Legends of Excalibur: Arthurian Adventures HC

[GameWyrd]

RPGObjects' Arthurian d20 series started life as two PDFs and have made it to the prestigious incarnation as a single hardback book. Legends of Excalibur has a mottled yellow-gold front cover which really makes it stand out. The next thing you notice as you begin to flick through the book are the colourful maps in the inside covers.

I'm not one of these people who need to have a pretty book or something to hold in order to order to appreciate good gaming material. I don't dislike PDFs simply because they're electronic. In fact Knight's Handbook and the Arthurian Campaign Guide are professionally done, nicely formatted and present no drawbacks for being electronic. That said... there's something about the hardback version which seems appropriate to the setting. Perhaps it's mental pictures of Merlin flicking through dusty tomes. Perhaps it's the subliminal reinforcement that Legends of Excalibur is a full blown d20 RPG in its own right and not a D&D fantasy supplement.

Legends of Excalibur is as a complete a game as the d20 license allows. There are no orcs in this fantasy world, no gnolls or kobolds (but there are dungeons and dragons, goblins and fireballs). That said this is a fantasy setting as well as an historic setting. In many Arthurian stories there are dragons and giants. Merlin prophecies to Vortigern that two dragons battling in an underground chamber below his tower will cause it to come crashing down. Vortigern's men dig where Merlin directs and the two dragons spring from the ground. As the usurper and his men flee they rang slap bang into Pendragon and Uther (and their army) returning from exile. Giants are the most common monster and before the main bestiary in Legends of Excalibur there is a "tour section" which lists and quickly discusses which common d20 monsters are suitable for the setting. There is space to flesh out giants a little more, adding some genealogy and Arthurian style to them. At the back of the book there is the actual bestiary. It covers much of the same ground again. The repeat is probably due to the original two PDF format of the product. In actual fact it's quite handy having the bestiary at the back and for some reason I don't feel as if I've been cheated out of page space, though I can think of better uses for it.

There's a similar "tour" to spell out character classes from the core rules are suitable for the Arthurian game. Quite a few of the classes work quite well - take the Barbarian class, it's ideal for Scotsmen (like myself) or the various Germanic tribes. Almost all of the magic classes are out; Legends of Excalibur uses a new magic system. I think I would have cut from the end of the book, moved pages to the front and started from scratch on the character classes. I think it helps atmosphere and mindset to simply say "Don't use D&D classes - use these ones" and I think that would be true even if we renamed the Barbarian class and tinkered it slightly. There are plenty of entirely new classes here; the Fool, Hedge Mage, Hermit, Knight, Minstrel, Noble, Priest, Robber Baron, Skald and Yeoman. There are prestige classes too (and notes on which we can take from the core rules); Alchemist, Berserker, Changeling, Court Mage, Crusader, Enchantress, Lady of the Lake, Quest Knight and Saint. There are also the Spectral Knights; Black Knight, Blue Knight, Green Knight, Purple Knight, Red Knight and White Knight.

What's with all the coloured knight prestige classes? Each one represents an order. Black Knights, as you might guess, have abandoned the Code of Chivalry. Red Knights augment their combat prowess with magic. Blue Knights serve the Ladies of the Lake. Purple Knights are Royal messengers and so forth.

Chivalry is crucial in Legends of Excalibur. You have renown scores, virtues, allegiances and oaths as a core motivation and plot driver in the game. These attributes aren't simply mentioned a few times and left for the GM to sort out. The game mechanics uses them. I'm not keen on heavy mechanics but it's great when the mechanics breed flavour and this is a success that Legends of Excalibur have scored.

Right at the start of the book we've the clever inter-weaving of crunch and flavour. Your bloodline, that is to say your lineage, is the first character trait players have to decide. If you elect to play someone with a criminal lineage then you'll be playing someone who will be treated extremely poorly and as you might expect will favour the rogue class. They'll suffer -2 Cha but gain +2 Dex. Bloodline affects attributes. Lesser Nobility earns a +2 Con.

The magic system is new but not entirely so. The usual spells fro D&D are preserved and this enables Legends of Excalibur to tap into a well known and large resource. It does risk, however, the old high fantasy flavour creeping back into the game. Spell slots are out. I think it would feel Arthurian if at a key time every night druids received new spells from the stars or after morning prayers that Priests replenished their spells/miracles. I don't mind that aspect of the traditional d20 rules. The whole preparation thing is less compelling. Legends of Excalibur moves the d20 system on to a magic point system and they make it work. I've seen attempts before (and after) and RPGObjects are (so far) the most successful. For a start we can cope with magic effecting feats. It's easy enough (though not entirely straight forward) to work out how many magic points it will cost to cast a specific D&D spell. There are benefits from the system immediately. Magic users can really push themselves and cast spells more powerful than usual at a great magic point and fatigue cost. Best of all the rules vary how and where certain classes regenerate magic points. Hermits, for example, fare better when they're away from civilization. Once again we see Legend of Excalibur using mechanics to complement the theme.

The campaign world itself is covered in the hardbound 160 pages. RPGObjects opts to conjure up the Arthurian flavour by looking at the famous places and people. Our feel for the place comes by looking at the pieces. There are many Arthurian legends and I think Legends of Excalibur gets it right to look at this issue right at the start of the book. The RPG discuss the generics of the legends and then explain that they're going to focus mainly on one interpretation and why. We're then given a "history" of the Arthurian world (starting before Arthur's birth and concluding after it) over quite a few pages. There are a couple of paragraphs for each significant event. You do have to have an interest in the setting to wade through all of it. Don't expect happy endings either. Places include cities and castles as well as leylines and henges.

I find the stat blocks for so many characters a little tiring. I don't want to have Guinevere's stats. What am I going to do with them? I suppose the idea behind having the combat block for King Lot of Lothian or Mark, the King of Cornwall, is so that I can run a fight with them in. Perhaps the PC Black Knights move to capture Edinburgh (in Lothian, not Cornwall) and need to behead the fellow. I dunno. That's not the style of game I'd want to play. I know what happens to King Mark and King Lot - and they're not beheaded by my Black Knight anti-hero characters. There's a virtual encyclopedia of famous people and places in the latter chapters of the book. I don't think it's something you can sit through and read. It's something to flick through and pick things out as you need to.

I've got to say - I don't like the art in the book. It's an old fashioned style and in fact often taken straight out of old books. You'll find a credit beside each one. On page 103 there is "Guinevere in the Golden Days, Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale, from Tennyson's Idylls of the King (1911)" for example. Why don't I like it? It seems meh. It just doesn't seem appropriate to the cinematic adventure style of the d20 rules. We do have comic book magic after all (fireballs and lightening bolts).

I don't think Legends of Excalibur is going to turn anyone into an Arthur fan either. In fact you'll need to appreciate the time of Camelot in order to persist with the book. If you are an Arthur fan (and so many people are) then Legends of Excalibur offers you a mature d20 gaming option.

The big picture is quite rosy. Legends of Excalibur does give you everything you need to play in an Arthurian setting. You have more than you need, in fact. It does successfully utilize a modified d20 to do so - and it's a modification which keeps almost all the strengths of the rule set and manages to shake off some of the weaknesses. The point based magic system can be taken straight out of this campaign setting and used in your own. The book scales up from peasants struggling to survive to epic level classes which might go Grail questing. I dabbled in Pendragon (the RPG) when I was younger but was put off by the pace and how hard it was to get the rules (over here in Scotland) and never went back. I'm keen to see what'll come of the line in 2005. In the meantime I'm entirely happy with RPGObject's Legends of Excalibur.

* This Legends of Excalibur review was first published at GameWyrd.

 

[Psion]

"I *liked* that PCs could adventure for a long time, getting up to 15th level, and Lancelot was still a figure to be dreaded as a draw in the lists."

I loathe that approach to quantifying NPCs. It's like a proclamation that your character will never near those of the favored NPCs of the setting. When I play an RPG after a specific setting that I like, it is to emulate the characters in the setting that I appreciate, not to wallow in their shadow and wish I could be like them.

 

[JoeGKushner]

When looking over new review products, one is Legends of the Samurai. I looked over the old Legends of Excalibur and realized that I hadn’t done a review of it before. Part of the reason was that I received it for Ennies and review and well, the Ennies were more important at the time. With a little more free time on hand, and to act as an example of where the author is coming from, I decided the time was good for a review of Legends of Excalibur.

Unlike Relics & Rituals Excalibur, this book provides you with historical earth as it’s background setting. It provides you with maps, characters and a new magic system. It makes some chances to the d20 system to handle wizards casting fireballs and other high fantasy elements that might not be appropriate for a d20 Arthurian campaign.

Broken up into six chapters, Legends of Excalibur clocks in at 160 black and white pages for $29.95. A little expensive for a book of that size, but not unheard of. The interior covers are used and are in full color, providing maps of several important locals including the city of Yorke, Cameliard, Orkney Islands, the Known World, the town of Caerleon, Sir Ector’s Realm, and Tintagel. Interior art appears to be all public works which to be honest, isn’t my favorite type. I didn’t like it in the Atlas books and I’m not crazy about them here.

The book includes a single page table of contents but lacks an index. Layout is standard two-columns. Many sections are introduced with quotes from various sources like Idylls of the King or Le Morte d’Arthur.

The book starts off with the idea of bloodlines. In some ways, these are similar to backgrounds from other games. They range from criminal to middle class to royalty with ability adjustments and favored class modifiers. Bonus feats come from limited lists and also include other traits like bonuses to skill checks, and information on starting funds. In addition, characters can have an optional nationality that can provide things ranging from extra favored classes to class skills.

The Player’s Handbook classes aren’t worthless though. Notes are provided for those classes which are appropriate, including those which aren’t appropriate like the paladin, surprisingly enough to the sorcerer and wizard. So how do you make up for some of those missing elements?

You’re provided with new core classes. Some of these help fill out middle age elements like the Fool, Minstrel, and Skald, to fighting appropriate men like the Knight and Yeoman. Others fill in the missing spellcasters like the Hedge Mage and Priest. Each one is fully listed at twenty levels and includes all special abilities. Some of them would easily work in a standard d20 campaign but others would probably be out of place due to their limited fighting or survival if you will, options.

The Noble here is a bit of a religious figure in that they are beyond the common man. This includes many abilities that might be attributed to the Paladin in other systems like an Aura of Courage that makes them immune to fear or Divine Wrath, similar to the ability of a Paladin’s Smite.

Prestige classes are focused towards the flavor of the game. Take the Alchemist or an old favorite, the Berserker who can share space with the Changeling, a master of animal shape changing, or the Court Mage. Others are specialized versions of core classes like the Crusader or the Quest Knight, while some capture classic elements like the Enchantressess or Lady of the Lake.

It’s a good mix of new core classes and PrCs that allows the GM to throw in individuals like the Black Knight or hermit recluse Saints, to various Spectral Knights like the famous Green Knight.

When looking at a new setting, there are often new skills and feats. We don’t get a lot of new feats here, just Prophecy, with a listing of DCs to forecast events in the near future ranging from 24 hours to 4 days or more but requiring very high checks to do so.

On the other hand, there are several new feats. These ranging from Dark Heritage where the mage’s spell DCs are increased by 1, to Heritage of Nobility, where the character gets a bonus to his Nobility score. These 1st level feats are similar to Talents from Arcana Unearthed or Regional Feats from the Forgotten Realms.

Thankfully, the author didn’t do a half-job with the feats. See, it uses a different spell system, one that relies on points and so it notes what effects the metamagic feats undergo like Extend Spell has a +2 spell point cost while Maximize Spell is increased by +6 points.

So I’ve mentioned Nobility. It has a base range, determined by your blood line and then is modified by the transgressions you commit or the virtues you follow. Some of these are obvious like dishonesty or cowardice while others might not be so accepted, like violence. Thankfully, the virtues are also relatively simple, like honesty and bravery, but also others like gentleness.

Some other ideas like Renown and Allegiances are present and many sample allegiances are listed, such as Code of Chivalry and Oath of Silence. These alliances have game effects and when broken, game effects that are harsher than the benefits gained.

Other ideas include Fate and Destiny Points. A player can pick a fate or so for himself, but then the GM selects his destiny. When the player spends his fate points, the GM gets destiny points that he can use to insure that the character’s destiny comes to pass. Like action points, the higher the character’s level, the more dice he rolls. Unlike action points though, this is a sum value, not the highest die.

For those looking for more role playing value for their characters, Knightly Orders are a good step. These details include a brief background section, as well as prerequisites and benefits. Perfect for the GM wishing to provide enemies or allies to a new group of knightly players.

While a few items and weapons are included, more space is provided for mount traits and includes various rankings of mounts, ranging from bag of bones to noble steed, each like a mini-template, to mount traits, ranging from being skinny, to tough as nails.

One thing I’m not sure is needed, but makes sense overall, is the material on Epic Level Characters, including all of the core classes and PrCs and even many Epic Feats.

It’s only when we get to Chapter Two, that we get to magic. Characters gain spell points based on level and a spell’s cost is depending not only on the spell level, but also the caster’s level. This is a matrix like the player level against the monster’s CR. For example, a 1st level caster needs 12 spell points to cast a 2nd level spell, while a 20th level caster only needs to spend 2 points. Rules for how spell points are recovered, as well as how different sources of power effect spellcasting, are included. These are different for different characters, which is a nice touch. Why should a hermit, who gains fewer spell points in the city, have the same type of recovery as a priest, who gains more when on Hallowed Ground?

Spells for the new characters include several standard PHB ones like Cat’s Grace and Knock, but are missing the Evocation or “Boom” style spells. This doesn’t mean that higher level mages are easy to destroy however as the Power Word spells are still here and mages still have a lot of versatility.

New spells are included that capture the feel of the setting. These range from Gawaine’s Morning Star, where the spellcaster continues to gain strength as the sun rises and then loses strength as the sun sets. Other spells focus on the spell point system effecting how the character gains or loses spell points.

Chapter Three is perhaps the biggest departure from R&R: Excalibur. Here, we get a decent background to Arthurian Legend with ‘historical’ details and a gazetteer, as well as a ‘Who’s Who’ in Arthruian England,

Chapter Four continues that departure by providing several locations and black and white maps, the same as the full color ones on the interior cover, but here, we get the details of what’s in those locations. These are brief details but provide a good grounding for any GM or player looking to start an Arthurian game.

Role playing notes include ideas on how to run quests and campaigns and incorporate things from campaign set-ups to recurring themes and supporting cast. Opinions on how to use Arthurian campaigns, ranging from following ‘cannon’ to deviating highly from it, are introduced, along with a sample campaign, the Childhood of Arthur.

So after that’s out of the way, we move back to game mechanics. Here we get things ranging from armor and shield special ability descriptions to specific armors and weapons. Not all of these are swords though as we have things like Albion’s Bane, a battle axe that’s a giant bane and against those giant’s of Albion’s Bloodline, the weapon does even more damage. Of course no sourcebook on this era or time period, would be complete without it’s own version of Excalibur or the Holy Grail.

The last chapter, Bestiary, includes notes on monsters appropriate from the Monster Manual, to several new monsters. These monsters are not illustrated and don’t include the general descriptions, but are 3.5 game terms including modifiers for armor class and details on base attack, full attack, number of squares in addition to movement listings, and level adjustment, when appropriate.

This is a much different book than Relics & Rituals Excalibur. It takes the Arthurian myths and brings them into the D&D game and provides game stats for them, as well as a world for them to live in. It provides a new spell system and by eliminating inappropriate spells, is very true to the setting.