Thousand Thrones Review [Here be Spoilers]

I finished reading this book last week, and I considered I might as well share my thoughts about it. I do this in a thread of my own so as not to create confusion in jadrax' thread.

Warning 1: here be spoilers!

Warning 2: This review is very long!

Warning 3: an abridged version of this review is to be found on Strike-to-Stun(look under 'WFRP 2', the The Thousand Thrones' thread, page 4), in case you don't want to read the whole bloody thing.

Chapter 1: Introduction & Overall Plot:

The central plot of 'The Thousand Thrones' is as follows: A Kislevite wise woman got turned to the Dark Powers (and became Known as 'The Black Witch') in Praag during the 'Great War Against Chaos'. After Magnus defeated the horde at the gate of Kislev, he rode to Praag and burned the city down, but the Black Witch managed to escape and found a final retreat in a cave in a small mountain range in the west of Kislev. She died there from her wounds, but her spirit lived on and became the terror of the local Oblast (Kilsevite plains), demanding a young woman as a sacrifice every 10 years or she would wreak havoc on the people.

After about 200 years (i.e. around the 'current' time; early 26th century IC) she becomes aware of the birth of a child in distant Marienburg that has the 'gift' of compelling people to love him. The witch desires to posess him so that she might have a body and, with his powers added to her own, can destroy the Empire. So, she manipulates him through dreams to travel to Kislev (by pretending to be his mother; the boy is an orphan).

But others want the boy as well. First, a sorcerer of Nurgle sees in him a tool to bring the Empire under his command; if he were subverted to the cause of Chaos, and the love of the people made him emperor, then the fall of the country would be assured. So, he orders his minions to kidnap the boy, and brand him with the Twin-Tailed Comet to further enhance his 'holyness', but he escapes to the street and manages to lash out at one of them with a hammer.

So he is seen by the people of Marienburg, with the brand, and the hammer, and this special power, and all this combined creates an instant crowd of followers who believe he must be Sigmar reborn. The local high priest of Sigmar in Marienburg (who falls for the boy like the others), confirms this and thus is born the 'Crusade of the Child' which sets off to Altdorf, where they hope the Grand Theogonist and the Emperor will acknowledge him and abdicate in favor of him.

But there's more: The Black Witch requires the blood from one Vampire of each of the five clans to complete her posession of the boy, so she contacts them as well by making them believe he is the 'Champion of Night', foretold in ancient vampire prophecies, who will usher in the age of 'The Thousand Thrones' wherein one thousand Vampires will rule the world. Yet all clans have different interpretations of said prophecies, with the effect that some want to kill him, some want to kidnap him for some nefarious goal of their own, some want him to get to Kislev safe and sound and so on.

So now there are a total of seven groups with interests in the boy; the Sigmarite humans, the Nuglish cultists, the Black Witch, and four Vampire clans (the Blood Dragons don't really care about the prophecy). The campaign follows the travels of the boy and his crusade from Marienburg through the Empire and eventually into Kislev, where the Black Witch awaits.

The PC's are initially hired to investigate into the boy's origins, but soon find themselves following after the crusade, where they (or some of them, at least) will too fall under the boy's spell and thus desire to serve and protect him all the way to Kislev. Along the way, all the different forces of evil will attempt to get their hands upon the boy, so the PC's will have their hands quite full, and that's not even considering the internal politics of the crusade!

My take: The overall plot of the campaign is, quite simply, a nice idea crushed under the weight of the demands put on the writers. It's obvious that the ones who commissioned this campaign (i.e. B.I.) desired that their recent products were showcased in it. 'Tome of Salvation' provided the 'crusade' concept, 'Realm of the Ice Queen' made Kislev a necessary part, and finally, 'Nights Dark Masters' put the vampires in the campaign. Now, there is nothing wrong with wanting to utilise new source material, but when such desires become stronger than common sense and internal logic, the result is likely to suffer.

This is seen most clearly in the inclusion of the Vampires, or more accurately, in the inclusion of all five of the bloodlines for no good reason. Sure, the witch requires 'the blood of one vampire of each bloodline', but this rationale is just plain bad. There is no real in-game reason why she requires that; the ritual could easily have been written otherwise, and neither her history, allegiances or powers, nor the boy's history or powers, nor anything else points to Vampires being in any way relevant, much less 'one from each clan'. Indeed, the whole 'one from each clan' concept sounds like something I myself might have come up with ... when I was 12 and just starting out to play RPG's. It's just stupid.

Furthermore, there are quite a number of other things that don't make sense. In no particular order:

- The shortest route from Marienburg to Kislev is across the sea of Claws to Erengrad. The boy has no interest to become Emperor, he just wants to find his mommy. Why is he allowing this huge detour? And, given that the leaders of the crusade all love him (he's 'the center of your universe', as it is put at one point), how can they go against his wishes?

- How did the Black Witch know of the boy, manage to enter his dreams, manipulate a bunch of Vampires, all from a cave that she can't leave, without any agents to help her? Sure, it's easy to say 'she has special powers of Chaos' and leave it at that, but if she could do all this, why did the Black Witch wait for 200 years before trying to posess a body once more? Surely there have been other useful people in that time (like some nice Chaos Warrior or Sorcerer, or Valten!).

- The ritual of the Black Witch Requires the blood from 'all five bloodlines', but in truth, there are seven bloodlines, not five. Two of them never moved into the Old World, but went to the east and south from Lahmia, but they're still Vampires and therefore just as important as any others (see p. 44 of NDM, as well as SteveD's work o this, found on BI's site). Even if they were totally destroyed, they were part of the original Vampires.

Finally, there are a few things about the campaign in general that don't work very well. Again, in no particular order.

- The 'spell' of the boy. OK, it provides an easy reason for the whole crusade to form, but it's too easy. The crusade could form just as well for mundane reasons. Also, the players will likely resent such a heavy handed way of involving them in the plot. This issue is adressed by saying "Being magically compulsed is roleplaying too," which is true, but that's beside the point, which is that it's a railroad, and the whole idea of roleplaying is to have the freedom to make your own decisions (even if they have consequences, as they certainly will in the Old World).

- There are many points in the campaign where there are very good reasons for killing the little twerp (in fact, if they did their work in Marienburg, see Chapter 1, they will want to do so ASAP), and preventing this by an almost inevitable magic compulsion just smacks of an 'cop-out' by the writers, as if they were trying to say: "Yes, we know that the logic of the whole campaign is flawed, but it's the best we could do, so here's a 'Poof!' method to mask this problem."

- Repetition. There are only so many instances where the boy can be assasinated, kidnapped or manipulated into doing this or that before it becomes boring. The first time it works, the second time it's a bit 'stale' and the third time it's just annoying.

-Railroading. There are quite a few situations where this or that must happen 'no matter what' because the plot requires it. This is just weak, particularly if the PC's are present and active, but still the boy gets kidnapped, the cultist escapes, the NPC gets killed, or whatever. In an RPG, no event in which the players are involved should have a mandatory outcome, since it robs them of their action and turns them into puppets.

-Deus ex Machina. Like railroading, above, this technique takes away the PC's freedom and makes their efforts insignificant. It doesn't happen much (except in chapter 4, where it happens all the time), but it's a shame when it does anyway.

After all this critique, one might think that the whole book is a waste of money. This is not the case; most of the individual chapters are actually quite good, and where they are flawed (due to railroading, illogicality or any of the other problems identified above), it is mostly due to the demands of the campaign.

So before I discuss the individual chapters, I would like to say that chapters 1, 2, 3 (first half), 4 (second half), 5, 6 (second half), 7, and 8; in short, everything which doesn't directly involve the crusade, could be turned into an enjoyable independent adventure with a little work, and that chapters 3 (second half), 4 (first half), and 6 (first half); i.e. everything which does involve the crusade, can be used as a good basis of a (more sensible) 'crusade' campaign of your own. The only thing to throw out totally would be chapter 9, which is both extremely deadly and extremely stupid.

Now, on to the chapters!

Chapter 1: The Call of Chaos:

This chapter takes place in Marienburg, a few days after the crusade left the city for Altdorf.
Note that there is a lot of free background material on Marienburg (including a map of the city) available at the BI site, and it would be very helpful for this chapter! I have not yet read all of that material, but what I did read is quite good. Also, if you have (I personally don't, sadly), or can obtain, the WFRP first edition sourcebook "Marienburg: Sold down the River", I presume it would be useful too.

In any case, the PC's are hired to look into the background of this mysterious boy, said to be Sigmar reborn. A number of different employers, with different motivations, is provided, so there will always be a 'hook' that appeals to you and your players. Regardless, the employer doesn't matter much except as a 'setup', so it's easy to provide one of your own design if you want to.

The first part of this adventure is a pure investigation, having the PC's run all over Marienburg for information. Along way, they encounter an ambitious priestess of Shallya, a doped out Witch Hunter, and a host of other characters, some nefarious, some pure, and most self-serving. Eventually, they venture into the treacherous Swamps that surround the city to find an old temple, in fact the temple where the child was born, home to a cult of Stromfels. With clues found there, the Characters return to Marienburg, venture into the worst slum of the city, get into moral and physical predicament, and finally brave the sewers in order to find the hidden lair of the Nurgle cultists who kidnapped the boy. The cultists are gone, but they've left a 'guardian', a mad 'prophet' and a final clue, pointing to the cultists involvement in the crusade. Armed with this information, the PC's are supposed to travel after the crusade and prevent the Nuglist from harming the child.

My take: This chapter is very, very good. The investigations are well done, the characters are colourful, realistic, and very Warhammer, the swamp, temple slums and sewers are all nice and different environments, with interesting physical, intellectual and moral encounters, and the whole thing fits together clearly, logically and sensibly. In short, it's great!

How to convert: If you want to use this chapter as an independent adventure, the main problem you're going to face is the child itself. Since you're not using the crusade, you will have to find some other point of interest about him, and some way to have him be unavailable. One way to do this is to have him be spirited away to Altdorf quietly, instead of at the head of a crusade. Another way is to make him the 'chosen' of another cult (Mannan, for instance, or Handrich/Haendryk) and have him be taken to some place inaccessible to the PC's (out to sea if Mannan is the God used).

Chapter 2: An Unquiet Peace:

This adventure takes place while the PC's are in hot pursuit of the crusade, in the village of Pfeifeldorf, on the road from Marienburg to Altdorf. The village is on the edge of collapse from the aftereffects of the crusade passing through, the local nobles are trouble, and worst of all, a chicken is missing! Not much more than the core rulebook is needed for this adventure, though SH and NDM would prove useful.

To start the adventure, the PC's are railroaded into an arrest by a gang of nobles, put in jail, and told that they may speed up the process of their release by looking into a particular 'village mystery'. This is probably about the weakest 'hook' I've seen in a long while (even if there's some sense to it from the point of view of the NPC's involved), but that's not insurmountable. Regardless, the PC's are sent running here and there across the village, having to deal with, among others, a senile farmer, a bailiff who can't hold his liquor, and a reeve who's quite out of his league ... and his head. In the end, all leads to the two village nobles Lucas and Lennhart von Speier and, if all has gone according to plan, to a nice moral dillemma. See, one of the brothers is a vicious brute who will terrorize the villagers when he comes into power, but in an effort to prevent this, the other one is (or was) prepared to sacrifice his brother to a Vampire! It's up to the PC's what course of action to take next; do they rescue the brute, or do they let the other (much nicer) brother get away with his crime 'for the good of all'. Regardless of what they choose to do, the scenario will come to an end with a savage fight with a number of vampires; whether in the cramped confines of a mausoleum or the open spaces of the village itself.

My take: Another investigation. Aside from being quite irrelevant to the plot, having a railroaded beginning (which is easily amended) and an end which requires a bit of work, it is very nice. Again nice characters (which should prove a lot of fun to play), multiple fun 'mini-quests' and general warhammerishness make it a winner. Nevertheless, given the effect of space constraints on some later chapters, I wonder why it was included at all.

To convert: Since this is pretty much an independent adventure already, there's not much to change. About the only thing you need to do is to find a different reason for why the village is so on the edge; a horde of refugees from the Storm of Chaos (led by some charismatic priest) would do nicely. Furthermore, the end involves no less than 9! Vampires; even if their goal is not to kill the PC's, it is a bit much; replacing most of them with ghouls would work much better.

Chapter 3: The Crusade of the Child:

This chapter falls into two pieces. The first is the continuing effort of the PC's to catch up with the crusade; in the second the PC's finally reach it and get to experience the power of the kid up close and personal. ToS would be handy for this second part, but not essential.

In the first part, the PC's find an abandoned coaching inn, discover that it is not abandoned after all (an wounded but still bloody arrogant elf is hiding within), have to put up with another arrival (a classic 'fat and corrupted' Sigmarite Priest), get to deal with some starving mutants (a good moral dilemma) and finally face an onslaught of beastmen (which they will be more likely to fend off if they have befriended the various groups earlier.

In the second part, we finally get to the crusade. It is depicted very well, a sort of cross between a rock festival and a fundamentalist sect's compound, boiled in pure warhammer grimmness. What exactly will happen here depends on the PC's plans and antentions towards the kid (which may differ between them), but in any case one or more of them will fall for the young leader, which will seriously complicate any plans of harming him. Regardless of how they proceed, the chapter ends with an attack by undead, under the control of ... a Vampire (dun, dun, dun!), which gives the PC's a chance to defend the kid and thus become heroes to the crusade, which will make whatever they want much easier in the future.

My take: The 'Inn' part of this chapter is good. Again, plenty roleplaying opportunities; the priest, the elves and the mutants all take a different approach. Furthermore, the 'beastman siege' is nice and scary, without overwhelming the Players with dice rolls. Once more, it has little to do with the main plot, but as a 'fright night' scenario it works well.
The 'crusade' part is not bad either. Sure, some things are annoying, and the childs power is more than annoying, but the outer and inner workings of such a thing as a crusade are described with realism and in WFRP style, making it perfect as source material for your own 'crusade' (or 'pilgrimage') themed campaign.

To convert: The first part is totally independent, so it doesn't need converting. The second part is too ingrained in the overall plot to be easily convertable, but it does spark the imagination for material of one's own.

Chapter 4: Written in Blood:

Again a chapter in two parts; the first details the crusade's move towards Altdorf, the second is an investigation within that great city as, oh horror of horrors, the child is kidnapped by nefarious powers! SoA is, despite it's name, utterly unnecessary, as it is practically useless as source material for the city.

During the crusade, the PC's have the opportunity to get closer to it's leaders and find out more about what's going on behind the scenes. In the process, the cult from chapter 1 makes it's move (one of it's moves, anyway) and tries to infect the people with a hideous disease. The PC's can stop this from happening, but they will never find out the ultimate leader of the cult, and since all the cultists have a 'suicide pill' the PC's efforts are ultimately stymied and the wrong man will be accused for cooking up this plot. This is nicely grim, but being prevented from succeeding no matter what is sure to frustrate our stalwart heroes.

Then, the crusade reaches Altdorf, and the leaders come up with an unimaginably stupid plan (that will go on regardless of what the PC's do) to get the kid to the Emperor and the Grand Theogonist (where they hope he will be recognized for what he is). Furthermore, the plan goes (predictably) awry immediately, and (sadly, also predictably) the PC's are railroaded into being unable to prevent this from occuring. 'Sigmar reborn' is kidnapped, and the PC's must find him. This investigation itself is quite good, again with the interesting characters and locations, but is prevented from it's full potential by the fact that some things simply must happen and that the PC's are blatantly helped on a number of points by a character (surprise, surprise, a Vampire) who really ought to be way more subtle according to her kind (Lahmian). In the end, the PC's find out that the final clue is way out of town, which ends this chapter.

My take: For the first part (the 'crusade') part, the same can be said as above; good as source material, less so as actual part of the campaign. The 'suicide pill' is a weak concept, and should be removed anyhow.
Aside from the setup (which is just plain dumb), the second part is nice in concept but flawed in execution. Removing chapter 2 (good as it is) and spending part of the page count on this chapter would have improved it so much. As it is, Deux ex and inevitable happenings take it down from what it could have been.

To convert: Again, for the first part, use as source material. The second part could work as an independent scenario if the 'Deus ex' elements were changed. Fortunately, given that there is no mandatory outcome anymore, this should not prove too difficult.

Chapter 5: Metamorphosis of Villa Hahn:

This chapter sends the PC's into the mysterious Drakwald to find the final clue to the boy's location. After a lot of travel and a bit of asking around in various backwater villages, the PC's finally find that location, the Villa Hahn, which has indeed been metamorphosed into a Nurglists dream, which means it will be the utter nightmare of any sane PC! ToC would be useful for this chapter.

The traveling part and the final investigations are solid and quick, but the real meat of the adventure is the Villa Hahn. It once was the home of a wealthy merchant (who is still there, in a way ...), but since his son joined a Nurgle cult and brought his new friends home, things have gone downhill a bit for this once proud family. The place is infested (badum tish) with cultists, monsters and disease, and the PC's will need to be careful if they are not to leave here with at least one of father Nurgle's 'gifts' in their system. The PC's also need to be smart in order to deal with the various traps, monsters and family members scattered about the estate, and to find the way into the cultists inner sanctum. There, they can rescue the boy (or kill him, finally!), which signals the end of this chapter.

My take: This is just plain good. The villa is truly creepy, and the various family members are both tragic and horrible. The diseases might need to be toned down a bit, though. Not much more to be said about it, except that I don't really like Nurglists as enemies, but that is entirely personal.

To convert: This chapter could be used as an independent adventure with very little work. As a bonus, due to the former dealings of the family patriarch, this is a great place to set up clues to an adventure of your own.

Chapter 6: Heralds of a New Dawn:

In this chapter, the PC's return to the crusade, now at the ruins of Wolfenburg, kid in tow (assuming they've not killed the brat!) and are promptly hailed as heroes. In their absence, the cult leadership has changed somewhat, and the followers have split into numerous (and humourous) factions, as well as being whittled down quite a bit without their saviour to lead them. Regardless, now that he is back, all is well, and everyone is confident once again. But a mysterious murder will unveil yet another plot (and yet another Vampire) against the kid. Can the PC's prevent the unthinkable from occuring? The (non-WFRP) book The Life of Sigmar could greatly enhance this chapter, but is not necessary.

While the investigation is solid and fine, it's not spectacular in any way, and, on it's own, wouldn't merit much attention, particularly since it is the 5th one in 6 chapters. The true gem of this chapter, however, is the play. See, an enterprising playwright has decided to cast a performance of his latest play, based on 'The Life of Sigmar' to boost morale. One way or another, some of the PC's will have to take roles in that performance, either because they're "Just perfect for this role.", or, because they discover that the enemies have infiltrated the play, and the only way to expose them is to participate as well. Thus, the PC's must a): keep ther play going even when the vilains try to create mayhem, b): expose and dispose of these villains without tipping their hand, and c): protect the kid from harm, while he's sitting in the front row! This, played rightly, should strike just that dark comedy tone that is so characteristically Warhammer! The foiling of the plot (pun intended) ends this chapter.

My take: Another very nice chapter, both as part of the crusade, and on it's own. Space constraints take it down a bit, but not much, and the 'play' thing, is pretty original and done very well. The only mayor thing I would change is having the villain only show up in act 6 (disguised as the villain of that act, a role he should be able to fulfill quite well

), since the play sounds like too much fun to cut short!

.

To convert: Again, it can be run as an independent adventure with a bit of work. All you need is a refugee camp (not too hard to do in the wake of the SoC) and you're good to go!

Chapter 7: Death Do Us Part:

This chapter sends the PC's on a wild chase to find the boy, who once again has been kidnapped. Only, it turns out it is instead some other kid that they're chasing, so their efforts have no real point other than to remove the PC's from the crusade see chapter 8 as for why exactly). Meanwhile, there is once more a Vampire (Von Carstein, this time, hey a rhyme!

) involved, and, just by coincidence, the PC's stand a chance to learn some of the background of the overall plot. NDM would be a big help here.

On the trail of the missing kid, the PC's visit Talagaad (port of Talabheim), Hermsdorf and Wurtbad in quick succession, deal with mysterious dreams and face evil blood cultists. The trail ends at the village of Siegfriedhof, on the very edge of dreaded Sylvania, where they have to negotiate with the strange monks of a monastery of Morr before finally heading into the haunted province, to Helfurt, to be exact, to find out the real reason the kid is kidnapped and put a stop to the evil Vampire's plans. Along the way, there's the mystery of a tryptich (triple painting) that sheds some light on things best left in the dark, such as the truth about Sigmar's relation to Nagash (the great Necromancer) and the dark practices of the ancient druids.

My take: This chapter is an odd one. It has a lot of nice things in it, but (again due to space constraints, when will they ever learn

) many things are very vague (like the whole 'prophecy' thing, what's really going on in the monastery and the motivation of the main villain). Ok, maybe I'm being thick, but I must confess, there are just too many things in this chapter I don't really understand. I do understand, however, that giving most of the tryptich puzzle away at the beginning (at the end of chapter 6, actually) is no good. Furthermore, at least one of the puzzles seems incorrect here (six circles, but only five symbols put in them) and another (the puzzle box) is just reduced to a die roll, while it would be nice to make it a physical thing (on paper, with handouts, but still). Finally, the monks of the monastery; I just didn't 'get' their motivations, which makes it hard to play them.

So, probably I just didn't 'get' this chapter (never having so much as touched a Dan Brown book might explain some of that), but IMO it is better used as source material, or extensively rewritten, than as it is.

To convert: This chapter is an independent one, so no problem using it as such. The whole 'prophecy' thing can be used to set up adventures of your own making.

Chapter 8: The Black Witch:

Ah, the Kislev chapter. Since the PC's have wasted their time in Sylvania, they will have to catch up to the crusade once more, which means braving the desolate plains of Kislev on their own. When they finally find the remnants of the once proud crusade, they learn that not only is the kid missing yet again, but that the village is harbours a terrible secret which will ultimately spell it's doom. Also, the Vampires have gathered in great numbers nearby! RotIQ is a useful recourse for this part.

Once more we have two parts here. The first covers the PC's trek through Kislev, meeting various monsters and personas, most of the 'less than nice' variety, along the way. The second part (and the meat of this chapter) has the PC's live through what will prove to be the final days of the village of Zhidovsk, as the villagers gather to pay their tribute (a young maiden) to the Black Witch. The PC's will discover that this time, it is not the Black witch who demands sacrifice, but a clever merchant who has set up the situation so that he might kidnap the maiden and have his way with her. The combination of this and a disease that runs through town has finally broken the mind of the local priestess of Shallya, and her actions spell final doom for the village at the hand of Kislev's Knights, who've come to cleanse the town of evil.

Oh, and there's also the crusade, and Vampires! But neither has really a role to play. The crusade has broken up during the trek through Kislev, most of it's leaders are dead, the followers have been reduced to a small number, and it is in general irrelevant to the plot here.

As for the Vampires, well they play a role in chapter 9, but for now, they don't do much, just hang out with 4 clans in the same place all nice and peacefully, and do't seem to bother anyone in the village either.

My take: The trek through Kislev is good. As a part of the campaign, however, this one really falls down. Eliminating all the interesting people, internal plottings and stuff like that is a big letdown, and signals to me that the authors just didn't know how to keep it up. But the biggest sillyness of the chapter is the 'Vampire camp' just outside of town. What village will stand for that? Why do the vampires allow their rivals to be there? Whats to prevent anyone from going there in daylight and burning the place up?

To convert: As an independent thing (sans crusade & sans Vampires), it can work quite well, and the 'plot in the village' is done nicely and suitably 'grim and perilous'.

Chapter 9:Womb of the Black Witch:

The dreaded chapter 9! Tzeentch's curse really came down on this one like the twin tailed comet on Mordheim. A huge and extremely deadly dungeon, with stupid and/or silly traps and monsters and a time-constraint that makes it almost impossible to finish even if the PC's manage to survive. And as a final insult, one of the rooms has the Black Witch's army, which is so poweful (and can multilpy indefinitely to boot) that there's absolutely no reason for her to need the powers of the kid. Any villager would have sufficed. I won't even attempt to go over it in detail, since it may cause me to void my stomach on my keybord. It's utter rubbish. The only reason for it's existence I can think of is that Rob Schwalb (the writer) already knew of BI's imminent demise and decided that putting any more effort in was a waste of his time. Either that, or he just hates us all.

Conclusion: Most of the relevant things have been said, so I'll keep it short. This book has a lot of potential and a lot of nice episodes, but the overall plot is wrecked by many serious issues. It is best used as a collection of independent scenarios and material for inspiration, but not as a campaign.

Salvaging the whole thing: Well, like I said before, most chapters run nicely as independent adventures with a bit of work, but if you want to rescue the main plot from it's own problems here's what I'd do:

- Get rid of the Black Witch, get rid of all but one Vampire Clan as main protagonists (the Lahmia's seem like the best one to keep, as they want to rule the empire from the shadows), get rid of the 'Vampire Prophecy', get rid of the annoying elves, replace the Nurgle Cutists with Tzeentch cultists (as they are the only ones ambitious, creative and smart enough to pull the whole thing off).

- Devise some backstory in which a Lord of Change (Greater Deamon of Tzeentch) has foreseen the birth of the boy and is masterminding the whole thing, directing the crusade to his stronghold.

- Devise some plot complication in which the Lahmians want to get the boy to the Silver Pinnacle, to train and seduce him, so that he might become their puppet Emperor eventually.

- Devise some goal for the crusade that makes their travels make sense. For example, the boy 'Sigmar reborn', must be brought the place where Sigmar underwent his apotheosis (somewhere beyond Black Fire Pass) so he can receive the full essence of Sigmar and return to the Empire as a true 'god-man'.

- Run chapter 1 more or less as written, run chapter 2 if you want to as a side track, run chapter 3 also more or less as written (but remember, there are both Tzeentchian and Lahmian cultists afoot, and their enemies in this case most likely Strigoi will serve as attackers of the crusade.

- Run chapter 4 (again) more or less as written, but here, the brat is kidnapped by Slaanesh Cultists (or whatever). Run chapter 5 as written, but modify the castle to reflect the kind of enemy (a Slaanesh 'pleasure palace' should be ... fun

).

- Run chapter six as the point where the different groups (Tzeentchian, Lahmian and Human) will want to take the crusade in different directions. Run the play, but have both evil groups have agents onstage/backstage/in the public, all poised to kidnap the kid and/or eliminate their rivals. Ideally, the existence of both 'evil' groups should only be fully revealed to the PC's at this point.

- Lose chapter 7, 8, and 9, and devise your own ending, depending on which groups have controls the kid, the crusade or both. This could take the PC's to such fun places as the Dark Lands, the Silver Pinnacle, or the abode of a Lord of Change. Also, whatever group does not have the kid could well become an grudging ally for the PC's

Excellent stuff!

This will be so useful (together with Jadrax thread) when I finally get the book myself...

Dr. Rudolf von Richten wrote:The dreaded chapter 9! Tzeentch's curse really came down on this one like the twin tailed comet on Mordheim. A huge and extremely deadly dungeon, with stupid and/or silly traps and monsters and a time-constraint that makes it almost impossible to finish even if the PC's manage to survive. And as a final insult, one of the rooms has the Black Witch's army, which is so poweful (and can multilpy indefinitely to boot) that there's absolutely no reason for her to need the powers of the kid. Any villager would have sufficed. I won't even attempt to go over it in detail, since it may cause me to void my stomach on my keybord. It's utter rubbish. The only reason for it's existence I can think of is that Rob Schwalb (the writer) already knew of BI's imminent demise and decided that putting any more effort in was a waste of his time. Either that, or he just hates us all.

That does surprise me a little. The fact it's Rob I mean - while we have seen GR's generic D20 writers trying (and failing) to evoke the special tone of Warhammer, I would have thought Mr Schwalb knew better than to add a hack dungeon to WFRP.

Dr. Rudolf von Richten wrote:
Conclusion: Most of the relevant things have been said, so I'll keep it short. This book has a lot of potential and a lot of nice episodes, but the overall plot is wrecked by many serious issues. It is best used as a collection of independent scenarios and material for inspiration, but not as a campaign.

That was pretty much my conclusion to the whole thing.

(Although TBH I struggle to find a single campaign in the history of role-play where this is not the case.)

The campaign vs. interwoven stories vs. indepedent-but-related scenarios or adventure hooks has always been an issue for me... Often, I've found that the challenges outlined in a campaign don't scale well with the actual XP curve the campaign affords (ie, the campaign becomes deadlier at a brisk pace, while the XP has the PCs improving at a slow pace, to the point they can't realistically complete with the encounters as written)...

That's one of the reasons the first full-blown module I wrote for D&D was a series of related, but non-consecutive, adventures... The idea was to create an overarching plot contrivance/goal/theme, with a series of several short chapters you could sprinkle into your ongoing adventure and campaign. Perhaps every fifth session or so you could sidetrack play to one of these side plots -- and by the time you reached the second or third of these you'd start to see a bigger picture forming.

You can check it out here... Dungeon Crawl Classics #14: Dungeon Interludes

I'd love to see this sort of treatment used in Warhammer. A series of plot threads woven into your ongoing campaign -- enough to offer GMs some great tips and ideas, and an occassional break from planning and prep. Enough to whet the appetite and interest of the players... But short enough to keep from derailing other plans. And separaet so the GM can decide when to best introduce the individual elements based on his unique group's talents and experience.

I think one of the things that is missing, and someone mentioned it in there review (Making me swear that I had not,) is that WFRP Campaigns, due the career system, go of on lots of tangents. very PC will have a character goal in terms of training, acquiring of trappings et al, and will pursue that goal above and over any forced plot from the campaign.

Its like Oblivion, (The PC game,) the over arching plot is that Hordes of daemons are consuming the earth and need to be stopped ASAP.... but what you actually do as a player is ignore that and deal with someone's rat issues so you can get the next level of Fighter... its a bit silly really, but that's how the system is set up.

This means the ideal WFRP Campaign is something like the "The Enemy Within" basically a lot of pissing about in a boat having fun, with no pressing need to get on with it.

ynnen wrote:The campaign vs. interwoven stories vs. indepedent-but-related scenarios or adventure hooks has always been an issue for me... Often, I've found that the challenges outlined in a campaign don't scale well with the actual XP curve the campaign affords (ie, the campaign becomes deadlier at a brisk pace, while the XP has the PCs improving at a slow pace, to the point they can't realistically complete with the encounters as written)...

Luckily that isn't much of a problem in WFRP.

Dr. Rudolf von Richten wrote:Along the way, there's the mystery of a tryptich (triple painting) that sheds some light on things best left in the dark, such as the truth about Sigmar's relation to Nagash (the great Necromancer)

So, my good Doctor, what do I have to threaten to do to your loved ones to get more details out of you? I won't be getting the book anytime soon, and I'd be *dying* to know what's this all about, if I wasn't Undead already

I thank you for your time

Lord Gorthuar de Veris
Cult of Nagash

Gorthuar wrote:
So, my good Doctor, what do I have to threaten to do to your loved ones to get more details out of you? I won't be getting the book anytime soon, and I'd be *dying* to know what's this all about, if I wasn't Undead already

Why are you presuming my loved ones are still in such as state of being as to be capable of being threathened by you?

Basically (and for anything more on this, you'd have to buy the book or ask the writer of this chapter (Herr Arnulfe a.k.a. Jude Hornborg) directly), when Sigmar 'temporarily inconvenienced' your Lord and Master, he stole his crown (proving his base and ignoble heritage) and wore it for a while. Now, the few imperial scholars who are aware of this believe that Sigmar was 'strong' enough to fend of the 'taint' of the Great necromancer, but I'm sure you're not so squeamish in this matter, and have long suspected the truth ... that the crown did indeed 'influence' Sigmar, and that, when his supposed 'apotheosis' came, it took a rather 'bloody' form.

And that's all you'll get out of me for now. You will repay me in due time ... yesss

CapnZapp wrote:That does surprise me a little. The fact it's Rob I mean - while we have seen GR's generic D20 writers trying (and failing) to evoke the special tone of Warhammer, I would have thought Mr Schwalb knew better than to add a hack dungeon to WFRP.

It was not his first choice.

rob schwalb wrote:
For those interested...

The original plan was for the final chapter to take place in the Chaos Wastes, but it was rejected in favor of a more controlled environment. I placed the end sequence inside a "dungeon" because it provided a bounded environment with which we could present the many faces of Chaos without taking the characters over the border. I'll admit, I went for a British ending with this one and I didn't and still don't expect PCs to survive to the end, let alone come out without a long list of mutations. This might be an unsatisfying end for some, but then again, the Holy Grail wasn't that much of a satisfying end either. I had hoped to evoke a bit of the Time Bandits feel with this. Maybe it worked, maybe it didn't. Don't know for sure. To those who get there, good luck.

And with that, I think I'll be stepping away from the Old World for a while.

Dr. Rudolf von Richten wrote:
Why are you presuming my loved ones are still in such as state of being as to be capable of being threathened by you?

If they are still mortal, it takes but a single word to place them in my power. If they are dead, they already are in my power. If servitude to the Gods has brought them immortality, destroying them will take more effort, but still can be done. Are there any other states of being?

Dr. Rudolf von Richten wrote:
Basically (and for anything more on this, you'd have to buy the book or ask the writer of this chapter (Herr Arnulfe a.k.a. Jude Hornborg) directly)

Those basics work well, thank you Doctor. So the barbarian *did* take the Crown? Like so many before him. That's a new fact to memorise and preach.

I thank you for your time

Lord Gorthuar de Veris
Cult of Nagash

jadrax wrote:

CapnZapp wrote:That does surprise me a little. The fact it's Rob I mean - while we have seen GR's generic D20 writers trying (and failing) to evoke the special tone of Warhammer, I would have thought Mr Schwalb knew better than to add a hack dungeon to WFRP.

It was not his first choice.

rob schwalb wrote:
For those interested...

The original plan was for the final chapter to take place in the Chaos Wastes, but it was rejected in favor of a more controlled environment. I placed the end sequence inside a "dungeon" because it provided a bounded environment with which we could present the many faces of Chaos without taking the characters over the border. I'll admit, I went for a British ending with this one and I didn't and still don't expect PCs to survive to the end, let alone come out without a long list of mutations. This might be an unsatisfying end for some, but then again, the Holy Grail wasn't that much of a satisfying end either. I had hoped to evoke a bit of the Time Bandits feel with this. Maybe it worked, maybe it didn't. Don't know for sure. To those who get there, good luck.

And with that, I think I'll be stepping away from the Old World for a while.

Very interesting, could you perhaps offer a link to his original post?

Unfortunately I have had a small nap between posting that and you asking and now have no idea where it was from, apart from it was his blog.

Gorthuar wrote:

Dr. Rudolf von Richten wrote:
Why are you presuming my loved ones are still in such as state of being as to be capable of being threathened by you?

If they are still mortal, it takes but a single word to place them in my power. If they are dead, they already are in my power. If servitude to the Gods has brought them immortality, destroying them will take more effort, but still can be done. Are there any other states of being?

I will leave you to ponder this one, but remember "That is not dead...."

That was a very good and informative review. Thank you for it, Doc.

jadrax quoted:

rob schwalb wrote:

For those interested...

The original plan was for the final chapter to take place in the Chaos Wastes, but it was rejected in favor of a more controlled environment. I placed the end sequence inside a "dungeon" because it provided a bounded environment with which we could present the many faces of Chaos without taking the characters over the border. I'll admit, I went for a British ending with this one and I didn't and still don't expect PCs to survive to the end, let alone come out without a long list of mutations. This might be an unsatisfying end for some, but then again, the Holy Grail wasn't that much of a satisfying end either. I had hoped to evoke a bit of the Time Bandits feel with this. Maybe it worked, maybe it didn't. Don't know for sure. To those who get there, good luck.

And with that, I think I'll be stepping away from the Old World for a while.

That is interesting to hear. The original plan certainly sounds more interesting (just about anything else would've been better than the truly awful climax that we have).

A very good review! Seems like there are only "bits" in there I can use. I'll see when I get my copy

Are there any new careers or talents or other 'non-adventure-oriented' material?

Drakar wrote:Are there any new careers or talents or other 'non-adventure-oriented' material?

No, no clear 'cut out and use as is' things like that (no new spells either, though there is one ritual) But, as I wrote, there is plenty of good material on 'how to run a crusade' in the chapters 3, 4, and 6, and chapter 7 has a lot of stuff on ancient vampire prophecies, mysterious connections between certain gods and other funky stuff.

Oh and for all that like this review: thanx!

Drakar wrote:Are there any new careers or talents or other 'non-adventure-oriented' material?

In My Review I listed most things that can be used as basic resources, (i.e. spells, monsters et al) in a generic campaign. (Although I missed out a magic item that's hidden in there.)

EXCELLENT review Herr Doktor! That was what I was looking for. Sounds like a mess, but should be fun though. The end is horrible as expected, PotD is not too intriguing, but definitely better than this... Well, perhaps I can start it somewhen next year when were finished with this epic campaign of the "other game".

jadrax wrote:Unfortunately I have had a small nap between posting that and you asking and now have no idea where it was from, apart from it was his blog.

Blog: http://roninevil.livejournal.com/
Specific post: http://roninevil.livejournal.com/70744.html

I must say, Rob's reasoning is not only dodgy, but reminds me of Robin D Laws' Heart of Chaos as well. Or, as the ultimate expression, Greg Costikyan's Violence (both of which James Wallis must take a share of the blame for).

In one word - burnout.

Why write a Warhammer supplement if you're sick and tired of it? Alternatively, if you confuse grim and perilous with nasty and depressing? Or, if you can't stomach the naive joy of classic fantasy, and feel a need to bring modern concepts into it?

I hope that future WFRP developers learn one lesson: don't do dungeons in WFRP! Thy can only exist if you're willing to buy into certain genre assumptions. These assumptions are specifically not part of WFRP. Hence, WFRP dungeons must be the death-traps any real person would design them as (rather than the amusement parks everybody accepts in D&D). This is, put simply, not fun. Thus I conclude there should be no dungeons in WFRP.

Logically laid-out completely-mapped realistically-sized things like abandoned mines or goblin-infested Dwarf keeps etc on the other hand - that kind of "dungeon" could and would work in WFRP...!

Sadly, this seems to require a much more ambitious effort than a hack dungeon, certainly too much for BI as evidenced by their complete absence during the last few years...

Regards,
Zapp

Vlad wrote:

The end is horrible as expected, PotD is not too intriguing, but definitely better than this...

I wasn't sure if you were saying that PotD was better than TTT as a whole or just its' ending. FWIW I'd be willing to run TTT though with some serious tinkering done. I've never wanted to run PotD as a complete campaign, though I'd be willing to use its' individual components. In general I found TTT to be far more inspiring and full of ideas.

CapnZapp wrote:

jadrax wrote:Unfortunately I have had a small nap between posting that and you asking and now have no idea where it was from, apart from it was his blog.

Blog: http://roninevil.livejournal.com/
Specific post: http://roninevil.livejournal.com/70744.html

I must say, Rob's reasoning is not only dodgy, but reminds me of Robin D Laws' Heart of Chaos as well. Or, as the ultimate expression, Greg Costikyan's Violence (both of which James Wallis must take a share of the blame for).

In one word - burnout.

Ah, roninevil rather than Evil Ronin, you would have thought after 7 years working for a council I would have (re)checked that option!

The burnout comparisons to the end of Hogs Head's run do seem appropriate, still at least it was only one chapter that stunk rather than the whole supplement.

One thing that does get me is that the idea of "English" role-play is killing the party! I would like to point out that it was Gary "Cheese Whiz Eater" Gygax that started the trend, and Ken "Wouldn't know a proper cup of tea if it bit him" Rolston that added all the Unbeatable and Utterly lethal encounters to The Enemy Within.

English role-play is like test cricket! Takes hours upon hours, takes place in the rain and *nobody* wins at the end, not even the vindictive GM.

CapnZapp wrote:
Why write a Warhammer supplement if you're sick and tired of it? Alternatively, if you confuse grim and perilous with nasty and depressing? Or, if you can't stomach the naive joy of classic fantasy, and feel a need to bring modern concepts into it?

I must admit this paragraph confuses me a little. Wouldn't someone with an aversion to the "naive joy of classic fantasy" be just the person to write a WFRP adventure? Concluding a campaign with a hack n' slash dungeon captures the very essence of classic fantasy, something WFRP tends to steer away from (to varying degrees of success I'll admit, no pun intended).