Wednesday, October 30, 2019

Review: Cha'alt


I was very intrigued about this when it was on kickstarter but I was unable to participate when it was live. I acquired the pdf the first chance I got and Venger Satanis sent me a physical copy for review purposes. 

In Venger's own words, "The world of Cha'alt started as a fairly typical medieval land with elves, dwarves, snake-men, clerics, and magic-users; steeped in superstition along with antediluvian traditions, before the Old Gods went mad.  

Three-thousand years passed. The surface dwellers split from the malevolent creatures who slithered below. Those who remained on the surface lost the understanding of magic, but their civilization became a highly developed, technological empire of domed cities welcoming interstellar travelers, their massive starships hovering high above in blue skies.

But in the deep crevasses of the world, a power older than time stirred from its deathless slumber. The Ancient Gods, long forgot, had not died but continued to dream... growing chaotic and full of darkness.  And those living underground hastened the Old Ones' rising because they yearned to reclaim Cha'alt for themselves.

When the Great Old Ones awakened, they were angered by the lack of worship, sacrifices, or even casual acknowledgement that they had fashioned the world and all life upon it. 
Soon enough, Cha'alt was all but destroyed by those vengeful Gods, jealous of their creations' achievements and bitter that they had been forgotten.  Civilization in ruins, the surface-dwellers of Cha'alt turned to barbarism as sorcery reappeared, dragons appeared in the now-magenta sky, and demons took hold once more.

Cha'alt is a mysterious world where you're likely to encounter mutant bikers with laser rifles, tentacled sandworms in the deep desert, tribal warfare as blood-splotched shamans ululate at the crimson rock, and alien pirates on anti-grav skiffs looking to steal relics of a bygone age."

This is just the tip of the iceberg. It has so much more potential then just being a campaign setting. It can be used as a location to to send players and one could easily drop any location, monster, NPC, dungeon room, or factions into any other campaign little to no effort. There is enough setting information to give game masters a solid footing in the world but there is wiggle room to make Cha'alt a sandbox world of your own. 




The above map shows twelve locations one can visit. Each location is given some information but four places places are given a lot more detail. The locations that are focused is the City of Kra'adumek, the ruins beneath Kra'adumek, the frozen Violet Demon-Worm, Gamma Ineel Cantina, and the Black Pyramyd. 



The city of Kra'adumek is given descriptions but there are no NPCs, maps, or specific plot hooks. 

The Ruins beneath Kra'adumek is an introductory dungeon that is also doubles as an introduction to the setting. There are multiple ways characters can end up there and it starts the party right in a dungeon. I personally love this idea and I have used this technique multiple times. 

The frozen Violet-Demon Worm is a giant worm that is frozen outside of Kra'adumek. No one knows the if the worm is actually dead. The worm itself is a location that characters can explore and inside of the worm is a mini mega Dungeon in it's own. Inside the belly of the worm there are encounters like a family that took shelter and the wife is about to give birth and an almost intact pirate ship.

Ah, the Black Pyramid. This is the heart of Cha'alt and is a Mega Dungeon that spans pages 81 to 199. This thing is stuffed full of encounters like a madman in a playhouse, a tiki bar, and a giant frozen peach with ape men. 



Presentation: I have to saw that I am completely blown away by the physical presentation of Cha'alt. It is a 211 FULL COLOR paged, dust jacketed, hardback tome that should live on your coffee table. Under the dust jacket is a reddish brown cover that has a burlap texture with gold inlay. The pages are thick and edge to edge full color (not just the art). The images inside the book is a mix of fantasy/sci-fi, live action, and abstract images that are probably from the lucid dreams of H.P. Lovecraft himself. 

       

Character Creation: It is designed basically OSR system agnostic which means you could easily plug in your OSR system of choice with it. Though, with that being said Cha'alt is designed using Crimson Dragon Slayer d20 (these rules are included in the back of the book) which is Venger Satanis's own rules light hack with a DnD 5th Edition flare. Character creation boils down to choosing a name, race, class (there are 4), alignment (law, chaos, neutral), and writing down something noteworthy about your character.


Resolution System: If you use the included Crimson Dragon slayer then the dice mechanics are d20 vs. Target number or Armor Class. Anything that needs to be determined outside of roleplay it is vs. a DC of 15 but the player adds their character level to the roll. Saves are 20 - character level and must roll that number or better to succeed. The advantage/disadvantage mechanic is used instead of numeric modifiers.

Crunch: There is none. 


Final Thoughts: This is what happens when H.P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Ray Bradbury, Manly Wade Wellman, and Frank Herbert all drop acid and play Gamma World. Cha'alt has aspects of Dune, Gamma World, gonzo fantasy ala Warhammer Fantasy, and just about anything from Weird Tales. They way it is written you could tone down or crank up the gonzo, the sci-fi, or the fantasy aspects. Even if any if these aspects do not fit your taste or gaming style it is worth getting your hands for inspiration and mining for ideas. 

My favorite thing about this is that all of the encounters and designed where things, people, and monsters have their own motivations and are going about their business in addition to whatever the encounter with the party brings. This creates role play rich opportunities and gets ride of the kill everything and ask questions later mentality. To be honest, combat is not always the wise or best option in the harsh sands of Cha'alt. 

You can acquire this Tome of Maddening Awesomeness here:



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3 comments:

  1. Thanks for the review, hoss. Glad you liked it. I hope it brings you years and years of kaleidoscopic insanity!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I have a feeling that is exactly what it's going to do.

    ReplyDelete