Role Playing Games

When last we saw our heroes, they had just been hired by local “businessman” and rather colorfully-dressed elf, Gwindore, to head for the catacombs far above Bone Falls and search for another party of adventurers sent in some weeks ago and who have not reappeared since. Gwindore was willing to pay them 10 keys each with another 5 keys per adventurer found alive. Cuthmar had still not appeared after the party lost him in the tunnels outside Bone Falls days ago, and now Celiophane had also gone missing, but intent on making a fast fortune, Sherman and Eirik set on their way.

In recent years, we’ve seen a lot of early RPGs, such as Traveller and Runequest, resurrected in new editions with cleaner rules and more modern presentations which, for the most part, have retained the original feel of the game. Chivalry & Sorcery has seen several editions over the years, the last almost 20 years ago in 2000 (not counting the 2011 “Essence” release which was only 44 pages). Now, following a successful Kickstarter, a new 5th Edition has returned at a whopping 602 pages.

When we first met our heroes, they were already well on the way to making a name for themselves. Sherman, Cuthmar, Eirik and Celiophane had taken on the task of rescuing a local merchant’s daughter from a band of marauding goblins, tracked the goblins to their cave-lair and fought their way to the goblin shaman who was about to make a blood sacrifice of the young girl. They figured they’d won, but with his dying breath the shaman uttered a dire curse.

The Star Trek Adventures: Command Division sourcebook introduced stats for new ships from Star Trek canon, many of which have either never been seen or seen only rarely on-screen. Among them is the Norway Class, which was designed by the Advanced Starship Design Bureau for rapid emergency response. So, what’s it like being on the crew of one of these ships, what adventures can you have and how do you handle them?

The Command Division sourcebook for Star Trek Adventures includes, almost hidden away in the Federation Small Craft chapter, the details of the Federation Attack Fighter, also called the Zabathu1 class (after an Andorian riding animal). This is really the first reference in the rules made to any sort of fighter class ship and, to be sure, such craft are rarely seen in Star Trek itself. Most ship battles on screen are between two or more capital ships which make up the vast majority of any faction’s fleet.