Not Just a One Trick Pony

Ian Warner is taking a short break from the Shadow World to prove that he isn’t just the guy who mocks White Wolf. Two exciting new projects are now in the works.

Tough Justice: A game of courtroom drama set under the Bloody Code where over 200 crimes carried the death penalty. If you fancy yourself as budding Garrow or Sylvester or one of their many associates then this is the game for you.

Smeaton’s War: A pitch black satire on Right Wing alarmism and the threat of Islamic Fundamentalism: Smeaton’s War is set in a nightmare future where ‘Islamists’ have Europe and only Glasgow under the rule of self appointed Laird John Smeaton stands against the night. If you think this sounds like a great new version of RaHoWa you’re the person this is taking the piss out of.

Both use the “Beer and Crisps” system from Urban Faerie and Invaderz as a starting point but introduce new ideas that make them somewhat more unique.

You can follow the development of both games on their respective blogs

Tough Justice: http://toughjustice.blog.co.uk

Smeaton’s War: http://yacoomtaglasgowwesetabootye.blog.co.uk

’45: Psychobilly Retropocalypse – The Pukes of Dannger (Part 2)

Judge Gourmand:
Strength 2, Resilience 3, Dexterity 3,  Speed 2, Intelligence 4,  Perception 4, Charm 3,  Control 3, Resolve 5,  Resistance 5
Skills
Argument/Legal/Prosecution 4, Intimidation/Bossy 3, Business 3, Firearms 2, Drive 2
Merits & Flaws
Lecherous -1 on social rolls/resistances versus women (3 points)
Greedy – Always takes more than his fair share (2 points)
Nasty Reputation +1 bonus to intimidation and courtroom Law checks. (2 points).
Gear
Hog-leg – Sawn off shotgun, white-painted jeep.

Sherrif Haslok Poutane:
Strength 3,  Resilience 4, Dexterity 3,  Speed 3, Intelligence 3,  Perception 3, Charm 4,  Control 2, Resolve 3,  Resistance 3
Skills
Drive/Police Cruiser 3, Firearms/Pistol 3, Animal Handling/Dog/Swift 3, Alertness 2, Tracking 1, Melee 2
Merits & Flaws
Animal Companion – Swift the Bassett hound (8 points)
Lucky Escape – Can completely negate all damage from a car crash once per game (3 points).
Gear
Battered old police cruiser, mutant bassett hound, .38 revolver, 12 gauge pump action shotgun, billyclub.

Swift the Bassett hound:
Strength 2,  Resilience 3, Dexterity 1, Speed 2, Intelligence 1,  Perception 4, Charm 4,  Control 3, Resolve 2,  Resistance 2
Skills
Tracking/Scent 5, Looking sad and adorable 4, Running Under vehicles 3, Biting 1
Merits & Flaws
Mutant Immortality – Swift regenerates one column of damage every turn, even if killed or reduced below what the wound table would allow. (12 points). Swift can only be destroyed by fire.
Gear
Collar,  Weird little antennae sticking out his head.

Deputies Rufus Gourmand & Enis Bent:
Strength 3, Resilience 3, Dexterity 3,  Speed 3, Intelligence 2,  Perception 2, Charm 3,  Control 3, Resolve 2 Resistance 2
Skills
Drive 3, Tracking 2, Firearms 2, Alertness 2, Melee 2
Merits & Flaws
Too dumb – Rufus and Enis are gullible but any direct mental attacks or attempts to confuse them suffer from the fact they find anything but blindly following orders to be too mentally demanding. They gain a +1 bonus to all resistance checks, because they’re too dumb. (2 points).
Gear
.38 revolver, pump action shotgun, billyclub.

Crazy Pooter:
Strength 3,  Resilience 4, Dexterity 4,  Speed 3, Intelligence 2,  Perception 2, Charm 2,  Control 2, Resolve 2,  Resistance 2
Skills
Engineer/Automative/Jury Rig 4, Brawling 3, Melee/Wrench 2
Merits & Flaws
Gills – Pooter is beginning to mutate and, as a consequence, can breathe underwater (4 points).
Gear
Big wrench, toolbox, radioactive moonshine in a thermos.

Lola Gourmand:
Strength 3, Resilience 4, Dexterity 1, Speed 1, Intelligence 4, Perception 4, Charm 3,  Control 4, Resolve 5, Resistance 5
Skills
Intimidate/Men 5, Cooking/Southern style 3, Business/hotelier 3, Brawl 2, Melee/Frying pan 3
Merits & Flaws
Armour of corpulance –  Lola reduces all incoming harm by 1, due to her blubber. (3 points).
Natural authority – Lola gets a +1 bonus whenever she’s ordering or bossing anyone around. (3 points).
Gear
Rolling pin, Frying pan, Fan.

Doc Petticoat:
Strength 1,  Resilience 1, Dexterity 2, Speed 1, Intelligence 2, Perception 1, Charm 4,  Control 4, Resolve 4,  Resistance 4
Skills
Medicine/quackery 1, Bullshit/medical 4, Elicit Sympathy 5
Merits & Flaws
Senior Moments – the Doc constantly forgets things, up to 3 things each session when it would be most annoying for the players (3 points).
Gear
Doctor’s bag, seersucker suit.

Rose Puke:
Strength 3,  Resilience 3, Dexterity 4, Speed 4, Intelligence 3,  Perception 4, Charm 5,  Control 3, Resolve 3, Resistance 3
Skills
Seduction/Flirtation/Elicit Favour 4, Waitressing/Get Tips 3, Survival/Swamp 4, Lie 3
Merits & Flaws
Drop Dead Gorgeous: +3 to any manipulation of menfolk (9 points).
Gills: Rose is partially mutated and, as such, can breathe underwater (4 points).
Gear
Tiny, tiny, denim shorts and a halter top.

Aunty Bessie Puke:
Strength 4, Resilience 4, Dexterity 2, Speed 2, Intelligence 4, Perception 3, Charm 3, Control 4, Resolve 4, Resistance 3
Skills
Brewing/Distilling/Moonshine 5, Survival/Swamp 5, Brawling 2, Melee 3, Firearms/shotgun 3
Merits & Flaws
Gills: Bessie is partially mutated and, as such, can breathe underwater (4 points).
Mental Control of the Clan: Bessie can telepathically give commands to the fully transformed Pukes (4 points).
Gear
Double barrelled shotgun, old truck.

Lo Puke:
Strength 3, Resilience 4, Dexterity 3, Speed 4, Intelligence 3, Perception 4, Charm 4, Control 3, Resolve 3, Resistance 3
Skills
Drive/Muscle Car/The Beauregard 4, Brawl 3, Archery 3, Melee 3, Survival/Swamp 4, Dodge 3, Tracking 3
Merits & Flaws
Gills: Lo is partially mutated and, as such, can breathe underwater (4 points).
Gear
Compound bow, arrows, knife, dynamite.

Booker Puke:
Strength 4, Resilience 4, Dexterity 4,  Speed 4, Intelligence 3, Perception 3, Charm 3, Control 3, Resolve 3, Resistance 3
Skills
Drive/Muscle Car/The Beauregard 5, Brawl 4, Archery 2, Melee 3, Survival/Swamp 3, Dodge 3, Tracking 2
Merits & Flaws
Gills: Booker is partially mutated and, as such, can breathe underwater (4 points).
Gear
Compound bow, arrows, knife, dynamite.

The Beauregard:
Sports Car: Health 13, Armour 3, +2 Speed/Acceleration +1 Handling
Armoured
Blower
Heavy Chassis: +1 health box per row.
Oversized Engine (2 seats only)
Smuggling compartment
Turbocharged
Wheel Blades 9 damage.

’45: Psychobilly Retropocalypse – The Pukes of Dannger (Part 1)

Fulfilling another Christmas wish:

The Pukes of Dannger
Deep in the south lies Dannger County, a tucked away, rural area that was spared the worst of the war, but not the worst of the fallout. The town of Dannger City is constantly on a knife-edge of survival, caught between being too small to survive and not being large enough to attract any attention from anyone powerful enough to harm them.

They’re also protected by their ruthless ‘hanging judge’, Judge Hoss Gourmand. The Gourmand family are credited – largely self-credited – with being the saviours of Dannger County and the city. Judge Gourmand’s rough justice is another reason that few people bother the county. Backed by his sherrif and deputies Judge Gourmand runs a tight ship and claims ownership of just about everything within the county’s borders, standing for no guff.

There’s a problem though, one clan of swamp-billies is holding out against Gourmand’s attempts to bring justice and civilisation to the county. Mutated, rebellious and determined to spread their corruption to others, the Puke family runs radioactive moonshine to the outlying farms and even into Dannger City itself. One by one people are succumbing to strange mutations and disappearing into the swamps and there’s nothing Doc Petticoat – the town’s aging doctor – can do about it.
There’s little Judge Gourmand and his law officers can do to stop the Pukes, thanks to their souped up muscle car, the Beauregard, about the only fast car in the whole county.

Desperate to bring the Puke clan under control, Judge Gourmand sets out to hire people from outside to deal with the Pukes once and for all. That’s where the players come in…

Dannger County
Dannger Country consists of Dannger City, outlying farms and a good deal of swamp. It’s criss-crossed with trails and dirt roads that pick their way alongside the rivers and through the swamps. None of them are great surfaces to drive on and there’s so many dead ends and blind turns that the whole thing is incredibly dangerous to anyone who doesn’t know the area.

In the summer Dannger Country is a sweltering, fly-blown and stinking place and it’s not much better the rest of the year.

Dannger City
Dannger City is the only town in the whole county and it’s not much of a city. It has a few houses, a bar – The Gator – which belongs to the Judge, the Hotel Dannger, the doctor’s office and Pooter’s Garage.

The Gator:
The Gator is a big wooden building, it’s ceiling lined with rotating fans (the generator runs off swamp gas). It serves local food but – alas – no drink. There isn’t much that’s suitable for making into booze in the swamps. Indeed it’s something of a mystery what the Pukes use to make their ‘shine. You can get food and entertainment here, not least of all the lovely presence of Rose Puke, a pretty swamp flower who was rescued from her cousins in the clan Puke by the Judge and his law officers, about the only victory that they’ve ever had over the Puke clan the whole time they’ve been duking it out.

Hotel Dannger:
Judge Gourmand lives here with his impressively fat wife Lola, who runs the hotel. It’s clean and relatively dry and that’s about all that can really be said about it. It’s horribly overpriced for what it is – at least if you’re an outsider – but Lola is a fierce and intimidating woman and won’t stand for any guff, least of all her husband and she’s the only person in the whole area aside from the Pukes who stands up to him.

Doc’s Office:
Doc Petticoat is ancient and wrinkled old near-corpse. He has forgotten more about medicine than most people have ever known. Unfortunately he’s also forgotten most of what he’s known. Any talent he still has for medicine may have more to do with an intimate, personal knowledge of death than any medical skill. He only has the most basic of medical equipment and yet he’s still the best doctor (the only doctor) for some considerable distance.

Pooter’s Garage:
A graveyard of scrap metal, Pooter does his best to cobble together and keep running the few vehicles the town has going for it. The Judge suspects that Pooter is helping the Pukes keep their own car running, but he’s not been able to prove it as of yet and Pooter is far too valuable to the town to lock up or accuse without cause.

The Puke ‘Stead:
The Puke Homestead is a terrifying old farm out in the swamps, lurking atop a big pile of earth and slowly but inevitably sinking into the swamp bit by bit. The Pukes don’t spend much time there any more, it’s really just a rotting heap though it still contains many stuffed and mounted animals in its cobwebbed depths and the Pukes still congregate here as a clan on notable occasions.

The Swamp:
The swamp is a tangled mess of twisted and mutated trees, sucking mud, alligators, snakes and giant mutated catfish. It’s also home to the Puke clan – scattered in various hovels where they run their stills – and the mysterious source of their power and the fruit that they use to make their ‘shine.

Hovels and Stills:
The Puke clan hovels are all close to the raised dirt tracks that criss-cross the swamp but are little more than shacks with fold down beds and a pot to piss in. The stills are primitive affairs, distilling mashed up and fermented foul-smelling fruit into a clear, powerful, slightly glowing liquor that can be very flammable and explosive.

Mother Hydra:
Deep in the Puke-owned swamps is a grove of seven twisted trees, hung with heavy, misshapen fruit that smells faintly of fish. This is the source of the Puke clan moonshine and the mutation effects of their radioactive moonshine that introduces strange, fish-like traits to those who imbibe it, over time. Some members of the Puke clan who’ve been drinking it for some time have completely transformed into ‘Creatures from Lagoons’ (P85 of the ’45 rulebook) and rest here, protecting the mother trees.

Townsfolk
Judge Gourmand:
Fat, arrogant, disgusting, murderous, lecherous. Gourmand is, nonetheless, the unbending master of Dannger County and the only one standing between the county and chaos. Shame he’s such a disgusting, horrible, bastard.

Sherrif Haslok Poutane:
Incompetent and goofy the only reason he’s sherrif at all is that Gourmand knows he can be easily dominated and made to do what he wants. Haslok has an unreasonable love for his mutated bassett hound, Swift.

Swift the Bassett hound:
A mutated dog, trained by the military to wear a explosive harness and run at tanks, Swift turned out to mutate, during the short war and has somehow managed to survive many attempts to destroy tanks, tractors and several cars. Perhaps swift is immortal?

Deputies Rufus Gourmand & Enis Bent:
Interchangable, amiable dumb-dumbs whose defining characteristic is that they’re dumb enough to be ordered around by Poutane.

Crazy Pooter:
A slowly mutating, secret alcoholic, Pooter is utterly in the pocket of the Puke clan. He’s a good engineer but he’s just not on-side with the town or the judge.

Lola Gourmand:
A heaving mass of pale flesh and terrifying, indomitable will, Lola is a woman you do not want to cross. Through sheer power of intimidation and hard stares she can cause as much damage as a man with a shotgun.

Doc Petticoat:
A dried-up, ancient, mumbling, living corpse getting the Doc’s help with your injuries may be more harmful than not bothering at all.

Rose Puke:
A gorgeous woman, Rose is the only member of the Puke clan that’s liked around Dannger City. She was rescued from the Puke clan and brought into the town, taken under the Judge’s wing and given a job at The Gator. She has a sunny and bright disposition and everyone loves her to bits. Little do they know that blood is thicker than water and that she allowed herself to be ‘rescued’, just so that the Pukes would have an extra person in town to look out for their interests.

The Puke Clan
Aunty Bessie Puke:
A big, beefy woman, Bessie is the matriarch of the whole Puke clan. Clad in denim overalls she circuits the Puke family stills ensuring that they’re producing a good product that carries the taint that will mutate others in the same way as the Puke clan has been, spreading their mutant taint in service of the mysterious trees in the hidden grove.

Lo Puke:
Blonde, muscular and charming. Lo Puke is the salesman of the Puke clan, roaring around in the Beauregard and convincing people – who are already desperate for a drink – to buy their ‘shine.

Booker Puke:
Dark haired and dangerous, Booker Puke is the muscle of the Puke clan, a bareknuckle boxer who intimidates into compliance those who Lo cannot charm.

The Puke Clan:
Mutated into rampaging swamp beasts the majority of the clan hides in the swamps

The Beauregard:
A souped up muscle car resembling an Oldsmobile Jetstar 88, the Beauregard is painted grey and has the racing number ‘OO’ painted on the side.

Granting Xmas wishes Number 1

Can’t give you more Tobyart yet, but here’s a little preview from the next collection:

Xmas?

What would YOU like for Xmas from Postmortem Studios? Do let me know.

Snow Joke

Black Death Chapter

Back in 1988 I picked up Warhammer 40,000 (Rogue Trader). The hardback book edition with the Crimson Fists fighting orks on the cover. That was a much stranger, more open and – frankly more fun – period for warhammer. Anything went and information was scant. White Dwarf was stil a fun, humour-filled gaming magazine rather than a catalogue that you paid for.

I had a lot of fun with it, particularly making up my own chapter, the Black Death chapter.

There were no army lists per se back then, you could put together your troops however you wanted and I bought miniatures based on how cool they looked, not to fulfil a particular set of codex requirements.

Of course, a lot of my ideas were stupid, childish, naive and laced with munchkinism back then, but I thought it might be fun to reinvent them for Death Watch as, with the RPG side of 40k out now, there’s the chance to indulge in some individuality and fun again.

***

The Atra Mors (Black Death – Or Terrible Death)
The Black Death chapter are – or rather were – a second founding chapter created using recovered, uncorrupted gene seed from the Death Guard, harking back to their time as the Dusk Guard when they still had honour. There was a desperate need to add diversity to the new chapters of marines, especially with so many coming from the ultramarines, pure, but orthodox. If the Horus Heresy had taught the Imperium anything, it was that threats could come from anywhere and at any time. The need for adaptability was sufficient to overcome objections to using the genetic material from a traitor legion, though the Atra Mors would be held under suspicion throughout their history and would often receive older and less prestigious equipment.

The Atra Mors were a feared chapter, exploring the periphery of the Imperium – out of harms way – identifying new threats and eliminating them before they could threaten the Empire of Man – all too often via the means of exterminatus. In particular the Atra Mors were invested in the identification, elimination and use of disease. The universe is a vast place and genestealers are not the only insidious biological threat that exists. There are diseases that could wipe out the whole imperium if they spread, there are the supernatural sicknesses associated with the ruinous powers, there are pathogens that control minds or turn men into beasts. More importantly there is a constant need for new weaponised diseases and chemical weapons to use in exterminatus or to adapt to the over-changing and ever-diversifying nature of the Imperium’s enemies.

The Atra Mors would eliminate diseases, wipe out populations, destroy cults and eliminate genestealer cults with flame, sword and viral weapons of their own. Something that only enhanced their already fearsome reputation.

The chapter disappeared some five-hundred years ago, leaving only a handful of knights errant scattered around the galaxy on individual missions, these being folded into The Dark Angels as it became apparent that their home chapter had disappeared. The nature of the disappearance remains unknown. Did they turn traitor? Were they corrupted like their ancestors? Did they run into something that they couldn’t cope with? Rumours abound, but truth is hard to come by.

Livery
Atra Mors power armour is typically of the Mk III and Mk VI model. Their terminator unit was unusual in that it was entirely equipped with the Mk I version of the tactical dreadnought armour. Smaller and more mobile on board ship, giving them greater mobility around the Keres and faster movement across planetary surfaces.

Atra Mors wear black armour with a bronze details and shoulderpads. Their chapter symbology typically includes skulls, carrion birds and bone detailing. Officers and veterans also typically wear cowls and robes of fireproof material as do the chapter’s devastator marines, though in their case it is more because of necessity than as a mark of rank or service.

Battleship Keres
The Atra Mors had no homeworld, their duties took them to the far flung fringes of the Imperium and required them to be mobile. It also allayed concerns that they might have access to the resources of a whole world if they went the way of their genetic ancestors. As such the Atra Mors were based not upon a world but upon an enormous battleship, a virtual hulk and a survivor of the space battles of the Heresy, the Keres.

Resembling nothing so much as an enormous castle, set afloat in space, the Keres was slow moving but implacable, sailing through the warp with a terrible, unstoppable inevitability and becoming a horror-filled legend amongst the xeno races whose paths it had crossed. A bringer of death and disease, a destroyer of worlds and a bearer of flaming destruction.

Lost to the warp, Keres has supposedly been seen, a drifting and battle-scarred hulk, fading in and out of real space across the Jericho Reach and Koronus expanse. These accounts are apocryphal at best but may have some truth to them. If they are true then, perhaps, something of the Atra Mors may survive or, at least, be recoverable. The samples of alien diseases and the compliment of virus bombs alone make the Keres a valuable and dangerous prize for any risk-taking pirates or Rogue Traders who want to claim it.

Survivor’s Strength
The Atra Mors took their recruits in a manner different to that of most Space Marine chapters. Rather than looking for necessarily the strongest, most dangerous or most accomplished warriors they looked for grit, determination and refusal to die. All of the chapter’s recruits were men who had withstood the ravages of disease and survived. Men who had an ineffable quality of luck or determination that allowed them to pull through, not only a guide to the toughness of the individual but a guard against the corruption of their forebears. The process of implantation could make any man strong, power armour could make any man tough, the Atra Mors were looking for something more.

Combat Doctrine
The Atra Mors approach to combat was one of sowing fear, confusion and dread and then exploiting the opportunities that created ruthlessly. When they had to confront an enemy in open battle they would seed the battlefield with smoke, hallucinogens, viral pathogens and toxins. Using the smoke, confusion and random death to approach to assault distance and to eliminate their enemies with some of the most fearsome weapons in the imperial arsenal, particularly melta and flame weapons. There was always a strong emphasis within the Atra Mors upon assault troops and devastators, but relatively little use of vehicles other than drop-pods and drop ships.

Black Death Characters
Atra Mors marines are relentless and implacable warriors with incomparable will and determination. They rely on fear and confusion to defeat their enemies and use terrifying and unconventional weaponry along with their fearsome reputation to turn the tide of battle.

Atra Mors space marines gain the following benefits. +5 Weapon Skill, +5 Willpower and the Chapter Ability Soul Survivor.

Relentless
Relentless is a demeanour unique to the Atra Mors. This demeanour is triggered when they are carrying on against the odds, struggling past terrible wounds or resisting toxins or diseases, even throwing off implantation by alien species and corruption by chaos in feats of extreme willpower.

Soul Survivor
Required Rank 1
Effects: As survivors of terrible personal suffering the Atra Mors can call on deep reserves of personal determination to keep going despite wounds and debilitation that would fell a lesser warrior. Once per combat the Black Death Marine can shrug off a single point of damage, ignoring it.
Improvement: At rank three and above this rises to two points of damage. At rank five to three. And at rank seven to five.

Preview: Invaderz Pocket Edition

Check out your new giant, killer robot.
You’re going to have SUCH fun destroying the filthy humans!

Review: Deathwatch (40k RPG)

Introduction
There’s a lot I don’t like about the 40k RPGs. The fact that they’re split across several books, classes and levels instead of the career approach of WFRP, the extremely tight and constricting focus/construction of the games. That said, there’s a lot to like as well. Having waited for a 40K RPG since the original Rogue Trader hardback wargame came out and being steeped in the influences that lead to its creation (primarily British fantasy/SF art, Moorcock and 2000AD) I love the 40k universe like no other and, despite not having been involved in the wargame hobby for some years, I seem to have assimilated the newer stuff (Dark Eldar, Tau, Necrons) by sheer gaming osmosis.

Deathwatch ‘completes’ the series of three books and three settings for the 40k RPG, each in ascending order of sheer munchkinism being Dark Heresy, Rogue Trader and Deathwatch.

In Deathwatch you get to play Space Marines.

Mwahahahahahahaha!

Background
It’s the grimdark future of the grimdark 41st millenium, it’s grim and dark and there is only war, grimdark war on a thousand grimdark fronts against the grimdark alien threat. You’re part of the Imperium of man, which is still pretty grim and dark but not quite as grim and dark as being the slave of orks, the torture-porn of Dark Eldar or being twisted into a spiky-death ball by the ruinous powers of chaos.

Honestly, the commie-pinko-liberal Tau are looking pretty good right now, but then most imperial serfs don’t know about them.

In this iteration of the game you’re Space Marines, knights of the Imperium, augmented supersoldiers of legend. Members of one of a thousand chapters, each of akipedia thousand marines, the elite of elite, the matchless warriors of the Empire of Man and, what’s more, your characterskipedia are members of the Deathwatch, an even more elite cadre drawn from the best of all the chapters and unleashed upon the threat of the alien.

The best way to think of Deathwatch is to think of the player group as a special forces unit, sent wherever the action is hottest to do the tasks that others – even other space marines – cannot be trusted with. It’s hard to do an investigative game when you’re an eight-foot tall, power-armour clad, scripture-spewing fanatic but with an ‘impossible mission’ slant you can do a pretty wide variety of things.

Mechanics
The mechanics are the same as with the other games in the series, d10s are used and most rolls are percentile (save damage). You can save your arse and modify your rolls with Fate Points. Marines are not normal in the slightest and are suitably boosted and powerful with rules that reflect all their implants and their superhuman status, with weapons to match.

Given the emphasis on unit action there are rules for the group to act as a team, a ‘Squad Mode’ as well as a ‘Solo mode’ with different benefits and tactical options. There are also rules for engaging a ‘horde’ so that your unit of marines can mow down large numbers of lesser enemies in a suitable fashion.

You get a good number of enemies as well, with a particular emphasis on the Tyrannids. Rounded out with the material in the other books in the series you have a half decent bestiary though, personally, I feel that each book on its own is a little scant in the enemy stakes.

Atmosphere
The writing and quotations do a good job of setting the atmosphere and the briefings on the situations and war-fronts in the sector. It does feel a little too shiny though, where I feel that there should be a more battered and cathedral-like, ecclesiastical feel to the presentation. Perhaps that’s my old-school sensibilities coming through though, since the ecclesiarchy and their troops are very much separated from the other parts of the Imperium now. Otherwise, one thing 40k has always had going for it has been atmosphere, drawing on a rich geek-culture strain of ideas that are found across many forms of British fiction.

Artwork
As mentioned above I think that the presentation could have been a bit more atmospheric but the Space Marines are an iconic image and there’s plenty of appropriate imagery, heraldry and various aliens being punched in the head and shot to keep you happy. My printing looks a little muddy in the colour images and they look a little fuzzy but that and the overal thematic choice are my only – mild – complains.

I do miss the old pointy-nose power armour though.

Conclusion
The circle is complete and we end on a high, supersoldier special-operations. Military SF is easy to make up adventures and missions for and the hook is a simple ‘You’re ordered to…’ which can be convenient for a GM but, like all the 40k RPGs I can’t help but feel this a little tight-focussed though, of all of them, it has the best excuse.

On the plus side:

• Space Marines that feel like the dangerous adonai they should be.
• Worthy adversaries.
• Completes the game line.

On the minus side:

• You really need all three books for a ‘complete’ game. Especially if you want to do something off the wall like space pirates in the same setting.
• The design/art could have worked harder to promote the ascetic/religious warrior aesthetic.
• Hard to mingle marines in with existing groups unless they’re very experienced.

Score
Style: 3
Substance: 5
Overall: 4

Review: Dark Sun Creature Catalogue – 4e D&D

Introduction
This was a bit of a disappointing book. It may be my mind playing tricks on me but I seem to remember Dark Sun having a lot more naturaHaving not so long ago having gotten through praising Monster Manual 2 for making all the monsters at least look scary I’m afraid to report that some of the ones in this book end up looking either ‘meh’, or ‘ridiculous’. Not flumph-scale ridiculous, but really not great. This is a shame as the wildlife of Athas is meant to be some scary-ass stuff, terrifying and dangerous. Not silly. Somehow that isn’t conveyed by this book and topping out at 150 pages, somehow it feels a lot thinner.

Background
As a Monster Manual by any other name, the Creature Catalogue only contains a couple of paragraphs of information on most creatures but it does also contain a section on ‘Personages’. This goes into more detail on the various movers shakers and interesting folk of Athas and fleshes out some meat on the bones of what was covered in the main setting book. While this is a good thing there can be a tendency for statted figures to end up just being another thing to kill, rather than a villain per se. It may have been better – in this instance – to forego the background data and include more monsters as the personality entries take up 2-3 times the space of a regular monster entry.

A few of the entries are Athasian spins on existing critters from the Monster Manuals and they’re presented complete here – which I’m in two minds about. Again, space could have been saved for new creatures by leaving these out or noting the differences, but it’s nice – for once – that they’re not trying to get you to buy another book and that everything’s there.

Mechanics
The monsters use the newer stat block from MM3 – my first encounter with it – and I can’t say as I see that much difference, all things considered, in terms of clarity or ease of use. In addition to the standard critters we get rules for customising other creatures to fit Athas – an example being given is a silt-shark – and a number of themes for creatures such as those bred to fight in the arena or infused with elemental power. The book wraps up with some fantastical terrain, unique to Athas, which makes for some colourful encounters, especially the arena ones which are suitably bloody and delicious.

Atmosphere
Atmosphere is pretty hit and miss in this book, the artwork is a bit of a culprit for that but what amounts to a list of monsters can’t help but be a little dry. It’s the nature of the beast to be such. This makes the artwork all the more important and, as I’ll cover in the next section, it falls a bit short.

Artwork
Having not so long ago having gotten through praising Monster Manual 2 for making all the monsters at least look scary I’m afraid to report that some of the ones in this book end up looking either ‘meh’, or ‘ridiculous’. Not flumph-scale ridiculous, but really not great. This is a shame as the wildlife of Athas is meant to be some scary-ass stuff, terrifying and dangerous. Not silly.

On the ridiculous side we have the Belgoi, the Cilops and the Mekilot.

On the ‘meh’ side we have the Anakore, Braxat and Zombie.

Genuinely fearsome looking, fortunately, we have the Chathrang, Dune Reaper and Megapede.

Conclusion
A bit of an essential if you’re intending to run some Athasian games but even so, it’s a bit disappointing. I remember Athas being a lot scarier and deadlier and too much of what we have here feels familiar and/or looks silly and that’s a bit of a let down having gotten so excited over Dark Sun.

On the plus side:

• Nice creature modifiers/themes.
• Fantastical terrain/hazards are interesting.
• Athasian essentials covered.

On the minus side:

• Mixed bag on the art side.
• Strange choices of what to include.
• Feels ‘light’ on material, despite the size.

Score
Style: 3
Substance: 4
Overall: 3.5