Rowan, Rook, and Decard (DIE, Eat The Reich) have announced an upcoming sourcebook for Heart: the City Beneath, Ways and Means, will begin crowdfunding July 15.
The first half of the book (the “Means”) focuses on player options. It adds three new classes (the freewheeling bardic Witness, the mind-warping fungal Blightborn and the Crawler, described by its author as a “bibically-accurate dungeoneer”) and three new Callings (Artist, Demagogue and Protector) kick off the player-facing half of the compendium.
Delvers can get also their hands on new allies and equipment to make their one-way trip into the depths easier, or at least more interesting, including:
– Hirelings: the legbreaker, the pole-carrier, the mumbler, the cook, and so on
– Pets: the watch-hog, the decidedly ignoble heartsblood horse, and the so-called Useless Worm
– Guns to shoot things with or blow up in their hands
– Drugs to bung up their noses in search of enlightenment or oblivion
– Artistic supplies including a paint that’s the metaphysical opposite of blue and “sculptor’s dynamite”
– Black market spells to buy from a shady wizard that let them step between tiers of the Heart, pin their soul to a moment in the past or absorb incoming hexes by jamming nails into a Witch’s heart
– Real AND fake religious artefacts including holy water, sacred shrouds, devotionally itchy shirts and a pampered scapegoat
The other half of the book – the “Ways” half – is devoted to Delves, and aimed at the Gamesmaster. They’ve broken down the Heart into domains and added hundreds of modular elements that GM’s can shuffle together and construct into thematic, interesting and dangerous journeys between islands of stability.
In this vein, they’ve added dozens of new Bounties – self-contained one-page jobs that a GM can plug into any ongoing game to act as a reason for player characters to chuck themselves headlong into disaster or to provide impetus for a one-shot game.
Original authors Chris Taylor and Grant Howitt (Heart, Spire, Paranoia, Eat the Reich, Honey Heist, Jason Statham’s Big Vacation) are joined by Elaine Lithgow (The Laundry Files, Imperium Maledictum, Soulbound), Eleanor Hingley (The Doctor Who RPG, Sin: A Spire Sourcebook), Thomas Manuel, Taylor Navarro (winner of the Diana Jones emerging designer award 2024), Pam Punzalan (D&D, World of Darkness, Pathfinder, Blades in the Dark) and Finley Palaniki.
Dagger in the Heart illustrator Sar Cousins returns to take the lead on art, and is joined by original Heart artist Felix Miall who’s drawing the three new classes.
The crowdfunding campaign for Ways and Means begins on July 15th. Backers will be able to get their hands on digital and hardcover copies of the book as well as The Delve Deck: a set of cards that provide a condensed version of the delve prompts in the book. If this is a backers’ first foray into the Heart, Rowan, Rook, and Decard has included bundle deals including the corebook and GM screen too. As with previous campaigns, supporters at higher tiers can have a hand in the contents of the book. A limited number of black market spells (or cursed items) that backers can sponsor and help create.
Backer can sign up for updates on Backerkit, with the game launching on July 15.
Images via Rowan, Rook, and Decard
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