Corsairs Versus Cthulhu

It is odd to think that in over forty years since Call of Cthulhu was first published, it has been supported by numerous supplements detailing other times and places, from the classic period of the Jazz Age and the here and now to the Roman Empire of Cthulhu Invictus and the more recent late Georgian period supplement, Regency Cthulhu: Dark Designs in Jane Austen’s England, but not the Age of Sail or indeed, anything piratical. This is not to say that that that have been no scenarios involving both Lovecraftian investigative roleplaying and piratical roleplaying. Arguably, Green Ronin Publishing’s Freeport Trilogy for Dungeons & Dragons, Third Edition was the first to do it in 2000, but there have been a few scenarios since specifically for Call of Cthulhu, such as Lost Port Royal and The Curse of Black Teeth Keetes, which have involved pirates, if not actual piracy. That changes with Corsairs of Cthulhu – Fighting Mythos in the Golden Age of Piracy, a supplement for Chaosium, Inc.’s Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition, published by New Comet Games following a successful Kickstarter campaign. This is a rules and setting supplement detailing the Golden Age of Piracy—between 1650 and 1730 CE, for Call of Cthulhu, and further, it provides a complete campaign in which the Player Characters, or Corsairs, will set sail on the high seas to face and fight the evil of the Mythos. They will chase and board other vessels, encounter strange ice demons in the frigid lands to the far south, sail across the Pacific to make land at numerous islands and encounter strange practices the inhabitants engage in, and travel far beyond their imagination before returning to sail into battle against an alien foe they could never have imagined!

Corsairs of Cthulhu – Fighting Mythos in the Golden Age of Piracy is an ambitious book. Which given that it is published by New Comet Games should be no surprise as the publisher has aimed high with each of its previous titles for Call of Cthulhu. However, in the case of all three of those books— The Star on the Shore – Struggles Against Evil in 1920s New England, Devil’s Swamp – Encountering Ancient Terrors in the Hockomock, and A Time For Sacrifice—that ambition remained undeniably unfulfilled. The question is, has New Comet Games again sets its ambitions too high with Corsairs of Cthulhu – Fighting Mythos in the Golden Age of Piracy, its first period sourcebook and campaign? If not, has the publisher actually fulfilled those ambitions and presented content that the Keeper can bring to the table with ease, without need for further development, and be both enjoyable and engaging for her players? The answers to those questions are ‘yes, but no’, for although Corsairs of Cthulhu is a very straightforward sourcebook and campaign, explaining how good both the source background and the campaign actually are, is far from straightforward.

It is important to note what Corsairs of Cthulhu is not and that is an examination of the Mythos during the Age of Piracy, the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Thus, there is no background at all pertaining to the presence of the Mythos in the Caribbean or indeed what its adherents, races, or entities might be doing during this period. Its background and source material is wholly mundane then. This though does not necessarily mean that it is bad. In fact, the source material is decent enough. There are roleplaying books which do it far better, such as Skull & Bones: Swashbuckling Horror in the Golden Age of Piracy, but nevertheless, Corsairs of Cthulhu is decent enough in terms of background content. It starts with a solid if repetitive overview of both the period of the Golden Age of Piracy and the Caribbean before diving into the rules. Character creation follows the standard rules for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition but adds a wide selection of new Occupations—Adventurer, Boatswain, Coxswain, Criminal, Fisherman, Master Carpenter, Master Gunner, Sailing Master, and more. Many of them are specific to positions aboard ship, although Alchemist and Voodoo Priest/Priestess are included as optional. There is an array of new equipment, as well as skills such as Antiquarian—the equivalent of Archaeology, Artillery—for cleaning and firing cannon aboard ship, Language: Pirate Chant, and Seamanship, whilst Art/Craft (Voodoo Rituals) and Science (Alchemy) are for the optional rules and Occupations.

Alchemy is based on Hermetic sorcery and practitioners study a variety of formulae—divine and greater and lesser arcane, but can only learn a relative few. For example, Transmutationibus, one of the Arcanum Mortis Divina Formulae, creates a salve which can be spread over lead to turn it into gold as per the legendary aims of the science of alchemy, whilst the Orbis potion, one of the Arcanum Mortis Luminare Minus Formulae, allows the imbiber to always know magnetic north. What an Alchemist knows in terms of formulae is very much limited by his skill rating, and learning more as the Alchemist gains in skill will be a challenge in itself and for the major formulae, likely SAanity draining. Finding ingredients and mixing up the potions also takes an Alchemist time and effort, countering their often-powerful effects. Voodoo practitioners—known as Bokor or Caplata—call upon the deities and saints known as Loa, through song, dance, and other rituals to cast rituals such as Create Zombie, Curse of Misfortune, and Gift of Tongues. All rituals cost both Magic Points and Sanity to cast, and like Science (Alchemy), a practitioner’s skill in Art/Craft (Voodoo Rituals) limits the number of rituals he can perform. Learning a new ritual takes time, but are faster to cast than creating potions. In addition, Bokor or Caplata may begin play with an understanding of the true nature of the world and thus the Cthulhu Mythos. The rules for Alchemy and Voodoo are optional, but workable enough should a Keeper decide to bring them in to her game.

For all things nautical, Corsairs of Cthulhu details the ship’s crew and their duties, pirate culture and life, as well as the major parts of a ship, ship types and sizes, ship’s weaponry, as well as how to handle ship-to-ship combat. The rules for chases and combat are succinctly described, but an example of combat does help the Keeper understand how they work. Once ships start exchanging volleys of cannon fire, combat can become very deadly for the crew. Unfortunately, the critical result tables for combat do not include the possibility of the Player Characters killed unless they hold one of the important positions aboard ship. This is not all of the background content in Corsairs of Cthulhu, although the rest of it is at the back of the book, separated by the campaign itself and placed in a series of appendices. ‘Ports of Call’ details several notable pirate ports across the Caribbean, ‘Pirates and NPCs’ give stats and write-ups for notable pirates such as Anne Bonny and Edward Teach, and ‘Slang, Swears, Songs & Shanties’ is exactly that and can be used to add colour and flavour to a Corsairs of Cthulhu campaign. Apart from rules for using Pulp Cthulhu: Two-fisted Action and Adventure Against the Mythos in Corsairs of Cthulhu and ‘More Adventures’ which provides several extra adventures for the Keeper to develop, the rest of the appendices support the campaign. They consist of the ‘Bestiary’, which has full stats for the monsters and NPCs in the campaign, plus the officers of the ship in the campaign, whilst ‘Pre-generated PCs’ provide read-to-play Corsairs, and finally, all of the handouts. One change to the ‘Pre-generated PCs’ which is absolutely necessary is to ensure that one of them speaks Ancient Greek when transposed onto Investigator sheets as none of them do, and for the campaign, they do need to be able to read Ancient Greek.

The Corsairs of Cthulhu campaign is set in 1697 and begins en media res in exciting fashion, chasing down another vessel and about to engage it in an exchange of cannon fire. The Corsairs are crew members recently hired, aboard the Cronos under the command of Captain Kristoff, who is in search of a treasure known as the Astronomer’s Map. This treasure plays a major role in the campaign. It has been broken into multiple pieces and as the Corsairs locate more and more sections of it, they will gain further clues as to what the campaign is about and where the next sections are located. Full colour illustrations are provided for the various sections of the Astronomer’s Map, but the Keeper can also use STL files to print copies of the section as physical handouts so that the Corsairs can piece the artifact together as they progress further into the campaign. As members of the crew of the Cronos, the Corsairs are directed, if not led, by Captain Kristoff, and as members of the crew they sail from capturing the ship in the first scene to shore leave in Nassau and then onwards into the Pacific after a difficult journey through the Drake’s Passage. From Easter Island—visited by the Cronos some twenty-five years before Europeans actually visited it historically—to Galapagos and beyond, the Corsairs track the sections of the Astronomer’s Map across the Pacific to experience one extremely strange encounter after another. This includes hunting wererats on Easter Island, dining with the vampire daughter of Nyarlathotep in the Dreamlands, freeing and being thanked by Mother Hydra, being transported into a post-apocalyptic future of a city that is yet to be, and so on. Ultimately, as written, the Corsairs will discover the true nature of the Astronomer’s Map and the identity of the villain of the piece, and sail on the risen isle of R’lyeh, ready to unleash volleys of cannon fire upon Great Cthulhu himself!

Given all this background material and the great scope of its campaign, the actual campaign itself in Corsairs of Cthulhu should be good. Yet it is not. In fact, it is far from good. The idea of sailing the high seas to ultimately face Cthulhu as pirates sounds good, but in practice, the campaign is linear and the Corsairs themselves have no agency over the direction of the campaign. Instead, the Corsairs essentially island hop back and forth across the Pacific Ocean, first at the direction of the captain of the Cronos, then from clues given on the Astronomer’s Map, until the final confrontation. Much of the action in the scenario takes place in the Pacific and thus away from the Caribbean. Consequently, barring a couple of scenes, the Corsairs have extraordinarily little opportunity to engage in piratical activity of any sort. And although they start play aboard the Cronos, the Corsairs have little motivation to be aboard to begin with or to really engage with the campaign except for the fact that Captain Kristoff will them throw overboard if they do not swear to remain aboard as part of the crew. This applies to the pre-generated Corsairs, let alone what the players might come up with. Once under sail, there are all too often scenes where the Corsairs have to stand around and await until some ceremony is over and an NPC can advise them before they can act. Then there are scenes which are more plot fiat rather than actually adding to either play or plot, such as automatically, but accidentally killing a cat in the Dreamlands or when sailing through the Drake’s Passage to the Pacific, the crew of the Cronos have the choice of sailing the quicker, but more dangerous route closer to the shallows of the coast of South America or the calmer, slower, but much colder waters to the south. It does not matter what choice they decide on as ultimately the Cronos will be driven south into the colder waters where they will be attacked by Ice Demons which skip across the sea to board the ship. The encounter is pointless, an excuse for some combat and dice rolling which only serves to scrape some Hit Points and Sanity Points from the Corsairs—and that is ignoring the fact that Ice Demons add nothing to the Mythos. Similarly, there are points where one of the Corsairs has to sacrifice himself to in order for the campaign to progress, and whilst there are ways round this, it makes progress that much more difficult. Then, when the Corsairs do encounter the Mythos, it is with Elder God after Elder God—Nyarlathotep, Nodens, the Yellow King, as well as Father Dagon, and Mother Hydra—all put in an appearance, like some sort of Mythos medley. Father Dagon and Mother Hydra do make sense, but the others? Lastly, the campaign drops hints as to who the villain of the piece is, mostly coming from the dead Corsair who can appear in his former comrades’ dreams, but never really lets the Corsairs act on it as if trying to forestall the inevitable showdown at the end of the campaign.

Physically, Corsairs of Cthulhu – Fighting Mythos in the Golden Age of Piracy looks clean and tidy, and for the most part it is. Unfortunately, the layout is not always consistent and certainly early on in the book, Corsairs of Cthulhu needs the input of a professional editor, as the content is repetitive and oddly phrased. The maps are actually nicely done, but the artwork is highly variable in quality. Some of it is good, the rest is often just artless.

Yet for all of its faults, Corsairs of Cthulhu – Fighting Mythos in the Golden Age of Piracy is not necessarily a bad campaign or a bad supplement for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition. It does provide the rules for running a pirate scenario or campaign for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition and it does provide a campaign that can be played. In that, New Comet Games has achieved its aims and definitely fulfilled its ambitions. However, that does not mean that those ambitions have been in any way exceeded, or as the publisher’s best book to date, that Corsairs of Cthulhu is a good supplement. The new rules and background included in the pages of Corsairs of Cthulhu are undoubtedly fine. A Keeper can take those and can run a scenario or campaign using them. The campaign though, is not fine, and definitely not good, but at the same time, not terrible. Fundamentally, it is too linear and does not give the players and their Corsairs enough agency, and it is more like a heavily plotted Derlethian video game than a roleplaying campaign. Ultimately, Corsairs of Cthulhu – Fighting Mythos in the Golden Age of Piracy is arguably the best book for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition that New Comet Games has published to date, but then only for part of the book and in comparison to the quality of the previous books.

Making Mesoamerica Mundane

Almost from the start, Call of Cthulhu has been fascinated by South and Central America. From the Peru chapter in the original The Fungi from the Yuggoth in 1984, the scenarios ‘The Pits of Bendal-Dolum’ and ‘The Temple of the Moon’ from 1986’s Terror from the Stars, all the way up to the Peru prequel chapter found in Masks of Nyarlathotep: Dark Schemes Herald the End of the World and the Bolivia chapter of The Two-Headed Serpent: An Epic Action-Packed and Globe-Spanning Campaign for Pulp Cthulhu. Perhaps the best treatment of the region is The Mysteries of Mesoamerica, published by Pagan Publishing in 2009. What has run through each of these scenarios and support is a fascination with the strange, complex, if notoriously bloodthirsty stone age cultures found throughout the region, with their rich pantheons of gods, and the sophisticated structures they left behind in the wake of their societal collapses and later subjugation at the hands of the Spanish invaders. The latest supplement for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition to visit the region is A Time for Sacrifice.

A Time for Sacrifice is published by New Comet Games, following a successful Kickstarter campaign. It is the publisher’s third title for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition, following on from The Star on the Sure – Struggles Against Evil in 1920s New England and Devil’s Swamp – Encountering Ancient Terrors in the Hockomock, both of which were ambitious in terms of their production values, but ultimately let down by their lack of development and editing. A Time for Sacrifice is an anthology of five scenarios set deep in the jungles of Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula, in Honduras, and on the island of Cuba during the nineteen twenties and early nineteen thirties. It is not, however, a sourcebook on the region with regard to the Cthulhu Mythos or Call of Cthulhu, with the aforementioned The Mysteries of Mesoamerica probably the best source as well having its own excellent scenarios. Otherwise, as the publisher mentions, the Keeper will need to do her own research with regard to the region and its history. As with the previous two books for Call of Cthulhu from New Comet Games, the production values for A Time of Sacrifice are high, including full colour throughout and glossy paper, but it remains to be seen if the issues with editing and development.

A Time for Sacrifice opens with ‘Egg Out of Time’, the first of three scenarios by the anthology’s publisher, Ben Burns. It opens en media res, the Investigators members of an expedition on the Yucatán Peninsula, running to the rescue of a college professor and fellow expedition member who has fallen ill mysteriously at the entrance to a ruin, and then racing him to the nearest hotel. Then upon receiving a note intended for their ill colleague, they come to the aid of an expedition which has been attacked by the locals who appear to be performing a pagan summoning of some kind. Of course, it turns out to be a bait and switch and the likelihood is that the Investigators will need to find a way to stop the terrible danger they have unleashed. ‘Egg Out of Time’ does have an entertaining idea at the heart of its plot, but as presented it never really lays out the groundwork for the plot and it compounds this problem with a page-and-a-half of exposition explaining the plot which the Keeper is expected to read out to her players. In terms of a story, this works fine, but in terms of a roleplaying scenario, it is unengaging and breaks the narrative. This combined with the underwritten set-up, the insufficient advice on who the Investigators might be and why they are on the expedition, as well a lack of information that they might know at the start of the scenario—instead the Investigators are expected to research much of it—and ‘Egg Out of Time’ launches A Time for Sacrifice in underwhelming fashion.

It is followed by Brian Courtemanche’s ‘Pyramid Scheme’, which specifically takes place after the Wall Street Crash of 1929, at the start of the Desperate Decade of the nineteen thirties. The bulk of this scenario is again set on the Yucatán Peninsula, but it begins in New York. Here the Investigators—who are presumed to have conducted numerous previous enquiries into the outré—are hired by a lawyer to infiltrate Ritterville, a company town in Mexico belonging to Ritter Nautical and Industrial Supply, a rival to his employer’s company. Research soon reveals that the owners of Ritterville suffered terribly during the Wall Street Crash and possess some outré interests, so the lawyer wants the Investigators to determine what is happening in the town. The set-up leads to delightful opening scenes which capture the desperate nature of life during this period, but which otherwise set the Investigators on a linear path—and not just because they will be taking a number of train and boat trips to get to their destination. The timing of these journeys structures the scenario quite tightly, so that the Investigators will have limited scope for optional activities throughout. Consequently, the scenario feels like a connected series of scenes, but many of them are at least engaging and there is a constant sense of the Investigators being toyed with throughout and this sense of being played continues right into the dénouement which has the Investigators actually engaging in a pok-ta-pok faceoff! The scenario has a knowing title and borders on a Pulpy sensibility and would not be too difficult to adapt to be run using Pulp Cthulhu: Two-fisted Action and Adventure Against the Mythos.

Ben Burn’s second scenario in the anthology is ‘Space Between Time’, which at first is not set in Central or South America at all, but on the island of Cuba, before actually switching to the island of Cozumel, off the coast of Mexico. The Investigators are hired by Miskatonic University to attend a cultural exchange conference in Cuba, but the team leader, Doctor Donald Sanderson has other plans. He has evidence that his father, William Sanderson, whom everyone claims to have been killed on an expedition when Donald was a boy, is still alive and he wants the Investigators’ help in finding him. If the Investigators agree—and there is no scenario if they decline—he takes them to where his father disappeared, and into the strangeness that is the ‘Space Between Time’. This is a space between from travellers can access any world, any time, and any dimension, and contained within are any number of dangers and things best left untouched, although Investigator and player curiosity may dictate otherwise. Apart from one or two interesting interactions with the Mythos, ‘Space Between Time’ is primarily the equivalent of an escape room made all the more dangerous because something is hunting the Investigators. There is very much the danger of a ‘Total Party Kill’ here if the Investigators do not solve the mystery to the scenario, and even if they do, the end result may not be all that satisfying given that one Investigator may need to sacrifice himself to let the others escape.

The fourth scenario is ‘The Thirteenth Bak’tun’ by Jonathan Bagelman. Set in Mexico, this is the best written of the five scenarios in A Time for Sacrifice. The Investigators are hired by Miskatonic University to join an expedition already in the field as experts and extra security, but by the time they reach Vera Cruz, they learn that it has been attacked by bandits and the task becomes a rescue mission. The scenario nicely brings in Mexico’s febrile interwar politics—the one scenario to really make use of the setting in the anthology—and comes with a lot of backstory and a solid plot. However, in places it feels a little like a tourist handbook and the plot itself is essentially a variation upon one which has been seen again and again in Call of Cthulhu, that of a Serpent Person wanting to restore his people to greatness after their millennia old slumber. Overall, the scenario is decent and could even serve as the lead into a campaign of the Keeper’s own devising, or even perhaps tied into The Two-Headed Serpent: An Epic Action-Packed and Globe-Spanning Campaign for Pulp Cthulhu.

The anthology ends with ‘Doorway of the Gods’, Ben Burns’ third scenario. Again, linear and again, the Investigators are hired by Miskatonic University to join an expedition, this time in Honduras. After another sea voyage beset by strange dreams, the Investigators arrive in Honduras to learn that contact has been lost with the expedition and once at the site—at the base of a step pyramid with a strange doorway, that everyone is missing. However, the author drastically ups the action in this scenario—first, crew and passengers on the sea voyage from Boston being hunted by something which returns to the ship again and again; second, the Investigators and their guides are hunted at the site of the missing expedition; and third, the head guide, having learned that his men have been snatched, is not only determined to enter through the strange doorway, but has come armed for bear! Or is that Dimensional Shambler? M1921 Thompson Submachine Guns with drum rounds, Short Magazine Lee–Enfield Mk III rifles, twelve-gauge shotguns, .38 automatic pistols, and grenades! It is such a radical change of tone after the previous four scenarios, but ‘Doorway of the Gods’ essentially becomes a ‘Search and rescue’ mission combined with a ‘bug hunt’, and with such an emphasis on action and combat, is really better suited to Pulp Cthulhu: Two-fisted Action and Adventure Against the Mythos than standard Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition.

As with previous titles for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh edition from New Comet Games, A Time for Sacrifice is physically ambitious. So, it is full colour throughout and fairly heavily illustrated. However, the artwork varies greatly in quality—some being quite decent, some bland, and a lot of it being quite dark and murky, whilst the numerous handouts, also in full colour, are dull and rarely benefit from being in colour. Similarly, the maps vary in quality, many being quite plain, others having something of a period feel. Of course, it goes without saying that all of the scenarios in A Time for Sacrifice demand another edit, let alone the need for further development in some cases.

As an anthology, A Time for Sacrifice is at best uneven in tone, plotting, production values, and support. In addition to preparing any one of the five scenarios in its pages, the Keeper will need to research some basic background on the Mayans, and both the Mexico and Honduras of the period—not just for herself, but for her players and their investigators too. As a campaign, which the publisher suggests that the five scenarios could form if run in chronological order, A Time for Sacrifice would need a great deal of work upon the part of the Keeper. Although they share a general location and themes—the Mayans and Mesoamerica in common, there is little here to hang a campaign on. Better still to use them as one-shots or pick and choose the ones that a Keeper wants to run, just as she might with any other anthology. Whilst there are perhaps one or two decent scenarios in the collection, in the main, their set-up is too similar and their plots linear, such that running one too soon after another would make it too familiar. Ultimately, it is difficult to get really excited or enticed by A Time for Sacrifice, and the combined effect of the anthology is to make Mesoamerica mundane.

Undeveloped Territory

Following a successful Kickstarter campaign, in 2017, Dark Cult Games published The Star on the Shore, an attempt to write a sandbox for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition. The  resulting scenario was not without potential, but was ultimately undone by a lack of development and editing which got in the way of the Keeper actually running it. Now following a rebranding as New Comet Games, the publisher has returned with Devil’s Swamp – Encountering Ancient Terrors in the Hockomock, its second scenario for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition.

Published following a successful Kickstarter campaign, Devil’s Swamp – Encountering Ancient Terrors in the Hockomock, is like The Star on the Shore before it, set in New England and so within the reach of Lovecraft Country. It centres on the Hockomock Swamp, Lake Nippenicket, and the bordering town of Bridgewater, all in south east Massachusetts in an area known as the Bridgewater Triangle. Thus Devil’s Swamp will encompass ghosts, strange lights, giant beasts, Bigfoot, ‘Puckwudgies’, and the legends of the Wompanoag tribe as well as elements of the Mythos. That is in addition to the dangers of the swamp itself—sinkholes, quicksand, snakes, leeches, mosquitoes, bears, lions, and more…

Devil’s Swamp – Encountering Ancient Terrors in the Hockomock consists of eight scenarios, which will present mystery after mystery that will again and again draw the investigators into Hockomock Swamp abutting the town of Bridegewater in south east Massachusetts. It opens with a set of encounters to be rolled for whenever the investigators are in the swamp and a description of various establishments in and around Bridgewater. Each of the thirteen locations detailed, from the Bridgewater Public Library and the Coroner’s Office to the Train Station and both of the town’s newspapers, is given a slightly odd box of text. It is difficult to determine whether these are sections of prose to be read out to the players or reminders for the Keeper’s benefit because their text wanders back and forth between information which would be obvious at first sight of the establishments and information which would only readily apparent should someone enter and interact with the owners or the staff. The description of the town is accompanied by a pair of maps, one for the players and their investigators, of the town, and similarly, there is also a similar pair of maps of Hockomock Swamp.

All but three of the eight scenarios in Devil’s Swamp are written by Ben Burns. The anthology opens with his first, ‘Lost’, in which a twelve-year old boy has gone missing in the swamp. Locating him will be hampered by some strange encounters in the swamp and recalcitrant parents, but help comes from a decidedly strange quarter. Accepting this help is really the only method to resolving the scenario, which involves an ophidian twist upon the changeling myth. It also sets up an NPC or two who could be of use to the investigators, though one of these will not reappear in the collection until much, much later. ‘Lost’ is a straightforward and linear affair which lacks a hook to get the investigators involved unless they happen to be in Bridgewater.

Similarly, Christopher Smith Adair’s ‘Deeper Than Skin’ has no hook unless the investigators happen to be in Bridgewater and good terms with the town’s lackadaisical police department, which would rather have them investigate the circumstances of a death than have its officers do it. The body is that of the town banker and clues point to his wife, recently sent to the Danvers State Hospital, and her circle of friends, and then to a local spa which they frequented. Although this ultimately involves fighting monsters, there is a lovely genteel feel to the scenario combined with some refreshing ideas.

More youngsters in peril are the subject in ‘Where the Spirits Dwell’ by Ben Burns, when the town is beset by a rash of suicides. This brings legends of the Wompanoag tribe to the fore and the investigators will probably need to enlist their help in stopping the menace. Again a straightforward enough scenario, it is followed by the more complex ‘Canned Articles’. Written by Brian Courtemanche, veteran players of Call of Cthulhu are likely to recognise the Mythos entity involved, the scenario being about another missing person, this time a professor of anthropology whose latest writings hint at mad discoveries… This is a reasonable scenario which feels a bit stodgy in places (its own encounter table feels redundant) and could have done with a better map. Unlike the other scenarios, this is likely to have long term consequences for the investigators.

A farm attacked by strange hounds again sends the investigators into the swamp in Ben Burns’ ‘Hockomock Hounds’. The clues from the farm leads back to strange goings on at the local college and of course, someone meddling with things best left alone. It is a reasonable scenario, though its ending has the potential to be confusing for the players and their investigators as well as annoying since one of them may be forced to make the ultimate sacrifice. ‘Terror in the Swamp’ is Ben Burns’ next scenario and despite feeling a bit like Stargate, is definitely the best in the anthology. Another beast is attacking farms on the edge of the swamp and whilst that it is where the threat emanates from, clues point to a case previously investigated by the Bridgewater Preservation Society. Pleasingly, there is little if any combat in the scenario and though short, presents the investigators with an interesting situation.

The penultimate scenario is Jonathan Bagelman’s ‘The Recluse’. A local newspaper posts a reward for a missing journalist who went to interview a reclusive scientist who resides in the swamp. There is little investigation involved in the scenario and again, it comes down to a monster fight in what feels like a cross between Frankenstein and Grapes of Wrath. The anthology closes with Ben Burns’ ‘A Cry for Help’. Another missing person, this time a Professor at MIT with links to Nikola Tesla, again leads the investigators into the swamp. Unfortunately, the scenario has choke point, narratively and literally, which may impede the investigators’ progress and so bring both scenario and the anthology to an unsatisfying conclusion. Once past this, the scenario again ends in a fight and is probably not as interesting as it could have been.

In coming to the final scenario, ‘A Cry for Help’, there is actually a callback to the very first scenario in the anthology, ‘Lost’. It is not developed though, but it is almost as if the eight scenarios in Devil’s Swamp could be run as a campaign. Unfortunately, whilst the suggestion that Devil’s Swamp can be run as a campaign is certainly a possibility, it is all but completely ignored by the authors. There is no advice to that end and whilst there are sort of hooks which can pull the investigators into exploring the strange incidents in and around Hockomock Swamp again and again, they are barely touched upon in the anthology. For example, the investigators could be students or staff at Haynes College, members of the Bridgewater Preservation Society which investigates the strangeness which seems to seep from the swamp, or they could just be residents of the town concerned at the lack of action by the local police. Any one of these would work, but it is very much left up to the Keeper to develop these because the authors have not. Further, the inclusion and discussion of any one of these would have countered the weakness of the introductions to the scenarios in this collection, which do not work if the investigators are not local to the town.

Were Devil’s Swamp to be run as a campaign, it would be as a loose collection of scenarios and encounters rather than an investigation into one singular overarching threat or antagonist—essentially monster or mystery of the week rather than going up against a ‘big bad’. Arguably, Hockomock Swamp is the ‘big bad’ here, one that of course, cannot be defeated, but that is more ‘man against nature’ than ‘man against the Cosmic Horror’. 

What is so disappointing about this is the fact that Kickstarter explicitly states that the investigators are members of the Bridgwater Preservation Society, looking into the mysteries and situations which local law enforcement refuses to and which seems to emanate from the Hockomock. The question is, why was this not included in the final book?

Physically, Devil’s Swamp – Encountering Ancient Terrors in the Hockomock is a handsome hardback. The layout is clean and tidy, though somewhat cramped in place. The artwork is a mix of the good and the merely okay, but a lot of it gets used again and again, so distracts from its impact. The maps of Hockomock Swamp and the town of Bridgewater are decent enough, but a regional map would have been useful too, especially since the investigators are likely to want to go further afield. Plus several lines of enquiry in the scenarios do take the investigators away from the Hockomock Swamp and the town of Bridgewater.

Unfortunately, the writing is all too often undone by the editing, leading to two problems. One is a lot of repeated text—for example, the information about various locations such as Carson’s Outfitters and the Public Library in Bridgewater, and Danvers State Hospital elsewhere—when the Keeper could refer to the descriptions given in the write-up of the town at the start of the book. The other is a case of the Keeper sometimes having to make the connection between clues and plot in the scenarios herself and facts being revealed to the Keeper at the last minute rather than at the start of the scenario. This is in addition to details being included in one scenario and not in another.

The previous scenario from the publisher, The Star on the Shore, was let down by combination of too much of a focus on making the book look good and a lack of development and editing. With its second Call of Cthulhu scenario, there are hints that New Comet Games has tried to address those issues, but unfortunately it has not been successful in that aim. In failing to achieve that aim, it has not really succeeded in creating a campaign built around a location—in this case Hockomock Swamp—either. Whilst the scenarios themselves are reasonable enough, they are not supported by either the underwritten description of the town or a campaign framework. In the hands of an experienced Keeper, there is no reason why this anthology would not work, but it would take some effort upon her part to build a campaign around them. Ultimately, Devil’s Swamp – Encountering Ancient Terrors in the Hockomock is better than The Star on the Shore, but it still needs more editing and more development time. It is a sincere wish that the third supplement for Call of Cthulhu from New Comet Games gets both.

Far from the Sure

Behind an impressive looking cover that echoes the Call of Cthulhu titles of the 1980s, The Star on the Shore is ambitious first scenario which sets out to a create a sandbox investigation set in New England. Unfortunately, whilst it has just about everything that a Keeper needs to run the scenario, The Star on the Shore is hampered by a lack of development, organisation, and ultimately, editing. The truth is, The Star on the Shore is a first scenario from a new publishing venture and it very much shows.

What strikes you first though about The Star on the Shore are its production values, which are high indeed. A slim hardback printed on high-grade paper, it has gorgeous, full colour painted covers front and back; it is full colour throughout with illustrations aplenty; and the maps feel lovely, especially the pull-out town map whose style echoes that of the Lovecraft Country line. That said, whilst none of the artwork is bad, some of it is not as good as the book’s best and feels as it should have been in a pulpier, more traditional style of horror roleplaying game rather than Call of Cthulhu.

Written for use with Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition and published by Dark Cult Games following a successful Kickstarter campaign, The Star on the Shore can be run as sequel to classic ‘The Haunting’ scenario—now found in the Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition Quick-Start Rules—or as standalone scenario, although given that it takes place in Rockport, Massachusetts, on the New England coast, it could be added to a Lovecraft Country campaign also. Actually, to say that it is a sequel to ‘The Haunting’ is not really true. Only one element of the plot of The Star on the Shore is tied back to ‘The Haunting’, and then only to the background of 'The Haunting', not the actual scenario that the players and their investigators play through. 

The Star on the Shore begins in Boston in 1921. The Boston Museum of Fine Arts has hired a member of the Dark Wing Detectives to conduct a survey and excavation of the ruins of Chapel of Contemplation, the baleful church at the end of the lane from Mister Corbbit once lived. It is these ruins that the investigators may have had the chance to visit during the events of ‘The Haunting’. In the meantime, the excavation has uncovered a hidden annexe in which was found a statue of an obnoxiously octopodid being, carved in granite and weighing several hundred pounds. Unfortunately, someone sneaked into the Chapel of Contemplation, killed the nightguard, and stole the statue. The question is, who were they and why would they want the statue enough to kill for it? (The scenario does not address how a three-hundred-pound statue was got out of the basement room it was in or whether anyone noticed it being moved.) The investigators—who are described as a “crack team of investigators”—are hired to find the statue, but not by the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, but by the representative of the Dark Wing Detectives that the museum hired. (The scenario does not address why a member of a group of detectives is hiring other detectives and it does not explain who or what the Dark Wing Detectives are either.) Clues point to the town of Rockport on the Massachusetts coast. Oddly, the hirer will happily inform the investigators of a strange light seen to crash into the sea off the coast of New England, but not of the nightguard’s death. Which suggests a certain duplicity upon his part, and whilst there may not be any intended, this is certainly how the players are likely to interpret it. Another clue to Rockport, ‘Motif Number 1’ could also have been better explained without the need to look it up.

It is in the description of a strangely-befogged Rockport itself that the sandbox element of The Star on the Shore comes into play. Almost half of the book is given over to describing the major locations and their inhabitants in, off, and under the town. These vary in length, detail, and relevancy, but each entry suffers from a complete lack of organisation. They are written in an almost ‘stream of consciousness’ fashion so that every entry reads like a little sandbox itself that you have to investigate in order to put all of the information together and then be able to impart to the players and their investigators as the Keeper. It does not help that there is no real description of Rockport itself so that it will be difficult to describe the town to the players.

The Star on the Shore does include some notes on running the scenario and they are useful. These cover the course of events over the three days that the investigators are supposed to be in Rockport, the dreams they will suffer whilst there (this the first time that the dreams are mentioned), a list of the notable cultists, spells, and possible outcomes. Ideally, the list of cultists should have been a bit more upfront along with more details of the cult organisation and what each knows, all for easy and quick reference. One nice touch is that the stat boxes for the NPCs are colour-coded per their relationship with the cult which dominates Rockport, but this only explicitly made clear after the description of the town and its inhabitants. Also, a list of clues would not have gone amiss, as there are a lot of them spread about the town such that they are awkward for the Keeper to maintain a track of. There are also a lot of locations for the investigators to visit over the course of the three days and there are some locations that seem to have no reason for the investigators to visit despite how interesting the clues to be found there actually are…

Although the scenario addresses possible outcomes, it only addresses the possible outcomes of the dénouement against the Mythos threat. It does not address what happens afterwards in terms of the cult and its influence if the investigators succeed and it does not really address what happens if they fail. Either way, there are no indications as to what Sanity rewards or losses should be given out once the scenario is finished.

The scenario is supported by some twenty or so handouts, all of them done in full colour. Most of them are nicely done, but some are rather bland and one contains a really odd anachronism. The maps though, as mentioned previously, are really very nice. In addition, The Star on the Shore includes some ten pre-generated investigators. To a man and a woman both, these tend towards a pulp-style and are somewhat underwritten. As a set of pre-generated investigators, they are merely okay, but as a set of pre-generated investigators specifically written for use for The Star on the Shore, they are definitely underwritten.

In addition, The Star on the Shore comes with a second scenario, ‘Key to the Abyss’, which concerns itself with ordnance leftover from the War of 1812. It is set in Rockport still and can be run as part of, or separate to, The Star on the Shore. The problem with that is that it lengthens the scenario and distracts from the main plot. Also, it is written without any explanation until you read the handout, so its set-up also is rather confusing and lacking in answers to any questions you might have.

As for The Star on the Shore, there is a decent plot to the scenario. It probably tends towards the Pulp style in tone, certainly as evidenced by some of the artwork. There is also doubtless a good game to be got from the pages of The Star on the Shore, but ultimately, it fails to do what a good scenario should do—and that is, present its information in such a way that the Keeper can readily absorb it and then be able to present it to his players and their investigators during the game. This is due to three factors. The first is ‘stretch goal creep’, the concentration of a creator upon giving the backers of a Kickstarter campaign more and prettier rewards, so that once funded he is concentrating upon getting them all together, rather than concentrating upon getting the basics right. Which leads to the second and third factors, a lack of development and a lack of editing.

In the end, The Star on the Shore as written is simply not a good scenario. Undoubtedly, there is a good scenario and a good game to be got from the pages of The Star on the Shore, but it does not even start to do enough to make that process easy. As lovely as The Star on the Shore looks, it would be unfair to describe it as ‘all style, no substance’, but ‘nice style, hidden substance’ would be more accurate.