Whimsy and Wonder, and Yet?

Neverland is that faraway land where Peter Pan and the Lost Boys frolic and play, fairies gather in revelries, Captain James Hook connives and seeks vengeance against Peter Pan for cutting off his hand, the mermaids croon and scheme—and of course, children never grow up. As told in J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan; or, the Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up, it is also the island and land to which Peter Pan brought the Darling children—Wendy, John, and Michael—to be the family that he never had. It is a story of growing up and accepting the responsibilities of becoming an adult, and putting childish things behind you, that is, part from Peter Pan himself. In the process, they lose the way to Neverland. In other tellings of the tale, Peter Pan becomes a story about what is lost—which of course, is childhood—and then reclaiming it. Yet what if the adults could find their way to Neverland, three adults in particular, and grow old? What if Wendy, John, and Michael Darling found their back to Neverland? What would they become? Would their presence change the island? Would Peter Pan notice? These are some of the themes explored in Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting, a hexcrawl designed for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition.

Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting is published by Andrew McMeels Publishing—best known for publishing ZWEIHÄNDER Grim & Perilous RPG—and features a roleplaying interpretation of Neverland, richly detailed across twenty-four hexes, over one hundred monsters, creatures, and NPCs, fourteen or factions, and numerous locations. The latter includes coral caves, Gnome hamlets, the Home Underground where Peter Pan and his Lost Boys have made their hideout, an inverted home to a lich, an amphitheatre dedicated to mermaid performances, Captain Hook’s ship the Jolly Roger, and the very Crocodile who hunts for the rest of Captain Hook, which can actually be explored as if it was an actual dungeon!

From the outset, Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting is very much a book for the Dungeon Master, beginning with a very clear explanation of who’s who on Neverland and the various factions on the island. They include all three of the Darlings—all grown up, Peter Pan and his Lost Boys, Captain Hook and his crew, and much more. There is a wide array of factions on the island, all of them drawn from Peter Pan; or, the Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up, but many of them unlikely to be unfamiliar to the players since they are more likely to be familiar with works based on the play rather than the play itself. It should be noted that in drawing from the original source, Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting also updates one or two of them, since attitudes towards certain groups and words have changed in the century or so since the original play was performed.

Rules also cover travelling and exploring across the island—including, if the Player Characters can get sufficient fairy dust, the ability to fly, and using the Mermaids’ secret whirlpools and the Lost Boys’ hollow trees, the island’s daily cycle and movement of the Crocodile. Fun and recreation includes games of Hurling, Gnome Fairs, and Pirate Parties, whilst advanced rules cover chase sequences, and the dangers of harvesting from the dead—also pointing to a scarcity of resources on the island, and of harnessing the powers of a star, which can be used by non-spellcasters to cast spells appropriate to their personality. The huge Cast covers numerous monsters and creatures, as well as the various characters from Peter Pan, including the eponymous hero, the Darlings, Captain Hook and his crew, and more…

In comparison, the section devoted to the island of Neverland feels a little short, with just the one page devoted to each of its twenty-four hexes. Each page includes a larger view of the hex in question—taken from the larger isometric map of Neverland, a short description, a note of the timed events which occur twice daily, and a quintet of tables which can be used to generate encounters. These can occur every hour, and since it takes four hours—or a Clock in ‘island time’—to cross a hex, every hex can be very busy. Many of the hexes are also the locations of key places on the island, and whilst these are mentioned, they are not cross-referenced, making the flipping between the two in the book that little bit awkward. The various locations, whether a dungeon or a ship or an inverted tower or a mine, and so forth, are each given a page each, so feel a little more expansive than the pages devoted to individual hexes.

Besides various tables which provide adventure hooks, animals, fairy trades and tricks, locations, loot, Lost Boy traps, Mermaid games, objects, trinkets and trophies, and more, the book comes with ‘Tales from Neverland’, a set of eight short stories presented as extra chapters to the original Peter Pan story. They are each a very quick read, and can serve as inspiration, hooks, clues, and the like. They do add some flavour and perhaps a little context for the Dungeon Master, but nothing more. Rounding out Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting is not only a bibliography, but also a sketchbook. This collection of sketches, finished pieces, and notes nicely charts the development of the look of the book and its art. Its inclusion undoubtedly adds to the charm of Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting.

However, as rich and as well-presented as Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting actually is, there is a handful questions that it does not effectively address. These include, “What do I do with this?”, “How do I get there?”, and “What do I play?”. There is some initial discussion of the book’s themes, but it is all too brief. Then, at the end of the book, the author provides six ready-to-play pre-generated Player Characters, ranging from a Big Game Hunter or Ranger and Child Pickpocket or Thief to Holy Orphan or Cleric and Stranded Pirate or Fighter. All of these are done as Humans and all have reasons for being on the island, and together the hextet feel just a very little like the adventurers from the Dungeons & Dragons cartoon in being from the ordinary world and cast into the land of dreams that is Neverland. They also suggest reasons why Player Characters might end up in Neverland, but beyond this, there is a lack of advice for Dungeon Master on what Classes and types of characters the players might play, how they might get to Neverland, and what they do when they get there. To some degree this is offset with tables of random and specific adventure ideas, plot hooks, and rumours, but whilst the author states that they are there if the Dungeon Master is stuck as to what to do next, what if the Dungeon Master is stuck at the start?

Another issue is with the monsters. Including variations, there are over one hundred of them, and whilst that gives Neverland and the Dungeon Master variety aplenty, it does feel like a lot for a twenty-four hex hexcrawl and the likelihood is that many of them the Dungeon Master may never bring into play. Now that is not necessarily a bad thing, but with that many entries in the bestiary or cast list as Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting terms it, not all of them are given the descriptions that they deserve, forcing the Dungeon Master to rely upon their illustrations to describe them. Which is disappointing.

Physically, Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting is a beautiful book, done in rich blocks of greys and blacks, reds and green. The layout is crisp and clean and the book itself is an easy read. The cartography is also good. However, the book could have been better organised, especially when it comes to cross referencing the locations in the text and the placement of the random tables which come in the middle of the book rather than at the end where again they might be easier to find.

Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting is a rich and detailed setting, one which takes the whimsy and wonder of the source material, Peter Pan; or, the Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up, and makes it somewhere that the Player Characters can explore and perhaps discover the darker secrets of the island. It is beautifully presented, but ultimately, it needs more effort upon the part of the Dungeon Master to bring to the table and to draw her players in than perhaps it should.

An Alpha Primer

The Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook is the second setting supplement for Modiphius Entertainment’s Star Trek Adventures roleplaying game following on from the Beta Quadrant Sourcebook. It is home to Federation member worlds such as Betazed and Tellar Prime, but its dominant powers are the Klingon Empire and Romulan Star Empire. However, these are not the focus of the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook, which pushes out to the frontier where fractious borders exist between the Federation and the Cardassian Union, the Breen Confederacy, and the Tholian Assembly, whilst the Ferengi Alliance pursues between them all. Further, the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook pushes out to the nexus of the conflict in the region—the planet Bajor, Deep Space 9, and the Wormhole (although the supplement is not a Deep Space 9 sourcebook)—and on a further year into 2372 from the 2371 of Star Trek Adventures and the Beta Quadrant Sourcebook. Although there are mentions of them here and there, the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook is not a sourcebook for a campaign setting during the periods of Star Trek: The Original Series or Star Trek: Enterprise.

The slimmest book to date for Star Trek Adventures, the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook is essentially a series of briefings given by Benjamin Sisko, the commander of Deep Space 9, to a Starfleet starship captain assigned to the quadrant. In turn, it covers the recent history of the quadrant with the recent liberation of Bajor from Cardassian occupation by the Bajoran Resistance, the discovery of the Wormhole through to the Gamma Quadrant, incursions by the strange forces of the Dominion from the other side of the Wormhole, and the Klingon Empire’s withdrawal from the Khitomer Accords which have maintained peace between the Klingons and the Federation for decades. Three worlds of the Federation are covered in some detail, Betazed, Denobula—probably the prime section of information for a Star Trek: Enterprise campaign in the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook, and Tellar Prime, the latter completing coverage of the founding members of the United Federation of Planets. These are presented in some detail, not just Betazoid physiology, but also their political structure, legal system, culture, important locations, and more. There is a lot of nice background here, such as the Temple of the Great Houses where information about the no longer existing Great Betazoid Houses is kept, but which can be restored if descendants can be found; Quok’lox Trash Island on Denobula where everything on planet that cannot be recycled is kept and is rumoured to be home to Denobulans living apart from the rest of the planet; and the difficulties of Tellarite-Andorian relations, the former with their love of antagonistic debate, the latter with their propensity for martial action. Bajor, the Cardassian Union, the Ferengi Alliance, the Tzenkethi Coalition, the Breen Confederacy, and the Tholian Assembly are all given similar treatment, so for Bajor it looks at the effects of the Cardassian Occupation, the Provisional Government, Bajoran spirituality, whilst Deep Space 9 and the Wormhole are detailed under Places of interest. Full stats are given for Starbase Deep Space 9 as well. Included in the background to the Cardassian Union are details of Maquis, the resistance movement that resulted from the Federation-Cardassian treaty of 2370 which created the DMZ and saw some colony worlds transferred to the Cardassian Union, whilst the Rules of Acquisition are discussed in the section on the Ferengi Alliance. Various worlds of the Cardassian Union and the Ferengi Alliance are also described.

From the Arbazan and the flight-cable, bewinged Aurelians—complete with rules for flight—to the Ktarians and the Zaranites, the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook introduces eleven new species available as playable options, including the Ferengi, whilst the inclusion of the feline Caitains and the tripedal Edosians are sure to please fans of the Star Trek: The Animated Series. Some ten starships are detailed for the Cardassians, the Ferengi, the Breen, the Talarians, and the Tholians. These range from the Cardassion Hideki-Class Corvette and Keldon-Class Heavy Cruiser to the Spinner and Weaver vessels of the Tholian Assembly. As in other supplements for Star Trek Adventures, these are poorly illustrated, or not all, and as with the Beta Quadrant Sourcebook, there are no starships given for the Federation, but again, this is less of an issue.

Rounding out the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook, its ‘Encounters and Adversaries’ explore some campaign ideas and present various NPCs across the Demilitarized Zone, the Badlands, and the Federation Border. As well as background they come with encounter seeds and campaign ideas, such as a Maquis-themed campaign and a Federation Border campaign, and write-ups of major NPCs such as Gul Dukat, Ro Laren, Michael Eddington, and Thomas Riker. These are all useful and the campaign ideas point towards the potential of the Alpha Quadrant and the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook.

There is a wealth of detail in the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook, especially when it focuses upon the various polities at the far reaches of the quadrant and their particular worlds. The write-ups of the Betazed, Denobula, and Tellar Prime are all decent, as are those of the Cardassian Union and Ferengi Alliance, and the campaign ideas and adversaries all support the material in the supplement. Yet, the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook is far from perfect. Its problems are fivefold. First, it is not the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook, but the ‘Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook in 2372’, so there is no timeline and no sense of history to the region as if nothing really happened until recently. Second, it covers just a handful of worlds and third, whilst it gives numerous new species to play or use as NPCs, it does not give them a great deal of background or details of their worlds. In many cases, they are not illustrated either, leaving the Game Master to work with some really underwritten descriptions—for example, the reader is left with no idea what the Tzenkethi look like. Fourth, there is an avoidance of the technical elements that a Science Fiction setting and roleplaying game would seem to want. So, in addition to the lack of a timeline and the lack of illustrations for certain species, starships are not illustrated when detailed, worlds are pictured, but not mapped, and so on. Fifth, the writing is often unengaging, especially in the case of the sidebars, which all too often add flavour but not substance.

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

Ultimately, just like the Beta Quadrant Sourcebook, the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook has much to cover—and it is a lot—but it is not quite up to the job. Again, there are whole sections, like the Cardassian Union and the Ferengi Alliance, the Badlands and the Demilitarised Zone, which could have had whole sourcebooks and campaigns of their own devoted to them, and as good as the information is on say, the Cardassian Union and the Ferengi Alliance, the Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook does not feel comprehensive. Further, the focus on the one period of Deep Space 9 and relations with the Cardassian Union and Bajor, do leave the treatment of both the rest of the Alpha Quadrant and its history lacking by comparison. The Alpha Quadrant Sourcebook is interesting and informative, but it never gets away from feeling like an introduction to a sourcebook on Deep Space 9 or the Cardassian Union, and again, the Game Master is left wanting more.

Friday Fantasy: The Coral Tower of Naaman al-Raman

The abandoned wizard’s tower is almost as much a cliché for Dungeons & Dragons as the dungeon below ground is, but the joy of coming to an abandoned wizard’s tower (or indeed, a dungeon) in Dungeons & Dragons is seeing what the author has done with it to make it is own, to make it stand out, and to make it different. The Coral Tower of Naaman al-Raman is an adventure designed for Player Characters of Fifth Level by Louis Counter for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition which involves an abandoned wizard’s tower. It scores points for originality by not being just another run-of-the-mill abandoned wizard’s tower ready to be dropped into the cod-medieval setting of the Dungeon Master’s choice, but by being set in Zakhara, the Land of Fate, from TSR, Inc.’s setting inspired by One Thousand and One Nights and the Hollywood cinema which drew from it, as detailed in Al-Qadim: Arabian Adventures and Al-Qadim: Land of Fate. This places it to the southeast of Faerûn, the Forgotten Realms, with the Coral Tower of the title being specifically in the foothills of the Furrowed Mountains southwest of the village of Talv, some days travel to the southeast of Muluk, ‘The City Of Kings’. Of course, the scenario can be moved elsewhere in Al-Qadim, and even elsewhere bearing in mind that the scenario involves Djinn, Efreet, Dao, and Marid—as well as their rivalries, relationships, and politics, which firmly place the scenario in Al-Qadim, or at least settings with similar Arabic elements.

The Coral Tower of Naaman al-Raman is designed for Player Characters of Fifth Level and does not require any characters of specific Classes. That said, The Coral Tower of Naaman al-Raman is an abandoned wizard’s tower, so arcane spellcasters will be useful and since the scenario involves Djinn, Efreet, Dao, and Marid—as well as their rivalries, relationships, and politics, a Sha’ir will be useful. Three adventure hooks are given to get the Player Characters involved. Two involve the Player Characters being hired to recover a gem known as The Liquid Heart, one by a Marid, Oshaba Abu Zobaah, the other by a Dao, Ynadin. The third suggests that the Player Characters are attracted by the possibility of the treasures to be found in the Coral Tower of Naaman al-Raman. These do feel underwhelming, especially the third, and especially given that the hook does not suggest or hint as to what treasures might be found within.

The Coral Tower of Naaman al-Raman of course stands alone. Its lower floors have been occupied by an evil shepherd and his guard ‘dogs’ and both they and one or two middle floors have suffered from being exposed to the elements. The lower floors because the shepherd and his guard ‘dogs’ do not care and the middle floors appear to have suffered some kind of explosion. Could that have been the cause of Naaman al-Raman’s disappearance? The explosion has also caused a break in the tower—which is still standing despite the break—and this likely to initially impede the Player Characters’ progress until they can find a way up. Fortunately, the means is provided for them to bridge the gap. It is worth the effort, for this is where the tower gets interesting and more detailed. There is a strong sense of the elements and the elemental races native to Al-Qadim to the descriptions given of various rooms and locations, with paintings which appear to give off the natural light of the elemental regions they depict. It has a slightly weird, almost ethereal feel to it in one or two of the rooms, and whilst there are monsters, the Player Characters will find themselves being faced with puzzles just as much fights. There is also plenty of treasure to be had, though none of it comes in the form of coins and indeed, very little of it in the form of traditional magical items. That may be disappointing to some players and their characters. It would have been nice if a few more the books to be found within the tower had been given titles.

Ultimately, The Coral Tower of Naaman al-Raman is lacking a climax. Not necessarily a final boss battle, but at least the option for the Dungeon Master to stage one. With a Marid and a Dao both wanting The Liquid Heart, a standoff between the two seems like a great way to end the Player Characters’ explorations. Plus, The Liquid Heart is also underwhelming in the sense that it is at best a MacGuffin—but it could have been more, perhaps with its own power and then the opportunity for the  Player Characters to wield some of that power (or even The Liquid Heart to wield one of them!). 

Physically, the layout for The Coral Tower of Naaman al-Raman is basic, but tidily presented. It does need an edit and behind its decent cover, the scenario is unillustrated. Instead, it is left up to the floor plans of the tower to break up the text. These are drawn by the ever-dependable Dyson Logos and so are good as you would expect. However, the floor plans for his ‘shattered wizard tower’ are released under a free, royalty-free, commercial licence which does mean that they are not original and they will be used elsewhere (such as ‘The Tower of Jayúritlal’ in The Excellent Travelling Volume Issue No. 11). There is thus, a certain familiarity to them, a chance—a slim one, but a chance that they might be recognised. However, what is interesting about their use here and elsewhere, is just like the very nature of the abandoned wizard’s tower, seeing how another author approaches them and details them.

Where The Coral Tower of Naaman al-Raman really works is its use of themes and setting, the elements and the elemental races native to Al-Qadim, to detail the various rooms and locations of the Coral Tower. It enforces that setting as does the author’s tying in of Dao and Marid rivalries, relationships, and politics, and suggested link to the the Ruined Kingdoms campaign. It suffers though in terms of Player Character motivations and potential storytelling elements, but a good Dungeon Master can address those. Overall, The Coral Tower of Naaman al-Raman is a thematically enjoyable take upon the traditional abandoned wizard’s tower that needs a little more development in places.

Miskatonic Monday #58: Too Close to Home

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

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

—oOo—

Name: Too Close to Home

Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Benjamin Schäfer

Setting: Modern

Product: Scenario
What You Get: Twelve page, 31.04 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: “It isn't hard at all to make a wish. The difficultly lies in how to make what you wish for a reality.”
Plot Hook: A strangely impervious corpse, a missing funeral director, could they be connected?

Plot Support: Simple and straightforward plot, detailed location descriptions, four maps, four NPCs, and a single ‘monster’.

Production Values: Clean and tidy, well organised, and reasonable maps.

Pros
# Easy to adapt to other time periods
# Short one to two session scenario
# Nicely detailed locations

# Monster light

# Mythic mystery

Cons
# Mythic mystery
# Mythos light

# Monster light

# Potential for handouts, but no handouts

# Mystery might not be revealed

Conclusion
# Mythic mystery, which might not be revealed

# Short and ineffable

Thursday's Children

It is somewhen in the nineteenth century… It is the dawning of a new age, yet the relationships of the past age linger… For centuries, the peoples of Scandinavia have lived side by side with the Vaesen, supernatural creatures who helped out on the farms, gave a hand when it came to calving, ensured that lost children would find their way home, and kept everyone alive during the harsh winters of Northern Europe, and in return would receive milk and grain from the farms. As Scandinavia is changed by war and industrialisation and revolution and urbanisation and migration and sciences, the once symbiotic relationship between the people and the vaesen has been driven asunder. The ways of the country have been forgotten, few knowing how to appease the vaesen, and in turn the vaesen have turned aggressive, bloodthirsty, and wicked—snatching children where they once would have kept a watch over them, wrecking houses when once they would have swept them clean, and burning barns when once they would have driven out the vermin. In their wrath, they grow stronger and volatile, and the supernatural seems to spread as streams run with blood, calves are born with two heads, children are lost in the forests, and faeries skip into villages to lure the young maid and the handsome man away with them. The vaesen—Mermaids and Wood Wives, Werewolves and Witches, Revenants and Mylings, Sea Serpents and Kraken, and more, have become a threat and for the good of all, a solution must be found to their pernicious activities!

Yet there are those who have not forgotten the vaesen. In fact, it was an encounter with vaesen, perhaps a werewolf under the full moon or a troll under that bridge, which gave them the gift of the Sight, the ability to see vaesen, and made them each a Thursday’s Child. Some of those with the Sight have gathered at the headquarters of the Society, the old and decaying Castle Gyllencreutz by the Fyris River in Upsala, a city noted for the size of its Gothic cathedral and power of the Church, its large university, and recent which devastated much of the city. The Society was a body of men and women which for centuries had dedicated itself to the study and understanding of the vaesen, whose last members have been missing or resigned for at least a decade. As members of the newly re-established Society, they will travel across Scandinavia, seeking out vaesen, not to hunt them or take them as trophies, but to understand them and to help them, so that they will stop preying upon the peoples of Scandinavia. It is not a matter of taking force of arms to stop the vaesen, but to research them, to identify their weakness, and to use it against them. And despite their courage, conviction, and ability to see the supernatural, this is not without its dangers for members of the Society. Exposure to and confrontation with the vaesen and their strange abilities and the secrets of Scandinavia, will scar members of the Society, perhaps even permanently. However, duty and the lure of understanding will drive members of the Society to confront the vaesen for as long as they are able…

This is the set-up for Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying, a roleplaying game of investigative folklore horror set in nineteenth century Scandinavia, based on Vaesen: Spirits and Monsters of Scandinavian Folklore as collected and illustrated by Johan Egerkrans, and published by Free League Publishing. It is an investigative horror game set in Scandinavia during the nineteenth century, using the Year Zero engine first seen in Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days, and subsequently a wide array of roleplaying games from Tales from the Loop – Roleplaying in the '80s That Never Was to Forbidden Lands – Raiders & Rogues in a Cursed World. Although suitable for oneshot scenarios, Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying is designed for campaign, the Player Characters expected to return from their investigations into the vaesen to Castle Gyllencreutz where they have the chance to recover from and ruminate on their encounters and discoveries, explore the castle and perhaps uncover its secrets and facilities, make friends and allies in the community at large, and hopefully ward off the unwanted attention and intrusion of the curious, the superstitious, and the sceptical… To that end, Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying provides the means to create characters, investigate and confront the vaesen, develop and explore Castle Gyllencreutz, details of the various types of vaesen with some twenty or so fully described, advice for the Game Master, and ‘The Dance of Dreams’, a complete introductory mystery.

A Player Character in Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying is defined by his age; Attributes and Skills; a Motivation, a Trauma, and a Dark Secret; a Talent and a relationship with another Player Character, a memento, and some equipment. Age sets the balance between Attributes and Skills, the Attributes of Physique, Precision, Logic, and Empathy being rated between two and five, Skills between one and five; Motivation explains why the Player Character is prepared to hunt down and confront vaesen, whilst Trauma explains why or how the Player Character gained the Sight; and the Dark Secret is something that the Player Character wants to keep. Each Talent is a trick or trait, such as Bookworm which provides a bonus to the Learning Skill or Nine Lives, which enables a player to switch the dice when rolling to determine what critical injury his character suffers. Talents are either tied to a particular Archetype or general, in which case, any character can select them later on in the game. A Memento is a possession which the Player Character holds dear, such as a dried red rose or a golden box from a distant land, and by interacting with it, help him overcome a Condition.

To create a character, a player has two options. The first is to choose an Archetype of which there are ten—Academic, Doctor, Hunter, Occultist, Officer, Priest, Private Detective, Servant, Vagabond,  and Writer. Each provides options for the player to choose from in terms of Names, Motivation, Trauma, Dark Secret, and Relationships, and lists the Archetype’s main Attribute and Skill, and suggested Talents and Equipment. The player also assigns points to his Attributes and Skills.

Our first sample character is Selma Nilsson, a middle-aged women who always wanted to be a writer, but her ambitions were thwarted by having to look after her sick mother, who also frowned on her desire to tell stories. Unable to complete any stories due to her mother’s influence, it was a great shock to discover upon her mother’s death that her mother had written stories herself. Not long after Selma published the first few of them, she was visited by a strange creature who cursed her for stealing its stories… And now she cannot complete any stories!

Name: Selma Nilsson
Age: Middle-Aged
Motivation: Revenge
Trauma: Cursed by a homeless vaettir to write a book in your own blood
Dark Secret: My life’s work is a lie
Relationship: Tries to win your appreciation (Doctor)

Physique 2
Precision 3
Logic 4
Empathy 5

Talent: Automatic Writing

Skills
Agility 0, Close Combat 0, Force 0, Inspiration 3, Investigation 0, Learning 2, Manipulation 1, Medicine 2, Observation 2, Ranged Combat 0, Stealth 0, Vigilance 2

Equipment: Writing utensils and paper, camera, pet dog
Memento: Gold jewellery worn by your mother

The other option is to create a character using the Background tables at the rear of the book. This covers everything from a Player Character’s Class, Upbringing, Profession—which determines his Archetype, to life events which can be rolled numerous times, aging the Player Character in the process. Both options are quick, but the Background tables add flavour and detail lacking in the simple method of picking an Archetype.

Our second sample character then is Oskar Dolk, a Vagabond whose strange capture and subsequent escape from a troll bag ultimately led him to the doors of Castle Gyllencreutz. Oskar Dolk is not his real name, but that of a fellow prisoner who Rolf served part of his sentence with. Rolf’s family were servants to the nobility, much put upon and unhappy in their lot, and after one too many beatings, he ran away and was captured by the troll. When he escaped and made his way home, his masters beat him some more and banished him from his former home. Forced to live on the road, he was first arrested for vagrancy, and then accused and imprisoned for theft. He later escaped, finding refuge with a former cellmate, Oskar Dolk, and when he died the next winter taking his identity.

Name: Oskar Dolk (Rolf Krabbe)
Age: Young
Class: Poor
Upbringing: Servant
Profession: Day Labourer
Motivation: Being liked
Trauma: Survived a week inside a troll bag
Dark Secret: Stolen identity

Relationship: Feigned gratitude (Hunter)
Life Events: Prison

Resources: 1

Physique 5
Precision 4
Logic 3
Empathy 3

Talent: Hobo Tricks

Skills
Agility 1, Close Combat 1, Force 1, Inspiration 0, Investigation 0, Learning 0, Manipulation 3, Medicine 0, Observation 2, Ranged Combat 0, Stealth 1, Vigilance 1

Equipment: Walking stick, knife, liquor, lockpicks
Memento: A scruffy cat

Mechanically, Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying uses the Year Zero engine, Free League Publishing’s house rules, which uses pools of six-sided dice. Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying uses a simpler version than first seen in Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days—so not Base (or Attribute) dice, Skill dice, and Gear dice, but simply Attribute and Skill dice, plus whatever bonus or penalty dice the Game Master awards, such as from the situation or a Talent. For a character to undertake an action, his player rolls dice equal to the character’s Attribute and Skill appropriate for that action. To succeed, all he needs to roll is typically one Success or six—though sometimes it may be more—on any of the dice. Extra Successes can be expended to gain various effects, such as gaining bonuses to further skill tests where the information will be useful in Observation tests or increase damage or inflict stress upon an enemy with Ranged Combat.

Where the Year Zero engine and Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying gets interesting is that if a player fails a roll, he can reroll or Push the test. A player rerolls everything bar the Successes already rolled to get more. In other iterations of the Year Zero engine, such as Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days and Forbidden Lands – Raiders & Rogues in a Cursed World, rolls of one in both the original roll and the pushed roll are kept and have negative effects upon the character, typically reducing temporarily, the Attribute used in the roll or damaging the item of equipment used. Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying does not use that mechanic and so there is not the degradation of Attributes or equipment as there are in those games. Instead, the character suffers a Condition if forced to Push a roll, the nature of the Condition depending upon if the action was physical or mental. So Exhausted, Battered, and Wounded are physical Conditions, whilst Angry, Frightened, and Hopeless are mental Conditions. The Condition only comes into effect after the dice roll has been made and its success or failure been determined. Each Condition of the same type reduces the number of dice rolled for the associated type of action and if a character acquires four Conditions of the same type, then he is Broken and cannot undertake any actions of that type.

For example, Oskar Dolk believes that the flop house he is staying in is haunted and the landlady knows what is causing it—he has determined that she is meeting something down in the cellar. He decides to creep down the stairs and spy on what is going on—this is what Oskar’s player states that his aim will be. The landlady has locked the cellar door behind her, but fortunately, Oskar has the late Rolf’s set of lockpicks. The Game Master sets the difficulty at one and Oskar’s player assembles the dice pool of five dice from his Precision Attribute and Stealth Skill. He rolls one, two, four, five, and five—so no Successes. His player decides to Push and pick up all of the dice again and rerolls them, this time rolling one, two four, five, and six, for one Success! However, Oskar also suffers a Condition, which will be a Physical one because Precision is a Physical Attribute. The Game Master selects Exhausted for him and suggests that he has not getting enough sleep and until Oskar addresses the Condition, his player will roll one less die on all physical tests.

Combat in Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying uses the same core mechanics, but adds tweaks to both initiative and actions. Initiative is handled by both players and Game Master drawing from a ten-card deck, numbered one to ten. Initiative then proceeds in ascending order, though some Talent allow Initiative to be changed and players can swap initiative cards if one character needs to act before another. Otherwise it remains the same throughout a fight. In combat itself, a character can perform two actions—a Fast Action and a Slow Action. The first might be a dodge, a parry, a swing of a heavy weapon before an actual attack with a heavy weapon, run, aim, and so on, whereas the second might be a slash with an edged weapon, stab with a pointed weapon, a taunt or persuade attempt, and so on. Fast Actions typically do not require dice rolls, whereas Slow Actions typically do.

One major change to the Year Zero engine is that damage suffered in combat does not directly degrade a character’s Attributes. Instead, it inflicts further Conditions, and once a character has suffered four Conditions of one type—Physical or Mental—and is Broken, he also suffers a Critical Injury, which is rolled randomly. Tables are provided for both Mental and Physical Critical Injuries, and can be defects or insights, as well as potentially fatal. So for example, a Physical Critical Injury might be a Knee injury, a defect which causes a skewed walk and reduces the character’s Agility skill by one, whereas a Coma grants the insight of Prophetic Vision for up to six days and a bonus to the Investigation skill. When the character returns to his headquarters, he has the choice to heal both defects and insights suffered or make them permanent.

Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying is a horror game and so has a Fear mechanic. This is either an Empathy or Logic test rolled against the Fear value of the Vaesen or the situation being faced. For example, a terrible situation such as encountering a werewolf or discovering the corpse of a child, has a Fear value of two and this is the number of a Successes a player must roll to avoid becoming Terrified. If this happens, a character suffers Conditions equal to the Fear value and must either flee, freeze, faint, or attack—the player’s choice. Like the rest of the mechanics in Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying, the Fear mechanic is simple, fast, and effective, as well as enforcing the fact investigating the vaesen is a collective endeavour—bonus dice are awarded for the number of characters present when a Fear test has to be made.

There is also a sense of the collective when it comes to the most immediate element of the setting for the Player Characters, the crumbling Castle Gyllencreutz, the headquarters of the Society in the city of Upsala. There a sense of mystery to the place, with doors locked and keys missing and sections closed up, but the Player Characters have the opportunity to improve the castle each time they return home from solving a mystery. Here there is a marked difference between Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days and Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying. At the end of each session or scenario in both roleplaying games, the Game Master asks questions of his players, such as “Did you play in the session?”, “Did you go somewhere new?”, and so on, and for each positive answer, a Player Character earns a Development Point. In Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days, the Player Characters invest their time and skill in improving their community—their ark—but in Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying, the Player Characters invest Development Points, which might otherwise be expended to improve Skills and Talents. As a consequence, there are more questions to be asked and potentially, the Player Characters can earn more of them. Upgrades to Castle Gyllencreutz come in the form of facilities, such as Butterfly House and Séance Parlour, Contacts, from Banker to Psychiatrist, and Personnel, from the Butler Algot Frisk (he more or less comes with the castle though) and Stable Boy.

There is a delightful scope for roleplaying in this aspect of Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying. The connections to the Contacts and Personnel can of course be roleplayed, but so can the Facilities. Essentially, the Player Characters do not so much simply purchase them, but they might find them behind a hidden door or find the key to a locked door, and so be restoring them rather than simply building them. There is a potential downside to every upgrade though, in that the growing Society can be faced with Threat, which is rolled for, such as a Journalist intent on exposing the Player Characters’ secrets at any cost or a bank clerk who comes to collect on an old debt connected to the castle’s previous owner, providing further opportunities for roleplaying.

The history of the Society is given in some detail, from the involvement of the young scientist Carl Linnaeus through to its relatively recent dissipation and refounding by the Player Characters. Beyond the Society, Upsala is explored in some detail, taking in its high points and low points, from Upsala University Hospital—the most modern in Sweden, and Upsala Botanical Garden of Upsala University to the Poorhouse and Wellspring Street 59 ( a highly disreputable brothel). In comparison, the Mythic North is explored in broader detail, taking in Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Denmark, the social upheavals which wrack the region throughout the nineteenth century, such as between country and city, science and faith, and so on. There is very much an ahistorical feel to the background, which lets the Game Master set her campaign at any time throughout the nineteenth century.

At the centre of Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying are the vaesen themselves. This covers their nature in general, but not necessarily defining ‘exactly’ what they are, simply categorising them into five broad types—nature spirits, familiars, shapeshifters, spirits of the dead, and monsters. Their magic is also presented—Enchantments (animals being born with defects or terrible storms), Curses (inflicting a sense of self-loathing or making someone lame), and Trollcraft (altering age or transforming victims into animals), all powerful, but clearly stated as being story tools rather than means of eliminating the Player Characters. It is possible for Player Characters to learn magic, but each spell or cure is treated as an individual skill and cannot be simply studied. Vaesen are simply defined, and mechanically, their actions are decided by the Game Master to suit the narrative rather than her rolling the dice. Similarly, the Player Characters do not test their skills defeat or banish any one vaesen. Instead their players describe what they do. If it matches the criteria, then the attempt to banish the vaesen automatically succeeds. The conflict here lies in discovering what the means of banishment actually is, protecting or defeating those persons who have fallen under the vaesen’s sway, making the preparations, keeping the vaesen from attacking them, and so on.

Each of the twenty-one vaesen in Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying, from the Ash Tree Wife, Brook Horse, and Church Grim to the Werewolf, Will-o’-the-Wisp, and Wood Wife, is given a two-page spread. Along with some flavour text and a description, this lists its magical powers, the Conditions it suffers if the Player Characters do manage to hurt it, the ritual required to banish it, and a trio of example conflicts, essentially each one a scenario hook the Game Master can develop into a fuller mystery. This is in addition to hooks scattered throughout the book. As a side note, Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying looks at vaesen around the world, so that although no stats are given, a Game Master could set her campaign elsewhere other than the Mythic North with some effort. The write-ups of the vaesen are accompanied by an excellent guide to what makes up a mystery—atmosphere, clues, locations, the conflicts at the heart of the mystery, and so on, plus its structure and advice for the Game Master. The structure is broken down into a series of eight steps, from the prologue where the Player Characters can have a scene each in Upsala and an Invitation which gives them the reason to go to the country location where a vaesen is proving to be a problem, to the confrontation with the vaesen and its aftermath. Along with the good advice for Game Master, this is a solid chapter, and it even comes with suggestions as to how to make each mystery and a campaign, more like traditional fairy tales.

Rounding out Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying is ‘The Dance of Dreams’, a short mystery designed to start a campaign. It is a nice little haunting tale tied back into the history of the Society and its secrets, whilst also laying the foundation for scenarios and content to come.

Physically, Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying is simply lovely. It is richly illustrated by Johan Egerkrans, drawing on his Vaesen: Spirits and Monsters of Scandinavian Folklore, and gives the roleplaying game a consistently singular look throughout. The book is very well written, being engaging and easy to read throughout. The book also feels good in the hand, with a tactile cover and off-white pages which give it the look of a period tome.

There can be no doubt that Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying is a beautiful book, there being something mythical, almost lyrical and fairy tale-like in Johan Egerkrans’ artwork. It sets the tone and style for the roleplaying game, whose tried and trusted Year Zero mechanics have been tweaked to support its ‘monster-mystery’ style of play—a style of play that ultimately emphasises brains over brawn. Vaesen – Nordic Horror Roleplaying is a superb horror roleplaying game, one which takes a different take upon the genre and a different take upon the period, and one which begs to be played.

1981: The Legend of the Sky Raiders

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

—oOo—

It is often forgotten that in its first swashbuckling few years, that much of the background that we know of today as the Third Imperium in GDW’s first roleplaying game, Traveller, was developed in conjunction with other parties. Whole sectors would be parcelled out to third parties to develop and publish content about. For example, Judges Guild developed the Ley Sector, FASA the Far Frontiers Sector, and Paranoia Press both The Beyond and the Vanguard Reaches Sectors. Much of this content would subsequently be declared non-canonical, but in the case of FASA, it was where the publisher got its start in gaming before developing roleplaying games based on licences, such as Star Trek: The Role Playing Game and The Doctor Who Role Playing Game, and its own properties, such as BattleTech, Shadowrun, and Earthdawn. However, Traveller is where the publisher got its start and many of FASA’s titles for Traveller are still highly regarded—especially those written by the prolific J. Andrew Keith and William H. Keith, Jr. Perhaps none more so than the ‘Sky Raiders’ trilogy—The Legend of the Sky Raiders, The Trail of the Sky Raiders, and Fate of the Sky Raiders.

Published in 1981, the back-cover blurb for The Legend of the Sky Raiders reads, “The Sky Raiders... They pillaged a dozen worlds sometime in the distant past, then vanished. Who were they? A beautiful archaeologist leads a band of adventurers into the swamps of the planet Mirayn, searching for their secrets ... and their lost treasure hoard. Join the search ... the expedition seeking the truth behind ... The Legend of the Sky Raiders.” Then inside the front cover, the dedication reads, “To Indiana Jones, who would feel right at home here.” Raiders of the Lost Ark, the obvious inspiration for The Legend of the Sky Raiders came out the same year and it clearly put the Keith brothers in ‘Pulp Adventure’ frame of mind, for the adventure—and this is very much an adventure rather than a scenario—combines archaeological mystery with scurvy artefact smugglers and hot, sweaty environments. Another inspiration might well have been Chariots of the Gods? Unsolved Mysteries of the Past by Erich von Däniken which hypothesised that early human cultures were contacted by alien astronauts, for that is exactly what is hypothesised by archaeologists on the world of Mirayn in The Legend of the Sky Raiders.

The Legend of the Sky Raiders takes place on Mirayn, a non-aligned world in the Jungleblet subsector of the Far Frontiers Sector. This is a Tech Level 7 world, perpetually enshrouded in clouds, and ruled by a council of landowners who through its Antiquity Laws maintain a tight control on the planet’s two primary sources of income—tourism and archaeological finds. Extensive ruins left by an indigenous culture have attracted the interest of both tourists and scientists and with the right permits, parties of both have begun making trips into ‘The Outback’. Interest has grown recently with the publication of Hoard of the Sky Raiders by Jothan Messandi, Professor of History at the Institute for System Studies on nearby Alzenei. This suggested that the Sky Raiders, a semi-mythical band of raiders said to have pillaged planets across the Far Frontiers Sector may have originated on Mirayn and may have left a treasure hoard in the lost city of Tlaynsilak, when they disappeared some five millennia ago.

The set-up for The Legend of the Sky Raiders is simple enough. The Player Characters are down on their luck and find themselves stranded temporarily on Mirayn. With competition for work amongst freelancers tough, the Player Characters take the first job they can. This is to outfit and crew an archaeological expedition led by Lorain Messandi, the young daughter of Jothan Messandi who has followed in father’s footsteps and become an archaeologist, and wants to follow up on some of theories presented in her father’s book, Hoard of the Sky Raiders. The outfitting process is essentially a big shopping and hiring process, something that many roleplayers seem to enjoy, but is hampered by the Player Characters being on a budget—a budget out of which they also need to pay themselves, hire vehicles and drivers—the vehicles in this case being hovercraft, hire guides, and purchase supplies and equipment, and obtain the permits necessary to mount such an expedition; government interest in the expedition—such as bureaucrats checking their permits and soliciting bribes; and the potential interest of other smugglers and the criminal underworld. The Game Master has various NPCs, rumours, and encounters to put into the path of the Player Characters and so make their stay in the frontier town of Val Preszar, the primary jumping off point for expeditions into The Outback, interesting and challenging.

If the outfitting process and various encounters in the frontier form The Legend of the Sky Raiders’ first act, the second takes the expedition into The Outback following information provided by the expedition’s leader, perhaps backed up with clues discovered earlier in Val Preszar. Here the Player Characters have freedom to more or less wander looking for locations of note. There is chance here for the expedition to run into various forms of the local wildlife, but by the time the Player Characters have completed their explorations, they will have gained further clues which lead them into the third act and a strange encounter or three with another archaeological party, their capture—not once, but twice, and ultimately, revelations that hint as to who the Sky Raiders might have been.

Structurally, The Legend of the Sky Raiders feels like not one, but two sandboxes—one in Val Preszar, the other in The Outback. The first sandbox is very well supported with lists of equipment and supplies to purchase and hire, NPCs to hire, and rumours and antagonists to throw into the path of the Player Characters. The Game Master will need to judge where and when the Player Characters will run into them, but they serve to foreshadow much that will occur later. The second sandbox is more open and for the most part player-driven as they decide where to go in The Outback, leavened with random encounters. It is difficult to describe the final revelation as being particularly astounding, it is at least interesting and it does serve to drive the plot onto the scenario’s epilogue and then into Trail of the Sky Raiders.

The Legend of the Sky Raiders is very well supported, both from a Game Master and a player point of view. There is the ubiquitous Library Data, which covers the world of Mirayn, its history, the Sky Raiders themselves, the Hoard of the Sky Raiders, and more. This is supported by further details about Hoard of the Sky Raiders, essentially a handout. There is also an extensive equipment list, including various types of hovercraft and a portable, backpack computer which weighs twenty-five kilograms! A set of eight pregenerated Player Characters are provided should the players not necessarily want to create their own. For the Game Master, there is a wide cast of NPCs—potentially too many for her to handle effectively, and rumours and encounters to use.

The Legend of the Sky Raiders is richly appointed, certainly in comparison to the austerity of GDW’s ‘Little Black Books’ for Traveller. There is extensive artwork throughout, all of it by William H. Keith, Jr., and all of it good. Similarly, his full colour, pull-out map is also good, depicting the town of Val Preszar, the region of The Outback around the town, and the smaller area where the finale of the adventure takes place. Disappointingly, the lost city of Tlaynsilak is not given a map. Barring some minor issues, The Legend of the Sky Raiders is also well written.

When The Legend of the Sky Raiders was published in 1981, it was a terrific adventure and it still is. It presents a Pulp-style—though not a cinematic-style—romp from a frontier town into the wilderness of The Outback, dealing with shenanigans and mystery, whilst also giving the Game Master plenty of NPCs to roleplay and some fun encounters to present. Now whilst its contents could have been better organised, the real issue with The Legend of the Sky Raiders is the poor handling of some the NPCs. There are a lot of them, and some are simply there to annoy the Player Characters and get killed as part of the plot, whilst the Game Master is advised to keep a number of them alive for Trail of the Sky Raiders, also part of the part. This may mean that the Game Master will have to force events if she is to keep them alive, which in terms of storytelling is clumsy.

—oOo—

The Legend of the Sky Raiders was well received at the time of its publication. In reviewing The Legend of the Sky Raiders in Different Worlds Issue 21 (June 1982), Tony Watson said of the scenario, “Suffice it to say that the adventure is interesting, with plenty of twists and turns, and the travelers should find it very challenging. The elements opposing the party are formidable, and the secret of the Sky Raiders, as much as is revealed in this adventure (FASA is apparently planning a sequel), is fascinating. Perhaps the only criticism this reviewer can level at the book is the fact that to retain the integrity of the scenario, the referee may have to be a little heavy-handed in his guidance of the course of the action. Still, it is an excellent adventure, well worth the time and effort.”

William A. Barton said  in The Space Gamer Number 50 (April 1982) that, “The details in LEGEND OF THE SKY RAIDERS are extraordinary – nearly everything a referee could conceivably need is provided.” before concluding that, “LEGEND OF THE SKY RAIDERS is definitely worth adding to your Traveller collection and, when run, should prove one of the more exciting adventures your players have yet experienced.”

Bob McWilliams reviewed not just The Legend of the Sky Raiders in White Dwarf No 31 (June/July 1982), but also Ordeal by Eshaar, Action Aboard, and Uragyad’n of the Seven, which together comprised the first four releases from FASA. He described all four as, “Well produced and with plenty going on, the designers have provided referees with as much help as can be fitted in booklets of this size, gone into details at points in the adventure where it’s necessary and not filled out with ‘chrome’. These comments apply particularly to the last two booklets [Uragyad’n of the Seven and The Legend of the Sky Raiders] – being so involved with Traveller on a day-to-day basis, it takes something above the average to get you interested, and these two certainly did that.” He awarded all four scenarios two scores each, based on their suitability for use by novice and expert referees. For The Legend of the Sky Raiders, this was eight out of ten for each.

—oOo—

At the time of publication, all that was needed to run The Legend of the Sky Raiders is the core Traveller rules, plus Supplement 4: Citizens of the Imperium, although Book 4: Mercenary, Book 5: High Guard, Supplement 1: 1001 Characters, and Supplement 2: Animal Encounters could all be used in conjunction with the scenario. Information on the Far Frontiers Sector was not necessary to play, but was not readily available then, and certainly is not today. There is certainly no doubt that The Legend of the Sky Raiders could be run using Mongoose Publishing’s version of Traveller, and it would be certainly helped by the inclusion of the expanded career options such as Scholar and Colonist, and expanded skills as the Archaeology speciality for the Science skill. Tracking down information on the Far Frontiers Sector would be problematic. In fact, it might be easier to simply shift the ‘legend of the Sky Raiders’ and the Sky Raiders trilogy to another Sector of space entirely, but then again, The Legend of the Sky Raiders would probably be easier to adapt to another Science Fiction setting or roleplaying game.

Forty years since its publication and there are other issues with The Legend of the Sky Raiders. One is the colonial/post-colonial aspects of the scenario, it being suggested that the description of Val Preszar be based on the coastal towns of the nineteenth century Africa, such as Casablanca or Stanleyville. Further, the indigenous species of Mirayn, a bipedal, hexapodid Tech Level 1—but previous Tech Level 3—race are called ‘Gogs’ by offworlders. Unintended at the time, in 2020, there can be no doubt that the term has the potential to offend, but it would be easy to change.

The Legend of the Sky Raiders always had the reputation as being a good adventure, and forty years on, it still is. It has a sweaty, jungle hot Pulp Sci-Fi feel to it, but without being over the top and with wearing its influences in the hatband of its fedora. The Legend of the Sky Raiders is an entertaining and nicely detailed classic.

The Other OSR—Warlock! Compendium

The Warlock! Compendium is the first supplement for Warlock!, the Old School Rennaisance-like Career and skills roleplaying game whose inspiration is a hybrid of Fighting Fantasy a la The Warlock of Firetop Mountain and Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. Published by Fire Ruby Designs, it complies the first four expansions for Warlock!, each of which adds flavour and detail to the core rules, particularly when it comes to Careers and magic. In turn, adds new Careers for the non-human races of the Kingdom—or wherever the Game Master’s campaign is set, new magic, rules for magic from old body parts, and rules for what happens if you entreat the unholy powers.

The Warlock! Compendium opens with ‘Part 1: Different Paths’, in particular, ‘Community Careers’. One of major omissions in Warlock! was a lack of Careers for Dwarves, Elves, and Halflings. ‘Community Careers’ amends that with an expansion of the Career table in the core rules, which a player rolls on to determine his character’s first Career. This table extension adds six more, such as Dwarf Inventor, Elf Kin Guard, and Halfling Gong Farmer, which when rolled determine both a character’s first Career, but also his Community. This does not necessarily replace a player’s option to choose his character’s Community, but rather means that the character will definitely be a member of one if the right roll is made. Some of the Careers, such as Dwarf Tunnel Fighter and the Advanced Careers of Dwarf Slayer, Elf Champion, and Halfling Burglar, all feel very much inspired by a certain British fantasy roleplaying game. Warlock! however, is not a fantasy roleplaying game in which one Community is mechanically any different from any other, but ‘Community Careers’ adds potential flavour without adding any undue mechanical complexity or advantage.

‘Part 2: The Grimoire’ is all about magic. It starts by adding advice for discovering spells—essentially research, research, research—and copying scrolls. The latter is particularly trying, costing a wizard stamina which cannot otherwise be recovered. Now whilst this can be done, it definitely feels as if the author is persuading the wizard against such a rash action, suggesting instead that he concentrate upon exploration and the search already completed scrolls rather than create his own. This is followed by some forty spells, from Beam, Bleed, and Curse to Tremor, Whisper, and Yearn. These all fantastically gritty and down-to-earth, such as Dry, which protects the caster and anyone nearby from the rain, but makes all incredibly thirsty, or Glamour, which grants a bonus to the target for all actions where beauty is involved, but makes the target ugly and repulsive for several hours after the spell’s effects have worn off! ‘Rods, Staves, and Wands’ cover a wizard storing spells in them, whilst ‘Rare and Wondrous Artefacts’ adds a handful of magical items, typically with a sting the tail, such as the ‘Boots of Striding’ which enable the wearer to leap great distances, but with the chance that one boot will be left behind, the other at the destination, and the wear equally as split! ‘Lost Relics’ provides rumours of a handful of missing items, whilst ‘Community Spellcasters’ adds Advanced Careers for Dwarves, Elves, and Halflings capable of using magic, such as the Dwarf Runeforger, Halfling Conjurer—street magicians who use illusion and beguilement, and Elf Druid—who can sacrifice of the blood of sentient species for a much darker version of the Druid typically seen in fantasy roleplaying. 

‘Part 3: Necromancy’ presents the dark arts of dealing with the dead and the undead, practitioners often beginning with contacting the spirits of the departed to learn their secrets and then it is a slippery slope to degradation and terrible power. Of course, in the Kingdom, the art is forbidden and outlawed. From Bind Spirit and Create Guardian to Spirit Speak and Summon Dead, some eight necromantic spells are given as well as detailing the dangers of necromantic miscasts and some necromantic artefacts.

‘Part 4: Corrupted’ covers the effects and consequences of the dark arts, another slippery slope to power for ambitious—or foolish!—wizard, but does actually detail how a wizard might take such a path. With the inclusion of the Cultist and the Death Knight—a sorcerer who has fallen under the influence of a demon, demonic marks and gifts bestowed upon such Death Knights, along with  demon swords, demon goblins, and descriptions of such demon masters as the Cthulhu-like Delock, Lord of the Depths and the demon lord of war, Pazaali, the Warlock! Compendium strays ever closer to Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay in emulating its inspiration.

Physically, the Warlock! Compendium is a handy, digest-sized hardback. It is decently illustrated throughout, the occasional roughness of the artwork contributing much to the British Old School style and look that Warlock! seeks to evoke. The book is well written and an engaging read, and everything within its pages is easy to grasp and pull out into a game.

Although it offers a little more than that, the Warlock! Compendium is very much the magic supplement for Warlock!, adding new spells, magical Careers, necromancy, the dark arts, magical monsters, and so on. As useful a set of additions and expansions as they are, it is the six Careers—the Community Careers for Dwarves, Elves, and Halflings which feel the most useful addition in the Warlock! Compendium, for in giving them something that is intrinsically theirs, they flesh out the core game rather than just adding to it. Plus, they do it without adding to the rules or mechanics—just the setting. The Warlock! Compendium is overall, a solidly sorcerous expansion for Warlock!