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Saturday, 20 March 2021

Kickstarter Watch - Terror of Octobernomicon



The other day I reviewed William Adcock's Call of Cthulhu scenario 'Without Warning'.  Hard on that comes news of a new piece by him.  Regardless of this link though, I think I'd probably flag this Kickstarter from Golden Goblin Press.

On offer is a book containing six Call of Cthulhu scenarions from young and up-coming authors - two Americans, three Brits and a Pole (the KS page includes video interviews with each of them, which is a nice touch).  It's intended to be a showcase for new talent.  The settings are varied - one in Roman Arabia, one in the Old West, and four in the 1920s Golden Age (one each in Lovecraft County, a cruise on the Nile, Cornwall and Vienna).  Each sounds interesting.

All in all, I think I'd probably be interested in backing this.  But then we come to the old problem of shipping.  Without a UK or EU distributor, shipping across the Atlantic doubles the cost for a hard copy.  That itself isn't Golden Goblin's fault (lord knows we all suffered since Trump's ultimatum to the  International Postage Union!) but the decsion does cut them off from a large market.  The lack of a European distributor is even more surprising given that in one of the interviews the point is made that the UK, Poland and Germany have thriving Call of Cthulhu communitites.

Sadly, it's not just the Kickstarter: if GGP had an European distributor, there's a lot in their back-catalogue that I'd be interested in.

Nevertheless, I put it forward for your consideration...

Tuesday, 16 March 2021

Without Warning

Some of you may remember that last October I took part in the virtual Miskatonic Repository Con 2020 celebrating the Miskatonic Repository, the online collection of user-made content for Call of Cthulhu supported by Chaosium, the CoC publishers.  Details of the MR and several hundred products (mainly scenarios) can be found on the DriveThruRPG here.

Although I was able to listen to some of the panel discussions, due to some scheduling problems I only participated in one of the games that were on offer that weekend.  This was a play-test of William Adcock's 'Without Warning' (to be honest, that chance of playing in one of Bill's games with him as Keeper was what brought me to the con in the first place).  

Well, the published version of the scenario is now available through DriveThruRPG.com.  I would recommend it - I had fun playing it and reading later drafts.

The setting is the Canadian Arctic in 1958, where something odd had happened to the crew of a remote radar station...

Fans of 'The Thing from Another World' will love it

Bill makes no secret that the inspiration for this was Howard Hawkes' 1951 classic 'The Thing from Another World'.  For me, that is recommendation in itself.


OK, to steal a format from the incomparable Reviews from R'lyeh...


Name: Without Warning

Publisher: Chaosium Inc (Miskatonic Repository).  Availble to download.

Author: William Adcock

Setting: 1950s Arctic outpost (military)

Product: Scenario

What You Get: 27 page, 18.74 MB illustrated PDF

Elevator Pitch: The Arctic is deadly, but sometimes it's worse than that...

Plot Hook:  November, 1957. An isolated DEW-line radar station in the Canadian Arctic has radioed in a medical emergency. A relief flight carrying a medic is dispatched, but as a winter storm closes in, the crew of the Hula Honey discovers something far worse than seals and seabirds roaming the Arctic ice.

Plot Support: Plot set-up, one plan/map, one handout, stat-block for adversaries, six pre-generated Investigators.

Production Values: Clean and readable, well-laid out (by Danial Carroll), atmospheric illustrations (by Jonathan Myers), PDF background layer can be turned off for easy printing.

Pros

  • One-night, one-shot set-up
  • Potential convention scenario
  • Set firmly in the period
  • Could be set in other periods (back to a Franklin Expedition-like mystery, forward to a contempory setting, or even transfered to an outpost on another planet)
  • Could be included in a Cold-War conspiracy campaign
  • Pre-generated investigators tie in well with scenario
  • 'Time running out' scenario set in a bottle location
  • Captures the feeling of 1959's 'creature features'
  • Evocotive and menacing adversary
  • Optional additional encounter raises the stakes significantly.
Cons
  • One-night, one-shot set-up
  • Set firmly in the period 
  • 'Time running out' scenario set in a bottle location
  • All pre-gens are male.  Even within the restraints of the setting, a female character could be introduced as a civilan medic or scientist.
  • Very little oportunity for player agency or character development
  • Linear plot
  • Not much will come as a surprise to anyone familiar with 'The Thing from Another World'
  • Mythos-light
  • Could degenerate into a 'creature feature' if the Investigators don't follow the clues to the second location

Conclusion

I enjoyed taking part in the play-test and reading the final text (finding out what we'd missed in-game!) and would recommend it for an afternoon or evening's play.  

It's bottle adventure suitable for one-shots or convention play, which is a draw-back, though of course there no reason why this might not just be the beginning for any surviving Investigators...

Sunday, 14 March 2021

Wasters No 5: 'Making Mischief'

 


Played 17 Jan 2021 (On-line) 

Due to various circumstances, this ended up being a one-on-one session – not necessarily a bad thing to have during a run of play-tests.   I think we showed that it’s feasible to play Wasters with only two participants.  Not surprisingly, it took less play-time than a group session. 

I’m writing this up two months after the event from notes I made at the time – please excuse me any faults in narrative coherence! 

 

Seph 

Games Master 

 

Me 

Mieville - Level 1 Sentinel 

Retainers 

 

Boston – Level 1 Ronin 

 

Skunk – Level 1 Infiltrator 

 

 


The Job 

To travel to a named block and do as much to disturb the status quo there. 

Preparation 

Mieville determined that this was a covert infiltration job best suited to a small team.  He therefore didn’t involve the usual Crew, but just took along a couple of goons – Boston who appeared to be quite useful muscle and Skunk, who Mieville had worked with before.  [Boston was a GM-generated retainer-for-hire.  Skunk is my reserve PC.  My notes also mention ‘Freddy’, but I’ve no idea who he is!

We also bought a quantity of spray-paints in various colours. 

The Action

Moving the four blocks into The Wastes necessary to get to the target was uneventful, although it meant traversing territory claimed by the Street Cats.   
 

On reaching the target block, we hunkered down before cautiously scouting the area.  Almost immediately we encountered a Crazy, clad in animal skins and wielding an axe.  A sharp combat ensued which left him dead.  As the first stroke of Mieville’s cunning plan, the body was left in a prominent position, with a fake Street Cats tag sprayed on the wall nearby. 


Soon afterwards Skunk heard the sound of approaching feet.  After we took cover, we saw a group of Food Service Bots approaching.  Skunk insisted that they might be a good source of tech, if not hard cash.  Boston shrugged “I’ve got this” and confidently strode into the street.  He was soon swamped by the deranged bots, a barista knocking him over as it insisted on giving him a seat, and the others trampling him in their eagerness to sell him their wares.  Belatedly, the others joined in, Mieville deploying a jamming function that drove two of them off.  When the remaining bots were defeated, it was clear that Boston was dead.  To make things worse, the bots had no salvage of value on them. 
 

We hid Boston’s body but left the evidence of the bot carnage.  Nearby Mieville faked the tag of the Fast Dogs, seemingly defaced by Butch Killers. 

Scouting of the block continued.   

The next site of interest was an office building.   There were no lights showing, but some evidence of recent activity.  We put a fake tag on a side door and gathered refuse together to set a fire by the front door before retreating to secure positions.  Once the fire took hold, a gang member with two guard dogs came out to investigate.  From his hidden position, Skunk made a sniper attack, killing the gangster.  One of the dogs was also killed in the surprise attack, and the other ran off.   

After stripping the gangster of his tactical armour and weapons, we left the bodies out in the open and the fire burning before again retiring to secure positions. 

This mayhem had the desired effect.  Soon, two groups – three members of the Butch Killers and four Fast Dogs – were approaching to investigate.  As they faced off against each other Skunk made another sniper attack, killing one of the Fast Dogs.  Bloodshed followed, with the Killers eventually driving the Dogs off. 

As night-time was approaching, our group decided to retire into a neighbouring block (formerly a Park) which was unclaimed and promised to be a safer area in which to camp. 

Moving in to this block, Skunk hear the noise of an animal in one of the alleyways.  On investigation this appeared to be a heavily-laden mule.  Thinking we’d scored, we moved in, only for a hidden figure to pop up and warn us off.  This turned out to be a wandering trader.  Mieville indicated that he thought that parley was better than combat, and everyone stood down.  The trader offered various goods, but we declined them.  We agreed to go our separate ways and make their own camps for the night. 

As the night wore on, it became clear that there was some serious fighting taking place in the neighbouring block.  We therefore decided that our mission had been a success and that we should head back in the morning.  We made contact again with the trader, and offered to escort him back to the Safe Zone for a fee, but he was a solitary, anti-social type and declined. 

The morning’s journey back was uneventful until, just on the verge on entering the Safe Zone, we encountered a group of six youths wearing the colours of the Street Cats.  We were better armed, but outnumbered and they had the jump on us.  Communication was difficult, but in the end. we managed to trade the armour and weapons we’d taken from the Butch Killer for safe passage.  They went off, presumably to spin a tale of besting one of their rivals. 


We transited into the Safe Zone successfully, and returned to Club Lavender to collect our payment for a job well done. 


Saturday, 13 March 2021

A Couple of Podcasts on the Apollo Programme


As I posted the other day, I've decided that this March my reading should be themed around Mars.  This was because of the various missions arriving at the planet in Feb/Mar 2021.  I'll post about that reading in my usual end-of-month summary.

But it's 2021 and even I don't just get my info from the printed page.  So, I've spent some time on digital resources and looking for podcasts.  I want to flag a couple - I won't link to them, as you'll want to find them in your favorite podcast-supplier-thing.

The first is Planetary Radio: Space Exploration, Astronomy and Science, a weekly show put out by the (American) Planetary Society.  But that doesn't just cover Mars of course.

Several episodes first broadcast in 2019 (which, of course, was the 50th anniversary of the landing on the moon) have been grouped together as a sub-podcast, A Political History of Apollo.  These five episodes (ranging from about 50mins to about 90mins) make very interesting listening, and are the reason for this post.  As the title suggests they take a very different approach to what the presenter terms the 'usual flags and footsteps' story.  They cover why the programme was set up in the first place, what the contemporary views of it were (even at its peak, under 50% of Americans supported the expenditure), why it was cancelled and where that left NASA.  There is also an excellent episode on the Soviet Space programme which completely revises what I thought I knew of it.

And if I'm plugging Apollo podcasts, I must mention a BBC World Service production 13 Minutes to the Moon.  The first season (also originally broadcast for the 50th anniversary) covers Apollo 11 and the build-up to it.  The second season (from 2020) focused on the Apollo 13 crisis. Both rely heavilly on NASA's oral history programme, but also include new interviews and first-hand accounts.

Tuesday, 2 March 2021

Books & Stuff (NS, No 13) - A Self-Imposed Challenge

This month I thought I'd do something different.  On a whim, I've decided that March should be Mars Month.


When I went to my bookshelf I realised that I had fewer non-fiction books on the planet that I'd thought, all but two of which I'd read.  (Of the above, by the way, my recommendation is for Oliver Morton's Mapping Mars).

But no matter, I'm going to have to do some re-reading if I'm going to have a whole month of Mars, and in any case, I have no intention of sticking with non-fiction.

NASA concept art, 1964


Thunderchild's Last Stand by Scot Andrew Bailey


Monday, 1 March 2021

Books & Stuff (NS, No 12) - Reading in Feb 2021

 Finished Reading

WH Hodgson, The Casebook of Carnacki: The Ghost Finder

I was disappointed by this.  Mainly because a friend recommended Hodgson last month knowing that I am a fan of MR James.  I already had Carnecki on my shelf, so put it on the pile to read when I'd finished James' Complete Ghost Stories.

Frankly, I just found these stories tedious.  The corny and repetative framing device (Carnacki summons three friends, barely talks to them over supper, tells them his tale and then throws them out) can be excused by the fact that they were originally separately published as magazine stories.  But I found the situations the 'Ghost Finder' found himself in unengaging.  And there's too much use of deus ex machina - solutions to problems hinge on Carnacki using his trusty Electric Pentangle or reciting the last stanza of the Rite of <insert foreign-sounding name here>.

I may be being a little harsh.  Perhaps I was spoilt by just having read the James stories.  

But then...

John Birmingham, the Dave Vs the Monsters Trilogy (Emergence, Resistance and Ascendance)

...I went completely low-brow.

These books about an oil-rig worker who becomes an acidental hero with super-powers after the world is invaded by demons doesn't pretend to be anything is they're not (though I wonder if there was an aspiration to a movie deal): competent nonsense.

Jonathan Stroud, Lockwood & Co: The Screaming Staircase

The first in a series of urban fantasy books aimed at Young Adults (and like most of the best of YA fiction, perfectly serviceable of Older Adults), this deals with a Great Britain which has been suffering from a 50-year-long 'Problem' of ghost hauntings, which has resulted in the establishiment of a number of agencies of ghost hunters.  The twist is that the talents to see the ghost fade with adolescence, so that the agences are staffed by teenagers and pre-teens.

Very nicely done, with an interested plot and some nice characters.  It might seem odd to compare a contemporary YA book with a 'Classic' such as Carnacki, but it is so much better than the latter.

I understand that an adaptation is in development for Netflix.

Currently Reading

Julian Whitehead, Rebellion in the Reign of Charles II

Oddly enough, it's the non-fiction that's provided the most enjoyable read this month.

It's taking me time to read this well-written study of intellegence gasthering during the Restoration.  The main reason is that it's a book I've been reading from the stock of Diplomatist Books - and I keep selling it!  (I've sold out twice since starting reading it).