Why I Love Lamentations of the Flame Princess - A Review

Why I Love "Lamentations of the Flame Princess"
A Review
https://www.lotfp.com/RPG/about

I have played a good number of systems since I started role playing back in my first year of university. I started with Dungeons and Dragons, 4th ed. and ended up playing World of Darkness, Call of Cthulu, Savage Worlds, Rogue Trader, Eclipse Phase, D20 Lite, Firefly and a good few others. I like almost every system I play but for some reason I absolutely fell in love with "Lamentation of the Flame Princess".  I blame Oliver Palmer entirely for introducing me to it.  It's good fun, easy to pick up and quick to create characters. Whilst there are some issues with the system, and it is nowhere near as large in lore or following as the behemoth of RPG'S, Dungeons and Dragons, it has so much to offer, so many good stories and the atmosphere fits my style of role play and story-telling perfectly. I like old school (even though I am not old enough to have experienced old school, I get a sense of false nostalgia). I like weird. I like twisted. I like gory. I like mystery and I like folklore.

Character creation is quick and hassle free. Your character can start life and then immediately die if the modifiers don't add up to 0 or above, however, you can easily re-roll your numbers without having to break out a calculator or rub out your entire character sheet.

My First Two Character attempts.. Rest In Peace Nameless PC 1 and Nameless PC 2.

 You pick a class and roll up the stats with a breakdown of how to fill the sheet out at the back of the book along with everything you need on only two pages. The rest of the book is composed of rules and spells for your clerics and magic users; but more on that later. The character creation is simple and in its simplicity it is easy to focus less on the stats of the character and more on who your character is within the game setting. You find it easy to come up with a character whilst making your sheet because you are not bogged down rolling ten different dice . You can think about who you are playing. The equipment list isn't huge but it has everything necessary for a keen adventurer (although I always forget rations...). The amount of money you own when you create a character is based on a roll, either leading to a frugal and thrifty browse of the list or an all out spending spree for the more cash positive players. The only downside of the equipment is that the rifles/guns are not with the usual equipment at the front and they are located at the back of the book. This can sometimes be missed by over eager players who like to skim the PHB rather than sit and read it cover to cover, however, these are all very detailed pages with damage and reload times, accompanied with some gorgeous pictures.

Imagine this, but BETTER.

The simple system relies on Skills being rolled as a 1-6 chance with players increasing their chances if they are a specialist with skills. Different classes gain different abilities as they level. This is accompanied by your main stats, Wisdom, Intelligence, Strength, Charisma and Dexterity along with saving throw rolls for magic, breath weapon and so on.. You have to roll your X in 6 chance on your skill with a D6 to pass a skill check, you can make a stats roll and have to get under it to pass, or you make a saving throw roll and you have to get over. Once you have this down, it is incredibly easy to roll and players often don't need to be reminded of the roll they need to make. You do not have to go through any intense multiplication, or add thirty D6's when you hit higher levels. This allows a great deal of flexibility to both the game master and player on what the player can do and reap the terrifying consequences then and there without delay. If the player wants to try and convince someone that they are their second cousin twice removed whilst balancing on a precipice, two rolls, a Dex and Cha, determine the success. If a player wants to sneak, but they are a warrior in plate mail, they have naturally a 1 in 6 chance of sneaking. If they are a specialist, they might have a 4-6 chance. Overall the system feels very easy and easy is slick. Slick means a "quick to engage" game without getting bogged down in the rules and spending two hours trying to find the right page to check if something can be done and the mathematical equation to figure it out.  One of the downsides of combat is that you and your enemy could miss each other over and over again until you finally land a hit, however, this can easily be resolved with a little house ruling, and is not common. 

The spell lists are great fun, although sometimes a little broken. One of the first spells that a player can have is Summon. This brings forth a demonic monstrosity that may or may not be in the control of the caster and has around 5-6 pages dedicated to it. The player can summon something that could completely kill everything and everyone in the area. The first time I used summon whilst playing Purple Putrescence I summoned a massive frog demon who I had no control over. It had a myriad of nasty spells and a drive to kill us all. The only reason we did not have a full scale player wipe was down to Purples unique spells and a very good roll sending the giant demonic frog to a Masquerade in old Venice. Italy suffered, we survived. The other spells scale with caster level becoming larger and more powerful. What I love about this is that the magic user class doesn't have the power to punch nor do they have the skills to really be useful sneaking, but their intelligence coupled with the mighty spell list makes them absolute great fun to play and powerful foes. It is best not to piss them off. They feel stronger each time you level, rather than feeling scaled down to everything you face, and a well maneuvered spell can have some brilliant effects. You can use them creatively, to get yourself out of a jam using Web and setting it alight, or using your unseen servant to bypass traps, or you can become a combat based mage with a Magic Missiles to the face. 

The specialists are a great class because as they level they are the only class to gain new skill points to spend as you wish allowing you to customize as you go. They therefore become an important character when you play them as they can do a lot of things other players would struggle to do, like searching, sneak attacking or opening doors. A specialist I knew became an expert gunman; carrying several pistols and a rifle. Due to the reload time he would unload all of the pistols and the rifle one after the other, drop them and attack with a sword. He became a very effective and very sneaky assassin. The specialist is a great example of how each class in Lamentations has a clear role, giving players a sense of importance and unity.

The warrior grows in physical power as you level and what is great about this game is that it manages to make you feel like there is a clear progression with leveling up that benefits your classes uniqueness. Fighters become killing machines and have a lot of interesting perks, such as the ability to slip into a defensive stance or push their attack for extra benefits.

Try not to piss off your Warrior...

The Cleric is a class I have neglected to play, the class can either be your designated healer or have more of a heavy religious combat element. It is a hybrid between a warrior and a magic user. The Cleric's healing spells are useful, however, they do not bring a character to full health all the time and like old school games, it take  a day for a spell to refresh, making them an important addition to the group whilst still keeping the element of danger and certain death in the minds of the players. Clerics have to be strategic with their healing, which makes playing them an exciting challenge.

One of the strange things about Lamentations is that Half-lings, Elves and Dwarves are classes in themselves. A lot of the time, I have been with players who have avoided being a Half-ling, Elf or Dwarf in favor of the Magic User, Fighter, Cleric and Specialist. I have found that the appeal of playing a race as a class is not strong enough to have me play them over the others. However, Lamentations does allow for the game master to adapt, for example in a game based in Shakespeare's London, one of the player's opted for being a Half-ling class due to their sneakiness in order to play an effective street urchin. This again shows the flexibility that I love about Lamentations in that it is easy to tweak the classes in favor of having an enjoyable gaming experience. Also, unlike in a game where Elves, Dwarves and Half-lings are inescapable it is easy to leave out these classes without it feeling forced or having to rewrite entire stories. The unfortunate reality of these "classes" is that they are often ignored or left out of games in favor of the four "main" and more familiar human classes. However, it has been mentioned to me by enthusiasts of LOTFP that the Elves, Dwarves and Half-lings may be edited or removed as James Raggi moves the focus of "Lamentations of the Flame Princess" towards a more magic-tainted historical setting rather than a generic old school fantasy setting. 

Something else about the system I enjoy is the unforgiving rolls. Although you feel like you have a massive impact, your character hangs on the edge of death at every turn. You may even face foes you couldn't possibly destroy, leaving you with the option to run or find another solution to your problem and reminding you that you are "only human". A badly rolled save or a tumble into a vat of acid will leave you with a character death and sometimes a game can result in more deaths than Sean Bean's career. This gives players the incentive to be more cautious, to really search and explore before simply diving head first into combat. Players who usually like a chaotic "kill them all, loot the things" characters find themselves investigating rather than cutting through the masses. That is not to say this play style is not welcome to the game, it is just more likely to end in a player death early on. First level characters feel vulnerable, and when a player levels the reward is that much sweeter and leveling actually does feel like a reward in this game rather than a simple mechanic.

But gold is also a reward, don't forget the gold.

What I love most is that both playing and game mastering is fun with Lamentations of the Flame Princess. There are already plenty of excellent games out there to play for it. Some of the games I have found the most fun are Tales of the Scarecrow, The Pale Lady and No Salvation for Witches. Creating your own campaign is easy and you can create a game and then fit Lamentations System into it easily. You can adapt any story or Campaign to use the Lamentations system without difficulty. The great thing as well about this system is how easy it is to pick up for new players and old players alike. I ran my current work in progress, a one-shot The Wandering: Panic in Pluckley using the Lamentations of the Flame Princess system in MK RPG and I had around five players who had never used the system before; within minutes they were playing without difficulty and all expressed how neat the system was for players to pick up and roll with (pun intended).

The Artwork for the "Lamentations of the Flame Princess" is another reason I love it so much simply to look at and really adds flavor to the system. The style reminds me of the Elizabethan era and each image draws you into the twisted and weird style of the game. Some of the images are definitely NSFW work, which helps emphasize the unique, gory, and horrifying setting and style of "Lamentations of the Flame Princess".

Overall, this is one of my favorite systems to play for ease and inspiration, and to run as a new game master. It gives a great sense of nostalgia for old school games which challenge the players rather than let them swan through a session, it has great spells, it is a wonderful system to use when creating new games, and overall the main reason I love lamentations?

It is really good fun. 

All images are free from http://www.stockfreeimages.com/. This blog does not use images for commercial or monetary gain. 

Panic In Pluckley 

A Review of a Mad Playtest

Part 2: TheWandering

Warning this contains spoilers for The Wandering: Panic in Pluckley, which I will be releasing on PDF. 

The last time I left off my review of my recent play test, the players had arrived at the mysterious red lake, where villagers had been disappearing, with their captive priestess. She raised her arms to the dark heavens and howled at the moon. Before the players, the red lake rippled and parted to reveal an ominous staircase twisting down into the black earth.

Unfortunately, two of our players had to take their leave of the game; our burial obsessed Cleric and our Mad Magic User. 

Luckily, two new players dived into the fray. Renford the Dwarf and The Drunk Cleric. Renford had been hiding by the lake after visiting Pluckley with his wife and their nine children. All of whom had wandered the night before into the lake. The Fighter (Scott!) pointed out that a nearby bush had a beard and appeared to be talking at which point Renford revealed himself.

On holiday, our Drunk Cleric hoisted himself up from where he had been drinking and smoking in the moonlight and decided to wobble after the party out of pissed curiosity.

Thus, the players tossed some stones down the staircase and then unwisely decided to run down after Dawn Ingbert who they had drugged in the previous game. 

I failed my even number roll four times which meant that the lake did not close over the stairs before the players could get down there and possible drown or dissolve a few of the players. 

They were greeted by a squat elf called Dave who sat at a desk writing in a book in a reception room with massive intricately designed doors behind him. He handed all of the players keys apart from The Fighter, who he identified as a werewolf and suggested that the queen had a rather horrible punishment for him instead. He mocked the werewolf and told the players that they were not able to leave. They had homes now and could make any complaints directly to the queen. After insulting The Fighter,  The Fighter decided that his character had had enough of the annoying elf and attempted to kill him, three times, and each time failed. Dave the elf ended up cowering beneath the desk and told the players to visit the queen. 

No one noticed that Dawn Ingbert had been dragged off by the guards.

The players the doors behind Dave's desk. It revealed a gargantuan banquet hall with a full table of rich food. The beautiful silver haired queen sat lounging on her throne. Several  nobles wandered about the hall and wolfish elf guards (dubbed Welfs by the players) stood along the hall guarding them all. 

The queen greeted them and found the players amusing. The dwarf confronted her about stealing his wife and  was exceptionally rude. She laughed in his face and informed him his wife was quite happy with her children in her house which he had the key too. 

The players questioned the weird powerful queen who told them she was looking for a new groom. Little did the players know, her grooms always ended up horribly killed on the wedding night. Immediately the Halfling and Mortimer the Specialist leapt to be her husband. Mortimer went onto his knees to pledge his worthiness. The Drunk Cleric hiccuped and decided to join in and the Elf also threw in his hat for her hand, although the queen was confused by his gender she said she did not mind bedding a woman, much to the Elf's embarrassment. 

She gave them three tasks, to bring her a gift, prove their loyalty and offer a sacrifice. 

The players decided to visit their houses first in case there was something useful. There were two doors leading out of the palace "The Door that takes you to where you Want to Go" and "The Door that takes you to where you Need to Go". The players went for the latter door. The Halfling threw it open and stared into a strange black void which he decided to stick his hand into. His hand disappeared as if it had never existed. The players mage a Save Vs. Magic role to see if they remembered that the Halfling had lost his hand via the door or if they could never remember him having a hand in the first place.

The Halfling then grabbed a Welf guard and shoved him in, all but the Welf's hand. The hand became disembodied and moved of its own accord much like the Addams family favorite, Thing. They kept it as a mascot. It occasionally made obscene gestures.

Bored and alarmed by the void door they went to the other door to view their homes. The Halfling had a wonderful miniature home within a hill, bordering on a beautiful forest, which had lots of places to sneak and hide. Mortimer had a intricately locked Tavern full of at least 97 naked women who were washing themselves in a variety of warm bubble baths on the grassy lawn. He brought one out with him and seemed to struggle with the temptations of all of the women, who had only existed for twenty three minutes. The halfling shoved her back in and slammed the door to save Mortimer of his "temptations". The Drunk Cleric had a forest full of colorful mushrooms and hallucinogenic plants as well as a massive winery. The Elf had a wonderful intricately decorated home in the woods. The Fighter ended up with a dark room with shackles and silver torture instruments. The Dwarf opened his door to find his Wife shouting at him for being late with nine kids around her. He quickly shut the door.

The players then began to explore the castle. They spent a long time working through the mirror puzzle. Stepping into the mirrors and messing up the poor denizens of the world, including getting a small boy in one of the mirrors beaten to death by a bunch of guards. They realised they could put the mirrors on the table and special items would fall out. Here, The Fighter gained the magical cloak The Skin of Lycoan, they also received the Gift of Meliboea, a golden apple and a lute which lulled people into a state of calm happiness. 

The players then went into the Egg room, where they gave their blood loyally to bring to life the disturbing undead horror that was the queens broodling. 

We were running out of time, so the players tried one more room which was the Bath Room with the three muses washing themselves. Immediately, the players decided they all wanted to jump in and swim with the naked women except, they decided that it seemed a bit fishy. Mortimer beckoned a lady over and groped her. He failed a westle role and she through him into the pool. He dissolved horribly into a clean white skeleton (which the dwarf decided to carry around on his back). The women smiled sweetly and said "Thank you for your sacrifice". 

RIP Mortimer.

The players returned to the queen and she informed them they had passed. They each gave a speech on why they were worthy and she picked The Drunk Cleric to be her husband. 

The Fighter was given his own home, as she was reminded of her son when she was given the Gift of Meliboea. He decided to stay as it revealed a constant full moon, deer and sheep to hunt, and a huge barbaric fighting arena on the hill. 

The Dwarf took his wife and children away from The Wandering to return to his home in the real world. The Elf decided to stay for the wedding and play music outside of the queens bedroom on his lute. The Halfling escaped with his treasures and Mortimer remained a skeleton. 

Once The Drunk Cleric had married the queen she took him to her bedroom where she split him open, consumed his inside and laid her undead offspring in his corpse to form a new egg for the Egg room. 

The Elf opened the door, saw this, screamed and ran back to the real world with his Lute.

The players seemed to really enjoy the second half and there was a lot of laughing involved. There was so much to cover it was a shame we could not get to it all. If I had more time, I may have stretched this out over three sessions so the players could fully explore all of the rooms in the castle.

Thanks for reading! I will let you know when the PDF is ready and available for download.

 

 

Panic In Pluckley 

A Review of a Mad Playtest

Part 1: The Village 

Warning this contains spoilers for The Wandering: Panic in Pluckley, which I will be releasing on PDF.

I am not sure what I was expecting when I wandered into our local MK RPG Club and waved my recently written game in everyone's faces demanding poor unsuspecting players. 

I had a naive attitude that they would not expect what was to come.

Obviously, being a new GM I severely underestimated the ability
of players to bugger up everything you have written and turn it entirely on its own head. It was fantastic.

The game was played with the Lamentations of the Flame Princess system and was run over two sessions so I will break my review into two. I will try to cover the highlights rather than detail everything that happened however the game was very eventful!

The basic premise is that a strange town named Pluckley has had some strange occurrences happen. Nobody is able to go in or out of the village and the only trades coming out are a strange selection of potions. Immediately, the players were intrigued and set off across the swamp which separates Pluckley from the rest of the world. They took a horse and cart and bantered with the one eyed man who drove it.

Before the cart departed, The Fighter grabbed a bunch of potions left at the coach station and downed them. This earned him a phobia of reflective surfaces. He could no longer look into mirrors without seeing the pulsating horrors of other dimensions. He did not learn his lesson, however, and downed another immediately after, becoming a werewolf, which he kept secret from the other party members. 

We had six players in total. An overly effeminate and exuberant elf, a suspiciously sneaky half-ling, a body burying cleric, a weird and wonderful werewolf fighter, a overly horny specialist and a magnificently mad magic user. 

When the cart pulled to a halt outside of Pluckley they argued with the price of the trip with the cart driver and asked him questions about the town. The cart driver refused to go any further than the outskirts of the town. In defiance of the extortionate price they faced, the elf swept out of the cart and, failing a dexterity role for his elegant departure, landed face first in the mud. The other players immediately paid the cart driver.

The Fighter decided the best course of action was to hit up the Hags Hollow Tavern and buy some of the Ale. The others agreed and they trekked through the mud to the tavern. When they entered they spotted a bickering couple by a raging fire, an old haggard lady spitting into cups and cleaning them with a dirty rag at the bar, and a pissed patron sat in the centre.

Mortimer, the Specialist, and the Elf made a beeline for the old lady and asked her questions about the town. She told them all about Pluckley and some of the missing individuals who had been wandering off into a strange lake which had appeared almost overnight several months ago. They learned about the Twins in the market who were distributing the potions and the hunters encountering strange elf like beings in the woods.

Meanwhile, the halfling, the magic user and the Fighter drank some of the ale. They made a save vs. magic and only the Fighter lost, who then became cursed to go to the lake at night. No one was aware of this at the time.

After milking the old lady for all of the information they could, Mortimer the specialist made a very successful Sneak and went upstairs to investigate the rooms. He found the Pregnant daughter, Beatrice Nox, of the couple downstairs and decided the best thing to do would be to rob her blind while she slept. He found yellow potions on her bed side cabinet and within the drawer he found a necklace with a picture of a young boy and a badly written pornographic fanfiction of two of the male villagers, clearly written by the old lady downstairs. The players requested this actually be written.

After some debate about going to the lake or staying at the inn out of the rain, the Cleric suggested visiting the Church to discuss the strange goings on. He was convinced the dead were walking and had a morbid fascination with the way the villagers, and other individuals who visited were trapped forever, were buried. There was some excellent roleplay from the players regarding their characters who brought their pre-genned characters to life.

Mortimer the Specialist and the Elf decided to stay and book out one of the rooms to keep an eye on the couple. They quickly decided against talking to the Pissed Patron, as he was rambling about frogs and did not seem to have any useful information (a pity, as he had quite a lot of interesting stories!).

This did not end well, which I will detail after the equally as disastrous encounter at the church...

The cleric, the magic user, the halfling and the fighter made their way through the dark to the church on the hill. The church was circular with a beautiful frieze depicting wolves and men hunting in the woods under the light of a full moon. There were many pillars and it was greek in our world in style. Inside, there was a priestess named Mother Dawn Ingbert who told them that people were drinking from the yellow potions and wandering into the lake. She informed the players that the Brewery had been closed for months but the ale and potions were still flowing because the Twins had taken over.

She greeted the Fighter as a brother, for he was now a werewolf and she the leader of the Pack of Pluckley,

Here, the players became completely mad. The Fighter saw all of the horrors of the world in the silver reflective surfaces of various artifacts within the church. He grabbed his sword and started destroying them violently. The questioned priestess shrieked in terror and begged them to stop. Suddenly, the fighter glazed over and began to walk out of the church towards the lake where his curse began to take effect. The other players tied him to a pillar and the cleric preached that he had gone mad with lycanthropy and needed to be cleansed. The priestess dispelled magic on him, removing the curse which wanted to take him to a lake. However, the fighter still wanted to go to see what all the fuss was about.

Immediately, the halfling looted the church and stole the valuables while the rest were distracted. Together, the players decided they did wish to go to the lake but did not know the way so they through a yellow potion they had found in the face of the priestess to use her as a guinea pig.

MEANWHILE....

Mortimer and The Elf enjoyed a very naked sleep in the inn when they suddenly heard someone moving. Mortimer abandoned the elf and ran out, stark naked, to see the Pregnant Nox walking in a trance down the corridor. He and the elf attempted to stop her by grappling and succeeded at which point her parents burst out of the room and demanded to know why a naked man was man handling their pregnant daughter. 

Left with no other choice, Mortimer knocked the pregnant lady out and deposited her on the bed. They then questioned the Noxes and discovered that their daughter had been taking the yellow potion nightly and that only recently had these potions been having strange effects ever since the lake appeared.

They decided to meet their comrades  (Wisely, they got dressed before going.) and fill them in, which caused them great surprise when they found they had kidnapped and drugged a priestess. No one seemed to object and it seems that morals went right out of the window at the start of the game.

The players followed the drugged priestess through the winding woods to an immense red lake with strange twisted trees growing on the banks. A successful role revealed many footprints leading into the lake.

One of the players seized a stick and stuck it into the water which resembled a thick oily ooze rather than water. It promptly dissolved as if touched by acid. Undeterred, the half-ling seized the priestesses raised arms (for she was standing on the bank with her arms up to the moon) and tried hanging over the death trap of a lake.

They watched as the the woman threw back her head and howled at the moon. The lake rippled suddenly and then parted to reveal a great dark staircase leading down into the dark.

The players shat themselves and I ended the session on a successful cliff hanger.

Overall, the first session went really well with lots of opportunity for role play. I feel that I could improve the game by including more hints and hooks to have the players explore the village more, however, there is so much the players can do they are unlikely to cover it all. The players found themselves with a lot to do and at no point did the story become disengaging enough for the players to feel they had to pushback.

I am happy with how the first session went for the first part of the game and will give a review of the second part soon!