Book Description
The long-awaited d20 adaptation of Call of Cthulhu in one all inclusive rulebook.
Since the early 1900's, H.P. Lovecraft has been considered one of the top writers in the entire horror genre. Elements of his work have appeared over the years in numerous horror arenas, but now roleplayers can delve into a campaign centered around the author's popular Cthulhu Mythos. The Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying Game contains everything needed to play or narrate a roleplaying campaign, including all core-game rules for the d20 game system.
Customer Reviews:
Librum Cthulhum Deetwentii.......2005-09-11
I had the Chaosium Cthulhu book for a few years when someone recommended that I get the WotC D20 Cthulhu book for additional ideas. After buying and reading it, I feel that it stands well on its own. So I won't be reviewing it in comparison to Chaosium's BRP book, or recommend which one is better, but just to review it as it stands.
First, the externals. It is a nice book - a solid hardback, with art to look like a grimoire or other tome. I like a sturdy rulesbook that structurally feels in flavor for the game it is made for. The interior art is in color (!) and is mostly very good, with the chapter heading paintings looking particularly realistic. The layout is readable, the paper feels dependable, and the page coloration changes subtly by chapter (for quick flipping). In short, it looks and feels like a book you might like to own (sometimes I feel guilty about owning ugly books).
Next, I'll note that the mechanics are included. That's good, because I don't intend to buy any more d20 products (wait, that's a lie. I have already bought another d20 book to use with this one; I definitely wouldn't have if the d20 rules weren't spelled out). Everything you need to know about generating a character, advancing in levels, acquiring skills, and combat is included (which I didn't necessarily expect when I bought it - I guess it's a true stand-alone). It was difficult to sort through, and not terribly well organized. I assume that the mechanics were squeezed in so that more could be spent on Cthulhu than on d20. I did feel that my old AD&D 2E book was more clear (not saying the mechincs were better, just that I understood the presentation better after reading it). Feats and skill ranks are new to me, so I can't really review that section other than to say that it's there. I personally think that for all the rules, tables, and modifiers, the DM is just going to pick a dice check number that matches the difficulty he/she thinks the situations should have relative to your skill, so why bother with all the crunchiness? But I'm not a big shot like Monte Cook or John Tynes, and this is d20, so I'll take their word for it.
Guns and other equipment is covered in excellent detail - nice to have it all in one place.
Magic - tomes are covered very well, and even BRP Cthulhu people might benefit from reading the section on how sanity loss from reading Mythos books occurs. Specific tomes are covered, along with all the spells from the BRP game.
Creatures - all the major critters have entries. I think the stats are a little silly, and not consistemt with descriptions or at appropriate levels relative to other monsters. Also, given the deadliness of some monsters' descriptions, the challenge ratings seem much too low.
The Mythos - the idea of Lovecraft's vision is explained. Also, each decade is explained in terms of the progression of the End Times, and how each decade might be played along with movie and literature references that are appropriate for inspiration.
How to run a game - this is probably the most useful chapter in any game book I've ever bought. There are 40 pages on how to create backstory, create good horror, keep a game going, and please your players. I wish all gmaes came with this kind of explanation about what are the elements of a good game with lots of examples. Even if you never play d20, this is great for any other horror game.
The two scenarios are well-designed with plenty of investigation that is also accessible to the players. All useful details are included for what may be a first-time GM.
At the back are a Monstrous Compendium of deities for use if you want in a D&D game. I feel like they need to be in the book, and the stats hardly matter anyway. There is also a conversion table for BRP and d20, as well as a bibliography of Cthulhu books to read.
Excellent presentation, excellent material, useful to more than just d20 players but contains everything needed to play d20. An excellent buy for anyone in horror gaming, I think.
Excellent d20 book.......2005-01-22
This d20 Call of Cthulhu is probably not to the liking of purists since it presents, to begin with, a set of different rules. As you know, people don't like to change of game mechanics. So, if you really like the d20 / D&D 3rd rules, this d20 supplement is for you!! In fact it is an excellent product, with nice layout and illustrations, and well written. Just if you wanted to add the Mythos to D&D 3rd ed., this book is worth the purchase. Now, as much the purists want to see a Call of Cthulhu game as one where player characters are expected to die within a couple of sessions, some others don't!! There are also players who like games where the PCs survive and thrive. As such, a combat oriented d20 CoC is not necessarily a bad thing! Anyway, if you really would like to do a "pulp" Cthulhu, you would better add some d20 Modern to it, since d20 CoC nonetheless goes for characters who are weak and nearly hopeless.
Roleplaying or Combat?.......2004-09-03
Very simple. If you want to roleplay, love character (personality) development, truly love the horror of Lovecraft's brilliant world and want a memorable experience, buy Chaosium's original, elegant game.
If you want a combat oriented game with a clumsy, ugly gaming system, go d20.
Your choice.
A fine adaptation--I just wish it weren't d20!.......2004-01-13
First, a word of warning to the shopper--although Amazon doesn't make it clear in the title, this is the d20 version of the Call of Cthulhu RPG.
That out of the way--the greatest thing in this book is John Tynes' articles on how to GM a Call of Cthulhu game, and the background info on the Mythos. They are actually better than what's in the regular (non-d20) Call of Cthulu rulebook. Also, the rules for psychic characters are intriguing, and it's kinda kewl to have all those Mythos monsters and gods statted up for d20, so you can spring them on your unsuspecting Dungeons and Dragons characters.
Those good points are so very very good that I give this product 5 stars, despite one very serious flaw: the rules are lame. Oh, Tynes and Cook do good things with them--many of their ideas were later used in other d20 products, and they certainly make some small improvements with the d20 rules. But it's still d20, and thus far clunkier and less elegant than the original Call of Cthulhu rules. Now, those CoC rules are far from perfect, but still, they are so much easier to learn and to use, and really, the *only* thing you need to buy to play CoC is the rulebook--no, not the "core" rulebook, because there *aren't* any other rulebooks! Oh sure, there are supplements, but unlike D&D, none of them is crucial to play. And unlike D&D, when Chaosium does a new edition, they don't change it so much that it's completely incompatible with previous material. Most of the changes are in gathering together published spells and monsters and equipment, so that (gasp!) you won't *have* to buy other supplements!
So, I didn't actually buy it for the d20 rules--although that will allow me to introduce my local gaming group (some members of which refuse to play anything other than D&D) to CoC. I bought it as a supplement for the regular version of Call of Cthulhu--something entirely unnecessary, but beautiful and fun to have. Looked at that way, it's 5 stars, easy.
A Fine Adaptation.......2003-12-02
Okay, I'll be honest. I do prefer the original Chaosium CoC to Wizards Of The Coast's adaptation. What I supremely loved about the original Call Of Cthulhu was that knowledge that reading that obscure occult tome was NOT a good idea and that nothing at all was what it seemed. Yes, characters either died or went insane, but that's what made it fun. The original Call Of Cthulhu was about the journey rather than the end. The new d20 Call Of Cthulhu takes away from that paranoid feel of the original game, making it a bit more combat-intensive and less mood-oriented.
However, let's be honest here. It's the GM that creates the mood for the game. It's all about imagination, baby. It's easy to create a more mood-oriented d20 CoC campaign - the book even gives pointers. The rulebook is quite adaptable, including tips on incorporating the Mythos creatures, deities, and Sanity rules into a D&D Campaign (I imagine that they can be added to a d20Modern campaign as well).
If you already have Chaosium's core CoC rulebook, there's no need to get this unless you want to incorporate the Mythos into D&D. If you're a D&D3E fan and don't own Chaosium's rulebook and/or have never played Call Of Cthulhu but want to learn it in a familiar framework, you can do far, far worse than WotC's adaptation of a classic game. The d20 adaptation features gorgeous artwork, a recommended reading list, and even adaptations to older CoC supplements.
Enjoy!
Book Description
An unparalleled selection of fiction from H. P. Lovecraft, master of the American horror tale
Long after his death, H. P. Lovecraft continues to enthrall readers with his gripping tales of madness and cosmic terror, and his effect on modern horror fiction continues to be felt-- Stephen King, Anne Rice, and Clive Barker have acknowledged his influence. His unique contribution to American literature was a melding of Poe's traditional supernaturalism with the emerging genre of science fiction. Originally appearing in pulp magazines like Weird Tales in the 1920s and 1930s, Lovecraft's work is now being regarded as the most important supernatural fiction of the twentieth century.
Lovecraft's biographer and preeminent interpreter, S. T. Joshi, has prepared this volume of eighteen stories--from the early classics like "The Outsider" and "Rats in the Wall" to his mature masterworks, "The Call of Cthulhu" and "The Shadow Over Innsmouth." The first paperback to include the definitive corrected texts, The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories reveals the development of Lovecraft's mesmerizing narrative style, and establishes him as a canonical--and visionary--American writer.
"I think it is beyond doubt that H. P. Lovecraft has yet to be surpassed as the twentieth century's greatest practitioner of the classic horror tale." --Stephen King
Customer Reviews:
Skillfully anthologized and skillfully written. Haunting tales that encompass the Cthulhu mythos. Highly recommended.......2007-10-01
NOTE: This review is specific to "The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories (Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics)".
As one of the three Penguin Classic Lovecraft anthologies, The Call of Cthulhu collects the stories that lead up to and include the Cthulhu Mythos, arranged in chronological order with introduction and explanatory notes for each story from the anthologizer, S.T. Joshi. Joshi does an exceptional job selecting stories that create a coherent narrative through Lovecraft's early work, developing themes, and final strong stories; his annotations are interesting and useful both to the casual and studious reader. Lovecraft's writing itself is also exceptional: in this wide selection of short stories, he explores issues of miscegenation, scientific exploration, and the discoveries of the great beyond--from the reaches out outer space to the depths of the sea, wherein ancient inhuman forces lurk, threatening those that come too close to the truth. Skill and quality differs from story to story but is universally high, and Lovecraft's tones are delightfully dark and threatening, occasionally humorous, and always otherworldy. This collection is greatly enjoyable and I highly recommend it.
The Penguin Classics anthologies divide Lovecraft's work into three collections, all edited by S.T. Joshi, all collecting short stories that address central themes in Lovecraft's work. Obviously, this compilation focuses on the Cthulhu Mythos, beginning with Dagon and moving through stories of life beyond death (Herbert West--Reeanimator), miscregation (The Shadow over Innsmouth), life from space (The Whisperer in the Dark), and life from the depths (The Call of Cthulhu). The collection is complete, with a clear focus, and indicates an active development of the theme as Lovecraft's writing matures. Joshi's additions are skillful: each story is given an introduction in the notes, mentioning its place in Lovecraft's career, relevant information, and present themes; the annotations (through numbered footnotes) are removed to the end of the text, maintaining the coherency of the printed stories and giving the reader the option of ignoring them altogether. The annotations run a bit overly-detailed and even off topic at times, but on the whole they are both interesting and useful. In short, Joshi's editing is exceptional, making this an accessible anthology as well as a useful resource.
More important than Joshi's editing is of course Lovecraft's writing. Lovecraft is a true artist of the horror genre; his work is considered classic for a reason. And perhaps none of it is more famous than the Cthulhu mythos, making this a true classic of the genre and a wonderful read. But my recommendation does not rest on how famous Lovecraft or these stories happen to be; rather, it rests on the fact that the writing is exceptional, enjoyable, and haunting. Some of the tropes become repetitive, and not all of the stories match others in quality or lasting impact, but on the whole this is an impressive collection of consistently high quality. The forces present in Lovecraft's writing are dark and insidious, hidden on the edges and in the crevices of human consciousness; those that seek them out find more than they bargain for--some are killed, some driven to madness or suicide. Lovecraft's stories move accordingly, building up auras of suspense, slowly revealing more ominous information, and often climaxing in names, entities, and fates that are all the more frightening for our own inability to comprehend them, pronounce, or describe them. Lovecraft uses words to introduce concepts that are beyond words, concepts that escape description. His writing is atmospheric, haunting, and skillful, and a true delight to read.
I came upon this text as a curious reader that had heard much about Lovecraft but never read his work and did not know where to begin. I was exceptionally pleased with this book, and believe it was an ideal introduction. The combination of Joshi's superb selections and editing and Lovecraft's exceptional writing make this a wonderful starting place, introducing some of Lovecraft's strongest themes, exploring them through his career, and including all number of classic stories. I was impressed with and greatly enjoyed this text, and I highly recommend it.
Great intro to HPL.......2007-08-15
This volume is the perfect introduction to the works of H.P. Lovecraft. The Shadow Over Insmouth which was the inspiration for the movie Dagon is worth buying the entire volume. These stories chill you to the bone without being graphic and going for the cheap scare like modern horror tales. Lovecraft lets you use your imagination to let the tension build, and it leaves you thinking of fantastic possibilities long after you put the book down. I highly recommend this volume and the 2 additional Penguin Classic volumes which take in almost all of Lovecrafts major writings.
experience of reading.......2007-07-18
It took me a great deal of time to actually purchase some of Lovecraft's work. I was hearing a lot about it from numerous sources, mostly connected with science fiction, horror, weird imaginative cults and such things. Comic books often immersed themselves into the world that Lovecraft created. Being what it is it offered great many possibilities to explore, create, destroy or modify and never actually lose connection with Lovecraft's vision.
I find this vision strangely fascinating. There is certain richness in those maddening vision, in out-of-this-world words, in whispers from the darkness that makes the sane mane go insane. One can almost feel growing horror of Lovecraft's characters, one can feel threads of sanity breaking, one can feel paranoia, psychosis, fear, and one can connect with these characters.
Lovecraft is master of creating atmosphere. Deserted places, god forsaken cliffs and roads, lost secrets, all are there for reader to feel the weight of nightmares, heaviness of horror that may creep upon ones mind.
Yes, some of these stories are naive, some of them are really bad writing, most of them are predictable in terms of narrative. Yet, there are some which are strangely poetic and beautiful, like Nyarlathotep, and some which, despite great amount of naivete, portrays that feelings of no escape which are maddening and sad like Whisperer in the Darkness.
This edition is indeed "overly-edited" as someone said before, and many of the explanatory notes could be, without any damage to the edition, thrown out. Nevertheless, editor - S.T. Joshi, did great ammount of work and, for anyone who is looking into Lovecraft for reasons other than joy of readin, should start with this edition. It offers secondary literature, and thorough introduction.
So, if you don't mind sometimes peculiar language (after all this was written at the early 20th century), sometimes banal construction, and other kind of structural inadequacies and if you like strong visions, poetic heights, disturbing scenery, and hint of supernatural in everyday banality, than stories of H.P. Lovecraft are just what are you looking for,
AAAARRRGHHHH!!!!! JUST TELL ME THE ENDING!!!!!!!!.......2007-04-09
Well, this book covers just about every Lovecraft story you could want. I bought this book mainly for the story "The Call Of Cthulhu", after hearing about it in the movie "Dagon", and hearing stuff about it in a song or two. I'm not a big fan of reading, but it kept my attention. The only drawback is the damn cliff hangers! Yes, it makes for a dramatic ending, but also after a while kind of gets annoying (hence 4 stars instead of 5). Lovecraft's style of writing is quite different from other authors. But for me, it worked. The title is very accurate when it says "And Other Weird Stories". So be prepared. It's also a nice deviation from most of the other horror books out there today. About 98% of which seem to be about vampires. Each story is unique, in every aspect of the word.
Classic .......2007-03-24
H.P. Lovecraft is, in my opinion, on the same level as Edgar Allan Poe as far as short horror story writers are concerned. This book was the first material by him that I ever read, and I must proclaim that his writing style is nothing short of superb. The words he uses when constructing his elaborate sentences just seem so perfect that I can't help but be in awe. Another thing I love about Lovecraft is that he often describes the monster, but never too much. That way, the reader can create their own interpretation of what the monster looks like. My favorite stories here are "The Shadow Over Innsmouth," and of course, "The Call Of Cthulhu." Horror fans will love this.
Product Description
Nestled along the Massachusetts coast, the small town of Arkham has existed for centuries. It is the source of countless rumors and legends. Those who have visited it each telling a different and remarkable account, whisper tales of Arkham. Reports of impossible occurrences, peculiar happenings and bizarre events, tales that test the sanity of the reader are to be found here. Magic, mysteries, monsters, mayhem, and ancient malignancies form the foundation of this unforgettable centuries' old town. Collected in this volume are the strange and terrifying stories of the legend-haunted city.
Customer Reviews:
Miss this!.......2007-05-31
Once when I visiting H.P.'s grave, I found a maunscript left by a fan. The enclosed letter said that the author knew his work was poor, but he was leaving it as a fan, and hoped it was appreciated. I read it, sitting by that grave. And he was correct; the work had promise, but needed a lot of work.
That's what this collection reminded me of. A bunch of works left at the grave of H.P.L. with very little to encourage them. There is a certain amount of promise in this work, but it is quickly buried under stories that never seem to go anywhere. The writing is cliched in most of the tales, and sometimes the mythos seems to be an afterthought to what's going on.
Poor editing contributed to the poor effect, but really, the quality of the stories does not match most of the "fan work" that has come before. It reads like a bunch of adventure intros for the "Call of Cthulhu" RPG, and not like a series of genre stories.
A WASTE OF MY TIME AND MONEY!.......2007-05-08
I couldn't believe how bad this book was on so many different levels...especially after reading the glowing customer reviews, here!
First, there were unintentional bad syntax and misspellings throughout...which was both irritating and distracting. Did anyone even proofread or edit this collection before it went to press? I really wonder!
Second, most of the stories...with (if I remember correctly!) only two notable exceptions...were simply poor. The plots and writing "styles" reminded me of something straight out of a high-school campus magazine...and most were too predictable and not at all frightening. The rich imagery of Lovecraft and his best inheritors was totally absent. The results were, mostly, dull and unimaginative.
Third, too many of the stories dealt with different private detectives dealing with Arkham horrors...and these were written in a very corny, dated style that read like bad Mickey Spillane. I think that the Old Master, Lovecraft, would have cringed at some crap!
If you are a true Lovecraft Mythos fan who has enjoyed some of the really good spinoffs from some of the first generation of Lovecraft's inheritors, I would recommend that you bypass this book altogether.
SOLID LOVECRAFTIAN STORIES.......2007-04-22
Almost 70 years after his death, H.P.Lovecraft continues to cast a giant shadow over the horror genre with new books, films, and comics coming out every year that are inspired by his works. Chaosium is best known as the published of the outstanding "Call of Cthulhu" role-playing game but they also put out some great Lovecraftian fiction as well and their latest offering features 17 stories set in his fictional city of Arkham, Massachusetts. One of the most difficult things for modern writers to capture is that overall sense of dread, and the feeling of something dark and disturbing lurking just out of the way of your glance that Lovecraft was able to convey so well. While not all of the writers in this collection succeed, I'm happy to say that many of them do and contribute some fantastic stories. "Mysterious Dan's Legacy" by Matthew Baugh is set in 1873. Daniel Hawkins as traveled to Arkham from Dodge City to collect an inheritance left behind by a cousin, an old and very rare book. When Hawkins turns down an offer to sell the book, he'll find that there are strange people in town who will do anything to get their hands on this prize.
"They Thrive in Darkness" by Ron Shiflet is perhaps the best example of a book that captures that true Lovecraft feel and sense of helplessness. Owen Blake makes acquaintances with a jovial man in an Arkham pub who invites him to his home to see the mysterious door in his basement. It's what's behind the door that Owen should be concerned about.
In John Goodrich's "Arkham Rain" a man learns the horrific history of his family and the gruesome fate that awaits his brother, when he visits the accursed town of Innsmouth.
Other stand-out stories include "What Sorrows May Come" by Lee Clark Zumpe and "The Idea of Fear" by C.J. Henderson. My only reservation is that a few too many stories conclude with a rather clichéd happy ending. Overall, however, a very solid collection of Lovecraft-inspired stories.
reviewed by Tim Janson
Typical Chaosium Cthulhu Collection.......2007-01-03
There are good stories and bad stories in this book, but fortunately, like most Call of Cthulhu fiction, there are more good than bad. I won't review story by story, since so much of that is subjective to the reader, but this collection is easily good enough to buy and the price is very reasonable.
All new fiction in a winner from Chaosium and their Call of Cthulhu game.......2006-08-15
Arkham Tales is perhaps the beginning of a new venture for Chaosium, all original fiction set in the world of their Role Playing Game, Call of Cthulhu. Back in the day, before the internet, I was unaware of the small and (semi) thriving of small press mythos magazines. The only access to modern Lovecraftian fiction I knew about was through the cycle books, trade paperbacks by Chaosium. The most recent example of these was The Tsathoggia Cycle. Generally, these books featured reprinted stories gleaned and selected, usually by Robert Price, from these various magazines (Cthulhu Codex, Crypt of Cthulhu, Midnight Shambler etc). These were a definite mixed bag, with the books often containing a few winners, much mediocrity and a fair number of dogs. Alas, this was all that was available, except for an occasional fine quality hardback like Cthulhu 2000 (and even that had reprints). Lately, with improved on line connections and facilitation of book production by small presses the amount of books containing almost all new published mythos fiction has sky rocketed. Also, maybe it's only my imagination but this new generation of authors (not that the last one has moved off the scene) (maybe the 4th or 5th Lovecraft Circle?) is immensely talented so most of these collections have highly superior fiction. I always say we are in a golden age of mythos fiction, and point to books like Dead But Dreaming, Hardboiled Cthulhu, Horrors Beyond and the Delta Green books. And there is so much more in the pipeline, it is almost an embarrassment of riches. GW Thomas is set to release Cthulhu Express soon, and Rainfall Books has some titles in the offing, while Pagan Publishing has a new trade paperback collection of DG chapbooks planned. Elder Signs Press has stayed very, very busy, while Kevin O' Brien and Lindisfarne Press are getting back on their feet. Edward Lipsett has opened our eyes to Japanese mythos fiction via Kurodahan Press, John Pelan plans to issue The Cthulhian Singularity and Charlie Stross' The Jennifer Morgue is coming from Golden Gryphon. This is the golden age! Even so, we must admit our debt to Chaosium and Robert Price for keeping the eldritch fires burning.
And we also owe a debt to Chaosium for their role playing game, Call of Cthulhu. Actually I never played it; back when I had time for such leisure pursuits I was a D&D fan (but you gotta love a game where no matter how good you are, you eventually go insane or get eaten...). So here is my bias for the review: I do not know the source materials other than the stories by HPL and his legion of followers. And here is my assessment: you do not need to know their source material! Just like you don't need to know any of the Delta Green sources to really enjoy their books. Frankly, it's a wonder it took so long for Chaosium to elicit fiction based on their game world. After all there are tons of D&D based books. Delta Green, a version of CoC set in the modern era rife with secret government agencies and conspiracies, has been generating GREAT fiction for years now. Maybe the idea was germinating for a while but Chaosium was too broke to act on it, I dunno. Although set in or about Arkham, authors had free rein about all other content and setting, so there is no sense of repetition at all.
Someone will have to fill me in on the authors' reimbursement but I think it was peanuts plus 2 copies of the book, so truly these stories are labors of love. What I really like is there was a solicitation of stories and a culling process by the highly respected William Jones, from Elder Signs Press. This means the stories are notches above the cycle books. List price is $15.95 but it is discounted on Amazon to $10.37, and available for free shipping if you buy $25 worth of stuff (like Hardboiled Cthulhu!). The book itself is a good quality trade paperback, like all the cycle books. Page count is 288, not counting the editor's note, so very generous! The editor's note by William Jones is quite useful and details the setting for the anthology in Chaosium's world. Unfortunately there are no bios on the authors. Cover art is by Steven Gilberts. It shows a grizzled one eyed grounds keeper at Miskatonic University, shadowed by various critters. I am not sure about this, but I believe Mr. Gilberts did the artwork for some CoC game scenarios, so this is a very appropriate choice. This brings me to the biggest flaw in the book: there were at least a half dozen careless typos, mostly word substitutions. I did not jot them down as I was reading but, for example, p160 "fowl odors" (unless everything was supposed to smell like chickens). I think someone relied too much on a spell checker. Also in the story Burnt Tea by Michael Dziesinski busted was used as a descriptive adjective, "busted body." OK, I'll accept that a woman has a bust, or a narc conducts a bust, or you sculpt a bust. I'll buy that if you are writing colloquially in dialogue, or representing someone's thoughts, to say something was busted is appropriate slang, but in narrative detached from thoughts or dialogue it reads like the mistake of an ignoramus. Why not "broken body?" I saw this same mistaken usage twice in another story somewhere recently, maybe a chapbook, and I was equally put off by it. I won't say it killed the story, but goodness gracious it peeved me. I greatly enjoyed Eats, Shoots, & Leaves by Lynne Truss, so consider this my panda paw print.
Here are the contents (not otherwise listed elsewhere that I could find, so I typed the dang thing myself):
Mysterious Dan's Legacy - Matthew Baugh
Vaughn's Diary - Robert Vaughn
The Orb - Tony Campbell
The Nether Collection - Cody Goodfellow
Worms - Pat Harrigan
They Thrive in Darkness - Ron Shiflet
What Sorrows May Come - Lee Clark Zumpe
Arkham Pets - James Ambuehl
Small Ghost - Michael Minnis
Burnt Tea - Michael Dziesinski
Arkham Rain - John Goodrich
Regrowth - David Conyers
The Idea of Fear - CJ Henderson
Disconnected - Brian Sammons
The Lady in the Grove - Scott Lette
On Leave in Arkham - Bill Bilstad
Geometry of the Soul - Jason Andrew
Spoilers may follow so stop now if that bothers you *********
Mysterious Dan's Legacy - Matthew Baugh - This is a new author to me. In 1873 a Kansas cowboy (that was frontier territory right after the Civil War) comes to Arkham to collect an inheritance, which brings unwelcome knowledge, responsibilities and enemies. This was a very likeable story; I wonder if the protagonist, Daniel Hawkins, will become a regular character in Mr. Baugh's stories.
Vaughn's Diary - Robert Vaughn - Here is one story where my knowledge of the source material wasn't up to scratch and I couldn't remember if there was an antecedent story but HPL or someone else, so I don't recognize the name Timothy Erasmus Vaughn. Regarding this tale, never ever read the diary of a deceased relative who was an occultist in Arkham. Never! I hadn't read anything by Mr. Vaughn before, but this was a good read and I hope he is writing more mythos fiction.
The Orb - Tony Campbell - Tony Campbell wrote After the War which appeared in Horrors Beyond. I liked that story well enough but it didn't knock my socks off. That impression is confirmed in The Orb, which is also OK but doesn't stand up to the best in this anthology. A Miskatonic Unversity librarian's father has to match wits with the Hounds of Tindalos and Nyalathotep.
The Nether Collection - Cody Goodfellow - After the absorbing Cahokia in Horrors Beyond and the unreasonably entertaining To Skin a Dead Man in Hardboiled Cthulhu, and his sensational novels Radiant Dawn and Ravenous Dusk, Mr. Goodfellow can basically do no wrong. This was a change of pace, being a story of Harry Houdini and Lovecraftian ghouls. What can I say, I really liked it.
Worms - Pat Harrigan - This was a fascinating story by an author I never encountered before. It chronicles the rise of a man from office drone to fanatical rabble rouser, with terrific Lovecraftian touches scattered throughout. I loved that more subtle touches were used as opposed to the usual rub your face in the fact that there's a mythos out there.
They Thrive in Darkness - Ron Shiflet - With Unfinished Business in Hardboiled Cthulhu Mr. Shiflet now has two tales of Pickman and his ghouls in print. While I enjoyed the story, I confess to liking Unfinished Business better.
What Sorrows May Come - Lee Clark Zumpe - Mr. Zumpe wrote The Breach, a terrific story in Horrors Beyond, and has a few stories in mythos magazines. This effort was OK, sort of a reanimation tale with a protective ghost thrown in. I liked the prose but the story left me flat; I didn't dislike it, there was just better stuff here.
Arkham Pets - James Ambuehl - This very brief story by the ubiquitous Mr. Ambuehl concerned a boy who finds some crawly things in an Arkham swamp and decides to bring them home. Complications ensue. I found this amusing and diverting.
Small Ghost - Michael Minnis - Mr. Minnis is very productive. Recently we've had A Little Color in Your Cheeks in Horrors Beyond (mostly good) The Prodigies of Monkfield Cabot in Eldritch Blue (OK), Salt Air (superb) in Dead But Dreaming and The Butcher of Vyones (great) Lost Worlds of Space and Time #1. Small Ghost was terrific, maybe the highlight of Arkham Tales. It was about Brown Jenkin, the rat-like witch's familiar and someone with the health department.
Burnt Tea - Michael Dziesinski- I already mentioned my problem with the typos. Otherwise this was a very nifty work by an author I never encountered before, about the Hounds of Tindalos and Japanese tea ceremonies in the 1920s.
Arkham Rain - John Goodrich - Mr. Goodrich is active on the mythos scene but I don't recall seeing his work before. I'll have to remedy that! Arkham Rain was a terrific story about the Innsmouth taint visiting an unwitting family. An old mythos trope? You bet! But this was a wonderfully original take.
Regrowth - David Conyers - I'm a big David Conyers fan. He is becoming well published in almost all the newer mythos anthologies. This story has some thematic similarity to False Containment in Horrors Beyond, and deals with unnatural melding of disparate species. Being a Conyers yarn it was a darn good read, although I've liked other stories by him better.
The Idea of Fear - CJ Henderson - We, of course, did need a hard boiled PI story in this book! Who better to do it than the masterful CJ Henderson? But this story was refreshingly different; the ending will catch you by surprise, as a PI and a medium try to find a ghost.
Disconnected - Brian Sammons - Mr. Sammons can also do no wrong, especially after One Way Conversation in Horrors Beyond. This is another winner. It is about the Mi-Go and Yuggoth, and a PI tracking down a missing relative. But like everything else by Brian Sammons, do not expect the usual mythos conventions or story format.
The Lady in the Grove - Scott Lette - Yet another new author to me and yet another auspicious introduction! An Irish enforcer is sent to Arkham to provide a little muscle for an MU professor.
On Leave in Arkham - Bill Bilstad - Ditto the above. This story has a complex construction with rapidly switching time frames and viewpoints, about WWI veteran/murderer. Very worthwhile read.
Geometry of the Soul - Jason Andrew - Also a new author to me, Mr. Andrew's story was only OK, about a MU expedition that goes horribly awry. The initial few pages in the Arkham sanitarium were much better for me than the last few pages.
So in summary, this is a terrific book of all brand new fiction. Even the stories that aren't the best are pretty good, and the best stories are first rate. The price is low and the page count is generous. Many of these authors are new on the scene and the rest are among the hot new mythos talents. Don't try to choose between it and Hard Boiled Cthulhu; order both of them discounted from Amazon! Together they are still less than Weird Shadows Over Innsmouth. Mythos fans should not hesitate.
Average customer rating:
- RPG
- Perfect roleplaying game for over 30's!
- d100
- A great book / supplement...
- Fun Evening
|
Call of Cthulhu: Horror Roleplaying in the Worlds of H. P. Lovecraft, 6th Edition
Sandy Petersen , and
Lynn Willis
Manufacturer: Chaosium
ProductGroup: Book
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Shadows of Yog-Sothoth: A Global Campaign to Save Mankind (Call of Cthulhu Horror Roleplaying)
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The Keeper's Companion: Blasphemous Knowledge, Forbidden Secrets: A Core Book for Keepers, Vol. 1 (Call of Cthulhu Horror Roleplaying, #2388)
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Malleus Monstrorum: Creatures, Gods, & Forbidden Knowledge: Roleplaying Game Guide (Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying Game)
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Miskatonic University: A Sourcebook (Call of Cthulhu Horror Roleplaying)
ASIN: 1568821816 |
Product Description
CALL OF CTHULHU is Chaosium's classic roleplaying game of Lovecraftian horror in which ordinary people are confronted by the terrifying and alien forces of the Cthulhu Mythos. CALL OF CTHULHU uses Chaosium's Basic Roleplaying System, easy to learn and quick to play. This bestseller has won dozens of game-industry awards and is a member of the Academy of Adventure Game Design Hall of Fame. In 2001 CALL OF CTHULHU celebrated its 20th anniversary. In 2003 CALL OF CTHULHU was voted the #1 Gothic/Horror RPG of all time by the Gaming Report.com community. CALL OF CTHULHU is well-supported by an ever-growing line of high quality game supplements. This is the softcover 6th edition of this classic horror game, completely compatible with all of previous editions and supplements for CALL OF CTHULHU. This is a complete roleplaying game in one volume. All you need to play is this book, some dice, imagination, and your friends.
Customer Reviews:
RPG.......2007-09-03
Become an investigator, and soon realise that the most important thing in the world is trying to hang on to your sanity. Avoiding being
destroyed by creeping monsters and crazed cultists, is good, too, but a quick axe murder might be preferable in some cases to a life and existence of crazed, terrified insanity.
Perfect roleplaying game for over 30's!.......2007-08-08
It's been a good 20 years since I've played a roleplaying game, and was reluctant to go back to hacking up Orcs with a +2 Broadsword.
After some research I learnt about Cthulhu. Unsure of whether to use the original rulebook ( this one ) or the revised (controversial) D20 version, I proceeded to warm my credit card and get both ( the d20 out-of-print version costing double the cost of this book ).
The d20 book arrived first, and I was quite disappointed. The artwork was juvenile, the game system over complicated. There's just something about adding up endless numbers and then rolling a 20-sided dice that is just, well, uncompelling. The d20 version also has none of the 1920's theme that (for me) was half the movie.
Two weeks later, this book arrived. Call me old fashioned, but what a treat. Emotive, moody black and white illustrations,numberous Lovecraft quotes(even the full Cthulhu short story), and straightforward game system that appeals to an adult that doesn't have time for convoluted bollocks.
The writing style is both simple, engaging and quite tongue in cheek.
Even if you never plan to drag your married friends around a table and force them to roll funny little dice, the book holds up as beautifully realized tribute to Lovecraft and pulp supernatural horror.
I now understand what all the fuss was about between d20 and the original.
Sandy's version wins. Hands down.
PS. mint condition d20 cthulhu rulebook for sale :)
d100.......2007-07-25
This is the old system based on d100 for skills. The rules are easy to understand, enough examples are included and not too much as to make it tedious. The book was inspiring.
A great book / supplement..........2007-02-17
If you have an interest in the Cthulhu Mythos, even if you don't roleplay, you're going to love this book. It's worth buying just for the three story scenarios in the back. They are impeccably written, and more atmospheric than most of the Lovecraft pastiche you see floating around now days.
Fun Evening.......2006-12-15
A gamer friend introduced our social group to this game about a year ago. Many people think these games are just for kids. They aren't. We are 30 something to 50 something in age and we had a great time working together to solve our "case." If you have never played one of these role playing games, they aren't all about weapons and fighting. Yes there are monsters to deal with but this series is ripe with 1920's ambiance that makes the characters fun to play. This rule book contains several adventures to get you started and from there you can choose other scenerio's like San Franciso or New York during the same time period. Share the fun with friends and a good bottle of wine. You won't be disappointed.
Average customer rating:
- Pagan Does it Again!
- Not Receive
- A CoC supplement that kicks ... and takes names...
- An essential supplement for Call of Cthulhu!
- Just what I wanted
|
Delta Green: Countdown (Call of Cthulhu Horror Roleplaying, Modern Era)
Dennis Detwiller ,
Adam S. Glancy , and
John Tynes
Manufacturer: Pagan Publishing
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Delta Green (Call of Cthulhu D20)
ASIN: 1887797122 |
Book Description
Delta Green: Countdown is a supplement of the Role Playing Game Call of Cthulhu. It is a sequel to the award winning Delta Green supplement and expands that campaign setting into the realm of the international. It includes seven new modern organizations with an interest in the Cthulhu Mythos, three new scenarios and a wealth of appendices.
Customer Reviews:
Pagan Does it Again!.......2005-11-30
If Delta Green is the Best RPG suppliment ever, then this is Number 2. You get more bang for the buck out of this book for $40 than you do in 4 $20 books. It's very well written and is a great read as well. It is how a RPG SHOULD be written.
If you're a Call of Cthulhu gamer, then this book is a MUST! If you like horror, X-Files, etc...then check it out.
Not Receive.......2005-09-30
This product is awesome, but i don't receive form amazon, i buy from others sellers because the delay of order.
This order be canceled.
A CoC supplement that kicks ... and takes names..........2002-02-25
Well worth the seemingly hefty price. In addition to containing source material that benefits *any* modern-day game (e.g. details on international law-enforcement agencies), it includes expansions on things alluded to in the main Delta Green book, such as the Army of the Third Eye, and new icky horrors like the Skoptsi.
There is also wonderful information on ghoul society and on the "King in Yellow"/Hastur mythos, concluding with "Night Floors," which is in my opinion one of the best damn adventures ever written.
An essential supplement for Call of Cthulhu!.......2001-06-11
If you already have Delta Green, Countdown should be your next purchase (if you don't have Delta Green, BUY IT!!!). Countdown adds write-ups for PISCES (Britain), GRU SV-8 (Russia), The Skoptsi, The Outlook Group, Phenomen-X, Keepers of the Faith (Ghouls), and a new look at The Hastur Mythos. Add rules for the Gift (Psychic Powers) and international templates from all over the world and you have a book that would be cheap at twice the price!!
Pagan Publishing has done it again!!!
Just what I wanted.......2000-08-31
After getting and reading the Delta Green book, I was very impressed, but left wanting more. The main DG book has a lot of detail, but it's scope is a bit limited - the main adversaries available are MJ-12, the Karotechia, the Fate, the Mi-Go, and that's about it. There is a lot of terrific, well-researched info on these four, but I wanted more options. More options is what Countdown provides. The bulk of the large book is taken up by thorough, detailed descriptions of more organizations, much like the ones in the original book. These add a wealth of additional details and possibilities to the game world. If you're going to run a DG game, you definitely want to have this book!
Book Description
Some of the finest horror stories ever written. Arthur Machen had a profound impact upon H.P. Lovecraft and the group of stories that would later become known as the Cthulhu Mythos. This first volume of Chaosium's Arthur Machen collection begins with the chilling "The Three Impostors" in its complete form, including the rarely seen sections "The Decorative Imagination" and "The Novel of the Iron Maid." Rounding out the first volume are "The Great God Pan," "The Inmost Light," and "The Shining Pyramid," all are excellent tales. Introduction by S.T. Joshi.
This book is part of an expanding collection of Cthulhu Mythos horror fiction and related topics. Call of Cthulhu fiction focuses on single entities, concepts, or authors significant to readers and fans of H.P. Lovecraft.
Customer Reviews:
More chilling than gore.......2006-08-03
This review is only about the title story, or rather, short novel. It is a circular story, as it ends where it begins. Characters have multiple identities and strange coincidences abound. It is a macabre joke, a foundational book of the cosmic horror a la Lovecraft and his Ctulhu mysteries. It is also a peak of the late Victorian era and much more. What makes it more than a genre story is the poetic quality of its literature. There are paragraphs that would make little perfect prose poems.
Along several months, or years, Dyson and Phillips meet different persons, who have in common the search for a shy and nervous young man with a little black moustache and big spectacles. Each one of these persons tells his or her story in inserted chilling tales, full of the imagery that would later become cliche. This is no cheap horror: it has a great sense of humor, it is not about axe-grinding nor about phantoms and exorcisms. It is pure cosmic horror, the horror of hidden forces and obscure memories of a remote past. It is a horror of strange gatherings and incognoscible conspiracies. The inserted stories are often compiled independently of their contextual frame: "The novel of the Dark Valley" is an adventure in the loneliness of the Rocky Mountains, with a pre-Kafkian touch that makes you go pale. "The novel of the Black Seal" happens in the Welsh wilderness, with a mad scientist and beings from the past. "The novel of the Iron Maiden" includes a collectionist of instruments of torture. "The novel of the White Powder" is about a substance that transforms humans into something indefinible and horrific. Finally, ""The story of the Spectacled Young Man" closes the circle and "explains" everything.
Like a good Englishman, Machen is a master of the understatement. More than showing, he insinuates to let the readers feel for themselves all the weight of the horror of the world, the mysteries that haunt us, and the strangeness of this life. Little surprise, then, that this was one of Jorge Luis Borges's favorite books, since much of his beloved subjects are here: ancient and undecipherable languages; stories lost in time; mirror games; equivocal identities; implacable gods; and somber mansions. Much recommended.
A Bit Dry But Worthwhile.......2005-06-17
Other reviews are longer and more in-depth. This is meant as a quickie.
The title story is the heavy-hitter of this collection; it ties several shorter stories together under one title. The other stories are much shorter but have their twists and turns as well.
The language is not as dry as one might expect from stories written a century ago.
Worth four stars out of five.
Convinced to buy Vol. 2.......2004-05-03
As the title says, I found this collection so intriguing that I will be buying the next volume (The White People and other Tales). The only work that I had previously known by Arthur Machen was "The Great God Pan", which has shown up in so many anthologies that I am thoroughly sick of it, although it is a good read the first few times through. "The Inmost Light" was quite disturbing to me in terms of plumbing the depravity of the human soul. "The Shining Pyramid" was a good supernatural detective story, in my opinion, although the intuitive leaps made by the protagonist would have made Fox Mulder proud. This clearly inspired quite a few of Robert Howard's stories.
Clearly, the crown jewel of this collection is "The Three Imposters." The deeper I got into this novel, the more engrossed I became. It is made up of 14 short stories, each of which is part of an overarching storyline that involves the protagonist, a golden coin, a man with spectacles, and 3 people who are not who they say they are. Each successive short story drew me in further. Some of the best reading I have done in years!
One of the Great Masters of the Macabre.......2003-11-19
Arthur Machen (1863-1947), an English author best known for his eerie stories about supernatural creatures and situations, served as a major influence on later explorers of the macabre. H.P. Lovecraft, for example, cited Machen as an authority and even wrote articles about him on occasion. The introduction to this compilation of some of Machen's best stories, written and edited by S.T. Joshi, underscores the author's ability to shock his Victorian contemporaries, who blasted his works publicly by labeling them obscene. Joshi argues the ridiculousness of this criticism, for Machen actually was an orthodox Anglo-Catholic who presented the concepts of nature as a corrupted influence that only civilization with its strict rules can negate. That's one way to view Machen's work: with a lot of scholarly blather. For most horror fans, it simply does not matter whether this author used horror as a means to support the social status quo. What is important is that Machen wrote cracking good stories that are not only eerie but also inspired future writers in the genre.
The best story in this collection is arguably the first one, "The Great God Pan." This horrific tale boils down to one sublime theme: don't mess with Mother Nature. A doctor performs a brain experiment on a young lady with absolutely horrific results, although the scope of the terror isn't widely known at first. As the story unfolds, we discover that this woman had a physical experience with something beyond our realms of perception, something so bizarre that our frail little minds can barely grasp the implications of such an unholy union. The result is a child, a very special child with a very evil character. This wicked offspring consequently ravages her way through the upper crust of British society, luring men into her clutches and then performing acts on them that cause the dupes to die in a quite terrible manner. There are some clever twists and turns throughout the story, such as bringing one of the doctors present at the beginning of the story back into the plot towards the end, that I quickly realized is a trademark of Machen's writing style. "The Great God Pan," perhaps better than any other story in this collection, shows the influence this author had on Lovecraft and others. Like the author of "The Mountains of Madness," the narrator here only alludes to shocking incidents in an oblique way, leaving it up to the reader to fill in the terrible blanks.
"The Inmost Light" and "The Shining Pyramid," while intriguing in their own ways, do not seem to pack the emotional punch of the "The Great God Pan." One story that does rise to the level of greatness is "The Three Imposters; or, The Transmutations," a sprawling epic that forms the bulk of the book. This is a wonderfully constructed oddity, a larger story built up of numerous interlocking smaller tales that could well stand on their own. Two characters, a Mr. Dyson and a Charles Phillips, encounter three individuals looking for a mysterious man wearing spectacles. The three people tell various stories to one or another of these men, including one set in the American West, a wacky yarn about an overachiever who imbibes a mysterious white powder with horrific results, and "The Novel of the Black Seal," my favorite story by far. In this intense tale concerning our lack of knowledge about the ancient past, a scientist going on retreat to the wilds of Wales mysteriously disappears forever after attempting to prove his theories about a weird little seal inscribed with the most curious markings. Parts of this story read like a mystery novel, as the main character in the story (a female servent/secretary type) discovers the aftermath of weird goings on and attempts to investigate the strangeness. I thought Machen achieved an amazing level of taut pacing with this story, and the conclusion to "The Three Imposters" shows the author bringing together the story in a satisfactory way.
One of the things I liked about Machen's stories is the emphasis he puts on atmosphere and background. Outside of Dickens, I cannot remember reading another author who describes the squalid streets and alleyways of London as well as Machen does. Joshi mentions this in his introduction to the book, but until you actually sit down and read the stories you simply won't grasp the detail Machen offers on every page. Moreover, this hyper atmospheric writing style extends to stories that take place outside the city as well. As anyone who has read horror knows, atmosphere is as important, if not more so, to a story than nearly any other element. With his bleak descriptions of the seedy London byways, Machen elevates horror to new heights.
In fact, all of the stories in this collection achieve greatness in their own unique ways. From what editor Joshi said in the introduction to this book, Machen failed to sustain his career in the long run. His later stories didn't sell well at all and seemed to be mere shadows of his former glories. Fortunately, we still have his creepy gems to read and savor today. If I had to rank Machen in the pantheon of grand horror writers, I would place him on more or less an even keel with Lovecraft but below Algernon Blackwood. But that comparison comes from only having read the few stories in this slim book. Certainly there are still Arthur Machen gems out there I have yet to see, so perhaps his stature will rise even higher in my eyes in the near future. Still, if you like Lovecraft and wish to read similarly themed stories, you need to pick up "The Three Imposters and Other Stories" soon. You won't be disappointed.
A Review of the Three Imposters with a Calumny against Joshi.......2003-04-16
If you're familiar with Machen, you've probably read the frequently anthologized chapters of "The Three Imposters" -- "The Novel of the White Seal" and "The Novel of the Black Powder" -- as stand alone short stories. I found that I appreciate them more after having read them in their original context as chapters or "novels" of this odd picaresque (or maybe arabesque) novel. In "The Three Imposters", these "novels" appear as stories narrated by characters within the main plot. It's an interesting idea. However, the "novels" stand out as better stories than the narrative in which they are imbedded. So I'm not sure it's such a good idea. The book ends with a truly gruesome finish -- even for Machen.
This is definitely a worthwhile read even if you've read the aforementioned novels. As usual, skip Joshi's introduction. For example, Joshi finds the source of Machen's numinous sense of horror in -- surprise! -- Machen's Victorian discomfort with sexuality. Not to mention the fact that he was a Christian, too. Ooh those Christians just hate sex! I suppose we are then to believe that Machen undertook the translation of Casanova's "Memoirs" as some sort of penance, like the protagonist's hair shirt in Machen's "Hill of Dreams". (Machen's "Memoirs" is still the standard translation in English, by the way.) Or could it be the case that Machen was more subtle than the freshman composition caricature of a sexually repressed Victorian Anglo-Catholic Joshi draws in his introduction; that in fact one of Machen's great themes is the reconciliation of sensuality with mysticism? Not surprisingly Joshi, who professes a peculiarly coarse and unreflective variety of atheistic materialism, is blind to this possibility.
Whatever happened to E. F. Bleiler or Lin Carter? (Well, they're dead, sadly. But can't Chaosium and Dover find a better editor for their Weird Fiction?)
Customer Reviews:
Excellent book.......2006-04-21
Denied to the Enemy is excellent - one of the best mythos novels I've read in a long time.0
Independently, for I'm sure the writers of both novels did not read each other's material, Denied to the Enemy ties in, like a glove, to the novel "Other Nations" by T&P Marsh - as if these are two novels written from two disparate views - with the contents in them about both Aquatic races and Yith Race being wholly compatible.
How to ruin a good read.......2005-07-15
What could otherwise have been an entertaining and useful additional to the Delta Green back-story is simply ruined by poor research, obvious stereotyping, and horrendous punctuation ! I know this may seem a bit petty, but it is frankly impossible to lose yourself in the storyline (of the Nazis' search for legendary Thule and the efforts of the Allied OSS to thwart them) when you are constantly being jarred back to reality by basic factual mistakes (Whitby isn't across the Channel from France !) and some pretty poor typos and chronic punctuation.
Don't get me wrong ; I am not sorry I bought and read this book, as its look at the newly formed OSS, the Karotechia and the machinations of the Great Race across time have their place in the otherwise excellent Delta Green "mini-Mythos", but when you are just waiting for the next editorial blunder or slack bit of proof-reading, the whole thing just becomes a chore.
WWII Fiction for Award-Winning DELTA GREEN.......2004-10-28
DELTA GREEN is the modern adaptation of Call of Cthulhu. Drawing on
the same body of UFO lore and paranormal activity as the X-Files, DELTA
GREEN has tapped into something very deep. And of course, once you have
a successful RPG, you might as well start the fiction flowing, right?
Do you trust your government? Would THEY withhold information from the citizenry, information on a plot to colonize humanity, in order to keep society functioning as THEY wish? Is it better to die not knowing what waits in the darkness? DELTA GREEN knows that since 1928 the FBI has had knowledge of an undersea race, implanting their genes into coastal communities, establishing a population of collaborators for the coming invasion. And things only got weirder from there...
"Denied to the Enemy" is a story about Nazis during WW II, and their attempts to use occult powers to further their eugenic agenda. However, a secret cabal has found ancient knowledge, knowledge their Nazi masters cannot be trusted with. Knowledge that falls into the hands of the Allies during a raid to stop the cabal from tapping into the power of the undersea race.
But that's just the beginning. "Denied to the Enemy" is also a story of WWII espionage. Yanks and Brits have to decide how much they can trust each other, and how much of their secrets they can reveal. Each partner has had a glimpse of The Truth, the reality that lies outside the comfortable, sane picture of the universe that humanity collectively constructs. Each side hungers for the knowledge of the other, but worries about the sanity of the other should they, too, know all. An interesting dilemma, no?
But now we get to the meat of the story. "Denied to the Enemy" is a story about a time-traveling race, establishing their own future. However, time is not static; our future turns on a knife's edge, and this time-traveling race must ensure its own survival in the future by carefully orchestrating our own demise in the present. However, one member develops a sense of morals, and decides that it would be more fair if EVERYONE dies (has a certain charm, huh?). The agents are pawns of both sides, but who to trust, if anyone? Changing the future is a dicey business, considering that every moment, the future becomes the past.
But, of course, "Denied to the Enemy" is a story about one man. If all the world's a stage, then there's an audience of one. All of those around us are mere scenery as we wend our way through Time in infinite isolation. The real story, the drama, is the monologue we carry on as we parcel out our measure of time. One man knows his script ahead of time, and that makes all the difference. Does he have the courage to ad-lib his lines? Do any of us, really?
Masterful and Entertaining.......2004-08-26
Simply put, this book is brilliant. The story is well done and clearly the author did considerable research for the Second World War setting. Furthermore, it is a great read, unlike many post-HPL-circle stories. It is a true credit to the Delta Green concept. More, Detwiller's story is so well done it very well could be one of the best post-HPL circle mythos stories around and should be read by not just those interested in the Delta Green concept but anyone interested in Cthulhu Mythos stories.
Suggestion: Read HPL's "Arthur Jermyn" and "The Shadow Out of Time" BEFORE reading this novel. Detwiller mentions his love of and use as building blocks of these stories in the "Author's Note" at the novel's end, which is a shame; his modest "additional layer" to the stories shows all the better if one has read the two HPL tales before reading his novel. (Indeed, it would be nice if all post-HPL-circle stories mentioned in the beginning which stories they built upon.) Also, if you can read Detwiller's short story in the Delta Green: Dark Theatres anthology before, that is all the better. (Not necessary, but beneficial to enjoyment and appreciation of this novel.)
Hopefully, as they are great fun, Armitage House will produce many more Delta Green novels and anthologies, as well as reprint their previous releases (such as the impossible to purchase DG: Alien Intelligence). Again, these books are some of the best post-HPL-circle stories available today and are highly recommended to anyone who enjoys Cthulhu Mythos stories.
Riveting World War II Supernatural Thriller.......2004-06-11
Dennis Detwiller delivers an exciting Cthulhu novel set against the battle for world supremacy in World War II. The fascinating characters and fast-paced plot will keep you hooked until the end. This is an outstanding addition to the Delta Green series which I recommend to both Cthulhu fans and also those who love thrillers and mysteries.
Average customer rating:
- Deep Ones are just the surface
|
Malleus Monstrorum: Creatures, Gods, & Forbidden Knowledge: Roleplaying Game Guide (Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying Game)
Scott David Aniolowski
Manufacturer: Chaosium
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General
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Call of Cthulhu: Horror Roleplaying in the Worlds of H. P. Lovecraft, 6th Edition
-
Miskatonic University: A Sourcebook (Call of Cthulhu Horror Roleplaying)
-
Secrets of San Francisco: A 1920s Sourcebook for the City By the Bay (Call of Cthulhu Horror Roleplaying)
-
The Keeper's Companion 2: Prohibition, Firearms, Tomes, & Creatures (Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying, 2395)
-
The Keeper's Companion: Blasphemous Knowledge, Forbidden Secrets: A Core Book for Keepers, Vol. 1 (Call of Cthulhu Horror Roleplaying, #2388)
ASIN: 1568821794 |
Customer Reviews:
Deep Ones are just the surface.......2007-03-08
of this amazing collection of CoC beasties. I don't play CoC currently, but this book is so useful that it's worth having and converting d20 to CoC is fairly simple.
Average customer rating:
|
Return to Dunwich: Unearthing Ancient Horrors in Rural New England (Call of Cthulhu)
Keith Herber
Manufacturer: Chaosium
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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Herber, Keith
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Willis, Lynn
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ASIN: 0933635710 |
Average customer rating:
- Purchased as a gift.
- The Big Book of Useful Filler
|
The Keeper's Companion: Blasphemous Knowledge, Forbidden Secrets: A Core Book for Keepers, Vol. 1 (Call of Cthulhu Horror Roleplaying, #2388)
Keith Herber , and
William Deitze
Manufacturer: Chaosium, Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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The Keeper's Companion 2: Prohibition, Firearms, Tomes, & Creatures (Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying, 2395)
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Call of Cthulhu: Horror Roleplaying in the Worlds of H. P. Lovecraft, 6th Edition
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H.P. Lovecraft's Arkham: Unveiling the Legend-Haunted City (Call of Cthulhu Horror Roleplaying, Chaosium # 8803)
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ASIN: 1568821441 |
Product Description
The Keeper's Companion vol. 1 is an invaluable resource for Call of Cthulhu keepers. New material includes advice for new keepers, a lengthy study of Mythos artifacts, a learned discussion of many occult books, an up-to-the-moment description of every facet of forensic medicine, a thorough revision and expansion of the game skills (including nearly two dozen new ones), and the augmented text of the Keeper's Compendium, somewhat updated forbidden books, secret cults, alien races, and mysterious places. Additional short essays and features round out this book.
Customer Reviews:
Purchased as a gift........2007-01-15
I got this as a gift for my son-in-law. I have no knowledge of the book itself other than the person for whom it was purchased seems to like it very much. For me it served its purpose very well.
The Big Book of Useful Filler.......2002-03-17
One of the very nice things about the Call of Cthulhu role playing game from Chaosium is that they rarely publish pure junk or something that doesn't have something useful within its pages, somewhere. The Keeper's Companion is just one of those books, yes, it contains material from the main rules and Cthulhu Now, but expands upon it, it is also laid out in a clear fashion that makes finding things easy. The first section, "Good Cthulhu Hunting", is mainly sage advice for players and written with tongue firmly in cheek, but also makes a good deal of sense as a sort of `Dos and Don'ts' section. It is followed by a section for Keepers, a sort of thirteen ways to improve your game. Again, common sense advice for the foolish GM who might have let his investigators keep the repeating laser cannon they found in the last adventure.
Call of Cthulhu is best played, not people who know the genre cold, but rather by novices who understand the mechanics, not the genre. Lovecraft's world is a mundane one, intruded upon by the not-so-mundane, whether it be something relatively minor as an encounter with a solitary Deep One or a sanity-blasting encounter with Yog-Sothoth, the all-in-one god, it is the character's imperiled peace of mind which will be steadily chipped away by the stuff of nightmares and that which mankind is best to ought not know. Players kept in the dark, fed only what they need or discover on their own, are the best players of all.
There follows the advice section, pages on books of the occult, most or all are actual books, some of which can be found on Amazon, but that you would be better of not reading. Exciting sounding tomes like `The Book of the Dead' or the `Golden Bough' are deadly dull and won't do anything except upset your parents and Tipper Gore. However, it is a nice lexicon for GMs who may want to throw non-Mythos books at their players from time to time. Following that is a handy little section on languages, real and Mythos-related, and their origins. It also includes some badly drawn examples of things like Mi-Go runes and R'lyeh glyphs.
The next section is an expanded and detailed listing of those oh-so-wonderful mind melting pages of actual Mythos tomes- those great books that burn through your sanity, but also give you spells your characters can use. It also adds a few new spells and creatures taken from additional stories written by other authors. Next up is Arcane Antiquities, which is basically magic items and happily it bears little or no resemblance to the back of the AD&D Dungeon Master's Guide. Magic items in Call of Cthulhu are extremely rare. There are a couple of mirrors, a dagger, a ring, and a few other odd devices, so don't expect any +4 swords of dimensional shambler slaying.
Let's face it, cults make life interesting. Even in real life cults provide annual entertainment with their suicidal comet worshiping antics. In Call of Cthulhu they are a somewhat less self-destructive and instead are bent on summon up some moldering nightmare to screw with mankind's mojo. Cultists are great fun, both for Keppers and player alike. As bad as it was, the guys resurrecting Imhotep in the The Mummy Returns were great, if comical and somewhat inept, examples of cultists. Cultists can come in any flavor and hardly need to be justified since they're nuts.
Forensics has always been a hobby of mine. One of the aspects of Call of Cthulhu I have always admired is their inclusion of real world details to really give Keepers and players a sense of how it all works. While Cthulhu Now pretty much gives anyone a brief history of forensics, from the first documented coroner inquests in England right up to DNA evidence- it's all here as well in easy to read and understand terms, complete with bibliography. From the ways people die to firearms and drugs, it's all distilled down into a handy reference.
From the mundane we arrive at Alien Races, a collection of beings and their origins from Deep Ones to the fungi from Yuggoth to the Voormis of the Hyperborea, this section gives the reader a little more detail than the standard entries in the creatures section in the main rule book. Next is Mysterious Places and includes Atlantis (bleah!), Hyperborea, unknown Kadath, Lemuria (also bleah!), unfortunately, they only give us a scant three paragraphs on R'lyeh, the sunken city and tomb of Great Cthulhu. Finally, the last section is on Skills, adds some new ones and explains all in great detail.
All in all a welcome addition to my growing Call of Cthulhu collection, a game that I have played for nearly twenty years. I miss the late eighties/early nineties covers and don't much care for the cover art. However, this is a good addition for Keepers who may want to add a little more detail to their campaigns. Like most of Chaosium's publications, it is well researched and exceptionally well written while being very readable, fun and occasionally funny. It may lack detail in some places, and this is probably it's only real flaw- the alien creatures and places section could have had a little more meat in them, but other than that it's a solid addition...
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