Friday Fantasy: Weird Ancestries

Shadow of the Weird Wizard does something odd in terms of fantasy roleplaying games. It places non-Human species as an ‘other’, rarities and oddities once primarily confined to the mysterious and strange and wondrous lands to the east of the Weird Wizard. It meant that the lands of the Great Kingdom are humanocentric. This though, is the situation at the very start of the roleplaying game designed and published by Schwalb Entertainment, and it is one that changes at start of Shadow of the Weird Wizard when the Weird Wizard suddenly disappears, removing the divide between his lands and those of the Great Kingdom. As refugees from the former lands of the Weird Wizard flee west into the Great Kingdom and pioneers and settlers begin to explore the newly opened lands to the east, the peoples of the Great Kingdom are exposed to a wider range of peoples and species. This has a consequence narratively and mechanically. Mechanically, a player is only able to create a character whose Ancestry is Human using the core rules, although there are basic notes on Ancestries to be found in the Bestiary chapter of Secrets of the Weird Wizard. Narratively it means that with the core rulebooks, a campaign would have a Human-centric basis and thus be able to explore a world in which they did not have to rely on other species and even explore a world that is changing and one those changes is the appearance of other peoples. Now to be clear, Shadow of the Weird Wizard does not make non-Humans aliens or intrinsically threats. They are just different.

Weird Ancestries is a supplement that changes both the situation in Shadow of the Weird Wizard and the options available to the players. It describes in some detail thirty Ancestries for the roleplaying game, six more than those found in Secrets of the Weird Wizard. There is no structure to anyone of the entries as such, though each one will always end with a section on adventurers of that Ancestry. This will include broad details of the Paths that an Adventurer of that Ancestry might take, followed by the common traits of the Ancestry and then its ‘Ancestry Path’. This is a new addition to Shadow of the Weird Wizard which not only grants benefits upon Player Character creation, but also at Second Level and Fifth Level in addition to the bonuses and extras the Player Character gains from his Novice, Expert, and Master Paths. The bulk of the write-up foreach Ancestry explains its role and appearance in the New Lands that were once under the control of the Weird Wizard, where they live, their relationship with the Weird Wizard, and the nature of their society, enabling a player to have a good understanding of the typical background to his character’s Ancestry. Then, of course, the Haren Traits enable the creation of characters by the players and NPCs by the Sage from that Ancestry.

For example, the Haren are leporine Ancestry, egalitarian in their society and preferring to live in hilltop fortresses, with a dislike of the Weird Wizard despite the fact that he did them no harm, have no experience working metals, and are strict herbivores. In terms of adventurers, Haren fight to survive, so are good warriors; have no formal magical training, but can learn alteration, protection, and war spells from their elders; may worship nature spirits, though have no gods; and speed, stealth, and cunning make good rogues. They have ‘Keen Hearing’ and ‘Keen Scent’ and can learn great distances, but at First Level, they are ‘Battle-Trained’ and can attack with a Boon and treat spears and javelins as nimble weapons, and when hurt, can trigger ‘Lepus Fury’ to attack for a turn with another Boon and a critical result occurs on a roll of eighteen. At Second Level, a Haren gains increased Health, ‘Evasive Recovery’, and ‘Springing Attack’, and then at Fifth Level more Health and extra Hit Points, as well as ‘Great Leaper’.

Each of the Ancestries receives this treatment. The Ancestries are a mix of the familiar and unfamiliar. So, alongside the Dwarf, Elf, and Halfling of traditional fantasy roleplaying games, there are what would normally be classed as monsters in those other fantasy roleplaying games. Dhampirs, Goblins, Hobgoblins, and the like, but even they find their way into some fantasy roleplaying games as Player Characters, whereas creatures such as Demigods, Harpies, Naga, Revenants, Sphinxes, and Spriggans do not. Even the treatment of the traditional Ancestries is not always what the players might expect. Whilst the Dwarves are famous for their mountain holdfasts and the Elves for living in faeries realms, the Elves have a unique feature such as scales, feathers, or wings, which they can grow or change over time, and the Halflings are nomads, traders and travellers, with hairy ears, and only three fingers and a thumb on each hand and four toes on their feet. There is even some variation within some Ancestries, such as the divine heritage of the Demigod, whose divine parent might be Lord Death, making the Demigod pale and sickly with bruised eyes and sunken cheeks, or Revel, meaning that the Demigod smells sweetly of wine, fresh flowers, and honey! A Clockwork must have a function such as Artisan, Entertainer, or Soldier.

One notable absence for the list is the Orc, but Shadow of the Weird Wizard does not treat the Orc as a ‘race’ or Ancestry, but rather the result of a curse that causes a ‘Soul Sickness’ that can transform the sufferer into an Orc, as explored in the first scenario for the roleplaying game, One Bad Apple. Similarly, Goblins are selfish, mean, and cruel because their upbringing and association with the Goblin King, but can be good and selfless if exposed to the right circumstances, and the Cambion might have had an infernal origins and so be mistrusted, that is not what they are all like.

Physically, Weird Ancestries is well organised, laid out, and easy to use. The artwork is excellent.

In many ways, Weird Ancestries is very much a supplement for the player, providing with a diverse range of options in terms of kindred species for his character. All of them different and all of them wanting to make their mark on the Borderlands in Shadow of the Weird Wizard. It gives the player a chance to play characters of backgrounds that he would be unlikely to have access to in other traditional fantasy games, but does not expect him to play them like they are often depicted in those other roleplaying games. This marks Shadow of the Weird Wizard out as different and intentionally so. Of course, all of the background information on the Ancestries is useful for the Sage too. Shadow of the Weird Wizard is not a roleplaying game that needs or has lot of supplements, but Weird Ancestries is definitely one that both players and Sage are going to want.