The Two-Headed Serpent - Initial Impressions and Bolivia

Following my post on Pulp Cthulhu it's time to crack into the review of the Two-Headed Serpent campaign.

The following is a review of the Bolivia chapter of the Pulp Cthulhu campaign The Two-Headed Serpent (Chaosium: 2017) based on actual play. I intend to review each chapter of this epic campaign as we play through it, highlighting what I see as strengths and weaknesses, and providing some suggestions along the way for what I’d do differently if running it again. Spoilers follow, so don’t read on if you ever plan to play in this Pulp Cthulhu campaign.

Initial Impressions

The book is beautiful, with high-quality art and maps throughout. It is well supported in PDF form with a Keeper Resource pack that includes pre-generated characters, and compiled references and handouts.

Several appendices in the book offer details of key NPCs, monsters and weird science that feature in the campaign. The backstory is interesting (if somewhat convoluted) and well detailed in the opening pages. While there is a definite twist in the plot arc, the campaign anticipates that the investigators may choose different ways to engage with the scenario, and offers different entry points for each chapter to reflect this. There are also notes from the playtest session sprinkled across the book, which can be interesting and insightful.

Overall these factors given the campaign the feel of a modern, well resolved, set of linked scenarios which will be entertaining for players and keeper alike. Unsurprisingly, the Two Headed Serpent was nominated for an Origins and ENnie Award. But how does it play in practice? 

Chapter One - Bolivia

There’s a lot to like about the opening chapter of the campaign which drops the characters into Bolivia and straight into the action. Setting the scenario in the ‘Green Hell’ of the Chaco War and allows groups to explore an interesting piece of history in an evocative setting. There are some great set-piece scenes and the scenario has a nice tempo, with the action increasing in intensity right through until the end.

Starting out as it means to go on, the campaign begins in-media-res; interrupting an NPC mid-sentence with a shot to the head, then jumping straight into a combat sequence as the investigators are ambushed! This is a nice touch that sets the tone well and allows the players to introduce their characters in an exciting and dramatic way.

However, there are also a few drawbacks to this approach. As written, the characters must learn about the true purpose for their presence in Bolivia (and what to do next) by rifling through the papers of the deceased Dr. Ursini and then checking in with headquarters via a portable radio. If they do neither of these things the Keeper has a major problem, and there’s no scripted options to get things back on track. Successful Idea rolls could bridge this gap, but I feel this is an inelegant solution where there’s no reason the plot couldn’t accommodate a more robust option.

This could be solved by dispensing with the radio, and bringing one of the characters into the second tier of Caduceus in advance of the commencing of the campaign and providing them with the orientation package and a briefing for the scenario so they can pick things up to ensure the mission is completed. This has the added advantage of reducing the narrative burden on the Keeper and allowing any doubts and reservations that the character may have to be roleplayed across the table by the investigators.

The remainder of the scenario revolves around three main scenes; the aid camp, the stone wards and the temple of the dreamer, which is ‘unlocked’ only when the investigators have deduced the purpose of the wards and opened a second of them. There’s also an entertaining encounter with a monkey toting a flame pistol.

The description of the aid camp provides some details of the key NPCs who are Caduceus employees, a local hero and details the uneasy presence of the soldiers who are occupying the camp. The scenario includes some local history that relates to the temple of the dreamer, and an associated festival, along with some guidance about how the soldiers are likely to react to the investigators. However as an "opportunity for roleplaying and investigation" ascribed by the scenario there is little here to detail the circumstances of those seeking aid, the impact of the war, or other dramatic opportunities for the investigators to help out. Such details must be supplied by the Keeper.

For me this seems like an opportunity lost. Setting the scenario amidst the Chaco War might have allowed the authors to explore some of the themes of this conflict, through the plight of the refugees. This could have been achieved through detailing the stories of some of the refugees, and perhaps having tensions within the camp linked to the conflict. 

I also feel like the role of the soldiers – who are magically brainwashed by the Inner Night operatives - could have been more thoughtfully addressed. As written, they function as little more than mooks to support the inner-night and make the combat sequences more challenging and ensure the investigators have a good supply of shotguns.

After being ambushed in the jungle, it seems fairly likely that the investigators will also assume the soldiers at the camp are enemies and carry the fight on to them immediately. This has the potential to remove the role of the roving patrol to participate in the climax of the scenario. It’s also not immediately clear why, if they are willing to tolerate the presence of the Caduceus doctors a the aid camp, the soldiers would attack the supply column in the opening scene of the scenario.

If I were to run this again I would give this a slightly different treatment to highlight the more insidious and parasitic aspects of the serpent people’s interaction with the humans they consider so inferior.

• Rather than being ambushed initially, the investigators would first encounter the battle scene and the first ward The formless spawn would attack quickly, killing Dr.Ursini mid-sentence as scripted giving the high-action opening.
• Whether the investigators flee or defeat the spawn, they would seek refuge at the camp. Here they encounter the soldiers – but rather than being enemies from the outset, they might be more ambivalent. Perhaps they may even offer to supply the investigators with explosives to defeat the monster. Amidst their number is the disguised Karnassh who pretends to have suffered some facial wounds in a previous battle to conceal his imperfect disguise. 
• As time passes the serpent man would slowly exert his influence over the soldiers. 
• The investigators may note the gradual changes in their behaviour with unease, but unless they provoke events the soldiers do not fully become the pawns of Karnassh as scripted as the investigators approach the temple. 
• In the interim Vorsinnish has been trying to locate the remaining wards with a clutch of serpent hounds (allowing for an additional combat encounter in the jungle and for the investigators to retrieve the serpent map). 

This reasonably significant re-structuring of the scenario may lead you to conclude that I believe that the opening chapter is fundamentally flawed – that’s not the case at all. 

The chapter is perfectly serviceable as written, and if your investigators are playing action-oriented types who just want to be pointed in the direction of danger, and who wouldn’t bother with the motivations of the NPC’s anyway, then I wouldn’t suggest that these changes are necessary at all. But if you have investigators who are likely to be interested in the wider story, the motivations of NPC's and who may want to spend time roleplaying in the camp then I think these changes will provide a more fulfilling experience.

The remaining sections of the scenario; the wards and the temple are excellent. The mix of monsters and traps is likely to lead to some thoroughly entertaining scenes that really plays up the strengths of Pulp over vanilla Call of Cthulhu. The only challenge may be in ensuring that the characters actually retrieve Tyranissh without simply dispatching her as another ‘snake-monster’. Here, again, having stressed to one of the characters the importance of retrieving her intact from the temple in advance of the scenario starting, may tip the balance in favour of completing the mission as intended.

What works:

• The setting is unique and interesting, and the plot (while simple) has a nice increasing action tempo
• Beginning the game in-media res lets the investigators jump right into the action
• Temples, traps and monsters are a great way to showcase the Pulp genre and are likely to make for a really entertaining time 

What could have been better:

• The initial link from opening scene to chapter plot is a little tenuous 
• Not exploring the setting in more detail feels like a missed opportunity 
• The role and motivations of the soldiers could have been used to better effect 

Overall, this is a solid opening chapter that is likely to prove entertaining and really get the players in the right mindset for the escalating action of the rest of the campaign. It conveys the key themes of the campaign (the enemy within, ancient civilisations, lots of snakes and monsters) in a clever way that’s woven into the action. At the end of the session the players may wonder if it’s possible to top this heady mix of action and adventure – but rest assured, the campaign is up to the challenge.

RPG Awards

The ENnie Awards are currently undergoing a review.  This post serves as an open submission to those undertaking the review.  I've posted it online with the hope of providing some insight to those who are looking to self-publish their own RPG products.

Awards are important for all RPG publishers - particularly small, independent publishers. To illustrate why, it might be helpful to briefly describe my view of the wider industry.  

Games sell by reputation. A small portion of people are willing to try new games and experiment, but the bulk of the market buy based on word-of-mouth.  There are a couple of ways that you can generate 'buzz' to drive sales:

• use an established retail network
• leverage an established internet following
• demo it at large RPG conventions (which are almost all in North America or Western Europe).
• win, or be nominated for, a significant award

For self-publishers who aren't based in North America or Europe (like me) awards represent a significant opportunity to get much needed exposure. They also represent an important way to showcase diverse voices and encourage people to participate in the industry.

I've previously described the ENnie Awards as the beautiful agony.  A self-publisher may be able to gain a nomination through the review of the judges - which is huge.  But the chances of actually winning in any category but those of free game or supplement are remote, due to voting.

In some ways I like the idea of public voting for awards - after all what can be fairer than a democratic process?  But there are obvious considerations.  Awards can be divisive, particularly for those who feel their voices aren't being heard, such as in the case of the Hugo Awards.  

Then there's the scale of competition. For example, let's imagine there are awards for soda drinks in the same way as the ENnie Awards. In 2010 Coca Cola released Coke Zero, Pepsi released Cherry Vanilla Pepsi, and Hosmer Mountain Bottling Company released Hosmer Dangerous Ginger Beer. All three are nominated for an award.  Even if 90% of all the people who have purchased Hosmer Ginger Beer vote for it to win, they will be vastly outstripped if only 1% of those who have purchased Coke Zero vote for that.  And based on market share in 2010, Pepsi will always come second. 

Public voting will always favour bigger publishers, or those who have the ability to leverage large audiences.  It may not reflect quality, innovative or important works. The ENnies do award the Judges Spotlight awards, which are awarded to products not nominated for an award, selected by individual judges.  From the perspective of a small publisher these are actually better than a nomination where you have no chance of winning.

Public voting aside, there's also an obvious disparity in comparing a product which a single person has created, with something that has multiple writers, professional art and layout, and editing.

It's all well and good to critique something, but I always appreciate it when people provide suggestions at the same time, so here are my recommendations to address the above points:

• Retain Public Voting for Judges, Fan’s Choice - Best Publisher and create a new award for Fan's Choice - Best Product
• All other categories to be based on Judges deliberations (perhaps also include a judge who won an award in the previous year and has nothing in contention this year).
• Make a summary of the Judges deliberations available after the awards
• Create categories in some awards for small, mid and large publishers with guidelines based on revenue (i.e. small = less than $1,000 per year, large is $100,000 or more and mid is everything in between).  Publishers pick the category when they submit.
• Create a new Award for Best New Talent, for anyone who hasn't submitted a product before, and ask those who wish to be nominated to submit a small bio.
• Create a new award for Services to Gaming to be awarded to anyone who has made a significant contribution, in terms of supporting diversity, promoting charity or doing good works in gaming.

Full disclosure: I've had products nominated for 6 different ENnie Awards and won a Judges Spotlight Award.

Pulp Cthulhu

It's been a while since I posted here, but now it's time to blow off the dust and add some new content.  As I posted back in December, we spent the first part of the year playing through The Enemy Within campaign for Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 3rd Edition. It had it's high points, some neat set pieces and more than a few problems, but overall it was a fun time.

Now we've returned to Call of Cthulhu, or more specifically (the ENnie Award Winning)  Pulp Cthulhu to play through the Two Headed Serpent Campaign.  I'll shortly begin a chapter by chapter review, as I did with Horror on the Orient Express.

Before I get into it, I thought I might start with a few reflections on Pulp Cthulhu itself.  First, the obvious - it's a beautiful book, brimming with content and ideas.  A worthy purchase for any Keeper, even if Pulp isn't to your taste.

At a more detailed look, Pulp Cthulhu sells itself thus:


"Tired of your investigators dying in quick succession when jaunting around the world in a desperate bid to save humanity? Wishing that sometimes your investigator could make a stand instead of hiding and waiting for the eldritch horror to pass? Pulp Cthulhu ups the ante and provides you with tougher, more capable heroes—ready to take on the villainous machinations of the Cthulhu Mythos!"

In my view, the core Call of Cthulhu System is focussed on investigation and sanity mechanics.  Other things, like combat, are serviceable but not really intended to be the meat of the game-playing experience.  To meet the pitch set out above, Pulp Cthulhu imports a point-spend mechanic, using the Luck system from the 7th Edition Rules with a suite of new options and significantly increasing Luck accrual between sessions.  

This means that, for every skill based roll of the game, players must decide whether to spend points to increase their result, knowing that they will have their Luck Pool replenished to some extent at the end of the session.  So long as players keep 30 Luck in their pool, the are guaranteed that their investigator will survive certain death.

As a mechanic, the 'Luck economy' it works well because it puts the decision making in the hands of the players, allowing them to decide where their characters will enjoy ridiculous success or survive certain death.  The only criticism that I'd make is that the calculation aspect encourages players to muse different possibilities and can break the flow of narration and is somewhat at odds to the free-flowing style you might typically associate with epic pulp combat.

There are a variety of other innovations, and a 'pulp-o-meter' which allows the Keeper to tune the options to their pulp preference - and that's great.  I recommend the ever-quality Reviews from R'lyeh post if you'd like further information.

But I want to pick up on something else, that I'll raise again in relation to my review of the campaign.  That's the tension between the pulp and investigation themes.  The origins of pulp are about 'lurid, sensationalist and exploitative" tales.  In many cases they more closely resemble a superhero story, than a police procedural.

The question for me is; in an investigative game should pulp scenarios be necessarily more simplistic than non-pulp scenarios?  Each of the four scenarios included in the Pulp Cthulhu book have a decent investigative component, but only one of them is a sandbox, where the investigators have full freedom of movement.

I can understand the temptation of streamlining the scenario to an extent, as it allows the Keeper to dictate the pace and limits the scope of the characters to engage with things that aren't relevant to the scenario - but the luck economy means that many of the frustrations of typical Cthulhu investigations are not a factor for Pulp Cthulhu.  Or, put another way, if I really want to play a primarily action rather than investigative outing, is Pulp Cthulhu actually the best system for this?

This is a theme I'll touch on again, in the context of the Two-Headed Serpent, a 'globe-spanning' campaign which presents an ambitious plot set in a variety of interesting locations.  Stay tuned for chapter one.