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Kevin H.
United States
Crescent City
California
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Welcome to the first of what is hopefully a series of short capsule reviews of material and scenarios for the Call of Cthulhu RPG.
N.B. #1: My personal preference is for the FUDGE scale in most of reviews and ratings in lieu of a 5-star or 1-10 scale. For those who are unfamiliar with it, it is, from best to worst:
Superb
Great
Good
Fair
Mediocre
Poor
Terrible
N.B. #2: This is also a "semi-review;" I have not played these scenarios either as an Investigator or a Keeper.
N.B. #3: I'll try to keep the spoilers to a minimum, but needless to say, if you intend to play in one of these scenarios stop reading now.
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This is Chaosium's Miskatonic University Library Association Monograph #0346, Farewell, My Sanity, originally published in 2007. The MULA books are limited print run, rough-draft style releases from Chaosium. Their purpose is threefold: one, to test the market on a limited basis to see if there is demand for a wider release; two, to allow authors a quick path to publication in the hobby; three, to save Chaosium money on editing, typesetting, art, etc.
The good news is that you can get more unusual material, or that with limited mainstream appeal, than you would otherwise. The downside is that this is often little more than a step above self-publishing, and they are often expensive compared to what you get. Farewell, My Sanity is $20 for 120pp of material; however in this case the quality is excellent and I feel it is a decent value for the money.
Content-wise, this contains two excellent, solid scenarios that really capture the feel of both CoC as well as Los Angeles.
"Under The Boardwalk", by Aaron Vanek, 26pp.
Setting: Classic. Los Angeles/Venice, 15-Dec-1920.
Adaptability to other places: Poor. Much of this is based around LA and derives its sense of history and atmosphere from that city. Many of the NPCs are Mexican-American and would not work as well outside of Southern California, or at least the southwest. It could possibly go to Coney Island but would require rewriting of almost everything outside of the basic plot sketch.
Adaptability to other eras: Terrible. Gaslight is just nonsensical; modern-era Venice Beach is just as nonsensical but for totally different reasons.
Suitability for campaign play: Good. Assumes the PCs are members of a detective agency; pregens are included but any setup where the PCs in LA and for hire will be fine.
Likelihood of PC survival: Good to Mediocre, depending on their choices.
Final Rating: Good. A nice use of actual historical background tied into the plot in clever ways that give some surprises. A standard threat is given a good twist in their use of the environment. Several excellent set pieces provide some memorable showdowns at various points.
"An Enchanted Evening", also by Aaron Vanek, 31pp.
Setting: Classic. Los Angeles/Catalina Island, 16-Aug-1923.
Adaptability to other places: Good. The LA angle is well-researched but the plot does not depend on it quite so much.
Adaptability to other eras: Mediocre. You'd have to change a few things here and there but it could easily go Gaslight or Modern without serious modification to the plot. Major NPCs would need rewriting.
Suitability for campaign play: Good. As above.
Likelihood of PC survival: Superb to Terrible, depending on their choices.
Final Rating: Good. A somewhat standard trope done well.
OVERALL RATING: Great!
Vanek really gets both CoC and Los Angeles. Both of these are really well-done scenarios that made me want to run both after reading them. The writing is quite good; several negligible typos but nothing that really detracts.
The historical angle is phenomenally well-researched here; all relevant places, times, etc. are explained in loving detail that gets to the heart of the issue without going into too much detail (for the most part). The caveat there is because at times the historical background felt a little like padding; however it is easy enough to skip over. Non-Angelenos and foreign players will no doubt appreciate the detail, especially if they want to represent the real LA (i.e., most people don't actually work in the film industry or even care about it that much, especially in 1923).
The premade characters, both PCs and NPCs, are fully realized and manage to strike that difficult balance between having strong, recognizable personalities but not going so far as to be walking, two-dimensional stereotypes.
The art is adequate to excellent -- this is a MULA monograph, so top-notch commissioned art is not the standard here. The cover art and character portraits are acceptable, but what really takes this book to the next level is its abundance of period photographs of LA, Venice Beach, and Catalina. With so many of these in the public domain now, it would be easy for artists/authors to find many different suitable pictures. As photos often convey the sense of place much better than a handful of line drawings, I would love for this to become a trend in the MULA line.
Graphic design is a bit of a mish-mash. It's mostly pedestrian and straightforward -- not in a bad way per se, just not exciting. One questionable choice is splitting up long sections of background information over multiple non-adjacent pages. E.g.:
p38: scenario material.
p39: historical background on Catalina Island (1/2).
p40: scenario material.
p41: historical background on Catalina Island (2/2).
p42: scenario material.
...etc.
This is very jarring to read and a better layout would make things flow better.
The handouts are adequate and certainly get the job done, with the exception of the art pieces which are quite good and well-executed (one of the NPCs is an artist and leaves some art-based clues lying around). Unfortunately you cannot get any of them from Chaosium's download page, so you must photocopy them out of the book and possibly damage the binding, or pay extra for the PDF of the monograph.
In conclusion this is one of the best monographs out there for scenarios, and Mr. Vanek has really done a stellar job. I hope this gets picked up for a wider official release from Chaosium and I look forward to more of Mr. Vanek's work.
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James Lowry
United States
Sunnyvale
California
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Quote: Farewell, My Sanity is $20 for 120pp of material;
Actually, that sounds reasonable. However, from the rest of the review, I get the idea it is actually ~58 pages....
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Kevin H.
United States
Crescent City
California
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The rest is handouts and a page or two of ads.
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