Rackham Vale
Rackham Vale is a classic fantasy setting for Old-School Essentials, written by Brian Saliba and Craig Schaffer and published by Crowbar Creative.
By Aaron T. Huss
Learn more about Rackham Vale here
Purchase Rackham Vale here (paid link)
Find other Old-School Essentials posts here
The following review refers to two separate properties:
- Arthur Rackham – British illustrator from the late-1800s / early-1900s. Illustrated many books, including many fairy tales such as Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm, Rip Van Winkle, and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.
- Old-School Essentials – latest OSR, retro-clone role-playing game, published by Necrotic Gnome. Books for both Classic Fantasy (Basic/Expert D&D) and Advanced Fantasy (Advanced 1st Edition D&D). Apparently retro-clone mechanically, but with a modern presentation.
Rackham Vale is a mini fey sandbox setting based on the artwork of Arthur Rackham, available in the public domain. It is designed for use with Old-School Essentials, but honestly it’s easily usable with other retro-clones, contains a lot of system-agnostic material, and could be converted if desired. Arthur Rackham’s artwork blends perfectly with the old-school fantasy theme as it exhibits a style that is very thematic, atmospheric (the background of the artwork is as illustrative as the figures in the foreground), and a colorization that feels like the age it came from. It’s a great way of visually capturing classic fantasy, although leaning towards stories that would come straight from a fairy tale. It is a very straightforward book that focuses on key locales and individuals while weaving adventure hooks throughout. There’s no one way to approach the setting, providing GMs with a multitude of uses!
There’s two things I really like about Rackham Vale. First, I love how different the detailed key figures are. Not how different they are from each other, although that’s a great value too, but how different they are from what you normally see in a fantasy bestiary. None of them simply exist; they have a purpose and are an integral part of the setting. Plus, they’re not the normal, run-of-the-mill fay you might see in fantasy settings. There just a bit different and they definitely are influenced by fairy tales.
Second, I love how the sandbox is designed. It starts with a map and descriptions of all the major locales (plus some bonus, deeper looks at a few locales) and includes why they are important to the setting. This is in opposition to many adventures that define why a locale is important to the adventure/campaign. This creates maximum flexibility to the GM to incorporate that locale in any way desired. Then weaved throughout is a large collection of adventure hooks (specifically defined or inferred), giving GMs a lot of content that can be stitched together in fun ways.
The only complaint I have about Rackham Vale is that it’s a bit crowded. There’s a lot of content squeezed into a small book and presented to ensure each entry flows smoothly. There’s very little white space plus a collection of black text against a light background and white text against a black background. Anyone that has difficulties reading or disabilities that make reading difficult will likely struggle with this book. Fixing this would require trimming down the content, but I bet it’s doable. This might be a non-issue for most players while serving as an issue for some.
I am not a fan of classic fantasy, especially the dungeon-crawling style. Rackham Vale, however, is something I appreciate and would enjoy playing many sessions in because it feels like something fresh and different. I can also see using this as a starting point for a lengthy campaign that centers on Rackham Vale (the location by the same name), building that setting outward and seeing what else there is to find!
