When I first saw the promotional material for this game, I was eager to play it. The whole idea of roleplaying angels and demons seemed very appealing to one of my upbringing (ex-catholic). When the game finally came out I was one of the first to the shop to pick up my copy - a beautiful limited edition - Hell based cover of course. A lovely black tome with a shiny red cross on the cover - broken naturally. But what of the game itself?
Stairway into Heaven
Based on a french game by Asmodeé - the original setting was a satrical look at society through the eyes of celestial beings. More in the vein of Good Omens than the Prophecy, the idea was great. SJG decided that they wanted a more serious setting - while carefully making sure that Heaven is good and Hell is evil. And it works, most of the time.
Part of the problem is that there isn't that much consistency in the setting. While Heaven is somewhat divided and serious - they are pure. But Hell comes across less evil and more like the Frathouse of the Damned. Lucifer and God are very briskly described - mainly along the lines of "they are so busy no one meets them" - whereas the politics between the Archangels and the Demon Princes is beautifully constructed. It's here that In Nomine is its strongest. The scope for stories is extremely broad - if only the main rulebook was easier to read...
Descent into Hell...
I must admit that In Nomine is one of the singly most frustrating books to read if you actually want to
learn anything about the system or setting. It seems as if the writer had simply placed things down as he thought of them - there is little in the way of clear layout here. Now I know that this is a regular fault of SJG whose policy seems to be to fill every spare inch of page with writing. But there is something to be said for the strategic use of empty space.
Finding your way around the main section of the book is an exercise in frustration - there is no simple guide to character generation, the segment that lists where to look is poorly referenced, and the index leaves a lot to be desired. Also, major concepts that need to be considered when creating a character are never mentioned only suggested at within the obscure text.
The system itself (d666) is quite effective and fairly easy to get used to - but creation of characters in unnecessarily complicated by the poorly laid out book - and an appallingly laid out character sheet. Considering how much a player needs to be aware of a larger sheet with a sample marked out step by step would have greatly aided the game.
In summary, In Nomine is a great concept - and once you have become accustomed to the book, its a fun game. I think the Songs (miracles) concept was nice, but again a little arbitrary - much like WitchCraft's Invocations - and a more simplified system would have been better. Most importantly, the designers should have put more effort to be clear about what they meant in various cases, and provided a better source of GMing advice - the book contains almost no support for GMs which is extremely frustrating. The book is useless without the Gamemaster's Guide - something that could have been fixed at the outset.
Go to forum!
(Due to spamming, old forum discussions are no linked.)