For a long time, Draug was such a work in progress, and there was talk of publishing it privately until Spartacus grabbed the chance. Now the book is available in book stores all over the country. The remarkable thing isn’t just that this is a professionally published RPG created by Norwegians (there are many examples of those, both in English and Norwegian) and published in the Norwegian language (also done before), but that the background and setting themselves are also uniquely Norwegian. Traditional fantasy RPGs are often inspired by the universes of J. R. R. Tolkien and those who came after him, while Draug is inspired by the Norwegian fairy tales collected by Asbjørnsen & Moe, in addition to Norwegian history from the early 1800’s.

What are you getting into if you buy this book? Is Draug a game for everybody? If you’re wondering about this, read on. There are many ways to evaluate role-playing games. I’ll divide them up into three categories: the organization and presentation of the content; the background and setting; and the conflict system and rules.

Draug is divided into three sections: the Player’s Book, the Gamemaster’s Book and the Book of Adventure. I’m retro enough to think that these sections would’ve been well-suited to be published as three smaller books and put in a box, like the first RPG’s. Such a division would’ve been a practical advantage for this game. The problems of having the players’ and game master’s sections in the same book should be familiar to everyone who’s used books that keep this information together. This applies to Draug as well, since the book simply has so much information, particularly historical information, that it can take a long time for the players to read through this section before playing. It can easily be too much of a good thing for the average player - not to mention a newbie - to read through it all. Of course, a GM could lend the book to the players or ask them to buy their own copies, and just trust them not to read more than they should. The most likely thing is that the sheer amount of information stops most players from reading through it all beforehand, so they have to make do with a small dose of knowledge given out by the game master before play. This is too bad, since the players’ book also has a lot of good information about role-playing in general, and role-playing Draug in particular, that especially new gamers would do well to read. So this should only be a short-term solution. In the long run, the goal should definitely be to let all players gain more insight into the historical period, something that’s bound to increase the enthusiasm and desire to play.

This brings me to the first “warning”: Draug is quite different from other role-playing games. You have to completely forget orcs, elves, swordfights and huge muscle-bound characters. In Draug you’ll find peasant life, hard times, history and national romanticism, and maybe also creatures like nøkken, huldra, vetter, trolls and nisser - not to mention the Devil, Gamle-Erik himself! Even though Draug has lots of mysterious and supernatural elements like other RPGs, players may still find it has a strongly different style than what they’re used to playing. You have to be very aware of this from the beginning, otherwise you’ll quickly end up disappointed. Draug is not a heroic system. It’s not a combat-oriented system. It’s not at all supportive of the type of play many other role-playing games promote. On the surface, the setting is also much less fantastical than what you’re usually presented with, even though there are, as mentioned, plenty of supernatural elements there. Draug can be more than peasant life and hard work - but at the same time you shouldn’t expect every session to be filled to the brim with creatures from old Norwegian folk beliefs. Whether or not this is desirable is a totally different question, since the subterranean creatures are often very dangerous, and both can and will kill characters who aren’t careful. Ideally, a Draug player should relate to the supernatural in the same way that Call of Cthulhu players relate to the creatures and mythos of that game.

I’ve already mentioned that the books are full of historical facts, overviews of daily life in different parts of society, and more. Here is where the author has done marvelous work - reading historical references, collecting knowledge and recreating it in an understandable manner. I hardly dare to think of how many hours of research that must have gone into this section. The level of that which is presented is also more than high enough for educational use; and if role-playing games are ever to be integrated in education, I think Draug must be one of the best candidates for this. Even though I must confess that the sheer amount of facts made this section a bit of a heavy read the first time, the information is still very well-structured, presented in a good and interesting fashion, and has the perfect balance between a superficial sweep on the one side and richness of detail on the other. However, since the book is also trying to address new players, I still feel that much of this information could have been presented in a more practical way for the game master to use – especially newbie GMs will struggle, I imagine. Certain parts could also have been embellished; this especially goes for period maps (and preferably also more geographical information) over the largest/most important cities and areas in Norway at this time. But perhaps this is material that lends itself especially well to source books, if the author wants to augment the game with supplements?

In addition to the sections with historical details, there are the sections that describe elements from folk tales and old stories: the supernatural and the mystical. This information can mostly be found in the game master’s section, so that the spell of mystery won’t be broken for the players, which seems sensible. Here you’ll find everything from information about creatures from old Norwegian beliefs to supernatural powers (which are available for practitioners of Christianity, Devil worship and Spirit magic (only for Sami characters)). This also seems well researched, although the rules for playing a noaidi (a sort of Sami shaman) are so strict that I don’t see it as possible to play such a character for any length of time. The chapter on the little people and creatures from folklore is very good, and although I miss information on old favourites like Daldegasten and Kvernknurren, all of the most well-known ones - and some more - are represented here. Again, it’s clear that there’s impressive research behind this. It seems, however, that many of them are there for the sake of completeness - some lack a complete physical description, and others seem difficult to use in practice, unless you simply want the characters to meet with death and destruction (again, think Call of Cthulhu creatures). Still, as reading material and background this section is very fascinating.

This brings me to the rules themselves. These are inspired by the free system Fudge, although they’ve been somewhat adjusted and partially rewritten from the beginning. I’ve seen some of the old working documents for Draug, and I can say that the revisions in nearly all cases have improved the system. The question is whether that’s enough. I should mention that I’m not a great fan of Fudge. A criticism of the rules of Draug can therefore quickly become a criticism of Fudge, but it must be said that there’s enough people who like Fudge. They will probably like Draug a lot too. Personally, I think Fudge (and consequently Draug) give far too general descriptions of characters, in addition to a tendency to reward creative players. The most creative players usually manage very well in role-playing games, and I don’t really feel that we need rules systems that reward them even more.

In Draug, this is especially noticeable in character generation. Here you don’t roll any dice to find out how strong/agile/smart/skilful you are. In fact, there are no pre-defined attributes or skills at all! What you have is ten empty slots on the sheet, where you fill in your choices about which skills or abilities you want your character to have. In Draug these skills are called traits ("Trekk"). Along with your traits, you get ten predetermined level scores, which you can distribute among these traits as you desire (two good, three okay and five average). There are seven levels in Draug, from terrible ("Elendig", the worst) to superb ("Fremragende", the best). (Note for Norwegians: In Draug "dugeleg" is actually better than "god", which really doesn’t seem right to me, but I’ll let it pass). So basically only the imagination limits what kind of traits a character can have. As a consequence, the creative players in the group will get an insane amount of freedom to make characters with the most incredible traits you could imagine, but experience shows that there are also people who aren’t as comfortable with such a process and end up with traditional, less creative traits. It is of course possible to help them, but this must be done with tact, otherwise they can easily feel that their characters’ traits aren’t their own - and so the character isn’t experienced as their own, either. If, on the other hand, you succeed in this process, you will feel that you have a living and exciting character. It can be worth jumping in at the far end, in other words - but again: you should be aware of what you’re getting into. I don’t think this is for everyone, but many will probably like this method.

In addition to traits, a character will typically have a profession as well. Here there are many suggestions in the book that the players can consider, or make their own if they have good and acceptable concepts. A profession will mainly contribute to the characters’ motivations for what they do and how, and doesn’t have to be a guide to the traits they choose. Of course, sometimes certain traits will be a natural choice for certain professions - what’s a fisherman with no knowledge of boats? - but at the same time, there can be a reason for things being as they are, and this is the most important thing. Background history plays a large role in Draug.

In Draug you use so-called "Fudge dice" - dice with two plusses, two minuses and two blank sides. Since there will be players who don’t have Fudge dice at hand or a game store around the corner, I think the book might have given a solution so you could manage with two ordinary six-sided dice. If you for example say that 2 = four minuses, 3 = three minuses, 4 = two minuses, 5 = one minus, 6, 7 and 8 = zero, 9 = one plus, 10 = two pluses, 11 = three pluses and 12 = four pluses. Doesn’t this work in pretty much the same way?

The rules are otherwise pretty uniform and general, and generally work well. Usually you need a certain result to succeed in a certain action, and the plus/minus dice are used to adjust the relevant trait upwards or downwards to see if you make it. The advantage of such a general process is that it’s easily used in almost any situation. The disadvantage is that there’ll always be a few areas where it’s too general. An example of where it doesn’t work for me is combat situations. It’s said several places that this isn’t a combat system or a heroic system like many other role-playing games are. This is fine, but it doesn’t mean that certain character types will not be involved in physical combat from time to time (the system lets you create soldiers, knife-wielding gypsies etc), so I think it’s unfortunate that there are no specifics about how to use the conflict system in combat. You’re pointed towards the rules for opposing rolls (which are used in all situations where a character tries to "compete" against another about something). In this situation, both characters roll against their trait, and the one who gets the best result wins the competition. This is simply far too vague! The rules for what damage you get in different situations also seem to be a bit random and arbitrary. The few points of suggestions at the bottom of page 57 are all you have to go by. It’s possible that I’m spoiled/damaged after playing a lot of role-playing games through the years with much clearer rules for (and focus on) such things. Possibly one of the author’s goals is to minimize the focus on combat so that it’s almost left out of the book and out of the adventures, but I’m inclined to think there are other and better ways of doing this. Personally I’m of the opinion that it’s easiest to ignore a rule after you’ve really grasped it - something you can’t do here. This might mean that all players of Draug have to make their own house rules for how to handle battle. Definitely not a simple task for new players, either.

Now I want to mention the last of the three "books" you find in Draug: the Book of Adventure. I like this one incredibly much! In addition to an introductory scenario (which, unlike most you get in similar rule books, is well-written and good!) this is the game master’s little treasure trove of ideas, methods and tools you can use when making scenarios for Draug. I’ve seen many attempts to make something similar other places, and far from all have been as useful in practice. This attempt is far better, and best of all: equally useful for both new and experienced GMs alike!

I’m still uncertain whether Draug is a suitable book for new game masters. On one hand, the book has a lot of what other books lack. The reader’s knowledge is never taken for granted. Everything is explained well, and it manages to be just as basic as it needs to be for the beginners while also keeping it relevant for more experienced players as well. It’s all here, from the traditional chapter on "what is a role-playing game" to the aforementioned "Book of Adventure" which deftly leads the game master through the many components of an adventure. This is very useful stuff for players of any level of experience. On the other hand, there is a lot in the book that isn’t well-suited for new game masters. For example, there’s a lot of historical information - wonderfully collected and structured, but no info on how you can actually use most of this in practice. The fact that many of the rules are unclear (or, at best, very general and flexible) is also a problem. I think it’s easier for new players to relate to clear, unambiguous rules, even though they (often rightfully so) might see these rules in a less favorable light with experience. No matter how clear the rules might be, most who read a role-playing book for the very first time will be troubled by the feeling that the game appears vague and unclear. In the case of Draug, this can even be a problem for experienced players at times. At the same time the setting can seem a bit overwhelming. The large amounts of background information would definitely have given me trouble at start, if this had been the first role-playing book I read as an inexperienced games master.

I don’t know if it is me who strongly underestimate new players, or if Draug overestimates them; regardless, I’m still certain that it’s the more experienced players who can get the most out of this game. Experienced players can “roll with it” much easier, which is exactly the playing style that this game promotes. Draug can also seem refreshingly different from other RPGs. The setting (in particular), rules and playing style combine to give a playing style that’s different from most other games, and the role-playing experience should be quite unique for all Norwegians. Since this is part of our history and cultural heritage, we all relate to this in some form or fashion. It may be a bit demanding on the player to play a long campaign set in Norway around 1801, but that might be even more fun if it’s successful. And you get the most success if all the players contribute, together with the game master, to make it happen.

After living with and testing out Draug for a month or so, I must conclude that this game isn’t for everyone, but anyone who likes Norwegian fairy-tales (doesn’t everyone?) and/or Norwegian history around 1801, have finally found the game they’re waiting for in Draug. Those who want to try something different will also get a lot out of this game. Draug is a pearl of Norwegian culture that deserves to be given a chance. Whether you end up loving it or disliking it, you’re guaranteed some unique role-playing experiences! What more can you ask for? And how many of the new games that have come out over the last years can promise the same thing?

Johannes H. Berg would rightfully have been very proud over the dedication.

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