Watch Well Games #59
Cubicle 7’s and its Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay takes the spotlight in this newsletter.
Welcome to our newsletter!
Hi. I’m K.J.
Today we offer you a load of entertaining reading material that focuses primarily on one of our favorite RPG publishers - Cubicle 7. Guest writer Warren Davidson gives us a sneak peek into the Warhammer the Old World Roleplaying Game Player’s Guide. K.J. shares her interview with WFRP Producer Pádraig Murphy. So grab your favorite drink and get cozy for a good read.
What’s Up, K.J.?
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Review: Warhammer the Old World Roleplaying Game Player’s Guide
by Warren Davidson (aka Wazza)
Warhammer roleplay’s illustrious history stretches back 40 years and has been extensively played and refined through several editions. It’s the de facto dark fantasy game whose world setting is second to none, where heroes fight chaos with the promise of a quick brutal death, a stark reality.
I was pleasantly surprised to hear about Cubicle 7 releasing a new Warhammer RPG with an impressive lineup of future releases scheduled for early next year which you can view on their website. They kindly provided me with a review copy. You can pre-order the Players Guide directly from Cubicle 7 for $49.99 and will receive an instant pdf download from their website or DriveThruRPG, its 192 pages are full colour, lavishly illustrated and presented in a clean and readable format. So let's begin.
Introduction
This presents the world’s current state of affairs and it’s a grim one. The Old World’s mighty empire is corrupt and beset on all sides by power hungry nobles, servants of the ruinous powers and the depraved forces of chaos. While their impotent leaders engage in petty political ambitions the ordinary folk turn to your heroes for protection in these dark times.
Character Creation
The longest chapter at 54 pages, begins with the basic game mechanics, which forgo the 1d100 resolution system of its predecessors in favour of an innovative dice pool.
Creating your hero begins with choosing a race: Human (Bretonnian and Empire), Dwarf, Halfling, High Elf and Wood Elf, There’s a useful two-page spread on how to read and fill-in your heroes character sheet followed by a full page description of each races history and how the other view them. Origin option tables give random benefits before we dive into careers.
Warhammer pioneered the concept of careers, fleshing out your characters past and making each hero unique and compelling to play. Why play a simple fighter or rogue when you can play a Bounty Hunter or a Rat Catcher! There are a total of thirty careers to choose from, each one beautifully illustrated and given a colorful description. Your Career determines your starting Skills, Lores, trappings, Talents Status, and contacts and it's great to see the Rat Catcher there after all this time!
Next choose two NPC contacts hailing from the extremes of great and the good, common folk, comrades in arms and wastrels and wanderers who can be close friends or bitter rivals. And finally you receive a few assets and determine your appearance, demeanor, foibles and your relationship to the other party members.
All this means you create a believable and well-rounded character and is ideal for players new to the hobby.
Abilities
What your character can do is determined by their characteristics, Skills, Talents, Lores and Status. Each of the ten Characteristics has two Skills associated with it, in the case of Strength it’s Brawn and Toil. Every one is detailed with suggested complications from failure and extra effects for exceptional success.
Talents provide your character with permanent benefits. Choose Battlefield Musician to lead your allies into battle with an awe-inspiring song. Some have prerequisites before you can choose them. There’s a wide variety on offer with my favourites being: Familiar, bind an arcane pet to your will, bestow the babbler gift, and they’ll never shut up! And seek the Holy Grail with Questing Vow.
Lores are academic achievements from accountancy to the sepulchral habitats of the Undead and broken down by field: Cultural, Enemies, Environmental, Magical and Trade. Only in stressful situations will a test be required to remember something important otherwise a general knowledge of the subject is assumed.
Equipment
Every Player's favorite chapter and this doesn’t disappoint with a cornucopia of weapons, armour, tools, services, mounts and vehicles. Warhammer may have been one of the first RPGs to introduce black powder weapons and there’s a nice variety of long ranged mayhem on offer here. If you prefer to get up close and personal you’re covered too. Almost every weapon has a trait providing an additional benefit in combat.
Rules
Roll a pool of d10s equal to your characteristic then roll equal to or under the value of the associated skill on each die. So if you have a Weapon Skill characteristic of 5 and a Melee skill of 4, you roll 5d10, with each result of a 4 or less a success, succinct and simple. The chapter then expounds upon them with opposed tests, time critical tests, and how fate can affect the game. Combat is narrative with positioning unnecessary, rather zones determine where you are and whether you can hit your target. This speeds things up considerably allowing you to focus on the drama of combat. Combat is swift, brutal and short, with a few good hits downing the toughest hero. Mounted and vehicular combat get in on the action too. We finish with investigation, exploration and social encounters.
Between Adventures
Rather than improvise downtime activities heroes can undertake endeavours, want to speculate to accumulate? Choose the invest endeavour. Need a new spell? Memorise Spell is the answer. They’ll provide a fun diversion between adventures.
Religion & Belief
Everyone reveres one God or another in the old world and each one is described along with their dogma, prove your devotion to be rewarded divine favours and prayers.
Magic in the Old World
Potent and feared, magic is separated into winds of eight distinct colours with wizards manipulating them to cast spells. There’s Battle Magic, Elementalism, Illusion and Necromancy, each with a good selection of spells.
The Old World
The final chapter describes the Old World and The Empire, the powers that be and important lands, cities and towns, with the dismal port of Talagaad expanded upon making a great campaign starting point.
Final Verdict
An impressive player’s guide with a strong underlying game system, both new and experienced players will have a lot of fun with this.
Interview: Cubicle 7’s WFRP Producer Pádraig Murphy
by K.J. Montgomery
Pádraig Murphy, Cubicle 7’s Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay producer, graciously took time out of his busy schedule to answer K.J.’s burning questions.
K.J.: What is coming next for the Old World RPG? Anything extra you can share with the audience awaiting to see this release?
Pádraig: Not just yet, but you can expect to see us explore some new areas of the World of Legend, perhaps even some seen rarely, maybe never, in a previous TTRPG!
K.J.: What's next for Imperium Maledictum?
Pádraig: Yes, we’re looking forward to a new adventure book, followed by a new two-book expansion in the same vein as the Inquisition Player’s and GM’s Guides. This one will explore the Adeptus Mechanicus in detail, which we think people will enjoy! We’ll have lots of new augmetics, new options for players looking to portray Tech-Priests or cybernetic warriors of the Cult Mechanicus, and lots of exciting tech heresy and archaeotech marvels for GMs to spin exciting adventures around.
K.J.: Any update on plans for Warhammer fantasy roleplay? The up and coming release of Sea Wardens of Cothique gives GMs info on the High Elves. Do you plan to do a similar two book thing (one for players, one for GMs) for the Wood Elves?
Pádraig: That would be cool, but it’s probably not the very next release. We’ll be returning to an old favourite shortly, I believe, with lots more planned for the line after that.
K.J.: C7 has a great habit of releasing really good PDF-only content. Are there any imminent PDF-only releases planned for any or all of the above?
Pádraig: Well, thank you! We’ve tried to be careful with what we release in PDF only and what ends up in books. We have some Warhammer: the Old World Roleplaying Game PDF only content on the way, as it’s usually quicker to get into people's hands than a book.
K.J.: Is there any news you can share regarding the planned 40k Horus Heresy RPG?
Pádraig: Other than we’re very excited, not too much just now. It’s on its way to pre-order relatively soon (I leave it as an exercise for your readers to determine what constitutes soon) and we’re really looking forward to it. In many ways, it’s the antithesis of something like Imperium Maledictum, as rather than being servants of a great power, you are incredibly powerful individuals in your own right, with an entire warfleet at your disposal. Of course, that’s exceeded many times over by the forces arrayed against you, but it does make for a very exciting game.
K.J.: Switching gears, what led to the decision to go from using d100 in The Laundry RPG 1e to a pool of d6s in the second edition of the game? (I’m a fan of both dice mechanics, so I’m very interested in knowing!)
Pádraig: Partially it was to work with a system we’d become very familiar with, and partially to allow for future expansions if there is demand for them. The d100 system is great for scrappy occult investigations, but when it comes to depicting some of the events shown later in the series, the D6 system gives us some more flexibility. This isn’t to say you can’t do wonderful things with a d100, but some combinations felt more natural to us.
K.J.: What's been the most rewarding aspect of being in the tabletop RPG industry? What's been the more uncomfortable or challenging bits?
Pádraig: I have met the same father and son duo in Nottingham at several different game launches/previews, and I often think of them when asked questions like this. I love meeting the fans and hearing the stories they’ve been able to tell in our games. I had so many fantastic moments in RPGs over the years, and I love being able to help other people have similar moments. That’s by far the most rewarding aspect, though it has also been wonderful working with so many dedicated and frankly fanatical people, both at C7 and our partners at Games Workshop and elsewhere.
The second part of your question is tougher — it’s probably dealing with the reality of letting down at least some fans at least some of the time. It’s sort of unavoidable; we can never be as quick or as all-encompassing as we might like to be, or to have as many releases on as many platforms, but we try! But 99.9% of people are wonderful and understanding, so it’s all quite manageable.
K.J.: If you were to go back in time and tell a younger you a bit of insight from where you are right now in the game industry, what would you say?
Pádraig: My younger self would lose his mind to know he’d one day be working on this stuff. I’d probably tell him not to be ashamed of his passions, and name every single model in that Blood Angel army if he really wants to. I say the same thing to my own kids. Er, about embracing their passions, not necessarily about naming Blood Angels!
K.J.: What encouragement or advice would you give someone looking to get into the tabletop RPG industry right now?
Pádraig: If you want to work in the industry, discipline is as important as creativity. I’d also say that playing games with your friends is wonderful in its own right, and not to be afraid to put as much effort as they want into creating things for an audience of four as you might for four thousand. Also, send us your CV! jobs@cubicle7games.com
K.J.: Describe Cubicle 7 in 10 words or less.
Pádraig: Passionate, creator-led company making games we’d like to play! If you start with ‘passionate’, I think that’s ten words ;-)
K.J.: How often do any of you senior producers personally run or play tabletop RPGs just for fun?
Pádraig: Not nearly as often as I’d like, but I think most of us have some kind of weekly or bi-weekly game going. I have two small kids though, so I’m probably running more games than the average father in my position!
K.J.: Bonus question: Any updates for fans eagerly awaiting the Marienburg book?
Pádraig: I have seen the future and it includes a really wonderful rendering of a coat of arms with a mermaid on it ;-)
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