High-quality fairytales: A review of Rackham Vale Paintbox Edition

A few years back, Geek Native had a preview of Rackham Vale original edition which featured an introduction from the author Brian Saliba.

A few weeks ago, a copy of the Paintbox Edition was supplied to Geek Native for review. Wouldn’t it be awkward if I was underwhelmed by the production quality or left uninspired by the locations?

Fortunately, the book is a delight! Now, hold up, is this suspect? A review copy and one followed by a preview? I took the time to film a quick video tour of the book so you can see for yourself. Rackham Vale Paintbox Edition sings a siren song of quality.

What is Rackham Vale?

Inspired by the fantasy and folklore art of the 19th-century golden age illustrator Arthur Rackham, Rackham Vale is a drop-in setting for Old-School Essentials.

I think it’s easily adapted to most fantasy systems, however.

Rackham drew fairytales and relatively high fantasy. That’s to say monsters, but perhaps not war beasts and high magic. Thus, Rackham Vale has a similar style. We’re dealing with villages, villagers with down-to-earth problems, lurking monsters, and some folklore-style horror.

The book is centred around the map of the Vale. The Paintbox Edition has a bleed down the middle of the two-page map, an enhancement from the first Kickstarter zine in which some details were lost in the page join.

Taking up nearly half of the book are details of key features in this map. For example, the Old Keep, Chalcot Village, the Stinkwood and the Alchemist’s Tower.

As you read the location, you’ll first be told who and what is there, then what is interesting about the place and then some encounters and motivations. Those last two are a table which you can roll once or twice on for, essentially, on-theme wandering monsters.

The set-up is designed to aid GMs by getting information out clearly and quickly.

The other big chunk of the book is the Bestiary. It’s here that Rackham’s art is used cleverly to bring the setting to a dangerous life. The authors have skillfully drawn on publicly available art to illustrate the setting.

Monsters lean heavily into the Brothers Grimm and other folklore-led warnings with critters like The Fish King, Root Trolls, The Serpentangle and The Damsel of Distress.

Each monster comes with OSE stats, which are easy to understand even if you need to get used to the rule system.

There’s more in the book, such as adventure hooks and plenty of appendices. Importantly, only some things have been included. By design and necessity, there are places and things mentioned in the text that the GM must imagine. I like this, I know some won’t, but I’m with writers Brian Saliba and Craig Schaffer that it’s good to make a place your own by conjuring up entities unique to you.

Rackham Vale’s ease of use and design

I appreciate the quality of the production of the Paintbox Edition. Is it too early to be talking about Christmas? I only go there because Rackham Vale is the sort of book you an give someone as a gift and impress them.

The original edition is the result of a Zine Quest challenge on Kickstarter and must be black and white as a result. The Paintbox Edition has no such limitations and is a colourful success.

Underlined words and phrases are a touch of magical genius in Rackham Vale and are used to signal secrets. This means you can, as a GM, scan a location notes and see what details you should reward the players with as their characters explore. You also see what not to use as flavour and what’s likely important.

The book has two ribbons, which are almost essential for anyone running a game from it. I’m the sort of GM who ends up with a half dozen sticky tabs when using paper (rare these days, I admit) and the foresight to include some bookmarks means Rackham Vale is twice as likely to be plucked from my shelves.

Supporting the bookmarks is a table of contents, but there’s no index. There’s a list of backers from the Kickstarter because that’s the required page sacrifice, and I suspect it comes at the expense of the index.

Overall

I’m almost annoyed that Rackham Vale uses the word zine. I’ve nothing against zines, but this book feels, reads, and runs like a deluxe professional edition.

I’ve had time only to use Rackham Vale as support material, switching the name of a village and dropping it in as an encounter in a different game system. That was a straightforward manoeuver and a rewarding one, a bit like walking off one train and being able to walk across the platform into the waiting first-class carriage of another. It worked so well that it felt good.

I’m not a fan of linear pre-written adventures. The lines the authors imagine are never the paths the players follow. I wish more adventures were designed and presented like Rackham Vale.

I’ll say the heresy now and at the end of the review. The art of Arthur Rackham, the inspiration headline, is just a nice thing to have. The thoughtful RPG aspects of the book give Rackham Vale lasting value, and the production value, including expert layout, makes it shine.

Quick Links

• Preview: Original edition.
• Buy: PDF | Hardcover.

Disclaimer: Geek Native’s copy was provided for free to review. We did not get the colour bestiary cards, so no mention of them has been made, but they look stunning too..