Trail of Cthulhu - "Bookhounds of London"

Every so often you find a roleplaying game or setting that just gets you as a player or gamesmaster. It fits you like a glove in terms of the atmosphere,theme or mechanics. I've experienced that over the years with games like "Call of Cthulhu", "Kult" and "My Life With Master". I also felt it when I ran games in the "Ravenloft" setting for AD&D 2E.

Now I've found another in Pelgrane Press "Bookhounds of London", a campaign setting for "Trail of Cthulhu" written by Kenneth Hite. The setting is London in the 1930's. The players are somehow connected with a bookstore that deals in occult books, and this serves as a backdrop for drawing them into deeper mysteries and a lot of trouble. The 1930's brings the pressures,and opportunities, of Depression era economics. There are plenty of dilettantes who have fallen on hard times and have very rare and dangerous books to sell, along with an audience of buyers who may well be cultists or satanists.

There are new options for character occupations too. A player could be the bookstore keeper who owns or manages the store, the character who is effectively the party leader. There's the book scout, the "street" character who trawls through junk sales to find that special bargain,by fair means or foul. Then we have the catalogue agent (think of Johnny Depp in "The Ninth Gate"), the private investigator who represents a specific dealer. Of course, given the pressures of supply and demand, we also have the forger.

The group create the bookshop together at the start of the campaign and can invest some of their points into the shop itself, to provide it with the chance of having just the right book when they need it. This alone would provide plenty of story hooks. When you add in the new occupations, there is tremendous potential for character-driven storylines.

The background material on London is superb, lots of maps from the era are included and guidelines for evoking London. There are also three "types" of London suggested, and I'm already struggling to choose one, so I'll let the group decide. There is "Sordid" London, which is along the lines of "From Hell". "Arabesque" London is the labyrinthine world that Sherlock Holmes knows well. "Technicolor" London is more akin to the world of Dennis Wheatley and Hammer horror, full of vivid colors and wealthy satanists.

This will be my first run of "Trail of Cthulhu" as well, though some colleagues tell me that me my games are already closer to it in spirit than "Call of Cthulhu". This starts in August, so do look for gameplay reviews and summaries later this year.