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The present review is part of a series of reviews of fantasy games. By fantasy I mean, for the purposes of the present series, pre-modern fantasy involving low levels of technology (up to the equivalent of 15th century Europe without gunpowder guns), magic and fantastic creatures. After the review you can find links to the games that were covered before.
BEFORE WE START
It was long ago that I started to read in Casus Belli and other French magazines about Rêve de Dragon, Jeu de Rôle d’Onirique Fantaisie (in a literal translation, Dragon Dream, Role-Playing Game of Dreaming Fantasy, RdD from now on), a French fantasy role-playing game. Most of what I read was praise and more praise. Time passed until last year in a trip to France I decided the moment had come for me to buy it and judge by myself whether the praise was deserved or not. One things leads to the other, so finally you have this review in your screen.
Two small notes before moving into the review: I have the French second edition and this is what I’m reviewing. The book mentions that there were many changes from the first edition. I’m not the person to explain what changed. Neither am I the person to comment on the English translation that can be found at http://www.malcontentgames.com/ .
The second note is to point that I’ve written this review long before the wave of attention that Rêve grabbed here at RPGnet some months ago.
FORM
RdD is an A4 hardbound book with 272 pages (of which 260 are “content” and the other 12 tables, the index and character sheets) with a high quality binding. The text is a Times or similar font of type 10 organized in three columns except when we get to reference material (like spells, creatures and the like) where it turns into a 2 column format. As you can guess, it is a dense book. In any case, the design uses bold, italics, grey background and boxes to distinguish different types of information, and does it for good effect.
The book is b&w (colour is used only in the cover). The standard decoration used throughout the book consists in “laces” at the header and footer (they change from time to time to avoid uniformity). There is plenty of art composed of b&w drawings. It’s good and definitely French. I didn’t count it but can safely guess that close to 60% of the pages have art in it. All of it came out of Roland Barthélémy’s ink pen. All of the art is intentionally related to the text it comes with. Thanks to its quality and uniformity of style it provides mood and graphical clues to the game that complement the text nicely. The beautiful cover is another beautiful piece of typical French graphic novel output, in this case by Miss Florence Magnin.
I didn’t spot typos or at least don’t remember it. By the way, if you didn’t figure it so far, the game I’m reviewing is in French.
I guess that the only complain some people can have is the fact that there’s no colour inside the book. Oh, and there’s no index. There’s only a two-page detailed table of contents at the back (where it usually is in French books). Since the book is very well organized and clear, it can happily live without a proper index. Furthermore the preface provides some useful guidelines on how to use the book.
What can I say? 5 for Form.
SUBSTANCE I – SETTING
RdD has a setting, but one that it defies the concept of “setting”. Let me use a quote to explain it:
“The sages use to say: ‘When we dream at night don’t we make up a world? A world different from the reality we live in when awaken, a world of our own, a world that in fact is non-existent? Yet, as long as our dream endures, we believe in the reality of the world in it. Only through the proof of awakening do we dismiss that world and realize that it was nothing other than a dream. If this is true about our dreams, why wouldn’t it be the same on what concerns the reality of the world? ” (my translation)
“The world is the dream of Dragons. … We don’t know who they are but we know they are the Great Dreamers of the world. … We are the great dreamers of the entities that populate our own dreams, and we can easily figure that the Dragons that dream us are themselves dreamt by even bigger Dragons.”
That’s it. The world of RdD is a dreamland. That dreamland has several levels: the lowlands of the dream are the ‘mundane’ world where men live. This plan of existence is the creation of the dreams of the Dragons. The highlands of the dream are the plan of the Dragons. It cannot be attained by men. In between exists the middlelands of the dream. These can be attained through (dream) magic.
Since the lowlands – and the creatures that inhabit it, including the PCs – are the result of dreams, they have some characteristics connected with that nature:
* There are no ‘powers from above’ in the sense of gods or high spirits. It is clearly stated in the book that the world of RdD is atheistic.
* The lowlands are subject to major changes due to breaks, ‘jumps’ or re-directions of the pattern of sleep and dream of the dragon.
* The world has no boundaries and does not necessarily keep a consistent pattern through time and space.
Furthermore, there are two key aspects that shape RdD that are a result of the nature of the universe and have a direct influence in the characters:
The first has to do with death. You see, all entities exist in and through the dream of the dragons. As long as the dragons keep dreaming them, they exist. If the dragons awaken they stop dreaming, so the entities in their dream also cease to exist. Of course, the entities themselves are not aware of this, since they only exist in the dream. Death is the result of an interruption in the dream of a dragon (in other words, the interruption in the dream is perceived by the creatures that exist in it as death).
Yet dragons are almost always sleeping. Interruptions are usually brief. The dragons seek to get fast asleep so that they can resume their dreams. Usually there’s a line of continuity between the dreams, but there are also changes.
The result is that characters don’t really die. A dead character is ‘reincarnated’ in another character (often far away from where his previous self existed). That means that characters are at a more profound level: they have their current self, but they also have a more essential archetype that survives death, since the archetype is not destroyed by the interruptions in the dreams of the dragons.
In game terms, that means that the players have both the current character and its archetype. When the character dies, the archetype survives. It will resurface in a different character when the dragon resumes dreaming it. Each life changes the characteristics of the archetype, so that it improves with it.
The second aspect is connected with the High-Dreamers. These are the magicians of RdD. They have a talent (acquired in the infancy – a character either has it or not) that allows them to blur the frontiers between dream state and awaken state. They are able to reach the middlelands of the dream, a plane where they can perform magic. The high-dreamers are not exactly cherished. The world of RdD has gone through two ages and is at the start of a third one. The cataclysmic changes from age to age are connected with the intervention of magic. So the real-dreamers (the un-talented for magic) are loathsome of high-dreamers.
The nature of the dreams that make up the game world means that there can be situations where one can go from his current dream (his current reality) to another dream. This can operate in different forms one of which works like portals and another like a voyage to a dream plane (these are crude approximations).
In terms of culture RdD is directly inspired by the European Middle Ages at around the 12th or 13th centuries, except for the lack of religion and for the nature of magic.
And for the creatures. The bestiary comprises 15 humanoids – man included; 37 fantasy animals; a list of venison; 16 dream (or nightmare) entities. It is not long and includes some well known suspects (trolls, gnomes, unicorns, etc.). Most of the original creations are very nice, though.
What’s there for players to do in such a world? Adventure, of course! Only through adventure can one build up its characteristics, thus improving the archetype. You see, characters in RdD are, by definition, wanderers in the most classical style of medieval fantasy. They have the compulsion to wander from place to place.
The game world combines very creative ideas with rather lame ones. Among the latter is the mentioned division of history into three ages separated by cataclysms (this has been done to death in fantasy), some of the creatures and the hints in some of the drawings that the previous age was our contemporary world. Among the former are some of the aspects I skipped over above.
The funniest thing is the “metaplot” that underlies RdD, because, you see, there’s a metaplot to it and it’s old style D&D! I mean it, really. Let me explain: I think that some elements in the setting were designed to deal with inconsistencies that creep if you’re playing the hack and slash, wandering hero of D&D as played in France more than 20 years ago (check the scenarios in the magazine Casus Belli of the time to see what I mean). There are two basic inconsistencies: If a character dies, the new character of the player will be a lot less powerful than the characters of the other players; if you wander too much you will en stepping back to somewhere where you have been in the past but risk finding a completely different outlook to it. Now, it seems to me that the concept of a character archetype that moves from Dragon Dream to Dragon Dream, and that the breaks in the pattern of the Dragon Dreams allow the handling these two problems by keeping an in-setting consistency to things that would be inconsistent in a Cartesian world. This is my guess but if it is true (only the game designer could answer this), it’s is superb.
In the end, what puts RdD apart is the way it colours everything in a very personalized way in a setting that does not provide ‘metaplots’ (in the traditional sense, not in the sense the word is used above), ‘story lines’ or automatic super-human characters. I give it 5 for setting.
SUBSTANCE II – SYSTEM
The system in RdD can be characterized as being detailed and complex, yet founded on a core of very simple ideas and rules. The basic principle is that you use a table (the Decision Table, form now on) to cross your value in a characteristic (the rows) with your value in a skill (the columns, modified by difficulty and situational modifiers). The table provides a value to be tested in a % roll. This table (it’s printed in the character sheet) is used for everything. The book provides the rational behind it, which is nice.
If the basis is simple, what has been done with it is not so simple. Let’s see why:
For a start, there are 15 primary characteristics – size, presence, constitution, strength, agility, dexterity, sight, hear, smell-taste, will, intellect, empathy, dream (the magic attribute) and chance – and four derived characteristics (based on the other ones: melee, shot, throw, dodge). Further to the characteristics there are several other attributes derived from the former (things like HPs, fatigue points and – if you think these are not enough – endurance points). All of this is detailed and requires some form of numerical bookkeeping. On the plus side they are well chosen, well explained, and have clear usefulness in terms of roleplaying.
The skills are divided into several categories. Each category has an initial level (a column in the Decision Table). For instance, the skills in the General Skills category start at a rather high level, while Draconic (magic) or Knowledge skills start at the lowest skill level. The list of skills is comprehensive without being overwhelming. Some skills branch into specialized sub-skills when the basic skill reaches the medium level.
Character creation is simple in concept but harder in execution. For a start one has 160 points to distribute by the Primary characteristics. No one can be lower than 6 or higher than 15. Next one buys levels in the skills (and spells if the character is an high-dreamer). One has 3,000 points to that effect (no more than 300 can be spent in spells). The cost varies with the level: higher levels cost more (this is tied into the starting level for the skill category). Next fill in the blanks: determine the derived characteristics and attributes, give the character a name, etc. Finally, one has a fixed amount of money to buy equipment.
The game designer makes explicit that he opted to follow a “build it up” approach to character creation instead of going through the “classes/archetypes/prototypes/etc.” road. It’s fair, but I think it’s possible to have both things. I would like to see some pre-designed, configurable character types. It’s easily doable, and can save a lot of time to lazy players or players in a hurry.
As I said, the basics of action require the player to make a % roll based on a characteristic versus a skill. The combination characteristic vs. skill allows to a lot of flexibility in play. Say, you are a sword fighter. You use melee\sword to fight, sight\sword to evaluate the quality of a sword, presence\sword to frighten an enemy, dexterity\sword to use the sword in non-fighting situations, intellect\sword to write a treatise in sword fighting or empathy\sword to teach sword fighting. (Furthermore, if you are not sure which characteristic applies in a given situation, just average the ones you are considering.) Many games do this but, since RdD has such an extensive list of attributes and skills, it has an increased level of flexibility that allows – and encourages – the players to look at the particular circumstances of the situation at hand.
If all was that simple! You see, further to this there are difficulties, qualified results, quality points (for actions with an outcome where it is important to know how good it is; say, in cooking), tasks (the player has a precise objective to be achieved individually or collectively; of course, it can only be done through task points). Most of these require some form of special bookkeeping or arithmetic operation.
The system covers a lot of ground. Certainly, there are the usual suspects like combat but there is a lot more than those. Here are some of the topics: movement and stealth; food, water and sleep (more points); all types of health hazards – and how to recover from them – including fatigue, endurance, damage, sicknesses, poisons, etc. And that’s only the standard rules. The optional section includes destiny and chance, astrology, moral and (this is a French game, you should never forget it) the good times: drinks, music and love. What else could you want? Knowledge, of course. And knowledge you have: Botanical knowledge and alchemy. Finally, there is a set of naval rules.
The major sections in the game system are combat and the magic rules. Let’s look with a little more attention at these:
Combat works like any other skill: roll % according to relevant characteristic vs. combat skill, with variant results according to the level of success (or failure). Based on this there are all the normal variants and special rules for missile, melee and empty handed brawling. The rules offer several tactical possibilities that may introduce some twists if well used.
Damage is rolled with 2d10 plus weapon less armour. The value rolled goes from a scratch (1-10) to critical damage (20 or more). Damage consists in loosing endurance and, in some cases, HP. Major wounds can generate a spiral of loss to HP that can lead to death if not treated.
All in all, the combat system is detailed without being complex in a case-by-case basis. The complexity comes from the accumulation of particular cases. In the end, it’s up to the players to decide what they are going to use and how, thus adjusting the game to their preferences. And everything in it makes sense and is well done.
The Book of the High Dream (the magic rules) is the highlight of RdD. Magic (I may be wrong, but I think they actually never call it “magic” in the book) is the ability to manipulate the dream: “The high-dreamer is the one that whispers to the piano player: ‘play mi instead of mi bemol!’ The piano player obeys in spite of his own wishes, and the music, the creation, continues. Yet, for a moment it turned different from what it could have been.” Like everything in RdD, the rules are fairly detailed. I will not go through all the detail so I’ll concentrate on the key points.
There are four ways to do magic:
* Oniros – the dream in its pure state. It allows to physically change the world.
* Hypnos – the sleep that creates the dream. Concerns the exercise of influence in the spirit of creatures through suggestions, illusions and invocations.
* Narcos – the deep sleep of torpor. Allows the creation of enchanted objects (“infusing dream into matter”).
* Thanatos – the awakening that destroys, the death of the dream. It’s the way of necromancy.
As you can see, most of these ways concern things that are part of the standards of fantasy. Yet, these are incorporated into a whole that is unique.
Magic consists in spells and rituals and requires the usage of a skill (one each for the four magic ways) and the spending of dream points. Of course, magic is different from each way of magic to the others.
The most interesting twist in the magic system is the Middle Lands of the Dream (MLD), a dream-like land where magic is shaped. In order to do magic, the high-dreamer needs to go up to the MLD. The twist is that there’s a precise representation of the MLD, a map like the board of a board game (according to the author this is inspired in a similar device created in the 17th century!). Each time the HD goes to the MLD he stops at a particular place. Now, the spells and rituals can only b executed in particular places within the MLD. If the HD wants to do a certain spell, he has to go to a location that allows him to. Helas, the MLD is a dangerous place. Moving around can generate events that may be very nasty (or very good). And it takes time.
Most probably this system could work as a board game by itself. As a role-play device, it can be very effective to break up the mechanical aspect of magic where one uses it as a simple tool. It certainly is very original. On the other hand, if it takes too long to finalise a spell, it may become boring to the other players that basically have nothing to do while the HD wanders in the MLD.
On the overall, Rêve’s system is very well crafted. The core mechanic in particular is really good. There will be people that will complain about the excessive detail. I personally think that there’s too much over-design in the more detailed rules, but that’s a question of preference. The point is, the rules are complex but do their job, are consistent and handle stuff that makes sense. Hopefully each group of players will be able to find their comfort level by keeping the rules that are acceptable to them and discarding those that are they consider too cumbersome to use, or that cover things they have no interest in using. I would give it 4.5 for the over-design mentioned above but the excellent stuff that’s at the core of the game and the fact that those rules can be easily skipped makes me give a 5 instead.
SUBSTANCE III – OTHER RELEVANT ASPECTS AND OVERALL RATTING
Scenarios There are three scenarios that are fairly good at introducing the rules to the players. The first one concentrates on wilderness survival first, and social interaction next. There is no combat and it is very original. The second has a good balance of investigation, combat opportunities and social interaction. The third has also a good deal of investigation, social interaction and the opportunity to experiment with artistic and athletic skills. Taken together they allow the players to enter the system and to grasp the setting without being overwhelmed by it.
Art as content. I said it before but think I should highlight it again. Art in this book is meaningful. It is there to convey content, to illustrate the text and feed our imaginations. As I mentioned above, the examples spread through the book present to us a consistent set of characters. The main character is a young lady, Nitouche. She is both the main character in the written and the drawn examples. Don’t start salivating with the anticipation of images of French eroticism. Nitouche is drawn in context, what means that she is, gasp, correctly dressed. Most of the time. If nudity makes sense in the context, it is there. Remember, this is a game book that comes from a civilization that just cannot make sense out of the expression “politically correct” (to be franc, neither do I).
The character sheet. A good character sheet can certainly contribute to the success of a game. RdD’s 6 pages character sheet is excellent. Data is well organized with a logical break up of information so that the player has right in front of him everything he needs for each particular game situation. I particularly loved the page for the recording of equipment and goods. This is a page that I recommend for any game.
A creative setting, a solid system, excellent execution, all contributes to a final ratting of excellent for substance: 5 on 5.
THE FUN FACTOR
It is there, I mean, the fun factor. The game is dense so it took me some time to get it. But it is there. This is a game that is not ashamed of being so. The more I read the book, the more I want to play it.
Given that, I want to…
* Re-read the book: Yes, I’ll be going back to it. 4.
* Be an occasional player: No. RdD characters require too much involvement to be satisfying for an occasional scenario. 1.
* Play in a campaign: Yes but. I want RdD for other purposes (see below). 4.
* Be an occasional game master: Ditto as for occasional players.
* Game master a campaign: That’s it. I want to game master RdD. It begs to be game mastered. 5.
PREVIOUS REVIEWS IN THE SERIES
Hero Wars: http://www.rpg.net/news+reviews/reviews/rev_3385.html (technically not part of the series, I’ve included it because the game falls into the scope of games I’m reviewing)
RuneQuest 2: http://www.rpg.net/news+reviews/reviews/rev_7969.html
RuneQuest 3: http://www.rpg.net/news+reviews/reviews/rev_8012.html
Basic D&D: http://www.rpg.net/news+reviews/reviews/rev_8045.html
D&D 3E: http://www.rpg.net/news+reviews/reviews/rev_8088.html
Prince Valiant: http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/9/9189.phtml
Exalted: http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/9/9204.phtml
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