A Campaign of Leagues

For over a decade, there is something that Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! has been lacking. The roleplaying game of globetrotting adventure and mystery set during the ‘Gay Nineties’ at the end of the nineteenth century is published by Triple Ace Games and in its time has been very well supported with numerous supplements, including Leagues of Gothic Horror, which took it into the realm of classic horror and Leagues of Cthulhu, which took it into the far realms of Cosmic Horror. However, in that time, what it has not had, is a campaign. That all changes with the publication of The Great Campaign – A Globetrotting Campaign in Four Glorious Parts. Inspired by the works of Joseph Conrad, in particular, Heart of Darkness and The Secret Agent, as well as H. Ridder Haggard and Rudyard Kipling, even a little Indiana Jones, and a big fat serving of treacle sponge history covered in lashings of occult custard and radical political thought, The Great Campaign will take the Player Characters—or Globetrotters—from a missing persons case in Cambridge to the ‘Roof of the World’ via assorted assassinations, anarchy in the UK, a journey to the Russian Wild West, and the ‘Great Game’. Throw in a mix of steampunk technology and what you have in The Great Campaign is an over-the-top, unashamedly Imperialist, pulpy campaign that delivers murder, mystery, intrigue, corruption, and more, but ultimately, just one big ripping yarn.

The Great Campaign – A Globetrotting Campaign in Four Glorious Parts, published following a successful Kickstarter campaign, can be played using just the core rules for Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! even to the point of playing using the seven pre-generated Globetrotters in the book, plus their followers. There are several supplements which will prove useful to run the campaign if the Game Master has access to them. These are The Globetrotters’ Guide to Expeditions, Leagues of Gothic Horror, Globetrotters’ Guide to London, The Globetrotters’ Guide to Dramatic Developments, and the character collection, Dramatis Personae. Of these, Leagues of Gothic Horror adds rules for Corruption and Sanity, the former earned and the latter lost for vile deeds and suffering the travails of journeys beyond the borders of civilisation. Both Corruption and Sanity are included as part of The Great Campaign, but only come into play if Leagues of Gothic Horror is being used. Their inclusion does suggest an interesting possibility though. Though The Great Campaign is not a cosmic horror campaign, through Leagues of Gothic Horror and then Leagues of Cthulhu, it connects to Cthulhu by Gaslight, the Victorian era supplement for Call of Cthulhu. Should the Game Master—or rather Keeper—have a mind to, The Great Campaign could be adapted to run with Cthulhu by Gaslight, though the use of Pulp Cthulhu: Two-fisted Action and Adventure Against the Mythos is highly recommended should she decide to do so. Another option would be run the campaign using the Ubiquity system version of Space: 1889, though the Game Master will need account for aerial vessels in the third and fourth parts of the campaign. Perhaps by having the Czar impose an aerial interdiction in the region?

The campaign opens in late 1891 with ‘The Dreaming Spires’ which takes place in Cambridge (rather than Oxford and its dreaming spires). Sir Reginald Ponsonby and his wife, Lady Fenella, are worried about their son, Edmund, who has gone missing after having been sent down from Trinity College, Cambridge. Hunting for clues as to his whereabouts reveals that Edmund Ponsonby had got himself mixed with a bad lot—foreign radicals (but not French!) and Socialists to boot. The trail leads away from the college to a house in the fens and back again. By the time the first adventure is over, the Globetrotters should have stopped one anarchist plot—here in Cambridge—and gained hints of another, playing out far away in Central Asia, and gained the Ponsonbys as patrons. The last few scenes should ideally involve a race back to Trinity College and a desperate search for its hidden secrets, but there is also an exciting chase across the rooftops of the university to get the heart racing a little earlier.

If they are successful in ‘The Dreaming Spires’, by the time of the second part of the campaign, ‘The Emerald Scarab Conspiracy’ in late November of 1891, the Globetrotters will be famous enough to be invited to a grand Christmas ball to be hosted by the Russian Embassy aboard by HMS Hrimnir, the ice leviathan capable amphibious land and sea movement, especially on the ice. Before then they are asked to investigate the death of a prominent rocket scientist, which will draw them into London’s Russian immigrant community and bring them into contact with Konstantin Tsiolkovsky. All quickly too quickly, someone takes a violent interest in the Globetrotters’ investigation, but before they can find out the Globetrotters must attend the grand ball. With numerous members of different governments in attendance, the event does not end with the Prussian Princess Charlotte ending up dead and the gift she has just been given—the Emerald Scarab of the title—in the possession of one of the Globetrotters. If an international incidence is to be avoided the Globetrotters need to think and investigate fast. Fortunately, their good reputation should be enough for them to avoid incarceration, but that is not enough for the true culprit who will strike first at the Globetrotters in classic location before launching an even bigger attack elsewhere, hoping to bring the major powers of Europe to the brink of war and beyond. As with ‘The Dreaming Spires’, ‘The Emerald Scarab Conspiracy’ is a pacey affair which ends in a race to save the day, but much more scaled up.

‘The Emerald Scarab Conspiracy’ climaxes with the Globetrotters thwarting the plans of the anarchist cell in London and hopefully, defeating its leader. It leaves the matter of N.F. Fyodorov, who is somehow connected to the anarchists and their plot, but is far away in Central Asia. Of course, if that is the case and the man is dangerous, could India, the Empire’s jewel in the crown, be danger. As a part of a ‘Justice Expedition’, the third part of the campaign, ‘Journey to the Roof of the World’ quickly takes the Player Characters across Europe in comfort and style on the Simplon-Orient Express, but once in Constantinople, that is where the comfort and style ends. From Batum to Baku across Transcaspia, across the Caspian Sea—where of course, the Globetrotters might run into the ‘Pirates of the Caspian’—to Krasnovodsk, and from there fabled Samarkand, and beyond into the Pamirs, said to be the ‘Roof of the World’. Unlike the first two scenarios which were quietly tightly focused in their storytelling, ‘Journey to the Roof of the World’ opens up and is more episodic in nature, focusing on the travel and its possible difficulties, having to deal with both the region’s Russian overlords and the native peoples, and in the process discover some of the secrets of the region.

The campaign comes to a close with ‘Paradise Lost’, the title hinting at what the Globetrotters will find at the ‘Roof of the World’. Once past the native peoples protecting farther progress, they must climb the mountainous glacier high into the Pamirs. Here, in an isolated valley, the Globetrotters have the opportunity to locate and apprehend N.F. Fyodorov, hopefully discovering whether he was connected to the anarchist plots back in England, and possibly secrets that go all the back to the Garden of Eden. It is a classic climax to this type story, revealing the secrets to a big mystery like that of Eldorado or Atlantis.

Besides the seven pre-generated Globetrotters and their cohorts given in its first appendix, The Great Campaign comes with another four appendices providing further support. This includes sixty-one additional Followers, for the Game Master who needs a Bagpiper or a Mime; eight additional Globetrotters; Professor Pennyworth’s Catalogue of Gadgets, such as an Endless Chain Saw, Enhanced Itching Bomb, Targeting Monocle, Aquatic Tripod, and Clockwork Soldier; and More Leagues of Adventure, from the Alpine Horticultural Society and the Author’s Club to the Tobacconists Club and The Turkophile Society. In fact, not all of it directly supports the campaign, but Globetrotters and Followers are useful as a source of replacement characters and the devices for the scientist or engineer to design.

Physically, The Great Campaign is ably presented. Much of the artwork is decent and the cartography clean and easy to read. However, the layout is busy, often relying on a lot of bold text especially when presenting NPCs and interrogations of NPCs. This very much a case of the style for Leagues of Adventure, but it can be a lot to take in.

The Great Campaign – A Globetrotting Campaign in Four Glorious Parts is the campaign that Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! wanted and needed. It certainly has plenty of opportunities for both rip-roaring and derring do, along with the investigation and the exploration. The Great Campaign – A Globetrotting Campaign in Four Glorious Parts is a classic campaign of Victorian adventure, torn from the pages of Victorian novels and the film cells of the silver screen.

Leagues of Mythos Miscellanea

Leagues of Cthulhu: Codicil is a supplement for use with both Leagues of Cthulhu, the supplement of Lovecraftian horror for use with Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! and its expansion, Leagues of Gothic Horror. Published by Triple Ace Games, it expands greatly upon the information and details of the Cthulhu Mythos given in the previous supplements. It describes new bloodline Talents and Leagues, a wide array of rituals, tomes, locations, and dread horrors, expanded advice for the Game Master running a Leagues of Cthulhu campaign, and more. In fact, that more is a detailed exploration of the mystical Dreamlands, including rules for dreamers and altering the landscape of the Dreamlands, rituals and tomes unique to that fabled land, a complete gazetteer, and a bestiary of its notable human and inhuman denizens. This is a first for Leagues of Cthulhu, but in effect, the section on the Dreamlands is a supplement all of its very own. Literally, because its chapter numbering starts anew! In addition, what few stats there are for use with the Ubiquity system are easy to interpret and adapt to the system of the Game Master’s choice, whether that is Cthulhu by Gaslight for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition, Trail of Cthulhu, or Victoriana.

In the main, the Leagues of Cthulhu: Codicil is for the Game Master, but there are a handful of elements for the player too. These include the new Hobby Skill, which can include things like Cartography, Fossil Collecting, or Numismatics, and new Bloodlines and new Leagues. The new Bloodlines include LeBlanc, which provides political Contacts, and Northam, which provides Status, as well as dire effects detailed later in the book. The new Leagues include the Elder Club whose members possess sufficient status to keep the truth of the Mythos from society at large and the Elder Race Society, which holds that Human history is far longer than is normally accepted. Various Mythos languages are discussed, such as Aklo and Yithian, and there is a list of Manias to have the Globetrotters suffer, and glorious new Flaws like Blabber Mouth, Fainter, and Screamer!

The content for the Game Master begins with ‘Magic & Manuscripts’ and provides several new Rituals. With Drain Life a caster can inflict lethal damage upon a target to heal his nonlethal wounds (or downgrade a lethal wound to the nonlethal); with Mark of Madness he can inflict Sanity loss upon a victim; and even gain protection against the fell beasts which hunt down along the angles with Sign of Tindalos. The forty or so Eldritch Books—or Mythos Tomes—are all new and are nicely detailed such that the Game Master can draw inspiration from and further, ties into further content elsewhere in the supplement. For example, The Assassin’s Creed: An Expose of the True Hashshashin is a diary of conversations between a crusader and a fellow prisoner about the true nature of the Old Man of the Mountain and details the links between both the fabled and feared assassins. It is not a little tongue in cheek, but does tie into the extensive entry on the Templars, the possible nature of the order’s actual treasure, and the description of what they do in the modern day of the Purple Decade given in the lengthy ‘Gods, Monsters, & Cultists’ chapter. As you would expect, each Eldritch Book description includes its language, author, date of publication, Complexity, Horror, and Mythos values, and contents in terms of spells. This is accompanied by a decent description as to the origins and history of the volume, plus what it actually describes. For example, The Serpent Through History is in English, was written by Sir Reginald Grosvenor and published in 1818, has Complexity 2, Horror 2, and Mythos 1, and contains the spells Commune Yig, Summon Child of Yig, and Summon Serpent Men. It is an examination of snake cults throughout history, including the Voodoo loa Damballa, cults in ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Rome, and Mesoamerica, plus numerous snake spirits known to American Indians and the nagas known in Indo-China. Grosvenor makes it clear that the presence of so many snake cults is no coincidence, that they are linked to an ancient race of serpent people and that behind it is a universal cult—or at least a cult which set the pattern for those to come—dedicated to an entity that he names as Father of Serpents.

The Eldritch Relics are given a similar treatment, such as Aladdin’s Lamp, which unlike the late addition to the Arabian Nights tells, was discovered in Iram of the Pillars and does not contain a genie. Instead, greatly enhances—almost automatically—the user’s ability to summon a Flying Polyp! Woe betide any daring Globetrotter who decides to give it a rub in case of three wishes… One or two of the items here are not new, such as Liao, which when injected grants the user the capacity to understand the mathematics of traveling through time if not the means, plus items such as the Fungi Brain Cylinder and the Gnoph-Keh Horn Dagger. Or rather, they are not necessarily new to Lovecraftian investigative roleplaying, but new to Leagues of Cthulhu. Which still leaves a lot which is new to both.

The trend of the mix of the new to Leagues of Cthulhu, but not new to Lovecraftian investigative roleplaying continues with the gazetteer. Thus as it guides us around the five main continents—and beyond, it takes us to such well-known places as the original Dunwich, Kingsport, Ponape, and Roanoke Colony, along with innumerable lesser-known locales. All are quite lengthy descriptions, especially the counties of Somerset and Cumbria in the United Kingdom, which is no surprise that they have been previously explored in the supplements Avalon – The County of Somerset and Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Cumbria and thus in more detail. The principality of Wales receives some attention too, whether it is the dark history of Anglesey—also known as Yns Dywyll or the ‘Dark isle’, the sparse are of the Cambrian Mountains identified as the ‘Desert of Wales’, or St. Brides Bay with its sea-caves with tunnels which are said to run deep under the sea, bulbous-eyed, wattle-necked inhabitants, and the ancient, inscribed menhir that it is said the locals dance and cavort around. What this highlights is that Call of Cthullhu—or at least Lovecraftian investigative roleplaying—deserves its own supplement devoted to Wales. This section is a good start though. Further, all of these locations are accompanied by an adventure seed that the Game Master can develop.

Perhaps the longest chapter in Leagues of Cthulhu: Codicil is devoted to ‘Gods, Monsters, and Cultists’, a collection of new creatures and entities of the Mythos, such as the Beast of K’n-Yan and Courtier of Azathoth, alongside the old like the Serpent Man and the Tcho-Tcho, all joined by the Giant Albino Penguin. However, these are minor additions in the face of the nineteen cults described in the book, all of them accompanied with write-ups of two NPCs, one a typical NPC cultist, one a named member. For example, the Order of the Fisher-God is a quasi-Christian cult which began as a secret society on the Society Islands before adopting Christian beliefs, whose practice of child sacrifice led it to be driven from the islands and forced to adapt in distant lands. Members seek ascent to a higher plane, which includes transformation to forms better suited to life under the sea, and so their cultists preach those parts of the Bible involving the sea. Thus, the sample NPC, Pastor Andrew, is a popular figure and preacher along the docks. Also included is a discussion of Scaninavian cults as they relate to Azathoth, Nyarlathotep, and Shub-Niggaurath. Here perhaps Leagues of Cthulhu: Codicil may diverge from how some Keepers view the Mythos, whether they necessarily equate certain entities of the Mythos with real world gods—Azathoth as Odin for example, or even Nyarlathotep as Loki (although actually, that would not be wholly inappropriate). Of course, such an interpretation is up to the Keeper to include or ignore, and it is only one of multiple cults presented in the supplement. Other cults include a new take upon the Thuggee—complete with an entertaining nod to Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, the aforementioned Templars, and The Universal Hive, a bee cult with some decidedly fungal infestations… Rounding out the chapter are descriptions of various notables from Lovecraft’s stories, many of them, like John Raymond Legrasse, appearing in earlier incarnations than their appearances later in the fiction. All useful should the Game Master want them in her Leagues of Cthulhu set in the 1890s.

In addition, boxes throughout Leagues of Cthulhu: Codicil add further detail and flavour. This includes trapped tomes and self-activating spells, the exact meaning of Nephren-Ka’s name, the nature of genies in the Mythos—Flying Polyps or Fungi from Yuggoth?, and Sherlock Holmes and the Mythos. This provides some of Holmes’ cases which might be developed into Mythos mysteries, rather than suggesting how the great detective might become involved in confronting the Mythos.

Leagues of Cthulhu: Codicil sort of ends at this point, yet there is more in the volume. ‘The Realms of Morpheus: The Dreamlands’ starts the numbering of the chapters again and presents a four-chapter exploration of the Dreamlands for Leagues of Cthulhu. As well as suggesting the stories which the Game Master should read as inspiration, it provides new Globetrotter options, details the means of entering the realm of sleep, and gives a gazetteer that covers the places, peoples, and monsters of the Dreamlands. It includes the Dreamlands Lore skill, the Adept Dreamer Talent and the Dreamlands Persona Talent—the latter enabling a player to create a second character specific to the Dreamlands, and Leagues such as the Feline Club whose members might just follow the cats into the Dreamlands and the Morpheus Club, whose members learn to shape dreams. Archetypes like the Addicted Artist, Friend to Cats, and Seeker of Justice provide ready-to-play Globetrotters (or NPCs if necessary), whilst the gazetteer takes the reader from the entryway that is the Cavern of Flame and the magnificent port of Celephaïs to the Plateau of Leng and the port of Dylath-Leen with its thin basalt towers and berths to the much feared, black-sailed galleys whose crews are never seen. Gods include Bast and Nodens, the creatures Ghasts, Ghouls, and Gugs, and of course, Zoogs, and the NPCs, Kuranes, mysterious king of Celephaïs, and both Nasht and Kaman-Thah, guardians of the Cavern of Flame. 

‘The Realms of Morpheus: The Dreamlands’ does feel out of place in Leagues of Cthulhu: Codicil. Not just the fact of the separate numbering, but really an abrupt and unexpected switch in subject matter. This is not to say that the material is neither good nor informative—it is. More so at the time of publication when there is limited information available for the Dreamlands for Lovecraftian investigative roleplaying, whether for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition or other roleplaying games. So then it may perhaps be seen as an unexpected bonus, but still, at almost a third of the length of the Leagues of Cthulhu: Codicil, ‘The Realms of Morpheus: The Dreamlands’ does feel as if it should have been a Leagues of Cthulhu: The Dreamlands supplement of its very own (perhaps with the addition of an adventure or two).

Physically, Leagues of Cthulhu: Codicil is well written and presented, although there are few illustrations to break up the text, so it is fairly dense. It does lack an index—for both parts—and so that density is not ameliorated.

Leagues of Cthulhu: Codicil contains a huge amount of lore and ideas, along with cults and monsters and items of the even weirder science found in Leagues of Cthulhu, adventure seeds, NPCs, and more. It could be argued that this one volume is the equivalent of both The Keeper’s Companion vol. 1 and The Keeper’s Companion vol. 2, such is the richness of its content. Even discounting ‘The Realms of Morpheus: The Dreamlands’—which is a bonus, Leagues of Cthulhu: Codicil is a cornucopia of Cthulhoid content, containing a wealth of material for Leagues of Cthulhu that will provide the Game Master of any roleplaying game of Lovecraftian investigative horror with support and ideas until almost the stars come right...

Leagues of Infidels

As the title suggests, Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Afghanistan is a supplement for use with both Leagues of Cthulhu, the supplement of Lovecraftian horror for use with Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! and its expansion, Leagues of Gothic Horror. Published by Triple Ace Games, it presents a guide and a gazetteer to the little understood country of Afghanistan in the Late Victorian Era, not just the history and the geography, but the Mythos and the folklore, and more. Although it is not a comprehensive guide—being relatively short at just forty pages—it presents more than enough information to bring a campaign to the British Empire’s North-West Frontier, whether a supernatural campaign for Leagues of Adventure or a Lovecraftian investigative horror campaign for Leagues of Cthulhu. In addition, what few stats there are for use with the Ubiquity system are easy to interpret and adapt to the system of the Game Master’s choice, whether that is Cthulhu by Gaslight for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition, Trail of Cthulhu, or Victoriana.

Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Afghanistan explores a country which has been much contested over its long history, many times conquered, including by Alexander the Great and the Mongols, but never truly tamed. Sat on the Silk Road between the East and the West, it has been an important crossroads for both Central and South Asia, not just for trade, but also for learning and faiths. Previously a great centre of Zoroastrian and Buddhist learning,  in more recent times the Emirate of Afghanistan has become known as a fiercely independent Islamic state which despite defeating the British Empire in the First Anglo-Afghan War has become a British protectorate under the sway of the British Raj in India following its defeat in the more recent Second Anglo-Afghan War. Essentially Afghanistan has become a buffer state between the British and Russian Empires as part of ‘The Great Game’. Though mountainous and remote, with only one real point of access—up the Khyber Pass after a thousand mile journey by rail north from Bombay, what this means is that the crossroads of Asia are open to the intrepid explorer, adventurer, historian, and archaeologist, should they be brave enough to traverse its dense mountain ranges and deep valleys, all the whilst minding their Ps and Qs, and doing their very best not to offend local customs.

Of course, the region has a history older than some mere ape descendants, and in most cases, older than some mere ape descendants can imagine. In the long geological past, it has been home to an Elder Thing city, whilst in the more recent geological past, the Serpent Men settled in Afghanistan’s lower lying regions, and to this day, the Mi-Go continue mine the country’s higher peaks for rare minerals. In more recent times, Alexander the Great campaigned against the worshippers and entities of the Mythos, but in the millennia since his death, dark faiths, dark entities, and dark artefacts have been traded back and forth along the Silk Road. Many found a home in Afghanistan and almost as many were destroyed by the wave after wave of invasions the country would suffer in the course of its history, most notably under the Mongols in the thirteenth century. Fragments of these cults, the subjects of their venerations, and their blasphemous objects and texts remain; in the libraries of religious scholars, amongst the wares of curio dealers on dusty backstreets, in the ruins of ancient cities and monasteries, and carved into the walls of buildings usually avoided by the local inhabitants or into the rock high up on the side of remote valleys. Some will be familiar to scholars, but some maybe new, whilst others simply hint at something else or something older… Worse still are the secrets that some tribes hide or at least do not talk about. Often things best left assuaged through sacrifice or locked or buried away, not through ignorance, but fear for family and tribe—and more should such things be free once again to ravage the Earth. Though not all such tribes act to protect the world, some do, whilst other tribes and cults are true worshippers, reviled and feared by other Afghans in equal measure.

Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Afghanistan opens with an introduction to the country. This covers its history, both the outré and the ordinary from prehistory to the modern day of the Mauve Decade; explains how to get there (starting with an airship since Leagues of Adventure and Leagues of Cthulhu are steampunk roleplaying settings); and provides an overview in turn of its geography climate, peoples, cuisine, economics, entertainment, and more. A lot of this will add flavour, such as the dishes that the Player Characters will likely eat, but details such as the lack of ready information sources, that is, no newspapers except those which are weeks old from outside the country, and Pashtunwali, a guide to Pashtunwali, the code of conduct that the Pashtuns adhered are more likely to have an impact upon play and what the Player Characters say and do. Much of this is straight background material, but elements of the fantastic are added in sections of boxed text also. For example, The Book of Arda Viraf is a Zoroastrian Mythos tome, Pashtunwali is detailed as a Code of Conduct, and a new League of Adventure is described. This is ‘The Alexandria Club’, whose members are dedicated to locating and excavating all of the many cities built across Asia by Alexander the Great.

The Gazetteer covers just some of the various ancient sites, monasteries and temples, rock inscriptions, natural features—from the Hindu Kush Mountains to the Khyber Pass, and settlements to be found across Afghanistan, all given a paragraph or two each, and a rating for their Eerie Atmosphere, with most accompanied by an adventure seed. For example, the Mountain of Genies, lies in south-eastern Afghanistan, its barren heights inhabited by a tribe known locally as the Sky Devils, feared for their stealth and their propensity for stealing away animals and people without trace, though sometimes mutilated bodies are found in the valley below. The disappearances include British troops committed to the region during the Second Anglo-Afghan War and almost every expedition since has failed to reach or map the mountain and its surrounds due to disaster and mishap. Indeed, the adventure seed involves a member of one such expedition staggering into Kabul, raving about “winged devils”, “monoliths from beyond time”, and so on. Elsewhere, the members of the Prospectors’ Club have explored too deep below Mes Aynak, which sits atop the country’s largest deposits of copper and come across the last remnants of a very ancient and alien civilisation, whilst Zorkul, a lake in the Pamir Mountains lying on the contested border with Russia, was noted by a Chinese explorer as containing an idol of sea-green stone depicting a ‘water dragon’. Perhaps the lake was the site of ill-fated Sarnath and when rumours spread of a ‘dragon’ statue seen in the lake following a drought, perhaps the Player Characters have the opportunity to confirm this?

The Mythos itself is kept fairly light in Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Afghanistan. Mentions are made of various entities, such as knowledge of Shub-Niggaurath having been brought into the region with the Persians and Yog-Sothoth via the Zoroastrians. Two or three cults are mentioned, such as the Cult of the Black Hand which works to set the Russians and the British at each other’s throats and the Illuminated Fraternity of the All-Seeing Eye, which seeks world domination, but these are mere mentions and left wholly undeveloped. The Cult of the Silent Fire, whose members take a vow of silence to violent, self-mutilating extremes, is given a more detailed wrote-up, as is one of its leading cultists, and also a Mythos horror, the Darkness from the Void, a collective intelligence which takes the form of a thin, black sludge which comes down from space and infects organism after organism. The Cult of the Silent Fire seeks to spread its inner truths to all those who will listen and then learn the reality, whilst the Darkness from the Void seeks to infect all in an attempt to acquire all knowledge and come to a true understanding of the universe. That all said, the author also simply advises that at times, the monster need be no more than a tentacle, whether emerging from some cold deep lake, or the blackness of a tunnel.

Numerous stock NPCs are detailed, such as Afghan Craftsman, Russian Spy, and British Junior Official, whilst Afghan War Veteran—very Doctor John Watson, and Correspondent-at-Arms are written up as sample Player Characters. Perhaps the most entertaining NPC detailed is one Peachy Carnehan, an ex-British army sergeant, Freemason, and adventurer, now a crippled and scarred beggar wandering the streets of Kabul with a strange bundle in his arms. Devotees of Rudyard Kipling and likely Sean Connery and Michael Caine will enjoy this inclusion.

Physically, Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Afghanistan is decently done. It needs a slight edit here and there and whilst light on illustrations, it at least comes with a map or two. These are very useful, especially given the lack of familiarity that many a reader of the supplement is likely to have with Afghanistan during this period. It would have been useful if the previous region guide, Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Cumbria, also had such maps.

One obvious issue with Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Afghanistan is that its subject matter is likely to be contentious, since it deals with the Imperialism and racism of the period. Fortunately, the author addresses these issues and handles them with some care. For example, it is suggested that the attitudes of the Victorians towards the natives be reflected not in actual expressions of racism, but rather that all Afghans initially suffer a Bad Reputation Flaw because of the poor attitudes and ill-informed opinions of the British and other Europeans towards them. Then this can be roleplayed initially, but as the Player Characters interact, they can learn otherwise and it effectively fade into the background and not be applied. The other advice is for the game play to be respectful of ruins and holy places, lest offence—in game and out—be caused. Overall, simple, but justified advice.

Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Afghanistan has much in common with the earlier Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Cumbria in that it combines a solid overview of the region and its people with the Mythos worked deep into the fabric of the country. However, there is less of an emphasis upon folklore and myth and superstition behind which the Mythos can be hidden than there is in Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Cumbria, perhaps because of the lack of familiarity and far away strangeness of the setting. Most of the manifestations of the Mythos in Afghanistan are relics from its long and ancient past, though there are some which are active, but whether relic or active, they are underwritten and will need no little development upon the part of the Game Master or Keeper to turn into a full mystery and bring to the table. The disappointing lack of a bibliography will not help the Game Master to that end. 

Overall, Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Afghanistan is an interesting and informative introduction to Afghanistan during the late Victorian era, especially given our general lack of familiarity with both period and region. There is no denying that Afghanistan deserves its own supplement for Lovecraftian investigative horror, but in the meantime, Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Afghanistan is a good, if imperfect, starting point.

Leagues of Gammerstangs

As the title suggests, Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Cumbria is a supplement for use with both Leagues of Cthulhu, the supplement of Lovecraftian horror for use with Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! and its expansion, Leagues of Gothic Horror. Published by Triple Ace Games, it presents a guide and a gazetteer to the English county of Cumbria in the Late Victorian Era, not just the history and the geography, but the Mythos and the folklore, and more. Although it is not a comprehensive guide—being relatively short at just thirty-two pages—it presents more than enough information to bring a campaign to England’s North-West, whether a supernatural campaign for Leagues of Adventure or a Lovecraftian investigative horror campaign for Leagues of Cthulhu. In addition, what few stats there are for use with the Ubiquity system are easy to interpret and adapt to the system of the Game Master’s choice, whether that is Cthulhu by Gaslight for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition, Trail of Cthulhu, or even Liminal.

(Note: ‘Gammerstang’ means awkward person in the local dialect.)

Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Cumbria details an area of the north of England, bordering Scotland, which is best known as the Lake District—for the lakes Windermere, Coniston Water, Ullswater, Buttermere, Grasmere, and many others, and as the home of the ‘Lake Poet School’ whose members included William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey. Since the Victorian period it has been primarily been seen as a tourist destination, but prior to that, it was a source of worked-flint, a frontier of the Roman Empire, a frontier region between England and Scotland, a rural backwater, and more recently, with the coming of the railways, an industrial centre. Yet in ages past, races of the Mythos like the Elder Things and the Fungi from the Yuggoth operated in the region, whilst with the coming of mankind, the Deep Ones migrate to the Cumbrian coast and begin interacting with them. The Celts brought worship of the Shub-Niggurath and avatars of Nyarlathotep to the region, whilst the Romans also imported the worship of dark gods from the far edges of their empire.

Now despite its title of Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Cumbria, the supplement actually describes not the county of Cumbria as it is today—which only dates from 1974—but rather Cumberland, Furness, and Westmoreland. (For ease of play, the supplement simply uses Cumbria.) It covers the region in three chapters. The first of these introduces the area and gives its history, geography, a guide to getting there and what to find when you do, the latter including cuisine, entertainment, policing, and so on. The inclusion of a guide to toponyms—Cumbrian place names, the local dialect, folk remedies, and general superstitions all add a pleasing degree of verisimilitude. In game terms, it suggests various Leagues of Adventure faculties to be found in the region, for example, the Anglers’ Club, Bath Club, Mariners’, and Society of Aquanauts share a clubhouse in Bowness-on-Windemere. (The presence of the latter a knowing nod—backed up by an even more of a nod in an adventure seed to The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes.)

The second chapter is the gazetteer and forms the heart of the supplement. It covers ancient sites, natural features, Roman sites, and settlements, many of which are accompanied by adventure seeds. Thus, the Castlerigg Stone Circle outside of Keswik, whose number of stones is said to be uncountable and at the centre of which is a firepit which when unearthed was a blob of “some dark unctuous sort of earth.” The adventure seed for this suggests that this was the remains of a Black Spawn of Tsathoggua. The natural features include the region’s various caves and lakes, the Roman sites of two major forts in the area, whilst the settlements cover its towns and villages, from Ashness Bridge and Aspatria to Whitehaven and Workington. It describes the Dacre family, a prominent Cumbrian family which in the past was split between its worship of Cthulhu and Shub-Niggurath, and supports this with a new Bloodline for Leagues of Cthulhu. Tying back to the Lakeland poets and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, a notable narcotic ‘Kendal Black Drop’ of the period, better enables users to enter the Dreamlands or simply opens them to the thoughts of the Great Old Ones…

The third chapter presents denizens of the region. They include lists of dignitaries—aristocrats, bureaucrats, clergymen, and Members of Parliament—all names which Game Masters and Keepers will want to research before bringing into their campaigns. The only famous person fully detailed is the bon vivant Earl Lonsdale, known as the ‘Yellow Earl’ for his favourite colour. This may or may not signify something… Lastly, the supplement details a cult, the Brotherhood of the Maimed King. Linked to Arthurian myth, this is horridly both fecund and bucolic and is the content in the book which is probably the easiest for the Game Master and the Keeper to develop into a scenario. 

Physically, Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Cumbria is a plain affair. It is simply laid out, there are no illustrations, and there are no maps. The latter is more of an issue than the former, forcing even the most casual of readers to do some research to give context to places and features described in the text. That said, any good Game Master or Keeper will probably do more research if she is going to run a scenario or take her campaign to Cumbria, so maps are not as much of an issue as they could be. Still, it would have been nice if there had been one included.

Anyone coming to Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Cumbria expecting the Mythos to be running wild across the rolling hills, up and down the fells, along the long the deep valleys of the region, conspiracies of worshippers working to bring about some grand plan to end the world, will be disappointed. Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Cumbria is not that supplement. It is broader in its over overview of the region, encompassing the supernatural as well as the Mythos, but layering it under folklore and myth and superstition. What manifestations of the Mythos there are in Cumbria are holdouts, relics from the ancient past, perhaps best left to linger and die off rather than arise again due to some meddling from all-too inquisitive Globetrotters or investigators. Anything in Leagues of Cthulhu: Guide to Cumbria will need some development upon the part of the Game Master or Keeper to turn into a full mystery, but is still worth keeping on the shelf as reference or just in case the Globetrotters or investigators feel like a holiday in Wordsworth country.

Leagues of Monsters & Places

Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion is a supplement for Leagues of Gothic Horror, itself a supplement for Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration  and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age!. This is Triple Ace Games’ roleplaying game of globetrotting adventure and mystery pushed into that most melodramatic genre, full of legends, ghosts, vampires, dark magic, great evils, sinister villains, and even romance—gothic horror. Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion adds an array of new character options, a whole new culture, haunted upon haunted locations, and new monsters, NPCs, and heroes. There is a wealth of content in this supplement which will support a campaign for some time.
The options in Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion open with new Talents for the player character, including Corruption Resistant, Evil Eye—which lets a character place a minor curse on others, (Monster) Hunter—which grants a bonus when hunting and investigating specific types of creature, and Past Life—provides access to a skill that the character may not have, but the ancestor might. Flaws range from Slow Healer to Opinionated and include genre standbys, Screamer and Fainter. Both pure Hammer Horror! Of the two new Leagues, Fairy Investigation Society is perfectly in keeping with the Victorians’ fascination with fairies, whilst the Gypsy Lore Society ties in with the background information given about the gypsies in the book’s second chapter. There is just the one new Ritual, that of Nightmare, which inflicts a terrifying dream upon the victim.  

The selection of new Weird Science devices showcases a pleasing degree of invention, such as Ecto-Armour which protects against ghostly attacks and Etheric Purgative Tablets which can expel a possessing spirit from its host, whilst many a player character is going to want a Miniature Gatling Gun. Unfortunately, it is only available from the Ministry of Unusual Affairs! Similarly, the Specimen Collection Vehicle, an internal combustion powered vehicle designed to safely collect and transport supernatural creatures and evidence, is also only available from the Ministry of Unusual Affairs. Both add a certain muscularity to a Leagues of Gothic Horror campaign a la Torchwood. As well as devices,  Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion gives numerous occult relics. So the Babel Stone Amulet adds a bonus to the Linguistics skill, the Kladenets is a ‘self-swinging’ sword of Russian fairy tales, the Ghost Shirt and Fumsup both protect against bullets, genuine Lucky Heather does provide a luck bonus, and the Witch Pin can be used to determine if someone knows magic (though not if they are a witch). Witch hunting dominates the list of new occult tomes, such as Compendium Maleficarum, Daemonolatrione Libri Tres, and De Lamiis et Pythonicis Mulieribus. This a good selection of things to add to a campaign, giving the Game Master lots of potential and pleasingly, if there is a focus on Europe in the relics and tomes, it is tempered by a few interesting entries from elsewhere round the world..

Any coverage of the Gypsies—or Romany—is covering potentially contentious ground, but fortunately, ‘Gypsies & Szgany’ provides both their history and their background as well as ways to bring them in a game of Gothic Horror. It highlights how throughout their history, the Gypsies have been distrusted and discriminated against, with reputations for enacting curses and cheating and thievery. What the chapter does is separate the Gypsies into two groups—Gypsies and Szgany. In particular, it makes clear that it is the Szgany who are responsible for the poor reputation that Gypsies have in general. Whereas the Gypsies are sworn to defend all of humanity against evil, the Szgany have long fallen from grace, corrupted by supernatural horrors native to the Balkans, having turned to superstition rather than faith and sold their loyalty for gold, including knowingly vowing their loyalty to powerful vampires. This includes the ultimate vampire lord himself, Dracula, a la Bram Stoker’s novel. What this means is that the Game Master can still be seen to use Gypsies as villains and henchmen, so adhering to their role in the genre, whereas the Szgany are the true villains. At the same time, the Gypsy way of life and their culture can also be brought into play, whether that is as a Gypsy globetrotter player character or Gypsy rituals, and so on. 

Whether a haunted house or castle, the decaying mansion of a devil worshipping despot or a blood covered Aztec altar, or a vampire’s crypt or werewolf-stalked forests, supernatural sites in Leagues of Gothic Horror are meant to be special and should ideally offer the Game Master solid roleplaying potential which she can work up into a good encounter, scenario, or mystery for her players. Besides generic locations, the Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion offers over fifty such supernatural sites, from Australia and Austria to Russia and the United States. Each comes with a suggested antagonist from Leagues of Gothic Horror or from one of the other supplements such as Guide to Apparitions or Guide to Mummies, plus a suggested number of bonus Style points for those using the optional Dark Places rule. Optional rules allow for Corrupted Sites where even just spending time in them means that a Globetrotter might accrue Corruption Points and Eerie Atmosphere which penalises a globetrotter’s Horror checks! Under these rules Castle Dracula is not a place you want to visit just because…! Finally every location comes with an adventure seed, suggesting how the Game Master might use it—which means fifty over adventure hooks.

The sites themselves include Devil’s Pool, reputably the most haunted site in Australia; Houska Castle in Bohemia, constructed over a void known locally as ‘the Gateway to Hell’; and Farringdon Street Station in London, an underground said to be haunted by a ‘Screaming Specter’. It is fair to say that the majority of the supernatural sites described do come from the United Kingdom, which does have a reputation of being particularly haunted, yet this is also in keeping with the Victorian focus of Leagues of Gothic Horror and Leagues of Adventure. It also addresses one of the issues with Leagues of Gothic Horror and that is a lack of supernatural places.

The longest chapter in Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion is ‘Things That Go
Bump in the Night’, so monsters. Or rather some forty or so ghosts, monsters, greater horrors, unique villains, and more. The ghosts are categorised as types, such as the strong motive of the Avenger, the hope-sucking Leech, or the forlorn Lost, but also include variants like the Clanker, effectively a weaker, noisier poltergeist, or an alternative, spirit-like version of the Wendigo. The monsters include classics likeAnimated Armour and the Hangman Tree as well as more specific beings like the raven-swarm Sluagh of Scottish and Irish folklore, which rip the souls from the near dead. Greater horrors take a step up in terms of power and evil with demons such as Baal who grants or curses invisibility and Focalor, a duke of Hell specialising in the sinking of battleships, and then unique villains tie back in to several of the supernatural sites detailed earlier in the book. For example, Black Annis, the crone who lurks in the wilds of the Dane Hills of Leicestershire and is known to have a predilection for the flesh of children, and then Doctor Henry Howard Holmes, the infamous serial killer of 1890s Chicago. Doubtless though, the Game Master will have fun with Igor, a scientist henchman who keeps working for scientists already on a dark path over and over… Similarly Doctor Who fans will take a certain pleasure from encountering the giant, two-hundred-and-fifty pound rat known as the Mudger, lurking in London’s extensive sewer system. In addition to ghosts and monsters, Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion includes two cults—the Benevolent Society of Saint Elizabeth of Hungary and Cult of the Horned God—both suited for longer term play and both suitably gothic in their origins. Certainly, the Cult of the Horned God echoes the stories of Dennis Wheatley, but both feel inspired by Hammer Horror.

Lastly, Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion includes heroes both ordinary and unique. The latter includes Andrei the Bear, a Gypsy monster hunter, and Penny Dreadful, a masked avenger who hunts werewolves and vampires. Plus there is a whole of ordinary NPCs, including Gypsy Horse Dealer,  Gypsy Storyteller, and Reformed Szgany to tie back into the ‘Gypsies & Szgany’ chapter, and several sample, ready-to-play player characters, such as the Cursed Clergyman, Folklorist, Fortune Teller, Scarred Survivor, Stage Magician, and Werewolf Hunter.

Physically, Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion is surprisingly all text—there are no illustrations. That aside, it is neatly laid out, the writing is good, and despite the lack of index, the contents are relatively easy to reference.

At its most basic, Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion expands on the dearth of supernatural locations detailed in Leagues of Gothic Horror. Indeed, fifty or so adds a great number of them, but that is only a quarter of the book! Plus you do get a scenario hook with every location. In fact, half of Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion is dedicated to new monsters and ghosts, NPCs and cults, plus new player character types. Which is exactly what a roleplaying game of gothic horror really needs and that is in addition to new character options and a nicely done treatment of the Gypsies! All together, Leagues of Gothic Horror Expansion is useful companion to Leagues of Gothic Horror, but the new supernatural locations make it an essential supplement.

Ministerial Leagues

Have you had an encounter with the inexplicable and want answers? Have you been the victim of an evil magician and prevented his dominance over you through sheer willpower? Has your sister fallen foul of the influence of a blood sucking fiend? Have you foiled the perfidious plans of a perverse cult that threatened the security of the Empire? Did your esoteric research uncover truths which undermine your fundamental understanding of the universe? Are you a loyal subject of Her Imperial Majesty, Queen Victoria? Then you sir (and madam, of course), may be just what we are looking for. Who are we, you ask? Why we are the Ministry of Unusual Affairs, and whilst Her Majesty’s government would deny the existence of magic, the supernatural, and such as folderol as the stuff of the tabloid press, charlatans, and mountebanks, privately it needs a body of men (and women) who attend to such matters with decorum and professionalism.

This, essentially, is the set-up for the Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs, a supplement for Triple Ace Games’ Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration  and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! and its expansion, Leagues of Gothic Horror (and its expansion, Leagues of Cthulhu). Now at the core of Leagues of Adventure are the ‘leagues’, the exclusive or secret—or not so secret—society, such as The Alpine Club, the Epicurean Society, or The Temporal Society. Every character or ‘globetrotter’ in Leagues of Adventure is a member of one such league, with each league providing contacts, resources, and patrons that will call on the globetrotters just as the globetrotters can call upon the aid of their Leagues. For the most part, the various Leagues possess a friendly rivalry with each other where their interests conflict, but there exist villainous Leagues whose aims are far from honourable or enlightened. The Thuggee is one such villainous League, as is The Immortals Club, whose members seek ever greater power and the means to keep it for themselves. Of course, Leagues of Gothic Horror and Leagues of Cthulhu add further leagues. Now this provides a social framework for the player characters, but the Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs provides a professional framework for both the player characters and the Game Master’s campaign.

The Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs is presented as informal introduction, one that you might receive upon your first day at work or at a prospective interview. So it opens with a history of the ministry, beginning with its origins as a cadre of witch-hunters under James I and the actions taken against Doctor John Dee, before going on to detail the investigations along the Severn Valley by one Ramsey Campbell, the truth behind the madness of George III, and the outbreak of Devil’s Footprints up and down the country, until last coming up to date with the invaders from Mars and the Ripper murders. At various points throughout the history, it mentions the founding of certain departments, such as the witch-hunters which were the basis of Department P. There are five departments, each with multiple sub-departments. So Department C—‘The Collection’—also includes The Black Archive, Department of Artefacts, and Department of Literature. The other departments include Department F—‘Foreign Intelligence’, Department M—‘Mythos’, Department P—‘Paranormal’, and Department—‘Science’.

Two of these departments are of particular note, though for different reasons. Department P includes sub-departments which deal with Apparitions, Vampires, Shapeshifters, Walking Dead, Mummies, Magic, Mentalism, and Cults. These enable the Game Master to plug other Leagues of Gothic Horror supplements into the Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs. For example, the Guide to Apparitions and the Guide to Mummies support investigations and missions which dealt with by Sub-Department E1 and Sub-Department E5 respectively. This organisation means that the Game Master need only open up each department or sub-department when she wants to add the threats that each deals with to her campaign and so better pick and choose the supplements she wants to purchase and use. Until that time, of course, an agent of the Ministry of Unusual Affairs lacks the clearance to access that department. The other department is Department M—‘Mythos’. Now unlike the other departments, this one is entirely optional, since it deals with the Lovecraft Mythos, and that means that all of the other threats, whether that is vampirism or invaders from another world, pale by comparison. 

In terms of characters, the Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs points out that the Government Official is the most obvious type of archetype for a campaign revolving around its various departments. And certainly there is no harm in having such a character as one of the player characters. It suggests though, that since the ministry employs all types, there is room for military officers and big game hunters as much as there is alienists, clergymen, mentalists, and monster slayers, so there is plenty of room for flexibility. All new agents of the ministry receive get Rank (Ministry of Unusual Affairs) 0 for free, are assigned to a department of their choice and trained in a mix of standard skills for all agents and those taught by their department. Of course, having a number of different agents from different departments means that a team is better able to investigate and deal with a wider range of the unusual. As an agent is promoted, then he can be posted to other departments and so gain wider experience of the ministry’s operations. He is though, not given any training in the new department.

In terms of mechanics, the Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs details the Escape Artist Talent for agents with a high Acrobatics skill and Collector Mania as a Flaw, in which an agent succumbs to the urge to fill in the gaps and display cases in museums and libraries. Also detailed are the means to handle ministry budgets for missions, mundane gear like straitjackets, and weird science gear, like Coagulant Spray (useful for medical purposes, but not against vampires), Dig-o-Matic (for automatically disinterring graves without all of that messing about with shovels and getting dirt on your clothes), the Encyclopediamtica (a suitcase-sized device which contains hundreds of books miniaturised on small glass plates), and a Specimen Collection Vehicle (for collecting and transporting specimens and samples in relative safety). Fans of The Avengers—the British sixties television series, not the Marvel films—as will every well turned gentleman, will appreciate the inclusion of various modified umbrellas, including armoured, beguiling, and gas-launching. Rounding out this section is a complete list of the other weird science devices and creations to be found in other Leagues of Adventure and Leagues of Gothic Horror supplements, again enforcing the connection between this supplement and others in the line.

Roughly half of the Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs is dedicated to NPCs, agents and department heads of the ministry. Notable department heads and agents include Philomena Freeman, the cranky, bad-tempered, foul-mouthed, allegedly three-armed head of Department C who really hates lending anyone the objects and items in her department’s collection; Mina Harker, head of Sub-Department E2 and perfect for tipping a Leagues of Gothic Horror campaign into The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen territory; and Jerimiah Benn, an ex-actor whose skill in disguise is so good that he has fooled fellow agents and the members of the cults he infiltrates alike. All of these NPCs are nicely done, all different and memorable for the Game Master to roleplay, several of them suffering from the effects of years of service in the ministry. Lastly the sample characters provide a ready supply of generic NPCs and character archetypes, the latter either ready for the players to play as agents or the Game Master to develop as more detailed NPCs, the latter including Cover-Up Specialist, Field Agent, and Spiritual Guide.

Penultimately, the Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs provides some advice on handling investigations. Much of this is obvious, but one of the ministry’s missions is to prevent knowledge of the supernatural and the weird becoming knowledge, so understandably there is an emphasis in this advice on covering up signs and evidence of it. This includes containment, concocting cover stories, hiding the truth, handling witnesses, and pulling rank and status—of course a lady of good character or a gentleman who is a renowned big game hunter would confirm that what you saw was a wolf rather than a werewolf! Certainly all prospective agents should be aware of this given it is part of the ministry’s remit.

Physically, the Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs is generally well presented and written, though some of the artwork is disappointing. Unlike a lot of the supplements for Leagues of Gothic Horror, the Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs is not a must-have purchase. In comparison, if the Game  Master wants to focus more on vampires in her game, then she buys Guide to Vampires and if she wants to focus on werewolves, then Guide to Shapeshifters is an obvious purchase. Instead of providing supernatural threats to fight, the Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs instead gives a reason for the player characters to investigate and combat the unusual, a campaign set-up for the Game Master to work with, and a big cast of NPCs for the player characters to interact with. Overall, the Guide to the Ministry of Unusual Affairs is perfect for the Game Master who wants a campaign set-up with pulpy undertones and hopefully, there will be scenarios, perhaps even a campaign, supporting the activities of Her Majesty’s most secret ministry.

Leagues of Revenge

Most of the supplements and scenarios for Triple Ace Games’ Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration  and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! and its expansion, Leagues of Gothic Horror (and its expansion, Leagues of Cthulhu) are written by the game’s designer, Paul ‘Wiggy’ Wade-Williams, so it is a pleasing change to see that the latest scenario for the line is penned by a different author. Published by a successful Kickstarter campaign, Ghost Writer is written by Walt Ciechanowski, the author of Le Mousquetaire Déshonoré, the campaign for All For One: Régime Diabolique. This is, as the title suggests, a ghost story, and being a ghost story for Leagues of Gothic Horror is a florid, melodramatic affair, a tale of revenge from beyond the grave.

The scenario has few if any requirements beyond access to Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! and Leagues of Gothic Horror. The Game Master may find that having access to Leagues of Gothic Horror: Guide to Apparitions be useful, but it is not necessary in order to run Ghost Writer as full details of the apparition and how to run it are included in its pages. Similarly, Globetrotters’ Guide to London may also be useful, but is not required to run the scenario. Although the globetrotters will have to defend themselves at various times throughout the scenario, Ghost Writer is not a combat-focused affair, instead emphasising investigation and horror and the social attitudes of ‘Mauve Decade’ in late Victorian London. The scenario works best if the globetrotters have a Mentalist or Mystic amongst their number, especially one who has the Second Sight Exotic Talent as that will give them an edge in facing the antagonist at the heart of the scenario.

Ghost Writer is set in London in the middle of 1891. It begins with an invitation, the player characters receiving tickets for the premiere of a new opera, Boudicea, at Richard D’Oyly Carte’s newly opened Royal English Opera House. (Other hooks are included, from a mentalist having a premonition to the globetrotters actually being members of the cast or back stage crew, but the default is the invitation.) The Royal English Opera House’s first opera, Ivanhoe, produced by Arthur Sullivan of Gilbert and Sullivan fame, has been a big success and it is hoped that Boudicea, proudly proclaimed to be based on a lost play by William Shakespeare will be equally as successful. The premiere—a formal, top hat and tails affair—goes off with nary a hitch and the reception prior to the performance is the perfect opportunity for the Globetrotters to meet any interesting or important personage of note that the Game Master wishes. Several of them are already in attendance of course, but there is plenty of room for more. 

Unfortunately as the evening comes to a close, a strange fog seems to settle in over the streets of the city and by morning there will come the news that the opera’s composer has been pulled from the Thames dead. There is the possibility that the globetrotters will have been nearby when it happened, but if not, they will learn of it the next day. They will also be contacted by Sir Reginald Jellicoe, the producer of Boudica, in the morning to look into the matter for him—initially to locate the missing composer if neither the globetrotters or Sir Reginald are yet aware of his death or to ensure that it does not reflect poorly upon the production when they are.

Once engaged, the globetrotters will find themselves faced by a number of problems. Not just the matter of the increasing desperate ghost who seems to enshroud its victims in a seaborne fog of an unnatural origins, but also a worried, verging on neurotic, Sir Reginald, and an investigating police inspector who is the epitome of ‘Mister Plod’. Inspector Martin Chumley (!) is a by-the-book, the most obvious solution is the correct solution, ‘open and shut’ case type of officer whose brusque approach to each murder will all too soon frustrate the globetrotters. The Game Master though, will probably have a huge amount of fun in portraying Inspector Chumley as pompously as she possibly can. In general though, the investigation, which in the main takes in London’s theatre district, some of its less salubrious areas, and just a few of its more genteel sitting rooms, manages to be reasonably detailed and relatively complex without being too convoluted.

Ghost Writer should not prove too difficult a scenario for the Game Master to run. In fact, it would be relatively easy for the Game Master to adapt its plot to the system of her choice (if not the setting). It is not quite perfect though. The main issue is that it is not quite as obvious as it should be which scenes are optional and which are not. Some are obvious, some not. Another issue, is that in some scenes the players are expected to make tests that do not necessarily add to the play of the scenario. Nor is it helped that the book does not always present the information in the way it claims it does. That though, is primarily a problem with the editing and the organisation, both of which could be better. A last issue is that perhaps to an English eye, the author does not quite get mores of the period quite right, but really that is a very minor issue and few players are likely to spot them anyway.

Physically, Ghost Writer is generally well presented and written. Though some of the artwork is disappointing, much of it is pleasing ghoulishly melodramatic. Thus, these illustrations set the tone for what is a dramaturgic ghost mystery. Ghost Writer delivers what it promises—murder, mystery, a curse, death from beyond the grave, forbidden love, and a plummy, melodramtic gothic tale. It just needs a Game Master to ham it up!

The Ubiquity of Lovecraft

Winner of the People’s Choice award for Best Role-Playing Expansion at UK Games Expo 2018, Leagues of Cthulhu is a supplement for use with Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! and its expansion, Leagues of Gothic Horror. Published by Triple Ace Games following a successful Kickstarter campaign, Leagues of Cthulhu is written for use with the Ubiquity System,  and draws on the writings—but not the attitudes—of author H.P. Lovecraft to present new skills, talents, and flaws; leagues and archetypes; sanity mechanics, magic, and manuscripts; and a gazetteer of Mythos threats and locations, plus Game Master advice. All together, Leagues of Cthulhu not only brings the Cthulhu Mythos to the 1890s of Leagues of Adventure and Leagues of Gothic Horror, because it employs the Ubiquity System—first used in ExileStudio’s Hollow Earth Expedition—it also brings the Cthulhu Mythos to other roleplaying games which uses those mechanics. So, want to bring Cosmic horror to the Hollow Earth of Hollow Earth Expedition, the Mars of Space: 1889, the seventeenth century France of All for One: Régime Diabolique, or the post-apocalypse of Desolation, then Leagues of Cthulhu is the obvious supplement to refer to.

The starting point for any Roleplaying Game of Lovecraftian investigative horror is of course, the works of H.P. Lovecraft—and that is where Leagues of Cthulhu begins—and ends. The focus is thus on a limited number of entities—gods and creatures—as well as tomes and spells, with an emphasis on forbidden knowledge, the advancement of science without moral guidance, and dangerous secrets. This means that both focus and supplement possesses a certain purist approach. That said, the use of the Ubiquity System means that the mechanics pull Leagues of Cthulhu towards a Pulp feel and sensibility. It also keeps contents of the supplement quite trim.

This all starts with the addition of a single skill to Leagues of Adventure and Leagues of Gothic Horror, but it is the only pertinent skill. ‘Elder Lore’ covers knowledge of the Great Old Ones, the alien races associated with them, and more, and is divided into five specific Disciplines—Artefacts, Creatures, Great old Ones, Locations, and Tomes. It is learned through exposure to the Mythos, the reading of Forbidden Books, and going mad, each of which earns a globetrotter—as player characters are known in Leagues of Adventure—Eldritch Experience Points. These can only be spent on improving the Elder Lore skill and their expenditure is mandatory, which means that if a globetrotter has accrued enough Eldritch Experience Points to purchase a Level in the Elder Skill, then he must. Of course, this will have a deleterious effect upon the globetrotter’s Sanity. Elder Lore can be used just like any skill, but given that it deals with knowledge beyond the understanding of man, such knowledge is far from exact… (which enables the Game Master to be deliberately vague.) 

In general, the mechanic scales the range of a player character sanity to between one and ten, in line with the skill range, but still manages to keep it relatively nuanced, especially with the specialisations for the Elder Lore skill. This goes hand-in-hand with an increase in the Horror rating from between one and five to between one and ten. This reflects the greater scope and overwhelming impact of the Mythos and its entities. 

In terms of Talents, those new to Leagues of Cthulhu are mostly Flaws as much as they are Talents, so are perfectly Lovecraftian. They are Bloodlines, such as Jermyn and Pickman, and they all have their advantages, but they have their downsides too. The exact nature of their negative side is kept hidden in the Game Master’s section. This being a Leagues of Adventure supplement, there are also new leagues, essentially clubs or societies focussed on particular interests. The Aeon Club is for those who have had encounters with the Mythos and is primarily a support club for survivors, although it does conduct and collect some knowledge, whereas the Hounds of Nodens will take some proactive against the Mythos. Several new pieces of weird science are given, each intended to aid in facing or recovering from facing the Mythos. Three sample characters are described in detail—Book Dealer, Fearful Academic, and Questing Mariner—and done in rather nice detail. It is a pity that there are just the three of them. 

Where in Leagues of Adventure, the Magical Aptitude Talent is required to cast magic, in Leagues of Cthulhu magic is wholly democratic. Anyone can learn it, that is if they are foolish or desperate enough to want to, have access to a mentor, or can study from a tome. Certain rituals, such as Augury, Healing, and Rewind Time, from Leagues of Gothic Horror do not fit the Cosmic Horror of Leagues of Cthulhu, and so are not used. Instead, most of the given rituals consist of Call, Commune, and Summon type spells, and these are joined by the expected rituals such as Elder Sign and Voorish Sign. Leagues of Cthulhu greatly parrs the spell list down in comparison to other Roleplaying Games of Lovecraftian investigative horror. This does mean that the Call, Commune, and Summon spells are genericised somewhat, but the Game Master should add elements and aspects to made the demands of such casting, if not more demanding, then more flavourful.

In comparison, the treatment of Eldritch Tomes is more detailed and flavoursome. All of the classics are included—the Necronomicon (of course), Cultes des Ghouls, Von Unaussprechlichen Kulten, The King in Yellow, Nameless Cults, and so on—as well as some interesting new ones, such as My Journey to the Inner World by Jeff Combos-Tower and the Winkelgleichungen Zum Queren Der Dimensionen by Patric Götz. These are all drawn from Lovecraft’s own fiction, and this continues with the gazetteer and bestiary. The former takes the reader from Africa and the Americas to the Ocean Floor and Other Worlds, and at twenty-five pages in length, is the longest section in the volume. In each case, it provides a continental—or larger—sized overview, before focusing on specific places. So, in Africa, the Ugandan Ruins from the short story ‘Winged Death’ and Queen Nitocris’ Tomb from ‘The Outsider’ and ‘Imprisoned with the Pharaohs’; Arkham and The Witch House from ‘Dreams in the Witch House’ in the Americas; the eponymous cities from ‘The Nameless City’ and ‘The Doom that Came to Sarnath’; the Black Museum from ‘The Hound’ and Kilderry Bog from ‘The Moon-Bog’; and so on. It does deviate a little by including The Black Monolith from Robert E. Howard’s ‘The Black Stone’, but every location is accorded a solid description as well as an adventure hook.

For its treatment of the Great Old Ones, Leagues of Cthulhu takes a leaf out of Trail of Cthulhu, Pelgrane Press’ roleplaying game of Lovecraftian investigative horror, by giving them but a single stat. Here it is their Horror Rating, the point being that such entities cannot be killed in the material sense. They can be contacted, communed with, and summoned, necessitating the learning of the spells earlier in the supplement. The horrors themselves, the lesser entities, creatures, alien races, and servitors, from the Black Spawn of Tsathoggua, Black Winged One, and Colour Out of Space to Shoggoth, Spawn of Cthulhu, and Spawn of Shub-Niggurath, are given stats, since they can be affected on the material realm. Less dangerous foes, mainly because they lack a Horror Rating, come in the form of cults and their leading proponents, for example, Pierre Deveraux for the Church of Starry Wisdom. Rounding this out are write-ups of various notables of the Mythos, some anathema to the Mythos, such Doctors George Gammell Angell and Henry Armitage, others anathema to mankind, such as Keziah Mason and Lavinia Whateley.

Lastly, as well as listing the skeletons in the closet for each of the Bloodline Talents given earlier in the supplement, Leagues of Cthulhu closes with some advice on running a game of Lovecraftian investigative horror for the Leagues of Adventure and Leagues of Gothic Horror Game Master. It sets the default Style of Play as Dark, emphasises how Leagues of Cthulhu is very much an investigative game rather than one of action or exploration, and provides guidance as to how clues should be used to help rather than hinder the player characters. It also points out that being set in the Mauve Decade of the 1890s, the Leagues of Cthulhu setting is set before and therefore not bound by the canon of Lovecraft’s writings, so the Game Master has more of a free rein when creating investigations and mysteries of her own. The advice is borne of years of experience with other roleplaying games of Lovecraftian investigative horror and so both useful and to the point.

Physically, Leagues of Cthulhu is slim hardback done in full colour with some rather nice pieces of artwork. The writing is to the point and in keeping with the supplement’s trimmed down treatment of the Mythos. 

One issue with Leagues of Cthulhu is that it is a supplement of a supplement, so to get the fullest out of it, the Game Master will need Leagues of Gothic Horror as well as Leagues of Adventure. To counter that, Leagues of Cthulhu does not repeat anything from either the roleplaying game or the supplement. This leaves Leagues of Cthulhu to focus on the Mythos without any extraneous content which would have increased its page count unnecessarily—though the Easter Eggs might count.

If Leagues of Cthulhu is missing anything, it is a mystery, a scenario, for the globetrotters to investigate and discover the dangers of Cosmic Horror which lurk beyond all that this good and wholesome. That though is a matter of space, though hopefully Triple Ace Games will rectify this soon. If there is an issue with the treatment of the Mythos in Leagues of Cthulhu, it is in the inclusion of the spell, True Name of Azathoth, which when uttered has the power to drive even the Great Old Ones from the Material Plane, if only temporarily. It is a potent spell and perhaps the ready answer to confronting any Mythos entity, but whilst both difficult and horrifying to cast, its inclusion not only partly negates the threat that is Cosmic Horror, it makes it ever so slightly mundane. This is because once a group of investigators has used it once, what is to stop them from using it again? After all, this is what a group of players would really have their characters do...

Ultimately, what Leagues of Cthulhu does is shift Leagues of Adventure: A Rip-Roaring Setting of Exploration and Derring Do in the Late Victorian Age! and Leagues of Gothic Horror further away from scenarios focusing on exploration and adventure to those focusing on investigation, specifically investigation into the manifestations of Cosmic Horror which threaten the globetrotters’ sanity, let alone the future of mankind and the planet! It does this with a neatly trimmed down treatment of the Cthulhu Mythos that draws primarily on Lovecraft’s own writings to provide a Purist approach for use with what would otherwise be the Pulp mechanics of the Ubiquity System. Leagues of Cthulhu opens up the Cthulhu Mythos to Leagues of Adventure and the Ubiquity System in both an efficient and effective manner, ready to drive us insane whatever the setting.