We all know that England is famous for raining, an awful lot. The Dark Albion setting, being a fantasy version of England, is no different!
(this is what they call one of the lovelier summer days)
Now, I know what you're thinking, a little rain never hurt anyone, right? True, but a lot of rain can be positively deadly for a medieval party on the road.
First though, let's figure out how often it rains, and where. This is an important image to check out, although its contemporary and not medieval, but even if the numbers would be slightly off the general pattern would still be mostly correct:
Take note that some areas, specifically the mountainous areas, and the less populated regions, have heavier rainfall. There are two important things to note in this: first, it is not a coincidence that the area of heaviest population is also where there is less rain. Too much rain makes a place less livable.
Second, and important for Albion campaigning, the isolated wilderland places are the places that get the worst rainfall!
In the period where Dark Albion is set, Europe was at the start of a slow but steady cooling period that would end up having major climate effects on the population. One of the reasons for this was that with the cooling period came increased rainfall. The "little ice age" caused serious decrease in crop yields and increase in famine that kept Europe from being able to repopulate after the devastation of the Black Death, and there is ample historical/archaeological evidence of mass abandonment of villages in highland regions throughout the British Isles in this period. Entire communities ceased to exist because of this.
Now, we can't get specific information on medieval weather patterns at the level we're used to today, but this being an RPG and not a history lesson, we can wing it with an approximation. See the brown areas on the map above? Let's say that during the summer period there's a chance of 2/6 that on any given spring/summer day it'll be raining. If you wanted to be more precise you could maybe switch that to 4/10 in springtime, and 2/10 in summer or early autumn.
The non-brown areas would get rain on a 3/6 on any given day; or if you prefer, 5/10 in springtime, 3/10 in summer/autumn.
In either case, if you generate a rainy day, there's a subsequent chance of 4/6 that it's only a partially rainy day (it only rains lightly, for only a few hours); otherwise, it's heavy rain, that lasts throughout most of the day.
Why does all of this matter?
When it's raining, especially if it's been raining heavily, or over several days without ceasing to give time for things to dry, there are several problematic results for adventurers on the go. First, the dampness can affect equipment: under heavy rain, bowstrings (regular and crossbow) and other equipment can become unusable. Even arrows can be wrecked by rain as they absorb the damp and become heavier. Now, most bowstrings would be treated with beeswax to make them more resistant to rain, and quivers were made to be closed and sealed as waterproof as was possible at the time. But this does not completely prevent the harm, only mitigate it. When it's raining, bowstrings have to be removed, and arrows sealed up. This means that if the PCs don't do this for some reason, there's a very high chance (4/6?) that their missile weapons will be wrecked. Adventurers in this period should know about this, though, and if they were smart would take precautions; but this means that in the case of a random encounter, they won't have their missile weapons ready for action.
And of course, if your PCs are of the lucky rich sort to have firearms, this is at least as big a problem when it comes to gunpowder. If your powder gets damp, it won't fire. In seriously wet conditions, even if you've taken care to store your powder and pistol/rifle carefully, there's a 4/6 chance that a gun will simply fail to fire.
Even if you manage to get a shot off, be it with bow or with powder weapon, firing in the rain should cut your range by half. Note that visibility is seriously decreased in the rain as well, by one-third in light rain to one-half in heavy rain, so the range reduction becomes partly academic.
Are your PCs travelling with a cart to take all their extra equipment there, and all their loot back home? Remember that only the most significant of main roads had any kind of protection from rain; if they're going on most medieval roads, rainfall will muddy up the whole place, and reduce travel times by half as well. There'll be an additional 1/6 chance every hour of travel that the cart will get stuck in the mud and require strength checks to push/pull it out.
Horses are elegant creatures, but if its raining heavily they won't be able to go on most terrain at more than a walk; and if you try to charge with a horse at an enemy in the rain, some type of check will be required to avoid disaster.
Are the PCs traveling in the mountains? Rains can cause mudslides. Any time that its been raining for at least two days in a row, there's a 1/10 chance every day of heavy rain of getting caught in one while in mountainous areas. A saving throw is required to avoid getting knocked down by one and taking 3d6 points of damage (if you're on a horse, there could be additional damage from falling off).
Are the PCs heading to a river? Rains can cause rivers to flood. Any time there's been rainfall for more than five days in a row, or heavy rainfall for three days in the past week, there's a 4/6 chance that the river will have flooded, making crossing almost impossible (except perhaps at major bridges).
Can your PCs manage to get to a town? That will sure be good for their survival in the rain. If not, they're stuck trying to build a fire and shelter in pretty sub-optimal conditions.
Wilderness survival skills must be rolled, at a penalty depending on light or heavy rain, to successfully build a fire. If you can't do it, then even in the summer night, heavy rain can cause bitter and harmful cold.
Any time that a PC sleeps outside in rain (light or heavy) without some kind of shelter and the warmth of a fire, there's a 1/20 chance of becoming ill. This would be some type of flu, most likely, but remember that back then this was a pretty dangerous thing to get, without adequate rest and medical attention. Saving throws should be rolled to recover, with penalties if the PC is not able to get rest (in a warm and DRY environment!) and bonuses if they are getting attended by a doctor. Failing would mean that the disease evolves into life-threatening pneumonia, which would leave the PC flat on their back for at least a week or two, and would require further saves to avoid decline of Constitution and possibly death.
Now of course, snow is as dangerous as rain, at least, and even colder. And in this period it certainly snows in Albion during the winter (with the cold getting worse as the campaign period progresses). But there's a simple reason why we focus on rain and not snow: you'd have to be INSANE to go traveling through wilderness in the winter. That's something to remember in your campaign in itself: PCs should spend the winter close to home, and not out adventuring; travel would only be short and in safe areas (safe being defined in this period not as actually safe, but as places where you could get from one village/castle to another in under a day of winter travel). If your PCs insist on going out adventuring in mid-winter, feel free to hit them with everything they deserve.
RPGPundit
Currently Smoking: Raleigh Hawkbill + Image Perique
So, we've had a couple of reviews that suddenly came out at the same time, for a couple of different RPGPundit Presents books!
Interestingly enough both of these were for 'Last Sun' products in that line. I get the feeling that DCC fans are getting increasingly turned on to the Gonzo material of my Last Sun campaign world, which of course began at first as a DCC campaign.
As of our last session, the PCs were returned to their place in Space/Time, by BOLT-0, before they could get any reward for having saved the continuum from a Dimension Bug incursion. No sooner had they arrived, as the Catboy was kidnapped by Anema, who has fallen out again with Fabritzio the biker-Wight revolutionary.
Now:
-This is the 5th anniversary of the DCC Last Sun campaign! As with last year, we had a celebratory cake.
"The cake was thanks to Vizi/Bill's player. Which is fitting, as Bill is the only surviving character from the start of the campaign."
"Well, surviving is a strong word..."
-"So the only one who saw you being kidnapped was the Vegomagus."
"'saw' is a strong word, he's blind in the Sun."
-"You know, it's not just that the Vegomagus is blind in the Sun, it's that his cyber-eyes are constantly being blinded. He's in constant pain!"
"Yeah, that's hilarious!"
-Heidi, Sami and Vizi are catching up with Roman and Captain Harry, and the Jesuses.
"So, do you chaps think these time dinosaurs will be after me?"
"Oh yeah, we made sure of that."
"Bugger."
-"You left Mongo unattended? After he ate Chocolate Jesus last time?"
"It's not like he'll eat any of the rest of us. We're not delicious."
"Aren't you the guy who said 'eat my flesh' and 'drink my blood'?"
-"Where are our companions?"
"I knoweth not; I hath chosen to avoid them."
"You have chosen wisely."
-"They were near the hydroponics lab."
"Hydroponics?"
"They grow vegetables."
"Yeah... vegetables... if the federal government asks, that's what we grow. Vegetables."
"I'm surprised, Republican Jesus. Aren't you supposed to be against weed?"
"Nope. It's very popular in the heartland. We just don't talk about it in public like the hippies do."
-"I hear the Vegomagus, not far from here, crying desperately for help. We should go the other way."
"Agreed."
-Roman, Vizi and Republican Jesus are smoking some of the 'vegetables' in the hydroponics lab.
"So we can understand the Time Dinosaur language now."
"Wow. It's supposed to be a very complex language."
"Yeah."
"Some have speculated it's actually a composite language, composed of the combination of their incomprehensible squaks and the movement of their tiny dinosaur arms."
-"We ought to be getting Anema and Fabritzio back together, and getting ourselves to the Crown of Creation... but then I got high."
-Roman seems worried that BOLT-0 might have said something about him.
"You know, BOLT-0 tries to act all funny and quaint and likeable, but deep down he's a complete asshole."
"Huh. Sounds like Roman looking into a mirror..."
-Meanwhile, unbeknownst to anyone, Anema has left the Sun with Catboy, and the two have ended up in a high-tech city, populated by a super-advanced utopian Kobold society.
-"This place wasn't like this at all the last time I was here. It was a pretty little valley, with cute fuzzy creatures who tried to poke me with pointed sticks!"
"Yes, our early encounter with you united our fighting clans, and we gradually developed over thousands of years to this advanced state you see today. It was thanks to your interference."
"Wow, so you worship me as a goddess?"
"We used to. We have now moved beyond that and long since realized you were actually just a very advanced entity."
"Wow. Well, ok!"
-"In order to keep our society safe, we have created a complex system of force fields, camouflage fields, and interference against magical detection. Thus, our valley remains hidden to all."
"They're wakandan kobolds!"
-"By any chance, has your advanced technology ever invented a machine that can suck a soul out of a wight and put it back in its owner?"
"No.. but given enough time and experimentation, we could make such a thing."
-"Although we usually do not allow outsiders into our culture, because of her role in creating our civilization, we welcome Anema and her companion!"
"I'm Catboy."
"That's self-evident."
"No, I mean that's my name. I'm also called Meow, or Catabra."
"Do you have any name that isn't a pun?"
"...no."
-"So wait, your force-field thingy means that no one will even know we're here?"
"The Kobolds look horrified that the founder of their culture uses the word 'thingy'."
-"I guess we'll stay here, if it means no one can find us! That way, I'll have time to get to know my new boyfriend better..."
"You're a super-entity, why are you interested in romance?!"
"You kobolds are boring. I'm ashamed that I created something so boring."
"It's alright. We still respect your role in the founding of our culture, we just think you're our inferior now. We've evolved past you."
"That's OK with me, I'm a catboy, everyone thinks I'm inferior!"
-"I'm curious, does the catboy's penis have--"
"No! That's a level of detail we won't be going into in this campaign. Who do you think I am, Venger Satanis?!"
-Meanwhile, Sami finds Mongo, sound asleep in the gym, still clutching a very perturbed-looking rabbit.
"I'll try to pry the rabbit out of Mongo's hands."
"He's got a death-grip on it. The bunny looks up at you with sad eyes, as if telling you to that it's too late for him, and you should leave it behind and save yourself."
-Black Jesus finds Sami and Heidi, having found out that Anema is missing. He then goes off to find Vizi and Roman, but they're still in the hydroponics lab, and then Black Jesus gets high.
-"Hey can you make some vanilla ice cream?"
"Motherfucker, what did I tell you?!"
"Oh fine, chocolate then?"
"Now that I can do! SHAZAM!"
-The PCs come up with a plant to trick Fabritzio into being jealous of the catboy and wanting to go 'rescue' Anema.
"What we need to do is make him think he's the hero and protagonist of the story, but really we're manipulating him at every step to fulfill our agenda."
"Yeah, Captain Harry, you're right and... wait a minute!"
"We know you're trying to do that to us, Harry, we're not dumb!"
"No, of course you're not."
"Stop that!"
-"we'll need someone to keep an eye on Mongo."
"Maybe Mexican Jesus? He's usually the one we get to do jobs that no one else wants to do."
-Sami goes off to see Fabritzio.
"Anema has run off with the catboy? ...well, what do I care? She is stupid!"
"I mean, who would choose a catboy over such a sexy wight?"
-"You're really taking this maturely, Fabritzio. It is remarkable how maturely you're handling losing to the Catboy. Especially since he said he thinks he's better than you."
"Anyways, she's probably in some evil empire that needs overthrowing, and no one wants to be bothered with that job."
"yeah, but you should just stay here."
"No! I will go with you. First I will overthrow this evil empire, and then I am going to kick the crap out of this catboy!"
-"You manipulated Fabritzio very well, and absolutely of your own free will.."
"Shut up, Harry."
-The PCs decide to arm up before going down to the surface. Republican Jesus shows them his hangar-sized armory.
-"This backpack that RJ gave me must either be camo colors or have the American flag."
"It has both, actually."
"That's the American version of 'compromise'."
-"Wearing armor is for pussies. The real way to go into combat is bare-chested and wearing a headband."
-"Can you tell us anything about this, Harry?"
"Well, I seem to remember the history books said something about Anema running off with a catboy. That's the only mention of him I recall."
"That doesn't bode well for the catboy!"
-"So after this we go to the Crown of Creation, right?"
"Well, I wasn't much of a reader, but I seem to recall there were many other parts to this story before you got to the Crown."
"Goddamnit!"
"Yes, the ancient chronicles were often criticized for being too long with endless side-quests."
"Harry, why the fuck did you end up being the time traveler if you're not good at history?!"
"Family connections."
-Anema and the catboy had sex.
"Well... that was really.. sweet."
"Hah, we know what that means! Anema thinks you sucked, catboy"
"Oh.. so I suppose you'll want to go back to Fabritzio, Anema?"
"Oh no! I didn't mean it that way, sweetie. Aww, you're so adorable when you look at me with those pathetic eyes. It makes me want to comfort you!"
-"I guess we should go to this ceremony the kobolds are putting on in your honor, Anema."
"Yeah. Then after that we can come back here and try again!"
"You say that like I failed!!"
-"you're so insecure, catboy. You shouldn't let the rest of your party push you around!"
"You're right, Anema."
"You should stand up to them!"
"Yes dear!"
"You shouldn't care what they think and just do what I want!"
"Yes dear..."
-"So what sort of things can you kobolds do with your supertechnology?"
"Well, for example, our primitive lifespans were about 15 years; but now we use nanites to extend our lifespans to centuries."
"Really? Can you use those on me?"
"Certainly.. stand there."
"Wait.. you're not going to probe me, are you?!"
"No, that beam of light was the whole process."
"Seriously?"
"Yes, we have long since moved beyond both the technological need for probing and the sense of humor that would find the probing of others to be funny."
-While Anema is being praised by all the Kobolds, someone sneaks up on the catboy and threatens him with a pointed stick. He immediately surrenders and lets himself be taken into an alley. His kidnapper is a scruffy-looking antisocial kobold.
"Alright, don't try anything, I'm going to search you."
"I don't have anything of value!"
"You have a machinegun, a laser pistol, and I can see at least a half dozen other weapons."
"Oh, yeah those."
-"And just to review, the catboy was armed to the teeth but let himself be kidnapped by a guy who just had a pointed stick?"
"A guy about half his size, yes."
-"My name is Jezzro. I'm a Kobold traditionalist. We have become decadent and weak because of our technological advancement. We can only return to greatness by rejecting everything that has made our world a utopia!"
"Sure, that makes sense."
-Jezzro leads Catboy into a building and then down into a concealed bunker.
"Sit on this chair."
"It's a tiny kobold chair."
"Ok, then sit on the floor."
"Do you have a bed?"
"Beds are for weak men who prize a soft society. I sleep on straw. Well, nanite-generated straw, but it's still straw!"
-"So are you guys terrorists?"
"There's really just me. Well, me and a few other people who sympathize with me. We talk a lot about old stories on a communication network."
-"If you let me, I can call up some people who'll totally destroy your culture just by showing up here."
"Really? An external enemy... yes, that could work!"
-"We're calling this place Kobowanda."
-Jezzro contacts the Utopian (Kobowandan) Leadership and reveals his terms.
"The Catboy has been kidnapped by a malcontent named Jezzro. We thought of him as troublesome but incompetent."
-The Catboy is allowed to speak by radio with Anema.
"Anema, can you call my friends to get this guy?"
"You.. you need all your friends to save you from one kobold?"
"Oh.. um.. yeah."
"OK.. no I mean it's ok, I don't want you to get hurt. I'll get your friends, and they'll save you... since you can't save yourself."
-Sami uses divine aid to find Anema. It works! But then moments later Anema contacts them anyways.
"Typical."
-"Anema?"
"Quick, I need you to save the Catboy!"
"What? No!"
"Too late! I'm teleporting you."
-Fabritzio immediately wants to overthrow the Kobold Utopia.
"Anema doesn't want the overthrow, though."
"Anema wants a lot of things, but she was the one who brought us here, and she should have known the second she did that, this whole civilization was doomed."
-"I think Anema is actually a bit tired of the Catboy."
"Well yeah, she's been with him for almost an entire day."
-While the PCs are busy chatting, Anema and Fabritzio take off, assault a flying car, and head to rescue the Catboy.
-"So, science kobold, where can we go assault someone for a flying car?"
"Please, you don't need to assault anyone! We can just give you transport."
"Oh.. OK."
"Hey, I just remembered we can fly with the jetpack!"
"You just wanted to assault someone."
-"I don't know if it's a good idea to leave Republican Jesus unsupervised."
"Well, Roman is with him."
"That's worse!"
"Well, Captain Harry is there."
"That's worse!"
"Well, Vizi is.. you know, never mind."
-Catboy was tied up in the bunker, but then he hears shots upstairs. He manages to break out, only to find some kobolds dead, and Jezzro missing. At that point, Heidi & Sami arrive.
"What are you doing free?"
"Yeah, you need to be captured again to make Anema sick of you!"
-The Catboy sneaks away while Heidi & Sami debate on how to force the catboy back into imprisonment.
-"Get back here catboy, or I'll throw grenades at you!"
"Get back here, Catboy, or I'll have you fixed!"
"the Catboy is cat-hiding."
-Heidi catches the catboy and they throw him back into the bunker and seal it.
"Remember, you never got free."
"Remember, snitches get stitches!"
-"So for us to get to the Crown of Creation, Anema and Fabritzio have to bone, while in love, in the Sun, while we have the sunstaff attached to open the gate to the supernal triad?"
"Yup."
-"We should have Fabritzio cuck the cat right in front of him so that Anema loses all respect for him."
"Hey, I'm right here, you know!"
"Yes, we know."
-By the time the PCs catch up to Fabritzio, he's helped the Kobold Jezzro put together a whole revolutionary brigade!
-Heidi & Sami force the catboy to act like a wimp in front of Anema.
-Seeing that Fabritzio and Anema seem to be doing well, Heidi, Sami and the Catboy decide to leave them alone and go back for the others.
-The Kobold authorities are still not convinced of any real danger. They also don't have any kind of real police force, much less an army. They're thus likewise unwilling to give the PCs any nanite augmentation that they might want to use for violence.
"We will simply send some probes to find Jezzro, disable him, and then take him in for mental alteration to fix his obvious instability."
"Oh, sure, go ahead. I'm sure that plan will work..."
"Good! We shall proceed."
"In addition to violence and humor, they appear to have evolved past sarcasm."
-"All our probes have been destroyed!"
"Oh no, we totally couldn't have predicted that!"
"If only we could help, but we're not strong or fit enough, without nanites..."
-"We do not understand. Why would Anema herself be helping to destroy the culture she was partly responsible for creating?"
"She might be controlled!"
"How could an entity as powerful as Anema be controlled?"
"Seriously, have you guys not spent at least 5 minutes with her?!"
"Yeah, she's not the brightest entity in the bunch..."
-"How do we know you will help us?"
"Trust me, we promise we want Anema and Fabritzio back on the sun more than anyone."
"How will you accomplish this?"
"By Any Means Necessary!"
-"Don't you trust us? We're heroes."
"Yeah, did you hear about the Evil Overlord of the Badlands?"
"No.."
"Exactly!"
"You're welcome!"
-"We'll be able to do this, but you'll need to enhance our strength, or speed, or endurance, or whatever..."
"It sounds like you're just using us because you want stuff."
"Yes! Exactly."
-The Kobolds relent, and use their nanite beams to increase Sami, Heidi and the Catboy's strength, Agility and Stamina.
"OK, let's go!"
"Wait... could the kobolds be monitoring us?"
"Why would they?"
"You know if they were concerned that we plan to betray them.. not that we were going to of course!"
"You're talking out of character there, right?"
"Yes."
"Then why are you lying? I'm the GM, I know you're planning to betray them."
"We're not lying to you, we're lying to ourselves."
-The PCs, with their newfound enhancements, just head back to the Sun, leaving Fabritzio and Anema to bond by destroying the entire kobold civilization in a savage uprising undoing thousands of years of social development.
"It was hard, but we did this to save the world."
"You did this to get stuff!"
"Well, yeah, at heart I'm still a hooker."
-Sami is wracked with guilt to learn of the destruction of the entire utopian kobold culture. She goes looking for Mongo and finds him in the (non-hydroponic) garden, with Mexican Jesus.
"Has he behaved himself?"
"Si."
-Heidi, the Catboy and Roman go looking for the Vegomagus, who has been missing all this time, lost and blinded in the enormous labyrinthine corridors of the Sun.
"Why do we even want to find him?!"
"He has the Sunstaff."
"Oh. Shit."
-After a few hours of searching around, they find the Vegomagus splayed on the ground, unconscious, and badly dehydrated.
"Is he alive?"
"Let me kick him."
"meep!"
"Yeah, he's alive."
"Ok. So should we take the sunstaff and leave him?"
"Yeah."
-"It seems to me that the more advanced a civilization is, the more vulnerable it is to be utterly ruined by you PCs."
"True."
"Well, no, I mean, Lol is fine."
"How is it fine?! It's much, much worse than it was when you found it, and had an attempted robot extermination and two violent revolutions!"
"Well, I mean, it's still as fine as it could possibly be after encountering us."
-"How did you like the destruction of the Kobold civilization, RJ?"
"Hell, we did what we did to protect democracy, and make kobolds great again!"
-"On the plus side, Anema and Fabritzio seem to have totally rekindled their attraction."
"Yeah, Anema is attracted to Fabritzio's blind brutal spirit of action, compared to the wimpier and less manly nature of certain others..."
"oh shut up!"
-Sami finds the Sun's bar, and has a somewhat disturbing talk with Roman. She can't get him to admit what his real agenda is, but it's glaringly obvious to everyone he has an agenda.
-"Yo, Anema's back!"
"With Fabritzio?"
"Yes. It looks like they were getting it on."
"Quick, drag them into the sunstaff chamber!"
-"So now that we're headed to the Crown of Creation, I should get the demonslayer sword, right Harry?"
"Well, yes, but be careful, Grandpa!"
"What are you worried about?"
"Well, unless grandma was very naughty, if you die fighting Sezrekhan I'll cease to exist."
-"I want to see if Harry vanishes. If not, it means Heidi was being cucked! You know, like me."
-"Hey Republican Jesus, can you bless our weapons?"
"Sure, put them in a pile."
"Sami, are you going to put your Sanctuary spell in the pile?"
-"Wait, before we go, should we try to get allies?"
"Which ones? We've killed almost everyone we know."
"Well... what about Blitzkrieg and Space Bear?"
"They wouldn't really be useful without a skyship."
"What about Max the bard?"
"Come on! Max is living out his dream in the warden's citadel. Let's try to leave ONE person better off for having known us!"
-Everything is set up; Anema and Fabritzio are in place, the sunstaff is active... and then the party gets an ERROR message.
"Oh what the fuck?!"
"Its ok, I can bone Anema like three or four more times still!"
-"What happened?!"
"Apparently there's a safeguard in place. If there's an open gateway from the Qlippothic Realms in the material plane, then the gateway to the Crown of Creation won't open until it's closed."
"Well where the hell is there an open gateway to the Qlippothic realms?!"
"Oh crap... I know where. In the kingdom of the Demon Zozzsz."
"goddamnit. Another freaking side quest!"
"Told you so."
So on that bombshell, we ended the session. Next time, the PCs are going to have to go into a whole kingdom of demons to somehow disable a permanent plane to the infernal underworld. Expect hilarity to ensue.
RPGPundit
Currently Smoking: Castello 4k Collection Canadian + McLintock Syrian Latakia
So, my latest RPGPundit Presents issue is just a day late, that happens sometimes. But it was worth the wait! This week, I present to you Mutant Hordes of the Last Sun, my complete guide to playing Mutant PCs in the Last Sun gonzo-fantasy setting!
What do you get for your $2.99?
An explanation of where mutants come from in the world of the Last Sun and why they've almost completely replaced humans. Along with guidance to randomly determine if your PC is a mutant, and what kind of classes he can play.
A set of tables for generating your specific mutant! This includes your Mutant Race, Potential Mutant Qualities, and Random Mutant Tribal/Cultural Weirdness.
Each type of mutant is given a complete breakdown. This includes Color Mutants, Cold Mutants, Nudist Mutants, Mud Mutants, Transparent Mutants, Vegan Mutants, Gold Mutants, Radioactive Mutants, Hairy Mutants, Scottish Mutants, Dutchmen, Animal Mutants and Trans-mutants.
There's also rules for special mutant powers including a complete and easy system of OSR psionic powers for pyschic mutants.
So yeah, if you're looking for a gonzo-style subsystem for creating either mutants or weird human variants, then this is the book for you!
I've had or seen several people asking why it is in the Dark Albion setting that the Clerics, with all their power as a single coherent order and all their magic, don't stop the Frogmen? After all, the Cleric's magic and military structure is notable; and their miraculous power can often over-rule the chaos-based magic of the Frogs. Even if we assume the Frogs are too powerful now, why didn't the Clerics stop the Frogs from taking over Frankland in the first place??
(From an Anglish illustration: "Frogmen speaking through the mouths of human heretics"
To address the first question first: the Frogmen have too much power for the Clerics by themselves to deal with, by a longshot. Consider logistics: the Frogmen control a vast kingdom, and even though they are a minority in their own lands, they are assisted by a relatively loyal cadre of chaos-worshiping humans who know they would be burnt at the stake should the Frogmen fall. These act as the soldiers and overseers of the large peasant population. The Clerical order, on the other hand, does not have authority to control armies directly, but must operate with the kingdoms that they find themselves located in. It's not enough that the clerics might want a holy war against the Frog menace, they would need to convince countries like Albion, Burgundy, Lorraine, Arcadia or Iberia to work together on this.
Second, while clerical magic can be very impressive, Clerics are only a tiny percentage of the population. There are perhaps barely 5000 clerics in all of Albion at any given time; this figure includes clerics who are still children/novices, elderly clerics, the infirm, clerics who run the miraculous sites (like the healing waters of Bath), etc. Only about 1 in 1000 people born are gifted to be clerics (there being about 5 million people in Albion, total), and they are better suited as elite troops (or sometimes, as commanders) than to serve as a rank and file army. The Frogmen are much more than this, there's about 420000 Frogmen ruling over a population of 13 million humans. They have magic items they can use themselves or pass on to trusted humans. They can call on their dark gods to grant powers and mutations. They send out agents to corrupt or divide those kingdoms that oppose them (depending on what you want for your campaign, Queen Margaret may be one of them!). There are plenty of reasons why the Frogmen, having now succeeded, may be very difficult to stamp out.
A perhaps much more interesting question is: why did clerics fail to find and stop the corruption of the Frankish Kingdom in the first place?
There were several reasons for this: first, you have to understand the situation of Clerics. They are an order, within the Church. I mentioned above that the Clerics are only 1 in 1000 humans. Compare this to the clergy (priests, monks, and nuns), which occupies about 1 in 50 adults at this time. Additionally, Clerics are independent of the standard ecclesiastical hierarchy; they govern themselves and are answerable only to the Pontifex. This has certain advantages, in that they can not be manipulated or abused by corrupt priests or bishops, but it also has the disadvantage that their absence from the standard hierarchy makes the latter vulnerable to corruption. Clerics operate in small groups, or are assigned individually to very important nobles, or to a bishop, or work as inquisitors, or fight with armies (all these aside from those cleric-administrators that run the clerical houses). That is to say, they are usually pretty spread out. It is thus potentially easy for those corrupted to keep clerics 'in the dark', or if necessary to get rid of individual clerics who find out the truth.
Second, the tactics the Frogmen used: they sent out human agents first, to gradually corrupt the nobility into decadence and sin, while corrupting part of the Church into the Cathari heresy. The latter in particular distracted the Clerics (and other Frankland nobles who were devout to Law), who saw a visible enemy (the heretics) and went off to fight them, losing sight of the more subtle corruption of the aristocracy. In the end the Frankish armies won the battle against the Cathari, but lost the war against the Frogs. Their tired armies were betrayed by some of their own commanders when the Frogmen finally started streaming out of the Paris Swamp. Sects of human chaos-worshipers emerged at the same time all over Frankland.
The Clerics had managed to catch a number of Cults and conspiracies, and to oppose the major heresy (Catharism) before their eyes, but they failed to uncover the masterminds behind it all. They had, until that time, assumed the Frogmen to be dangerous chaos humanoids in the same way Anglishmen view goblins: scary and dangerous but more likely to eat humans than to try to use subtlety to corrupt them. It hit the clerics completely out of left field, along with all the rest of the lands of the Sun.
(they used to look like this
(until they suddenly became something like this
Finally, a note from the point of view of mechanics: remember that while Clerics have a lot of social advantage in the setting, the Dark Albion setting is generally a low-level world. While Clerics, being (most of them) dedicated to a life of opposing Chaos, tend on average to have more experience than most other people in the world, the average Cleric is still only level 1-4. The greatest, most advanced clerics (the Commanders and Supreme Commanders of the Order) are only level 9-14. So we're talking maybe one to three clerics of level 9+ PER COUNTRY. Someone might ask "why doesn't Commune just solve everything"? The answer is that there's likely only the tiniest number of Clerics alive at any given time who even have that power. As great as the Clerics may be, they're far from omnipotent, nor are they immune to being fooled or betrayed.
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Hoy aviso que la aventura de "RPGPundit Presents #25: El Umbral De Las 16 Puertas" ahora esta disponible!
Explora una puerta mágica que usa lÃneas ley geománticas para transportar a tus PJs a 16 planos de existencia diferentes. Esta puerta puede ser integrada en cualquier aventura de fantasÃa, ya sea como curiosidad o como su eje central. Ya sea visitando el Sendero de los Mundos o el enorme Fuerte Enano, este artefacto desconcertará e intrigará a tus jugadores.
Con 31 paginas, es el suplemento de RPGPundit Presents mas grande hasta ahora!
So this is a weird entry in two respects: first, that it is a video review. I've never done a video before. In fact, apart from a couple of interviews on RPG podcasts in Spanish, I've never done any video stuff before at all!
Second, it is different in the sense that it is a review of an RPG product you can't actually buy. At least, not online. You can only get them at certain gaming Cons. It was still a subject so "up my alley", as it were, that I had to go ahead and do the review anyways, even though it didn't technically fit my rules.
So keep in mind when I say "you may want to pick this up if...", I should maybe have added that right now, at least, you can only pick it up if you go to Cons where Bittman is in attendance. Of course, who knows?! Could the Pundit Bump cause enough interest and demand for him to make this into a full blown product (in spite of my slight reservations about the concept)? We'll have to see.
So, check out my video review of Jobe Bittman's "Bone Divination for Game Masters":
Let me know what you thought, and whether you'd want to see more videos in the future!
RPGPundit
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