation. Mining and aerospace company Reiner-Gama dominates and has its operations confined to the Solar System, but others include the engineering-based Leyland-Okuda; the British-based Erebus, built up from oil extraction in the Antarctic; Russian conglomerate Voroncovo, which provides data brokerage and security services alongside heavy engineering; Hong Kong-based manufacturer, Wu-Ketai; the Tokyo-based Matsuyama which specialises in colony construction and support; and the Tharsis Corporation, a mining company which originated on Mars and is led by Compton de Vaille, who at 223, is the longest lived human in history. The activities of these and lesser corporations are regulated by the United Corporate Combine, but peace, law enforcement, and labour relations across human space are still regulated by the political blocs and organisations of Earth. In the American Arm, the Federal Colonial Marshal Service stations officers on every colony, the Union of American Space Labor supports the safety and well-being of the workers everywhere, and the United States Marines provides military protection and peacekeeping. This includes the Tau Ceti 4 colony, originally divided between China and the United States of America, where the collapse of the newly democratic China in 2166 led to the foundation five new states all of whom claimed control of the former Chinese colony, civil unrest on the colony, and then insurgency and counter-insurgency as the United States Marines stepped in as a peacekeeping force, welcomed and rejected at the same time.

This is the setting for Hostile, a gritty, near future roleplaying setting inspired by the Blue-Collar Science Fiction of the seventies and eights, including the films, Alien, Outland, and Aliens. It is a future in which space exploration and colonisation is difficult, harsh, and dangerous, but in which there are asteroid systems and worlds to be exploited and great profits to be made. Conflict is not unknown—between colonies, between colonies and corporations, between corporations, and when that gets too much the Interstellar Commerce Organisation steps in or peacekeepers such as the United States Marine Corps are sent in, but in the main, space is a working environment. One with numerous hazards—the vacuum of space, radiation, adversely high and low temperatures, poisonous planetary atmospheres, potential insanity from being exposed to hyperspace, and strange alien creatures which see you as intruder, food, or incubation for its brood—which humanity must cope with in addition to the stresses of space travel and working away from Earth.

Hostile Setting is published by Zozer Games. It is the companion volume and setting guide for the publisher’s Hostile Rules, derived from Samardan Press’ Cepheus Engine System Reference Document, the Classic Era Science Fiction 2D6-Based Open Gaming System based on Traveller. The Hostile Setting can be run using the Hostile Rules or the Cepheus rules, but is primarily designed as the setting guide for the former. Instead of offering the chance to begin again in a golden age of opportunity and adventure, the Hostile Setting instead explores a new age of work, industrialisation, danger, retrofuturism, and cynicism. The supplement provides a complete that includes a future history that runs into the twenty-third century, details of major government, corporate, and criminal players along the American Arm, data for some one-hundred-and-fifty world worlds and detailed descriptions of over twenty, rules for character creation, equipment, arms, and armour, a space bestiary, rules for handling and working the hazardous environments of the future—including zero-g, radiation, and mining, starship construction and current designs, a write-up of the USCS Hercules—a newly released commercial towing vessel, including deckplans, over thirty detailed scenario hooks, and nods aplenty to the subgenres it is inspired by.

There is some crossover between Hostile Setting and Hostile Rules. This is primarily mechanically in terms of the Career options—including Corporate Agent, Corporate Executive, Colonist, Commercial Spacer, Marine, Marshal, Military Spacer, Physician, Ranger, Roughneck, Scientist, Survey Scout, and Technician. The Android Career is included also, but primarily for NPCs. The possibility of an Android as a Player Character is discussed and it is strongly—in fact, very strongly—advised that should a Player Character Android be included in a campaign, it should not be able to break its programming. Only six general options are suggested for androids—spacer, survey, scout, physician, scientist and technician. Elsewhere, Hostile Setting and Hostile Rules complement each other. Hostile Setting provides not just the setting that Hostile Rules lacks, but also details of specific arms and armour, equipment, and starships, as well as the rules for creating the latter. The rules for spaceship construction does feel slightly superfluous given the number of vessels detailed as part of the setting, but doubtless, there will be some Game Masters and readers who enjoy tinkering with them and designing their own starships.

In terms of what type of campaigns can be run in the Hostile Setting background, several options are discussed. These include working as troubleshooters, working as a crew of an interstellar transport, members of the United States Marine Corps or Federal Colonial Marshal Service, or explorers out on the frontier. The peacekeeping mission of Tau Ceti 4 lends itself to a low intensity military campaign and Hostile Setting focuses on this colony more than any other in the book with some colourful fiction for the situation there. A Hostile Setting campaign need not even leave a colony or mining station though, the Game Master could easily develop a colony which could support any number of situations involving exploration, survival, criminal activities, technical difficulties, labour relations, and more. For the Game Master wanting a nod to the primary inspiration for Hostile Setting, the film, Alien, there is guidance for creating and handling horror in the setting and a discussion of the types of exomorph—or alien horror—that the Player Characters might encounter in the far, dark reaches of space. Whilst several examples are included, the Game Master is advised to introduce these with care. A number of hyperspace anomalies are also discussed as potential sources of fear. Whatever the type of campaign chosen, there is some solid advice on how to describe the setting, including excellent lists of elements which can help enforce the look and feel of the environment.

Physically, Hostile Setting is serviceably done. The artwork is decent, capturing very much the grim and gritty feel of space being a working environment. One noticeable design feature is the text size, which although sans serif, is large.

The contents of Hostile Setting will feel familiar to anyone who played or read either Traveller or Cepheus, but very much filtered through not one, but three different Science Fiction subgenres—Blue Collar Science Fiction, Horror Science Fiction, and Military Science Fiction—and combined into one heavily implied setting with obvious inspirations. Hostile Setting can use either of those rules, but best works with Hostile Rules, since they complement each other. Further, the Hostile Setting showcases a setting not just where a Xenomorph—or in this case, an Exomorph—could be encountered somewhere far out from the safety of the Earth, but a Science Fiction setting rife with other dangers and other story possibilities. In fact, to come to the Hostile Setting expecting to focus mainly on encounters with dangerous alien lifeforms would lead to disappointment and to solely focus on that in play, would be to ignore those other, in many ways, more interesting story possibilities.

For the Game Master who wants a near future, grim and gritty Science Fiction setting which focuses upon Blue Collar protagonists rather than heroes, the Hostile Setting is a very good choice. The Hostile Setting takes its Blue-Collar Science Fiction inspirations and provides a well-realised background with support and scenario suggestions aplenty.

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