Astro Jones, Steven Cummings Arcana Academy character. Sketch by Steven Cummings
COVID-19 and quarantine changed my tastes in roleplaying games. Before them, I liked moodier RPG settings like World of Darkness, high drama D&D, and Powered by the Apocalypse games that turned on the emotions that drove the characters. I could really get into a night of over the top, melodramatic roleplaying.
That was, until people started dying in a new and unexpected way and exiting the safety of your home became a gamble. That flipped a switch in the pleasure centers of my grey matter. By late March, I had zero interest in pursuing darkness at the gaming table or in other media. I needed a new taste, something light and wholesome. My viewing habits went from genre fair targeting adults to Harry Potter, The Worst Witch, and Just Add Magic, largely genre shows targeting young audiences. For the gaming table, a friend suggested that we mirror those habits. Thus, Arcana Academy by Jordan Palmer.
Steven Cummings (co-creator and artist of Wayward through Image Comics as well as the artist of Champions at Marvel Comics and many more)
Steven plays Astro Jones
“In the world before, Aaron Anders had a different life with a different family… Until the White Light washed them away.” ~ The Echo Effect by John McGuire
Most of our group has gamed together since the 80s/90s. There are more players including the GM, Wolf, who shared a few reviews / interview with me, but these articles will focus on the feedback from Steven, John, and I.
THE PLAYERS
Steven Cummings:
“When COVID appeared the world I work in, the comic book industry, got hit hard like everywhere else and suddenly I had a much freer schedule. Egg invited me to join in for a game or two just like old times and I was happy to actually get to play a character in a game instead of running one. At home, my kids and I play a lot of D&D and I am the DM for those games responsible for game prep, calculating experience points, and refereeing fights over treasure. I haven’t just played in decades and given the state of the world this was a welcome offer. In fact, the last time I played was with some of the very same people as are in this current group. You can grow up but you can’t outgrow your very first RPG group!
Art by Steven Cummings
When I found out this was a Harry Potter kind of world that just made it better and I was all set to play a Hagrid kind of character but with probably a mullet and a skinny tie. Maybe a pork pie hat. But the GM insisted I make an original character so Astro Jones was my next best idea. An interesting bit of trivia but I borrowed the name from a character I made for a Rifts campaign that got put on hold when COVID started.”
John McGuire:
“Why did I play? Well, that was what the GM said we were going to play!
Weirdly, I don’t have some deeper connection to the whole Magic Kids worlds like Harry Potter or The Worst Witch, but I do have a connection to the various 80s movies where the kids were the heroes saving the day (Goonies, Last Navigator, Monster Squad). I love the idea of playing these kids who are just about as clueless about the bigger world as I might be about specific references. I can lean into my ignorance all the better that way.”
ARCANA ACADEMY
Art from the Arcana Academy RPG
This column will dive into our campaign using the Powered by the Apocalypse RPG, Arcana Academyby Jordan Palmer. Described as a “tabletop role-playing game where you get to play as students attending a magical school. Solve mysteries, get into trouble, learn magic, and forge lasting friendships or bitter rivalries.” While the game is influenced by Hogwarts or The Magicians’ Brakebills, we tilted more Harry Potter than Quentin Coldwater.
However, before we get into the campaign (that’ll be in a future article, this is preamble), it’s timely to discuss the franchises that inspired our take on this game. While the obvious material is Harry Potter, both the books and the movies, we also owe a debt to The Worst Witch and more.
HARRY POTTERING
Steven Cummings:
“One of the biggest properties in the modern entertainment world is Harry Potter, and the take on magic is very fresh compared to the old D&D system of magic that a lot of us have dealt with. The fact that magic doesn’t disappear from our character’s minds when we cast out spells makes this a much more interesting way to play magic using characters even if the characters are only 11 and annoying. In some of our cases, very annoying. In a lot of ways this game is about taking a single spell and adapting it in different unique ways to try and achieve new results and that kind of creative thinking makes this game very fun to sit in on. If only I rolled better. I kind of worry I am approaching Egg levels of crappy dice results. Seriously dude, did you jinx my dice rolling through the internet or something…”
[AUTHOR’S NOTE: I can’t roll for $#!%! My rolls are so bad that there are times the awful bleeds over to others. In Steven’s case, I don’t do it intentionally. Most of the time.]
John McGuire:
The Crossing by Robert Jeffrey II, John McGuire, and Sean Damien Hill
“Here’s the biggest blasphemy in this article, I’ve watched three, maybe four of the movies… that’s it.
Now before you come to my house and yell at me, [AUTHOR’S NOTE: Too late. Egg went to John’s house and yelled at him about not watching all of Harry Potter!] I do like what I’ve seen, but now it’s become that idea of needing to watch all of the films in a marathon style fashion. So it’s going to happen; it just hasn’t yet.
That said, I think that the world of Harry Potter is now my default image of what the campaign is playing. The weird bits of magic and ghosts and monsters that are never too far away from your dorm room door. The strange classes that you go to where, really, they shouldn’t be teaching any of that stuff to such young kids. Heck, the idea that the kids are just as likely to research some crazy spell on their own without the adult supervision is just sitting there. I mean, you’re not going to do exactly as your told when you are 10 years old, are you?”
[AUTHOR’S NOTE: While on the subject of Harry Potter, it’s important to say that JK Rowling’s views on trans individuals are upsetting and we reject them. Trans rights are human rights. However, Rowling’s draconian thinking does not lessen the appeal of the worldbuilding behind Harry Potter. Ultimately, we took the high level concepts from those books to use in our game without setting the game in the Potterverse. In this instance, we’re getting to legally use the parts of the works we enjoy without financing their creator’s POV.]
THE WORST WITCHING
For those that haven’t read or seen The Worst Witch (TWW), it’s a book series by Jill Murphy as well as a 1980s TV movie starring Fairuza Balk and Tim Curry, a pair of 90s/early 2000s TV series, and, currently, a series on BBC and Netflix in it’s 4th season (the 4th season dropped last week in the US, though it’s been out in England for several months). Each of the series follows Mildred Hubble, the worst witch at Miss Cackle’s Academy for Witches, who is, generally, poor at the craft she only recently discovered. Mildred and friends, typically because of Mildred’s lack of skill, get into mischief that impacts their school. Unlike Harry Potter, TWW’s stakes are not the future of the Earth, they’re more tangible concerns like being expelled or transforming back from a pig. The book series is episodical with simple plots and antics. The current series takes the books and elevates them with solid scripts, acting, and easy to digest continuity. While most of the special effects are low budget, they have moments that really work. As a whole, the lightness and hope of the series speaks to me in these dark times. From that, the campaign pulls just enough flavor to feel like its akin to TWW without forcing each player to read the books and all of the series to insure they’re not missing anything.
THE FOUNDATION LAID
When writing about campaigns I’ve enjoyed, I like to lay out the foundation. Why we’re playing, where we cribbed from, and how that influences the game. This is no different. As I stated at the top, quarantine and the new normal impacted my tastes. It turns out, Arcana Academy was to all our likings. It’s a solid time that I will write about to relive some of the joys I’ve experienced.
In the next installment we’ll discuss Arcana Academy itself as well as other wizarding school RPGs.
PLAYER BIOS
Wayward Book One by Jim Zub and Steven Cummings
Steven Cummings likes to draw. He’s been doing comic books since sometime in 2002 and has worked for too many companies to count. He also does art for RPGs. His recent RPG clients are Palladium Books, Battlefield Press, and Kenzer and Co. His recent comic book work is his creator owned comic series from Image called Waywardand from Marvel Comics is Champions and Fantastic Four 2099. Steven and Egg used to hang out in high school and do nothing but talk about comic books and eat junk food. Good times.
Steven Cummings is available to produce illustrations for games and comics. He can be contacted via Twitter and Facebook for work inquiries.
John McGuire is the author of the science-fiction novel The Echo Effect, the dark fantasy novel Hollow Empire, and the urban fantasy novel The Dark That Follows. In addition, he writes comics as well, including the steampunk graphic novel the Gilded Age and the parallel worlds sliding comic, The Crossing, and co-author of the RPG zine, Love’s Labour’s Liberated for 5e [physical copies available via itch.io].
Egg Embry participates in the OneBookShelf Affiliate Program and is an Amazon Associate. These programs provide advertising fees by linking to DriveThruRPG and Amazon.
In Our Dreams Awake #1: A Cyberpunk/Fantasy Adventure
By Egg Embry, John McGuire, Edgar Salazar, and Rolands Kalniņš with a variant cover by Sean Hill
"Jason Byron can't wake up. Each moment feels real, yet each moment feels like a dream. Issue #1 of a dreampunk comic book series coming to Kickstarter."
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I’m a freelance RPG journalist that writes RPG crowdfunding news columns for EN World, the Open Gaming Network, and the Tessera Guild, as well as reviews for Knights of the Dinner Table and, now, d20 Radio. I've successfully crowdfunded the RPG zines POWERED by the DREAMR and Love’s Labour’s Liberated.
NOTE: Articles may includes affiliate links. As a DriveThruRPG Affiliate/Amazon Associate/Humble Partner I earn from qualifying purchases.
“One of the biggest properties in the modern entertainment world is Harry Potter, and the take on magic is very fresh compared to the old D&D system of magic that a lot of us have dealt with. The fact that magic doesn’t disappear from our character’s minds when we cast out spells makes this a much more interesting way to play magic using characters even if the characters are only 11 and annoying. In some of our cases, very annoying. In a lot of ways this game is about taking a single spell and adapting it in different unique ways to try and achieve new results and that kind of creative thinking makes this game very fun to sit in on. If only I rolled better. I kind of worry I am approaching Egg levels of crappy dice results. Seriously dude, did you jinx my dice rolling through the internet or something…”
For those that haven’t read or seen The Worst Witch (TWW), it’s a book series by Jill Murphy as well as a 1980s TV movie starring Fairuza Balk and Tim Curry, a pair of 90s/early 2000s TV series, and, currently, a series on BBC and Netflix in it’s 4th season (the 4th season dropped last week in the US, though it’s been out in England for several months). Each of the series follows Mildred Hubble, the worst witch at Miss Cackle’s Academy for Witches, who is, generally, poor at the craft she only recently discovered. Mildred and friends, typically because of Mildred’s lack of skill, get into mischief that impacts their school. Unlike Harry Potter, TWW’s stakes are not the future of the Earth, they’re more tangible concerns like being expelled or transforming back from a pig. The book series is episodical with simple plots and antics. The current series takes the books and elevates them with solid scripts, acting, and easy to digest continuity. While most of the special effects are low budget, they have moments that really work. As a whole, the lightness and hope of the series speaks to me in these dark times. From that, the campaign pulls just enough flavor to feel like its akin to TWW without forcing each player to read the books and all of the series to insure they’re not missing anything.
