jueves, 3 de julio de 2025

Crónica de las jornadas de rol online Runas Net 2025

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Las jornadas de rol online Runas Net 2025 centradas en juegos D100 se celebraron el fin de semana del 6 al 8 de junio. Esta fue su 6.ª edición y tuvo bastante éxito como las anteriores. Si tienes curiosidad, puedes leer la crónica de las ediciones de 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 y 2024. Esta vez también formé parte de la organización de las jornadas junto con Thorkrim y Emod, así que a continuación explico cómo fue eso, además de las partidas que jugué, las charlas en las que participé y la partida de RuneQuest que dirigí.


Algunos de los juegos con sistema D100 que se jugaron en esta edición de las jornadas Runas Net


La organización


Las Runas Net se suelen celebrar en el mes de mayo, pero esta vez hubo que ajustarlas a los calendarios de algunos de los organizadores y nos fuimos al primer fin de semana de junio. Cabe destacar el póster que creó Thorkrim con su habilidad natural para ello, esta vez inspirado en los pósters de películas de ciencia ficción de los años 50. Igual que en la edición de 2024, contamos con la página web para presentar las jornadas y las partidas, aunque el chat común y el contacto con las jornadas se hizo en el Discord de las Runas Net. El sistema de apuntar partidas también funcionó bien en general. En esta ocasión se registraron hasta 26 partidas de juegos con sistema D100, con un total de 63 participantes entre directores y jugadores. Por desgracia, 2 partidas al final se cancelaron antes de las jornadas debido a imprevistos: una de Basic Roleplaying y otra de La llamada de Cthulhu. Otras tres se cancelaron por falta de jugadores y eso siempre nos duele porque sabemos que las personas que las han preparado se han esforzado en ello y también porque nos esforzamos en publicitarlas por Twitter, Bluesky, Youtube, Telegram, Roleplus y Facebook. De todas formas, se jugaron unas 21 partidas con un total de 14-15 juegos distintos. Además, en el mismo finde de las jornadas entraron bastantes jugadores que se pudieron colocar a tiempo. Esta vez nos pusimos las pilas con el vídeo de presentación en Youtube y lo emitimos con suficiente antelación, aunque su repercusión en redes tal vez fue limitada. Puedes verlo aquí donde hablamos de todas las partidas que había en oferta:


Vídeo donde los organizadores explicamos cómo apuntarse y presentamos las partidas disponibles en las jornadas


Como otros años, nos encantó contar con la colaboración de muchas editoriales y otros patrocinadores que aportaron premios para el sorteo final o partidas: 77Mundos, HT Publishers, Shadowlands, El Refugio de Ryhope, Outremer Ediciones, La mazmorra, Juancho Duma, Con pluma y píxel, y Roleplus. También contamos con la colaboración del canal de Youtube de Friki Vetusto y sabios como Mordigan y Antonio Guarás que se prestaron para emitir charlas sobre temas de juegos D100 (ver más abajo).



Las partidas que jugué


Como siempre, se presentaron partidas muy atractivas y dudé mucho a cuáles apuntarme. Me habría gustado jugar la partida «Citoplasma» de Zweihänder dirigida por Terrax porque tenía un planteamiento muy sugerente (por cierto, ahora mismo está el suplemento Main Gauche en mecenazgo). También me habría encantado jugar «El caso del Barón Wilcox» de Los agentes de Baker Street, porque era una oportunidad única de probar este juego que la editorial El Refugio está a punto de sacar. Por otro lado, me atraía mucho probar el juego Far West con la partida «La última bala». Y por supuesto, me moría de ganas de jugar en partidas que dirigieron amigos como: Emod con su «Media luna blanca sobre fondo carmesí» con un Mythras simplificado que prometía ser «un paranoiaso» como dijo él. Thorkrim dirigió una de M-Space que tenía pintaza: «Llamada de auxilio» y Karjedon otra de M-Space sacada del juego basado en la serie The Expanse: «El sueño de los justos». ¡Ojalá las dirijan en otra ocasión! Aun así, no me quejo, porque al final pude jugar nada menos que 3 partidas que me gustaron mucho: «Sick Again» de Delta Green, «Lur Xallac» de Mythras y «Farolas en flor» de Unknown Armies.


El sábado por la noche, después de haber dirigido mi partida de RuneQuest (ver más abajo), me colé en la partida de Cecilia para disfrutar de una historia de investigación y terror al más puro estilo de la serie de TV Expediente X. Tenía muchas ganas de jugar a Delta Green porque sus aventuras han dado mucho que hablar y me encantan las historias cthuloideas situadas en la actualidad. La aventura «Sick Again», se incluye en el libro de módulos Control Group que publica Arc Dream Publishing y que Devir pretende sacar en español (como anuncié en las noticias de abril). Estos módulos están pensados para empezar a jugar a Delta Green, así que los jugadores no necesitan saber nada de esta organización secreta. En este caso, todos los PJ éramos miembros del Centro de Control y Prevención de Enfermedades de los EE.UU. en 2012 (¡mucho antes del COVID!). Entre los 6 personajes a escoger había 3 médicos, 2 microbiólogas y un gestor de proyectos. Nos convocaron con urgencia a un pueblo de Arizona donde había estallado una epidemia extraña y nuestra misión era contenerla e investigar para encontrar una posible cura.


Collage con mi hoja de personaje en la partida, un mapa del hospital y la portada de Control Group


Al principio, Cecilia tuvo problemas técnicos con la plataforma de juego Foundry, así que pasamos de todo y nos apañamos muy bien con las tiradas de dados en Discord y las hojas de personaje editables en PDF. Los jugadores al inicio también nos sentimos bastante inseguros: ¿cómo vamos a saber qué hacer si no somos expertos en epidemias? Pero poco a poco nos fuimos metiendo en el papel y descubrimos pistas cada vez más preocupantes. La sensación de intranquilidad empezó ya al llegar al minúsculo hospital del pueblo, cuando la DJ nos pidió: «Decidme exactamente qué tipo de traje os ponéis». Y es que había cuatro tipos para escoger, cada uno con un mayor nivel de protección contra patógenos, pero también con más desventajas a la hora de moverse y comunicarse. Otro elemento inquietante era la carrera contra el tiempo: cada cuatro horas (en la ficción) se actualizaba una tabla de información donde veías qué pacientes habían pasado a qué fase de la enfermedad... ¡y cuántos habían muerto! Daba yuyu cuando veías que varios médicos y enfermeros estaban en la última fase... En esos intervalos tenías que decir a qué te dedicabas en concreto y hasta podías pasar de dormir si querías para poder hacer más cosas y avanzar más en la investigación, aunque eso iba a tener consecuencias, claro.


Ver la evolución de la parrilla de contagios y muertes te daba una sensación de urgencia y responsabilidad fuertes


Por suerte, los personajes jugadores son profesionales competentes (con buenos porcentajes de habilidad en sus campos) y eso, unido a unas cuantas buenas ideas y suerte con los dados, hizo que fuéramos avanzando en la investigación. Pero no fue nada fácil. Entre los descubrimientos desconcertantes y los acontecimientos imprevistos, todo empezaba a irse de madre por momentos y yo ya no sabía si reír o llorar. La DJ hizo una buena labor porque en esta aventura era muy importante ir cambiando el foco de un PJ a otro, ya que cada uno se dedicaba a una cosa para tratar de ganar tiempo. Recuerdo que en un momento dado, uno de los PJ se encerró a sí mismo en un cuarto de utensilios de limpieza gritando cosas, mientras afuera los médicos corrían de un lado para otro. En otra escena brutal, uno de los PJ se echó en una camilla y le dijo a otro PJ: «tú no te preocupes, hazme [este procedimiento totalmente peligroso - no lo especifico aquí para evitar spoilers] y si me matas, al menos ya sabremos que eso no funciona» (!!!). Mola mucho cuando los personajes comienzan a actuar de forma totalmente desquiciada para un observador casual, pero tú como jugador ves que tiene cierto sentido. Al final lo flipamos cuando fuimos encajando las piezas y terminamos con una sensación de «¡uaaala...!». Además, la DJ nos felicitó por lo bien que lo habíamos hecho y nos contó tras terminar que el módulo te especifica cuántos muertos se producen según lo que hagan los investigadores. Es inquietante, porque te quedas con la sensación de haberlo podido hacer mejor... lo que creo que encaja muy bien con el papel de los expertos en detener epidemias. El epílogo de cada uno de los PJ ya fue la guinda del pastel y mi personaje, aunque acabó mal, por lo menos pudo poner su apellido a una enfermedad desconocida hasta el momento. ;-P


El domingo por la mañana jugué una partida de Mythras dirigida por Albesias. En «Lur Xallac», aventura de la que ha hablado en su blog, nos metimos en la piel de los habitantes de un mundo mágico inspirado por las culturas precolombinas. Me gustó porque, pese a haber dirigido una campaña larga con Mythras, tenía ganas de disfrutarlo como jugador. Además, pude interpretar a Zebe, una bruja en contacto con los espíritus y usar la magia animista, cuyas reglas me molan mucho. Albesias tenía algunas inseguridades con el reglamento, pero en realidad la partida fluyó fenomenal y la disfrutamos mucho. Todo empezó como prisioneros del rey, quien un día nos ofreció la ansiada libertad a cambio de partir en la búsqueda de un objeto sagrado: «la Luna de Imalpuc», perdida en las profundidades de la jungla.


Varios recortes de la información sobre Zebe, mi personaje de Mythras


Tres personajes jugadores: a la bruja Zebe le acompañaba su hijo Jalute y un buen amigo de este. Nos alejamos del palacio y el DJ usó las reglas sencillas de conflictos para determinar cómo sobrevivíamos hasta llegar a la jungla, pero gracias a un montón de éxitos críticos nos fue la mar de bien. Una vez allí, contacté con los espíritus de la naturaleza y les pedí permiso y ayuda para atravesar la foresta, lo que facilitó el proceso de llegar hasta el templo perdido que buscábamos. Los poderes a los que tenía acceso mi PJ molaban mucho y tenía tantos a mi alcance que casi no sabía a qué espíritu invocar. Además, me gustó cómo Albesias describía el entorno y con la música de fondo que puso nos vimos transportados de lleno a su mundo. A la mitad de la partida llegamos a un primer clímax donde descubrimos el pastel y entonces tuvimos que decidir cómo solucionarlo. Barajamos varios planes, con sus ventajas y desventajas, y al final nos decidimos. Hicimos una elipsis brutal en la que tratamos de buscar aliados a lo largo de todo un año y se resolvió fácilmente con varias tiradas de dados.



Albesias prefiere sugerir con descripciones, pero sí nos mostró este cuadro de Henri Rousseau como inspiración


Para terminar, se produjo la gran batalla final donde usamos las reglas de combate de Mythras. Zebe se transformó en jaguar y atacó a uno de los guardaespaldas del rey, mientras Jalute disparaba al monarca y su amigo atizaba al segundo guardaespaldas. Fue genial estar en el centro decisivo de la batalla y usar los efectos de combate más apropiados para la situación. Casi fracasamos, pero en el último momento los dados estuvieron de nuestra parte y pudimos devolver el equilibrio al valle. Es de las pocas aventuras de una sola sesión, tal vez la única, donde he tenido la sensación de haber cubierto más tiempo dentro de la ficción, por lo que fue cómo crear una película épica entre todos. Pero no se vayan todavía... ¡aún quedan partidas por jugar!


El domingo por la tarde pude jugar mi primera partida de Unknown Armies, un juego de ocultismo y magia en el mundo real que tenía muchas ganas de probar. Dirigía Despot, con quien jugué una partida de Cthulhu en las Runas Net de 2024 y éramos 5 jugadores. Aunque en esta partida se pasa de puntillas sobre el reglamento, la trama que componen los 5 personajes es brutal. Hay que ir con mucho cuidado al hablar de este módulo, porque contiene sorpresas que es mejor reservar (pero si te interesa dirigirla, se puede descargar en Sinergia de rol). La partida se sitúa en una tarde de verano en Madrid, en una casa con jardín donde dos parejas de amigos se han reunido para hacer una barbacoa. Una de las parejas son un periodista y una enfermera, y la otra un detective de policía y una escritora de historias de terror. El quinto personaje jugador es un amigo de esta última que aparece algo de improviso. Cada uno de los personajes jugadores tiene información que el resto desconoce, además de opiniones sobre el resto, y una serie de impulsos y miedos en la hoja de personaje que los hace actuar de una forma concreta. Por ejemplo, mi personaje era Jaime: un policía egoísta con un impulso fuerte de defender a las mujeres, pero a la vez un gran miedo a la pérdida de control.


Parte del trasfondo de mi personaje: el policía egoísta. Yo pensaba que tenía secretos, pero en realidad no tenía idea DE NADA.


Me pareció original que las habilidades se presenten como 5 parejas de conceptos opuestos. Por ejemplo, en la pareja Atención-Discreción mi personaje tenía 55% en Atención, lo que le dejaba solo 25% en Discreción. Las dos siempre suman 80% y el máximo-mínimo que puedes tener es 60-20%. Por ejemplo, tenía 60% en Aptitud física, pero eso me dejaba solo 20% en Esquiva. Y luego están los 5 dementómetros que miden lo que tardas en adquirir un síndrometara al acumular sufrimiento en uno de estos campos: impotencia, aislamiento, yo, lo antinatural y violencia. Cada una de las habilidades sirve para infligir «daño» en uno de los dementómetros o contadores de otra persona, y cada una de ellas te ayuda a defenderte de los ataques a uno de tus dementómetros. Por ejemplo, para evitar sufrir daño en «lo antinatural» usas tu habilidad de Conocimientos. Para hacer un símil con La llamada de Cthulhu, es como tener 5 puntuaciones de cordura diferentes según el tipo de agresión que sufras (o inflijas). De hecho, la cordura en Delta Green también funciona casi como uno de estos contadores.


Trozo de la hoja de PJ en inglés con obsesión, impulso noble, miedo, 2 pares de habilidades y 2 dementómetros


La barbacoa empezó bien, con los jugadores improvisando conversaciones anodinas sobre sus vidas y bromeando entre ellos. Poco a poco, el elemento sobrenatural se fue haciendo cada vez más presente, de forma inquietante pero reservada a una de las parejas de personajes, aunque el resto de jugadores lo estábamos viendo también. Flipé en colores con las excelentes interpretaciones de los jugadores, sobre todo con las de Viejo y Cecilia. Las discusiones que improvisaron entre Roberto y Natalia parecían que estuvieran en un guión de una película. Más tarde, sucedió «algo» que nos puso a todos muy tensos, ya que se inició una cuenta atrás y a partir de ahí empezaron a aflorar secretos de manera vertiginosa en una cadena de dolorosas revelaciones que desencadenaron comportamientos cada vez más idos de madre. Fue muy divertido, pero a la vez, los temas que se tratan son muy adultos, así que que hay que ir con cuidado con no herir sensibilidades. Yo estaba todo el rato pensado: «madre mía, ¿pero qué haría mi personaje ahora?». Al acabar la partida hicimos una pausa y luego charlamos media hora sobre cómo había ido todo. Le dije a Despot entonces que entendía perfectamente por qué anunció la partida con tantos avisos de contenido y con varias medidas de seguridad. Me hizo gracia que varios jugadores coincidieron en que «lo habíamos pasado bien a base de pasarlo mal», ¡jaja! Fue muy intenso y al final cada uno de nosotros pudo narrar cómo terminaba su personaje. Yo describí cómo el mío moría de forma rápida y patética. :-) Tengo ganas de jugar más a Unknown Armies!



Las charlas


En las Runas Net se aceptan charlas que los participantes quieran emitir en Youtube durante los días de las jornadas. Siempre son de temas relacionados con los juegos D100 y en esta edición hubo dos, gracias al apoyo del canal de Friki Vetusto:


Los Portadores de la Luz: Ernesto, Thorkrim y yo hablamos sobre los dioses de las tormentas de Glorantha y sobre uno de sus mitos principales. Orlanth, Humakt, el Toro Tempestuoso, pero también Issaries, Lhankhor Mhy, Eurmal, Chalana Arroy y otros.


Vídeo donde Friki Vetusto, Emod, Thorkrim y yo hablamos sobre los dioses de las tormentas de Glorantha y sus mitos


Ambientación al servicio de los juegos D100: Mordigan, Ernesto y Antonio Guarás hablaron sobre el ambientacionismo, un enfoque de creación de juegos de rol donde el mundo de juego tiene una importancia fundamental. Se describe bien este enfoque que se incluye en el libro El rol al desnudo (en proceso de mecenazgo) y se comentan varios juegos de rol con este enfoque: Warhammer Fantasy, RuneQuest, Eclipse Phase, Peregrinos de la ruina y otros.


Charla sobre cómo varios juegos con sistema D100 enfatizan la ambientación como plato fuerte de la experiencia de juego



La partida que dirigí


El sábado por la tarde dirigí una partida de RuneQuest Aventuras en Glorantha. El misterio de Burgo Seco tenía dos detalles muy poco comunes para mí. Para empezar, pasa poco que me invente una aventura desde cero, pero en esta ocasión fue así. En segundo lugar, casi nunca dirijo una aventura que ya haya dirigido antes, pero esta vez fue así. El motivo es que creé esta aventura para la campaña de la milicia del Condado Solar que estoy jugando con el grupo de los lunes y la dirigí solo unas semanas antes de las Runas Net. Esto me permitió recabar opiniones y consejos de mis jugadores habituales que me vinieron de perlas para dirigirla esta segunda vez, ya que pude corregir algunos detalles, sobre todo para jugarla en solo 5 horas de juego, ya que la primera vez duró 4 sesiones de unas 2 horas (!). De todas formas, en las dos ocasiones me lo pasé genial. Y curiosamente, esta vez resultó que casi todos los jugadores también estaban en el chat de Telegram de Glorantha Hispana.


Usé el mapa incluido en el libro Cuentos de la milicia del Condado Solar para situar a los jugadores en la ambientación


Para los personajes jugadores dejé escoger entre los 10 PJ pregenerados que vienen en el libro Cuentos de la milicia del Condado Solar (disponible en DrivethruRPG). Sokar, que nunca había jugado a RuneQuest, eligió interpretar a Egistar, el yelmaliano líder del grupo. Alexaco escogió a Mareeka, una mercenaria humakti que ha perdido parte de su memoria. RoFran se quedó con Pellam, un sabio de Lhankor Mhy que lleva la contabilidad de la milicia. Antonio se quedó con Aurimenas, un joven granjero yelmaliano muy popular en la zona y Dana eligió a Owe «Patea caballos», un explorador praxiano iniciado de Yelmalio y Waha, aunque al final le surgió un imprevisto y no pudo jugar. La aventura empezó con los protagonistas presentando sus respetos en un funeral, pero de repente el espíritu del difunto se materializó sobre la aldea y empezó a increpar a todos los presentes: quería que le trajeran a su asesino. A partir de ahí, los milicianos tuvieron que investigar, interrogar y buscar pistas para encontrar al culpable, pero pronto se dieron cuenta de que iba a ser difícil. Aun así, Mareeka se plantó delante del fantasma, se inspiró en la runa de la Muerte ¡y logró amedrentarlo! Eso aportó un valioso periodo de paz para poder investigar sin que el espíritu diera la lata. Hablaron con aldeanos y Egistar hizo descubrimientos: vio un tipo que se alejaba por una colina, aunque se alejó antes de poder atraparlo. También habló con una pequeña diosa de la zona que le otorgó una pista clave. Mientras tanto, Aurimenas trató de inspirarse en la runa de la Verdad para sonsacar información a un aldeano, ¡pero pifió la tirada! Eso le afectó su comportamiento más tarde, aunque también sacó información de una jovencita. Finalmente, Pellam fue clave gracias a su habilidad con las cuentas y la Burocracia, pero también a la poderosa magia del dios del conocimiento. Fue genial verlo dudar sobre a quién lanzarle el conjuro que permite leer la mente. Pero al final, gracias a eso consiguieron confirmar sus sospechas. 


Clic para ampliar - Los milicianos llegan a Burgo Seco y empiezan a ver cosas raras. Cada vez más raras...


Todos los jugadores estuvieron geniales y se metieron en su papel en seguida. Me impresionó cómo Antonio interpretó la interrogación a la que Aurimenas sometía a los aldeanos, o cómo Sokar describió a Egistar y cómo interactuaba con los niños de la aldea. Pero sin duda, lo mejor fue cuando los personajes discutieron entre ellos sobre qué debían hacer. Se enfrentaron a un pequeño dilema y rolearon el debate que dio gustó verlo. Como los personajes son «la policía» del lugar, eso da pie a dinámicas interesantes. Por un lado, son la autoridad, pero por otro, tienen una gran responsabilidad y deben dar ejemplo de seguir las reglas. En el tramo final, fue muy divertido ver las decisiones que tomaban para llevar la aventura a buen puerto. Tuvieron buenas ideas para sacarle partido a la magia, usaron sus pasiones y hubo momentos tensos, pero al final lograron cumplir con su misión de forma excelente. Bueno... a ver... hubo algunos procedimientos algo fuera de lo común que no saldrán en el «informe» oficial, pero bah, detalles sin importancia... xD


Tras una fiesta de éxitos especiales y críticos, los milicianos de Corazón de Arena hicieron papilla a sus pobres adversarios


En resumen


Fue un fin de semana intenso y sensacional. La gente pareció pasarlo bien, hubo muchas partidas y muy buenas, charlas interesantes y en el sorteo final se repartieron muchos premios. Algunos puntos seguro que podemos mejorarlos para el año que viene, pero yo por lo menos quedé muy satisfecho. 


martes, 17 de junio de 2025

The Chaosium Con UK 2025 write-up (Part 2)

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In the first part of my write-up I told everything I did at the Chaosium Con UK 2025 from the day I arrived until Saturday morning and the panel "What's new with RuneQuest?". Below you can read all I did from that point until the end of the con on Sunday night! With more Glorantha, more RuneQuest, more new games I had the opportunity to play, like Age of Vikings, QuestWorlds, and Lords of the Middle Sea, and more interesting people I met and talked to! Let the games continue! :-)


My badge with the two RuneQuest flags hanging below


Saturday 24th (continued)


10:00 - I played an Age of Vikings demo game run by Carol. The GM had the table set with lots of Viking runes, and even wooden figurines of Viking gods! Diana Probst (author of many JC publications such as The Dregs of Clearwine and Sacred Earth, Sacred Water) role-played her character for around 10 minutes before her head was brutally gored by a crazy ox (her character's, not Diana's!). She had previously told the GM she had to leave early, so they had both actually arranged that PC's horrible death in advance! Haha, at the time I thought it was for real, so I felt totally sorry for her! We kept playing with Mark and John, and learning more about this awesome game set in Iceland. I chose one of the pregens called Njáll Þórólfsson, because Njáls Saga is the only Icelandic saga I've read so far, and I enjoyed it. Although, of course, this was a different Njáll: a towering, honourable fisherman skilled in sword and shield.


The table where I played my first game of Age of Vikings, filled with runes, Viking gods, and cool characters.


The rules are pretty similar to the ones in RuneQuest, with passions and augments. I liked that characters have 3 favoured gods and goddesses they can automatically get inspiration from in order to increase their chances in a skill roll, if appropriate. For example, my character was devoted to Heimdallur, god of duty, protection, and vigilance, so in a situation in which these topics where relevant, such as in trying to perceive hidden enemies, I could get inspired by the god to get a +20 to my Spot hidden skill once. The rules for the Viking rune magic also looked interesting, as one of the other players played a character who could use it (Þrymur), and he did it by actually carving specific runes on an item. You can also sacrifice points of POW called Wyrd in order to turn failed rolls into successes, and the fact it is so costly will no doubt make this a last-resource mechanic. The demo game was a short, but interesting investigation, with magic, guilt, and some creatures of the Viking folklore involved. After the game, Carol told us how much she was into Viking history, reenactments, and culture, and also recommended the Contingency Con that takes place every year in January.


BTW, I could not attend the seminar on Sunday "Basic Roleplaying - Age of Vikings - What's new in BRP" that Jason Durall and others hosted, but on the BRP Central Forum Jason Durall posted that the first supplement for Age of Vikings will be the Companion, and after that the GM screen. As of June 11th the Age of Vikings Companion is "nearing the end of editing and art direction", and it will include the following:


  • Cover also by Ossi Hiekkala (they showed it at the seminar, but alas, I wasn't there to take a picture)
  • Creation rules for heroes from other places other than Iceland 
  • Playing non-human heroes such as hidden folk, sealskins, jotunn, dwarfs, and ravens 
  • Revised devotion abilities (the allegiance system from the previous edition has been revised and associated divine abilities will be compatible with the new Devotions and dedication point system) and rules for being godless or converting to Christianity
  • Community creation rules 
  • A greatly expanded bestiary with creatures from Iceland, elsewhere, and a large range of human NPCs
  • Several standalone adventures and a four-part campaign 



12:00 - Time to buy things:


I went to the Artists' Atrium and bought some things from Daniel Barker's stand. He had prints of many of the art pieces he did for Tales of the Reaching Moon and other publications from the 90s, but he also had excellently crafted Gloranthan bank notes I could not help buy as a gift for a friend. I then went to the store Chaosium had set up, and bought some of the thinnest books I could find on the Jonstown Compendium, as my backpack only allowed those. But hey, fortunately one of these was a limited preview edition of Rhigos: Kulyanan's Tale by Martin Helsdon! I also bought some RuneQuest dice for a friend and me. I would have bought half the store if only I had had more space in my small backpack! For example, the print edition of QuestWorlds, the recently released Age of Vikings corebook, the book on Furthest...


Some of the beautiful books at the Chaosium store at Chaosium Con UK 2025, and the beautiful books I bought.


On my way to the restaurant, I chatted a while with the guys from QuestPortal. They happen to be from Iceland, so they are promoting the Age of Vikings game, among the rest of Chaosium's games you can play in their flexible VTT. Their website also supports Call of Cthulhu, Rivers of London, and soon also RuneQuest. I asked how easy it would be for users to translate the character sheets into other languages, and they showed me it was a piece of cake. They also generously gifted me with a cool set of purple dice! Thank you guys!!!


A picture of an Age of Vikings character as it appears on the QuestPortal virtual tabletop.


Once I reached the bar, I spotted Ludovic and we chatted for a while, then Jonathan Webb joined us, which was great, as he is the author of the campaign set in Sandheart (in the Praxian Sun County) I'm currently running at home. I showed them a picture I had taken of the cover of the new RuneQuest, and we chatted a while about the upcoming alternative edition. I told Jonathan I had devised a murder scenario set in the Sandheart district he had created and he was delighted to hear that.


14:00 - I was excited to play in a QuestWorlds Glorantha game GMed by Matthew Cole, author of the yet unpublished Vistas of New Pavis, and the full 3D-render of the city! The other players were Chris Went, Roy Duffy, Katherine from the Never Mind the Dice Rolls magazine, and Hervé Carteau, whom I also remembered from THE KRAKEN con, although I had never talked to him yet. We found out Matthew is a very meticulous GM, who had a really interesting heroquest scenario laboriously prepared for us. We started by creating our PCs from a template. We were all riverfolk fishermen, and had to help Zola Fel who was trapped in the Underworld. Apparently, a powerful Zola Fel heroquester had fucked up really bad in a previous heroquest, and now the river gods' magic was no longer working! Hervé played a loud-mouthed merchant duck excellently (and he hates ducks!), and was very funny ("Quack! That's what Issaries always says!"). Roy and Kat role-played the twins who were often bickering, which was also really funny, while Chris played a good-hearted, but absent-minded fisher. I played a hard-working fisherman, and assigned to him abilities like "Swim against the current", "Friend of the newtlings", and "Tavern pariah". It was great to be playing QuestWorlds and building most of our characters as we played.


Matthew used customised HeroQuest Glorantha character sheets with some predetermined skills on them. Can you spot the duck?


All through the game, I was amazed at how many little details Matthew had prepared for the game. We had tiny runes we could stick on our character sheets, stickers for the magic items that we would use on our quest, poems for their powers, cards with myths/customs we could introduce into the adventure... All of a sudden, poor Matthew accidentally turned his glass of water on the table, and someone exclaimed: "Of course, what better way to start a Zola Fel heroquest!" to try to cheer him up. Hahaha! I hope he gets to publish his scenario one day, because it is a crazy trip down and up the heroplane. It was a pity he had to rush us through the second half of the scenario in order to get to the end in time, but I had great fun nonetheless. We had to retrieve the "Tarn Bough" from the failed heroquest, which would then allow us to "Become the Rain at the Celestial Rainbow...", but remember: Hide it from the Sky People! And do not become prisoners...!


BTW, at the time I was playing this game, the seminar "What's new with Cthulhu?" was taking place, hosted by Mike Mason, Lynne Hardy, Paul Fricker, and Keris McDonald. They announced the scenario book The Sutra of Pale Leaves - Twin Suns Rising, which is already out and can be played as a campaign, and its following volume Carcosa Manifest, with 4 more scenarios and which will be out later this year. They also announced a new setting for Call of Cthulhu called "Campfire Tales", in which the PCs will be children who are in a summer boyscout camp and have adventures. It will include a rule by which the PCs gain badges that allow them to roll skills with a much better percentage. Finally, they announced they are working on the new edition of the supplement on Innsmouth, and they showed pictures of the 3D map of the coastal town! Have a look at this video for more.


18:00 - I had lunch with Nader, Vas and his friend, while chatting about various topics, such as the games and panels we had attended so far. The food was lovely all through the con, by the way. We even got vanilla ice cream for desserts.


19:00 - RuneQuest game with Andrew Moreton: Harvest Queen


This was the second half of a scenario the GM had run the previous day with a different group of players. I got to play again with Geoff (who played Kallyr, an Orlanthi rune lady, but not the Kallyr you may be thinking!), Dominic Swan (Ulvera, her Ernaldan fiancée), Steve (Griselda Black Axe, a bloodthirsty Babeester Gori), but also with new people like Diecke (who played an armoured bear!), and Rob Marcus (who played Harmast, a Humakti near rune lord status). We went into the Woods of the Dead and killed lots of ghouls, talked to trolls, explored a tower, and killed many Lunar hoplites. It was great to play powerful characters. For example, Yalana Goldhair (the Yelornan mounted warrior I played) had 7 rune points and rode a unicorn. At one point, I spent 4 rune points to cast a powerful Shooting Star spell, and shot 8 flaming arrows dealing 3D6 damage each against a unit of 14 Lunar hoplites. Pity I fumbled my 5th shot and immediately lost my bow, but anyway... The other characters were as powerful or more, particularly the Vingan runelady, and the Odaylan initiate who had transformed himself into a bear for two weeks (a clever character concept)! However, the opposition was obviously on par...


Andrew gave us the character backgrounds so we could choose the character we would like to play


Our mission was to catch a Lunar witch who had tried to kidnap the harvest queen of an Orlanthi clan in Sartar (that had happened in the previous scenario). Her tracks led us to the Woods of the Dead, so in we went! I liked a lot how the GM was really quick at managing combat with lots of enemies. For example, he threw a small horde of 14-16 ghouls against us, and we dealt with them in about two or three rounds of exciting combat. This happened again midway through the adventure as we faced a full unit of Lunar hoplites, and then also at the climax, where we fought the Lunar witch and Brangbane King of the Ghouls mounted on his zombie horse, protected by another horde of 20 ghouls, and 15 more hoplites! The duel between the witch and the Vingan runelady was truly epic, with almost unfathomable amounts of magical armour, and damage. I had to note down the details when the Stormlady dealt 29 damage to the witch's leg, and she immediately fell down, cast Heal Body, and got up again! She eventually was cut down only when she fumbled a parry, and Kallyr dealt 43 points of damage to her abdomen! At the same time, the Humakti faced Brangbane and managed to cut his leg, and then also his horse's back in one brutal blow thanks to his Humakti gifts and powerful sword magic (looots of rune points!). I almost felt bad for our archenemies in the end. xD Haha! I have just remembered another funny scene: when we charged the first unit of Lunar hoplites, one of them fumbled her attack against Steve's Babeester Gori, who then fumbled her parry, and they both got exactly the same result in the fumble table, so they rolled down the hill together for a couple rounds!


My character had 90% in her Lance, Bow, and Fire rune skills.


Afterwards, I spent some time in the bar chatting with Rob Marcus. Wait for it: he's not only the author of The Indagos Bull scenario, but he also created one of the scenarios in the Masks of Pavis original fanzine by Ian Thompson... and his current boss is Jonathan Quaife! (he created the Greydog clan campaign published in the last issues of the Tales of the Reaching Moon magazine). It was great to talk with Rob about the Pavis and Zola Fel valley campaign he's running, and about a hundred many other things with a Guinness in hand.



Sunday 25th


9:00 - After breakfast I headed excitedly to play a RuneQuest game run by Simon Bray (long-time illustrator of HeroQuest books and author of Furthest: Crown Jewel of Lunar Tarsh). That game ("Strange Aberrations") was also set in Furthest, and one of the first things our GM did was to unfold his beautiful full-colour map of Furthest on the table. One of the players was none other than Simon Phipp, whose incredible website dedicated to his high-level Gloranthan campaigns, cults, and material I have been a fan of for many years. He's also the author of many Jonstown Compendium publications about Dorastor, such as Dorastor: Seven Hills, or Secrets of Dorastor, and Secrets of HeroQuesting.


Simon Bray unfolded his detailed map of Furthest and Chaosium's map of Tarsh to introduce us to the setting of the game


Simon Bray's scenario focused on investigating the disappearance of a well-to-do scholar from a noble family. The party leader was Marius, a somewhat horny scribe and private investigator played by Dominic Swan, accompanied by a couple of his bored rich friends (Emilia and Lorilia) played by Neil Edmond and Ray Irving. The rest of the party was hired muscle: Jurus the exgladiator (played by Jon Reed), Nobil, a shady servant (played by Simon Phipp), and Talin the Yelmalian mercenary (played by me!). All characters had their own colour portrait by Simon Bray of course, which was great to better imagine them and their personalities. Each also had their quirks and nice details. For example, my light cavalryman was a veteran who had won many horse races in his youth, but had later been sent to the Risklands right next to Dorastor as punishment for some slight, and now had to take his medicine in secret so as not to cough constantly. His nickname was "Hoarse-Whisperer"! He also had a pet hawk in mindlink who kind of despised him. I loved my character!


Simon's portraits of each character helped enormously in imagining their look and personality


We started by exploring a noble mansion and soon found out that foul experiments had been attempted. We interrogated some philosophers, talked with shopkeepers, found out a bit about entropic alchemy, met the local mafia, and ended up forging a deal that benefitted us all. Well, some of us more than others, but it was good enough! xD I can't tell you more, because Simon Bray plans to publish this scenario and others in an upcoming supplement for his book on Furthest.


Afterwards, I sat down for lunch with Chris Went and Simon Phipp. They told me how they were going to attend the Games Expo UK down in London in just a week's time, although that one is more focused on publishing companies and not so much on playing games. And then in July Continuum Con would take place at the exact same venue as Chaosium Con UK!


14:00 - I hurried to the room where I was going to play one of the VIP games, meaning a game run by a Chaosium author, which cost 25$ extra, but what the heck. Even though I had already met Jason Durall at THE KRAKEN convention in 2018, it was a unique opportunity not only to play in a game run by the guy who put together the Big Golden Book and the new Basic Roleplaying book, but also to try out the new yet-unpublished RPG he is developing: Lords of the Middle Sea!


Jason laid out the map of the world from the old Lords of the Middle Sea wargame, together with a new colour map done specifically for the RPG, and a drawing of the different rooms in the dirigible.


In the scenario "Hard Cargo", we played the crew of the Bella Dama, a dirigible in an post-apocalyptic North-America that was now mostly underwater, and where new nations had been created. The tone was very much like a sci-fi Western. Actually pretty similar to the Firefly TV show, only not in space, but on an airship in a post-apocalyptic version of the Earth. It was pretty cool, and the rules, with passions, a short list of skills, and such, was easy to grasp if you have already any experience with any other BRP game like RuneQuest or Call of Cthulhu. It also has personality traits like in Pendragon, and a rule by which each of the members of the crew has one character they feel is their "best friend", and another one they hate, which produces interesting group dynamics. You can also create the details of your airship. For example, you have to choose a quirk your airship has, and ours had a "puffballs infestation". I sat between Martin Helsdon, who played the resourceful mechanic, and Ludovic Chabant, who played Diego the charismatic captain. The other players were Nader, who played a crazy armed-to-the-teeth nun, and Simon, who played Dr. Chan, who was secretly a deadly ninja with one subtle mutant power. As for me, I chose to play Esmeralda, the rogue pilot, who had secretly fled from a highly patriarchal island nation.


The main side of my character sheet, and the character sheet of our airship!


The crew's job that day involved taking a group of passengers to a rendezvous at a place two days away. We prepared for our trip, roleplayed our characters as if we had been playing them for ages, and had a lot of fun. Obviously, we soon found out our cargo was not precisely easy to carry, and in a short period of time blood was all over the place, and we had to deal with a storm outside and inside our airship. I loved how Jason roleplayed the NPCs, and how the players played their characters. For example, the mechanic manipulated the engine to cause the dirigible to make a sudden turn to catch the baddies unaware so we could get an advantage over them, while Sister Manita and Dr. Chan made a bloody short work of our main enemies! Another highlight for me was when the captain retorted the following line to an unpleasant NPC:


"See Boyd, the difference between you and me is you like to stay in the middle of the storm, while I'm more the type trying we don't go into the storm..."


And right then... Jason narrated how the airship faced the actual storm ahead of us... Brilliant! If they ever make a TV show out of this game, the scriptwriters should definitely include that line in the dialogues! After the game, Jason told us the text of Lords of the Middle Sea is 90% finished, and now he is giving the final touches to the air-land and air-water combat rules. Then it will go into layout and art procuring. After they release the rulebook, the plan is to publish a "companion" volume with additional rules and scenarios. The scenario we played will probably feature in the rulebook!


After the game, Ludovic introduced Pookie to me, the man behind the Reviews from R'lyeh blog. I used the opportunity to ask him how he manages to write so many reviews per month, and he gave me some tips. It was great to chat with him about writing reviews. He even told me he's already preparing something special for his 3000th review!!! We then talked to Neil Robinson, who kindly arranged a short demo of the upcoming Credo! board game by Chris Gidlow later on for us.


18:15 - At the central room in the venue, the Chaosium team gathered all the attendees and made a speech as a closing ceremony. They were delighted the con had managed to attract way more people than they had initially expected, 350 people in total!, so they announced they are going to organise another Chaosium Con UK at the same time next year! Hooray! As a token of appreciation, they told the audience we each could choose one publication that had been left over after the "Issaries Market" event to carry home. At that event, Chaosium's staff and many fans had brought old publications they wanted to sell or barter. But many had been left sitting there on a table. I quickly inspected them and chose a copy of Wyrms Footprints, the compilation of Wyrm's Footnotes articles from the 90s, profusely illustrated by Daniel Barker. Since there were some left over after everyone had made their pick, I also took a copy of the Convulsion 4 fundraiser: a compilation of Gloranthan short stories. There were also many issues of Tales of the Reaching Moon #17 which I already own, a copy of the German box set "Glorantha - Die Götter", and a copy of the German RQ3 scenario Schatten in den Hügeln, which I was very tempted to pick up, but did not.


The Chaosium team gave the closing speech on Sunday evening. Jeff Richard had had to leave on Saturday.


18:50 - After a nice dinner at the restaurant, we got to the room at the appointed time, and Susan O'Brien told us a bit about how to play a game of Credo. In fact, Chaosium had published this board game in 1993, but now they are doing a much nicer edition wonderfully illustrated by Kalin Kadiev. The game mimics the agreements about the core Christian doctrine the bishops convened during the First Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D. As a bishop in that council, your role is to try to get into the core Christian doctrine as many of your faction's beliefs as you can. But beware, random event cards and the rest of the players can foil your plans! Ludovic stayed to play a game, but I had another appointment...


The box and some components of the Credo board game: each player gets a sheet with their "doctrine", with spaces that will be filled by the articles of faith and core beliefs the bishops agree on during the First Council of Nicaea.



19:00 - The big game of Glorantha: The Gods War


Brian Duguid hosted an 8-player game of this board game by Sandy Petersen with huge miniatures. Hervé played the Malkioni faction, Ricardo played the Solar faction, Martin Smart played the Earth faction, Brian played the Storm faction, Thomas Zunder played the Darkness faction, Geoff played the Chaos faction, and Dominic played the Lunar faction, while I got to play the Sea faction. I started on the wrong foot when I made a risky move against the Earth faction, and never recovered. I figured if I had any chance of winning the game I had to take risks early on... but unfortunately it didn't pay off, and I was defeated. Next time, I need to be more conservative during the initial turns and group together many more of my huge monsters before committing to an attack! Anyway, it was great to participate in such a big game of Glorantha: The Gods War, because this game is a show in itself no matter who ends up winning in the end. In my last game at home, the Darkness faction had achieved a resounding victory, but this time it was funny to see how the Solar faction was one of the three best. In the end, it was a very close game between 3 of the factions: the Malkioni empire, the Yelmic celestial armies, and the Lunar forces. Dominic was declared the winner although in 4,5 hours we didn't even get to the middle of the game!!! I suspect the Lunar strategy was to look unmenacing and keep building shrines and temples in a corner of the board!



Yelm managed to get out from Hell quite quickly, and the biggest fights involved the Solar and the Earth factions


23:00 - After the game I spent my time chatting in the bar with Hervé, who told me great and many things about the cons at Castle Bacharach, Greg Stafford, Chimériades, and other stories. Dominic joined us later on, and then also a guy called Francis.


The next day I had breakfast with Ludovic and Hervé, and I again forgot to ask Hervé how the RuneQuest game he had run on Friday had gone...! Ahh, maybe next time! Stuart Morrison kindly gave me a lift to Milton Keynes coach station, and from there to the airport and back home.


What a weekend! In just 3 days I ran one game, played in seven, and one board game! I also played three games I had never played before. Moreover, it was amazing meeting so many people I had only known from Facebook or the BRP forums and blogs so far. And everyone was so friendly and kind!!! Next time, I now know I need to perhaps play a bit less, and spend more time chatting with all the fantastic people there! I honestly recommend everyone to go to one of these cons at some point. Chaosium Con Poland is taking place next October, so... who knows! ;-P

BTW, if you also were at the con, I hope you will share how the games and panels you participated in were, I'm very keen in knowing the details of all the events I missed!

domingo, 15 de junio de 2025

The Chaosium Con UK 2025 write-up (Part 1)

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I had an awesome experience at Chaosium Con UK 2025 in Cranfield between May 23rd to 26th. It was the first time the company publishing RuneQuest, Call of Cthulhu, and other games organised its own convention in the UK. Before that, they had only held them in Michigan. This year, however, was different, because 2025 marked Chaosium's 50th anniversary, and as part of the celebrations they decided to hold conventions in other countries around the world, such as Australia, Poland, and the UK. It was a great opportunity to meet some of the authors, get the latest news, and play some of their recently released games, as well as meet other fans like me, so I signed up for it! It also was, in fact, my first time at a convention in the UK! Here you can read all about my experience at the Chaosium Con UK. Read Part 2 here. You may also be interested in reading how hard it was to choose what panels and games to sign up for! :-D


My badge with Chaosium's 50th anniversary pin on top. The art is from the Rivers of London supplement: In Liberty's Shadow.


Thursday 22nd


I landed at Luton airport at midday, and despite a slight delay I had enough time to get on the coach that would take me to Milton Keynes coach station. Once there, I only had to wait 15 minutes before I could take a local bus to get to Cranfield University. This Chaosium Con was held at a convention centre at one end of the campus: the Cranfield Management Development Centre. It is a hotel and a convention centre all in one building, with restaurant, bar, garden, and even gym and indoor swimming-pool. The room was £64 per night (breakfast included), plus £15 for every dinner. Aside from that, the con badge was 60$ for 3 days, or 25$ for just one day. Through the window in my room I had a view of green meadows with grazing sheep and strange black birds. I spent the afternoon preparing some of the character sheets for the RuneQuest game I was running on the next day. At 8 o'clock I went down to the restaurant for dinner, and enjoyed my meal. I could see most of the Chaosium team sharing a table in the restaurant. Since I didn't know anyone, I sat alone, but that would change in the following days! :-)


This was my planning for Chaosium Con UK: a busy schedule!


Friday 23rd


7:50 - The restaurant offered a wide range of juicy dishes for breakfast, and I sat down at a table and immediately started chatting with a guy from Scotland. We were then joined by 3 other gamers and chatted about different topics. A guy named Adan had been to Gen Con in Minneapolis some years ago and said it was almost too huge, but also totally worth it, and had visited Chicago after that. Nader then said he had been to Gen Con almost every year (as he used to live close by), and also recommended going.


8:55 - I looked for the room where the 1st round of the RuneQuest Tournament was going to take place. On my way there I met Nick Brooke, introduced myself, and he kindly gave me a brief tour along the way and taught me to open doors by touching a button! He told me where the Chaosium store would be set and where the Artists' Atrium was, although at that time the artists were still readying their stands. Still, I saw some originals by Mark Smylie, who has done a number of covers for Chaosium books, and also for Martin Helsdon's awesome RQ supplements.


I then managed to find the table of the RuneQuest Tournament, my first event at the con! This tournament would have 3 rounds (one game played each day) and in order to decide who would go on to the next one the players at each table had to vote at the end of each game who they considered the best roleplayer. At my table there were 4 other players. Adan was already there, and also Vas, Martin, and Dave. Two of them had never played RuneQuest before, but after the game they said they loved it! Our GM was going to be Ricardo Shankland (author of the Skull Ruins: Tusk Riders Need Blood scenario!!!). We chose our player characters from a range of pregens. Three players had already chosen warrior types (a Humakti, a Babeester gori, and Vasana the Vingan), so I decided to go for something different. I was tempted to play a duck thief called Phinneas Pinfeather, armed with two daggers, but I picked up a Lhankor Mhy scribe with good sword and dodge skills, while Adan chose an Ernalda priestess. In the same room there were 3 other tables where other gamers were going to play the exact same scenario, and 4 more tables in a nearby room. I told the GM I wasn't interested in qualifying for the next round of the tournament, and there was no problem whatsoever. In fact, Dave wasn't interested either.


The pregenerated RuneQuest heroes ready to defend the giant cradle and its baby at all costs (the standees were not in scale).


Interestingly, we would be using the alternative RuneQuest ruleset Jeff Richard and Mike Mearls (designer of D&D5) are developing to attract a new audience to RuneQuest and Glorantha (more on this later!). The rules were pretty similar to the current edition, but somewhat simplified and faster. However, this game wasn't going to be a proper playtest, and so the GM wisely did not stop to check the rules when in doubt, and instead kept the game flowing nicely.


Once we had chosen our characters, the organisers gathered us in the other big room and Brian Duguid (author of The Voralans and The Children of Hykim books) told us all the premise of the scenario: a charismatic adventurer called Garrath Sharpsword had recruited each of us and many other allies to board a giant cradle that was flowing down the Zola Fel river (AKA the River of Cradles). Apparently, the Lunar occupying forces in Pavis were going to try and plunder it, so it was our sacred duty to defend it and the giant baby from any assailants. This was the beginning of the classic The Cradle scenario Greg Stafford published in the RQ2 supplement Pavis. After explaining this, Jeff Richard read aloud Garrath's rousing speech, and after a choral cheer we set off on our way north towards the approaching cradle!


Garrath Sharpsword (with Jeff Richard's voice) giving his speech: ¡¡¡hooray!!! Comic bubble by pngtree.com


The game experience was improved thanks to Roy Duffy and Dario Corallo. Roy provided big colour maps of the giant cradle (I bet Chaosium is going to hire him!), and Dario created dozens of colour standees for the PCs and NPCs, so the game had a great visual component for the battles on board the cradle.


11:00 - During the pause halfway through the session, I hurried to the Artist's Atrium and managed to buy a deck of Gloranthan cards from Lee O'Connor. He was only selling one deck per person, probably to avoid having people resell the extra ones. I later learnt he sold them all, but he's now got permission from Chaosium to sell more from DrivethruRPG. I also got to chat a bit with Katrin Dirim, who was selling prints of her art at her stall.


Going back to the giant cradle, I remember my PC (Sora Halthi) cast Detect enemies at a crucial moment and so managed to alert her companions fighting on the prow, that the stern was being overrun by other Lunar troops! She also managed to fight some dragonewts so that the Ernalda priestess (Orane Garhound) could reach a badly-wounded comrade in time. "You focus on fighting, and let me do the healing!!!" yelled the priestess to her companions. The fight was tough, but still some enemies' heads were cleanly lopped off to everyone's amusement. Later on, we had some time to explore the decks below, we had a strange vision that Sora managed to understand that it had something to do with the celestial realm. Intriguing!


The heroes defend the giant cradle from mercenary dragonewts!


Finally, the second wave of assailants included some elite warriors, and we were forced to retreat. We then voted for the best roleplayer, and were again summoned to the other room for the finishing speech and rounds of applause to the players who had qualified for the second round. Later I learnt that Claudia Loroff (Jeff Richard's wife who played Yanioth in the example campaign in the RQ rulebook) had been going around the tables and at some point she had acted like a Chalana Arroy divine intervention to resurrect some dead PC (!). She also visited our table and handed me a "My favourite age is the Bronze Age" badge.


15:00 - After the game, I stopped to gaze at the small display of the upcoming new plastic miniatures for RuneQuest. There, John Hunter (author of Back to Balazar) told me a bit about them. Some minutes later, Paul Johnson (IIRC) explained these miniatures are being made by Reaper, will come out by means of a Kickstarter campaign, and Chaosium had told them they wanted the miniatures to represent the pregens from the rulebook and the Starter Set first, and then for a couple more adventures they are developing, so fans can use them to play these adventures. I found the broos and trolls to be particularly awesome. I forgot to ask if they are planning to do any scorpion men. At the same time, Andrew Taylor, who has been making several crowdfunding campaigns these past years to make Gloranthan miniatures, is about to release some wargaming rules for playing skirmishes with 28mm minis. After that, I got my badge for the con, together with a second hanging flag I attached to it: "Glorantha Forever". I also attached the "My Favorite Age is Bronze" flag to it. On top of that, I also got a pin and a sticker of Chaosium's 50th anniversary. :-)


Some of the plastic Glorantha minis on display: trolls, trollkin, PCs, mounted PCs, broos... There will be a Kickstarter soon!


15:25 - I went to the bar to buy a sandwich and a drink for lunch. On my way back to my room, I spoke briefly again with Ricardo Shankland, who told me he is now working in a book for the Jonstown Compendium filled with scorpion men and devising new ways of making them even more dangerous (!!!).


16:00 - The Ruins of the God Learners!


I got a couple minutes late to the room, and my 5 players were already waiting there by the door. After this somewhat embarrassing start, I gave them 7 character sheets to choose from. I had prepared the pregens from the rulebook, plus Mago the Fierce from the RuneQuest Starter Set, as I figured someone would like to try one of the newer pregens. One of the players was Roy Duffy (author of Boldhome Blues and some lovely maps) who I had already played with at THE KRAKEN convention in 2018. He chose to play Yanioth, which was nice, because I wanted to see how the scenario played out with her in it. The other players were Dominic Swan (Vasana), Geoff Revill (Sorala), Andrew Sutton (Harmast), and Stephen Mooney (Mago).


The last time it had taken me 2 sessions to run this scenario online. This time I tried to get the PCs to the ruins faster, but the players prepared well for the trip downriver and decided to do some research about the place and two particular King Argrath's thanes first. This allowed me to test a part of the scenario I hadn't had the opportunity to test yet, although I wondered if those veteran players did not really know already what they found out from the published books (?). The preamble in New Pavis took a full hour, so in the 3 remaining hours they didn't have the time to explore the whole ruins and find out what they were used for. That was not a big problem though, because these ruins are kind of a sandbox, so you can choose to go wherever you please. I also fumbled a bit with all the props I had prepared for the game, and I failed to time a couple of events that would have made the scenario better. Nonetheless, the players seemed to have fun, and Roy and Geoff luckily engaged well with all the puzzles. After the game, Roy confessed he actually usually dislikes solving puzzles as a player, as he prefers to just roll some skill so that the character solves it! Although I wish we could have had more time for the players to explore more of the ruins, at least I managed to provide a fitting ending just in time. Another highlight was the heated discussion Yanioth and Sorala engaged in right at the end, when they had to make some tough decisions about the loot they had gotten.


The charming players I ran my scenario to, discussing what to do next!


I had a lot of fun seeing the decisions my players made. They played it really smart at different points in the adventure, and produced some funny scenes. For example, I was impressed when Sorala managed to augment her Sleight skill to do something shady, and she succeeded! The Storm Bull warrior managed to sacrifice a magic item to his god and be rewarded for it, and Yanioth was one of the bravest when she dived into the waters to explore the flooded basement! Moreover, Dominic gave me some interesting feedback after the game. By the way, there was no way to switch off the air conditioning in the room we were playing in, and it was chilly. 


18:20 - I got in the queue for the barbecue outside on the terrace, and managed to gobble up my dish in time for my next game. The weather was nice and sunny, and I got to chat a bit more with Dominic Swan, and shared the table with Katrin Dirim. Dominic told me how he had worked really long hours in his job years, and we also discussed a bit the alternative RuneQuest rules.


19:00 - I got to play an official Rivers of London scenario titled The Font of All Evil, masterfully GMed by Rob Silk. He introduced the game's setting extremely well. Maybe it was the tone of his voice, or his fine storytelling skills, but everyone at the table started listening to him immediately. Ludovic Chabant sat next to me for that game (author of A Short Detour, To Hunt a God, and The God Learners podcast), and all the other players were also lovely people, like Chris Went. The game started with a gruesome murder and the supernatural branch of the Metropolitan Police was called in to investigate due to the strange wounds on the corpse. That evening I learnt about a peculiar, very London thing called "mudlarking" (thanks to Chris Went!), which I had never heard about. The rules of the game were extremely easy to grasp, particularly for anyone who has played the current edition of Call of Cthulhu. Curiously, one of the players used to work for one of the pubs that feature in the scenario! The investigation went well, we followed the clues, role-played the interactions with witnesses, and other informants... and one of the player characters died horribly in the climax, but the rest managed to avenge her and achieved a resounding victory. And my character got to cast a fireball spell! It was great to try out this game with such a nice group of players, GM, and scenario.


The character sheet of my PC: Nafeesa Jones, a young police officer with Newtonian magic, and the table after the game.


Saturday 24th


8:00 - I had breakfast together with Andrew Sutton, Adan, Geoff, and others. Andrew told me he is currently running a game of RuneQuest using the awesome The Red Cow campaign for HeroQuest. Then Geoff told me about the awesome Prax/Pavis campaign he is currently running, in which all the PCs are Pol-Joni warriors who have established themselves in Pavis County after King Argrath left the city for Sartar. After that, I hurried to go find the seminar room where I would be attending a panel I had great expectations for...


9:00 - What's new with RuneQuest?


Brian Holland (in charge of marketing at Chaosium) was there in the big seminar room, as he joked, to make sure Jeff Richard did not spill the beans too much. First they talked about RuneQuest: Cults of Fire & Sky. Someone in the audience asked Jeff what his favourite part was, and he replied the Lokarnos cult, because they are like the truckers of Glorantha. He also recalled Greg Stafford was fascinated by birds, and owned many field guides to identify them. He even convinced Jeff's wife to get some chickens to raise!


Later he mentioned how the RPG market is undergoing a major transition, both because people are again slowly leaving online gaming to go back to playing face to face, but also because there is a big influx of new gamers for a variety of reasons that are fed up with D&D and want to try other games. I guess it is for this next generation of players that they (Jeff and Mike Mearls) are mainly creating the alternative ruleset titled RuneQuest Fantasy Roleplaying. However, he also mentioned how in 2015 the design goal for the current edition was to gather all the fans together again, but now for this upcoming alternative edition they aim to make it easier to play RuneQuest, streamline the rules (ditch Strike Ranks and substitute them by a phase system similar to the one used in the war-game White Bear and Red Moon), make it more intuitive, and apply all the feedback received in the last years to improve the game.


Then they showed everyone the logo and mock-up cover of the upcoming alternative ruleset, by Loïc Muzy. Jeff mentioned the setting is going to be the city of Pavis and the ruins of The Big Rubble because it is an easy entry point to the setting: the adventurers are basically exploring old ruins, and they can learn more about the setting little by little as they play. They want to release it together with 4 supplements including scenarios so that fans can start playing right away:


  • GM book including a bestiary and some scenarios
  • 4-part campaign with added material like extra backgrounds and cults
  • Player Aid Pack with cardboard standees of PCs and NPCs to make it more visually appealing.
  • After that, a cadence of scenario books!

Jeff Richard reveals the mock-up cover of the RuneQuest Fantasy Roleplaying core rulebook. Right: a close-up of the cover.

Jeff added that, since they are releasing a GM Book for this other line, it probably does not make much sense to publish the one that had been promised for the current edition! That was disappointing. They want these books to be between 64 and 256 pages (the new rulebook will be as thin as RQ2) and they will probably be released around May 2026! I asked whether all these new books would delay the planned releases for the current edition of the game, and they responded that won't happen because there are people working on both product lines ("to a degree"). However, they could not say what exactly the next releases for the current edition are going to be. I found that odd, but days later Chaosium revealed Michael O'Brien is going to manage the current edition line (RuneQuest Roleplaying in Glorantha) while Jeff Richard is 100% focused on RuneQuest Fantasy Roleplaying. So I guess when Michael could not attend the panel, they decided to leave that out until he could be present (hopefully at Chaosium Con Poland in October 2025?). By the way, you can watch a recording here.


OK, since this post is already long enough, I will stop here for now. Please check the second part of my write-up! In it you can read about my first game of Age of Vikings, a game of QuestWorlds set in Glorantha, and the Harvest Queen scenario for RuneQuest. And then all I did on Sunday: the RuneQuest game set in Furthest, by Simon Bray, the VIP game with Jason Durall, in which I got to play his upcoming game: Lords of the Middle Sea, and finally the big 8-player game of Glorantha: The Gods War I played! Please let me know what you think so far about all this in a comment below!


Keep reading what I did afterwards at Chaosium Con UK 2025


 
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