Arkham, Awards and New Adventures

First I wanted to point you to the nominees for ENnie Awards this year; these awards celebrate excellence in roleplaying products.  Voting is now open and it doesn’t take long to go through and vote and I encourage you to take a look and exercise your ability to participate, if you see some things you like.  I don’t have a product nominated this year, although my whodunit RPG Wicked Lies & Alibis picked up a judges spotlight award (thanks to the excellent taste of Judge Stacy Muth). 

I’ve posted before about the beautiful agony of the ENnie Awards, where micro-publishers like myself can (if we’re lucky) be nominated, but ultimately are extremely unlikely to win an actual award based on the size of our customer base (when compared with much larger publishers).  The Judges Spotlight Award, on the other hand,  is a perfect recognition for a micro-publisher like me.   In related news, friend and one-time EPOCH scenario author Mike Sands has been nominated in the category of Best Rules for the Evil Hat edition of his bestselling game Monster of the Week, so congratulations to Mike!

We’ve just wrapped up the 13th and final session of Arkham Chronicles, and cleared our way to play the (recently ENnie Award Nominated) Horror on the Orient Express, now that it has finally arrived in magnificent physical form.  You may recall that we had already played the Orient Express Gaslight prequel scenario – The Blood Red Fez.  I plan to run the Orient Express campaign with all the trimmings, including the Invictus, Dark Ages, Modern and Dreamlands additions, as well as music, miniatures, and all manner of handouts as appropriate. 

As I read through the campaign I am reminded just how old some parts of it are.  The implicit assumptions about character actions and motivations are not something you’d expect to see in a modern scenario, as they are simply too brittle to survive contact with resourceful, creative and engaged players – highlighting a tension that can (appropriately in this case) be termed as railroading.  Rather than simply try and shoehorn the characters into difficult and dangerous situations, or frustrate their players by stymieing any but the approved investigative avenue, I’ve had some open conversations with my group about this aspect of the game. 

As I told them, I’ll do my best to meet them half-way with these kind of plot elements, but I’ve pushed the players to look to their own characters motivations, and to view the game as a television series, where the setup is usually the same at the beginning of the episode, sometimes ignoring just how crazy and dangerous things were in the previous episode.  I’m also using some of the optional elements from Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition and introducing a house rule; a ‘Mark of Destiny’ which will work as a one shot option to allow a character to avert certain death, take a reduced SAN loss or boost their Luck (this being a critical resource in 7th edition using the optional rules, to both levy consequences and enhance investigative progress).

I’ve really enjoyed running the Arkham Chronicles, and it’s been a great way to develop characters which have strong player buy-in before the campaign and learn the seventh edition rules a little as we go.  As is traditional, I post the key stats from this mini-campaign below:

SCENARIOS

• Dark Rivals (Dead Reckonings)
• Darkness Illuminated (Island of Ignorance)
• Dead Light
• Missed Dues
• The Condemned  (H.P. Lovecraft’s Arkham)

CAMPAIGN STATS

Players  = 7

Characters created = 8
Characters killed = 0
Characters institutionalised = 1
Outer Gods encountered = 1
Great Old Ones encountered = 1

ENnie Awards - The Beautiful Agony

Being nominated for an ENnie Award is a big deal for a little publisher.  For those not familiar with the process, publishers of roleplaying game, podcasts, websites and the like can submit their products from the previous year for consideration by a panel of elected judges.  The Judges then read each publication, and debate amongst themselves which 5 of these products are sufficiently awesome to be nominated for an award (and in which category).  For a really interesting insight into the process of being an ENnie Judge, you might like to read this account on the Iron Tavern.

Once the nominees are announced the public have 10 days to vote for their favourites, with the top two products in each category being awarded a prize at the ENnie Awards Ceremony held at Gen Con.

Both of these mechanisms  are a little controversial - the selection of nominees is obviously a subjective assessment, albeit moderated somewhat by a group of people.  The voting process meanwhile is often seen as a popularity contest, with the big publishers being able to mobilise overwhelming support.

Last year EPOCH products were nominated in 4 categories (Best Rules, Best Electronic Book, Best Free Product & Product of the Year) and these nominations were both very gratifying and proved a big boost to interest in the game.

This year I was extremely pleased that War Stories, a collection of 5 scenarios set during wartime (a 155 page book or PDF with an RRP of $7.99, currently half price)  was nominated in the category of Best Adventure.  I was particularly proud when I reviewed the other 4 nominated titles:

• Eternal Lies; an epic campaign for Trail of Cthulhu  (a 400-page hardback book or a 396-page PDF with an RRP of $49.95)
• The Sense of the Sleight-of-Hand Man, A Dreamlands Campaign for Call of Cthulhu (a 294-page book or PDF with an RRP of $49.99)
• Rise of the Drow, a mega-module for Pathfinder (a book of nearly 500 pages, with an RRP of $41.99 or $99 in print)
• Razor Coast - Heart of the Razor, a collection of four adventures for Pathfinder (a 160 page book currently available for $29.99)

Some serious competition to say the least! All of these look like great products (so much so that I already own the first two).  So how does War Stories stack up? 

• The first scenario in the book is FROM ABOVE AND BELOW, by Marcus Bone.  A thrilling plunge into the darkness and the horror that lurks beneath the trenches of the Western Front during the Great War.  I had a great time playtesting this scenario, and would love to try running it in the dark with each player wearing a head-lamp that is extinguished when their character is eliminated.
• Next up is THE COLDEST WINTER by Mike Sands which thrusts the characters into the hostile climate and freezing forest in a brutal struggle for survival during the Russian invasion of Finland.  When I ran this game it had the feel of a true Russian epic which spanned the entire war experience for the surviving characters, and culminated in a suitably bleak ending.
• Then it's HOME FRONT, Andrew Millar's homage to Dad's Army where the well-meaning Home Guard of the British village of Blakely are sent to secure the wreckage of a German bomber.  Although this scenario is truly creepy, I most remember the Inglorious Basterds style shootout, which was the epic climax to the tensions between the characters. 
• Next is my scenario MASS DESTRUCTION which blends modern catastrophe with ancient evil, and which I've recently ran at Kapcon to good effect.
• Finally, Liam Jones presents BEHIND THE MASK OF EVIL which draws on his own experiences of Peace operations in the Congo and adds a supernatural twist.  I loved playing this so much I used our playtests as an example of how to structure flashbacks.

So, although these scenarios were contributed by friends,  I think they've delivered an excellent package which will provide you with hours of quality gaming.  Can we win?  No. Like many small games EPOCH simply doesn't have a fan-base which can compete in a popular vote.  But I think it's clear that just being nominated is a victory in its own right.   

Voting for the 2014 ENnie Awards is open for the next 10 days, so no matter who you vote for, spend a few minutes to participate in the Beautiful Agony that is the ENnie Awards.

Horror For The People - An ENnie Awards Platform

The EPOCH roleplaying game was thrilled and honoured to be nominated for several ENnie awards this year (Best Rules, Best Electronic Book, Best Free Product & Product of the Year).  However, looking at the competition in each category it became clear that we were by-far the smallest dog in this fight.  However, like all small dogs, we know the value of making a big noise, and we thought we might have a little fun during the voting process. 

Without further ado, I present EPOCH chairman and cover-model, the Doomed Diver to present our platform to voters, who might never have heard of our game:

“For too long roleplaying games have demystified horror, and sought to tame the nameless terror that lurks in the darkness.  Players have felt confident and comfortable at the gaming table, their characters ensconced in levels, professions and classes, empowered to dispatch the horror they encounter.  Dice pools, attributes and tokens have become the currency of heroism, perpetrating a terrible inflation on infamy which no monstrosity can afford.  Worse than this, the greatest heroes of horror have been diminished by this golden age of character empowerment. 

The repulsive, terrifying and powerful vampires who were once masters of the night have become glorified bureaucrats, ensconced in conspiracy and intrigue.  The noble zombie, once a frightful and relentless mockery of life has been studied, classified and embraced as an iconic role-model to be emulated.   Ghosts and spectres who once preyed on the sanity and life-force of the living are now valued for their historical insights and emotional mysteries.  Emotionless iron automatons now serve those they once would have crushed beneath their heavy metal treads.

Enough I say!  It is time for horror to return to its proper place in role-playing games.  Bring EPOCH to your gaming tables and restore the rightful balance.  EPOCH will unleash true horror once more, dispelling any notion that terror can be classified and catalogued, appearing with a charming picture and vital statistics at the back of a game book.  EPOCH will summon that which has long remained chained and banished, and unlock the terror deep inside you.  A vote for EPOCH is a vote to make this a better, more frightening, world!  Horror for the People!”

Voting is now open, and runs until 31 July.  There are many great products, and even if you don't vote for EPOCH, please do go and vote!