2023 Day 22: Electric Bastionland
I love the design aesthetic on Electric Bastionland. It’s laid out with lots of space, but I found that it perfects conveying a lot of information in few words. It’s partly because it’s about mood, aesthetics and ideas. It doesn’t contain so many off-the-wall ideas as Spire, even though the setting is definitely zany, but I was definitely left with a clear idea of what kind of game I would play or run with this book. And the game advice is similarly clear and efficient, grouped into sets of three bullets. I don’t think it’s as detailed as the advice in Houses of the Blooded or some Greg Stolze books but it’s good advice and very clear.
Cover of Electric Bastionland: Deeper into the odd
As for the game, you are life’s failures in an unforgiving world. Your only chance is to go treasure hunting for your debtors, and you will probably die. Your stats are low, you are likely to be taken out by a single blow and you pretty much only roll to avoid danger. There’s a lovely decision for the players built into the game: when PCs are wounded you need rest; but if you rest, your rival might get to the treasure first; so do you leave your wounded comrade to die or say better together?
Everything above I like, but I read the game as expecting ST preparation - I wish there was an adventure generator to reduce the upfront load. And I think it expects player-level strategising to reduce the risks of bad things happening - that’s not me (anymore). But beyond that, there is plenty of scope for player-defined worldbuilding.
As a side note, as I was hunting for an editable character sheet I came across this great article about the play vision of the game: https://www.bastionland.com/2020/07/how-osr-is-bastionland.html
Geraldine is … well, we’ll see. Let’s do some random generation.
- Strength 11
- Dexterity 9
- Charisma 8
Geraldine’s failed career is determined by their highest and lowest ability score (11 and 8 respectively), and a lot of the book is given to these careers.
So apparently Geraldine was one of the Star Blessed, specifically a Flagellant so has a whip (d6), mace (d6), a ceremonial headband and lashmarks. They were given an alien bone: it looks like a wishbone but only grants your wish if that wish is to send a psychic wave of pain to those nearby.
Star Blessed also gives me some suggested names but I noticed them too late.
- 4 Hit Protection
- 5 New Pounds (enough for an expensive sandwich)
- Shared debt: £10,000
And that debt might be owed to Baztuon Order of Vaultkeepers, also giving us shared ownership of a vault-buster bomb.
I think Geraldine comes from a line of sinners. Their entire life is about paying for their sins and everything bad that happens to them is accepted as inevitable and just. Mostly. So sure, when the order got into debt, Geraldine took the fall. But that’s as far as the debt goes. Their job is not to die for it, but to live to pay it back. Geraldine is seemingly very meek and deferential but is essentially a coward. They will always choose slow and safe over other options. It is possible that, outside of the order, they will develop a proper personality but it will depend who they hang around with.
On a side note, I’m pretty certain that Geraldine has children (because the order needs more flagellants), but only by artificial means; they will never have met them, have no emotional attachment and their primary purpose in the story is a disturbing emotional twist.
Character sheet for Geraldine
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/308100/Electric-Bastionland