Fanzine Focus XII: Vacant Ritual Assembly – Issue #6

On the tail of Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed another DM and group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord and Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, as has Swords & Wizardry. Leading the way in their support for Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have been the fanzines The Undercroft and Vacant Ritual Assembly.

Published in the Winter of 2016, Vacant Ritual Assembly – Issue #6 saw the return of the fanzine from Red Moon Medicine after a hiatus of a year. Devoted to both Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay and the campaign of the editor, Clint Krause, the issue marks a change in production values and format for the fanzine. Previous issues, such as Vacant Ritual Assembly #5 have been obviously fanzines in their stapled format. Vacant Ritual Assembly – Issue #6 is available in Print on Demand, so is more easily available and comes with double the content. It contains some eight entries, including three articles, a monster and an encounter, two scenarios, and an interview.

After the Clint Krause’s usual recommended listening and reading, the fanzine opens with his ‘Grigoro’s Wonders Untold: A Strange Travelling Show’, a description of a travelling freak show, its members, exhibits, and secrets. The exhibits include Growler and Howler, gentle conjoined giants—perhaps from Yoon-Suin - The Purple Land?, Baron Bicuspid, cruspucular gentleman demon, and Grembly, a legless Dwarf-sailor who can walk on water! Each of these individuals is fully stated and detailed as are the scams that Grigoro and his brethren run to extort the incredulous. This is a lovely set of NPCs and oddities for the player characters to encounter and likely lose monies to!

Krause also details ‘The Gallows on Heretic Hill: A Campaign Hub’ and ‘A Light in the Black: A New Heretical Faction’. The first in these paired articles is a counter to the lethality of Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay and allow a character to retain knowledge after his death, a graveyard where those buried by the hangman Penitent Jack with a noose around their necks will awake in a new body hanging from the gallow. They are undead, but retain their identities and memories, but have the skills and abilities of their new bodies. Then they are cut down, but left with the noose around their necks so that when they die, they return to a ‘new’ body provided by Penitent Jack. This is such a fun idea and sets up the second article which is more particular to  the Synod, the dominant monotheist faith in Krause’s campaign world  as described in ‘Unholy Inversion of Hope’ in Vacant Ritual Assembly – Issue #5. This describes the Noosefriars, a secret order of heretics which is forced to serve the Synod as a penance over and over for their crimes against angels. This is a great set-up and provides some hooks for the Referee as well as a base and some obligations for the player characters.

The monster is ‘The Grimsly Hill Cherubs: Some Murderous Children’, also by Krause. It describes some bloody knife-wielding kids to be found in The Driftwood Verses and is okay. This is followed by the encounter, ‘Papa Lathmos’ Sugar Cane Crop: A Hyperglycemic Nightmare’ by Anxy P. It presents four strange things which might be found in sugar cane fields, the occupants and field workers all old, black-skinned, dehydrated, and sweet smelling with rot. These are weird, strange encounters, probably difficult to use due to their location and the imagery they suggest. 

Kathryn Jenkins provides the first of two scenarios in the issue, ‘From Dunnholt It Rises’. Described as a’A Grim Island’, this describes the miserable island of Dunholt which lies off the coast of Scotland and has become a quarantine site following an outbreak of the plague on the mainland. The adventurers are in Duncladach, the nearest port to the island when a ship crashes out of the fog and into the harbour, spilling it pus filled, tumour-ridden crew onto the dock… The clues point to Dunnholt, but if the island is meant to be safe, what has happened and does this mean that nowhere is safe? This is a horrid pustulant affair, fairly straightforward, but riddled with the plague and plague-references. 

The other scenario is not so much a dungeon bash, but a house bash. ‘Death Planted the Esther Tree: A grim, mansion-crawl adventure’ by Kreg Mosier is set in the same world as Clint Krause’s The Driftwood Verses and begins with the player characters being hired by Beauregard Relecroix to discover what is going on at his mansion home. The wealthy merchant returned home to be greeted by a deluge of acidic rain and his being forcefully ejected from the house by something unseen. This is a sort of haunted mansion adventure, its anonymous homunculus servants adding a certain certain creepy atmosphere and the detail nicely contrasting with the ruin which has befallen the house.

Rounding out the issue is ‘Emmy Allen: Of Wolves and Winter – An Interview’. This interview, with the designer of Wolf Packs and Winter Snow’ is as informative and as interesting as the previous interviews in Vacant Ritual Assembly.

Physically, Vacant Ritual Assembly – Issue #6 is well presented, decently written, and comes with some reasonable artwork. The cartography is also good. Where previous issues of the fanzine felt a bit cramped, here the extra space has been put to good use and it is clear that this issue is full to the brim and no more. The content does vary in quality, the monster and encounter not as interesting as the two articles about the Noosefriars, which are also clever and full of potential. This does not mean that any of the content is bad, but these two articles do stand out from the eight in the issue. Vacant Ritual Assembly – Issue #6 continues the fanzine’s record of providing a good selection of material for the Referee to pick and choose from and indicates that the hiatus has had no impact on the quality of that content.

Fanzine Focus X: Virtual Ritual Assembly #5

On the tail of Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed another DM and group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord and Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, as has Swords & Wizardry. Leading the way in their support for Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have been the fanzines The Undercroft and Vacant Ritual Assembly.

Published in the Winter of 2015 by Red Moon Medicine, Vacant Ritual Assembly #5 follows on from the solidly done issue #1, issue #2, issue #3, and issue #4. evoted to both Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay and the campaign of the editor, Clint Krause, the issue marks a break for the fanzine as the editor and publisher takes time to work on other projects, most notably, The Driftwood Verses. Indeed, it would be another year before Vacant Ritual Assembly #6 would see publication.

Vacant Ritual Assembly #5 contains just five articles, providing the Game Master with a setting, a new Class, a faith, a disease, and an interview. The setting is Judd Karman’s ‘Koster’s Knob’, a Hobbit shire best known for its pipe weed, the occasional stalwart adventurer, and as a rest home for overworked wizards. It is far from the rural idyll that most Hobbit shires are depicted as, there being a distinct divide in social class between the rich and the wealthy—who live in the Knob, a hill at the centre of the shire and the various farming families and surrounding their lands. Most of the inhabitants of Koster’s Knob possess a strong sense of cynicism, especially with regard to the inhabitants of the Knob, Hobbits who go on adventures and come back, and wizards who come to take a rest. The attitudes of these Hobbits really shine through in this article which includes details of notable NPCs, some encounters, and a guide to ‘Weedwise Wizarding’ and the pipe weed of Koster’s Knob. Besides the samples of different pipe weeds, it adds the Pipe Arts skill, which enables a Wizard who smokes pipe weed to forget spells he has prepared and recover Hit Points in return. Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay is  not a fantasy roleplaying game known for its inclusion of Hobbits, but ‘Koster’s Knob’ adds a cynical, almost knowing twist to their treatment and is all the better for it.

‘The Ritualist’, by Kathryn Jenkins, is the new Class. This takes up the idea that magic is illegal, taboo, and dangerous and applies to a variant of Magic-User who has to go to great extremes to both hide and cast his magic. Instead of the traditional spell slots, the Ritualist has access to a limited number of spells and what spells he knows varies from one day to the next, but can cast those spells as often as he likes each day. Unfortunately, doing requires a Ritualist to sell part of his Soul—represented by the permanent loss of Hit Points or Ability points to the greater power he has entered into a pact with. Further spells require the use of rare ingredients—monster bones, gems, herbs, and so—to cast. Accompanied by eight sample spells (the included Wall of Flesh is quite vile), the Ritualist as a Class is designed as a something akin to a witch, scholar, voodoo practitioner, and so, all having to put a lot of effort into casting their magic. It is an interesting concept, especially for the Referee and player who wants to do and roleplay magic differently to the standard ‘fire and forget’ spellcasting of the Magic-User, but here feels underwritten and deserving of greater development.

The fanzine’s editor takes us back to his home campaign with ‘Unholy Inversion of Hope’. This describes the Synod, the dominant monotheist faith in his campaign. It is profoundly anti-magic, so would work very well with the Ritualist. It covers its core beliefs, leadership, major divine beings associated with it—sort of like saints, and its guardians and inquisition, the Templars. There are no stats provided, but then all of this information is given in a couple of pages, and anyway, a Referee should be able to provide these should he need them. This is accompanied by ‘The Sineater Wolves’, which brings Lycanthropy to Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay, and of course, gives it a twist. The twist is that the Sineater Wolves is actually a heretical order of monks, which in its desire to cleanse all sin from the world, abandoned the humanity of its members and embraced the curse of Lyncanthropy. Now the order uses the bestial strength of the wolf to confront and battle evil, but this perhaps the aspect of the order and article which is left unexplored. It does include rules for Lycanthropy, a secret or two, and a schism, which is all useful. It just does not fully explore what the order does.

As per usual, Vacant Ritual Assembly #5 is rounded out with an interview of an Old School Renaissance personage of note. This time it is with James Raggi IV, the designer and publisher of Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay. Now Raggi has been interviewed lots of times and is probably the most interviewed man in the Old School Renaissance niche, but the interview is light and informative, if a little dated. The latter of course, being due to the much delayed nature of this review. The only complaint would be that the title of the interview, ‘On the Raggi’, is both trite and tasteless.

Physically, Vacant Ritual Assembly #5 well presented, decently written, and comes with some good artwork. The cartography of ‘Koster’s Knob’ is good too. If there is one problem with Vacant Ritual Assembly #5, it is the lack of space. Too many of the articles feel as if they needed a page or two extra and thus room to better develop and present their ideas. This is not to say that the articles in question—‘The Ritualist’ and ‘The Sineater Wolves’ are bad, rather that they have not realised their full potential. Just as with the previous issue, Vacant Ritual Assembly #5 presents a good mix of content, all of which can be added to a campaign with relative ease. Overall, a good selection of material for the Referee to pick and choose from as well as a good point at which to put the fanzine on a hiatus.

Fanzine Focus IX: Vacant Ritual Assembly #4

On the tail of Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed another DM and group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord and Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, as has Swords & Wizardry. Leading the way in their support for Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have been the fanzines The Undercroft and Vacant Ritual Assembly.

Published in the Autumn of 2015 by Red Moon Medicine, Vacant Ritual Assembly #4 follows on from the solidly done issue #1, issue #2, and issue #3. Devoted to both Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay and the campaign of the editor, Clint Krause, the issue can be divided roughly in two. The first half presents a narcotic themed mini-adventure and a narcotic themed mini-setting, whilst the second half describes a pair of mini-setting elements which can be used to create interesting backgrounds for both player characters and NPCs. All accompanied by the author’s personal updates and recommendations and a little bit more.

The issues opens with ‘The Abstract’, a description of an establishment of the same name and some of its regulars. The Abstract is a den of intellectual iniquitous discussion, home to a number of drug fiends, wastrels, and wayward scholars and occultists. Both pursuits—narcotic consumption and the discussion of nefarious topics such as the occult and the esoteric—are common occurrences here, making The Abstract a useful source of weird knowledge as well as narcotics. The article includes a number of NPCs, one of whom is clearly is clearly inspired by Aleister Crowley, some ‘intellectual’ topics of conversation, all enough to add the establishment to a city in a Referee’s campaign.

The Abstract is a potential source of information for the scenario which follows its description. ‘The Lotus Eater’, inspired by contributions to Rafael Chandler’s Narcosa, it is a short one-night affair in which the player characters are hired to rescue the black sheep of a rich family from a narcotic-induced coma. This involves actually entering into a world of the young man’s creation somewhere in the spirit realms. The characters will need to find a source of the same drug as the young man took—perhaps to be found at The Abstract?—and explore his freaky fantasy if they are to discover a way to bring both themselves and him back. This is short and dirty and good for the one night.

Contributor Anxious P offers up the first of the two setting and character articles.  ‘The Oolai Cloth-Skins and Dragon Blackhide Bastards’ describes an island culture where the Oolai People adhere to a pair of ritual practices known as Cloth-Skinning and Black-Hiding. Children born under a crescent moon are submitted for the rite of Cloth-Skinning in which Oolai weavers will wrap and sew the child in one of six mystic cloths. These have various effects, for example, Copper Bombazine, woven from twilled silk and worsted cotton and dyed copper, gains the wearer the ability to heal after laying hands on a stone and renders them partially immune to copper weaponry. Once cloth-skinned, the wearer remains encased for life. Only one child born of a crescent moon can undergo this ritual, so the fathers of all those born under the crescent moon must fight to the death to determine whose child is selected. The other orphaned children have another destiny—as congregants of the alligator-priests, the Bastard Dragons of Temple Blackhide. These orphans are permanently enshrouded in black, scaly hide which will grow with them. It becomes their armour, gives them immunity to infection and poison, and they train to grapple and roll just like an alligator. An unwavering hatred is instilled in the Black-Hide of their Cloth-Skinned Other,often driving them to murder. For outsiders, there are said to be shameless Oolai weavers who will perform the ritual for a certain fee…

‘Furious Gods’ describes the lands of three tribes in the ‘barbarian territories’—the Glacierhorde, the Silverhorn, and the Gnashmaws. Each is led by and worships a primal godbeast and each wages constant war against its rival tribes. The three godbeasts—Frostbite, the Ghost Ape of the Glacierhorde, Impalor, the Armoured Death of the Silverhorn, and Gnashmaw, the Hungry of the Gnashmaws—are huge fearsome beasts who grant favours to the faithful who undergo great trials.

What ‘Furious Gods’ and ‘The Oolai Cloth-Skins and Dragon Blackhide Bastards’ share is the capacity to provide backgrounds and Race-like abilities for both player characters and NPCs. Certainly in ‘Furious Gods’, the region of the ‘barbarian territories’ would be a ready source of barbarian-type Fighters and guidelines are given to that end. Use the content of these articles and the Referee can add Barbarians, Cloth-Skinned, and Black-Hides as both player characters and NPCs. Both articles contain material that can be easily be dropped into a campaign and add an element of the exotic. 

Rounding out Vacant Ritual Assembly #4 is ‘David McGrogan’s Opium Dream’, an interview with the author of Yoon-Suin - The Purple Land. It is a bit scrappy, having been conducted via e-mail, but it is a short and enjoyable read. It is also to the point, which cannot be said of McGrogan’s other interview, in Random Encounter #1. Physically, Vacant Ritual Assembly #4 is clean and simple in appearance, the writing clear and content easy to grasp, and the artwork perhaps, a little rough around the edges.

Vacant Ritual Assembly #4 contains a good mix of content, all of which can be added to a campaign with relative ease. The narcotic-themed content may not be to everyone’s taste, but then it does show their use in a negative light. Overall, a good selection of material for the Referee to pick and choose from.

Fanzine Focus IV: Vacant Ritual Aassembly #3

On the tail of Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed another DM and group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord and Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, such as The Undercroft and Vacant Ritual Assembly.

Published in the Summer of 2015 by Red Moon Medicine, Vacant Ritual Assembly #3 follows on from the solidly done issue #1 and issue #2. Devoted to both Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay and the campaign of the editor, Clint Krause, the issue presents a sandbox that he has mythologised as part of his Dungeons & Dragons campaign from the woods behind his house when he was a child.

The campaign, known as ‘Dragon Trench’, is located in the Lost Forest, a wilderness best known for the long trenches created when a dead dragon fell from the sky. In the time since, the dragon’s corpse has withered away, but infused the region with magics and legends. The trenches have become thoroughfares for trade moving through the Lost Forest, patrolled and protected by the Knights of the Dragon Clan. The latter is a chivalric order best known for its victory over an Orc legion at the Battle of the Bloody Leaves, but which has since lost its importance.

Other inhabitants of the Lost Forest include the Thundercloud Druids, the Timberwives, and Sting. The Thundercloud Druids cast their magic via flutes and wield ‘thundercasters’, large bore muskets that use finely ground-up crystal shards to fire hand-crafted stone balls. Thundercloud Druids are available to play as player characters and with their focus on flint, crystal, and fire, they are very much a rougher, less nature-obsessed alternative to the traditional Druid Class. Timberwives are almost spirits of the forest driven mad, near bestial wood witches that hunt in packs at night wielding great flint cleavers. The Sting is biggest threat to the Lost Forest and the lands beyond, a demon ‘Father of Thorns’ who grants thorny protrusions, wasp-like wings, and stinging nettle hair to his worshippers. They include Goblins and Orcs, and Nettle Goblins, as well as swarms of wasps, are a constant threat to travellers in the forest. ‘The Temple of the Grand Sting’, the Sting’s vespiary is one of the few locations detailed in the ‘Dragon Trench’ sandbox. Although no recommended player character Levels are specified, this is not a dungeon for low level characters.

The ‘Dragon Trench’ sandbox is nevertheless, a relatively low power and fairly small sandbox. There are, after all, just seven locations. It is not really a location designed to be fully explored in one go. The need for higher Level characters for ‘The Temple of the Grand Sting’ is proof of that, so rather it is a location that can be dropped into most campaign settings and ideally visited by the player characters several times. There one or two hooks in the descriptions, in particular to the Ghoul Market described in Vacant Ritual Assembly #1, that link it to a wider world. Nevertheless, more would have been appreciated, especially if the GM wants his players to come back again and again. Hopefully the author will visit it in future issues.

Rounding out Vacant Ritual Assembly #3 is an interview with Rick Saada, the designer of Rogue-like computer game, Castle of the Winds. It is almost disappointing to turn to this after the gaming material provided in the preceding pages, but it is an engaging enough piece that looks at the state of creating and publishing computer games in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Informative and pleasingly does not outstay its welcome.

Physically, Vacant Ritual Assembly #3 is well presented, if in need of an edit here and there. The artwork varies in quality, but none of it is truly awful. Overall, Vacant Ritual Assembly #3 is a solid and likeable issue. It uses its focus upon the sandbox ‘Dragon Trench’ to present a low key, earthy setting that can be dropped into almost any campaign, but which nevertheless is still very personal to the author.

Fanzine Focus II: Vacant Ritual Assembly #2

On the tail of Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it began with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed another DM and group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is tcompatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord and Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, such as The Undercroft and Vacant Ritual Assembly.

Published in the Spring of 2015 by Red Moon Medicine, Vacant Ritual Assembly #2 follows on from the solidly done issue #1 and like that first issue is devoted to Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay and the campaign of the editor, Clint Krause. Unlike that first issue there is no real theme to Vacant Ritual Assembly #2, but this does not mean that the contents of this issue suffer for it.

Once past the editorial and the editor’s campaign update, Vacant Ritual Assembly #2 opens with a pair of slight pieces, a list of names for a dark fantasy game and a reinterpretation of the Zodiac as part of character creation. This is followed by ‘Dretcher’s Bay’, a description of a forlorn, Innsmouth-like hamlet. Governed by ‘the captains’, the village is best known for the Bell Crab, the rich meat of which sells for high prices. Each of the captains commands rival crews of crabbers that dive upon the nearby submerged ruins of Acray to harvest the crabs, though the creatures are sacred to the strange lobster-like Nephroids who herd them. The description of Dretcher's Bay does not include any plot hooks or scenario ideas, but the setting itself has plenty of opportunities, whether the player characters want to get involved in village politics, dive for Bell Crabs, or scour the ruins for its secrets. It feels old and mouldering and is easily dropped onto any suitable coastal spot in a Referee’s campaign.

The only piece in Vacant Ritual Assembly #2 offered by an author other than the editor is ‘Oarsmen & Their Woes’ by Anxious P. This describes a strange Charon-like race that might be encountered singly when someone needs to escape from a situation or environment. The Oarsman offers a way to somewhere safe—or at least somewhere safer—aboard his ferry along impossible creeks, but there is a price. The Oarsman will not only share the woe that lead to him becoming an Oarsman, but also demand a price for their passage to be paid by one of the adventurers. This is usually something personal and vital to the adventurer. ‘Oarsmen & Their Woes’ offers both something useful and something creepy to a campaign and really works if used more than once because no two woes and no two prices should be alike. To that end, a few more suggested prices might not have gone amiss, but a competent Referee should be able to devise a few more.

‘With Thine Eye Beheld’ offers a short encounter with a strange cargo cult obsessed with a cyclops-God and his eye. It details the small, family cult and its temple, essentially a small dungeon. There is relatively little to the scenario, but it carries its eye motive as far as it can in a few pages, right up to a sort of bonkers magic item. Just as ‘Dretcher's Bay’, this scenario lacks the hooks to get the adventurers involved, but unlike ‘Dretcher's Bay’, this scenario lacks the depth for the Referee to really develop interesting hooks. So the Referee will need to work harder to work it into his game, but it is nevertheless easy to drop ‘With Thine Eye Beheld’ into a hex of your sandbox.

As with the first issue, rounding out Vacant Ritual Assembly #2 is a lengthy interview. This time it is with Greg Gorgonmilk, the co-author and publisher of Dolmenwood - Character Archaics. It is informative, but at six pages, it is somewhat lengthy given that the fanzine is just twenty-four pages long. Essentially it is a magazine-sized article and perhaps it could have been split over two issues?

Physically, Vacant Ritual Assembly #2 is well presented, and there are decent maps whilst the illustrations do vary in quality. Where second issues—whether of albums or fanzines—might seem to have a difficult gestation with ultimately unsatisfactorily results, this is not the case with the Vacant Ritual Assembly #2. It contains some satisfying and usable content in both scenarios, an interesting creature to encounter, and even page filling pieces that can be used. Overall, a solid issue with a few problems which can easily be overcome for issue #3.

Fanzine Focus: Vacant Ritual Assembly #1

On the tail of Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed another DM and group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord and Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, such as The Undercroft and Vacant Ritual Assembly.

Published in the winter of 2014 by Red Moon Medicine, Vacant Ritual Assembly #1  is the first issue of ‘An OSR Zine’ devoted to Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay and the campaign of the author, Clint Krause. If there is a focus for this inaugural issue, it is upon certain aspects of magic that do not feature in Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay. The first is the acquisition of magic items, in the author’s campaign available at the Ghoul Market, a roving underground collection of traders who source magic items from high and low—mostly low. Items such as Wind Whales (2000sp) and the Ostritch-like Ergoraptor mounts (1000sp) add an expensive if outré element to a game, whilst Fairy Amber (3000sp per piece) can be bought and embedded in arms and armour to gain a bonus, though if too many are used there is the chance that the bonus will be lost.

Also seen at the Ghoul Market, is the Skinsmith as detailed in ‘Meat the Skinsmith’. This demonic and corpulent being provides surgeries—replacement limbs and even resurrection of the dead, though this comes at a terrible price, the possibility that the resurrected returns to life with the head of a bull, a demonic face in each palm that whispers ill to the resurrected, or even with his non-vital organs replaced with internal ‘pockets’ for the easy storage of small items. A regular customer at the Ghoul Market is detailed in ‘Vespero the Antiquarian’, a fixer who arranges for the finding and obtaining of objects and artefacts, perhaps employing adventurers such as the player characters to do so. He will have magic items for sale too, a different inventory each time he opens up shop. Both of these NPCs would make sold additions to a more fantastic style of campaign Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay as they both retain the dark horror elements intrinsic to the RPG.

‘Luminari, Lady of the Golden Lamp’ provides a respite from the horror.  It details a possible roleplaying encounter deep in the forest with the goddess of fireflies and is easily dropped into most campaigns. Perhaps the highlight of Vacant Ritual Assembly #1 is ‘Brahnwick is Dead’. This scenario starts with the player characters being hired by Vespero the Antiquarian to recover a signet ring from the late Lord Brahnwick as part of a succession dispute. To do this they must visit the Brahnwick family seat of Sylvan Lake, a village that has been partially drowned following the collapse of an ancient dam and infested with escaped patients from an asylum, the House of Mercy. The scenario sees the player characters boating across the submerged valley, going from one building to the next, and diving down to the lower floors whilst dealing with the escaped and insane inmates and scavengers. The scenario has a pleasing feel to it because it is a relatively mundane affair barring the upside down environment. Now there are ‘weird’ elements to the scenario, but they are kept to a minimum and the scenario is all the better for being underplayed. This also makes the scenario easy to drop into another setting, even the Early Modern period setting seen in official scenarios from Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay.

Rounding out the first issue is an interview with Chris McDowall, the author of Into the Odd, the post-industrial age dungeon exploration RPG. This is rather a decent advert for the game and it got me interested in reviewing the game. It is followed by a map of ‘Greycandle Manor’, an abandoned priory turned manor house now awaiting the GM to populate it, accord it a plot or two, and drop it into his game.

Fanzines can of course vary greatly in quality since they are not produced by professionals, but to a certain extent, there is no excuse for poor layout as desk top publishing has been available for decades. Fortunately, Vacant Ritual Assembly #1 s reasonably laid out and on the whole is rather serviceable. The writing is clear and the author pleasingly takes the time to describe how each of the pieces in the issue played out in his campaign.

As the first issue—of which there are five to date—Vacant Ritual Assembly #1 is a solid affair. It contains elements that are all connected. Both Meat the Skinsmith and Vespero the Antiquarian to the Ghoul Market, and Vespero the Antiquarian to ‘Brahnwick is Dead’, but at the same each is easy to separate from these connections to be used on their own. Good support for both Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay and for darker Old School Renaissance campaigns from the off—let us hope that the next issues will be as good.