Wednesday, April 13, 2011

A Quick Vornheim Review


- The layout (and especially the black borders) make me feel like I'm reading a 90s-era newsprint hardcore zine; when I'm flipping the pages I'm half expecting to see ads for Bovine Records and Capitalist Casualties seven-inches or interviews with Rorschach, Dystopia and Assuck.

- The general vibe of the material really makes me think of Fairy Tales; the surreal fucking Fairy Tales that exists in a never-was Victorian-Medieval Dreatime. As Talysman pointed out in a discussion on the Hill Cantons regarding what era D&D is set in, it can be argued that D&D takes place in the anachronistic, iconic world of Fairy Tales. For some reason I imagine the city of Vornheim as a Dreamlands analogue of Prague.

- It's an innovative product, but it shouldn't be; that not an indictment of Vornheim but of what RPG products are generally produced. Vornheim is full of flavorful, useful and inspiring proceedural D&D tools and random tables; and it's a damn shame that more books like this haven't been produced.

- There's less art than I expected.

- It's appropriate that LOTFP is publishing this, as it's definitely a sibling to Carcosa (and the whole Greyhawk, Blackmoor, Kalibrun, Arduin, Cinder, etc. tradition); notes and materials developed in a DMs campaign presented as a palatte of resources (note that to me Carcosa is a kickass campaign setting BUT ALSO an amazing DMs toolkit).

- ...D&D mohawks... *sigh* ...however that's one of the best D&D depictions of a flail I've ever seen.

- I would have likes grid-lines of some kind for the "hand tables," just for the sake of "less visual/mental processing cycles."

Overall it's something I find theoretically useful as well as entertaining and inspiring; I rate Vornheim 1 Slaughter "Strappado."

EDITs:

1 - A reference to Telecanter's Receding Rules! Awesome.
2 - I sure didn't describe what's actually inside the book; good thing the press release covers that.
3 - The Maggot Naga pretty much demands statistics.

12 comments:

  1. For the record, having Mandy in D&D garb on the cover was a specific request from James. So blame him.

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  2. Ah-ha! Now we know that James has a fetish for having women from real-life depicted on the covers of RPG products!

    I'm just cranky from "mohawks everywhere in real life" fatigue...

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  3. Apparently they haven't reached Niagara, Ontario yet...

    http://discourseanddragons.blogspot.com/2011/04/course-on-rpgs-introducing-newbs-to-d.html?showComment=1302637032515#c2892348553059320549

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  4. Well that took a while to read but the payoff in laffs was well worth it!:)

    Conversely to my above opinionm, I do think it's awesome that a dude in the band photos for Sarcofago's I.N.R.I. and the skelton mascot for Slaughter both have mohawks...

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  5. @ Zak

    It's still 1982 in large parts of rural Ontario.

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  6. @huth

    About once every 2 months I get reminded there are still these places where people believe in god and have TV haircuts. I think it's really cute, actually.

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  7. It sort of looks like Monkeybite! I didn't realize it thumbing through the PDF, but you're right. I wish was a review section, and in that section there was a division dedicated to reviews of Spazz records.

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  8. @Zak - In California it looks cute. In Alabama... :)

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  9. P.S.

    For some reason I imagine the city of Vornheim as a Dreamlands analogue of Prague.

    You might've just sold this to me.

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  10. Whoa, didn't know about the reference until your review, thank you. Really nice of Zak.

    Prague is beautiful and only Krakow is higher on my places I wish I could live.

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