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H.P. Lovecraft's Dreamlands

"Follow me, to the edge,
and follow me...into the dream"

H.P. Lovecraft's Dreamlands is a sourcebook about H.P. Lovecraft's Dreamlands (oddly enough) for Chaosium's Call of Cthulhu game. For those that don't know, H.P. Lovecraft (HPL) was a pulp author in the early 20th century (writing from about 1915, until he died in 1937). HPL basically wrote two sorts of stories - horror stories about the Cthulhu Mythos (though not all his horror stories really fit into this), and some dreamy fantasy stories inspired by Lord Dunsany. They were tied together, but the Dreamland stories have a more adventurous feel to them. Still sort of creepy, but more fantasy than horror.

This is the 5th version of the Dreamlands sourcebook, earlier versions had slightly different names. Apparently this is very close to 4th edition (based on what the credit section says, anyway), but with some additional material added (monsters and gods) and some character generation (almost making it a stand alone book. Almost. You should be okay with Cthulhu Dark Ages, or just about any version of Call of Cthulhu, at least for the character generation part). Also all the adventures that have appeared in any of the previous Dreamlands rulebooks.

Despite the name of this book, it's not entirely H.P. Lovecraft's Dreamlands that this book describes. It also is based on the works of Brian Lumley, who wrote several Dreamlands novels (and also novels and stories about the Cthulhu mythos). And some of Gary Meyers works are also used, but I've never heard of him before (or read his stuff). But apparently it's mostly Lumley that is borrowed from.

Lumley has a somewhat different take on things than HPL, though. Both in the Dreamlands and in the Cthulhu Mythos. I've just recently read 8 HPL inspired books by Lumley - 2 books of short stories, plus the 6 "Titus Crow" novels, which don't really star the title character (actually most star Henri Laurent de Marigny, son of HPL's character Etiene Laurent de Marigny), but do fit together to form a coherent plot. They change quite a bit in tone from book to book, though.

For instance, the first one, "The Burrowers Below" is a fairly standard modern day mythos story, dealing with the Cthonians. The next is sort of a continuation of the first. "The Clock of Dreams" is set entirely in the Dreamlands, with de Marigny having to travel there to rescue Titus Crow and his girlfriend. "Spawn of the Winds" deals with Ithaqua stealing a party of investigators from Earth, and putting them on an ice planet, and stars Hank Silberhutte, who is a Texan and could have been torn from the pages of a 30s pulp adventure magazine (I suspect he's a Robert Howard reference).

The last two "Titus Crow" novels almost have a Doc Smith Space Opera-ish feel to it, with the hero (de Marigny) zooming around the universe in his Tardis like spaceship (basically, it is the Tardis, but a clock, not a police box. Though HPL seems to have invented it in the first place), blasting Hounds of Tindalos with his laser beams.

The short stories are creepy enough, some fairly derivative, others very original and horrific on their own, not because of Mythos elements. Lumley seems to take a more Derlethian view on the Mythos (that is, based on August Derleth's Mythos stories) - the elder gods are quite benevolent, and Cthulhu, Hastur and company are almost child-ish in their thoughts and motivations. Ithaqua seems mostly motivated by his desire for women. (There is a quote from Blazing Saddles that would fit him quite well. )

But don't be too alarmed if you're a purist - neither the Derlethian aspect of his stories, nor the pulpy/space opera-ish style of his novels shows up in this book. Basically, this book seems to borrow 3 things from Lumley - a vampire lady and her vampire nemesis, that the "eidolon Lathi" is a termite lady, and "Xura" should be spelled "Zura". Probably enough to drive purists batty, but probably not enough for most people to notice. Meyers mostly seems to contribute "The House of the Worm", which I don't know enough about to explain, and a couple gods, including an Athena-ish god of the Dreamlands and what can only be described as a really evil looking onion with horns and tentacles.

"Catch my hand and come with me.
Close your eyes and dream.

No words, no talk, We´ll go dreaming
No pain, no hurt, We´ll go dreaming "

Anyway, enough background. The book starts off with a 12 page or so overview of the Dreamlands and dreaming - that is, how to enter it and leave, then a very short section (3 pages) on the "atmosphere" of a Dreamlands game. One suggestion I like, is to use real dreams you've had. I happen to keep a dream journal/blog, and while most of my dreams probably aren't suited for Dreamlands adventures (because of the technology), there is a fair amount of weird stuff that would work. Often very surreal stuff. Better yet, would be having your players keep a dream journal, and borrow bits from their dreams (though this is probably asking too much of them). And it discusses the difference in tone and style between HPL, Myers, and Lumley.

There are some special rules for the Dreamlands and dreaming, but pretty sketchy ones, in keeping with the rules light nature of CoC. Basically, there are two new skills, "Dream Lore" and "Dreaming". "Dream Lore" basically works like any other knowledge skill. "Dreaming" is somewhat different than most skills, it allows the character to alter the dreamworld on a successful skill roll. In theory, they can do just about anything, but it will cost them magic points (the more grandiose the dream, the more points), plus POW to make it permanent in the Dreamlands. The rules for the point cost of the dream creation is actually very vague. Just a couple examples - a beautiful woman (or man or sheep) would be 36 magic points, because it would be 18 points for its most important attribute, appearance, being 18, times two because it's a living mammal. A palace might be 450 points, a sword 9. There are vague example given. So sort of back of a cocktail napkin rules.

"Why does it seem that's it's all just a dream?
And why do they say that life is never what it seems to be?"

The Gazetteer of the Dreamlands is about 45 pages long. It covers the major cities and features of the Dreamlands. Most places get a paragraph or so. Important places may get half a page. It often uses a zoom in view of the pull out map, but in some cases, there are maps of actual places, though these tend to be very crude. For instance, the map of Celephais looks like it was sketched on a cocktail napkin in about 45 seconds. While this style may suit Call of Cthulhu (though I never liked it much), it doesn't fit the Dreamlands.

The Dreamlands is sort of quasi-medieval. Think of Snow White and Cinderella, and that pretty much sums up the technology and feel of much of the area, though some parts have more of an Arabian Nights feel. There's the timeless lands of Ooth-Nargai, ruled by King Kuranes, which is a pretty big place, including a floating island, complete with sky ships. There's the Six kingdoms, including Ilek-Vad, a cliff city, only the cliffs are made out of glass; Ulthar, where there are cats everywhere ; The Principalities of Kled, where everyone has a silly name.

Actually, just going over this makes me think that this must have heavily inspired Gary Gygax, when he was creating his Greyhawk. A lot of the terminology is similar, and some names. For instance, the Dreamlands has a "Barrier Peaks", though in this case, it's "Grey Barrier Peaks". I can't really do it justice - it's filled with lots of weird and wondrous places.

People of the Dreamlands gets about 10 pages devoted to them. Although it uses the Lumley version of Zura and the eidolon Lathi, it doesn't present any of Lumley's own original Dreamlands characters, as far as I can tell. (Maybe their permission doesn't go that far?). There is probably one big variance from HPL - whatever he meant by eidolon, he probably didn't mean a lecherous termite lady. Zura is also probably a lot different than HPL, though I'm not entirely sure. In Lumley's version, she's sort of a lecherous necromancer lady. Actually, if not for borrowing from Lumley, this section would have been entirely male. HPL never seemed to have any female characters in his stuff.

Amusingly (at least for me), two housecats get statted up. Which is funny in of itself, but the picture of one of them actually looks like someone famous, but I can't figure out who. Richard Nixon? Gary Coleman? Benny Hill? It looks so familiar, but I can't place it. (Neither of the cat pictures actually look like cats, their faces look human instead of cat-like.)

The Bestiary is about 40 pages long. There's a whole range of critters, 60+. Most of them are fairly icky, suiting a Call of Cthulhu supplement. There's a variety of minions of various Gods; variations on humans (Merfolk, Tickfolk, Termitefolk), something called a "Blupe", which seems to be distantly related to the Slurpee; 3 types of cats - regular cats, Cats from Saturn, and everyone's favorite, Cats from Uranus. Only one sort of llama (apparently Chaosium doesn't love Alpacas), who are surprisingly tough. Some other odd real world animals, like yaks.

There are a couple of rodents: Zoogs, which are famous prominent in HPL's stories, which are basically rats with tentacles on their mouths; Snouters, which are basically fast, long nosed squirrels. Well, you get the idea. Lots of fairly odd critters, plus the usual icky stuff. Actually, a lot of the names remind me of Lewis Carrol's Wonderland stuff (which strangely, other than those 2 AD&D modules, doesn't seem to have made much of an appearance in the RPG world).

The Gods of the Dreamlands take up about 15 pages. In several cases (10), it simply tells you that the god is unchanged from the entry in the main Call of Cthulhu book. This is probably the only place where Cthulhu Dark Ages might not be enough - unfortunately, I had to sell my copy, so I can't look it up, but it had something of an abbreviated god list.

Many of the gods in this are "Great Ones", which are apparently gods of the Dreamlands. These are somewhat human looking in some cases, but some are fairly grotesque. To a certain extent, the Dreamlands doesn't seem to have a coherent pantheon. For instance, there's a god of fungus, a god of holding spears (really. He just holds it). But no god of the sky, or god of the sea, or the typical sort you find in real world cultures. Probably because the world was developed in stories - when someone needed a god for the story, they made one up.

One of the weirder gods is Sthood - he's the Gary Meyers creation that looks like an evil onion with horns and tentacles. His priests don't so much worship him, as keep others from worshiping him. Because if he gets worshiped, he wakes up. But why this is so terrible isn't really mentioned, just that when he awakes, he performs a "miracle" then goes back to sleep.

"They keep me in a dark room...
Where I can have my visions
And show them to the treasure"

There are 6 adventures, taking up about 70 pages (plus 15 pages of handouts in the back). At least two of these are basically pointless, being very very short, and little more than tourist excursions. One from a point of view of dreamers from the waking world, the other from Dreamlands natives. The rest of the adventures are for Earth dreamers, and are all pretty much standard CoC scenarios, saving someone from something awful, or foiling some diabolical mythos based plot. Though in this case, using the Dreamlands is essential.

Pickman's Student is one of the better ones. A famed painter is possessed, and the PCs must save him by entering the Dreamlands via his paintings. The PCs apparently are involved in this adventure to help his girlfriend.

The Land of Lost Dreams is interesting, in that it comes from a version of the Dreamlands before it was Lumley-ized, and so has a different take on Xura, including spelling it the proper way (Xura). It's also a case of possession, actually. And also they seem to want to help because of the victim's girlfriend.

Season of the Witch is also a case of someone being possessed. But in this case, it's a female college student, who based on the illustration, looks a lot like Rhea Pearlman, only with a bigger hair. (Though the adventure text gives her an appearance stat of 16 - I guess the drawing was by Danny Devito)

Captive of Two Worlds is thankfully, not about possession, but the most straight forward Call of Cthulhu scenario. Basically, the PCs are captured by a Mythos cultist, who also happens to be a dreamer. So they have to go to the Dreamlands to kick his ass and make him let them go in the real world.

"I could have been a dreamer, I could have been a shooting star, I could have been a dreamer, yeah.
I'm another number and you know the numbers must agree"

This book does include character generation rules - 10 pages worth. I hesitate to say this could be a stand alone book - clearly it's not meant to be, but it almost could be. It gives you the step by step instructions. Experienced role-players could likely figure it out pretty quick, but might be confusing to new ones. Basically, it's like most Call of Cthulhu character generation exactly, except it's meant to create characters that are native to the Dreamlands, so it's tweaked to fit those. The occupations are different, the skills are lower-tech, etc.

It uses Chaosium's house system, BRP or "Basic Role Playing". It's very similar to D&D without classes or levels. Characters have several attributes rated from 3 to 18 or so (Strength, Dexterity, etc), along with a percentile based (d100%) skill system, where skilled are rated from 1 to 100 (and on up). Skills work very simply, to use a skill, if you roll under a character's skill rating, it's successful. If not, it's not.

Not my favorite system in the world ( too vague, too gritty), but not bad, either. It works, and is easy to convert to d20.

"I had a dream, when I was young
A dream of sweet illusion"

I think this is the first Dreamlands to be a hardcover. The cover art is just okay (sort of a generic seascape with a ship), but the end papers are absolutely gorgeous, they depict a cityscape. A very fantastic cityscape, with curious buildings, and clouds and trees and rays of light. Really neat. The inside pages are fairly well illustrated, if you like Earl Geier's work (though there are some other artists), and there's a whole lot of art. The paper is very very thin. In many cases, the backside art or map, where heavy black is used, bleeds through, which can make it difficult to read on a few occasions (mostly the page on the other side of the map of Celephais).

There is a very nice pull out map by Andy Hopp, who I seem to have heard of from somewhere, though I'm not sure where. At any rate, he did a wonderful job on the map. But like most pull out maps, I managed to rip it, as the perforation was not perforated enough, I guess. I doubt it's because of my incredible strength.

The book is well organized and laid out. There's also a pretty decent index. The side margins are pretty small on most pages, so it's a pretty good value, in terms of how much text you get per page.

"Dream a little dream, this dream is over"

All in all, it's a very good book, but where it really fails (for me) is in how it views the Dreamlands. It basically looks at the Dreamlands from the point of view of the Call of Cthulhu game. That is, the Dreamlands exist as a way for the PCs to foil schemes of Mythos cultists and other baddies.

While that's okay as far as it goes, that's not really how HPL viewed them (as near as I can tell) - I think the Dreamlands needs to be a fantasy setting first, not simply an add-on to Call of Cthulhu. You could conceivably do that with this book, but running a fantasy game set in it will require a lot of work on the part of the GM, because the information in the book is scant at best, and the chances of this seeing any support from Chaosium (other than a reprint in a few years) is only slightly less likely than Cthulhu rising from the sea. The Dreamlands is a very wondrous place, and I'm not sure I could come up with detailed descriptions of many of the cities in this. While I do have an imagination, it's largely geared at other areas than the sorts of stuff in this book.

Also, I think the original Dreamlands, as envisioned by HPL, and maybe Myer's version of it, is reasonably well suited for Chaosium's Basic Role-Playing System. But the Lumley version of the Dreamlands is probably better suited for D&D/d20. Or maybe something cinematic like D6 or Storyteller. (Not quite Exalted's level of Storyteller, but close).

I personally have no problems with Lumley's version of the Dreamlands, but I can't help but think it would have been better to have one sourcebook devoted just to HPL's Dreamlands, with a follow-up sourcebook covering Lumley's stuff. Especially as only a few things from Lumley appear in this book, missing some of his more interesting characters and places.

I really have no idea how to rate this. It's not a bad book, but it's almost just like an overview. There really should be entire sourcebooks for most the cities and regions of the Dreamlands, and full fledged monster and character books. But that will never happen (for various reasons). So it's like a tantalizing glimpse of what could be. Which perhaps captures the essence of the Dreamlands, something vague and unrealized, but ultimately, like dreams, unsatisfying.

Still, it's a good overview, good enough for its intended purpose, that is a sourcebook on the Dreamlands for Call of Cthulhu. It's just a shame there couldn't be a Dreamlands RPG. Though I do remember as a kid, how just a tiny Gazetteer and foldout map of Greyhawk thrilled my friends and I, really fired our imaginations. But back then, I had a lot more free time. Actually, the map in this does have the coolness that old Greyhawk map did, only it's a smaller map, the equivalent of 4 normal pages.

"All I dream is the same dream..."

If you have 4th edition, it's probably not worth upgrading, unless you want a hardback and a really nice map. Might be worth the jump if you have a 1st-3rd edition, and aren't bothered by the non-HPL stuff. I used to have the 2nd or 3rd edition (don't remember which, lost it when I lost just about all my gaming stuff 10 years ago) and while there is some stuff I remember, there's lots I don't.

(The quotes are (in order) from the following songs: Lange - "Follow Me"; BT - "Dreaming" (from his pre-N'Sync days); DJ Astrid - "The Spell"; Masters & Nickson - "Out There" (the song actually seems to be about remote viewing as opposed to dreaming, and it's the only song I know to use the word "ether" in it); Dio - "I Could Have Been a Dreamer"; Queen - "One Vision"; Van Halen - "The Dream is Over"; Brainbug (and maybe Johnny Vicious, too) - "Rain")

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