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Vaesen RPG – Mythic Carpathia
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
October 29, 2025
Mythic Carpathia is a brilliant expansion, and it’s an obvious setting to explore through Vaesen’s dark, atmospheric world. Having read some of The Witcher books, several of the creatures in the series are familiar, and it is wonderful to learn more about other nations’ folklore.
The three mysteries in the books are thematic, complex, and intriguing, and I imagine any investigators embarking on them will have their work cut out for them.
Having now covered Scandinavia, the British Isles, and Eastern Europe, I hope the Vaesen team will look outside the continent for the next setting. Mythic Japan, Africa, or South America is a welcome addition, and to explore some of the mythical beings native to these regions, through Vaesen’s respectful approach, would be interesting to many otherwise mostly exposed to Western-European folklore.
The three mysteries in the books are thematic, complex, and intriguing, and I imagine any investigators embarking on them will have their work cut out for them.
Having now covered Scandinavia, the British Isles, and Eastern Europe, I hope the Vaesen team will look outside the continent for the next setting. Mythic Japan, Africa, or South America is a welcome addition, and to explore some of the mythical beings native to these regions, through Vaesen’s respectful approach, would be interesting to many otherwise mostly exposed to Western-European folklore.
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May 3, 2026How? I got Mythic Carpathia, City of My Nightmares, and the Vaesen starter set from the kickstarter.
What? The Vaesen starter set is exactly that -- a shortened form of the rules, a beginner adventure (a ghost in a castle), and several accessories.
City of My Nightmares is a series of adventures around a magical luck-giving cursed monster known as a spertus, now owned by a cork magnate who wants to avoid going to Hell.
Mythic Carpathia is a guide to the Carpathian area, including Prague, Ukraine, etc. -- but mostly here because of the vampire and other monsters; it ends with a few adventures.
I'm going to spoil a bunch here after the break.
Yeah, so? Sometime when leafing through City of My Nightmares, I thought, "Vaesen wouldn't have as much success as it does without the art of Johan Egerkrans."
Like, I might be wrong, or simply have read these in a bad mood but: this doesn't work. I mean, stepping back, there's an investigation game here that shares issues with many investigation games: how do you make sure people find the clues and act on them enough to figure out the next step. When you have investigation _campaigns_, that problem grows -- how do the clues and problems from one adventure help get you to the next adventure without giving away the mystery of that adventure.
Meh, ok, let's look at some things and try to be a little less grump and a little more precise.
The Starter set is fine -- but doesn't feel necessary.
City of My Nightmares has 4 adventures, none of which I particularly like: the first involves a werewolf, and I think is actually fine for the idea of transplanting myths into the city. (which is what the foreword mentions); the others involve a murdered wife getting revenge in a country house (fine, but not city enough); a romp through the memories of a past member of the Society, which secretly lets you find where the artifact is (fine, but ... going into someone's memories is a little odd in this context and not really thematically interesting); and finally a battle in the city to keep a monster from inflaming riots (which is a good theme, but by this point I'm not that interested).
Mythic Carpathia has a pretty surface level guide to the area and peoples; a much more interesting look at the monsters; and three adventures, which I actually mostly like: a mostly benign vampire lord faces revenge from a former consort (whose parents he did kill), who is trying to bring down the lord using the lord's pet werewolf, which itself is looking to gain enough power to escape; a prison warden returns to the prison/former monastery where he accidentally killed a nun, who has turned into a monster; and a golem story where the twist is that it's a Christian who made the golem and also the city is facing riots because of the horrible deaths. (Which is ok, but also feels... kinda random -- the weakest of the bunch.)
So overall... I've been collecting Free League RPGs and I mostly like them, but Vaesen might be towards the bottom. And this clutch of products kinda keeps it there. Is there anything that we could take? Well, the art -- and maybe the frame of this not as PC monster-hunters, but as PC monster-investigators who keep finding that humans are part of the problem.
What? The Vaesen starter set is exactly that -- a shortened form of the rules, a beginner adventure (a ghost in a castle), and several accessories.
City of My Nightmares is a series of adventures around a magical luck-giving cursed monster known as a spertus, now owned by a cork magnate who wants to avoid going to Hell.
Mythic Carpathia is a guide to the Carpathian area, including Prague, Ukraine, etc. -- but mostly here because of the vampire and other monsters; it ends with a few adventures.
I'm going to spoil a bunch here after the break.
Yeah, so? Sometime when leafing through City of My Nightmares, I thought, "Vaesen wouldn't have as much success as it does without the art of Johan Egerkrans."
Like, I might be wrong, or simply have read these in a bad mood but: this doesn't work. I mean, stepping back, there's an investigation game here that shares issues with many investigation games: how do you make sure people find the clues and act on them enough to figure out the next step. When you have investigation _campaigns_, that problem grows -- how do the clues and problems from one adventure help get you to the next adventure without giving away the mystery of that adventure.
Meh, ok, let's look at some things and try to be a little less grump and a little more precise.
The Starter set is fine -- but doesn't feel necessary.
City of My Nightmares has 4 adventures, none of which I particularly like: the first involves a werewolf, and I think is actually fine for the idea of transplanting myths into the city. (which is what the foreword mentions); the others involve a murdered wife getting revenge in a country house (fine, but not city enough); a romp through the memories of a past member of the Society, which secretly lets you find where the artifact is (fine, but ... going into someone's memories is a little odd in this context and not really thematically interesting); and finally a battle in the city to keep a monster from inflaming riots (which is a good theme, but by this point I'm not that interested).
Mythic Carpathia has a pretty surface level guide to the area and peoples; a much more interesting look at the monsters; and three adventures, which I actually mostly like: a mostly benign vampire lord faces revenge from a former consort (whose parents he did kill), who is trying to bring down the lord using the lord's pet werewolf, which itself is looking to gain enough power to escape; a prison warden returns to the prison/former monastery where he accidentally killed a nun, who has turned into a monster; and a golem story where the twist is that it's a Christian who made the golem and also the city is facing riots because of the horrible deaths. (Which is ok, but also feels... kinda random -- the weakest of the bunch.)
So overall... I've been collecting Free League RPGs and I mostly like them, but Vaesen might be towards the bottom. And this clutch of products kinda keeps it there. Is there anything that we could take? Well, the art -- and maybe the frame of this not as PC monster-hunters, but as PC monster-investigators who keep finding that humans are part of the problem.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews