Kingbeast's Lair

Date At Start Of Game: September 11th, 1935

[Author’s Note: This is the log for the 7th session. Note that the order of the events in this record may not be in the exact order that they occurred during play.

Note that for the first two hours of this session we worked on converting all of the characters from Trail Of Cthulhu to Call Of Cthulhu.]

Circus Act

The session opens with the PC gathering at the Hower estate to stop three members of the Clyde Beatty Circus from breaking into the house. Detective Keagan takes the lead by openly walking up the driveway with his shotgun in hand. He spies the three performers on one side of the Hower Mansion. After cycling his shotgun and telling them to freeze two of the burglars raise their hands to surrender. The third large performer, Vladimir, rushes forward in a frenzy! Detective Keegan takes a shot but it goes wide. Tredge moves over to the wall with his bat to block his escape. This time Detective Keegan does not miss. The shot sends Vladimir to his knees. As Tredge approaches to brain the large weightlifter he mutters, “Great Cthulhu will feed!” With that Tredge brains him with his bat knocking him unconscious.

After apprehending the performers they are brought back to the station for questioning. Detective Keagan and Professor Peaslee are in the room while the other PC are watching through a one way window. They first question Harriet Evans. Harriet explains that the circus is failing. They have been losing money at each stop due to poor attendance. Also costs escalated when one of their tigers needed significant medical care. The trio have been committing robberies up and down the eastern seaboard to keep the circus afloat. Their motive operandi is to case a mark at the show. They then follow the mark home or pick their pocket to get their address. After getting the address they case the house. The next night they commit the robbery. They focus on small high value items only. Jewelry, small antiques, and rare artwork are what they try to steal. Vladimir has a brother in Moscow who he mails the items for fencing in Russia. The brother then send them money for the item after taking a cut.

The PC next ask what Harriet knows about “Cthulhu”. She does not know anything about Cthulhu and does not know what made Vladimir so crazed. Harriet also mentions that they normally don’t pull jobs so quickly but Vladimir did not want to wait.

Next the PC ask about the black book with the strange symbol on the cover. Harriet explains that in Boston they robbed the house of a man named “Jahraus”. One of the items they made off with was a small wooden box. Inside was a set of golden scales. When they accidentally dropped the box a hidden compartment popped open. Inside was this strange black book. The language looked like it might be Italian so they showed it to Claudia (aka the fortune teller). She told them it was Latin not Italian. Claudia could only make out a few words but it seemed old and valuable. When the PC started asking about it at the circus Harriet gave the book to Claudia to sell. They should talk with Claudia to see if she was able to actually sell it.

Questioning Sergei does not reveal anything additional of interest except that Vladimir’s brother is named Yuriy. The PC have not yet attempted to question Vladimir who is still out cold.

At this point the PC began to weigh their options…

Date At End Of Game: September 12th, 1935

This year Atlas Games came out with a list of 31 RPG related questions that they wanted people to answer. I will tackle them in small bite sized morsels to make them a bit easier to swallow. Here are the next set of questions.

REVERB GAMERS 2012, #6: Describe your all-time favorite character to play. What was it about him/her/it that you enjoyed so much?

I almost always run games so my list of favorite characters is not too big. I think one of my favorite PC to play is Green Ghost. Green Ghost is a Champions PC. He is a mild mannered law abiding construction worker who dug up an ancient cape that grants him strange magical ghostlike powers. I really enjoy Green Ghost for several reasons. First he has some really fun super powers. Green Ghost can walk through walls, fly, disrupt objects by phasing into them, and produce an ethereal gas to choke out foes. As his powers come from green life magic he is vulnerable to attacks that are red. This can be a lot of fun in conventions as I often need to ask the GM the colors of every attack that comes at him. Another great source of fun is Green Ghost’s near complete law abiding stance. Even though he is a ghost he will not enter a structure unless it is legal to do so. This often brings up lots of fun moments. The fact that Green Ghost is also a father brings up some great role-playing moments.

REVERB GAMERS 2012, #7: How do you pick names for your characters?

For superhero characters I use a thesaurus. For fantasy characters I will often piece together parts of other words. For modern characters I will use a baby name book or random name generator. Right now my preference is Inspiration Pad from NBOS. (You can pickup a copy of Inspiration Pad for free at this URL.)

REVERB GAMERS 2012, #8: What’s the one gaming accessory (lucky dice, soundtrack, etc.) you just can’t do without? Why?

I can only pick one!?! 😀 I guess I would have to pick my landscape Customizable GM Screen. I love the landscape format and having plastic slots for inserts is REALLY nice. Superb product. (You can pick one up at Noble Knight Games for $24.95 at this URL.)

REVERB GAMERS 2012, #9: Have you ever played a character of the opposite sex. Why or why not? If yes, how did the other players react?

I have played a female character but it was VERY early on in my RPG career. After only a game or two I completely gave up trying to play female PC. As I did a terrible job at it the other players did not react well. I have gotten better at playing female NPCs from the GM side of the screen.

REVERB GAMERS 2012, #10: Have you ever played a character originally from a book/TV/movie? How did the character change from the original as you played? If not, who would you most like to play?

I have not played a character that was directly from a published source but I have played some with only the serial numbers filed off. The one that springs to mind is Ridge Runner. Ridge Runner is a Champions character that is essentially Black Panther with a few less enhanced senses. 😉 He ended up being a private eye and less noble than the source.

GAME ON! 😀

-== What is it? ==-

RAWR!: The Monstrous Adventure Game is a role-playing game geared for families. The players take on the roles of humorous monsters who are fighting to save the Land Of Dreams from Nightmare and his evil minions. RAWR! was written by David G Martin and published by Protagonist Games. The artwork was done by Dan Houser, Matthew Dolan, and Sarah Hill. It was released in January 2012.

The PDF is colored from start to finish. The book is 6.3” x 9.5” and is 130 pages in length. The first 45 pages of RAWR! are the rules and the rest is a sample campaign. That means you are paying for 85 pages of sample campaign material. I am reviewing a PDF copy that I bought then printed out in 8.5″ x 11″ size and had spiral bound. I have not played the game I have only read the book.

-== What I Like ==-

The system presented in the first 45 pages of the PDF uses a simple 2d6 plus modifier system. Math is kept very simple for younger players. Monsters are built with Attributes, Skills, figured Stats, Gear, and Abilities. The system presented by RAWR! should be VERY easy for people to pickup.

RAWR! contains several sample PC that are each given their own page and artwork. Having a large sampling of example PCs is great for folks who are new to role-playing games.

I’m not sure it is needed but the rules could very easily be hacked to get a different feel. It would be easy to make the monsters tougher, weaker, etc based on what the GM wants to do.

I really love the artwork in RAWR!. It has a childlike flair and bright vivid colors. It would be really cool to get a color copy if I decide to run this with my kids.

-== What I Don’t Like ==-

The RAWR! rules include something called Fright Factor. Fright Factor is essentially a morale check that players must make whenever they meet a Nightmare minion. These rules feel to me like they would be stifling for most younger kids. Why should the good guy brave monsters get scared so much that they have mechanical penalties?!? Not sure I would use these rules with my boys.

The campaign section is WAY too long. As I mentioned earlier 85 pages of the book is dedicated to the sample campaign. That means 2/3 of the cost for RAWR! is for the campaign material. I really think a much shorter section with 1 or 2 really well done adventures and a page of hooks would have been plenty. By shortening this section the publisher could have reduced the cost of purchase and made it smaller and easier to digest for newbies.

One of my biggest complaints with the campaign presented in RAWR! is that in more than one sample adventures NPCs jump in and either act as the heroes or steal their thunder. This is a really poor practice. Stealing thunder from the heroes is not fun for older players and would really stink for a younger crowd.

Adventures in the presented RAWR! campaign also include fights the PC are not supposed to win. For example, their goal might be to only delay their foes. From my experience this is a hard concept for younger crowd to grasp especially if they are not told outright that this is their goal.

I would have really liked to have a section on advice for writing adventures for kids. Most folks who would pickup RAWR! have experience writing adventures for adults but they may not have any experience writing adventures for kids or in the RAWR! style.

The maps in the campaign section are very simplistic. For the most part they are completely useless and should be removed or made smaller so that they do not take up so much space.

I found several minor typos and formatting inconsistencies in the product. RAWR! could use an editing pass.

More can be done with the RAWR! character sheet to make the product even more accessible to newbie role-players. One helpful addition would be to have the simple stat formula on the character sheet. For example, Defense = 7 + Speed + Monstrous Ability Modifiers.

-== Summary ==-

This was a really difficult review for me to write because I really wanted to like this product. I am a big fan of the monster hunting genre and I thought my boys would get a kick out of playing silly monsters who are after other bad guy monsters. By dropping some the fear rules and coming up with my own adventures I could make RAWR! work but I was hoping for a better base product. Right now the product is on sale for only $9.99 at DriveThruRPG and I think that price point is great.

You can get copies on DriveThruRPG at this URL for $9.99.

I give it 6 out of 10 paws.