Review of City Guard Chronicles: The Case of the Misguided Lover

In your average game of D&D, most town or city guards are relegated to a minor NPC role, often serving as occasional obstacles or nuisances for the players. Afterall, most TTRPGs tend to lean heavily toward or embrace lawlessness.  Sure, there are many investigative games out there, but they too will often have players create private investigators, or some other independent entity that operates outside of any established system of law or government entity. For this reason, I was very excited to get my hands on a copy of today’s review. So, shine up your badge, and grab your manacles as we dive into City Guard Chronicles: The Case of the Misguided Lover (CGC).

The Game

City Guard Chronicles: The Case of the Misguided Lover is the first case in a series of investigative adventures created by Cyril Ronseaux and Jan “Jetty” Jetmar. Players take on the role of City Guard specialists who are tasked with investigating certain bizarre crimes in “The City,” a setting agnostic location designed to place it wherever you like within a medieval fantasy setting. The players/investigators will have the rank, skills, and agency to follow investigations as they see fit.     

The Book

The PDF (which I purchased for the review) is 37 pages long and details everything you will need to know about running a CGC Case. Additionally, new users will be happy to know that the PDF is meticulously linked between sections, which is especially helpful if, as a GM, you need to move between sections when referencing the case. The PDF is broken down as such:

City Guard Chronicles

• The City – info about districts, government and conversion to other established settings.
• The City Guard – details the structure of the City Guard including specialized units.  
• The Rules – Savage Worlds info including providing new Edges, Hindrances, Races, and compatibility with the Fantasy Companion. Additionally, there are guidelines for utilizing rules like networking, outlining guard behavior, calling in reinforcements, and the City Guard relationship with the arcane.

The Case of the Misguided Lover

• Background – provides a beautiful day by day breakdown of the events leading to the case.
• Dramatis Personae – covers the major players of the case including the victims, witnesses, etc.
• Overview – this is my favorite page, as it beautifully outlines and hyperlinks each section of all three acts.
• Prologue – an optional scenario in which you can begin the game.  Starting from this point will provide investigators with a nice call back to some helpful information, but its absence will not hinder the investigation.
• Act 1 – The Assignment – the introduction to the case and outlines the first location.
• Act 2 – The Investigation – outlines all of the possibilities regarding the various branches and leads that the investigators could possibly follow.
• Act 3 – The Conclusion – details how the investigators can resolve the case.  There are several variances dependent on certain factors of the investigation.
• Epilogue – provides suggestions on how to conclude the investigation.  As noted in Act 3, some factors may change, and depending on how the case goes there may be some unanswered questions which in turn could become another case!
• Cast – lists stats for all of the major and minor NPCs

Archetypes                

• This last section provides eight (8) completely pre-generated investigators to choose from. Each are wildly different, and have a myriad of useful Edges/Skills, and interesting Hindrances. 

It should also be noted that the PDF provides nice artwork that gets you into the spirit of the game.  Also, if the author is reading this, I totally got some Jay and Silent Bob vibes from the front cover… and I love it!

The System & Setting

Despite being setting agnostic, CGC is specifically designed for use with Savage Worlds Adventure Edition (SWADE).  The authors go into great lengths to flesh out custom Edges, alternative rules, archetypes, NPCs and the like. It would be difficult to unpair the system from the adventure, although not impossible.  With that being said, GMs will need a copy of SWADE to run a game of CGC along with any other optional supplemental material like the Fantasy Companion. Additionally, investigators start at a Seasoned rank, which is nice in a new game, and makes sense in the context of the game.

Since the setting was so easy to plug and play, I set the game for my group in the Forgotten Realms and called the game Law & Order: Waterdeep. Since both my players and I were familiar with the setting from previous games (Dragonheist, anyone?), it wasn’t hard to adapt this at all. Additionally, I could see this case working well in other settings like Lankhmar, Eversink or any other fantasy setting. 

Running The Case

Without going into spoilers, the investigation centers around a double homicide.  From the initial assignment, the investigators will be given plenty of evidence and trails to follow.  What is nice about the design of the case is that there are no real dead ends, and every branch will eventually lead you to a major break in the case. Certain skill rolls may provide more information in specific instances, but every location will give you something to work with. Also, new players and GMs will note that certain details of this case are dark and intended for a fantasy setting, so there will be fantastical/magical elements along with some gruesome subject matter. It should also be noted that the cases were inspired by the Hawk and Fisher series by Simor R. Green.       

My advice to new GMs is to read over the case at least twice. Memorize the patterns/connections, keep track of how long it’s taking your investigators to solve the case, and prepare for any unforeseen questions. My group is rather fastidious, and they took the investigation into places that I did not completely consider, which was great! Also, the complete picture of the case was a surprise to them until the last 10% of the session, making it even more tense for them as players.  

The Good

City Guard Chronicles is a master crafted sword in a sea of rusted blades. It pairs everything you want from the investigative genre with the solid mechanics of SWADE. If done right, it will have your players on the edge of their seats from beginning to end.

The Bad

Like most pre-generated material, GMs are going to have to do their homework to ensure this case runs smoothly. Also, I’m sure there are those players out in the world that do not like playing as “Johnny Law,” but that is their loss.

Overall

This is my first time writing a review for an adventure module as opposed to a core book or new system. I hope to see many more City Guard Chronicle cases in the future. Yes, buy it! Independent creators deserve like this deserve our support!