| Call of Cthulhu (d20) By Monte Cook and John Tynes Cost: $39.95 Overall score: 6 of 10 When converting a game from one system to another, anything could happen. Most often games lose something in translation. Whether or not the d20 Cthulhu is true to the original game is something I can�t assess since I never played the original game. I have read almost all of Lovecraft�s work though so I can say that the system is capable of properly describing his world (since 95% is the work of the DM not the system, the other 5% being how the investigators go squish). Additionally if you are one of the DM�s who likes to transplant terrors from beyond or want some appropriate creates for the Far Realm this book has some stuff to offer. Chapters one through three detail aspects of character creation. The game uses the standard six attributes, skill system and feats. Characters do not a have a class only a template for skill selection. Characters are fairly weak with only 6 hit points to start and no attack bonus. Thus just because a character has a shotgun doesn�t mean he should be cocky, even his foe is another human. There are new feats for use with firearms as well as psychic feats, which allow a character all sorts of powers at the expense of his sanity. Without the sanity cost and the lack of supernatural abilities amongst the investigators these feats would probably be too powerful but as is they are almost a liability. Chapter four covers sanity, which is based off of Wisdom and can range from 99 (minus ranks in Cthulhu Mythos) to �10 (or permanent insanity). There are some rules to keep PCs from going off the deep end from encountering corpses too much in one day but still those who venture into the unknown will probably become at least temporarily insane eventually. There are a variety of ways to recover sanity but they tend to be less effective than the forms of losing it. Chapters five and six deal with combat and equipment respectively. Not much new in combat for d20 but the equipment chapter is fairly extensive. The major pieces of equipment discussed are firearms. Dozens of different guns across the 20th century are described. Also described are the laws restricting firearms and a nice talk about how ineffective they typically are against Mythos creatures. Both are things, a smart player or DM should remember. Chapter seven deals with magic: how to get it, what is its horrible cost (sanity and stats), and what bad things it does. The chapter also deals with alien artifacts and those ancient insanity-inducing tomes we love so much. A lot of fun stuff even for a D&D campaign. Chapter eight is the monster manual of Mythos creatures. These range from the merely disturbing to the horribly dangerous. And no, Cthulhu is not listed here (that�s in the appendix). Those looking for creatures to import into their D&D games should remember that most of these creatures should rely on their inhuman intelligence not their claws and fangs (where they might be outclassed by standard monsters). Pretty good critters are the colour out of space (which eats attributes), shoggoths, tcho-tcho (nasty cannibals) and terror from beyond (which exist in other dimensions and eat people who see them). The worm that walks would make a great villain (a creatures made of the worms that ate a wizard and now contains his consciousness). Chapter nine talks about the Cthulhu Mythos and the various ideas inherent to them. It also gives hints on how to go about building that evil cult or monster or horrible family. There is a lot of good advice in here for anyone who wants a Lovecraftian feel to his or her game. Chapters ten and eleven talk about game mastering and building stories. Most of this is pretty basic but there is a lot of detail on maintaining the horror and suspense of the game. Chapter twelve deals with the campaign setting (i.e. where and when in the 20th century) as well as the basic make up of the party. It is nothing spectacular but something to keep in mind. The rest of the book includes two adventures (one with an evil cult, the other using one of my favorite monsters) and the appendix. The adventures are pretty good, both suitable for 1st level adventurers (though if they fight the monsters directly they won�t stand a chance). The appendix though contains rules for converting stuff from this book to D&D as well as giving your D&D game a Lovecraftian feel (complete with sanity). Also as I mentioned earlier, this is where the Great Old Ones are. Any of these would wipe the floor with all but the most powerful of D&D characters. Finally there is a conversion system between the original Call of Cthulhu and the new one. This product contains a great deal of good material with over 300 pages of horrific fun. My only beef with this book is its high price. The book is worth it to those who like Call of Cthulhu but increasingly Wizards is putting out products that aren�t. As a tip to the wise combined with the gods in the back of this book, Oerthian gods article presented Dragon #294, and Wizard�s web enhancement you can skimp on Deities & Demigods ($30) and build your own deity system that is probably almost identical to the standard one. |