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After hearing a lot of good stuff about Pendragon from sources I respect, I went out and bought the thing. From what I could see, Pendragon had a limited following, most of whom liked the game a lot and were very loyal. In this way, it sort of resembles its former sister publication, Call of Cthulhu.

The Pendragon rulebook also resembles the Call of Cthulhu rulebook, in that it has rather the feel of a compendium. Obviously, there was once a small core rules book in there, but a decade or more of Pendragon supplements and rules refinements and elaborations have all left their mark on the book. It's not really the kind of thing you can just sit down and read. I finally felt myself qualified to review this game after taking a week and more to browse through it.

SETTING

This game is, of course, set in a legendary Britain. Specifically, it's the mid-6th century (531 is the usual starting date for campaigns), but it is the mid-6th century as envisioned by the writers of the high middle ages. Thus, King Arthur and his knights live in a feudal society, ride around in plate armor, carry lances, and in general behave like it's the 13th century. I quite like this idea. There's also a rather nebulous concept (more on that later) called the Pendragon Escalation, which states that each decade of King Arthur's reign equates to a century of European history.

CHARACTERS

Most player characters are going to be knights. Rules are provided for creating magicians of various types, but the knights are clearly the game's main characters. There are both Basic and Advanced Character Creation systems. In the basic system, all characters are assumed to be members of the majority Cymric Christian culture, and to live in Salisbury, a county described in detail later in the book. In the Advanced system, characters may come from all over Britain or parts of Europe. Character creation in Pendragon is basically a vast list of options. The GM can choose to include or exclude certain options with almost no trouble. For example, racial bonuses give characters more or less of particular attributes - but these are not all equal. Picts just stink compared to any other race. Fortunately, nothing at all stops you leaving this rule out - it's not integrated into the character creation system. This means that character creation can take some time, but the "toolbox" feel of the rules makes customizing character creation to a campaign very easy.

GAME MECHANICS

Pendragon runs on a modified version of the Call of Cthulhu/Runequest system. Skills and attributes run from 1 to 20 or so (sometimes higher). Players attempt to roll under their skill values to succeed. There's a little more to it, but not a lot.

The most unusual feature of the Pendragon rules must be the Personality Traits and Passions. Personality Traits are pairs of opposed traits which together must add up to 20. These are things like Chaste/Lustful, Proud/Modest, Valorous/Cowardly, and so on. In situations where a character wants to do something which might contradict a personality trait, he has to roll against it. Thus, a character with a Lustful of 15 and a Chaste of 5 who wanted to avoid pursuing an attractive woman in order to fulfil a vow would have to try and roll under his Chaste. Traits are raised and lowered by experience. Thus the character from the previous example, if successful, might see his Chaste rise and his Lustful decline.

Complicating this is the fact that different Traits are valued by different cultures and different groups. Thus, it's hard to be a good pagan and a good knight at the same time, since paganism values Pride and chivalry values Modesty. Different regions and professions also give modifiers to the traits.

Passions are general traits such as Loyalty to one's lord, Love for one's family, or Amor for a lady (or the queen - a pretty widespread problem). Passions function somewhat differently from Traits, but they serve the same general purpose: to set the game firmly within the moral, religious, and romantic framework of the Arthurian legends. Some might find this kind of personality mechanism intrusive, but I rather like it. It gives the game a feel of nature overriding will, very appropriate to a setting which is, when all is said and done, tragic.

The other unusual thing about the rules is the passage of time. A year may well go by in a session, and the knights are assumed to stay at home during the winter and go adventuring during the "adventuring season." Winter rules cover marriage, birth and death, as well as the accumulation of Glory, a measure of the deeds a knight has done (whether good or bad), his wealth, and the prominence of his family. The more Glory a knight has, the better known he is.

Much of the rest of the book is taken up with specific sets of rules for the kinds of things that knights often do, including fighting in battles, jousting, hunting, and so forth. In each case, the rules mechanisms are intertwined with information about the culture and the role of knights.

There are also rules for magic-users, whose spells are nicely medieval in nature, involving making the weather nice, insuring that unions are fertile, putting curses on one's enemies, and so on. Interesting stuff, but I can't see a magician adventuring with knights much. These rules are probably mainly for NPC magicians.

OTHER STUFF

There are extensive and well-done sections on the geography of Arthurian Britain, stats for NPCs (including luminaries such as Arthur, Guenever, Lancelot, and so on), adventures (referred to in game as "adventures," which is a nice touch), history, religion, prices of goods, courtesy, and all the things a GM would need to run a campaign in Arthurian Britain. The book is peppered throughout with quotes from the sources, and these are often used to illustrate the rules. For anyone who has read the most recent Call of Cthulhu rulebook, the feel is familiar: it's a basic rulebook, with a bunch of subsequent material apppended. Very interesting reading.

PRODUCTION

The art is quite nice, capturing the not-quite-historical flavor of the setting well. There's a fold-out map of Britain in the back, which I personally think would have been nicer without a scale in kilometers. All in all, the book is visually very solid.

SO IS THERE ANYTHING WRONG WITH IT?

My chief complaint about Pendragon is its rather scattered layout. Remember the Pendragon Escalation mentioned above? I'm having a hard time finding it explained. It isn't in the index. Likewise, character creation, by its very nature, requires a lot of flipping back and forth, and it isn't always obvious what section things are in. The character creation rules for magicians are much later in the book than the rules for knights, with the rules for ladies in the middle. All in all, the "compendium" feel which makes the game so enjoyable to browse through can make looking things up kind of a pain.

Pendragon was designed in 1985, and it shows a lot of traits from a more rules-heavy era. There are rather a lot of tables.

Since magic is rarely discussed in the sources, the quotations which are found in the chapters on knights are replaced in the section on magicians by explanations of magic, supposedly by Morgan Le Fay, which sound very much as if they were written in the 1990s. They're a bit technical.

Despite its excellent content, then, Pendragon can be kind of a headache to read through. I recommend slowly browsing through the game for a few weeks, getting a feel for the system, and then going for the details.

GETTING STARTED

The book provides an easy entrance for the players: the basic character creation section is directly linked to the detailed description of Salisbury and the provided scenarios, which begin with the characters as squires and included their knighting. This is a great way to start a Pendragon campaign, and requires a minimum of difficult rules stuff for the GM.

SUPPORT

Last year, a company called Green Knight acquired Pendragon. They're a small company which produces only Pendragon, and you can visit their website at www.greenknight.com

CONCLUSION

Pendragon is a superb game based around an interesting and unique set of character rules (the Traits and Passions). It really gives the feel of Arthurian romance (or high medieval adventure, if you want to run a middle ages game and dispense with Camelot). Some players may find it long on rules, and GMs may find reading the rulebook daunting, but I think Pendragon will return the investment of time and energy.

Style: 3 (Average)
Substance: 5 (Excellent!)

King Arthur Pendragon 4th Ed.
Author: Greg Stafford with Sam Shirley and Bill Bridges Category: game Company/Publisher: Chaosium - now Green Knight Line: Pendragon Cost: $26.95 Page count: 352 ISBN: 1-56882-006-2 SKU: 2716 Capsule Review by James Holloway on 12/02/99. Genre tags: Fantasy Historical	After hearing a lot of good stuff about Pendragon from sources I respect, I went out and bought the thing. From what I could see, Pendragon had a limited following, most of whom liked the game a lot and were very loyal. In this way, it sort of resembles its former sister publication, Call of Cthulhu. The Pendragon rulebook also resembles the Call of Cthulhu rulebook, in that it has rather the feel of a compendium. Obviously, there was once a small core rules book in there, but a decade or more of Pendragon supplements and rules refinements and elaborations have all left their mark on the book. It's not really the kind of thing you can just sit down and read. I finally felt myself qualified to review this game after taking a week and more to browse through it. SETTING This game is, of course, set in a legendary Britain. Specifically, it's the mid-6th century (531 is the usual starting date for campaigns), but it is the mid-6th century as envisioned by the writers of the high middle ages. Thus, King Arthur and his knights live in a feudal society, ride around in plate armor, carry lances, and in general behave like it's the 13th century. I quite like this idea. There's also a rather nebulous concept (more on that later) called the Pendragon Escalation, which states that each decade of King Arthur's reign equates to a century of European history. CHARACTERS Most player characters are going to be knights. Rules are provided for creating magicians of various types, but the knights are clearly the game's main characters. There are both Basic and Advanced Character Creation systems. In the basic system, all characters are assumed to be members of the majority Cymric Christian culture, and to live in Salisbury, a county described in detail later in the book. In the Advanced system, characters may come from all over Britain or parts of Europe. Character creation in Pendragon is basically a vast list of options. The GM can choose to include or exclude certain options with almost no trouble. For example, racial bonuses give characters more or less of particular attributes - but these are not all equal. Picts just stink compared to any other race. Fortunately, nothing at all stops you leaving this rule out - it's not integrated into the character creation system. This means that character creation can take some time, but the "toolbox" feel of the rules makes customizing character creation to a campaign very easy. GAME MECHANICS Pendragon runs on a modified version of the Call of Cthulhu/Runequest system. Skills and attributes run from 1 to 20 or so (sometimes higher). Players attempt to roll under their skill values to succeed. There's a little more to it, but not a lot. The most unusual feature of the Pendragon rules must be the Personality Traits and Passions. Personality Traits are pairs of opposed traits which together must add up to 20. These are things like Chaste/Lustful, Proud/Modest, Valorous/Cowardly, and so on. In situations where a character wants to do something which might contradict a personality trait, he has to roll against it. Thus, a character with a Lustful of 15 and a Chaste of 5 who wanted to avoid pursuing an attractive woman in order to fulfil a vow would have to try and roll under his Chaste. Traits are raised and lowered by experience. Thus the character from the previous example, if successful, might see his Chaste rise and his Lustful decline. Complicating this is the fact that different Traits are valued by different cultures and different groups. Thus, it's hard to be a good pagan and a good knight at the same time, since paganism values Pride and chivalry values Modesty. Different regions and professions also give modifiers to the traits. Passions are general traits such as Loyalty to one's lord, Love for one's family, or Amor for a lady (or the queen - a pretty widespread problem). Passions function somewhat differently from Traits, but they serve the same general purpose: to set the game firmly within the moral, religious, and romantic framework of the Arthurian legends. Some might find this kind of personality mechanism intrusive, but I rather like it. It gives the game a feel of nature overriding will, very appropriate to a setting which is, when all is said and done, tragic. The other unusual thing about the rules is the passage of time. A year may well go by in a session, and the knights are assumed to stay at home during the winter and go adventuring during the "adventuring season." Winter rules cover marriage, birth and death, as well as the accumulation of Glory, a measure of the deeds a knight has done (whether good or bad), his wealth, and the prominence of his family. The more Glory a knight has, the better known he is. Much of the rest of the book is taken up with specific sets of rules for the kinds of things that knights often do, including fighting in battles, jousting, hunting, and so forth. In each case, the rules mechanisms are intertwined with information about the culture and the role of knights. There are also rules for magic-users, whose spells are nicely medieval in nature, involving making the weather nice, insuring that unions are fertile, putting curses on one's enemies, and so on. Interesting stuff, but I can't see a magician adventuring with knights much. These rules are probably mainly for NPC magicians. OTHER STUFF There are extensive and well-done sections on the geography of Arthurian Britain, stats for NPCs (including luminaries such as Arthur, Guenever, Lancelot, and so on), adventures (referred to in game as "adventures," which is a nice touch), history, religion, prices of goods, courtesy, and all the things a GM would need to run a campaign in Arthurian Britain. The book is peppered throughout with quotes from the sources, and these are often used to illustrate the rules. For anyone who has read the most recent Call of Cthulhu rulebook, the feel is familiar: it's a basic rulebook, with a bunch of subsequent material apppended. Very interesting reading. PRODUCTION The art is quite nice, capturing the not-quite-historical flavor of the setting well. There's a fold-out map of Britain in the back, which I personally think would have been nicer without a scale in kilometers. All in all, the book is visually very solid. SO IS THERE ANYTHING WRONG WITH IT? My chief complaint about Pendragon is its rather scattered layout. Remember the Pendragon Escalation mentioned above? I'm having a hard time finding it explained. It isn't in the index. Likewise, character creation, by its very nature, requires a lot of flipping back and forth, and it isn't always obvious what section things are in. The character creation rules for magicians are much later in the book than the rules for knights, with the rules for ladies in the middle. All in all, the "compendium" feel which makes the game so enjoyable to browse through can make looking things up kind of a pain. Pendragon was designed in 1985, and it shows a lot of traits from a more rules-heavy era. There are rather a lot of tables. Since magic is rarely discussed in the sources, the quotations which are found in the chapters on knights are replaced in the section on magicians by explanations of magic, supposedly by Morgan Le Fay, which sound very much as if they were written in the 1990s. They're a bit technical. Despite its excellent content, then, Pendragon can be kind of a headache to read through. I recommend slowly browsing through the game for a few weeks, getting a feel for the system, and then going for the details. GETTING STARTED The book provides an easy entrance for the players: the basic character creation section is directly linked to the detailed description of Salisbury and the provided scenarios, which begin with the characters as squires and included their knighting. This is a great way to start a Pendragon campaign, and requires a minimum of difficult rules stuff for the GM. SUPPORT Last year, a company called Green Knight acquired Pendragon. They're a small company which produces only Pendragon, and you can visit their website at www.greenknight.com CONCLUSION Pendragon is a superb game based around an interesting and unique set of character rules (the Traits and Passions). It really gives the feel of Arthurian romance (or high medieval adventure, if you want to run a middle ages game and dispense with Camelot). Some players may find it long on rules, and GMs may find reading the rulebook daunting, but I think Pendragon will return the investment of time and energy. Style: 3 (Average) Substance: 5 (Excellent!)

King Arthur Pendragon 4th Ed.