 Goto [ Index ] |
Introduction is exactly what it sounds like, listing reference materials one might find useful or inspirational, a brief synopsis of the setting, and so forth. For those who want it, a breakdown of the setting’s Four Colors from Wild Talents is also given and explored. The main thing to keep in mind is that as time passes the Blue rating of the setting(Wild Talents’ measure of how over the top things are) goes from a slightly off 2 to end at an anything goes 5.
Chapter 1: the Kerberos Club, details the Kerberos Club in regards to its headquarters, customs, location, and so forth. How members keep their finances up, how they view society (and in turn are viewed by it), the process by which they join, the nature of the Club’s serving staff (and how their fulfilling of their duties could be the focus of games) are all mentioned in at least passing. The chapter drips with ideas and plot hooks. The only things I think it really lacks are a useful map of the Club itself, and perhaps more details on the contents of the building. But given that the building is constantly being remodeled, rebuilt, and re-“some word for new tenants that move in that starts with re”… given all the constant change the club is meant to undergo I can see how maps and more detail would actually be of little use at best.
The chapter also includes brief glimpses into some of the other major powers of the world, and how they handle the Strange. In short, the French Societe Scientifique pursues mad science from a public forum, the Russian Section Seven uses magic to aid the government in controlling the land (and other magicians), the American North and South are torn and may never reunite as the Queen-Goddess Victoria sides with the South (ignorant of the horrors the slave owners are truly up to). But back in England, factions align against the Kerberos Club and the Queen. Some fear the Club’s power and Strangeness, others fear the rising cult of Victoria and her transformation into something possibly, truly, divine. A few (all too few) famous figures of the time are also explored, from the Club member known as the Elephant Man, to the automaton businesswoman Ada Lovelace, to the master of crime known only as the Turk.
Wrapping things up are some brief overviews of the early, middle, and late periods of the Club, and how adventures during these times might be compared with TV shows or comics. During the early period the Strange is uncommon and kept quiet and hidden (like an episode of X-Files). In the middle period the public learns that the Strange is real as it becomes more prevalent, and the Club members start adopting secret identities and the Strange is accepted as fact. By the end of the period Atlantean war parties travel up the Thames to sack London, the colonization of the lands of the faerie is well underway, and knock-off werewolf technology is being used by rival militaries. And over the course of it all, Victoria herself becomes less mortal and more divine.
Chapter 2: All Things Right and Proper seems like a standard historical reference chapter at first glance. How do people of various socio-economic classes make a living, cheat on their spouses, handle their gambling debts, that sort of thing. A few maps of various house styles are also offered, which is always appreciated by me. But the nice thing is that the author never lets you forget that this isn’t a standard historical setting. The effects of faerie pollutants on childbirth are mentioned, aero ships and electric cars are available for transportation, and the growing power of the Queen’s cult is discussed under the religious section.
Chapter 3: Victoria’s Century is a timeline from the year 1801 to the year 1902. And while the chapter feels a bit short (only coming in at 50 odd pages), that’s probably because it’s brimming with story hooks, setting flavor, and wonderfully bizarre tidbits. Good things always end too soon. Perhaps the worst part is the teasing nature of how the author provides a rich, wonderful world that is rapidly spinning into a more and more glorious outlandish place and then- it ends. Now, at this point I have to admit my complaining comes more from a hungry appetite for more delicious ideas and hooks than a deficit from within the text itself.
Anyway, a lot of things happen. Pathways and treaties are made with the faerie, allowing British to send criminals and citizens alike to colonize it (in a manner similar to that Australia experienced). Technology advances at a mad pace, but standardization and regulation is more problematic, but when something becomes the standard (such as Lovelace’s automotons) then the world changes yet again (and futureshock is also a recurring theme in KC). A serial killer known as the Empty Man strikes across London. Victoria’s armies develop power armor as well as transformation amulets, both of which see other nations make inferior copies of. Atlantis is discovered, and the Atlanteans rise up to stop British exploitation of their territories (the Atlanteans lose). Syphilitic vampirism spreads among various strata of society. A tunnel is dug under the English Channel. A heroin-induced hallucinatory apparatus allows people to access a virtual reality connected to Babbage’s analog computational devices. And there’s even a bit of travel to Mars and beyond. Taken singly each of these ideas could form the basis of an entire campaign, but taken all together they become almost overwhelming, which is a large part of the entire point of the setting.
Chapter 4: Throne of Empire covers the city itself, London. While a bit more “down to earth” than other parts of the book, this chapter still reminds the reader that the KC is not a standard Victorian setting on numerous occasions. The city is given a broad overview first, then it narrows in on specific neighborhoods (each getting a paragraph or so), and then further narrows in to locations of interest. The locations, like Bedlam or Whitechapel, are further expanded with a mixture of specific story hooks, “local color”, and some ideas as to what kind of people could be found there. It’s not a bad chapter by any stretch, but it’s not nearly as gripping as what’s come before it.
One thing I would like to point out though is that this chapter, like Chapter 2, doesn’t sugar-coat or overly romanticize the time period. Sure the Kerberos Club is all egalitarian and progressive and liberal (and don’t forget, extremely wealthy and more than a little influential, which helps provides them such social luxuries), but it’s the exception to the setting to make contemporary RPG players feel that they can play any character they want. The rest of the society is either living a life of grotesque wealth and “proper” appearances, barely struggling to stay middle classed and live in the shadow of the rich, or else looting corpses in open sewers just to stay poor. Racism, classism, sexism, nationalism, and prejudices of all sorts are thriving quite nicely in this time period. While it’s a setting of gonzo adventure and escalating weirdness, it’s also one based in the social problems of the 19th century, possibly made all the worse (or at least prolonged) by the futureshock the world goes through as the Strangeness worsens.
Chapter 5: The Great Game is all about making characters but also provides some new mechanics. Default characters are built on 250 points, and can come from any Archetype. Three new Archetypes are included as well, Faerie (which sadly reminded me greatly of every other game’s presentation of faeries these days), Magus (a character who can sell their Convictions for more occult power), and Human Oddities (you’re a super freak, super freak!). Rules for Unrest are provided as well, giving GMs a tool to create rioting mobs for players to deal with (and possibly incite). There’s also a bit on how to game in the setting, some neat ideas on what happens when a super device (or potion, or whatever) becomes mass-marketed, and a new mechanic called Convictions. Convictions replace Loyalties and Passions that other Wild Talents’ settings use, giving Willpower when they’re followed and costing Willpower when they’re denied. Characters can change their Convictions if they run out of Willpower, but doing so is considered a majorly dramatic event. Since powers don’t have to run on or be vulnerable to Willpower, this mechanic isn’t as important as it might be (like in a game of Godlike for instance), but it provides an interesting incentive to get players to more actively role-play their characters.
But the high point of this chapter (beside the bit on mass-producing wonders) was the new system for creating skills it includes. Skills now cost 1 point for a regular die, 2 for a hard die, and 4 for a wiggle die for a Basic skill. Making the skill Broad (covering a large amount of related material) adds another +1/+2/+4 points, as does making it Flexible (able to be used with other Stats) or Influential (offering status or reputation). For example, “Pistols” might be a basic skill to let you fire pistols. “Gunshooter” is a possible Broad skill that lets you fire any sort of firearm. “Expert Pistoler” could be a Flexible skill that lets you use your Mind to design and build guns, woo ladies with sharpshooting tricks and Charm, while you actually fire them with your Coordination. “Man With the Guns” won’t help you use them directly, but as an Influential Skill it means lots of people owe you favors for the guns you get for them. And “The Greatest Gunman of the American West” makes for a fine Broad, Flexible, Influential Skill, as your mastery of firearms causes all of London to idealize your skills and status as a rough American hero (or at least an amusing novelty). Much like building powers in Wild Talents, KC admits that it’s easy to “game” this system, and I think GMs will need to work with players to make sure everybody is on the same page with how a skill will (and won’t) work in the game. And for those who find the new system to be too much of a hassle, a more standard selection of skills relevant to the setting is also offered.
Chapter 6: Dramatis Personae offers a selection of sample PCs, NPCs, and more normal figures. Sample PCs include a man-monkey, a stone-man, a fae-touched child, a grim avenger of the night (the four characters on the cover), a master detective, and a Fae Lord. Each is given a fairly detailed background, and mostly work as presented. Other, less detailed but still interesting, characters include a sphinx, a Hindu goddess come to check out Victoria, the Elephant Man, the chess-playing automaton the Turk, Cthulhoid horrors, alien explorers, a dinosaur woman, Asian masterminds, and so on. Not all are meant to be used as PC options, but most of them are. I really enjoyed this chapter, both as (yet again) a collection of great ideas, but also helping to showcase just how bizarre and over-the-top the setting can be.
The Adventure of the Black and White Decks wraps up the book. For fear of spoilers I won’t say much, other than it involves automotons behaving badly. I don’t care much for pre-made adventures, but this one is adequate and there’s a few items in here I’d probably try and use in other scenarios involving the Kerberos Club.
Style: I’m going with a low 4 here. Todd Shearer’s work is better here than it’s been in some of the other projects he’s worked on, but for some reason it doesn’t really grab me. Benjamin Baugh’s writing is also somewhat… not lacking, but not as… dynamic as it’s been in other works. Which isn’t to say the writing is bad, it really isn’t at all, but this book does feel less exuberant in tone than, say, Monsters and Other Childish Things. To be honest, I’m possibly being a somewhat harsh critic here, and I admit it. What really hurts this book more than anything though is that it needed a closer editing of its mechanics. The sample PCs in Chapter 6 aren’t always built properly (even counting acknowledged “dud” powers), other mechanics elsewhere aren’t quite right, and so on. Nothing that hurts my understanding of the game or the new concepts it offers, but enough to throw me for a loop and slow things down a bit. A better edit and I’d easily raise this to a solid 4.
Substance: A solid 5, and that’s even after considering two big problems I had with it. See, even if I thought the writing was missing some intangible element in style, it’s overflowing in terms of ideas. Every sentence seems to offer a plot hook, and every paragraph has some wonderful new campaign basis. Okay, I exaggerate a bit, but only a bit. This book is really good, and really fun. Having said that, I find it also leaves me a bit hungry for more. Part of this is Wild Talents’ fault. When KC talks about dinosaurs and lions and dragons and such, I realize that if my characters were to face them then I’d have to stat such beasts, as Wild Talents doesn’t currently have a very good bestiary (barring some PDF file buried on some obscure website somewhere possibly). Wild Talents isn’t the most complicated system to work with, but statting up elephants and Yeti takes time and there’s not a lot of good starting points to refer to. The other problem I have is that the default assumption seems to be that adventures will take place in London. There’s a bit of information regarding a few agencies here and there, how the Civil War and the Ghost Dance turn out, a few sentences on the Boxer Rebellion, and the like, but for the most part the world is a blank slate. In this case I’ll admit a majority of “the problem” is that I’m hungry for more excellent ideas, but I also think that a society of globe-trotting adventurers deserve a globe just as fantastic as themselves. I kind of wish the pre-made adventure had been sacrificed to make more room to cover these issues, but I can understand how other people would rather have the scenario instead. On the bright side, this is what supplements are for!
Who Should/Shouldn’t Get This: Let me put it to you this way, if you haven’t made up your mind one way or the other by now, I either failed in my role as a reviewer or you don’t know what you like in your games.
The Other Editions: As of this writing, there’s a Savage Worlds edition out and an upcoming HERO System edition as well. I wish I could say more about either one, but I haven’t seen either.
Conclusion: I didn’t love the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and I don’t get the fetishizing of Victorian London and culture some gamers see to enjoy. But this was a really, really good book that appealed to the gamer in me who likes outlandish things and ideas. I found its London to be suitably ugly yet attractive at the same time, and the new mechanics for Skill creation to be a wonderful addition to any game of Wild Talents. Heck, even among the sample PCs and NPCs there was a majority of characters that I thought looked downright fun, which is something so rare I can’t recall if it’s ever happened before. While those looking for a good, generic reference material for Victorian-era games would probably be at least somewhat disappointed, I found this book positively overflowing with ideas for its intended purpose.
Please help support RPGnet by purchasing the following (probably) related items through DriveThruRPG.
