Weapons and Assassins

Weapons and Assassins (WaA) is a reprint of one of Palladium Books’ first publications, one of a series of five books about weapons. The book covers three historical societies of assassins - the original Assassins (aka the Hashashin), the Thuggees of India, and the Ninja of Japan - in an essentially systemless manner.

Originally published in 1983 as staple-bound softcover, the new printing of WaA has a proper binding and a new, attractive cover depicting a ninja with ninjato (sword) at the ready. The book retains its original 7"x10" format.

Once you open the book and look inside, you quickly learn that this is, unfortunately, literally a reprint. For some reason, WaA was typeset in what looks very much like Courier - in any case, a fixed-space font that looks like a typewriter’s output - and most of the black and white interior art is shaded in rough halftones (dots) which is quite unattractive. Emphasis in the text is noted with capitals, which you’d rarely see today outside of a Usenet forum. This looked bad even back in 1983; the previous books in Palladium’s weapons series were more attractively typeset, and they used line drawings which were better.

There is admittedly quite a lot of that interior art, and much of it is useful in showing equipment or techniques. Some of it does, though, smack of being filler. For instance, a map showing the area of India in which the Thuggees operated fills an entire page - with the area of Thuggee activity marked as a simple rectangle, and only one city marked on the entire map. There is another two pages depicting Japanese castles, and last page shows the stages in donning samurai armour. Interesting, but barely relevant. (And also, I believe, reprinted from Weapons and Castles of the Orient.)

The treatment of the three societies in the book varies greatly. The Assassins get a mere six pages, two pages of which are given over to the clothing worn in different parts of the Muslim world (my, how useful...), the Thugs get nine, and the Ninja 18. Aside from the introduction, table of contents, and these sections, there is also a 4-page section on poisons, a 5-page glossary, and single pages for a bibliography and a brief chronology.

The section on the Assassins gives us a rundown on their history, and a tale of one assassination.

For the Thugs, we are given a historical overview, an explanation of the stages by which a young Thug was initiated into the cult, and a description of a typical Thug assassination. Strangling techniques and river thugs are also treated.

The longer Ninja section talks, again, about history, as well as describing a typical assassination, tactics, training, weapons, equipment, and special techniques for dealing with climbing, bodies of water, and winter weather.

I have no doubt that the information presented is well-researched - Wujcik cites 16 sources, aside from two previous volumes in Palladium’s Weapons series. However, the book was published 20 years ago, and the newest source is dated 1980. Furthermore, there just isn’t that much substance to the book! The six-page section on the Assassins has enough text to fill up perhaps two pages (the rest given over to images), the Thugs three, and for the Ninja, six. Keep in mind as well that the book is in a somewhat compact format to begin with!

The section on poisons and the glossary are puzzles. The poison section devotes very little attention to poisons actually used by any of the groups described in the book, with as much information about some infamous poisoners of Renaissance and Restoration Europe as the ninja. The glossary would be perfectly fine if it weren't for the fact that terms related to all three groups are mixed together. I think it would have been much more useful if the terms for each society had been separated.

The book’s presentation of weaponry is pretty weak. The previous books in the series rated weapons for damage, type of damage, size, mass, and ease of throwing (plus others I have probably forgotten), but that information is not presented here. Instead, pictures of weapons are accompanied only by their length and damage rating (from 1 to 4; a key is provided to translate these numbers into die sizes suitable for a game such as D&D).

Again, in the content as well as the artwork there is filler. The map of the Japanese castle is accompanied by an entire page describing them (although written from the point of view of ninjas trying to break in), and there is also a page about samurai warriors. Thanks, but if I wanted to read about the samurai, I would have picked up a book about them.

My advice regarding this book would be to steer well clear of it. If you are interested in a treatment of the ninja for roleplaying games, I am sure that Gold Rush Games’ book Shinobi would provide much more information for your money (127 pages for $20 U.S.). If you are looking for systemless information about the ninja or the other assassin groups, I think you would be better off investigating nonfiction available in an ordinary or online bookstore.

Weapons and Assassins
Weapons and Assassins Capsule Review by Chris Camfield on 28/11/02 Style: 2 (Needs Work) Substance: 2 (Sparse) An exact reprint of a 20-year old supplement; short on both content and style. Product: Weapons and Assassins Author: Erick Wujcik Category: RPG Company/Publisher: Palladium Books Line: Weapons Cost: 7.95 Page count: 48 Year published: 2002 ISBN: 0-916211-03-7 SKU: 403 Comp copy?: yes Capsule Review by Chris Camfield on 28/11/02 Genre tags: Historical Generic	Weapons and Assassins Weapons and Assassins (WaA) is a reprint of one of Palladium Books’ first publications, one of a series of five books about weapons. The book covers three historical societies of assassins - the original Assassins (aka the Hashashin), the Thuggees of India, and the Ninja of Japan - in an essentially systemless manner. Originally published in 1983 as staple-bound softcover, the new printing of WaA has a proper binding and a new, attractive cover depicting a ninja with ninjato (sword) at the ready. The book retains its original 7"x10" format. Once you open the book and look inside, you quickly learn that this is, unfortunately, literally a reprint. For some reason, WaA was typeset in what looks very much like Courier - in any case, a fixed-space font that looks like a typewriter’s output - and most of the black and white interior art is shaded in rough halftones (dots) which is quite unattractive. Emphasis in the text is noted with capitals, which you’d rarely see today outside of a Usenet forum. This looked bad even back in 1983; the previous books in Palladium’s weapons series were more attractively typeset, and they used line drawings which were better. There is admittedly quite a lot of that interior art, and much of it is useful in showing equipment or techniques. Some of it does, though, smack of being filler. For instance, a map showing the area of India in which the Thuggees operated fills an entire page - with the area of Thuggee activity marked as a simple rectangle, and only one city marked on the entire map. There is another two pages depicting Japanese castles, and last page shows the stages in donning samurai armour. Interesting, but barely relevant. (And also, I believe, reprinted from Weapons and Castles of the Orient.) The treatment of the three societies in the book varies greatly. The Assassins get a mere six pages, two pages of which are given over to the clothing worn in different parts of the Muslim world (my, how useful...), the Thugs get nine, and the Ninja 18. Aside from the introduction, table of contents, and these sections, there is also a 4-page section on poisons, a 5-page glossary, and single pages for a bibliography and a brief chronology. The section on the Assassins gives us a rundown on their history, and a tale of one assassination. For the Thugs, we are given a historical overview, an explanation of the stages by which a young Thug was initiated into the cult, and a description of a typical Thug assassination. Strangling techniques and river thugs are also treated. The longer Ninja section talks, again, about history, as well as describing a typical assassination, tactics, training, weapons, equipment, and special techniques for dealing with climbing, bodies of water, and winter weather. I have no doubt that the information presented is well-researched - Wujcik cites 16 sources, aside from two previous volumes in Palladium’s Weapons series. However, the book was published 20 years ago, and the newest source is dated 1980. Furthermore, there just isn’t that much substance to the book! The six-page section on the Assassins has enough text to fill up perhaps two pages (the rest given over to images), the Thugs three, and for the Ninja, six. Keep in mind as well that the book is in a somewhat compact format to begin with! The section on poisons and the glossary are puzzles. The poison section devotes very little attention to poisons actually used by any of the groups described in the book, with as much information about some infamous poisoners of Renaissance and Restoration Europe as the ninja. The glossary would be perfectly fine if it weren't for the fact that terms related to all three groups are mixed together. I think it would have been much more useful if the terms for each society had been separated. The book’s presentation of weaponry is pretty weak. The previous books in the series rated weapons for damage, type of damage, size, mass, and ease of throwing (plus others I have probably forgotten), but that information is not presented here. Instead, pictures of weapons are accompanied only by their length and damage rating (from 1 to 4; a key is provided to translate these numbers into die sizes suitable for a game such as D&D). Again, in the content as well as the artwork there is filler. The map of the Japanese castle is accompanied by an entire page describing them (although written from the point of view of ninjas trying to break in), and there is also a page about samurai warriors. Thanks, but if I wanted to read about the samurai, I would have picked up a book about them. My advice regarding this book would be to steer well clear of it. If you are interested in a treatment of the ninja for roleplaying games, I am sure that Gold Rush Games’ book Shinobi would provide much more information for your money (127 pages for $20 U.S.). If you are looking for systemless information about the ninja or the other assassin groups, I think you would be better off investigating nonfiction available in an ordinary or online bookstore.