Ill Met In Lankhmar (A Gamers Gaming Getaway 2022)

RPG system: Ill Met In Lankhmar
Participants: 1 GM, 6 players

By

A Gamers Gaming Getaway (2022), Blackwells Adventure Centre, Near Bromsgrove, B60 1PY, United Kingdom

Alan Morrigan

Description

“And Ningauble began to sort out in his mind the details of the Mouser’s story, treasuring it the more because he knew it was an improvisation, his favourite proverb being, “He who lies artistically, treads closer to the truth than ever he knows.”

― Fritz Leiber, Swords in the Mist

Six thieves, and only one that would call themself such, and then with the pomposity of a prince. Six thieves in old Lankhmar, set to be hung inventively each particular to their proposed crime, and by Thieves that always capitalize their profession. It is an hour as the thirteen clocks would reckon it, perhaps two until they can agree, and if the winds that wander the corridors of the guild turn just so then perhaps the six will hear that reveille to the last of their lives.

Ill Met in Lankhmar is a role-playing game for up to six players set in the literary world of Nehwon by Fritz Leiber. It is not necessary for have read the books, nor even the excellent Mike Mignola adaptations, for it should be noted that the city of Lankhmar was that originally pastiched by Pratchett in Ankh Morpork (and which over the years simply gave up and accepted that it was Lankhmar after all). Published between 1939 to 1988 the Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser stories are the grandparents of every fantasy city of thieves that followed, and which is so familiar to us today. Wretched, fabulous, wondrous, decadent, dangerous yet delightful Lankhmar began it all.

Though the characters are pre-generated (and gender neutral until adopted by a player) their skills are still quickly adjusted to that player’s preference. The system is quick, simple, and frankly rarely used unless at times of particular stress or difficulty. This is a role-playing game, not a wargame, and investment in the character, clever thinking, wit and passing cooperation will see the character to better things than those nasty moments when hand has to reach for dice.

The game will get going quickly and will come to a conclusion. Whether at the end of the tale or that of a rope.

And as Neil Gaiman has said, ‘I learned how to play the game of literature—a game of power and precision and elegance—from reading Fritz Leiber, but it was a lesson I learned in fits, chasing his stories across scattershot anthologies.’

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