Bathtub Reviews are an excuse for me to read modules a little more closely. I’m doing them to critique a wide range of modules from the perspective of my own table and to learn for my own module design. They’re stream of consciousness and unedited critiques. I’m writing them on my phone in the bath.
Beyond the Pale is an 89 page overland adventure for Cairn by Cairn’s creator, Yochai Gal. For fairness sake, I’m friends with a few people who got acknowledgments on this book, but when has that ever affected my opinion on a book? I’m excited to see what the team of Between Two Cairns (Brad Kerr is on developmental editing duties here along with my friend Amanda P) can do with a project like this. It’s a very culturally specific project — it’s inspired by Jewish mysticism and real events that occurred in the western Russian Empire.
Clik here to view.
Up front, this doesn’t go easy on terminology. I have a cold as I’m reading this, so maybe I’m a bit impaired with my memory right now, but despite using the sidebar to define all uncommon terms (by the third page of text we have Dybbuk, Venne Velte, Parnas, Estrie and Mazzikim), I initially struggled with wrapping my head around these unique — I assume rooted in Jewish culture and folklore — terms. If you aren’t familiar with the terminology, you’re going to have to put in some work. On the other hand, this declares itself loudly and early for what it is, and I really adore that in any module. The first three pages feel self-indulgent and unashamed, and if we want to talk about making modules as an art, unashamed incorporation of the soul and spark of the author are key elements to me; this screams it from the rooftops.
The information design in entries is clearly based on Anne’s Landmark, Hidden, Secret framework, which any listener of Between Two Cairns will know that Yochai is a big fan of. It uses special bullets, which is a neat approach but not quite as clear or flexible as the approach taken in Nightwick Abbey. There are fourteen named NPCs, each with about half a page of text devoted to them, but to be honest that overstates the wordiness: It’s a one line description plus a few dot points of information on them or secrets they know; all presented as the kind of stuff people gossip over at the Tavern House. These NPCs are easy to handle and are largely people I’d enjoy embodying.
There are two major “mayses or folktales”; these are basically major plots that run across the whole module, that take the form of mysteries. I like these, but they don’t fit my own understanding of folktales so the titling didn’t sit right with me: In my opinion, better to stick with “mayses” and lean into the theme as it does elsewhere, else add in a clearer description like “plots” or “mysteries”.
It’s not clearly stated but it’s implied in the Shtetl description and in the timeline that the action is supposed to take place over about a week, with advancing time clearly marked by progression of a particular holiday over the week. The location descriptions are not tightly bound to a structure and hence are really useful: The market varies by time, for example, but the tavern has a menu and gossip. I enjoy bespoke entries with familiar core structure. The descriptions however are neither numbered or alphabetical, and I can’t figure out what order they’re in — it’s not following streets either on the map. This makes it hard to reference, despite the well signalled headings. I’m sure there is a structure here, but might have been best outright stated.
The structure loses its cohesiveness as a result of this, combined with the unclear differentiation between town, out of town, the Blue Forest and the wider area. An extra layer of headings, some illustrations or spatial usage, could have clarified this. I’m on my phone and this would be easier in print, but I’d still have to be flipping to and fro to figure where I am. In a later section, a mini map is used for a very small nine-room dungeon; this also could have been used to good effect to clarify here, in my opinion.
That nine-room dungeon — the Tree of Life — is a fascinating design, though. I’m not sure if this would translate to the players, but as a referee it feels mystical in a way few magical spaces in modules achieve. Part of this is its design around a familiar real-world mystical shape — the sefirot — and it appears a lot of thought has been put into conceptualising the spaces as both lair of a big bad and as ceremonial space used to summon magic. Very, very cool stuff, and I was a little incredulous when the idea was first presented to me.
In terms of the writing itself: Workman-like but clear and easy to use. It never reaches the heights of Siew, Gearing or Yaksha in terms of pure oozing personality, but it works to achieve some real strength, which just happens to be one of the most important aspects of module design for me: These places and characters are full of interrelationships, that pull you in multiple directions until as players the hardest part isn’t knowing what they could do next but choosing what not to do. It’s a sandbox in the truest sense: There is no lack of things to do and no doubt as to how to pursue them. It presents the facade of being a real place so well that in play you’d choose to just go to the tavern and chill with the locals. I cannot understate how strong this positive is: There are only a few writers working in this space, and I’m excited to see more work done here.
We have three people on layout here, which I’d assume is too many cooks for one broth, but honestly most of this book is pleasing to the eye and extremely usable; I’m just surprised the larger navigational issues were missed. This feels reflective of a breakdown between the information design and the layout, which resulted in the incoherent sectioning I mentioned above earlier. This is as simple as changing approaches to headings or adding a section footer or header to help with navigation! It’s fully illustrated and laid out in a 2:1 column layout not dissimilar to the Explorer’s Template. The art is cartoonish, clean line work that really suits the otherwise clean lines. I really, really adore the cartography by Ezra Rose as well, which treads a line between the cartoonishness of the artwork and usability. The main negative of this cohesive aesthetic approach is that none of this art screams “turn the book around and show the players this image”; but y’know, I think I can live with that.
Overall, I have some conflicting opinions here: The cohesiveness of the module isn’t great from an information design standpoint point; I definitely couldn’t run this off a digital file, and I think if I printed it I’d have to label or colour code different sections to help with navigation, especially with the unorthodox location ordering. For this reason I think it’s a mistake to make the print as beautiful as it’s promised to be; it’s too pretty to be amenable to making up. But Beyond the Pale good enough at the nuts and bolts that I’m trying to figure out how I can bring it to the table. The setting is unique enough and successful at communicating why this tale could only be told through this cultural lens that I’d be excited to play through it, as well, which is saying something: It’s rare that vibes give me a strong urge to bring something to the table, but this really feels like something special.
Idle Cartulary