“A Thousand Thousand
Islands” is a set of 4 ‘zines and 2 topic-adjacent booklet; in the words of the
creators, it is “a series of fantasy settings, designed
for use with tabletop RPGs, inspired
by the material cultures, lived stories, and mythistories of
Southeast Asia.” With the 3rd and
4th issues of the zine now out, the four core booklets total
something like 156 pages with 2 detached foldouts. This is equivalent to a
pretty generous setting book, and so seems worthy of a review along those
lines. I can give you the headline judgement by saying that – as a setting book
– this could well be a highly worthwhile investment for your campaign,
presuming you like the Southeast Asian flavour and are willing to do the
necessary work to translate this to the table.
Each of the four ‘zine
issues covers a different sub-setting in the Thousand Thousand Islands (Is the
setting actually made up of islands? It’s plain not every sub-setting is its
own island). These all have evocative names: “Mr-Kr-Gr, The Death-Rolled
Kingdom”, “Kraching”, “Upper Heling, The Forest Beloved By Time”, and “Andjang,
The Queen on Dog Mountain”.
I’ll talk a little
about each of them below, but let me sum up the shared strengths and
weaknesses. They are all fantastic grist for the mill; they are absorbing to
read, and therefore great for the DM at the level of spurring the imagination.
Each begins with a title page describing how you arrive at the locale.
Mr-Kr-Gr, for instance, begins thus: “FIVE DAYS BY BOAT, UPRIVER. You
come to a wide lake, watched by limestone cliffs. Shapes lurk in the water.
Shapes wait up ahead.” The flow of pages from there in each issue tend
to go from the fringes of the setting into its heart, thereby mimicking a
travelogue. This is immersive – and for all of our justified snottiness at
overwritten 1990s setting books privileging depth over usability, immersion is
important for the DM, too.
This brings up the
second shared strength: the art by Munkao. Each title page is faced by a
beautiful line drawing depicting the scene. The art throughout the booklets –
and it is copious – is magnificent. Munkao is undoubtedly one of the best
artists in the “OSR” – probably top 3 or 5 for me. The magnificent blend of
almost photographic realism and splendid imagination, touched with an ethereal
quality by being uncoloured, suits the setting and communicates the vision. The
art in these booklets is absolutely an equal partner with the writing (which
has its weaknesses; see below).
The final shared
strength I want to focus on is in the evocative nature of the writing. Zedeck
writes in a manner that is both terse and dream-like, and it nearly always
works. He writes of a pair of cats in a cat-revering culture:
JYOTI AND JOVIN,
DARLINGS
Pale ginger tabbies.
Everybody who sees them stops and fawns, ‘Oh, Jyoti, Jovin, where have you
been?”
The pair went missing
for a month. Agents of the Retractable Claw, back from murdering a Bambung
prince.
You see? So much
contained in so few words. We see the human-feline relationship here, but we
also see the magical nature of the cats in this place. We can begin to imagine
how they will mess with our PCs, how they might be enemies or allies (even
employers) as needs dictate, how they present themselves to the world. The
writing is rich in its density.
That leads to the main
– really, only – flaw I’d ascribe to the series. It’s not a small flaw, either.
The ‘zines are largely made up of quirky, terse description (usually of NPCs),
and aforementioned copious amounts of art. Whilst these two are very helpful
for immersion, neither is automatically “gameable”/”useable”. In the
description of the tabbies I quoted above, the atmosphere is rich, but the
table-ready content is minimal – how might the PCs cross them? Who might their
next target be? There are wonderful random tables (e.g. the d20 Magic Weapons
of Andjang table in that issue) which can definitely find use in prep or at the
table; the d10 table in Mr-Kr-Gr of the powers of different demon idols could
be integrated into a random encounter table, for instance. Issues #3 and #4 add
table-usable foldouts, which is a big improvement.
But the problem is
endemic. The issue is not that the ‘zines are statless – they are – but that
the indirect, evocative text is itself the barrier. It means that turning this
into a campaign setting will require plenty of DM work – more than in
comparable ‘zines. Of course Zedeck and Munkao aren’t trying to pretend they’re
offering a complete campaign that just needs players, but it’s worth bearing in
mind that these ‘zines really only provide a substratum on which you must
build. It’s not that, say, Echoes from Fomalhaut or Wormskin do
not require work – if nothing else, ‘zines always provide settings with gaps,
due to their serial nature and limited space. But Echoes and Wormskin,
after four issues, provided much more table-ready material. This is where the
generous ladles of art come in – the art uses the space that in other ‘zines
might go to detailing out scenarios and locations ready for table use. This is
an intentional decision, and not entirely unsuccessful, but it must be borne in
mind by the prospective buyer. If you want to run A Thousand Thousand
Islands, and not just enjoy the luxuriant writing and art, you will need to
put in a disproportionate amount of work.
What of the individual
issues, then?
#1 Mr-Kr-Gr – The
Death-Rolled Kingdom depicts a kingdom ruled by sentient crocodiles,
though largely peopled by humans (there is a bear-person ambassador and a
half-sword/half-man, though!). There are some real strengths in this one: a 2d6
random encounter table, the four pages of “Forest Goods” (great for caravans,
fetch quests, etc), the general concept of sentient crocodilians who aren’t
also humanoids. On the other hand, there’s little in the way of developed adventure
ideas – here the writing style strikes. Three NPCs – Gr-Rm-Dr, Tohey, and
Mahanat San Orm – have something approaching a standard hook, and other NPCs
have something that can be worked into a hook, but that’s it.
#2 Kraching is about a land
directed by its human/feline god Auw. Lots of creepy sentient cats, some cool
NPCs, probably not quite as interesting a *setting* as Mr-Kr-Gr. There is,
again, a useful craft goods section and a forest encounter table. The chief
improvement in this issue is the direct nature of some of the “hooks”. For
example: “Neha [a buffalo-woman who has lost her counting-spirit
servant...which is awesome] offers a steep discount for Ari’s safe return. A
bay cat stole him. It will roll him off a cliff, hoping to smash his cage.”
That’s directly usable and the situation is set up. Of course there’s work to
do – but there’s an imaginative leap made here that makes it even easier for me
as a DM to use this.
#3 Upper Heleng – The
Forest Beloved By Time is probably the most compelling of these in
terms of the setting itself. It’s a strange philosophy-is-reality dreamscapey
place. People turn into animals, people go through the “time” of different
animal gods which informs their behaviour/purpose/etc, the oldest god (the
Leech, the taker of memory) has spawn who suck not your blood but things from a
d20 table including your gender, a cherished memory, your eyes. The NPC/quest
hook stuff is a bit more indirect again, but there is some wonderful interplay
that develops as you read it as the DM – it gets your brainjuice flowing. So a
village on the random village generator is being stalked by a former villager
now in “the time of the tiger”. Later an NPC is described who’s in the time of
the tiger who you might meet in the forest, who might offer to be your guide.
He wants to kill his old village-mates...oh, and the next NPC described is this
guy’s brother, who’s basically the ace-shot-gone-drunk-and-depressed type.
Maybe there’s a story here...This issue also has good craft goods (including
perma-staining fluorescent fruit juice) and the most directly gamable thing in
any issue, the foldout “map” which you die-drop on to determine which locations
are present on any one day and how they are connected. Probably the best issue
for theme.
#4 Andjang – The Queen
on Dog Mountain is about a peaceful land ruled vampiric
superpowered ruling family drawing a blood tithe, replete with living rattan
puppets and magical eye tattoos. The theme is good on the whole, but the real
thing about this issue is that there is a RUMOUR TABLE. And a MAGIC WEAPONS
TABLE. And a detailed pseudo-dungeon with a foldout map (the royal palace). In
sheer table-use terms, this is probably the best issue. The theme doesn’t
excite me personally quite so much, but so much of this issue is readily
translatable to your actual game. The “dungeon”, it should be said, isn’t
really developed as a mapped environment ready for immediate table use as a
normal dungeon. Nonetheless, it’s still worthwhile.
These are worthwhile
‘zines. I commend them to you. But let me state a few requirements on the DM
who wants to run this as a campaign setting. You will need to stat everything.
The form this takes will not always be obvious. You will usually need to create
a meaningful rumour table. You will need to translate many hinted “quest hooks”
into player-facing information. You will need to map things in many cases.
There is no complete dungeon environment or point-crawl or anything similar.
Factions are sketched in some cases but never – even in Andjang,
where factions are most detailed – in any depth. These ‘zines are an
inspiration and an imaginative toolkit, not ordinary setting and adventure
modules – but what an inspiration they are.
Buy here: https://itch.io/t/570165/a-thousand-thousand-islands-fantasy-tabletop-rpg-zines-inspired-by-southeast-asia
