Fairyland
This is a booklet scenario that is very similar to the thin "bookmark" format that Graham Walmsey has used for some of his self-published scenarios. I was pretty sold on the premise/pitch for the scenario: Victorian Fairies meet the Cthulhu Mythos but having had a quick read through it seems to have a few problems.
It has the problem that James Raggi was complaining about in Monolith Beyond Space and Time of very quickly hitting the Cthulhu brand names rather than the concerns of the Mythos. Packaging the engaging concept into a very established pattern sucks all the excitement out of things.
The game focuses on the parents of a young girl, which is a brilliant premise but then seems to progress as if this will be a standard party game of about five players and spends some time on while all these new arrivals will turn up at remote Scottish village at the same time. I think it would have been better to focus on the three player set up and make that sing.
One really interesting thing it does is to highlight text with an iconography that indicates the mechanical aspects of the scenario. This helps it wear its system agnosticism well and is actually a really subtle but effective way of conveying additional information without disrupting the flow of the text. This seems an innovation that is worth stealing.
It has the problem that James Raggi was complaining about in Monolith Beyond Space and Time of very quickly hitting the Cthulhu brand names rather than the concerns of the Mythos. Packaging the engaging concept into a very established pattern sucks all the excitement out of things.
The game focuses on the parents of a young girl, which is a brilliant premise but then seems to progress as if this will be a standard party game of about five players and spends some time on while all these new arrivals will turn up at remote Scottish village at the same time. I think it would have been better to focus on the three player set up and make that sing.
One really interesting thing it does is to highlight text with an iconography that indicates the mechanical aspects of the scenario. This helps it wear its system agnosticism well and is actually a really subtle but effective way of conveying additional information without disrupting the flow of the text. This seems an innovation that is worth stealing.
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