3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Not At All Essential, But An Interesting GM Resource, 14 Jan 2011
By Stephen Mann - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Malleus Monstorum Call of Cthulhu (Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying Game) (Paperback)
Anyone new to Call of Cthulhu, especially those coming from the D&D world, could be forgiven for thinking the game might benefit from a "Monster Manual".
I can tell such people that because of the completeness of the rulebook back to the earliest versions, the need for this volume is imaginary. The latest version of The Call of Cthulhu has a bestiary which should fuel any campaign for years (remember that Mythos Creatures are often repeat performers, not single-episode walk on targets for players to coat with arrows and fireballs). I have a very extensive collection of published scenarios and campaigns for the game and I can't recall ever seeing anything in them that wasn't either in the rulebook or described in the publication itself.
That said, this volume contains a staggering amount of information on just about every monstrous thing that should not be that has ever waved a tentacle or pulsed with colors unknown to earthly beings. A Keeper/GM will find a wealth of useful information with which to pad out his bad-guy arsenal.
The incidental artwork is superb too, depicting circus posters, tarot cards, Mesoamerican antiquities and so forth, all subtly (and not-so subtly) altered in some vile mythos fashion. I found myself doing spit-takes on more than one occasion while browsing through it.
Production-wise, what you have is a perfect-bound paperback, with black and white printing throughout on almost 300 pages. The only color you'll find is on the cover. Personally, I wish they'd put out this one as a hardback with stitched signatures and a cloth binding so that it would be easier to use in-game and harder wearing, but if wishes were pennies we'd all be living on our own Tropical Islands. Should Chaosium ever make a hardcover version, I would buy it (and I already have this volume *and* several versions of the rulebook).
As it stands it is good value for money as these things go, notwithstanding my earlier assertion that this is definitely a Call of Cthulhu luxury item rather than an essential addition to the core rulebook (there is in fact no such thing - the rulebook, some RPG supplies and a few friends are all you'll need).
I would even go out on a limb and say that the Trail of Cthulhu GM and the Realms of Cthulhu GM would also find this volume of interest, if not so immediately usable without some conversion work.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
More monsters than you can shake a stick at, 22 Jan 2008
By Skyman "Simon" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Malleus Monstorum Call of Cthulhu (Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying Game) (Paperback)
I play Call of Cthulhu by Chaosium and this resource book is great for Keepers to draw from. Enough monsters and Old ones for any investigation. BRP is easy to convert to D20 so those folks into that will have no problem throwing into a D20 scenario/campaign. The most notable thing outside the content is the art work. Seems to take old photos/Ads/Artwork and splice mythos flavor into it. I recently used an avatar of nylarthotep in the book in one of my games with fun results. Makes designing encounters easier and fun.
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Best collection of monsters ever for a RPG, 22 July 2008
By Arashi Ravenblade - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Malleus Monstorum Call of Cthulhu (Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying Game) (Paperback)
At my heart im a D&D players and love monster books. In the last few years I have gotten in Lovecrafts works and have begun to pick up the games books by chaosium. Then I found this little gem.
A collection of almost evey God, Old one, Elder, monster and normal animal from Chaosiums books. Im sure there are more, but that only means there will be a Malleus Monstrorum II.
THe Lore is well written and the book is made of good quality, though I wish there was a Hardcover.
My only complaint is there werent enough pictures of the beasties to give me a good idea of what they looked like, only a vague description. Now I have pretty good imagination but an imagincation usually needs something to go off of. And This is where the product fails. It doesnt give you enough of a physical description. The lack of pictures would have been fine if replaced by some great descriptions.
Overall though this is a great book. Any Lovecraft fan should buy this book, evne if you do not play the game.