The Inside Scoop on Gaming

When you first open up the cellophane, you're greeted not only by an 80 page book of new rules and that rich GRW stuff that makes your imagination soar, but you also get 16 sheets full of spell reference cards and new templates. And there's *lots* of new spells in "Cry Havoc!" to reference. The templates show the area affected by these new spells, much like the "Boom!" template did from GRW. The card stock supplement is not die-cut, it certainly would have been mind-blowingly more expensive to have these cut for us. So plan on taking the time to trim these yourself.

As I unwrapped the package, I was right away hit by my first dose of disappointment and reality. "Cry Havoc!" does not have any new troop types, nor does it have the troop cards for the new types introduced in "Fistful O' Ghost Rock". That was not the intention for this product, and for those of us that are impatient to see new troops, well, we'll just have to wait a bit longer for the release of the first "Dogs O' War" book.

The book has a range of new rules that breathe more life into creating a battlefield. The first chapter, "Opening Volleys", tries to bring all the errata we've seen for GRW into one single location. The second chapter, "The Lay O' The Land", describes more standard terrain types, more detailed Strange Locales, and weather. Chapter three, "More Magic, More Mayhem" and chapter four, "Fleshin' Out The Dead", expand the available GRW spells and powers to catch us up with the wealth of new tricks we've learned from the Deadlands supplements. Chapter five, "The Miracles O' Weird Science", add more gizmos to the tabletop. In amongst these rules, we learn how to finally use our Indian Shamans, and we can introduce two new character types from Deadlands -- the Alchemists and Spellslingers.

"Opening Volleys" introduces some rule errata and nobly tries to consolidate all the new rules and errata generated for GRW so far. We get reprints of the Duel rules, Rogue rules, and a few others. For errata, "Crack Shot" no longer provides a +2 to hit (and there's been a lot of howls heard from the sharpshooters out there). Infiltration can now only be used against "generic" (brown background) posses. Hangin' Judges and Walkin' Dead are now cheaper to buy for their respective armies.

The Infiltration rules still don't seem complete to me. I can see the need to specify who can and who can't be infiltrated, but the limitations seem too severe now. I can see why you may not want to allow someone to Infiltrate a Pinkerton posse (you'd never trust your Gatling Shotgun man again), but I cannot see why it's illegal to infiltrate a posse of UB or DR Riflemen, or ID's Ronin or Tong gangs. It's no longer necessary for armies to buy standard Gunmen or Scouts, especially with the wealth of optional troop types we've been seeing (and we expect to see soon). That just makes it that much tougher to use troops like Skinchangers. I think the list of potentials to infiltrate could be spelled out specifically, but certainly it should be expanded. Future troop types could define whether or not they could be infiltrated.

"Hold!" has now been redefined, and although the new rules still trip me up simply because I'm not used to them, I think they are vastly improved over the original rules. The new interpretation is clear and concise, not a "patch" to try to make an old but flawed rule work better.

The number of Bounty Points you score for killing a Gatling crew has been reworded, but it's *still* cryptic and we have gotten errata from John Goff trying to clarify this. Further. Again.

The list of Edges and Hindrances has also been greatly expanded, to keep up with the new roleplay personality traits we've been getting. The random charts for picking new Edges / Hindrances for heroes is getting ... bloated, though. There's a lot to choose from, and many of them are so situational- specific that you usually wouldn't want to roll them up for a trait. Imagine generating a hero, and rolling up such edges as "Aquatic" and "Steam Jockey" for his tricks. For most battles I'd want this boy to be Put Down as soon as possible. [While writing this, I found out the new Edge "Drivin'" is not available on the random tables. Hmm.]

I was surprised to see that PEG chose to try and consolidate the rules like this. The series is only four books long ("Great Rail Wars", "Fistful O' Ghost Rock", Derailed!", and now "Cry Havoc!"), and it seems to me that we will continue to get new rules and new errata as future books come out. John Goff said "Cry Havoc" doesn't try to include the new rules from "Derailed!", but I don't understand why. This means "Cry Havoc!" is consolidating the rules from only two other sources (three, if you count the errata in the "Reinforcements!" pack), and I don't understand the need. Sure, someday we'll want it. But I don't think we need it so soon. The task of consolidating the errata also seemed incomplete. There are errata to be found in the cover of the "Reinforcements!" pack, and although I think these rules should CERTAINLY be included in a book somewhere else (it seems the most likely reference that could get lost), the errata for Fighting and buying horses for heroes did not make it into "Cry Havoc!". I just suspect that sometime down the road we'll get another reprint of all the new rules and errata. I don't begrudge the eighteen pages used in this book for the purpose, but I think the attempt was premature and incomplete.

"The Lay O' The Land" was my favorite secret toy surprise in this book. We get some new Difficult Terrain types (like Swampland, made up of Bayou, Thickets, and Marsh). But the most fun is the "Even Stranger Locales". The original entries for "Strange Locales" have either been included or reworded, new Locales have been added, and all of them are more interesting. There are new rules to give Bounty Points for heroes to enter a Strange Locale (a better reason to risk it than "we've got this scenario pretty much wrapped up, let's go stir up some trouble"), there are more good and more bad and fewer "no effect" results on all the tables. One minor complaint -- they describe graveyards as being Light Cover for troops hiding in there. What? Marble headstones rate no higher than scrub oak? I'd certainly think tombstones should be Hard Cover.

There is also an extensive description of weather, including a random weather table. I think the idea of snowbound scenarios sounds like a lot of fun. The strange part about the weather is that it could significantly unbalance a scenario. Devil Bats wouldn't care about mud, Ronin and Tongs wouldn't care about high wind. Randomizing it before playing should be carefully considered by the players, first.

I think the real treasure to be found in "Cry Havoc!" is the chapters on "More Magic, More Mayhem" and "Fleshin' Out The Dead". All the original spells are reprinted here, along with the new spells -- so again we have a single point of reference. I haven't crawled through each spell to examine it's potential yet, but suffice to say there are a BUNCH of new things to try out. Spell casters will be quite interesting for months to come just to see what effect they have on the battlefield. In the original rules, there were somewhere around a dozen spells. Their use became like a chess game -- finding the richest combination for the situation at hand. Now those limits have been blown away by a wealth of new stuff to choose from. I suspect that clever people will come up with incredibly wicked combinations, and I look forward to hearing reports on what tricks people are using.

Spell descriptions now come with Spell Symbols (or "lucky charms"), to quickly tell at a glance who can use it. Blessed, Houngan, Huckster, Shaman, Sorcerer, and Witches all have their own symbol. A spell might be sporting one or many different symbols to show who can use this particular spell. For instance, "Bloodhound" can be cast by all but Sorcerers, whereas "Battle Hymn" is strictly a Blessed spell. These symbols are also on the quick reference cards that came on the card stock -- probably the first new doo-dad that you notice when you're unwrapping the book. Makes for a great quick visual queue, it's very well thought out and done effectively.

I do have some concern about all the new spells, though. I trust the designers and editors to protect us from any unbalancing spells, but with such a wealth to choose from I worry that there are a lot of spells that just might be overkill. "Flypaper Fingers", for instance, lets a huckster climb sheer surfaces and do more damage in hand-to-hand. When picking out my three spells for a hero, this would definitely fall on my "B" list of choices (unless I was playing a "scale the Great Maze mesa" scenario, which just doesn't come up very often).

There are also some differences between the spells in GRW and the spells in Deadlands. I don't mind them being different, I can play them both ways. I just don't understand *why* there's a difference. For instance, does range and cover affect Soul Blast? In Deadlands it does not, but in GRW it does. Does a Blessed automatically get Protection? In Deadlands you do (if you have any Faith), in GRW you do not. More than once this has confused me in my games, when I just know it's supposed to be one way and I find out it isn't.

Another nit-pick. The spell "Howl" causes a Guts check for all enemies that hear it. In the scenario "Battle For Marshal's Pass", "Howl" also allows a nearby wolf pack to try to attempt to rally. Is this ability limited only to the scenario? Or does the new definition of "Howl" supersede the previous one?

I guess what surprised me was that these concerns are not new. It would have been beneficial if the PEG folks had asked the mailing list about the new changes, just to promote feedback. I thought it worked really well when they changed the combat system for Deadlands in "Law Dogs". Maybe PEG felt overwhelmed by our enthusiastic response, and didn't want to repeat the experiment. But I think it would have been beneficial, in this case.

There are no reference cards for the expanded list of Harrowed powers. It would have been very nice, but I suspect that because Harrowed are not common then the reference cards wouldn't have been as widely used. But still, perhaps in the future we can get reference cards for Harrowed powers? Maybe a toppling tombstone would make a good Spell Symbol for the Harrowed?

The last chapter, "The Miracles O' Weird Science", provides us with some new gizmos. Unlike the spell list, the gizmo list does NOT include things from the original game, so the single point of reference scheme breaks down here. Many of the gizmos repeat toys we saw from "Derailed!" (like the Improved Rocket Pack and the Air Catcher), confusing me on whether these are changes to "Derailed!" or merely included for some sort of completion. A lot of the new gizmos are not wildly interesting -- nothing that out-does the Flamethrower jumps from the pages. Acid guns, electrostatic guns, it just doesn't have the excitement level that so much else in the book does.

There's also a section on Alchemy, bringing this new character class to life on our GRW tabletops. Nothing new beyond what you find in "Smith & Robards" is presented, instead we learn how to use these potions at the tactical level. New rules for throwing potions basically recount the rules for throwing dynamite, but now we can throw smoke and Greek Fire.

A new image is creeping into the artwork for GRW. PEG has been chastised before for becoming more and more sexually exploitive, and the art in "Cry Havoc!" regresses even more from the former sexual equality we had been growing used to. The cover of the game sports a busty witch flashing a whip and bare midriff. Now maybe "Xena: Warrior Princess" has defined wearing a leather sports bra as a social norm since the Roman Empire, and I've just missed the transition in fashion. But, even though I truly appreciate the quality of the artwork on the cover of "Cry Havoc!", it is a book that I am embarrassed to leave lying in the open in case I have to defend what exactly my games are "fantasizing". The artwork on page 34 of a witch Soul Blasting a cowboy is truly something I don't want others to know that I own. Not only is the quality of the drawing in question (what exactly is she supposed to be standing on?), the up-the-skirt view, the abs-accentuating push-up bustier, and up-to-the-armpit stripper's gloves are all in questionable taste. For the first time, I have a PEG book that I keep buried to keep prying eyes away. Can't help but wonder if there's miniatures in the making for these poses. Do women in power really dress like this? Wonder Woman didn't go public until WWII. I guess Jane Fonda dresses that way because it's functional in the gym, but I don't think it'd be too practical in the legions of the Black River. Don't wanna think of Janet Reno in a push-up ... (ow, failed that guts check).

"Cry Havoc!" is a good addition to the GRW line. The spell descriptions are the "meat with extra sauce" for this product, and I think the higher price is justifiable for the spell cards included. The Strange Locales are a rich addition to the game. It's a simple thing, but I'm greatly impressed with the new troop point costs assigned to the Hangin' Judge and the Walkin' Dead. It shows, what, a level of clarity on the designers' part, to really understand what they're seeing and how best to fix it. The new rewrite for "Hold!" makes a fundamental rule in the game that much better to play, and I'm surprised the change can be incorporated so easily. Inclusion of most of the new rules from "Fistful O' Ghost Rock" now make it optional to buy instead of required. PEG has done a bang-up job in making a product that adds richness to the game without adding on unwanted complexity, and I'm pleased that I own it.

Tom Huntington The Truth Is Yonder

Style: 4 (Classy and well done)
Substance: 4 (Meaty)

Cry Havok!
Author: John Goff Category: miniature Company/Publisher: Pinnacle Entertainment Group Cost: $24.95 Page count: 80 cardstock Capsule Review by Tom Huntington on 01/01/99. Genre tags: Horror Old_West	When you first open up the cellophane, you're greeted not only by an 80 page book of new rules and that rich GRW stuff that makes your imagination soar, but you also get 16 sheets full of spell reference cards and new templates. And there's lots of new spells in "Cry Havoc!" to reference. The templates show the area affected by these new spells, much like the "Boom!" template did from GRW. The card stock supplement is not die-cut, it certainly would have been mind-blowingly more expensive to have these cut for us. So plan on taking the time to trim these yourself. As I unwrapped the package, I was right away hit by my first dose of disappointment and reality. "Cry Havoc!" does not have any new troop types, nor does it have the troop cards for the new types introduced in "Fistful O' Ghost Rock". That was not the intention for this product, and for those of us that are impatient to see new troops, well, we'll just have to wait a bit longer for the release of the first "Dogs O' War" book. The book has a range of new rules that breathe more life into creating a battlefield. The first chapter, "Opening Volleys", tries to bring all the errata we've seen for GRW into one single location. The second chapter, "The Lay O' The Land", describes more standard terrain types, more detailed Strange Locales, and weather. Chapter three, "More Magic, More Mayhem" and chapter four, "Fleshin' Out The Dead", expand the available GRW spells and powers to catch us up with the wealth of new tricks we've learned from the Deadlands supplements. Chapter five, "The Miracles O' Weird Science", add more gizmos to the tabletop. In amongst these rules, we learn how to finally use our Indian Shamans, and we can introduce two new character types from Deadlands -- the Alchemists and Spellslingers. "Opening Volleys" introduces some rule errata and nobly tries to consolidate all the new rules and errata generated for GRW so far. We get reprints of the Duel rules, Rogue rules, and a few others. For errata, "Crack Shot" no longer provides a +2 to hit (and there's been a lot of howls heard from the sharpshooters out there). Infiltration can now only be used against "generic" (brown background) posses. Hangin' Judges and Walkin' Dead are now cheaper to buy for their respective armies. The Infiltration rules still don't seem complete to me. I can see the need to specify who can and who can't be infiltrated, but the limitations seem too severe now. I can see why you may not want to allow someone to Infiltrate a Pinkerton posse (you'd never trust your Gatling Shotgun man again), but I cannot see why it's illegal to infiltrate a posse of UB or DR Riflemen, or ID's Ronin or Tong gangs. It's no longer necessary for armies to buy standard Gunmen or Scouts, especially with the wealth of optional troop types we've been seeing (and we expect to see soon). That just makes it that much tougher to use troops like Skinchangers. I think the list of potentials to infiltrate could be spelled out specifically, but certainly it should be expanded. Future troop types could define whether or not they could be infiltrated. "Hold!" has now been redefined, and although the new rules still trip me up simply because I'm not used to them, I think they are vastly improved over the original rules. The new interpretation is clear and concise, not a "patch" to try to make an old but flawed rule work better. The number of Bounty Points you score for killing a Gatling crew has been reworded, but it's still cryptic and we have gotten errata from John Goff trying to clarify this. Further. Again. The list of Edges and Hindrances has also been greatly expanded, to keep up with the new roleplay personality traits we've been getting. The random charts for picking new Edges / Hindrances for heroes is getting ... bloated, though. There's a lot to choose from, and many of them are so situational- specific that you usually wouldn't want to roll them up for a trait. Imagine generating a hero, and rolling up such edges as "Aquatic" and "Steam Jockey" for his tricks. For most battles I'd want this boy to be Put Down as soon as possible. [While writing this, I found out the new Edge "Drivin'" is not available on the random tables. Hmm.] I was surprised to see that PEG chose to try and consolidate the rules like this. The series is only four books long ("Great Rail Wars", "Fistful O' Ghost Rock", Derailed!", and now "Cry Havoc!"), and it seems to me that we will continue to get new rules and new errata as future books come out. John Goff said "Cry Havoc" doesn't try to include the new rules from "Derailed!", but I don't understand why. This means "Cry Havoc!" is consolidating the rules from only two other sources (three, if you count the errata in the "Reinforcements!" pack), and I don't understand the need. Sure, someday we'll want it. But I don't think we need it so soon. The task of consolidating the errata also seemed incomplete. There are errata to be found in the cover of the "Reinforcements!" pack, and although I think these rules should CERTAINLY be included in a book somewhere else (it seems the most likely reference that could get lost), the errata for Fighting and buying horses for heroes did not make it into "Cry Havoc!". I just suspect that sometime down the road we'll get another reprint of all the new rules and errata. I don't begrudge the eighteen pages used in this book for the purpose, but I think the attempt was premature and incomplete. "The Lay O' The Land" was my favorite secret toy surprise in this book. We get some new Difficult Terrain types (like Swampland, made up of Bayou, Thickets, and Marsh). But the most fun is the "Even Stranger Locales". The original entries for "Strange Locales" have either been included or reworded, new Locales have been added, and all of them are more interesting. There are new rules to give Bounty Points for heroes to enter a Strange Locale (a better reason to risk it than "we've got this scenario pretty much wrapped up, let's go stir up some trouble"), there are more good and more bad and fewer "no effect" results on all the tables. One minor complaint -- they describe graveyards as being Light Cover for troops hiding in there. What? Marble headstones rate no higher than scrub oak? I'd certainly think tombstones should be Hard Cover. There is also an extensive description of weather, including a random weather table. I think the idea of snowbound scenarios sounds like a lot of fun. The strange part about the weather is that it could significantly unbalance a scenario. Devil Bats wouldn't care about mud, Ronin and Tongs wouldn't care about high wind. Randomizing it before playing should be carefully considered by the players, first. I think the real treasure to be found in "Cry Havoc!" is the chapters on "More Magic, More Mayhem" and "Fleshin' Out The Dead". All the original spells are reprinted here, along with the new spells -- so again we have a single point of reference. I haven't crawled through each spell to examine it's potential yet, but suffice to say there are a BUNCH of new things to try out. Spell casters will be quite interesting for months to come just to see what effect they have on the battlefield. In the original rules, there were somewhere around a dozen spells. Their use became like a chess game -- finding the richest combination for the situation at hand. Now those limits have been blown away by a wealth of new stuff to choose from. I suspect that clever people will come up with incredibly wicked combinations, and I look forward to hearing reports on what tricks people are using. Spell descriptions now come with Spell Symbols (or "lucky charms"), to quickly tell at a glance who can use it. Blessed, Houngan, Huckster, Shaman, Sorcerer, and Witches all have their own symbol. A spell might be sporting one or many different symbols to show who can use this particular spell. For instance, "Bloodhound" can be cast by all but Sorcerers, whereas "Battle Hymn" is strictly a Blessed spell. These symbols are also on the quick reference cards that came on the card stock -- probably the first new doo-dad that you notice when you're unwrapping the book. Makes for a great quick visual queue, it's very well thought out and done effectively. I do have some concern about all the new spells, though. I trust the designers and editors to protect us from any unbalancing spells, but with such a wealth to choose from I worry that there are a lot of spells that just might be overkill. "Flypaper Fingers", for instance, lets a huckster climb sheer surfaces and do more damage in hand-to-hand. When picking out my three spells for a hero, this would definitely fall on my "B" list of choices (unless I was playing a "scale the Great Maze mesa" scenario, which just doesn't come up very often). There are also some differences between the spells in GRW and the spells in Deadlands. I don't mind them being different, I can play them both ways. I just don't understand why there's a difference. For instance, does range and cover affect Soul Blast? In Deadlands it does not, but in GRW it does. Does a Blessed automatically get Protection? In Deadlands you do (if you have any Faith), in GRW you do not. More than once this has confused me in my games, when I just know it's supposed to be one way and I find out it isn't. Another nit-pick. The spell "Howl" causes a Guts check for all enemies that hear it. In the scenario "Battle For Marshal's Pass", "Howl" also allows a nearby wolf pack to try to attempt to rally. Is this ability limited only to the scenario? Or does the new definition of "Howl" supersede the previous one? I guess what surprised me was that these concerns are not new. It would have been beneficial if the PEG folks had asked the mailing list about the new changes, just to promote feedback. I thought it worked really well when they changed the combat system for Deadlands in "Law Dogs". Maybe PEG felt overwhelmed by our enthusiastic response, and didn't want to repeat the experiment. But I think it would have been beneficial, in this case. There are no reference cards for the expanded list of Harrowed powers. It would have been very nice, but I suspect that because Harrowed are not common then the reference cards wouldn't have been as widely used. But still, perhaps in the future we can get reference cards for Harrowed powers? Maybe a toppling tombstone would make a good Spell Symbol for the Harrowed? The last chapter, "The Miracles O' Weird Science", provides us with some new gizmos. Unlike the spell list, the gizmo list does NOT include things from the original game, so the single point of reference scheme breaks down here. Many of the gizmos repeat toys we saw from "Derailed!" (like the Improved Rocket Pack and the Air Catcher), confusing me on whether these are changes to "Derailed!" or merely included for some sort of completion. A lot of the new gizmos are not wildly interesting -- nothing that out-does the Flamethrower jumps from the pages. Acid guns, electrostatic guns, it just doesn't have the excitement level that so much else in the book does. There's also a section on Alchemy, bringing this new character class to life on our GRW tabletops. Nothing new beyond what you find in "Smith & Robards" is presented, instead we learn how to use these potions at the tactical level. New rules for throwing potions basically recount the rules for throwing dynamite, but now we can throw smoke and Greek Fire. A new image is creeping into the artwork for GRW. PEG has been chastised before for becoming more and more sexually exploitive, and the art in "Cry Havoc!" regresses even more from the former sexual equality we had been growing used to. The cover of the game sports a busty witch flashing a whip and bare midriff. Now maybe "Xena: Warrior Princess" has defined wearing a leather sports bra as a social norm since the Roman Empire, and I've just missed the transition in fashion. But, even though I truly appreciate the quality of the artwork on the cover of "Cry Havoc!", it is a book that I am embarrassed to leave lying in the open in case I have to defend what exactly my games are "fantasizing". The artwork on page 34 of a witch Soul Blasting a cowboy is truly something I don't want others to know that I own. Not only is the quality of the drawing in question (what exactly is she supposed to be standing on?), the up-the-skirt view, the abs-accentuating push-up bustier, and up-to-the-armpit stripper's gloves are all in questionable taste. For the first time, I have a PEG book that I keep buried to keep prying eyes away. Can't help but wonder if there's miniatures in the making for these poses. Do women in power really dress like this? Wonder Woman didn't go public until WWII. I guess Jane Fonda dresses that way because it's functional in the gym, but I don't think it'd be too practical in the legions of the Black River. Don't wanna think of Janet Reno in a push-up ... (ow, failed that guts check). "Cry Havoc!" is a good addition to the GRW line. The spell descriptions are the "meat with extra sauce" for this product, and I think the higher price is justifiable for the spell cards included. The Strange Locales are a rich addition to the game. It's a simple thing, but I'm greatly impressed with the new troop point costs assigned to the Hangin' Judge and the Walkin' Dead. It shows, what, a level of clarity on the designers' part, to really understand what they're seeing and how best to fix it. The new rewrite for "Hold!" makes a fundamental rule in the game that much better to play, and I'm surprised the change can be incorporated so easily. Inclusion of most of the new rules from "Fistful O' Ghost Rock" now make it optional to buy instead of required. PEG has done a bang-up job in making a product that adds richness to the game without adding on unwanted complexity, and I'm pleased that I own it. Tom Huntington The Truth Is Yonder Style: 4 (Classy and well done) Substance: 4 (Meaty)

Cry Havok!