PC and NPC Combat Tracker for Clockwork & Cthulhu

I've created a Combat Tracker PDF doc so that I can better track initiative and turn progress for running combat during my Clockwork & Cthulhu campaign. 

Specifically character's Dexterity as well as six boxes to be used to track reload rate for a character's black powder firearms. Whether you tick off boxes or write in what combat turn they expect to be reloaded and ready to fire. These boxes are intended to coordinate with the three sets of twelve boxes in the doc's footer. A regular combat turn is 5 seconds and so 12 turns gives you a minute. I usually tick off boxes for the character in question because sometimes their reloading may be interrupted before they finish.

There is a box for tracking decreasing Hit Points and Sanity while the usual lines are available for pertinent skills related to their combat capabilities. There will be a permanent link for the document on the "Summonings" page of the blog so you can come get it anytime. For those who frequent the BRP Central forum it will be up in the downloads section as soon as I can get it in there. 

The PC's Current "Party"

For my own reference here is a list of the characters which make up the Player Character's group in our Clockwork & Cthulhu campaign. The nominally secret (C)(l)ockwork (U)nderground (B)ureau's list of agents includes;

Zeal-for-the-Lord Harrison, Scoutmaster General NMA-Norfolk, and a major NPC.

Dr. Thomas Norton, NMA Physician, PC.

Ralph Norton, NMA Conscript, PC.

Guillio, NMA Mercenary, PC, and

Craigh, NMA Mercenary, PC (KIA) and replacement currently being rolled up!

The rest of the party consists of the NMA soldiers assigned to Zeal's company when they set out for Yarmouth. Here is the roster of the current living and combat capable NPC's;

Sergeant Francis Sherfield,

Will Drum,

William Frank,

Henry Worth,

Joseph South,

Jan Burkhunt,

Richard Van,

Tobias Bear,

Chris Deere,

Edmund Crew,

Jan Southworth,

Cuthbert Cobb,

Nicholas Tellman,

John Fanshaw,

Joseph Crooke,

Samuel Crooke,

Tom Shaw.

This is the roster of casualties since the company left Norwich;

James Bartlett (Wounded)

Sergeant Anthony May (KIA)

Randall Moelant (KIA)

Mathew Pedlar (KIA)

Roger Kely (KIA)

Thomas Williamson (KIA)

Roger Howard (KIA)

Chris Cox (KIA)

Character Death 3 in Clockwork & Cthulhu

It sure took long enough for the third PC death of the campaign. Craigh the Outlaw Scot looked where he shouldn't have looked and promptly disappeared like smoke up a chimney. The character's player left the character's choice up to a die roll. I don't know what contested roll against himself he settled on, but it was not the first time he had decided character action by a roll against probability. D100 of course, this is Renaissance.

The NPC body count has been gruesomely high during the game's run and at first the two earlier PC deaths seemed appropriate and fit the pace of my fiendish tastes. But man, there sure was a lag between two and three. Initial characters are robust due to a more generous damage mechanics than found in typical BRP games such as Call of Cthulhu and Elric! The chance for quick death does not punch in until characters are in negative Hit Points. Musket shot at 2D8 damage always pose the threat of serious shredding, but yes the PC's can take some punishment before Serious and Grave Wounds takes them out of the fight.

Of course in the world of Clockwork & Cthulhu horrid magic and weird creatures can exact quick (or lingering) death. And this was the situation for the scotsman Craigh. The mysterious hole had the words "Gaze Not" scrawled above it. So it was presented as threatening. It wasn't random, blam, you look in the room and then you are dead. The player had to make the choice. And I use these death puzzles sparingly. Suites the flavor of the game world; grim and deadly. I also make a point of sometimes fiddling with obscene things may work in the player's favor. I think it is a 70/30 mix. Seventy percent of the time you mess around with arcane forces you will get hosed while thirty percent of the time it will confer some advantage or vital knowledge.

Two products deserving a second look; England Upturn'd, and Clockwork & Cthulhu

... or how I was wrong about two great game products.

I chimed in to Bryce Lynch's review of England Upturn'd  and agreed with many of his points sited. Then I found myself returning to England Upturn'd again and again during my Clockwork & Cthulhu campaign. Not only that, but I mentioned in game I thought the Clockwork & Cthulhu sourcebook from Cakebread & Walton was "a bit thin" in game to my players. I need to reassess these two opinions in light of the milage I have gotten out of these products for my BRP Cthulhu &  Chivalry campaign. 

England Upturn'd by Barry Blatt is still an adventure I would not run whole cloth, but very rarely do I use an adventure as presented so this should not be taken as a knock. The module does provide information on the political divisions found within English society during the civil war. As a "Yank" I am not well versed in the scope and sweep of the English Civil War and I think most people running a period piece game will find the description of the different "sides" in this complex and consequential war useful. Barry puts in enough to run you initial adventure. After this if your game continues you will want to pick up some real history. No adventure is going to give you, nor should it, a comprehensive view of this conflict. I believe some of my initial frustration with England Upturn'd was mostly my perturbation realizing I had to do some of my own research to run my campaign to my satisfaction. But what these 128 pages gives you are useful disease and weather tables, laundry list of useful NPC's, plenty of plot hooks and enchanted items, useful locations and maps, and art which puts forth the absolute brutal nature of the times. As a PDF the value is met and exceeded.

Clockwork & Cthulhu, yes it only clocks in at 159 pages but there isn't a piece of this book I have not used. My first impression of the three scenarios was meh, but I have gotten so much milage out of just one of the scenarios it is kind of ridiculous. Same for the mythos, bestiary and factions chapter. When you have had to tape the book together and it becomes heavily tabbed and highlighted, well, I find this the operative definition of "utility".

At the end of the day these two publications have given my campaign game an essential framework which I and my players have been able to embellish with our own ideas and given us all a "believable" world in which to run around in burning warlocks and demons and such. So if you plan on running a sixteenth century English campaign I recommend these two books highly for the Game Master.

This Special Joy

I was able to run another session of my "long running" BRP Cthulhu & Chivalry campaign after a month on hold. It was on hold because of my vacation schedule fell on our game dates so weeks passed by without a session.

But we got back on the horse, killed people, and interacted with new and interesting beings. At the conclusion of the session one of the players posted; "Thanks for a pretty weird session today. I've missed playing with you guys."

And that is about as good as it gets. As we all know the game doesn't run without everyone's investment and participation. According to Robin's Laws of Good Gamemastering I as Keeper only count for 30% of the game experience. I can get on board with that. I can write up all sorts of adventures, read fiction, look for inspiration wherever I can, but without a group of PC's to "toss the salad" all I have is just pretty poor fiction plot outlines.

So, I missed you guys too. Thanks for another great game!

Cthulhu & Chivalry NPC Deaths of Recent Note

The players of my Cthulhu & Chivalry campaign have had the luxury of travelling in a group of well armed NMA troopers. Enough of these "red shirts" suffered grievous wounds today one of my players accused me of whittling down the herd because I didn't want to keep up with the paperwork. Nothing could be further from truth! I had given the entire squad names so I could lovingly track the horrible fates which some of the supporting cast would surely meet. Here are the brave NPC meat-shields which took the deadly hits instead of my band of plucky PC's in this morning's session;

Chris Cox, NMA Soldier; died falling from rope bridge fending off an attack from a large bird.

                             
Roger Howard, NMA Soldier; gunned down by his own party after becoming infected with a strange, sticky substance.

Thomas Williamson, NMA Soldier; fell from rope bridge trying to flee from the horrid sticky substance turning his flesh into writhing vines.

There is also the case of the unfortunate Mr. Bartlett. This unlucky soldier has been battered by possessed trees, attacked by wolves, almost joined his brother in arms Cox in the rope bridge death-plunge and now suffers a gruesome wound from an errant musket shot. His last hope now resides in the good Dr. Norton patching him up. With that man's track record absolutions are already being prepared for good Mr. Bartlett.

Clockwork & Cthulhu Story Arc

Butters wrote up a concise synopsis of the games arc to date on our community page. Here it is reprinted for those interested in the plot which has unfolded so far. This is a cockpit view of the PC's experience as they've rolled through the adventure I've set up as Keeper over a year of play. Make no mistake; this is not a regurgitation of description I told my players, they're knowledge has come from kicking in doors, faces, and prodigious lopping of limbs (not to mention the caving of baby skulls with rocks in the rain). Two PC's have died bloody death piecing things together so far. The game has been run bi-weekly, sometimes with a month break; and managing pace, intrigue, and excitement has been a fun challenge. The big lift, the helpful bits have come from using published game material and hacking it to my tastes. Trying to come up with all this stuff on my own and not be dull and predictable would be demanding.

What is he up to?

Mallebench and his brother come to Norfolk looking for heretical items all of which are possibly connected with the order of Kites a religious crusading order which their ancestor belonged to.

Mallebench brings in the Crows a mercenary band whilst his brother brings in the Cardinals to support him.

Mallebench goes to a great deal of trouble to get himself set up in Norwich, he arranges to have Randolph Nutley (A clockwork engineer) murdered by the Crows so that he could take his place at Norton Ironworks. This gives him access to a clockwork production facilities and after impressing the owner with his skills managed to become part of the companies inner circle very quickly especially after he helped secure a major military contract and happened to discover a nearby source of cheap coal.

All this seems to have been done to be able to secure men to mine and further guards/enforcers as the military contract required armed guards to be employed and as he was so trusted by the now grateful owner there was very little oversight on how resources were being used.

His brother remained outside of Norwich itself and seemed to be roaming around the surrounding countryside with his gang (The Cardinals) collecting artifacts and gathering information.

They were killed during the incident at Gothards hollow where they had attempted to recover a strange ruby bell from the tomb of a knight who later on appears to have been their ancestor from the Order of Kites.

Meanwhile Mallebench was spreading his influence in Norwich bribing some whilst corrupting others through blackmail he even hired a local gang by the name of the name of the Tenebrous hand

Seemingly one of the first to fall was a man called Rimehart a man who ran an import /export company of somewhat shady reputation and ideally placed to help Mallebench gain more artifacts and blackmail material. More weak men followed including a Captain in the town garrison.

Also during this time he seems to have set up a satanic temple and recruiting members of the upper classes into it this provided more funds as he soon made requests for soft loans.

All this effort seemed to be in aid of gathering resources and funds for some big operation various tunnels were explored under Norwich including several under the castle (The source of the cracked wall?)

It seemed he was after something in particular though as he seemed happy to sell a powerful artifact to one of the new Satanists (The cursed sword) for a huge amount of money.

All this effort seems to be spent suddenly after something was found at the small hamlet of Conistan and even though his brother had died the plan was still on.

Mallebench now started spending money and transferring miners from the New Norton coal mine at Wythburn to excavations now starting at Coniston.

More and more resources were diverted from Norton ironworks including men, digging equipment and a variety of clockwork devices.

This couldn't go on for too long though as the diverted resources started to effect the main ironworks the dwindling supply of coal being the most noticeable.

The dig at Coniston uncovered a strange and terrible structure which seemed to be a vast temple complex

Soon all the German miners were sent to the Coniston dig where they were all sacrificed to call forth a demon of some sort if this was the plan then due the somewhat accidental actions by the Party this failed to go off correctly resulting in the destruction of Coniston, the sending back of the demon? and the creation of the blighted area.

Mallebench then seemed to go into clean up mode as the effective removal of the demon combined with the Parties return from the Pale Ladies realm not only caused a big explosion, the Blight but brought other strange changes. So after leaving the Coniston area via Keswick (This resulted in the centre of Keswick being burnt down during a flesh beast attack) he returned to Norwich and seemed to begin eliminating anyone who could identify him.

The Hand were set up to be attacked by the Party after failing to recover some books that he wanted he also arranged for the murders of the Satanist group he had set up.

The last of the Crows died in a cavern under a ruined church in Norwich to some sort of hell toad ? Whilst trying to return those self same books.

So what's Mallebench up to his brother is dead, the demon didn't work out, he blew his cover at Norton's by using up all those resources, he hasn't managed to get his books back and seems to be destroying whatever was left of his Norwich network so what is he up to and what if anything is he still looking for? What were Ghwon and Tobias doing in that cavern and more importantly where the hell is he?

Still alive

Rimehart

The World Between for the Renaissance Game Engine

Jack Shear's Tales of The Grotesque and Dungeonesque  is a Gothic Fantasy Supplement for old-school fantasy role-playing games. He now has three publications in print containing house rules, random tables, new spells, new monsters, and a campaign setting for Gothic Fantasy adventures. He calls the setting "The World Between" and it is fit to drop right into your favorite B/X retro-clone. That means, if you are like me, this wonderful setting needs to be dropped into a completely different game system!

I have this perverse streak of grabbing hold of cool game settings and wanting to use them in an entirely different system than they were written for. Probably because the preponderance of great DIY stuff being released these days is written specifically for old school D&D. Therefore there is always a high chance I will need to convert because I have a head full of game systems and I'm always on the hunt for the "right" setting to play them in. Not all the time. Dolmenwood in the pages of Wormskin I would slot right into LotFP without changing a thing. I'm still on the quest for the right mash up of system and setting for a Space Opera campaign. With over a year of play I may be just starting to get comfortable with Cakebread & Walton's Clockwork & Chivalry game. More to the point, getting comfortable with using Chaosium's system, commonly referred to as BRP (Basic Role Playing) system. You know, d100 mechanics and the whole Call of Cthulhu engine.

I've mentioned plenty about my first exposure to BRP through Stormbringer. How I fell in love with it and believed it would give me the flexibility, the ability to go beyond a class and level system I had been playing with A/D&D. But I never got a chance to play it all that much. In fact the game puzzled me some. I knew I liked the combat system, and character creation framework seemed just what I wanted. The chance to make characters pretty much how I wanted them. I guess as a teen I just didn't know how to uncouple the system from the setting and then reskin.

Now that I'm back gaming I can reap the benefits of getting older and wiser. The plethora of DIY game materials available online from the OSR community continues to be an embarrassment of riches. There is literally a f$%k-ton of material so that players and referees can create any flavor of game they wish.

So now I finally have a satisfying fantasy setting to place a d100 game I can get my teeth in. The World Between's most attractive feature is it is relatively complete in concept. There is enough information on the game world and fantastic random tables I can sprout adventure ideas with relative ease. This also avails players with character color to give them a handle on what kind of world they are in for. The world map, found in Volumne II, conjures up Moorckock's other fantasy realm The Tragic Millennium, the world in which Dorian Hawkmoon quested for the Runestaff and battled the vile forces of Gran Breton. This is helpful because I have a copy of Chaosium's Hawkmoon on my shelf so can utilize these slim sourcebooks for immediate NPC and monsters stats.

The Clockwork & Chivalry rule book will give me all the Chaosium rules mechanics I could want including a nice framework for character creation. Its specific ties to European 1600's colors the magic system a certain way so it will need to be tailored to better reflect Shear's fantasy setting, but hell you have all the clockwork rules you could want! Cakebread & Walton also offer a free PDF of the "Renaissance" system which is actually much easier to flip through when creating characters. The free PDF does lack clockwork rules, but has alchemy and witchcraft, so keep that in mind when deciding whether to spend money or not.

Here is how I retrofitted character creation with this D&D based setting: Go ahead and roll starting attributes per the Renaissance/C&C rules. Then flip to the Character Background Table in TotGaD and make a random roll. Chaosium attributes line right up with D&D's. The only switch is Wisdom becomes Power. So attributes which receive bonuses from the character background  table translate point for point. Now compare the background rolled to the list of professions available in Renaissance/C&C. Pick the one which most aligns with the background rolled. For example; if you rolled Initiate then you have many good options. Witch/Warlock, Witchfinder, Scholar, Preacher, and Cunning Man or Wise Woman are all good matches for this one background. Your profession picked gives bonuses to certain Common Skills as well as giving the new character particular Advanced Skills. Also the profession picked indicates which Social Class you can pick from the five available.  Your Social Class gives your character further bonuses to Common and Advanced Skills. Note this is backwards from the regular character creation process outlined in the Renaissance/C&C rules.

Two Advanced Skills to pay attention to at this point are Lore(Any) and Craft(Any). If your character ends up with these it is now a good time to roll the character's nationality. There are fifteen nationalities listed in the World Between so make a random 1d15 roll for nationality and then a review of the TotGaD books, focusing on entries relating to the nation rolled. For example; if you rolled the Island of Jade Mysteries there is a section on "Monsters of the Jade Mysteries". This becomes a setting specific Lore skill which makes sense for your new character's background. Note the preponderance of undead listed amongst the different nations. Each has their own flavor and the unliving flesh is a common trope in gothic fiction. Characters having knowledge about these monsters should be useful in their upcoming adventures when they must confront these terrors. A look at the examples of suggested crafts in the Renaissance/C&C book should help with selections which relate to this gothic setting. Apothecary, Alchemy, Weaponsmith; all should find use in this world. I suggest skill in "Clockwork" can be either a Lore skill or a Craft skill.

The final thing which nationality will help flesh out is the characters starting languages. The character's native language will be obvious from the table in Volume II. The next language a character should have is the common language known as "Tradecraft". This is in effect a free additional Advanced Skill which should be noted on the character sheet. Each character will be required to have at least 30% in this language so that the party will be able to converse with each other and NPC's. The 250 free skill points each character gets at creation will be used to boost their starting skill in this language to at least the minimum.

So the last step in your World Between character creation process will be to distribute your free 250 points per the Renaissance/C&C rules. Here players will want to work closely with the Game Master if they are interested in utilizing magic. Now it is time to roll on the Dark Secrets table in TotGaD Volume I. Between this table, your nationality, character background, and chosen profession will be all the information the player will get to make their case for starting magic. For example; say I roll a "Dandy" on the TotGaD Character Background table with "Arcane Dabbler" for a Dark Secret. The Nationality roll gives me Mord-Stavian, a land of clockwork technomancy and undead worshippers. With access to Lore(Any) and Craft(Any) skills I have plenty of ingredients from the TotGaD books to brew up some type of magic wielder. From the Renaissance/C&C book I choose "Courtier" for profession and "Gentry" for Class. This combination will give me access to a Lore(Any), Craft(Any), and an Art(Any) skill. Flipping through the TotGaD books I come up with Lore(Witchcraft), Craft(Clockwork Technomancy), and Art(Gypsy Fortune Telling). I will now discuss with the GM what spells and or magical equipment my character will start out with, relying on guidance and inspiration from Jack Shear's background information.

Actually the last step will be to purchase equipment, so let's take a look at how to go about this process. Roll starting coin per the Renaissance/C&C rules. The monetary system for Renaissance is English with the common coin being the shilling. Just convert shillings into silver. You'll want a fantasy appropriate equipment list and you will need to classify armor into Light, Medium, and Heavy categories. This will give you corresponding protection in Renaissance/C&C values. I recommend jacking the prices of black powder weapons than are found in the C&C rules. I want my gothic fantasy world to have a premium on firearms.

Let's take a look at the Renaissance character sheet as we wrap up character creation. I'm not using Factions from the Renaissance rules so this part of the sheet is not being used. "Player" is to be used for the character's name. "Adventurer" is where you would write down your result from the Dark Secrets table. In the TotGaD book this is on page 44 and is highly recommended. Irregardless of the character's national origins the rolled result should be tailored to the character's profession and background so the Game Master has "personal apocalypses and a constant exposure to danger" to work into adventures for their players. "Nationality" should be used to list the character's national origin and "Homeland" is a useful line to write down their native language as well as Tradecraft and its percentage skill value. Any other languages known can be listed here also.

"Profession" is what you get from the background table and add the short descriptor from Dark Secrets. For example; Pirate-Silent Witness. Don't write down the profession you compare it to from the Renaissance book even though you are using that particular profession to identify the Common and Advanced skills your new character is starting out with. In the Character Background description is a Leading Question. This should be written on the "Connections" line of the character sheet. This is another useful bit of color the Game Master can use for plot hooks and adventure seeds. On the back Alchemy may be used if the character takes it as a Lore skill and Witchcraft section will be useful for spell casting ability.

Here is a character example; we've rolled are starting attributes giving us STR:10, CON:08, SIZ:13, INT:14, POW:11, DEX:08, and CHA:09. Before we establish the three figured attributes we should roll now for character background. We roll 80, Servant. We have a choice of a +1 to CON, or +1 to CHA. We'll boost CON to 09 as this will increase the character's starting Hit Points as well. The leading question described in the background will be written down on the Connections line of our character sheet, this being "What scandal forced you to resign your position?" Valet/Lady's Maid is the obvious profession here. Townsman is the only listed Class available so this will set the starting skills for our character. To finish defining our character concept we roll on the Nationality and Dark Secrets tables. We get Ulverland and Spy for the Inquisition. Now I have all the ingrediants I need to complete the concept. Defining the two starting Lore(Any) skills and the one Craft(Any) skill I look to the TotGaD books. Ulverland has some nifty descriptions for Enchanted Teas and seems they have a bit of a Troll problem. I shape up these skills such; Lore(Enchanted Teas), Lore(Trolls), and Craft(Apothecary). The Craft skill is how adept the character is in brewing the magical beverage and the skill number can be tossed into the Alchemy section of the character sheet. You get the idea...

BRP Clockwork & Cthulhu Session Reports

About twelve weeks ago one of the players in my BRP Clockwork & Cthulhu campaign starting writing up some very enjoyable session reports and posting them to the community page. Not only were they a delight to read the session reports gave me valuable information on the details of the adventure that I might otherwise forget. With a loose outline of major NPC's and their plots and no particular endgame envisioned the events and items which get created during any session become the adventure seeds for future sessions. I try to remain flexible and get forced to create adventure content on the fly. I don't have a lot of time for world building and trying to nail down every stinking detail just seems to be a bore. I want to get just as much delight seeing which way the campaign will go as the players!

So the value I took from the written session reports deemed experience point awards to the writer. Nothing unusual here either. But another player added their own session report. So I decided any and all PC's can write session reports for xp. If I can get two to three reports from individual players on any given day I start to have a game seen through the eyes of the players. My vision gets supplanted by the characters theater of the mind and once again I am carried along for the ride. Kind of like a police investigator interrogating multiple witnesses to an event. No two views are going to be exactly the same. They all need to be corroborated to establish the truth of the matter. The game becomes the story of the players and not a series of events the Game Master has orchestrated because then the story is just what the players endured at the hands of the Game Master. So yeah, the session reports have become essential food for my enjoyment of the game :)  

Cool Things in Clockwork & Cthulhu

Today a PC decided to dispatch an NPC the party was interrogating. No torture or anything. The NPC was answering questions, rather compliant tied up in a chair. But without hesitation, matchlock pistol to the head! The player just couldn't see an answer to the problems the NPC represented short of death. What that threat looked like for the PC I don't know. Nothing to be done about party paranoia.  Hurray, must mean I'm running the game right.

Any who, so the NPC  is now an open cavity of brains spread over the ale and blood soaked bar table and the PC has a moment of reflection. Have I gone too far? Blowing out the brains of a defenseless enemy? The player asked me if there was a need for a sanity check. I was like whatever, you killed a hardened mercenary, your fine.

On reflection, I thought that was kinda cool. The players are invested enough in the campaign that I don't have to hammer home consequences. They are creating their own experience to the events because the story has come alive at some point for all participants.

This campaign has been rocking really well by I think these elements;

Quality adventure product,

PC buy in regarding genre tropes,

and a GM making the action where the PCs are which means hacking the hell out of the published material to bend and reflect the PCs actions in the game world.