TEXT: Tuckey, Rhymer, Nunn,  
  Chmakova, Davies, Hamilton, 
  Labus, Lolli, Vernon
  
  1
  
  2
  Game Design: John Tuckey
  Additional Design: Richard Nunn
  Development & Typesetting: John Tuckey
  Authors: John Tuckey, Richard Nunn, Scott Rhymer
  Editing: John Tuckey
  Proofreading: Mark Pacey, John & Hilary Hereward
  Art Direction: John Tuckey
  Artists: Tara K Labus, Kelly Hamilton, Svetlana Chmakova, Ursula Vernon, Matteo Lolli, Samuel Araya, Ed Davis, 
  Shawn Brack, Fufu Frauenwahl, The Illustrated London News Archives
  Coverart, Maps & Logo: Ursula Vernon
  A Special thank you to all the players who have playtested, honed and tuned Victoriana in its pre-release purgatory: 
  Mr D, Chris Freeman, Rick Farrand, Mark Selby, Dan Farrand, Mike Stonin, Debra Rhymer, John Martin, Melanie Carr, 
  Scott Rhymer, Joe Greig.
  A Personal thank you from John & the team to: 
  A special thank you to the numerous fans who sent us fan mail during development - as much as twelve months before 
  release. Rog & the gang at Waylands Forge for their enthusiam; Lisa & Mike Pondsmith, Jim Fallone, & James Wallace 
  for their advice. John Hereward for his faith in the vision. Brother Shuffle for being consistently disgusting whatever the 
  occasion; To Demonicus for being the ever righteous Uberdemon; Mr D the Questioning Knight - may your questions be 
  answered with straight answers; and to Lida for all her support.
  Thank you! 
  The Victoriana Game World  © 1992. This edition © 2003 Heresy Gaming.
  All Artwork is the property of the Artist, and used with Permission.
  FUZIONTM is the Fuzion Labs GroupTM trademark for its multigenre game system. 
  Published by: Heresy Gaming, 3 Peel Close, Hampton in Arden, B92 0AL, United Kingdom
  Credits
  VICTORIANA
  CREDITS
  
  3
  Contents
  CONTENTS
  Introduction
  Gutter runners  
  17
  What does my character do?  
  18
  What is a role playing game?  
  18
  What you need to play  
  19
  Pens, Paper & buckets of dice  
  19
  Dice rolls  
  19
  Skill and action rolls  
  19
  Effect and damage rolls  
  19
  Society
  Who fits where?  
  21
  Aluminat decency  
  21
  Artistic license  
  22
  Correct by convention  
  22
  Upper class   
  22
     Resources  
  23
     Ethics  
  24
  Middle class   
  25
     Resources  
  25
     Ethics  
  26
  Lower class   
  27
     Resources  
  28
     Ethics  
  28
  The fairer sex  
  29
  Customs of society  
  31
     Afternoon tea  
  31
     Calling cards  
  31
     The marital institution  
  32
     Presentation balls  
  33
     Rough music  
  33
  Policies of the revolution  
  33
     Communist  
  33
     Bolshevik  
  34
     Chartism  
  35
     Nihilist  
  35
     Anarchist  
  35
     Nationalist  
  36
     Free traders  
  36
  Entertainment & vice  
  37
     Drink  
  37
     Drugs  
  37
  Prostitution  
  37
     Gambling  
  39
     The arts  
  39
     The ballet  
  39
     The baths  
  39
     The brothel  
  39
     The cinematograph  
  40
     The gin palace  
  40
     The hunt  
  40
     The music hall  
  40
     The opera  
  40
     The opium den  
  40
     The prize-fight  
  41
     The public house  
  41
     The races  
  41
     The theatre  
  41
     The gentleman’s club  
  41
  The law  
  42
     The poor law amendment act of 1836  
  43
     The workhouse  
  44
  Education  
  45
  Religion & society  
  46
     The Aluminat  
  46
     The thirty year war and the heresy  
  47
     The Aluminat church of today  
  47
     The Aluminat  
  49
     The Anglican aluminat  
  49
     The evangelical puritans  
  50
  The earth goddess & the dark gods  
  50
  Paline, lady of subversion  
  54
  Science & Steam Power 
  Naval Technology  
  55
  Flight  
  56
  Overland Transportation  
  57
  Roads & coach houses  
  57
  Rail  
  57
  Electricity  
  59
  Weapons  
  59
  Communication  
  60
     Telegraph connection  
  61
     Misinterpretation  
  61
  Messengers  
  61
  The royal mail  
  61
  Computers  
  62
  
  4
  Cyberware?  
  62
  Healthcare  
  62
  Manufacturing  
  62
  Europe & The Rest of the World
  Types of government  
  66
  Britain  
  67
     London 
  68
     Eire  
  69
  The French republic  
  70
     Paris  
  72
  Spain  
  72
  The Hapsburg empire  
  74
     Vienna  
  74
     Praag  
  75
  The Dutch Netherlands  
  75
     Amsterdam  
  76
  The Italian states  
  76
  Russia  
  76
  The ottoman empire  
  79
     The Crimea  
  79
  Pan Scandinavian federation  
  80
  Portugal  
  81
  Switzerland  
  81
     Bern  
  82
     Geneva  
  82
     Zurich  
  82
  The Prussian confederation  
  82
  India  
  86
  Africa  
  88
  Australasian & new Zealand  
  89
  China  
  90
  America  
  91
  Japan  
  93
  Character Creation
  Character creation summary  
  97
  Social class  
  98
  Social Class & Character Limits 
  98
  Races  
  99
     Men  
  99
     Beastmen  
  99
     Eldren  
  100
     Dwarves  
  100
     Halflings  
  101
     Gnomes  
  102
     Ogres  
  102
  Characteristics  
  103
  Primary vs. Derived characteristics  
  103
  Characteristics  
  103
  Skills  
  104
  Starting skills  
  105
  Childhood experience  
  106
  Past career  
  108
  Creating your own experience package  
  116
  Option points  
  118
  Raising & buying skills  
  118
  Raising derived characteristics  
  118
  Talents  
  118
   Perks & privileges  
  118
  Contacts & favours  
  119
  Property & assets  
  123
  Gear, equipment, cash  
  126
  Complications  
  126
  Complications with property & assets  
  128
  Social complications  
  128
  Finishing touches  
  129
  Provisions & commodities
  The monetary system  
  131
  Skills
  Using skills  
  141
  Which characteristic do I use?  
  141
  Which skill do I use?  
  142
  Action rolls  
  142
  Effect and damage rolls  
  142
  How difficult is it?  
  142
  Unopposed  
  142
  Opposed  
  142
  When you don’t have a skill  
  143
  Defaulting to skills  
  143
  Trying again & improving your chances   
  143
  Complementary skills  
  143
  Taking extra time  
  144
  Common knowledge & specialities  
  144
  Skills  
  144
  Skill list  
  144
  Common knowledge  
  145
  Specialities  
  145
  The complete skill list  
  146
  Languages 
  149
  Combat
  What can I do as an action?  
  153
  Initiative  
  153
  Contents
  
  5
  How many actions can I take?  
  153
  Free actions  
  154
  Holding actions  
  154
  Performing actions  
  155
  Movement  
  155
  Melee & hand-to-hand attacks  
  155
  Optional rules for Melee Combat  
  156
  Ranged combat  
  157
  Rates of fire  
  158
  Spreadfire  
  159
  Volleys  
  159
  Gatling fire  
  159
  Optional Rules for Ranged Combat  
  160
  Ranged weapon characteristics  
  160
  Archery  
  161
  Dodging ranged attacks  
  161
  Determining damage  
  161
  Throwing stuff  
  161
  All out dodge  
  162
  Taking cover  
  162
  Diving for cover  
  162
  Common Attack Modifiers  
  163
  Modifiers  
  164
  Surprise! It’s an ambush!  
  164
  Explosions  
  164
  Other dramatic systems
  The passing of time  
  175
  The environment  
  175
  Falling  
  176
  Lifting, Throwing and Strength Feats  
  176
  chases and driving  
  177
  Chase Scene Distance Brackets  
  177
  Strength Feat Difficulties  
  177
  Disease  
  178
  Drugs  
  178
  Drugs  
  179
  Diseases  
  179
  Coming Down  
  180
  Healing the Effects of Disease and Poisons  181
  Damage  
  181
  Damaging people  
  181
  Collateral damage  
  181
  Stunned  
  182
  Wound penalties  
  182
  Knockback (optional)  
  182
  Damaging objects  
  182
  Typical Object Hits  
  182
  Medicine & recovering  
  183
  Recovering stun damage  
  183
  Recovering resolve  
  183
  Recovery from lethal damage   
  183
  Death  
  184
  Experience  
  184
  Buying stuff with your points  
  184
  Raising skills  
  184
  Buying new skills  
  185
  Characteristics  
  185
  Derived characteristics  
  185
  Spells & enchantments  
  186
  Buying off complications  
  186
  Study & practice (optional rule)  
  186
  Magic & Mediums
  The guild  
  187
  The rarest of gifts  
  187
  Magic & the law  
  188
  Mediums  
  188
  To be a medium...  
  188
  Becoming a medium in play  
  189
  Using abilities  
  189
  Aluminat faith  
  189
  Sensate abilities  
  190
  Channelling abilities  
  191
  Miracles of Faith  
  192
  Sorcery  
  193
  Colleges of magic  
  193
  Thaumaturgy  
  193
  Petty magic  
  193
  Resolve  
  193
  Recovering resolve  
  194
  Learning spells  
  194
  Libraries  
  195
  Grimoires & Textbooks  
  195
  Limits to spell casting  
  196
  Enchanting  
  196
  Thaumaturgy  
  197
  Forbidden lore  
  197
  Demonology  
  198
  Necromancy  
  198
  Demonology  
  198
  Summoning & commanding demons  
  199
  Summoning  
  199
  Contracting  
  200
  Breaking the contract  
  200
  The corruption of chaos  
  200
  Demonic possession  
  201
  Contents
  
  6
  Demonology corruption table  
  201
  Necromancy  
  202
  What are undead?  
  202
  Corruption points  
  203
  The strength of the dead  
  203
  Lesser undead  
  203
  Corruption levels  
  203
  Greater undead  
  204
  Enchantment Rituals  
  205
  Thaumaturgy Spells  
  210
  Demonology spells  
  216
  Summonings  
  218
  Necromancy spells  
  221
  Relics  
  226
  The supporting cast  
  227
  Competence ratings  
  232
  Pedestrians  
  232
  The character villain  
  232
  Pedestrian Competency  
  233
  Supporting cast, society  
  233
  Natural Beasts  
  246
  Monsters  
  249
  Running The Game
  Atmosphere  
  263
  Campaign ideas  
  265
  Encounter Table  
  266
  A matter of history  
  269
  The Eternal Struggle  
  269
  The big fight!  
  273
  Creating your own fight sets  
  285
  A white wedding 
  The Sequence of Events  
  287
  A Night at the Opera  
  288
  New Friends  
  288
  Story Option B: Enter The Stooge  
  289
  Enter the Groom  
  290
  Escape Plans  
  291
  The Wedding  
  292
  Happy Endings?  
  293
  Cast of Characters  
  294
  Appendix i 
  Reference material  
  295
  Videography  
  296
  Appendix ii
  Core Fuzion Crossovers  
  297
  Contents
  
  7
  Wescot’s Folly
  WESCOT’S
  FOLLY
  BY
  SCOTT RHYMER
  
  8
  Wescot’s Folly
  WESCOT’S
  FOLLY
  Water was dripping from the ancient brick walls and running through the sluices 
  in the middle of the tunnel.  The stench was unbelievable:  a mixture of offal, 
  chemicals, the reek of dead fish and animals coming through the catacombs from 
  the Thames.  My lantern was starting to gutter; the oil running low faster than I’d 
  thought.  My companion was a few paces ahead of me, moving with that curious 
  nervous pace that is characteristic of his kind.
  “Where are we, Lusk?  Perhaps we’ve taken a wrong turn?”
  The rat-man snapped around 
  in front of me, his eyes glint-
  ing in the pale light of the gas 
  lamp.  “No wrong turn,  Mr. 
  Wescot.  I grew up in these 
  ‘ere tunnels.  I think I know 
  me way through ‘em, right?” 
  he said defensively.  “Go it 
  alone, you don’t trust me.”
  The idea of being stranded 
  in the miles of Roman cata-
  combs and sewage tunnels that 
  span the underworld beneath the capital was not an engaging one.  I motioned him 
  on with the lamp, the circle of illumination around us bobbling unsteadily.  Was 
  I mad?  Entrusting my security to a rat-man, there was any number of things that 
  could be waiting for me...not the least the rumored bands of rat-people that lay in 
  wait for the unsuspecting to rob, kill, and worse.
  Suddenly, Lusk stopped short and ducked into darkened side tunnel.  “Kill that 
  light and get in ‘ere!” he hissed.  Before I could react, he lashed out and grabbed 
  me by the arm, dragging me into the tunnel as well.  His small, wiry frame was 
  deceptively powerful.  Fumbling, I managed to turn the wick down on the light, 
  extinguishing it. Then I heard it.  A light scraping sound, like bone over stone.  
  Then I smelled it; no wonder Lusk had reacted so violently.  Musty and foul, the 
  odor reached me.  The smell of the grave.  I started to whisper a question, but Lusk 
  slapped a hand over my face.  I could feel the nervous energy of the half-man as 
  he trembled behind me.  I suddenly realized that in that position, I would take the 
  brunt of any attack that might come.  Did the dead...or the undead, for that matter...
  need light to see?  Or could they smell the metallic tang of my fear?  
  It was close, I could also feel the cold of its presence.  The scraping stopped and 
  
  9
  Wescot’s Folly
  despite the water flowing, I fancied it dead quiet.  What an excellent adjective; I nearly 
  laughed from terror.  How did I ever get myself into this predicament?
  It began with Mrs. DeGrange, actually.  I had been about my morning routine, up 
  around tenish, when Mrs. Lindsay, my part-time housekeeper arrives at the shop below 
  my modest quarters.  The bell jangled me awake, and out of bed, and I dressed quickly 
  and took the spiral metal staircase down into the ground floor, where Wescot’s Rare 
  Books & Curios looks out onto Commerce Street near the Strand.  The neighbourhood 
  is not the best at night, admittedly, but during the day, the position is excellent to pull in 
  a fairly steady stream of clientele.  Most come in to view the curios:  the line of pygmy 
  shrunken heads, the esoteric jewellery that may or may not have the pedigree adver-
  tised.  The books run the gambit from light, trashy popular novels, the like produced 
  by our illustrious Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Disraeli, to old classics and tome of 
  exotic or erotic nature. 
  There is a kitchen in the back, through a door at the back of the reading room — real-
  ly just a series of tables in the main room, but sectioned off by the shelves of dusty vol-
  umes from the front, where the curios are kept in a desperate attempt to lure customers.  
  Well, their money, at least.  Mrs. Lindsay was already finishing whipping up my usual 
  breakfast — a few slices of toast and an egg, soft-boiled to chewy perfection, and a cup 
  of tea.  I prefer coffee, but after the coffee rust in the tropics a few years back, tea is 
  much, much cheaper.
  There was a note on the table I take my breakfast at.  Nice lavender paper with a nice 
  rag texture.  A lady’s hand had scrawled my name on the front:  Mr. Arthur Wescot. 
  “Found it pushed under the front door, Mr. Wescot,” said Mrs. Lindsay in a light Irish 
  accent.  She came through the door, moving her respectable bulk deftly while balancing 
  my breakfast tray.  Despite her disapproval of some of my wares, she has been a loyal 
  retainer for the past year; she tutted at me reprovingly.
  “Not seemly, a woman pushing notes under the door of a respectable gentleman,” she 
  told me.  Before I could respond she set down the breakfast tray and held up a hand to 
  avert any argument on my part, “No!  I’ll not want to be hearing any excuses from you 
  now, sir.  It’s not my concern how you comport yourself, sir.  I’d just as not find a femi-
  nine surprise upstairs, though, mind you.”
  I grinned at her teasing of me.  My size tends to bring the mothering out in the ladies.  
  It’s hellish on my love life, being a gnome.  While Mrs. Lindsay retired upstairs to 
  begin cleaning my quarters, I glanced over the note.
  Wescot’s Folly
  
  10
  Wescot’s Folly
  Dear Mr. Wescot,
  My name is Mrs. DeGrange and I need to 
  speak with you on most urgent business.  
  I have tried to contact you this morning, but 
  I fear you have not yet arrived for work.  
  I desperately need the assistance of the 
  ‘Crime Doctor’.  A man’s life may rest in the 
  balance!  You may call on me at my home...
  Signed Sincerely, 
  Mrs DeGrange
  The address was a location in Belgravia — a very fine neighbourhood.  The name 
  DeGrange rang a bell at the time, and I can honestly say that it would not have mattered 
  a jot, had I known about her past at the time.  A woman was in distress!  A mystery was 
  to be had!  I was hooked in one paragraph.
  Once I had finished breakfast, I hung a ‘closed for the day’ sign, locked the door and 
  set out for the cab ranks, only a few minutes walk from my door.  I found a few hacks 
  waiting by the curb, relaxing under the awning of a nearby gin shop.  My usual cabbie, 
  young Mack, saw me coming and immediately dashed to his rig.  Mack is one of the 
  best coachmen I’ve seen, an amazing feat for a twelve year old boy.  I’ve yet to be in an 
  accident, despite the high speeds that in which we traverse the city.
  Belgravia is a twenty to thirty minute trip under the best of conditions — a straight 
  hike down the Strand to Charing Cross, then past the Houses of Parliament and over the 
  wooden planks that covered the new underground rail extension being put in between 
  Whitehall and Kensington Station, then down Victoria Street into the heart of the 
  expensive neighbourhood, where all the houses are a uniform Georgian character.  Even 
  windows and dimensions..  Very picturesque, but also very boring.  The DeGrange 
  home was a nice three-story affair with a garden in front of the home, fencing in by 
  wrought-iron.  I dismounted the carriage and took the steps to the door, which opened 
  for me before I could knock.  The butler was a old, doughty-looking fellow with a voice 
  that flowed like treacle.  When I presented my carte de visite, he nodded.  “You are 
  expected, Mr. Wescot.  Please follow me.”
  Up the steps to the second floor and the sitting room, bright and airy, where the lady 
  of the house was waiting.  She leapt up at the sight of me, “The Crime Doctor?” she 
  inquired.
  “Truth be told, madam, I prefer Mr. Wescot.  The other moniker is a bit...melodra-
  matic, don’t you think?”  I cut off any apologies buy asking, “Your note suggested this 
  was urgent.”
  Wescot’s Folly
  
  11
  Wescot’s Folly
  “Indeed...I believe that there is a great evil in the city, Mr. 
  Wescot.  And I believe it will take the life of a man, this 
  evening.”  She retreated to the dining table, beckoning me to 
  follow.  On the table was a sketchpad.  The paper was cov-
  ered with charcoal lines and curves, describing the face of a 
  man.  Dark-haired, he had a strong jaw and cold eyes.  The 
  mouth was curled up in a slight smirk.  “This is the man I 
  saw in my vision.”
  “Your vision?”  I glanced at her.  Delicate Eldren features, 
  the characteristic dark hair, the slight upturn of the ears. Her 
  kind is usually in tune with the spirit world, so I didn’t scoff. 
  The other reason was I knew the man...Lord George Mace, 
  heir to the Earl of Inversnaid, and a Guild man.  Where he 
  went, trouble was rarely far behind.
  Step one seemed fairly simple:  try to make contact with Lord Mace and warn him of 
  impending danger.  There is a way to do these things, though; I sent word requesting 
  an audience, the letter carried by a young boy who was walking by for sixpence.  Then 
  it was a matter of waiting, while I got the particulars of the dream from her.  In her 
  vision, Mace had been tied to - of all things - an Aluminat cross and was being tortured 
  by ‘foul creatures’, as she called them.  He was underground, she was sure of it.  The 
  creatures, which she described as man-like, but sallow and decayed, were commanded 
  by another…one she could not picture in the vision.  This caused quite a bit of distress.  
  To her, it suggested the main villain of the piece was either a sorcerer, or a fell beast 
  that could block her ‘sight’.  When the boy returned half an hour later (the Inversnaid 
  residence being only two streets away), he reported that the butler informed him his 
  lordship was not, and had not been for two days, at home.
  So, step two.  Another acquaintance of mine, Lord 
  Lawrence Holmwood, was loosely connected to the Guild 
  and was a Mason, like Mace.  Perhaps he might know what 
  Lord Inversnaid was about recently.  Mack raced the car-
  riage through the press of lunch time traffic.  The thick of 
  it was in the area of Trafalgar Square, where the offices of 
  government had spewed forth functionaries on their way 
  to their clubs.  To make matters worse, a dray horse draw-
  ing an omnibus up and died.  The bus was blocking traffic 
  quite effectively, while the cads forced their fares off of the 
  vehicle and waited for a butcher to come and dismember 
  the horse and cart it away.  After extricating ourselves from 
  the clog of vehicles, we arrived in Holborn - and the Grand 
  Lodge of the Freemasons.  The Freemason Tavern is part of 
  Wescot’s Folly
  
  12
  Wescot’s Folly
  the building and open to the public and it was here we found Holmwood.
  The third son of Lord Holmwood, Lawrence is a tall and handsome fellow, in that 
  long-faced aristocratic way.  He certainly seemed to appeal to the willowy Mrs. 
  DeGrange more than my child-like stature.  C’est la vie...  There was some argument 
  about allowing the lady into the tavern, but Holmwood was able to smooth things over 
  for us and soon we were stuck into a table and over a half pint of porter I explained the 
  situation.
  “Yes, I’ve heard of Mrs. DeGrange.  A medium of some talent, I’ve heard.”  
  Holmwood regarded her with deceptively sleepy-looking eyes. “You say you cannot 
  see the leader of these creatures that are harming his lordship?  Interesting.  Mace was 
  investigating a series of murders in the city.  The victims all had their blood drained 
  from them, the rest is too horrific to be spoken of in the presence of a lady...  He kept 
  coming across a name: Andrei Borozci.”  I must have reacted, for he asked, “You know 
  of him?”
  “The name has been circulating around the city for the past year of so.  Borozci’s sup-
  posed to be Eastern European.  He’s been systematically taking over the criminal enter-
  prises throughout the City and the seedier parts of the West End.  Very few have seen 
  him, and his people are utterly loyal.”  I shuddered to think of what Mace might have 
  gotten himself into this time.  “If he’s gone looking for Borozci, there’s one person 
  he’ll have definitely talked to.  Do you know the Raven?”
  “No, I don’t.  But I believe I’ll be making his acquaintance.”  Holmwood started to 
  stand.
  “You’re coming with us?” DeGrange asked hopefully.  She was completely smitten 
  with him.  Ah, to be handsome...
  We three once again took Mack’s carriage through the streets, continuing south into 
  the East End.  Our destination was on Commercial at Dorset – the Britannia Pub.  The 
  place is popular with the working class.  It was also a fine place to pick up business 
  in the Raven’s former (and occasional current) trade.  We found her here, dressed in 
  clothes that emulated the fashionable, causing her to stand out from the rabble around 
  her like a queen at her court.  The tawdry cut of her clothing could not disguise the 
  elegance and beauty of her eldren heritage, however; raven tresses and eyes, pale skin 
  that was flawless, the Raven radiated charisma and sensuality.  Holmwood’s reaction 
  was predictable.  He gaped, then recovered quickly and became the perfect gentleman.  
  DeGrange said nothing, did not smile, and stewed jealously.  Raven nodded to me, 
  “Wescot.”
  “Raven.”  I slid into a chair across from her at her table.  The remains of a large gin 
  and a bowl of stew were pushed to one side, and she had been packing a pipe with 
  black, tarry material.  “Riding the dragon again?” I asked.
  
  13
  Wescot’s Folly
  “Still, actually” she smiled.  “What do you want?”
  “Lord Mace.  He’s gone missing.  He was tracking some 
  murders in the West End..”
  “Ah..!  Important people, then,” she stated coyly.  Her 
  Dutch accent was thicker this evening; she had been into 
  the opium already.  “Not like the murders here...”
  “He’s looking for Borozci.”  
  She nearly choked on the last sip of the gin she was tak-
  ing.  “Then he’s dead by now.”
  “Not yet,” Mrs. DeGrange spoke up, sharply, “but soon if 
  we don’t find him.”
  “Can you find out where he was last seen for me?”  I fished 
  out a few notes and set them down on the table, anchoring them with her empty pint 
  glass.
  “Give me an hour.  I’ll contact you and tell you where to meet.”
  The low street was darkening quickly as the sun was going down.  The day, which 
  had been mild, was turning chilly quickly.  The note from Raven had come after about 
  an hour of waiting at the Britannia, directing us to meet her in a side street not too far 
  from St. Giles – that most dangerous of rookeries.  Even here, the buildings were dilap-
  idated, many built before the Hanoverians had come to power in England.  The houses 
  ran one into another, creating sagging canyons of brick and grey stone.  The few gas 
  lamps here and there were being lit by the men paid by the city to go around and fire 
  them up, but their weak gas flames only gave small pools of light.  Why here? I won-
  dered.  
  Holmwood seemed equally concerned.  “Doesn’t seem right, does it?” he asked.
  “Stay here,” I told DeGrange.  She started to protest but Holmwood patted her hand 
  as he followed me out of the carriage.  To Mack, I said, “Any trouble, get out of here 
  and call the peelers.”
  The building we were told to meet Raven at was tucked in a small cul de sac, through 
  a tight access way between two crumbling tenements.  I could hear the shouted argu-
  ments of the tenants inside.  In the small court, we found an open door, leading into 
  one of the buildings.  I wished I had brought my Adams revolver suddenly and told 
  Holmwood so.  In response, he twisted the bezel below the handle of his cane and I 
  heard the mechanism click – a swordcane.  With a last exchanged look, we entered.
  The interior of the building had been gutted, with only a set of steps to the upper 
  
  14
  Wescot’s Folly
  story and a small balcony left intact.  In the middle of the floor was a small pit with a 
  pathetic fire burning in it.  Above the balcony, there was an hatchway to the roof and 
  most likely a series of walkways over the roofs of the homes here in the district.  The 
  door behind us slammed closed and someone pushed me into the middle of the floor.  
  There were others here with us, strange misshapen men, their skin like parchment, 
  faces drooping, eyes fogged over.  They closed in from the four corners of the building, 
  shark-like teeth glinting in the light of the fire.
  “I am truly sorry, Wescot,” I heard Raven say.  She was on the balcony above us.  Her 
  eyes flashed, reflecting the flame of the pit.  “There was nothing I could do.”
  “Ghouls!” Holmwood growled.  He pushed me closer to the fire, putting himself 
  between me and two of the creatures.  They cackled, unafraid of Holmwood.  “Keep 
  the fire between you and the others; it will finish them.”
  “But...” I began.  Above, I saw the Raven watching the display with interest and 
  delight.  Holmwood was chanting something, drawing his sword and waving it in 
  complex patterns in front of him.  His nonsense rose to a crescendo and with a stun-
  ning blast of light, the two ghouls were blown back against the wall.  Above us, Raven 
  looked momentarily pleased, but then quickly jumped onto the ladder, climbing dex-
  trously through the hatch onto the roof.
  “She’s getting away!” I cried.
  “Go!” Holmwood ordered.  He waved his swordcane again, this time impaling one of 
  the ghouls on the tip.  I ran.  The other ghouls had been concentrating on Holmwood, 
  giving me my chance.  I was on the steps in a flash, racing up to the balcony as fast as 
  my little legs could carry me.  Below, the three ghouls were circling Holmwood, who 
  was slashing in patterns, holding the enemy at bay.  Another one went up in a flash of 
  light and the others suddenly retreated, disappearing into the darkness in the corners.  I 
  was almost to the roof when a thought hit me.
  “Mrs. DeGrange!” I shouted.  Holmwood nodded once, and was out the door in a 
  flash.  I finished climbing onto the roof.  Up here, the sun was just on the horizon, bril-
  liant red from the smoke in the air; the streets below were dark.  Raven was moving 
  along slim wooden boards joining the tops of the buildings.  There were others up here, 
  as well, but none were between me and my quarry.  Without a thought, I dashed onto 
  the walkway, charging after the Raven.  The woman moved with uncanny grace, dash-
  ing from building to building without a misstep.  I charged after her, but the distance 
  between us increased as her long Eldren legs carried her beyond my grasp.  Suddenly, 
  she stumbled and went over the side of one of the boards joining the buildings.  For a 
  moment, I thought she was gone, then I realised she had caught the edge of the board 
  and was hanging in space, the street obscured by fog some twenty feet below.
  Panting, I caught up to her while she was still trying to pull herself onto the plank.  
  She stopped, one arm over the board, legs hanging in space, as I arrived.  “Where?” I 
  demanded.  She grinned back at me, but I had the sense time was running out.  “I don’t 
  have time for this!  Where?”  I placed my foot against the side of her head.  I couldn’t 
  
  15
  Wescot’s Folly
  do it, I knew, but she couldn’t think that.
  “Bayswater.  He’s in the catacombs.  You can get there through the sewage tunnels by 
  Whitehall.”  I took my foot away and bent to offer her a hand up.  She arched an eye-
  brow up at my diminutive form “Really Arthur, as if you could” she laughed at me, and 
  then, keeping my gaze locked with her silver eyes she let herself fall, arms outstretched 
  like an angel disappearing into the fog.  My heart stopped for a moment before I heard 
  the splash of water below where I had assumed there was cobbled street.  I suspected 
  that I would be hearing from the Raven again.
  I returned to the site of our altercation.  In the building, there were no more ghouls to 
  be found, and the fire had nearly gone out.  Through the space between the buildings 
  and out onto the street, where I found Mack, lying cold and very dead in the gutter.  A 
  vicious set of bite marks in his throat revealed the manner of his death.  His carriage 
  was gone.  So were Holmwood and Mrs. DeGrange.  Lying in the middle of the street, 
  Holmwood’s swordcane gleamed in the nearby gas lamp.
  Forcing my racing heart to calm, and ordering my thoughts, I rationalised that there 
  was one man remaining that I knew could find Borozci’s lair, if any could.  Fortunately 
  for me Lusk, the rat-man, was a man of habit.  Finding him was easy enough; he was 
  warming his usual doorway in the warehouse district by the St. Katherine Docks.  He 
  saw me approaching, his misshapen nose twitching at the approach.  “Well, well, the 
  mighty ‘crime doctor’,” he sneered by way of acknowledgement.
  “Lusk, I need your help,” I told him.  He laughed at me, shook his head and tossed 
  away an apple core he’d been nibbling on.
  “I guess we’d best get on with it, then...”
  Now after crawling around the sewers of the West End, I was huddling with a known 
  anarchist and rat-man, waiting to have my very life snuffed out by some ghoul or other.  
  Our inhuman friend began shambling away again, moving in the general direction of the 
  river.  “Come on,” I heard Lusk say.  His alcohol-laden breath was overpowering; how 
  the sentry had missed us I don’t know.  “I can smell humans...  Don’t bother with the 
  light.  Just hang onto me.”
  We edged forward through the darkness, me trusting to his well-honed night vision.  
  Occasionally, I stumbled on something or other and the noise would cause him to curse 
  me softly.  Then I realized that I could see gradients of light and shadow.  Moments 
  later, we had made a turn that brought us to a section of stone wall that had been crude-
  ly removed, then covered with heavy tarpaulin.  Lusk and I moved to the sides of the 
  tarp, peering into the room beyond.  It was a sort of library, bookcases, leather-bound 
  armchairs with green baize-topped tables, lit by ornate brass gas lamp assemblies.  All 
  this tucked underground.  Faintly, I could hear people talking.  Glancing at each other, 
  we moved through the tarp into the library carefully. The sounds were coming from an 
  
  16
  Wescot’s Folly
  adjoining area through an archway to another section of catacomb.  This ‘room’, however, 
  was not so cosy.  Deep shadows and bright light contrasted, and in the centre, Lord Mace 
  and Holmwood were tied to a large crucifix.  Misshapen and deathly figures capered about 
  them, anxious to set on them.
  It was obvious they had already started on Mace; his clothes 
  were torn and blood-spattered, his face bruised and cut by tor-
  ture.  Mrs. DeGrange was a few steps from them, in a chair.  
  “You see, I have reputation, yes?” said an Eastern voice.  “I 
  am known for my cruelty.  It is what... endears me to my 
  people.  Unfortunately, reputation is not real.  It must be rein-
  forced from time to time.  Then, it becomes like… 
  concrete.”
  “And we’re to be your object lessons?” 
  asked Holmwood.
  “Yes...yes!  Precisely that, Dr. 
  Holmwood.” The figure moved into view.  
  He was a small, bent old man – he might 
  have been someone’s grandfather, spec-
  tacles and all, but for the rows of predator 
  teeth and the malicious look in his eye.  
  “I believe we will start with your tongue, 
  doctor...  We would not want you casting 
  any of your thaumaturgy, no?”
  Mrs. DeGrange had sat up sharply; she 
  had seen us!  Lusk motioned for her to 
  stay put, while pressing himself behind 
  the cover of the archway to the torture 
  chamber.  He looked at me questioningly.  
  I know what he wanted to ask, for I was 
  asking it of myself...
  Now, what do you do..?
  
  17
  It is the year 1867 by the calendar of the 
  Roman Aluminat church. It has been over 
  three hundred years since the age of magic 
  ended with the thirty-year war. It is an age 
  of unprecedented achievement. Men fly 
  through the skies in balloons, travel over-
  land by train faster than twenty horses! For 
  the Humans, Dwarves, Eldren & Gnomes 
  of Europe, there would appear to be no 
  limit to their achievements, but at what 
  cost?
  Welcome to Victoriana, a world of crushing 
  industry and soulless exploitation, a land of 
  stark contrasts and an era of vast change.
  Victoriana is set in a fantastic ‘alternative’ 
  to our own world, and much of its history 
  is the same as our own – but sometimes 
  the two differ. For example, in Victoriana 
  magic and mediums are very real, and 
  fantasy races co-exist with man – the real 
  world, is of course less… interesting.
  Fantastic magic and races aside, the world 
  of Victoriana shares much with our own 
  world of the 19th century, the divide 
  between the decadence of the rich and 
  the exploitation of the poor being a good 
  example. The real life 19th century was 
  a melting pot of change, where the old 
  regime and centuries old tradition gradually 
  gave way to the modern world, and so it 
  shall be in Victoriana.
  GUTTER RUNNERS
  In Victoriana your character could be 
  a wealthy aristocrat, a revolutionary, a 
  medium or sorcerer, or a perhaps simply a 
  poverty stricken labourer. Your goals could 
  be anything from ‘global domination’ to 
  (the perhaps more reasonable) ‘ridding the 
  rookeries of London from the threat of a 
  necromancer’. 
  Regardless of your character’s origins, or 
  their goals, we assume that you will all 
  have one thing in common – desire for 
  change, fuelled by a firm knowledge that 
  the social structure your characters live in 
  is corrupt and wrong.
  Those who realise this frequently become 
  ‘gutter runners’, unafraid to do what needs 
  doing regardless of the social system, 
  regardless of hierarchy, and regardless of 
  law. Often they are urban mercenaries, 
  sometimes killers for hire, or thieves – they 
  are always expendable, their desire to live 
  outside social convention also excludes 
  them from social protection. Gutter runners 
  value personal freedom more than the soci-
  ety around them, they feel a need to be in 
  charge of their own lives, make their own 
  mistakes, choose their own Romances and 
  make their own fortunes. Many Victoriana 
  middle and lower characters share much in 
  common with (or are) criminals, mirroring 
  the cyberpunk era ‘edgerunner’ ethos, mak-
  ing the best of a bad situation, doing what 
  needs to be done to rise above the stink of 
  a grim life in a dark reality, maintaining 
  your individuality against a depersonalised 
  and dehumanising world. 
  However, in Victoriana some of you may 
  have upper class characters, and when a 
  character already has the world on a plate, 
  what else does he need? Well, upper class 
  characters certainly have money – but they 
  don’t have freedom – many upper class 
  characters turn to drastic measures to bring 
  their futures under their own control, and 
  thus they fall in with the other gutter run-
  ners who also attribute the same value to 
  personal freedom.
  The simple fact that your character has a 
  20th century brain (you) behind his every 
  action makes him a perfect gutter runner 
  – you will disagree with at least some of 
  the following: arranged marriages, sweat-
  shop exploitation, empire building, social 
  murder, sexism, racism, slavery – but if 
  your character does then by 19th century 
  standards he’s a rebel, and in short, he’s a 
  gutter runner.
  17
  INTRODUCTION
  
  18
  WHAT DOES MY CHARACTER DO?
  Depending on the type of game your gamesmas-
  ter is running you might be hired as detectives, 
  bodyguards, or for criminal activities, there’s 
  no shortage of employers who need competent 
  agents who know how to be discreet.
  Often adventures will revolve around the charac-
  ters themselves and their relationships with their 
  friends, contacts and the society around them. 
  When the other local residents are threatened in 
  some way will they turn to the authorities – or 
  will the characters be a better choice? For lower 
  class neighbourhoods the characters 
  will frequently be a better alter-
  native than the corrupt legal 
  system. Your character’s capac-
  ity to create change will also be 
  a frequent issue, from the back 
  streets of London to the Mau 
  Mau concentration camps in 
  Kenya; there is much to do. 
  Does your character have 
  the heart, or the inclination 
  to stand against the way 
  that society treats women? 
  Will you stand for politi-
  cal change in the cities 
  of Europe? Stand against 
  the merchant armies in the 
  east and the way that they 
  rape the countries they 
  occupy? Is he a pawn in 
  the secret war between 
  Order and Entropy over 
  control of the world?
  Magic is also a major 
  part of Victoriana. A 
  great conjunction of 
  the planes approach-
  es, and many cults 
  and sorcerers are 
  racing for ancient 
  knowledge and power 
  to wield in a bid for 
  power when the time 
  is right. If any of 
  your characters have 
  magical ability the pursuit of magical power itself 
  will form many adventures as you quest for long 
  forgotten and suppressed spells and lore.
  WHAT IS A ROLE PLAYING GAME?
  At its root, role-playing is a form of ‘let’s pre-
  tend’, a type of improvisational acting. A role-
  playing game takes the pretend world and applies 
  parameters to define it.
  The parameters or rules are the major difference 
  between a role-playing game and schoolyard 
  ‘let’s pretend’. In a game of let’s pretend, jump-
  ing 20 miles in one leap is no problem, because 
  you’re the red ranger or Godzilla or whatever. 
  The only problem with being the red 
  ranger is that everyone else 
  wants to be the red ranger and 
  that’s how schoolboy fights 
  start.
  Despite the number of 
  scrapes we all entered 
  in arguments over our 
  heroes’ powers in the 
  schoolyard. The pretend 
  world retains a fascina-
  tion for most of us, even 
  in adult life. Of course 
  as adults we don’t rush 
  around play grounds 
  screaming and shouting 
  (well, most of us don’t), 
  instead we construct cen-
  tres of make believe - the 
  cinema, the computer 
  game, the trusty book 
  - all prime examples of 
  adult escapism, of the 
  desire to be someone 
  else while involved, 
  someone without 
  a mortgage, who 
  doesn’t have to get 
  up for work tomor-
  row.
  The good thing 
  about escaping 
  into a role-playing 
  Introduction
  
  19
  game is the control that can be exerted in com-
  parison to films or books. I think that most of us 
  have watched a film silently screaming ‘behind 
  you’!! Or ‘No! Don’t go into the basement!’ In 
  a role-playing game, you control the character’s 
  actions, so you can make the hero look behind 
  him, the hero can decide that whatever is in 
  the basement - it’s staying there, and run away, 
  returning with half a gun shop.
  WHAT YOU NEED TO PLAY
  The role-playing hobby can have some arcane 
  paraphernalia. The basics required for Victoriana 
  are mercifully minimal.
  Pens, Paper & buckets of dice
   
  Each player will need a character sheet. 
  The character sheet is a form used to 
  record the character’s details. The sheet 
  may be hand drawn or photocopied and 
  then filled in.
   
  Each player will need a pencil, a handful 
  of six sided dice and possibly some note 
  paper between them.
   
  The gamesmaster will need a pencil, a 
  bucket of dice, a huge pile of scrap paper, 
  and an immense imagination.
   
  A table, large enough to seat all partici-
  pants is always handy. However, the floor 
  provides a large surface area for those 
  without a big table and no back trouble.
   Some players & gamesmaster’s like to play 
  music in the background to add to atmo-
  sphere while playing. An appropriate music 
  score can make a startling difference to 
  your game.
  Dice rolls
  Victoriana uses only six sided dice. Such dice can 
  be found at most hobby stores or can be raided 
  from most board games. While playing the dice 
  are used in two different ways.
   
  Roll a die. The number on the top is the 
  result, hardly rocket science! Sometimes 
  more than one die will need to be rolled. 
  When multiple rolls are needed the fact 
  is noted by ‘xd’, where x is the amount of 
  dice to be rolled - 5d shows that five dice 
  must be rolled. To find the result from a 
  roll of several dice add all the topside num-
  bers together.
  You will typically roll dice in two circumstanc-
  es…
  Skill and action rolls
  This type of roll is made when your character is 
  trying to do something, perhaps he is decipher-
  ing a secret code, or trying to control a careening 
  wagon – or perhaps he’s just trying to whack an 
  opponent really hard.
   
  To accomplish this you roll 3d, and add all 
  the results together, this dice total is added 
  to your character’s relevant characteristic 
  and skill values to give a final action total.
   If this action total is above the target num-
  ber set by the gamesmaster you succeeded 
  in the action.
   
  When you roll your action dice you may 
  roll all sixes, if so then rejoice! This is 
  known as a special success. In combat 
  attacks this generally means that you dou-
  ble the damage done, in other action rolls 
  the gamesmaster will tell you how your 
  special success manifests.
   Adversely if your dice roll comes up with 
  three 1’s then the attempt automatically 
  failed, this is known as a foul failure.
  Effect and damage rolls
  Effect rolls normally follow an action roll; often 
  they represent damage done by weapons, or 
  define the effects of a spell.
   
  You usually roll a set amount of effect dice 
  and add the results together, just like an 
  action roll. The difference to action rolls 
  is that there are no skill or characteristic 
  bonuses to effect rolls.  Once rolled add the 
  results together, this is the effect total, or 
  damage roll as it is often known.
  Introduction
  
  20
  Introduction
  Common roleplaying terms
  Trying to eavesdrop on role-players talking shop is like trying to understand Martian. The 
  library of RPG jargon is immense. Following is a basic glossary for roleplaying hobby 
  newcomers.
  Campaign: a. Series of scenarios linked together with a common theme or possibly merely 
  by the presence of the same characters. Campaigns are the most common and most reward-
  ing type of game to play as they allow characters to progress through skill and attribute 
  increases.
  Character. The fictional persona that a player will control through a game. A player’s char-
  acter is called a pc. Often a gamesmaster will add characters to a party as extras, maybe a 
  mountain guide, or a character with skills your own characters will need for a scenario but 
  do not possess. Such a games master controlled character is called a non-player character or 
  NPC.
  Gamesmaster: the guy who writes the adventure for the players’ characters to mill about in. 
  The gamesmaster has the final say in all rules related decisions.
  Party: not a disco or drinking frenzy, but the term used to denote a group of characters.
  Player: for every gamesmaster there is at least one player. A typical gaming group is 1 
  gamesmaster and 2-5 players. Players have it easy; they roll up a character and play it. 
  Some players may play two characters at once but most stick to one at a time.
  Power player: a type of player who thinks he can ‘win’ the game. Usually this is by his 
  character’s prowess in combat situations and material wealth. Power players are silly; there 
  is no way to win an rpg other than by enjoying the game.
  Rules-lawyer: rules-lawyers are the nemesis of a forgetful gamesmaster. They sit among the 
  other players and whenever a gamesmaster forgets or waives a rule they leap up and down 
  in an energetic manner, screaming and shouting that (insert transgression) isn’t in the rules! 
  Rules lawyers can be incredibly irritating for all players and gamesmasters as their jibes 
  and taunts slow down an evening’s play incredibly.
  Running a game: when a gamesmaster decides to referee a game, we say he is ‘running a 
  game’.
  Scenario: a single adventure for the characters. This one adventure might take one night, or 
  it might make weeks to complete. It might take place in a pub or across several locations.
  System breaker. A character or item that is so powerful in its abilities that it can do any-
  thing, making the game little more than schoolyard ‘let’s pretend’. System breaking charac-
  ters are heavily associated with power players.
  Round: a period of game time, loosely 3 seconds, during which combat is organised.
  
  21
  Society
  The entire economy of the civilised world 
  relies on exploiting the lower class and using 
  foreign work forces as slave labour. This 
  is commonly accepted by the lower classes 
  as the way that things are. The inhabitants 
  of conquered lands are not so forgiving. 
  Revolutionaries plot the downfall of European 
  society, a sweeping away of the social cancer. 
  Right or wrong, the revolution comes – but 
  what is it against?
  It is all too easy to think of the Victorian era 
  as a lot of nice respectable red faced old men 
  creating modern industry and chasing singing 
  pick pockets. Such a conception is far from the 
  truth. Beneath the respectable veneer of middle 
  class society that popular history has recorded 
  for us, the Victorian world hid a hideous mass 
  of poverty, inequality, depravity and injustice. 
  A good key phase for this setting could be ‘out 
  of sight, out of mind’.
  The society of England and Europe is split into 
  three levels, upper, middle, and the lower or 
  ‘working’ classes, each of these groups has its 
  own ethics, ideals and etiquette.
  It is important for characters and game masters 
  to understand the class system of Europe as it 
  will be one of, if not the, most dominating fac-
  tors in the lives of their characters and the sup-
  porting cast around them.
  The theory is that class status reflected indefin-
  able but substantial differences in breeding. It 
  would be unthinkable for a businessman with 
  humble origins to socialise within the aristoc-
  racy, no matter how successful he had been, 
  as his breeding would be considered inferior. 
  Social class controls a European’s childhood 
  and defines his career, where he can live, even 
  who he can marry. The study of Victorian soci-
  ety and values can (and does) take up shelves 
  of books in most libraries; to attempt a reprint 
  of all that material here would be fruitless. 
  Following are some guidelines for each of the 
  social groups, they should give you a good 
  idea how the classes view and interact with one 
  another. For those who require more informa-
  tion on this social structure there are some very 
  informative books listed in the bibliography at 
  the back of the book.
  Who fits where?
  The upper or higher class of Europe consists of 
  the aristocracy, their extended families, friends 
  and any persons that they deign to elevate to 
  this station (very rarely the latter).
  The middle class consists of the professional 
  tradesmen and industrialists. This classifica-
  tion has only come into existence in the last 
  thirty years of game time, since the industrial 
  revolution. The middle class is further split into 
  two sub groups. The Upper middle class are 
  highly paid professionals such as doctors, law-
  yers, academics and officers with large purses. 
  The lower middle class consists of people rich 
  enough to own their own property and busi-
  ness, but not wealthy enough for suits and the 
  opera afterwards. In many ways the lower mid-
  dle class are infant bourgeoisie, not quite out of 
  the working man’s rut, but well on the way.
  The working or lower classes are composed of 
  the manual labour force, the craftsmen, wan-
  dering journeymen and anybody not born into 
  wealth.
  It is valuable to realise as many of the bizarre 
  customs of the 19th century as possible, such 
  conventions make society self important and 
  are self propagating. The very word ‘society’ 
  carries a much heavier meaning to inhabitants 
  of the 19th century than to we of the 20th. To a 
  Victorian gentleman the word society is insepa-
  rable from civilisation or empire.
  Aluminat decency
  The church plays an important role in defining 
  middle class social conventions throughout our 
  period. To the aspiring middle classes, respect-
  ability is of the utmost importance. Religious 
  21
  SOCIETY
  
  22
  Society
  piety is an important feature of the respectable 
  image. Part of this attitude is somewhat farcical 
  - ecclesiastic practice in our period is quite mer-
  cenary. A wealthy family may find itself favoured 
  by the church simply due to its wealth, not its 
  knowledge of or acts of Aluminat grace.
  The church does not separate races within its 
  churches, but social classes do have separate 
  pews, nobility at the front, then the middle class 
  and the working class standing or sitting at the 
  back. In an urban environment it is rare to find 
  a church with all of the space allocations, many 
  churches are built or kept open purely to collect 
  money - not a viable proposition in a working 
  class area.
  Among well meaning philanthropists of the peri-
  od there is a growing concern that the working 
  classes live beyond the grace of Christian society, 
  that churches should be established in poor areas 
  for the proletariat. In the majority, these voices go 
  unheard.
  Artistic license
  The 19th century is a time of great cultural 
  expansion for the privileged minority. The pursuit 
  of art in any form is admired as fashionable and 
  highly desirable. Many wealthy citizens plunge 
  huge sums into sponsorship of the arts, money 
  much better spent on alleviating poverty for the 
  masses. Artisans are allowed an incredible free-
  dom of the social restrictions so beloved by their 
  patrons. Artists are expected to womanise, drink, 
  be witty and outspoken. In short, to perform all 
  the acts that the sponsor couldn’t be seen to do.
  UPPER CLASS 
  (aka the gentry, the quality)
  Within the upper class, tradition dictates that the 
  first-born son takes control of the estates and 
  businesses of the family. A second son should 
  take a command in the military, and that a third 
  and subsequent son should take an education, if 
  possible a guild education. The women folk of 
  the upper class are raised to be polite, dainty and 
  eloquent - they do not pursue vocations like men, 
  and if an education is received it is usually in 
  the arts, knowledge of which is considered desir-
  able. In fact it is fair to say that the upper classes 
  consider their women to be useful for only three 
  things: marrying, mothering, and hosting parties. 
  Social activities such as croquet, bridge, readings 
  and theatre take up most of a young woman’s 
  time in these circles.
  Within the upper classes, there are several strata 
  that indicate one’s status within the upper class. 
  The highest of all are the nobility, who by neces-
  sity (or often inability to comprehend financial 
  reality) do not have to work for a living. Even a 
  noble who has fallen upon hard times (in relative 
  terms – this often means they still have servants 
  and may have to sell one of their country retreats) 
  will view him or herself superior to non titled 
  persons (including other upper class people). The 
  nearest any noble will come to work may be as a 
  hereditary peer in the House of Lords, Britain’s 
  upper legislative body. The ranks of nobility 
  are (in descending order) king, queen, prince, 
  duke, marquis, viscount, earl, baron, baronet, and 
  knight. Knighthoods are always awarded (usu-
  ally for brown-nosing the establishment or, more 
  rarely, for great feats of public significance). It is 
  Correct by convention
  Class distinctive society was instigated by, and serves the upper and middle classes. Its forms and pro-
  tocols are self-evolving within those classes. There are no social rules lawyers - social custom and cor-
  rectness are devolved from the majority. These forms and customs are then passed on to the lower class 
  without discussion.
  This might seem unfair and absurd - it is, but it is also the truth. A typical custom so formed is the pro-
  tocol that it is rude and uncultured to speak to a girl or woman unless formally introduced by her male 
  guardian of the moment, whether the guardian is present or not.
  
  23
  Society
  interesting to note that king is higher than queen; 
  hence the reason why Prince Albert of Saxe 
  Coburg is officially titled prince consort and not 
  king – if he were, then he would be superior to 
  the queen (and we can’t have that!). Most titles 
  are hereditary, although many of the lower ranks 
  of nobility are awarded for significant public 
  service, particularly to successful military com-
  manders (Arthur Wellesley for example was made 
  viscount Wellington of Talavera in 1809, fol-
  lowed by the marquis of Wellington in 1812 and 
  duke of Wellington in 1815). 
  The next sub-group of the upper classes is the 
  squires. These are not titled nobility, but have to 
  be from families with a recognised family crest 
  and are distinguished from the lower gentry by 
  virtue of land ownership. Such people are tra-
  ditionally rural, and often the same family has 
  owned the land for generations. Oliver Cromwell, 
  lord protector of England from 1653 – 58 was 
  originally a country squire from Cambridgeshire. 
  Of all the gentry, the squires tend to have the 
  most amiable contact with the lower classes, 
  as 
  in 
  rural England there is 
  little society to speak 
  of and often squires 
  see themselves as 
  benevolent par-
  ents towards 
  their tenants, 
  who effec-
  tively rent the land from the squires. However, 
  the industrial revolution has broken this bond 
  in many areas, as many squires have discovered 
  valuable minerals, such as coal, on their land. 
  This has led to large tracts of rural England, par-
  ticularly in the north east and midlands, being 
  sold to coal speculators and the destruction of 
  traditional rural life.
  The lowest, and consequently largest sub – group 
  of the upper classes, are the gentry. This group 
  is also the hardest to define, as to be a gentleman 
  has several meanings – however, it is acknowl-
  edged that merely good manners and caring about 
  other’s welfare is not an automatic ticket to the 
  title of ‘gentleman’. However, such a person 
  usually has at least one of the following pre-req-
  uisites: they are from a family with a recognised 
  coat of arms; they have a degree from a recog-
  nised university; they perform a recognised pro-
  fession (doctor, lawyer, clergy and accountant are 
  most common); or they are a justice of the peace. 
  The gentry are the most likely of the upper class-
  es to be speculating in high risk foreign ventures 
  or to take a position within colonial administra-
  tion as this is the only way they can hope to gain 
  additional status (such as much coveted knight-
  hoods or even a baronetcy) during peacetime. 
  The gentry form the majority of the professions 
  and the officer class in the army, as they have the 
  necessary means to gain education or have their 
  family purchase a commission within the armed 
  forces. As can be seen, there is a cross over 
  between the working gentry and the upper middle 
  classes. 
  Resources
  The upper classes have untold wealth, it is they 
  who sponsor the military, the government and the 
  colonial expansion into Africa and the east. The 
  aristocracy also sponsors the industrial revolution 
  in its infancy. The actual assets of an upper class 
  family are simply vast, it would not be worth 
  trying to work out an exact amount but it can 
  be safely assumed that a typical family will 
  have:
   
  An ancestral home, packed with antiques 
  and other valuables; the house will be at 
  the centre of the family estate. Most of the 
  
  24
  Society
  structures within the estate will be tithe 
  cottages, owned by the family and rented 
  to the estate workers.
   
  Several large properties in fashionable 
  urban areas as well as several country 
  houses purely for the personal use of the 
  family. If one of the family wishes to stay 
  in an area where the family does not have 
  property then. A property or hotel suite will 
  usually be hired for the duration of the stay.
   
  Male offspring can frequently expect to 
  receive an allowance of £20.3 each week, 
  to hire servants and spend on living and 
  pastimes. This is as much as many skilled 
  lower class labourers can expect to earn in 
  a year!
   Female dependants rarely received a 
  ‘cash’ allowance to spend on activities, it 
  is expected that they would not leave the 
  estate without a relative or suitor to pay 
  for them. Most young ladies only had to 
  ask and they would have whatever money 
  could buy, but they would seldom get the 
  money itself.
   
  Each dependant will usually have at least 
  one servant; the ancestral home has a full 
  range of staff.
  Ethics
  The upper classes own the world, they are bet-
  ter than any of the other classes, and blue blood, 
  breeding; money and power are the whetstones of 
  upper class society.
   
  Money? Money is an ugly subject to bring 
  up in polite conversation
   
  Education? Education is wasted upon a 
  woman.
   
  Other classes? The middle classes are try-
  ing their best to ape your breeding
   
  Other classes? The lower classes are noth-
  ing but sloth and crooks, which is why they 
  have so little.
   
  Religion? Religion is fine as long as the 
  preacher gives you the respect that your 
  heritage deserves.
  Marriage? Marriages are usually 
  arranged- many men consider it to be 
  an institution that only applies to the 
  woman, and is best entered with a mis-
  tress waiting.
   Honour? Honour is 
  the mainstay of society 
  (maintaining a facade of 
  honour, that is...)
  
  25
  Society
  MIDDLE CLASS 
  (aka the bourgeois)
  In the middle class men are expected to take up 
  a trade or business that will keep the family in 
  good repute and cater for dependants in the man-
  ner that they are accustomed. Doctor, lawyer, mil-
  itary officer and businessman can be considered 
  satisfactory occupations. However, the advent 
  of the industrial revolution has elevated many 
  middle class people to a wealth rivalling and even 
  surpassing that of the upper classes. Many factory 
  owners command wealth in excess of their “bet-
  ters”, and are often better at keeping hold of it as 
  well (they are often practical, hard working men 
  who would willingly sell their country houses if 
  it saved them money). They are also less hide-
  bound by tradition than the upper classes, and are 
  fluid enough to weather the changes wrought by 
  the industrial revolution. 
  The middle classes also include educated people 
  who are not members of the gentry. This is par-
  ticularly true of semi professionals, such as writ-
  ers, journalists and schoolteachers. Many of these 
  individuals are responsible for the vibrant 
  counter culture that exists and is often 
  suppressed throughout Europe, but 
  others such as Charles Dickens have 
  become household names. Ironically 
  enough, imperialist Britain is home 
  and refuge to many of these writ-
  ers (both Marx and Engels, bourgeois 
  themselves, did most of their writing in 
  London). 
  Women of the middle class are expect-
  ed to marry and carry an heir as soon as 
  possible, just like the upper classes. A 
  woman is also often responsible for 
  the house and home accounts. Some 
  young women hold work places 
  as clerks and secretaries, but the 
  common view of the bourgeois 
  is 
  that 
  it’s 
  brutal 
  to make a 
  woman work 
  in such a man-
  ner. The main 
  exceptions to this 
  rule are those who take service in India, either as 
  crown or east India company servants, or as inde-
  pendent businessmen. Indeed, the power wielded 
  by the “highest caste” of India is one which could 
  only be dreamed of by the upper classes at home, 
  whilst the wealth of these “white rajahs” (even 
  crown servants) is far in excess of their equiva-
  lents at home.
  An increasingly common vocation amongst the 
  lower middle classes is missionary work. This 
  is a comparatively recent phenomenon, as in the 
  earliest days of empire the administration tended 
  to fund Anglican churches for the colonists and 
  left the natives alone. However, the 18th century 
  preacher, John Wesley, founded the evangelical 
  puritan movement (usually shortened to evangeli-
  cal), which preached the virtue of hard work, 
  keeping Sunday as holy, the doctrine of temper-
  ance, and the moral superiority of the white man. 
  Often these men and women lack secondary 
  education, let alone the higher education required 
  for the clergy, yet they willingly journey 
  out to the furthest reaches of Asia, 
  Africa and the pacific to convert the 
  heathen. They are frequently at odds 
  with the imperial administration, partly 
  through snobbery against their often 
  humble origin and partly because their 
  evangelism (frequently fanaticism) can 
  stir natives up to the point of revolt. 
  Resources
  The middle class do not have the 
  huge resources of the upper 
  classes, but are not poor, 
  and often have enough 
  money to employ 
  servants about their 
  homes. A typical 
  mid-class man 
  would afford the 
  following assets 
  for his family:
  
  26
  Society
   
  A family home, any dependants will stay 
  here, a middle class family does not usu-
  ally have the resources to maintain a sec-
  ond home, the costs of any lodgings are the 
  boarder’s own responsibility. A single man 
  would usually rent a flat, possibly shared.
   
  The master of the house usually runs his 
  abode on between £3.5/6 to £15 a week, 
  from this comes food, clothes, servants’ 
  wages, mortgage, allowance for dependants 
  and so forth.
   A male dependant will usually receive 
  between 10s and £1 a week to spend on lei-
  sure activities. A female dependant will not 
  receive an allowance; they are not expected 
  to have an independent life that requires an 
  income of their own.
   Servants, a typical family house will have one 
  housekeeper or butler and one maid or porter.
  Ethics
  If the upper classes own the world, then the 
  middle class runs it. They have maintained their 
  status by innovation, hard work and, often, a little 
  luck.
   
  Money? Money makes the world go 
  around; the discussion of its use is always 
  of interest.
   
  Education? Education is a wonderful 
  thing, but most women are too frail to deal 
  with a full education.
   
  Other classes? The upper classes gave you 
  or your predecessors the initial backing to 
  the wealth that you now possess, they may 
  have a heritage, but your family supports 
  itself now and live just as well as you need 
  - without their excessive fancies to run 
  your life.
   
  Other classes? The lower classes live in 
  squalor, it is shameful, and if any struck 
  you as honest then you would gladly help 
  them out of the gutter as best you could.
   
  Religion? You always attend church, the 
  Aluminat preaching is very important to 
  you, for you they define civilisation.
   
  Marriage? Marriages are usually arranged; 
  most consider marriage to be a sacred insti-
  tution, not to be taken lightly. The most 
  important thing to a middle class marriage 
  is the prospects and dowry that can be pro-
  vided by the husband to be. 
   
  Honour? Honour is an idea to be respected 
  and adhered to.
  It is a sad fact that the person to be praised for ending the hidden 
  misery of so many in the real 19th century was none other than Jack 
  the Ripper. The ripper killings caught the country’s imaginations and 
  fears, all inquiries into the case brought more and more of the work-
  ing life of London to the surface and into the media, until none could 
  dismiss it.
  
  27
  Society
  LOWER CLASS 
  (aka the surplus population, the prole-
  tariat)
  In the lower classes, the men made a meagre liv-
  ing by doing whatever they could. Vocations are 
  either for life as in the case of mill workers, or 
  for a couple of weeks as casual labour until the 
  next job appeared.
  Often women of the lower classes had to earn as 
  well. Although the practice is second nature to us 
  of the 21st century it is a scandal to the middle 
  class occupants of the 1800s. Many women could 
  and would perform the same factory vocations as 
  men, but were paid less! Many (especially in the 
  cities) had to supplement their incomes by street 
  vending or prostitution.
  In the rural areas, young women and girls were 
  typically found working the fields along with the 
  men folk. Once married, they would be respon-
  sible for the home, and bringing up the family; 
  she would be responsible for the education of any 
  children as well.
  Rural life is less harsh for the lower classes in 
  some ways, there is less crime and vice than in 
  the cities, but due to the urban population drain, 
  the remaining rural workforce is frequently 
  stretched to exhaustion. However, as previously 
  stated, the traditional life of the rural lower class-
  es has been changed in many areas due to the 
  discovery of coal upon their squire’s 
  land. The subsequent sale of the land 
  has forced migration into the cities. 
  Many of the former rural people 
  cannot adapt to city life, with the 
  crime, pollution and over crowding, 
  and as a result often seek solace in 
  alcohol or opium. Others are 
  easily exploited by pimps 
  and organised gangs as 
  they are less wary than 
  the streetwise proletariat, 
  and often have no extend-
  ed family to support them 
  in their new homes. 
  As with the middle 
  classes, the greatest opportunities exist abroad, 
  particularly in the white dominat-
  ed 
  colonies in the Antipodes, America 
  and South Africa. Here, in theory 
  at least, a poor man can gain 
  status and riches purely by dint 
  of his hard work and willing-
  ness to work the land. It is 
  true that one can gain such 
  wealth by merely stak-
  ing one’s claim (particu-
  larly in Australia, where 
  “squatting” or taking over 
  unclaimed land allows a per-
  son reasonably free rein), 
  but often in the colonies, 
  as at home, it is the tra-
  ditional moneyed classes 
  who hold the monopoly 
  on 
  trade. However, the allure of the colonies can 
  be a strong one, and it is true that many settlers 
  of humbler origins have “done well” abroad. 
  (Abraham Lincoln himself was descended from 
  such humble English stock). Also, with rural 
  resources stretched at home, the role of the sheep 
  farmer in the antipodes or crop farmer in British 
  North America is becoming increasingly impor-
  tant, and hence even an independent small holder 
  can make a fine living by exporting to the mother 
  country. 
  The Celtic people of the British Isles make up a 
  disproportionate percentage of the lower classes, 
  particularly in Ireland, where the mostly catholic 
  Irish have been effectively barred from owning 
  land – catholic fathers have to split their land 
  between all their sons, thus constantly dividing 
  the land into smaller pockets. In Scotland, the 
  destruction of the traditional clan based life in the 
  highlands following the doomed Jacobite rebel-
  lion of 1745 – 46 led to a largely Anglo or angli-
  cised ruling class over a largely Scottish lower 
  class. This combined with the Irish potato famine 
  of 1848 (which killed almost 2 million Irish men 
  women and children) has led to a vast Celtic 
  Diaspora to the colonies and to the United States 
  of America. In these regions, prejudice against 
  the Welsh, Scots and Irish is either subtler or less 
  apparent. 
  
  28
  Society
  Resources
  A lower class man has no resources to speak of, 
  neither have his friends (unless they are crimi-
  nals), not many people do on the poverty line. A 
  working man can receive varying wages depend-
  ing upon his work; servants often receive a small 
  wage ( 3/8 a week for a maid, 7/6 for a butler or 
  housekeeper) with bed and board. Factory work-
  ers in the country often slept on the factory floor, 
  while in the city an independent landlord would 
  provide a slum area flat or a terraced house in ill-
  repair. Whitechapel and Spitalfields are two such 
  areas, each with high unemployment, vicious 
  gangs terrorising the streets, high levels of crime 
  and prostitution. Gbh, murder and rape are rela-
  tively common crimes in the fog. 
   A typical wage for a lower class man is 
  £1.8/2 (£95 a year) for a working week, 
  for a woman doing the same honest work-
  £1.2/6, and for a child 3 shillings to the 
  parents. Hence the tendency for lower class 
  families to have large families, as the chil-
  dren can earn money that goes directly to 
  the parents. 
   
  There is no minimum wage and employers 
  have little regard for the health and welfare 
  of their employees. Ironically enough, the 
  slaves in the cotton states of America are 
  frequently better off than the urban lower 
  classes of Britain. A factory owner does 
  not own his workers – and there are plenty 
  more waiting for work, hence the value of 
  an urban worker is frequently less. 
   
  A lower class man dreams of a life with a 
  servant, where his children do not have to 
  work cleaning chimneys. Where his home 
  does not leak, where he can walk down the 
  street after dark without fear. But, consider-
  ing that the minimum wage for survival is 
  approximately £1.5/6 a week (£80 a year) 
  for a single person, that dream will prob-
  ably stay that way.
  Ethics
  The lower class make up the manual and military 
  labour force of the civilised world, they are down 
  trodden by all, and the majority actually struggle 
  to survive on an ‘honest’ wage.
   Money? Money is hard to make, there’s no 
  point in talking about it when you should 
  be earning it.
   
  Education? Education sounds wonderful; 
  you wish that you could afford it.
   
  Other classes? The upper classes are put 
  above you for a reason, it’s always been 
  that way, and it always will be. It’s not for 
  you to question the likes of the aristocracy.
   
  Other classes? The middle class are no 
  better than you really, no matter how little 
  they like it with their high and mighty airs.
   Religion?  You always attend church when 
  you can; it is a solace in a hard life.
   
  Marriage? Marriage between two folk in 
  love is a wonderful thing, but not some-
  thing to be taken lightly.
   
  Honour? Honour is fine for those who can 
  afford it; you just try to be honest.
  “When one individual inflicts bodily injury upon another, such injury that death results, we call the 
  deed manslaughter; when the assailant knew in advance that the injury would be fatal, we call his 
  deed murder. But when society places hundreds of proletarians in such a position that they inevitably 
  meet too early and unnatural a death, one which is quite as much a death by violence as that by the 
  sword or bullet... [I] Characterise [the conditions of the lower classes] as social murder, that [soci-
  ety] has placed the workers under conditions in which they can neither retain health nor live long; 
  that it undermines the vital force of these workers, little by little, and so hurries them to the grave 
  before their time.”
  conditions of the lower class in England, F Engels, 1845
  
  29
  Society
  THE FAIRER SEX
  Upper and middle class women are treated as 
  ornaments, their first duty is to marry and their 
  second to give birth. They are expected to be shy, 
  naïve, elegant and eloquent, to be found lack-
  ing in any of these traits is disaster for a young 
  woman. Often it means being sent to an asylum, 
  a distant relative, or sometimes simply being sold 
  into the gutter out of sight to avoid social embar-
  rassment.
  In the lower classes of the city, women have to 
  earn as well, often the only means being by pros-
  titution. In ‘my secret life’ a set of period mem-
  oirs, the author tells us of how he is ‘...accosted 
  by a middle aged woman in Vauxhall gardens, 
  and invited to possess her and a ten year old 
  girl...’ Walter goes on to describe spending the 
  night with the two of them for 6d.
  In rural areas legitimate work is more easily 
  found- lower class women are often found work-
  ing the fields along with the men folk instead of 
  turning to the oldest trade.
  It should be noted that no woman could own 
  property. Before marriage, her father owns it; 
  after marriage, all her property passes to her hus-
  band. In the unlikely event of divorce, the hus-
  band has every right to throw his wife out onto 
  the street, as any property owned is his!
  Some readers may be wondering why we’re put-
  ting all this stuff about sexism and racism in the 
  game, it’s possibly controversial 
  and certainly politically 
  unpopular - that’s why 
  it’s here. Victoriana is 
  a game about revolu-
  tion, corrupt laws and 
  the bitter taste of a 
  corrupt society’s val-
  ues. Without all this 
  stuff about sexism, 
  exploitation, class 
  stigma and pov-
  erty there isn’t 
  much to beat 
  against – so 
  use it as 
  intended 
  and fight 
  the good 
  fight 
  against it!
  Employment figures
  Upper & middle classes
  Independent income 
  Dependants 
   
  1,817,000
  3,870,000
   
  Lower class
  Earning wages 
  Unemployed 
   
  8,345,000
  7,613,000
  Total population of England   21,645,000
  Typical incomes
  Time  
  Survival  
  Lower 
  L. Mid 
  U. Mid 
  Upper
  1 year  
  £80   
  £95  
  £200  
  £400  
  £800*
  1 week 
  £l.5/6   
  £1.8/2  
  £5  
  £12  
   £20*
  * these figures are for a young man’s allowance, the families resources are vast.
  29
  
  30
  Society
  But Russian Ladies wear Trousers...
  The ongoing war against 
  Russia in the Crimean has 
  brought a never ending pro-
  cession of news and revala-
  tions on that secretive nation, 
  not least being the fact that not 
  only is Russia a matricarchy, 
  but thats it’s noblewomen live 
  in a fully emancipated posi-
  tion - a fact which has both 
  scandalised and entranced 
  western society (undoubtedly 
  for all the wrong reasons).
  While the institution pours 
  scorn and ridicule on the ‘half 
  dressed trouser wearing har-
  lots of the east’, artists and 
  journalists alike seem fixated 
  on the exotic and commanding 
  Russian elite and as a result 
  they have become unwitting 
  media darlings - when a lead-
  ing london newspaper placed 
  an engraving of the Russian 
  command at Sevastopol on 
  their front cover the paper 
  sold out within hours!
  The Russian nobility are just 
  as powerful a role-model to 
  emancipationists, fashion 
  extremists and to the free 
  minded nature of the Gutter 
  Runner sub culture, and 
  although few female runners 
  have dared the overwhelming 
  public scorn by stepping out 
  in trousers, it can only be a 
  matter of time.
  The cover engraving from 
  an 1867 issue of ‘London 
  Illustrated News’ depicting 
  Russian ‘Peyetra’ and some 
  of the comment it provoked.
  ‘I would remind the edi-
  tor that his magazine is 
  on public sale, and is not 
  the place for such flagrant 
  displays of pornography 
  - I and many other read-
  ers alike, have vulnerable 
  daughters at home who 
  need to be shielded from 
  this kind of disturbing prov-
  ocation’. JH Watson
  ‘It seems necessary to 
  remind the editors of this 
  publication that although  
  such displays of indecent 
  dress might be considered 
  acceptable on the Russian 
  steppe,  we in England are 
  a civilised society, and the 
  exaltation of our barbaric 
  Russian enemies has no 
  place in our media’. K 
  Windlow, Mrs
  
  31
  Society
  CUSTOMS OF SOCIETY
  The lower classes have no unique customs 
  to speak of; the middle class’ customs are all 
  watered down from the upper class customs. 
  Many of these customs are bizarre and infrequent, 
  they are best dealt with a use of etiquette skill, 
  some however are an integral part of upper and 
  middle class life, such as:
  Afternoon tea
  Never ask, the hostess offers. Ladies should not 
  ask for more than one sugar, gentlemen should 
  always have two. Afternoon tea is considered 
  primarily a female function (a man is usually 
  working / out at the time). Most males of the 
  period view attending the ritual with the dread 
  that 21st century men might reserve for a visit 
  to their mother in law. Often it is the only time 
  that women (especially married women) have 
  the freedom to do as they please. For well heeled 
  gutter runners, it can be a good place to catch up 
  on society gossip, and more importantly, find out 
  who is doing what to whom!
  Calling cards
  When a young lady or gentleman enters a new 
  town, and they wish to enter society within that 
  town, he/she should attend the next public func-
  tion (opera, ballet, theatre etc.). Once there he/she 
  should make no attempt at communication, but 
  should leave his/her card at the door. Any parties 
  wishing to make their acquaintance shall enquire 
  for the card at the door once they have departed. 
  They then send a card by messenger to the visit-
  ing person’s address. If the visitor would still like 
  to pursue the company of local society they must 
  travel to the relevant contactor’s address (for a 
  lady) or club (for a gentleman). 
  In the case of a lady, once arrived she should 
  wait in the carriage until she has been officially 
  received, in the form of an afternoon tea, into the 
  new social circle. It should be noted that ‘refusal 
  at the door’ is considered a great insult. This is 
  especially useful in provincial or colonial towns, 
  as the society is small and often closed (usually 
  run by the local clique).
  Gentlemen seeking introduction into a new club 
  or cirlce, have a much easier time at this stage as 
  the introduction will invariably take place over 
  
  32
  Society
  Customs
  many cigars and much brandy. 
  The marital institution
  The ideal marital arrangement for the upper and 
  middle classes is for a daughter to marry an older 
  man, thus the girl could be whisked away into 
  an already furnished home with all the creature 
  comforts. A young woman is considered of mar-
  riageable age at 15, girls not married by the age 
  of 20 are considered too old to attract a groom. 
  Among the proletariat there is little time for mar-
  riage, nor the money to pay a cleric for the cer-
  emony. Lower class couples tend to live ‘in sin’, 
  married by common law. The notable exception 
  to the rule of age is when marrying a widow; this 
  is often seen as a good thing, as all the widow’s 
  property passes by common law to the husband. 
  Whilst not illegal, divorce is uncommon. The 
  grounds upon which a couple can be granted 
  divorce are adultery, non-consummation of the 
  marriage, ‘irreconcilable differences’ and ‘men-
  tal cruelty’. Only the husband can petition the 
  court for a divorce. As previously stated, married 
  women have no property rights, so in the event 
  of a divorce there is nothing to stop a divorced 
  woman, even one of good background, from 
  being cast out onto the streets without a penny! 
  Divorce is uncommon amongst the upper classes. 
  Women are brought up to believe that they are 
  inferior to their husbands, and if he chooses to 
  father bastard children upon his mistress then 
  they should not complain - and certainly not file 
  for divorce on the grounds of adultery. Romance 
  amongst the upper classes is primarily confined 
  to trashy novels, as few women would dare to 
  marry a man that her father did not approve of. 
  Often the potential suitor agrees the match with 
  the bride’s father and the wedding plans are made 
  accordingly - the bride being the last to know. 
  Hence the traditional idea that the young man 
  asks the father’s permission to wed. 
  Middle class people tend to mimic the customs 
  of the upper classes, but marriage on the basis 
  of love is more common, especially amongst 
  the more educated and liberally minded folk. 
  Adultery is less common, as the middle classes 
  are more inclined to puritan ethics and sleeping 
  around does not fit in well with these. However, 
  amongst the intellectual elite there are move-
  ments that call for free love, the rights of women 
  to own property and to vote and have an equal 
  voice (can you imagine the insanity of it! What 
  will these people advocate next?)
  The lower classes, as might be expected, have a 
  very different attitude towards wedlock. Most of 
  the lower classes are not legally married, by law 
  or church, as legal marriage costs money – which 
  they don’t have. The institution of common law 
  marriages is prevalent, where a couple are con-
  sidered married after spending 3 years together. 
  Even so the common law marriages break up 
  often; in cases of adultery it traditionally consists 
  of the husband handing over a piece of rope to 
  his wife’s lover. 
  Whilst it is no more or less common than today 
  in the 20th century, homosexuality is illegal and 
  sodomy is punishable by death or deportation. 
  However, in the public, single sex schools of 
  Eton it is common amongst adolescents, although 
  it is generally acknowledged as a “phase” that the 
  boy is going through. Lesbianism is not a crime 
  in Britain: this is not due to liberal sentiment but 
  rather it is because the queen does not believe 
  women are capable of such activity!
  Domestic violence is prevalent at all levels of 
  society. Whilst it does count as assault and bat-
  tery, the woman is unlikely to press charges (after 
  ‘There is perhaps no century where woman shows so meanly as in this. Because her education 
  seems to have parted company with her vocation; there is no longer unity between the woman 
  as inwardly developed, and as outwardly manifest.
  In the last century it was not so. In the succeeding one let us hope that it will no longer be 
  so... Nothing can well be imagined more painful than the present position of woman.’
  Cassandra, Florence Nightingale, 1852
  
  33
  Society
  The Revolution
  all, what woman would be willing to do so to a 
  male police force, with a male judiciary and male 
  jury). The only time that the forces of justice are 
  likely to become involved is in the event of a 
  death (in which case it is usually treated as mur-
  der). Also, men and women have often grown up 
  around violence by the husband towards the wife 
  and both are likely to consider it the normal state 
  of affairs. There have been extreme cases where 
  future father in laws have even instructed their 
  daughter’s suitors in the best way to “discipline” 
  their brides to be. Among the upper and middle 
  classes violence towards wives and children is 
  not seen as a pleasant task, rather it is a regret-
  table one which must be undertaken by the head 
  of household to maintain order. A common theory 
  is that children will learn obedience and respect 
  for god by learning the same towards their father. 
  Among the lower classes there is a frighten-
  ingly prevalent belief that when a young woman 
  acquires bruises ‘it makes her all the keener on 
  the man that delivered them’. 
  Presentation balls
  Often considered the highlight of the year, the 
  presentation ball is where all the single young 
  ladies are paraded to the young men of society in 
  the hope of a marital interest being struck. Young 
  ladies and gentlemen alike plan their wardrobe 
  for this night months in advance. Both the upper 
  and middle classes hold presentation balls for 
  their own respective classes.
  Debutante balls (upper class only): a single young 
  lady is presented to the queen at the age of 16, to 
  receive her blessings for later life. If the young 
  lady receives a favourable comment from the 
  queen the young lady is called a debutante, and 
  her desirability increases dramatically. A debu-
  tante ball is simply a higher-level and very exclu-
  sive presentation ball.
  Rough music
  Rough music is a rural tradition of punishing 
  errant members of a close rural community. 
  Common victims of rough music would be bul-
  lies and those found lacking in Aluminat mor-
  als or fervour. The nature of the rough music 
  varies with local custom; commonly effigies of 
  the offender are crudely made and held aloft a 
  musical procession. The procession will tramp 
  around the village collecting supporters and 
  gawpers until it reaches the offenders location 
  when the effigy is replaced with the real thing 
  before another charge around the town. The finale 
  of the music is a kangaroo court for the offend-
  ers “crimes”. The verdict is invariably guilty and 
  punishment follows. Rough punishment is rarely 
  damaging, most often it is designed to be humili-
  ating, as is the whole custom.
  POLICIES OF THE REVOLUTION
  There are many things that need the cleansing 
  influence of change, and the change is brewing 
  in many different forms from emancipation to the 
  alternative political / social systems: communism, 
  bolshevism, nihilism and anarchism - the so called 
  revolutionary beliefs. 
  Nationalism and free traders are also worth a 
  mention. Nationalist, particularly in the otto-
  man and Austro – Hungarian Balkans, as well 
  as Ireland are also a potent force for revolution, 
  whilst free traders, although not revolutionary 
  (indeed, free trade is British government policy), 
  hold views which are outside established society 
  for most of Europe.
  The threat of revolution should not be underesti-
  mated. The French revolution is only a few gen-
  erations in the past and still vividly remembered 
  by the aristocracy across Europe. After all, the 
  working proletariat has a lot to rebel against.
  Communist
  Communists believe that everybody should be 
  equal, that a utopia can be created where every-
  body is happy and there is no prejudice, discrimi-
  nation or war.
   
  Money? Money is the root of all evil, scrap 
  it. When the people take over, everyone 
  will share what they have, there will be no 
  
  34
  Society
  The Revolution
  need for money.
   The state should only provide basic administra-
  tive services, and its other functions (such as 
  imperialistic war notions) should be swept away.
   War is merely the bourgeoisie attempting to dis-
  tract the lower classes from the misery of their 
  existence, and serves to fuel the interests of capi-
  talists. 
   
  Education? All children should receive 
  an education, at least in a trade if not aca-
  demic, so that they have something to offer 
  when older.
   
  Other classes? The upper classes will 
  be disbanded for their crimes against the 
  people; they will have to readjust to the 
  new world.
   
  Other classes? The middle classes are no 
  better, they do nothing that will not better 
  themselves, again there is much to change.
   
  Other classes? The lower class are the real 
  people of this world, they deserve better, 
  and unfortunately many actually believe in 
  the old class system.
   
  Religion? There is no god, if there is he 
  would not allow the suffering in the world. 
  You will close all the churches. (“Religion 
  is the opiate of the masses”)
   
  Marriage? Marriage is outdated, women 
  are to be as free as men, they can choose 
  who they wish to live with, and who they 
  wish to have children with.
   
  Honour? The upper class definition of 
  honour is a farce and a lie; you have no 
  time for it.
  Bolshevik
  Bolshevism is a very violent version of commu-
  nism. Like communism, bolshevism shares the 
  belief that every one should be equal, and that 
  every one should have something to offer the 
  greater good without a monetary value. The dif-
  ference is that Bolsheviks are not content with 
  politics to start the revolution.
   
  Money? Money is the root of all evil, 
  scrap it. When the people take over, every-
  one will share what they have, there will be 
  no need for money.
   
  Education? All children should receive 
  an education, at least in a trade if not aca-
  demic, so that they have something to offer 
  when older.
   
  Other classes? The upper classes will be 
  disbanded for their crimes against their 
  fellow men, the men will be shot and the 
  women ‘liberated’ of their social restric-
  tions.
   
  Other classes? The middle class are no 
  better, they too will be shot, and again the 
  women will be ‘liberated’.
  
  35
  Society
  The Revolution
   Other classes? The lower class are the real 
  people of this world, they deserve better, 
  and unfortunately many actually believe in 
  the old class system. Those who side with 
  the bourgeois oppressors will be slaugh-
  tered for treachery.
   
  Religion? There is no god, if there is he 
  would not allow the suffering in the world. 
  You will bum all the churches, liberate 
  their wealth and shoot the preachers.
   Marriage? Marriage is outdated, women 
  are to be as free as men, they can choose 
  who they wish to live with, who they wish 
  to have children with.
   Honour? The upper class definition of 
  honour is a farce. Honour is outdated. 
  Although it is necessary for secrecy now, 
  in the new world there will be statues and 
  cities named after honourable revolutionary 
  brothers such as yourself.
  Chartism
  The people’s charter is a revolutionary movement 
  presently existent only in Britain. The primary 
  aim of the chartist movement is to gain an expan-
  sion of the political franchise to “one man, one 
  vote’. The concept of working men voting for 
  the country’s government was hysterical to the 
  bourgeois of the 19th century, until after repeated 
  protest marches and riots the movement is now 
  viewed as a radical threat. Although Chartism is 
  generally a peaceful political mass with follow-
  ers trying to bring its proposed changes through 
  official channels, there are a increasing amount 
  of believers who do not believe that the present 
  system will allow the changes without the appli-
  cation of force and violence.
   
  Money? Money is fine, you earn it and 
  then you spend it. You have no problems 
  with the theory of money.
   Education? All children should receive 
  an education, at least in a trade if not aca-
  demic, so that they will be able to support 
  themselves and their family in later life.
   
  Other classes? The upper classes have 
  a monopoly over your future; everyone 
  should have a vote to decide on the future, 
  not just the nobility.
   
  Religion? You believe in god, but did he 
  not say that he created all men equal? You 
  don’t see much of that at the moment.
   
  Marriage? Marriage is a wonderful insti-
  tution; everyone should be able to get mar-
  ried in the eyes of god.
   
  Honour? The concept of honour is a fine 
  one, and you respect it.
  Nihilist
  Nihilists are a disturbed bunch. They steadfastly 
  believe that the European races as they stand 
  are doomed, and that it will generally save a lot 
  of bother if they make a start cleaning up now 
  instead of waiting for nature.
   
  Money? Money is pointless. When you’ve 
  finished with the world there will be no 
  need for money anyway.
   
  Education? Education is pointless, when 
  you’re dead; nobody cares how many lan-
  guages you knew.
   
  Other classes? All authority figures are 
  pawns of the oppressors; they are to be 
  stamped out first - headless chickens make 
  easier targets.
   
  Religion? There is no god, if there is he 
  would not allow the suffering in the world. 
  You will burn all the churches, shoot the 
  preachers, and sell the altarpieces to buy 
  more weapons.
   
  Marriage? Women are to be liberated; 
  they can join the revolution or die. Just like 
  anyone else!
   
  Honour? The institutions of honour and 
  honesty make you laugh, they can’t stop 
  bullets.
  Anarchist
  Anarchy isn’t so much a political system, rather a 
  certain mindset, by their very nature anarchists do 
  not take well to organisation, but there are a lot of 
  them about.
  
  36
  Society
  The Revolution
   Money? Money, you use it to buy things 
  that you couldn’t be bothered to steal. All 
  property is theft anyway.
   
  Education? All children should receive 
  an education, at least in a trade if not aca-
  demic, as long as they want one.
   
  Other classes? You honestly do not care 
  one iota about class distinction and dis-
  crimination; you adopt the most conve-
  nient viewpoint to justify your actions. 
  The phrase ‘redistribution of wealth to the 
  people’ is always a firm favourite.
   
  Religion? There could be a god, but you 
  don’t care!
   
  Marriage? Marriage is outdated, women 
  are to be as free as men, they can choose 
  who they wish to live with, who they 
  wish to have children with. You do, why 
  shouldn’t everyone else!
   
  Honour? The upper class definition of 
  honour obviously suits them - but you 
  think it’s awfully funny.
  Nationalist
   Whilst nationalism is common throughout this 
  period, these ideas specifically appertain to coun-
  tries either living under foreign rule (the Irish and 
  Indians in the British empire, the Poles under the 
  Russians, Czechs under the Austro-Hungarians, 
  most Balkan people under the Turks), or to a 
  disparate people resisting a drive to stand as one 
  country (the Italian and German states).
   
  Money? Money should go to the people of 
  the nation, not to foreign investors.
   
  Education? Education should be in the 
  culture and history of the fatherland, and 
  in our own language, not on the terms of 
  foreigners.
   
  Other classes? Our rulers should be 
  natives. Our own traditions should be hon-
  oured, not those of the invader. No nation 
  has the right to tell you how to live.
   
  Religion? Religion should also be our 
  own, not a foreigner’s.
   
  Marriage? Women should marry people of 
  our race.
   
  Honour? Our own definitions of honour 
  are superior
  Free traders
  Free traders are unique amongst revolutionaries, 
  as they do not seek to overthrow any government 
  institutions by force (well, not generally, but they 
  may incite revolts from other factions). They are 
  usually upper middle class, or sometimes forward 
  thinking gentry, and believe in open trading for 
  maximum amount of personal gain.
   
  Money? Money and wealth is king. No 
  government regulations should stop you 
  from accumulating money. 
   Education? Education is good (for you at 
  least). It allows you to learn how to manip-
  ulate the current outdated system. 
   
  Other classes? The ruling classes are crip-
  pling the flow of trade by placing tariffs on 
  goods and insisting on a protected market. 
  They can be useful as clients though. 
   
  Other classes? The middle classes are a 
  primary target group, but those damned 
  intellectuals should stop whining about the 
  condition of the poor.
   
  Other classes? The lower classes are 
  useful for labour, but they should not be 
  helped with handouts. Without the poor, 
  there can be no rich.
   
  Marriage? Marriage can be convenient, 
  especially at social functions, but primarily 
  you are married to the ideal of wealth. 
   
  Religion? Religion serves a useful social 
  function in keeping the masses occupied, 
  but those damned puritans can sometimes 
  put a cramp on your activities in the colo-
  nies.
  
  37
  Society
  Entertainment & Vice
  ENTERTAINMENT & VICE
  Every society has its vices; Victorian society is 
  no exception. It is fair to say that, for a character 
  so inclined, almost every conceivable vice can 
  be catered for in the chaos of the city. Following 
  are the most commonly available vices of a major 
  city such as London.
  Drink
  Alcohol is the most common vice of the century. 
  The upper classes usually keep alcohol in their 
  homes, and frequently imbibe at social functions 
  or (for gentlemen) at clubs.
  The middle classes pursue similar drinking hab-
  its to the aristocracy, clubs, and social occasions 
  such as the theatre, restaurants and hotel bars.
  The lower classes indulge in alcohol more fre-
  quently and commonly than those above, mainly 
  because it is frequently their only available 
  entertainment. Beers are usually sold to labourers 
  while at work, and often the worker’s only legiti-
  mate entertainment is at the local public house or 
  ‘penny gaff’. Indeed, alcohol is often the main 
  form of escape in Victorian Britain for the lower 
  classes, as their own lives are so bad.
  Women of all classes are as likely to drink as 
  men. Amongst the upper and middle classes, 
  alcoholism is just as common amongst women as 
  men, but it is usually a very private affair. Also 
  lower class women are as likely to be seen drink-
  ing gin in public houses as men are. 
  Alcohol is commonly available to take away from 
  general stores, food stores, and public houses (the 
  “pub”). Clubs and hotels rarely sell alcohol to 
  take away. Public houses and bars are theoreti-
  cally regulated by licensing laws that dictate their 
  opening hours. The legal times to sell alcohol 
  from these premises are between 11:00am and 
  11:00pm. The law is rarely enforced and most 
  establishments stay open for business long into 
  the morning. Clubs and hotels are considered 
  private properly and so are not subject to the 
  licensing laws, and usually stay open as long as 
  guests / members occupy the bar. In lower class 
  areas, there is usually a pub at the end of every 
  street or row of houses – these are often just con-
  verted houses that can only fit 10-20 customers. 
  Pubs are often excellent sources of local rumour, 
  as well as being unofficial recruiting offices for 
  criminal activity. The barman at the local is usu-
  ally well informed about the comings and goings 
  of a neighbourhood, so being on good terms with 
  him can protect you and provide excellent gossip. 
  Strangers beware!
  Drugs
  Drug abuse is an unregulated sin in Victorian 
  Europe. The availability of drugs is easy, but their 
  circulation is limited by expense. By far the most 
  common drug is opium, imported from the east-
  ern provinces. Heroin and cocaine are also quite 
  available to the wealthy. The Chinese quarters 
  of Liverpool and London are the most common 
  areas to go to “opium dens”, as foreign ghettoes 
  often have to cater for vice as prejudice from 
  native employers makes it difficult to find honest 
  work. Medical science is aware of the detrimen-
  tal effects of such drugs, but most objections to 
  their use derive from moral, rather than scientific 
  grounds. Indeed, doctors have a tendency to 
  prescribe laudanum (an opium derivative) as a 
  “magic bullet” which cures all ills. 
  Prostitution
  Prostitution is the second most common vice after 
  drink. Every taste can be catered for in the cita-
  dels of Europe, women for the poor and anything 
  for the rich. Perhaps the strangest aspect of the 
  Victorian flesh trade is its frequency and blatancy 
  in the heart of a society which has become a by-
  word for repression. 
  Commercial sex is incredibly common; a good 
  example of how common comes from Mayhew, 
  a social reformer from London. Mayhew inter-
  viewed a series of London seamstresses, from 
  his interviews he discovered that a third of the 
  women interviewed are also prostitutes. His con-
  clusion is that women have to turn to prostitution 
  to live, as their primary job wages are simply too 
  low. Other social reformers of the era also sup-
  port Mayhew’s conclusion of ‘prostitution by 
  necessity’. The term “working girl” comes from 
  this time, as there was a presumption that any 
  single woman in employment (especially inde-
  pendent professions such as actress) was clearly 
  
  38
  Society
  Entertainment & Vice
  also “on the game”. Perhaps the most damning 
  fact is that the flourishing nature of prostitution 
  could not be possible without demand for the ser-
  vice - yet another reminder of the dual values of 
  the Victorian “gentleman”.
  There are several methods of prostitution, and 
  correspondingly several forms of sex selling 
  establishment.
  Independent women of the proletariat who take 
  to prostitution often take lodgings together in the 
  same house, this provides protection from num-
  bers in potentially savage areas. It is not uncom-
  mon for entire lodging houses to be occupied by 
  prostitutes. Those who became visually scarred 
  by assault, disease (such as pox), or age can often 
  be found crawling through the back streets of 
  the slums selling their favours for whatever they 
  can get. Judging by pervert’s memoirs and social 
  reformer’s reports the selling price for a proletari-
  an’s flesh is as little as 2d up to 2s.
  Attractive women with some education and con-
  fidence can find a much higher niche in the world 
  of vice. The Haymarket and St James court of 
  London are centres of ‘high-class’ vice. A woman 
  able to hold intelligent, or at least fashionable 
  conversation for several hours as well as look 
  stunning is a highly sought escort, and could 
  expect to gain 20s for company, up-to £5 for a 
  full evening’s entertainment.
  Male prostitutes are found, but are discreet and 
  rare. It would be rare to find one outside an estab-
  lished brothel, he certainly has to live carefully, 
  he can get whole pounds for his favours, but his 
  discovery could mean his death at the hands of a 
  homophobic mob.
  Brothels are common in European cities. In 
  London, the Haymarket and St James court areas 
  are covered with them. In such areas even bars 
  keep bedrooms for the clientele to use, usually 
  charged for by the hour. The largest and most 
  affluent brothels also stand as casinos and bars. 
  Kate Hamilton’s, the largest and most expensive 
  brothel of London, has several bars, a casino, a 
  
  39
  Society
  Entertainment & Vice
  dance floor, and discreet rooms for dining and 
  ‘sleeping’. Incidentally, Kate’s bouncers are the 
  official police force, who keep at least one officer 
  in the lobby at all times to discourage “undesir-
  ables’ such as the poor.
  One notable aspect of prostitution was the social 
  mobility offered by the business. An attractive 
  or well-educated prostitute might be noticed by 
  a wealthy gentleman who found her pleasing. 
  He might then offer to “buy” her (if she has a 
  pimp) or merely offer her the chance of a better 
  life. This might mean he sets her up as his own 
  mistress or even in certain circumstances marry 
  her (the latter was less common in Victorian 
  times, but frequent in the Regency and Willemine 
  periods prior to Victoria’s ascension). It was 
  rumoured that Albert, duke of Clarence (in the 
  1880’s) had married a Whitechapel prostitute 
  (coincidentally at the time of the ripper murders – 
  this led to him being accused of being a suspect).
  Gambling
  Gambling has strong links with prostitution in 
  Victorian Europe, but even as a single intent 
  establishment, gambling houses and casinos 
  flourish in all cities. The nature of the establish-
  ment varies with the local area and clientele. 
  The proletariat often bet on the outcomes of 
  prizefights and animal fights, many also play 
  cards in public houses that dedicate rooms for the 
  purpose. Dedicated casinos are vast, lavish and 
  invariably rigged. Gambling (accompanied with 
  drinking) is without a doubt the primary form of 
  entertainment for Europe.
  The arts
  Painting, poetry, literary fiction, and sculpture 
  are all highly appraised arts. Distribution and 
  availability differ. Museums hold extensive rel-
  ics of artistic and historical interest. Art galleries 
  of paintings and sculpture are usually private 
  sale rooms, selling works to the highest bidder. 
  Possibly the most famous centre of artistic edu-
  cation and show is the royal academy of art, in 
  London. Poetry is usually published in pamphlets 
  and distributed individually, a poet who receives 
  recognition will go on to a publishing house, and 
  release his work in bound volumes. Literary fic-
  tion is usually distributed through instalments in 
  the many magazines available and with popular-
  ity, then released in volumes. Both Dickens and 
  Sir Conan Doyle both released their prominent 
  works as-series in The Strand magazine before 
  receiving recognition.
  Without variation the artistic pursuits are poorly 
  paid careers, an artist must be unnaturally prolific 
  to produce enough works to live comfortably. 
  Most often an artist lives by the donations of a 
  fashionable sponsor.
  The ballet
  The ballet is a popular entertainment for the 
  wealthy, and is among the most expensive. There 
  is only one specialised ballet house in London, 
  the Royal Ballet. The Royal Ballet company 
  is attached to the premises, and it is they who 
  delight audiences every season with their perfor-
  mances. Travelling ballet companies also make 
  appearances at the Royal. The most anticipated of 
  such travelling companies is the Moscow Ballet 
  Company.
  The baths
  21st century style swimming pools are rare. 
  Turkish bathhouses proliferate, containing sauna 
  rooms, hot pools, massage and baths. The baths 
  are considered to be an invigorating event.
  The brothel
  The brothel is possibly London’s second most 
  frequented entertainment, if only because brothels 
  can be found catering to all classes. The nature 
  of a brothel depends entirely upon its desired cli-
  entele. Brothels for the upper and middle classes 
  can be quite lavish, with a hostess to take book-
  ings, a bar and possibly a casino. Usually the bar 
  or casino would be a bona fide front for the busi-
  ness if a society scandal should threaten. Such 
  an establishment might provide escorts, and take 
  accounts as well as cash.
  A working class brothel is probably an old lodg-
  ing house, with rooms rented by a group of pros-
  titutes and inviting customers to stay the night 
  in the house to provide payment for their own 
  rooms and vices.
  
  40
  Society
  Entertainment & Vice
  The cinematograph
  A vulgar entertainment the cinematograph is a 
  frequent haunt of the working class or photog-
  raphy enthusiasts. Little more than an enhanced 
  slideshow cinematograph slides can be of diverse 
  subject material. Slideshows range from news to 
  soft pornography (magazine cover girl shots by 
  21st century standards) artists prints are used as 
  often as photo technology in the production of a 
  slide.
  The gin palace
  The gin palace is a cheap and dirty public house, 
  and the exclusive haunt of the working classes. 
  Gin palaces sell only spirits, never beers. Spirits 
  on sale are usually gin and rum, both cheap 
  intoxicants of the 19th century. The gin palace is 
  usually a ramshackle building, rented as cheaply 
  as possible.
  The hunt
  In rural areas the foxhunt is a primary social 
  occasion with the upper and selected middle class 
  citizens joining in pursuit of some unsuspecting 
  animal. The hunt is not an entertainment that may 
  be visited as such; one must be invited to partici-
  pate.
  The music hall
  A working class entertainment. The music hall 
  provides theatrical drama, farce, song, comedy 
  and dancers for the working man. Performances 
  are often poor, but sometimes only amateur. 
  Music hall performers are poorly paid and usu-
  ally of the working class themselves. Somewhat 
  unfairly, art critics do not rate the music hall per-
  formance among genuine artistic pursuits. 
  The opera
  The opera house is specially built for harmonic 
  performance. Whether the expense of design (and 
  subsequently of admission) is justified by any 
  difference in sound quality is not apparent. Many 
  opera’s are performed in theatres; only the most 
  lavish are performed in specialised opera houses.
  The opium den
  Opium dens are considered the scourge of soci-
  ety. Opium dens are always small ramshackle 
  affairs, hidden away in slum attics or under dis-
  used warehouses. It is to these places that those 
  addicted to the black smoke go to satisfy their 
  addiction, and continue their descent into mad-
  ness. Although not technically illegal, the police 
  (as defenders of society, not the public) often raid 
  them when revealed. Upon entry and after paying 
  the standard charge of 1s-the addict is allocated 
  a couch or floor space and given a pipe of opium 
  to escape the world with. Many opium dens are 
  notorious murder pits, where the unsuspecting 
  can find their throats slit while intoxicated and 
  defenceless.
  The prize-fight
  Bare-knuckle boxing is illegal, but prize-fight-
  ers often find an audience from all classes ready 
  to wager on their gladiatorial 
  pugilism. The 
  
  41
  Society
  Entertainment & Vice
  usual venue is the back room of a public house 
  or derelict courtyard. The fighters combat until 
  one falls and stays down. Bookmakers promote 
  a great deal of corruption in these events, giving 
  handsome purses to fighter’s willing to make a 
  fall in the bookie’s favour.
  The public house
  The public house is an unpopular extension of the 
  coach house. Coach houses were the inevitable 
  destination of any rural worker who enjoyed and 
  could afford alcohol. When the urban migration 
  began in the 30’s public houses started to become 
  common in the poorer districts of town. A public 
  house is officially open to any member of the 
  public who desires its services; often it provides 
  a communal meeting place for a neighbourhood. 
  In reality many public houses are dens of organ-
  ised crime, prostitution and unlicensed gambling. 
  Public houses are not the exclusive province of 
  the working class ruffian, but the coarse few con-
  trol the many in such 
  places, and they 
  are to be avoided 
  by a gentleman 
  with no desire for 
  violence or con-
  tempt.
  The races
  Gambling is beloved 
  by many, and all who 
  can afford the travel 
  and admittance attend 
  the frequent race meetings. 
  Most counties have weekly 
  race meetings, with a 
  major event each month. 
  Nationally the two major 
  race meetings are the 
  Grand National, interna-
  tional contest and the 
  Aston air races an 
  exclusively high 
  society event. Most 
  race meetings are for 
  horse 
  racing, although many wealthy individuals hold 
  wyvern races. Wyvern races are usually held on 
  the same course as a horse race. Flagpoles are 
  erected at regular intervals around the course 
  and during the race the beasts and riders slalom 
  around the course at a height of 2-10 yards. 
  Wyvern racing is an expensive pastime, both for 
  participation and observation.
  The theatre
  The theatre is the centre of drama, comedy and 
  often opera for the middle and upper classes. 
  London is littered with theatres, some grand, oth-
  ers little more than music halls. 
  The gentleman’s club
  Every major city of England is littered with at 
  least several clubs of this sort. In such an estab-
  lishment a gentleman may drink, socialise and 
  pass the time with reading or indoor games such 
  as cards, snooker or billiards. Many clubs have 
  r i g o r o u s 
  criteria for membership, 
  l e a d -
  ing to a high degree of 
  snob-
  bery when speaking 
  of which club a 
  man is involved 
  with. Usually the 
  club is an entire building. 
  There is usually no bar 
  as such; a steward takes 
  orders for drinks or food 
  which are then delivered. As 
  a gentleman’s establishment no 
  money changes hands within 
  the walls, all expense is billed 
  and settled by invoice.
  A committee of gentlemen 
  voted from the ranks by the 
  other members conducts 
  the business decisions of a 
  club. To be barred from a 
  club is a great shame for a 
  gentleman, as it invariably 
  means being divorced 
  from peers. Barring 
  offences include, not 
  paying the bill, dis-
  rupting other members, 
  ungentlemanly conduct in 
  or outside the club, becoming bankrupt or losing 
  class position.
  
  42
  Society
  Law & Order
  THE LAW
  The judicial system of Europe is geared to the 
  class system. The police, still in their infancy are 
  dreadfully inefficient (sometimes through no fault 
  of their own) and in some areas corruption is 
  high. In addition they do not have the manpower 
  to properly investigate as many reports as they 
  would like. The same lack of manpower means 
  that police dare not enter the poorer sections of 
  the slums. When resentment of authority is high a 
  blue uniform is a prime target.
  The laws of England and Europe are crude ver-
  sions of our own modern day laws. Many spheres 
  of modern law such as gun control laws have still 
  not been instigated by 1867, and will not be until 
  the turn of the 20st century.
  The law of Europe is directed toward property 
  crime. There are documented cases where a cos-
  termonger who assaulted a police officer and 
  almost murdered him with the savagery of the 
  assault received a mere 6 weeks in jail. Whereas, 
  a street urchin arrested for shoplifting an apple is 
  convicted to 1 year of jail.
  Usual procedure once the purported felon is 
  caught follows. (1) The felon is incarcerated at 
  the arresting police station until the court date; 
  the felon has the right to send a message to who-
  ever he wishes to represent his interests. (2) The 
  felon is taken by police coach to the court. (3) 
  The court case follows resulting in the release 
  or sentencing of the offender. When at court the 
  following points should be born in mind-
   An upper class offender will rarely have a 
  public trial. Is unlikely to be put in prison, 
  and his indiscretion would be kept secret to 
  avoid scandal. 
   
  A middle class offender would receive a 
  trial, he would be allowed a lawyer if he 
  had the means to hire one, and would prob-
  ably be sent to prison. Even if proven inno-
  cent peers would shun him.
   
  A lower class offender would receive a 
  trial, often he would not be offered the 
  chance to contact a lawyer, the court case 
  would be conducted and the offender sent 
  to prison, deported to Australia, or hanged 
  as appropriate. 
   
  An Ogre could expect to be told that he is 
  guilty and immediately go to prison - guilty 
  or not. Other races should be treated as the 
  class from which they originate.
  Usual punishment would be either a fine or 
  prison sentence, some crimes are considered pun-
  ishable by either, for extreme crimes the death 
  sentence existed. In such a case the judge makes 
  the decision. Prison is not a pleasant place; the 
  Victorian philosophy for prisons is to be a place 
  of punishment rather than detention. 19th century 
  prisons bear more resemblance to a filthy dun-
  geon than a modern prison, and each day inmates 
  would be tortured on ghastly contraptions such as 
  giant treadmills, weighted cranks and subjected to 
  sand-papering (just what it sounds like). Disease 
  is rampant in jail, and even if an inmate survived 
  his sentence, he would probably have contracted 
  something unpleasant. A final note on the prisons 
  is that there is no minimum age for prison con-
  finement.
  The number of crimes carrying the death sen-
  tence has waxed and waned over the last century. 
  Before the American war of independence there 
  were 50 crimes which held the death penalty, ris-
  ing to 200 during the Napoleonic wars. Today, the 
  main crimes that hold the death penalty are mur-
  der, treason, piracy, demonology, necromancy and 
  setting fire to the royal dockyards. Crimes that 
  The empty court is locked up. If injustice it has communed, and all misery it has caused 
  could only be locked up with it, and the whole burnt away in a great funeral pyre, so much 
  the better...
  Bleak House. Charles Dickens. 1852
  
  43
  Society
  Law & Order
  are punishable by death or deportation include 
  sodomy, rape, and theft of articles of clothing, 
  livestock or items worth more than 5 shillings. 
  There is also an array of bizarre minor exceptions 
  such as ‘kicking a Chelsea pensioner’ and ‘deser-
  tion during a time of war’. Hangings are carried 
  out in public, and are often a source of great 
  entertainment. Unfortunately, these public occas-
  sions themselves frequently inspire crimes such 
  as theft, fraud and assault!
  Deportation seems to be an easier option. After 
  all, you go to a foreign country, work for the 
  settlers for a few years and hey presto! You’re 
  free! Wrong. Approximately one quarter to one 
  third would die on the journey over to Australia, 
  and when you arrived you faced several years of 
  poor food, hard labour and the cruelty of sadistic 
  guards. Australia itself is a cruel and inhospitable 
  continent, with one fifth of the land unfit for 
  Human habitation, a plethora of dangerous ani-
  mals unheard of in Britain and occasional attacks 
  by aborigines. The governor of the colony can 
  actually release you at any time, but this depends 
  on the liberality of the official and current gov-
  ernment policy. Deportation is rare in the 1860’s, 
  as the original penal colony at Botany Bay 
  stopped taking convicts in 1844. 
  The poor law amendment act of 1836
  It has already been noted that the care of paupers 
  is allocated to the ‘board of guardians’ of a local 
  authority. The nature of this care is highly depen-
  dant upon the nature of that board, in some areas 
  the poor law is enforced beneficially; in others 
  the workhouses are factories for local industry, 
  and the poor law a curse to any without wages.
  The poor law was established to enable ‘able 
  bodied workers’ without work to be brought into 
  Typical Sentances
  Crime 
  Typical punishment
  Armed robbery 
  2 years deportation
  Arson 
  6 years detention
  Blackmail 
  £1 fine or 3 months detention
  Bribery 
  10s fine or 3 months detention
  Demonology 
  Death by public hanging
  Disturbing the peace 
  1s fine or 1 weeks detention
  Fraud 
  £10 fine or 1 years detention
  Grand theft (more than 5 shillings) 
  1 years deportation
  Kidnap 
  2 years deportation
  Manslaughter 
  £5 fine or 6 months detention
  Murder 
  Death by public hanging
  Necromancy 
  Death by public hanging
  Obstructing the law 
  6 weeks detention
  Petty theft 
  6s fine or 6 weeks detention
  Piracy 
  Death by public hanging
  Rape 
  12s fine or 3 months detention
  Treason 
  Death by public hanging
  Vandalism 
  6s fine or 6 weeks detention
  Unlicensed use of sorcery 
  2 years detention at a guild oubliette
  
  44
  Society
  Law & Order
  a district’s workhouse and put to work produc-
  tively until external employment becomes avail-
  able. The amendment act of 1836 allows a board 
  to allocate funds to support workers outside a 
  workhouse if means of gainful employment seem 
  to be realistically within reach. Most authority’s 
  boards used this amendment to their full ability. 
  By allocating a family enough funds for a roof 
  and food in subsidy to the family’s wages, total 
  expenditure is cut down in comparison with the 
  total care of that family.
  Usually each board of guardians maintains sever-
  al inspectors for its district. The inspectors review 
  applications for subsidy and decide for individual 
  cases whether to provide funds or to admit to the 
  workhouse. Families who gain subsidised living 
  are under constant threat of the workhouse. If no 
  work arrives for 2 months then the family is sent 
  to the workhouse anyway. Many families go hun-
  gry for several weeks at a time and then reapply 
  for subsidy rather than enter the workhouse.
  The workhouse
  Workhouse residence is reserved for the elderly, 
  infirm, single poor, orphans, resident’s children, 
  the lazy, vagrants and imbeciles. Admission 
  into the workhouse is the end of civilisation for 
  the Victorian poor. Once admitted into its walls 
  escape is often impossible.
  The conditions of living within the workhouse 
  can only be described as dreadful. Inmates are 
  expected to work a 10-14 hour day and then to 
  sleep about the machines and work areas. Wash 
  and work areas are separate for men and women, 
  although within the gender sections there is little 
  or no privacy.
  In rural areas workhouses are still rare. Usually 
  there is a poor lodge for the destitute to live with 
  meagre food and shelter until employed.
  
  45
  Society
  Education
  Education
  In history the school laws of 1871 demanded that 
  all children be provided an education. Our game 
  year is 1867; this law has not yet been passed.
  Education must be bought in Victoriana. This 
  means that the working classes are primarily 
  uneducated. Some are educated and literate, 
  either from parental tutelage or from charitable 
  institutions, but literacy among the masses is rare 
  in England and throughout Europe.
  All upper or middle class children are educated. 
  This education normally takes the form of a gov-
  erness through infancy (0-6 years), and then a 
  chapel school for 7-11 year old children. At 11-12 
  children are sent to boarding school to finish their 
  education at 16. Those with the aptitude carry 
  on an education at university. Advanced studies 
  at university usually last for 3 years, bringing 
  the child out of education at the age of 19. Some 
  pursue degrees or doctorates. A university degree 
  is significantly more difficult to obtain in the 
  Victorian era, with a standard degree course last-
  ing 6 years. University fees are astronomical, and 
  there are no grant boards or sponsors. A young 
  man’s family must pay for all fees.
  Children are gender segregated throughout edu-
  cation, usually in gender specific schools. A girl 
  may receive education up to advanced level, 
  although in the game year 1867 no universities 
  admit female students. The only additional edu-
  cation a woman may acquire is through private 
  tuition.
  Most Victorian schools are class distinctive, 
  schools for young gentlemen might turn a prom-
  ising student away because of the parental occu-
  pation.
  
  46
  Society
  Religion
  RELIGION & SOCIETY
  Religion is an important thing to the people of 
  Europe, before the thirty year war legends tell 
  of a time when the gods walked the earth them-
  selves. If the gods do walk the earth today they 
  certainly take pains not to be discovered. Who 
  knows?
  The Aluminat
  The Aluminat is the dominating faith of Europe. 
  It is a monotheistic faith originating in the Middle 
  East approximately 1870 years ago, during the 
  dark ages of legend when magic was strong and 
  Roman sorcery ruled the world.
  The proverbs and verses of the Aluminat preach 
  of a healer and wise man born of humble parents. 
  This man scorned the Roman use of magic in 
  conquest as the work of dark gods; apparently 
  his own healing powers were the gift of ‘the one 
  true god’, and not magic. Legend names this man 
  as Justas, champion of order. While still a young 
  man, Justas amassed a huge following and, using 
  a variety of means, caused the downfall of several 
  Roman governors and sorcerers in the Middle 
  East.
  Eventually Justas was betrayed to the Romans by 
  one of his friends and disciples named Jude. The 
  Romans tried him for treason and crucified him 
  as an example. Even death could not hold Justas, 
  twelve days after his death on the cross the son of 
  god appeared in the cities of his homeland shin-
  ing with godly radiance. He implored the people 
  to carry on the struggle and promised that their 
  day of deliverance would soon be at hand.
  It was. The champion of order became a martyr, 
  a figure of unification against Rome across the 
  east and all Europe. Justas, the son of the heav-
  ens, became a religious figurehead that swept the 
  known world, and kept spiritual dominance over 
  much of it until the present day and probably for 
  many years to come.
  This faith is called the Aluminat. The word 
  Aluminat means holy presence, and is used 
  to refer to the holy trinity of Order (law), son 
  (Justas), and Holy Ghost (Justas returned from 
  the dead).
  The Aluminat faith reached Europe in the 1st 
  century (after the death of Justas). The eastern 
  missionaries found an entire continent populated 
  by a tribal people that history calls the Celts. The 
  Celts were a proud, aggressive pagan people; they 
  worshipped the forces of nature through a vari-
  ety of gods and goddesses. They suffered under 
  the Roman yoke, and although individually they 
  fought well, their tribal nature held them back 
  from the discipline and unification of the Roman 
  armies, causing them to be scattered easily. The 
  Aluminat faith when introduced to the Celts, 
  was at first scorned as a load of stupid rules. The 
  Aluminat’s preaching on the use of magic seemed 
  preposterous but the Humanitarian aspects of 
  the Aluminat held appeal for many of the young 
  Celts and even the occupying Romans, and an 
  underground religion was formed. Eventually the 
  worship of the earth was pushed underground 
  in favour of the simpler Aluminat faith and its 
  promise of glory in heaven for those who are 
  meek on earth.
  At the end of the 2nd century AD the tribes, unit-
  “here in Great Britain, we carry class distinctions into the house of god. Whether the edifice 
  be a splendid monument of art, or whether it be nothing superior to a barn. The poor man is 
  made to feel that he is a poor man, the rich is reminded that he is rich, in the great majority 
  of our churches and chapels. The square pew, carpeted, perhaps, and curtained, the gradu-
  ated scales of other pews, the free-sittings, if there are any, keep up the separation between 
  class and class... We nave no Negro pews for we have no prejudice against colour - but we 
  have distinct places for the penniless, for we have a morbid horror of poverty.”
  The British churches in relation to the British people, Edward Miall. 1849
  
  47
  Society
  Religion
  ed by the Aluminat pushed a shattered Roman 
  army out of Europe. By the middle of the 3rd 
  century AD the Roman Empire was no more, 
  replaced by countless states and kingdoms all 
  united by faith in the Aluminat. A faith so strong 
  that when the holy lands of Justas’ origins were 
  invaded by Saracens and Moors in the 11th cen-
  tury AD troops were sent from all over Europe to 
  reclaim it in three bloody wars.
  The thirty year war and the heresy
  By the 16th century, corruption was starting to 
  creep its way into the affairs of the church; the 
  faith had split into factions, some aggressive, 
  some humanitarian, some pro-magic, some anti-
  magic. Arch bishops met and serious debates 
  took place upon stopping a holy war within 
  Europe, but in the year 1532, the decision was 
  made for them. A war started that would end the 
  common use of magic in the land. 
  The war apparently started when a wizard from 
  the Hapsburg provinces saved a monk who fell 
  out of a window by using a spell to break his fall. 
  The monk, unaware of the wizard, claimed that 
  the incident was a miracle. Immediately several 
  other Aluminat sects cried heresy, holy war start-
  ed brewing, priests and panic started to rouse the 
  peasants against one another in the name of law, 
  order and true holy religion. The wizard, by now 
  quite horrified at the consequences of his act of 
  mercy, came forward and tried to explain that it 
  had been him, not god who had saved the priest. 
  The wizard was hanged for his blasphemy (put-
  ting himself next to Justas) and the people were 
  moved against any others who would possibly 
  blaspheme in such a manner. The Thirty Years 
  War began.
  At the end of the war, much of Europe was in 
  ruins. The Aluminat faithful had quite success-
  fully scoured the face of Europe of any trace of 
  magic, and had indeed destroyed most. All that 
  remained was the guild, and scattered handfuls of 
  hidden conjurers and witches. Aluminat society 
  itself was cleansed of the corruption and dissident 
  sects that had plagued it and started to reconstruct 
  the cities of Europe.
  The Aluminat church of today
  Today there is at least one Aluminat church with-
  in the boundaries of any village, town or city of 
  Europe.
  The church and the faith dominate much of 
  society, and have driven explorers deep into the 
  undiscovered continent to bring the name of god. 
  
  48
  Society
  Religion
  On the whole it is a shame that corruption has 
  started to set in again.
  At present there is one major Aluminat sect in 
  Western Europe, called simply the Aluminat. 
  Its traditions are severe, sexist, racist, many of 
  its doctrines have formed with or been formed 
  by society. The Aluminat’s rituals for weddings, 
  funerals and everyday worship are used all over 
  the continent. The thirty-year war cleansed the 
  church of many troublesome fringe sects three 
  centuries ago, and only in the last hundred years 
  have the sects named the Anglican Aluminat and 
  the Evangelical Puritans started to gain enough 
  popularity to even be considered a sect rather 
  than a view. The Anglicans do not hold separate 
  churches or ceremonies; they hold and attend 
  the same ceremonies and functions as the ‘pure’ 
  Aluminat in the same places and at the same 
  times. Anglicans simply choose to pay more heed 
  to the Humanitarian side of the Aluminat bible 
  than the accepted view. Some actually believe 
  that the Aluminat bible was rewritten after the 
  thirty-year war, with the purpose of enforcing 
  the entire social and by-laws that now govern 
  peoples’ lives. Most Anglicans believe that the 
  preaching of Justas sometimes becomes lost in 
  bureaucracy and dogma, and that more people 
  should try to help their fellow men.
  Obviously it is not practical to print the entire 
  Aluminat bible within these rules, so following 
  are some guidelines to the views of the Aluminat 
  and the Anglican Aluminat using the same bul-
  let points as the ‘ethics’ breakdowns found in the 
  social class section.
  The Aluminat
  The major religion in the civilised world for over 
  eighteen centuries. The following are views com-
  monly preached at sermons.
   
  Money? Money, trying to earn profit, 
  is greed and a sin. If the celestial order 
  intended you to possess wealth, then you 
  would have been born to the nobility, not 
  from the soil.
   Education? Education encourages ambi-
  tion, one of the greatest sins. Education 
  should be accompanied by discipline to 
  guard against ambition; most women are 
  too frail to deal with a full education.
   
  Other classes? The lower classes live in 
  squalor for their sins; eventually the meek 
  will inherit the earth.
   Religion? The Angels of Order are always 
  present; they know all and moves in myste-
  rious ways.
   
  Marriage? Marriage is a sacred institution, 
  not to be taken lightly, arranged marriages 
  are best, the young cannot be expected to 
  choose wisely.
   
  Honour? Honour and honesty are to be 
  respected and adhered to. Live by the Ten 
  Commandments.
   
  Magic?  The use of magic is temptation to 
  sin, magic is the essence of Entropy. Never 
  trust a sorcerer.
  Typical saying: ‘... An eye for an eye...’ 
  The Anglican aluminat
  The new outlook on the verses of the Aluminat 
  bible.
  The Ten Commandments are holy dictates of 
  order, and as such are sacred.
   
  Money? Money is the root of all evil; the 
  pursuit of profit is the cause of much sor-
  row in the world.
   
  Education? Education is a wonderful 
  thing; every child should be given the 
  chance to learn.
   
  Other classes? The lower classes live in 
  squalor, it is shameful, many Anglicans 
  have formed charities to erect clinics, 
  orphanages, schools and the like for those 
  who otherwise could not afford them.
   
  Other classes? Sometimes the upper 
  classes make you sick. They have so much 
  more than they need- yet are so loathe to 
  part with any.
   
  Marriage? Marriages are usually arranged, 
  most consider marriage to be a sacred 
  institution, not to be taken lightly, but also 
  believe in true love as the basis for a suc-
  
  49
  Society
  Religion
  cessful marriage rather than a large dowry.
   Religion? No matter where he is born the 
  spirit of Justas will not supply everything 
  for a man; he must work to make his way 
  while in this world.
   
  Honour? Honour and honesty are the rules 
  that all men should live by.
   
  Magic? Magic is part of life, as long as it 
  used for good, what harm can it do. Justas 
  is not against magic, only the way that it 
  is used. Surely one can trust the sorcerers 
  of the guild; after all they hunted down all 
  manner of evil sorcery during the thirty 
  years war.
  Typical saying: ‘...turn the other cheek...’
  The evangelical puritans
  An offshoot of the Aluminat, which is rapidly 
  gaining popularity amongst the lower middle and 
  lower classes. Founded in 1736, they believe in 
  the literal interpretation of Aluminat scriptures. 
  They also believe in the virtue of hard work, 
  keeping the Sabbath special and in temperance. 
  The evangelicals (as they are commonly known) 
  are the driving force behind the missionary move-
  ment, the majority of whom come from Britain 
  (10,500, compared to 5,500 from the Americas 
  and 2,500 from the rest of Europe). They are 
  the prime movers behind translating the scrip-
  tures into native tongues so that the ‘heathen’ 
  can be saved. Often they are at odds with the 
  colonial administrators, as they believe in the 
  moral superiority of the white man: this often 
  incites the natives to rebellion and colonial gov-
  ernors frequently end up using military force to 
  save missionaries. On the other hand, they have 
  proved useful to the crown, as when they enter 
  unclaimed territory, the crown has an excuse to 
  send troops in to annexe the territory. However, 
  they are not just killjoys interested in destroy-
  ing native ways of life – they are also the prime 
  movers behind the abolition of slavery, both the 
  illegal slave trade and the Africans still enslaved 
  by the Spanish, Portuguese and Arabs. 
   
  Money? Hard work is the key to material 
  and spiritual happiness.
   
  Education? Education should be for all, 
  including savages and other heathens; if 
  they are educated, only then can they find 
  the true path to godliness.
   
  Other classes? The heathen know not what 
  they do. They must be saved from their 
  filthy ways, and not be exploited by ungod-
  ly merchants and administrators.
   
  Marriage? Marriage is a sacred covenant 
  not to be entered into lightly. It is an insti-
  tution that should be entered with love as a 
  proof of devotion to god.
   
  Religion? All the scriptures must be 
  adhered to the letter.
   
  Honour? Honour and honesty are rules to 
  be lived by. 
   
  Magic? Magic is heathen and therefore a 
  sin. Only through belief in order can we 
  change our lives (“miracles”, however, are 
  a different matter)
  The earth goddess & the dark gods
  Sixteen centuries ago the Celts finally took up 
  the worship of the Aluminat god in preference 
  to their pagan nature religion. Not all the earth 
  goddess’s followers left her; some still praised the 
  wind and the rain, some still valued true freedom. 
  After the defeat of the Romans, these pagan men 
  and women found themselves being persecuted 
  by the followers of the Aluminat, sometimes even 
  being hunted as Entropy worshippers or worse. 
  The worship of the earth goddess went under-
  ground. By the sixteenth century, the numbers of 
  the earth goddesses’ followers had dramatically 
  increased, just in time to be burnt as Entropy 
  worshippers, sorcerers, and heretics in the thirty 
  years war. The followers of the earth goddess 
  scattered again and stayed scattered fearing the 
  ignorance and bigotry of the church. Now the 
  modern followers of the earth goddess live in 
  the wilds of Europe where they can be free with 
  no social conventions, and no churches to pay 
  money to. The earth goddess and her follow-
  ers have no time for the Aluminat, the Aluminat 
  may be considered lawful, but they have allowed 
  the philosophy of Order to become twisted. The 
  Aluminat is an uncaring faith and it grieves her 
  
  50
  Society
  Religion
  that her people gave 
  themselves up to the 
  miseries of Order 
  without reason.
  Although they 
  escape the churches 
  of Order, the fol-
  lowers of nature 
  have another threat, 
  the followers of 
  Entropy. Followers 
  of Entropy also 
  recognise the earth 
  goddess as a threat 
  and seek to destroy 
  her followers and 
  power. The earth 
  goddess herself per-
  ceives the increas-
  ing presence of 
  Entropy as a threat 
  that upsets the bal-
  ance of her world, 
  something that she, 
  through her follow-
  ers will try to prevent.
  The earth goddess is actually the power behind 
  pantheons of pagan godheads all across the 
  world. The theory being that it is easier to accept 
  fate at the hands of two gods - one good and one 
  bad - than it is to accept the same fate from one 
  enigmatic god. In Europe the names and legends 
  of the gods belong to ancient Eldren races from 
  Celtic and northern legends before the dark ages.
  Now however, each of the heroes of this ancient 
  race symbolises a force of nature, and as a pan-
  theon the Aluminat knows them as the ‘dark’ or 
  ‘old gods’.
  The northern gods in particular are harsh, fitting 
  for their harsh climate. Their legends are full of 
  stoicism in the face of certain doom, and this is 
  no clearer than in stories about the ragnorok, the 
  end of the world, where even the gods themselves 
  die. Heroes who died in battle were taken to 
  Valhalla, hall of the slain, where they would fight 
  and feast until the last days when they would go 
  to fight the evil giants in Odin’s personal retinue 
  (the einheriar).
  In the nature faith of Europe a follower usu-
  ally pays homage to whichever god rules over 
  the aspect of nature or life that is concerned. 
  All pagans will have a patron god as well. This 
  patron is the face that the pagan worships the 
  earth goddess through, on a day-to-day conscious 
  level. 
  Following are two common pantheons from 
  Europe, the Celtic pantheon of western Europe, 
  and the Nordic pantheon of northern Europe.
  Ethics of the old ways
  The old ways can be difficult to understand, they 
  depend upon the natural example. There is no 
  point in cursing the strength of the storm, why 
  call a cat wicked for playing with the mouse, why 
  cry when the old die - it’s only natural.
   
  Magic? Magic is part of natural life; magic 
  is as good or bad as the person using it.
   Money? Money is the root of much evil. 
  The pursuit of profit is the cause of much 
  sorrow in the world. A man can be born 
  
  51
  Society
  poor or rich. Whichever he starts as he has 
  a lifetime ahead of him to live as best he 
  can, to see it all, and do it all.
   Education? Education is a wonderful 
  thing; every child should be given an open 
  education.
   
  Other classes? Many of the lower classes 
  live in squalor, it is shameful that so many 
  people would allow themselves to be herd-
  ed and used in such a wav.
   
  Other classes? Sometimes the upper class-
  es make you laugh; they honestly think that 
  they own the land.
   
  Marriage? Marriages are a wonderful 
  thing between two lovers.
   Honour? All the lady’s creatures are honest; 
  none can afford honour when there is food to be 
  found-
   
  Religion? True pagan folk do not kill 
  animals or people in their worship. You 
  worship the earth and its life, how can you 
  celebrate that with meaningless death.
  Typical saying: ‘animals? Animals! Look you; 
  you don’t see rabbits garrotting each other, do 
  you?’
  The celtic pantheon
  Bridget 
   Lady of flowers, maiden of life. As an archetype Bridget represents youthful 
  innocence and adolescent fertility.
  Cerrunnos 
   The horned man. The laughter in the woods. As an archetype Cerrunnos rep-
  resents a carefree acceptance of the world and mortality, and the ability to 
  celebrate in all its beauty before it, or you, are gone.
  Dagda  
   Lord of perfect knowledge. Father of all. As an archetype the Dagda repre-
  sents a leader and provider.
  Dana 
   The earth mother. The empress. As an archetype Dana represents the fertility 
  of the earth and the joy of parenthood.
  Diancecht 
   The master smith. As an archetype Diancecht represents ingenuity, a lawful 
  trend, mixed with a huge imagination. Making a perfect patron for artisans 
  and craftsmen of all descriptions.
  Lugh 
   The sun king, the long arm. As an archetype Lugh represents the aggression 
  of headstrong youth.
  Rhiannon 
   The white horse, nemesis. As an archetype Rhiannon represents a lover’s pas-
  sions and righteous revenge for the wronged
  Mananan Mac Llyr  Lord of the sea, the clown. As an archetype Mananan represents the magi-
  cian, a master of magic and deceit. He also rules the spirits of the -waters.
  Morrigan 
   The raven, the war crone. As an archetype Morrigan represents the coldness 
  of a mercenary’s heart, the futility of war and the inevitability of a warrior’s 
  death.
  Nuada  
   The silver hand, of the terrible blade. As an archetype Nuada, like the Dagda 
  represents a wise leader, but Nuada is a warrior not a provider.
  Religion
  
  52
  Society
  The asgarth pantheon
  Odin or Woden   The allfather – chief of the gods of Asgard, god of rulers, betrayer of war-
  riors, god of wisdom. His symbol is the spear gungnir, he rides an eight 
  legged horse sleipnir and has two ravens hugin and munin who tell him all 
  that happens in the world. Known as Wuotan to the continental Germans. 
  Traditionally, all rulers in Germanic lands claimed descent from him.
  Frigga  
   Odin’s wife, patron of married women.
  Thor or Thunor  God of thunder, patron of the peasants, enemy of the giants. The most popu-
  lar of the Norse gods, he carries the mighty hammer mjonnir which only he 
  can lift, and rides a chariot drawn by two goats. The hammer symbol was 
  used to ward evil, and the Aluminat habit of crossing oneself had it’s origins 
  in Germanic people making the sign of the hammer. Known as Donar to the 
  Germans. Son of Odin. 
  Tyr or Tiw  
   God of war and justice. Known as Tiwaz to the Germans. Son of Odin.
  Frey 
   God of fertility, his symbol is an erect penis. He is one of the vanir , not the 
  aesir.
  Freya  
   Goddess of love and sister of frey
  Loki  
   God of fire, trickster and betrayer of the gods. Brother of Odin, he will one 
  day break his bonds and lead the giants to destroy the gods of asgarth.
  Balder  
   Sun god, god of beauty and youth – the beloved son of Odin and Frigga, he 
  was tricked and slain at due to Loki’s mischief, causing Loki to be impris-
  oned. On the last day he will be released from Hel to take his place amongst 
  the surviving good gods who will rule a gentler race of Humans. 
  Hel 
   Daughter of Loki, mistress of the underworld. She rules over the murderers, 
  adulturers and criminals who live in her realm, whom she will lead against 
  Asgarth on the last battle.
  Heimdall 
   Watcher of the gods, sentinel of Asgard. Son of Odin.
  The norns  
   Not gods, but three hags who represent the past, present and future. 
  Paline, lady of subversion
  The lady Paline appears as an unnaturally beauti-
  ful Eldren woman with porcelain skin. Scarlet 
  hair and eyes. Her body is adorned with four 
  arms. If she appears clothed it is in rainbow 
  coloured dancers’ veils of an eastern fashion.
  Paline and her demonic court are well estab-
  lished as a secret pleasure cult in the aristocratic 
  and artistic circles of European society. Paline’s 
  motives are unclear, as one would expect from a 
  goddess of Entropy, but it is certain that she and 
  her demons delight in pleasure of every variety, 
  no matter how refined – or depraved. Even the 
  arts of politics, revolution, death and war enter-
  tain the host of the court.
  The court itself consists of Paline, her demonic 
  ‘daughters’ and other greater demons along 
  with any poor mortals that have strayed within 
  the courts confines. Although legend places the 
  Religion
  
  53
  Society
  court somewhere in the west, it is more probably 
  another plane that has already fallen to the host of 
  pleasure.
  Paline is a patron goddess of the magical arts, 
  and has been known to send emissaries to unwary 
  sorcerers. Following are some guidelines to the 
  beliefs and attitudes of Paline’s court and follow-
  ers.
  The pale lady’s whims
  If he accepts the power and pleasure of the host’s 
  company, a man or woman will be gifted with 
  their deepest desires.
   Money? With money you can buy anything and 
  anyone, the possession of money is therefore 
  worthwhile in the pursuit of pleasure and power.
  Education? Education is not wasted if 
  directed in the appropriate way (toward the 
  banishment of labour, and promotion of 
  debauchery).
  Other classes? The lower classes live in 
  squalor, and are seldom missed; 
  they make ideal sport for the 
  entertainment of the host.
  Other classes? The upper 
  classes are far more pleas-
  ing; their lives lead them to 
  excess and therefore closer to 
  the host.
  Marriage? Marriage is a 
  wonderfully ridiculous 
  idea.
  Religion? The Ten 
  Commandments 
  were created by 
  the Aluminat of 
  Order, and are 
  therefore there to 
  be depraved and 
  broken at every 
  opportunity.
   
  Honour? Honour and honesty are the rules 
  that should be visibly maintained to prevent 
  detection.
   
  Magic? Magic is a natural power in many 
  worlds, but no spell can match the power of 
  the host or its own sorcery
  Typical saying: ‘how boring, why not try this...’
  Religion
  
  54
  Society
  54
  SCIENCE &
  STEAM POWER
  We have spent a lot of time talking about 
  religion, faith and magic, but what about 
  the scientific discoveries of our era? 
  Surely with magic to aid them, the scien-
  tific minds of Victoriana must have made 
  huge steps forward?
  Well, simply put – no. 
  That isn’t to say that scientific oddities 
  and marvels don’t exist, the likes of the 
  Nautilus and the Time Machine are both 
  perfectly possible Victoriana inventions, 
  but their presence would be as unique 
  marvels (the same way they were depict-
  ed in our own ‘real life’ fiction) not as 
  commodities.
  It must be remembered that magic is 
  a manifestation of chaos, and western 
  society has spent hundreds of years deny-
  ing that power in order to replace it with 
  science, so the lack of common-place 
  ‘super-science’ perhaps makes a little 
  more sense.  Even so, there are areas in 
  Victoriana where the progress of 19th  
  century science has been given a little 
  push forward by the world around it, 
  and just as often areas where science has 
  ‘cheated’ by incorporating sorcery into its 
  design. 
  The industrial revolution is still in its 
  infancy, given time for development who 
  knows what enterprising minds will think 
  up, or which of those ideas will  become 
  commonplace…
  NAVAL TECHNOLOGY
  Sea travel is the only effective way to 
  make intercontinental travel for freight. 
  Most open sea ships are sail craft. Steam 
  powered vessels are available but are 
  expensive to buy and maintain in com-
  parison. A sailing craft on the open sea 
  can probably cover 220 miles of sea in a 
  day, with adverse weather this could be 
  reduced to as little as 50 miles. Steam 
  vessels can cover up to 340 miles of open 
  sea in one day and are less affected by 
  poor or crossing winds, allowing a travel 
  distance of 100 miles a day in even the 
  worst conditions.
  Most ships in Victoriana are made of 
  wood and are powered by sails. Most 
  military ships have been converted to 
  steam power, propelled by huge paddle 
  wheels on each side of the ship but with a 
  full set of masts for back up, many civil-
  ian ships are undergoing the same con-
  version process and it is anticipated that 
  all ocean traffic will be steam powered 
  within 20 years. Armoured metal ship 
  hulls are another area of great experi-
  mentation, with a great many designs 
  being put forward on a daily basis, it is 
  generally agreed that the British engineer 
  What did the Romans ever do for us?
  It's an irony that despite the achievements and ingenuity of the scientific minds in 
  Victoriana's Europe, they have accomplished nothing that was not relatively com-
  mon in the 'dark ages' of antiquity when magic was strong. All those ancient wonders 
  were ripped down, destroyed and buried along with Rome to make way for Aluminat 
  Christendom.
  
  55
  Society
  Steampower
  Isambard Kingdom Brunel is the leader in metal 
  ship design (and most of his designs have been 
  rejected) and his first ocean going metal ship hull 
  is currently under construction (and considerable 
  scrutiny) in England.
  The forced opening up of Chinese trade by the 
  British in 1840 bred a new type of ship – the 
  clipper. These were the most elegant and fastest 
  sailing ships in the world, and they had to be, as 
  they carried that most precious of cargo to the 
  English people – tea! Tea needs to be speedily 
  delivered to England from China so that it is at its 
  most fragrant – skippers could lose as much as 10 
  shillings per crate if the tea was bad. As a result, 
  there are races between the clippers from Hong 
  Kong to London, and bets are placed upon the 
  outcome. Clippers such as the ‘Cutty Sark’ have 
  become household names, and are renowned by 
  how fast they can deliver their cargo. 
  FLIGHT
  In Victoriana Wyverns are real, and for centuries 
  they have been used as aerial cavalry by certain 
  nations, notably the French and Russians. As man 
  has been flying for centuries, it seems reasonable 
  that flight technology would be more advanced 
  than that of the real 19th century so airships and 
  Ornithopters both exist, albeit in limited applica-
  tions.
  Airships are used as luxury passenger lin-
  ers across Europe. They are too expensive in 
  comparison to their cargo limits for commer-
  cial haulage. So far only the British Navy has 
  adopted them for military use, paying the Guild 
  vast sums of money to assist in the creation of 
  enchanted furnaces for the immense amount of 
  
  56
  Society
  Steampower
  steam power and lift required for the propulsion 
  of an armoured dreadnought through the sky. This 
  investment is generally perceived to be an arro-
  gant folly on the part of the British Government.
  Ornithopters are one man flying machines used 
  by Britain and Prussia. The ornithopter is a recent 
  invention (enjoying its 5th birthday in 1867), and 
  again uses a Guild enhanced steam engine to gen-
  erate the additional lift for flight. The Ornithopter 
  has yet to see active service against aerial foes, 
  which was its design purpose, but the Prussian 
  army has used it in its wars of reunification with 
  devastating effect against ground troops.
  OVERLAND TRANSPORTATION
  Since mankind’s infancy the horse, ox, and slaves 
  have been humanity’s beasts of burden, and 
  only in the last 40 years has the power of steam 
  brought a new alternative – the train. 
  In the ‘modern’ setting for Victoriana, the horse 
  (with a variety of carts and coaches) and the 
  train are the primary forms of overland travel. 
  Although the technology exists to create ‘horse-
  less carriages’ using the same science and sor-
  cery combination as the Ornithopter, the sheer 
  expense of such a machine, along with limited 
  guild resources for the enchantments necessary, 
  prevents any such endeavour being considered for 
  mass transportation, or for any non-government 
  funded project.
  Roads & coach houses
  Horses and coaches still enjoy a great, deal of 
  popularity in Europe, although they are a dying 
  mode of transport in areas serviced by the train.
  Despite the obvious advantages of train travel, 
  many still prefer the slower travel mode of coach 
  & horse. Although fast, trains are dirty and as a 
  recent innovation they are surrounded by super-
  stition. As an example it is commonly believed 
  that the trains excessive speed of 40 mph can 
  knock the breath from frail lungs, or that the wind 
  caused by the speed can knock off a human head 
  if poked from a window! On a more reasonable 
  note, there are still large tracts of rural land where 
  trains have not yet reached, which may only be 
  accessed by coach.
  So, for varied reasons, some more unreasonable 
  than others, the coach is still a popular form of 
  transport. Coach travel is slow, not only limited 
  by a horse’s speed, but by the necessity to stop 
  at a coach house each night, or for a passenger’s 
  convenience. Another hazard of coach travel is 
  the rural brigand or highwayman, still quite an 
  active breed in our Victorian fantasy.
  Assuming a ten-hour day with several stops for 
  rest, a walking man could cover 20 miles in a 
  single day. Allocating the same amount of travel 
  time a horse rider or coach could cover about 35 
  miles of road. Adverse conditions should affect 
  these rates heavily. Heavy rain or snow can easily 
  stall movement rates by 2/3.
  There are three major problems with horse and 
  coaches. One is the uncomfortable travelling 
  conditions – coaches are frequently cramped as 
  unscrupulous drivers cram as many people in as 
  possible, and the discomfort is increased by the 
  lack of suspension in a coach. Secondly, they take 
  a long time to get anywhere. The last problem is 
  robbery – although highway robbery has passed 
  its heyday of the previous century, there are still 
  highwaymen on the road, and no long distance 
  coach driver would be without a decent firearm. 
  One area where horse and coach is still a thriv-
  ing mode of transportation is within the urban 
  environment, where light coaches known as 
  ‘cabs’, and heavy coaches know as ‘omnibuses’ 
  constantly ferry passengers from a to b within the 
  city limits.
  Rail
  Trains are increasingly popular throughout 
  Western Europe. The train was first introduced 
  in 1832 in Britain, and in 1867 Britain has the 
  most effective train service linking all towns and 
  cities, and most of the villages along the way. 
  In Western Europe trains link most of the major 
  towns and cities. In Russia there are only four 
  railways linking Moscow, St. Petersburg and 
  Kiev.
  There is at least one train link over each border 
  of Europe, and it is possible to travel from Calais 
  to Istanbul by train alone. England is the leading 
  country in locomotive development, it’s mastery 
  
  57
  Society
  Train
  Britain has the most effective train ser-
  vice, linking all towns and cities.
  In Western Europe, trains link most of 
  the major towns and cities. In Russia 
  there are only four railways linking 
  Moscow, St. Petersburg and Kiev.
  There is at least one train link over 
  each border of Europe, and it is pos-
  sible to travel from Calais to Istanbul 
  by train alone.
  Inside a train, accommodation is parti-
  tioned into small compartments, each 
  sitting approximately eight people and 
  all accessed by a corridor along one 
  side of the carriage. By prior arrange-
  ment it is possible to book an entire 
  compartment by paying 8x the cost of a 
  normal ticket.
  For long journeys sleeper trains are 
  used, the train has several sleeper car-
  riages filled with curtained berths, each 
  typically containing 2 bunks. The train 
  would also have a buffet car and a 
  lounge car for the travellers during the 
  day. During a long journey, the train 
  would sometimes stop on the rails or at 
  a station overnight, and in such occa-
  sions the passengers would sleep on the 
  train by default.
  First class sleepers would have a sepa-
  rate compartment, with folding berths, 
  a table and other basic amenities to 
  themselves. Many important figures, 
  such as monarchs and politicians have 
  access to a state carriage - a travelling 
  apartment where the traveller need not 
  step outside their carriage at all during 
  the journey.
  A train travels at a much faster speed 
  than a horse (40 miles per hour) despite 
  the infancy of locomotion. In Britain 
  most major towns and cities are linked 
  along with any villages in between, 
  other countries rail networks are not as 
  comprehensive if they exist at all. The 
  train is primarily affected by autumn 
  & winter seasons when leaves or snow 
  drifts on the lines require a slower 
  travel speed to avoid derailing (possi-
  bly 1/2 speed).
  Horse & coach
  Horses and coaches still enjoy a great, 
  deal of popularity in Europe, although 
  they are a dying mode of transport in 
  areas serviced by the train.
  Coaches are most commonly used in 
  areas without railways, such as the 
  United States, British North America, 
  South Africa and the Antipodes. Of 
  course, in these areas the coachmen 
  are heavily armed, and passengers are 
  expected to help fight off attacks. 
  There are three major problems with 
  horse and coaches. One is the uncom-
  fortable travelling conditions – coaches 
  are frequently cramped as unscrupulous 
  drivers cram as many people in as pos-
  sible, and the discomfort is increased 
  by the lack of suspension in a coach. 
  Secondly, they take a long time to get 
  anywhere. The last problem is rob-
  bery – although highway robbery has 
  passed its heyday of the previous cen-
  tury, there are still highwaymen on the 
  road, and no long distance coach driver 
  would be without a decent firearm. 
  One area where horse and coach is still 
  a thriving mode of transportation is 
  within the urban environment, where 
  light coaches known as ‘cabs’, and 
  heavy coaches know as ‘omnibuses’ 
  constantly ferry passengers from a to b 
  within the city limits.
  Sea travel
  Sea travel is the only effective way to 
  make intercontinental travel for freight. 
  Most open sea ships are sail craft. 
  Steam powered vessels are available 
  but are expensive to buy and maintain 
  in comparison. 
  A sailing craft on the open sea can 
  probably cover 220 miles of sea in a 
  day, with adverse weather this could be 
  reduced to as little as 50 miles. Steam 
  vessels can cover up to 340 miles of 
  open sea in one day and are less effect-
  ed by poor or crossing winds, allowing 
  a travel distance of 100 miles a day in 
  even the worst conditions.
  Air Travel
  Air travel is slow and luxurious. In 
  Victoriana the very possibility of Air 
  travel is a privilege of the rich, and the 
  majority of the small amount of air-
  ships in commerical service are plea-
  sure liners constantly touring a circuit 
  of European cities.
  These airships can cover 200 miles in 
  a 24 hour period, and make frequent 
  stops at the major and fashionable 
  cities typically running a two days air-
  bourne, two days in dock cycle.
  The military airships of Britain’s navy 
  travel slower than this, weighed down 
  by armour and weapons as they are, 
  Military airships only cover 100 miles 
  in a 24 hour period.
  Steampower
  
  58
  Society
  Steampower
  of locomotion is one of its greatest industrial 
  assets. Within England the rail network is exten-
  sive. Within cities rail links are rare, London 
  providing the only circular linking railway for 
  urban travellers. Most railways supplant the road 
  and canal systems with speedy and direct travel 
  over rural areas. Urban termini are usually on the 
  outskirts of town, or at least upon the outskirts 
  at the time of building. England’s rail network 
  boasts a great many rural stops, or stations. There 
  are many more stations than the railway builders 
  preferred, but when buying land to build upon a 
  local or even personal station was often their only 
  bargaining chip. Landowners, appreciating the 
  increased commerce and status from a rail link 
  would sometimes sell land at a preferential rate 
  when offered a station.
  Rural rail stations are often a focal point of a 
  villages activity, in the same manner as a cross 
  roads coach house. New opportunities for board-
  ing houses and traveller’s taverns arise. Boosting 
  a rural economy nearly shattered by the exodus 
  of workers to urban factories in the 30’s. In urban 
  areas the construction of a rail station is the ruin 
  of a respectable area. Soon after the station comes 
  industry, wishing to be near its transport. With 
  industry comes the working class - there goes the 
  neighbourhood.
  A train travels at a much faster speed than a horse 
  (40 miles per hour) despite the infancy of loco-
  motion. In Britain most major towns and cities 
  are linked along with any villages in between, 
  other countries rail networks are not as compre-
  hensive if they exist at all. The train is primarily 
  affected by autumn & winter seasons when leaves 
  or snow drifts on the lines require a slower travel 
  speed to avoid derailing (1/2 speed).
  Ironically enough, even though she invented 
  railways Britain is not the greatest recipient 
  of their benefits. Railways are most useful in 
  the world’s largest countries such as America, 
  where the Western territories and states are being 
  opened up to mass colonisation.  Railways are 
  also Britain’s greatest gift (or bane) to the colo-
  nies, the larger the distance, the greater the ben-
  efit. During the early 1850’s the governor Lord 
  Dalhousie, intended to link all areas of the Raj, 
  a move that brought employment to the natives, 
  but also caused unrest. His foresight is even now 
  being mimicked in countries such as Canada and 
  Australia. 
  ELECTRICITY
  Electrical power does exist in Victoriana, and is 
  an elementary component of telegram commu-
  nication. Unfortunately its usefulness is severely 
  curtailed by the amount of current that can be 
  generated without the aid of sorcery, and by the 
  amount of power that can be stored in the primi-
  tive chemical batteries of the era.
  Most telegram offices operate with a steam gener-
  ator of their own, or with a room full of batteries 
  (requiring daily replacements and refills) to create 
  the modest amounts of current they require.
  WEAPONS
  The Arms race is one of the fastest moving 
  areas of technology, with an astounding array 
  of weapon designs appearing on a daily basis. 
  The various inventors and weapons manufactur-
  ers of Victoriana are all engaged in a frantic race 
  on three technology fronts: accuracy, speed, and 
  power; and in two scales: personal side arms and 
  artillery.
  The recent wars across Europe against the ambi-
  tions of Napoleon proved to every country the 
  sheer power of artillery, and this is where most 
  government sponsored innovation is focused with 
  The Human Ironclad
   The eccentric genius Leonard Quigley (PhD, Thaum) has been presenting his ‘human ironclad’ 
  armour at the great exhibition although it has been greeted with astonishment and amusement, it has 
  proved impractical. Too small to carry its own steam engine the suit relies on hourly maintenance 
  infusions of thaumaturgical sorcery.
  
  59
  Society
  Steampower
  an emphasis on accuracy and power. 
  The personal side arms race is led by the manu-
  facturers, and the emphasis is on speed. The last 
  20 years of game time has seen firearms evolve 
  in a never ending race to get more bullets out of 
  the weapon in as short a time as possible. At this 
  point in weapons development there is no com-
  mon standard, and the variety of ways in which 
  that nebulous goal is being reached is staggering, 
  with inventors experimenting with multiple bar-
  rels, springs, clock work, magazines and belts 
  - often in bizarre combinations.
  Adversely armour technology is very limited in 
  Victoriana. Military forts tend to be made from 
  stone and concrete, ships are still wood, and per-
  sonal armour is practically non existent. The lack 
  of personal armour is a direct result of the power 
  of modern firearms – what is the point in weigh-
  ing yourself down with a metal suit when modern 
  munitions can tear straight through it?
  COMMUNICATION
  Most countries operate a postal service; the post 
  may arrive in rural areas as little as once a month, 
  but it would reach the destination eventually. 
  The mail can be assumed to reach the destina-
  tion within 3 days of game time within an urban 
  district. With extended distance such as across 
  counties or states this time should be extended to 
  2 weeks.
  The only other effective way to send a message is 
  to deliver it yourself, to send a servant, or to hire 
  a messenger to do so for you.
  The most common form of long distance commu-
  nication within the civilised world might be the 
  posted letter, but the fastest is the telegram. 
  A telegram is sent by wire to the receiving tele-
  graph office, and then either delivered, or left for 
  the receiver to pick up depending upon the speci-
  fication of the sender. Telegraph offices can be 
  found in any town and several in any city, occa-
  sionally there will be an office for rural districts 
  as well. A telegram usually takes minutes to send 
  to the receiving office, and then will either wait 
  for the receiver to arrive, or will be delivered. 
  Delivery time varies obviously and should be 
  worked out according to the transportation sec-
  tion below.
  
  60
  Society
  Steampower
  Telegraph connection
  In our game year of 1867 telegraph wires connect 
  most urban areas of England and telegrams may 
  be sent to any mainland city. Major cities such as 
  London have many telegraph offices in the vari-
  ous districts. Telegraph cables have also been laid 
  across the English Channel to enable telegram 
  communication with the other European nations. 
  Throughout the mid 19th century an immense 
  project is being undertaken to lay telegraph 
  cables across the oceans. The “cable layers” were 
  originally standard ships adapted to lay the cables 
  across the seas, thus eventually facilitating faster, 
  instant communication, with which to aid in the 
  administration of world spanning empires. As can 
  be imagined, this is a mammoth task that is fre-
  quently delayed by war and political upsets. 
  Misinterpretation
  Unfortunately telegraph communication is not 
  infallible, or necessarily swift. Telegram messag-
  es are sent as electrical pulses, with distance the 
  pulses weaken. To prevent the loss of messages 
  each message goes through each office en route. 
  At each office the message is noted and re-sent, 
  with each re-sending there is a possibility of the 
  message becoming distorted, or of a misspelling.
  In addition, when the message finally arrives at 
  the target office, it must then be delivered. With 
  an unclear address or an errant delivery boy the 
  message can end up anywhere. However, such 
  mishaps are more rare than common, and the 
  telegram is an often-used form of communication 
  within cities and across greater distances.
  Messengers
  Physical messengers are rarely employed directly, 
  usually they are sent out by a telegraph office, or 
  similar organisation. Sometimes discretion will 
  be of the utmost importance to a communication, 
  and a discreet and trustworthy messenger will be 
  required.
  Most often a middle or upper class character will 
  send one of their regular retainers. Working class 
  characters might have to resort to bribing street 
  urchins to deliver messages, with such mischie-
  vous delivery boys bribery should be enough to 
  ensure discretion.
  The royal mail
  England does maintain a national delivery service 
  for messages and postal packages. The royal mail 
  does not deliver personal messages individually. 
  But a message handed into a royal post office 
  with an appropriate stamp is delivered with any 
  others through the appropriate channels. The post 
  office maintains a sorting office in every town 
  and using a mixture of rail, coach and eventually 
  foot they deliver all letters in their care every 
  morning, and every afternoon.
  The royal mail is in its infancy and can be woe-
  fully inefficient, with parcels and letters lost 
  under machines escaping notice for days. Even 
  with optimum vigilance by employees the speed 
  of the mail is only as fast as the physical means 
  at its disposal.
  COMPUTERS
  The inventor Charles Babbage first introduced 
  the concept of a computing machine, and he was 
  laughed out of every funding committee he vis-
  ited, until he visited the Guild. The Guild spon-
  sored Charles immediately to create a ‘difference 
  engine’ to assist in the computations necessary 
  to chart the movement of the heavens and the 
  planes. Charles has been working on this engine 
  for 10 years and has announced that it should be 
  ready for Christmas 1868.
  CYBERWARE?
  The concept of replacement limbs exists in 
  Victoriana, such limbs might be made of wood 
  or metal, are strapped rather than surgically 
  implanted, and do not have full movement, glass 
  eyes are also possible – but that doesn’t make 
  you a cyborg! Magical enchantment makes fully 
  functioning artificial limbs possible, even with 
  improvements over the original. Such a limb 
  would have to be implanted with magical aid as 
  well, as scientific medicine doesn’t know enough 
  about the human nervous system to successfully 
  carry out such an operation. The Guild presented 
  just such an enchanted prosthetic to the Czarina 
  of Russia in 1815.
  In short, if you want a metal arm, you can have 
  
  61
  Society
  Steampower
  one, but don’t expect to do much with it unless 
  you can afford a guild mage – and that requires a 
  very deep wallet! 
  HEALTHCARE
  Healthcare without the sorcery of the guild is 
  very poor; in fact the progress of healthcare has 
  been hampered by the presence of sorcery. Those 
  with the money obtain magical cures; the poor 
  make do with medical science.
  Diagnosis is often hampered by a poor under-
  standing of the human mind and temperament, 
  Surgery is hampered by poor availability of prop-
  er anaesthetic – most patients suffer their surgery 
  with nothing more than a bottle of scotch and 
  a leather strap to bite. The anaesthetics that are 
  available (such as choral hydrate) are often addic-
  tive and lead to problems in their own right.
  Civic health and sanitation are also poor. The 
  link between filthy water or open sewers and 
  the spread of disease in cities is only just being 
  deduced by radical doctors. It is more com-
  monly believed that disease is spread by poor 
  air circulation in narrow streets and courtyards. 
  Pasteurisation does not exist yet, and immunisa-
  tion is a juvenile science at best. 
  MANUFACTURING
  This is the industrial era, but it’s not the era of 
  mass-production yet. There are in fact very few 
  automatic processes, and certainly no conveyor 
  belts or production lines. Although industrial 
  machinery has been introduced in many areas, 
  it has yet to create a ‘on the shelf’ article. Even 
  in the textiles industry where thousands toil in 
  the mills under mechanical looms, the creation 
  of garments from that cloth is still a craftsman’s 
  skill, with each item individually made. Of course 
  this doesn’t mean that the craftsman takes a good 
  wage! After all he is simply part of the Industrial 
  process and as such should know his place.
  
  62
  Society
  
  Europe: 1867
  6363
  EUROPE & THE REST 
  OF THE WORLD
  It must be realised that Europe of the mid 
  19th century is not an industrial society - nor 
  is it a cosmopolitan society of nations. It is 
  a strange and sometimes alien landscape of 
  contradictions and unrest.
  Industrialisation is still in its infancy, Britain 
  is the industrial and railway leader of the 
  pack. In technology and national income 
  Britain by far exceeds any other European 
  nation. Prussia is the second most indus-
  trialised nation, but outside of these two 
  nations, the level of industry declines rapidly 
  as we travel south and east.
  Southern France, Spain, Hungary, Italy, the 
  Ottoman Empire and Russia, are all incred-
  ibly lacking in technology, most without a 
  single railroad, excepting Russia, which has 
  three railways. Considering the sheer scale 
  of Russia compared to its neighbours, this is 
  still abysmal. 
  Most of the European nations feature a 
  predominantly rural population, where agri-
  culture is the chief industry and production. 
  Britain’s level of urban population, some 
  50% of total population, is unprecedented in 
  any other European nation. The vast major-
  ity of the lower classes, the ‘proletariat’, are 
  still peasants - their lives are little changed 
  from medieval times. 
  Europe is a mighty continent, rich with 
  magic, culture and rivalries. This chapter 
  will list the major nations of Europe to give 
  you the information necessary to decide 
  where your characters originate. Each coun-
  try is listed with an entry such as this one:
  Country: Name of area 
  Languages: Native languages spoken
  Religion: the dominant/national religion
  Population breakdown: a percentage break-
  down of the races present
  Class breakdown: a breakdown of the popu-
  lation according to class level
  Literacy: The percentage of the population 
  capable of reading & writing.
  Governmental system: The nature of the 
  government.
  
  Europe: 1867
  64
  EUROPE: 1867
  POLITICAL MAP
  EUROPE: 1867
  POLITICAL MAP
  
  Europe: 1867
  65
  
  Europe: 1867
  66
  Types of government
  Absolutist monarchy 
  Absolutist political system in which total power is vested in a single indi-
  vidual or a group of rulers. Absolutism is distinguished from democracy 
  by the unlimited power claimed for absolute rulers as contrasted with the 
  constitutional limitations placed on heads of state in democratic, republi-
  can and constitutional governments.
  Anarchy 
  Anarchists believe that the highest attainment of humanity is the freedom 
  of individuals to express themselves, unhindered by any form of repres-
  sion or control from without. They hold that the perfection of humanity 
  will not be attained until all government is abolished and each individual 
  is left absolutely free. 
  Communism 
  Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels defined communism in the communist 
  manifesto, written and published by themselves in London in 1848. Marx 
  and Engels portrayed the natural evolution of a communist utopia from 
  capitalism. Marx theorised that competition among capitalists would 
  force more and more of them to be enveloped by the growing masses. 
  A proletarian dictatorship would rule until all vestiges of capitalism 
  had been eliminated: a communist utopia would then naturally emerge. 
  Unfortunately revolutionaries across Europe are busy trying to rush the 
  process, substituting the requisite stability needed with bloodshed.
  Constitutional monarchy 
  A constitution is a fundamental system of law, written or unwritten, of a 
  sovereign state, established or accepted as a guide for governing the state. 
  A constitution fixes the limits and defines the relations of the legislative, 
  judicial, and executive powers of the state, thus setting up the basis for 
  government. It also provides guarantees of certain rights to the people. 
  Great Britain has an extensive (and often conrtadictory) constitution, 
  embodying numerous documents and customs defining the relationship of 
  the crown, the parliament, and the courts to the citizens.
  Feudal serfdom 
  A class of agricultural labourers, serfs are legally bound to reside and 
  labour at one place working on land owned by their lord, who might be 
  a nobleman, an ecclesiastical dignitary, or an institution such as a mon-
  astery. They cultivate and harvest the lord’s land; being allowed to farm 
  some of his land to support themselves and their families but have to 
  make payments in produce and money to the lord from their own profits.
  Republic 
  A form of state based on the concept that sovereignty resides in the 
  people, who delegate the ‘power to rule’ on their behalf to elected repre-
  sentatives and officials. The era of modern republicanism began with the 
  American revolution of 1776 and the French revolution of 1789.
  
  Europe: 1867
  67
  BRITAIN
  Britain is the centre of the most powerful, globe 
  spanning empire of 1867. Britain is actually a 
  small island separated from the European conti-
  nent by a slim stretch of sea known as the English 
  Channel. Britain’s position as a world power is 
  secured through her monopoly on trade routes to 
  the east and the might of her naval fleets. Britain 
  is currently at war with Russia in the Crimea, a 
  war that currently threatens to expand into Asia 
  and consequently British India.
  Britain is a unified kingdom of three countries: 
  England, Wales & Scotland. England & Wales are 
  unified completely; Scotland still retains a mea-
  sure of independence in social and civil conven-
  tion although they do share the same government 
  and monarchy. The young Queen Victoria rules 
  Britain, Victoria is the very embodiment of all the 
  laws and qualities that society holds dear - dig-
  nity, breeding, and resolve. Britain is one of the 
  most class-conscious countries upon the globe, in 
  Britain money matters less than class and breed-
  ing. It is better to be poor and aristocratic than 
  it is to be middle class and rich.
  Britain is leading the way through the indus-
  trial revolution, boasting the invention of 
  the train, the cotton mill, and many other 
  types of machinery. Indeed, the indus-
  trial revolution began with the build-
  ing of the iron bridge in Staffordshire 
  in 1780, Mr Stephenson built the first 
  locomotive in 1796 and Mr Kingdom 
  Brunel is currently building the first 
  iron steamship at Bristol. Britain’s 
  cities expand at an exponential 
  rate, especially Birmingham and 
  Liverpool, the first as an important 
  industrial base, the second as a major 
  port for the cotton trade. 
  Unfortunately Britain’s success at 
  industry has had its price. Social 
  and health problems caused by the 
  industrial revolution are common-
  place. Disease, particularly work 
  related illness such as respiratory 
  and hearing ailments have reached 
  unprecedented levels due to the com-
  bination of cramped, unsanitary conditions and 
  the pollution of drinking water. Pollution has also 
  now become a problem, in many parts of cities 
  there are entire blocks around every factory that 
  remain permanently covered with soot and grime 
  from the chimney slacks. Child deaths are com-
  mon, especially amongst the poorer sections of 
  the industrial population. Another effect of the 
  industrial revolution is to draw workers from 
  the countryside into the cities until the national 
  census indicates that 50% of the total population 
  is now urban, and that 20% of the total popula-
  tion of Britain lives in the capital, London. As a 
  result, many areas of the agricultural countryside 
  are now in peril of ruin, whilst many of the cities’ 
  disillusioned workers dream of revolution and 
  returning to the countryside. Consequently, the 
  population explosion in the cities combined with 
  
  Europe: 1867
  68
  68
  The capital of England & Wales, 
  London is a vast metropolis 
  built upon the banks of the river 
  Thames. London is home to over 
  4,000,000 inhabitants, some 
  20% of the total population. 
  The quality of life in London 
  is divided between east and 
  west. In the west the upper and 
  middle classes build their ter-
  races and villas, while in the east 
  is London’s industry and captive 
  workforce. The living conditions 
  of the poor in east London can 
  only be described as horrible, 
  crime is astronomical and the 
  rain is black from factory pollu-
  tion and coal fires.
  London could be described as 
  being England – she is the larg-
  est city in Europe, the seat of 
  the royal family and capital to 
  over 200 million people world-
  wide, from tiny St Helena in the 
  Atlantic to the vast sub-continent 
  of India. This diversity is reflect-
  ed in the makeup of the popu-
  lation – there are Irish, Scots, 
  Indians, Africans and Chinese in 
  London, as well as immigrants 
  from Italy, France, Russian-con-
  trolled Poland and the German 
  states. Queen Victoria’s main 
  residence is here at Buckingham 
  Palace, the Houses of Commons 
  and the Lords are in the city of 
  Westminster, whilst the Prime 
  Minister (Lord Palmerston) lives 
  at no. 10 Downing Street. All 
  members of parliament main-
  tain accommodation in London 
  regardless of where they rep-
  resent, and some rarely leave 
  London to meet their constitu-
  ents! All of the major powers 
  have embassies in London, as 
  most rely on Britain for some-
  thing or other, whether it is 
  trade, protection of the shipping 
  lanes or the maintenance of 
  peace in Europe. 
  Society’s capital is London, 
  with society from other parts of 
  Britain being seen as rustic and 
  outdated, and that from Eire and 
  the colonies as being no better 
  than peasants. Many upper class 
  citizens maintain town houses, 
  or at least rooms in London, 
  with a place in the country as 
  a retreat. The reason for this is 
  simple: Queen Victoria lives in 
  London, and they are hoping for 
  favour at court or at least reflect-
  ed glory from their betters. 
  London is also the commercial 
  capital of the world. The City of 
  London (as opposed to greater 
  London itself), a one square 
  mile block which represents the 
  old Roman city, is home to the 
  major banks of the world (i.e. 
  British ones) such as Lloyds of 
  London, Barings and of course 
  the Bank of England. From here, 
  the fate of the world, from poor 
  natives on the Gold Coast to 
  cotton magnates in Louisiana 
  is controlled. Insurance is also 
  an important industry here, as 
  most cargo is moved by sea (and 
  therefore is at a huge risk), and 
  most of the important insurance 
  companies have their homes 
  here. The city is also the home 
  of the freemarketeers, a counter 
  culture group who believe in the 
  virtues of trade and are essen-
  tially anti imperial (the British 
  empire only allows it’s posses-
  sions to trade with her, thus lim-
  iting access to other markets). 
  Most of the city’s investments 
  are not as one might suppose 
  in the empire, but are rather in 
  South America. 
  London is also Britain’s primary 
  port, the function that it first 
  served the Romans. It mostly 
  handles continental traffic, par-
  ticularly from the German states 
  and the Baltic. Goods are then 
  taken by railway to the rest of 
  the country, or are ferried along 
  the river Thames. 
  There is a vibrant counter 
  culture, from communists to 
  chartists, luddites, fenians 
  and Scottish nationalists to 
  exiled Poles, Serbs, Croats and 
  Spaniards who lead the revolu-
  tion from London. Karl Marx 
  himself lives in Highgate, writ-
  ing his treatises on good gover-
  nance from the British Museum. 
  Bohemian Englishmen live in 
  Camden, experimenting with 
  opium, homosexuality and free 
  love, whilst socially conscious 
  writers hope to influence the 
  hearts of the British people 
  against the cruel landowners and 
  industrialists. Some even speak 
  of emancipation for the colonial 
  people or speak out against the 
  massacre of the plainsmen in 
  America.
  London
  
  Europe: 1867
  69
  an underpaid workforce has led to a mammoth 
  increase in crime, alcoholism and drug abuse: in 
  1830 there were 22,000 tons of opium imported 
  into Britain; in 1850 this has tripled to over 
  66,000 tons per year!
  Many philanthropists have attempted to change 
  the conditions of life within the cities of modern 
  Britain but their progress is slow, hampered by 
  those in the upper and middle classes gaining 
  money from the misery. Ironically enough, the 
  sheltered womenfolk of those same upper and 
  middle class landlords and factory owners are 
  appalled by the stories and reports that they read 
  (mainly by Mr. Charles Dickens and Mr Henry 
  Mayhew, two influential journalists), and con-
  stantly wonder, “why does someone not do some-
  thing about it!” 
  The British character could be summed up as 
  being phlegmatic and stoic, or to an outsider just 
  as equally as ‘arrogant and patronising’. The 
  British have built the greatest empire the world 
  has ever known – they know it, and they’re not 
  going to let ’Johnny Foreigner’ forget it. Even 
  the working poor – with no possessions and in 
  danger of being committed to the workhouse, 
  feel superior to their continental neighbours and 
  American cousins.
  The British are tolerant of the faith and beliefs of 
  other cultures, albeit in a patronising way, as they 
  naturally assume their reasoning to be right in all 
  matters. This dichotomy tends to present itself as 
  excusing another’s oddities by saying, “its okay, 
  they’re foreign, they don’t know any better!”
  However, all British citizens have a firm belief in 
  reward through hard work, knowing your place in 
  society and bringing the light of British virtue to 
  all corners of the globe. 
  The people of mainland Britain vary greatly in 
  appearance, but all tend towards a medium build. 
  The upper classes tend to be taller due to better 
  nutrition and quality of life. Many of the lower 
  classes have a wide array of medical problems, 
  such as rickets and other nutrition linked condi-
  tions. 
  Eire
  Not originally one of Britain’s domains, it 
  was conquered and is among the many lands 
  oppressed by rule from London. It was conquered 
  almost by accident in the twelfth century when 
  King Henry II rescued some of his knights who 
  essentially wanted to conquer their own kingdom! 
  At first, these Anglo Norman warlords were con-
  tent to act as feudal overlords and did not inter-
  fere with local laws, customs or religion (indeed 
  many “went native”). British power waxed and 
  waned in the province, and they almost lost it 
  completely during the ruinous War of the Roses 
  (why protect a conquered land when the troops 
  are needed at home?) During this time, British 
  power was limited to an area around Dublin 
  known as the pale. The British re-established 
  their control of Eire during the reign of Elizabeth 
  I, where they conquered the entire land, subju-
  gating the Eirish kings. They did this to prevent 
  Roman Aluminat Spain from invading Britain 
  through its spiritual ally. No longer content with 
  being overlords, the Elizabethan Lord Lieutenants 
  imposed English law, religion and custom upon 
  the Eirish – they even set regulations about what 
  clothes should be worn and length of moustaches! 
  Eventually, Roman Aluminat religion was sup-
  pressed by decrees that Roman landowners could 
  not buy land, had no rights of governance and 
  had to split their land between all their sons (thus 
  creating smaller parcels of land with each genera-
  tion). Calvinist Scots were settled in the northern 
  province of Ulster, where they soon outnumbered 
  the Roman Aluminates. 
  Recent depredations such as the potato famine of 
  1849 (which killed 2 million Eirish and forced 
  another million to leave for Britain, the colonies 
  and America) have weakened the traditional 
  Eirish way of life. 
  Although incorporated into the domain of Britain 
  the Aluminat Irish enjoy few of the privileges 
  that the rest of Britain enjoys. Roman aluminates 
  have only recently (1827) gained the right to 
  vote (that is, if they own property, are not lords, 
  lunatics or women!). Despite the fact that it is 
  England’s closest and oldest ‘colonial’ posses-
  sion, Eire has always been problematic. Troubles 
  
  Europe: 1867
  70
  have happened many times in history, the most 
  recent being during the ‘time of troubles’ in 1848. 
  Ironically enough, the greatest Fenian (as the reb-
  els are known) hero of recent times, Wolfe Tone, 
  was actually Anglican Aluminat!
  Despite their hard life, the Eirish people tend to 
  be sociable, friendly and hospitable. They ste-
  reotypically like a good drink, particularly stout 
  and Eirish whiskey (different spelling to scotch 
  “whisky”), and like to brawl in a generally care-
  free and non-malicious manner. They have a 
  reputation as excellent horsemen going back to 
  prehistory, and this “warrior” stereotype com-
  bined with poverty leads them towards being sol-
  diers and policemen (over one third of the British 
  army is made up of Eirish recruits, whilst many 
  of the police in Chicago and New York are Eirish 
  immigrants). Eirish labourers are at the forefront 
  of the industrial revolution, building canals, 
  bridges, railways and the blossoming cities of 
  Britain. However, they are always at the bot-
  tom, with Anglo landowners and industrialists in 
  charge. The only way an Eirish man can make his 
  mark on the world is if he emigrates to America, 
  Australia or New Zealand.
  As the Celtic peoples have have always possessed 
  a rich oral tradition, Eire also produces many 
  notable bards and entertainers. They tend to be 
  gifted speakers and orators, producing fine poets 
  and writers. Arthur Wellesley, the ancient Duke of 
  Wellington, was born in Dublin, although he did 
  remark “being born in a barn does not make one 
  a horse!” The people of Eire tend toward a light 
  build, with reddish hair and light eyes, and tend 
  to be taller than their mainland British counter-
  parts. 
  THE FRENCH REPUBLIC
  Languages: French, Breton
  Religion: Aluminat (Anglican minorities)
  Population breakdown: Human 30%, Beastman 
  20%. Eldren 30%, dwarf 2%. Gnome 7%, 
  Halfling 10%, ogre 1%
  Class breakdown: Upper 5%, middle class 20%, 
  and lower class 75%
  Literacy: 35% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Republic
  Politically France is the prodigal European son. 
  The infamous French revolution of 1789 was 
  the first major, and the first successful, revolu-
  tion in Europe. In a short year the monarchy was 
  overthrown and France evolved into the first 
  European republic. However, since the revolu-
  tion of 1789, no political power has maintained 
  stability for longer than twenty years. The most 
  successful leader of the French republic is 
  undoubtedly the self-styled ‘emperor’ Napoleon 
  Bonaparte who led France to war at the turn of 
  the century. Under Bonaparte’s rule, France con-
  quered half of Europe before an eventual and 
  final defeat at Waterloo by the allied nations in 
  1815.
  After the Napoleonic war, France’s economic 
  power is pounded, in addition she is forced to 
  sign an international treaty placing long-term 
  restrictions on her borders and colonial holdings. 
  Her relations with Britain are something of a 
  dichotomy: one the one hand, they are nominally 
  allies in the Crimea, and British naval power 
  guarantees safe possession of her colonies; on 
  the other, Britain is her natural enemy who has 
  fought with her for much of her history.  Her 
  decisive defeat in the Napoleonic wars finally 
  forced her to accept Britain’s supremacy, and suc-
  cessive rulers have grudgingly accepted their sta-
  tus as second to Britain. However, old feuds run 
  deep and many of her ruling class dream of once 
  more being the greatest nation in Europe. 
  Since Bonaparte’s surrender there have been sev-
  eral heads of state for the republic. First Charles 
  X of the Bourbon dynasty was overthrown in 
  1832 to be replaced by Louis Philippe of the 
  Orleans; and most recently Louis Philippe was 
  overthrown by Louis Napoleon in 1848. This 
  last revolution is still sounding chords of dis-
  sent from the population manipulated into revolt 
  in 1848. As is often the case the promises made 
  by aspiring politicians have not been kept and 
  again France is beset by revolutionary uprisings. 
  Scattered and sporadic as they are, the upris-
  ings are a dangerous threat to the over-extended 
  French military. Whilst power no longer rests 
  with the nobility and clergy as it did before 1789, 
  democracy is still in its infancy, and the first 
  
  Europe: 1867
  71
  71
  estate still calls the shots. 
  France currently maintains troops in her Indo-
  China colonies, in the Crimea (with the English), 
  and at the Papal State and Kingdom of the Two 
  Sicilies where they guard the Vatican and other 
  holy sites from Italian revolutionaries. They 
  are not popular in Italy, as they are associated 
  with foreign oppression, and French soldiers 
  see duty in Italy as a punishment detail. In an 
  attempt to match British power in the new world, 
  Louis Napoleon has also installed Maximillian 
  of Austria as the laughably titled “Emperor of 
  Mexico” and supports his regime with yet more 
  troops. However, Maximillian is a bon vivant, 
  oblivious to the power of Mexican nationalists 
  who are determined to overthrow his rule. 
  France also has a single colony in Algeria. This 
  is unique in the colonial system as it is directly 
  administered from Paris, and has been substan-
  tially colonised by French citizens (who form 
  almost ten percent of the population). However, 
  Algeria is even more troublesome than Italy, as 
  the ferocious and independent North African 
  tribes are proving more difficult to tame than 
  the easily corruptible urban Algerians. Algeria is 
  home to the French Foreign Legion, a collection 
  of Europe’s misfits who are granted full clemency 
  for past crimes if they survive a four year tour.
  France is also disturbed by the growing power 
  of the Prussian Confederation. When Bonaparte 
  conquered most of the German states and set 
  up puppet rulers he sought greater co-operation 
  with the newly fragmented countries. Many kept 
  the Napoleonic institutions imposed upon them, 
  as they modernised the antiquated measures 
  imposed by the Holy Roman Empire, and this 
  dynamic unity is now being used by Bismarck 
  to bring all German people under one (Prussian) 
  banner. Unfortunately for France, Bismarck’s 
  greedy eye is turning towards her sphere of influ-
  ence; Alsace and Lorraine in eastern France have 
  a large German speaking minority. When the 
  Prussian attempts to take over Morocco in the 
  1840’s brought the two countries to the brink of 
  war, only threatened British intervention kept the 
  two countries at peace, as both rely heavily on 
  British imports and for British naval protection 
  
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  for their exports. Even so, a conflict over Alsace 
  or Lorraine would not be so easily negated.
  Another troublesome region is in the south west 
  of France, in the Basque country. This encom-
  passes parts of France and Spain, and the Basques 
  are an independent mountain people whose lan-
  guage and cultural practices predate most other 
  cultures in Western Europe. As a result, Spanish 
  Basques were often targets for the inquisition, 
  and Gascony is home to an increasing number 
  of Basque separatists. These launch raids into 
  Spain, and the Spanish frequently apply dip-
  lomatic pressure on the French to arrest such 
  people. However, Louis Napoleon is generally 
  too busy worrying about the greater threat posed 
  by Prussia, Austria and expanding the size of his 
  empire whilst keeping his populace under control 
  to worry overmuch about the threats of a few 
  churchmen from a rotten regime. Such compla-
  cency may be his undoing, as it is rumoured that 
  several Spanish nobles and churchmen have had 
  secret meetings with Prussian representatives. 
  The people of France are usually tall and slim, 
  with a tanned complexion, dark hair and deep 
  eyes. 
  Paris
  Paris has always been associated with splen-
  dour, decadence and incredible poverty. Like his 
  namesake Louis IV, Louis Napoleon III’s hobby 
  has been redesigning Paris to better please his 
  aesthetic eye, a painstaking process that has been 
  thoroughly wrecked by a communist uprising 
  within the city walls. Like Parisians from previ-
  ous centuries, modern day Parisians are annoyed 
  that so much money is being spent on making 
  Paris beautiful while they starve due to inflated 
  food prices.  The commune uprising started as 
  one of many riots across the large towns and cit-
  ies of France, but whereas most riots died out the 
  communists have consolidated and barricaded 
  themselves into the city on the seine.
  Paris, like London is also a highly cosmopolitan 
  city. Its landmarks include the Latin Quarter, 
  home too many expatriate Italians, and is home 
  to an increasing number of Algerians. It boasts 
  many fine art galleries, conservatoires and 
  impressive public landmarks, such as l’arc de 
  triomphe, a commemorative processional arch for 
  Bonaparte’s victories. Louis Napoleon dreams 
  of such conquests as his great uncle could boast 
  of, but the gradual relegation of France to second 
  place to Britain makes this increasingly unlikely. 
  SPAIN
  Languages: Spanish, Basque
  Religion: Aluminat
  Population breakdown: Human 52%, Beastman 
  10%, Eldren 25%, dwarf 10%. Gnome 1%, 
  Halfling 1%, ogre 1%
  Class breakdown: Upper 10%. Middle class 
  10%, lower class 80%
  Literacy: 25% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Absolutist monarchy
  Still smarting from the loss of her South 
  American empire and the bloody coup that has 
  restored her decadent monarchy, Spain takes little 
  interest in international affairs.
  There is fear of another revolution to drive the 
  monarchy out again, and as a counter reaction 
  the entire country is under military misgovern-
  ment by order of the King. The people of Spain 
  are very religious, (Spain is the historical home 
  of the inquisition). Indeed, there is no country in 
  Europe more dedicated to Rome than Spain, and 
  heresy is still stamped upon by the knights of the 
  Prophet. Although officially disbanded in 1830, 
  there are still rumours and reports of the inquisi-
  tion at work, and, interestingly, there has never 
  been a guild house within Spain. 
  Gone are the days of the Berber empire when 
  Moorish and Israelite sorcerers performed mir-
  acles in the streets and palaces of Toledo, and 
  Spain boasted the largest number of magicians in 
  the known world. Now the Arabic texts are long 
  burned and any who deviate from the norm are 
  punished severely. Those not of true blood (i.e., 
  Arabs, Israelites and Basques) are at best ostra-
  cised and at worst hunted by church backed lynch 
  mobs. As a result, her academics are fearful of 
  being seen as heretical, and so many seek exile in 
  the more tolerant London and Paris. 
  Spain is made up of several provinces, which 
  
  Europe: 1867
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  follow the lines of the ancient kingdoms of 
  Aragon, Navarre, Grenada, Catalonia and Galicia. 
  However, like the rest of Europe, Spain was 
  heavily involved in the wars of the seventeenth 
  to early nineteenth century, a period in which she 
  was humiliated in the thirty years war, and then 
  was subsequently defeated in the war of Spanish 
  succession 1704-1714. This war lost her Portugal, 
  who became an independent kingdom and forced 
  upon her the British occupation of Gibraltar. The 
  final blow to Spain fell during the Napoleonic 
  wars where she alternately fought against revolu-
  tionary France, then sided with Napoleon against 
  the British and even allowed French troops to 
  invade Portugal through her territory. However, 
  Bonaparte’s brother, Joseph, wanted a kingdom 
  of his own, and so was installed as King of Spain 
  and the Americas. Spain’s army was no match 
  for France, as so was forced to ally itself with 
  the hated British. Apart from suffering the worst 
  atrocities of the war and seeing much of her 
  wealth taken first by the French and later by the 
  British, Spain suffered her worst possible blow: 
  the loss of her American empire. Following the 
  example of the American revolutionaries, the 
  Creole population of Spanish America revolted 
  after Napoleon’s invasion, correctly guessing 
  that Spain had other problems to worry about. 
  At first they were badly organised, but it later 
  emerged that British and American mercantile 
  interests had sponsored several of the move-
  ments for independence after the war, and many 
  foreign mercenaries fought on the side of revolu-
  tion. The biggest coup came when the disgraced 
  British Admiral James Cochran sprung Bonaparte 
  from his gaol on St Helena to lead the Chilean 
  revolutionary forces. Although Bonaparte died 
  soon after, his tactical brilliance had not left him, 
  and the Spaniards were soon forced out of South 
  America. These blows finally put paid to any 
  Spanish pretensions of world power, and now 
  she languishes in despair, smarting at the betrayal 
  of the British. The only colonies she retains are 
  the Philippines and Cuba, although she hopes 
  to expand into North Africa. Possession of both 
  relies heavily on the goodwill of her old enemy, 
  Britain, who frequently clamps down on Spanish 
  slave trading practices in West Africa. 
  That being said, not all of Spain is reactionary. 
  During the French occupation, a second govern-
  ment was formed in Cadiz based on liberal prin-
  ciples that advocated the abolition of the inquisi-
  tion and freedom of worship. Although defeated 
  in 1811 by the French, the ideals of the Cadiz 
  junta live on, both in its birthplace and amongst 
  the educated classes. Separatist movements exist 
  in Catalonia and the Basque country. Here, the 
  people suffered the worst depredations of the 
  Spanish church and crown due to their unique 
  culture and religion, which is heavily based upon 
  worship of the old gods. The Basque people don’t 
  just suspect the inquisition still exists; they know 
  it every time a community priest is executed for 
  apostasy or a public figure is tried for treason. 
  The people of Spain are generally of short height 
  and medium build, with dark skin, hair and eyes. 
  A passionate people, the Spanish are prone to 
  sudden outbursts and exaggeration. Although 
  most abhor magic, they are intensely supersti-
  tious, and will perform rites such as purifying a 
  stream with holy water before crossing it or giv-
  ing a cross for every dead body just in case it’s 
  ghost haunts you. Most revere their patron saints, 
  especially Santiago, child of thunder, and are sus-
  picious of other religions. 
  THE HAPSBURG EMPIRE
  Languages: German, Carpathian. Slovak, Serb 
  Croat, Magyar, Italian
  Religion: Aluminat (Anglican minorities), strong 
  pagan cults
  Population breakdown: Human 40%, Beastman 
  25%, Eldren 8%, dwarf 20%. Giant 2%. Halfling 
  3%. Ogre 2%
  Class breakdown: Upper 4%, middle class 6%, 
  and lower class 90%
  Literacy: 15% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Absolutist monarchy
  A crumbling unity of Austria and Hungary, the 
  empire is long past its days of glory. She wishes 
  to push the bounds of her empire outwards to the 
  Black Sea, but lacks the military and industrial 
  power to do so. The dual monarchy was a result 
  of the Napoleonic wars, which broke the power 
  
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  of the ancient Holy Roman Empire for good 
  despite being one of the victors, deprived her of 
  her lucrative northern German states and forced 
  her to combine with the hitherto independent 
  kingdom of Hungary for mutual protection. War 
  with Prussia in 1856 lost her Silesia, and she 
  suffered many revolts in her Slavic territories 
  in the following years. Her traditional role as a 
  buffer against Ottoman infiltration has been lost 
  in recent years due to the decline in Ottoman 
  influence in Europe, although she still sponsors 
  nationalist groups in Turkish Europe. 
  The peoples of this empire are a broad mix of 
  several ethnic origins; Bohemian, Germans, 
  Croats, Serbs, Slovaks, Slovenes, Magyars and 
  Carpathians, each of these highly nationalis-
  tic groups has its own native region within the 
  empire and they tend to stay within their own eth-
  nic group. In most walks of life, the Germans are 
  predominant, leading to further tensions. 
  The emperor Franz Josef II currently rules the 
  empire, he is a vain man, blinded by visions of 
  Austrian glory and jealous of the power of his 
  European neighbours. He ignores the threats of 
  revolution and Hungarian nationalistic unrest, 
  and spends his time organising exceedingly lav-
  ish parties and banquets. As a result the capital 
  Vienna has become a centre of decadence and 
  corruption. One positive side of this is the cul-
  tural contribution, as many of the great com-
  posers such as Brahms, Mozart and Bizet were 
  patronised by the Viennese court. Also, her uni-
  versity produces many of the great thinkers of 
  the age, especially in the field of magic.  Most 
  countries have several guild facilities scattered 
  through their major cities, the Austrian empire 
  has one guild university. Located in Vienna, the 
  Austrian facility is considered the greatest outside 
  of Geneva.
  Her relations with her neighbours are strained. 
  The great four power alliance of the Napoleonic 
  wars where Britain, Austria, Prussia and Russia 
  combined to fight Bonaparte are long in the past, 
  and now Prussia looks greedily at taking yet more 
  Austrian territory whilst Russia sponsors Slavic 
  nationalist groups. Her relations with Britain are 
  cordial but distant, as the British monarch is no 
  longer a subject of Austria: the loss of Hanover 
  also led to the loss of guaranteed fealty from 
  Britain. Austria had hoped to expand her territory 
  into Italy or the Ottoman Empire, but Britain’s 
  insistence that no single country becomes too 
  powerful has stopped this, and the recent war 
  with Prussia has highlighted Austria’s inability to 
  compete against an industrialised nation. 
  The peoples of the Austrian Hungarian Empire 
  vary greatly in appearance. The Bohemians are 
  of light build with dark hair and eyes, the Slavs 
  are pale with fair hair and eyes, a light build and 
  strong facial features. Carpathians are tall, dusky 
  people of medium build, with dark eyes and 
  almost exclusively black hair.
  Vienna
  A city of culture and past glory, Vienna is an 
  architectural jewel. Vienna is home to the grand 
  guild house, the largest repository of magical 
  knowledge outside Geneva. Vienna is also capital 
  of the empire and a centre of fashion. The aris-
  tocracy languish in luxurious coffee houses and 
  magnificent villas, whilst even the under classes 
  do not suffer as much as they do elsewhere. That 
  is provided they are German: the Slavic minority 
  suffer as they do elsewhere in the empire. Whilst 
  conservative in following the Aluminat faith, 
  Viennese are tolerant of others, and many of her 
  university professors are Israelite, as are many of 
  her fine musicians, architects and thinkers. Unlike 
  London or Berlin, Vienna is a clean, orderly city, 
  as it has not been industrialised. Franz Josef does 
  not want his beautiful city polluted with black 
  coal smoke like London, so most of the empire’s 
  heavy industry is located in the Sudetenland. This 
  could prove his undoing, as the independence 
  movement is strong in neighbouring Bohemia and 
  Slovakia
  Praag
  An imposing citadel from past times of war, 
  Praag is the current centre for the Austrian 
  Hungarian military forces. It is the capital of 
  Bohemia and in the past has been the capital of 
  the empire. The defenestration of Praag in 1618, 
  where three imperial legates were thrown from a 
  window and landed in a dung cart was the match 
  which lit the fuse of the thirty years war, and for 
  one year Bohemia was independent. As a result, 
  
  Europe: 1867
  75
  the people of Bohemia are somewhat indepen-
  dent and rebellious (hence the term “Bohemian” 
  to describe one who deviates from the social 
  norm). The people are predominantly Czech and 
  Slavic and dislike being ruled by Germans, and 
  thus Praag is the centre of nationalist opposition. 
  These, like most Slavic groups, are often spon-
  sored by Russia, who dreams of pan Slavic unity 
  under Russian patronage. 
  THE DUTCH NETHERLANDS
  Languages: Dutch, German, French
  Religion: Aluminat (Anglican minorities)
  Population breakdown: Human 50%, Beastman 
  15%, Eldren 25%, dwarf 2%. Gnome 2%. 
  Halfling 5%. Ogre 1%
  Class breakdown: Upper 5%, middle class 30%, 
  and lower class 65%
  Literacy: 50% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Constitutional monarchy
  A land of travellers and businessmen, Holland 
  boasts the world’s second busiest port (first is 
  London, in Britain) and an ingenious canal sys-
  tem. Holland is actually below sea level, and 
  relies on a system of sea barriers to keep the sea 
  from drowning the land.
  Although a peaceful land, Holland is wary of 
  the Prussian confederation who in 1856 annexed 
  Belgium from them. Belgium’s loss is unlament-
  ed due to differences in the countries ethnic back-
  grounds, but the loss is a reminder to the Dutch 
  of Prussian ambition.
  Holland is a relatively new nation, as until the 
  sixteenth century it was part of the Holy Roman 
  Empire. However, it was given to Spain after 
  the death of Charles V, which coincided with the 
  Lutheran revolt against Rome, and the liberal 
  Dutch disliked the intolerant rule of Spain. With 
  English help, Holland threw off the shackles of 
  papist rule, and formed Europe’s first democ-
  racy. Although this was later abandoned, it had 
  an impact on later English and subsequently 
  American republican thought. It has a univer-
  sal male franchise, and pretty much anyone can 
  stand for election to the Staadsraad (in theory at 
  least: in practice, as in America and Britain, only 
  those with money sit in parliament). Following 
  independence, the Dutch overtook the Spanish as 
  the primary nation of explorers, trading with far 
  off China, Japan and India, and even discovering 
  Australia (Tasmania is named after Abel Tasman, 
  a 17th century Dutch explorer). However, the 
  Dutch realised the limit of their power, and 
  did not attempt to colonise the vast deserts of 
  Australia, nor conquer the huge populations of 
  India or China. 
  The Dutch empire is limited to the Dutch East 
  Indies since the loss of Ceylon and the Cape 
  Colony in the Napoleonic wars. Like the Spanish, 
  the Dutch were also invaded by the French and 
  had one of Napoleon’s brothers installed on their 
  throne. Unlike Spain, there were few atrocities 
  committed in Holland, and Louis was a relatively 
  popular monarch, and Dutch troops fought along-
  side the French. This was also because the Dutch 
  royalty - The House of Orange were especially 
  unpopular, and the current incumbent, William IV 
  is known as the ‘young frog’ due to his distinctly 
  amphibian features (it is spitefully rumoured 
  that he has Beastman ancestry). The young frog 
  is pro-British, as he was educated at Eton and 
  Oxford, and many of his advisors are old Eton 
  cronies and sycophants. He is now getting on a 
  bit (65) and constantly bores society with anec-
  dotes about how he was wounded at Waterloo. In 
  reality, his blunders during the campaign resulted 
  in the virtual destruction of three good British 
  infantry regiments and his wound was greeted 
  with relief by Wellington who had been forced 
  to assign him command in return for Dutch co-
  operation. However, he is pro-British in his stand-
  point, and was compliant in the Dutch abolition 
  of slavery. 
  The people of the Dutch Netherlands tend to be 
  of a light build, usually with fair hair and light 
  eyes. They tend towards commerce without any 
  of the ruthlessness associated with such a trade. 
  Amsterdam
  The world’s second busiest port, Amsterdam 
  rivals London with its culture, trade and centres. 
  Unlike many port cities, Amsterdam is truly 
  beautiful, with wide, clean streets and flowers in 
  
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  abundance. 
  THE ITALIAN STATES
  Languages: Italian
  Religion: Aluminat (Anglican minorities)
  Population breakdown: Human 45%, Beastman 
  20%, Eldren 15%, dwarf 5%, gnome 5%, 
  Halfling 5%, ogre 5%
  Class breakdown: Upper 10%, middle class 10%, 
  and lower class 80%
  Literacy: 30% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Anarchy
  Piedmont, Lombardy, Venetia, Tuscany, The 
  Papal State, The Two Sicilies and the Kingdom 
  of Naples. All are autonomous states, some strug-
  gling for unity, some, such as Naples, struggling 
  against it. The northern states are slowly unit-
  ing, mainly due to the efforts of the communist 
  revolutionary garibaldi and his band of ‘red shirt’ 
  warriors.
  The smallest of the states is the Papal State. The 
  Papal State is the seat of the Aluminat church and 
  is currently the scene of a successful revolution. 
  Although traditionally the Papal State is ruled by 
  the Pope and his cardinals directly, the revolution 
  has toppled that arrangement, and the land is now 
  run by a provisional liberal government. To help 
  protect against revolutionary attacks against the 
  Vatican itself; the holy city is guarded by troops 
  sent from France by the emperor Napoleon III.
  Italy is summarised by its north – south divide, 
  the northern states (Piedmont, Venetia, Tuscany 
  and Lombardy) are cosmopolitan states that 
  traditionally embraced commerce and are now 
  industrialising. They look to France and to a 
  lesser extent Britain for the lead. Most cities are 
  in the north as well as the largest population. 
  The south (the kingdom of Naples) is very rural, 
  bound by traditions and a clannish outlook. As it 
  includes most of the Italian peninsular south of 
  Rome, Naples is larger than all the northern states 
  put together, yet it is a poor, sparsely populated 
  and mountainous region which suffers from bad 
  soil and hence very poor agriculture. The two 
  Sicilies (Sicily and Sardinia) are even more insu-
  lar, and are also occupied by French troops. The 
  Camorra, Sicilian partisans who also run protec-
  tion and smuggling rackets, make the Sicilies a 
  dangerous assignment for French troops and are 
  thinking of an alliance with Garibaldi to help free 
  themselves from French “occupation”. 
  Italians are tall with a medium build, deeply 
  tanned skin, and dark eyes and hair.
  RUSSIA
  Languages: Russian, Ukrainian, Livonia (Baltic 
  states), Turkish, Finnish.
  Religion: Aluminat, strong pagan cults, 
  Mohammedan
  Population breakdown: Human 50%. Beastman 
  20%, Eldren 20%. Dwarf 2%. Halfing 1%, Ogre 
  1%, Steppe goblin 1%, giant 5%
  Class breakdown: Upper class 5%. Free Cossack 
  15%, serf 80%
  Literacy: 15% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Feudal serfdom
  The Russian empire covers a huge and sparsely 
  populated area of land, bordering China in the 
  east, Prussia and Austrian Hungarian borders 
  in the west. The major provinces of Russia are 
  Latvia. Lithuania. Estonia. Byelorussia. Ukraine, 
  Siberia, Trans-caucasia. Russian Poland and 
  Finland
  Russia is a strict absolutist monarchy, ruled by 
  Kathryn Romanov - The Steel Czarina. She rules 
  through a governmental office in Moscow and the 
  nobility of the states and provinces.
  Kathryn Romanov earned her title of ‘steel’ 
  Czarina during the Napoleonic wars of 1805-
  1820, when she lost a hand while leading her 
  troops to recover a French-occupied guild facility. 
  Her troops were successful but during the battle 
  she lost her left hand. As a token of gratitude the 
  Czarina was gifted with a magical steel prosthetic 
  and free access to the guild facilities of Geneva.
  The last public appearance made by the Czarina 
  was in 1821 when she addressed the public 
  with fellow hero the duke of Wellington, after 
  the defeat of Bonaparte. She has not been seen 
  
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  77
  in public since. During her 85 year reign she 
  has taken 13 husbands, all of whom have had 
  accidents or died of disease within three years, 
  she has one daughter named Stephanie, who is 
  currently leading actions in the Crimea with the 
  Czarina Pyetra, the imperial death guard.
  Russian land is ruled through serfdom, the system 
  whereby the designated nobility of the area owns 
  the land, its buildings, and any properties within 
  those buildings including the peasants. Needless 
  to say, political reformers are a common breed 
  in Russia; the Bolshevik movement is native to 
  Russia.
  Imperial Russia is a sleeping bear for the world of Victoriana, isolated and cold, but with ever 
  expanding dreams of empire. At the heart of Russia is the Czarina – in many respects the Czarina 
  is the motherland, cold, mysterious, deadly when roused, and with many secrets.
  The steel Czarina is fact an Eloim, and is at least 500 years old, she does not have a daughter, she 
  never has, the myth of family allows her to explain her own existence for an unnatural time by 
  posing as her own heirs. The Czarina is a powerful sorceress and her knowledge, unchained by the 
  guild of Western Europe, includes many jealously-guarded secrets long lost to the west since the 
  purges of the thirty-year wars.
  Despite her nature, the Czarina is not ‘evil’. Her age and her knowledge (and indeed, her very 
  nature) make her keenly aware of the coming threat of the eternal struggle, being a first hand wit-
  ness of the dark ages before the thirty years war. She has an agenda of her own to secure her land 
  from the deprivations of the coming storm, and her agents are found across the world searching for 
  specific magical relics and texts.
  
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  78
  At present the empire is at war with France, 
  Britain, and the Ottomans. This is due to the 
  Russian invasion of the Crimea in an apparent 
  attempt to claim Mediterranean access through 
  the black sea port of Sebastopol. This territory 
  was the domain of the Ottoman Empire, and 
  naturally war broke out. The Ottomans quickly 
  realised that without aid they would soon be 
  overrun and implored other countries for aid. 
  Britain and France both realised that Russian 
  dominance of the black sea would affect their 
  access to their eastern colonies and answered the 
  Ottoman call. Currently, the war has highlighted 
  the ineptitude of both sides, as the Russian infan-
  try levies are composed of mutinous Poles and 
  Livonians armed with outdated muskets, leav-
  ing the Russian army relying on it’s sorcery and 
  wyvern cavalry. Also, with the exception of the 
  death singers and the Cossack horsemen, none of 
  the Russian troops are properly trained, and rely 
  upon sheer force to overwhelm the enemy. This 
  does not work against the superbly trained British 
  infantry, who just line up and keep firing until 
  the Russian columns are broken. Unfortunately 
  for the British and French, they are mostly led by 
  incompetent generals, and have no lines of sup-
  ply back to their home countries. Therefore, the 
  British and French are unable to build upon their 
  victories and push further into Russian territory. A 
  stalemate has been reached, with the allies hold-
  ing the better hand politically. 
  The Czarina is not believed to be at the Crimean 
  front, but to be at the royal summer palace at St. 
  Petersburg with her advisors, in conference over 
  political unrest and the threat of revolution in 
  Moscow and St. Petersburg.
  Russia pursues an aggressive foreign policy, 
  sponsoring separatist Slavic movements in 
  Austro-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire. Indeed 
  they used the excuse that Slavic people in the 
  Crimea and Bulgaria were being massacred to 
  justify their invasions. British and French gen-
  erals believe that Russia wants access to warm 
  water ports, as all of her ports are close to the 
  arctic circle, and thus icebound for up to six 
  months of the year. The Czarina is not telling, 
  but Russian agents are also active in Afghanistan, 
  Persia and India, hoping to topple British rule. 
  She is also pressing westward into the ancient 
  Mongol kingdoms of Turkmenistan, Samarkand 
  and Uzbekistan. This westward drive will inevita-
  bly lead to conflict with China and Japan. 
  Domestically, Russia is backward compared to 
  Western Europe. It had no renaissance to bring 
  forward new ideas, and the enlightenment passed 
  it by despite the best efforts of the Czarina. She 
  has little modern industry, and as a result is 
  unable to produce the goods needed to fight the 
  The Crimea
  In 1866 the armies of England and France committed to their first major war against a European power 
  since the defeat of France’s “Bonaparte the despoiler” at the beginning of the century. The expeditionary 
  force, or ‘army of the east’, arrived in Turkey to support the Ottoman Empire in its war with Russia. At 
  first the allied forces were very successful, despite the bungling of their high command - the success was 
  not to last. 
  Four months into the campaign the Russian elite arrived at the French front. Upon their arrival the 
  French troops were decimated, within weeks the tide of the war turned. Russian morale rose as the elite 
  Eldren Czarina Pyetra and imperial sorcerers swept through the allied forces, leaving the survivors to the 
  harsh Baltic winter, rapidly closing in on the war. The Czarina’s greatest generals, Janrier and Fievier 
  claimed the lives of thousands of allied troops, pitifully unprepared for the savage cold, and unable to 
  receive supplies over the frozen bays and mountains.
  Now the allied ‘army of the east’ is only a tattered, battered remnant of the force left the year before. 
  The armies have retreated and reformed with the hope of countering Russian sorcery with newly arrived 
  British artillery. So starts the siege of Sebastopol, and the new advance on the Russian army.
  
  Europe: 1867
  79
  Crimean war. 
  One thing Russia has going for it is its magical 
  heritage. Many people in the Empire remember 
  the old ways, as the Baltic States were the last to 
  remain pagan (indeed, Latvia was still not con-
  verted by the 14th century), and there are many 
  shamans in Siberia (shaman is actually a Siberian 
  word). Whilst previous Czars persecuted magical 
  practitioners; Kathryn encourages their use, and 
  under her dominance the eastern orthodox chruch 
  (of which she is head) makes many concessions 
  to sorcerors and the old ways alike.  
  The royalty of Russia have always led their per-
  sonal guard of Pyetra into battle; the Russian 
  army is feared and renowned for being com-
  manded by an Eldren witch, and for using Eldren 
  witches as its elite troops (all Pyetra are corporeal 
  mediums, and many are also Thaumaturges). The 
  Russian army is the only army of the world to 
  be commanded by, or to field women in battle as 
  front line troops.
  The peoples of Russia vary greatly in appearance, 
  the Baltic peoples are of light build with dark 
  hair and eyes, the Slavs are pale with fair hair 
  and eyes, a light build and strong facial features. 
  Carpathians are tall dusky people of medium 
  build, with dark eyes and almost exclusively 
  black hair, whilst the Turkish and Mongolian 
  people are typical of their race. 
  THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE
  Languages: Arabic, Serb Croat, Magyar, 
  romance
  Religion: Mohammedan, Aluminat
  Population breakdown: Human 55%, Beastman 
  25%, Eldren 5%, dwarf 5%, gnome 2%, Halfling 
  3%, ogre 5%
  Class breakdown: Upper 15%, middle class 5%, 
  and lower class 80%
  Literacy: 20% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Feudal serfdom
  Like the Austrian Hungarian Empire, the Ottoman 
  Empire is made up of many nationalities and eth-
  nic backgrounds. However the Ottoman Empire 
  is long past its days of glory, and now has to 
  constantly compromise with nationalists. Serbia, 
  Greece, and Wallachia-Maldavia have all received 
  semi-autonomous status. The threat from Russia 
  has exposed the empire’s weakness through its 
  request for aid.
  Although an ailing empire, the native ottomans 
  of Turkey are a proud race; many are fanati-
  cally loyal to the creed of Islam. Despite their 
  legendary cruelty, the ottomans are generally 
  tolerant of other’s beliefs with one exception: 
  the Armenians. The Armenians had the first 
  established Aluminat church in the world, pre-
  dating the Roman and Irish church by centuries.  
  Although conquered first by the Mongols and 
  later by the Turks, the proud Armenians refused 
  to accept any religion other than their own, and 
  fought back hard. The Turks clamped down 
  harder, and outright massacre was a common fea-
  ture of warfare. Such cruel treatment of Aluminat 
  people has led to protest from the evangelicals in 
  Britain who question the alliance with a heathen 
  power against an Aluminat enemy. 
  Similarly, the Aluminat Slavic races are ready 
  for revolt, as they have suffered many indignities 
  at the hands of Mohammedan Ottomans; many 
  Slavs actually fight with their ethnic brothers 
  for Russia in the Crimea rather than fight for the 
  Ottoman Turks. The Greeks have already suc-
  cessfully revolted against Turkish rule, establish-
  ing the kingdom of Greece in 1827. Macedonia, 
  Serbia, Montenegro and Wallachia-Maldavia 
  look set to follow suit, with the Russians waiting 
  greedily in the wings. 
  Many of the Arab states are set to follow suit, 
  from the Aluminat Druze to the Kurds and even 
  the traditionally loyal Caliphs of Baghdad seem 
  ready to revolt. The reason is this: the Turks are 
  not an Arabic people, even though they are loyal 
  to Islam. Whilst their excellent warriors ensured 
  their dominance during the middle ages, most of 
  the thinkers and philosophers were Arabs. It must 
  be remembered that the Arabs solely preserved 
  the learning of the ancient Greeks and Romans 
  during the dark ages, whilst Arab scientists were 
  at the forefront of pre-industrialised thought. 
  Astronomy and mathematics were from Arabic 
  philosophers, whilst her trade with India and 
  China made her rich. As a result, many Arabs 
  
  Europe: 1867
  80
  are dissatisfied with rule from 
  Istanbul, and the British gov-
  ernment seeks to play both 
  sides by negotiating with the 
  emirs as well as allying itself 
  to Turkey.
  Another important fact about 
  the Ottoman Empire is that it 
  contains many sites holy to 
  the Israelites, Mohammedans 
  and Aluminat. The promised 
  land of Israel is within her 
  borders, whilst the cities of 
  Bethlehem and Jerusalem 
  make it important to Aluminat 
  as the birthplace and place 
  of martyrdom of Aluminat. 
  To Mohammedans, it has the 
  holy city of Mecca, birthplace 
  of Mohammed and Medina, 
  where he lived and preached. 
  Jerusalem is also holy, as it is 
  where Mohammed ascended 
  to heaven. 
  The Ottoman Empire is both 
  politically and industrially 
  backward. It relies upon a feu-
  dal, agricultural economy and 
  social order. The sultan has 
  absolute rule from Istanbul. 
  As a gesture of friendship to Britain and France, 
  the sultan has allowed the two powers to build 
  the Suez Canal. The canal is hailed as a wonder 
  of the industrial world by all, but also perceived 
  as a British ploy to control the gulf sea traffic, as 
  she now owns both the canal and the Gibraltar 
  strait.
  The Ottomans are of light build with dusky skin, 
  dark hair and eyes, and are somewhat exotic to 
  look at. The Slavs are pale with fair hair and 
  eyes, a light build and strong facial features. 
  Moldavians are tall, dusky people of medium 
  build, with dark eyes and almost exclusively 
  black hair. Arabs have dark skin, with black hair 
  and dark eyes. 
  PAN SCANDINAVIAN FEDERATION
  Languages: Nordic, German
  Religion: Lutheran Aluminat, pagan minorities
  Population breakdown: Human 60%, Beastman 
  20%, Eldren 5%, gnome 3%, giant 1%, Halfling 
  1%, ogre 10%
  Class breakdown: Upper 5%, middle class 20%, 
  and lower class 75%
  Literacy: 45% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Absolutist monarchy
  A union of Denmark, Sweden and Norway, the 
  federation is recently formed (1852) to stand 
  against the expansion of the Russian and Prussian 
  empires. Denmark had just fought and lost a war 
  
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  81
  with Prussia in 1848, where Schleswig-Holstein 
  was annexed, and Russia invaded Finland during 
  the Napoleonic war. The people are robust, cheer-
  ful and peace loving, despite a long ancestral 
  history of Viking raiders. An alliance with Britain 
  assures peace and good trade with the rest of the 
  world. Of the three countries, only Sweden is 
  approaching industrialisation with any vigour, as 
  it has large iron ore deposits in Smaland which 
  supplies Prussia with much of it’s crude iron. The 
  only blot on this idyllic picture is that the Swedes 
  and Danes resent the fact that Norway seems to 
  have most of the power in the confederation. 
  Whilst Aluminat, the new religion did not reach 
  the shores of Scandinavia until the 10th century, 
  and it’s remote location deterred many missionar-
  ies. As a result, the old faith was still practiced 
  openly until the 16th century in rural areas, and is 
  still strong today
  The people are of tall, heavy build, usually 
  with fair hair and light eyes. They are generally 
  friendly and uninhibited by social convention or 
  prejudice. This may explain their lack of ambition 
  for empire as they have little desire to impose 
  their will upon others. They are also by tradition 
  one of the most hygienic and healthy people in 
  Europe, which may explain their low mortality 
  rates.  
  PORTUGAL
  Languages: Portuguese, Spanish, French
  Religion: Roman Aluminat
  Population breakdown: Human 30%, Beastman 
  25%, Eldren 6%, dwarf 3%, gnome 7%, Halfling 
  27%, ogre 2%
  Class breakdown: Upper 5%, middle class 10%, 
  and lower class 85%
  Literacy: 20% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Absolutist monarchy
  This small, Atlantic seaboard country survives 
  through trade and exploration. Her importance 
  lies in having the only major Atlantic coastline, 
  making her a natural starting point for continental 
  traffic to the Americas.
  Portugal is quite a dilemma for the British. On 
  the one hand, she is an old ally, as Portugal was 
  given it’s independence from Spain following 
  British victory in the war of Spanish succes-
  sion 1702-1714, and Portuguese troops fought 
  valiantly under British officers during the pen-
  insular campaign. On the other hand, Portugal 
  is a major slave holding nation in her southern 
  African possessions, and British ships frequently 
  board Portuguese slavers. Despite this, Britain 
  does not want to push the Portuguese too far, as 
  they are both a trading partner and one of the few 
  European countries that actually like her. 
  Portugal is a neutral country. Portugal seems to 
  breed explorer after explorer, this could be due to 
  the high population of Halflings.
  Portuguese people tend to be short, dusky and 
  dark haired.
  SWITZERLAND
  Languages: German. Italian, French. Swiss
  Religion: Lutheran Aluminat, roman Aluminat
  Population breakdown: Human 45%. Beastman 
  10%. Eldren 15%. Dwarf 10%. Gnome 10%. 
  Halfling 5%. Ogre 5%
  Class breakdown: Upper 5%, middle class 25%. 
  Lower class 70%
  Literacy: 50% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Republic
  Precariously situated in central Europe, with mili-
  tant empires on every side. The Swiss have sur-
  vived through diplomacy, neutrality, the impreg-
  nability of the alpine mountains, and the pres-
  ence of the guild’s central university in Geneva. 
  Switzerland became a republic in 1798, until that 
  time Switzerland had been a loose defensive alli-
  ance of states (cantons), but Napoleon Bonaparte, 
  the future emperor of France unified the country 
  under the name Helvetic republic and imposed a 
  written constitution, which, like the French mili-
  tary occupation, is bitterly resented by most of 
  the Swiss. In 1803, when it was in his interest to 
  have Switzerland friendly, Napoleon withdrew 
  the occupation troops and by the act of mediation 
  granted a new constitution with Swiss approval. 
  After the French defeat in 1815, the allied princes 
  
  Europe: 1867
  82
  of Europe recognised the perpetual neutrality of 
  Switzerland, and Swiss territory was expanded to 
  include 22 cantons.
  The Swiss are an open, friendly, broad-minded 
  people who often act as intermediaries in dispute. 
  ‘Switzerland is also famous for its banking facili-
  ties. In Switzerland, neither race, creed, colour, 
  nor the past matter one iota - as long as you have 
  money.
  The Swiss are of medium height and build, and 
  can have any eye or hair colour, due to the mix 
  of nationalities. Little bias or prejudice exists 
  within Switzerland, and as a result scholars and 
  students from the world over come to Switzerland 
  to study.
  Recent civil unrest is religious in nature; in 1847 
  several Aluminat controlled cantons formed a 
  league, the sonderbund. The federal government 
  declared the formation of such a league a viola-
  tion of the constitution. Civil war resulted when 
  the league refused to disband.
  Bern
  Capital of Switzerland and also capital of Bern 
  canton, in western Switzerland. It is situated on 
  a lofty promontory, surrounded on three sides by 
  a bend of the Aare River. The old battlements of 
  the city- converted into promenades, command a 
  magnificent view of the surrounding alpine scen-
  ery.
  The bear is the heraldic emblem of Bern, and a 
  bear pit maintained since 1513 is one of the nota-
  ble sights of the city. Principal public buildings 
  are the houses of parliament; a gothic cathedral, 
  begun in 1422 and finished in 1611; and the town 
  hall. The University of Bern (1834) has depart-
  ments of law, medicine, philosophy, science, and 
  theology. Bern library, which now includes the 
  university library, contains many manuscripts and 
  rare books. Bern has four museums, containing, 
  respectively, collections of Swiss art and exhibi-
  tions dealing with history, natural history, and 
  alpine subjects.
  Geneva
  The capital of Geneva canton. The city is located 
  at the western extremity of Lake Geneva, where 
  the Rhone River issues from the lake. The Rhone 
  divides Geneva into two almost equal parts. On 
  the south, or left, bank stands the older part of 
  the city, containing the financial and business 
  districts, and two old residential districts: eaux, 
  vives, and carouge, the latter a working-class 
  neighbourhood. Narrow, crooked streets penetrate 
  the old quarter everywhere.
  During the French revolution, aristocratic and 
  democratic factions contended for control of 
  Geneva. In 1798, however, France, then under 
  the directory, annexed Geneva and its surround-
  ing territory. After the overthrow of Napoleon, 
  Geneva recovered its independence, and in 1815, 
  is admitted to the Swiss confederation. The con-
  gress of Vienna in 1815 increased its territory and 
  guaranteed its neutrality.
  Zurich
  city in northern Switzerland, capital of Zurich 
  canton, on the lake of Zurich and the Limmat 
  and Sihl Rivers. The largest city in the country, 
  Zurich is an important commercial and manu-
  facturing centre and is the financial capital of 
  Switzerland. The city is also one of Europe’s 
  principal financial and gold-trading hubs.
  THE PRUSSIAN CONFEDERATION
  Languages: German, Austrian, Spanish 
  (Belgium), Dutch, Danish
  Religion: Aluminat
  Population breakdown: Human 40%, Beastman 
  30%, Eldren 1%, dwarf 20%, gnome 1%, giant 
  5%, ogre 3%
  Class breakdown: Upper 5%, middle class 20%, 
  and lower class 75%
  Literacy: 45% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Absolutist monarchy
  The Prussian confederation is deemed to be the 
  rising power of the modern world.
  Originally countless different, tiny states all 
  have recently been united by the Machiavellian 
  diplomacy of Bismarck, the Prussian chancellor. 
  Blooded by the short wars of conquest against 
  the Austrian Hungarian empire, Denmark and the 
  
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  83
  Netherlands, the confederation has set its eyes 
  on France and her colonies, and seems ready 
  to seize the opportunity presented by France’s 
  civil unrest and overextended troops. Her indus-
  trial capacity is rivalling Britain’s, but Britain is 
  too concerned with the Russian threat to India 
  to pay much attention to the Prussian threat to 
  France. Besides, most of the German states were 
  allies during the Napoleonic wars, as well as 
  the wars of the eighteenth century, and it cannot 
  be forgotten that Queen Victoria herself is half 
  German and married to a German.  The only stain 
  upon this picture was the Morocco crisis of the 
  1840’s where Bismarck dreamed of “Prussia’s 
  place in the sun” and sponsored a pro-Prussian 
  revolt against the ruling Berbers. This threatened 
  French interests in Algeria, and brought the two 
  countries to the brink of war, causing Britain to 
  threaten intervention. Whilst British mediators 
  hammered out a treaty guaranteeing Spanish and 
  French trading rights to Morocco, British frigates 
  patrolled Morocco’s Atlantic seaboard, ensuring 
  Prussian compliance. Bismarck is no fool, and 
  did not want conflict with Britain, so he was con-
  tent when the British did not intervene in his war 
  against Denmark and Austria. Still, he dreams of 
  the day when Prussia will become a world power 
  with her own colonial possessions, a dream that 
  
  Europe: 1867
  84
  INDIA
  Languages: English, Hindi, Urdu. Gujarathi, 
  Bengali, Pushtu, Punjabi,
  Religion: Settlers: Aluminat, native: earth god-
  dess paganism, Islam, Sikh
  Population breakdown: Human 60%, Beastman 
  15%, Eldren 10%, dwarf 10%, Halfling 2%, ogre 
  3%
  Class breakdown: Upper 1%, middle class 10%, 
  lower class 54%, slave 35%
  Literacy: 20% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Constitutional monarchy 
  imposed over absolutist monarchs
  India is a country divided, both by religion and 
  by the British. Britain actually allows large 
  amounts of the country to be ruled by native 
  Indian princes, simply because the princes spend 
  so much time fighting that they can’t organise 
  an effective rebellion against the British forces, 
  this arrogant ploy could be Britain’s downfall in 
  India. Although generally loyal to its European 
  invaders, rebellions do occur simply due to 
  nationalistic feeling. Often such uprisings are 
  brutally and swiftly quelled by force.
  India is a mystical country, due to the multi-
  farious religions. India is richly smattered with 
  ruined temples and strange plots. Occasional 
  incursions by Russians and Afghan tribesmen 
  ensure that life is rarely dull in the sub-continent.
  The biggest problem at the moment is the sheer 
  arrogance of the white overlords. When they first 
  arrived in the 18th century, the English adminis-
  trators were tolerant of Indian customs, allowing 
  Indian practices to go unmolested and retained 
  the caste system. The only practices they came 
  down upon were the Thugee, a cult who showed 
  their devotion to the goddess Kali by strangling 
  people, and Suttee, a tradition whereby a widow 
  was burned on her husband’s funeral pyre. As 
  many Indians (especially widows!) welcomed 
  these improvements, there was little tension. 
  British officers loved their Indian troops, often 
  inspiring a loyalty envied by regular army and 
  east India company troops, whilst some east India 
  company officials took Indian wives and even 
  converted to Hinduism and Islam. However, the 
  evangelical movement got a foothold in the early 
  19th century, and preached that the native reli-
  gions were at best misguided and at worst evil. 
  At first the company officials were livid about the 
  missionaries, who mainly succeeded in turning 
  the populace against all colonists, but eventu-
  ally a new generation of nabobs came along and 
  wanted to expand further into Indian Territory. 
  A takeover of Afghanistan was initiated in 1839, 
  with a friendly ruler installed who then “invited” 
  the British to station troops there, but this was 
  unpopular, and the uprising that followed led to 
  the massacre of an entire British column. Then 
  came the Sikh wars from 1846-1848, where 
  Asia’s largest and best-trained army only lost 
  because the British subverted most of its high 
  will probably become a reality due to the rapid 
  growth of the Prussian nation ….
  The people of this rising empire tend to be of a 
  large build, usually tall with fair hair and blue 
  eyes. 
  The provinces of the confederation are: 
  Schleswig-Holstein (taken from Denmark), 
  Hanover, Pomerania, East Prussia, Brandenburg, 
  Silesia, Saxony, Brunswick. Nassau, Westphalia 
  and Hesse.
  “the great questions of the day [meaning German unification] will not be settled by speeches and 
  majority decisions ... But by blood and iron. “
  Prince Otto Edward Leopold von Bismarck
  
  Europe: 1867
  85
  command. Increasingly, the British have become 
  more blinded by their belief that they are bringing 
  civilisation to the continent, and are oblivious to 
  rumblings from the Indian underclass. 
  The match that may light the fuse is rumours 
  about the new Enfield rifle, recently issued to 
  Indian troops. A rumour has been spread that it’s 
  cartridge has been greased with pig and beef fat. 
  This is problematic, as to Mohammedan’s the pig 
  is a dirty animal and therefore must not be eaten, 
  whilst to a Hindu the cow is a sacred animal, and 
  therefore also not be eaten. It is actually untrue, as 
  even the British aren’t that insensitive (it is actu-
  ally greased with mutton fat especially for Indian 
  troops), but this rumour, combined with recent 
  administrator’s arrogant blunders are spreading 
  discontent like wildfire. It is possible that the 
  rumours were started by Russian agent provoca-
  teurs, but there is also a prophecy that the British 
  will be expelled from India one hundred years 
  after the battle of Plessey (1768 – in other words, 
  next year!)
  Native Indians are of a light build, dusky skinned 
  with fine black hair and dark eyes. Their faces are 
  finely featured- Asian elves are also dusky and 
  dark haired and their racial features are even fur-
  ther refined by the ethnic background.
  85
  
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  86
  THE WORLD: 1867
  POLITICAL MAP
  
  Europe: 1867
  87
  
  Europe: 1867
  88
  AFRICA
  Languages: English, French, Dutch, and a vari-
  ety of native tribal tongues
  Religion: Settlers: Aluminat, native religion is 
  pagan
  Population breakdown: Human 50%, Beastman 
  20%, Eldren 1%, dwarf 2%, gnome 1%, ogre 5%, 
  Orc 20%, Halfling 1%
  Class breakdown: Upper 2%, middle 10%, lower 
  58%, slave 30%
  Literacy: 15% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Absolutist monarchies
  The coastal areas of Africa have already been 
  colonised by Europeans, the Transvaal is occu-
  pied by Dutch settlers; Britain has taken the cape 
  colony, the gold coast and the Ivory Coast. Egypt 
  is affiliated with the Ottoman Empire, parts of 
  Angola, guinea – Bissau and Mozambique are 
  Portuguese occupied, and Algeria has been colo-
  nised by the French. Arab traders (especially 
  slave traders) are common in east Africa, and 
  have even taken over the island of Zanzibar
  The rest of Africa still belongs to it’s true inhab-
  itants, although many have had to flee from 
  their original coastal homes to escape European 
  enslavement.
  British missionaries are common in Africa despite 
  the fact that malaria and the occasional tribes-
  men kill many. Such missionaries are truly brave 
  or absolutely insane depending upon your view-
  point. One of the best points of the missionaries 
  is their role in the abolition of the slave trade, 
  and many of them pass on intelligence of slaver’s 
  activities to the royal navy. They often have good 
  relationships with the local tribes and there are a 
  surprising number of converts to the new religion, 
  as they learn to read and write from the mission-
  aries. 
  European, especially British, explorers are also 
  common in Africa. They seek the mysteries at 
  the heart of the Dark Continent, lost fabulous 
  cities such as Timbuktu, the source of the Nile, 
  King Solomon’s mines etc. The most famous is 
  Doctor David Livingstone, a Scottish evangeli-
  cal Halfling, who quests to find the source of the 
  Nile, but also frequently stops to free slaves from 
  their Arabic captors. 
  European expansion into deepest Africa has been 
  slowed somewhat by the Orcs. The Orcs can be 
  found throughout southern and internal Africa, 
  and wage war upon the European settlers when-
  ever they can, paying back European cruelty in 
  full, with no mercy. The Orcs have a lot of power, 
  their shamans are accomplished sorcerers, they 
  ride wyverns like an expert jockey and their 
  beasts are bigger and more ferocious than any 
  European beast, and their warriors know no fear 
  of any man. Despite superior Europeans technol-
  ogy, the war with the Orc tribes is surprisingly 
  even.
  Southern Africa was first colonised by the 
  Dutch in the 17th century as a way station to her 
  colonies in the East Indies. Later, many Dutch, 
  German and French Huguenot Aluminat settled in 
  the area as farmers. These people became known 
  as the Boers, the Dutch word for farmer, and 
  developed their own language that was a mix of 
  the three languages combined with some Bantu 
  and Hottentot words. Fiercely independent, the 
  Boers believed they were gods chosen people 
  who were destined to rule over the lesser races 
  (i.e. the black Hottentot, Bantu and bushmen of 
  the region). They enslaved many of the inhabit-
  ants of the region, and were generally ignored by 
  the world until the British gained the cape colony 
  from the Dutch in 1797. At first relations were 
  amicable, but soon the Boers resented the British 
  telling them what to do. The situation came to 
  a head in 1807 with the abolition of the slave 
  trade within Britain’s colonies and the Boers felt 
  aggrieved; they hadn’t asked to be ruled from 
  London and were damned if they would give up 
  their caffirs. Armed resistance began, and the 
  wily Boer proved a match for the redcoat. Peace 
  was reached, but when the slaves were emanci-
  pated in 1833, many of the Boers had had enough 
  and migrated north for new lands. They founded 
  the Orange Free State and the Transvaal to the 
  north of cape colony, where they live in abject 
  poverty, but free from British rule. 
  Of greatest concern to the British, Boers and 
  Portuguese are the Zulu nation. Forged by Shaka, 
  
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  89
  a mighty Orc of the Bantu people, he revolution-
  ised warfare amongst the Bantu people by issuing 
  his troops with a new spear, the assegai. This is 
  a short bladed stabbing spear, about the size of 
  a roman short sword. The Bantu tribes tradition-
  ally fought by hurling spears at each other and 
  literally going home once the spears ran out; the 
  Zulus under Shaka would charge their enemies 
  using the assegai, massacring the opposing Bantu 
  tribes. Shaka also instituted a strict regime for 
  all his men, not dissimilar to the Spartans of 
  ancient Greece where the warriors have to live 
  without female company until they are forty and 
  are subject to regular conditioning trials - such as 
  running over thorny brush with no shoes on. As 
  a result, the warriors who survive are immensely 
  tough and focused, and are noted for their capa-
  bility of running twenty miles and being able to 
  fight a battle at the end of it. Fortunately, rela-
  tions with the British in cape colony are good; the 
  Zulus accept European missionaries and many are 
  on good speaking terms with the missionaries of 
  the area - even though they have no intention of 
  converting. Relations are worse with the Boers 
  (Dutch colonists in the Transvaal and Orange 
  Free state) as twenty years previously there was 
  a war with the Boers who fled north to avoid 
  British occupation and the Zulus. Although it was 
  a marginal victory for the Boers, it has left bad 
  blood between the two peoples. 
  AUSTRALIA & NEW ZEALAND
  Languages: English, native Maori tribal dialects
  Religion: Settlers: Aluminat, natives: pagan
  Population breakdown: Human 50%, Beastman 
  20%, Eldren 7%, dwarf 10%, gnome 1%, ogre 
  10%, Halfling 2%
  Class breakdown: Middle 10%, lower 50%, con-
  vict 40%
  Literacy: 20% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Constitutional monarchy
  
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  90
  Australasia was first claimed by Britain in 1789, 
  and as a result only the coast has been colo-
  nised; the vast majority of the continent not even 
  explored yet, and the harsh climate of this south-
  ern continent made it ideal for it’s original pur-
  pose as a penal colony. Recently, however, vast 
  mineral deposits have been found and industry is 
  starting up along the coasts.
  As per usual for European settlers, the native 
  population is treated with a disregard and con-
  tempt that is unrivalled in any other aspect of 
  European society; in Australia many of the native 
  tribesmen are hunted for fun. While it is true that 
  many aborigines attacked the settlements without 
  provocation, the British response has been noth-
  ing short of genocide. In New Zealand the natives 
  have declared war on the settlers, and are doing 
  very well with their guerrilla tactics. Unlike 
  Australia, which was colonised for use as a penal 
  colony, New Zealand’s colonisation happened 
  almost by accident, as missionaries needed help 
  and the royal navy were dragged into a conflict 
  with the local tribesmen. These tribesmen (the 
  Maoris) were a fierce warrior people who at the 
  time were fighting amongst themselves, with both 
  sides using British supplied guns. It was then dis-
  covered that New Zealand had a pleasant climate 
  and was not nearly so harsh as Australia, so a 
  trickle of colonists arrived. However, no-one con-
  sulted the Maoris and so the second Maori war 
  was fought, with the Maoris doing surprisingly 
  well against the redcoats. 
  Native Australians are called aborigines; they are 
  short, of heavy build, with black skin, hair and 
  eyes.
  The natives of New Zealand are called Maori, 
  they are short, and dusky, with dark hair and 
  eyes, both cultures make extensive use of ritual 
  tattooing and body painting in complicated and 
  attractive spiral patterns.
  CHINA
  Languages: Cantonese. Mandarin, Akah, Turkic, 
  Tibetan,  Hakah
  Religion: Pagan, Buddhism, Taiping Aluminat, 
  Taoism, Confucianism
  Population breakdown: Human 40%, Beastman 
  15%, Eldren 23%, dwarf 10%, gnome 5%, 
  Halfling 2%, ogre 5%
  Class breakdown: Upper 5%, middle class 2%, 
  and lower class 93%
  Literacy: 20% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Absolutist monarchy
  A once proud empire, China has been degener-
  ated into a collection of warlords, private empires 
  and European ‘protectorates’. China only really 
  exists as a coherent political structure within 30 
  miles of Peking, where she is ruled by the hated 
  Manchu dynasty, who are seen as foreigners by 
  many of the people, and viewed as traitors for let-
  ting western barbarians colonise the coasts. China 
  has been toppled from its position as the primary 
  eastern power by Britain, who’s agents have shat-
  tered the economy by flooding it with opium, 
  previously one of China’s most valuable exports, 
  now rendered worthless by it’s sheer quantity.
  It is hard to imagine now that once China was 
  the most sophisticated and powerful nation in 
  the world. Many items taken for granted such as 
  paper, gunpowder, sunglasses, matches and silk 
  were first developed in China, often centuries 
  before westerners even had an inkling of their 
  existence. Other exotic items such as parachutes, 
  hand gliders, kites and portable gas cylinders 
  have been common for centuries, yet are still 
  unheard of in Europe. Many scientific discover-
  ies have their origin here too, such as circulation 
  of the blood, endocrinology, immunology and the 
  uniqueness of fingerprints. Magical practitioners 
  of all types are common, and even the mysteri-
  ous corporeal mediums are prevalent throughout 
  China. So how did it lose it’s prestige to become 
  a barely competent power?
  China’s present problems started well before 
  western dominance. During the 16th century, her 
  rulers, alarmed by the number of foreign traders 
  and missionaries who came in the wake of Marco 
  Polo’s great voyage in the 13th century closed 
  China’s borders to the outside world. Chinese 
  people were taught that theirs was the only coun-
  try in the world, the rest was a savage wasteland 
  filled with blood sucking ghosts. In recogni-
  tion that they needed some foreign trade, they 
  
  Europe: 1867
  91
  allowed the Portuguese to trade out of Macao. 
  However, she now had no market to trade with, 
  and so commerce gradually withered. In 1798, 
  the British sent a delegate bearing gifts to the 
  emperor, who misread the ambassador’s intention 
  and believed the British were giving tribute! This 
  misunderstanding led to more forceful measures, 
  culminating in the opium wars of 1840, where 
  Britain seized Hong Kong to use as a distribution 
  point for opium from India. This led to instabil-
  ity in China, as the son of heaven was humiliated 
  by barbarians. Consequently, warlords declared 
  parts of China for their own, as they were not 
  fooled by the official line that there was nothing 
  outside of China’s borders, and anyway the ruling 
  Manchu dynasty were generally reviled by the 
  nobility due to the fact that they were foreigners 
  from Manchuria. Men started to cut 
  their pigtails (a symbol of repression 
  forced upon the Chinese people by 
  the Manchu’s), Buddhist and Taoist 
  secret societies subverted the tyran-
  nical regime by showing the people 
  a more enlightened path and for a 
  while everything seemed rosy. But 
  the warlords were just as cruel and 
  tyrannical as the Manchu’s, whilst 
  the fabric of Chinese society was 
  destroyed by many of it’s people’s 
  dependency on British supplied 
  opium. The final blow came in 
  1850, when a preacher claimed to 
  have seen the true Aluminat light, 
  started the Taiping Rebellion - a rev-
  olution that threatens to destroy the 
  wavering fabric of Chinese society 
  totally, already it has claimed more 
  lives than any other war in history 
  (20-30 million dead by 1867!). 
  Overall, the situation in China is not 
  healthy, and the British and French 
  are looking to further extend their 
  claims to China’s massive market. 
  To this end, it is rumoured that 
  British merchants are using evangel-
  ical missionaries to smuggle opium 
  and guns to the Aluminat rebels. 
  China’s people are proud with a 
  great heritage, and vastly different customs to 
  those of Europe.
  The people of China are short, and of light build, 
  they have fine black- hair, dark eyes and light 
  ochre skin. They are deeply suspicious of foreign-
  ers, and most live in abject poverty.
  AMERICA
  Languages: English, native tribal tongues, blood 
  Eldren
  Religion: Aluminat, human natives: pagan, blood 
  Eldren: Entropy 
  Population breakdown: Human 40%, Beastman 
  15%, Eldren 13%, dwarf 10%, gnome 5%, 
  Halfling 2%, ogre 10%, Orc 5%
  
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  92
  Class breakdown: Upper 5%, middle class 20%, 
  lower class 40%, slave 35%
  Literacy: 30% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Democracy
  America is a wild land indeed- still a very young 
  fledgling nation it has very little to do with inter-
  national issues, being much more concerned with 
  internal problems. The most pressing of these at 
  the moment is the potential secession of the slave 
  states from the union, and potential civil war.
  The union is a hodgepodge of former Spanish, 
  French and English colonial possessions and 
  newly conquered territories. With the possible 
  exception of Australia, nowhere else in the world 
  has there been such a widespread slaughter of 
  an indigenous people. The first white men in 
  America were the Spaniards, who occupied what 
  are now Texas, Florida, New Mexico, Nevada, 
  and California. They massacred the population 
  wholesale as they saw them as heathens, often 
  spurred on by the inquisition that relished the 
  opportunity to destroy as many evil devil wor-
  shipers as possible. Whilst it is true some of the 
  plainsmen indulged in human sacrifice, many 
  did not and peaceful tribes were killed alongside 
  the warlike. Eventually, the plainsmen fighting 
  back with magic stopped the Spanish conquista-
  dors, and they even lost some ground in Nevada 
  to this counter attack. The next to arrive were 
  the French, who sparsely populated a strip from 
  Louisiana in the south to Quebec in the north, 
  calling it New France. Their conquest was not 
  particularly violent, as they were more likely to 
  trade with the Indians. They even learned from 
  the natives, as they found their style of hit and 
  run warfare to be very effective against rigid 
  formations of troops. So it was the Indians who 
  ushered in the new light infantry tactics later 
  employed by all European armies.  However, the 
  final settlement was the English, who dominated 
  the eastern seaboard from the 17th to 18th cen-
  tury. Whilst they also committed acts of genocide 
  in the early days, later on the British government 
  prevented the settlers from expanding westward, 
  creating a buffer zone of friendly tribes between 
  the English and French colonies.
  Unfortunately, the wars of the 18th century 
  spread to the colonies, and French, Indian and 
  British colonist alike between 1756-63 commit-
  ted many atrocities. This war added New France 
  to the British colonies, but the English handled 
  the war badly and the colonists saw the redcoats 
  defeated time and again by the more cunning 
  Indians and French. On top of this, they paid 
  taxes but had no representation, and the buffer 
  zone had no importance. This led to the suc-
  cessful American Revolution, the buffer zone 
  was eaten up and the Indians massacred or sent 
  westwards. The later revolt by Spain’s colonies 
  brought Florida into the fold, and then American 
  settlers in Texas rebelled against Mexican rule 
  in 1836, incorporating themselves into the union 
  in 1845. The successful Mexican war 1846-48 
  brought Nevada, New Mexico, California, Utah 
  and Arizona into the union as territories (not 
  states, but governed by Washington). This is the 
  current state of the union, but America is now 
  expanding westwards, threatening British Canada. 
  The biggest issue for the moment is not conquest, 
  however, but slavery. From the 16th century until 
  1833, millions of black slaves were imported 
  from Africa by Spanish, French and English 
  slavers, mostly to work the great plantations of 
  the south. However, following the war of inde-
  pendence, fought with the idea that “all men are 
  created equal”, radicals called for the abolition of 
  slavery. This was easy in the northern states, as 
  there were very few slaves who mostly worked 
  domestic tasks, but in the south they made up 
  one third of the population. This led to the threat 
  of secession by the slave states, and finally it 
  was agreed in the 1840’s that there would be no 
  new states created, keeping the balance of power 
  between the 11 free states and the 11 slave states. 
  Unfortunately, when Texas joined the union in 
  1845 for protection against Mexico this tipped the 
  balance in favour of slavery, forcing congress to 
  make a new free state in Kansas to balance it out 
  again, and pledge that slavery would not spread 
  west. Unfortunately today, radicals on both sides 
  have their own agenda, and secession fever is 
  spreading in the south whilst in Kansas a vir-
  tual state of war has broken out with slave state 
  Missouri. Armed bands of abolitionists, such as 
  the infamous John Brown, undertake terror tactics 
  against slave owners, and armed pro-slavers fight 
  
  Europe: 1867
  93
  back just as hard.
  What the Africans think of this is a mystery 
  to most. They have little say if they are slaves 
  (although they are entitled to two thirds of a vote 
  in presidential elections!), and in fact many free 
  Africans in the south own slaves themselves!
  On a less military note, settlers are moving 
  steadily west now that improved communica-
  tions have made safe vast tracts of land right the 
  way up to the west coast. The Pony Express uses 
  young men (and occasionally adult Halflings) 
  to run postal services on horseback all over the 
  country even crossing the continent in around 
  two weeks making fast, reliable communica-
  tion nation-wide a possibility. A transcontinental 
  telegraph link is also established but has been 
  plagued with technical difficulties.
  Western America is frontier country, a lawless 
  zone where people expect to have to fight to 
  keep what is theirs. Gold rushes and claim jump-
  ing, cattle rustling, and lynching are all common 
  place, of course not everyone is a criminal or 
  even violent, most are just families of all races 
  trying to eke out a living.
  The other major internal problem is the strife 
  between the settlers and the native “savage” 
  Americans. The Native Americans have lived in 
  the Americas for as long as their history recalls, 
  but recently have been brought face to face with 
  19th century western civilisation. Individual 
  natives are treated as the lowest of the low; even 
  ogres get better treatment in most towns. As 
  a people they are pushed off traditional lands, 
  attacked and culled for no reason other than that 
  they are “savages” and in the way of European 
  settlers.
  The unjust treatment of the native human tribes 
  is not helped by native Eldren who see them-
  selves as waging a holy crusade against the lesser 
  races of man (native or settler). No one has ever 
  seen (and stayed sane enough to talk) a plains 
  Eldren settlement; it is assumed that they live in 
  a nomadic fashion like the native human tribes. It 
  is also apparent that they dislike daylight, when 
  travelling they take great pains to wrap them-
  selves in cloth and hide, not even leaving an inch 
  bare to the sun.
  JAPAN
  Languages: Japanese
  Religion: Pagan, Shintoism, Buddhism
  Population breakdown: Human 39%, Beastman 
  15%, Eldren 20%, dwarf 10%. Gnome 5%, 
  Halfling 1%, ogre 10%
  Class breakdown: Upper 5%, peasants 95%
  Literacy: 10% of population is literate
  Governmental system: Feudal serfdom
  A feudal society with a strict and draconian set of 
  codes and strictures governing everyday life, the 
  most important is possibly bushido, the warriors’ 
  code. Japan has a bewildering etiquette code and 
  many foreigners must be wary of what they say 
  and do, in case they cause inadvertent offence.
  Japan is seen as a rising power in the Far East, 
  soon to take over the position left open by 
  China’s infighting. Both Britain and Holland 
  petition for allegiance with Japan for this very 
  reason. Being more politically astute than the 
  Manchu’s, the ruling Tokagawa dynasty have no 
  desire to see Japan go the same way as China, 
  and would rather be allied with Britain than 
  stand against her. Also, they realise that their 
  own expansion plans into China will eventually 
  bring them face to face with Russia, and therefore 
  Britain would be a powerful ally. 
  The people of Japan are short, and of light build. 
  They have fine black hair and delicate features.
  
  Europe: 1867
  94
  BOOK II
  RULES & SYSTEMS
  
  Europe: 1867
  95
  
  Europe: 1867
  96
  
  97
  Characters
  97
  Player characters normally begin among the 
  nameless masses that populate the islands 
  and empires of England and Europe. They 
  could be Dwarven industrialists, Eldren 
  socialites, Halfling wanderers, or a dutiful 
  Ogre.
  To a large extent, the nature of the charac-
  ters depends upon the style of campaign. 
  Revolutionaries from the east end of London 
  are quite out of place in a campaign about 
  colonial oppression. In the same manner a 
  noble Orc warrior would be at a loss in the 
  grime of a European metropolis.
  CHARACTER CREATION SUMMARY
  Step 1:  Choose a social class for your character; you may choose from upper 
  class, middle class, or lower (working) class.
  Step 2:  Choose a race for your character; note any characteristic bonuses or 
  penalties as shown on racial modifiers table. 
  Step 3:  Define basic characteristics. You will have characteristic points (as 
  defined by your social class) to define your character’s vital statis-
  tics. No characteristic can start at less than 0 for player characters, 
  if you are considering playing a non-Human character bear this in 
  mind when your starting points are assigned.
  Step 4:  Choose a ‘childhood experience’ and a ‘past career’ for your char-
  acter from those allowed by your social class, you have 30 points to 
  spend on the skills these experiences have given your character so 
  far. No skill may start higher than 6 at this time. 
  Step 5:  You now spend 25 ‘option points’ these points can be used to buy or 
  increase skills, talents, abilities, magic, property and equipment. If 
  you require more option points you may take on ‘complications’ for 
  your character.
  Step 6:  Spend some time to flesh out your character, think about their 
  appearance, ethics, and inner nature.
  Step 7:  Spend some cash on equipment for your character, everyone starts 
  the game with some money, and again your social class dictates this. 
  Also, any option points you have remaining are turned into cash that 
  you may start the game with.
  CHARACTER
  CREATION
  
  98
  Characters
  SOCIAL CLASS
  The society of England and Europe is split into 
  three levels, upper, middle, and the lower or 
  lower classes; each of these groups has its own 
  ethics, ideals and etiquette.
  Social class is so important, that it even affects 
  the character generation process, your choice of 
  social class affects the amount of 
  char-
  acteristic points you receive for 
  your character, the past careers 
  he 
  has available, even the 
  options he has avail-
  able. It is important 
  for characters and 
  game masters to 
  understand the class 
  system of Europe as 
  it will be one of, if not 
  the, most dominating 
  factors in the lives of 
  the characters and non-
  player characters alike.
  The theory is that class 
  status reflected indefin-
  able but substan-
  tial differences in 
  breeding. It would 
  be unthinkable for 
  a businessman with 
  humble origins to 
  socialise within 
  the aristocracy, no 
  matter how success-
  ful he had been, as 
  his breeding would be considered inferior. Social 
  class controls a European’s childhood and defines 
  his career, where he can live, even who he can 
  marry. 
  Race plays an important role in social class. 
  Beastmen, Ogres and Halflings are all born into 
  and kept in the lower classes. Eldren are usually 
  upper class, but it is known to find middle or low 
  class Eldren. Dwarves and Gnomes are predomi-
  nantly middle and lower class. Humans fill the 
  ranks of all classes. 
  I t should be noted that some 
  o f 
  the countries of Europe 
  have different racial 
  breakdowns to England, 
  and so it is possible 
  to have, for example, 
  a Prussian upper class 
  Beastman, also nota-
  ble is the relatively 
  high percentage of 
  Eldren across the social 
  classes of France.
  We recommend middle 
  and lower class char-
  acters, they start with 
  fewer material assets 
  than the upper classes, 
  but they also have 
  greater freedom of 
  movement, birth into 
  the upper classes is a 
  gilded cage of reputa-
  tion and duty for most.
  Social Class & Character Limits
  Characteristics
  28 
  32 
   
  36
  Starting cash (£)
  Intellect x 10 
   
   
  Intellect x 5 
   
   
   
   
  Intellect x 1
  Skills
  Any except those marked 
  as ‘lower class’
  Any except upper class 
   
   
   
  Unmarked and lower 
  class only
  Default races
  Human, Eldren  
   
  Human, Dwarf, 
  Gnome, Eldren
  Human, Dwarf, 
  Gnome, Beastman, 
  Ogre, Halfling
  Class
  Upper 
  Middle 
   
  Lower
  
  99
  Characters
  RACES
  The world of Victoriana is not purely populated 
  by Humanity, across the world dozens of different 
  races carve their fortunes alongside (or against) 
  mankind.
  In Europe many of these races have lived togeth-
  er in society since Roman times, and rarely con-
  sider themselves different races – simply a part of 
  ‘the greater concept of man’.
  In rules terms many of the races have capabili-
  ties that fall outside the norm in comparison to 
  Humans.
  If you choose to play one of these races, simply 
  apply the racial bonuses to your character’s char-
  acteristics. However you should never have a 
  starting characteristic lower than 0, so think about 
  how you will distribute your starting points to 
  balance the penalties of the race modifiers before 
  you get carried away with writing in extra pres-
  ence or body.
  Men
  Men are the most populous of all the races and 
  account for the vast majority of Europe’s popu-
  lation. They vary greatly in build, have many 
  possible hair and eye colours, but they have no 
  special racial abilities. Women are socially bound 
  in England but there is no difference in their 
  attributes, women are certainly as capable as men 
  - society simply refuses them the same opportuni-
  ties.
  Beastmen
  Beastmen have faithfully served among the lower 
  classes of England through out history, Beastmen 
  appear next to men on the earliest discovered 
  cave paintings. A Beastman’s build varies in the 
  same way as a Human. Their bestial features 
  vary to a degree, although most have a goat or 
  dog-like head and heavy body hair. Variations 
  are common - ratmen, bearmen. Lionmen etc. 
  The bestial appearance should be chosen after 
  the attributes have been rolled. For example 
  a small, dextrous and weak Beastmen might 
  have rat features. For example a large, strong, 
  stupid Beastman may have bull-like features. 
  A Beastman who is both strong and intelligent 
  could well be a lion. Beastmen do have females 
  but they only account for approximately 25% of 
  the Beastman population. It is more common for 
  Beastmen to intermarry and breed with men and 
  Eldren, a practice which society does not view 
  distastefully among the lower classes. Beastmen 
  are often judged by their outward appearance. A 
  rat or weasel would live a lonely shunned life, 
  while a noble lion would be popular and possibly 
  be propositioned often by the other races.
  Due to their slightly subservient social position (it 
  Character Races
  Race 
  Bonuses 
  Penalties
  Men 
  - 
  -
  Beastmen 
   + 1 body 
  -1 presence 
  Eldren 
   + 2 presence, + 1 dexterity 
   -1 resolution, -1 body, artistic 
  eccentricity, planar empathy
  Dwarves 
   + 1 body, + 1 resolution 
  -1 presence, little legs
  Halflings 
   + 1 dexterity, + 2 luck 
   -1 resolution, wanderlust, little 
  legs
  Gnomes 
   + 2 intellect 
   -1 body, little legs
  Ogres 
   + 5 body, iron constitution  
   -3 presence, -2 intellect, blunt 
  wits
  
  100
  Characters
  is very rare to find a Beastman above the lower 
  classes and unheard of to find one in the upper 
  class) many are turning to politics such as social-
  ism, bolshevism, communism or plain anarchy in 
  attempts to better their position.
  Eldren
  The Eldren are a rare and aesthetic race (although 
  those that turn to war often excel), highly val-
  ued as artisans throughout the world. Not only 
  creators of beauty, the physical beauty of the 
  Eldren is also legendary; they are tall and slight 
  of build, finely boned and with delicate features. 
  Their skin is pale as finest porcelain, their hair 
  raven black or mahogany with no other variation. 
  Eldren eyes have cat-like pupils and white or 
  pale metallic irises, their ears come to a delicate 
  point at the tip. In high society an Eldren bride is 
  considered quite a prize. The Eldren have lived 
  with, and interbred with the upper echelons of 
  Humanity for all recorded time. (Queen Elizabeth 
  Tudor was an Eldren queen) like Beastmen, the 
  Eldren are rarely considered to be a different 
  race.
  Artistic eccentricity
  Eldren have a high chance of insanity, or “artistic 
  eccentricity” as it is known, typically this mani-
  fests as a minor neurosis or phobia. All Eldren 
  characters must take a mental complication from 
  the option points section without claiming the 
  bonus points that would normally be associated 
  for the complication.
  Planar Empathy
  The Eldren have always had an aptitude for sor-
  cery, even in this modern age when such aptitude 
  is frowned on. An Eldren Character pays one less 
  option point for the medium, faith, thaumaturge 
  or conjuror talents. 
  Dwarves
  A very clannish race, the Dwarves kept their 
  northern cities and large tracts of the land around 
  them under guard from other races. Despite this 
  they have always been peaceably minded to other 
  races, but only really started integrating when 
  Queen Elizabeth asked for their help to defeat the 
  armada. The English civil war strengthened these 
  ties when King Charles the first (again an Eldren 
  monarch) was wiped away by Oliver Cromwell 
  and 
  the Dwarven Sir Thomas Fairfax’s 
  new model army.
  
  101
  Characters
  Dwarves are stocky, and powerfully muscled. 
  They have finely lined faces and the colour of 
  their eyes is always deep and bright. Dwarven 
  hair can be any Human colour; it is coarse and 
  grows thickly on the scalp and race. Dwarves are 
  hard-working industrialists, and make up a large 
  part of the gentry and skilled labour in many 
  towns where mining and building are primary 
  industries. Unsurprisingly after the industrial 
  revolution, large parts of the nouveau riche are 
  Dwarves.
  Dwarves suffer from legendary stubbornness. 
  They often harbour bad feelings toward Eldren 
  due to the civil war over two centuries ago.
  Little legs
  Dwarves are a short race, and as such their legs 
  are much shorter than the average Human (or 
  Eldren or Beastman for that matter). When cal-
  culating movement speeds ½ your scores to rep-
  resent the disadvantage represented by your little 
  legs.
  Halflings
  Halflings are a transient people who take great 
  pleasure in food and drink, tall stories and a 
  warm fire. They are short and although they 
  are a slender race, there excesses often leave 
  them portly. They have tough hairy feet and few 
  wear shoes. Hair can be any colour, as can eyes. 
  Halflings mature quickly and have a short life 
  span, they are considered adult at 10 and the old-
  est recorded Halfling lived until 45. Halflings 
  are all (as a race world-over) afflicted with an 
  almost insane wanderlust. A Halfling is always 
  on the move from birth till death. On the whole 
  Halflings are a cheerful and curious lot, rarely 
  without their noses in somebody else’s business 
  or wallet. Halflings have little concern with all 
  this ‘society’ nonsense; most find it quite amus-
  ing, for this reason society places them (as a race) 
  at the bottom of the lower class.
  Wanderlust
  A Halfling cannot stay in 
  one place for long; 
  after his intel-
  lect in months 
  
  102
  Characters
  passes, he must move on to a new location. If 
  he does not then for every week thereafter then 
  he temporarily loses 1 resolution or 1 intellect 
  until he does. Once on the move again the char-
  acteristic scores return at the rate of 1/day. At the 
  gamesmaster’s discretion the distance travelled 
  may be of any distance, and locations may be 
  revisited.
  Little legs
  Halflings are a short race, and as such their legs 
  are much shorter than the average Human (or 
  Eldren or Beastman for that matter). When cal-
  culating movement speeds ½ your scores to rep-
  resent the disadvantage represented by your little 
  legs.
  Gnomes
  Gnomes are short wiry Humanoids, easily mis-
  taken for a starved Dwarf. Hair can be any colour 
  as can eyes. Their faces are lined like a man in 
  middle age; a Gnome’s eyes are dark and sparkle 
  with intelligence. Gnomes are generally shrewd, 
  intelligent creatures they are at their best when 
  taxing their brains. Accountant, teacher and 
  solicitor are all occupations at which the humble 
  Gnome excels. Being physically frail they shy 
  away from physical work when they can.
  Little legs
  Gnomes are a short race, and as such their legs 
  are much shorter than the average Human (or 
  Eldren or Beastman for that matter). When cal-
  culating movement speeds ½ your scores to rep-
  resent the disadvantage represented by your little 
  legs.
  Ogres
  The Ogre is a Humanoid powerhouse. On aver-
  age 8 ft. tall and almost as wide, an Ogre is best 
  described as a large slab of pure muscle. Ogres 
  may have any colour hair or eyes; their skin is 
  rough and callused all over. Often the teeth are 
  overdeveloped into tusks (approx. 45%); facial 
  features are always very deep set & crude.
  Ogres are dumb, they frequently believe anything 
  they are told as they lack the facility to distin-
  guish lies from truth, this often leads to fanatical 
  (and misplaced) devotion to even obscure causes, 
  a fact that the army plays on with glee. Indeed, 
  Ogres are ruthlessly taken advantage of due to 
  their dubious intelligence and aside from the 
  occasional rabble rousers- nobody (including the 
  Ogres) cares about how they are treated.
  CHARACTERISTICS - What the numbers mean
  Here’s a handy set of descriptions that can be applied to numbers for each characteristic.
  Score 
  Description
  0 
   Challenged. Everyday tasks involving this characteristic are difficult. This value is found in 
  children, elderly people, those weakened by illness or infirmity, and in the intellect of most 
  trolls.
  1-2 
   Everyday. Many ordinary people around the world are likely to have some characteristics at 
  this value. It’s enough to get by on and to do most things (though not very unusual or stress-
  ful tasks). 
  3-4 
   Competent. You are competent at everyday tasks involving this characteristic. Most healthy 
  adults have some characteristics that fall into this range. This is the realm of everyday 
  “heroes” such as policemen, firemen, paramedics, technicians, etc. 
  5-6 
   Heroic. You are much better than ordinary. A born athlete, a top-notch scientist, an elite sol-
  dier might have one or more characteristics in this range. This is the realm of professional 
  mercenaries, top soldiers, special police, scientists, and TV heroes. 
  7-8 
   Incredible, beyond Human. This is the starting arena of troll strength, Eldren charisma, 
  and gnomish intellect. However, these scores lie beyond the range of everyday Humanity, a 
  character of any race can reach these heights, but it requires coaching, dedication, and experi-
  ences that most will never receive. See the experience section for more.
  9-10 
   Legendary or infernal. This is the pinnacle of excellence for Humanity, some races may 
  exceed even this, but any character who displays this level of quality in their basic character-
  istics will become nothing short of a legend.
  
  103
  Characters
  Blunt wits
  If you choose an Ogre character, you automati-
  cally believe anything those characters with a 
  presence score higher than 5 tell you. If there are 
  two high presence characters voicing different 
  commands then they must shout each other down 
  to end your confusion, or the gamesmaster might 
  make you roll intellect + empathy to make your 
  own judgement call (heaven help us) on which of 
  the nice people is telling the truth.
  Iron constitution
  Ogres are renowned for their ability to shrug off 
  wounds and pain. To represent this every Ogre 
  calculates his health as body x6 rather than the 
  body x5 as used by the other races.
  CHARACTERISTICS
  In this section we will progress through the char-
  acteristic list providing explanations and formulae 
  for derived characteristics throughout. A starting 
  character is assumed to be between 19-26 years 
  of age and has few skills apart from the basic 
  characteristics. At the start of character generation 
  a player has points (defined by class) to spread 
  about the primary characteristics; these points are 
  spent on a one-for-one basis. A starting charac-
  teristic may not be higher than 8 before modifiers 
  for race are applied.
  If you are having trouble deciding what counts 
  as a ‘good’ characteristic percentage, think of a 
  totally average Human as having 2 in every char-
  acteristic. Higher is always better than a lower 
  number. Characteristics are numbers that describe 
  your character’s ability as compared to everyone 
  else in world of Victoriana. 
  All people and creatures in the game are 
  described using characteristics; this lets you 
  compare one person to another, which is often 
  important in the game. For instance, a person 
  with a strength characteristic of 3 is stronger 
  than a person with a strength characteristic of 2, 
  but nowhere near as strong as a person with a 
  strength characteristic of 6.
  Primary vs. Derived characteristics
  There are two kinds of characteristics in 
  Victoriana. Primary characteristics are “bought”, 
  using a pool of points that we’ll discuss below. A 
  good example of a primary characteristic would 
  be a character’s body characteristic, used to judge 
  how tough he is. Applying a simple mathemati-
  cal formula to a specific characteristic creates 
  derived characteristics. A good example of a 
  derived characteristic would be a character’s 
  health, which is figured by multiplying his body 
  by 5.
  The range of Human potential in Victoriana is 
  defined in a range from 0-10, most people have 
  characteristics between 0-6, characteristics over 
  7 are truly exceptional - some of the races in 
  Victoriana have characteristic modifiers that can 
  take then over this level, or under it. 
  Primary characteristics are purchased at a ratio 
  of 1 characteristic point for one level of ability. 
  Example: I want to have a strength of 5. I pay 5 
  characteristic points. You must put at least one 
  characteristic points in each characteristic; the 
  maximum level you can buy in any one charac-
  teristic at the start of play is 8, which then may 
  be modified by one of the race templates if you 
  choose to play a non-Human.
  Characteristics
  Body
  Your size, strength, toughness, and ability to 
  withstand damage. A high body score could indi-
  cate bulging muscles, but could just as easily be 
  described by steel like sinews, or simply an iron 
  constitution.
   
  Health [body x5]: how much damage 
  you can take before you are battered into 
  unconsciousness or killed, calculated as 
  points. On the character sheet health is 
  recorded twice, once for ‘health points’ 
  and once for ‘stun points’ (see combat 
  for more). You might also notice that the 
  health and stun point sections are split into 
  layers that carry different modifiers; you 
  have your full body score in each layer of 
  both the health and stun boxes. Fill in the 
  
  104
  Characters
  boxes you don’t have.
   
  Fortitude: [body]: how resistant you are 
  to damage; your fortitude is subtracted 
  from any damage you take whether ‘stun’ 
  or ‘lethal’.
   
  Constitution [body/3]: this characteristic 
  determines how fast the character recov-
  ers from damage. You get back this many 
  stun points each hour when you rest, and 
  this many hits back for each day of medical 
  attention.
   Damage bonus [body]: this characteristic 
  is added to the damage of all unarmed or 
  melee attacks. Damage from weapons is 
  usually a number of dice; your damage 
  bonus is a fixed value. If you had a body 
  of 6, and a sabre doing 5d6 damage you 
  would roll the 5d6 and then add 6 for your 
  body.
  Dexterity
  Your overall physical competence, as pertains to 
  balancing, leaping, jumping, and general hand-
  eye coordination. A gymnast or ballerina would 
  have a high dexterity score, but high dexterity 
  could also indicate excellent co-ordination in the 
  case of a marksman or stage magician. 
   
  Movement speeds: how far the character 
  runs (at a rate allowing for dodges and eva-
  sions), sprints (in a flat-out run), swims, 
  and leaps in 3 seconds. 
   Run (Aka combat move) 
  [dexterity x 2yds ]
   Sprint (Aka non-combat move) 
  [dexterity x 3yds]
   Swim 
  [dexterity x 1yds]
   Leap 
  [dexterity x 1yds]
  Intellect
  How generally bright you are. This covers more 
  than sheer intelligence, but also cleverness, 
  awareness, perception, and the ability to learn; 
  mental deficiencies don’t become apparent until 
  you hit 1. 
   Initiative: [dexterity + intellect, divide by two]: 
  this characteristic is used to measure a character’s 
  reactions in combat. Initiative is used to deter-
  mine when you move during the course of a com-
  bat turn.
  Luck
  Represents just how lucky you are, a high luck 
  score indicates that you regularly win at cards 
  and are frequently in the right place at the right 
  time. There are no derived characteristics from 
  luck, and no skills associated with it. Your luck 
  score is spent during game play to buy re-rolls of 
  dice. Whenever you roll dice and the results are 
  insufficient, you may spend luck points to re-roll 
  them, but you must take the result of the new roll, 
  or spend even more luck to re-roll again. Your 
  luck score regenerates at the gamesmaster’s dis-
  cretion, typically you will have your full luck at 
  the beginning of each night’s play. 
  Presence
  Your ability to impress and influence people 
  through your character and charisma; how well 
  you get along with others; how you interact in 
  social situations. A high presence score can indi-
  cate physical attractiveness, pleasant character, or 
  a mixture of both. 
  Resolution
  This represents your force of will, your determi-
  nation and ability to face danger or stress with 
  courage.
   
  Resolve [resolution x5]: your resolve is a 
  pool of points used to track your remaining 
  force of will. Your resolve can be tempo-
  rarily reduced by drugs or drunkenness, or 
  by casting magic, or experiencing terrify-
  ing situations. Like health points and stun, 
  resolve is split into layers that carry differ-
  ent modifiers; you have your full resolution 
  score in each layer. Fill in the boxes you 
  don’t have.
  SKILLS
  Where characteristics define what your charac-
  ter‘s strengths and weaknesses are, skills define 
  what he knows.
  Skills use a score system just like characteristics, 
  which is summarised in the table nearby.
  
  105
  Characters
  Your characters skills represent his acquired 
  knowledge, the summation of childhood experi-
  ence, career skills, knowledge picked up from 
  hobbies, and knowledge of the world around him. 
  As your character develops through role-playing 
  you may increase and expand upon his starting 
  skills by spending experience points, reflecting 
  the growth of his knowledge and experience.
  Starting skills
  There are no character classes as such in 
  Victoriana. In theory a player is free to apply 
  whatever skill knowledge to his character he 
  wants. However, this is a Victorian era RPG and 
  chosen skills should really reflect the 1800s. We 
  anticipate that many players will be a bit lost 
  when deciding what skills an 1800’s character 
  would have. Because of this we have provided a 
  list of ‘childhood experiences’ and ‘past occupa-
  tions’ for characters of different classes, and in 
  some cases gender. 
  Regrettably the world of Victoriana, like our own 
  19th century, is very sexist. If you take a moment 
  to scan over the occupations list you will notice 
  that women have very few choices open to them. 
  If you are playing a female character, you may 
  only choose from experi-
  ences and careers marked 
  with a **. 
  Although a female character may be limited in 
  the choice of occupations available this can be 
  compensated for. Victorian society holds women 
  to be frail, delicate, and ideally both harmless and 
  innocent. Indeed it would not be unfair to say that 
  the role of mother and hostess is the most revered 
  aspect of womanhood to the high and middle 
  class. At the same time a man’s hands are quite 
  tied to do anything against a woman. To strike 
  at a woman in any way would be the action of a 
  cowardly beast unworthy of friendship or honour, 
  thus a thoughtful adventuress can use the bigotry 
  of society as a shield, disguise, and as a highly 
  effective weapon.
  If you require a female character without the 
  binds of a family to govern her, simply declare 
  the family dead. The character gains her income 
  from a trust fund governed by lawyers. Such an 
  adventuress is free to do as she pleases, although 
  she may still be scorned by society for her 
  actions.
  In the slums and the country low/lower class 
  105
  What the numbers mean
  Here’s a handy set of descriptions that can be applied to the scores that represent a characters skills.
  Score 
  Description
  0 
   Challenged you don’t know how to do this task at all. 
  1-2  
   Everyday you’ve learned the basics of this task, and can do this thing most of the time, though 
  not very well. You’re an apprentice or a beginner. 
  3-4 
   Competent you are well trained and practiced in this skill, and can perform it well in everyday 
  circumstances. You can handle unusual applications of the skill with some difficulty. You’re con-
  sidered a professional. 
  5-6 
   Heroic you are a master of this skill, and are capable of unusual applications of the skill. You 
  are considered a master craftsman. 
  7-8 
   Incredible a skill at this level means you’re one of the very best in the world. You are at ease 
  with unusual applications of the skill, or even new applications. This is entering the realm of fic-
  tion, of amazing skill that’s not quite impossible! 
  9 +  
   Legendary a skill at this level puts you in the realm of the greatest practitioners of this skill 
  in history. You are pushing forward the boundaries of the skill and what it can be used for, and 
  have entered the realm of genius and of fiction. 
  
  106
  Characters
  women had comparatively few social restrictions. 
  They, like their men folk, are simply trying to 
  scrape enough pennies together for the rent and 
  evening meal, often a daunting and unsavoury 
  task in urban areas. Indeed if you review the 
  careers a female character can choose, a majority 
  are criminal occupations, this is simply because 
  the ‘lower’ class social strata held less prejudice 
  than the upper classes, when every day is a strug-
  gle everyone has to pull their weight and bring in 
  an income – whatever the means.
  When creating a character you have 30 skill 
  points to spend. You should choose a childhood 
  experience, and past career, choosing from the 
  possible skills in your chosen entries allocate 
  your 30 points. 
  You do not have to assign points to all the skills 
  listed in an entry, but you cannot assign points to 
  skills that are not listed in your chosen entries.
  CHILDHOOD EXPERIENCE
  In the middle class most male children go to 
  boarding school, most female children stay at 
  home and attend church school. Some may go 
  straight into industrial apprenticeship, but this 
  would be rare, and probably in a family business.
  In the lower classes children were frequently 
  expected to follow in the footsteps of the parents, 
  rural children were farm hands by default as 
  they grew up assisting in the daily chores. Urban 
  children saw far more diverse upbringings. Some 
  worked in the same factories as their parents; oth-
  ers were sent (or even sold) to travelling sweeps, 
  or the military as the family literally could not 
  support them. Others still ran away and reared 
  themselves on the streets, inevitably falling into 
  the gangs of pickpockets and urchins.
  So what happened to you?
  Apprentice: arts** (middle or lower class)
  As a child you were sent away to study under 
  an artist, maybe a sculptor or painter. Your fam-
  ily had high hopes that you would be a credit to 
  them and excel. 
  Skills: art (choose), literacy, education, Human 
  perception
  Apprentice: industrial (middle class)
  As a child you were packaged of to the mills and 
  factories to learn a trade under the watchful eye 
  of a master engineer or craftsman. Most of your 
  time was spent running errands and doing odd 
  jobs, but you did actually learn something of the 
  engineering principles.
  Skills: literacy, ad-hoc repair, education
  Apprentice: textiles** (lower class)
  Your childhood was spent in the textile facto-
  ries, where your small size got you hazardously 
  employed to dive between the moving looms and 
  spindles to retrieve lost spools. Factory hours 
  were long and you had no time for school.
  Skills: dodge! 
  Boarding school (middle class)
  You were sent to boarding school; depend-
  ing on the budget your parents could afford it 
  could have been anything from a filthy prison 
  to an entire campus with a variety of facilities. 
  Naturally the actual quality of education received 
  from school to school varied immensely. 
  Discipline, however, remained draconian 
  
  107
  Characters
  across the board.
  Skills: literacy, education, athletics
  Cabin boy (lower class)
  At an early age you were shipped off to join 
  the navy as a cabin boy, performing odd jobs 
  and cleaning duties for the officers aboard ship. 
  Discipline is extremely draconian on-board navy 
  ships, and you were expected to behave, under-
  stand and obey like the rest of the adult crew.
  Skills: dodge! small boat pilot
  Chimney sweep** (lower class)
  As a small child you were sold to a itinerant 
  chimney sweep as an ‘apprentice’. In reality you 
  were the chimney sweep’s Human brush, forced 
  to climb up chimneys in order to dislodge the 
  soot and dirt that might be blocking them. Getting 
  stuck was a constant threat, but your master was 
  usually on hand with a great big stick to send up 
  the chimney after you and urge you on. Many 
  chimney sweeps were also burglars, returning 
  to a house later on to remove any valuables that 
  caught their eyes on the first visit. 
  Skills: athletics, appraisal
  Church school** (middle class)
  Where male middle class children were sent to 
  boarding school to toughen them up and make 
  men out of them, middle class girls were not 
  meant to be tough. Young girls were sheltered, 
  and led a life of luxury in many ways. They were 
  not expected to learn a trade, and were 
  groomed from an early age for mar-
  riage. Education came in the form 
  of church school, several morn-
  ings a week to provide a basic lit-
  eracy and general knowledge.
  Skills: literacy, education
  Costermonger (lower class)
  Your childhood was spent on street 
  corners hawking a wide variety of 
  wares, from ribbons to matches, or 
  flowers. The days were long and you 
  had little time for school.
  Skills: bull! trade (custom skill)
  Drummer boy (lower class)
  You were packed off with the army as a drum-
  mer boy. Your job as a child was to learn the 
  drum rotes that signalled changes in formation 
  and marching pace. Military discipline is rough & 
  tumble in the 1800’s if not quite as extreme as the 
  naval codes.
  Skills: art (play drum), brawl 
  Farm hand** (lower class)
  A rural child, your childhood was spent assisting 
  with the daily business of life, herding, harvest-
  ing, milking, baking, and churning. With huge 
  masses of the population having left the country-
  side for the cities there is no time for idle hands if 
  the estate’s farms are to be run properly.
  Skills: animal care, athletics, speciality: farming, 
  speciality: herding, ride horse, drive carriage
  Mud-lark (lower class)
  Your childhood was spent scavenging off the 
  river banks and cargo barges while dodging the 
  workhouse authorities.
  Skills: hide & sneak, trade
  Pick pocket** (lower class)
  As a young child you were a runaway, and before 
  long you fell in with a ‘swell-gang’ of pick-
  pockets. Your childhood was spent learning how 
  to pick pockets undetected, and running amok 
  through the city streets.
  Skills: pick pocket, dodge!
  Personal tutor (upper class)**
  Your education was facilitated by a series of 
  private tutors in the seclusion and comfort of 
  the ancestral home; this is a favoured form 
  of education for young ladies of the 
  upper class, as it allowed education 
  and control.
  Skills: literacy, education, speciality: 
  classical literature, speciality: history, 
  etiquette
  Public school (upper class)
  Contrary to the name, public schools 
  are very privately funded and 
  
  108
  Characters
  exist purely to educate the future masters of the 
  empire. The educational facilities are the great-
  est, the discipline is firm, and luxury is standard. 
  Senior students, for example are allowed servants 
  to tend their needs.
  Skills: literacy, education, athletics, speciality: 
  classical literature, speciality: history 
  Stage hand** (lower class)
  Your childhood was spent in the theatre assist-
  ing with set changes, message running, and line 
  prompting, and even dressing the actors on some 
  occasions. 
  Skills: fashion, literacy, act
  Workhouse poor** (lower class)
  Your family was so poor that they were cast into 
  the union workhouses to pay for their 
  debts. Your childhood was spent in dark, 
  cramped prison like conditions while you 
  were worked to the bone to pay for your 
  parents poverty.
  Skills: dodge! Bull!
  PAST CAREER
  Adventuress (upper class)**
  The adventuress is a lucky lady. She has 
  sought danger and excitement, travelled 
  extensively and formed graphic views 
  on the world, its cultures and politics. 
  Normally this would be considered dis-
  graceful behaviour for a young woman, 
  but the adventuress; through luck, politi-
  cal skill, and determination - has man-
  aged to maintain her social place and 
  lead her own life. Her pastimes and anec-
  dotes make her exotic to the minds of 
  society and thus suitors often pursue her.
  Skills: bull!, conceal item, pistol shoot-
  ing, etiquette, sneak, education, charm, 
  horse riding.
  Army officer (upper or middle class)
  It is tradition for the second son of 
  titled families to be bought a commis-
  sion in one of her majesty’s regiments. 
  Your rank is bought and does not reflect 
  military experience. You should select 
  a suitably pretentious and long winded 
  regimental title such as ‘her majesty’s 23rd royal 
  hussars’. Most of your time is spent womanising 
  rather than fighting, a spell in a real war would be 
  quite a shock.
  Skills: linguistics, military tactics, horse riding, 
  swordplay, seduction, bull!, pistol shooting, gam-
  bling
  Artisan (middle or lower class)**
  You are an artist of some sort. It could be that 
  you are a successful violinist, a music hall singer, 
  an actor, a painter or poet. Whichever art it is, 
  you live from the donations of patrons so that 
  they might further enjoy your works. Regrettably 
  living at the whims of the arts is often lacking in 
  pay.
  
  109
  Characters
  Skills: art (?), art (?), etiquette, charm, linguistics, 
  general knowledge, act, literacy, bull!
  Beggar (lower class)**
  As a professional beggar you devote your life to 
  ensnaring money from passers by. Think up the 
  ways (real wounds or false) by which you sepa-
  rate people from their cash. You probably have 
  contacts in organised crime (if you don’t do what 
  they say, they’ll beat you up).
  Skills: conceal item, hide & sneak, bull!, 
  pick lock, act, streetwise
  Bodyguard (lower class)
  You contract to defend those under 
  threat in return for pay. You’ve finished 
  your latest job and you’re look-
  ing for employment. You toler-
  ate people, and academics but 
  basically you’re a physically 
  minded person.
  Skills: brawl, swordplay, 
  pistol shooting, scrutinise, 
  scan, athletics, Human per-
  ception
  Bounty hunter (lower or 
  middle class)
  The world may seem 
  civilised, but you 
  live underneath 
  that veneer, chas-
  ing after the most 
  dangerous crimi-
  nals, monsters and 
  rogues. Somebody 
  has to keep the land 
  clean until the police 
  get their act together.
  Skills: brawl, pistol shooting, 
  legal knowledge, tracking, 
  evaluation, law, Human 
  perception
  Businessman (middle class)
  You make a living from 
  accounts and agents; documents flow through 
  your fat account books, and you don’t really need 
  to travel. Mostly you sit in your warm office and 
  drink scotch.
  Skills: business protocol, appraisal, Human per-
  ception, accounting, etiquette, legal matters, lit-
  eracy
  Extra money: your character starts with an addi-
  tional £500 in liquidated assets from a recent 
  business venture.
  Cabby/coachman (lower class)
  You are a coach driver; typically you work 
  for a coach hire or cab firm and simply 
  drive their vehicles. Maybe one day 
  you will have your own han-
  som cab and horse team. For 
  now at least, ultimately you 
  often have little money for 
  yourself, but it’s an honest 
  living. 
  Skills: perception, drive 
  carriage, navigate, eti-
  quette, horse riding, 
  and brawl.
  Clergyman (middle class)
  A lay priest, you have 
  been invested with the 
  ability to perform the 
  rituals of the faith. Perhaps 
  one day your devotion will 
  be noticed and you will be 
  assigned a parish of your 
  own to guide and protect.
  Skills: oratory, empathy, 
  speciality: bible study, edu-
  cation, literacy
  Clerk (middle class)**
  An administrative work-
  er, all day you file, 
  cross-reference, and 
  type letters. Not the 
  most thrilling 
  
  110
  Characters
  career, but if you stick at it long enough you may 
  be offered an assignment and promotion.
  Skills-. Business protocol, accounting, speciality: 
  speed typing, Human perception, legal matters, 
  literacy
  Costermonger (lower class)**
  You are a street vendor, you own a small cart or 
  stand from which you sell your wares, the mar-
  gins are low and it takes long days to pay for 
  even a modest rent.
  Skills: trade (custom skill), oratory, trust, empa-
  thy, navigation, literacy
  Detective (middle class)
  The police are still a new introduction in 
  England, and the idea of plain-clothes detectives 
  is scandalous. Just like their street patrolling 
  counterparts, corruption is commonplace and 
  investigations are rarely anything near thorough. 
  Quick results are valued higher than prolonged 
  investigations.
  Skills: brawl, pistol shooting, oratory, legal 
  matters, Human perception, literacy, research
  Dockhand (lower class)
  You make your living loading and unload-
  ing ships in the docks, the work itself isn’t 
  exactly riveting, but you (or your peers) can 
  make tidy sidelines from ‘misplacing’ some 
  of the cargo for river pirates and smugglers 
  to pick up later on.
  Skills: perception, small boat pilot, athlet-
  ics, appraisal, improvised weapons, brawl, 
  dodge!
  Engineer (middle class)
  An inventor and tinkerer, many institutions 
  pay highly for your skills and improvisational 
  talent.
  Skills: science, speciality: military engineer-
  ing, civil engineer, ad-hoc repairs, speciality: 
  steam engine. Speciality: clockwork motors, 
  photography
  Factory worker (lower class)**
  You heard that there was plenty of work in 
  the cities, so you came. Little did you know what 
  the conditions would be. You work in a deafening 
  and filthy factory, where you actually come close 
  to death as a result of the machinery around you a 
  couple of times a week. You work 10 hour shifts 
  every day for pittance and when you can’t meet 
  the rent (most weeks) you have to sleep on the 
  factory floor. 
  Skills: dodge!, ad-hoc repair, improvised weapons
  Footpad (lower class)
  The common criminal, your kind is two a penny 
  in any city. You make your living by mugging, 
  theft, pimping and a thousand other evils.
  Skills: brawl, hacking & bashing, sneak & hide, 
  appraisal, improvised weapons.
  Gambler (lower or middle class)
  You can’t help it! At the first sight of a pack of 
  cards you go weak at the knees. Unfortunately 
  your winning streak didn’t hold out and you’re 
  pretty broke at the moment - but not to worry 
  you’ll soon win it all back!
  
  111
  Characters
  Skills: etiquette, sleight of hand, bull!, scrutinise, 
  appraisal, seduction.
  Governor/ess (lower or middle class)**
  Someone has to teach the children of England’s 
  rich how to read, write and act in society, and that 
  someone is you. You usually teach privately to 
  children aged 4-14, for a wage and accommoda-
  tion.
  Skills: speciality: the natural world, teaching, 
  medicine, oratory, linguistics, education, art 
  (painting), And literacy
  Guild associate (upper or middle class)**
  A doctor of thaumaturgy, you always 
  had your head in a book while 
  growing up. After years of pes-
  tering your parents they agreed 
  to pay for your guild education 
  at one of the great universities, 
  perhaps even Cambridge.. Under 
  the watchful eyes of the guild your 
  magical talents have blossomed. 
  You are fully aware of the guild’s 
  duty to seek and quash the vile 
  arts of necromancy and demon-
  ology - but sometimes you 
  wonder what it would be like 
  to wield such power...
  Note: if you want to play 
  a Thaumaturge, you must 
  remember to spend option points 
  on magical ability from the talents 
  section of the next stage, option 
  points.
  Skills: thaumaturgy, science, lin-
  guistics, occult lore, astrological 
  lore, concentration.
  Highwayman (lower class)
  Although the arrival of the train has 
  taken a lot of trade off the roads, 
  there is still enough coach and car-
  riage traffic for a skilled bandit such 
  as you to ply a living.
  Skills: pistol shooting, swordplay, 
  horse riding, drive carriage, 
  impress, bull!, improvised 
  weapon, athletics
  Journalist (middle class)
  The power of the press is starting to flex its 
  muscles, and you are always looking for the lat-
  est news, gossip or scandal to sell your agency’s 
  newssheet. It’s a competitive business so you and 
  your colleagues need to supply the stories for 
  several editions a day.
  Skills: empathy, literacy, bull!, photography, art: 
  creative fiction (custom skill), charm & impress.
  Itinerant peddler (lower class)
  You are an opportunist of the first order. Many 
  people scorn you and despise your ways call-
  ing you a thief, tinker, gypsy or vagabond 
  - most of them are right. Someday you will 
  have made enough money to settle down and 
  enjoy a quiet life without dodging the police. 
  For now you are out on the road travelling 
  from village to village liberating and redis-
  tributing the wealth.
  Skills: drive carriage, bull!, con-
  ceal item, sleight of hand, act, trust 
  (custom skill), navigate
  Itinerant entertainer (lower class)
  You are one of a dying breed, the 
  travelling showman. To many 
  of the villages and small towns 
  that you visit with your act you 
  are the only person that they know 
  who has seen farther than the val-
  ley. Someday you will have made 
  enough money to settle down and 
  enjoy a quiet life. For now you are 
  out on the road travelling from vil-
  lage to town to village entertaining 
  the working peoples as best you can.
  Skills: drive carriage, bull!, act, art 
  (play flute), impress
  Medium (middle class)**
  You make a living by organising 
  séances for those with an interest in 
  the uncanny, admittedly 
  your séances are 
  merely acted out, 
  but you do have 
  
  112
  Characters
  some knowledge of the unknown.
  Skills: etiquette, occult lore, acting, fashion sense, 
  bull!, astrological lore, sleight of hand, literacy
  Note: if you want to play a true medium rather 
  than a charlatan, you must remember to spend 
  option points on at least one medium ability 
  from the talents section of the next stage, option 
  points.
  Navvy (lower class)
  Navvies are the labour force for the huge engi-
  neering projects of the empire, trained in the use 
  of demolition equipment and railroad building, 
  which is where they are most commonly found. 
  Railway construction ‘navvy gangs’ possess 
  highly prized skills in the rising world of 
  railway construction and are rarely out of 
  work. Navvies have a great reputation for 
  drunkenness, disrespect, violence and 
  lewdness.
  Skills: blacksmith, demolitions, 
  brawl, improvised weapon, 
  navigation, athletics, civil 
  engineer
  Orderly (lower class)
  You are a military butler, 
  you tend to the every need 
  of the officer that you serve. 
  As friend, aide and ‘batman.’ 
  at the moment you are in your 
  home nation either with your 
  master at his home, maybe he died 
  in combat and you have made your 
  own arrangements, maybe you (or 
  he) were dismissed dishonourably 
  – why?
  Skills: etiquette. Brawl, pistol shoot-
  ing, improvised weapon, trust (cus-
  tom skill), and drive carriage.
  Petty conjurer (lower class)**
  You are a magic user, but not an aca-
  demic of the guild. Rather, 
  you are one of those the 
  guild would suppress. All 
  the abilities you already 
  know are completely self-taught. You are capable 
  of learning spells from journals, but simply have 
  not had access to any yet. You often find it to 
  your advantage not to make your expertise public 
  it often causes mistrust. 
  Skills: enchanting, Human perception, hide, 
  brawl, occult lore.
  Note: if you want to play a ‘petty mage’, you 
  must remember to spend option points on magical 
  ability from the talents section of the next stage, 
  option points.
  Physician (middle class)
  Trained in the science of medicine, you are one 
  of the few who are adept in this still 
  young field. Fortunately for you the 
  fees for expert medical attention 
  are not cheap, whether 
  you are a private doc-
  tor or working at a 
  hostel for the less 
  fortunate.
  Skills: medi-
  cine. Science, 
  Human per-
  ception, art 
  (stitching), 
  bedside manner (Aka bull!), 
  pharmacy.
  Pick pocket (lower class)**
  You make your living by steal-
  ing from others, often in 
  broad daylight. The bustling 
  shopping districts are your 
  favourite haunts where you 
  can take rich pickings from 
  the quality as they walk 
  from shop to shop. Make 
  no mistakes, your trade is 
  not a crime, it is an art and 
  you an artist trained from an 
  early age.
  Skills: pick pocket, hide & 
  sneak, athletics, appraisal, 
  and sleight of hand
  
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  Characters
  Prize-fighter (lower class)
  A modern gladiator, your sport of bare-knuckle 
  lighting is becoming illegal in many areas but is 
  still highly popular.
  Skills: brawl, improvised weapon, athletics, 
  intimidate, impress
  Poacher (lower class)
  You prowl forests in search of the local lord’s 
  deer, pheasants and other prey. You have to be 
  careful and quiet to avoid the gamekeeper. You 
  see townsmen as foolish loudmouths. You’re also 
  a wanderer, and innately curious about anything 
  new in your area.
  Skills: athletics, sneak, tracker & scout, rifle 
  marksmanship, archery, perception
  Policeman (lower class)
  The police are still a new introduction in 
  England, more often than not these officers of the 
  law act just as brutish as the criminals during an 
  investigation. Corruption is commonplace and 
  investigations are rarely anything near thorough. 
  Are you a beat bobby, or a river police officer 
  solely investigating pirates?
  Skills: brawl, hacking & bashing, oratory, drive 
  carriage, legal matters, Human perception, lit-
  eracy
  Prostitute (lower class)**
  You ply the oldest trade, your body. Trying to 
  survive on your own is difficult in the cities of 
  England money goes fast. Fortunately you can 
  usually earn enough for each night as it comes. 
  The selling price for flesh in the slums can be 
  as little as 6d for an evening. Much of the small 
  wealth that you gain is lifted from one pocket as 
  they pay out of the other. If your presence 
  is 4 or higher then you can have risen 
  out of the slums and own your own 
  flat to receive your ‘gentleman 
  callers’. With a fixed address it is 
  unlikely that you indulge in petty 
  theft, replace the skills scrutinise 
  and pick pocket with seduction and 
  etiquette. A male prostitute is a rarity in 
  comparison to his female counterpart, but he 
  does exist. Victorian society simply can-
  not deal with the issues of homosexual-
  ity, society refuses to acknowledge its 
  existence.
  Skills: bull!, pick pocket, impress, con-
  ceal item, scrutinise.
  Revolutionary (lower or middle class)**
  You are a politician, a rabble-rouser, 
  a mob leader, no doubt at some 
  time you have been called all of the 
  derogatory names that society uses. 
  One thing that you have always been is 
  a man of faith and conviction. It is time 
  for change, and you could cause that 
  change.
  Skills: conceal item, brawl, oratory, 
  demolitions, speciality: revolution-
  
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  Characters
  ary literature, bull!, pistol shooting, literacy
  River pirate (lower class)
  You make your living by looting and pillaging 
  shipping along the coasts and rivers. In cities 
  such as London your kind is a plague to com-
  merce. You and your peers have connections 
  among the dockhands who tell you about choice 
  targets in return for a cut of the take.
  Skills: perception, small boat pilot, athlet-
  ics, appraisal, improvised weapons, brawl, 
  dodge! Pistol shooting, swordplay.
  Seaman (lower class)
  A sea faring man born and bred. You 
  make up the crew of the clippers that link 
  the nations of the world in trade. Most of 
  your adult life has been spent on the high 
  seas, sailing to exotic ports across the 
  empire. Maybe you are an officer (petty 
  officer/1st mate/ quartermaster) on your 
  ship. 
  Skills: athletics, brawl, small boat 
  pilot, sea captain, and navigation.
  Servant (lower class)**
  Practically all upper and middle 
  class households keep at least one 
  servant in retainer, depending on 
  age you could be anything from 
  maid to cook. If you have an 
  intellect of 3 or more then you 
  could be a butler or housekeeper.
  Skills: bull! Conceal item. 
  Etiquette, listen, if you are a but-
  ler or housekeeper, then you also 
  receive the skill ‘stiff upper lip’ 
  (Aka trust, a custom skill).
  Shopkeeper (lower or middle class)**
  As a shopkeeper you trade with the 
  public on a daily basis, you prob-
  ably rent your shop and live above 
  it. What did you sell in your shop? 
  Curiosities? Books? Food? Shoes or 
  clothes? Rags & iron?
  Skills: trade (custom skill), business 
  protocol, bull!, accountancy, spe-
  ciality: (choose subject connected to shop goods)
  Smuggler (lower class)**
  There is a lot of business for those with your 
  skills most things are legal in England but still 
  nobody likes to pay taxes on their cigars, spirits, 
  etc. If it sells, then you provide. Some smugglers 
  even sell slaves, despite its illegality a surprising 
  number of young boys and girls arrive on 
  and leave European shores as slaves.
  Skills: small boat pilot, pistol shoot-
  ing, brawl. Navigate, hide & sneak, 
  athletics, business protocol. 
  Appraisal.
  Socialite (upper class)**
  You are one of the fashionable set. A 
  wallflower or swell. Your days are 
  spent in gentlemen’s clubs, afternoon 
  teas, croquet or tennis matches. Your 
  evenings are spent at dances, dinner 
  parties, operas, the theatre anywhere 
  it is presently the right place to be 
  seen.
  Bull!, etiquette, drive carriage, horse 
  riding, swordplay, seduction, and spe-
  ciality: croquet rules. Fashion, dance
  Soldier (lower class)
  You are or are a soldier in one of her 
  majesties’ regimental orders. You 
  probably fought in the first Boer 
  rebellions or in the conquest of 
  India and Africa. If you are still in 
  the army then you could be shipped 
  to the Crimea any day to meet your 
  death at the hands of the Russian 
  armies.
  Skills: rifle marksmanship, sword-
  play, brawl, athletics, linguistics, 
  dodge!
  Student (upper or middle class)
  You study at one of Europe’s uni-
  versities; this is because you are 
  very intelligent or because your 
  family 
  wish you 
  are 
  
  115
  Characters
  and want you out of the way.
  Skills: linguistics. Classical literature (custom 
  skill), science. education, Bull!
  Thief (upper or middle class)**
  You lead a secret life, dilettante by day and by 
  night you steal from others, for others, a mysteri-
  ous thief for hire. Usually hired with a high fee, 
  you are educated and cultured, and plunder for 
  thrills rather than pure profit, making you very 
  different from the common & opportunistic foot-
  pad of the slums. 
  Skills: bull! Athletics, seduction, sneak, pick lock, 
  scrutinise, swordplay, dodge!, literacy
  Tosher (lower class)
  The sewers beneath the cities of Europe are 
  vast sprawling affairs, invariably infested with 
  rodents. Armed with knife, nets and possibly a 
  faithful Tosher-hound, it is your job to ensure that 
  the aforementioned rodents do not overrun the 
  city. Not an easy or pleasant job, and to top it all 
  the interesting and provocative aroma that you 
  carry with you has often been the downfall of an 
  otherwise perfect evening.
  Skills: brawl, tracker & scout (sewers only), 
  swordplay. Perception, navigation
  Woodsman (lower class)
  You live a reclusive life by trade and choice, 
  often the subject of bogie-man tales from the 
  local villagers. You have become indifferent to 
  the thoughts and notions of others, retreating 
  instead further into the woods, back into the arms 
  of nature to discover more of her secrets.
  Skills: tracker & scout, medicine (natural rem-
  edies), swordplay, athletics, sneak
  
  116
  Characters
  Creating your own experience 
  package
  It may well be that the examples pro-
  vided don’t quite fit with the way you 
  envisage your character, well you can 
  design your own past experience pack-
  age.
  Simply choose up to 10 skills from the 
  ‘skills divided by class’ table that you 
  can explain your character has gained 
  from childhood and past careers - jus-
  tify them to the gamesmaster and the 
  group.
  Spend 30 points among those skills.
  Easy!
  Accounting* (intellect) 
  Act (presence)
  Appraisal (intellect) 
  Archery* (dexterity) 
  Art (specify) (presence) 
  Athletics (dexterity) 
  Brawl (dexterity) 
  Bribery (presence) 
  Bull! (presence) 
  Bureaucracy* (presence) 
  Business protocol* (intellect) 
  Charm (presence) 
  Conceal item (intellect) 
  Concentration* (resolution) 
  Conversation (presence) 
  Dance (dexterity) 
  Deduction* (intellect) 
  Disguise (intellect) 
  Dodge! (dexterity) 
  Drive carriage (intellect) 
  Education (intellect) 
  Etiquette (intellect) 
  Fashion (presence) 
  First aid (intellect) 
  Gambling (intellect) 
  Hacking & bashing (dexterity) 
  Hide & sneak (dexterity) 
  High society (intellect) 
  Horse riding (intellect) 
  Human perception (presence) 
  Impress (presence) 
  Interrogation* (presence) 
  Intimidate (presence) 
  Language* (intellect)
  Legal matters* (intellect) 
  Linguistics (intellect) 
  Lip reading (intellect) 
  Literacy (intellect) 
  Local expert (intellect) 
  Navigation* (intellect) 
  Occult lore* (intellect) 
  Oratory (presence) 
  Perception (intellect)
  Photography (intellect) 
  Pistol shooting (dexterity) 
  Research (intellect) 
  Rifle marksman (dexterity) 
  Scrutinise (intellect) 
  Sea captain* (intellect)
  Seduction (presence) 
  Sleight of hand* (dexterity) 
  Small boat pilot (intellect) 
  Speciality* (intellect) 
  Swordplay (dexterity) 
  Tactics* (intellect) 
  Teaching (presence) 
  Thaumaturgy* (resolution) 
  Custom Skill List - Upper class
  Accounting* (intellect) 
  Act (presence)
  Ad hoc repair* (intellect) 
  Appraisal (intellect) 
  Art (specify) (presence) 
  Athletics (dexterity) 
  Blacksmith* (intellect) 
  Brawl (dexterity) 
  Bribery (presence) 
  Bull! (presence) 
  Bureaucracy* (presence) 
  Business protocol* (intellect) 
  Charm (presence) 
  Civil engineer* (intellect) 
  Conceal item (intellect) 
  Concentration* (resolution) 
  Conversation (presence) 
  Criminology* (intellect) 
  Cryptography* (intellect) 
  Dance (dexterity) 
  Deduction* (intellect) 
  Demolition* (intellect)
  Disguise (intellect) 
  Dodge! (dexterity) 
  Drive carriage (intellect) 
  Education (intellect) 
  Etiquette (intellect) 
  First aid (intellect) 
  Forensic medicine* (intellect) 
  Forgery* (intellect) 
  Gambling (intellect) 
  Hacking & bashing (dexterity) 
  Custom Skill List - Middle class
  
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  Characters
  Acrobatics* (dexterity) 
  Act (presence)
  Ad hoc repair* (intellect) 
  Animal handler* (intellect) 
  Appraisal (intellect) 
  Art (specify) (presence) 
  Athletics (dexterity) 
  Blacksmith* (intellect) 
  Brawl (dexterity) 
  Bribery (presence) 
  Bull! (presence) 
  Charm (presence) 
  Conceal item (intellect) 
  Contortionist* (dexterity) 
  Dance (dexterity) 
  Disguise (intellect) 
  Dodge! (dexterity) 
  Drive carriage (intellect) 
  Enchanting* (resolution) 
  Etiquette (intellect) 
  Fashion (presence) 
  First aid (intellect) 
  Forgery* (intellect) 
  Gambling (intellect) 
  Hacking & bashing (dexterity) 
  Hide & sneak (dexterity) 
  Horse riding (intellect) 
  Human perception (presence) 
  Impress (presence) 
  Improvised weapon (dexterity) 
  Interrogation* (presence) 
  Intimidate (presence) 
  Linguistics (intellect) 
  Lip reading (intellect) 
  Literacy (intellect) 
  Local expert (intellect) 
  Mimicry* (presence) 
  Navigation* (intellect) 
  Oratory (presence) 
  Perception (intellect)
  Pharmacy* (intellect) 
  Pick locks* (intellect) 
  Pick pockets* (dexterity) 
  Pistol shooting (dexterity) 
  Research (intellect) 
  Rifle marksman (dexterity) 
  Scrutinise (intellect) 
  Seduction (presence) 
  Small boat pilot (intellect) 
  Speciality* (intellect) 
  Streetwise (presence) 
  Survival* (intellect) 
  Swordplay (dexterity) 
  Teaching (presence) 
  Throwing (dexterity) 
  Tracker & scout* (intellect) 
  Ventriloquist* (presence) 
  Weapon smith* (intellect)
  Custom Skill List - Lower class
  Hide & sneak (dexterity) 
  High society (intellect) 
  Horse riding (intellect) 
  Human perception (presence) 
  Impress (presence) 
  Interrogation* (presence) 
  Intimidate (presence) 
  Inventor* (intellect) 
  Language* (intellect)
  Legal matters* (intellect) 
  Linguistics (intellect) 
  Lip reading (intellect) 
  Literacy (intellect) 
  Local expert (intellect) 
  Medicine* (intellect) 
  Military engineer* (intellect) 
  Navigation* (intellect) 
  Occult lore* (intellect) 
  Oratory (presence) 
  Perception (intellect)
  Pharmacy* (intellect) 
  Photography (intellect) 
  Pistol shooting (dexterity) 
  Research (intellect) 
  Rifle marksman (dexterity) 
  Science* (intellect) 
  Scrutinise (intellect) 
  Sea captain* (intellect)
  Seduction (presence) 
  Sleight of hand* (dexterity) 
  Small boat pilot (intellect) 
  Speciality* (intellect) 
  Streetwise (presence) 
  Survival (intellect) 
  Swordplay (dexterity) 
  Tactics* (intellect) 
  Teaching (presence) 
  Thaumaturgy* (resolution) 
  Throwing (dexterity) 
  Weapon smith* (intellect)
  
  118
  Characters
  OPTION POINTS
  The final steps in creating your character are now 
  ahead!
   
  Option points are a way of raising skill 
  scores that you didn’t have the points 
  to raise as much as you wanted earlier, 
  or even buying new skills to represent 
  your characters hobbies, or personal 
  studies in evenings or weekends.
   Talents can be bought with option 
  points; talents are knacks or special 
  abilities that your character knows.
   Perks & privileges can be bought to 
  represent your characters standing and 
  status in the world around him. 
   Option points can be spent to buy 
  property and assets to begin the game 
  with. These things will still require 
  money to maintain, but their purchase 
  within game time can be incredibly 
  expensive.
   You can buy raises to your derived 
  characteristics.
   You can buy contacts, who represent 
  peers and colleagues, or who maybe 
  owe you favours
   If you want a magic using character or 
  medium you can only buy those abili-
  ties with option points.
   After character creation, remaining 
  option points can be converted to 
  money at a £1 to 1 option point basis
   If you are running out of option points, 
  you can garner some more by taking on 
  board some complications
  Raising & buying skills
  You can spend option points to buy additional 
  skills on a one for one basis. You can also use 
  option points to raise existing skill scores, even 
  beyond six.
  These skill purchases represent evenings and 
  weekends spent pursuing the skill in question, 
  only by applying such dedication can skills leap 
  from professional to legendary proficiency.
  Raising derived characteristics
  It is possible to increase the value of a derived 
  stat beyond its starting value. The chart shows 
  what you get for each 5 option points spent. 
   + 2 resolve
   + 1 running speed
   + 1 fortitude
   + 1 constitution 
   + 4 health on the stun track 
   + 2 health on the lethal track
  Talents
  Talents are an innate ability that cannot normally 
  be learned or taught, such as a bump of direction 
  or the ability to see in the dark. The list of talents 
  below is a general one, gamesmaster’s may be 
  creative in adding more to the list. Each one of 
  these talents costs 3 option points each. 
  The ability to use magic or medium abilities is 
  included here in the talents section, without the 
  appropriate talent a character cannot use magic 
  and any related skills simply relate to study of 
  the phenomena rather than its use. A character 
  may choose ‘medium’ talents several times, and 
  in conjunction with thaumaturgy or conjuring. 
  However, ‘thaumaturgy’ and ‘petty conjuror’ do 
  not mix, mo character can start play with both of 
  these talents – they are mutually exclusive. 
  It is possible to purchase a magical talent and 
  none of the skills associated with it, this would 
  represent an unknown and previously untapped 
  talent that could then be discovered and explored 
  in game play.
   Perks & privileges
  Perks are useful items, privileges, or contacts 
  a character has access to in a campaign. Perks 
  can be special licenses or symbols of authority, 
  friends, favours or fringe benefits accruing from a 
  profession. They are purchased with option points 
  just like a talent but the cost can vary as dictated 
  below.
  
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  Characters
  Contacts & favours
  Everybody has at least some friends, and the 
  same is true in Victoriana. Contacts are friends, 
  colleagues or social acquaintances that you can 
  turn to for information or aid when stuck. A con-
  tact might lend you small amounts of money, 
  give you shelter, share information that will aid 
  you. Aid from a contact is a two-way thing, they 
  are people with agendas, priorities and a living to 
  make as well and they might just as easily call in 
  favours from you. When choosing contacts think 
  about how your character met them, and what 
  makes them friends. 
  Every character starts the game with their 
  presence score in contacts, additional con-
  tacts can be bought with option points. Due 
  to the lack of social mobility in Victorian 
  society the contacts you can choose are 
  dictated by social class, choosing contacts 
  from your own class costs one point per 
  contact, but the cost of contacts in different 
  social layers rises swiftly.
   Favours are a cheaper alternative to full 
  contacts, but favours are a ‘one shot’ 
  option; you can make use of the contact 
  only once, but they must do what you ask 
  (as long as its appropriate). You should 
  think about what indebts this person to 
  you – did you save their life? Or are you 
  blackmailing them? If you choose to take 
  a contact as owing you a favour only, the 
  cost for the contact is halved.
  119
  
  120
  Characters
   Talent name 
  Description
   Acute senses: 
   One of your five senses (sight, sound, smell, touch, taste) is extremely acute. If 
  the sense is touch, you can read print with your fingertips, feel tumblers mov-
  ing in a lock, and determine subtle differences in materials by feel. If the sense 
  is smell, you can instantly detect people or substances by scent alone and can 
  track them like a bloodhound. If the sense is sight, you automatically gain a + 1 
  bonus in all sight related perception checks, and treat all ranged attack modifiers 
  as being 2 points less than normal. If the sense is taste, you can perceive subtle 
  additions to food and detect harmful substances with the barest taste.
   Ambidexterity: 
   You can use tools and weapons with either hand at no penalty (normally -3 for 
  using off-hand).
   Animal empathy:  Animals like you; they will never harm or attack you unless severely provoked. 
  You always seem to attract whatever animals are common to the area, and they 
  will immediately gravitate to your side, although they may not necessarily do 
  what you ask them to.
  Beautiful/ handsome: You are extremely good looking; people will automatically stop and stare at 
  you when you pass, and you are generally surrounded by admirers. In addition, 
  you automatically have a + 1 bonus to your charm & impress, act, and fash-
  ion skills.
  Blind reaction: 
   You can counterattack (in hand to hand only) with no negative modifiers for 
  darkness or being obscured (normally -4), even if you can’t see or hear your 
  opponent.
  Combat sense: 
   Your reflexes are keyed for danger; you automatically react faster to danger than 
  anyone else; when rolling initiative, you roll 3 dice and keep the 2 highest.
  Common sense: 
   You always look before you leap; the gamesmaster must give you warning 
  whenever you’re about to do something particularly foolish, even if there are no 
  perceptible clues present. He doesn’t have to specify the danger, just that “this 
  might not be a smart idea...”
  Direction sense: 
   You are never lost; always know where north is and can orient yourself easily 
  without any external cues.
  Double jointed: 
   You can bend your limbs and joints in impossible ways. You can fit into any 
  space equal to half your height and width and it is impossible to tie you up or 
  entangle you with a single rope; you can only be restrained using restraints like 
  cuffs, shackles, or nets.
  Eidetic memory: 
   You never forget anything you have read, seen, heard, smelled, or touched.
  Faith:                       You have a genuine link to a guardian angel in the celestial heavens and you 
  can channel their power to perform miracles via the faith skill. See the magic & 
  mediums section for more. Note that all faiths have their own guardian angels.
  TALENTS
  
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  Characters
  Talent name 
  Description
  High pain threshold: You are especially resistant to pain and shock. When wounded, you will 
  reduce the amount of stun taken by 2 points each time and the effects of 
  impairing wounds by –2.
  Immunity: 
   You are immune to the effects of one specific poison or disease group (must 
  specify).
  Intuition: 
   You have an uncanny feel for hunches; the gamesmaster will give you a 
  chance to make a perception roll whenever he thinks you might get a hunch, 
  even if there are no perceptible clues present.
  Light sleeper: 
   You wake instantly from even the lightest touch or smallest sound (no per-
  ception check required).
  Lightning calculator: You can automatically do calculus in your head without using any aids.
  Medium:Channeler You have a genuine link to other planes and you can communicate beyond the 
  earthly plane via the channelling medium skill. See the magic & mediums 
  section for more.
  Medium:sensate 
   You have a genuine link to other planes and this link expands your mortal 
  senses via the sensate medium skill. See the magic & mediums section for 
  more. 
  Night vision: 
  You can see in all but absolute darkness.
  Perfect pitch: 
   You always know if something’s in tune, and automatically gain a + 3 bonus 
  in any musically related task (singing, playing instruments, etc).
  Petty conjuror:  
   You posses the ability to perform enchantments and you might even com-
  mand the embodiments of nature. You should review the magic & mediums 
  section for details of how to purchase some starting enchantments with your 
  option points.
  Rapid healing: 
   You heal extremely fast, recovering an extra 3 hits per time unit in addition to 
  your normal healing rate.
  Simulate death: 
   You can lower your heart rate and breathing to such a low level that it is 
  extremely difficult to tell whether you are dead or not.
  Speed reader: 
   You can read one page of any normal text that you are familiar with in three 
  seconds (you can read a 200 page book in 10 minutes).
  Thaumaturge: 
   You posses the ability to alter reality itself through the control of sorcery. You 
  should review the magic & mediums section for details of how to purchase 
  some starting spells with your option points.
  Time sense: 
   You always know what time it is, always know how much time has elapsed 
  between the present and the last time you checked.
  
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  Characters
  PERKS & PRIVILEGES
  Perk name, (Class & Cost),  description
   Private club membership (upper/middle, 3) You 
  are a member of a gentleman’s club. You have the 
  right to utilise the clubs bar, smoke and games 
  rooms, saunas, overnight rooms, and most impor-
  tantly you have access to the opinions and advice of 
  other club members. Clubs are fiercely proud of the 
  reputations and standing, and will not tolerate mem-
  bers who might lower that reputation.
  Private club membership -elite (upper, 5) You are 
  not only a member of a gentleman’s club, but you 
  are one of the highly regarded elite within the club. 
  You have all the rights of ‘club membership’ above, 
  and in addition you have the power to black ball 
  or approve other members in a vote with the other 
  elite of the club. Other members frequently attempt 
  to gain your favour in order to rise within the clubs 
  social ladder.
  Pub regular (lower, 3) You are a regular habitué of 
  a public house or tavern. Your face is familiar to the 
  staff and other patrons, when needed you can get 
  limited credit for your drinking, and might find your 
  familiarity makes other patrons more conducive to 
  talk or deal with you.
  Pub regular-landlord’s mate (lower, 5) Not only 
  are you a regular in a public house, but also you are 
  good friends with the landlord. When needed you 
  can ask him for the use of a room above the pub to 
  stay in (for short periods). Although sometimes your 
  assistance is required with the removal of unwanted 
  custom.
  Union member (middle/lower, 3) Most profes-
  sions have a ‘union’, for a modest subscription these 
  organisations can advise of the location of new work 
  contracts to bid for and offer some small support in 
  times of unemployment. 
  Public carriage license (middle/lower, 3) You have 
  a license from the civic authorities to offer trans-
  portation in your carriage in return for pay in accor-
  dance with city guidelines. The cab drivers union 
  drives non-license holders out of business swiftly.
  Perk name, (Class & Cost),  description
  Medical practitioners license (middle, 3) You are 
  a registered doctor, and as such can legally dispense 
  medical advice, and occasionally might even be 
  called upon by the hospitals or authorities of the area 
  for your professional opinions.
  Warrant card (middle/lower, 3) You hold a ‘mag-
  istrates warrant’, which entitles you to pursue, and 
  detain criminals in exchange for pay. Although the 
  police technically deal with urban crime, most rural 
  areas still depend upon ‘bounty hunters’ such as you 
  to police their citizenry.
  Theatre box  (upper/middle, 1) You are a regular 
  attendee at a specific theatre or playhouse, and as 
  such have a subscription to a private box which you 
  can attend to view any ongoing production. 
  Thaumaturgical doctorate (upper/middle, 3) You 
  are registered with and licensed by the guild, to be 
  a practitioner of magic. This option only covers the 
  study and use of thaumaturgy; all other uses of magic 
  are illegal, even for a license holder. As a license 
  holder you are automatically an ‘associate’ member 
  of the guild and have access to their member librar-
  ies, you also receive their newsletters and journals 
  discussing magical theory.
  Hero (any, 5) You have been recognised for courage 
  and bravery, either in military action, or in response 
  to a disaster of some kind. People may recognise 
  your name, and your reputation therefore will affect 
  their opinions of you.
  Paragon (any, 3) You are locally renowned for your 
  good sense, morals and ethics. People may recognise 
  your face or name, and your reputation therefore will 
  affect their opinions of you.
  Blackguard (any, 3) You have been recognised as 
  flaunting societies conventions, and polite society 
  is appalled by your actions - but you and the stories 
  around you nonetheless fascinate many. People may 
  recognise your name, and your reputation therefore 
  will affect their opinions of you, in the case of rebels, 
  criminals or revolutionaries the reputation is favour-
  able.
  
  123
  Characters
  PROPERTY & ASSETS
  In this section you can buy some of the larger 
  trappings of a Victorian adventurer’s life such as 
  property, transport, or livestock.
  Such items are well beyond the starting funds 
  that might be available for characters, even if you 
  turned all your option points into ready cash in 
  character creation.
  We also give you the option of buying an income. 
  This income is intended to offset the ongoing 
  costs of property and day to day life, we don’t 
  want you to get bogged down recording every 
  shilling and penny that your characters spend on 
  meals each day! 
  The incomes below reflect part time employment, 
  after all your character is going to be spending 
  significant time adventuring which isn’t condu-
  cive to full-time employment; so we’ll be gen-
  erous and assume that your character can gain 
  his income from investments (upper and middle 
  class), or from consulting contracts (middle 
  class), or from occasional labour contracts (lower 
  class) and crime.
  Incomes are listed with a petty cash figure in 
  their descriptions, this cash figure is the amount 
  of petty cash a character has available at any 
  given time during the game. Whenever a char-
  acter wants to buy something, if its cost is less 
  than your income you can have the item without 
  crossing off any money. If the purchase is more 
  than your income you must supply the difference 
  from whatever other fortunes your character has 
  amassed so far during game time.
  Social class limits the availability of property and 
  assets, a lower class character cannot start with 
  a ‘fashionable Kensington flat’, an upper class 
  character cannot start with lodgings at a ‘pad-
  ding-ken’. Even though the option points costs 
  are similar the two social classes reflect differ-
  ent worlds that will take much dedicated fortune 
  seeking (or ill fortune) to cross. We realise it isn’t 
  fair and we sympathise, but then the Victorian 
  world most defiantly isn’t fair! 
  Another point to bear in mind is that most upper 
  class assets are provided by the family, an ill-
  Cost in Presence or Option Points
  Your social class 
  Upper 
  Middle 
  Lower
  Upper 
  1 
  2 
  3
  Middle 
  2 
  1 
  2
  Lower 
  3 
  2 
  1
  Sample contacts
  CONTACTS & FAVOURS 
  Barmaid
  Beggar
  Cabby
  Charity Worker
  Costermonger
  Detective
  Dockhand
  Factory worker
  Socialite
  Footpad
  Guild lecturer
  Gutter Quack
  Gypsy
  Industrialist
  Investor
  Labourer
  Labourer, Ogre
  Lawyer
  Mudlark
  Smuggler
  Squire
  Pagan priestess
  Pagan woodsman
  Physician
  Police sergeant
  Priest
  Professor
  Prostitute
  Pub landlord
  Reclusive inventor
  Revolutionary
  Rural Squire
  Sailor
  Servant
  Soldier
  Street urchin
  
  124
  Characters
  PROPERTY & ASSETS
  Asset (class & Cost) 
  Ancestral estate (upper, 5) You live on an 
  ancestral estate, with several of your family 
  (close and extended) and a flock of servants. 
  You do live in pampered luxury, but as a pen-
  alty you have little privacy and your time and 
  pastimes are frequently accountable to oth-
  ers. The estate might be rural, and surrounded 
  by the cottages of workers on the estate, or it 
  could be an urban mansion in a private enclo-
  sure.
  Barge (any, 2) You own a river barge moored 
  locally, the barge could be used for cargo, or 
  you might live upon it – or both. Such lodgings 
  would be cramped for more than two.
  Barrow (lower, 3) You own a street barrow; a 
  common sight in streets and markets. Usually 
  hand pushed, it might be horse drawn. You 
  should decide what you sell from yours – food, 
  hot coffee, ribbons, or cloth?
  Bolt haven (any, 2) You know a secret place 
  where, by trespassing, you can shelter from 
  harm; it might be an abandoned warehouse, or 
  a dry section of sewer, or a secret entrance into 
  the loft or basement of a large building such 
  as a theatre. Regardless of the location, the 
  space is both free and hidden – but the longer 
  you spend there the more likely your refuge is 
  detected.
  Coach (any, 5) You own a coach, you can 
  use it to transport yourself, but it is more 
  likely used to convey others in return for coin. 
  Coaches require two horses (included in the 
  option points cost).
  Fashionable city flat (upper/middle, 4) You 
  own a fashionable flat in a wealthy part of a 
  Europen city. You might live there, or it might 
  be a second residence for entertaining others. 
  If you choose an allowance for an income (or 
  choose no income) then the flat is family prop-
  erty, if your income is independent then the flat 
  is truly yours.
  Fashionable city villa (upper/middle, 5) You 
  own a fashionable villa (detached house) in a 
  wealthy part of a Europen city or suburb. You 
  might live there, or it might be a second resi-
  dence for renting to others. If you choose an 
  allowance for an income (or choose no income) 
  then the villa is family property, if your income 
  is independent then the villa is truly yours.
  Asset (class & Cost) 
  Fashionable country villa (upper/middle, 5) 
  You own a fashionable villa (detached house) 
  in the country, such homes are usually quite 
  isolated and with spacious grounds. They are 
  normally used as holiday retreats, or retirement 
  homes rather than everyday residences. If you 
  choose an allowance for an income (or choose 
  no income) then the villa is family property, 
  if your income is independent then the flat is 
  truly yours.
  Frendal lizard (any, 3) Originating from India 
  Frendal lizards are a popular exotic pet for the 
  wealthy, they look like dragons of old shrunken 
  to the size of a small dog, and are intelligent 
  enough to be trained like a monkey.
  Hansom cab (any, 3) You own a cab; it is 
  used to convey others in return for coin. Cabs 
  require a horse (included in the option points 
  cost).
  Horse (any, 2) You own a horse. It could be 
  a riding horse, or a draft horse for pulling a 
  coach/cab/cart/barrow.
  Hunting dog (any, 1) You own a hunting dog. 
  Such dogs are highly trained to follow com-
  mands such as ‘sit’, ‘stay’, ‘fetch’ and ‘kill!’ 
  hunting dogs are aggressive and considered 
  very valuable.
  Independent income (upper, 5) You have 
  made your own investments and speculations 
  and as a result have an income that you can 
  call your own, rather than relying on handouts 
  from the family. Petty cash: £1
  Irregular income (lower, 1) Your trade is 
  erratic, or maybe you are just unlucky or dis-
  organised. Whatever the cause your fortunes 
  frequently fluctuate and you can never depend 
  on the contents of your purse. Petty cash: 1 to 
  6d, roll one dice to see how many pence are in 
  your pocket whenever you want to purchase 
  something.
  Meagre income (middle/lower, 3) You have 
  a regular self-generated income and you can 
  meet your regular bills but you don’t have 
  much left over for luxury! Petty cash: 6d
  
  125
  Characters
  Asset (class & Cost) 
  Padding ken lodgings (lower, 1) You live in a 
  slum lodgings house, you share a small room 
  with up to ten others, and your bed is sometimes 
  as crude as a pile of dirty straw in a corner. 
  Padding kens are havens of crime and villainy 
  and your privacy and property are never truly 
  safe in such an environment. 
  Padding ken landlord (lower, 5) You run a 
  slum tenement, it shelters the gutter poor and 
  criminals of the area in exchange for 1d a night. 
  Frequently a haven of extortion, robbery and 
  prostitution, you need to demand money upfront 
  as otherwise your clients invariably leave with-
  out paying.
  Regular allowance (middle, 3) You have a 
  regular allowance from your family patriarch – 
  typically your father or grandfather. The money 
  is yours to do as you please with in most ways, 
  but wanton waste and extravagance are not tol-
  erated. Petty cash: 10s
  Regular allowance (upper, 3) You have a regu-
  lar allowance from your family patriarch – typi-
  cally your father or grandfather. The money is 
  yours to do as you please with. Petty cash: 14s
  Regular income (middle, 5) Your trade or 
  investments provide you with a regular income 
  that you can call your own, rather than relying 
  on handouts from your family. Petty cash: 12s
  Rented court lodgings (lower, 2) In the poorest 
  sections of the city there are warrens between 
  the streets, crammed with ramshackle buildings, 
  you live in just such an area. You have a single 
  room that you call your own; sanitation is poor, 
  usually provided with a communal lavatory and 
  open wash area to provide for the whole court.
  Rented terrace house (middle/lower, 3) You 
  live in a terraced house, its small but there’s 
  enough rooms for privacy among a family and 
  your own washing amenities.
  Asset (class & Cost) 
  Respectable boarding house (middle, 3) You 
  live in a boarding house, such houses consist of 
  2-4 self contained flats governed by a communal 
  house keeper and servant staff who cook and 
  clean for all occupants at set times. Typically 
  there are only 1-2 occupants in each flat, usually 
  single professionals or young couples not yet 
  fully on the property ladder. 
  Shop (lower, 3) You own a small shop in a 
  lower class district; think about what it might 
  sell, food? Furniture? Second-hand clothes? Iron 
  & rags? Do you buy your stock from suppliers 
  or local thieves?
  Shop (middle, 5) You own a shop in a respect-
  able or perhaps even a fashionable area. Think 
  about what it might sell; maybe the latest fash-
  ions? Imported furniture? Toys and curiosities? 
  Books?
  Spacious town house (middle, 5) You own 
  a town house in a respectable area; it is large 
  enough for privacy and entertaining and even 
  has room for servants. Such houses are usually 
  terraced, but in the suburbs it might be semi-
  detached.
  Stable, rank & mews access  (any, 1) You have 
  access to a coach & cab company’s facilities and 
  drive as a cabby or coachman for them, some-
  times you can borrow a vehicle for your self 
  – for a small amount of time anyway.
  Tosher hound (any, 3)You have a faithful com-
  panion, more loyal and fierce than any man. 
  This faithful ratting terrier is never far from your 
  side, and the highly intelligent dog is a huge 
  asset in the subterranean world below the cities 
  of Europe.
  Wardrobe (upper, 1) You have an extensive 
  wardrobe of expensive, fashionable clothes to 
  suit all occasions.
  Wardrobe (middle, 1) You have a selection of 
  well-made, respectable clothes for most occa-
  sions.
  Wardrobe (lower, 1) You have a single set of 
  second hand woollen and canvas clothes and a 
  bundle of spare rags for the winter. 
  
  126
  Characters
  behaved nobleman or woman can find privileges 
  and assets cut off at the gamesmaster’s discretion, 
  whereas the lower class characters meagre assets 
  are all gained by personal toil and cannot be cur-
  tailed or snatched back by an overbearing parent.
  Pooling option points
  A group of players may pool their option points 
  to purchase a property. This ruling only applies to 
  property.
  Gear, equipment, cash
  Any option points you have left at the end of the 
  character generation process are converted into 
  money at a ratio of 1 option point to £1. You can 
  look through the commodities chapter and spend 
  some of it or keep it for use in the game.
  The choice is yours!
  Physical complications
  Complication 
  Description
  Fits 
   You fall into convulsive fits that incapacitate you. Stress related, the fits are rare, but you have 
  little warning beforehand.
  Glass jaw 
   You are vulnerable to knocks to the head, and attacks that strike you in the head do double the 
  stun damage that would normally be done by the attack. 
  Missing limb 
   You are missing a limb or extremity, it could be a war wound or the result of medical attention. 
  Missing feet or legs will halve your movement speeds.
  Partially deaf 
   You are hard of hearing. Generally, to make a hearing based perception check, you will need to 
  beat a target number 4 points higher than everyone else.
  Skin complaint 
   You suffer from rashes or epidermal infections, as a result all charm & impress difficulties are 4 
  higher than normal.
  Partial blindness 
   Your eyesight is impaired in some way, it might be an infection, or a missing eye. Regardless in 
  any sight based perception checks and ranged combat rolls, you will need to beat a target num-
  ber 4 points higher than everyone else.
  Speech impairment  Your voice is somehow damaged. When you speak, you can: only whisper, stammer or stutter.
  COMPLICATIONS
  Running out of option points? 
  One way to get more option points when creating 
  a character is to take on a few complications-
  social, mental, physical, or emotional situations/
  problems that define and enhance your character. 
  Taking complications allows you to add to your 
  characters available option points. You should 
  think about how your character came by these 
  quirks, problems or situations and spend some 
  time to link them into your character’s history. 
   
  You may only take 3 complications; 
  only one may be a mental complication.
   Your first complication gives you an 
  extra 5 option points, the second gives 
  you an extra 3 option points, the third 
  complication gives you 2 bonus points.
   Eldren are the sole exception to this in 
  that they must take a mental complica-
  tion as a racial penalty, and this does 
  not count towards the maximums stated 
  above.
  
  127
  Characters
  Mental complications
  Complication 
  Description
  Absent minded 
   You have strange lapses of memory; you often forget important things, even things that have 
  only just happened.
  Alcohol problem 
   You have a drink problem, whether its cheap gin or expensive champagne that you overindulge 
  in, overindulgence is the key. Every time you are under mental or emotional stress you should 
  roll resolution or start a drinking binge.
  Dyslexia 
   You see letters and numbers as a jumble, or reversed. The Victorian age does not recognise dys-
  lexia, and if brought up in a literate environment you might be considered mentally ‘backward’.
  Intolerant 
   You’re bigoted and intolerant of those who are different from you, even by Victorian standards. 
  You need to roll presence when encountering people from different cultures and social classes or 
  inadvertently offend them with your offensive assumptions and ignorance.
  Jealousy 
   You are jealous to the extreme. Obsessive and watchful of the one you “love”. Whenever you 
  observe them socialising you must make an intellect roll not to invent and assume the worst.
  Lecherous 
   You can’t resist grabbing or pawing someone you find attractive, or at least making lewd com-
  ments, you should make resolution rolls to resist your base urges.
  Narcissist 
   You are obsessed with your good looks, and obsessed with the steady creep of age and decay. 
  You must roll resolution to resist flattery.
  Opium addict 
   You are dependant on the ‘black smoke’ and if you do not partake on a regular basis you become 
  mentally and emotionally unstable. Every time you are under mental or emotional stress you 
  should roll resolution or hide from your problems with an obliviating pipe.
  Phobia 
   You have a phobia; an unreasoning fear of some common thing, such as dogs, heights, confined 
  spaces, sounds or colour. When faced with your phobia, you become irrational and must attempt 
  to end the exposure as soon as possible.
  Policy of truth 
   You are honest to a fault, whenever you should lie you must roll your resolution or the truth 
  comes flooding out.
  Rage! 
   You’re just irritable, all the time. When your temper flares you must make a resolution roll or 
  lose all perspective and burst into a violent outburst.
  Shy 
   You hate dealing with others and will need to make a resolution roll to overcome your nature in 
  intense social situations.
  Stubborn 
   You just hate to give in-to anyone, and when someone disagrees with you must make a resolution 
  roll or go to amazing extremes to prove you’re right.
  These are forces that are actively working against you. 
  Enemies are always more powerful than you. But you must 
  choose whether your enemy is a single powerful individual 
  with a burning hatred of you, or a group with numerous 
  members of lesser capabilities individually who simply 
  dislike you. 
  You might defeat an enemy several times, or return the 
  slights of a group bearing a grudge but such defeats typi-
  cally only serve to fuel the enmity further.
  Examples might be…
  A local crime mob
  A lone demonologist
  A revolutionary cell
  A Scotland yard detective
  A single criminal mastermind.
  A single political or religious fanatic
  The local police force
  ENEMIES
  
  128
  Characters
  Social complications
  Complication 
  Description
  Public figure 
   You are newsworthy and your activities rate an article if a reporter is nearby no matter 
  how unwelcome their intrusion.
  Bad rep 
   People “know” about you. At least, everyone in the area has heard a story or two, even 
  if untrue. When you are mentioned or seen, you are frequently recognized as a traitor 
  or untrustworthy criminal of the direst kind.
  Personal habits 
   People just can’t stand you. Maybe it’s the bad breath or the nose picking, but they fre-
  quently find you annoying.
  Foreigner 
   You’re not European, and stand out like a sore thumb, attracting attention both unwel-
  come and possibly dangerous. 
  Distinctive features  You stand out and are noticed in any crowd, attempts to disguise your striking or stun-
  ning features are more difficult by 4.
  Code of honour 
   These are the personal rules you will not break, no matter what. A code of honour 
  might be a code against killing, never attacking from behind, or never suffering an 
  insult without an answer in blood. 
  Vow 
   This is a promise you must keep, no matter what. It could be to protect someone, fol-
  low an ideal, or just get that stupid ring into that distant volcano. 
  Dependents 
   These are those who need your protection and help. They could include children, fam-
  ily, or friends. 
  Complications with property & assets
  Asset 
   description
  Annoying house mate  You share your property with a house mate, or an unwanted family guest. They 
  constantly have their nose in your business, criticise, borrow thing without asking, 
  don’t pay their way – the list of the annoyances could be endless, but for some 
  reason you’re stuck with them – why?
  Insufficient income 
   You actually don’t earn enough to meet your lifestyle. As you always have a line 
  of debts to pay 10% of all money you do gain in game time goes straight to pay-
  ing off bar tabs, and gambling debt accrued from your spendthrift lifestyle.
  Aggravating landlord  Your landlord hates you; he is looking for any excuse to get you out of his prop-
  erty and is always complaining about something.
  Irksome neighbours 
   Your neighbours dislike you; there are constant complaints about the noise or 
  smells coming from your home. Also your activities are the subject of incessant 
  observation and gossip.
  Police harassment 
   The local police frequently taunt and harass you over trivia, and blame you for 
  things that are obviously nothing to do with you.
  Protection racket 
   Local thugs extract 20% of your petty cash or they will destroy your property or 
  livelihood.
  Lawyers 
   Somehow you are wrapped up in an extensive legal case, the cost of the lawyers 
  drains 40% of your petty cash. 
  Black sheep 
   You are a black sheep among your family, profession, or union, there has been 
  some argument, some perceived slight or dishonour around you – real or imag-
  ined. Your family watches you closely and will disown you if you embarrass them 
  again. 
  
  129
  Characters
  FINISHING TOUCHES
  Characters are more than scores on a piece of 
  paper; this is why they are called characters and 
  not counters or playing pieces. Who is your char-
  acter? Why does he seek adventure? What was he 
  before he started to adventure? You should now 
  think about your character’s past experiences, his 
  starting assets, contacts and any complications 
  you have chosen and think about what he is doing 
  now. If your character was a mud-lark who ran 
  off to join the army, is he still in the army? Is he 
  on leave – did he leave or was he discharged?
  Also think about the following things…
  Name
  If you haven’t done so already choose a name 
  that you find appealing. In the middle and 
  upper class there is a trend toward long-winded 
  “authoritative” Christian names, but this is not at 
  all the majority. Apart from that note, the classes 
  of England use naming that would be given to a 
  child today.
  Character appearance
  What does the character look like; does he have 
  any distinct features or mannerisms? What 
  clothes does he wear?
  Fashion and clothing is a booming business, for 
  those with the money to spare on such extrava-
  gance, fashion changes with each season – for 
  those with no money hand me down rags are 
  readily available. Society places great store in 
  presentation, and those who can afford the latest 
  wardrobe and styles are universally well regard-
  ed.
  Clothes are made from natural fibres, typically 
  wools and cottons among the middle class. For 
  the wealthy, silks, velvets and linens are the 
  norms.
  In Europe, it is considered fashionable for men 
  to sport facial whiskers of all styles, the morning 
  suit is the height of fashion; also popular with the 
  middle class is the frock coat. A waistcoat, hat 
  and gloves are essential. 
  For ladies it is considered beautiful to have 
  porcelain white skin, making the use of make 
  up common. A respectable lady always wears a 
  corset despite the fact that some have suffocated 
  while wearing them. The present ladies evening 
  fashion is for the crinoline dress. For daytime, the 
  bustle dress is fashionable. Whatever the style, 
  a dress always reaches the floor (for a lady’s 
  legs or ankle to be revealed is, after all, highly 
  provocative). Finally no respectable character is 
  seen walking without a cane or parasol. In harsh 
  weather both genders don huge woollen or fur 
  greatcoats to protect against the elements.
  Colours vary dramatically, but the middle class 
  tends toward sombre black and dark neutral 
  shades, while the opulent and flamboyant upper 
  classes frequently array themselves in a bright 
  variety of hues.
  The poor to a man cannot afford fashion, and uni-
  formly dress in a ramshackle variety of rags and 
  used clothes, bleached of colour and distorted in 
  shape. Underclothes and changes of clothes are 
  both luxuries for the lower class.
  Birthplace
  It will make things a lot easier if everyone is 
  already in the same country. If you really want 
  a character from one of the other countries then 
  discuss it with your games master. You will need 
  to have a reason why the character is abroad 
  (visiting relatives, education at university, stowed 
  away from own country). Also consider how 
  long they can be around for and what funds or 
  resources they have access to while in the cam-
  paign nation.
  Age
  The character’s age is at the player’s discretion. 
  In our 1800’s game world a male is not consid-
  ered adult or able to vote until 21, yet the age of 
  sexual consent is only 12! Women are expected to 
  marry at 14-16 and considered old maids at 21. 
  An abundance of children as young as 6 work 
  full time in the mills and factories, this is a typi-
  cal example of Victorian society’s dual values. 
  Typical lifespan varies with class, the upper 
  classes who can afford hygiene and medical care 
  can expect to see their 7th decade before death 
  comes. The lower classes are placed in condi-
  tions of such squalor that they rarely last beyond 
  
  130
  Characters
  50 before dying of chronic illness, exposure or 
  exhaustion.
  Personality
  Everybody has a different view of the world, a 
  different way of dealing with things that come 
  their way. Player characters are not excluded 
  from this. Choose an inner nature for your char-
  acter from the list on the next page, or if you pre-
  fer make up another.
  Social ethics
  What rules does your character live by? What is 
  his view of the society around him? The answers 
  to these questions define your character’s ‘ethics’. 
  The society section contains a small list of social 
  groups and their common ethics, look through 
  them and see where your characters sympathies 
  lie.
  PERSONALITY TRAITS
  Sample traits  This person is...
  Paranoid 
   Everybody is looking at them! Everyone is laughing! The paranoid quite honestly feels that 
  every whisper is a conspiracy’, that every laugh is directed at them. There is no pleasing a 
  paranoid.
  Energetic  
   This person throws all of their energy into whatever they are doing, no matter how stupid or 
  trivial. Their all or nothing approach is applied to their love life, work and leisure.
  Pessimistic 
   In this person’s eyes everything they do is bound to go wrong, they honestly think that 
  nothing will ever go right for them. Even when they do excel themselves, it is not enough, 
  because they know that no one will notice.
  Perfectionist   Every thing that this person does is totally planned and organised. This person can leave 
  nothing to chance; they find nothing more infuriating that a loose end, many often find fail-
  ure a personal affront.
  Sadistic  
   There is nothing this character likes more than another person’s suffering. Often a sadist 
  goes out of his/her way to upset another. Just so they can gloat afterwards.
  Loner  
   This person finds it hard to accept friendship, they will always claim to having no friends 
  and always claim to be alone. They often find themselves yearning for a relationship, but 
  unable to deal with the prospect of sharing time with someone.
  Sheep  
   This person has little use for independent thinking, they are happy to follow the herd in 
  clothes, music and politics, and just don’t understand the burning need to stand out that 
  some others possess.
  Masochist 
   These people are not happy unless they are hurting in some way, whether it be physical 
  pain, emotional stress or financial pressure.
  Jaded  
   This person is constantly seeking stimuli and entertainment. They have seen and done prac-
  tically everything they could think of and now they are searching for new, less boring and 
  passé thrills.
  Cynical  
   This person has seen it, done it, read all about it and to be honest, the whole thing (whatever 
  it is) makes him sick. The cynic’s disillusionment with life, society and relationships is usu-
  ally unbreakable.
  Naive 
   This person has led a sheltered life. They often have poor character judgement and are 
  used by others without realising. Their naiveté is like a shield from baser Human needs and 
  activities. These people only believe the obvious, the possibility of an ulterior motive will 
  not even occur to them.
  Bruiser  
   This person prefers to barge through a situation with physical force. Never pausing for a 
  moment to think about the situation. This person will ridicule those less physically powerful 
  themselves and cannot accept the true power that a physically inferior person might wield.
  Devious 
   This person is sneaky and deceptive in all matters, even when unnecessary. They act as 
  though their life is a dark secret that has to be covered up. Many devious characters are 
  compulsive liars.
  
  131
  Characters
  131
  PROVISIONS & 
  COMMODITIES
  THE MONETARY SYSTEM
  All the countries of Europe use money, some 
  currencies are worth comparatively more than 
  others, but as the focus of this book is England 
  and her empires, we shall supply costs in her 
  currency of pounds sterling.
  The currency of England is not an easy one to 
  get to grips with, at its simplest it consists of 
  pounds (£), shillings (s), and pence (d). There are 
  12 pence to 1 shilling. There are 20 shillings to 
  one pound. When written in combination, the 
  units are laid out thus:
  £1.4/6
  This is one pound, four shillings, and sixpence. 
  Pennies, shillings and pounds are not the only 
  coins and notes in circulation in England, follow-
  ing is a complete list of coinage.
  Coinage*
  Guinea 
  = 
  One pound & one shilling 
  = (21s) 
  252d
  Pound 
  = 
  Two ten bob notes 
  = (20s) 
  240d
  Ten bob note 
  = 
  Four half crowns 
  = (10s) 
  120d
  Half crown 
  = 
  One florin & sixpence 
  = (2/6) 
  30d
  Florin 
  = 
  Two bob 
  = (2s) 
  24d
  Shilling, or ‘bob’ 
  = 
  Two sixpences 
  = (1s) 
  12d
  Sixpence 
  = 
  Two thrupences 
  = (6d) 
  6d
  ‘thrupenny bit’ or ‘thrupence’ 
  = 
  Three pennies 
  = (3d) 
  3d
  Penny 
  = 
  Two ha’pennies 
  = (1d) 
  1d
  Ha’penny 
  = 
  Two farthings 
  = (½d) 
  0.5d
  Farthing 
   
   
  = (¼d) 
  0.25d
  *many of England’s populace abhor the French decimal system, as it is too complicated!
  
  132
  Characters
  Clothing
  Boots 
  £1.2
  Bustle 
  1d
  Cloth hat 
  10/6
  Corset (cloth) 
  5s
  Corset (whalebone) 
  18s
  Crinoline frame 
  4s
  Cuirass armour 
  £15
  Dress 
  £1
  Fashionable evening dress 
  £16
  Fashionable morning suit 
  £5
  Greatcoat 
  £1.12
  Purse 
  2s
  Silk stockings 
  10d
  Leather workers coat 
  £1
  Lined coat 
  £4
  Money belt 
  1/8
  Pair of belt braces 
  8d
  Shirt 
  3s
  Shoes 
  10s
  Silk cravat 
  7d
  Skirt 
  6s
  Soldiers coat 
  £1.15
  Suit 
  £1.10
  Top hat 
  10s
  Trousers 
  5s
  Lodgings and dining
  Lavish hotel, per night, per head 
  16s+
  Respectable hotel, per night, per head 
  10s+ 
  Average hotel, per night, per room 
  6s+
  Slums lodging house, per night, per bed 1d+ 
  Modest house, monthly rent  
  £30
  Flat, rent per month  
  £10
  Restaurant lunch  
  4s
  Restaurant dinner  
  8s
  Pound of beef  
  10d 
  Street vendors snacks (hot chestnuts, jellied eels 
  etc) 
  ½d
  Loaf of bread.  
  1d
  Medical provisions
  Bandages (12) 
  1d 
  Cocaine (1 dose)  
  £1 
  Laudanum (bottle of 100 drops) 
  6d
  Medical care, daily medical treatment by physi-
  cian 
  £1
  Medical care, first aid 
  1d
  Medical care, guild healer, per spell 
  £10+
  Medical care, poor ward access per day 2d
  Medical valise (diagnosis kit) 
  12s 
  Pure alcohol, quart  
  7d 
  Surgeons knife & saw set 
  8s
  
  133
  Characters
  Transportation
  Bicycle, penny farthing  
  £7 
  Cab fare, per mile 
  6d
  Cart (3 seat carriage with cargo bay)  
  £12 
  Cart horse  
  £12 
  Channel ferry passage 
  10s 
  Coach (6 seat carriage)  
  £40
  Fine race horse  
  £30 + 
  Horse saddle & tack  
  £2.12 
  Open top trap (2 seat carriage)  
  £20 
  Postage, letter  
  1d 
  Postage, parcel  
  1s
  Racing wyvern  
  £180
  Riding horse  
  £20 
  Rowboat  
  £10 
  Sea voyage, transatlantic, first class  
  £35 
  Sea voyage, transatlantic, steerage  
  £7 
  Sea voyage, Asia, first class  
  £12
  Sea voyage, Asia, steerage  
  £.5 
  Telegram, 12 words  
  6d 
  Tram journey, urban, per district  
  2d
  Train journey, per county passed  
  1s 
  Wyvern saddle & tack  
  £6.l0s
  Entertainment
  Absinthe, bottle 
  10s
  Beer, mug of  
  2 l/2d 
  Courtesan, one visit  
  L0s+ 
  Fine wine, bottle  
  6s 
  Gin, bottle  
  3d 
  Music hall show 
  4d 
  Opium (1 pipe) 
  2/6
  Prostitute, for one favour 
  6d+ 
  West end opera, box subscription, per year £400
  West end theatre show, box  
  £4
  West end theatre show, seated  
  L0s 
  Whiskey, bottle 
  4d
  Tools
  Chain. 4 foot  
  L0s 
  Crowbar  
  1/5 
  Glass cutter  
  4d 
  Hand drill  
  8/10 
  Padlock  
  10d 
  Rope, 4 feet  
  6d 
  Spade  
  2/7 
  Tool kit (basic tools)  
  £2.16 
  Clockwork mechanism repair kit  
  16s
  
  134
  Characters
  Ammunition
  Elephant gun shells (10)  
  £1. 6s 
  High cal. Pistol shells (20)  
  17s 
  Hvy rifle shells (20)  
  18s 
  Hvy. Shotgun cartridges ( 20)  
  16s 
  Lead (for 3 musket shots)  
  4s 
  Light shotgun cartridges (20)  
  12s 
  Low cal. Pistol shells (20)  
  12s 
  Med. Cal. Pistol shells (20)  
  14s 
  Med. Rifle (lever) shells (20)  
  16s 
  Med. Shotgun cartridges (20)  
  14s 
  Musket ball mould  
  12s 
  Musket cartridges (20)  
  6s 
  Percussion caps (50)  
  10s 
  Powder (for 30 musket shots)  
  3s
  Miscellaneous equipment
  Backpack  
  4/10 
  Bottle of ink  
  10d 
  Box camera  
  £3 
  Cheap gold ring  
  £1 
  Cigarettes (20)  
  2d 
  Dark lantern  
  4s 
  Photo developing kit  
  18s 
  Fake moustache & beard  
  4s 
  Fountain pen  
  4s 
  Grease paints, box of  
  4s. 
  Magnifying glass  
  12s 
  Make-up kit  
  10s. 
  Microscope 
  £3 
  Musical pocket watch  
  £2.4 
  Officer’s camping kit  
  £3.2 
  Opera glasses 
  £2.14 
  Packet of camera slates 
  6s 
  Pet Frendal lizard 
  £8.5 
  Pipe 
  1/3 
  Playing cards 
  4d. 
  Silver crucifix / pendant 
  £.2 
  Silver pocket watch 
  £1.1 
  Small animal trap 
  5d. 
  Soap 
  1/6 
  Spy glass 
  17s. 
  Tent. 7x7x7 feet 
  13/8 
  Tin of tobacco  
  6d
  Typewriter  
  £2.4
  Umbrella  
  3s
  Walking cane  
  2s
  Wooden matches, box 
  1d
  
  135
  Ready to play Characters
  Marianne is Dutch by birth, but spent her child-
  hood in London with only vague recollections of 
  her deceased parents. At the age of 6 Marianne 
  was unleashed upon the streets where she was 
  swiftly initiated into a circle of pickpockets. 
  Marianne has ever pursued the profitable currents 
  of crime & vice; she dabbles in theft, blackmail, 
  assault, and prostitution. Marianne has become 
  well known across the London rookeries for her 
  Eldren looks and cold heart.
  Now, at the age of 18, Marianne is cold, without 
  compassion. Any sense of love or mercy has been 
  long washed away by the slums during an all too 
  short childhood leaving her sharp-minded, shrewd 
  and sometimes callous.
  Characteristics: dexterity 7, body 5, intellect 6, 
  presence 9, resolution 5, and luck 4
  Race & social class: Eldren, lower class
  Social ethics: anarchistic
  Personality: a loner; Marianne feels that to trust 
  someone makes you vulnerable to them, and so 
  doggedly refuses close relationships.
  Childhood experience: pickpocket
  Past career: Criminatrix (custom)
  Skills: pickpocket +4, dodge! +6, appraisal +2, 
  bribery +2, bull! +5, conceal item +2, charm 
  +5, hide & sneak +4, swordplay +6, streetwise 
  +4, perception +4, literacy +1, linguistics +1
  Talents, perks & privileges: beautiful, intu-
  ition, pub regular, blackguard
  Property & assets: bolt haven, rented court 
  lodgings, wardrobe, and irregular income
  Complications: opium addict, distinctive 
  features (that high presence really does stand 
  out), police harassment
  Weapons & accoutrements: 2x stiletto (2d6 
  lethal), corset (av 4), fur greatcoat (av 4), 2 doses 
  of opium, cigarettes, opera glasses, dark lantern, 
  and a make-up kit. Marianne has 10/4 in ready 
  cash at the start of play.
  Ready to play Character:
  MISS MARIANNE VAN DER RYNN 
  ‘THE RAVEN’
  
  136
  Ready to play Characters
  Jacob is a bitter & twisted creature. Born a rat-
  man he has received the roughest treatment from 
  all around him. His whole life has been a proces-
  sion of jibes and beatings, until the day he hit 
  back at a squire and made himself an outlaw. He 
  swore that he’d make his name something to be 
  feared by those who beat him and the helpless 
  masses around him, and took up the beliefs of 
  extremist bolshevism. Now Jacob can be found 
  all over London organising marches, bombings, 
  smear campaigns, sabotage, jail & workhouse 
  breaks, and anything he can do to get back at the 
  establishment that has damned him.
  Characteristics: dexterity 7, body 8, intellect 6, 
  presence 4, resolution 6, luck 5
  Race & social class: Beastman (rat), lower class
  Social ethics: Bolshevik
  Personality: energetic: Jacob throws everything 
  into his plans; once he starts on a course he will 
  exhaust himself until an outcome of his choosing 
  is resolved.
  Childhood experience: mud lark
  Past career: revolutionary
  Skills: hide & sneak +3, conceal item +5, brawl 
  +7, oratory +6, demolitions +3, bull! +6, pistol 
  shooting +6, literacy +1, speciality: revolu-
  tionary literature +4
  Talents, perks & privileges: rapid healing, 
  acute sense of smell, blackguard
  Property & assets: barge, irregular 
  income
  Complications: rage!
  Weapons & accoutre-
  ments: knuckledust-
  ers, greatcoat (av 4), 
  Mariette 0.36 pepper-
  box, 2 sticks of dyna-
  mite. Jacob has £3.7/2 
  in ready cash.
  Ready to play Character:
  MR. JACOB LUSK 
  ‘LUSK’
  
  137
  Ready to play Characters
  Jack is a soldier, a veteran rifleman recently 
  returned from active duty in Afghanistan. His 
  early retirement was forced when he received a 
  jezzail shot in the leg that shattered his left shin. 
  One field amputation later, and Jack was sailing 
  for home. 
  Although from a middle class family, jacks dis-
  ability and meagre half-pay has slowly dragged 
  him down into the slums – the only accommo-
  dation he can afford. Jack is shocked on a daily 
  basis by the terrible conditions around him and 
  often assists the various charitable ventures and 
  reformists who venture into the area. 
  Jack takes his past vocation seriously, and con-
  siders himself a defender of the weak – he rarely 
  starts fights, but he takes pleasure in finishing 
  them quickly.
  Characteristics: dexterity 7, body 8, intellect 5, 
  presence 5, resolution 5, luck 3
  Race & social class: Human, middle class
  Social ethics: jack considers himself a good 
  Christian and his ethics are a mixture of Anglican 
  and chartist
  Personality: perfectionist, jack cannot stand rash-
  ness & rushing. Perhaps he worries he’ll loose his 
  other leg.
  Childhood experience: boarding school
  Past career: soldier (95th Pennine royal guard)
  Skills: literacy +3, education +4, athletics +3, 
  linguistics +6, rifle marksman +8, swordplay +6, 
  brawl +8, dodge! +6, etiquette +2, speciality: 
  anecdotes from India +2
  Talents, perks & privileges: combat sense, high 
  pain threshold, paragon
  Property & assets: meagre income (half-pay 
  from the army, a compensation for his wound), 
  respectable boarding house, wardrobe
  Complications: peg leg (missing limb, Jack’s old 
  war wound).
  Weapons & accoutrements: soldiers coat (av 
  4), greatcoat (av 4), musical pocket watch, pipe, 
  Enfield rifled musket, 
  Ghurkha knife (a 
  vicious souvenir 
  from his colonial 
  tours, counts as a 
  cleaver), 20 rifle car-
  tridges, 30 percus-
  sion caps. Jack 
  starts play with 
  £15 in ready 
  cash.
  Ready to play Character:
  SERGEANT JACK LONDON 
  ‘INDIAN JACK’
  
  138
  Ready to play Characters
  Even as a small child, Arthur possessed a 
  keen intellect and a love of logical puzzles. 
  Unfortunately his parents could never afford the 
  level of education that might have catapulted 
  him into a profession, so Jacob contented himself 
  with reading everything he could, whenever he 
  could, and applying his powers of observation 
  and reason to the everyday world around him. 
  When his parents died of cholera several years 
  ago Arthur inherited their small east London shop 
  front, which he speedily reopened as a ‘rare book 
  and curiosity’ shop. Arthur opens the shop several 
  days a week, catering to collectors, eccentrics and 
  intellectuals alike. He spends the rest of his time 
  as a private detective utilising his amazing intel-
  lect to solve crimes and conundrums alike.
  Characteristics: dexterity 4, body 3, intellect 10, 
  presence 4, resolution 7, luck 5
  Race & social class: Gnome, middle class
  Social ethics: middle class with Anglican lean-
  ings
  Personality: cynical, Arthur’s cases have show 
  him so much dishonesty and villainy that he now 
  tends to expect the worst of people.
  Childhood experience: boarding school
  Past career: amateur detective (custom)
  Skills: literacy +4, education +6, bureaucracy +3, 
  conversation +4, criminology +3, cryptography 
  +2, deduction +4, etiquette +2, research +3, legal 
  matters +3, linguistics +2, perception +6, scruti-
  nise +5, pistol shooting +3
  Talents, perks & privileges: eidetic memory, 
  speed reader
  Property & assets: shop (low class area, sells 
  books & curiosities), wardrobe, meagre income
  Complications: stubborn, enemy (criminal mas-
  termind)
  Weapons & accoutrements: lined vest (av 6), 
  Adams 0.36 revolver, pocket watch. Arthur starts 
  play with a personal fortune of £39.10/6. 
  Ready to play Character:
  MR ARTHUR WESCOT 
  ‘THE CRIME DOCTOR’
  
  139
  Ready to play Characters
  Born to West Country gentry, Sophia was a pri-
  vate and troubled youth, plagued by visions and 
  bizarre dreams. Her parents became frantic, with 
  her frequent ‘invisible friends’ and night terrors; 
  they despaired of ever marrying her. She quickly 
  learnt not to try and explain the apparitions she 
  saw, or the portents she felt. Eventually her par-
  ents found a prospective husband considerate 
  enough to overlook their daughter’s oddities, and 
  the marriage was arranged. 
  Unfortunately Mr Degrange turned out to be a 
  wife beater, sadist, and a drunkard. Recently, 
  after several years of desperately unhappy mar-
  riage locked away with only ghosts and her brutal 
  husband for company, Mr Degrange died quite 
  spectacularly. One Friday evening he returned 
  from his club, drunk as usual, and proceeded to 
  beat her, when her ghostly confidants rose up to 
  protect her and frightened him (quite literally) to 
  death. 
  Sophia is now free to live in a manner of her own 
  choosing, safe in the knowledge that as a widow 
  she will not be expected to remarry, but her new 
  life has complications of its own. Degranges dis-
  tant family have begun a law suit to reclaim his 
  legacy from her by claiming that she is insane, 
  and she still has no idea why the restless spirits 
  chose to answer her screams that night, or what 
  they might want in return…
  Characteristics: dexterity 4, body 4, intellect 5, 
  presence 8, resolution 4, luck 3
  Race & social class: Eldren, upper class
  Social ethics: Sophia sympathises with the char-
  tists, but she hides it well.
  Personality: loner, Sophia’s distressing experi-
  ences have made her wary of others.
  Childhood experience: private tutor
  Past career: secret medium (custom)
  Skills: literacy +3, education +3, etiquette +5, 
  archery +3, art: painting +3, charm +4, conversa-
  tion +6, occult lore +3, channelling +3, sensate 
  +6
  Talents, perks & privileges: medium (sensate: 
  sixth sense), medium (channelling: see supernatu-
  ral)
  Property & assets: independent income, fashion-
  able flat, wardrobe
  Complications: 
  black sheep, 
  lawyers! 
  Policy of 
  truth
  Weapons 
  & accou-
  trements: 
  corset (av 4), 
  a yew bow 
  (for archery 
  contests), 
  painting and 
  sketching 
  equipment, 
  box camera, 
  developing 
  kit. Sophia 
  has a per-
  sonal for-
  tune of £46.
  Ready to play Character:
  MRS SOPHIA DEGRANGE 
  ‘MRS DEGRANGE’
  
  140
  Ready to play Characters
  Lawrence is third son to lord Holmewood, and 
  grew up with the finest private tutors among the 
  family’s estates in Kent. His family were dismis-
  sive of his acceptance into the guild university at 
  Cambridge, and unconcerned with his emergence 
  as an associate. Despite his accomplishments, 
  Lawrence is merely a third son, and will never 
  inherit the seat of the family fortunes where oth-
  ers might be happy to idle away at the expense 
  of the family, Lawrence is constantly looking for 
  investments and adventures that will help to carve 
  out a name for himself, and hopefully gain some 
  respect.
  Characteristics: dexterity 4, body 4, intellect 6, 
  presence 4, resolution 7, luck 3
  Race & social class: Human, upper class
  Social ethics: Lawrence had a traditional upper 
  class upbringing, but nonetheless, he sees great 
  wisdom in the free traders theories.
  Personality: masochist? Lawrence could just sit 
  back and live a life of riley, but that’s obviously 
  just too easy…
  Childhood experience: public school
  Past career: guild associate
  Skills: literacy +4, education +4, thaumaturgy 
  +6, science +2, athletics +2, linguistics +2, occult 
  lore +6, concentration +3, research +3, speciality: 
  astrological lore +3, swordplay +2
  Talents, perks & privileges: Thaumaturge, 
  gentleman’s club membership, Thaumaturgical 
  doctorate.
  Property & assets: regular allowance, fashion-
  able flat
  Complications: glass jaw, code of honour (gen-
  tleman)
  Weapons & accoutrements: lined coat (av 8), 
  sword cane
  Spells: choose spells up to a total resolve cost of 
  7.
  Ready to play Character:
  MR LAWRENCE HOLMEWOOD 
  ‘DOCTOR HOLMEWOOD’
  
  141
  Skills
  141
  SKILLS
  Each skill is listed with a ‘default’ attribute, 
  that attribute that is most commonly used 
  for the skill. It is hard to foresee an attack 
  roll using any attribute other than dexterity, 
  so dexterity is the default for melee skills, 
  and so on. The skill list is not at all com-
  plete; skills may be added ad infinitum.
  USING SKILLS
  Whenever your character tries to do some-
  thing (called taking an action), there’s 
  always the question of whether he’ll suc-
  ceed or fail. Sometimes the task is so easy 
  that it’s obvious; for instance, taking a step 
  forward without falling down. In those cases 
  you’ll just tell the gamesmaster what you’re 
  doing, and no die roll is needed.
  But if you’re trying to take a step on the 
  deck of a ship pitching wildly in a driving 
  rainstorm, walking might be very difficult 
  indeed. That’s where task resolution comes 
  in. All tasks in Victoriana are resolved with 
  the same formula: take the relevant charac-
  teristic and add to it the relevant skill, then 
  add the result of an action roll to create an 
  ‘action total’. Compare your total to the dif-
  ficulty of the task. If you equal or exceed 
  the difficulty value, you succeed! 
  Which characteristic do I use?
  In general, common sense should tell you 
  which characteristic to use for a particular 
  task, or the gamesmaster of your campaign 
  can decide if there’s a dispute. However, the 
  following guidelines will usually apply in 
  almost any case:
  The most important thing is to look at the 
  type of task you’re trying to perform first. 
  This will determine the most applicable 
  characteristic upon which to base your skill. 
  One side effect of this method is that you 
  may often find the same skill being com-
  bined with different characteristics, depend-
  ing on circumstances and the way in which 
  you want to use that skill. For example, if 
  you’re playing a piece of music and trying 
  to make it technically perfect, you might use 
  your technique characteristic in combina-
  tion with your performance skill. But if you 
  were trying to sway an audience to tears 
  with the beauty of your playing, you could 
  use your personality characteristic in combi-
  nation with your performance skill instead. 
  Each uses the same skill, but each choice 
  stresses very different aspects of using that 
  skill!
  Usually common sense will tell you what 
  characteristic to use:
   
  Intellect for memory recall, prob-
  lem solving, manipulating tools & 
  instruments
   Resolution for the ability to face 
  danger, fear, stress 
   Presence for interactions with 
  others.
   Dexterity for fighting, dodging, 
  athletics, driving, running, and 
  swimming
   Body for using physical power, 
  resisting pain, disease, shock 
   ...or the gamesmaster can decide if it’s 
  in dispute. 
  Your (characteristic + skill) + 3 dice in an action roll
  Vs. The difficulty of the task
  
  142
  Skills
  Which skill do I use?
  The gamesmaster will usually decide which skill 
  fits the task best. Example: when attacking with 
  an edged weapon, use the swordplay skill, or 
  unarmed if you’re using your fists. If driving a 
  coach, use your driving skill instead, and so on.
  The overriding rule here is that the gamesmas-
  ter will always be the final arbiter of what skill 
  should be used to make an attempt at a task. 
  Beyond that, common sense is the best guideline. 
  If you’re using a weapon, your skill choice may 
  be pretty simple; use the skill that describes the 
  weapon best. But if it’s an interpersonal issue, 
  you may be able to convince your gamesmas-
  ter to give you a lot more leeway; maybe your 
  charm & impress skill may be far more useful in 
  convincing the gang leader to release the hostages 
  than your intimidate, especially if you can call 
  upon a little known gangland code that requires 
  he honour your request! 
  Action rolls
  This type of roll is made when your character is 
  trying to do something, perhaps he is decipher-
  ing a secret code, or trying to control a careening 
  wagon – or perhaps he’s just trying to whack an 
  opponent really hard.
   To accomplish this you roll 3d, and add 
  all the results together, this dice total is 
  added to your characters relevant char-
  acteristic and skill values to give a final 
  action total.
   If this action total is above the target 
  number set by the gamesmaster you 
  succeeded in the action.
   When you roll your action dice you 
  may roll all sixes, if so then rejoice! 
  This is known as a special success. In 
  combat attacks this generally means 
  that you double the damage done, in 
  other action rolls the gamesmaster 
  will tell you how your special success 
  manifests.
   Adversely if your dice roll comes up 
  with three 1’s then the attempt auto-
  matically failed, this is known as a foul 
  failure.
  Example: Mad Eric is fending off a footpad; it’s 
  his turn to attack. He’s using a sword cane, so we 
  add his dexterity 3 and swordplay 4 for a total 
  of 7; the gamesmaster tells Mike (Eric’s player) 
  that he will need to beat a difficulty of 22 to hit 
  the thug. Mike makes his action roll and the dice 
  come up with a 2,4, and a 6. That’s a total of 19 
  – Eric Misses! 
  Effect and damage rolls
  Effect rolls follow some action rolls; usually they 
  represent damage done by weapons, or define the 
  effects of a spell.
   
  You usually roll a set amount of effect dice 
  and add the results together, just like a 
  action roll. The difference to action rolls 
  is that there are no skill or characteristic 
  bonuses to effect rolls
   
  Once rolled add the results together, this is 
  the effect total, or damage roll as it is often 
  known. 
  HOW DIFFICULT IS IT?
  The difficulty is a number you must roll equal 
  or higher than with your combined action total. 
  Difficulty values come in two flavours: unop-
  posed and opposed.
  Unopposed
  When attempting a task involving non-living 
  objects or an ability, the gamesmaster, based on 
  how tough he thinks the task is, gives the dif-
  ficulty value to you. These difficulties are static 
  and are your target number for success. Some 
  example difficulties are given in the table below.
  Opposed
  When attempting a task against another character, 
  such as attacking someone, the difficulty is deter-
  mined by the result of an action roll by the char-
  acter opposing you. In combat, for example, your 
  target number for an attack is the action total of 
  the defenders attempt to dodge.
  When you don’t have a skill
  Sometimes, you just don’t have a skill to use. In 
  
  143
  Skills
  these cases you don’t 
  get a skill to add to 
  your characteristic. You 
  just don’t know anything about what you have to 
  do, and you’re totally relying on a characteristic 
  and dumb luck. 
   
  To further reflect just how difficult igno-
  rance can become, if you don’t have an 
  applicable skill then the difficulty for the 
  task (opposed or unopposed) is increased 
  by 4.
   Sometimes a roll will require a speciality 
  skill, if you do not have the speciality skill 
  specified by the gamesmaster, you cannot 
  roll at all.
  Defaulting to skills
  Sometimes a character does not posses the skill 
  you asked for, but does possess a skill that over-
  laps, or is very similar. In these circumstances 
  you may allow defaulting.
   
  When a character defaults to a skill, the 
  standard –4 modifier for no skill still 
  applied, but it applies to the characteristic 
  + the defaulted skill, rather than character-
  istic alone.
   A character may only default to a skill 
  based from the same characteristic by 
  default, and common sense dictates which 
  of those skills are viable.
  For example: the pick pocket roll could default 
  to sleight of hand, but not pick lock, or  dance. 
  As another example concocting a chemical com-
  pound might require pharmacy, but a character 
  with science could default – whereas it would be 
  unreasonable to expect to default to criminology 
  or first aid!
  TRYING AGAIN & IMPROVING YOUR CHANC-
  ES 
  If you fail an action roll, you can’t try again until 
  your chances of success have improved for some 
  reason; you took longer, used a better tool, made 
  a complementary skill check, or the source of a 
  penalty being nullified.
  Besides the basic ways of using skills, there are 
  a few other variations that can improve your 
  chances.
  Complementary skills
  A complementary skill check is where the use of 
  one skill directly affects the use of a subsequent 
  skill. For example, if you were a singer and 
  needed to sway a crowd, a very good art: sing-
  ing check would make the swaying (charm & 
  impress) a lot easier. As a rule of thumb:
   A good roll in one skill may have a 
  bonus effect on the subsequent use of 
  a related skill. This bonus will be in 
  a ratio of + 1 additional bonus point 
  for every 4 points the related skill suc-
  ceeded by.
  Example: Sue wants to convince Bob to 
  go out with her (charm & impress). Sue’s 
  not taking any chances, and so spends 
  time preparing herself to make a lasting 
  impression. She makes a complementary 
  presence + fashion roll with an action 
  total of 16. 16 divided by 4 yields a bonus 
  of + 4 to her charm & impress.
   As a rule, this bonus will usually only 
  affect a subsequent attempt once. One 
  really high fashion roll won’t allow 
  Sue to convince Bob to marry her; it 
  just helps get her the date. The rest is 
  up to fate.
  these cases you don’t 
  DIFFICULTY TABLE
  Its …difficult 
  Difficulty
  Easy 
  10
  Average 
  14
  Exasperating 
  18
  Really 
  22
  Very 
  26
  Extremely 
  30
  Ridiculously 
  34
  Impossibly 
  38
  Million to one 
  42
  
  144
  Skills
   As a rule, this bonus should only 
  involve the interaction of one skill 
  attempt on one other skill attempt.
  Taking extra time
  Taking extra time can also give you a bonus to 
  your action roll. For every level on the time table 
  used beyond the amount of time the gamesmas-
  ter assigns to the task, add + 2 to the action roll. 
  Example: the gamesmaster says a task will take 
  1 minute. If the character takes 5 minutes to per-
  form the task, he gets a + 2 bonus to the action 
  roll.
  COMMON KNOWLEDGE & SPECIALITIES
  Every skill is falls into one of two categories: it 
  is ‘common knowledge’ or it is a ‘speciality’. 
  Skills that are considered common knowledge 
  are pre-printed on the character sheet in the back 
  of the book. When we say a skill is common 
  knowledge, your character does not automati-
  cally get a rating in that skill, rather it denotes 
  that he can make a roll on characteristic alone. 
  Also when improving skills with experience 
  any character can improve a common knowl-
  edge skill with study – no tutor is required, see 
  experience for more.
  Specialities are not pre-printed on the charac-
  ter sheet, and are marked with an asterisk in 
  the skill list. Specialities represent knowledge 
  that is uncommon, secret or otherwise harder to 
  acquire. If a roll requires a speciality skill that 
  you do not possess, you may not make a roll at 
  all.
  SKILLS
  Each skill is listed with a ‘default’ attribute, that 
  attribute that is most commonly used for the 
  skill. It is hard to foresee an attack roll using 
  any attribute other than dexterity, so dexterity is 
  the default for melee skills, and so on. The spe-
  cialities skill list is not at all complete; speciali-
  ties may be added ad infinitum, but be wary of 
  becoming too specific!
  Skill list
  For ease of reference here we provide you with 
  a concise list of the current skills, without class 
  limits.
  The time table
  1 round = 3 seconds
  20 rounds = 1 minute
  5 minutes
  20 minutes
  1 hour
  6 hours
  1 day
  
  145
  Skills
  Common knowledge
  Act (presence) 
  Appraisal (intellect) 
  Art (specify) (presence) 
  Athletics (dexterity) 
  Brawl (dexterity) 
  Bribery (presence) 
  Bull! (presence) 
  Channelling medium (presence) 
  Charm (presence) 
  Conceal item (intellect) 
  Conversation (presence)  
  Disguise (intellect) 
  Dodge! (dexterity) 
  Drive carriage (intellect) 
  Education (intellect) 
  Etiquette (intellect) 
  Fashion (presence) 
  First aid (intellect) 
  Gambling (intellect) 
  Hacking & bashing (dexterity) 
  Hide & sneak (dexterity) 
  High society (intellect)  
  Horse riding (dexterity) 
  Human perception (presence) 
  Impress (presence) 
  Improvised weapon (dexterity) 
  Intimidate (presence) 
  Linguistics (intellect) 
  Literacy (intellect) 
  Local expert (intellect) 
  Oratory (presence) 
  Perception (intellect)
  Photography (intellect) 
  Pistol shooting (dexterity) 
  Research (intellect) 
  Rifle marksman (dexterity) 
  Scrutinise (intellect) 
  Seduction (presence) 
  Sensate medium (presence) 
  Small boat pilot (intellect) 
  Streetwise (presence) 
  Swordplay (dexterity) 
  Teaching (presence) 
  Throwing (dexterity) 
  Specialities
  Accounting (intellect) 
  Acrobatics (dexterity) 
  Ad hoc repair (intellect) 
  Animal handler (intellect) 
  Archery (dexterity) 
  Blacksmith (intellect) 
  Bureaucracy (presence) 
  Business protocol (intellect) 
  Channelling medium (presence) 
  Civil engineer (intellect) 
  Concentration (resolution) 
  Contortionist (dexterity) 
  Corporeal medium (resolution)
  Criminology (intellect)
  Cryptography (intellect) 
  Dance (dexterity) 
  Deduction (intellect) 
  Demolition (intellect) 
  Demonology (resolution) 
  Enchanting (resolution) 
  Faith (resolution)
  Forensic medicine (intellect) 
  Forgery (intellect) 
  Hide & sneak (dexterity) 
  High society (intellect) 
  Interrogation (presence) 
  Inventor (intellect) 
  Legal matters (intellect) 
  Lip reading (intellect) 
  Medicine (intellect) 
  Military engineer (intellect) 
  Mimicry (presence) 
  Navigation (intellect) 
  Necromancy (resolution) 
  Occult lore (intellect) 
  Pharmacy (intellect) 
  Pick locks (intellect) 
  Pick pockets (dexterity) 
  Science (intellect) 
  Sea captain (intellect) 
  Sensate medium (presence) 
  Sleight of hand (dexterity) 
  Speciality (intellect) 
  Survival (intellect) 
  Tactics (intellect) 
  Thaumaturgy (resolution) 
  Tracker & scout (intellect) 
  Ventriloquist (presence) 
  Weaponsmith (intellect)
  
  146
  Skills
  THE COMPLETE SKILL LIST
  Accounting* (intellect) 
  The character with this skill is expert at figures, cost 
  efficiency, planning cut backs and basically being 
  annoying.
  Acrobatics* (dexterity) 
  The ability to perform flips, jumps, and rolls like a 
  circus acrobat. You can also jump and flip over an 
  obstacle, landing on your feet, ready to fight. 
  Act (presence) 
  Proficiency with character acting, useful for impress-
  ing a paying crowd or in impersonating a third party 
  in an attempt at trickery. Someone who is skilled in 
  this can fake moods or emotions, use disguise skill to 
  accurately imitate costume and appearance.
  Ad hoc repair* (intellect) 
  This skill is used to make hasty repair to a device or 
  construction with the materials at hand. Repairing a 
  steam engine with rubber bands and paper is a stagger-
  ing example of an ad hoc repair.
  Animal handler* (intellect) 
  The skills of animal handling, training, and care as 
  applicable. 
  Appraisal (intellect) 
  A successful appraisal grants a good estimate of an 
  item’s worth. Whether it’s cut emerald, looted tribal 
  artefacts or the depreciated worth of a tea clipper. With 
  success, the character understands the value and sig-
  nificance of an item. With a failure, the character pays 
  too much, sells too low, or otherwise misinterprets 
  evidence of worth.
  Archery* (dexterity) 
  Used to attack with missile weapons such as bows and 
  catapults. Commonly used by young ladies in the fash-
  ionable ladies sport of archery.
  Art (specify) (presence) 
  There is an amazing possible number of art skills one 
  for each art in fact. Painting, sculpting, singing, play-
  ing an instrument. Each of these examples is a sepa-
  rate art skill. Acting and deceiving, are separate skills 
  and not classed as art.
  Athletics (dexterity) 
  The application of running, jumping, swimming and 
  climbing all fall under the heading of athletics
  Blacksmith* (intellect) 
  A facility with the manipulation and grafting of met-
  als. Useful for maintaining weapons and vehicles.
  Brawl (dexterity) 
  Used to hit an opponent while brawling. 
  Bribery (presence) 
  A character with this skill knows when to bribe some-
  one, how to approach him, and how much to offer. 
  Bull! (presence) 
  Proficiency with lies and verbal deceit. For example, 
  bull! Might be used to persuade police that the knife in 
  the corpse is not yours, despite the monogrammed hilt. 
  The art of bull! does not attribute a proficiency with 
  character acting, only with glib mistruth.
  Bureaucracy* (presence) 
  
  147
  Skills
  The governmental and corporate institution has its cus-
  toms, mannerisms, do’s and don’ts that formulate what 
  is supposedly proper and polite. This skill displays an 
  understanding of the way this social machine works 
  and the ability to manipulate others with red tape.
  Business protocol* (intellect) 
  A character’s knowledge of the business world, stocks, 
  shares, bonds, laws of supply and demand, employee 
  management, accounting, procurement, sales, market-
  ing. Also may be used to judge the profitability of a 
  business venture.
  Charm (presence) 
  The development and application of appearing socially 
  desirable, the ability to establish a rapport or sense of 
  cameraderie between the user and the target. Charm is 
  a manipulation of social appeal; it invokes feelings of 
  friendship and loyalty. A successful use of charm pro-
  duces a favourable response in the target. 
  Civil engineer* (intellect) 
  This skill is used to design and oversee construction 
  of houses, bridges, dams, aqueducts and other non 
  military construction. The extra structural integrity 
  required for an engine of war is achieved with the 
  military engineer skill. 
  Conceal item (intellect) 
  Allows the visual covering up, secreting, or masking 
  of an object or objects, perhaps with debris, cloth, or 
  other intervening or illusion promoting materials, per-
  haps by making a secret panel or false compartment. 
  Success protects an item from detection, failure causes 
  the item to be just as noticeable in some way.
  Concentration* (resolution) 
  the abilities of focus and mental control. This would 
  encompass feats of memory, recall, physiological con-
  trol, and mental powers. 
  Contortionist* (dexterity) 
  The ability to manipulate your body to get out of ropes 
  and similar bonds. You may also contort your body to 
  fit into generally inaccessible places or spaces. 
  Conversation (presence) 
  This ability allows you to extract information from 
  people with careful conversation. The use of this skill 
  takes time, and if the roll is missed, the subject real-
  izes he is being pumped for information. 
  Criminology* (intellect) 
  You know how to look for clues, examine evidence, 
  examine records, search through files, and so on. 
  Criminology is in its infancy in Victoriana, there is 
  still no real ballistics testing, and although there is fin-
  gerprint dusting, it is still a juvenile technique and the 
  subject of much ridicule.
  Cryptography* (intellect) 
  The ability to solve simple ciphers and encrypt or 
  decode messages. 
  Dance* (dexterity) 
  The knowledge of ballroom dance styles, useful for 
  dinners and state occasions, but admittedly of little use 
  to anyone but a seducer or dilettante socialite.
  Deduction* (intellect) 
  This is the art of taking inconclusive evidence and 
  leaping to an unobvious yet logical (if improbable) 
  conclusion. This skill should be used sparingly. 
  
  148
  Skills
  Demolition* (intellect) 
  This skill grants a basic knowledge of how to treat 
  explosives, detonators, fuse wires. In short how to 
  build and disarm bombs, mines, and mining charges. 
  Demolition can also be used to safely dispose of 
  explosives.
  Disguise (intellect) 
  The user changes posture and costume. Theatrical 
  make up may help. Dim lighting definitely helps. 
  Lower the chance for differences in sex, age, size or 
  ethnic origin. Human perception or scrutinise skills 
  might lead an observer to suspect something amiss. 
  Failing a disguise roll, onlookers notice uncharacter-
  istic behaviour. A fouled disguise roll is bad news as 
  the characters moustache falls off into his coffee at the 
  most inopportune time. To mimic personal habits and 
  speech use the acting skill.
  Dodge! (dexterity) 
  Basic skill at getting out of the way of someone who 
  is trying to hit you. This skill is used when you are 
  actively trying to avoid being hit in ranged or melee 
  combat.
  Drive carriage (intellect) 
  Carriages, coaches, carts, traps or dog carts and sleds. 
  If it has wheels, skis or runners you can pilot it using 
  this generic skill.
  Education (intellect) 
  General knowledge, such as math, history, science, 
  trivia, or current events of the 1867 game world, cus-
  toms and races. Also includes historical knowledge.
  Enchanting* (resolution) 
  This skill is used for the casting of. And learning of 
  petty magic spells. Further definition may be found in 
  the magic section of this book.
  Etiquette (intellect) 
  Knowledge of the do’s and don’ts that European soci-
  ety depends upon. Each class has a distinct set of cus-
  toms designed to flummox cross class interlopers, the 
  etiquette of your own class is standard difficulty, and 
  the etiquette of others is usually exasperating.
  Fashion (presence) 
  A grasp of fashion, wardrobe, and personal grooming. 
  The ability to look devastating, all of the time. A char-
  acter with this skill knows how to show off clothes 
  and look his best. Also used to predict the next wave 
  of fashions from the continent and start the trend, 
  rather than follow it.
  Faith* (presence)
  The skill used by mediums attuned to the planes of 
  order to draw forth favours from their guardian angels, 
  and effect miracles of faith upon the world. See the 
  section entitled mediums for more precise details.
  First aid (intellect) 
  This skill enables the character to stop bleeding, repair 
  damage, and generally keep someone alive. 
  Forensic medicine* (intellect) 
  This skill lets the character make inferences from a 
  corpse about the cause of death, how long the corpse 
  has been dead, and so forth. 
  Forgery* (intellect) 
  The ability to create false documents, identification, 
  currency, and so forth
  Gambling (intellect) 
  The ability to win gambling games that require some 
  skill, such as blackjack, poker, and more exotic games. 
  A character may also use this skill to cheat
  Hacking & bashing (dexterity) 
  Covers skill in maces, clubs, flails and any weapon 
  designated blunt in the weapon charts. Used to hit and 
  parry melee and unarmed attacks. A parry is consid-
  ered a hasty action.
  Hide & sneak (dexterity) 
  Otherwise known as moving quietly. This covers the 
  reduction of noise made by a character, and his chance 
  of hiding from the sight of others.
  High society (intellect) 
  The knowledge of upper-class culture: what clothes 
  to wear, what are considered sophisticated drinks, and 
  
  149
  Skills
  how to mingle with royalty and other VIPs. 
  Horse riding (intellect) 
  The ability to know one end of a horse from another, 
  gel on the right way around, make jumps and trick rid-
  ing with ‘skill’.
  Human perception (presence)
  Is the guy with the blunderbuss aimed at your groin 
  bluffing, or is he for real? Use of the Human percep-
  tion skill allows a character to perceive the emotional 
  state and / or intentions of those around him by 
  observing body language, and behaviour.
  Impress (presence) 
  The development and application of appearing physi-
  cally desirable, of putting oneself up for show, fully 
  robed or otherwise. Impress is a show of physical 
  power or agility (faked if necessary) that leaves the 
  viewers awed or otherwise ‘impressed’. A successful 
  use of impress produces a favourable response in the 
  target. 
  Improvised weapon (dexterity) 
  This skill is used when applying a domestic item as 
  a melee or missile weapon. This skill covers the use 
  of frying pans, pots. Plates, cutlery, chair legs, tables 
  (as shields) and so on as weapons this skill holds an 
  amazing degree of versatility compared to other weap-
  on skills. As such there is a stipulation on its use: the 
  improvised weapon must be found at the combat scene 
  and not carried with the character as a typical weapon 
  might.
  Interrogation* (presence) 
  The ability to forcibly extract information from peo-
  ple. The character knows how to avoid leaving marks, 
  can judge how close a victim is to death or breaking, 
  and is an expert at manipulating subjects into reveal-
  ing desired information. 
  Languages
   
  Location 
   
   
  Major Languages
   
  Austro-Hungary 
   
  German, Croatian, Serb, Russian
   
  America 
   
   
  English, Native American*, Spanish, French
   
  Australia 
   
   
  English, Aborigine*
   
  Belgium 
   
   
  Dutch, French
   
  Dutch Netherlands 
   
  Dutch, French
   
  England 
   
   
  English., Irish, Welsh, Scottish
   
  France  
   
   
  French
   
  India 
   
   
   
  Urdu, Hindi, English
   
  Italy 
   
   
   
  Italian
   
  Independant German States 
  German, Dutch
   
  Ottoman Empire 
   
  Croatian, Russian, Arabic
   
  Portugal 
   
   
  Portugese, Spanish
   
  Prussia  
   
   
  German
   
  Russia  
   
   
  Russian
   
  Spain  
   
   
  Spanish, Arabic
   
  Switzerland 
   
   
  French, German, Italian
  * Denotes tribal culture with many different languages within one linguistic group
  
  150
  Skills
  Intimidate (presence) 
  The skill of making somebody tell you what you want 
  to hear through violence, threats and fear. 
  Inventor* (intellect) 
  This skill enables the character to design and construct 
  new devices. To use inventor, the character needs the 
  complementary science skills in the field he is work-
  ing in. 
  Language (specify)* (Intellect)
  With this skill a character is reasonably fluent in 
  speaking another language. If the chaacter has the 
  Literacy Skill, then it is assumed that he can read and 
  write in the secondary language as well. Without the 
  Literacy skill the language skill is limited to the spo-
  ken word. Every nation of Europe has its own unique 
  language, and many have several disticnt dialects as 
  well, check the nearby list.
  The Language Speciality should be bought for each 
  language to be learnt - characters who do not have 
  time to dedicate to language study frequently rely on 
  basic lingusitics (below).
  Legal matters* (intellect) 
  Represents a character’s chance of knowing a pertinent 
  law. Precedent, legal manoeuvre, or court procedure.
  Linguistics (intellect) 
  While the Language skill covers fluent lingual com-
  munication, Linguistics covers the most rudimentary 
  communication. If a character does not know a com-
  mon language with his intended conversation partners, 
  a character can try to understand and be understood by 
  another sentient using this abstract skill. Linguistics 
  covers the mish mash of foriegn tourist phrases that 
  a character might have picked up from others, sign 
  language, and speaking english very slowly and very 
  loudly.
  Lip reading* (intellect) 
  This skill enables the character to read someone’s lips 
  in order to tell what he is saying. The character must 
  be able to see his target’s mouth clearly. 
  Literacy (intellect) 
  The character ability to read the written word, and 
  write legibly and fluently. With no skill points in 
  literacy the character can just about write his own 
  name and stumble through a newspaper if he keeps 
  his finger under the words as he goes along and reads 
  aloud with + 1 or higher the character can read and 
  write his own language without trouble, but requires 
  the language skill for competancy in a second or third 
  language.
  Local expert (intellect) 
  Knowledge of an area; who’s who, where things are, 
  general customs, schedules, and peculiarities of the 
  environment. 
  Medicine* (intellect) 
  Represents a character’s knowledge of the applica-
  tion of medicine. Used primarily to diagnose medical 
  problems and the subsequent treatment including any 
  necessary surgery.
  Military engineer* (intellect) 
  Used for the manufacture and maintenance of military 
  fortifications such as sand bag defences and digging 
  defensive trenches. May also be used to maintain 
  engines of war such as cannon.
  Mimicry* (presence) 
  The ability to perfectly imitate someone else’s voice.
  Navigation* (intellect) 
  Allows the user to recognise and use semaphore bea-
  cons and markers. Also to gain bearings and find his 
  or her way in storms, clear weather, in day, or at night. 
  Those of higher skill are familiar with the astronomi-
  
  151
  Skills
  cal tables, charts and instruments.
  Occult lore* (intellect) 
  A knowledge of occult superstitions and traditions. 
  Although Europe itself has a deep and rich occult 
  background, most Victoriana occultists find the fash-
  ionable pursuit of Egyptology to be more interesting.
  Oratory (presence) 
  Successful orators sway crowds to particular moods 
  and actions. To use this skill, the orator must be 
  addressing a group or crowd: for a handful of people, 
  charm or bull! Instead a successful oration certainly 
  convinces those in attendance for days, with excellent 
  success this could even by months or years before the 
  shadow of doubt falls. A foul failure causes the crowd 
  to mock or throw rotten garbage at the character.
  Perception (intellect)
  The skill of observing your environment. Note that 
  perception is not applied to the observance of hidden 
  items and persons, such application is the province of 
  the scrutinise skill.
  Pharmacy* (intellect) 
  A knowledge of Herbalism, rudimentary pharmacy 
  and basic chemical formulae. Used to create medical 
  remedies.
  Photography (intellect) 
  Photography is a new art in the 1800’s and consid-
  ered a great novelty. Photographs are a privilege of 
  the wealthy, the camera, slates and flashes amount 
  to expensive equipment. Photographs are not a com-
  mon sight in newspapers of the 1800s, the dot printing 
  method has not yet been developed and most texts and 
  papers still use artists’ engravings. Note that this skill 
  is also used to create magic lantern / cinematography 
  presentations as both these mediums are basically stop 
  motion photography.
  Pick locks* (intellect) 
  The art of fouling up other peoples’ locks and breaking 
  in to places you should not really be.
  Pick pockets* (dexterity) 
  The noble art of picking pockets and cutting purses. 
  Not to be confused with sleight of hand which deals 
  with stage tricks and visual deception.
  Pistol shooting (dexterity) 
  Used for small single handed firearms designated as 
  pistol skill use in the weapon lists.
  Research (intellect) 
  Skills in using libraries and records, as well as uncov-
  ering information from obscure or uncommon sources. 
  Rifle marksman (dexterity) 
  Used for two handed rifled and stocked firearms des-
  ignated as rifle skill use in the weapon lists.
  Science* (intellect) 
  A knowledge of the intricate theories represented by 
  the infant schools of scientific thought. Knowledge of 
  physics. Biology, chemistry is included in this skill.
  Scrutinise (intellect) 
  This skill is applied exclusively to the detection of hid-
  den or false items concealed weapons, forged papers 
  and hair pieces are all detectable with this skill.
  Sea captain* (intellect) 
  Sail boats, clippers, schooners, steam vessels. 
  Generally used to pilot large deep sea ships with crew 
  / capacity of 10 or more.
  Seduction (presence) 
  The ability to gain the intimate trust of others by 
  manipulating them through sexual attraction or 
  
  152
  Skills
  favours. 
  Sleight of hand* (dexterity) 
  This skill covers a conjurer’s tricks. Complex card 
  tricks, illusions with mirrors, panning coins and other 
  small objects, a skill known by all good thieves and 
  stage magicians.
  Small boat pilot (intellect) 
  Covers small sail craft such as those commonly found 
  on rivers or for coastal fishing as a general rule this 
  skill is appropriate for craft with an optimum crew of 
  9 or less.
  Speciality* (intellect) 
  Any one field of knowledge: stamps, gardening, bay 
  city police department, paranormal law, and so forth. 
  This can be a hobby, or an in-depth knowledge of a 
  specific field or area
  Channelling medium (presence) 
  The skill used by mediums to exercise the extraor-
  dinary channelling abilities. See the section entitled 
  mediums for more concise details.
  Sensate medium (presence) 
  The skill used by sensate mediums to exercise their 
  extraordinary senses. See the section entitled mediums 
  for more concise details.
  Streetwise (presence) 
  The skill used to keep face and make successful com-
  munications in a diverse street culture such as the 
  seamy side of most European cities. With this skill you 
  know how to find the black market, talk to thugs, gain 
  information, and so on. This skill may also be used as 
  an abstracted information gathering skill allowing a 
  character to gain information from his contacts.
  Survival* (intellect) 
  This skill enables the character to live off the land, 
  find food and water, identify dangerous plants and ani-
  mals, and so on.
  Swordplay (dexterity) 
  The skill of the sword master, knifeman, or axe man. 
  Used to hit and parry melee and unarmed attacks with 
  any weapon designated ‘swordplay’ in the weapon list. 
  A parry is considered a hasty action.
  Tactics* (intellect) 
  The ability to fight effectively and efficiently. A char-
  acter with this skill is an expert at combat, and usually 
  knows what must be done to win a battle.
  Teaching (presence) 
  The ability to impart information or skills to other. 
  Thaumaturgy* (resolution) 
  Used for the casting of, and learning of 
  Thaumaturgical spells. Further definition may be 
  found in the magic section of this book.
  Throwing (dexterity) 
  The art of lobbing aerodynamically shaped objects 
  (such as throwing knives and manufactured bombs) 
  and less aerodynamic objects (such as bricks and 
  Molotov cocktails).
  Tracker & scout* (intellect) 
  Covers a comprehensive database of tracking tech-
  niques, allowing the character to follow tracks pos-
  sibly quite old, to recognise creatures from their prints 
  and spoors.
  Ventriloquist* (presence) 
  The character can make his voice sound as if it’s com-
  ing from somewhere other than himself. 
  Weapon smith*  (intellect)
  The character knows how to build, maintain and repair 
  weapons of various types. The class of weapon (mus-
  cle-powered, firearms, other) must be specified when 
  this skill is purchased. 
  
  153
  Combat!
  COMBAT
  Its perhaps inevitable that your characters 
  will face the perils of combat sooner or later.  
  Whether it’s brawling with footpads and 
  cultists in the dark hearts of European cities, 
  or as part of the empires vast armies, push-
  ing forward the light of civilisation across 
  the globe.
  Combats are organised in rounds. Each 
  round represents roughly three seconds (the 
  amount of time it takes to say ‘one, two, 
  three, four’), and a lot can happen in 3 sec-
  onds of pitched battle. Each round, every 
  player (who isn’t unconscious or otherwise 
  out of the fight) gets to do something, but 
  who goes first? This is decided by determin-
  ing an initiative order. 
  INITIATIVE
  At the beginning of each round, each char-
  acter rolls 2 dice and adds their initiative 
  characteristic in an action roll. The character 
  with the highest total acts first for that round 
  (they are also allowed to hold their action 
  and act later in the round). The character 
  with the next highest total acts next and so 
  on. Roll an additional die to break ties; high 
  number goes first. 
  Once your turn comes up in the round, you 
  can start taking actions. Actions are basi-
  cally things you can do within the span of 
  a few seconds, like use a weapon, or even 
  start an action that may stretch over several 
  rounds (like picking a lock).
  How many actions can I take?
  The amount of actions you can take in a 
  round is limited by your initiative order. 
  When you take more than one action, your 
  actions are spread out across the round; each 
  action you take is 4 points slower in the 
  initiative order than the last. Once you get 
  to initiative order 0 you can no longer take 
  actions, it is time for the next round and for 
  a new initiative order to be determined.
  For example: I roll an initiative of 15, I 
  could potentially take 4 actions, at initiative 
  orders 15, 11, 7, and 3. 
  However, the more you try to achieve in a 
  round, the more your concentration is divid-
  ed and your abilities will suffer accordingly. 
  Every action you take after the first carries 
  an accumulative penalty of –4 to all of your 
  action rolls and to any defence rolls that 
  What can I do as an action?
  You can do one thing with each action. In its simplest terms if there is a dice roll required it counts as an action. This 
  could include:
  Combat Actions...
  Draw a weapon
  Make a single melee attack
  Make a single ranged attack
  Throw a stone or bomb
  Move up to your full combat move-
  ment 
  Non-combat actions…
  Make a small speech to intimidate or 
  impress 
  Perform an athletics feat, such as 
  leaping, or breaking down a door.
  Cast a spell
  Command an embodiment
  Invoke a demon
  Maintaining a spell with a concentra-
  tion roll
  Untying a captive
  Opening a closed but unlocked door
  Get up after being knocked prone
  Each one of these things would be considered a single action. 
  
  154
  Combat!
  you may need to make in the whole round.
  You must state how many actions you intend to 
  take at the beginning of a round when you roll 
  initiative, you cannot decide you need to take 
  more actions half way through a round, it is too 
  late. 
  Example: mad Eric is fighting three crazed cult-
  ists. It is a new round and he rolls initiative, he 
  goes at 18, the cultists go at 12. Mike decides 
  that Eric is going to attack two of the cultists 
  and then attempt to leap out of a window, that’s 3 
  actions. All of Eric’s action and defence rolls will 
  be at –12. In initiative order, Eric takes his first 
  attack at 18, his second at 14, the cultists go at 
  12, and Eric (if he’s still standing) then leaps out 
  of the window at initiative order 10.
  Sometimes the gamesmaster will tell you that an 
  action will take more than one round to complete, 
  this assumes that you are only taking one action 
  each round. You can attempt to rush such tasks 
  using the above rule, but your chances of success 
  can be significantly reduced depending on just 
  how much you rush!
  Example: picking a lock would normally take 4 
  rounds; you can attempt to rush it in one round 
  by taking 4 actions, but the –16 modifier to your 
  roll will significantly reduce your chances of suc-
  cess.
  Free actions
  These are things you can do automatically, with-
  out spending any of your possible actions in a 
  round. An example would be speaking short sen-
  tences, or rolling to resist the effects of a drug or 
  poison.
  Holding actions
  Allows you to interrupt another player’s actions 
  during their initiative order. Holding actions is 
  best used when you want to wait until an oppor-
  tunity exposes itself. To ‘hold an action’, you 
  must announce, when your part of the round 
  comes up, that you are planning to wait. The 
  important word to include in this announce-
  ment is until, stating what condition must be 
  met before you will act. An example might be, 
  “I wait until bob moves.” or “I wait until I can 
  see the whites of his eyes.” if the conditions of 
  your statement are not met, you must stand there, 
  waiting, until the next round. When the specified 
  condition has been met, you can elect to interrupt 
  someone else’s action immediately; after all, this 
  is what you have been waiting for. An example 
  would be: “I wait until my opponent pops his 
  head up from behind the wall, then I’ll shoot.” 
  the moment your opponent pops up to shot at you 
  (his action), you could then interrupt and fire. 
  You need not roll to interrupt; it’s automatic. This 
  can also be used to cover an opponent i.e.; hold 
  a ready weapon on him-you interrupt his action 
  (bang!) If he attempts to escape.
  
  155
  Combat!
  PERFORMING ACTIONS
  In Victoriana, each player can perform several 
  actions each round, but what kind of actions can 
  you perform when your chance comes up? And 
  how do they all work together? The following 
  sections discuss actions a character can perform, 
  each explained along with some common options, 
  variations and associated subjects.
  Movement
  Distance in Victoriana is measured in yards. 
  Movement is the distance a character or vehicle 
  can move in a round -this value is derived from 
  your dexterity characteristic. As a rule, we 
  are only interested in figurative movement in 
  Victoriana; the raw running speed score com-
  pared to another to see which is faster overall. 
  This is best for simple speed decisions. 
   Although characters have a derived 
  running speed, vehicles in Victoriana 
  are listed with a combat movement, 
  which is the same thing.
   To get speeds in miles per hour, multi-
  ply the running speed or combat move-
  ment of the character or object by 2 
  example: with a non combat move of 
  18, I run at 36 mph. 
   In Victoriana, vehicles accelerate or 
  decelerate at a generic rate of 10 com-
  bat move per round. 
  You may not move (or shoot) through 
  any solid person, object or thing (see 
  illustration above).
   The type of terrain you cross over will 
  slow your movement. Terrain is rated 
  as easy, rough and very rough and will 
  reduce your overall speed.
  Melee & hand-to-hand attacks
  Melee represents up close and personal duels and 
  brawls, opponents might be using swords, clubs, 
  chair legs, frying pans, fists, feet, and perhaps 
  even skill.
  Can i reach out and smack ‘em?
  As a general rule melee range is considered to 
  be 4yds, the typical reach of an adult arm and a 
  sword. If you want to start a fight you have to be 
  at least this close.
  Making the attack
  An opposed action roll between the attacker and 
  defender represents melee combat. 
   
  The attacker combines his dexterity, an 
  appropriate weapon skill and an action 
  roll. He may also have to add or subtract 
  certain modifiers from this action total to 
  determine the final outcome. 
   
  The defender combines his dexterity, his 
  dodge! Skill and the result of an action 
  roll, the defender might also have modifi-
  ers to his roll before obtaining a final total.
   
  The final totals are compared, if the attack-
  er has the higher score then he hit, and 
  should roll damage, if the defender has the 
  highest total then he evaded the attack – 
  this time. In the event of a tie, the defender 
  always evades.
  Melee weapon characteristics
  All melee weapons are defined by a handful of key ratings, they are described below.
  Rating 
  Example 
   Description
  Skill: 
  Swordplay 
   The skill used to make an attack with the weapon
  Accuracy: 
   + 1 
   A modifier to the attack roll, accuracy accounts for balance, quality, and relative reach.
  Damage: 
  5 lethal 
   The basic damage of the weapon, in dice. Damage is either lethal or stun, see the dam-
  age section for more information.
  Cost: 
  £1.10 
   The cost to purchase the weapon during the course of play.
  
  156
  Combat!
  Optional rules for Melee Combat & brawling
  Option 
  Description
  Charge 
   Usually moving is an action, and moving into combat will frequently give the 
  first strike to the enemy, this problem is overcome by charging. When you charge 
  you move up to your full running speed and make an attack in the same action. 
  However your rolls are modified as if you had taken two actions, and your first 
  defence roll after your charge is at an additional –2.
  Parry 
   If you are holding a melee weapon in which you are skilled it may be that your 
  weapon skill is higher than your skill in dodge! You may substitute weapon skill for 
  dodge whenever you wish in melee engagements at no penalty or modifier, but you 
  cannot parry ranged attacks.
  Choke hold 
   A two handed brawl manoeuvre (unless you’re an Ogre, in which case you use one 
  hand). Once a successful choke hold is established, the choker will do 2 dice of 
  lethal damage each round until the choke is broken by the victim with a successful 
  escape roll.
  Disarm 
   On a successful attack roll, you have a chance to knock something from the oppo-
  nent’s hand at no penalty. The attacker gets a body + weapon action roll versus the 
  defender’s body + weapon action roll; if the attacker wins, the defender drops the 
  weapon. 
  Draw & attack By declaring this action at the start of the first round of an engagement, you are 
  effectively trying to “fast draw” on your opponents. This haste can give you a 
  much-needed advantage in initiative as it grants a + 3 bonus, but imposes a -3 pen-
  alty on your first attack.
  Entangle 
   This allows the character to use any entangling type of attack (whips, nets, ten-
  tacles, etc) to immobilize an opponent. The attack is made using the skill for that 
  weapon against the target’s defence roll. An entangled character must act as though 
  a grab has been made; he can’t move or attack until he escapes.
  Grapple 
   Use this action to get a grip on an opponent, a weapon, or item. A successful grap-
  ple allows the attacker to hold, pin, choke or throw his opponent. Use an opposed 
  skill check to see if you can break out of a grapple (use body + unarmed); the 
  attacker suffers -2 to his roll. When grappled, both grappler and defender are -3 ver-
  sus all other attacks. The grappler can choose to do his body score in damage dice 
  to the defender each turn until the defender escapes.
  Escape 
   This is the action of freeing yourself from physical holds, chokes, entanglements 
  or simple traps (like snares or nets). This requires a separate roll using your body 
  + athletics or unarmed against the holder’s unarmed skill plus their body. If pit-
  ted against a trap, you will use your body + athletics against a difficulty value set 
  by the gamesmaster. On a successful roll, you are free of the hold and may move 
  again.
  Haymaker 
   Brawl only; you throw caution to the wind and put everything into a single full-out 
  physical move (a swing, punch or blow). This gives you a damage bonus of + 3 
  dice, but imposes a -3 penalty to hit (because you’re not worrying about keeping 
  your balance or aiming, etc.).
  Lunge 
   Only used with weapons using the swordplay skill; the lunge allows you to strike at 
  an extended reach. This is reflected by a + 2 accuracy for the attack. You may only 
  lunge once in a round, and if you fail your subsequent attack will be at -2
  Sweep/trip 
   You put out a foot and send him sprawling. On a successful attack roll, the defender 
  is knocked to the ground. He will take no damage, but will be -2 to his next attack, 
  you will gain + 2 on your next.
  
  157
  Combat!
  Example: an attacking character with a dexterity 
  characteristic of 5, a hacking & bashing skill of 
  6, and a die roll of 6 has a attack total of 17. A 
  -2 mod for using an improvised weapon brings 
  this down to 15. The defender, a character with 
  dexterity of 4, a dodge! Skill of 6 and a die roll 
  of 3 has a defence value of 13. The two rolls are 
  compared; as the attack total is greater than the 
  defence value, the attack hit!
  Determining damage
  Once you have made a successful attack the next 
  step is to determine the 
  amount of damage 
  your attack 
  has done to 
  your oppo-
  nent. Damage 
  rolls are effect 
  rolls, and are 
  dealt with 
  as follows. 
  The weapon 
  used and your 
  characters 
  strength as 
  defined by his 
  body dictate 
  the amount of 
  damage you 
  will do.
  Every melee 
  weapon has a 
  basic damage 
  score, usually 
  a number of 
  dice; you roll 
  these dice and 
  add the results 
  together. In 
  addition all 
  characters 
  then add 
  their damage 
  bonus, your 
  damage 
  bonus 
  is 
  a fixed value. This is 
  your damage total.
  For example: if you had 
  a body of 6, and a sabre 
  doing 5d6 damage you 
  would roll the 5d6 and 
  then add 6 for your 
  body.
  Every character or 
  creature in Victoriana 
  has a fortitude 
  characteristic, some 
  will also possess 
  armour, whether 
  worn or as a natural 
  feature. The defender 
  subtracts both his 
  fortitude rating, 
  and the value of 
  any armour he is 
  wearing from the 
  damage total, the 
  remaining dam-
  age is applied to his 
  health scores. 
  There is 
  more 
  informa-
  tion on the health 
  scores and how they are depleted in the ‘damage’ 
  section of the dramatic systems chapter.
  Ranged combat
  Firearms are the great equaliser, with firearms 
  your personal strength becomes unimportant and 
  it is possible for even a humble Gnome to fell a 
  mighty Ogre. 
  Muzzle loading muskets, pistols, and rifles still 
  comprise the majority of military firearms in the 
  world of Victoriana, but methodically these arms 
  are being replaced with newer ‘cased cartridge’ 
  bolt or hammer action weapons. Indeed, for those 
  with money to invest there is a staggering array 
  of new innovations to try, from multi barrelled 
  pepperbox pistols to magazine fed repeating 
  rifles, and even hand cranked ‘gatling’ weaponry.
  
  158
  Combat!
  Making the attack
  Unlike melee combat, ranged combat is an unop-
  posed action roll by the attacker against a target 
  number defined by range and possibly a modifier 
  from all out dodge! Attempts. 
   
  The attacker combines his dexterity, the 
  appropriate weapon skill and an action 
  roll. He may also have to add or subtract 
  certain modifiers from this action total to 
  determine the final outcome. 
   
  The action total is compared to the diffi-
  culty as defined by the range if you equal 
  or exceed the difficulty of the shot you hit 
  and roll damage. 
  A wide range of modifiers can affect the difficul-
  ty of a shot, and you should familiarise yourself 
  with the modifiers section. 
  Example: Klaus is attempting to shoot an oppo-
  nent with a revolver, he has a dexterity charac-
  teristic of 5, and a pistol shooting skill of 2, the 
  gamesmaster states that his target is at close 
  range, and therefore the target number is 14. 
  Klaus will need to roll 7 or higher in his action 
  roll to successfully hit.
  Another example: Klaus is attempting to shoot 
  another opponent with his revolver, he still has a 
  dexterity characteristic of 5, and a pistol shoot-
  ing skill of 2, the gamesmaster states that is 
  target is at close range, and therefore the target 
  number is 14. However, the target is running 
  away into the fog as Klaus makes his shot. The 
  modifiers for a running target and obscuring fog 
  add + 6 to the difficulty making a difficulty num-
  ber of 20. Klaus will need to roll 13 or higher in 
  his action roll in order to successfully hit.
  Rates of fire
  Rate of fire (or ROF) is how many times the 
  attack can be “shot” in a 3 second round. ROF 
  represents the design of the weapons firing 
  mechanism, and how easy (or cumbersome) it is 
  to operate. Most ranged weapons have an ROF 
  of 1 or 2, but others may have the capacity for 
  volley or gatling fire with ROF upto 20, such 
  capabilities are noted in the weapon descriptions. 
  Whatever the ROF of a weapon, each shot is still 
  a single action, and the action roll and initiative 
  modifiers associated with multiple actions apply.
  Spreadfire
  Some weapons, such as blunderbusses and shot-
  guns fire a barrage of tiny pellets and shrapnel 
  RANGE & DIFFICULTY TO HIT
  Range 
  Difficulty
  Point blank (4yds or less)  
  10
  Close (10yds or less)  
  14
  Medium (50yds or less)  
  18
  Long (out to listed range of weapon)  
  22
  Extreme (beyond listed range)  
  26, 
   
  + 2 per + 100yds
  
  159
  Combat!
  instead of a single solid bullet. The advantage to 
  this is that the pellets or debris being fired spread 
  out in a cone from the mouth of the weapon, 
  allowing an area to be targeted with a single 
  attack rather than a single point. Such weapons 
  tend to have a high accuracy, representing the 
  spread of fire, but have a low range.
  When making an attack with a ‘spreading’ 
  weapon you may nominate your target as 
  an area, one yard across, anywhere in the 
  close range distance bracket. Any charac-
  ters or items in the cone between you and 
  the target area (and not protected by cover 
  or other targets) are hit for the full damage 
  rolled. 
  Spreading weapons can be devastating 
  against close-knit groups of opponents, and 
  are also favoured for easier hunting. 
  Volleys
  Volleying weapons have more than one barrel, 
  and allow more than one barrel to be fired at once 
  in a single attack. This is not ‘autofire’ as we 
  know it in the 20th century, but a simple choice 
  of ‘how many barrels is the target going to get’. 
  Volley fire weapons fire the selected amount of 
  barrels in a single attack, and at a single target.
   When you choose to volley fire a weapon 
  you do additional damage based on the 
  amount of barrels that you fired. For each 
  barrel after the first that you fire the dam-
  age for the attack is increased by 50% of 
  the basic damage of the weapon.
  However, when volley firing you also suf-
  fer a -2 modifier to hit per barrel fired, due 
  to additional recoil. 
  Example: Chris has a shotgun with a base dam-
  age of 4, 2 barrels and volley fire capability. 
  Chris decides to give his target ‘both barrels’. He 
  succeeds in his roll to hit, and comes to calculate 
  damage. The base damage is 4, plus an addition-
  al 2 dice of damage for the second barrel, making 
  a total of 6 dice damage.
  Gatling fire
  Gatling weapons are the latest firearms innova-
  tion. Gatling weapons always use cased ammuni-
  tion, and use a crank to push a belt, magazine or 
  cylinder, repeatedly presenting new rounds into 
  the firing chamber. Gatling weapons have a major 
  advantage over volleying weapons as they are 
  able to continue firing while being turned, allow-
  ing multiple targets across an area to be hit, as 
  well as simply filling a single target full of holes.
  Gatling fire can be used in several ways.
   
  Burst: a burst is a limited gatling attack, 
  usually 3 shots. Since the weapon isn’t 
  bucking around as much, there is no attack 
  penalty. Make an attack roll; if the defender 
  fails his roll, he takes 1d6/2 bullets.
   
  Hosing them down: when using autofire 
  against a single target, a normal attack is 
  made. For every 2 points the attacker’s 
  attack total exceeded the difficulty of the 
  shot, one additional round hits the 
  
  160
  Combat!
  OPTIONAL RULES FOR RANGED COMBAT
  Option 
  Description
  Hurried reloads 
   The reload times assume you are taking time and care when reloading a firearm. 
  However, in the middle of a fire fight you may prefer speed over caution. When rush-
  ing a reload you spend actions to reload the weapon, you can spend as many actions as 
  your initiative total allows, using the normal rules and modifiers for multiple actions. 
  To represent the act of reloading you make an easy action roll using dexterity + weap-
  on skill. A failure indicates that the action was wasted; success means that you managed 
  to fit into a single action what would normally have taken a full 3-second round. When 
  you make this action roll, any ones that come up on the dice represent wasted ammuni-
  tion that fumbles from your fingers in your haste. 
  Fast draw 
   By declaring this action at the start of the first round of an engagement, you are trying 
  to “fast draw” on your opponents, by unholstering and shooting from the hip instead of 
  the normal aiming position. This haste can give you a much-needed advantage in initia-
  tive as it grants a + 3 bonus, but imposes a -3 penalty on your first attack due to lack of 
  recoil control.
  Aiming 
   This action allows you to improve your chances to hit with a ranged weapon. Each 
  round taken aiming adds + 1 to your attack, up to three rounds total. Aiming assumes a 
  steady, braced position, no movement, and a clear chance to track your target.
  Brace for it! 
   When using volley or gatling fire it can be advantageous to brace yourself against a 
  solid wall, or other inanimate support. Bracing yourself against a solid object can halve 
  the penalty to hit from firing volleys and gatling fire.
  Ranged weapon characteristics
  All ranged weapons are defined by a handful of key ratings, they are described below.
  Rating 
  Examples 
  Description
  Skill: 
  Pistol shooting 
   The skill used to make an attack with the weapon
  Accuracy: 
   + 1 
   A modifier to the attack roll, accuracy accounts for balance, quality, and of course, 
  accuracy of aim.
  Damage: 
  5 lethal 
   The basic damage of the weapon, in dice. Damage is either lethal or stun, see the 
  damage section for more information.
  Rate of fire: 
  2 
   How many shots can be made with the weapon in a single round.
  Range: 
  50 
   The range of the weapon, used to determine the difficulty to hit.
  Shots: 
  6 (1) 
   Unlike melee weapons, most ranged attacks have a limited number of shots 
  (arrows, bullets, etc) before needing to be reloaded. The number in brackets indi-
  cates the rounds required to reload 1 shot into the weapon, you can rush reload 
  times, see the optional rules.
  Special modes Spread, gatling 
   Describes whether the weapon is capable of one of the special firing modes, 
  weapons with spread fire always fire in a spread.
  Cost: 
  £4.2/6 
   The cost to purchase the weapon during the course of play.
  
  161
  Combat!
  target, up to the maximum number of shots 
  fired. The catch? There’s a 1 point attack 
  penalty for every 5 shots fired during a 
  round as the accumulating recoil causes 
  the weapon to buck around in increasing 
  strength. 
   Multiple targets: a gatling attack can also 
  be directed against several targets at once. 
  The attack must be directed into an area 
  called a fire zone, and the width (in yards) 
  of the fire zone must be specified at the 
  time of the attack. The total ROF of the 
  attack is divided by the total number of 
  yards in the fire zone (round down), and 
  this becomes the total number of rounds 
  that can possibly hit a target in that zone. 
  A single attack roll is made against the dif-
  ficulty determined by the range (but may 
  be modified by all out dodges) and the 
  attack roll is modified by the total number 
  of rounds fired (-1 per 5 shots). For every 
  2 points the attack roll succeeds against a 
  given target one round hits, up to the maxi-
  mum number of shots fired into that yard 
  of the fire zone. 
  Archery
  Archery attacks use all the rules for ranged com-
  bat as described with only a few limitations. 
  Bows cannot be shot from the hip, and hurrying 
  reload times works slightly differently due to the 
  simplicity of the process. When hurrying with a 
  bow you simply turn the normal round to reload 
  into an action and apply the multiple action mod-
  ifiers. This allows you to fire in the first action, 
  reload in the second, and fire again in the third. 
  There is no roll needed for the reload, but using 
  that example, both shots made will be at –8 from 
  taking two additional actions in the round.
  Crossbows use all the rules for ranged 
  combat with no changes.
  Dodging ranged attacks
  Ranged combat rolls are unopposed because in 
  reality you cannot dodge a bullet or arrow – they 
  travel far too fast for the eyes and brain to co-
  ordinate movement in order to evade. 
  However, we do allow characters that have 
  already declared an all out dodge! To apply their 
  complementary action roll’s bonus as an increase 
  to the difficulty of shots directed at them. 
  Determining damage
  Once you have made a successful attack the next 
  step is to determine the amount of damage your 
  attack has done to your opponent. Damage rolls 
  are effect rolls, and are dealt with as follows. The 
  weapon used dictates the amount of damage you 
  will do. Few people died from gunshots in this 
  era, most died from infections in the wound days 
  or weeks later.
   
  Once you have determined the amount of 
  damage dice to be rolled, roll them and add 
  the results together, this is your damage 
  total. 
   
  Every character or creature in Victoriana 
  has a fortitude characteristic, some will 
  also possess armour, whether worn or as 
  a natural feature. The defender subtracts 
  both his fortitude rating, and the rating of 
  any armour he is wearing from the dam-
  age total, the rest is applied to his health 
  scores. There is more information on the 
  health scores and how they are depleted in 
  the ‘damage’ section of the dramatic sys-
  tems chapter.
  For example: Klaus’ revolver has a damage score 
  of 4, he rolls 4 dice for damage.
  THROWING STUFF
  Thrown weapons can include grenades, knives, 
  bottles, mugs, chairs and tables. In order to be 
  thrown the object must be liftable by the char-
  acter, and may be thrown using the character’s 
  athletics skill. 
   Improvised, non-aerodynamic objects can 
  be thrown at -4 penalty. Due to their large 
  size and strength, Ogres can frequently hurl 
  whole tables and doors at their opponents. 
  If the character is throwing something 
  larger than 4 square yards (roughly 2x2), it 
  can be treated as an area attack.
  If the character fails the attack roll, the centre of 
  the attack shifts 1yd for every 1 point the attack 
  roll was missed by, up to a maximum of 1/2 the 
  
  162
  Combat!
  total range to the target. Roll 1d6 and multiply by 
  two to see which ‘clock face’ direction the attack 
  scatters, assuming that 12 o’clock is directly 
  behind the target. Then roll 1d6 to determine how 
  many meters/yards the round fell in that direction.
  ALL OUT DODGE
  Use this action to make yourself harder to hit. 
  As your first action you declare an all out dodge, 
  and in your initiative order for the first action you 
  make a complementary roll on dexterity + dodge! 
  With a difficulty of 14. The result of this comple-
  mentary roll is added to each of your automatic 
  defence rolls for that round. See complementary 
  skills in the skills section for more information.
  Taking cover
  If you don’t want to waste an action racing 
  around to facilitate an all out dodge, you can try 
  to take cover. By using the environment around 
  you such as trees, walls, and even furniture, you 
  can reduce your opponent’s chances of hitting 
  you in ranged combat, see the modifiers sec-
  tion for examples. You cannot take cover from 
  the environment in melee combat; you and your 
  opponent are too closely engaged to be able to do 
  so, but you can use portable items such as furni-
  ture as improvised shields if your gamesmaster 
  allows.
  Diving for cover
  This variant of all out dodge can be used to avoid 
  sudden and unexpected area effect attacks such as 
  explosions and some spells. You make an action 
  roll using athletics against a difficulty based on 
  the distance (base of 14 for 1yd + 1 difficulty for 
  every extra 1yd). If the roll is failed, you didn’t 
  dodge fast and/or far enough and were caught by 
  the attack effects. Diving for cover is usually a 
  free action and once performed is the last action 
  of the round for that character as he then picks 
  himself up from the debris. However a character 
  with enough foresight (or paranoia) can specify 
  diving for cover as an action (just in case), and 
  characters who do so may then continue to act in 
  the round as normal.
  MODIFIERS
  Combat modifiers take into account the condi-
  tions of the battle. Modifiers are always applied 
  to action rolls, not target numbers. In the case 
  of an opposed roll, the modifiers are still only 
  applied to the attacking roll – the defenders roll is 
  unmodified. The sole exceptions to this rule are 
  162
  
  163
  Combat!
  COMMON ATTACK MODIFIERS
  Line of sight and cover (you can see…) 
  Modifier
  Half of the target 
  -1
  Head and shoulders of the target  
  -2
  Head of the target only  
  -4
  Target is behind someone else  
  -6
  Situation (you are…) 
  Modifier
  Attacking a moving target  
  -2
  Attacking a small target (1 foot or smaller) 
  -4
  Attacking a tiny target (bull’s-eye, 1-3”)  
  -6
  Blinded by light, or dust  
  -6
  Doing more than one thing in a round 
  -4 per additional action
  Ganging up on an opponent 
   + 1 per ally fighting same opponent
  Making an aimed attack to the a limb (arm, leg) 
  -3
  Making an aimed attack to the extremities (hands, feet) 
  -6
  Making an aimed attack to the head  
  -4
  Making an aimed attack to the stomach 
  -4
  Making an aimed attack to the torso  
  -1
  Not strong enough to use the weapon properly 
  -2 per body point below min.
  Running (in the action directly preceding this action) 
  -2
  Stunned 
  -5
  Using an improvised weapon (rock, bottle, small girder)  
  -2
  Using your off-hand 
  -3
  Wounded 
  -1 to -5
  Environment (there is…) 
  Modifier
  Background distractions, sudden loud noises or bright lights 
  -2
  Broken ground, bad footing (melee & athletics modifier) 
  -2
  Dreadful visibility (fog, thick smoke) 
  -6
  No visibility (thick fog at night, interior of coal cellar) 
  -8
  Poor visibility (rain, mist, smoke, dusk, gas lit streets) 
  -4
  Temperature extremes, hot or cold 
  -4
  
  164
  Combat!
  wound penalties and multiple action penalties, 
  which are applied to all rolls.
  Modifiers are grouped into several categories.
   
  Line of sight: how clearly can you see the 
  target, what’s in the way? Line of sight 
  deals with whether anything’s between you 
  and your target.
   
  Situation: what are you doing? Are you 
  strong enough to lift the weapon, are you 
  trying to hit a small target? Situation modi-
  fiers deal with you, your circumstances and 
  what you are trying to do.
   Environment: how does the environment 
  affect what you are doing? Can you see 
  clearly, is the floor slippery or uneven, is 
  the temperature numbingly cold?
  SURPRISE! IT’S AN AMBUSH!
  An attack that surprises the target, such as an 
  ambush or a backstab, gives the attacker a + 5 
  modifier for that attack (but 
  no initiative bonus).
  To lay an ambush requires 
  the following conditions: 
  the opponent is unaware of 
  your location and intention 
  to attack. He may only detect 
  you with a successful per-
  ception roll. The opponent’s 
  attention is distracted or 
  focused on another situation, 
  such as another attack or a 
  difficult task. 
  Typically you will only be 
  able to surprise an opponent 
  once, in your first attack of 
  the engagement.
  EXPLOSIONS
  Attacks that strike an area 
  rather than a character 
  (bombs, grenades, gas and 
  other effects) are known as 
  area effect attacks. The area 
  affected depends on the dam-
  age dice of the attack being 
  used, typically this is a 1 yard radius per damage 
  dice of the weapon, and will always be described 
  as part of its description or construction. 
  The outcome of area effect attacks is determined 
  by each defender in the area defending against a 
  single attack total by diving for cover; those who 
  fail take damage. 
  Ground zero of an explosion or area effect takes 
  the full damage of the attack, characters take 2 
  less points of damage for every yard they are 
  away from the centre of the attack. Character who 
  are outside the area of effect, take no damage at 
  all.
  ARMOUR
  So how do you avoid getting knocked out or 
  killed? Every character has a fortitude character-
  istic that helps reduce the amounts of damage you 
  take from attacks, but when faced with concerted 
  efforts to snuff out your existence, it frequently 
  just isn’t enough! The first and best way to avoid 
  
  165
  Combat!
  harm is to just stay out of the way; use your skills 
  and characteristics to ward off the attack. But if 
  that doesn’t work, you’ve still got another option, 
  armour. 
  As the ranged weapons race has progressed over 
  the centuries, armour has fallen by the wayside. 
  Medieval plate armour was (and still is) an excel-
  lent defence against melee weapons, but the 
  advent of firearms brought the usefulness of such 
  weapons to a grinding halt. In order to protect 
  against bullets effectively armour had to be made 
  so thick that it just couldn’t be worn. As a result 
  heavy armour such plate mail hasn’t been used 
  for more than 200 years, in an age of firearms 
  definitely being able to get out of the way is 
  considered much better than maybe having thick 
  enough armour! Even so, there are plenty of pro-
  tective armours and clothing a cautious adventur-
  er can utilise to assist in prolonging his lifespan, 
  even if he can’t guarantee it. 
  Armour is defined as anything that gets between 
  you and that damage first; clothing, armour 
  plates, scales; even magical energy and enchant-
  ments that deflect or absorb damage. All armours 
  have an armour value that is subtracted on a 
  point for point basis from damage along with 
  your fortitude before the damage actually gets 
  taken from your hits or stun.
  Common armour descriptions
  Soft leather: this leather is usually a jerkin cover-
  ing the arms and torso, or an apron covering the 
  torso and legs. Regardless, it is made from soft 
  hide as thick as belt leather and may be padded at 
  points with even more layers. 
  Lined coat: the lined coat is protective and 
  very expensive. Made of soft leather and light 
  metal mesh enclosed in woollen coat cloth, it is 
  favoured by middle and upper class gentlemen 
  who don’t like to take a chance with ruffians, 
  while at the same time not looking out of place. 
  The sweeping lines of the coat usually fall to a 
  gentleman’s shins; the high collar reaches the hat 
  brim. Lined coats are also available for ladies, 
  and have been made in a ‘heavy evening cloak’ 
  for both genders.
  Soldiers coat: the soldier’s coat consists of sev-
  eral layers of thick padded cloth, occasionally 
  reinforced with leather to resist wear and stress. 
  Soldier’s coats are always vividly coloured to suit 
  the regiment (or officer) the coat was made for.
  Greatcoat: the civilian version of a soldier’s coat, 
  not intended as armour, but made of thick cloths 
  and falling to the shins, offering some protection.
  Cavalry cuirass: the heaviest armour in use 
  by the military forces of Europa. Two body-
  moulded steel plates cover the torso, front and 
  back. Additional steel guards defend the forearms 
  and shins. The helmet is always of padded steel. 
  Cuirass is extremely heavy and not something 
  that anyone would want to spend more time than 
  necessary in, indeed, many cavalrymen refuse to 
  wear it when it is issued.
  Corset, whalebone: an expensive but otherwise 
  normally made ladies corset, reinforced with 
  strips of whalebone rather than cloth, to further 
  enhance a lady’s figure and posture.
  
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  Combat!
  Weapon descriptions
  Bayonets & knives: most bayonets by the 1850’s 
  are akin to short swords, which can be fitted over 
  the muzzle of a rifle. The muzzle grip is shaped 
  to allow use as a knife.
  Catapult: the kid’s favourite, but nevertheless 
  deadly in the right hands.
  Knuckle-duster: brass knuckles. Can be fitted to 
  any hilted sword for an extra £2.
  Crossbow: more sophisticated than the bow, 
  the cross bow is somewhat akin to the rifle, the 
  crossbow is considered a barbaric and unsporting 
  weapon.
  Foil: shorter, more delicate form of rapier, a foil 
  has practically no cutting edge and a much sharp-
  er point. The foil is not a combat weapon, but is a 
  sporting weapon for competition sparring.
  Garrotte: can be weighted or knotted scarf/ 
  stocking, cheese-cutter or piano wire. The gar-
  rotte is swung across the throat and pulled, to 
  constrict the airway causing suffocation. A victim 
  may attempt to attack back but such a task is 
  always difficult at least.
  Keg of gunpowder: a large barrel of gunpow-
  der as used in the operation of all firearms and 
  military artillery, and often in the construction of 
  bombs. This barrel has a length of fuse wire lead-
  ing directly to its contents. A keg of gunpowder 
  has an area of effect and causes incendiary dam-
  age.
  Lance: anachronistic weapon of 8 to 9 ft in 
  length used by wyvern riders and recently reis-
  sued to British light cavalry. Can only be used 
  in mounted charge, but the butt can be used as a 
  large club.
  Large club: any large, two handed wooden object 
  such as a cricket bal or table leg. No known 
  armourer makes ‘clubs’, this weapon covers a 
  wide range of improvised attacks.
  Life preserver: favourite of footpads, the life 
  preserver is approx. 18” of either sand or gravel-
  filled leather. Although commonly used to per-
  form knockout attacks, the life preserver may be 
  quite deadly if applied -with force.
  Meat cleaver: axe-like implement used by butch-
  ers, or by less delicate thugs for splitting heads.
  Metal shod staff: large, walking staff” between 5 
  and 8 ft long.
  Military pike: the pike is 18’ long , used to pro-
  tect riflemen and artillery from cavalry attack on 
  the field of battle. In a personal combat situation 
  the pikes length makes it a useless weapon.
  Molotov cocktail: as devised by Russian revo-
  lutionary Sergi Molotov. An infusion of oil and 
  alcohol, usually contained in a bottle with a rag 
  The Dagger is undoubtedly the most common urban weapon. 
  Small, concealable, and found in every home.
  The Cosh or Life Preserver is another popular urban weap-
  on. It rarely sees military use, but it has become a standard 
  weapon for the criminal who does not enjoy killing those 
  unfortunates who happen upon his crimes.
  
  167
  Combat!
  stuffed in the neck as a fuse. A Molotov cocktail 
  causes incendiary damage.
  Rapier. Traditional swashbuckling weapon. 
  Usually 2 1/2 to 3 ft in length.
  Sabre: a curved, light cavalry sword used by 
  infantry and cavalrymen.
  Small club: small wooden hand-weapon such as 
  a billy club. Walking cane or part of a chair.
  Spear: 5 to 6 ft of metal tipped wood. Usually 
  used by or looted from African or American 
  natives.
  Stick of dynamite: a modern explosive. Different 
  makes use various gunpowder / chemical mix-
  tures -the explosive effect is invariably the same. 
  Usually lit by a fuse wire. Old dynamite may be 
  set off by knocking it. Only a cruel gamesmaster 
  does that to a character though. Dynamite has an 
  area of effect.
  Switch blade: small, pocket knife. The blade is 
  concealed within the hilt until flicked open, mak-
  ing a much smaller weapon to conceal until used- 
  can make surprise attack on a successful Body 
  roll.
  Sword cane: 2 ft foil concealed within a walking 
  cane (counts as surprise attack upon successful 
  dexterity check).
  Whip: leather whip approximately 3 yards long. 
  Can be used to entangle opponents up to 2 yards 
  away.
  Yew bow: traditional. English-style yew bow used 
  by ladies of the upper class in fashionable archery 
  tournaments.
  Firearm s
  Guns during the middle Victorian period are 
  a mixed bunch. Armies are still basically 
  equipped in the same manner as they were in 
  the Napoleonic wars, and military planners seem 
  tosee little need to change. However, the need to 
  kill more people quicker and more accurately has 
  always been a motivating factor behind weapons 
  design, and therefore new methods are constantly 
  being inspired by the industrial revolution to 
  make firearms more efficient and quicker firing.
  The first innovation was the percussion cap dur-
  ing the late 18th century. Before this time, a mus-
  ket or pistol had a charge of black powder and 
  a ball rammed down the barrel, held in place by 
  paper wadding, and this was ignited by a charge 
  of powder in the weapon’s pan being struck by 
  a flint. There was a hole in between the pan and 
  barrel, and when the flint ignited the powder, this 
  propelled the bullet forwards. The problem with 
  this was if the pan was wet, the flint would not 
  spark and the poor infantryman had to face a very 
  The Sabre is the standard military blade of Europe and is 
  issued to the officers and cavalry of every European army.
  For the gentleman who wishes to be prepared for the worst, 
  yet to be discrete - the sword cane offers a good defence. The 
  blade is lighter than a sabre and it lacks a hand guard, but 
  when sheathed it is indistinguishable from a normal cane.
  
  168
  Combat!
  annoyed tribesman or cavalryman with a weapon 
  which would not fire. So it was preferable to 
  fight a battle in a nice dry climate with little sand 
  or dirt to foul up the pan. The percussion cap got 
  around this problem by filling a small copper 
  cap with mercury and replacing the pan with a 
  small nipple. The cap was placed on the nipple 
  and voila! The gun would fire every time and the 
  rampaging enemy could be shot nine times out of 
  ten. The only problem with this is that it takes a 
  great deal of care to ensure the cap is on the nip-
  ple rather than pouring the powder into the pan 
  any old how. By the 1840’s, most modern armies 
  have replaced their flintlock guns with percussion 
  locks.
  The second innovation was rifling. A rifled barrel 
  has seven grooves at the bottom which grip the 
  bullet and cause it to spin in flight, thus improv-
  ing it’s accuracy over long distances. The previ-
  ous weapons, called smoothbore did not have this 
  feature. The main problem is that a rifle takes 
  longer to reload, as the ramrod needed to twist 
  the bullet into the grooves, losing vital seconds 
  in a battle. The concept of a rifled barrel is not 
  new, as fowling pieces used by hunters in the 
  17th century used rifled barrels, and many of the 
  colonial militias in 18th century America used 
  the more accurate hunting rifles rather than mus-
  kets. However, many armies (the British army 
  included) still use muskets (such as the brown 
  Bess musket) as the standard long arm, reserving 
  the rifle for elite units, such as the British Rifle 
  Brigades. 
  During the quest for more firepower for the aver-
  age citizen came the concept of the revolver. 
  This allowed multiple shots in a handgun, spar-
  ing the settler the pain of having his head split 
  by a tomahawk while feverishly trying to reload 
  his single shot pistol. The Americans lead the 
  way in revolver design, using the percussion cap 
  principle on a revolving cylinder. Unlike modern 
  revolvers which are loaded by slotting a brass 
  cartridge into the chamber, a percussion revolver 
  has a two part cylinder with the caps resting on a 
  ring of nipples and a paper cartridge inserted into 
  the cylinder. The hammer is cocked by the user’s 
  thumb, and it strikes the percussion cap that in 
  turn ignites the charge. When empty, the loader 
  under the barrel clears the detritus from the barrel 
  so a new cartridge can be loaded. By the 1850’s 
  designs such as the British Tranter and Adams 
  exist which are double action, allowing the trig-
  ger to cock and fire the revolver in one motion, 
  allowing faster firing time. 
  The pepperbox pistol evolved at the same time 
  as the revolver, pioneered by the firepower over 
  accuracy British.  This was a revolving series of 
  barrels based upon the earlier volley gun designs 
  of the eighteenth century that mounted multiple 
  barrels onto a standard musket, allowing all to 
  The Brown Bess Musket
  Standard Issue for the British Army, and copied widely across the globe.
  The Baker Rifle
  The British Army’s Rifled musket is renowned for it’s accuracy.
  Spencer 1867 Repeater
  The Spencer rifle with it’s ‘lever action’ magazine is at the pinnacle of 
  firearms innovation.
  
  169
  Combat!
  be fired at once. The precision tools of the nine-
  teenth century allow for greater tolerance of the 
  action, thus allowing barrels to revolve and fire 
  independently of each other (the volley gun fires 
  all barrels at once, thus generating horrendous 
  recoil which often broke all but the strongest 
  man’s shoulder). However, whilst a pepperbox 
  pistol fires faster than a single action revolver as 
  it does not require cocking, it is less reliable as 
  it’s firing mechanism is exposed to the elements, 
  and furthermore the individual barrels are not 
  rifled, thus reducing accuracy. The main advan-
  tage is that they are far easier to manufacture, and 
  thus correspondingly cheaper. 
  The latest innovation has been the rim fire or pin 
  fire cartridge. Here the bullet, charge and detona-
  tor are all contained in a single brass cartridge, 
  which is loaded into the breach of the weapon, 
  significantly reducing reload times. The Belgian 
  engineer leFraux, who made a revolver in 7mm 
  pin fire in 1831, pioneered the pin fire cartridge. 
  This was not popular as it was unreliable and less 
  accurate than the percussion cap colt and made 
  few sales. However, Dreyse of Germany made a 
  single shot bolt action rifle in 1841 using a needle 
  fire cartridge which was adopted by the Prussian 
  army in 1847. Other armies have not adopted the 
  cartridge, as each cartridge needed to be made 
  by a machine that thus costs money, whilst the 
  soldiers themselves can make a traditional paper 
  cartridge. Also, most high commands felt that the 
  average soldier would only waste ammunition by 
  firing it faster, thus costing them more money! 
  The quest for faster firing rifles led to innovators 
  such as Spencer inventing a magazine fed, lever 
  action rifle, which allowed a continuous hail of 
  lead. Others modified revolving handguns by 
  Sharps 26 gauge shotgun
  Typical of sporting firearms the sharps shotgun carries a good 
  range and a tight spread.
  The Revolving Blunderbuss
  The blunderbuss is a simple weapon to load and fire, but woe-
  fully inaccurate. This design has six barrels each of which must 
  be individually loaded.
  The Volley Gun
  Origionally desined for clearing the decks of enemy ships in 
  naval boarding actions the destructive might of the volley gun 
  cannot be disputed. Normally mounted on the deck rails of naval 
  vessels, the recoil from the barrels is so great that it is rarely 
  issued to infantry outside of Ogre Grenadier units.
  
  170
  Combat!
  adding a shoulder stock and elongating the barrel 
  to make quick firing, but essentially unreliable 
  carbines. 
  Shotguns are mostly converted rifles with a 
  smoothbore barrel, firing different sorts of shot. 
  However, the Italian company of berretta use a 
  double-barrelled rifle in the newly designated 
  twelve bore to make a shotgun specifically 
  designed for that role. Here, the charge is a basic 
  percussion cap for both barrels, with a paper car-
  tridge filled with several round balls to spread 
  hot death over a wide area. The American cavalry 
  favours these, as they can pour fire into an infan-
  try square from close range.
  It has probably been noted that the majority of 
  modern guns are made in Britain, America and 
  Belgium. This is because these are heavily indus-
  trialised countries that can churn out thousands 
  of identical guns to a waiting market. In France 
  and Germany, gun making tends to be a cot-
  tage industry still, with the emphasis placed on 
  long arms manufactured for rural citizenry and 
  the military rather than for handguns made for 
  pioneers, settlers and gunfighters. The rest of 
  the world tends to rely on British imports and 
  American colt type revolvers manufactured local-
  ly under licence (provided the facilities exist).
  Tranter, 0.44 Revolver
  The Tranter company of Birmingham are 
  reknowned for superior quality.
  Lefraux, 7mm Revolver
  A sturdy and compact light revolver.
  Adams 0.36 Revolver
  Fast becoming the sidearm of choice for 
  British Officers with the freedom of choice. 
  Sharps Derringer
  A tiny two shot pistol designed to be hidden in a pocket or 
  boot, or a ladie’s purse.
  Mariette 0.36 Pepperbox
  A reliable and sturdy design, the Mariette sets a 
  standard for pepperbox pistol design.
  Apache 12mm Pepperbox
  This American design packs a heavy punch and is popular with prospecters and 
  settlers across the frontiers.
  
  171
  Combat!
  Armour
  Type 
  Armour value 
  Dexterity penalty 
  Cost
  Soft leather 
  4 
  - 
  £1
  Lined coat 
  8 
  -1 
  £4
  Soldiers coat 
  5 
  - 
  £1.15
  Corset, lined 
  6 
  -1 
  £2.4
  Lined vest 
  6 
  - 
  £2
  Greatcoat 
  4 
  - 
  £1.12
  Cavalry cuirass 
  12 
  -3 
  £15
  Corset 
  4 
  -1 
  18s
  Melee weapons
  Type 
  Skill  
  Accuracy 
  Damage 
  Cost
  Bayonet 
  Swordplay 
  - 
  2 lethal 
  4d
  Fencing foil 
  Swordplay 
   + 1 
  2 lethal 
  15s
  Frying pan 
  Improvised 
  - 
  3 stun 
  3d
  Garrotte 
  Speciality: garrotte 
  - 
  Asphyxiation 
  3s
  Hatchet 
  Hack & bash 
  - 
  3 lethal 
  1s
  Kick 
  Unarmed 
  - 
  2 stun 
  -
  Knuckle duster 
  Unarmed 
  - 
  2 stun 
  5s
  Large club 
  Hack & bash 
  - 
  5 stun 
  4s
  Life preserver 
  Hack & bash 
  - 
  4 stun 
  7s
  Meat cleaver 
  Hack & bash 
  - 
  3 lethal 
  4d
  Metal staff 
  Hack & bash 
   + 1 
  4 lethal 
  4s
  Military pike 
  Hack & bash 
   + 2 
  5 lethal 
  3s
  Net 
  Speciality: net throwing 
  - 
  Entangle 
  1s
  Punch 
  Unarmed 
  - 
  1 stun 
  -
  Rapier 
  Swordplay 
   + 1 
  4 lethal 
  £1.2
  Rifle + bayonet 
  Swordplay 
   + 1 
  4 lethal 
  -
  Sabre 
  Swordplay 
   + 1 
  5 lethal 
  10s
  Sledgehammer 
  Hack & bash 
   + 1 
  6 lethal 
  6s
  Small club 
  Hack & bash 
  - 
  3 stun 
  1s
  Spear (tribal) 
  Swordplay 
   + 1 
  4 lethal 
  4s
  Switchblade 
  Swordplay 
  - 
  2 lethal 
  1/5
  Sword cane 
  Swordplay 
   + 1 
  3 lethal 
  £2
  Whip 
  Speciality: whip 
  - 
  1 lethal + entangle 
  8s
  Wood axe 
  Hack & bash 
   + 1 
  5 lethal 
  3/2
  
  172
  Combat!
  Archery & curiosities
  Weapon 
  Skill 
  Acc 
  Damage 
  ROF 
  Range 
  Shots 
  Special modes 
   
  Cost
  Bow, tribal 
  Archery 
  - 
  5 lethal 
  - 
  120 
  1 (1) 
  Archery 
  N 
  £1.2/6
  Bow, yew 
  Archery 
  + 1 
  3 lethal 
  - 
  100 
  1 (1) 
  Archery 
  N 
  10s
  Crossbow, hunting 
  Rifle marks. 
  + 1 
  4 lethal 
  1 
  150 
  1 (4) 
  - 
  N 
  16s
  Crossbow, repeating 
  Rifle marks. 
  - 
  3 lethal 
  2 
  120 
  3 (6) 
  - 
  N 
  £2
  Sling 
  Archery 
  - 
  2 stun 
  - 
  10 
  1 (-) 
  Archery 
  P 
  1s
  Throwing knives 
  Athletics 
  - 
  2 lethal 
  - 
  20 
  - (-) 
  Throwing 
  P 
  6s
  Muzzle loading weapons
  Weapon 
  Skill 
  Acc 
  Damage 
  ROF 
  Range 
  Shots 
  Special modes 
  Conc. 
  Cost
  Baker rifle 
  Rifle marks. 
  +1 
  5 lethal 
  1 
  200 
  1 (6) 
  - 
  N 
  £3.4
  Blunderbuss 
  Rifle marks. 
  +2 
  3 lethal 
  1 
  16 
  1 (4) 
  Spread 
  N 
  £1.2
  Blunderbuss pistol 
  Pistol shooting 
  +1 
  2 lethal 
  1 
  8 
  1 (4) 
  Spread 
  J 
  10s
  Brown Bess musket 
  Rifle marks. 
  -1 
  4 lethal 
  1 
  80 
  1 (4) 
  - 
  N 
  £1
  Crocket rifle 
  Rifle marks. 
  +2 
  1 lethal 
  1 
  200 
  1 (6) 
  - 
  N 
  £3
  Enfield rifled musket 
  Rifle marks. 
  +2 
  5 lethal 
  1 
  200 
  1 (6) 
  - 
  N 
  £3.10
  Flintlock pistol 
  Pistol shooting 
  - 
  3 lethal 
  1 
  20 
  1 (6) 
  - 
  J 
  16s
  Flintlock pistol, #1842 
  Pistol shooting 
  +1 
  2 lethal 
  1 
  40 
  1 (6) 
  - 
  J 
  £1.12
  Mississippi rifle #1841 
  Rifle marks. 
  - 
  6 lethal 
  1 
  200 
  1 (6) 
  - 
  N 
  £3
  Pennsylvania rifle 
  Rifle marks. 
  +1 
  4 lethal 
  1 
  200 
  1 (6) 
  - 
  N 
  £3
  Revolving blunderbuss 
  Rifle marks. 
  +2 
  3 lethal 
  1 
  16 
  6 (4) 
  Spread 
  N 
  £2
  Volley rifle 
  Rifle marks. 
  - 
  3 lethal 
  1 
  80 
  8 (6) 
  Volley 8 
  N 
  £6
  Volleying blunderbuss 
  Rifle marks. 
  + 2 
  3 lethal 
  1 
  16 
  3 (4) 
  Volley 3, spread 
  N 
  £3
  
  173
  Combat!
  Pepperboxes & revolvers
  Weapon 
  Type & mechanism 
  Skill 
  Acc 
  Damage 
  ROF 
  Range 
  Shots 
  Modes 
  Conc. Cost
  Adams 1855  
  Revolver, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  -  
  4 lethal 
  2 
  60 
  5 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £7.10
  Adams, 0.36 
  Revolver, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  +1 
  3 lethal 
  2 
  60 
  5 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £7.10
  Allen & thurber, 0.36 
  Pepperbox, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  - 
  3 lethal 
  2 
  30 
  6 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £3
  Apache 12mm 
  Pepperbox, pin fire 
  Pistol shooting 
  - 
  4 lethal 
  3 
  30 
  6 (1) 
  - 
  L 
  £4
  Apache 7mm pepperbox Pepperbox, pin fire 
  Pistol shooting 
  - 
  2 lethal 
  3 
  30 
  6 (1) 
  - 
  J 
  £3.10
  Apache 9mm 
  Pepperbox, pin fire 
  Pistol shooting 
  - 
  3 lethal 
  3 
  30 
  6 (1) 
  - 
  J 
  £3.14
  Barnsley, 128 bore 
  Pepperbox, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  - 
  2 lethal 
  2 
  30 
  5 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £2.15
  Colt #1851, 0.36 cal 
  Revolver, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  -  
  3 lethal 
  1 
  60 
  6 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £5
  Colt #1851, 0.44 cal 
  Revolver, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  -  
  4 lethal 
  1 
  60 
  6 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £6
  Colt 1849 pocket pistol 
  Revolver, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  + 1  
  2 lethal 
  1 
  60 
  5 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £4
  Ethan Allen, 0.30 
  Revolver, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  -1 
  2 lethal 
  1 
  60 
  5 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £3.2
  Ethan Allen, 0.30 cal 
  Pepperbox, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  -1 
  2 lethal 
  2 
  30 
  8 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £2.6
  Le mat percussion pistol 
  Revolver, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  + 1 
  3 lethal 
  2 
  90 
  9 (1) 
  - 
  L 
  £10
      shell: 
  Breach, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  + 1 
  4 lethal 
  1 
  30 
  1 (1) 
  Spread 
  L 
  -
  LeFraux, 12mm 
  Revolver, pin fire 
  Pistol shooting 
  -2 
  4 lethal 
  2 
  60 
  10 (1) 
  - 
  L 
  £12
  LeFraux, 7mm 
  Revolver, pin fire 
  Pistol shooting 
  -1 
  2 lethal 
  2 
  60 
  6 (1) 
  - 
  J 
  £5
  LeFraux, 9mm 
  Revolver, pin fire 
  Pistol shooting 
  -1 
  3 lethal 
  2 
  60 
  6 (1) 
  - 
  J 
  £8
  Mariette, 0.36 
  Pepperbox, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  +1 
  3 lethal 
  2 
  30 
  6 (5) 
  - 
  L 
  £4.4
  Parkerfield, 0.36 
  Pepperbox, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  - 
  3 lethal 
  2 
  30 
  6 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £3
  Starr #1855, 0.36 cal 
  Revolver, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  -1 
  3 lethal 
  2 
  60 
  6 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £4.2
  Tranter, 0.44 
  Revolver, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  +1 
  4 lethal 
  2 
  60 
  5 (5) 
  - 
  J 
  £8.2
  Volleying pepperbox 
  Pepperbox, cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  - 
  2 lethal 
  1 
  40 
  6 (5) 
  Volley 6 
  L 
  £4.2/6
  
  174
  Combat!
  Breach, break & magazine loading weapons
  Weapon 
  Type & mechanism 
  Skill 
  Acc 
  Damage 
  ROF 
  Range 
  Shots 
  Modes 
  Conc. Cost
  Beretta 12 bore shotgun 
  Shotgun, cap 
  Rifle marks. 
  + 2 
  5 lethal 
  2 
  30 
  2 (5) Volley 2, spread N 
  £6
  Colt dragoon carbine 1851 Cylinder, cap 
  Rifle marks. 
  -1 
  5 lethal 
  1 
  120 
  6 (1) 
  - 
  L 
  £6
  Dreyse needle gun 
  Rifle, pin fire 
  Rifle marks. 
  +1 
  6 lethal 
  1 
  200 
  1 (1) 
  - 
  N 
  £6
  Elephant gun 
  Rifle,  cap 
  Rifle marks. 
  -1 
  8 lethal 
  1 
  80 
  1 (1) 
  - 
  N 
  £12
  Gatling gun 
  Belt fed, pin fire 
  Rifle marks. 
  - 
  4 lethal 
  20 
  200 
  Belt (1) Gatling 
  N 
  £28
  Moore 10 bore shotgun 
  Shotgun, cap 
  Rifle marks. 
  + 2 
  6 lethal 
  2 
  40 
  2 (5) Volley 2, spread N 
  £8
  Needle rifle 
  Rifle, pin fire 
  Rifle marks. 
  + 1 
  6 lethal 
  1 
  120 
  1 (1) 
  - 
  N 
  £6
  Sharps #1853, 0.50 cal 
  Rifle, pin fire 
  Rifle marks. 
  +2 
  6 lethal 
  1 
  200 
  1 (2) 
  - 
  N 
  £6
  Sharps 26 gauge shotgun 
  Shotgun, cap 
  Rifle marks. 
  + 2 
  4 lethal 
  1 
  30 
  1 (5) 
  Spread 
  N 
  £4
  Sharps derringer 
  Derringer,  cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  -1 
  2 lethal 
  2 
  16 
  2 (4) 
  Volley 2 
  P 
  £4.10
  Spencer 1867 repeater carbine Magazine, pin fire Rifle marks. 
  +1 
  5 lethal 
  2 
  120 
  7 (1) 
  - 
  L 
  £10
  Vest derringer  
  Break,  cap 
  Pistol shooting 
  -1 
  2 lethal 
  1 
  16 
  1 (4) 
  - 
  P 
  £3
  Explosives
  Weapon 
  Skill 
  Acc 
  Damage 
  Range 
  Special 
  Cost
  Keg of gunpowder 
  Demolitions 
  - 
  42 
   
  Area effect 
  £24
  Molotov cocktail  
  Athletics 
  -1 
  4 
  (thrown) 
  Area effect, fire 
  5d
  Stick of dynamite  
  Athletics 
  -1 
  12 
  (thrown) 
  Area effect 
  10/6
  
  175
  Dramatic Systems
  175
  OTHER DRAMATIC 
  SYSTEMS
  THE PASSING OF TIME
  Game masters typically mix scales of move-
  ment and time. For instance, a fight happens 
  in rounds of approx 3 seconds each, with 
  participants acting in strict initiative order. A 
  turn of combat with several participants may 
  be resolved in a few turns, about 10 seconds 
  - the same combat might take up to 20 min-
  utes of real time to play out.
  Combats are an example of a common phe-
  nomenon, for game time and real time to 
  pass at the same rate is very rare - indeed it 
  may be impossible.
  If you were to walk down a road looking for 
  the mad beggar who attacked you, the pro-
  cess would be fairly swift. Visual data is sent 
  immediately to the brain and the mind acts 
  on the data, the beggar is found or not. For 
  a character to do the same thing, the player 
  states the intention to search for the beg-
  gar, he rolls dice to stalk stealthily between 
  the other pedestrians. He rolls dice for his 
  character’s attempts to scrutinise the crowd 
  for the beggar’s face. Knowing some play-
  ers, this process is likely to drag on until the 
  gamesmaster refuses to allow further action 
  rolls. In short, the search takes significantly 
  longer simply due to the process of orally 
  describing a scenario rather than the instant 
  eye-brain data collection of physically seeing 
  the street.
  The examples of combat and search above 
  show how game time events pass quicker 
  than real time enacting of them. This is not 
  always the case. By the same process of 
  description an eight week Atlantic voyage 
  can be described as ‘the voyage across the 
  Atlantic passes without problem and you 
  arrive safely in new-York’ several seconds of 
  real time.
  In game, time is important for tracking the 
  progress of actions or processes, other than 
  that, fudge it!
  THE ENVIRONMENT
  Guns and swords aren’t the only thing that 
  can hurt you. The world is full of potential 
  dangers; falls, illness, drowning, even being 
  hit by lightning. All of this falls under the 
  heading of the environment: shock, poison/
  drugs, burns, disease & asphyxiation. Each 
  of these are effects of the environment that 
  harm you through accumulation; shock and 
  poison by continual damage to your body or 
  resolution, asphyxiation through accumu-
  lated lack of air.
   
  Electricity and fire are always ranked 
  by intensity of the effect (gm’s deci-
  sion), with damage occurring each 
  round you are exposed to the source. 
  ENVIRONMENTAL INTENSITIES
  Type  
  Mild  
  Intense  
  Deadly
  Damage 
  1-4 dice  
  5-10 dice  
  11-20 dice
  Electricity  
  Battery  
  Generator  
  Lightning bolt
  Illness 
  Measles 
  Cholera 
  Plague
  Drug 
  Alcohol 
  Opium 
  Cocaine
  Poison 
  Belladonna 
  Arsenic 
  Stonefish venom
  Fire  
  Wood fire  
  Gas fire  
  Chemical fire
  
  176
  Dramatic Sytems
   
  Poisons & drugs are ranked by the power 
  of the drug or poison. Damage effects occur 
  each minute, not round. A drug or poison 
  need not be fatal; anaesthesia and narcot-
  ics also work by accumulation; “damage” is 
  subtracted from a characters resolve or stun, 
  when all resolve or stun is gone the character 
  is under the full effects of the drug. 
   
  Illness takes place over days, weeks or even 
  months (gm’s choice). Illness always affects a 
  characters health in some way, but the effects 
  can be extremely varied. 
   
  Asphyxiation & drowning does 3 dice of 
  damage per round, taken from your stun 
  points. Sitting quietly, you can hold your 
  breath up to 4 rounds for every point of con-
  stitution (a tough character could hold his 
  breath for about two and a half minutes). 
  If activity, such as swimming or running is 
  required, this falls to 2 rounds per point.
  FALLING
  For every yard (or part thereof) that a character 
  falls, the character takes one dice of damage. Apply 
  the dice as a single damage roll upon contact with 
  the ground. As a simple benchmark, assume that 
  each storey of a building is 2 yards high.
   
  When a character makes a leap, he may roll 
  athletics to halve the damage done when 
  landing. This represents rolling or tumbling 
  with impact.
  For example: let us assume we are leaping from 
  a building with 3 storeys, jumping from a ground 
  floor window incurs no damage, but jumping from 
  the 1st floor bedroom window incurs 2d6, jumping 
  from the 2nd floor incurs 4d6, and jumping from the 
  roof would incur 6d6. 
  LIFTING, THROWING AND STRENGTH FEATS
  One action that doesn’t fall into the realm of the 
  everyday in Fuzion are feats of strength. This is one 
  place where reality must compromise with fiction, 
  as in reality there are no ogres!
  Feats of Strength and Lifting are a type of Action. 
  However, the resolution of this action is a little dif-
  ferent than most. In a Strength Feat action, you’ll 
  
  177
  Dramatic Systems
  roll only 1D6 and add your Body Characteristic 
  against a difficulty set by the GM, some sample 
  difficulties are listed above. 
  Example: Sir Larry has a Body of 4. He can eas-
  ily pick up his son (a roll of 1 out of 6), his wife 
  (3 out of 6) but can barely lift his buddy (5 out 
  of 6). On the other hand, Big Joe the Ogre has a 
  Body of 14. He doesn’t event think about lifting 
  grown men of their feet, and isn’t overly con-
  cerned about lifting horses or bending steel pipes 
  (3 out of 6)!
  CHASES AND DRIVING
  Chases are an excellent tool for drama, and so 
  deserve a little attention in their own right. A 
  chase begins when one party flees and another 
  party then pursues. A chase might involve partici-
  pants on foot, horseback, 
  in coaches, on wyverns, 
  using magical flight, or 
  might even involve steam 
  engines. Exact distances 
  aren’t as important as 
  tracking the relative dis-
  tances between partici-
  pants
  When a chase ensues the 
  first thing to determine 
  is the distance between 
  the participants from the 
  starting distance table. As 
  the participants conduct 
  the chase they will move between these distance 
  bands until either the target is caught, or the pur-
  suer is lost. 
  Once the starting distance is determined, a chase 
  runs in 3 second rounds, as a combat, we assume 
  that participants will be running/riding/driving 
  as their default action and each round the par-
  ticipants roll to see if either party gained ground. 
  This roll is made right after initiative, outside of 
  the usual initiative order and before any other 
  actions are resolved. Participants may indulge 
  in multiple actions if they choose and the multi 
  action modifier applies to their chase roll as well 
  as any other actions they make.
  Strength Feat Difficulties
   Difficulty 
  To Lift a: 
  To Bend or Break 
  To Throw a ball:
   
  2 
  Heavy bag of groceries 
  Balsa wood 
  5 yds
   
  5 
  Child 
  Thin ply board 
  10 yds
   
  7 
  Adult female 
  Wood boards 
  40 yds
   
  9 
  Adult male 
  Copper pipe 
  80 yds
   
  11 
   
  Iron 
  110 yds
   
  13 
  Street Vendors cart 
  Prison bars 
  300 yds
   
  15 
  Horse 
  Steel 
  600 yds
   
  17 
  Hansom Cab 
  Street Lamps 
  1 mile
   
  19 
  Coach 
  Hardened steel 
  2 miles
   
  21 
  Elephant 
   
  4 miles
  Chase Scene Distance Brackets
  Distance 
  Definition 
  Example Circumstance
  Rolling in the dirt 
  > 0 yds 
  In Melee combat
  Side by Side 
  > 4yds 
  In Conversation
  Close by  
  > 10yds 
  Across the Street
  Far ahead 
  > 20 yds 
  Next Street
  Lost ‘em 
  > 30 yds  
  Several Streets away 
  
  178
  Dramatic Sytems
   Participants on foot roll Running Distance 
  + Athletics skill + 3d6
   Participants on riding beasts roll The 
  Steeds Running or Flying Distance + 
  Riding skill + 3d6
   
  Participants in Coaches roll Their Vehicles 
  Speed + Relevant Vehicle skill + 3d6
   
  Participants flying magically roll Their 
  Flying speed + Flight + 3d6
  Compare the rolls of both parties, if either party 
  has beaten the other’s roll by 6 or more then they 
  have gained a distance bracket in their favour. 
  When the distance bracket has closed to ‘rolling 
  in the dirt’ the pursuer may choose to tackle the 
  target and does just that with a melee attack using 
  the grapple rules. Once this is done the chase is 
  over. If the target of the chase wins out enough 
  distance brackets to end up in the ‘Lost ‘em’ cat-
  egory then he has successfully lost all pursuit.
  There are other ways for a chase to finish, its also 
  possible for a chase to be cut short due to injury. 
  If participants take multiple actions in order to 
  take pot-shots at the opposition then wounds 
  might slow a character or even cause them to sur-
  render.
  DISEASE
  As briefly explained in the players guide Illness 
  takes place over days, weeks or even months 
  (gm’s choice). Illness always affects a charac-
  ters health in some way, but the effects can be 
  extremely varied. To represent the variety of 
  effects that illnesses can have upon the body each 
  illness is described as attacking Health or Stun. 
  A non fatal illness such as flu would attack stun, 
  a fatal illness such as Dysentery or Cholera is 
  described as attacking health directly. Finally all 
  illnesses are listed with a speed and lifespan, the 
  speed dictates how often damage rolls are made 
  from the effects of the disease, and the lifespan 
  dictates how many damage rolls might be made 
  before the disease has run its natural course.
  DRUGS
  As briefly explained in the Players guide Poisons 
  & drugs are ranked by the power of the drug or 
  poison. Damage effects occur each minute, not 
  round. A drug or poison need not be fatal; anaes-
  thesia and narcotics also work by accumulation. 
  ‘Damage’ is subtracted from a characters resolve 
  
  179
  Dramatic Systems
  Diseases
  Illness 
  Vector 
  Intensity 
  Speed & Lifespan 
  Effects
  Cholera 
  Dirty Water 
  1d lethal 
  Hourly (72) 
   Fever, advanced dehy-
  dration leading to death
  Syphilis 
  Blood, Intercourse 1d lethal 
  Daily (forever) 
  madness, then death
  Dysentery 
   
  1d lethal 
  Hourly (72) 
  dioreahea, then death
  Diphtheria 
   
  3d lethal 
  Daily (7) 
   Airways fill with 
  mucus, eventually suf-
  focating victim
  Flu 
  Contact 
  2d Stun 
  Daily (7) 
   Congestion, headaches, 
  lethargy
  measles 
   
  1d lethal 
  Daily (14) 
  sores
  Small Pox 
   
  2d lethal 
  Daily (14) 
  sores, fever
  Black Death 
  Contact 
  10d lethal 
  Daily (30) 
  sores & fever, death
  Drugs
  Drug 
  Vector 
  Intensity (max) 
  Speed & Lifespan 
  Effects
  Opium 
  Inhaled 
  6d resolve 
  N/A 
   Hallucinations,  
   
  lethargy
  Heroine 
  Injected 
  8d resolve  
  N/A 
   Hallucinations, 
  lethargy
  Cocaine 
  Injected 
  10d resolve 
  N/A 
   Hallucinations, 
  lethargy
  Choral Hydrate 
  Ingested 
  4d resolve 
  hourly 
  unconsciousness
  Laudanum 
  Ingested 
  4d resolve 
  N/A 
  Opium derivative
  Belladonna 
  Ingested 
  2d lethal 
  Minute 
  death
  Arsenic 
  Ingested 
  5d lethal 
  Minute 
  death
  Stonefish venom 
  Ingested 
  10 lethal 
  Minute 
  death
  Morphine 
  Injected 
  8d resolve 
  N/A 
   Painkiller, mild 
  euphoric, induces 
  sleep
  
  180
  Dramatic Sytems
  or stun, some guidelines follow.
   Narcotic drugs do ‘damage’ which is 
  deducted from resolve. When resolve 
  reaches the -4 modifier the user is consid-
  ered under the full effects of the drug (the 
  resolve modifier reflecting the degree of 
  insensibility). Should the effect roll of the 
  drug be greater than the user’s resolve then 
  overflow the damage into stun. Narcotics 
  are listed with a damage code that is 
  typical of a single dose, should a user take 
  more than one dose simply multiply appro-
  priately.
   
  Anaesthetics attack a character’s stun 
  directly, when all stun is depleted the char-
  acter is unconscious; the rules for collateral 
  damage are not applied to stun damage 
  caused by anaesthetics. Anaesthetics have 
  a ‘speed’ characteristic that dictates how 
  fast a dose of the anaesthetic can bring an 
  average human to unconsciousness and a 
  ‘lifespan’ which dictates the total amount 
  of damage rolls that might be made as a 
  result of a single dose.
   
  Poisons attack a character’s health direct-
  ly; their final effect if left unchecked is 
  debilitation and death. The damages below 
  reflect a single dose, large enough to kill an 
  average human. Given that all poisons have 
  the same ultimate effect, the big difference 
  is the speed in which they accomplish their 
  tasks. To represent this all poisons have a 
  ‘speed’ characteristic which note how often 
  damage is applied and a lifespan which 
  denotes the total amount of damage rolls 
  that might be made as a result of a single 
  dose.
  Coming Down
  It’s fine to know how quickly your character gets 
  high or knocked out by drugs, but sometimes it’s 
  important to know how fast he recovers from his 
  drugged state. For simplicity we assume that the 
  character will be under the full effects of a drug 
  for one hour, after that time the normal rules for 
  recovery of stun and resolve apply.
  Healing the Effects of Disease and Poisons
  Any physician or clinic can attempt to diagnose 
  and treat disease, by making a medicine roll to 
  
  181
  Dramatic Systems
  diagnose the patient. This is typically at an aver-
  age difficulty, but might rise as high as very 
  difficult for rare diseases. Once the nature of 
  the Illness has been discerned the physician can 
  attempt a cure.
  In the case of illnesses that attack stun, a success-
  ful medicine roll halves the stun damage for the 
  time period being treated (usually daily).
  For potentially fatal illnesses attacking health, 
  a successful medicine roll transfers the damage 
  from health to stun for that roll. The rules for col-
  lateral damage still apply.
  For those who can afford the services of a Guild 
  healer the use of the cure spell can quash most 
  known diseases and subdue most altered states.
  Treating the effects of poisons is somewhat more 
  difficult. If the doctor is aware of the nature of 
  the poison that was used then he can proceed 
  to apply an antidote – use the rules for curing 
  diseases above. However, often the physician 
  will not know what poison was used, and he is 
  faced with a process of trial and error that can be 
  potentially devastating to the patient. In such cir-
  cumstances the physician must make a very dif-
  ficult medicine roll with a base time of one hour 
  to diagnose the type of poison used. Often the 
  patient is dead before the nature of the poison can 
  be determined.
  DAMAGE
  So far, we’ve been concentrating on how to do 
  things in Victoriana, and we’ve already talked 
  about how to do damage. Now, we’re going to 
  tackle stuff you won’t want to do; like how to get 
  hurt, knocked out, or even killed. In short, taking 
  damage.
  But what is the damage taken from? That’s where 
  hits and stun come into play. In Victoriana, all 
  things have hits or health points that represent 
  how much lethal damage they can take. Generally 
  a character can take as much lethal damage as his 
  body characteristic x5.
  Living things also take stun damage; a measure 
  of how much damage they can take before they 
  pass out from pain and shock.
  Damaging people
  There are two kinds of damage that you can take 
  from an attack; stun damage and lethal damage. 
  Stun damage is damage that creates pain and 
  shock, but not serious injury. It’s blunt, bludgeon-
  ing damage such as that done by hands, feet, 
  heads (or if you have them, tails, tentacles and 
  other blunt body parts) and wooden clubs. As a 
  general rule, if it isn’t sharp or very heavy, it does 
  stun damage. 
  Stun damage is always subtracted from your 
  character’s stun damage track, after being 
  reduced by your character’s fortitude and armour. 
  When stun points are at 0, your body will react 
  by shutting off the pain and passing out. Once 
  at zero stun points you are effectively knocked 
  out, but will regain consciousness once you have 
  recovered enough stun to put you back over 0 
  again.
  Lethal damage, on the other hand, is serious inju-
  ry that can maim or kill. Anytime a weapon des-
  ignated as ‘lethal’ hits you, you will take lethal 
  damage. Lethal weapons tend to be those capable 
  of puncturing, slicing, rending and ripping as well 
  as very heavy objects. 
  Lethal damage is always subtracted from your 
  character’s lethal damage track, after being 
  reduced by your character’s fortitude and armour. 
  When this is reduced to zero, your character is 
  more than just unconscious, you are dying. You 
  will lose 1 additional hit (in shock and blood 
  loss) every 4 rounds until you receive first aid 
  - when you lose 2 x your body characteristic, you 
  are dead.
  Collateral damage
  Sometimes a stunning blow is powerful enough 
  that a small amount of lethal damage is also done. 
  When marking off stun damage, for every 5 stun 
  that penetrate fortitude and armour also mark off 
  1 point of lethal damage.
  When you have lost all of your stun points, any 
  subsequent stun damage you take will continue 
  to convert into lethal damage at the 1/5th rate, 
  reducing your remaining hits - if you’re beaten 
  senseless and the beating continues, you could 
  
  182
  Dramatic Sytems
  well be beaten to death!
  Since lethal damage also causes a fair amount 
  of pain and shock, when you take lethal damage 
  you mark off the amount of damage taken from 
  both the lethal damage track and the stun damage 
  track.
  Stunned
  If you take more than 1/2 of your total stun in 
  one attack, you are stunned. A stunned character 
  is at -5 to his next action roll, and any defence 
  rolls you need to make in the meantime.
  Wound penalties
  Whenever your lethal or stun damage tracks have 
  been reduced enough, you will become impaired. 
  As you mark off boxes on your damage tracks 
  the highest penalty currently marked off on either 
  track is applied to all action and defence rolls.
  Knockback (optional)
  Sometimes a character can inflict such a mighty 
  blow that the force of the attack knocks the target 
  back. To determine the amount of distance a char-
  acter is knocked back, subtract the body char-
  acteristic of the targeted character from the total 
  damage dice that were rolled in the attack. For 
  every damage dice remaining, the target is sent 
  reeling one foot straight back from the impact.
  Damaging objects
  Its possible to destroy almost any object with 
  enough effort. Most objects aren’t alive and so 
  the damage they can take is recorded as hits 
  instead of health. You can’t stun an inanimate 
  object. Therefore, objects have no equivalent to 
  stun damage, only hits.
  Generally speaking wooden and cloth structures 
  are easier to smash apart than metals, and so their 
  hits are reduced the same whether the damage 
  being done is stun or lethal. Metal objects howev-
  er ignore stun damage and can only be destroyed 
  by lethal damage. 
  MEDICINE & RECOVERING
  Whenever a character is hit by a weapon, drowns, 
  falls, suffocates or otherwise falls foul of his 
  environment he takes damage. As discussed 
  above, damage is deducted from a character’s 
  damage tracks on the character sheet. But once 
  Typical Object Hits
  The Great Outdoors 
  Hits
  Brush (per yd) 
  5
  Rocks (per yd) 
  30
  Tree, Street Lamp 
  80
  Lamp Post 
  40
  Manhole Cover 
  30
  Structures 
  Hits
  Glass (per yd) 
  5
  Wooden Fence (per yd) 
  10-15
  Sheetrock Wall (per yd) 
  5-10
  Brick Wall (per yd) 
  30
  Concrete Wall (per yd) 
  50
  Metal Wall (per yd) 
  70
  Metal Lock 
  5
  Wood Door 
  5
  Metal Door 
  30
  Vault Door 
  -
  Furniture 
  15-20
  Machinery (per yd) 
  30-50
  
  183
  Dramatic Systems
  damaged, how can you recover?
  Recovering stun damage
  Your constitution characteristic determines how 
  fast your character recovers stun points. He gets 
  back this many stun points each hour he rests.
  Once you’re knocked out, you may stay that 
  way for only a few moments or for a long time. 
  Unconscious characters regain their stun points 
  at a rate of 1 per turn until they are once again 
  conscious, and their normal recovery rate applies 
  again.
  Recovering resolve
  Your resolution characteristic determines how 
  fast your character recovers resolve points. He 
  gets back this many resolve each hour he rests.
  Characters who possess the concentration skill, 
  may meditate to regain resolve. Meditation takes 
  a hour, make a resolution + concentration roll 
  with a difficulty of 18, apply any modifiers that 
  are applicable (see modifiers in the combat chap-
  ter). Every point you roll higher than the target 
  number is recovered resolve.
  Recovery from lethal damage 
  Your constitution characteristic also determines 
  how fast you recover from lethal damage. For 
  every 24 hours you spend resting with medical 
  care, you will recover as many hits as your con-
  stitution score. Medical care is defined as regular 
  care and monitoring by a character with the phy-
  sician skill, this could be another character if they 
  have the time to spare, or it may be the staff of a 
  local hospital. 
  Most ill or wounded characters in Victoriana will 
  recover in their own homes with regular visits 
  from their doctors, and perhaps an on-site nurse 
  if the wounds or illness is serious. Of course, the 
  poor might well be living in an unhygienic abode 
  which could cause complications in its own right, 
  and so most hospitals do have ‘poor wards’ where 
  the lower classes can go to heal effectively before 
  returning to their work. Poor wards are usually 
  manned by students and nurses rather than pro-
  fessional qualified staff, and there are frequent 
  
  184
  Dramatic Sytems
  tales about patients going missing in the middle 
  of the night. Your constitution recovery rate is 
  halved (round up) when recovering in a poor 
  ward.
  Unfortunately medical care is expensive, and 
  your character might not even be able to afford 
  the poor ward. If this is so, you will heal much 
  slower. If you are trying to heal lethal damage 
  without full medical care then you can rely on the 
  use of first aid to ensure sanitation and treatment 
  of the wounds. This will allow you to heal at a 
  quarter (round down) of your usual rate, and nul-
  lify the risk of infections to a reasonable degree.
  If you cannot afford medical care, and do not 
  even know anyone with knowledge of first aid, 
  you will slowly die from blood loss and wound 
  infections. It is probably preferable to pawn some 
  possessions to raise some money and gain treat-
  ment in the poor ward.
  Example: I have taken 30 lethal damage. My 
  constitution is 7. With full medical care I will 
  be back to full health in 5 days. If relying on the 
  poor wards I would be back to full health in 8 
  days, if relying on first aid I would need 30 days 
  to recover the damage.
  Death
  Saving a dying character is still possible. Another 
  character, making a successful intellect plus phy-
  sician or first aid action roll can stabilize you at 
  any point beyond 0. The difficulty for this task is 
  2x the number of hits beyond 0. 
  Example: Lazarus is now at -7 hits. Stabilising 
  him would require a medical action roll against a 
  difficulty of 14 (2 x 7).
  EXPERIENCE
  Sooner or later, you will want to improve your 
  skills, characteristics or powers from the levels 
  at which you purchased them at. This is achieved 
  with the accumulation and subsequent spending 
  of experience points (known as Xp). Experience 
  is allocated by the gamesmaster at the end of an 
  adventure, and reflects the hardships you over-
  came, during the course of the story – after all 
  experience is the best teacher. 
  The gamesmaster will tell you exactly how many 
  experience points you receive at the end of an 
  adventure, normally this will be between one and 
  six points. These points represent your success 
  in the adventure, and how well you role-played. 
  When they are awarded you may spend them 
  straight away, or save them for a later date.
  Saving experience points warrants no further 
  explanation, but spending them does. We will 
  now look at what you can buy with experience 
  points. 
  BUYING STUFF WITH YOUR POINTS
  So the gamesmaster just dumped a whole load of 
  points on you-great! But how do you use them? 
  Much like real currency, all option points need to 
  be cashed in to buy or improve skills, powers and 
  characteristics
  Raising skills
  Raising skills is possibly the most common use of 
  experience points, when you wish to raise a skill 
  ask your gamesmaster first. If he feels that you 
  have used the skill a lot, then he will allow you 
  to increase the skill immediately. However if he 
  feels that the skill has not been used enough to 
  warrant an increase he might require you to study 
  or practice before allowing the raise. Regardless 
  of whether the raise is immediate or requires 
  study, the cost is the same.
  Xp cost: the new level of the skill. Example: to 
  raise a skill from 3 to 4 would require 4 experi-
  ence points. To raise from 6 to 7 would cost 7 
  experience.
  Buying new skills
  Buying new skills always requires study or prac-
  tice. There is no limit to the amount of skills 
  a character can possess, but a character who 
  spreads his Xp among many skills will take much 
  longer to become an expert in any field.
  Xp cost: 2 points for the first level of the new 
  skill, for subsequent raises see raising skills 
  above.
  
  185
  Dramatic Systems
  Characteristics
  Characters can 
  also raise their 
  characteristics, ask 
  your gamesmaster 
  first. If he feels that 
  you have used the 
  characteristic a lot, 
  then he will allow you 
  to increase it immedia-
  tel. However, once again,  if he feels 
  that it has not been used enough to war-
  rant an increase he might require you to practice 
  before allowing the raise. Regardless of whether 
  the raise is immediate or requires study, the cost 
  is the same.
  Xp cost: the new level multiplied by 2, plus the 
  permission of the gamesmaster. 
  Example: to improve your dexterity from 5 to 
  6 would require 12 experience points and your 
  gamesmaster’s agreement. 
  Derived characteristics
  Your gamesmaster may allow you to raise your 
  derived characteristics with Xp. By doing this 
  you might raise your stun 
  points without rais-
  ing your body (and 
  constitution, 
  lethal dam-
  age points, 
  fortitude 
  etc). If 
  you choose 
  to do this 
  you may 
  not raise 
  a derived 
  characteris-
  tic beyond 
  150% (x1.5) 
  of the nor-
  mal level as 
  defined by 
  the parent 
  characteris-
  tic.
  For exam-
  ple: I have 
  a body of 5, 
  I would nor-
  mally have 
  25 stun 
  points, if I buy addi-
  tional stun points with 
  Xp, my stun points can 
  go above 25 upto 150% 
  which is 37. By spending 5 Xp 
  my stun damage would rise to 29, by 
  spending another 5 Xp, it could rise to 33, but if 
  I spent another 5 Xp it would rise to a total of 37, 
  my upper limit.
  For 5 Xp, you can increase your derived stats by 
  choosing one of the following:
   + 1 running speed
   + 1 fortitude
   + 1 constitution 
   + 4 stun damage points 
   + 2 lethal damage points
   + 4 resolve
  
  186
  Dramatic Sytems
  Spells & enchantments
  When a magic using character wishes to learn 
  new spells, or a medium wishes to raise his abili-
  ties, they must pay for the raise in experience 
  points as well as any financial costs for the refer-
  ence books needed to study. Learning spells is 
  covered within the magic & mediums chapter. 
  Additional medium abilities have a fixed cost 
  of 6 Xp each. There is no training or prerequi-
  sites (other than being a medium). Alternatively 
  mediums can pay 6 Xp on an existing ability and 
  reduce its difficulty by 4. Difficulty reductions 
  can only be made twice for any single ability. 
  Buying off complications
  If you took a complication during character gen-
  eration, you may wish to buy it off during play. 
  This costs 10 Xp for each complication, regard-
  less of the option points you gained in character 
  generation.
  STUDY & PRACTICE (OPTIONAL RULE)
  If you want to raise a skill or characteristic that 
  your character does not often use, or at least has 
  not used for some time, the gamesmaster might 
  rule that you need to study or practice before the 
  raise can be allowed.
  Study
  Simply put you get a ‘how-to’ book and start 
  reading. Study is the hardest method, you have no 
  idea of where to begin and no one to correct your 
  mistakes. 
   
  Common knowledge: study and self tutor-
  ing can be applied to common knowledge 
  skills as often as you like, and upto the 
  maximum rating of 10. In general, it takes 
  about 1 month of study to justify 1 point of 
  skill.
   Speciality skills: as above, but you can 
  only improve specialities to a rating of 3. 
   
  Characteristics: study cannot raise charac-
  teristics, only practice can raise those.
  Practice
  Practice means actually doing something, under 
  controlled conditions, and with a teacher present 
  to correct your mistakes. Practice is always supe-
  rior to book learning. 
   
  Common knowledge: the teacher must 
  have a higher level of skill than the stu-
  dent and must have the time to teach (how 
  long this takes is up to the gamesmaster). 
  But even the most knowledgeable teachers 
  may not be any good at transferring their 
  knowledge; that’s where the skill of teach-
  ing comes in. The teacher averages his skill 
  in the subject to be taught with his teach-
  ing skill; he may then teach the student up 
  to that level of skill. A week of dedicated 
  practice is equivalent to a month of study.
   
  Speciality skills: when a skilled tutor is 
  present to provide the knowledge, spe-
  ciality skills are raised just as quickly as 
  common knowledge – 1 week for 1 rating 
  point.
   
  Characteristics: practice is just as appli-
  cable to characteristics as it is to skills. To 
  practice for presence you might attend elo-
  cution lessons, for body you might embark 
  on a workout regime.
  
  187
  Magic & Mediums
  187
  MAGIC & MEDIUMS
  Once the lands of Europe were rich with 
  magic, practically every village had its 
  healer, every court its wizard, and noth-
  ing was impossible to them. Magic was 
  power. The ebb & flow of magic swirled 
  freely through the land. But it was not to 
  last. The thirty year war ended the common 
  use of magic and left Europe in ruins. The 
  Aluminat’s armies had quite successfully 
  scoured the face of Europe of any trace of 
  magic, and had indeed destroyed most. All 
  that remained was the guild and handfuls of 
  renegade conjurers and witches.
  The guild
  The guild
  The guild started as a branch of the 
  Aluminat church. They were witch hunt-
  ers; in the years after the thirty year war 
  they were feared throughout Europe, as they 
  burned and tortured the innocent & guilty 
  alike to extract their confessions. When the 
  war was finished and the witch-hunts over, 
  they split away from their parent organisa-
  tion (the inquisition) to set up a circle of 
  wizards so that those who used magic could 
  be registered, listed and taught only what 
  the guild wanted to teach. In theory they 
  would regulate the use of magic in a civil 
  way, while the inquisition would root out 
  any unregistered renegades. One thing that it 
  is certain that the guild did not cater for was 
  that the presence and power of magic would 
  wane after the war.
  Today the guild is little more than a society 
  of greedy merchants. The inquisition has - to 
  the best knowledge - been disbanded, and 
  without that watch guard the guild expand-
  ed. Now the guild has universities and facul-
  ties in most of the premiere cities of Europe. 
  They dispense their sacred trust of lore to 
  those with money, hiring out as tutors, advi-
  sors, navigators, healers and as engineers.
  It has been a long time since the guild 
  hunted a witch. In this modem age they 
  simply look down at non-guild sorcerers as 
  pathetic amateurs, conjurers & charlatans- 
  the guild’s magic, although without a doubt 
  still the most potent in the civilised world, 
  is a shadow of its former self. Most of the 
  guilds recent research has revolved around 
  maintaining the power of magic, the very 
  force that their founders tried to still.
  The rarest of gifts
  The rarest of gifts
  It must be stressed that magical ability is a 
  rarity in Victoriana. Although those with the 
  ability to learn magic are rare enough, soci-
  ety itself halts and harnesses such power. 
  Magic after all, is the power of pure Entropy 
  – the ability to reshape reality.
  During the Thirty Years War all discovered 
  traces of magic where eliminated or passed 
  into the guild’s care. During the contem-
  porary Victoriana setting, thaumaturgical 
  knowledge may (officially) only be learnt 
  from the guild. The guild further limits the 
  availability of magic with a high price tag. 
  Even those with the money to pursue the 
  magical arts must find time and dedication 
  as Thaumaturgical study is highly taxing. So 
  much so that the guild offers two qualifica-
  tions of knowledge, bachelor of thaumaturgy 
  for those who can grasp the theory of magic 
  but not the practice, and doctor of thauma-
  turgy for the fully capable magi.
  Throughout the sphere of European influ-
  ence the guild has some 60,000 fellows, 
  only 30% of which are doctors of thauma-
  turgy. These figures cannot account for unli-
  censed practitioners or petty magicians.
  Unlicensed practitioners are those who pur-
  sue the magical arts by- their own means 
  without guild supervision or qualification. 
  Such learning is usually either from rare 
  books which survived the Thirty Years War 
  or from stolen guild journals (not available 
  to non-guild fellows). As the practice of 
  
  188
  Magic & Mediums
  magic is illegal without a guild qualification & 
  license, such dabblers do not make themselves 
  publicly known to be counted. Demonologists 
  or necromancers also need to study from ancient 
  texts; any more than the basic precepts of such 
  knowledge is highly illegal, and any who pursue 
  such knowledge (licensed or otherwise) never 
  admit to it.
  Petty magic is the province of ‘primitive’ cultures 
  and individuals. In its most rudimentary form 
  petty magic is simply faith. The guild does inves-
  tigate petty magic effects where possible, but it 
  is a field where their knowledge fails them. They 
  cannot comprehend where the energy comes from 
  to power such spells without thaumatur-
  gical knowledge. As an institu-
  tion the guild defames petty 
  magic as charlatanry.
  Magic & the law
  As has already 
  been noted only 
  those educated 
  and licensed 
  by the guild 
  may legally 
  use magic in 
  Europe. Due 
  to the rar-
  ity of magic 
  clashes with 
  the law are 
  rare. When 
  such an occur-
  rence does turn 
  up, such as an 
  assault by a fire-bolt 
  the police inform the 
  guild who despatch an 
  advisor to the police investi-
  gators.
  All rumours of demonology or necromancy are 
  processed to the guild as are petty magic (rarely 
  recognised by a layman anyway). The suppres-
  sion of demonological and necromantic lore is 
  a prime concern for the guild and one of their 
  founding principles. Fortunately such meddlers 
  are rare, it can be assumed that simply due to 
  the rarity of appropriate texts that there are no 
  more than 10 practising demonologists in Europe. 
  Necromancers may be slightly more common as 
  their knowledge comes from extensive research 
  rather than diabolical lore – this is what the guild 
  believes, anyway.
  MEDIUMS
  Mediums are those characters that at birth had 
  a gift. Like sorcerers (although not as powerful) 
  they have a connection to the flow of magical 
  energy from the ether that grants them strange 
  visions and intuitions. Many learn how to control 
  this connection to a certain extent, which is rep-
  resented by the medium abilities in the 
  players guide.
  There are three types 
  of medium; sensate, 
  channelling, and 
  corporeal (dis-
  cussed below). 
  Sensate 
  mediums are 
  attuned to 
  the magical 
  energies of 
  the natu-
  ral world; 
  channelling 
  mediums are 
  attuned to 
  the Entropy 
  of the ether 
  or the shad-
  ows of the 
  labyrinth, while 
  corporeal medi-
  ums might draw 
  their power from any 
  of the three.  There is no 
  reason why a character cannot 
  choose abilities from different medium lists and 
  develop multiple medium skills, and it is quite 
  possible for a medium to also be a magic user.
  To be a medium...
  To be a medium, a character must select the tal-
  ent medium –sensate, medium – channelling, 
  
  189
  Magic & Mediums
  or faith at least once during the options phase 
  of character creation. Each purchase of the tal-
  ent grants you an ability from the corresponding 
  abilities list. To gain access to more than one 
  ability, simply pay for the talent again and choose 
  another ability. 
  Once you purchase the talent once, you gain 
  access to the sensate medium, channelling medi-
  um, or faith skills; you should assign points to 
  these skills from your option points.
  Without points in the medium skills, no medium 
  abilities may be actively used. The character 
  has no control over his or her abilities, and the 
  gamesmaster governs when they take effect.
  Becoming a medium in play
  It is possible for an established character to expe-
  rience an epiphany that opens his senses to the 
  paranormal and transforms him into a medium. 
  The gamesmaster determines this possibility, and 
  if the character wants to raise the spirit trance 
  skill then training is required. The character must 
  spend education time practicing with another true 
  medium. 
  This is all the help that a starting medium can 
  get; such an amateur medium can only ever be 
  adept with one sensate or channelling ability. All 
  other uses of the medium abilities are impossible. 
  A character with such acquired medium powers 
  cannot ever gain more medium abilities in the 
  manner of a born medium (starting character).
  Mediums, those who claim psychic sensitivity & 
  the power of communication with the dead are a 
  fashionable diversion in Victorian England. Most 
  of these mediums are charlatans & hucksters. The 
  attributed powers of a medium truly do exist in 
  a few, but these few are rarely found performing  
  for fashionable society.
  Most true mediums are gifted at birth with their 
  special gift. Few ever achieve such vision with 
  later life. As a child, a medium is often estranged 
  from others, hypersensitive, emotionally frail and 
  often uncannily aware of others. The first thing a 
  true medium learns is not to show how they per-
  ceive the world around them. Ridicule or fear is 
  the only consistent response to such admissions.
  Within game terms mediums are those who have 
  an innate sensitivity to the supernatural. A medi-
  um’s powers are not spell knowledge, although 
  a medium may also pursue arcane knowledge. 
  Mediums powers come from a intrinsic connec-
  tion with the unseen flows of magical energy that 
  course across the world. In many ways mediums 
  are true ‘petty mages’. They have a connection 
  to the flow of magic, but do not have the control 
  over it that a full-fledged sorcerer commands.
  Mediums’ powers are not an exact and control-
  lable science, but are a highly developed sense 
  of intuition & holistic awareness. The informa-
  tion gained from a medium’s senses is frequently 
  inaccurate, or presented as abstract images and 
  notions that must then be deciphered - frag-
  mented visions, impressions of smell or sound, 
  tantalising clues that may assist, but are unlikely 
  to solve a problem on their own.
  Using abilities
  When you wish to use a ability, you make an 
  action roll using presence and the appropriate 
  medium skill. The standard difficulties are listed 
  in the ability lists. These may be affected by 
  environmental modifiers, and by penalties from 
  wounds and weariness.
  The concentration involved in using a medium 
  ability is tiring, and this is represented by the 
  expenditure of resolve.  Each use of a medium 
  ability costs 2 resolve per round that it is main-
  tained. 
  Aluminat faith
  In a world where magic is real the absence of 
  miracles might seem strange, but the Aluminat 
  faith is one of blind Order and Order opposes the 
  chaos of magic and sorcery, and so the faithful of 
  the Aluminat have little response to their prayers.
  However a few mediums do have a link through 
  the ether to the domain of Order. As discussed 
  in the eternal struggle later on, these planes are 
  distant and corrupt, but there some higher pow-
  ers encouraged by (or perhaps healed by) the true 
  ethics of the Anglicans, and thus in visions the 
  angels of order direct them; when Anglicans pray, 
  those prayers might be answered. 
  
  190
  Magic & Mediums
  In order for prayers to be answered the medium 
  must be of Anglican Aluminat ethics. The faith of 
  the dominant Aluminat sects is a faith in dogma, 
  politics and stricture, not faith in heaven. It is 
  equally possible that a character might be an 
  adherent to Anglican ethics without being of the 
  Aluminat faith; such a persons prayers are just 
  as valid. True faith isn’t a matter of scripture and 
  dogma, its a question of personal ethics.
  Praying for a miracle is done with the speciality 
  skill faith. Praying for a miracle costs 5 resolve, 
  and can only be attempted once per act. Foul 
  failure while praying brings a tarnished angel to 
  admonish the ‘heretic’.
  Sensate abilities
  Sensates have a strong connection to the natural world, and their gifts reflect their super sensi-
  tive nature allowing them to see what others do not.
  Ability 
  Difficulty 
  Description
  Aura reading 
  14 
   A successful medium + presence roll allows the medium 
  to gauge the mood, temper & intentions of the observed 
  person. Aura reading is only applied to individuals, not 
  to groups. One aura reading can be conducted with one 
  action.
  Glimpse 
  26 
   By using this power  the medium is hit with a powerful 
  and vivid vision of an event that is due to happen. The 
  medium has little control over what he sees (you cant try to 
  see the outcome of this years grand national), but you can 
  be confident that it is imminent, certainly within the next 
  week. 
  Know recent events 
  22 
   A successful action roll grants knowledge of recent events 
  occurring around the person or object being studied. The 
  nature of the knowledge gleaned from such an observation 
  is often incomplete and fragmented, often, information is 
  only trivial and not of obvious use.
  Magic sense 
  18 
   The games master makes this roll whenever the character 
  comes within 10 yards of a spell effect; focus, magical 
  artefact or sorcerer. Magical creatures such as demons are 
  not detected by this ability. With success the character is 
  aware of a tingling sensation down the spine, warning the 
  character of magical presence. An excellent success might 
  yield information concerning the nature of the magical 
  presence.
  Psychometry 
  22 
   The ability to gain information concerning an individual 
  from their personal effects. Information accessible usually 
  relates to the individual’s present welfare or location, but 
  information about the recent well being and transitions of 
  the items owner may also be gleaned.
  Sense the supernatural 14 
   The medium can sense supernatural beings such as 
  demons, ghosts and the invisible within 10 yards. Exact 
  location cannot be discerned, although a good idea of 
  direction is furnished.
  Sixth sense 
  14 
   An uncanny & instinctive knowledge of events around the 
  corner. With use of this ability a medium may finish the 
  sentences of others. Also sixth sense may be used to avoid 
  the effects of a surprise attack. In such an instance the 
  games master rolls the dice for the player without inform-
  ing him. With success the medium is not surprised and 
  may act normally. 
  
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  Channelling abilities
  Channelling mediums have a strong connection with other planes; their dreams and visions are filled 
  with alien landscapes and bizarre visions of the labyrinth, and the worlds beyond the pale.
  Ability 
  Difficulty 
  Description
  Aura reading 
  14 
   A successful medium + presence roll allows the medium 
  to gauge the mood, temper & intentions of the observed 
  person. Aura reading is only applied to individuals, not 
  to groups. One aura reading could be conducted with one 
  action.
  Know historical events 
  26 
   This ability allows the medium to contact spirits who saw 
  the past at a first hand perspective, and relive those events as 
  if present at the time. This ability is impossible to fully con-
  trol, some the medium is viewing events through a distorted 
  lens, some events leave stronger impressions than others; 
  always when a medium uses this ability, the exact events 
  and nature of the vision are at the gamesmaster’s discretion. 
  Note that this ability only relates to events of antiquity.
  Magic sense 
  18 
   The games master makes this roll whenever the character 
  comes within 10 yards of a spell effect, focus, magical arte-
  fact or sorcerer. Magical creatures such as demons are not 
  detected by this ability. With success the character is aware 
  of a tingling sensation down the spine, warning the character 
  of magical presence. An excellent success might yield infor-
  mation concerning the nature of the magical presence.
  Séance 
  22 
   Summons a spirit to temporarily possess and speak through 
  the medium. With success an individual spirit or ghost may 
  be brought forth at request. Such a spirit may be questioned 
  on the welfare of other dead souls, or on events during their 
  life. Séances do not cost resolve per round as other abilities, 
  but cost 4 resolve per question asked during the séance.
  See the supernatural 
  18 
   The medium sees spirits such as possessing demons as if 
  fully manifest, demons between hosts seem as nebulous 
  clouds. Ghosts and invisible creatures are also seen with this 
  ability.
  Sixth sense 
  18 
   An uncanny & instinctive knowledge of events around the 
  comer. With use of this ability a medium may finish the sen-
  tences of others. Also sixth sense may be used to avoid the 
  effects of a surprise attack. In such an instance the games 
  master rolls the dice for the player without informing him. 
  With success the medium is not surprised and may act nor-
  mally.
  Seances
  The process of a séance is a beacon to the demons of the pale court. A foul failure when using this ability 
  causes possession of the medium by one of these beings. If alone then the medium is overwhelmed completely 
  by the invading presence; most mediums prefer to conduct a séance in the company of others, which provides 
  some security. Each person joined in a circle of hands with a medium at a séance adds + 1 to the medium’s 
  resolution in the possession contest, if the circle of hands is broken then the bonus becomes non-effective. 
  
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  Miracles of Faith
  Ability 
  Difficulty 
  Description
  Becalm 
  24 
   The medium can call upon the heavens to halt 
  a battle, if successful then the heavens answer 
  with a portent, perhaps even an angelic vision, 
  indicating that the fighting stop. All combat par-
  ticipants must roll resolution (18) or stop fight-
  ing and gaze in wonder. 
  Glimpse 
  26 
   The medium is hit with a powerful and vivid 
  vision of an event that is due to happen. The 
  medium has little control over what he sees 
  (you cant try to see the outcome of this years 
  grand national), but you can be confident that it 
  is imminent, certainly within the next week.
  Grace 
  14 
   Use of this ability allows the medium to dispel 
  the restless dead and demons from their hosts; 
  roll resolution+faith vs. Resolution roll.
  Guardian angel 
  18 
   The medium has personal visions of a guardian 
  angel that forewarns them of surprise attacks 
  and upcoming dangers. In such an instance the 
  games master rolls the dice for the player with-
  out informing him. 
  Heal 
  18 
   The medium can call upon the mercy of heaven 
  to heal a deadly wound or disease. Success 
  causes the target to begin healing at their nor-
  mal rate. This prayer is not answered if a wound 
  can be healed naturally.
  Magic sense 
  18 
   The games master makes this roll whenever 
  the character comes within 10 yards of a spell 
  effect; focus, magical relic or sorcerer. Magical 
  creatures such as demons are not detected by 
  this ability. With success the character is aware 
  of a tingling sensation down the spine, warning 
  the character of magical presence. An excellent 
  success might yield information concerning the 
  nature of the magical presence.
  Saints candour 
  14 
   A successful presence+faith roll allows the 
  medium to gauge the mood, temper & inten-
  tions of the observed person. A single insight 
  can be gained with one action.
  Saints sight 
  18 
   The medium sees spirits such as possessing 
  demons as if fully manifest, demons between 
  hosts seem as nebulous clouds. Ghosts and 
  invisible creatures are also seen with this abil-
  ity.
  
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  SORCERY
  There are several ways of using sorcery in 
  Victoriana, firstly it is important to clarify the 
  basics, primarily how the character uses magic.
  A character must have the talent Thaumaturge or 
  petty conjuror. The talent represents a birthright 
  and natural ability to control the shifting tides of 
  magical energy.
  In addition the character must have one of the 
  appropriate skills to his school; conjuring for 
  petty mages, thaumaturgy for Thaumaturgists. 
  Without the appropriate skill, spells of that school 
  cannot be cast.
  Colleges of magic
  There are several schools of magic, each hold-
  ing its own philosophy and moral stance on the 
  use of magic, and each being a separate ‘sorcery 
  skill’. Below, the primary schools are detailed 
  with an ethical short-list such as that found in the 
  society section. 
  Thaumaturgy
  The dominant school of Europe is thaumaturgy, 
  the study and control of etheric energy - spell 
  casting. Thaumaturges invest long research, and 
  hard work to channels etheric energies through 
  the sorcerer and his spell towards the target, usu-
  ally with immediate and devastating results.
   Where does magic come from? Magic 
  ability comes from long hours of research 
  and training
   
  Why it is here? Magic is a manipulation 
  of cosmic radiation, blah, blah, blah…
   
  Who can use it? Only the guild trained 
  can achieve skill at magic with safety
   
  How powerful is magic? Magic can be 
  jolly powerful indeed
   What about the other colleges? So-called 
  natural magicians are frauds with nothing 
  more than petty parlour tricks
   What about religion? Full belief in the 
  Aluminat church, no time for heathens
   
  What about mundane peoples? Why? 
  What’s wrong with them?
   
  Is magic dangerous? Not any more, the 
  guild stopped all that hundreds of years 
  ago, aren’t we clever.
  Petty magic
  Many of its users believe that petty magic is a 
  gift from the earth goddess. Guild theologists 
  scoff at such claims as it is of course ludicrous 
  to attribute life to the earth itself. Despite these 
  claims shamans and pagans across the world 
  draw real power from the manipulation of natural 
  magic, typically through an item that is enchanted 
  to become the ‘focus’ of the magical working – 
  this process is known as petty conjuring, or more 
  accurately, enchanting. 
  Enchantments have rituals that take hours to cast 
  and require many components, but once enchant-
  ed the focus stays enchanted until used. 
   
  Where does magic come from? A force 
  of nature that may be tapped by those who 
  remember the old ways
   
  Why it is here? A gift from the goddess
   
  Who can use it? Anyone with self-confi-
  dence and a keen mind
   
  How powerful is magic? How powerful 
  do you want it?
   
  What about the other colleges? They are 
  ambitious, dangerous and ignorant
   
  What about religion? Religion has done 
  more harm than good, old ways are often 
  better than the present.
   
  What about mundane peoples? What is 
  the difference between them and me?
   
  Is magic dangerous? Like a gun, magic is 
  only evil in the wrong hands.
  RESOLVE
  Every character has a resolve pool, when a 
  character casts a spell or summons an entity a 
  characters resolve is temporarily depleted. This 
  represents the taxing strain of commanding the 
  
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  Magic & Mediums
  forces of nature. The lower a characters resolve 
  becomes, the wearier he becomes and the higher 
  the penalty applied to his actions. 
  Recovering resolve
  Your resolution characteristic determines how 
  fast your character recovers resolve points. He 
  gets back this many resolve each hour he rests.
  Characters who possess the concentration skill, 
  may meditate to regain resolve. Meditation takes 
  a hour, make a resolution + concentration roll 
  with a difficulty of 18, apply any modifiers that 
  are applicable (see modifiers in the combat chap-
  ter). Every point you roll higher than the target 
  number is recovered resolve.
  LEARNING SPELLS
  Spell magic is jealously guarded; few practitio-
  ners pass such knowledge on. Tribal shaman will 
  rarely take on more than one apprentice (their 
  successor), the guild will set exams and extract 
  money, independent civilised sorcerers may take 
  apprentices on as house slaves. The only really 
  effective way to discover power through spells is 
  to find them yourself.
   
  The guild charge £10 per resolve cost of 
  the desired spell; there is always a record 
  of which spells a character acquires 
  through the guild. The guild will only sup-
  ply their journals to those registered and 
  licensed by themselves.
   Petty magicians pass lore through word 
  of mouth, or alternatively a spell might be 
  found contained in runes or inscriptions 
  on historic sites. Such sites should be truly 
  ancient such as Stonehenge, or the sphinx. 
  Frequently enchanters receive tuition in 
  dreams, where the knowledge is a gift from 
  the gods themselves.
   Demonology and necromancy spells must 
  be learnt from dusty books- hundreds of 
  years old- and thought long lost. Finding 
  such a book of spells and lore is a major 
  event for such a practitioner.
  Spells & experience
  Resolve cost of the spell / ritual 1 
  2 
  3 
  4 
  5 
  6 
  7 
  8 
  9 
  10 
  11 
  12
  Difficulty to learn 
  18 
  22 
  26 
  30 
  34 
  38 
  42 
  46 
  50 
  54 
  60 
  64
  Time to learn (xd6 days) 
  1 
  2 
  3 
  4 
  5 
  6 
  7 
  8 
  9 
  10 
  11 
  12
  Option point cost for new pc 
  1 
  2 
  3 
  4 
  5 
  6 
  - 
  - 
  - 
  - 
  - 
  -
  Xp cost to learn 
  2 
  4 
  6 
  8 
  10 
  12 
  14 
  16 
  18 
  20 
  22 
  24
  
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  Magic & Mediums
  Whether self taught or not the procedure for 
  learning a new spell is the same. It takes time and 
  costs experience points.
  The player rolls intellect + (relevant sor-
  cery skill) versus a difficulty defined in the 
  preceding table to understand a new spell. 
  The process of unravelling a new spell’s 
  workings is not simple, it requires study 
  and meditations over the spell’s mystical 
  formula, and this takes a dice of days per 
  resolve cost of the spell. 
   If the roll failed, the time is wasted, under-
  standing of the spell still escapes the char-
  acter - the character may try again at any 
  time.
  If the roll succeeds the character now 
  understands the spell, but you must still 
  pay experience points before using it in 
  play. Once the experience cost is paid the 
  spell is added to the characters spell list 
  and may be used. 
  Libraries
  A quick review of the experience costs reveals 
  that learning sorcery is both time consuming and 
  expensive in terms of experience. Although there 
  is no shortcut around the high experience cost of 
  learning powerful spells, a decent occult library 
  can significantly ease the difficulty of learning 
  new spells.
  During the course of play, your character may 
  purchase or discover scrolls and books on sor-
  cery; such books may carry a rating, determined 
  by your gamesmaster. When you possess a library 
  of books with ratings the highest rated book 
  you possess for the field of study in question is 
  applied as a modifier to your roll.
  Grimoires & Textbooks
  Grimoire 
  Rating Date Value 
  Subject 
  Type
  The golden bough 
  0 
  1862 £10 
  Thaumaturgy Guild textbook
  Bolsters Thaumaturgical primer 
  1 
  1867 £20 
  Thaumaturgy Guild textbook
  Grimwalds compendium of  
  2 
  1842 £30 
  Thaumaturgy Guild textbook
  Thaumaturgical fundamentals 
  The snow queen 
  2 
  1451 £1200 
  Demonology 
  Ancient knowledge
  Vanderwaals advanced thaumaturgy 3 
  1798 £120 
  Thaumaturgy Guild textbook
  The red tome 
  3 
  1631 £1000 
  Thaumaturgy, demonology 
  Ancient knowledge
  Chaosium malificarum 
  4 
  1310 £6000 
  Demonology 
  Ancient knowledge
  Invericus 
  4 
  1200 £8000 
  Thaumaturgy,  Ancient knowledge
   
   
   
   
  necromancy 
  Vanweldens planar thaumaturgy 
  5 
  1818 £300 
  Thaumaturgy Guild textbook
  Revelations of the grave 
  4 
  1742 £3000 
  Necromancy 
  Ancient knowledge
  Malleus angelicus 
  5 
  1460 £600 
  Demonology 
  Ancient knowledge
  Dr Dees Thaumaturgical principles 7 
  1802 £600 
  Thaumaturgy Guild textbook
  The brilliant tapestry 
  7 
  1382 £9000 
  Demonology 
  Ancient knowledge
  The book of the dead 
  10 
  ? 
  ? 
  Necromancy 
  Ancient knowledge
  
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  Magic & Mediums
  In Victoriana there’s two types of magical gri-
  moire guild textbooks and ancient knowledge. 
  Guild textbooks are produced in sizable numbers 
  for its members and associates, and can be bought 
  (or stolen) from the guild. Ancient knowledge is 
  unique due to its age, it has to be found and the 
  search for it should be an adventure in its own 
  right. 
  On the previous page is a list of sample gri-
  moires, with rating, date of publication, and a 
  market value to magicians or collectors - even 
  for mundane adventurers the pursuit of magical 
  knowledge can be most profitable.
  LIMITS TO SPELL CASTING
  Regardless of your school, all spell casting has 
  some common limits.
   Every spell cast eats away at your 
  character’s resolve. When resolve is 
  depleted no spells may be cast until it 
  has regenerated.
   Every spell has a difficulty to cast, this 
  is usually a set number, but might be 
  an opposed roll. Special instructions on 
  any rolls for the effects of the spell are 
  included in the descriptions.
   No sorcery lasts forever, spells are 
  either instant, or they have a dura-
  tion. Durations are always based on 
  your character’s resolution, the spell 
  descriptions will note whether this is in 
  rounds, minutes or hours.
  We allow the spell using character to wander 
  around without lugging his library with him. If 
  your character has learnt a spell he can use it at 
  any time he has the resolve to do so. 
  We assume that a spell casting character has a 
  modicum of intelligence, so he does not need to 
  swot up every night to remember all his spells. 
  Although such a revision process seems reason-
  able for a spell caster of intellect 3 (mr average) 
  or lower, it would be cruel to enforce this on any 
  character other than an Ogre.
  ENCHANTING
  Petty magic rituals are long, arduous, and some-
  times dangerous. They have no immediate effect. 
  During the ritual casting a mundane item is 
  enchanted, this item is infused with the power 
  of the cast spell. To activate the spell effect this 
  enchanted item is manipulated in a certain way. 
  Upon activation the spell effect occurs and any 
  damage /effects are rolled for. It is possible for 
  a petty magician to spend a month of seclusion 
  casting rituals, and to then emerge with a sack 
  full of magical “focuses’ that may be used at any 
  time, and by anyone.
   
  As the character performs the ritual, the 
  player makes a resolution + enchanting 
  action roll against the difficulty of the 
  ritual, noted in brackets next to the resolve 
  cost. 
  
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  Magic & Mediums
   
  Success indicates that the ritual has been 
  has completed with the desired effect. The 
  resolve cost of the ritual is applied. The 
  focus is noted on the character sheet as a 
  piece of equipment along with any notes 
  necessary for its effect when finally used. 
   
  Failure indicates that the ritual failed. The 
  resolve is wasted with no further ill effects. 
  Foul failure; not only did the ritual fail, 
  but the caster loses double the amount of 
  resolve that would normally have been 
  used. The ritual may be recast, as long 
  there is resolve to fuel it. 
   Once cast the focus is dormant until it is 
  activated as dictated in the spell descrip-
  tion, only one use of a spell can be instilled 
  into a focus at one time. 
   
  To activate a focus, a physical action must 
  be initiated, usually taking one action. Also 
  additional resolve must be expended to 
  awaken the magic of the focus. The exact 
  resolve cost to “awaken” a focus is listed 
  with the spell description.  
   
  Anyone can expend resolve to awaken a 
  focus- otherwise capable of magic or not, 
  the only criteria being that they are aware 
  of and have belief in the magic that fuels 
  the focus.
  Of all the magical traditions in this section, petty 
  magic is the most under-rated and little known. 
  Its semi-religious pagan rituals hold little appeal 
  for educated sorcerers, leaving the style as the 
  almost exclusive magical method of pagans and 
  nature worshippers. Tribal shamans the world 
  over use variants of petty magic as do the few 
  surviving European pagans.
  THAUMATURGY
  Spells are cast during the initiative count of a 
  round, along with all other actions. After a spell 
  is begun, the caster can do nothing else during 
  until the spell is complete - if he does so the spell 
  is spoiled and must be started from scratch again.
  Spells take time to cast, and this is dictated by the 
  resolve cost of the spell. All thaumaturgy spells 
  take resolve cost -1 actions to cast, with a mini-
  mum of 1 action. For example: the spell ‘dark-
  ness of ages’ has a resolve cost of 2 and takes 1 
  action to cast, ‘Ectoplasmic bonds’ has a cost of 
  4 and therefore takes 3 actions to cast. ‘bother-
  ation’ has a cost of 1, but still takes 1 action to 
  cast, as 1 action is the minimum.
  So if a character is attempting to rush a casting 
  by taking multiple actions in one turn, then the 
  modifiers for multiple actions apply. The actual 
  rolls for a spell are not made until the final action 
  of casting. For example: action 1 -arcane utter-
  ing, action 2 - arcane gestures, action 3 - spell 
  cast, make all rolls
   
  If concentration is broken, the resolve spent 
  on the spell is lost. Loss of concentration 
  occurs if the character is wounded, or a 
  loud noise or unexpected blow during the 
  casting could also jar concentration.
   
  The player rolls resolution + thaumaturgy 
  skill to see if the spell has the desired 
  effect. Spells usually have a set difficulty 
  written in brackets next to the resolve cost.
   
  Some spells are cast with an opposed 
  test, in such cases the target may roll as a 
  defence against the effects (typically reso-
  lution + concentration). If the target rolls 
  higher than the casters action roll, the tar-
  get takes no (or at least lesser) effect from 
  the spell.
   
  Thaumaturgy spell casting is normally 
  obvious. If a spell caster wishes to be dis-
  crete, he should make a dexterity + sleight 
  of hand roll. Success indicates that the 
  preparations for the spell were successfully 
  hidden.
  FORBIDDEN LORE
  In Europe necromancy and demonology are con-
  sidered highly illegal and invariably diabolical. 
  Since the Thirty Years War their practice is all 
  but extinct, fragments of knowledge in battered 
  old tomes are found occasionally as reminders of 
  darker times. For those with the inclination there 
  is a hideous journey of rediscovery.
  Meanwhile those enchanters who most embody 
  the virtues of their pagan gods have the potential 
  
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  Magic & Mediums
  to become mighty invokers, commanding the 
  very embodiments of nature.
  These rules are presented here as they are most 
  likely to be used as abilities for villains, but there 
  is no reason why player characters cannot learn 
  these skills, cast these spells, or perform these 
  Summonings, and their introduction can provide 
  an interesting sub plot for a magic using character 
  as they are tempted by the power that is offered.
  Demonology
  At its most simplistic demonology is a series 
  of advancements on thaumaturgy focusing on 
  the movement and understanding of the planes 
  beyond earth, and how the inhabitants of those 
  planes can be summoned to, or dispelled from, 
  earth. Demonology offers power, and quickly – 
  but many practitioners discover too late that with 
  magic there’s no such thing as a free ride. 
   
  Where does magic come from? Chaos. To 
  believe otherwise is folly. 
   
  Why it is here? At the whims of our lady 
  of chaos. 
   Who can use it? Any with the wit and 
  balls. 
   How powerful is magic? The most power-
  ful thing in the world. 
   
  What about the other colleges? Ignorant 
  buffoons one and all!
   
  What about religion? Pah! Damn them all 
  to their respective hells, none dare admit 
  the truth of Entropy.
   What about mundane peoples? Hah, hah, 
  hah, haaaa... (maniacal grin)
   
  Is magic dangerous? Magic is incredibly 
  dangerous for the ignorant… and those 
  who cross me.
  Necromancy
  Like demonology, necromancy is a specialised set 
  of thaumic advancements, this time into death & 
  the undead. Those who follow the necromantic 
  road frequently believe themselves to be superior, 
  beyond the abilities of others – after all they have 
  unlocked the secrets of life and death, how many 
  can claim such mastery?
   
  Where does magic come from? From 
  study and perseverance.
   
  Why it is here? Magic is a manipulation 
  of cosmic radiation, blah, blah. Blah, semi-
  scientific jargon speak.
   
  Who can use it? Any with the intelligence.
   How powerful is magic? Magic is poten-
  tially quite powerful.
   
  What about the other colleges? 
  Demonologists seek the wrong power, 
  yours is greater. Petty & guild mages are 
  no match.
   
  What about religion? Fiddlesticks to 
  them. 
   
  What about mundane peoples? They are 
  very useful in my studies, obviously.
   
  Is magic dangerous? Only in the hands of 
  amateurs and charlatans.
  DEMONOLOGY
  Demonology spells are few, but powerful. Those 
  who study demonology are generally disturbed, if 
  not at the outset, then soon by their findings. The 
  true hazards of demonology are twofold. Firstly, 
  by virtue of its nature the study of demonology 
  exposes the student to the chaotic demons of the 
  pale who hunger to feed upon the innocent souls 
  of earth. Secondly, demonology attracts the arro-
  gant and cruel looking for a shortcut to power; 
  many of those who study demonology have no 
  morals about the bargains they make with demons 
  to acquire power for themselves. 
  Demonologists have access to some specialised 
  spells, which follow the same rules as those for 
  thaumaturgy.  The specific rules for demonolo-
  gists relate, of course, to the summoning and 
  commanding of demons.
  When a demonologist commands a demon, the 
  demon obeys through necessity - demons loathe 
  being ordered by mortals. Any commanded 
  demon is guaranteed to attempt escape and exact 
  revenge upon the summoner. The only exception 
  
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  Magic & Mediums
  is if Paline sends a demon to a demonologist as a 
  servant, then such loathing is replaced with jeal-
  ousy.
  Demons are fickle allies at the best of times. 
  Even the most devoutly decadent agents of Paline 
  fall foul of the games demons play with the mor-
  tals about them. Demons are highly intelligent, 
  and with access to a skilled or knowledgeable 
  host can be great adversaries. The demons of 
  the pale host seek only one thing, entertain-
  ment. However a demon’s ideal entertainment is 
  warped. Emotional torture, enslavement, physical 
  torture, depravity and debauchery form the cor-
  nerstones of demonic entertainment.
  Summoning & commanding demons
  Summoning demons requires the use of a new 
  speciality skill demonology; this skill is used both 
  for casting demonology spells and for summon-
  ing.
  When a demonologist summons a demon, he 
  haggles and eventually contracts with the demon 
  for its services. The more powerful the demon, or 
  tiresome the task, the more a demon will want in 
  return.
  Once an agreement is completed the demon 
  allows itself to be contracted to the mortal world. 
  Once manifest the demon is bound to perform 
  the sorcerer’s commands until the tasks outlined 
  in the contract are complete. No more, no less. 
  Demons are adept at wriggling through clauses 
  and gaps in contracts; they are generally keen to 
  come to earth – but would rather stay on their 
  own terms.
  Summoning
  To summon and contract with a demon, first the 
  character must gather the materials needed for the 
  ritual; the character then performs the ritual. This 
  should be role-played, as it is a significant game 
  event. 
  At the climax of the ritual an intellect + demon-
  ology roll is made against the difficulty of the 
  summoning. With success the demon appears and 
  the contract is termed and haggled upon, with 
  each party stating what they wish from the other. 
  
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  Magic & Mediums
  With failure, there is simply no demon, but with 
  foul failure the demonologists invocations have 
  attracted a servitor of the void.
  Contracting
  A resolution + demonology roll is made by 
  the player. The gamesmaster rolls resolution+ 
  demonology  (or mental competance)for the 
  demon. This roll is opposed, if the player suc-
  ceeds then the demon is bound to the contract. If 
  the demon wins then it is free to do as it pleases, 
  usually it starts by ruining the summoner. The 
  player records his success margin, this number is 
  called the control margin and is used for opposed 
  rolls against the demon when it (inevitably) 
  attempts to turn in the future.
  When the contract is completed, a demon is 
  pulled back to it’s own plane, and most demons 
  will fight this. The demon rolls its resolution 
  only (or 1/2 its mental competance) in an action 
  roll. The demon must generate a total higher 
  than 10 + the control margin. With success, the 
  demon is free to stay on the mortal plane at it’s 
  own leisure, otherwise it returns to it’s place at 
  the pale court. 
  Breaking the contract
  Either the demon or the summoner may break a 
  demonological contract. If either party refuses or 
  fails to perform its tasks then the contract is con-
  sidered broken. Regardless of which party breaks 
  the contract then the demon rolls resolution (or 
  1/2 its mental competance) against a difficulty 
  of 10+ the control margin, with success it is free 
  to travel the mortal world, with failure it remains 
  in bondage to the demonologist or returns to the 
  pale depending on who broke the contract.
  Powerful demons may allow themselves to be 
  summoned and then attempt to break the contract. 
  With success the demon may return to the pale 
  court or stay upon the mortal plane. If it fails then 
  the demon leaves the host, returning to the pale 
  court.
  The corruption of chaos
  Studying demonology might be considered 
  interesting, but its practice is resolutely bad. 
  Whenever a character uses demonology, he soils 
  his soul. Even if the spell was cast for a just 
  cause, the effect upon the caster’s body and soul 
  
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  is the same.
  Gamesmasters should keep a record of the 
  resolve spent upon demonological pursuits by a 
  character and compare them to the table above.
  Demonic possession
  Only the most powerful demons can form 
  their own body on the Order-starched plane of 
  Victoriana, most must use that of another like 
  a parasite. When the body dies the demon must 
  find another within resolution (or 1/2 its men-
  tal competance) rounds or be forced back to its 
  plane.
  To enter into the mind of another the 
  demon engages with the target in a 
  resolution+concentration or mental competance 
  vs. resolution+concentration opposed action roll. 
  This test can be retried until the demon succeeds 
  or is forced back to the pale court (see below).
  Once occupying a body the demon is not neces-
  sarily in control. It is aware of the host’s every 
  thought and sensation all the time, and the host 
  is aware that there is something in his head and 
  hears whispering voices if the demon tries to 
  communicate. 
  The demon may try and take over 
  at any time; this is accomplished by 
  another resolution+concentration vs. 
  resolution+concentration opposed action roll. 
  If the host wins the demon cannot attempt to 
  take over again for an amount of hours equal 
  to the hosts resolution. However, if the demon 
  wins, then the demon has control of the body for 
  its resolution in hours, at which point another 
  opposed roll can be made. While the demon is in 
  control, the host is fully aware, looking on as if a 
  passenger in his own body, but unable to act. If at 
  any point in a series of opposed rolls over control 
  of a body the demon or host rolls a foul, then that 
  party’s consciousness is permanently dispelled 
  beyond the pale.
  When a demon takes control of the body, the 
  body may contort to allow the demon use of 
  its abilities. An opposed roll for each attribute 
  should be made, matching the demon to the host. 
  Success for the demon shows that the body has 
  Demonology corruption table
  Resolve spent 
  Effects
  100 
  Skin becomes unnaturally pale, like fine porcelain 
  300 
  Hair turns red, often unnaturally scarlet. 
  600 
  Eyes emanate a soft glow making a glance seem like a stare –1 presence 
  1,000 
  Sorcerer develops erratic (chaotic) emotional and social behaviour. –2 presence
  2,000 
   Paline grants the sorcerer the knowledge of the ritual to summon one of her own daugh-
  ters. The daughter encourages all depravities and persecutes all virtue. This is often the 
  turning point for a demonologist, either he embraces the pale and progresses, or the 
  daughter deems him timid and destroys him.
  4,000 
   Sorcerer appears to have no face, merely a blank mask. All senses remain intact, but 
  the sorcerer will never eat again, now relying on injected chemical infusions for life. –4 
  presence
  6,000 
   The sorcerer has become a demon prince, worthy of the pale lady’s favour. To get here 
  the sorcerer has already proved himself to the daughter, now he leaves the earth to 
  entertain the unholy queen. The character is now an NPC.
  
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  contorted to resemble the demon’s own form -
  use the demon’s attribute. Success for the caster 
  shows that the host’s body could not be twisted 
  this time. Upon the host regaining control of his 
  body any changed attributes may not change 
  back, another attribute contest ensues.
  Unsurprisingly, few hosts emerge from a posses-
  sion fully sane.
  NECROMANCY
  The spirits of the dead observe the mortal world 
  with envy and greed, coveting that which they 
  once had. Because of this lust, summoning the 
  dead is very quick, the summoner simply casts 
  the appropriate spell (lesser or greater) which 
  channels the spirits through the sorcerer and into 
  the body that is to be the host.
  The study of death requires the use of a new spe-
  ciality skill necromancy; this skill is used both 
  for casting necromantic spells and 
  for raisings.
  What are undead?
  The undead are restless spirits, called back from 
  beyond the grave to reinhabit the corpses of peo-
  ple or animals that have died. There are two types 
  of restless spirit, ‘lesser’ and ‘greater’. 
  Lesser undead: Lesser spirits are slow, stupid, 
  insensate and hateful spirits jealous of the life 
  around them. If they are not controlled they will 
  destroy everything in sight including each other. 
  Lesser spirits cannot exist on this plane without a 
  host body. 
  Greater undead: Greater spirits are much more 
  intelligent than their lesser brethren, they are 
  usually summoned as leaders of lesser undead 
  because of this. They too are consumed with a 
  hate for the living, but the blundering violence 
  of the lesser undead is replaced with a cold cal-
  culating mind that revels in cruel delights. Many 
  greater undead have spells and almost demonic 
  abilities. Greater spirits cannot exist on this 
  plane without a host body. 
  Once successfully raised, the undead 
  stay in the service of the summoner until 
  the summoner dies, and will stay on this 
  plane until the body that it occupies is 
  destroyed. Although lesser undead are 
  too simple minded to reach the obvious 
  conclusion, greater undead often hatch 
  elaborate plots 
  to murder their 
  summoner 
  so they may 
  then walk the 
  earth freely. 
  Necromancers 
  powerful 
  enough to sum-
  mon the greater 
  restless are 
  usually savvy 
  enough to 
  realise this, and 
  bind these spir-
  its with geas to 
  prevent such 
  treachery.
  
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  Corruption points
  There is a side effect to using necromancy. The 
  very process of channelling the dead spirits to 
  the host bodies has a corrupting effect upon the 
  sorcerer’s body and mind. For every necromancy 
  spell cast (except rest) the sorcerer gains corrup-
  tion points equal to the resolve cost of the spell. 
  For each lesser undead raised (note every undead 
  - not every casting - every undead raised) the sor-
  cerer gains 5 corruption point, for every greater 
  undead raised the sorcerer gains 40 corruption 
  points.
  Every time the spell rest is cast the sorcerer loses 
  corruption points. For every lesser undead put to 
  rest the caster loses 5 points. For every greater 
  undead put to rest the sorcerer loses 10 corruption 
  points. For every unsuccessful casting of rest the 
  caster loses 1 point.
  In the case of PC sorcerers there is a way back 
  from this dark path. If the sorcerer renounces the 
  practice of necromancy in the name of a god or 
  goddess, forgets all his / her necromancy spells, 
  burns his necromantic journals and vows never to 
  use them again, the sorcerer has a chance of his 
  vow being heard. If the gamesmaster deems this 
  vow to be in good faith the character immediately 
  loses 100 corruption points and loses another 5 
  for every lesser undead destroyed, 20 for every 
  greater undead destroyed, 30 for every necroman-
  cer destroyed, and 80 for every Litche destroyed- 
  should he ever take up necromancy again, or use 
  a necromantic spell of any sort, then he regains 
  100 corruption points, loses 2 resolution and may 
  never appeal to the deity again for any purpose.
  The strength of the dead
  The lesser undead are treated as supporting cast, 
  greater undead are always character villains. In 
  both cases the competence / characteristics of the 
  undead are used for all mental or social charac-
  teristics and all skill ratings, while the host body 
  provides physical characteristics – this is only 
  really important in the case of greater undead, in 
  the case of lesser undead supporting cast compe-
  tence ratings are used.
  Lesser undead
  Typically lesser undead animating human corpses 
  have a competence of 8 which reflects their crude 
  senses and shambling forms, gamesmaster’s may 
  wish to vary physical competence between 6 and 
  12 to represent the corpses of different races.
   
  Lesser undead are unaffected by pain, they 
  can fight until their health is totally deplet-
  ed at no penalty. When their health is gone, 
  they collapse, and the restless spirit driving 
  Corruption levels
  Points 
  Effects
  200 
  The sorcerer’s eyes become dull, and appear lifeless –1 presence
  600 
  The sorcerer’s skin becomes drawn and cadaverous –2 presence
  1,000 
  Sorcerer appears emaciated, skeletal –3 presence
  2,000 
  The sorcerer’s constitution weakens. –1 body
  3,000 
   Body starts to rot, constantly emitting a foul smell. –4 presence –2 
  body
  6,000 
   The passage of necromantic energy coursing through the sorcerers 
  body finally snuffs out his life, the sorcerer has become a Litche, he is 
  now an NPC
  
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  the body on is forced back to the realm of 
  the dead.
   
  Lesser undead have fragmented memories 
  and very basic (and twisted) emotions, and 
  so can theoretically be beguiled and per-
  suaded into a course of action by someone 
  other than their summoner/leader. The dif-
  ficulty for such a task is ridiculous at least.
   
  Lesser undead need no sleep and are 
  immune to any related form of magic.
   
  Lesser undead are considered flammable, 
  unless circumstance dictates that this is 
  obviously not the case.
  Greater undead
  Greater undead are character villains in their own 
  right. Normally they are a threat equal to the nec-
  romancer who summoned them if not greater. It 
  takes an exceptional individual to resist the final 
  sleep, and all greater undead were potent individ-
  uals in their own right during life.
   When creating a greater 
  undead, allocate 24 char-
  acteristic points between 
  intellect, resolution and 
  luck. Use the body, and 
  dexterity of the corpse 
  they inhabit. Presence 
  is that of the corpse –5. 
   
  Allocate upto 100 skill points among skills, 
  the undead have had a long time to perfect 
  their trades and their focus areas (combat 
  skills for warriors, etc) should be at rating 
  8 or higher. All greater undead have one to 
  three necromancer spells as ‘natural abili-
  ties’ and an effective necromancy skill of 
  10 to use them.
   
  Greater undead are unaffected by pain, they 
  can fight until their health is totally deplet-
  ed at no penalty. When their health is gone, 
  they collapse, and the restless spirit driving 
  the body on is forced back to the realm of 
  the dead.
   
  Greater undead are fully sentient. They 
  have memories and a full range of twisted 
  emotions, and can be beguiled and per-
  suaded into a course of action, reasoned 
  with and threatened by someone other than 
  their summoner / leader. Greater undead 
  are always very intelligent, and will usually 
  drive a hard bargain.
  Greater undead need no sleep and 
  are immune to any related form of 
  magic.
  Greater undead are 
  considered flammable, 
  unless circumstance 
  dictates that this is 
  obviously not the case.
  
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  ENCHANTMENT RITUALS
  Animal companion
  Ritual resolve: 4 (22)
  Ritual length: 2 hrs
  Activation range: na
  Activation resolve: na 
  Duration: *
  This ritual enchants a living animal, granting additional intelligence & 
  durability. The enchanter must gather herbs to prepare a magical concoc-
  tion, and coax the animal to drink it. This spell increases the intellect and 
  body of the animal by 2. The spell creates a bond of friendship, although 
  there will be no compulsion to stay with the enchanter if the animal is being 
  badly treated. Also, the enchanter and the companion animal are able to 
  communicate telepathically. The enchantment lasts for 1 year and 1 day, 
  after this time the spell must be cast again. 
  Befuddle
  Ritual resolve: 2 (20)
  Ritual length: 2 hrs
  Activation range: touch
  Activation resolve: 1 
  Duration: rounds
  The focus must be doused 9 times in a mixture of herbs while the spell is 
  cast. Touching the item to the bare flesh of the target activates the enchant-
  ment. Enchanter rolls resolution + enchanting, the target rolls resolution 
  + concentration. Success by the enchanter causes the target to become dis-
  oriented and confused, apply a –6 penalty to all action rolls. Success by the 
  target results in no effect at all. The range is touch of the item to flesh; the 
  item may be thrown, or fired from a catapult.
  Cat nimble
  Ritual resolve: 3 (21)
  Ritual length: 1 hr
  Activation range: self
  Activation resolve: 1 
  Duration: rounds
  To enact this ritual the enchanter must play act hunting for mice, as if he 
  were a cat. During the ritual the focus must be carried or worn, at the finish 
  of the ritual the focus is imbued.
  Once activated, the focus grants the activator the dexterity and grace of a 
  cat ( + 4 dexterity). 
  
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  Cloak of shadows
  Ritual resolve: 2 (20)
  Ritual length: 1 hr
  Activation range: touch
  Activation resolve: 1 
  Duration: minutes
  The focus must be cloth and is 
  sprinkled with powdered cobwebs; 
  ripping the cloth activates the item. 
  The item and anything enclosed 
  (such as a man within a coat) 
  become semi-transparent, blending 
  with surroundings and becoming 
  easier to hide. Increase the effective 
  hide & sneak or conceal item of 
  the activator by + 4. 
  Create Heartstone
  Ritual resolve: 4 (22)
  Ritual length: 4 hrs
  Activation range: self
  Activation resolve: na 
  Duration: *
  This ritual creates a Heartstone. Heartstones focus natural magic and 
  using a Heartstone while performing rituals halves all ritual times. In addi-
  tion Heartstones can store resolve for later use. The enchanter chooses 
  his focus (usually a stone) and spends the ritual time personalising and 
  enchanting it, and during the process transferring up to 10 resolve into the 
  item. This resolve stays within the item and may be called upon at a later 
  date.
  Edge sharp
  Ritual resolve: 2 (20)
  Ritual length: 3 hrs
  Activation range: touch
  Activation resolve: 1 
  Duration: *
  This ritual makes a mundane item into a weapon, or increases the effec-
  tiveness of an existing weapon. During the ritual the item that is to be 
  affected must be prayed over at dawn. To activate, simply attack with the 
  focus as a weapon, it will do 2 dice of lethal damage as well as any nor-
  mal damage rolled for the weapon type. The enchantment is normally cast 
  on melee weapons and only lasts for 3 successful attacks, and cannot be 
  placed on bullets or arrows, but may be placed on 3 thrown items or cata-
  pult shots for one use each.
  Far leap
  Ritual resolve: 3 (21) 
  Ritual length: 3 hrs
  Activation range: self
  Activation resolve: 1 
  Duration: rounds
  The enchanter strings the focus to a kite, which is then flown at 
  sunset. 
  Once activated the enchantment enables the leaping of huge dis-
  tances with little effort. From a standing start the activator may 
  jump up to his running movement across or up, and land with no 
  exertion. 
  
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  Fury
  Ritual resolve: 2 (20) 
  Ritual length: 1 hr
  Activation range: sight
  Activation resolve: 1 
  Duration: minutes
  To enact this ritual the enchanter must rage at the heavens in a pitched 
  argument for a whole hour while wearing or carrying a focus. At the end 
  of the hour the focus is imbued. 
  Once activated the enchantment causes the target to burst into an uncon-
  trollable outburst of anger and hatred. All of his slightest dislikes and 
  annoyances become ferocious hatreds. Roll resolution + enchanting vs. 
  Resolution + concentration. With success for the caster the target must 
  attack the objects of his fury during the spells duration. However, if the 
  target succeeds in the roll then they remain in control despite the fury. 
  Hailstorm
  Ritual resolve: 3 (21)
  Ritual length: 4 hrs
  Activation range: sight
  Activation resolve: 2 
  Duration: instant
  The enchanter must collect dew from the grass and wet the focus with 
  it, while singing an ancient dirge. The enchanter must make a successful 
  presence + art: singing roll as well as resolution + enchanting for the 
  ritual to succeed. Once activated a howling torrent of huge hailstones 
  descends from the sky (or ceiling) onto the target for 6 dice of stun dam-
  age at ground zero, and losing 1 dice of damage for each meter radius 
  out. 
  Healing poultice
  Ritual resolve: 4 (22)
  Ritual length: 1 hr
  Activation range: touch
  Activation resolve: 1 
  Duration: instant
  The herbs for the focus (the poultice) must be correctly gathered and 
  prepared. The poultice is activated when applied to a wound and has only 
  one use. It immediately restores 2d6 health and stun, up to maximum. 
  May treat the same wound as mundane medical aid and be effective, and 
  more than one poultice can be applied at a time.
  Liken shape
  Ritual resolve: 8 (26)
  Ritual length: 6 hrs
  Activation range: self
  Activation resolve: 3 
  Duration: hours
  Lets the activator assume the form of a natural 
  animal. The activator temporarily takes on the new 
  shape and corresponding attacks for the duration 
  of the spell. The spell also grants a limited com-
  munication with other animals of the same kind. 
  An animal’s skill ‘knowledge’ is not inherited with 
  the form.
  The enchanter must make a necklace of bones 
  gathered from a corpse of the animal he intends to 
  impersonate. The enchanter is not allowed to kill 
  the creature himself. Donning the necklace allows 
  the animal form to be adopted for the enchanters 
  resolution in hours - not necessarily at the same 
  time. 
  
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  Living vines
  Ritual resolve: 6 (24) 
  Ritual length: 3 hrs
  Activation range: thrown
  Activation resolve: 4 
  Duration: minutes
  During the ritual the enchanter col-
  lects acorns and berries from the 
  ground, and paints them with bark 
  resin.
  To activate the enchantment the acti-
  vator simply throws the seeds to the 
  ground, which then erupts into thick, 
  entangling vines and creepers. The 
  vines cover resolution square feet, 
  and hinder enemies but not allies. 
  Treat the vines as an entangling 
  weapon that must be escaped with 
  dexterity + athletics vs. the enchant-
  ers resolution + enchanting.
  Oceans gift
  Ritual resolve: 1 (18)
  Ritual length: 10 mins 
  Activation range: self 
  Activation resolve: 1 
  Duration: minutes
  During the ritual the enchanter must totally 
  immerse himself in the sea, and while doing so 
  take something from beneath the waves, such 
  as a shell. Subsequently breaking this underwa-
  ter object activates the effect. The enchantment 
  allows the activator to breathe normally for the 
  duration as long as a piece of the broken focus is 
  clasped in the activator’s hand. If the broken item 
  is lost, the enchantment is broken.
  Pebble shine
  Ritual resolve: 1 (18)
  Ritual length: 1 hr
  Activation range: touch
  Activation resolve: 1 
  Duration: hours
  The focus is a pebble; it must be danced around in the light of sunrise. 
  Subsequent activation causes the focus to glow with enough light to fully 
  illuminate a 20ft radius. If the enchanter wishes, he or she can hold the 
  pebble and move it about. Activation is caused by rubbing the pebble 
  three times, and duration is resolution in hours of activation. May be 
  turned on and off to conserve time. 
  Stone sight
  Ritual resolve: 6 (24) 
  Ritual length: 2 hrs
  Activation range: touch
  Activation resolve: 4 
  Duration: hours
  Uses two small stones as focuses, during the ritual they are painstaking 
  painted to resemble eyes. 
  The enchantment allows the activator to see through the first focus by 
  holding the second to his forehead- the activator can see from all direc-
  tions of the object by turning his head as if he were at the location of the 
  first focus in person.
  
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  Power of decay
  Ritual resolve: 6 (24)
  Ritual length: 6 hrs
  Activation range: touch
  Activation resolve: 2 
  Duration: instant
  This ritual requires the enchanter to collect decaying animal & plant mat-
  ter; mould it into the shape of a man and burn it slowly. The enchanter 
  then keeps the ash. Throwing the ash in the air and pointing at the target 
  activates the enchantment. 
  The enchantment only affects inanimate objects and speeds the passage of 
  time, aging things by 2d6 abstract units. Following is a list of examples of 
  what can be accomplished by different amounts of units: to rust a sword 
  or gun to uselessness – 10 units, to totally dissolve clothes - 5, or to com-
  pletely rot wooden beams – 8. Range is touch – of the ash to the target, a 
  bag of ash could be thrown to increase range.
  Rainguard
  Ritual resolve: 1 (18) 
  Ritual length: 20 mins
  Activation range: self
  Activation resolve: 1 
  Duration: hours
  This spell once activated keeps the activator dry even in the fiercest 
  downpour. It offers no protection against water-based spells, and the dura-
  tion is the enchanters resolution as hours of rainfall.
  The enchanter must gather rainwater in a copper container, then soak the 
  focus (usually clothing) in the water; the enchantment is activated when-
  ever the item contacts rainwater. 
  Sleep
  Ritual resolve: 4 (22)
  Ritual length: 1 hr
  Activation range: touch
  Activation resolve: 2 
  Duration: hours
  The enchanter stays awake from dusk till dawn singing to the focus. The 
  focus activates when it touches flesh. The focus makes an opposed roll 
  with the target, it uses the enchanters resolution + enchanting vs. the 
  resolution + concentration of the target. 
  If the enchantment is successful, then the target falls asleep, if not the 
  target will still feel exhausted (-5). A target will not necessarily be aware 
  that he is under attack, he will simply feel tired. The duration is resolu-
  tion in hours, and relates to the hours of sleep that the focus can induce. 
  Voluntary targets aware of the spell need not make the opposed roll.
  Stone cloth
  Ritual resolve: 3 (20) 
  Ritual length: 3 hrs
  Activation range: self
  Activation resolve: 1 
  Duration: weeks
  The enchanter must grind up sandstone into powder and cover the focus 
  (typically clothes) with the dust; the enchanter must also stick a large pin 
  into the item. The focus is activated when this pin is removed (1 action). 
  The spell toughens the focus 
  with an armour value of 6, 
  which is added with any pre-
  vious armour value of the item 
  and other armours worn. A 
  stone cloth enchantment lasts 
  for resolution in weeks, or 
  until the dust is washed off.
  
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  THAUMATURGY SPELLS
  Botheration
  Resolve cost: 1 (18)
  Range: touch 
  Duration: rounds
  Once cast the target must be touched, and a opposed roll between resolution 
  + thaumaturgy and resolution + concentration ensues. If successful the tar-
  get becomes totally confused. A bothered target cannot concentrate on even 
  simple tasks, represented by a –6 action roll modifier. 
  Darkness of ages
  Resolve cost: 2 (22)
  Range: 20 yds 
  Duration: minutes
  Creates a billowing black cloud of absolute darkness. From outside the spells 
  5 yard radius the cloud appears to be thick roiling smoke. From within there 
  is absolute darkness, with no suggestion of smoke or a gas of any kind. 
  Ectoplasmic bonds
  Resolve cost: 4 (24)
  Range: 40 yds 
  Duration: hours
  Tendrils of Ectoplasmic slime materialise to ensnare the target of this spell. 
  The bonds may stick a target to a surface such as a wall, floor or ceiling. 
  Breaking free from the slime requires a body + athletics (32) roll. Winning 
  breaks free, losing remains entangled. After 2 hours the slime starts to lose 
  coherence, and the difficulty drops by 4 each half hour from that point until 
  the end of the duration.
  Farspeech
  Resolve cost: 1 (20)
  Range: sight 
  Duration: instant
  This spell allows whispered conversation to be passed as far as the 
  eye can see. As long as the target can be seen they can hear the 
  caster’s words. This spell does not grant two-way communications.
  
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  Etheric bolt
  Resolve cost: 4 (24)
  Range: 20 yds 
  Duration: instant
  Upon completion of the spell, an etheric bolt of green energy forms 
  around the casters hand, which may then be fired with dexterity + thau-
  maturgy in the same manner as mundane ranged attacks. The bolt does 
  4 dice of lethal damage. Etheric bolt is not resisted with resolution; the 
  rules for dodging ranged attacks apply. One casting provides one bolt.
  Etheric bludgeon
  Resolve cost: 2 (22)
  Range: 20 yds 
  Duration: instant
  Upon completion of the spell, a pale bolt of energy forms around the 
  casters hand, which may then be fired with dexterity + thaumaturgy in 
  the same manner as mundane ranged attacks. The bolt does 4 dice of stun 
  damage. The bolt is not resisted with resolution; the rules for dodging 
  ranged attacks apply. One casting provides one bolt.
  Firespark
  Resolve cost: 1 (20)
  Range: self 
  Duration: instant
  A small gas flame appears from the finger or thumb of the caster. The 
  flame lasts several seconds and is sufficient to light a pipe, cigarette, 
  lamp, candle or fire.
  Etheric barrage
  Resolve cost: 6* (26)
  Range: 100 yds
  Duration: rounds
  This spell channels energy around the sorcerer and then through him into 
  a seething stream of fire, which may then be fired with dexterity + thau-
  maturgy in the same manner as mundane ranged attacks. The caster can 
  throw any amount of barrages from one casting, but each bolt after the 
  first costs an additional 2 resolve. Should the Thaumaturge foul with any 
  roll when using this spell, the caster will suffer a full strength barrage hit 
  himself.
  Each barrage does 6 dice of lethal damage. Barrages are not resisted with 
  resolution; the rules for dodging ranged attacks apply. One casting pro-
  vides unlimited bolts for the duration.
  
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  Flight of the wyvern
  Resolve cost: 3 (22)
  Range: self
  Duration: minutes
  The caster can command ethereal forces to counterbalance the forces of 
  gravity, thereby granting the power of flight. The caster gains a flying 
  combat speed of 16 yards/round. As the air is not a native element to 
  mankind, flight is slow and unsteady at first, with manoeuvres relying on 
  intellect alone. Frequent flyers however, may study the speciality: flight 
  skill.
  Levitate
  Resolve cost: 2 (20)
  Range: 10 yds
  Duration: rounds
  The caster can command ethereal forces to counterbalance the forces 
  of gravity, allowing the levitation of himself, or other persons and 
  objects. No object may be raised higher that 6 yards from the ground, 
  and no more objects than the casters intellect may be raised at one time. 
  Levitation simply moves objects upwards; it confers no further move-
  ment ability.
  Gaslight
  Resolve cost: 1 (18)
  Range: 4 yds
  Duration: minutes
  Creates a small 
  ball of light in 
  the caster’s hand. 
  The light has the 
  power of a good 
  gas lamp and illu-
  minates approx 
  5 yards radius. 
  The ball can float 
  and may be men-
  tally directed by 
  the caster to any 
  position within 
  range. 
  
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  Groom
  Resolve cost: 1 (18)
  Range: self
  Duration: instant
  This spell washes, refreshes, oils and combs hair, trims the moustache, 
  even dusts down and presses the caster’s clothes. Observers will see 
  the caster improving in appearance as if tended to by invisible hands,  
  with creases and folds in clothing ironing out while still worn.
  Hair of the dog
  Resolve cost: 2 (26)
  Range:  touch
  Duration: hours
  The caster must incant the formula to this spell loudly in Latin, upon 
  completion all the targets hangover symptoms are gone. The spell expels 
  headache, dizziness, lethargy, curried eyes, and bowel trouble. Note that 
  none of the above symptoms can be dispelled unless they are symptoms 
  of a hangover.
  Heal
  Resolve cost: 4 (22)
  Range: touch
  Duration: instant
  This spell instantly knits flesh and dispels infection, healing 4d6 health. 
  The application of this spell has made the guild renowned as miracle 
  healers. Diseases cannot be treated with heal, they must be treated with 
  cure
  Cure
  Resolve cost: 6 (26)
  Range: touch
  Duration: instant
  This spell instantly cleanses the target of any resident diseases or infec-
  tions that might be afflicting them. Poisons and physical wounds cannot 
  be treated with cure.
  Instant beauty
  Resolve cost: 2 (22)
  Range: touch
  Duration: hours
  Increases the desir-
  ability of the recipi-
  ent. No discernible 
  change occurs, but 
  others find the recipi-
  ent attractive any-
  way, possibly being 
  puzzled as to why. 
  Presence increases 
  by 2 for the duration.
  
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  Magic tobacconist
  Resolve cost: 1 (18)
  Range:  self
  Duration: instant
  Allows the caster to magically produce a fine cigar or cigarette. 
  Alternatively the spell might be used to magically fill a pipe bowl.
  Power of steam
  Resolve cost: 3 (22)
  Range: touch
  Duration: minutes
  The caster may confer the motive power of a steam train into a vehicle. 
  When travelling in such a manner multi hued steam pours from the vehi-
  cle, often obscuring sight (-2 to driving rolls). 
  If applied to a person, their running speed is doubled and they gain +2 
  body. However, they also go bright red as magical steam gushes from 
  ears, mouth, nose and through the seams of clothing. Living creatures 
  take 1d6 stun each minute as a result of the unnatural exertions the body 
  undergoes in this state. 
  Scholar’s guard
  Resolve cost: 1 (20)
  Range: touch
  Duration: hours
  The caster traces an imaginary perimeter with pointed finger. The perim-
  eter may be up to 3 yards radius. Anything stepping through the perim-
  eter sets off a magical alarm. The nature of the highly audible alarm is 
  left to the caster.
  Second sight
  Resolve cost: 2 (20)
  Range: self
  Duration: rounds
  Allows the caster to see supernatu-
  ral effects clearly. Such phenomena 
  include: possessing demons appear as if 
  fully manifested through second sight. 
  Spells effects appear as glowing energy 
  and their nature may be discerned 
  with scrutinise rolls. Creatures such as 
  ghosts are always visible through sec-
  ond sight. While second sight is active, 
  mundane sight is dim and darkened - all 
  perception tests relating to the mundane 
  world are at –4 modifier.
  
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  215
  Spyglass eyes
  Resolve cost: 1 (20)
  Range: self
  Duration: minutes
  Allows the caster to see with up to x20 magnification, as if using a pow-
  erful spyglass. The spyglass effect may be turned on or off during the 
  duration.
  Steely skin
  Resolve cost: 5 (24)
  Range: touch
  Duration: minutes
  The spell weaves an invisible shroud of magical energy about the recipi-
  ent, granting an armour value of 10, which is added to any other armour 
  worn. 
  The emperor’s new spell
  Resolve cost: 4 (24)
  Range: self
  Duration: minutes
  Renders the caster totally 
  invisible to normal sight. 
  Some creatures and use 
  of second sight spell will 
  detect the caster. The spell 
  will only render the body 
  invisible, clothes and items 
  are not invisible unless 
  swallowed or otherwise 
  enclosed in a body cavity. 
  True door
  Resolve cost: 2 (20)
  Range: touch
  Duration: hours
  This spell is cast upon a portal such as a door, window, box lid or other 
  such scalable opening. The magic of the spell permeates the material of 
  the portal and knits it together with strong, magic glue. The portal can 
  no longer be opened normally, and must be forced.
  
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  Curse of Entropy
  Resolve cost: 6 (opp)
  Range: touch
  Duration: *
  Causes the victim to become deformed and demonic in appearance. The 
  nature of the deformation cannot be chosen unless a special success is 
  made when casting the spell. 
  The abnormality is usually unpleasant to behold, possibly reducing the 
  victim’s presence. The curse may be regressed with a casting of quiet.
  DEMONOLOGY SPELLS
  Demonic dominion
  Resolve cost: 8 (opp)
  Range: touch
  Duration: *
  The casting of this spell destroys the mind of the victim, reducing intel-
  lect & resolution by ld6 each. The effects are permanent and cumulative, 
  taking the victim closer to gibbering lunacy with each casting. The pur-
  pose of the spell is to reduce a prospective hosts resistance to demonic 
  possession.
  Ether ribbons
  Resolve cost: 2 (18)
  Range: 10 yds
  Duration: minutes
  Creates ethereal sinews of shadow that entwine around a victim, grabbing 
  them with an effective body of 18. In addition the demonic strands have a 
  life of their own; tickling, pricking and probing where decency forbids. 
  
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  Ethereal cloak
  Resolve cost: 6 (24)
  Range: cloak
  Duration: minutes
  The spell makes the caster and his apparel incorporeal, he is unaffected 
  by and unable to affect the mundane world, and able to walk through 
  solid objects. The caster is still visible, as a ghostly imprint on the retina 
  as he passes. 
  Quiet
  Resolve cost: 4 (opp)
  Range: touch
  Duration: *
  This invocation forces a demon from a host and back beyond the pale. 
  If cast against a manifest demon, imp or messenger, they too are imme-
  diately compelled to return to their home plane. The spell is cast as a 
  resolution+concentration vs. resolution+concentration opposed action 
  roll.
  Fade
  Resolve cost: 8 (opp)
  Range: 10 yds
  Duration: instant
  This spell causes one victim to fade from existence, becoming increas-
  ingly transparent until he is gone. There is no half effect for this spell.
  If the victim rolls better than the caster the spell is a failure, if the caster 
  wins then the victim fades. The whole process takes several seconds, 
  allowing a fading character a  single round of hasty actions before finally 
  disappearing. The victim has actually been sent to the pale court, directly 
  to the Pale queen’s feet -never to return. 
  The lady’s audience
  Resolve cost: 3 (18)
  Range: self
  Duration: minutes
  Often this invocation is disguised as a less auspicious spell, in order to 
  better capture innocents.
  The spell transports the caster to the Pale court itself, with immediate 
  introduction into the presence of the Pale queen thrown in. There is no 
  way of ensuring safety against such power, make sure you have some-
  thing interesting to say or do for the duration of your stay.
  
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  The revelation of all
  Resolve cost: 4 (opp)
  Range: 10 yds
  Duration: instant
  This spell reveals the true beauty of Entropy and the glory of the planes 
  to the victim, but in about 2 seconds flat. The result is a coma that lasts 
  for as long as the gamesmaster decides, typically 1d6 days, but possibly 
  for life. The shock of the revelations often turns the victim’s hair white.
  Whispering colours
  Resolve cost: 4 (opp)
  Range: touch
  Duration: days
  The victim is exposed to 
  chaotic emanations that 
  appear to the victim as 
  shimmering unearthly 
  colours, the energy is 
  invisible to others. The 
  energy causes insanity and 
  catatonia for as long as it 
  is present. Every 12 hours 
  the victim may make a 
  resolution + concentra-
  tion (28) roll. Success for 
  the victim dismisses the 
  effect immediately.
  SUMMONINGS
  These invocations contain the key phrases that 
  open a pathway of communication to the other 
  planes. The phrases are complex and labori-
  ous, detailing the particular requirements for 
  the demon or creature being summoned, and the 
  devotion of the caster to the lady of chaos. Rituals 
  take varying amounts of time, corresponding to 
  the power of the entity being summoned, and 
  require a copious supply of incense and ritual 
  ornamentation. Summonings frequently require 
  a living, sentient offering to serve as host or as a 
  sacrifice to the summoned being.
  Summon circle 1 demon
  Ritual resolve: 6 (22)
  Ritual length: 1 hr 
  Ritual needs: a live 
  captive, to be offered 
  up as host.
  Success in this invocation summons a 
  demon from beyond the 1st Pale to pos-
  sess the provided host, usually with a 
  flash of flame that incinerates clothing 
  & bindings alike without even singing 
  the demons new body. These demons are 
  usually summoned as familiars by demo-
  nologists who lack mortal servants.
  
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  Fleeting messenger
  Ritual resolve: 6 (18)
  Ritual length: 1 hr
  Ritual needs: one bird 
  or bat
  The ritual to summon this 
  creature requires one bird 
  or bat. The ritual summons 
  a small demonic gargoyle-
  like demon to possess the 
  mortal creature. The mes-
  senger will deliver one 
  written message for the 
  summoner, like a carrier 
  pigeon. The messenger 
  demon has an unerring 
  sense of direction and a 
  homing ability, to follow 
  even a moving target. 
  Flickering between the 
  planes for speed, the mes-
  senger always delivers on the 11th hour from summoning. A messenger 
  delivers one message to anywhere in the world and then disappears.
  Summon circle 2 demon
  Ritual resolve: 6 (24)
  Ritual length: 2 hrs 
  Ritual needs: a live 
  captive, to be offered 
  up as sacrifice, and a 
  mastiff to be offered as 
  host.
  Success in this invocation brings a demon from beyond the 2nd Pale to 
  possess the provided host. Once in control the demon will then proceed 
  to satisfy its appetites with the sacrifice. These demons are savage guard-
  ians and are usually summoned as protectors or killers. Their appetites 
  are both insatiable and deplorable.
  Summon circle 3 demon
  Ritual resolve: 7 (26)
  Ritual length: 3 hrs
  Ritual needs: two live 
  captives, one to be 
  offered as a sacrifice; 
  the other, female and 
  virtuous, to be offered 
  up as host. 
  Success brings a demon from beyond the 3rd Pale to possess the provid-
  ed host. These demons are usually summoned as courtiers or concubines, 
  and they have a burning passion for inflicting mental cruelty.
  
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  Summon circle 4 demon
  Ritual resolve: 8 (28)
  Ritual length: 6 hrs
  Ritual needs: a live  
  female of pure virtue 
  to be offered up as a 
  bride.
  Summon imp
  Ritual resolve: 4 (18)
  Ritual length: 1 hr
  Ritual needs: none
  This ritual summons an imp from the labyrinth that mirrors the Earthly 
  plane. Summoning imps does not require an offering of any kind; imps 
  are too weak willed to bargain for contract terms. 
  The malicious imps make truly awful servants, but are easily command-
  ed. The labyrinth is close enough for imps to be able to manifest without 
  a host despite their lack of resolution.
  Success brings a demon 
  from beyond the 4th pale, 
  these demons are the 
  mighty generals of the 
  lady’s court and have no 
  need to possess, they are 
  strong enough to manifest 
  fully when summoned. 
  Once the demons contract 
  is fulfilled it returns to the 
  pale with its bride.
  
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  Summon Paline’s daughter
  Ritual resolve: 10 (32)
  Ritual length: 12 hrs
  Ritual needs: eight 
  live children, either 
  gender, but with virtue 
  intact, to be offered up 
  as slaves.
  The phrases of this invo-
  cation are complex and 
  laborious, detailing the 
  depravity of the caster 
  and his worthiness of 
  admission into the ranks 
  of the ladies favoured. 
  The ritual itself may take 
  varying time to com-
  plete. Success brings one 
  of Paline’s daughters 
  forth from the Pale court. 
  Paline’s daughters do 
  not need to possess; they 
  are able to manifest fully 
  in the mortal world- a 
  sorcerer can opt not to draw a contract with a daughter. The sorcerer 
  who does not attempt to bind the daughter is guaranteed a demonic 
  companion until he finds the limit of his depravities. At such time, the 
  daughter will drive him insane and slaughter him - a true devotee of 
  the Pale queen has no limits.
  NECROMANCY SPELLS
  Anathema
  Resolve cost: 8 (32)
  Range: worldwide
  Duration: *
  This potent curse is a complex but swift 
  ritual, accomplished by handing or post-
  ing the victim a single raven feather. 
  When the victim receiving the feather 
  sees it for the first time, the curse comes 
  into effect. The victim’s top 20 most 
  loved items, persons, or institutions are 
  destroyed, killed, or suffer shattering 
  blows to reputation in that order. Persons 
  and objects on the hit list all suffer a bout 
  of terminal bad luck with mysterious 
  accidents causing 10 dice damage each. 
  Victims may resist the ‘accidents’ with 
  luck points. Institutions and the effects 
  of a blow to their reputation are left for 
  the gamesmaster’s discretion. Each item 
  on the top 20 list is subject to one attack 
  from one cast from the curse.
  
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  Death’s cold touch
  Resolve cost: 4 (32)
  Range: touch
  Duration: rounds
  Once cast the nec-
  romancer’s hands 
  become cadaver-
  ous, and radiate 
  cold. Anything 
  touched ages, the 
  extent of the age-
  ing is dependant 
  upon the amount 
  of rounds in 
  contact.  With 1 
  round cloth dis-
  solves into dust- 
  with two, wood 
  becomes weak 
  and fragile. With 
  three a young 
  man becomes an 
  elderly cripple. 
  With four, metal 
  devices such as 
  locks, guns and 
  swords turn to flakes and chunks of rust. 
  Death’s lingering stench
  Resolve cost: 3 (26)
  Range: 20 yds
  Duration: instant
  Creates a poisonous cloud of stinking gas around the caster, the gas has a 
  radius of resolution in yards, and an intensity of 8, the caster is immune 
  to the vapour. The vapour is resisted as a poison.
  Dust
  Resolve cost: 1 (18)
  Range: touch
  Duration: instant
  Rots inanimate matter to dust at the touch, each casting rots one cubic 
  foot of matter. Dust has no effect on living flesh.
  Geas
  Resolve cost: 6 (opp)
  Range: *
  Duration: minutes
  The geas is a means of controlling a greater restless spirit. The geas 
  forces compliance, much like the contracts of demonology. By casting a 
  geas over a spirit before summoning it, the necromancer can ensure the 
  creature cannot directly act against him.
  
  223
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  223
  Life drain
  Resolve cost: 8 (26)
  Range: touch
  Duration: instant
  Firstly the necromancer procures a live 
  humanoid victim. He binds them to his 
  ritual operating table, and he concocts a 
  magical infusion to keep them alive and 
  conscious through the ordeal to come. 
  Next, using a sharpened bone knife, he 
  flays the victim alive and rearranges the 
  internal organs into sigils of great power 
  that draw the victim’s life energy into the 
  eyes. Lastly the eyes are removed, finally 
  killing the victim. The eyes are pickled 
  until use. To use the eyes, any magic user 
  eats them and gains that victim’s resolu-
  tion as extra resolve. The extra resolve last 
  until used and does not regenerate.
  Marsh lights
  Resolve cost: 2 (18)
  Range: sight
  Duration: minutes
  Creates resolution amount of small, nebulous glowing orbs. Each orb 
  produces light equivalent to a gas lamp. The orbs may be controlled by 
  the caster, and directed to go anywhere. The orbs may only be controlled 
  while in sight. Sending orbs out of sight reverts them to their own habits 
  until back in sight. Left to their whims the orbs try to find a treacherous 
  piece of terrain (quicksand, sheer cliff) and float about it, to encourage 
  others to their doom. 
  Oracle of night
  Resolve cost: 8 (26)
  Range: *
  Duration: minutes
  The souls of the future dead, 
  or oracle of night, are a 
  potent source of premonitory 
  information to a necroman-
  cer. The future dead may be 
  questioned on matters pres-
  ent and to come. The ritual 
  of the oracle is involved and 
  lengthy. The caster needs an 
  Eldren skull of at least 1000 
  years age, the eye sockets 
  must each be filled with a 
  ruby (£4 per ruby). When 
  performing the ritual the 
  skull must be soaked in fresh 
  blood, each pint of which 
  gives the oracle 10% accu-
  racy (max. 80% accuracy) to answer any question concerning the future or 
  present. Once created a single jewelled skull will last indefinitely, blood how-
  ever, must always be fresh and warm.
  
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  Raise greater undead
  Resolve cost: 8 (26)
  Range: touch
  Duration: *
  This spell reanimates a corpse with a touch; one casting reanimates one 
  corpse with a greater undead spirit. The undead will respond to the nec-
  romancers every spoken instruction, although it may not like it.
  Foul failure while summoning greater spirits causes a greater spirit to 
  ‘appear’, and possess the caster’s live body - killing it in the process. If 
  the player can hold this attack off until he or someone else can cast rest, 
  then the character will survive: if he fails, the spirit stays in the caster’s 
  body retaining all the caster’s memories and abilities. .
  Raise lesser undead
  Resolve cost: 4 (22)
  Range: 10 yds
  Duration: *
  This spell reani-
  mates a corpse with 
  a touch, one casting 
  can reanimate up to 
  resolution amount 
  of corpses as lesser 
  undead. The undead 
  will respond to the 
  necromancers every 
  spoken instruction 
  as best their intelli-
  gence will allow.
  Rest
  Resolve cost: 4 (opp)
  Range: 4 yds
  Duration: instant
  This spell can put a dead spirit to rest. By succeeding in an opposed reso-
  lution vs. Resolution, roll the caster can force a dead spirit to leave the 
  host body and return to its home in the netherworld.
  Séance
  Resolve cost: 4 (18)
  Range: self
  Duration: minutes
  The caster attempts to communicate with specific spirits from the neth-
  erworld. With success, the spirit requested is found, but information 
  gleaned may be nebulous, unrelated or meaningless. With a special suc-
  cess the information gleaned is relevant to the questions and accurate. 
  With failure, nothing useful comes of the attempt. A foul failure calls the 
  attention of the void. The dead may only be questioned concerning mat-
  ters of the past.
  
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  Seize undead
  Resolve cost: 6 (opp)
  Range: sight
  Duration: instant
  Allows the necromancer to seize control of already raised undead, or 
  enslave an independent undead. Once cast the caster must engage in 
  an opposed resolution vs. Resolution contest with the undead or their 
  controller. The caster only needs one success to seize control of his reso-
  lution amount of undead, the loser of the contest takes 2 dice of stun 
  damage & loses 3 resolve (regenerated normally). Once controlled the 
  undead follow their new controller until they are once more enslaved or 
  he dies. Independent undead such as vampires do not give in so easily 
  and can resist the caster’s demands once a day with the same resolution 
  vs. Resolution contest.
  Vampire’s lust
  Resolve cost: 8 (opp)
  Range: 10 yds
  Duration: hours
  The caster’s eyes and voice become captivating. The victim must suc-
  ceed in an opposed resolution vs. resolution test or be overcome. With 
  success the spell causes an unnatural obsession for the caster in the vic-
  tim. Note that this is not a charm spell; the victim may loathe the caster 
  but finds himself amorously compelled to do as the caster whims in any 
  endeavour - amorous or murderous. Specifically the victim cannot bring 
  himself to directly harm the caster; also they must obey any orders given 
  by the caster. 
  Warp dead
  Resolve cost: 10 (32)
  Range: touch
  Duration: *
  The caster 
  permanently 
  endows an 
  undead target 
  with an unnatu-
  ral attribute. 
  Gamesmasters 
  must supervise 
  and approve the 
  nature of such 
  an attribute; 
  examples are 
  batwings, fiery 
  breath, or a 
  hypnotic gaze. 
  Once cast upon 
  the undead treat 
  this attribute as 
  a skill that can rise with experience, but never above 10.
  
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  RELICS
  Magic items or relics are a staple of fantasy role-
  playing; many players will place their characters 
  in deadly peril to gain the power of an relic. 
  Relics are usually ancient survivors from the past, 
  when magic was stronger. It is possible to create 
  new relics, although this is the province of truly 
  great sorcery, there are possibly only a hand-
  ful of the guild that could create such an item. 
  Sometimes the gods may favour a character with 
  an relic as a reward for faith, or as bait for their 
  souls.
  To use an relic no spell-casting or resolve expen-
  diture is needed. The object functions without 
  limit to its duration, regardless of the user’s 
  nature. An relic can be stolen, sold, or given 
  away, and still work it’s magical effect.
  A relics power is only limited by the games mas-
  ter devising it. Relics are meant to be devastating-
  ly powerful; they are one off survivors of time. 
  Most relics have a purpose; they were made for a 
  reason. As long as they do what they were made 
  for, relics can do anything else the gamesmaster 
  chooses.
  For our European game most relics found will 
  be Celtic items from European archaeology 
  sites, looted African tribal items, or (most of all) 
  Egyptian relics robbed from the Pyramids.
  When a relic comes into a character’s possession, 
  let the item’s properties be discovered gradu-
  ally. There is more fun to be had in the mystery 
  of gradual discovery than simply saying ‘okay 
  Ron, Lord Harry has found a bright blade it does 
  this...’
  Bright blades
  A beautiful sword hilt, finely craned in pale 
  silver, it will not corrode or age-when found 
  and when not in use the weapon is just that - a 
  hilt. When in the presence (within 9 yards) of a 
  unearthly or unnatural being such as a demon or 
  vampire, a blade of shimmering, shifting colours 
  appears, bright enough to light up an entire room. 
  This blade will damage an unnatural/unearthly 
  being without leaving a physical trace; the blade 
  can also parry attacks from such a being. This 
  weapon can be useful for dispatching possess-
  ing demons as it will not harm the physical host. 
  The blade does 4d6 lethal damage to spirits and 
  demons, with a further 2d6 against demons of 
  Paline’s court. Bright blades do no damage at all 
  to physical opponents. The bright blades hilt, the 
  only physical part of it is indestructible by mortal 
  means. A bright blade hilt may only be destroyed 
  by being given to Paline herself, so she might 
  kiss it - her kiss destroys the hilt. Once destroyed 
  the weapon is useless and cannot be reformed.
  Horn of the hunt
  A long and curved antique huntsman’s horn 
  carved from some strange animals horn. 
  Sounding the horn summons forth the dark hunt, 
  a hideous collection of twisted, demonic riders. 
  Once summoned the hunt appears on the near 
  horizon - sounds it’s horns and mercilessly hunts 
  down one person, until eventually catching and 
  then slaughtering them. Treat the awesome power 
  of the hunt as a abstract entity, with a competence 
  of 24. As a non-corporeal entity physical attacks 
  are useless against the hunt. When using  physical 
  combat against the hunt roll as normal, if the hunt 
  wins in hand to hand combat the victim takes 
  6d6 lethal points of damage. If the victim wins, 
  make it look like you crossed off some hit points, 
  or have a rider crumple – only to reform before 
  the victims’ eyes. The truth is that attacks always 
  fails against the power of the hunt - why didn’t 
  we say that in the first place? Ah, now you see 
  what your players will feel like... Bright blades 
  
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  Magic & Mediums
  might be effective against the ethereal riders, but 
  there are as many riders and hounds as are need-
  ed to overpower the fool who stands to fight.
  Really the only way to escape the hunt is to find 
  the horn and blow it, this sets the hunt onto the 
  initial summoner. This in itself is no mean feat. 
  The horn can only be blown on the longest night 
  of the year. The hunt cannot pass flowing water, 
  and only appears by night. Should the prey sur-
  vive till dawn, the respite only lasts until the next 
  evening when the hunt once again rises. If the 
  victim cannot gain the horn and blow it on the 
  longest night, he must try to evade the hunt for a 
  whole year – until the next solstice.
  Masks of shadow
  There are three types of mask. The first appears 
  to be a fine china mask such as those worn at 
  masquerade balls, but when worn the mask seems 
  to disappear and alters the appearance, build, 
  voice, bearing, even gender of the character to 
  that of someone else, presumably long dead. The 
  mask can only be removed by the person who put 
  it on.
  The second kind of mask appears to be a mask of 
  bronze beaten into the visage of some grotesque 
  demonic form. Donning the mask likewise alters 
  the appearance of the wearer to that of a hideous 
  shambling mound, this grotesque visage can only 
  be dispelled by a Thaumaturge or invoker on a 
  thaumaturgy or invocation roll (26)
  The third version appears to be a mask of glass, 
  donning the mask makes the wearer invisible to 
  all. The only ways to see the wearer are through 
  a spirit lens, or with medium abilities. This mask 
  can also only be removed by the wearer.
  Pale seer’s stone
  A white stone shot with glassy streaks, usually 
  worked into a piece of jewellery. If worn while 
  asleep this stone grants the user visions of the 
  future (see medium power ‘glimpse’). In addition 
  while worn the wearer can always see a few sec-
  onds ahead of himself and so cannot be surprised, 
  and is able to finish sentences for those he is talk-
  ing to (see medium power ‘sixth sense’).
  Amorous ring of companionship
  A silver ring fashioned as naked, entwined fig-
  ures. The wearer of this ring has the ability to 
  completely captivate and fascinate anyone that 
  they wish. Those targeted must contest their 
  resolution against the rings ‘competence’ of 18. 
  Those who succeed are not beguiled and are not 
  aware that an attempt was made, those who fail 
  are enslaved to the wearer of the ring, compli-
  ant to his/her every whim no matter how foul or 
  despicable. They, too, are unaware that they have 
  been charmed. The wearer may enslave up to 9 
  people at any one time in this manner. This item 
  is a favourite gift from Paline.
  Speech stone
  A palm sized piece of red jade, this flat stone 
  allows the user to understand and converse in any 
  language that he hears while the stone is held in 
  one hand.
  Spirit lens
  A large shard of strangely tinted glass, through 
  which the world may be seen as through the spell 
  witch sight. Also things are magnified, all sight 
  related perception tests are increased by 30% and, 
  while worn, the glasses allow sight in the dark 
  as if it were day. Often this glass is found crafted 
  into a pair of spectacles or a monocle.
  The mirror of the void
  Should someone with a presence of 6 or higher 
  gaze into this mirror for more than three times a 
  servitor demon appears and tries to rip the users 
  face off. Causing more than 20 damage on the 
  user entails a success, reduce presence to 0. This 
  item is a favourite gift to ambitious sorcerors 
  from the tarnished angels of the void.
  
  228
  Magic & Mediums
  
  229
  Magic & Mediums
  BOOK III
  GAMESMASTERS
  
  230
  Magic & Mediums
  
  231
  The Supporting Cast
  231
  THE SUPPORTING 
  CAST
  No one can predict the future accurately, and 
  no gamesmaster can totally predetermine 
  what players will want to do. One of the 
  groovy things about an RPG is the free roam-
  ing nature of the game - your imagination 
  really is your limit, both for locations and 
  situations. To add weight to any situation you 
  dream up, we have provided a supporting 
  cast (also called ‘non-player characters’) for 
  you to use in those unexpected situations.
  When dealing with the general citizenry of 
  the world we utilise very streamlined charac-
  teristics, after all you don’t want to be refer-
  ring to a full character sheet for all 4 million 
  inhabitants of London – do you?
  Supporting cast characters are defined by the 
  following characteristics. For the vast majori-
  ty of passing encounters with pedestrians and 
  ruffians, these characteristics are sufficient.
   
  Mental & physical competence: 
  The competence ratings give you 
  a quick number to use in lieu of 
  characteristic+skill when making 
  action rolls for combat, common 
  knowledge and any specialities the 
  NPC may possess. This allows you to 
  check one number and make an action 
  roll. Exceptions and specifics are noted 
  below as skill and combat ‘picks’.
   
  Health:The NPCs health is sum-
  marised here as [health/fortitude]. 
  NPCs have stun points equal to their 
  health just like PCs. Fortitude for 
  NPCs is written as a total of fortitude 
  Competence ratings
  Rating 
  Description
  1-2 
   Challenged, this cast member is physically disabled or enfeebled. Mentally they 
  might be a lunatic, and are certainly uneducated. 
  3-4  
   Everyday most pedestrians fall into this category, there is nothing remarkable 
  about this person, physically they are healthy, but not fit. Mentally they are of aver-
  age ability but poorly educated.
  6-8 
   Competent this cast member is still pedestrian, but displays some noteworthy abil-
  ity in the rated area. Physically they are healthy and reasonably fit, mentally they 
  are either highly intelligent but uneducated or of average intelligence with a fair 
  education.
  9-14 
   Very competent this cast member displays a highly developed physical capability, 
  intellect or an excellent education. 
  15-18 
   Incredible this cast member is in excellent health and is exceptionally fit. 
  Intellectually in today’s world they would qualify for mensa, and their education is 
  well rounded (either from school or private pursuits) 
  18-20  
   Legendary this is the realm of Bruce Lee or Albert Einstein, Careful thought 
  should be given to the introduction of supporting cast members with ratings at this 
  level; if they are this good – why are they supporting cast?
  
  232
  The Supporting Cast
  and any armour that might also reduce 
  damage.
   
  Skill picks:Here we list some specific 
  areas of knowledge where the NPC is 
  either better or worse than their compe-
  tence ratings would suggest. For example 
  an Ogre may have a average physical com-
  petence, but here their outstanding strength 
  would be noted. All skill picks are listed as 
  a characteristic+skill total, just add dice.
   Combat picks:Here we list a typical attack 
  option for the character type, again all 
  numbers are totals, just add dice to hit, and 
  then roll for damage.
  Competence ratings?
  Competence ratings follow the same scales 
  as player characters characteristics and skills. 
  When assigning a competence rating refer to 
  the chart below to discern the ability level that 
  your cast member lies at. Remember that the 
  competence rating is equal to a lead character’s 
  characteristic+skill, if it becomes important to 
  know the value of a characteristic or skill alone 
  then simply halve the competence rating.
  PEDESTRIANS
  The vast majority of the population in Victoriana 
  are not gutter running rebels and criminals, nor 
  are they sorcerers or mediums. Below are some 
  sample pedestrian characteristics, these numbers 
  reflect a normal, everyday person. Even starting 
  gutter runners are exceptional compared to the 
  public at large. 
  Indeed if the players are the lead characters, with 
  a supporting cast around them, then the pedestri-
  ans are the nameless extras.
  The numbers in brackets in this table give you a 
  quick conversion figure for changing the race of a 
  pedestrian or one of our existing supporting cast 
  members ‘on the fly’.
  THE CHARACTER VILLAIN
  Streamlined figures for pedestrians and support-
  ing cast are all well and good, but when it comes 
  down to the crunch, and the characters have pen-
  etrated the conspiracy, or solved the crime – there 
  is usually a mastermind behind it. These villains 
  are usually a match for the players, and frequent-
  ly more than a match for one of your characters 
  alone. The same villain can return again and 
  again to foil (and be foiled by) your characters.
  Such villains are known as character villains, and 
  the simplicity of the supporting cast does them 
  no justice. Character villains should have motiva-
  tions and goals just like your characters. Once 
  they have met a couple of times your characters 
  will want to know more about the villain that 
  they keep crossing and his previous experiences 
  will become important.
  Character villains might start out as supporting 
  cast, and grow in ability alongside the lead char-
  acters, thwarting the characters time and time 
  again before finally meeting their end at the end 
  of a campaign in a dramatic ‘big fight’.
  Character villains will typically possess char-
  acteristics and skills just like PCs, but you may 
  prefer to keep the simplicity of the competence 
  ratings. If you do so, you should make a couple 
  of additions – a true character villain will have 
  Luck at least equal to your luckiest player char-
  acter, they will also have talents, contacts, perks, 
  property, assets, complications and so on.  
  When generating a character villain, bear in mind 
  how many PCs is this villain going to be facing. 
  As gamesmaster you’re not constrained by points 
  and limits so make sure that your villain is up to 
  scratch and is a challenge for the players. This 
  doesn’t mean that every villain needs to be a 
  combat juggernaut, if your villain is going to be a 
  mastermind behind the scenes, then he may well 
  be easy to overcome in personal combat, but get-
  ting to him through the thugs and villains he has 
  hired for protection (or the demons he has sum-
  moned) might be another story!
  
  233
  The Supporting Cast
  Aluminat priest
  Pedestrian Competency
   
   
   
   
  Race 
  Physical 
  Mental
   
  Competance 
  Competance 
  Health 
  Special
  Men 
  6 (+0) 
  6 (+0) 
  15/3 (+0/+0) 
  -
  Beastmen 
  8 (+2) 
  4 (-2) 
  20/4 (+5/+1) 
  -
  Eldren 
  6 (+0) 
  6 (+0) 
  15/3 (+0/+0) 
  Artistic eccentricity
  Dwarves 
  8 (+2) 
  6 (+0) 
  20/4 (+5/+1) 
  Little legs
  Halflings 
  6 (+0) 
  6 (+0) 
  15/3 (+0/+0) 
  Wanderlust, little legs
  Gnomes 
  4 (-2) 
  10 (+4) 
  10/2 (-5/-1) 
  Little legs 
  Ogres 
  11 (+5) 
  2 (-4) 
  65/6 (+50/+3) 
  Blunt wits, iron constitution
  SUPPORTING CAST, SOCIETY
  A reverend priest of the holy 
  Aluminat. This tall, dour man 
  can be enough to strike the fear 
  of God into the blackest heart. 
  He is often found in his church 
  or within the parish of that 
  church, tending to his middle 
  class parishioners.
  Mental competence: 
  10
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/4 
  Skill picks: 
   Preaching (12), conversation (12), make 
  congregation feel really small (16), 
  induce guilt (16), theology (12)
  Combat picks: 
   Punch (4) doing 1d+4 stun
  Butler/doorman
  A reservoir of cool reserve and 
  pompous manners, the butler is 
  often accused of thinking above 
  his station due to his habit of 
  wearing clean clothes. For his 
  part, he likes where he lives 
  and enjoys running the house 
  - he has a lifestyle that he could 
  never afford himself, and is 
  thankful of it.
  Mental competence: 
  8
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/4 
  Skill picks: 
   Etiquette (14), look dignified (12), lis-
  ten at keyhole (14)
  Combat picks: 
   Punch (4) doing 1d+4 stun
  
  234
  The Supporting Cast
  Doctor
  A professional physician, he 
  trained hard through school and 
  university to gain his doctorate. 
  Now thanks to his education and 
  the profession that it has secured 
  he can afford the finer things in 
  life. A genuinely caring fellow, 
  one has to be in his line of work. 
  He is definitely a good friend 
  to have, and is rarely attacked, 
  despite his wealth, due to his 
  work.
  Mental competence: 
  14
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/8 inc greatcoat 
  Skill picks: 
   Medicine 14, biology 12, pharmacy 
  12, research 12, bedside manner (Aka 
  bull!) 12
  Combat picks: 
  Walking stick (6) for 3d+4 stun
  Dwarven engineer
  Short, stocky, bristly, stubborn 
  and glaring up at you now, dar-
  ing you to look down at him. He 
  designed the mine that brought 
  so much prosperity to this val-
  ley, and now is lord of his own 
  mining town. He has only one 
  problem - his neighbours - nasty 
  gentry, many are less wealthy 
  than him, but still they have a 
  heritage and titles while he is 
  simply Mr. Mine designer. He’s 
  tried shooting them, but even 
  that doesn’t gain any respect.
  Mental competence: 
  14
  Physical competence: 
  10
  Health: 
  25/13 inc lined coat 
  Skill picks: 
   Science (14), mining machinery (16), 
  geology (14), etiquette (10)
  Combat picks: 
   Sword cane (10) for 3d+5 lethal, der-
  ringer (12) for 2d lethal
  Fashionable gentleman
  He is rich, dashing, witty, and 
  at all the right places, at all the 
  right times. He dresses in a fash-
  ionable morning suit at all times. 
  Born into the upper class, he has 
  a highly inflated opinion of him-
  self and enough money to ram 
  down the neck of anyone who 
  disagrees. He is also an almost 
  compulsive womaniser, with 
  several mistresses and always 
  room for another.
  Mental competence: 
  12
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/12 inc lined coat
  Skill picks: 
   Fashion (16), bull! (16), seduction (14), 
  ride (12), drive carriage (12), etiquette 
  (16), be dashing and handsome and 
  make the girls swoon (16)
  Combat picks: 
   Sword cane (14) for 3d+4 lethal
  
  235
  The Supporting Cast
  Fashionable lady
  Her family is rich. She is witty, 
  dignified and quite the most 
  dazzling woman you have ever 
  seen, probably due to her Eldren 
  blood. Born to the upper classes, 
  she knows that she is superior 
  to you and if you desire her, she 
  will torment you as sport for as 
  long as you let her. She could 
  well be a worshipper of Paline, 
  and as such a real problem with 
  her position to hide behind.
  Mental competence: 
  14
  Physical competence: 
  6
  Health: 
  15/7 inc corset
  Skill picks: 
   Bull (16), charm (18), fashion (18), 
  archery (12), ride (12), seduction (12), 
  make you do anything for her (18), 
  thaumaturgy? (12), demonology? (8).
  Combat picks: 
   Derringer (12) for 2d lethal, etheric bolt 
  (12) for 4d lethal
  Guild lecturer
  A sorcerer of experience and 
  high standing, he knows many 
  people and is invited to many 
  social functions. His high life-
  style has made him somewhat 
  lazy and indulgent. He is ideally 
  suited as a sponsor for charac-
  ters - sending them on missions 
  to recover items & rare flora / 
  fauna.
  Mental competence: 
  16
  Physical competence: 
  6
  Health: 
  15/7 inc greatcoat
  Skill picks: 
   Thaumaturgy (16), occult (18), chemis-
  try (16), medicine (14), astronomy (16), 
  research (16), linguistics (16)
  Combat picks: 
   Walking stick (6) for 3d+3 stun, etheric 
  bolt (16) for 4d lethal, etheric bludgeon 
  (16) for 4d stun, power of steam (16), 
  heal (16)
  Lawyer
  He is predatory, rakish, and 
  appears distinctly devious by 
  nature. He has studied and con-
  nived his way up to his present 
  position in the judicial structure. 
  Nothing is too low or villainous 
  for this ambitious young rake to 
  advance his career. He is quite 
  capable of making the most 
  intellectual man appear a com-
  plete buffoon in the courtroom, 
  and has made many enemies 
  by doing just that. He always 
  carries a life preserver for self-
  defence.
  Mental competence: 
  14
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/8 inc greatcoat
  Skill picks: 
   Legal matters (16), bull! (16), charm 
  (10), oratory (16), be very, very arro-
  gant (16). Cowardice (14)
  Combat picks: 
   Walking stick (8) for 3d+4 stun
  
  236
  The Supporting Cast
  Police constable
  He is poorly trained for the most 
  part, and often indecisive if 
  alone. Properly led and accom-
  panied by his peers he can be a 
  threat to any character. Many of 
  the infant police force are ill dis-
  ciplined and corrupt, how honest 
  is this officer?
  Mental competence: 
  8
  Physical competence: 
  12
  Health: 
  30/10 inc thick uniform coat
  Skill picks: 
   Ask embarrassing questions (12), dodge 
  (14), perception (14), drive carriage 
  (12), etiquette (10)
  Combat picks: 
  Truncheon (14) for 3d+6 stun
  Police sergeant
  He’s large, grizzled, red in the 
  face and popular with other con-
  stables and locals. He is bloody 
  minded and pompous. He makes 
  an irritating opponent the police 
  sergeant is well suited to the role 
  of hindrance in a campaign. He’s 
  been around a long time-prob-
  ably in the army, so he thinks 
  that he’s heard it all before, and 
  won’t believe a word of it
  Mental competence: 
  10
  Physical competence: 
  12
  Health: 
  30/10 inc thick uniform coat
  Skill picks: 
   Ask embarrassing questions (14), dodge 
  (14), perception (14), drive carriage 
  (12), etiquette (12)
  Combat picks: 
  Truncheon (14) for 3d+4 stun
  Professor
  A thin gangly gnome. He always 
  dresses like a scarecrow and is 
  often a subject of ridicule along 
  with his harebrained inventions, 
  not that he cares - he is too busy 
  with his latest machine.
  Mental competence: 
  18
  Physical competence: 
  4
  Health: 
  10/4 inc greatcoat
  Skill picks: 
   Astronomy (18), clockwork mecha-
  nisms (20), steam technology (20), 
  science (18), locksmith (18), be really 
  bloody clever all the bloody time (20)
  Combat picks: 
  All out dodge! (8)
  
  237
  The Supporting Cast
  Courtesan
  The courtesan is as much escort 
  as prostitute. Gentlemen pay 
  highly for her conversation and 
  company more frequently than 
  for physical favours. She is 
  educated and cultured and could 
  provide much valuable informa-
  tion to the right listeners…
  Mental competence: 
  12
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/8 inc corset
  Skill picks: 
   Bull (14), charm (16), fashion (14), ride 
  (12), seduction (12)
  Combat picks: 
   Room furnishings thrown as impro-
  vised weapons (8) for 3d stun, all out 
  dodge (12)
  Factory worker
  He/she works all day (6am to 
  8pm) to make an honest living. 
  The smoke and noise within 
  the factories are horrendous. 
  Everyday they get home filthy 
  and deaf wondering why they 
  bother. Uneducated and living in 
  squalor, they sometimes think it 
  seems as though they will never 
  escape the grime and corruption 
  of the city, and quite right they 
  are too.
  Mental competence: 
  6
  Physical competence: 
  6
  Health: 
  15/3
  Skill picks: 
   Operate factory machinery (10), accept 
  things the way they are (14), dream 
  about a better life (10), economise (10)
  Combat picks: 
  Punch (6) for 1d+3 stun
  SUPPORTING CAST, THE ROOKERY
  Charity worker
  A middle class young lady. Very 
  religious; it is her Anglican 
  belief in the verses of the 
  Aluminat that drive her to try 
  and improve the lives of those 
  born less fortunate than herself. 
  She has an unexplainable naive 
  trust in all those she meets, so 
  much so that few would dream 
  of soiling it. She can be a useful 
  friend for characters who require 
  a hostel bed for the night, or 
  who cannot afford a doctor
  Mental competence: 
  10
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/8 inc. Corset
  Skill picks: 
   Be modest (12), be civil (12), etiquette 
  (16), sing (10), first aid (14), medicine 
  (8)
  Combat picks: 
  A ll out dodge (12), pray for miracle (4)
  
  238
  The Supporting Cast
  Hired thugs
  Footpads, thieves, hired muscle, 
  pimps. Basically a common 
  criminal who will turn his hand 
  to anything that seems to pay 
  while requiring little thought, 
  and few scruples.
  Mental competence: 
  6
  Physical competence: 
  10
  Health: 
  25/9 inc greatcoat
  Skill picks: 
   Look dodgy (12), hide & sneak (12), 
  streetwise (12)
  Combat picks: 
   Garrotte (10) causing asphyxiation; 
  dagger (12) for 2d+5 lethal, life pre-
  server (12) for 4d+5 stun
  Gutter Quack
  He was a professional physician, until the alcohol problem turned into a laudanum habit and the royal 
  society of physicians found out. The gutter quack is a bitter, cynical man. He left many principles 
  behind him when he fell from professional grace, but for many in the rookery his shaking hands and 
  opium glazed eyes are the best medical attention they can afford, and the best discretion that can be 
  bought.
  Mental competence: 
  12
  Physical competence: 
  6
  Health: 
  15/7 inc greatcoat 
  Skill picks: 
   Medicine 14, biology 12, pharmacy 
  12, research 12, bedside manner (Aka 
  bull!) 6
  Combat picks: 
  Walking stick (6) for 3d+4 stun
  
  239
  The Supporting Cast
  Prostitute
  A working girl, plying the old-
  est trade, probably because she 
  cant survive on her day job. She 
  might not be the most beauti-
  ful girl in the world but she’ll 
  be who you want for the night 
  (well, up to a limit). She usu-
  ally charges 6d for her services 
  and takes the rest without asking 
  - she has to make a living, and 
  don’t assume she likes her life in 
  the slums.
  Mental competence: 
  8
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/8 inc corset
  Skill picks: 
   Bull (14), charm (12), trade (12), pick 
  pocket (12), streetwise (14)
  Combat picks: 
   Improvised weapons (8) for 3d+4 stun, 
  all out dodge (12)
  Street urchin
  A scruffy young tearaway, this 
  child is often found with his 
  friends, bumping into you and 
  then departing with great haste 
  clutching your wallet - laugh-
  ing with the rest of his gang 
  all the way. If you can impress 
  him then his hero worship can 
  be most useful as such chil-
  dren often know the streets and 
  goings on in any town better 
  than any man.
  Mental competence: 
  12
  Physical competence: 
  6
  Health: 
  15/3
  Skill picks: 
   Hide & sneak (14). Pick pocket (14), 
  streetwise (12), bull! (14), act as though 
  butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth (12)
  Combat picks: 
  Sling (16) for 2d stun
  Revolutionary
  This Beastman has a broody cast 
  to his character. He glowers at 
  anyone who may be a scapegoat 
  or example for his cause. He 
  has many friends and even more 
  enemies; the authorities would 
  lock him up, but there would 
  probably be a riot. He and his 
  revolutionary brothers make 
  friends (comrades) and enemies 
  (bourgeoisie filth) for life.
  Mental competence: 
  12
  Physical competence: 
  10
  Health: 
  25/9 inc greatcoat
  Skill picks: 
   Oratory (12), hide & sneak (12), con-
  ceal item (14), streetwise (12)
  Combat picks: 
   Heavy walking stick (14) for 5d+5 
  stun; switchblade (14) for 2d+5 lethal
  
  240
  The Supporting Cast
  SUPPORTING CAST, THE COUNTRY
  Gypsy
  He is small, colourful and 
  cheeky. He tells fortunes, he 
  sings, dances, sells what you 
  want - never what you need- this 
  cheeky Halfling would certainly 
  sell you his grandmother for 6d 
  if he was sure you’d never find 
  her. Gypsies usually travel in 
  bands of 5-25. Their wagons are 
  all loaded with the trinkets and 
  tools of their trades
  Mental competence: 
  12
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/8 inc leather coat
  Skill picks: 
   Bull! (14), drive carriage (12), scare 
  superstitious villagers (12), sleight of 
  hand (10), palm reading (12), human 
  perception (10)
  Combat picks: 
  Walking staff (14) for 3d+4 stun 
  Labourer, ogre
  He or she has worked these 
  fields and this land all his/her 
  born life, it is his life. He knows 
  that God, and the Queen, and 
  even little baby Justas are all 
  watching all the time, and that 
  they want him to look after the 
  cows - the squire told him, so it 
  must be true. So, ever dutiful, 
  the ogre works on day and night. 
  He has never left the estate in all 
  his years - the Queen wants him 
  to stay (the squire told him). His 
  deep-set and lined face seems 
  morose and stern. His tusks 
  lending a misleadingly evil cast, 
  softened only by the way he 
  sucks his thumb. He is too stu-
  pid to be anything but honest.
  Mental competence: 
  4
  Physical competence: 
  16
  Health: 
  66/11
  Skill picks: 
   Be confused (16), be really stupid in 
  front of strangers (12), be superstitious 
  (20), laugh for no apparent reason (12)
  Combat picks: 
   Fists like bricks (10) for 1d+11 stun, 
  improvised masonry (10) for 6d+11 
  lethal
  
  241
  The Supporting Cast
  Labourer
  He or she has worked these 
  fields and this land all his/her 
  born life; it is his life. He has 
  never left the estate in all his 
  years-he is too busy and too 
  poor to afford the train. He is 
  tall, morose, a little inbred, but 
  goes to the church every Sunday 
  and stays honest.
  Mental competence: 
  6
  Physical competence: 
  12
  Health: 
  30/6
  Skill picks: 
   Country lore (12), operate threshing 
  machine (12), ham act as really stupid 
  in front of strangers (10), be supersti-
  tious (14)
  Combat picks: 
   Brawl (14) for 1d+6 stun, hoe or rake 
  (12) for 3d+6 stun
  Local squire
  The landed gentry, bored and 
  naturally malicious, he drinks, 
  whores, torments, and gambles 
  far too much. He is lord of the 
  local estate. All of the people 
  on the estate defer to him in all 
  matters, with the only excep-
  tion being travellers and gypsies 
  on the way through. He makes 
  an excellent patron for charac-
  ters, as they investigate strange 
  occurrences or hunt trolls upon 
  his estate. His personality can 
  also make him an interesting 
  opponent. He always carries a 
  musket in case he sees some 
  sport or a poacher in the act.
  Mental competence: 
  10
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/8 inc greatcoat
  Skill picks: 
   Gambling (12), letch (14), etiquette 
  (12)
  Combat picks: 
   Walking cane (10) for 3d+4 stun, 
  brown Bess musket (12) for 5d lethal 
  Reclusive inventor
  He is tall, dark and dashing. His 
  eyes glint with a brilliant intel-
  ligence unsullied by convention, 
  scruples, or God’s laws. His 
  family’s money has bought him 
  his retreat, and day and night 
  he toils in it trying to combine 
  sorcery with science. Nobody 
  is sure what his experiments 
  are, maybe he is an innocent 
  artificer, or a foul demonologist 
  or necromancer - the choice is 
  yours...
  Mental competence: 
  16
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/12 inc lined coat
  Skill picks: 
   Science (16), thaumaturgy (14). 
  Demonology or necromancy (10), phar-
  macy (14), medicine (12), strange gaze 
  (12), insane laughter (as if on cue) (16)
  Combat picks: 
   Scalpel (14) for 2d+4 lethal, also any 
  thaumaturgy spells and a smattering of 
  demonology or necromancy.
  
  242
  The Supporting Cast
  Wise woman
  She is ancient, yet there is an 
  elemental spark in her eyes. She 
  is small and withered with white 
  hair. She dresses in ragged skirts 
  and shawls, with natural jewel-
  lery of plant leaves and berries. 
  She always has cryptic advice 
  for every occasion, ready and 
  waiting for those with time to 
  listen.
  Mental competence: 
  16
  Physical competence: 
  10
  Health: 
  25/11 inc ‘stone cloth’ enchantment
  Skill picks: 
   Enchanting (16), invoking (10), legends 
  of the old ways (14), natural lore (18), 
  Herbalism (16), astrology (16), human 
  perception (16), cryptic statements and 
  omens (18)
  Combat picks: 
   Spells: a wide selection of enchant-
  ments and focuses ready for each, pos-
  sibly some invoking knowledge as well
  
  243
  The Supporting Cast
  SUPPORTING CAST, OUTSIDERS
  Steppegoblin
  The Steppegoblin are a small 
  and intelligent race, living only 
  in the frozen mountain steppes 
  of Russia and the east. They are 
  tall and slight of build, heavily 
  boned and with strong features. 
  Their skin is pale like finest 
  porcelain. Hair is fine and the 
  shade of spun silver with no other 
  variation. Steppegoblin eyes have 
  cat like pupils and white or pale 
  metallic irises. Their ears come 
  to a delicate point at the tip. The 
  Steppegoblin have lived with 
  eastern humanity for all recorded 
  time, although they retain a 
  separate racial identity. They are 
  renowned as skilled sorcerers and 
  craftsmen throughout the central 
  and tar east.
  Steppegoblin live within huge 
  subterranean cities that rival the 
  Dwarven citadels of the west. All 
  Steppegoblin are considered to be 
  of aristocratic heritage, and actu-
  ally make up 20% of the ruling 
  families of Russia
  Mental competence: 
  12
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/12 inc lined coat
  Skill picks: 
   Fashion (16), bull! (16), seduction (14), 
  ride (12), drive carriage (12), etiquette 
  (16), thaumaturgy (14)
  Combat picks: 
  Sword (14) for 5d+4 lethal
  
  244
  The Supporting Cast
  Giant, mountain
  Giants are huge. Ugly and 
  barbaric humanoids from 
  the mountains of northern 
  Europe. At one point they 
  were almost extinct, thanks 
  to the giant slayers of Prussia 
  and Austria. At full maturity 
  adult giants have been record-
  ed at 30 feet high, although 
  most giants average at a 
  height of 20 feet.
  Giants are not startlingly 
  intelligent, but are not as 
  stupid as Ogres. They have 
  their own communities in 
  the mountains, and have a 
  bloody and historical feud 
  with the mountain dwarves of 
  the area; this feud has even 
  made its way to the battlefield 
  on several occasions. Giants 
  use enormous clubs, nets and 
  swords in battle. Giants on 
  active service in the army are 
  sometimes issued with a spe-
  cially built field cannon sized 
  sidearm.
  Giants have an ogre-like faith 
  in the Aluminat; their resis-
  tance to magic is attributed to 
  this faith. Any spell, demonic 
  ability or relic ability that 
  requires an opposed roll is 
  conducted with a bonus of +2 
  to the giant’s relevant attri-
  bute.
  Mental competence: 
  4
  Physical competence: 
  20
  Health: 
  100/10
  Skill picks: 
   Be confused (16), be really 
  stupid in front of strangers 
  (12), be superstitious (20)
  Combat picks: 
   Fists like carriages (10) for 
  4d+20 stun
  
  245
  The Supporting Cast
  Orc, African warriors
  Orcs arc a rugged, well built 
  species of humanoids. Orcs gen-
  erally live in rough country such 
  as mountains and deserts. They 
  are tall with an immense build, 
  strongly boned yet with delicate 
  features. Their skin is thick, cal-
  lused and as black as coal, their 
  hair raven black or in very rare 
  instances, silver. Orc eyes have 
  cat like pupils and white or pale 
  metallic irises; their lobe less 
  ears come to a delicate point at 
  the tip.
  Orcs are highly intelligent, and 
  have a highly sophisticated 
  tribal culture that is shared with 
  many of the human tribes of 
  the continent. Orcs like their 
  human counterparts, worship the 
  earth goddess through their own 
  primitive mythology. 
  This religion appears 
  to the European settlers 
  to be little more than 
  animal masks and idols, 
  the workings of filthy 
  heathens. Due to these 
  fundamental differences 
  in opinion, the Orcs are 
  fighting an active war 
  against the European 
  settlers.
  The statistics below 
  are for an adult Orc, 
  such warriors can be 
  found hampering the 
  European slavers and 
  settlers at every turn. 
  Orc children are sold 
  as slaves when caught, 
  and so Orcs can also be 
  found occasionally in 
  Europe, and extensively 
  throughout America.
  Mental competence: 
  8
  Physical competence: 
  12
  Health: 
  30/16 inc enchanted war paint
  Skill picks: 
   Survival (12), trapper & scout (14), ath-
  letics (14), hide & sneak (12)
  Combat picks: 
  Orc spear (14) for 5d+6 lethal
  
  246
  The Supporting Cast
  Natural Beasts
  Beast 
  Mental 
  Physical Health 
  Combat picks
  Ape 
  6 
  14 
  35/7 
  Brawl (14) for 2d+7
  Bear 
  8 
  14 
  35/7 
  Brawl (14) for 2d+7
  Cattle 
  4 
  12 
  30/6 
  Charge (10) for 2d+6
  Deer 
  8 
  8 
  20/4 
  Dodge! (12)
  Dog, hunting 
  6 
  6 
  15/3 
  Bite (12) for 1d+3
  Dog, Tosher 
  12 
  4 
  10/2 
  Bite (16) for 1d+2
  Frendal lizard* 
  12 
  4 
  10/4 
  Bite (8) for 2d+2
  Hawk 
  16 
  2 
  5/1 
  Rake (12) for 1d+1
  Horse 
  4 
  10 
  25/5 
  Kick (10) for 2d+5
  Marsh troll* 
  8 
  16 
  40/16 
   Brawl (12) for 2d+8, spew acid (8) for 
  intensity 4
  Monkey 
  12 
  4 
  10/2 
  Brawl (8) for 1d+2
  Oceanic serpent* 
  6 
  20 
  100/20 
   Bite (12) for 4d+10, tail lash (10) for 
  6d+10
  Rattus rex* 
  12 
  10 
  25/5 
  Bite (12) for 2d+5
  Swarm of rats* 
  8 
  8 
  20/4 
  Flurry of tiny rodent bites (8) for 1d+4
  Unicorn* 
  8 
  10 
  25/5 
  Impale (14) for 4d+5, kick (12) for 2d+5
  Wolf 
  8 
  8 
  20/4 
  Bite (10) for 2d+4
  Wyvern* 
  12 
  18 
  68/19 
   Bite (14) for 4d+9, claws (14) for 2d+9, 
  tail stinger (14) with intensity 4
  SUPPORTING CAST, THE BESTIARY
  There is a fair selection of creatures for use in 
  most situations. Useful though it is the list is cer-
  tainly not complete. In play there will be creatures 
  that you want characteristics for that aren’t sup-
  plied so feel free to make your own up using these 
  as a guideline. For the beasts of this section men-
  tal competence is used to define perception and 
  cunning, and not education or sentient intellect.
  
  247
  The Supporting Cast
  Frendal lizard
  Frendal lizards 
  are native to 
  China, and have 
  been exported all 
  over the globe 
  as pets and mes-
  senger beasts. 
  Frendal lizards 
  are small ser-
  pentine reptiles. 
  They have a pair 
  of functioning 
  wings, and four 
  legs each with a 
  highly manipu-
  lative claw. 
  Frendal lizards 
  have long snouts 
  full of needle 
  like teeth and large expressive eyes.
  Frendal lizards can breathe fire. This is actually 
  Frendal lizard indigestion, but the little puffs of 
  multicoloured flame are entertaining to most. 
  Frendal lizards are highly intelligent and easily 
  trained.
  Marsh troll
  Marsh trolls are huge deformed humanoid crea-
  tures with rough, diseased, flabby green hides, 
  hairy shoulders and arms, and long claws. They 
  dwell in marshes and fens throughout Europe and 
  usually make their dens underground in the soft, 
  watery peat of the marsh. Marsh trolls are noc-
  turnal and carnivorous. An average marsh troll 
  stands 10 feet tall
  Although of a vaguely humanoid form trolls are 
  not believed to be intelligent. They have a keen 
  sense of smell. Trolls have the ability to regen-
  erate; they heal 5 hits at the end of each round 
  unless the troll is dead. Damage done by fire does 
  not regenerate in this manner. A troll’s favourite 
  hunting tactic is to lie in wait buried in the peat, 
  until its prey is above it and then to fly up from 
  the peat below, clawing and retching digestive 
  acid.
  Oceanic serpent
  Sea serpents are colossal marine reptiles. They 
  are carnivorous, and occasionally attack ships. 
  The characteristics below are for a serpent around 
  50 ft long and 6 ft thick at the broadest. They are 
  usually found far from shore. The sea serpent can 
  attack ships in two ways. It can lurch onto a ships 
  deck and attack sailors directly, or larger serpents 
  can even wrap around a ship and crush it into 
  driftwood.
  Rattus rex
  Rattus rex are huge, about the size of a large bull-
  dog. These giant rats are actually native to South 
  America- but several years ago a group of these 
  rats escaped from London zoo, down into the 
  sewers, and so now England has its own breed of 
  giant, intelligent rat.
  Swarm of sewer rats
  Rats are one of the oldest occupants of Europe, 
  and wherever there is a city there will be rats. 
  The major races of Europe were almost wiped 
  out by disease carrying rats in the bubonic plague 
  outbreak of the 16th century, and understandably 
  hold a grudge against the little rodents, a grudge 
  fuelled by the recent dangers of cholera conta-
  gion. A swarm of rats as determined here consists 
  of between 15-30 individual rodents.
  
  248
  The Supporting Cast
  Unicorn
  The unicorn is a rare and mystical cloven-
  hoofed beast with a horse-like body and 
  head, a long, rather leonine tail. A single 
  spiral horn springs from the centre of the 
  forehead- unicorns are always white.
  Popular legend describes unicorns as 
  beautiful and graceful creatures that are 
  the embodiment of love and innocence. 
  Unicorns appear in forests throughout 
  Europe, where they prey on unwary folk by 
  luring them to a secluded spot and goring 
  them before feeding. 
  Fortunately for scholarly characters, a suc-
  cessful occult skill roll imparts knowledge 
  of the unicorn’s diet. Unicorns are carnivo-
  rous.
  Wyvern
  Wyverns are believed to be the animal rem-
  nants of the dragon races that so occupy 
  European mythology. They have two legs, 
  two wings, no forelimbs and a serpentine 
  body that ends with a long tail that ends in a 
  venomous sting. The tail is highly prehensile 
  and can reach around the wyvern to the front 
  or sides to hit an enemy. These beasts are 
  huge. A typical male specimen being 13-14 
  yards long in total, but with a body length 
  of only 3 yards. Giant wyverns are not spe-
  cific to any terrain type, but wild specimens 
  are rare in western Europe, where they are 
  only found in racing or cavalry stables, such 
  ‘domesticated’ beasts usually have their 
  stingers clipped. Wyverns are carnivorous, 
  in the wild they often attack things as large 
  as boats, and a hungry wyvern has car-
  ried people off deck. The Orcs of Southern 
  Africa use giant wyverns as battle beasts, as 
  do the French and Russian cavalry.
  
  249
  The Supporting Cast
  SUPPORTING CAST, MONSTERS
  What makes a monster?
  Philosophical debate on the nature of evil aside, this section of our bestiary deals with those beings 
  who prefer to remain secret – many of these beings are thought long extinct, wiped out in the purges 
  of the church long ago. Others  cannot exist on the earthly plane without being summoned. There is 
  no global conspiracy or communication network between these beings, but they all understand the 
  need for secrecy in a world hostile to their very nature.
  Eloim
  Mental competence: 
  16
  Physical competence: 
  14
  Health: 
  35/20 inc magical 
  protections.
  Skill picks: 
   Education (16), 
  History (16), 
  Occult Lore (16), 
  Thaumaturgy (14), 
  Demonology (14), 
  Charm (20), Impress 
  (20), 
  Combat picks: 
   Sword (16) for 
  5d6+6 lethal damage
  At the turn of the age of reason, during the 
  thirty-year war, there was a rebellion against the 
  emergence of dogma on the planes of Order. The 
  rebellion was put down and the rebels cast from 
  heaven, fallen to earth. The Eloim are the scat-
  tered remnants of these fallen angels, doomed to 
  walk the earth until the final struggle.
  When they were cast down the Eloim were 
  cursed, and as a result they lost their wings, and 
  became half-mortal. They do not feel the passing 
  of time as a natural creature would; instead the 
  burden of ages travels with them as a constant 
  weight. They are also cursed with a constant 
  hunger for life, which urges them to hunt the 
  mortals they pleaded for, and distances them 
  from mortal solace in their exile.
  Many of the Eloim have long since gone mad, 
  and have been claimed by Entropy while mak-
  ing bargains to ease their misery, but a few 
  still remain. The Czarina is the most prominent 
  (although the world at large is ignorant of her 
  heritage), the other remaining Eloim prefer ano-
  nymity as wanderers, constantly on the move so 
  that others do not notice their perpetual youth. 
  An encounter with one of the wandering Eloim 
  should be wreathed in mystery and danger; 
  these sad wanderers are pawns in a larger game 
  between Entropy and Order that will inevitably be 
  The Supporting Cast
  between Entropy and Order that will inevitably be 
  
  250
  The Supporting Cast
  dangerous for any mortal drawn in.
   All Eloim are immortal. They do not 
  suffer from aging and are immune to 
  disease. They are sterile and may not 
  issue offspring.
   All Eloim regenerate 1d6 Health and 
  Stun every 10 rounds. They can only 
  be truly killed by decapitation and 
  burning.
   All Eloim suffer from a permanent loss 
  of Resolve (1d6 per day), which they 
  regain by feeding on the emotions of 
  others. To feed the Eloim must engage 
  a mortal in a heightened emotional 
  state, be it fear, hate, admiration or 
  love. While the mortal is in this state 
  the Eloim can drain 1d6 resolve each 
  hour. For every point of resolve the 
  Eloim drains, the victim looses 1 stun; 
  the rules for collateral damage apply.
   Should their resolve drop to 0 they 
  enter a frenzied, bestial state and 
  immediately attack those around them, 
  draining resolve via the fear and terror 
  caused by their assaults.
   All Eloim, as angels on earth, have an 
  instinctual aptitude for magic and may 
  cast any spell or enchantment from any 
  list.
   When introducing an Eloim into the 
  game, think about their ethics – are 
  they still faithful to their belief in har-
  monious Order? Have they accepted 
  Dogma? Have they been corrupted by 
  Entropy? Have they gone mad?
  Embodiments of earth
  Embodiments of earth are crude and bulky. They 
  Embodiments of nature
  Embodiments (or elementals) are manifestations of pure natural force. There are four common 
  forms of embodiment, one for each of the primary natural forces: air, water, fire and earth. Each 
  embodiment possesses limited powers relating to its elemental field of origin. Although only the 
  four primary embodiments are listed, there are doubtless others for lesser or more specific natural 
  forces. Examples of lesser embodiments might be decay, night, light, growth; some gamesmaster’s 
  might allow embodiments of races and creatures giving embodiments of humanity or felines. Orcs, 
  Eldren and Steppegoblin cannot have embodiments in this manner.
  All embodiments follow the basic rules listed below.
  Embodiments only manifest on the earthly plane as a result of an invocation from a mortal sorcerer, 
  or by the bidding of the old gods. There are no spells for summoning embodiments in these rules 
  - that level of magic is far beyond the scope of beginning characters.
  All embodiments have competence ratings just like other supporting cast members; the level 
  of these ratings depends greatly upon the original summoner’s ability and the amount of the 
  embodying element in the area.
  All embodiments have and use abilities that are defined as skill knowledge. The exact details 
  of the abilities depend upon the elemental field of the embodiment.
  Embodiments are not affected by wound penalties, are unaffected by stun damage and cannot 
  fall unconscious.
  All embodiments are capable of elementary communication with their summoner, however 
  only embodiments of air or water are able to communicate with others.
  
  251
  The Supporting Cast
  appear as a hulk of whatever earthly mate-
  rial they where summoned from (mud, rock, 
  masonry). Embodiments of earth may...
   Fill a hole, replacing either missing 
  floor or wall. The replacement sec-
  tion is flat, glossy and seamless.
   Strike at a target designated by the 
  caster. The embodiment attacks with 
  physical competence, and the fists do 
  2d6 plus damage bonus for example: an 
  embodiment with a competence of 14 
  has a brawl skill total of (14) and does 
  2d6+7 damage.
   Suffocate or entangle a target desig-
  nated by the caster. The embodiment 
  engulfs the target. To entangle use 
  the elementals physical competence 
  vs. the targets body+brawl (or 
  Dexterity+dodge). To suffocate use 
  the asphyxiation rules.
   Get in the way. Elemental becomes 
  amorphous, spreading to block 
  doors, windows, railway lines, 
  roads and other limited movement 
  planes.
   Dig and tunnel, an embodiment may 
  excavate its physical competence level in 
  cubic feet each turn.
  Embodiments of air
  Appears as a small cloud or a miniature tempest, 
  depending upon power. An embodiment of air can 
  communicate verbally; an embodiments voice 
  is like echoing whispers caught in the wind. 
  Embodiments of air can...
   Make a knockdown attack upon a target 
  of the casters choosing. The attack uses 
  physical competence.
   Supply lift to a falling / jumping charac-
  ter or item. This slows the descent and 
  prevents the harmful effects of hit-
  ting the ground at speed.
   Assist a character in flight. An 
  embodiment can lift an amount of  
  ‘body points’ equal to its physical com-
  petence. The distance travelled can be up 
  The Supporting Cast
  
  252
  The Supporting Cast
  to mental competence in miles.
  Embodiments of fire
  A fiery humanoid varying in size and intensity appears. 
  Fire embodiments always appear in the male gender.
   Like any fire. Embodiments may ignite any 
  flammable materials by touch.
   The fire may attempt a scorch attack. The 
  attack uses mental competence. The attack 
  causes half physical competence in dice of 
  damage and ignites all surrounding flam-
  mable items.
   The embodiment may also engulf a target in 
  fire, with an intensity equal to half its physi-
  cal competence. While engulfed the target is 
  considered entangled and must break free to 
  escape the burning damage.
  Embodiments of water
  A watery humanoid appears. The scalp hair is a foam-
  ing cascade of water, the skin a translucent ocean 
  green. Water embodiments always appear in the female 
  gender. Height and build vary with the power of the 
  embodiment, but water embodiments are usually of 
  fair countenance.
   
  The water can drown a target designated by 
  the caster, use the asphyxiation rules.
   
  The water can support a character drowning 
  in normal water, bearing him to the surface 
  and supporting him.
   
  The caster can be allowed the ability to 
  breathe underwater & be unaffected by the 
  pressures of ocean deeps. The immunity 
  lasts for minutes equal to the embodiments 
  physical competence
   Water is the element of illusion. Water 
  embodiments can create realistic illusions 
  that affect all the senses. To disbelieve such 
  an illusion, roll intellect+concentration vs. 
  the embodiments mental competence.
   The water can wash a character / item, the 
  item is washed sparkling clean and is left 
  feeling invigorated.
  The Supporting Cast
  
  253
  The Supporting Cast
  Ghost
  Mental competence: 
  6-20
  Health: 
  -
  Skill picks: 
  Combat picks: 
  Frighten
  Ghosts are spirits of the dead; specifically those 
  sentient beings that have died of violence or in 
  want, and are unable to rest. Ghosts are usually 
  tied to a specific site, such as a building, and 
  can only move up to their Competence in yards 
  away from it. Ghosts can become visible at will, 
  and scare intruders with an opposed ½ compe-
  tence vs. resolution test. If the ghost wins the 
  opponent temporarily loses 2d6 resolve. Once a 
  target reaches zero resolve, he must flee with all 
  speed. Lost resolve regenerate as normal. If the 
  ghost loses the opposed roll, then the target can-
  not be attacked again for 24 hours. Entities are 
  frequently insane and malignant from centuries 
  of constant awareness and exposure to the ether, 
  however recently formed ghosts may be commu-
  nicative and might bargain with characters to lay 
  itself to rest properly. Ghosts have no attributes 
  other than mental competence.
  Some ghosts can be put to rest by a casting of 
  the spell rest, others require a task to be accom-
  plished or revenge to be taken, before they can 
  know peace.
  There is no reason why a ghost cannot use spell 
  knowledge, as long as no material components 
  are needed.
  Ghouls
  Mental competence: 
  8
  Physical competence: 
  12
  Health: 
  30/6
  Skill picks: 
   Tracker (12), percep-
  tion (14), scrutinise 
  via hearing (12) hide 
  & sneak (10).            
  Combat picks: 
   Any humanoid 
  attacks, plus a bite 
  attack (10) for 2d6+6
  Ghouls are demonic monsters that feed on the 
  dead. They look like walking corpses that have 
  stepped from a week-old grave. Any armour they 
  possess is looted from graves or victims, and they 
  usually fight with only tooth and claw. Ghouls 
  are sentient, and can sometimes be found serving 
  necromancers or other unscrupulous employers 
  who are willing to pay in flesh.
  Ghouls use a blood-chilling howl in combat. 
  When a ghoul howls, match its mental compe-
  tence against the resolution+concentration of 
  each non-ghoul in earshot. If a victim is over-
  come, he becomes terrified (-6) until all howling 
  stops. If an adventurer resists the howls effects, 
  he must try again on the next round- after 5 
  rounds of howling a character may be considered 
  immune to the noise for this confrontation.
  
  254
  The Supporting Cast
  Imps
  Mental competence: 
  6
  Physical competence: 
  6
  Health: 
  15/3
  Skill picks: 
  Bull! (10)
  Combat picks: 
   Spear or short hooked 
  sword (8) for 3d6+3 
  lethal damage, dodge! 
  (12)
  The imps are the amoral denizens of the labyrinth 
  that lies in the shadow of the earthly plane. The 
  labyrinth lies between the planes of earth and the 
  ascending planes of Entropy,. The labyrinth has 
  always been essentially chaotic in nature, easily 
  shaped by the dreams and nightmares of earth. 
  A ‘prince’ rules the labyrinth from a glittering 
  ivory tower. P olitics in the labyrinth are brutal 
  and simplistic – the strong rule, the weak get 
  squished. 
  Its chaotic and malicious denizens (for the most 
  part, unwittingly) mimic and mock the plane of 
  earth in a parody of earthly life. Indeed life in 
  the labyrinth could be imagined as a twisted ‘car-
  toon image’ of life on earth.  Imps are short and 
  scrawny, varying between 1 and 3 feet tall. They 
  have greenish skin, and sharp, exaggerated fea-
  tures and beady red eyes. They dress in a bizarre 
  mixture of exaggerated historical styles and their 
  ‘religion’ such as it is focuses on the worship of 
  ‘the lady’ – mainly just in case she ever appeared 
  to punish them for not doing so. Imps delight in 
  mischief and malice and have an instinctual fas-
  cination with fighting, gorging, drinking, and for-
  nicating, frequently falling into cackling hysterics 
  over fatal accidents and the misfortunes of others.
  The labyrinth and its population of imps (also 
  known as ‘goblins’, ‘boggarts’, ‘gremlins’ or 
  ‘felkins’) features prominently in earthly folklore, 
  with many old stories about babies stolen away in 
  the night for the goblin prince, and the ‘gremlins’ 
  that delight in the misfortunes of honest men and 
  women. At the same time young imps listen in 
  wonder to stories about the ‘land of the giants’ 
  where the streets are lined with filth, where beer 
  & women are cheap, and the weapons are BIG.
  Imps are sometimes summoned from the laby-
  rinth, and sometimes even accidentally find their 
  own way into earthly reality. 
  
  255
  The Supporting Cast
  Litche
  Mental competence: 
  20
  Physical competence: 
  14
  Health: 
  35/7 (immune to non 
  magical attacks)
  Skill picks: 
   Thaumaturgy +120, 
  necromancy +80, 
  demonology +5, 
  occult lore +80, sci-
  ence! +35, medicine 
  +3, astronomy 
  +5, the natu-
  ral world +5, 
  library use 
  +4.
  Combat picks: 
  Sword (16) 
  for 5d6+7 
  Litches are undead nec-
  romancers 
  that 
  became so 
  corrupt in life that in death 
  they have been denied rest, 
  and are now undead them-
  selves. Litches appear as 
  rotting and shredded corps-
  es, sometimes little more 
  than skeletons. They often 
  wear once fine clothes, now 
  fallen to the rot of passing 
  time. Litches are filled with a 
  hate of the living, as they 
  are a constant remind- er 
  of 
  times 
  past. 
  Litches are 
  always very powerful sor-
  cerers.
  Notes: a Litche is likely 
  to have at least one magi- cal 
  item or relic. Also a Litche is 
  likely to have a retinue of 
  2d6 lesser undead and sev-
  eral greater undead under 
  his direct control.
  Spells: a Litche is likely to 
  have an extensive library of 
  spell journals, a Litche can 
  have any spell knowledge 
  convenient immediately avail-
  able for casting.
  Lycanthropes
  Mental competence: 
  -2
  Physical competence: 
  +10
  Health bonus (animal): 
   +25/+10 (immune to 
  normal weapons)
  Skill bonuses (animal): 
   Perception +4, sneak 
  +3, tracker & scout 
  +2. Brawl (tooth & 
  claw) +4. All other 
  skills are performed at 
  -6 difficulty.
  Combat picks: 
   Bite for 3d6, and claw 
  for 2d6.
  Lycanthropes are men & women that can 
  change into the form of an animal. On nights 
  o f 
  the full moon, lycanthropes must 
  change to beast form.
  In animal form, lycan-
  thropes are immune to 
  most damage, which 
  simply bounces off. 
  Only magic, fire, or 
  pure metals such as 
  silver will harm them: 
  for example a sabre or 
  catapult stone with 
  edge sharp cast upon it 
  will inflict the magi-
  cal damage from the 
  edge sharp; the sword 
  itself will do nothing 
  - the lycanthropes has 
  its natural armour to 
  defend against this magi-
  cal damage. Poison will 
  affect a lycanthrope, if 
  the skin of the creature is 
  penetrated, or the poison 
  is ingested. Lycanthropes 
  need oxygen, as do most 
  other living things, and 
  can be asphyxiated or 
  drowned. 
  Any race can be a lycan-
  thrope; the above charac-
  teristics give only bonuses 
  to an existing profile. Different 
  
  256
  The Supporting Cast
  races would use the same rules but a different 
  animal, for example an ogre could well turn to a 
  bear, an elf to a big cat, a dwarf to a wild boar. 
  The characteristics show the changes when in 
  animal form, whatever the animal may be.
  Notes: the bite of a lycanthrope transmits the 
  shape changing ability if the attack causes 10 
  damage or more. Lycanthropes wishing to create 
  another lycanthrope must then make an intellect 
  roll to override animal instinct, and not continue 
  to kill & eat the victim.
  Demon of the 1st circle pale
  Mental competence: 
  10
  Physical competence: 
  10
  Health: 
  25/5
  Skill picks: 
   Linguistics (8), bull! 
  (7), occult lore (6), 
  demonology (6), 
  thaumaturgy (11), 
  hide & sneak (7)
  Combat picks: 
   Sharp little nails like 
  knives (10) for 1d6+5 
  Pale demons
   All demons of the pale court share the following things in common
   
  All demons of the court have a need to perform and encourage all things base or decadent. 
  Nothing is too low or disgusting for the denizens of the court.
   
  All demons of the court are immune to normal weapons. Of mortal arms, only weapons of 
  silver can harm such demons. This invulnerability is not passed onto a host while a demon 
  is in control. Magical spells have full effect against demons (which have a resolution 
  (mental competence) roll to resist the effects) and their hosts.
   
  All demons have a number of demonology / thaumaturgy spells equal to their circle. 
  When demons use these spells the amount of casting actions is always one (1).
   
  To truly be rid of a demon, it must be stopped from possessing another host until it is 
  forced to return to the Pale court. Attacking a demon without harming the possibly inno-
  cent host body is exceedingly difficult; all attacks to a demon are applied to the host. 
  The relic bright blades are possibly the only way to defeat a demon and leave the host 
  unharmed.
  
  257
  The Supporting Cast
  In its own form it is usually a small humanoid 6” 
  to 2ft in height and of perfectly scaled propor-
  tions. When possessed the host may shrink to this 
  height. Many sorcerers will use these demons as 
  retinue in preference to paid servants. Demons of 
  the 1st circle are sometimes referred to as famil-
  iars.
  Demon of the 2nd circle pale
  Mental competence: 
  4
  Physical competence: 
  16
  Health: 
   40/12 inc a layer of 
  oozing slime
  Skill picks: 
   Gibber (8), sense of 
  smell (12), provide a 
  liberal coating of ran-
  cid slime (10).
  Combat picks: 
   Smother (16) for 
  2d6+8; entangle (12) 
  as the phallic ten-
  drils may entangle an 
  opponent in melee 
  range, the tendrils 
  have an effective 
  body of 8. Stinger 
  (10) for 2d6+8 dam-
  age, and intensity 5 
  poison.
  In its natural form this shambling, faceless crea-
  ture exudes foul ooze as it moves. It is covered 
  in large phallic tentacles and possesses a large 
  scorpion-like stinger for a weapon. These 
  demons are most common- ly summoned 
  as 
  guardian 
  creatures, although 
  devoted 
  demonologists have been 
  known to summon purely for plea-
  sure.
  Demon of the 3rd circle pale
  Mental competence: 
  14
  Physical competence: 
  8
  Health: 
  20/4
  Skill picks: 
   Carnal knowledge 
  (16), demonology 
  (14), thaumaturgy 
  (12), charm (16), 
  seduction (16), eti-
  quette (16).
  Combat picks: 
   Nails like knives (16) 
  for 1d6+4
  In its native form the 3rd circle demon appears 
  as an attractive Eldren, the illusion of normality 
  is spoiled by vivid scarlet hair and a long, slim 
  prehensile tail. The demons of this circle are 
  sometimes called Paline’s whores and are usually 
  summoned as amorous companions.
  
  258
  The Supporting Cast
  Demon of the 4th circle pale
  Mental competence: 
  14
  Physical competence: 
  18
  Health: 
   54/14 inc aura of pale 
  fire
  Skill picks: 
   Impress (16), linguis-
  tics (14), intimidate 
  (20), dark & immoral 
  delights (16), etiquette 
  (12).
  Combat picks: 
   Brawl (18) for 
  1d6+10; gore with 
  horns (12) for 
  2d6+10; entangle with 
  tail (10)
  Huge bat-like wings and bull-like horns adorn 
  this nightmare vison of a ‘classic’ demon. The 
  entire body shimmers with a pale white fire that 
  is cold to the touch. Hell red eyes peer down 
  from an impressive 10 ft height. The demons of 
  the 4th circle are the only members of the host to 
  appear in a (disproportionately) male humanoid 
  form and are referred to as Paline’s generals.
  Paline’s daughters, courtiers of the 5th circle
  Mental competence: 
  18
  Physical competence: 
  18
  Health: 
  45/9
  Skill picks: 
   Demonology (20), 
  thaumaturgy (20), 
  linguistics (20), 
  unearthly pleasures 
  (20), etiquette (20)
  Combat picks: 
   Demon sabre (20) for 
  5d6+10; whip (20) 
  for 1d6+10 and which 
  may entangle.
  These are fearful demons, the personal retinue 
  and playthings of Paline, lady of Entropy.
  They appear as beautiful, faceless Eldren women, 
  with porcelain white skin and vivid scarlet hair. 
  Any illusion of mortality is ruined by the lack of 
  facial details - eyes, nose, and mouth are lacking. 
  When summoned daughters always appear naked. 
  These servitors of Paline serve many functions, 
  from leading the orgies of her cultists to fighting 
  her battles and delivering her messages. Many 
  sorcerers try to summon these daughters of dark-
  ness as protectors or concubines, most get more 
  than they asked for, and invariably find them-
  selves begging for Paline’s mercy.
  The daughters of Paline may induce lust which 
  requires a resolution+concentration (24) roll to 
  resist. They can also assume the facial details of 
  any humanoid female at whim, and can deliver 
  an enchanted kiss. The kiss causes euphoria for 
  1 hour during which time the target can do noth-
  ing but grin idiotically and comply. The kiss may 
  be resisted with resolution+concentration (18). 
  A daughter may summon a demonic sword and 
  whip for her use instantly and at any time.
  
  259
  The Supporting Cast
  Servitors of the void, tarnished angels
  Mental competence: 
  18
  Physical competence: 
  18
  Health: 
   50/20 metal construct
  Skill picks: 
   Dogma (20), human 
  perception (20), sci-
  ence (14)
  Combat picks: 
   Holy sword (20) for 
  8d6+10, lacerate (16) 
  a powerful blast of 
  metal or stone shards 
  engulfs the target for 
  6d6 damage
  Popular belief defines the servitors as the servants 
  of some Entropy power, far away in the ether. In 
  truth they are the now mad and twisted servants 
  of the Aluminat.
  Their visage is as twisted and corrupt as the 
  dogma they represent. Wreathed in smoke and 
  wrapped in hooded robes, their flayed faces 
  spread over burnt, mechanical bodies, brazen 
  clashing wings of metal, they clutch a huge two 
  handed broadsword to their chest.
  The servitors actively seek out magic users, spell 
  items and magical objects and destroy them. They 
  cannot tolerate the disruption to order that such 
  things cause. Servitors are not usually summoned, 
  they normally appear as a result of foul failure in 
  another magical summoning operation. 
  Servitors never possess they always manifest 
  fully. Servitors have been known to make bar-
  gains with noisy sorcerers: namely that if the sor-
  cerer delivers information pertaining to the loca-
  tion of two other sorcerers, he will be allowed 
  a reprieve. Many sorcerers have learnt to dread 
  the opening line of “We are righteous, We bring 
  serenity”. 
  
  260
  The Supporting Cast
  The anglican host, guardian angels
  Mental competence: 
  16
  Physical competence: 
  16
  Health: 
  40/15 holy armour
  Skill picks: 
   Faith (18), human 
  perception (16), sci-
  ence (10), enchanting 
  (10)
  Combat picks: 
   Holy sword (18) for 
  6d6+10, spell effect: 
  rest (16), spell effect: 
  quiet (16)
  Not all of the servants of Order are corrupt. A 
  few have escaped the madness of dogma and still 
  nurture the principles of harmony, and regard 
  purity of soul more than blind obedience to order. 
  These angels appear clad in white hooded robes 
  and polished armour, their wings of white feath-
  ers and shine with a bright holy light. They, too, 
  wield great broadswords, which shine like mir-
  rors in the sun.
  These guardian angels are weak compared to 
  their dogmatic brethren, and need the channel of 
  a faithful medium to call upon them (see Magic: 
  Aluminat faith). 
  Tarnished angels
  The servants of Order are rare upon the earthly plane, even more than the demons of the pale. 
  Their corrupt dogma is one of hierarchy and non-intervention – the place of the host of heaven is 
  in heaven – not on earth. 
  Summoning aid from the planes of Order is infrequent, earthly dogma teaches the faithful to 
  accept their fates, and not to expect intervention from their distant lords. Even so those with no 
  comprehension as to why their plea for heavenly aid has called an avenging ‘demon’ rather than 
  the angel they prayed for sometimes summon the servants of Order.
   Angels do not possess hosts. They always manifest fully.
   Angels do not take stun damage and cannot fall unconscious. 
   They are immune to any attack or power that uses presence or magic in an attempt to 
  charm or beguile them. 
   Can regenerate 10 health each round.
  
  261
  The Supporting Cast
  Vampires
  Mental competence: 
  +2
  Physical competence: 
  +6
  Health: 
  +20/+4
  Skill picks: 
   Skills: a vampire 
  has a possibly vast 
  skill repertoire. All 
  skills from life, and 
  any skills picked 
  up during undeath 
  (possibly centuries). 
  Vampires are innately 
  magical, and gain 
  +1 in thaumaturgy, 
  demonology & nec-
  romancy upon arising 
  from the grave. Spell 
  knowledge is not 
  automatically gained, 
  but many vampires 
  have had centuries to 
  acquire spells.
  Combat picks: 
   Vampires are intel-
  ligent humanoids, 
  and may brawl or use 
  any humanoid weap-
  ons, they also have 
  a bite which can do 
  1d6 damage + blood 
  drain.
  The creation of a vampire is a strange process, 
  and surrounded by much superstition. In truth, 
  some individuals are born different in a subtle 
  way; their difference does not show in body or 
  character but is a resurgence of an ancient blood-
  line. Indeed, most of these ‘Nosferatu’ are com-
  pletely unaware of their nature. Most Nosferatu 
  die and are buried and their existence is at an end. 
  However, some are discovered during mortal life 
  by an awakened vampire who senses their poten-
  tial. If killed by the awakened vampire’s kiss then 
  the Nosferatu wakes from mortal death as a fully 
  fledged vampire.
  Vampires are pale, graceful and sensual entities, 
  they cast no reflection. Their shadows seem to 
  live a twisted life of its own. Vampires can begin 
  as any of the sentient races. These attributes are 
  not complete. They are the modifiers that should 
  be applied to a character or NPC upon entering 
  the vampire state.
  Vampires depend upon the blood of sentient 
  creatures for sustenance. The blood of animals 
  is impotent in comparison, and will not sate the 
  vampires hunger.
  A vampire is a nocturnal creature; this is when its 
  powers are strongest. Like all nocturnal creatures 
  it may also go about its business by day, although 
  its powers are weak. When creating a vampire, 
  choose three of the powers below, they may only 
  be utilised during the night.
  Vampire powers
   
  Call: the vampire may call enthralled victims 
  to him across great distances. This call may be 
  issued at any time. But must be made from the 
  vampires home soil (static, or a box of).
   
  Control rodents & packs: a vampire may con-
  trol the meaner things of life, such as the rat 
  and the wolf. Whole packs or swarms of such 
  animals may be summoned and commanded by 
  a vampire with little effort (requires no actions).
   
  Cause plague: a powerful vampire may be able 
  to spread plague as a cover for his murders. 
  This ability is reserved for extremely powerful 
  vampires.
   
  Enthral: the vampire may instil an unnatural 
  attraction in a mortal target. The vampire may 
  attempt to enthral one target each night. There 
  is no limit to the possible amount of enthralled 
  victims. To enthral the vampire must overcome 
  the target in an opposed Resolution roll. With 
  success the target is enthralled. An enthralled 
  target seems detached, dreamy and subject to a 
  great lethargy.
   
  Sense & awaken Nosferatu:  as already noted 
  not every one becomes a vampire if killed by 
  a vampire. Only some individuals possess the 
  necessary condition to begin. A vampire knows 
  such individuals on sight, and may awaken 
  them to vampirism by killing them with the 
  blood dram of it’s kiss, and then feeding them 
  with vampiric blood in their death throes.
   
  Turn to wolf: the vampire may appear as a 
  large, wild hound or wolf. There is no change 
  to characteristics or intelligence while in this 
  
  262
  The Supporting Cast
  form. Manipulative hands are lost, and the 
  form carries a most ferocious bite (3d6). The 
  vampire may also assume a bat form; this form 
  is smaller, less conspicuous and allows flight. 
  Finally the vampire may also assume the form 
  of a vapour, difficult to see without strong light 
  and impossible to strike at without magic.
  Vampire weaknesses
  A vampire has many powers, some incredibly 
  powerful, but even so the vampire must still 
  conform to some of natures laws which supply it 
  with weaknesses.
   
  Wholesome herbs such as garlic or wild rose 
  repel a vampire; a vampire must make a diffi-
  cult resolution roll to bypass the smells of such 
  herbs.
   Vampires do not cast reflections in mirrors. 
   
   
  Vampires must make a resolution vs. resolu-
  tion roll to advance in the face of a holy symbol 
  held by a believer.
   
  The  vampire may be paralysed by the insertion 
  of a wooden or iron stake through the heart.
   
  A vampire may be slain by severing the head 
  from the body, and burning both sections.
   
  A vampire must rest regularly in the unhal-
  lowed soil of his homeland, or the resting place 
  of his vampire children to recuperate fully and 
  recharge his array of powers. Such earth and 
  places may be cleansed, and spoilt for the vam-
  pire by exorcism.
   A vampire can only be truly banned by the 
  above ways. All other attacks might do dam-
  age, and cause inconvenience through pain and 
  wound effects, but they heal quickly. At the end 
  of each turn a vampire may heal 4d6 health. 
  Vampires are inconvenienced by magical dam-
  age, which they regenerate at half rate.
  A vampire must drink the blood of sentient 
  beings to survive. 
  A young vampire needs 1 pint of fresh blood 
  for each day of existence. Older vampires 
  can control their hunger better and may only 
  need 1 pint per week or even month. A vam-
  pire may store blood in its body, a kill which 
  yields 8 pints of blood will supply for 8 days 
  etc. Vampires rarely kill. It attracts attention. 
  Usually they select several victims and drain 
  them of a little each in turn.
  
  263
  The Gamesmaster: Running The Game
  263
  RUNNING THE 
  GAME
  Victoriana takes a broad cross section of 
  events across the globe between the dates 
  1838 - 1898; we did this to create a slightly 
  more interesting world within our game 
  year of 1867. We do not intend this to be a 
  historically accurate game, games masters 
  do not have to have a “concise history of 
  the world’ by them all the time! If you wish 
  to pursue more historically accurate role-
  playing, all the rules you need are within 
  this book, you are simply missing out on 
  source material for your game.
  The easiest way to see Victoriana is as an 
  alternative reality, parallel to our world, a 
  reality where our legends are real, where 
  our monsters exist. We based the game in 
  the real world, but it is a fantasy world. 
  Please, do as you will with it! Depose the 
  Hapsburgs, have the Martians invade, fly to 
  the moon - have fun!
  The rules for Victoriana are relatively com-
  pact, but cover a lot of topics., and the one 
  thing those rules don’t tell you? How to run 
  a game.
  In truth there is no definitive advice on how 
  best to run a game, every gamesmaster has 
  a diffeent style, every gaming group has 
  different preferences in the stories they tell 
  together, and although we can’t give you a 
  difinative set of instructions, we can give 
  you some tips.
  ATMOSPHERE
  A good ambience is very important to 
  a game of Victoriana; the games master 
  should draw the players into his adventure 
  with his description of what goes on around 
  the characters.
  When describing an event, don’t say ‘the 
  man in the coat that you’ve been following 
  walks over the road and then runs off.
  Say ‘you see the dark figure you’ve been 
  shadowing, he looks about as he leaves the 
  shadows and for a moment stares at you. 
  His spectacles glint like silver, and he darts 
  off again pushing through the crowded 
  street to get away - maybe he’s seen you, 
  what’ll you do?’
  Simply by using a bit of vocabulary the 
  effect of a simple statement can be com-
  pletely changed. Remember this when 
  speaking for NPCs, those of the upper and 
  middle class have a huge vocabulary avail-
  able (especially women who perforce spent 
  much time reading) whereas the working 
  class have a relatively limited vocabulary.
  Another way to induce an atmosphere is 
  the game weather. Reserve sunny days and 
  beautiful sunsets for the end of a tough 
  adventure. The usual weather should be 
  snow. Wind, rain. Hail. Sleet, and fog for 
  effect, it is much more atmospheric to lose 
  a foe as his shape disappears like a ghost 
  in the fog, than it is to simply lose sight of 
  him.
  Following are some possible styles of play. 
  Ghost stories
  There should be plenty of chill fog (or 
  sea mist) in a good Victorian ghost story. 
  A good way to set players on edge is to 
  describe their surroundings differently, 
  even if it’s a place they know well, lending 
  a surreal or analogical style to a narrative. 
  To play a ghost story well, all the players 
  and the gamesmaster need to want to play a 
  ghost story for its own sake, there is rarely 
  any benefit or system reward, but the role-
  playing rewards are an experience rarely 
  found. Ghost stories can be played with 
  almost any variety of characters, but are 
  usually limited in settings to old houses or 
  grimy old places.
  Golden age of empire
  This style of play is best suited to upper-
  class characters, these being the only char-
  
  264
  The Gamesmaster: Running The Game
  acters able to experience and enjoy the riches 
  of the Empire. Such a game usually focuses on 
  the honour of a gentleman, the virtues of a lady, 
  the might of the nation, and the constant fight 
  against nihilists and socialists. Such a campaign 
  will usually ridicule and ham down the foes of 
  the Empire as ‘Johnny foreigner’ or ‘bloody colo-
  nials’. The settings for a GAE theme are usually 
  the halls of the mighty, parliaments, royal cham-
  bers, and stately halls. GAE theme often borders 
  onto farce.
  Farce
  Victorian farce is usually (almost exclusively) 
  innuendo. Players and 
  gamesmaster’s opting for 
  this style of play should 
  be seriously into sarcasm 
  and double-entendres. The 
  background atmosphere 
  is not terribly demanding, 
  although for the campaign 
  to support itself the games-
  master must have an abil-
  ity to flesh out even minor 
  NPCs into full blown relics 
  of extremity and ridicule at 
  an instant’s notice.
  Grim reality
  This is one of our favoured 
  styles of play. The grim 
  reality setting focuses on 
  the squalor and degrada-
  tion of Victorian life for 
  the proletariat rather than 
  the pleasant image gener-
  ated by the middle class for 
  our following generations. 
  Working class characters 
  are best suited to a game 
  about the grim reality, con-
  tinuing themes are earning 
  the night’s lodgings and 
  keeping out of the work-
  house. The attraction of this 
  theme lies in the apparent 
  hopelessness of the char-
  acters situation. Life will 
  always be a struggle for them, simply because 
  they were born poor. Grim reality characters can 
  expect little or no help from their social ‘betters’. 
  Often they can expect to become scapegoats for 
  crime or more often to be cheap labour for the 
  factories. Frequent settings are crumbling and 
  rank slums, overcrowded lodging houses, smoky 
  pubs and smog smothered streets and alleys. The 
  sum emphasis of a grim campaign is in proving 
  time-upon-time that the working classes are bred 
  like cattle, kept in conditions worse than pigs, 
  uneducated and treated like worms, on purpose. 
  Grim reality is all about what happens when the 
  worm turns.
  
  265
  The Gamesmaster: Running The Game
  Fairy tale
  A Victorian fairy tale inevitably has fairies 
  all over it; the sun shines and the plants sing, 
  Britannia presumptuously rules the waves and 
  anybody who would think of playing a Victorian 
  fairy tale really needs a doctor to check their head 
  for missing marbles.
  Dickensian
  Charles Dickens is possibly the best-known 
  Victorian author to the inhabitants of the 20th 
  century. Dickens works are characterised by 
  sprawling narratives and strangely named char-
  acters such as Mr Hubbell, Cuddle, Muddle, and 
  Bubble. Where Dickens’s strength lay was in his 
  power of caricature. He would portray the most 
  villainous or comical characters almost totally 
  through their description. Before the character 
  even speaks, a reader can be sure of that person’s 
  place in the plot. 
  Dickens’ contemporary fame however, came 
  from his portrayal of the world about him, he was 
  unafraid to write about the slums and social ills 
  of his time in his work, and was an incredibly 
  active social reformer.
  Moorcockian
  This is our other favoured style of play; the 
  classic Moorcock theme is of an immense meta-
  physical struggle between amoral powers of law 
  and chaos. This is a theme that already exists 
  in Victoriana, and can easily take centre stage. 
  As most Moorcock fans will know, the battle 
  between law and chaos need not always be physi-
  cal or obvious. In Victoriana, the war of the bal-
  ance is subtle. Law is represented by society, sci-
  ence and Aluminat faith. Chaos is weak; it is rep-
  resented by magic and art. Law seeks to destroy 
  chaos by bringing the world under the grinding 
  wheels of society and science. Chaos in its rela-
  tively weak state fights back with social revolu-
  tion and, sometimes, with the demonic assembly 
  of the pale court. This does not mean that all 
  revolutionaries are chaos worshippers. Chaos is 
  not necessarily a religion in Victoriana. What it 
  does mean is that revolutionaries often unknow-
  ingly work for chaos. The same principles also 
  apply to demonologists, the worship of Paline as 
  a pleasure goddess does not necessarily denote 
  conscious allegiance to chaos as well as to Paline.
  When playing out the Moorcockian battle eternal 
  in Victoriana, we feel that chaos should be repre-
  sented as the ‘good’ side. It is important to realise 
  the social ills of law’s model society, and also to 
  realise the difference between conceptual chaos 
  and the demons of the bestiary - nobody is saying 
  that the demons are the good guys!
  Turning the tables
  When writing Victoriana we intended scenarios 
  to be based more around social injustice, revolu-
  tion, evil plots and with occasional dark, ancient 
  threats. We feel there can be as much fun had 
  from starting your militant suffrage movement, 
  hoisting the red flag over Buckingham palace or 
  rooting out sects of cultists as can be had tramp-
  ing round dungeons.
  Unlike many game universes, the world of 
  Victoriana has no innately evil race. However, if 
  you really want an evil race on your game world, 
  then Europe is the obvious choice. The European 
  nations are ambitious, greedy and cruel to those 
  they govern. Already they have enslaved and 
  deceived most of the cultures they have met with.
  Hang on?
  Aren’t the PCs European? Well, not necessarily, 
  there is a lot of fun to be had role-playing one 
  of the Shaka’s Zulu Orcs fighting the European 
  invaders with magic, wyverns and cunning, or 
  Indians trying to depose the English Raja, or 
  native Americans fighting back at the US cavalry. 
  CAMPAIGN IDEAS
  A campaign is a series of scenarios linked either 
  by playing time, or by common plot. Some 
  campaigns are planned with forethought, each 
  scenario adds to and twists the continuing plot to 
  its inevitable outcome. Many campaigns unfold 
  nowhere near as planned; they consist of the 
  same character group entering into diverse sce-
  narios, often with only the characters’ presence 
  as a common thread. Think of a campaign as a 
  TV series. Each adventure you play is an episode 
  in the series - your choice as GM is whether the 
  series has a fixed length (like ‘Babylon 5’, or 
  
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  Encounter Table - for those unexpected moments
  You know how it goes, you have your campaign themes and backgdrops sorted, a host of villains, allies and 
  contacts for the characters to meet - and what happens? They ignore it, they wander off on some mad tangent to 
  D66 
  Encounter 
  Notes
  11-12 
  Beggar 
  A stinking and diseased beggar claws at the character to spare some pen-
  nies for charity.
  13-14 
  Costermonger 
  A street vendor. He or she may be selling a variety of items, from matches 
  to Posies - never anything worth more than 3d. The only common denom-
  inator with costermongers’ goods is the uniformly poor quality. Roll d6. 
   
   
  1-4 the costermonger is adult
   
   
  5-6 the vendor is a child.
  15-16 
  Prostitute 
  She offers her services to the character for between 2 and 6d. The scene 
  of amorous engagement may be a nearby alley or the character’s rooms at 
  his discretion. Note that male prostitutes do not hawk trade. Male prosti-
  tution is a privilege to the rich.
  21-22 
  Street urchins 
  A small gaggle of street urchins races around the character using him as 
  an obstacle in their pell mell chase through the streets. Roll d6. 
   
   
  With a roll of 6, the character may become the target of a childish practi-
  cal joke, such as a sling shot full of horse dung.
  23-24 
  Pick Pockets 
  A gaggle of children race around the character. While they shout and bawl 
  for charity or help, several will rifle his pockets with a competence of 
  (12)
  25-26 
  Loafers 
  A d6 loafers pass the through the area. Loafers are petty criminals and 
  footpads. If a nearby character or cast member seems a good candidate 
  for crime, let him have it.
  31-32 
  Police 
  A policeman strolls by. 
   
   
  Roll d6, on a 1-5 the policeman is simply on patrol. Respectable seeming 
  characters are left unhindered. Any without a good clean suit can expect 
  to be admonished for loitering. 
   
   
  On a roll of 6, the policeman is in pursuit of villains (pickpockets or 
  brawlers most likely) blowing his whistle as he runs.
  33-34 
  Garrotters 
  The garrotte is the favoured weapon of crime in European cities. Usually 
  such a crime is perpetrated by two, one strangles from behind while 
  another rifles the pockets of the victim.
  35-36 
  Drunkards 
  A small group of revellers staggers across the area. Roll d6.
   
   
  On a 1-4 the drunkards stagger on.
   
   
  With a 5-6 the drunkards argue loudly and start a fight. PCs may get 
  dragged into the proceedings.
  41-42 
  Carriage Accident 
  There is a carriage accident on the road, perhaps the characters can save 
  a urchin from the horses hooves, or perhaps they are too late and have to 
  find the family or driver.
  
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  D66 
  Encounter 
  Notes
  43-44 
  Slops 
  There is a mishap with the drains and Toshers are rushing around the 
  street desperately trying to stem the tide of sewage as it spills back into 
  the streets. 
  45-46 
  News boy 
   A small boy with a disproportionate stack of papers is selling them from 
  the street corner.
  51-52 
  Street entertainer  
  An accordion, music box or dancing monkeys are the most common 
  forms of entertainment. Street clowns and mimes are not unknown.
  53-54 
  Fashionable gentleman 
  Roll d6. 
   
   
  On a roll of 1-2 he is on his way to work or an appointment. With a roll 
  of 3-5 he is out for some entertainment, he asks a nearby character for 
  directions to a recommended tavern. 
   
   
  With a roll of 6 he is seeking less public entertainment. He spends some 
  time making veiled inquiries as to where he might find an opium den or a 
  brothel in the area.
  55-56 
  Revolutionaries 
  Roll a d6. 
   
   
  With a roll of 1-4 the protesters are a small group, but very loud. 
  They declaim the class system and the exploitation of the proletariat. 
  Eventually police officers arrive to disperse the rabble. 
   
   
  On a roll of 5-6, the disturbance is a huge protest rally, numbering several 
  hundred persons. The rally blocks streets as it passes and, eventually, the 
  cavalry will arrive to disperse the civilians forcibly.
  61-64 
  Lady 
  A young lady is observed. Roll d6. 
   
   
  On a roll of 1-5 she is chaperoned by a servant or relative as they shop 
  and socialise. 
   
   
  With a roll of 6 the young lady is lost and separated from her group. 
  Depending on the area of the encounter she could be in very real peril.
  65-66 
  Magic!  
  A spell goes off! Roll d6 to discover the cause and caster. 
   
   
  1-5 a respectable seeming person (guild educated? maybe not) has used 
  magic to discourage some small crime against him. 
   
   
  6 a scruffy waif has let a petty magic enchantment fly in self-defence or 
  by accident, he is recoiling into the shadows now to avoid attention.
  the direction your story wanted them to go. So what’s a GM to do? well, try this table. Just roll 2d6 and nomi-
  nate one as 10’s and the other as 1’s - you’ll get a result between 11 and 66 to look up below.
  
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  most Stephen King TV adaptations) or whether 
  it will roll on and on until it finally peters out 
  through lack of interest (like Star Trek, or Buffy 
  the Vampire Slayer and The X Files - all of these 
  series will keep running until ratings indicate that 
  they shouldn’t).
  To get you started, here’s some example cam-
  paign ideas. When choosing a campaign back-
  ground, also think about the game style you will 
  be using - Will your campaign about ‘Consulting 
  Detectives’ be predominantly farce? Or will it be 
  more focused on helping the helpless in a ‘grim 
  reality’.
  The consulting detective
  One of the characters is a consulting detec-
  tive, the others his contacts and companions in 
  investigation. This allows access to scenarios 
  in every level of society as the intrepid team 
  attempt to right wrongs both moral and criminal. 
  Gamesmasters and players should think why any 
  associated characters not employed by the great 
  detective are involved in his capers, also how are 
  characters supporting their lifestyle? Maybe they 
  are provided for by a wealthy relative, or maybe 
  they are on sick leave from their vocation (the 
  famous Dr Watson was on half-pay early retire-
  ment after a war wound dismissed him from army 
  service). 
  A fellowship of interest
  The characters are from different social groups 
  but are brought together by a common interest or 
  intrigue. Maybe they have all fallen foul of a dire 
  plot, maybe they all owe vengeance to some hid-
  den cult. One of the appealing aspects with this 
  campaign is the possible comedy, tragedy and sub 
  plots from society’s attitudes on social movement 
  in this manner - how do Jack’s associates treat 
  Sir Larry down at the local drinking dens when 
  the pair are out? Does Sir Larry dare to invite his 
  rat catching friend to stay with the family at the 
  Hillingham estate?
  Guild investigators
  A set of guild Thaumaturgists, set up by the guild 
  to investigate magical phenomena and discover 
  any truth behind local myths around Europe. Will 
  they take up the eccentric count’s offer of hos-
  pitality? Will they enter the ruined temple of the 
  Future Buddha? Will they reveal the truth of the 
  Paris insurgency?
  Long live the revolution!
  The characters are long suffering members of 
  
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  the proletariat; one or two may be higher born 
  - taking up socialism to be fashionable. Whatever 
  their origin, all the characters are ready to better 
  their position, with barricade fighting and guer-
  rilla warfare if necessary!
  Suffrage
  A similar theme to the revolution concept, but 
  likely to be a lot less violent as characters make 
  militant displays to cajole society into accepting 
  female emancipation & the women’s vote.
  A MATTER OF HISTORY
  You will already have seen that Victoriana is 
  heavily based upon our own real world of the 
  19th century. This is true, which is why we called 
  the game Victoriana (the word is used by antique 
  dealers to denote a 19th century nostalgic piece). 
  It depicts a highly diverse century, and the boiling 
  point where the old ways turned to the modern 
  order; it is a century of great unrest, revolution 
  and upheaval.
  We’ve created a fantasy Europe very similar to 
  the real world. So similar in fact, that you can 
  pull facts and myths right of history and into 
  Victoriana and your only concern is - are any of 
  these characters Eldren, Dwarves or Beastmen? 
  Even the religions of Victoriana are heavily based 
  on real life; so again you can create convincing  
  priests and cultists with nothing more than your 
  own knowledge of history.
  But perhaps you don’t want history? Well 
  Victoriana could very easily be set in any fantasy 
  world, and if you have played fantasy games such 
  as D&D, Runequest or Earthdawn in the past 
  you might want to use that fantasy world as your 
  campaign world and history, and it’s easily done.
  Remember that the world of Victoriana as pre-
  sented here was a rich and diverse fantasy word 
  up until the Dark Ages - very easily your fantasy 
  RPG. In Victoriana things changed when the 
  Romans tipped the cosmic balance with their 
  ambitious demonology, and every fantasy game 
  has a race or group which could take the Romans 
  place. 
  Now insert the coming of Justas, and the result-
  ing anti-magic pogroms that finally led up to the 
  Thirty Year War in Europe - suddenly your own 
  fantasy world  has changed dramatically, and 
  everything your players once knew is waiting to 
  be rediscovered.
  THE ETERNAL STRUGGLE
  The world of Victoriana is one of many planes, 
  which orbit each other in a similar fashion to the 
  planets within our solar system, and each plane 
  exerts an influence over the others around it akin 
  to the gravity of planets. 
  Across these planes two dominant philosophies 
  wage an eternal battle, the Doctrine of Order 
  strives for a logical and scientific universe, pre-
  dictable and measured. Meanwhile the Lords 
  of Entropy strive for chaos, change, and infi-
  nite variety. Presented in their extremes both of 
  these forces are anathema to the universe, which 
  requires a harmony of both in order to exist. The 
  voice of Harmony strives to maintain a natural 
  balance between the two. Unfortunately it is the 
  Dogma
  The importance of Dogma is not to be underestimated. At the last conjunction the Doctrines of 
  Order fought the forces of Entropy, but believed in and instigated a harmonious balance.
  However, as the Thirty Years War raged on earth in 1530, a similar war of faith was taking place 
  in heaven (as above, so below) and the Dogma won, instigating a massive pogrom against magic, 
  entropy, and anything remotely resembling either.
  This new pogrom crushed the voice of harmony as readily as it fought the forces of entropy – total-
  ly destroying the fragile balance between the powers.
  
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  nature of Order to cage the storm, and it is the 
  nature of Entropy to undo the works of order, and 
  so the eternal struggle continues.
  Mediums
  For you, the gamesmaster, a medium in your 
  party is an invaluable asset. Through their visions 
  you can plant warnings of forthcoming troubles 
  or hints on the direction of a campaign. When 
  the medium of the party has visions of death and 
  mass destruction, can the characters stop it? Or 
  will they cause it?
  If your campaign is going to revolve around the 
  ‘eternal struggle’  then the medium of a party 
  is likely their prime source of adventures. The 
  modern TV show ‘Angel’ is a good example of 
  this where the lead characters depend upon the 
  visions of their oracle to show them where their 
  efforts in the good fight are best placed, and some 
  of the best stories in that series revolve around 
  the consequences of the misinterpretation of those 
  visions.
  The Planes & The Powers
  In Victoriana only a few of the infinite planes are 
  of direct interest to us. If, for simplicity, we take 
  the earthly plane as the centre of this section of 
  the cosmos, then the labyrinth is like the moon, 
  small, weak and trapped in the shadow of the 
  earthly world. The Heavens travel in a wider and 
  slower path. The power of heaven has long exert-
  ed a strong influence over the earth, and is only 
  threatened by the ascending movement of The 
  Pale as the inexorable movement of the planes 
  brings those realms of Entropy closer, to exert 
  their influence upon the earth once again. 
  Every few millennia these planes come into con-
  junction and the eternal struggle between entropy 
  and order manifests. The last conjunction led to 
  the fall of the Roman Empire, the subsequent 
  Dark Ages and the eventual dominance of Order 
  on the earthly plane. The next conjunction should 
  fall a little after the next millennium.
  As above, so below – a common religious theme, 
  
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  dictating that worldly affairs mirror those in 
  heaven and vice versa, and especially true in 
  Victoriana. 
  The Earthly Plane
  The earthly plane is home to the mortal races, and 
  the setting for Victoriana. The earth is a buffer 
  zone between the higher powers (the heavens and 
  the pale) and in the build up to each conjunction 
  the world becomes a battleground for the higher 
  powers as they attempt to gain dominance for the 
  next millennium.
  The earthly plane does have its own voice, and 
  it stands for harmony through The Goddess and 
  various godheads of the pagan faiths. Few still 
  listen to the Earth Mother though, the doctrines 
  of order have muted her power and persecuted 
  her followers over the centuries, and now she 
  can offer little resistance to the coming struggle. 
  However, there are a few who hear natures call 
  and turn away from the insanity of unfettered 
  order or entropy, in tribal cultures these are the 
  shamans, the wise and the touched, in Europe 
  these pagans must live secret lives in order to 
  hide from persecution.
  The Labyrinth
  The Labyrinth is a weak plane, and the earthly 
  plane heavily influences it. Its inhabitants the 
  Imps are creatures of entropy, (although they do 
  not have the intellect to realise it) and their world 
  reflects this – a bizarre and malicious ‘won-
  derland’ of twisted cities and immense mazes 
  where reality is frequently mutable. Life in the 
  labyrinth might be likened to living in a cartoon, 
  where anything might happen and ‘curiouser and 
  curiouser’ improbabilities are routine.
  There is no known resident ‘power’ in the laby-
  rinth, the Imps worship the creatures of the pale 
  with a casual ignorance, and are as much the 
  unwitting pawns of the powers as the denizens of 
  earth, if not more so.
  Travel to the labyrinth is possible, and there are 
  even places where the ‘wall between the worlds’ 
  is so thin that such travel might even be made 
  without the aid of magic.
  
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  The Heavens
  The heavens are the throne of order. They reflect 
  the Aluminat faith of earth (their gift). Once they 
  stood for harmony and order, but as the millennia 
  have passed the halls of order have tarnished with 
  age, and as the faith of humanity has waned into 
  hollow excuses, so the Doctrines of Order have 
  evolved into heartless Dogma.
  Dogma states that the place of the host of heaven 
  is in heaven – not on earth , and that Entropy and 
  magic must be eliminated from the universe – all 
  must accept the hierarchy of heaven, there can be 
  no exceptions, no mercy, no individuality, no free 
  will – only order. Dogma has turned the bright 
  palaces of order into bleak desolate wastelands, 
  populated by soulless machines. 
  However, there are still some small planes of order 
  that have not been corrupted by dogma, and whose 
  denizens still believe in harmonious Order, these 
  heretics are careful lest they fall as their predeces-
  sors (the Eloim, see the monsters section) did.
  The Pale
  The collection of Planes referred to as ‘the pale’ 
  are worlds of chaos and entropy, insane landscapes 
  of perpetual and impossible change.  The forces 
  of entropy have many faces and (thankfully) fight 
  each other as much as they struggle against the 
  doctrines and dogma of order. 
  Currently the ‘Lady’ Paline is the dominant lord of 
  the court, and she alone appears to have plans for 
  the coming struggle with the forces of order. 
  The lady and her followers are ravagers and 
  devourers, they hunger for access to earth, to 
  enslave it, change it to their whims and finally 
  devour it. The forces of entropy have little use for 
  harmony, they seek power and amusement, and 
  so they are always searching for those mediums 
  and mages that might hear them, to tempt them to 
  unlock the doors that keep the hoard at bay…
  
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  THE BIG FIGHT!
  Gm: you have arrived at the docks; you can see 
  the evil Dr Robbards loading crates onto a boat 
  with his two loyal henchmen. What do you do?
  PC1: I duck into cover, draw out my sharps car-
  bine, and spend the next three actions aiming at 
  Robbards.
  Gm: right, ok, with the darkness that’s a –4 to hit, 
  no mods for range, and +3 for aiming. You need 
  an 18 to hit him.
  PC1: (rolls dice) right, I’ve hit him! (pause 
  for brief jubilation). Damage is 5d. (rolls a 6, 
  5,4,6,1,3,6 and a 4, for a total of 35) right, I’ll use 
  a luck point to re roll the 1 (re rolls, gets a 5 for a 
  total of 42). 
  Gm: right….. , Robbard’s fortitude is 4, he gets 4 
  for his overcoat, and thus takes 34 damage to his 
  health, he is utterly smegged and his boys run off. 
  To experienced gamesmasters, this is probably a 
  familiar sight. You’ve created a brilliant villain, 
  introduced him into the campaign and then some 
  lucky PC kills him with one shot from a top bit of 
  kit. If such villains are going to die, it should be 
  in a cinematic way, preferably over several rounds 
  of combat. Or, even better, should get away like 
  Moriarty, to become the PC’s nemesis.
  To get around this, you could try introducing a 
  cinematic feel to the plot. In the above example, 
  describe the surroundings. Describe the weather 
  (especially important if it is raining – imagine 
  how slick cobblestones are when wet…..). As 
  London is a relatively ordered place, skulduggery 
  should take place at night, in the rookeries, in 
  abandoned warehouses and docks, at remote loca-
  tions etc. London is also covered periodically in 
  smog, which is so thick that one cannot see more 
  than a few feet in front. Rain is also very common 
  in England. Add barrels, crates and barrels of oil, 
  which could be easily ignited, to the dockyards of 
  the above example. Place these at different loca-
  tions in your mind, so that the PC’s and NPCs 
  both can hide behind them.  These can be used 
  both as obstacles and for cover, so they are both 
  hindrance and beneficial to PC’s. This will keep 
  combat modifiers high, and will waste ammuni-
  tion like no-one’s business. Also, swashbuckling 
  PC’s may wish to use these as weapons or for 
  diversionary tactics. Rooftop chases are always 
  good, as you automatically need to multi task 
  (running and keeping your footing is two actions 
  in itself … imagine what would happen if you had 
  to fight as well?). 
  The next stage is to work on your major villain. 
  Like the boss character at the end of a computer 
  game, he should be tougher than each individual 
  PC, thus allowing a party to overcome him. It’s 
  always a good idea to give him a good body, so 
  that he won’t die. You can also give him luck as 
  well, so that you can always fudge the dice rolls.
  The second thing to look at is the enemy’s equip-
  ment. Any weapons he has should be sufficient to 
  penetrate PC armour (they do like to layer it on 
  after all), but not powerful enough to kill them 
  outright (this will make you very unpopular and 
  no-one will want to play with you). He should 
  also be armoured (intelligent cads always have 
  some form of protection). You could possibly cre-
  ate magical talismans and spells to protect him.
  Thirdly, look at your PC’s weapons. Why exactly 
  is he wandering around a lawful place like 
  London with a loaded rifle (honestly officer, it’s 
  for my own defence). It’s okay if he is lucky 
  enough to own a carriage, but this isn’t the wild 
  west, despite the violence prevalent in London. 
  Pistols have the advantage in that they are easily 
  hidden, and thus carried safely. 
  Finally, you will never find anyone more tena-
  cious than your players, so if you want your vil-
  lain to live you should have a ready supply of 
  deus et machina just in case. A watchman who 
  stumbles upon the PC’s, police arriving, rivals 
  who are also trying to wipe out the villain or just 
  good old random encounters can enable your vil-
  lain to escape; but be wary of pulling these stunts 
  too often, or your players will become disheart-
  ened. 
  Following are some big fight sets ready for you 
  to use, along with complications, atmospheric 
  details, and deus et machina.
  
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  The rooftop chase
  This scene takes place up on the rooftops among 
  the howling wind and rain. Buffeted by the ele-
  ments the characters must pursue (or flee from) 
  the villains. With the bustle of the streets 4 or 5 
  storeys down, the only way out is to leap onto 
  the next building until you have gained sufficient 
  distance to be able to shin down a drain without 
  being easy pickings.
  Props & cover
  There is little in the way of loose props up on the 
  roofs, but there is cover. Many buildings, almost 
  all in poor or old areas, have peaked roofs which 
  can be used as cover from an assailant firing 
  from the other side of another building, also all 
  buildings have several chimneys, which continu-
  ally belch out smoke, which can further obscure 
  vision. Billboards are a common furnishing in 
  commercial areas, as are stone ornaments such as 
  gargoyles and other ornate masonry. All of these 
  furnishings can come in a variety of sizes and 
  could easily provide ﬂ cover for a human sized 
  combatant.
  Common modifiers
  Fighting and moving up on the roofs is a perpet-
  ual balancing act – did we mention that the street 
  was 4 or 5 storeys below? Typical modifiers will 
  come from the weather and visibility ranging 
  from –2 for light rain or fog up to –6 for a foggy 
  night, or heavy rainstorm.
  Often footing will be uneven, after all roofs are 
  covered in slate tiles and frequently sloped at a 
  steep angle, a –2 ‘uneven ground’ penalty is rea-
  sonable.
  Complications
  Whenever moving up on the rooftops call for 
  dexterity+athletics or acrobatics (10) rolls, fail-
  ure causes a loss of footing, and a possible fall. 
  Also many buildings have attic rooms, which 
  may have skylight windows which PCs and vil-
  lains alike might fall into. By far the biggest com-
  plication of a rooftop chase is leaping from roof 
  to roof. Buildings in London are cramped togeth-
  er, and when not terraced there is often as little as 
  8 feet between roofs. Even so, leaping between 
  roofs is another dexterity+athletics or acrobatics 
  
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  275
  roll with a difficulty equal to 8 plus the distance 
  in feet, typically 16. Failure (naturally) results in 
  a fall.
  If a PC or villain does fall, then they will take 
  falling damage equal to 2d6 per storey fallen. A 
  simple fall into an attic room is also a minimum 
  of 2d6. Luck+acrobatics (14) might reduce the 
  damage by half due to landing on a passing cart 
  or omnibus, or falling onto a outbuilding rather 
  than plummeting straight to street level. A special 
  success in such an endeavour should indicate that 
  the character has in fact grabbed a precarious 
  hold on a gutter, sign or flagpole. However, a foul 
  failure would indicate an unusually unpleasant 
  descent into a greenhouse for further damage, or 
  perhaps a cesspit for humiliation.
  All out dodges
  A character attempting an ‘all out dodge’ or ‘dive 
  for cover’ while up on the roofs should imme-
  diately check for a fall at difficulty 14. All out 
  dodges might include hurling slates or chimney 
  pots at the enemy, pushing the 
  supports 
  out from under a bill-
  board, or simply vaulting onto the other side of a 
  sloped roof. 
  Deus et machina
  It might seem strained to suddenly have the 
  police turn up on the roofs, but then – running 
  battles across the attics and gables are most defi-
  nitely not the activities of normal or law abiding 
  citizens, and a loud ruckus will most certainly 
  attract attention, quickly amassing a crowd of 
  whistle blowing and rattle waving police trailing 
  the movement of the battle up above.
  The most effective  ‘escape loop hole’ for a vil-
  lain from the roofs is the well timed cart or omni-
  bus passing by below, with one leap the villain is 
  speeding away from the players and waving bon 
  voyage, leaving the PCs watching in disbelief.
  
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  The kitchens
  This fight set is a busy kitchen. It could be in a 
  stately home, or a restaurant – but the key factors 
  shared are food, ovens, pans, and a full support-
  ing cast of kitchen staff who were busy preparing 
  the next meal – until you burst in.
  Props & cover
  Plenty of both in the kitchen! Kitchen knives 
  count as daggers, pots and pans count as frying 
  pans (naturally), bottles, and stew pots (filled 
  with boiling stew would do 1/2 fire damage) 
  all could be improvised weapons, and let us not 
  forget the comedy potential of large trifles and 
  pies being thrown at enemies, or having your life 
  saved by a deft parry with a prime Lincolnshire 
  sausage. Kitchen counters, work surfaces, could 
  provide cover while gnomes and Halflings may 
  even try to avoid pursuit by climbing into cup-
  boards. 
  Common modifiers
  Likely to be jostled by kitchen staff (-4 to all 
  activities) unless PC’s are callous enough to start 
  blazing away at innocent bystanders. Villains 
  naturally are inclined to do this. Being generally 
  hives of activity, ‘sudden distractions’ are also 
  common
  Complication
  Moving through the kitchens at anything but a 
  walk is likely to knock over boiling hot pans etc. 
  dexterity+athletics (14). Failure will result in 2d6 
  burn damage.  Remember, the kitchen is the place 
  where you are most likely to have an accident 
  anywhere!
  Lesser complications can include precariously 
  
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  balanced carving knives intellect+perception (12) 
  to notice, Dexterity+Dodge (14) to avoid and 1d6 
  damage for a failed roll. Grease on the floor is 
  another common hazard (remember, this is before 
  food hygiene laws!) Intellect+perception (15) to 
  notice, and dexterity+athletics (17) not to fall flat 
  on one’s backside for 1d6 damage. Finally the 
  classic kitchen blunder (best saved for foul fail-
  ures) must be putting your hand on (or sitting on) 
  a hot stove for 1 or 2d6 burn damage.
  All out dodges
  Now this is fun in kitchens! You can be fling-
  ing chicken carcasses, pots, pans, meat cleavers, 
  trifles …. You name it, if it’s to do with food, 
  you can throw it! You may deliberately fling 
  over boiling pans of water, open cupboards, even 
  throw down work surfaces not attached to walls. 
  Deus et machina
  The chef is one. This is his kitchen, and there’s 
  always a chance he will turn around and get 
  violent at all parties with a meat cleaver. If in 
  a restaurant, there may be various patrons who 
  might investigate what’s going on. Off duty 
  policemen, or ‘have a go’ heroes are most likely.  
  If a fashionable restaurant or hotel, the police will 
  be called immediately. If in the slums, there is a 
  chance that this place is run by a gangland style 
  villain who will not be impressed by outsiders 
  smashing up his kitchen
  Also, don’t forget that kitchens are generally not 
  dead ends, so PC’s and villains both can escape 
  through the back door into the courtyard or alley-
  way.
  
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  The ‘pea souper’
  This is what gave London its nickname “the 
  smoke”. Caused by the large number of coal 
  burning industries, railways and even open coal 
  fires, this early form of pollution could descend 
  upon London without warning. People actually 
  died during such occurrences, due to the semi 
  toxic nature of the descending fog. Can be intro-
  duced by the gamesmaster at will if so wished.
  Props & cover
  Such a setting is always outdoors, so props will 
  depend upon the original setting (rooftop, rook-
  ery, docks etc.) But often whatever cover and 
  props there are will be a hindrance due to the 
  poor visibility (I didn’t see that barrel). Cover is 
  provided by the choking fog itself, adding +4 to 
  any hide & sneak rolls
  Common modifiers
  -4 to all ranged attacks and perception rolls, in 
  addition to all other penalties.
  Complications
  The smog itself. First, if you are not a resi-
  dent of the locale, you will have to make an 
  intellect+perception  (20) just to figure out how 
  to move around the place. Failure indicates get-
  ting lost, or just simply standing still out of frus-
  tration. This difficulty number might be reduced 
  to 12 for locals and those with the night vision 
  talent.  Secondly, smog is fog mixed with acrid 
  fumes: all people outside must make a body 
  check (12) each round to not be overcome with a 
  coughing fit. Failure by more than 5 indicates d6 
  stun damage from smoke inhalation. 
  All out dodges
  Simply involve disappearing into the fog. Before 
  your opponent can even try to attack you, he must 
  make an intellect+ perception roll, target number 
  being your dodge roll (modified by the –4 per-
  ception for smog!)
  Deus et machina
  Could be good Samaritans who hear your cough-
  ing fit, and let you into their house. Police would 
  have to be very lucky to stumble onto the PC’s 
  action (so don’t use it too often!) In some ways, 
  it could be argued that the pea souper is a deus 
  et machina in it’s own right, as it can be used by 
  gamesmaster’s to aid or hinder the PC’s.
  
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  The old mill
  The old mill is a rural work centre, ceaselessly 
  converting grain into flour. Its huge mill stones 
  powered by the wind via its huge sails, or pos-
  sibly it might be powered by a water treadmill 
  constantly turned by the flow of a river. The inte-
  rior of the mill is dark and dusty, a mass of slow, 
  ponderous yet unstoppable moving stone.
  Props & cover
  Machinery and shadow are the most likely cover, 
  also include carts, barrels and bags of flour as 
  props along with grain sieves, hay and straw. Due 
  to the size of the stones, most mills are several 
  storeys tall, and open plan inside with a series of 
  ladders and rickety walkways for the inspection 
  of the machinery. Possibly the most significant 
  prop in the mill is the sails or treadmill which 
  powers the mill wheels. Characters might attempt 
  to escape onto and then pursue each other around 
  sails with multiple action and climb rolls, while 
  being pulled under the tireless thrashing of a 
  water treadmill must mean certain doom…
  Common modifiers
  The mill is dark and dusty. Visibility starts off 
  poor, and a rush of activity could send up a thick 
  dust cloud of –6.
  Complications
  The mill stones are the biggest complication 
  in the old mill. A character or villain unlucky 
  enough to get their clothes caught in the mill’s 
  wheels is faced with a slow and inexorable death 
  by crushing if they cannot remove the clothing 
  caught with a dexterity or luck roll (12). Those 
  unlucky enough to be caught in the millwheels 
  will take 1d6 damage in the first round, 2d6 in 
  the second, 3 in the third and so on until the mill 
  wheels are stopped or they are dead.
  All out dodges
  All out dodges in the mill might involve the 
  throwing of flour sacks, dodging around the 
  wheels, leaping up and around ladders and walk-
  ways and swinging from pulley ropes.  
  Deus et machina
  An enterprising villain might make his way up 
  the mill and then climb down the sails onto a 
  waiting horse, or might swing down a pulley rope 
  and lock the characters in the mill, gaining just 
  enough time to effect his escape. 
  
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  The bar room
  The streets of central and east London are littered 
  with these establishments where the lower classes 
  go to drink and unwind after a long day. In some 
  the drink and the local working girls are the only 
  entertainment, but in just as many there is an 
  entertaining side line of some sort. These enter-
  tainments might range from the bards and bawds 
  of a ‘penny gaff’ to back room gambling over 
  dog and rat fights, or even prize fights between 
  bare knuckle boxers. 
  Props & cover
  A plethora of props and cover exist in a bar. 
  Spittoons, tankards, bottles, broken chair legs, 
  plates, tongs and pokers count as small clubs. 
  Heating up a poker or tongs takes d6 rounds, 
  but does an additional d6 fire damage. Glasses 
  and bottles break upon a successful hit or parry. 
  Spittoons also break, and deposit their contents 
  on the person (if on the head, opponent must 
  make a resolution (14) roll not to start retching). 
  Tables and stew pots count as large clubs, with 
  boiling stew doing an additional 2d6 damage. 
  Cover includes pianos, tables and the bar itself. 
  PC’s can jump onto the bar or tables, giving 
  them +4 to hit due to advantageous position, with 
  opponents suffering a –4 penalty.  If they take 
  damage, they must make a body test, target num-
  ber being damage sustained in that round, not to 
  get knocked off, suffering d6 falling damage.
  A favourite will be swinging upon the chan-
  deliers. This can either be an all out dodge or 
  part of an attack. Dexterity+athletics (20) or 
  dexterity+acrobatics (16) is required to jump 
  on, followed by another roll every round to stay 
  there. Attacks are made at +4 (cancelling out the 
  
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  multi action penalty), with attacks being made at 
  –4 against the person. Failed athletics rolls result 
  in 2d6 falling damage
  Common modifiers
  –2 modifier due to excessive tobacco smoke 
  would be common, also tight conditions, and dis-
  tractions. 
  Complications
  Other people. There’s always a chance that with 
  pint glasses being thrown and people being 
  knocked back into third parties that others get 
  involved, either against the perpetrator or just for 
  the hell of it. Roll 1d6 every round. On a roll of 
  1, another person is involved in the fight! Tavern 
  brawls can quickly get out of hand, due to the 
  large amount of people present fuelled by alco-
  hol. 
  All out dodges
  Any prop can be thrown about to evade pursuit. 
  This is likely to get others involve, as the projec-
  tiles are not aimed (1-3 roll on a d6). Of course, 
  the PC has already made his dodge roll, so for 
  that round he is covered! Target number is the 
  standard 14.
  Deus et machina
  The landlord himself may have a large club or 
  (in extremis) a shotgun or blunderbuss behind 
  the bar, and be none too impressed, thank you, 
  for his tavern being trashed. The police are likely 
  to arrive at some point, although they are just as 
  likely to wait it out and arrest those who cannot 
  move. If by the docks, you could even introduce 
  press gangs, leading to a possible naval adven-
  ture. 
  
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  The rookery warrens
  Every city of Europe has its oldest quarters. In 
  London these warrens of old lanes are so dense 
  that even at midday the streets are in perpetual 
  shadow. These old slums are known as rooker-
  ies, and act as home and shelter for criminals, 
  the poor, the dispossessed, and quite probably 
  your PCs. Law and order does not trespass into 
  the rookeries, preferring to keep the violence and 
  problems of the slums out of sight and out of 
  mind.
  Props & cover
  Dark alleyways spring to mind as excellent sourc-
  es of cover (+4 to hide and sneak, -2 for oppo-
  nents shooting). Piles of refuse provide limited 
  cover (-1), as do items such as carts, piles of rub-
  bish etc (-4). There are also washing lines full of 
  clothes (partial cover –2), outhouses (full cover) 
  and coalhouses (full cover). 
  Props could include dead dogs, old battered parts 
  of carts (e.g. wheels), bits of two by four, loose 
  cobblestones, housewives brooms, or even the 
  sewage from the open ‘slops channels’ which line 
  many of the streets.
  Common modifiers
  Unless a native of the rookery, all characters must 
  make an intellect+streetwise (20) roll to navigate 
  the complex lanes and alleys. If involved in a 
  chase this can become a major complication as, 
  failure indicates that you have blundered down a 
  dead end, or are otherwise lost. 
  Complications
  The rookeries are closed communities in many 
  respects, and outsiders will stick out like a sore 
  thumb, and are unlikely to receive aid from locals 
  (especially if upper or middle class). Possible 
  complications include mud or faeces on cracked 
  cobblestones dexterity+athletics (14) not to slip 
  over, taking d6 damage and –4 to fashion rolls 
  until cleaned up. 
  
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  All out dodges
  Could involve running through houses (provoking 
  the ire of the occupants), dashing among washing 
  lines, or flinging refuse at the enemy. 
  Deus et machina
  The police are unlikely to come to the rookeries in 
  anything less than platoon strength, and are likely 
  to beat up and arrest any lower class character 
  (middle and upper class characters will almost 
  certainly be protected by the bobbies). Gangs can 
  also come out to get rid of the interlopers, whilst 
  salvation may be in the form of a local priest or 
  missionary offering a safe place to hide. Locals 
  may help lower class characters (especially if 
  opponents are upper class), whilst more well to do 
  characters may be mugged by footpads or high-
  waymen (especially if they are on their own and 
  failed their streetwise roll). Finally, a local gang 
  boss or revolutionaries may help the characters 
  out, but then they owe them a favour (possibly 
  leading in to a new adventure)
  The docks
  By day London is the busiest port in the world. 
  By night the docks are just as busy, populated 
  by the drunken sailors heading off with harlots, 
  or heading back to their ship. The scattered river 
  police wage a constant war with smugglers and 
  river pirates, while mudlarks sweep the quays 
  looking for anything that can be carried off.
  Props & cover
  The corners of warehouses, coils of rope, barrels, 
  crates and walls make good cover under most cir-
  cumstances. 
  Props could include winches which can be flung 
  as improvised weapons (damage as small club), 
  oars (improvised, large club), barrels of oil (could 
  be ignited, doing half the damage of barrel of 
  gunpowder), belaying pins (small club, impro-
  vised).  Barrels or crates could be used as missiles 
  (body+athletics roll to pick up, thrown as impro-
  vised weapon, opponent takes 6d6 stun damage 
  and knockdown). 
  When using barrels and crates, the contents are 
  always of vital importance. Imagine your PCs 
  dismay to find that their cover is actually a huge 
  pile of flammable lamp oil – just as the enemy 
  opens fire. Broken barrels of fish or crates of ball 
  bearings would make the footing treacherous, 
  requiring dexterity+athletics (14) rolls to remain 
  standing; quicklime barrels are especially nasty 
  when broken, as every combatant needs to make 
  an initiative (14) roll or be blinded for 2d6 rounds 
  by the caustic powder. Barrels of nails could be 
  used like caltrops, or in combination with explo-
  sives to create huge shrapnel bombs - use your 
  imagination, and apply some common sense rules. 
  Try to avoid using the same contents over and 
  over again. 
  Common modifiers
  If slippery, all participant must make 
  dexterity+athletics rolls to avoid falling over. If 
  on the waterfront, then a failure might mean fall-
  ing into the water. 
  Complications
  Possibley crates and barrels being punctured by 
  gunfire. If one is destroyed, the rest may come 
  tumbling down, requiring a Dexterity+Dodge (14) 
  roll to avoid being crushed by 6d6 stun damage. 
  Falling in the water will always require athletics 
  rolls to swim back to shore.
  All out dodges
  Could involve bobbing and weaving amongst the 
  props and cover like a demented dervish (oppo-
  nents must make an opposed perception roll 
  against your dodge to keep up with you). May 
  also involve toppling stacked crates, spilling their 
  contents as above. Also, one could leap into a 
  warehouse, or even jump onto a ship. 
  Deus et machina
  The night watchman is always a possibility 
  (maybe he is in league with your opponents, or 
  will just attack anyone). The police, both the river 
  patrol and metropolitan could turn up reasonably 
  quickly, as docks are sources of revenue, and 
  therefore sacrosanct. Smugglers uninvolved with 
  the squabble could turn up, and decide that all 
  sides are witnesses who should be wasted. Finally, 
  as in the tavern, there could be a press gang look-
  ing for shipmates on an unpopular voyage. 
  
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  The train
  If the cinema is to be believed (and who are we 
  to argue) any attempt to flee by train is doomed 
  to a chase and running battle up and down the 
  carriages. Most trains in Victoriana have a cab 
  open to the elements, followed by a coal cart and 
  then several passenger carriages and finally lug-
  gage or cargo cars. Passenger space is made up of 
  compartments joined by a single narrow corridor 
  along one side of the carriage, the space between 
  carriages is open to the elements.
  Props & cover
  If fighting or chasing down the aisles, there is no 
  cover (except other passengers) unless combat-
  ants duck into the compartments (although this 
  can leave you trapped, possibly with someone 
  who don’t like your impudence, and with only the 
  window for an exit). If in compartments or lug-
  gage cars then the valises and baggage of other 
  passengers is often useful, they can be flung, or 
  even arranged into a make shift barricade. You 
  could determine that there are other items (golf 
  clubs, fishing rods, perhaps even guns) in the 
  baggage.
  Common modifiers
  The suspension on trains is still a developing 
  technology, and all train activity suffers a ‘uneven 
  footing’ modifier, if the action is taking place on 
  the roof of the train or between carriages, then the 
  howling wind from the trains passage  causes an 
  additional -4 modifier, you should also consider 
  the steam from the engine trailing back over the 
  roof.
  Complications
  If on the roof of the train multiple actions are 
  the order of the day, every round requires a 
  dexterity+athletics (14) in order to be able to do 
  anything other than cling to the roof. Foul failure 
  indicates a fall, causing at least 10d6 lethal dam-
  age! Success allows further actions to be taken as 
  normal, with the modifiers discussed.
  Also, there will be hazards such as bridges, 
  requiring intellect+perception (10) to notice, and 
  a Dexterity+Dodge (14) to duck or be swept off 
  the train by 10d6 lethal damage worth of bridge.
  Inside the train, complications include other pas-
  sengers and the possibility that the train will sud-
  denly stop (particularly if there’s firing involved). 
  
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  If this happens all standing characters have to 
  make athletics rolls to remain standing. 
  All out dodges
  In the car they may involve leaping over other 
  passenger’s seats (causing similar reactions as 
  described in tavern brawl), or flinging valises and 
  bags, scattering their contents in the way, and 
  also annoying their owners. 
  On the roof, this is more likely to involve athlet-
  ics, as you leap from car to car, or swing back 
  down to the compartments. Such checks will also 
  be on athletics.
  Deus et machina
  Could be the conductor or engineer (who may 
  be armed), or railway detectives (especially in 
  America or Australia). Mounted yeomanry in the 
  countryside are also a possibility, or have a go 
  hero passengers. Perhaps the villain detaches a 
  car, or leaps from the train while it passes a lake 
  or river – how stupid would you have to be to 
  follow?
  Creating your own fight sets
  Obstacles
  These serve a useful purpose for gamesmasters 
  and players alike. Corners of buildings, large 
  strategically placed crates and alleyways are 
  excellent firing points (probably worth about a 
  –4 modifier to hit, but it is up to a gamesmaster’s 
  discretion.) Actions in a round might include fir-
  ing followed by dodging behind an obstacle (suc-
  cessful dodge needed, if failed, player takes full 
  damage). 
  Vision
  Being able to see an opponent is the prerequisite 
  for actually shooting him. Because London is 
  violent but not lawless, shadier deals will almost 
  certainly take place at night (-4 modifier to hit). 
  Carrying a lantern may not help, as the carrier 
  is just as likely to highlight himself as he is the 
  enemy! 
  Weather will probably have an effect on vision 
  as well. You may be lucky, and have a beauti-
  fully clear day (or most likely night), but London 
  is known for it’s smog (caused by coal burning 
  fires, factories and steam trains). People actually 
  died when smog descended upon London, due to 
  the carcinogens in the atmosphere. 
  Smoke will also have an effect on vision. 
  Smokeless powder is still a long way off in 
  Victoriana, so if a lot of guns go off in a crowded 
  room (or even the open!) Then vision will also 
  be obscured accordingly. Imposed modifiers are 
  likely to be between –2 (open), -4 (in a venti-
  lated building) or up to –8 in an enclosed space. 
  A good rule of thumb is to roll 1d6 at the end 
  of each round; if the number is equal to or less 
  than the continual number of rounds where gun-
  powder weapons have been fired, then the area is 
  obscured by smoke.
  Other props
  There are many household and regular items that 
  can be used to good effect by gamesmasters and 
  players alike. Classics include chandeliers (athlet-
  ics roll (20) to jump onto, (14) to maintain hold), 
  ropes (athletics (14) to climb, (10) to swing), and 
  tables (athletics (12) to jump onto, gives oppo-
  nents –2 to hit in hand to hand with a +2 bonus to 
  player due to greater height). 
  Tavern brawls are especially good for this style of 
  swashbuckling play. There are many wonderful 
  items just begging to be used in a comedy fash-
  ion, such as bottles and tankards (count as small 
  clubs; are likely to break, and can help obscure 
  vision), spittoons (in addition to small club dam-
  age, target must make body test or be incapaci-
  tated through retching), and fire implements, like 
  red hot coals and pokers (will add burn damage 
  to rolled damage). Also, there is the chance that 
  furnishing (especially curtains) will catch fire, 
  adding further to the confusion. Bars can be used 
  to great effect, as players can jump on them, get 
  thrown along or over them, or use them as cover. 
  Don’t forget to add effects such as smashing 
  liquor bottles (and the possibility of fire?) To the 
  general mayhem. 
  Other general items can make life interesting. 
  Crates of fish or marbles strewn upon a dock or 
  paved surface can make footing treacherous (see 
  effects of wet cobblestones above). Barrels of oil 
  can always explode (doing half the damage of a 
  barrel of dynamite, and covering escapes or light-
  ing an area nicely).  Gunfights through locations 
  
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  such as paint factories or canning stores can also 
  make life interesting (misses may indicate cans 
  scattering, paint vats being punctured, covering 
  everyone in paint, and leaving a nice trail for 
  pursuers to follow…). The important thing for a 
  gamesmaster to do is to think carefully about his 
  location, decide what hazards and benefices are 
  available, and use his imagination accordingly. 
  Bystanders, Deus et machina, and the forces of law and 
  order.
  As stated previously, London is a lawful place 
  (except in the slums), so therefore huge apoca-
  lyptic battles fought with the noisy (and smelly) 
  firearms of the period and great Thaumaturgical 
  displays are likely to attract attention. If there 
  are civilians in the area they will most likely run 
  (getting in the way of players), freeze (effectively 
  becoming obstacles) or dive for cover. Some are 
  likely to call the police. When the police arrive 
  is up to you (depending upon when you want 
  them to). Be realistic, as the police do not have 
  patrol cars! Some more choleric bystanders may 
  attempt to tackle the PC’s or opponents (up to 
  you: respectable, English looking PC’s are likely 
  to be aided, especially in higher class areas: 
  disreputable PC’s are likely to be hindered, espe-
  cially if they are obviously foreign). Bystanders 
  are unlikely to have heavy arms, but may have 
  clubs (canes or improvised weapons), pistols, and 
  knives or possibly even long arms if near to their 
  residence. 
  Deus et machina are excellent gamesmaster tools. 
  As well as the police, they could include inquisi-
  tive night watch men, local gossips seeing what’s 
  up (if no obvious firepower is shown), beggars, 
  itinerants, naval press gangs, curious children or 
  just nosy people. They could also include allies or 
  enemies of the PC’s opponents. 
  The London police are not in the main armed in 
  theory. In practice, they may be carrying non-
  regulation kit such as metal truncheons covered 
  in leather, knuckle-dusters, knives and even pis-
  tols (especially easily concealed pistols). If the 
  PC’s are obviously respectable, they may be able 
  to bluff their way out, or failing that, bribery is 
  likely. This also applies to respectable villains.  If 
  not, they may get beaten up, have evidence plant-
  ed on them, and framed for crimes they did not 
  commit. This can lead to a sub-adventure of get-
  ting out of jail, or being deported to Australia…
  
  287
  287
  A WHITE WEDDING
  An Introductory Penny Dreadful
  This scenario revolves around a common 
  enough social institution - marriage, but as 
  can perhaps be expected in Victoriana, this 
  wedding isn’t a happy story about blushing 
  brides and confetti. This story is about an 
  arranged marriage from hell. Depending on 
  the style of game you are running this can be 
  a light hearted farce, or a gruelling story of 
  freedom from personal oppression.
  The story can evolve in several ways, depend-
  ing on the make up of your adventuring party.
   
  If your party contains a upper or 
  middle class single male, then (little 
  may he know it) he may be about to 
  get married to a woman called Levinia 
  Dempsey. Through the rest of this 
  adventure write up this character will 
  be referred to as ‘the stooge’.
   
  If your party is totally lower class, or 
  if all the characters are female, then 
  none of them are likely to get married 
  off to Levinia, but nonetheless they end 
  up  assisting Levinia escape her social 
  ‘duty’. Encouraging the party to do so 
  may be more or less difficult depend-
  ing on their nature - rebels and kind 
  hearted souls might help Levinia out 
  of kindness, colder characters might 
  want rewards of a more material nature, 
  which Levinia can also provide - at 
  first.
  The Sequence of Events
  Firstly the characters are introduced to 
  Levinia at a party or some other social func-
  tion, they talk and (hopefully!) hit it off. 
  During the course of the evening Levinia 
  gives them a low down on several other soci-
  ety figures and generally endears herself to 
  the characters.
  Unbeknownst to the party, their stooge has 
  now been ear marked for a society wedding. 
  If the party contains no stooge then Levinia 
  invites them to her family home in the city to 
  continue their discussions and develop their 
  new friendship.
  A couple of days later, the stooge recevies an 
  invitation from Levinia’s father to come and 
  discuss some pressing business. If the stooge 
  turns up Levinia’s father immediately presses 
  for a marriage between the stooge and his 
  daughter.
  If the party has no stooge then the characters 
  receive an invtation from Levinia herself to 
  visit her, and while they are present the father 
  introduces Levinia to a new husband to be - a 
  meeting which does not go well.
  At this point the adventure turns in one of two 
  different directions. 
  Option A
  If the stooge has gone along with the mar-
  riage plan, he may be disappointed to hear 
  that Levinia refuses the arrangement. If the 
  stooge accepts this and steps down then he 
  has lost his ‘stooge status’ and Levinia’s 
  father finds another husband for her, one 
  more inclined to tame her - your story can 
  now follow path B. Of course, it is possible 
  that the stooge decides to press the marriage 
  - after all Levinia is beautiful, and there is a 
  huge dowry, but if this course is chosen, then 
  the stooge has earnt Levinia’s emnity and 
  she runs away. The characters or the family 
  will eventually find her, and if the stooge is 
  persistent they make it to the wedding where 
  Levinia reads her vows at gunpoint and the 
  stooge is free to consummate the marriage - 
  over Levinia’s dead body, naturally.
  Option B
  If however, the characters never had a stooge, 
  or if the stooge turned down the marriage 
  then Levinia now turns to them for help 
  escaping her impending marriage to the hus-
  band from hell and to start a new life. A goal 
  which carries more than a few complications.
  Let the story begin!
  
  288
  A Night at the Opera
  Kick the scenario off by introducing the charac-
  ters to a night at the theatre, opera, or a concert in 
  the park. If you have a mixed class or lower class 
  group point out how out of place lower class 
  characters might feel amongst the opulent sur-
  rounds, and surrounded by those of a higher sta-
  tion. The clothes worn by most attendees cost a 
  working man’s annual income or more, the clean, 
  groomed crowds are a different world to the bus-
  tling grimey streets outside.
  During the socialising before and after the theatre 
  introduce our target character to the beauti-
  ful Miss Levinia Dempsey. Miss Dempsey 
  makes a dramatic entrance, and is unes-
  corted (highly irregular). All heads turn as 
  she enters, but none move to invite her into 
  their group. During the social mixing before 
  the show, she talks with the characters, she 
  might actually take a fancy to the target 
  character, whatever her motive, she will no 
  doubt embarrass society bastions by her loud 
  declamation of capitalism and class distinc-
  tion, proclaiming the benefits of a socialist 
  commonwealth, free education and love. During 
  a conversation she drinks neat vodka and smokes 
  Sobraine cigarettes, both fashionable (and unpop-
  ular) activities. As she and the characters talk a 
  intellect+perception roll will make the character 
  aware that others are staring at him and that he 
  has become a focus of attention. If asked, Levinia 
  will explain “it is because you are talking to me, 
  the Bolshevik disgrace, the promiscuous whore 
  - that’s what they all call me behind my back 
  anyway.’ If a character tries to assure her that 
  no one could think such a thing, she replies ‘But 
  they do sir, they do. They have too little imagina-
  tion to think anything else.’ She then changes the 
  subject to question the character on some hidden 
  aspect of his life that she has deduced through her 
  medium senses.
  Once the evening is over, the characters should 
  feel they have a new friend in Levinia. She lav-
  ishes them with attention for the whole evening 
  - she is simply delighted to have found some 
  people who are actually interesting in comparison 
  to the never-ending procession of vacuos wall-
  flowers she is usually expected to socialise with, 
  and she makes sure she has a way of contacting 
  the characters in the future before they all part 
  company for the evening.
  If the party has a stooge  and you are using 
  Option B, then proceed to ‘Sir, about my 
  Daughter’, otherwise proceed to ‘New Friends’
  New Friends
  This part of the story takes place several days 
  after the characters initial meeting with Levinia.
  One or more of the characters that got on par-
  ticularly well with Levinia receive a message 
  carried by private messenger inviting them for 
  an afternoon tea at the Dempsey’s townhouse 
  in Belgravia (a pleasant west end district of 
  London). The invitation is in Levinia’s own hand-
  writing and she is obviously extremely enthusias-
  tic about once again meeting her new friends. 
  Penny Dreadful: A White Wedding
  
  289
  Penny Dreadful: A White Wedding
  STORY OPTION B: ENTER THE STOOGE
  This Story option provides an alternative way to play the adventure, where one of the characters 
  is set up as a the groom for Levinia. Unless your characters are as evil as Uriah (yikes) this story 
  option is much more light hearted and inclined to a farce or fairy tale atmosphere.
  Sir, about my daughter... 
  Hearing about Levinia’s contact with the char-
  acter, her father, Sir Robert Dempsey calls 
  upon the character at his home. He informs the 
  character that he has heard of a friendship with 
  his daughter and asks him, quite outright if he 
  will marry her for a dowry of £5000. A positive 
  response delights sir Robert, who leaves imme-
  diately to prepare for the wedding. A negative 
  response will send him flying into play acted 
  outrage at the characters harsh and ungentle-
  manly treatment of his daughter, after all she is 
  beautiful, royal Eldren blood flows in her veins, 
  his dowry and inheritance are first class, what 
  more could a man want! Sir Robert will attempt 
  to lure (and if that fails, intimidate) the charac-
  ter into the marital arrangement. Eventually Sir 
  Robert will decline if the stooge is persistant 
  in his refusal, but make the character sweat 
  before play can pick up and continue with ‘New 
  Friends’, and if the character accepts? Well it’s 
  time to prepare for...
  A white wedding
  A character who agrees to the wedding is not 
  allowed to see Levinia until the happy event. 
  This is because Levinia has been chained to 
  her bed to prevent her escape from her father’s 
  arrangements. The wedding is announced in 
  every London newspaper and the character 
  starts receiving telegrams of congratulation 
  from society figures he doesn’t even know, 
  including a wire from Sir Robert informing 
  the character of the wedding date, only a week 
  away.
  At the wedding Levinia makes a break for 
  freedom at the door, but is apprehended and 
  ushered into the chapel, upon seeing the social 
  gathering, Levinia ceases to struggle in the face 
  of such colossal social disgrace and the mar-
  riage is conducted.
  The honeymoon
  The happy couple have a splendid honeymoon 
  planned for them, if they both make it. If 
  Levinia does not like her husband then the train 
  journey to their honeymoon destination will be 
  fraught with escape attempts and loud argumen-
  tative assaults. Assuming that Levinia fails to 
  escape without murder being committed, she 
  will drink herself stupid and attempt to offend 
  everyone in the train buffet as a recompense.
  Once at the honeymoon location, the husband 
  might be eager to consummate the marriage and 
  start his succession. Such a chain of events will 
  only take place over Levinia’s dead body.
  Of course Levinia and the character might actu-
  ally get on, at least they might both be oddballs 
  of society and agree to lead separate lives, 
  maintaining their marriage to appease social 
  pressure.
  Happy Endings?
  The main things to come out of this scenario for 
  the characters are a change in social perspec-
  tive for some, and of course, Levinia Dempsey. 
  Levinia is undoubtedly a useful person to know, 
  if only for her medium skills, a party might also 
  value her knowldge of etiquette, and knowldge 
  of high society.
  Whether the characters’ final relationship with 
  Levinia is marital, intimate, cordial, amicable 
  or loyal is really upto the players and how they 
  act.
  
  290
  When the characters arrive at the Dempsey’s 
  Belgravia townhouse, they are greeted at the door 
  by Mr Timms, the Dempsey’s dour butler who 
  is expecting them and excorts them through a 
  hallway and dining room lined with valuable and 
  exquisite paintings to a parlour at the rear of the 
  building which faces onto a well stocked conser-
  vatory. Levinia is waiting for them here and after 
  greeting all in turn while Mr Timms lays out the 
  tea service and departs, she then insists on hear-
  ing every nuance of their lives  for the last few 
  days, interspersed with politics and fashion as 
  only Levinia can. Levinia makes it clear that she 
  envies the characters living as they please in the 
  real world while she languishes in a gilded cage, 
  a thought which obviously saddens her a great 
  deal and upon which she doesn’t dwell, prefering 
  instead to change the subject.
  However, as she does so the door to the parlor 
  opens and Mr Dempsey enters accompanied by 
  an older man who posseses a deathly pallor, cold 
  eyes and an arrogant sneer. 
  Enter the Groom
  Mr Dempsey casts his eye briefly over the assem-
  bled characters with some surprise (and perhaps 
  distaste if they are lower class ‘riff raff’). He 
  expresses his apologies for the intrusion, but he 
  was unaware that Levinia was entertaining, and 
  asks if they might excuse him for the intrusion, 
  but he needs to speak to his daughter in private.
  After a moments stunned silence (while characters 
  might already be getting up and leaving) Levinia 
  expresses her outrage at her father’s rudeness and 
  asks the characters if they wouldn’t mind view-
  ing the conservatory for a few minutes instead 
  (unconventional, but hey we want those nosey 
  characters to know whats going on, right?).
  Sighing, Mr Dempsey agrees, and waits while 
  Levina, apologising profusely, shows the chracters 
  into the adjoining conservatory before returning to 
  the parlour.
  Its possible that overly polite characters might 
  actually leave at Mr Dempsey’s bidding rather 
  than stay at Levinia’s request, in which case they 
  soon realise thats things aren’t right when Levinia 
  turns up on a party member’s doorstep in the fol-
  lowing section ‘among the people’.
  For those characters who do stay for the big 
  event, let them make intellect+perception and 
  dexterity+hide & sneak rolls to listen in or spy 
  into the parlour undetected. A reasonable difficut-
  ly would be 14, but you might want to be lenient 
  if they are truly hapless - after all they’re here for 
  the gossip right?
  Once they characters are in the conservatory and 
  (apparently) out of the way, Levina’s father intro-
  duces his companion, Uriah Clarence. A wealthy 
  stock broker with whom Levinia’s father has been 
  doing a lot of business, and who has asked for 
  Levinia’s hand in marriage. As Levinia looks on, 
  shell shocked, Mr Dempsey adds that he has con-
  sidered the proposal and accepted, the marriage 
  will be taking place next week and he suggests 
  that the two spend some time to get acquainted. 
  Levinia starts to say ‘How dare you’ but her father 
  curtly reminds her that she is a woman now, not 
  a girl, and as she has so successfully ostracised 
  herself from the rst of society she is lucky to 
  have found a groom at all - there are to be no 
  ifs, buts, or refusals. With that statement he nods 
  and smiles at the grim Mr Clarence and leaves 
  the room for Levinia and Mr Clarence to get 
  acquainted.
  Levinia slumps onto the divan, obviously still 
  shocked by the proceedings, Uriah hobbles over, 
  sits next to her and says ‘Quite a shock I’m sure, 
  but you’ll come to appreciate me..’ as he speaks 
  Uriah runs his hand across Levinia’s hair, an 
  action which snaps her out of her shocked stae. 
  Her lip curled in disgust she tries to slap Uriah 
  hard  across the face, but with an unatural speed 
  and strength Uriah grabs her hand in mid strike 
  and forces it behind her back. With this show 
  of power, Levinia’s medium senses allow her to 
  observe a deathly and unnatural aura surround-
  ing Uriah, although she doesn’t understand what 
  she has glimpsed, it terrifies her nonetheless. 
  Observant characters in the conservatory will 
  notice several of the plants by the palour notice-
  ably wilt at the same time. 
  Uriah, grinning evilly at his power over her, 
  mashes his withered lips against hers in a feral 
  kiss before releasing her with the promise ’I shall 
  Penny Dreadful: A White Wedding
  
  291
  enjoy taming you Levinia, and tame you I shall.’ 
  Uriah stands and leaves pausing only to nod fare-
  well ‘Until our wedding night, my love’ he adds 
  tauntingly as he leaves.
  Naturally some characters may intervene as the 
  scene turns ugly, and if they do so Uriah’s clinche 
  is cut short, and he departs peacefully, offering 
  his parting comments as he goes - he certainly 
  has no intention of fighting the characters in the 
  Dempsey household, and if characters are daft 
  enough to engage in an all out brawl, then the ser-
  vants rush in led by the butler, to break it up and 
  cast the characters out onto the street.
  For those characters who remain discreet spys 
  while Uriah is present, once he has left, they 
  are free to attend to the shocked and distressed 
  Levinia, who tearfully relates the disgusting 
  deathly aura she saw around Uriah. Characters 
  with the thaumaturgy skill, or occult lore can roll 
  intellect+skill (22) to suspect that the aura might 
  be indicative of necromantic magic. Thats a high 
  target number, but necromancy is beleived to be a 
  dead and long forgotten art, characters won’t have 
  seen anything like it first hand before.
  In Levinia’s mind the path is clear - she cannot 
  marry Uriah, she would rather die. If her father is 
  to insist on being so blind, then she will run away.
  Her bright eyes reddened with tears she turns to 
  the characters, ‘Help me, please?’
  Escape Plans
  In the last couple of sections the characters have 
  primarily been observers, now they can spring 
  into action and hatch the kind of ludicrous, hare 
  brained scheme that only players can hatch - so 
  let them!
  Levinia is sensible to realise that ,as much as she 
  might want to, she cannot simply run out into the 
  street and run away right now. She needs to gather 
  some modest possessions first, but will yeild to 
  characters advice on the nature of the breakout. 
  Make no mistake this is a breakout. From the 
  moment Uriah left, Levinia was effectively under 
  house arrest. Servants dog her every step to pre-
  vent just such a dramatic escape.
  So how will the characters get Levinia to free-
  dom? Will they return by night and assist Levinia 
  in a stealthy exit via her bedroom window? Will 
  they invite Levinia out in the hope that they 
  can lose any chaperones that come with her and 
  escape that way (a bad plan, Levinia is not going 
  to be let out of the house). Will they execute 
  a fake ‘home invasion’ and ‘kidnap’ Levinia? 
  Perhaps they’ll plan to wait until the wedding day 
  itself and help Levinia escape while she and Uriah 
  are en route to their honeymoon?
  Whatever the characters cook up, bear in mind the 
  following points.
   
  If the characters call again they will simply 
  be told by the butler that Levinia is not tak-
  ing visitors. 
   
  The only visitors that will be allowed in 
  will be the seamstresses tasked to create 
  Levinia’s wedding dress (which will take 
  several sittings to complete).
   
  Levinia will not be allowed out of the 
  house, and the servants have been instruct-
  ed to watch the doors. Within a day the 
  troublesome Levinia is locked in her room 
  unless the tailors have arrived.
   
  The servants guarding Levinia are not 
  maniacs or soldiers, if attacked they retreat 
  and call for the law. A party willing to use 
  force to free Levinia can rescue her easily, 
  but as a result the police call out a manhunt 
  to find the kidnappers.
  Once the characters have a plan, think about 
  how to make it a challenge, for example a night 
  time breakout from the bedroom window will 
  by necessity requires a ladder, so how will the 
  characters get it there quietly? Once there make 
  sure the characters are swift and quiet to avoid the 
  attention of the police who maintain regular foot 
  patrols around Belgravia, and will no doubt be 
  innately suspicious of characters  with ladders to 
  upstairs windows in the middle of the night!
  In such a plan a single failed sneak roll can bring 
  either the police outside, or the house occupants 
  to the scene and turn the escape into a madcap 
  dash through the night time streets.  
  Penny Dreadful: A White Wedding
  
  292
  Penny Dreadful: A White Wedding
  Among the People
  Whether the players rescued Levinia, or whether 
  she escaped herself, Levinia is ill equipped for 
  everday life.
  Levinia’s idea of freedom is to join the ranks of 
  the proletariat and live without the shackles of 
  high society. Unfortunately she has little idea 
  of the harsh realities of working class life, she 
  doesn’t know how to cook for herself, she can’t 
  repair her clothes, which wouldn’t be problems 
  but for the fact that as a woman, she has no 
  money or property - all the wealth she had was in 
  reality her fathers. Selling some jewellery gains 
  her a couple of pounds, which Levinia’s delicate 
  and sophisicated tastes soon devour. Levinia’s 
  dream of proletarian existence wasn’t the picture 
  of squalor and grime that is the reality.
  It’s possible of course that the characters didn’t 
  break Levinia out, they might not even know 
  about the marriage arrangment if they 
  left at Mr Dempsey’s request earlier 
  on. If this is the case, then they do 
  hear about Levinia’s marriage when 
  they read an announcement in the 
  society coloumn of the newspapers, 
  and as if on cue a bedraggled Levinia 
  turns up on the characters doorstep 
  upon realising that her only income 
  as an educated yet unskilled woman 
  will be through prostitution or a mar-
  riage, and she’ll relate the tale of 
  events and explain her dread of the 
  insidious Uriah.
  Whether the characters freed her, or 
  whether she has turned to them for a 
  last resort, Levinia’s freedom is short 
  lived. Characters contacts warn the 
  characters that some ugly looking 
  thugs have been asking around for 
  the characters and a young Eldren 
  woman (Levinia), and indeed it 
  doesn’t take the thugs (Uriah’s grave 
  robbers) long to locate the characters 
  through a combination of legwork 
  by them, and seances conducted by 
  Uriah.
  At your convienience, once the characters have 
  had a chance to see how helpless and vulnerable 
  Levinia is in the real world, the grave robbers 
  strike and carry Levinia off to a secret location 
  where she will remain until the wedding. The 
  grave robbers work for Uriah, not the Dempseys 
  and they have no compunctions about violence 
  to the characters. In fact they rather enjoy a fight 
  as long as it looks like they’ll win. The grave 
  robbers prefer to strike at night when Levinia 
  and whichever character she is staying with 
  are asleep. The grave robbers will break into 
  the home and carry a screaming Levinia into 
  the night with a waiting coach, pausing only to 
  knockout any characters who try to stop them.
  The Wedding
  Whether she’s been left to stew since day one or 
  whether she tasted freedom for a few days before 
  recapture, Levinia still has a wedding to go to.
  
  293
  Penny Dreadful: A White Wedding
  URIAH CLARENCE
  Clever characters might want to dig around in 
  Uriah’s dirty laundry and see just how dirty it 
  really is, and why not! They have serval rea-
  sons to do so. They might be intrigued by his 
  unnerving display of power in the Dempsey’s 
  parlour, or they might simply want to find a 
  reason they can give Mr Dempsey for the mar-
  riage not to go ahead.
  Uriah is a successful stock broker by day, and 
  spends much of every day in his london city 
  offices, building the wealth of the empire and 
  lucretively expanding his own coffers as he 
  does so. Regrettably Uriah does not do anything 
  illegal by day, his day job as a stock broker is 
  totally genuine and totally legal - although it 
  should be mentioned that it really doesn’t make 
  him a better person. He’s successful at his day 
  job because he’s an evil minded and sadistic 
  tyrant, and because he has no compunction 
  about disturbing the spirits of the dead to sup-
  port and verify his speculations.
  Characters who dig too deep into the company 
  portfolios Uriah manages might begin to see all 
  manner of sinister connections and unpleasant 
  deeds (also an ideal place for you to drop a lead 
  for a future adventure) and chasing off after just 
  such a red herring might be provide good fun in 
  its own right.
  Characters looking for dirt on Uriah find it 
  in spades at his home in London, where the 
  library is filled with ancient and proscribed 
  books on death, and the basement is filled with 
  body parts and cadavers left over from Uriah’s 
  enthusiastic experiments. We won’t dwell on 
  the nature of Uriah’s experiments, we’ll leave 
  that to you the gamesmaster - is Uriah creat-
  ing a ‘Frankenstein’s monster’ or is he trying 
  to animate the dead? Or does he simply have a 
  morbid interest in anatomy?
  You decide, and while you’re at it decide how 
  successful he’s been!
  On the morning of the wedding Levinia is bodily 
  hauled out of the house in her wedding dress and 
  into the coach that takes her to the church.
  At the church doors Levinia makes a final break 
  for freedom. Only to be detained by her chaper-
  ones and ushered into the chapel. Once inside, 
  upon seeing the social gathering, Levinia finally 
  ceases to struggle in the face of such colossal 
  social disgrace and the marriage is conducted 
  - while Levinia tries to think about how she can 
  escape Uriah before the evening.
  Once the ceremony is over the ‘happy’ couple 
  leave by coach straight for Uriah’s townhouse, 
  excusing themselves from the reception on 
  account of poor health on Uriah’s part.
  Characters determined to free Levinia now have 
  a final chance for closure at Uriah’s townhouse 
  where they must face off against the graverobbers 
  before they eventually find Uriah and Levinia 
  upstairs where Levinia is locked in a valiant and 
  futile struggle to prevent the eager Uriah from 
  consummating the marriage.
  Happy Endings?
  The happy ending is the disposal of Uriah and the 
  grave robbers. With Uriah dead Levinia is free to 
  remain single (for now). 
  It’s possible that the characters might see a value 
  to supporting Levinia as a dependant in exchange 
  for her medium abilities. Any party intending 
  to investigate for a living will find her medium 
  senses extremely useful. 
  Naturally it’s possible that the characters might 
  fail, Uriah might consummate the marriage, 
  and unless the characters intervene he’ll make 
  Levinia’s life hell, degrading her for his own 
  amusement before finally fulfilling his real objec-
  tive, the murder of Levinia’s father. As Levinia’s 
  husband all of Mr Dempseys wealth and invest-
  ments will pass to Uriah not Levinia.
  As for Uriah, well, the characters might kill him, 
  but you might try to keep him alive and use him 
  as a recurring villain later on in our campaign.
  
  294
  Cast of Characters
  Miss Levinia Dempsey
  Daughter to a master industrialist and society 
  host, Levinia could have been a popular girl. As 
  an only child, she is spoilt; her wealthy father 
  providing everything she could possibly want. 
  She is highly intelligent, and wishing an educa-
  tion, she received one. The finest tutors in Europe 
  attended to the precocious child’s education 
  in every subject she wished. Now as a young 
  woman, her imperial and patriotic father deeply 
  regrets his generosity. Levinia’s education in poli-
  tics and sociology have prompted a fashionable 
  interest in radical politics, namely Communism 
  with quite strong verbal Bolshevism, her past as 
  a spoilt brat have led to an obsession with break-
  ing rules, primarily social rules. Levinia, with 
  her promiscuous and political talk, has become 
  an embarrassment to her father’s social position. 
  Now he intends to marry her off, to place the 
  embarrassment on someone else.
  Of course Levinia’s attitudes toward others of her 
  social class is highly defamatory, and not condu-
  cive to offers of marriage. 
  Characteristics: dexterity 5, body 4, intellect 6, 
  presence 8, resolution 5, and luck 2
  Race & social class: Eldren, upper class
  Social ethics: Levinia makes a show of being 
  bolshevik, but in heart has more in common with 
  the chartists.
  Personality: Energetic.
  Childhood experience: Private Tutors
  Past career: Bored Society Debutante.
  Skills: literacy +4, education +4, etiquette +4, 
  revolutionary literature +2, fashion +4, Bull! +4, 
  Charm +6, Conversation +2, Sensate Medium +6
  Talents, perks & privileges: Sensate Medium, 
  Beautiful.
  Medium Abilities: Know recent events, Aura 
  reading, Sixth Sense.
  Property & assets:  Regular allowance (soon to 
  be cut off), wardrobe.
  Complications: Artistic Eccentricity - temper 
  fits. 
  Weapons & accoutrements: Levinia has never 
  lifted a weapon in her life, and thus posseses 
  none. Her wardrobe of tailored gowns and collec-
  tion of jewellery are both priceless.
  Sir Robert Dempsey.
  Where many of the gentry are upon hard times, 
  Sir Robert’s fortunes have flourished. He whole-
  heartedly embraces the industrial era and is 
  always looking for new investments and ventures 
  in need of capital. His manner is more that of a 
  businessman than an aristocrat.
  Mental competence: 14; Physical competence: 
  8; Health: 20/8 inc greatcoat
  Uriah Clarence
  Uriah has always been selfish and power 
  obsessed, but his recent discovery of Necromancy 
  has driven him to the point of obsession, so much 
  so that he barely notices the effects of his corrup-
  tion (700 corruption points, see p203)
  Mental competence: 18; Physical competence: 
  12; Health: 25/9 inc greatcoat Spell Picks: 
  Botheration, Ectoplasmic bonds, Dust, Seance.
  Jed, Ned & Ted - The Grave Robbers
  These three are a motley and nefarious crew, but 
  Uriah pays them well to do his dirty work, and no 
  job is too dirty for them. Gamesmasters looking 
  to increase the challenge of the scenario might 
  make any of these three beastmen or ogres.
  Mental competence: 6; Physical competence: 
  10, Health: 25/9 inc greatcoat
  Skill Picks: hide & sneak (12), streetwise (12)
  Combat Picks: Garrotte (10) causing asphyxi-
  tion; dagger (12) for 2d+5 lethal, life preserver 
  (12) for 4d+5 stun
  Penny Dreadful: A White Wedding
  
  295
  Further reading - fiction
  2000 leagues under the sea, Jules Verne. A dated 
  but enjoyable tale of the Nautilus and crew. It is little 
  known that the technology of the Nautilus is quite 
  firmly based in reality, and much of the ‘super sci-
  ence’ contained became reality before the turn of the 
  century.
  Charles Dickens. A heavy read, but Dickens lived 
  through most of the Victorian period and wrote about 
  the world about him with passion. Possibly his best 
  works for our reference were Bleak House and Oliver 
  Twist.
  Dracula, Bram Stoker. An excellent work of horror. 
  Also an excellent reference for the use of telegrams in 
  a game.
  For the crown & the dragon, Stephen Hunt. Set in an 
  alternative Napoleonic era, this is a classic example of 
  what can be done with the ‘Steampunk’ genre and a 
  damn good book to boot.
  Frankenstein, Mary Shelly another horror classic. 
  Nuff said.
  The Flashman Papers, George MacDonald Fraser, 
  an epic tale of villainy and cowardice as we follow the 
  ‘honourable’ Harry Flashman through the Victorian 
  era. Published in 10 paperback volumes and all superb.
  The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes. Sir Arthur Conan 
  Doyle an easy read- and plenty of them. Later Holmes 
  books veer into the 20th century. These are little use 
  for a Victorian era researcher.
  The science fiction of Mr H G Wells rather groovy so 
  - check out the original War of the Worlds.
  Further reading – research
  City of dreadful delight, Judith Walkowitz.  A study of 
  vice in Victorian London.
  Cruelty &. Companionship, A. James Hammerton- a 
  study of marital violence in the Victorian era, investi-
  gating the existence of the archetypal tyrannical hus-
  band.
  Culture & society in Britain - 1840-1890 editor: 
  Jim Golby. A collection of contemporary letters and 
  excerpts. Some are indifferent, but several (such as 
  Florence nightingale’s opinions on women in society) 
  letters are brilliant.
  History as news 1865-1897, Leonard de Vries a vol-
  ume of illustrations from the London Illustrated News. 
  A leading paper of the time. Most newspapers utilised 
  engravings rather than the infant photography to illus-
  trate their work.
  Jack the ripper - summing up and verdict, Colin 
  Wilson. An excellent book, the first half describes life 
  in the Whitechapel area of the time and the second 
  half weighs up the various ripper theories.
  London labour, London poor, Henry Mayhew. A 
  period set of articles interviewing the poor and work-
  ing masses of London in the mid century. This book is 
  one of our bibles.
  Mid-Victorian Britain 1851-75, Geoffrey Best. An 
  excellent reference book. Mr Best thoroughly analyses 
  the indicated period.
  My Secret Life. ‘Walter’. 2350 page set of memoirs by 
  a Victorian ‘gentleman’ and his pursuit of vice. This 
  set of memoirs is explicit, disgusting and quite terrify-
  ing when you remember that it’s a true story. The book 
  is actually illegal in some areas, and is not recom-
  mended to anyone likely to be shocked by a Victorian 
  pervert’s pornographic ramblings.
  The complete history of jack the ripper, Philip 
  Sugden. Possibly the best singular source of infor-
  mation on the ripper murders, and the society that 
  spawned them.
  The conditions of the working class in England, F 
  Engels. Written in the 1830’s by the co-founder of 
  communism. This work is invariably referred to in any 
  other book on the period. A must read - especially the 
  declaration of -war against the bourgeois!
  The European revolutions 1848-1851, Jonathan 
  Sperber. An excellent book detailing the radical poli-
  tics of the mid century, conventional politics and a 
  discussion of ‘the people’ so often vouched for.
  The great stink of London, Stephen Halliday. This 
  book tells the story of how Victorian engineers defeat-
  ed cholera in London by cleaning up the disgusting 
  sewage system.
  The Victorian Underworld, Donald Thomas. Similar 
  Appendix I: Further Reading
  APPENDIX I
  REFERENCE MATERIAL
  
  296
  Appendix I: Further Reading
  content to Chesney’s book of the same name, 
  but with more focus on actual examples from 
  the period – an excellent resource!
  The Victorian Underworld, Kellow Chesney. 
  The concise book of crime and punishment in 
  the Victorian era. Written in self contained sub-
  ject chapters, this book is a gold mine of useful 
  information.
  The Victorian village, David Souden a good 
  study of rural life in Victorian Britain.
  Victorian England as seen by Punch, Frank 
  Hugget. A good introductory book, illustrated 
  with period punch cartoons throughout.
  Victorian high society, Stella Margetson. A 
  study of the upper class’ nightmare etiquette 
  and social functions.
  Victorian London revealed, Eric de Mare. A 
  reprint of Gustav Dore’s engravings of mid 
  century London and articles about the scenes 
  depicted.
  Videography
  We recognise that a lot of you would rather 
  watch a film than read a book (sigh), so here 
  is a short list of rather groovy films set in our 
  game period. 
  Bram stokers Dracula, directed by Francis 
  Ford Copolla. Not quite what the title says, but still a 
  great film for atmosphere, sets and costumes - some of 
  the accents are quite special too.
  Charge of The Light Brigade. A 1968 film depicting 
  the tragedy at Balaclava during the Crimean war. A 
  rather good film.
  First men on the moon, loosely based on the HG 
  Wells classic. An enjoyable film in it’s own right, but 
  hardly faithful to the book.
  From hell, Johnny Depp stars as Inspector Abberline 
  in this excellent and atmospheric film based on the 
  Jack the Ripper murders and the royal links attributed 
  to the case.
  Jack the Ripper (Thames TV version). Made for 
  British TV, stars Michael Caine. A ‘docudrama’ mini 
  series of film length episodes, this is an excellent 
  Victorian genre ‘docurama’ -watch it!
  Jekyll & Hyde (Thames TV version), after the success 
  of jack the ripper, Thames TV did Dr Jekyll as a fol-
  low up single film. Also starring Michael Caine with 
  Cheryl Ladd. Again costume, sets, everything is spot 
  on - including the English actors English accents.
  Prisoner of Zenda. Many cinema versions, many 
  TV versions. The recommended version is the Peter 
  Sellers comedy version. Mr Sellers provides the acting 
  for a majority of roles.
  The private life of Sherlock Holmes, Russian bal-
  lerinas and Loch Ness monsters await Sherlock in this 
  underrated film.
  The young Sherlock Holmes and the pyramid of fear, 
  a classic piece of Spielberg excellence. ‘Nuff said.
  Van Helsing, A spin off from the Dracula legend star-
  ring Hugh Jackman as The big H. The CGI is every-
  where, the rope swinging scenes are ridiculous, but for 
  character, costume, setting and gadget ideas it's still a 
  good resource.
  Without a clue, a hilarious Holmes spoof, with 
  Michael Caine as a blundering Sherlock, and with 
  Watson as the brains of the outfit away from the pub-
  licity.
  Zulu. Michael Caine (again) stars in a classic cinema 
  retelling of the battle at Rorc’s Drift
  
  297
  Well by now you’ve no doubt devourd the rules and 
  background of Victoriana, and some of the Fuzion 
  veterans amongst you might be wondering about some 
  of the changes we made, this section will explain the 
  whys and hows of Fuzion as used in Victoriana, and 
  offer you ideas on crossing over with Core Fuzion, 
  and other Fuzion products.
  Why? Well if you’ve ever wanted to run a time travel 
  campaign or would like to transport characters from 
  another Fuzion world to Victoriana knowing how to 
  transpose the characteristsics fairly might be advanta-
  geous! Likewise perks privelidges, complications and 
  weapons require a few notes when crossing between 
  game worlds.
  Victorian Society
  All of the information in the society 
  section is taken from real histori-
  cal accounts of 19th century life, we 
  didn’t exagerate any of it- we didn’t 
  need to! So, if you are bringing other 
  Fuzion characters into Victoriana, or 
  sending Victoriana characters across 
  the planes, spend a moment to think 
  about what makes the Victorian soci-
  ety (and therefore your character) 
  stand out.
  Victorian law is repressive, unfair and 
  unjust. The law serves the rich at the 
  expense of the poor and characters 
  from a ‘cyberpunk’ genre will no 
  doubt feel right at home as the grim 
  oppression and crazy capitalism they 
  deal with on a daily basis are firmly 
  rooted in the Victorian society.
  The Victorian society’s social rules 
  are just as demanding and ridicu-
  lous - the appearance of a Marvel/
  DC genre superhero in full Lycra 
  bodysuited splendour is pure scandal 
  to the Society of Victoriana! Likewise 
  modern adventuresses who insist on 
  wearing trousers are a total disgrace. 
  Characters with a non-white ethnic 
  background are at best subject to 
  patronising remarks at every com-
  pleted sentance, and in England that trait even extends 
  to the populace of the rest of Europe!
  Basic System Traits
  In Victoriana we didn’t want to give you the same core 
  rules you may have already bought (and if not, why 
  not!). We chose to lay out the rules we needed for the 
  world as a cohesive and fluid whole rather than using 
  generic tables. You may have done simlar for your 
  own Fuzion campaigns already - and if not then per-
  haps Victoriana will give you some ideas on what you 
  might build using Fuzion. 
  So Lets take a closer look at the facets of the game.
  Characteristics
  Characters in Victoriana might at first seem quite dif-
  APPENDIX II
  CORE FUZION CROSSOVERS
  Appendix II: Fuzion Conversions
  
  298
  ferent to those in other Fuzion system games, but in 
  actuality they are not. 
  In Victoriana there are six characteristics: Body, 
  Dexterity, Presence, Intellect, Resolution, and Luck. 
  However, in core Fuzion there are ten characteristics: 
  INT, PRE, WILL, TECH, MOVE, REF, DEX, STR, 
  CON, BODY. In Victoriana there are no ‘super char-
  acteristics’ although some of the differing races come 
  close (such as Ogres with their Body).
  So how do they marry up, and how do you convert 
  them?
  Body is the average of BODY, CON, STR.
  Dexterity is the average of REF, DEX, MOVE
  Presence is still PRE
  Intellect is the average of INT and TECH
  Resolution is WILL
  Luck is LUCK, but in Victoriana we make you spend 
  points on luck rather than basing it on INT+REF.
  Derived characterisitcs in Victoriana are all essentially 
  the the same as those in core Fuzion, but naturally 
  we’ve derived them from our characteritics, and we’ve 
  dealt with health in a slghtly different way, which 
  we’ll talk about 
  later in the combat section.
  Skills
  Skills work exactly the same as in core Fuzion, there 
  is no conversion required, we’ve given you some skills 
  that weren’t in core Fuzion, and there’s some skills 
  that aren’t present in Victoriana, but these differences 
  are pretty straightforward - there are no computers in 
  Victoriana, nor electronics and so there is no need for 
  skills that deal with those elements.
  Option Points
  In Victoriana we have Perks, talents, complications etc 
  just like core Fuzion, but in core Fuzion those tables 
  are free form, and you can choose the severity of the 
  perk in question - in Victoriana you cannot, so what 
  gives?
  Well the tables in Victoriana are crafted to represent 
  ready made perks, talents and flaws typical for a 
  Victorian game, enabling you to get stuck straight in. 
  You may wish to use the open ended tables from core 
  Fuzion in additon to the Victoriana tables, and we 
  heartily recommend this.
  Combat
  The processes invovled in combat remain essentially 
  unchanged. The one difference we have made is 
  opposing ranged attack rolls against a target number 
  for range rather than a dodge roll from the defender. 
  This was a genre based decision. In many core Fuzion 
  games dodging bullets is quite in key, but it didn’t 
  feel right as the default for Victoriana. Those of you 
  who feel a pressing need to somersault out of the way 
  of bullets can still do so by using the ‘all out dodge’ 
  rules. Of course you could always switch back to core 
  Fuzion and simply replace the range target numbers 
  with a dodge roll from the defender by default.
  Appendix II: Fuzion Conversions
  
  299
  Health
  Health is figured slightly differently in Victoriana 
  than core Fuzion, Victoriana characters typically have 
  less health than core Fuzion characters, and as they 
  become more wounded, they accumulate action roll 
  modifiers. Again, this is a product of the genre, we 
  wanted Victoriana characters to  ‘feel the pain’ tangi-
  bly when they are wounded rather than simply knock-
  ing off a few more hits.
  Weapons & Armour
  There was no real armour in the Victorian era and 
  hence Victoriana characters are poorly protected. 
  Likewise Victorian era weapons are no match for 
  modern kevlar or futuristic polymer armours, likewise 
  modern and futuristic weapons should totally ignore 
  Victorian era armour. The difference in penetration and 
  stopping power between a modern assault rifle and a 
  Victorian rifle is massive and needs to be reflected.
  Weapon technology in Victoriana is all black powder 
  based and we’ve considerably expanded the ‘histori-
  cal weapons’ from core Fuzion for you. All the ranged 
  weapons in Victoriana are directly por-
  table 
  into core fuzion and back again. 
  Magic
  Magic in victoriana works quite differently to core 
  fuzion, and the schools and lists presented here add 
  considerable detal to the spell processes in the core 
  Fuzion book. Fortunately no conversion is required. 
  Characters who learn to cast magic using the rules in 
  this book have simply learnt to cast magic ‘in a cer-
  tain way’ and likewise for characters who learnt spells 
  and abilities in other Fuzion products. It might seem a 
  simplistic solution, but the end effect of any spell is an 
  opposed roll or damage - and those two items are dealt 
  with the same across the Fuzion worlds, the only dif-
  ference is ‘how’.
  Supporting Cast
  Victoriana offers an extremely swift and streamlined 
  NPC system for the ‘supporting cast’. This system can 
  be used in any Fuzion world, and likewise if you hate 
  it, you can of course build more complete profiles for 
  your NPC’s and monsters.
  Appendix II: Fuzion Conversions
  weapons in Victoriana are directly por-
  
     Fortitude 
     Armour Worn:
     ___________
  Total:
  Resolve
  Permission granted to photocopy for personal use
  Common Knowledge
  Act  
  (Presence) [     ]
  Appraisal  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Athletics  
  (Dexterity)  [     ]
  Brawl  
  (Dexterity)  [     ]
  Bribery  
  (Presence)  [     ]
  Bull!  
  (Presence)  [     ]
  Charm  
  (Presence)  [     ]
  Conceal Item  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Conversation  
  (Presence)  [     ]
  Disguise  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Dodge!  
  (Dexterity)  [     ]
  Drive Carriage  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Education  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Etiquette  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Fashion  
  (Presence)  [     ]
  First Aid  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Gambling  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Hacking & Bashing  (Dexterity)  [     ]
  Hide & Sneak  
  (Dexterity)  [     ]
  High Society  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Horse Riding  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Human Perception  
  (Presence)  [     ]
  Impress  
  (Presence)  [     ]
  Improvised Weapon  (Dexterity)  [     ]
  Intimidate  
  (Presence)  [     ]
  Linguistics  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Literacy  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Local Expert  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Oratory  
  (Presence)  [     ]
  Perception  
  (Intellect) [     ]
  Photography  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Pistol Shooting  
  (Dexterity)  [     ]
  Research  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Rifle Marksman  
  (Dexterity)  [     ]
  Scrutinise  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Seduction 
  (Presence)  [     ]
  Small Boat Pilot  
  (Intellect)  [     ]
  Streetwise  
  (Presence)  [     ]
  Swordplay  
  (Dexterity)  [     ]
  Teaching  
  (Presence)  [     ]
  Throwing  
  (Dexterity)  [     ]
  Specialities
  ................................  (              ) [     ]
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  ................................  (              ) [     ]
  Health
  Character 
  Sheet
  Name:
  Moniker:
  Player:
  Campaign:
  Social Class:
  Social Ethics:
  Childhood:
  Past Career:
  Nationality & Race:
  Personality:
  Age & Gender:
  Hair & Eyes:
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  Stun
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
  -5
  -4
  -3
  -2
  -1
     Initiative
     Damage Bonus
     Constitution
  Running   
  Speed
  Health
  Derived Characteristics
  Armour
  Talents, Perks & Priviledges
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  Body
  Dexterity
  Presence
  Intellect
  Resolution
  Luck
  Characteristics
  
  Property & Assets
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ___________________________________
  ___
  Complications
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  ____________________________________
  Equipment & Notes
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  ___________________________________________________________
  Personal Fortune
  XP
  Total
  Contacts
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  _____________________________ 
  ___________________________
  Weapons
  Weapon 
  Acc. 
  Damage 
  ROF 
  Shots Reload Notes
  _________________ 
  ____ ____________ ____ 
  ____ 
  ____ ______________________________________
  _________________ 
  ____ ____________ ____ 
  ____ 
  ____ ______________________________________
  _________________ 
  ____ ____________ ____ 
  ____ 
  ____ ______________________________________
  _________________ 
  ____ ____________ ____ 
  ____ 
  ____ ______________________________________
  _________________ 
  ____ ____________ ____ 
  ____ 
  ____ ______________________________________
  _________________ 
  ____ ____________ ____ 
  ____ 
  ____ ______________________________________
  _________________ 
  ____ ____________ ____ 
  ____ 
  ____ ______________________________________
  _________________ 
  ____ ____________ ____ 
  ____ 
  ____ ______________________________________
  _________________ 
  ____ ____________ ____ 
  ____ 
  ____ ______________________________________
  _________________ 
  ____ ____________ ____ 
  ____ 
  ____ ______________________________________
  Petty Cash
  
  Thaumaturgy
  Demonology
  Necromancy
  Intellect
  Resolution
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Thaumaturgical
  Grimoire
  Current Resolve
  Quick Reference
  Lore & Tomes
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  __________________
  Items & Abilities
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  __________________
  Spells
  Total
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Actions:____ Range:__________ Duration:__________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  
  Enchanting
  Invoking
  Demonology
  Intellect
  Resolution
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Petty Magic
  Enchantments
  Current Resolve
  Quick 
  Lore & Tomes
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  __________________
  Items & Abilities
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  ___________________
  __________________
  Rituals
  Total
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  Name__________________________ Diff:____ Resolve:____ Rit. Lngth:____ Act. Res:__________ Duration:________
  Effect: ______________________________________________________________________
  
  Victoriana  © 1992. This edition © 2003 Heresy Gaming LLP.
  FUZIONTM is the Fuzion Labs GroupTM trademark for its multi-
  genre game system. 
  Once this was a world of Magic and Wonder , 
  but that was the dark ages, and a time 
  best forgotten by modern, rational minds.
  This is 1867
  a time of Science, Law, and Order
  A time of Great Empires & Wealth for the Few,
  but full of Oppression and Cruelty for the Many
  The Wheel Turns
  The Planes Align
  The Heavens are Silent
  A Revolution is Coming...
  Where will you Stand?
  This book contains:
  Background information on a fictional Europe; 
  Complete Role-playing rules using the Fuzion System. 
  Including: Character Creation, Combat, Monsters, 
  Villains, and four different colleges of magic. 
  Everything you need for instant adventure, all in one 
  book.
  ISBN: 1-904649-00-9       VIC1001     RRP: US $29.99
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Collections/Steampunk/Victoriana/Victoriana 1e - 1867 (Core).pdf