Last Days of Constantinople from Avalanche Press

Why did Constantinople get the works?
That's nobody's business but the Turks
--J. Kennedy and N. Simon

As you may already be aware, roleplaying games as we know them
evolved out of strategic combat games, which in turn evolved
from reenactments of historical battles. The Last Days of
Constantinople, a d20 adventure by Mike Bennighof,
PhD, for Avalance Press, pays homage to the
history of the world and to the history of roleplaying as well
by giving players an opportunity to experience not just a great
battle but about a week in the history of an ancient city.

The book is intelligently made, with notes in the beginning
about historical attitudes toward gender, magic, race, and
hygiene; historical facts about money, food, clothing, and
weapons; and a few notes about how to adjust game mechanics to
fit the historical perspective-most notably alignment, which is
redefined a bit and made more internal, so that it describes a
person's internal motivations rather than allegiance. In this
module, a Lawful Good emperor and a Lawful Good sultan make war
on one another, their troops commit atrocities against each
other, and a full range of alignments exists on both sides.
This is not a classic battle of good versus evil but a realistic
battle over land and religion, where each side justifies its own
evils by vilifying the other.

The treatment of gender strikes a reasonable balance between
fairness and historical accuracy: female adventurers will be
welcome, as Constantinople needs all the warriors it can get,
but at the same time they are likely to make the Byzantine men
uncomfortable. Players wishing to play female characters are
likely to encounter prejudice but will not be barred from
participation.

Other notable adjustments: Magic is considered evil, so players
wishing to use magic will need to find ways to do it in secret.
Demihuman characters are possible but not recommended and will
be looked on with more suspicion than armed women. The wide
range of deities available to most d20 characters is, of course,
out. Player characters may be Catholic, Orthodox, or, for those
wishing another roleplaying challenge, Jewish (see notes on
female and demihuman characters above). Anyone practicing other
religions will have to do so in secrecy. However, while magic
is not socially acceptable, players do get to benefit from
prayer, mostly in the form of bonuses to will, fortitude, and
some saving throws. Another adjustment: because of the nature
of the adventure, player characters are more likely to die than
in other modules, so Dr. Bennighof has included a system of
Honor and Glory so that even characters who die-especially those
who die valiantly-can be rewarded for their actions.

With all of these variations, it is not surprising that the
module opens with an introduction suggesting that players will
want to set their fantasy-based characters aside and create new
characters specifically for this adventure. This seems like a
very good idea for players whose usual characters would not have
fit comfortably into the actual Medieval world; however, for
people wanting to start a campaign, this adventure may cause
some vexing concerns. By choosing a major turning point in
history as the starting point for an adventure for first- to
third-level characters, Dr. Bennighof has given the player
characters what is likely to be the high point of their lives
relatively early in their careers. Any adventures to follow
this one will inevitably be bound to the same standard of
historical accuracy, and attempts to top it will likely be
either anachronistic or anticlimactic.

On top of this, the use of specific historical events means that
(a) there are certain outcomes the player characters cannot
alter no matter what they do, and (b) the settings that are
detailed in the book will be destroyed, or, at the very least,
occupied, and therefore useless after the end of this adventure.
For these reasons, I wonder whether Dr. Bennighof might have
been wiser to write a sourcebook on Constantinople, with the
adventure module occupying a chapter toward the end of the book.

Given that he did not, he did an excellent job making a playable
adventure from this material. Known historical facts are
intermingled with gray areas where the players get to take part
in events that might easily have happened. The players cannot
save the city, but they will have a mission of their own,
possibly more than one, and the opportunity to make meaningful
choices of their own. In the players' primary mission, the GM
is given five different possibilities to choose from-ostensibly
to prevent unfair use of player knowledge, but with the added
benefit of allowing the GM to do a tiny bit of worldbuilding
within the module, to tailor the adventure to his or her own
gaming group.

This is overall a highly customizable adventure, with elements
of roleplaying, problem solving, and combat all written in to
the adventure in such a way that a good GM should have little
trouble shifting this balance to whatever the players enjoy
most. The NPCs are simple but sharply defined, the mysteries
adjustable to suit the group, and the adversaries brave and
plentiful. These challenges arise in a variety of environments,
and player characters can do their politicking in churches,
palaces, and brothels, and their fighting on barges, in tunnels,
and at the breach in the city walls.

The book ends with a historical note on the places, events, and
characters in the adventure, giving some insight into what was
actual and what was fabricated for the module. The history
appears to be well researched, though, not being a historian
myself, I cannot vouch for it with certainty. I would recommend
that anyone planning to run this adventure do a little research
on the side. I found the information at
www.greece.org/Romiosini/fall/html to be very useful, if
a bit dry, and mostly consistent with the information in the
module, though there were one or two notable discrepancies, and
at least one means of escape for player characters who have
fought valiantly up until the very end that was described in the
article but overlooked in the module.

For those wishing to develop a campaign from this adventure, the
Avalanche Press website www.AvalanchePress.com does not
outline a specific plan for sequels but mentions one d20
adventure (for 2nd to 4th level characters) that takes place in
the following year and another not yet completed module that
The Last Days of Constantinople appears to
foreshadow. It seems that those who wish it can find much to do
if they start their adventuring careers in Constantinople.

Added: November 6th 2001
Reviewer: David Sklar
Score:
Related Link: AvalanchePress
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Language: eng