Burning Sands Review

[Etta Lesniak]

Rippedfrom the headlines: Five Baruch College Students Face Murder Charges in Fraternity Hazing Death. Also, but not at CUNY, Three Former Members of Florida A & M]Marching Band Sentenced in Hazing Death. BURNING SANDS depicts the horrors that take place in Greek life, regardless of race and ethnicity, and even at multi-ethnic, multicultural City University of New York commuter colleges.

BURNING SANDS tells the story of five black college students who literally risk their lives and sanity trying to pledge at Lambda Phi fraternity. There is the constant notion and expression of brotherhood throughout the film and that is completely ironic.

Z sustains a major injury to his ribs in the first five minutes of the film during a hazing session at Lambda Phi. Eventually, it becomes clear he suffered a fractured rib. Z has exceedingly difficulty breathing as he continues with the strenuous hazing despite the injury. At this point, if Z continues on with the heinous hazing process, he may turn out to be one of those broken men.

Zurich has a breaking point and decides to speak to Dean Richardson, played by Steve Harris, who is a Lambda Phi alumnus, about the brutal hazing process. Richardson becomes irate and demands that Z recite a poem from the frat. Richardson tells him that he will see him on the other side of the burning sands.

When hell night arrives, Zurich tells the guys that they are the descendants of kings and queens, not slaves. He continues to say that once they are a part of the fraternity, they will treat everyone with dignity and respect.

Frank continues to be pummeled, blow after blow, until he starts foaming at the mouth. All five end up in a hospital and Frank is in the worse condition. Eventually, we see Z crying and he finally call his fathers.

Blurb from the publisher: ''I came seeking adventure, death and vengeance... and I found Capharnaum. It called to me with its ancient gods and enmities, its mysterious quests, desert caravans and dusty souks. I was tracking a djinn, one of the worst, a marid risen in a rebellion against Marduk the Dragon. In the depth of the desert I had a vision of a thousand warriors crossing this scorching land. Here everything is in motion, wind and sand, and the night has a thousand colours. Everything is struggle, even for those who seek a peaceful life...' - From the First Odyssey to Kafer Nahum, by Jilali Ibn Malik Abd-Al-Hassan, holy warrior of Khsaaba

You bear the Dragon Mark. You are destined for great things, adventure where you'll write the history of the world. In a land of mysteries and magic, where East meets West on the burning sands of Jazirat, your future awaits. Discover a whole new world, confront djinn, gods and dragons, and take your place among the heroes of the age!

Capharnaum - The Tales of the Dragon-Marked is a fantasy roleplaying game set in a world of Arabian Nights, Argonauts, and Crusaders. Inspired by the One Thousand and One Nights, the myths of ancient Greece, and the legends of the Crusades, it's where history meets myth, and legends are born.

Capharnaum - The Tales of the Dragon-Marked, translated from the original French, appears in English for the first time. With a vibrant community and supported by a line of supplements and adventures, all you need to play is this book, paper and pencils, and a handful of six-sided dice.

For those not in the know, Capharnam (with a diaeresis) is a French RPG that has been in the market for over 10 years. The RPG's name is the French rendition of the village known in English as Capernaum. Capharnaum, the RPG's English edition (without a diaeresis) was kickstarted and already delivered its products by mid-2018. Interestingly, 'capharnaum' in English does not mean the village. It means 'a place marked by a disorderly accumulation of objects', a meaning that the French language does not have. We will examine together whether this a good or bad omen.

The book describes itself as follows: 'Capharnaum - The Tales of the Dragon-Marked is a roleplaying gameset in a "fantasy Arabian" cosmos. The heroes you'll play are people with a legendary destiny, chosen by the dragons, guardians of the celestial gates, to quest to gain entry to the kingdom of the gods.

Bearing the mystical Dragon Mark, your characters will have to show strength, cunning and bravery to one day be worthy to take their place beside Hubal, Shirad, or Aether, the mighty Lords of Creation.

Capharnaum is a land at the world's heart, close by a sunlit sea. At the crossroads of the trade routes, it's a strategic focal point for whoever would control access between its lands and peoples. It's a place where history is made and unmade, where the threads of the world's fate are woven.

Finally, far from the sea lanes, the Northern Marches are home to the barbarian tribes of the Krek'kaos. Although disorganised, the inhabitants of these hostile steppes and the mountain ranges of their cold-scoured fastnesses raid the sunny southlands every year.'

The book is divided in three parts: playing Capharnaum (the rules), The World of Capharnaum (detailing the setting), and Al-Rawi's Guide to Capharnaum. Al-Rawi is not an Elminster equivalent; the word literally means 'story teller' in Arabic. Interestingly, these three parts are broken down in nine chapters, each of which bears the name of one of the ancient Greek Muses.

Characters are Dragon-Marked; they literally bear a claw-like mark on their backs, an omen that they are destined for great things. There are fewer than a thousand Dragon-Marked born in the world in the last six hundred years. Firstly players choose their characters' blood, namely the tribe and clan in which they belong. There are three Great tribes (the Hassanids, the Salifah, and the Tarekid), each with three distinct clans. There are also however the Tribes of the Shiradim (the Jews of the setting), the Agalanthian City States (the Greeks of the setting), and the Quarterian Kingdoms (the Western crusaders), also with three distinct clans each. Each clan provides attribute and skills bonuses, as well as a suggested path. A path is a generic term that demonstrates the character's life-style. He might be a sand preacher, a holy warrior or a bacchant (from Bacchus, a man invested in decadent arts and debauchery), to name but three out of the eighteen paths out there. Blood and path are used optimally when connected, yet they do not have to. In some cases a good backstory is enough to justify it, while in others your character will be a pariah, a person to be avoided.

Each character has three heroic virtues (Bravery, Faith, Loyalty), the average of which provides his Heroism. They range from 1 to 6, and showcase a hero's importance in society while influencing path abilities. They are determined non-randomly through a pool of 10 points. Each character has five attributes, namely Strength, Constitution, Dexterity, Intelligence and Charisma. They also range from 1 to 6 and are determined non-randomly by allocating 11 points. The game offers eight archetypes (Adventurer, Labourer, Poet, Prince, Rogue, Sage, Sorcerer, Warrior), a player however does not simply pick one: he ranks all of them depending on how they fit his character. Each archetype is linked to certain skills (e.g. the warrior is linked to Combat Training, Command, Fighting, and Intimidate). All skills of your primary archetype gain 3 points (the 32 skills in the game are also ranked from 1 to 6), skills of your secondary archetype gain 2 points, while those of archetypes three to five gain 1 point each. Finishing touches include distributing some free points, as well as randomly creating the legend behind your character. This happens through a 4-roll process, with tables per blood, archetype, other archetypes, and dragon mark. To round out a character a player also answers questions about his past, and determines his wealth and possessions.

The unnamed system uses a pool of 2 to 15 six-siders for any of its skill rolls, attribute rolls, unskilled rolls, opposed rolls etc. A player rolls as many of them as his character's score in one of the five attributes. Sometimes an additional number of dice equal to skill number will be added. Following the roll, a number of the dice rolled equal to the attribute should be added in order to obtain a result. Players also have access to at least one dragon die which should be a different colour than the other ones. Dragon dice are exploding dice: their 6s are rerolled again ad nauseam. The result is then compared to the task's difficulty which ranges from 6 to 30+. Successful results with a strong participation from the dragon dice mean supernatural involvement. The dice that were not used to obtain the result determine the magnitude of success or failure according to a table. Rolling the same number on three or more dice when rolling for a particular task activates a character's special power. Before rolling, players may willingly hold a die out of the result pool and keep it in the magnitude pool in order to 'swagger', practically lowering their chances of success and increasing the chances that whatever comes, success or failure, will be spectacular. Modifiers on die rolling are divided to modifiers on the difficulty of the roll, and a modified number of dice rolled.

When it comes to combat, initiative is random and happens at the beginning of each round, in which a player can do any and all free actions (speak, drop something etc), two standard actions (defend, parry etc), attack once or cast a spell once plus an additional standard action, take a brutal attack action, or take a charge action. Inflicted damage equals the character's strength plus the weapon bonus plus the attack's magnitude result. Losing more than half your health in a single attack causes a major wound, and that's bad. In order to emphasize the game's cinematic feel, villains and heroes do not die by accident or simply because they are reduced to zero health. One must state that he tries to kill another, or executes a coup-de-grace on a defenseless victim. The 'epitaph' rule allows the player to utter a flamboyant/cheesy phrase before finishing off his opponent. There are three types of opponents: champions, valiant captains, and babouche-draggers, the mooks which attack (and are taken out) in droves. Each uses slightly different combat rules in order to showcase their importance in the narrative.

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