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Wednesday, October 9, 2019

Kickstarter - Wolves of God: Adventures in Dark Ages England


"Experience savage adventures and grim perils in Dark Ages England in this historical fantasy RPG."

When Kevin Crawford releases a new Kickstarter, people pay attention. Kevin never fails to deliver amazing projects. I'd love to see him interviewed on a podcast (hint ;)

The Wolves of God: Adventures in Dark Ages England Kickstarter is Kevin's latest release, and yes, it looks damn good. Dark Ages England is an excellent choice of setting and I'm looking forward to having this project in hand.
Embrace the savage darkness of post-Roman Britain with Wolves of God, a semi-historical tabletop RPG from the creator of Stars Without Number, Godbound, Scarlet Heroes, and other best-selling role-playing games. 
It is the year 710 of our Lord as brother Bede reckons it. The barbaric English have long since swept over Britain, their passage shrouded by the smoke of burning cities. For six generations they have been masters of the best part of the island, driving the native Britons before them with bloody iron or taking them as thralls and subjects, until the wretched heirs of the Roman kings can have refuge only in the western mountains or the cold northern lands. The magnificent Roman cities of old have been thrown down, the roads have grown wild and perilous, and even the kings of the English must live in thatched wooden halls and ride from one royal villa to the next merely to feed their companions. It is an age of darkness, poverty, and unsleeping war. 
Four generations ago the English turned Christian under the ministrations of Roman missionaries and Irish monks. Scattered across their untamed lands are the minsters of these clergy, strongholds of learning and Roman civilization against the hard ways of the English tribes. Only in the minsters can stone buildings be found, with windows of glass and artisan-monks fashioning wonders to adorn their altars and reward the generosity of great lords. Brave abbots and wise abbesses rule these strongholds, always seeking to lift their kinsmen from their cruel ways and iniquities, and always in need of strong heroes to help them in their work. 
Yet there are worse things in the dark than raiding warbands and embittered pagan remnants. The Roman sorcerers, the Artifexes of old, carved cysts into the world where they and their slaves could hide from the fury of the English. These Arxes were sealed until help could come, but help never did; now they canker and rot, old magic gone sour and strange, and those that dwell within them have been terribly changed. The Arxes burst open within the fallen Roman cities, monstrous beasts and twisted men going forth to scourge the innocent and take revenge for the crime of their conquest. The minsters stand fast against their diabolic power, but the abbots and lords need brave heroes to venture into the cities and purge these Arxes of evil before they can swell greater still. 
You are one such hero. Whether a spear-wise gesith, a young ceorl of broad back and stout heart, a wild-eyed waelcyrige-maiden of battle, a charm-muttering galdorman, or even a blessed and pious saint, your ambition is to earn a deathless name of glory and an honored place among your people. Whether offering your aid to warring lords, plundering the riches of fallen Roman cities, delving the dark halls of a festering Arx, or acting as agents of some cunning abbot, you will dare great deeds with your brave warband of companions and win yourself a place in the songs of kings… or a nameless grave in some blighted earth.
20 bucks for the PDF. 60 for POD Print plus PDF. 80 for offset Print plus PDF.

I'm probably going in for 60 bucks.

5 comments:

  1. Waiting for this for so long. Thank you. Next please.

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  2. Looks fun. Just a FYI that the invasion model of post-Roman Britain has been rejected by scholars for 20 years. (Invasion model= invasion by angles, saxons, jutes, etc.). The archaeology doesn't support it.

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    Replies
    1. While it's true that a simplistic model of English Hordes sweeping over the sea as a monolithic bloc isn't supported by the archaeology, there do seem to be portions of England that got the invasion treatment all the same- or at least a methodical purge of the existing inhabitants rather than any signs of intermarriage and absorption. Either the Britons decamped en masse from these areas or the English simply killed them all... and Gildas is pretty good evidence that the latter was a real option on the table. Unless we take his descriptions as pure flights of fancy, the English really did slaughter huge numbers of inhabitants, and since Gildas was writing to an audience with living memory of events it seems implausible that he would be painting pictures they wouldn't have recognized.

      The most plausible model I've seen starts with the existing Roman-era English settlements of foederati serving as nuclei for addition immigration from the Continent, with local British tyrants and remnants of Roman authority utilizing them as muscle. Eventually the English became sufficiently numerous and aggressive as to either kill the Britons in an area or subjugate them so completely as to effectively erase their culture.

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    2. See Robin Fleming, _Britain After Rome_ for the most up-to-date stuff on this period.

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