Cthulhu ‘Old Style’ like its 1981

The first thing that you notice about Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition is how surprisingly white and colourful it is. There is bold use of colour in its chapter headings and then the rest of the book is simple, black on white text. Which gives it a clean, modern aesthetic, that is, of course, easy to read, but also in keeping with the setting for Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition. That setting is the modern day of the here and now because just like H.P. Lovecraft set his stories in his time, so the Game Master’s scenarios are, by default, set in her time. This does not mean that Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition cannot be set in other historical periods, but the modern day is the default. Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition is the roleplaying game of Lovecraftian investigative horror, which means it pitches ordinary men and women in extraordinary situations and confronts them with the true sanity-leeching mysteries of the universe as portrayed in the stories by H.P. Lovecraft. For its mechanics, it uses The Black Hack, Second Edition, the player-facing retroclone originally published in 2016. Lastly, the simple layout and use of colour allows the artwork of Paul Tomes and Andrés Sáez Martínez to really stand out.

Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition is published by Just Crunch Games following a successful Kickstarter campaign. Notably content for both editions of the roleplaying game is compatible and the roleplaying game is designed for quick and easy play, especially Investigator creation. After an introduction and a decent example of play, Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition wastes very little time in explaining the rules. For its core mechanic, whenever a Player Character—or Investigator—wants to take an action against a threat that will either hurt or hinder the Investigator, his player makes a Save against an appropriate attribute by rolling under it. If the roll is successful, the Investigator avoids the Threat, but suffers its consequences if his player roles equal to the attribute or higher. This is always player-facing, so whenever an Investigator wants to punch a cultist, his player will roll a Save against his Investigator’s Strength, but to avoid the cultist punching the Investigator, his player would roll a Save against his Investigator’s Dexterity. Depending upon the situation the player can also run with Advantage or Disadvantage.

The investigative aspect of Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition is handled via Resources. These categorised into three types—Investigative, Sanity, and Supplies. All types of Resource work in the same way. Each is represented by a die type. When a Resource check is called for, the Resource die is rolled. If the result is a one or a two, the Resource suffers a Break, meaning that the Resource is partially used up. Eventually the Resource die is stepped down to a four-sided die and when that suffers a Break, it is completely used up and thus Broken. Investigative Resources are divided between Smokes and Flashlights. Flashlights are divided into Smokes and Flashlights. Flashlights are used to get clues through studying, finding clues, spotting things, and so on, whilst Smokes cover gaining clues via interaction, financial means, or connections. When a one or a two is rolled on either Investigative Resource, a clue is still found, but something bad happens to the Investigator. When Flashlights is Broken, the Investigator is burned out and exhausted, whilst when Smokes is Broken the Investigator has brought too much attention upon himself.

In terms of running and playing the game, Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition lays its principles for both the Game Master and the player early on. For the former, this includes giving out plenty of information, setting the stakes when the Investigators are faced by threats, giving them opportunities and choices, and so on, whilst for the latter, to be a part of the story and support the other Investigators’ role in the story, to investigate and ask questions, to focus on survival rather than fighting, and more. Much of this will be familiar to veterans of Lovecraftian investigative horror, but not everyone is, so the advice here is more than welcome.

An Investigator in Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition has six Saves (or attributes)—Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Wisdom, Intelligence, and Charisma—that are rated between three and eighteen. He also has four Resources— Hit Die, Sanity, Flashlights, and Smokes—and various Benefits, including a Skill, and various Assets. Two methods of creating an Investigator are provided. Freeform gives the widest choice, but the simplest method is to pick one of the roleplaying game’s six Archetypes. There are six Archetypes—Adventurer, Bruiser, Performer, Philanthropist, Ruffian, and Scholar. Each determines the Resource die values for an Investigator’s Resources, gives a single Special Ability and lets the player choose another from a choice of three, and either rolls for or chooses an Occupation and an associated skill. There is actually a lot of flexibility within each Archetype, so that an Adventurer can be an Archaeologist or an Aviator, but he could also an Aristocrat or a Sales Rep.

Henry Brinded
Strength 13 Dexterity 12 Constitution 10 Wisdom 15 Intelligence 18 Charisma 11
Sanity D10 Flashlights D12 Smokes D10 Hit Die D4 Armed 1 Unarmed 1
Hit Points: 4
Special Abilities: Iron Mind, Deduction, Erudite
Occupation: Academic
Skill: Language (Latin)

An Investigator is meant to be fragile, although as a group, Investigators do have access to a pool of Fortune Points which allow a failed Save or Resource check to be rerolled. Combat follows from the core rules and in spite of Investigators having access to Fortune Points, enforces their fragility. They have relatively few Hit Points, weapons can be deadly, and armour is rare.

Sanity is handled as a Resource die in Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition. When an Investigator is confronted with something truly terrifying or the effects of the Mythos and the Investigator’s Sanity suffers a Break, it indicates that he has encountered something so hideous or unreal that he has temporarily lost his connection with reality. Sanity being Broken means that the Investigator has lost focus or is overwhelmed by the alienness of what he is confronted with. The Investigator becomes permanently insane when the number of times a Sanity Break occurs equals the Resource die for his Sanity. However, not all horror is equal, and it is possible to suffer a Shock instead of an incidence of Insanity when his Sanity suffers a Break.

The moments when an Investigator is likely to be at his most fragile is in confronting the Mythos. Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition does not include an extensive list of Mythos entities and creatures. It goes even further by not actually including stats for several of the Old Ones, but instead discusses their relationship with humanity (or in some cases, humanity’s ‘supposed’ relationship with them). This moves the seven discussed—Azathoth, Cthulhu, Hastur, Nodens, Nyarlathoptep, Shub-Niggurath, and Yog-Sothoth—into narrative roles rather than something that can be physically defeated. Only eight lesser creatures and races are given more detail, both in terms of background and mechanics. Traditional Mythos creatures such as the Deep Ones, Elder Things, Ghoul-Kin, Rhan-Tegoth, Shambler, Shoggoth, and Yuggothi, are joined by the Deathless, the equivalent of Keziah Mason from ‘The Dreams of the Witch-House’ and its antagonist. All of these are given nicely detailed descriptions and an excellent illustration. In each case, their stats are very simply presented, there is a note as to their motivation, and their origins, purpose, and allegiances are discussed, along with options and variants. It is interesting to note that Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition makes clear that Deep Ones are not the equivalent of Orcs or Goblins in the Cthulhu Mythos.

Both Mythos tomes and artefacts in Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition work in a fashion similar to Mythos antagonists. Each volume or item is measured by its Index, representing both the potency of its content and the danger it represents to the reader; Ire is the attention garnered by its possession—and especially—the use its lore, power, or spells; and Lore the ‘benefit’ gained from the successful study or use of it. The latter might a modifier to a Save, an Advantage on a later Save, a Skill, one or more Spells, and so on. In the case of the Index and Ire factors, the Investigator will need to make a Save against them. Failure in the case of Index means that the Investigator suffers a Shock and in the case of Ire, a failure means that the attention and scrutiny of cultists or other forces of the Mythos has been drawn to the tome or artefact and thus to the Investigator. This can lead to more direct encounters with them or set up difficulties in the story later on, meaning that Ire and a failure to Save against it has narrative rather than mechanical consequences. One thing not explored here are Mythos artefacts—the focus is entirely on tomes rather than objects.

The list of Mythos tomes avoids the classics of Lovecraftian investigative horror, so no Necronomicon, De Vermiis Mysteriis, or Unausprechlichen Kulten. There are several quite detailed examples though and tables for the Game Master to create her own. In terms of spells, there is a mix of the familiar and unfamiliar. Thus, there is The Voorish Sign and Elder Sign alongside Deceiver’s Charm and Cyclopean Shift. Of course, knowing and casting magic has consequences. Knowing any spells automatically imposes a reduction in the Resource die for an Investigator’s Sanity and casting spells requires a personal sacrifice, there being the possibility of an Investigator losing a point from of his six Saves. In addition, casting a spell triggers a save against the Ire of that spell, potentially attracting the attention of the cultists and other Mythos entities. Magic in Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition is deadly and dangerous, and its use is definitely not for the faint-hearted.

The scenario in Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition is ‘Save Innsmouth’. This is an expansion and development of Save Innsmouth: A Student Documentary. It is specifically written to be run in two hours, but is easily expanded to run in a longer, fuller session. In line with the rest of the roleplaying game, it is set in the modern day, taking place in Lovecraft Country in New England in the modern day, specifically in and around Innsmouth. In the short version, it begins en media res, with the Investigators trapped in the tunnels and caverns of the blighted town, decades ago shattered by the 1928 FBI raid. Already bruised and battered—and low on Resources—they must find their out of their rough and rancid prison, hunted by a strange creature… In the longer version, the Investigators, students at Miskatonic University and members of its Miskatonic Heritage Club, have travelled to Innsmouth, first by bus and then by hiking, in order to examine and photograph the pre-Prohibition town before it is completely bulldozed to make way for a health spa. It is a scenario in two parts. The bulk of its investigation is done in the journey to Innsmouth, whilst the action takes place in the second part, the imprisonment, which is what is played out in the shorter version of the scenario. If there is an issue with the scenario it is that the author talks about it for four pages before actually telling what the scenario is about. This is frustrating, although the information given in those four pages is both relevant and useful.

Lastly, Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition gives a short discussion of campaigns, supporting it with a series of tables of prompts and pointers that can be used to bring the Investigators and get them sufficiently intrigued by a mystery to want to investigate. These are good starting points which the Game Master will of course, have to develop. It also introduces the concept of Remnants, the consequences of encountering the Mythos upon an Investigator’s personality. Roleplaying these will reward the players as a whole with an extra Fortune Point.

Physically, Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition is nicely presented. It needs a slight edit, but is very accessible, clean, and tidy, and the artwork is excellent. This does include some artwork generated by MidJourney AI, but the publisher has made a charitable donation to the Artists’ General Benevolent Institution.

Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition is a streamlined and cleaner presentation of the earlier, The Cthulhu Hack, much like Old School Essentials is a cleaner and more accessible update of the Basic Dungeons & Dragons designed by Tom Moldvay. It is not just cleaner and more accessible, the book itself is handier and easy to use. The downside of that is that it is not comprehensive in its treatment of the Mythos, but it is complete in and of itself. In play, the consistency of the rules, especially Resources, means that an investigation becomes one where every effort matters, not just facing the Mythos, since there is a chance of depletion, of a Break, each time an effort is made towards the investigation. Thus, the consequences of an investigation are wider than mere loss of Sanity and the tension of looking into mysteries is prevalent throughout an investigation rather than in just the confrontation with the Mythos.

Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition is an excellent redesign and reimplantation of The Cthulhu Hack. It provides a solid introduction to Lovecraftian investigative roleplaying and for any looking for a Old School Renaissance compatible roleplaying game dealing with the Cthulhu Mythos, Cthulhu Hack, Second Edition is the obvious choice.

The Other OSR—The Black Hack – Classic Monsters

The Black Hack – Classic Monsters is a bestiary for use with The Black Hack, Second Edition, the player-facing retroclone originally published in 2016. It is both incredibly dull and incredibly useful before it gets a bit interesting. Designed to support the play of classic fantasy, it contains some of the stats and mechanical details of some two-hundred-and-forty monsters based on those that appeared in Original Dungeons & Dragons and the version of Basic Dungeons & Dragons and Expert Dungeons & Dragons designed by Tom Moldvay. So almost everything from Ankheg, Ant, Giant Worker, Soldier, and Queen, Ape, Man-eating, Basilisk, Bat, Giant, Bear, Black, Grizzly, Polar, and Cave—and that is just on the first page, to Wraith, Wyvern, Xorn, Yellow Mould, Yeti, and Zombie—and that is on the last page! Which is a lot of monsters to get on the one page. So, the question is, how does The Black Hack – Classic Monsters manage to cram as much monster on the one page?

The Black Hack – Classic Monsters is not a bestiary in the classic sense, despite containing a large number of classic monsters. To get as many monsters as it does in its forty-six pages it forgoes any monster description and almost any monster illustration. Instead, it contains just the stats, or rather the stat for each monster and a list of each monster’s abilities or notable features. Often with a little bit of humour. This for example, is the entry for the classic Dungeons & Dragons monster, the owlbear.

Owlbear – HD5
Claw, Claw, Bite – STR (1 Close) 6 dmg

• Huggy bear! If a failed Defence Roll is an odd number, the target takes Ongoing Damage until they make a successful STR Test as an Action.

The result is short, to the point, easy to use, but not necessarily all that interesting to read or look at. Certainly, in comparison to The Black Hack, Second Edition, which has its own bestiary and illustrations. However, The Black Hack – Classic Monsters is handy, especially if the Game Master is running an old module or scenario which itself draws from the same sources, as a ready reference to have at the table. The Game Master will still need to add some flavour to any encounter using these stats, but the likelihood is that either she would actually know many of these monsters and what they look like or her players will—if not both. Further, the scenario she would be running would have details she could use to add flavour and detail as well. So, an eminently serviceable supplement then? Well actually, The Black Hack – Classic Monsters contains a bit more than just one big list of monsters and their stats virtually free of any illustrations.

In fact, The Black Hack – Classic Monsters contains several lists. The main and longest lists contains the aforementioned monsters. The rest of the slim book consists of appendices. The first of these is a page of dinosaurs—just the one?—whilst the second consists of ‘Monsters of Legend’. These are reinterpretations of monsters extremely specific to Dungeons & Dragons. These include the Bestial Eye, Dimension Cat, Hooked Lurker, Koi-Ped, Mushroom Men, Under-Mauler, and more. These are decent adaptations, slimmed to the minimum of information necessary. However, in contrast to the easier entries in the book, the ‘Monsters of Legend’ are illustrated. This is as much to indicate to the Game Master what they are actually given the fact that the names have been changed for reasons! So, the Bestial Eye is a floating orb with a single large eye, a maw full of large teeth, and a halo of tentacles each ending in an eye of their own. The third appendix is the ‘Monsters’ Spell Index’. This lists all of the spells used by the monsters in the supplement for easy reference. It includes on how monsters cast spells according to the rules, that is, the players rolling to avoid or reduce the effect of a spell rather than the Game Master making the equivalent of a casting roll. There are guidelines too for creating shaman and witch doctor Humanoid monsters.

The fourth appendix is more expansive and possibly the most useful section in book. The ‘Conversion Guide’ provides a means for the Game Master to adapt any monster from Dungeons & Dragons to The Black Hack. This is a step-by-step process, explaining which stats and elements of Dungeons & Dragons monsters to adapt to The Black Hack. It is a quick and easy process, which with a bit of practice, the Game Master can even do during play. The notes also cover how to create powerful foes as well, and there is a list of sample abilities too. Most of these have been drawn from the abilities given for the various monsters listed earlier in the book, and of course, the Game Master can peruse their entries for other ones as well. Lastly, the final appendix, ‘Poison Tables’, provides a set of tables for determining poison effects other than death of Out of Action. These work with the book’s monsters as well as any assassins wielding a poison-coated blade!

Physically, The Black Hack – Classic Monsters is a handsome little book. The artwork is decent, if occasionally cartoonish, but the writing is clear and the layout clean and simple.

The Black Hack – Classic Monsters is more serviceable than it first appears to be. The lists of monsters are useful—and with some adjustment could be used with other microclones such as Knave or Cairn, but the ‘Conversion Guide’ makes just about every scenario or supplement monsters for classic roleplaying fantasy accessible and convertible to The Black Hack. Which is why every Game Master for The Black Hack should have it on her shelf.

Friday Fantasy: Dyson’s Book of Swords

Dyson’s Book of Swords is exactly that, a book of swords from a writer best known for his cartography, especially his fantasy cartography. However, over the course of September and October 2021, he wrote and illustrated a series of entries on his blog under the labels ‘#Swordtember’ and ‘#Choptober’, each one describing and depicting a blade which could be added to the fantasy roleplaying game of your choice. Now following a successful Kickstarter campaign, all fifty entries in the series have been collated into the one volume and published as Dyson’s Book of Swords by Squarehex, better known as the publisher of The Black Hack. This little volume comes in an odd size—six inches square—and each sword is given a two-page spread consisting of a full-page illustration opposite its description. None of the descriptions run to more than two paragraphs each and the descriptions concentrate on telling the reader what the sword looks like, its history, and what its capabilities are. The numbers amount to no more than each blade’s to hit bonus, damage bonus, and against what, although some cases a special ability will also be referenced. In the main though, the language is not so much systems neutral as systems adjacent, meaning that any one of the fifty swords in Dyson’s Book of Swords will work with the fantasy roleplaying game of your choice.

Dyson’s Book of Swords is not arranged in alphabetical or indeed, any kind of order, but flip through its pages and you find Spite, a gladius-style currently wielded by the Elven mercenary, Rhador. It is a Short Sword +1 which becomes a flaming blade upon command and when it is aflame is +2 versus trolls, pegasi, hippogriffs, and rocs, and +3 versus treants and the undead. It casts light and ignites things as a torch. Rhador wields this weapon until he regains his family blade from his nemesis. Flip to another and the illustration and description is of the Last Blade of the Lich Shogunate, the last ‘perfect’ blade to be forged by the master swordsmith of the final Shogun. It has no name of its own, but is a +2 sword which also grants a bonus on saving throws versus all effects, spells, and abilities of the dead. Of the two, Spite is the more difficult blade to include, in part because it is wielded by a particular NPC and in part because it has such a wide range of enemies which it can affect. However, it raises the questions, “Where did Spite come from?”, “Who is Rhador?”, “Who is his nemesis and how he did come into possession of Rhador’s family blade?”, and ‘What are the abilities of Rhador’s family blade?” All these point to story possibilities, as does the Last Blade of the Lich Shogunate, but they are perhaps a bit more straightforward. These include “What was the Lich Shogunate?”, “Who wielded the Last Blade of the Lich Shogunate?”, “Who was the Last Blade of the Lich Shogunate made for?”, and “Who wields it now and where did she find it?”

Dyson’s Book of Swords harks back to the noughties and the slew of books for the d20 System with its supplements dedicated to just rings, just spells, just monsters, just swords, and so on. Fortunately, with the advent of Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, or even with the Old School Renaissance, there has not been the avalanche of books and supplements dedicated to singular aspects of Dungeons & Dragons-style gaming, and so Dyson’s Book of Swords does not fall into that category. Fundamentally, Dyson’s Book of Swords just keeps everything simple—illustration, description, and minimal stats. This means that its contents are compatible with just about every Old School Renaissance roleplaying game and retroclone, including Old School Essentials, Mörk Borg, Whitehack, and more. They would also work with 13th Age and the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game, and even Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition!

Physically, Dyson’s Book of Swords is clear, simple, and easy to read. It is a little book of weapons that the players will want their characters to wield, the Game Master to arm her NPCs with and inspire or scare her players and their characters, and lastly, Dyson’s Book of Swords is a little book of inspiration.

Cthulhu 'Old Style' like its 1980

In the wake following the publication of The Black Hack has come a slew of games that either added to the Dungeons & Dragons-style fantasy of The Black Hack or took the Old School Rennaisence play style/player facing mechanics combination in another direction. So The Class Hack and The Race Hack, both from Cross Planes Game Studio added new/old Classes and Races to the game respectively, whilst Feral Games’ The WasteLand Hack goes all post-apocalypse, The Space Hack from Ivanhoe Unbound takes to the stars, and Just Crunch Games’ The Cthulhu Hack lets you confront the horrorifying nature of the universe. As can be seen from just from mentions of these, there are plenty to choose from, so after having selected that looked interesting to review in the form of The Jack Hack: A Role-Playing Game of Victorian Villains, Reviews from R’lyeh turns to the obvious one it should review—The Cthulhu Hack: Surviving the Unnameable made using The Black Hack.

The Cthulhu Hack combines the framework of the original fantasy roleplaying game with the player-facing mechanics of 2013 for its dark uncaring tones of Lovecraftian investigative horror. What this means is that The Cthulhu Hack is a Class and Level game which uses many of the design elements of Dungeons & Dragons. For its core mechanic, whenever a player character—or investigator—wants to take an action, he makes a Saving Throw against an appropriate attribute by rolling under it. This is always player facing, so whenever an investigator wants to shoot a cultist, he saves against his Dexterity, but he also saves against his Dexterity to avoid being shot. This is always on a twenty-sided die. Where an investigator has the Advantage on an action, he receives a second twenty-sided die and rolls them both, using the better result. Having the Disadvantage works the same way, but the worst result is used instead.

Like all games derived from The Black Hack, what the player facing mechanics means in terms of running the game is that the GM hardly has to roll any dice. This leaves him to concentrate on presenting the world and especially in The Cthulhu Hack, the presenting the plot for the player characters to investigate.

In terms of characters The Cthulhu Hack provides five Classes—Adventurer, Bruiser, Philanthropist, Ruffian, and Scholar. In the main, these Classes map back onto those given in The Black Hack. So the Bruiser, able to gain a second wind whilst in a fight, make extra attacks, and sacrifice a piece of equipment to stop an attack, is the Fighter. The Philanthropist can heal others out of combat, so this the Cleric, whilst with his ability to avoid traps and attack better from surprise, the Ruffian is the Rogue. Of the other two Classes, they do have a more investigative bent. Thus the Adventurer can gain a hint from the GM once per session, whilst the Scholar can improvise a solution to a situation or problem, using whatever means he has to hand, including from ye olde musty tome of forbidden lore.

In addition to selecting a Class, each player rolls to determine an Occupation related to that Class. So for example, the Scholar gives Astronomer, Professor, Medium, Librarian, Solicitor*, and Linguist, along with a set of possessions for each. Each Occupation also represents a character’s field of knowledge and grants the character the Advantage on rolls related to said Occupation. So for example, a Solicitor would have the Advantage in accounting or legal matters, whereas an Engineer from the Adventurer Class would have an advantage in fixing and designing things as well as working them out. This then covers another aspect of Lovecraftian investigative horror—skills and what a character knows as much as what he can do.

*The inclusion of the Solicitor an indication of the author’s nationality.

Our sample investigator is Rogatien Renaudeau, a French-Canadian sailor turned rumrunner. He runs whisky across the Great Lakes into Prohibition hindered USA. Of late, he has started noticing strange crews out on the water that are doing something other than running rum…

Rogatien Renaudeau
First Level Ruffian
Occupation: Smuggler
STR 11 DEX 16 CON 10
INT 13 WIS 10 CHA 14

Hit Points: 6
Sanity Die: d8
Attack Damage: 1d6/1d4 (Unarmed/Improvising)
Flashlights/Smokes: d6/d10

Gear
Revolver, Tide Tables, Radio, Codebook, $14

Like other Black Hack derived games, The Cthulhu Hack makes use of the Usage Die. This is rolled whenever a character uses, for example, a torch or ammunition. If the result of roll is a one or two, then the die is degraded by one step, for example, from an eight-sided to a six-sided die, and so on. The Cthulhu Hack does not use the Usage Die for money, but instead uses money as you would normally. What it does use the Usage Die for is Sanity, Flashlights, and Smokes.

The Sanity Usage Die is rolled whenever encounters a shocking or dehumanising situation. So learn of the death of your aunt or discover a dismembered body or be stalked by a Deep One, the Sanity Die is rolled and if degraded down a step, the GM also rolls for the character’s Temporary Insanity. A character whose Sanity Die has been degraded down to a four-sided die over the course of play and who then rolls a one or two when making a roll of his Sanity Usage Die goes permanently insane.

Flashlights and Smokes represents a character's ability to ability to conduct investigations and get clues. Flashlights are a character’s ability to discover things, whether from time spent in a library or spotting something odd, whilst Smokes are his ability to learn from others, whether through interrogation, persuasion, bribery, and so on. When their Usage Die degrades, they represent a character getting tired or clueless. Importantly, the Usage Die is rolled after the clue is gained, so the result of a Usage Die degrading is effectively the character gaining the clue with consequences, the equivalent of ‘Yes, but...’ or ‘Yes, and…’. Now where a character’s Flashlight Die and Usage Die refresh at the end of an adventure, the Sanity Die takes much, much longer to recover—weeks and months.

In terms of the Mythos, The Cthulhu Hack gives just a handful of creatures and entities, from Byakhee and Deep One to Mi-Go and Shoggoth. It does not give any stats for any of the Elder Gods, Great Old Ones, or Outer Gods, but rather abstracts them in the book’s discussion of, and introduction to, the Mythos. Of course there is much more that could be written about them, and whilst there is not the space to expand greatly upon the nature of the Mythos, it does leave the reader wanting. The main problem is that although the greater entities are discussed, only the stats are given for the lesser entities—the Elder Thing, the Great Race of Yith, and so on. Which means that there is no discussion of how they are used.

The Cthulhu Hack does though, include rules for Mythos spells. Only the Scholar and the Philanthropist can learn more than one spell and for each spell learned, a character’s Sanity die degrades. The spells themselves are divided into seven Levels, with three or four spells per Level. This does mean that some spells, like Elder Sign and Call Byakhee, do take quite a long time to learn.

It should also be made clear that The Cthulhu Hack is in the main period neutral. There is however, a slight bias towards the classic period of Lovecraftian investigative horror, that of the 1920s, in the choice of Occupations. Thus there is an Alienist rather than a psychiatrist. Nevertheless, The Cthulhu Hack is easy to run in most modern periods, but will need some adaptations upon the part of the GM if he wants to run it outside of the modern period.

Now there are oddities in The Cthulhu Hack. Why are things like ammunition abstracted with the Usage Die, but money is not? In actuality, it is designed to emulate the chaos of battle and that moment in the heat of a fight when track is lost of exactly how many bullets there are in a gun. Now this is not an unreasonable assumption, but it still feels odd. Then there is the matter of how both the entities and spells of the Mythos are covered, but Mythos tomes—such as the infamous The Necronomicon—are not. Also not covered is how knowledge of the Mythos is gained or learned and then applied in play. If the aim of The Cthulhu Hack is to simplify this to exactly what a character has learned in the course of an adventure, then this should have at least been addressed. Nevertheless, it does ignore a major aspect of the Mythos. Another oddity is that the Philanthropist carries over the Healing ability of the Cleric from The Black Hack in that it can heal Hit Points, but does not adapt it to deal with Sanity. This despite the fact that the Alienist and the Doctor are included in the Occupations for the Philanthropist, let alone the Clergyman who should be able to provide succour in times of need at least…

Physically, The Cthulhu Hack is neat little book. There are no illustrations, but it does not really need them. It needs an edit here and there.

From Call of Cthulhu and Trail of Cthulhu to Realms of Cthulhu and Shadows of Cthulhu, there have been plenty of RPGs of Lovecraftian investigative horror over the past thirty-five years. Now The Cthulhu Hack is not as simple as Cthulhu Dark – A Rules-Light system For Lovecraftian Horror, but it is stripped back and it does provide an elegant means for discovering clues and handling investigations in the form of Flashlights and Smokes. These are excellent additions to The Black Hack, yet as much as The Black Hack and thus The Cthulhu Hack are forward facing, The Cthulhu Hack still feels a little too much like the Dungeons & Dragons of The Black Hack and does not quite address all of the elements of Lovecraftian investigative horror. Fortunately, the mechanical simplicity of The Black Hack and thus The Cthulhu Hack means that the GM can address this issue with relative ease. Despite its omissions, The Cthulhu Hack offers a clean, simple, and unfussy approach to Lovecraftian investigative horror that feels refreshing compared to similar RPGs.

Game 'Old Style' like its 1890

In the wake following the publication of The Black Hack has come a slew of games that either added to the Dungeons & Dragons-style fantasy of The Black Hack or took the Old School Renaissance play style/player facing mechanics combination in another direction. So The Class Hack and The Race Hack, both from Cross Planes Game Studio add new/old Classes and Races to the game respectively, whilst Feral Games’ The WasteLand Hack goes all post-apocalypse, The Space Hack from Ivanhoe Unbound takes to the stars, and Just Crunch Games’ Cthulhu Hack lets you confront the horrifying nature of the universe. As can be seen from just from mentions of these, there are plenty to choose from, so Reviews from R’lyeh selected one to review that looked interesting that one was The Jack Hack: A Role-Playing Game of Victorian Villains.

Published by John R Davis, The Jack Hack is a Victorian era set RPG like any other. In other Victorian-set RPGs, such as Victoriana and Cthulhu by Gaslight, the players take the roles of heroes, but not so in The Jack Hack. In this RPG, the player characters are not heroes, but villains—and not even great villains at that. They are the men broken by one too many war or fight, who have run one too many scams, who have fallen from grace, and who have lost power in the underworld, and the women who have fallen from grace and become ‘soiled doves’. They have all hit rock bottom and been driven into the dark, dank streets of Whitechapel where a mysterious stranger has rescued them from a likely death… Perhaps this is a chance to redeem themselves, perhaps this is a chance to make a name for themselves, but there is a rumour that the streets are not safe. A murderer is stalking Whitechapel and who knows if one of the characters is going to be his next victim or even responsible…?

The Jack Hack comes with five new Classes. These are The Broken, a tough ex-soldier, sailor, or prize-fighter who can withstand damage for both himself and others, is inured to the sight of blood, and can attack twice per action. The Cokum is a former con man who is equally as good at lying as he is making a speedy exit, is good for a night’s drinking, and can shift blame to others. The Disgraced can rely upon his former profession, wealth, and even his dignity to get by, whilst the Fine-Wire can lurk and skulk, knows the shortcuts and byways, is charismatic, and is adept at getting in the first blow in any combat. Lastly the Night-Flower can spurn certain advances, withstand poisons, the ague, the pox, and a night of excess, always find a place to stay, and use her Charisma in the first round against a member of the opposite sex.

The first interesting fact about these Classes is that the exact nature of each depends upon the Hit Points rolled for each. So The Broken starts with between five and twelve Hit Points. If he starts with five or six, then he was a rifleman in the army, seven or eight a sailor, with nine or ten a hired hand, and with eleven or twelve a prize-fighter. This also determines his starting gear and this is done for each of the Classes. This is also an odd way of determining such details, but it works.

The second interesting fact is that some of these Classes are easier to play than others. The Broken and The Fine-Wire are going to be easier to play because they are less social Classes and rely less on their ability to interact with higher levels of society and less on the nebulous skills of their former profession.

The third interesting fact about The Jack Hack is that it is set in a sexist society and the Classes do reflect this. So whilst it is possible for the Night-Flower to be male or female, it is very unlikely that The Broken or the Disgraced would be anything other than male.

The fourth interesting fact about The Jack Hack is that when Leveling Up and rolling for attribute improvements, a character can lose points to one of his attributes. For example, when The Broken is Levelling Up, a roll of a one to improve his Intelligence will cause him to lose a point in his Intelligence. This represents the lifestyle of the character and his descent into the moral and physical squalor of his new life in the East End.

The fifth interesting fact about the The Jack Hack is that it develops the use of The Usage Dice from The Black Hack to reflect the ‘inner’ and ‘outer’ resources of the character. The White Usage Die represents a character’s ‘outer’ resources—his influence, infamy, contacts, and standing in Whitechapel, whilst the Black Usage Die represents his ‘inner’ resources, his self-esteem, even his sanity. When a Usage Die goes down through being used, the only way to improve it is when Levelling Up. Each of the Classes has a use for one the Usage Die types, but in general the use of either represents a means to handle a situation where an attribute may not be able to handle a situation. Their inclusion is clever, but the rules for their usage could have been better explained and better developed.

Being a ‘mundane’ Victorian set RPG, there is no ready healing in The Jack Hack and so this is much more brutal RPG than some players may be used to. So there is no magic and there is no supernatural, though the GM is free to add either, as well as the presence of Sherlock Holmes if he so chooses… There is room for one or more supplements dealing with each of these aspects of the setting, though this would push The Jack Hack towards being an Urban Fantasy RPG.

Over half of The Jack Hack is devoted to tables. From ‘20 things found floating in the Thames’ to ‘20 detailed menaces with long term goals’, thirteen or so tables give things to buy or find, places, personalities, goals, ways to die, and more. All of these to be found in the seedy squalor of the East End. It is absolutely not a guide to Whitechapel—for that the GM will need to conduct his own research—but rather a toolkit to spur game of The Jack Hack and to add detail and flavour. What definitely is missing is a table devoted to the player characters’ mysterious benefactor and what he might want.

Ultimately that is very much what The Jack Hack is—a toolkit. As such, it is somewhat stripped down, even underwritten, for example, even down to its bibliography. In fact, it does not actually have one, but the nearest it gets to that is mention of the one inspiration, BBC’s Ripper Street. Of course that series is is as much about the police as it is the crooks, where The Jack Hack is all about the crooks.

As a full RPG setting, The Jack Hack is underwritten. As a toolkit, The Jack Hack gives pointers and flavours aplenty to get a Victorian-set game mired in the seediness, squalor, and wretchedness of London’s worst slums. Playing villains and ne'er-do-wells puts the players and their characters in that mire and enables them to play from a non-traditional angle. The inclusion of The Black and White Usage Dice allow The Jack Hack to model inner and outer desperation and is a welcome addition. Overall, The Jack Hack is underdeveloped—and both the GM and players alike will need to work hard to get it to work—but rife with gaming potential.

Game 'Old Style' like its 2013

The Black Hack could be described as being like Original Dungeons & Dragons, but… Published by Gold Piece Publications following a successful Kickstarter campaign, the ‘but…’ involves the adoption of two modern design features that serve to streamline the senisibilities and structure of the original RPG without losing either. These two design features consist of having a single integrated mechanic and making play player facing. The result is a slick, simple addition to the Old School Renaissance family that can be used to run any scenario for Basic Dungeons & Dragons or its Retroclone derivatives.

The easiest way to explore The Black Hack is to look at a character. A character has the same six attributes as Dungeons & Dragons, but there are no attribute bonuses. It should be noted that whilst the basic roll to determine the value of an attribute is the traditional 3d6, it switches to 2d6+2 for the next attribute roll if the previous roll resulted in fifteen or more, before switching back to 3d6. This is an odd mechanic, but it mostly serves as a balancing factor in a retroclone where a character’s attributes play a major role. Also noticeably absent is Armour Class. Instead a character has Armour Points derived from the armour he is wearing and these points are ablative. 

Rogi the Brave
First Level Warrior
STR 15 DEX 10 CON 10
INT 10 WIS 12 CHA 13

Hit Points: 12
Armour Points: 12 (Plate & Mail, Large Shield)
Weapons: Sword (1d8)

Every character also has a Class and since The Black Hack is derived from Original Dungeons & Dragons, there are only four and none represent the classic fantasy races of Dwarves, Elves, and Halflings as in Basic Dungeons & Dragons. Indeed, The Black Hack is entirely humanocentric, its four Classes being Warrior, Cleric, Thief, and Conjurer. (There is already one expansion, The Race Hack, published by Cross Planes Game Studio, which addresses this issue with two options, one being to combine Class and Race as in Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition, the other being to allow Race to be played as a Class as per Basic Dungeons & Dragons. The first option presents nine Races—drakes, dwarves, elves, gnomes, half-elves, halfling, half-orcs, humans, and tiefling, whilst the second offers the Dwarf, the Elf, and the Halfling. A second expansion, The Class Hack, adds another ten Classes, mostly inspired by Advanced Dungeons & Dragons.) Each Class determines a character’s Hit Points, the arms he can use and armour he can wear, how much damage he does—character do damage by Class rather than weapon type, special features, and bonuses when leveling up. 

So for example, the Warrior uses the ten-sided die for Hit Points and Hit Point recovery, can use all arms and armour, does 1d8 damage with any weapon or 1d6 when unarmed, makes one attack per level, can sunder and have destroyed his shield to ignore any damage suffered in combat, and rolls twice for his Strength and Dexterity when leveling up. Of course the Warrior is the simplest Class, whereas the other Classes have to account for limited use of arms and armour, different special features, for example, the Thief’s attacks from behind and the Divine and Arcane spellcasting of the Cleric and Conjurer respectively.

The core mechanic in The Black Hack is rolling under an attribute on a twenty-sided die. Need to make an attack roll to hit that marauding Orc? Roll under your character’s Strength. If you want to throw a dagger at the Orc, then roll under your character’s Dexterity. Need to avoid an incoming blow? Then roll under your character’s Dexterity. A roll of one is a critical success, whereas a roll of twenty is a fumble, whilst any difficulty is represented by a penalty that is added to the player’s roll. This difficulty—and its associated penalty—can represent a more difficult monster faced by the characters or the level of a spells that a character is trying to cast. The traditional saving throws of Dungeons & Dragons are replaced by saves made directly against a character’s attribute. For example, rolls are made against Charisma to to save against Charm effects and Intelligence for spells and other magical effects.

In addition, if a character has the advantage in a situation, then the GM can award him an Advantage die, a second twenty-sided die to roll on the action,the better result being used to determine the outcome of the action. The Disadvantage die works in a similar fashion, but in reverse. For example, the Thief gains an Advantage die when testing his Dexterity to avoid damage or effects from traps and magical devices, or when attacking from behind. This is essentially the same mechanic as Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition.

The core mechanic of having the players roll for everything—to hit, to avoid being hit, and so on—is very similar to that found in Monte Cook Games’ Numenera. Like the Cypher rules, this means that The Black Hack is essentially player facing. That is, the player has to make all of the rolls rather than the GM, which reduces his workload and allows him to focus solely on running the game.

Combat in The Black Hack adds a couple of twists. To start with, a Dexterity check is made to determine initiative. Succeed and a character goes before the monsters, fail and the monsters go before the character. Then instead of Armour Class, a character wears armour and this Armour Points. These are lost when a character is successfully attacked and once lost, any further damage inflicted is taken off a character’s Hit Points. These Armour Points are regained after a character rests. What this represents is the character’s endurance in wearing and fighting in his armour, as the fight progresses, he becomes tired and cannot make effective use of his armour in combat. Lastly, two-handed weapons are represented by a +2 bonus to damage rolls, but a +2 penalty to rolls to represent that the weapon is harder to use.

Consumables in The Black Hack are also handled as dice rolls. Each Consumable has a die type, for example, a flask of oil has a Usage Die of d6. When used rolled and the result is one or two, the Usage Die switches to a lower type. In the case of the flask of oil, from d6 to d4. After the d4, the Consumable is consumed.

Lastly, The Black Hack does not use Experience Points. Instead, the GM decides when the characters level up. This can be after every session, dungeon level, quest, or major event, but it is up to the GM to decide. When this happens, each character rolls against each of his attributes. Roll over any one of them and the attribute goes up by one with each Class able to roll against one of a pair of attributes, for example, Intelligence or Wisdom for the Conjurer.

The Black Hack provides for ten experience levels, plus up to seventh level spells for both the Cleric and the Conjurer. For the GM there are forty or monsters against which to pitch his players and their adventurers. There is no advice for the GM, but this is not really an issue given that The Black Hack is designed for experienced GMs and players.

Physically, The Black Hack is a twenty-page, digest-sized black and white booklet. It is not illustrated, but the layout is clean and tidy. The booklet is an easy read and any experienced GM will be able to pick these rules up with ease.

The Black Hack is designed to handle Old School gaming in as unfussy and nontechnical a manner as is possible. This it does with a solid and contemporary set of player-facing mechanics that both support its play and acknowledge that ‘modern’ can be better whilst adhering to an Old School style. Plus the the mechanics do mean that the players get make all the rolls, leaving the GM to get on and run the game. The result is that The Black Hack is a slick, streamlined treatment of Dungeons & Dragons-style role playing that looks back to 1974 before just yelling, “Just get on with it!”.

—oOo—

Gold Piece Publications will be at UK Games Expo.