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Our Brilliant Ruin ^[1] is: “the first story-world developed by Studio Hermitage. Created for multiple formats including tabletop and video games, Our Brilliant Ruin ^[2] features the Dramark, an elitist society unraveling against the backdrop of a preternatural catastrophe. Welcome to a gilded age in which upstairs-downstairs personal and sociological drama meets existential horror.”

Created by Justin Achilli, Pam Punzalan, and Rachel J. Wilkinson, the Our Brilliant Ruin tabletop roleplaying game is a speculative fiction setting-rich in a class-divided world falling into catastrophe inspired by Victoriana, Lovecraft, and Downton Abbey. The location for the game is a world spurred to invention in the wake of a dead star’s light touching the planet centuries ago. At first, the ruling upper classes failed to identify and deal with the issues caused by the Ruin. Now, all of humankind is suffering, and a deep-seated hatred bubbles through every interaction. The game centers human interactions in a class-based society of three strata that’s falling apart. Choose from the aristocracy, the truefolk operating in guilds, and the unbonded who refuse to live according to society’s dictates. Then, choose your faction within those layers, to align your values within a family, guild, or selected archetype.

The Lovecraftian elements quickly come into play, because before you create a character you learn there is no possible way to “win”. The light of the Ruin cannot be stopped and will continue to exact a heavy toll. Thus, what matters is whatever you decide. What would you do in the wake of fatalism? What would you do knowing the world will end no matter what you do?

Basic Rules and Character Creation

After almost ninety pages of setting, it’s time to build a character. Character creation is split into three templates pending your decision to play as a member of the aristocracy, truefolk, or an unbonded. Before making a decision, I recommend reviewing the character sheet on page 280 to give you a preview of the narrative-heavy gameplay. I would also strongly recommend reading through the rules before making your decisions, because your choices are important.

The rules of the game are explained in chapter 4 and outline the gamemaster’s and players’ roles. Whenever a player wants to take action, a negotiation between them and the gamemaster is triggered before the player rolls a pool of six-sided dice. This is to acknowledge there are several ways to approach a potential action, and it’s up to the player to declare how they want to proceed. After dice are rolled, the results are tabulated: only sixes and ones matter. Sixes are “brills” and indicated measures of success, whereas ones are “gloom” and represent failure or catastrophe. Health is measured by your physical well-being, Vitality, and by your mental and emotional health, or Distress. When either drops to zero, the player can no longer take any actions. In addition to your core stats, you can also affect your dice pool by adding Passion. Lastly, in Chapter 5, you and your fellow players devise “community property” or a shared estate you can use as your home base of operations.

The second-half of Our Brilliant Ruin is designed for the gamemaster and includes NPCs, both friends and foes, along with monsters, obstacles, environmental challenges, and a full gazetteer. Most gamemasters will want to pay special attention to the introductory adventure found on page 262. Fortunes Turn at Crowscroft Manor is essential to understanding gameplay and the roles both gamemasters and players have. A game centered on human interactions requires a different type of adventure design, because there needs to be pain-or-pressure points that invites the players to act.

Impressions

Though the societal structure is dominant in character creation, the Ruin (pgs. 78-79 and pg. 145) is omnipresent and disaster is all but guaranteed in subtle and overt ways. This style of horror can be both unpredictable and fun at the table, because the mold on a cellar’s walls could be caused by the Ruin–or it could simply be a moldy cellar. To counteract this, clear objectives, like the missions laid out in the sample adventure, are a necessity.

Who would enjoy playing this game? My first thought was fans of The Walking Dead. Though the society and its technology is circa early 20th century on a world succumbing to alien starlight, you and your friends are struggling investigators who know full well how dangerous the Ruin is–even if other people pretend they don’t. Just like a virus, you can’t fight the Ruin–but you must deal with its effects on people who suffer from its taint, whether they’re human or forever changed.

Art, Format, and Availability

Heavy on aesthetics, Our Brilliant Ruin provides gorgeous, evocative art that underlines the Dramark. The effects of the Ruin aren’t as dominant in the art as the characters, manors, and setting, however, and some white text is harder to read on the dark backgrounds in the two-column format. The hardcover has been printed in a brilliant edition, funded on Kickstarter, and a standard edition; collectors will want to know the brilliant edition’s cover art is designed similarly to the standard edition published by Dark Horse. The brilliant edition’s cover, however, is bound to perfection and covered with a fine, emerald-green linen and embellished with black-and-gold details. Inside, the brilliant edition features embossed end pages, gold foil edges, silk ribbons, and superior color printing to highlight the thematic art.

Our Brilliant Ruin is now available in hardcover and digital. The Our Brilliant Ruin TRPG corebook ^[1], map packs ^[3], and several Clawmoor Heights character packs ^[4] are available for free on DriveThruRPG.com ^[5].

Also available from Dark Horse is the Our Brilliant Ruin: Horror at Crane Mansion ^[6] graphic novel adaptation. You can read our review of the graphic novel here at FlamesRising.com ^[7].


An unsigned brilliant edition of the Our Brilliant Ruin TRPG was provided to FlamesRising.com for review. This review, written by Allie Brooks, contains affiliate links.