Go Gentry Through The Hedgerow

Ever since Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson termed D&D'scharacter options 'Classes', RPG designers have searched for different nomenclature: profession, archetype, career, template, etc. They're all 'Classes' really and there must be a tiny sorrow in the heart of every new designer, because whatever cool name you come up with for your RPG character types, once the game gets played, everyone is going to call them 'Classes.'

In Through The Hedgerow, I make my bid for immortality by terming my character classes 'Gentries' - partly because it's got an Olde English flavour to it that matches the game's Dickensian and folkloric themes, partly from the Latin gens meaning a clan or nation. Let's see if it catches on!

Buggebers

Buggebers are a Fay Gentry: they are headless trolls birthed from nightmare who (usually) serve the Dark, when they're not pursuing their own hideous hunger. They have teeth in their neck stumps, long prehensile tongues, hairy misshapen bodies, and big claws.

Peter Johnston's weirdly wonderful art for Through The Hedgerow. Here's a Buggeber from the Age of Steel (18th century), enjoying fine dining.

Not a very attractive option for a player character? Well, it takes all types. But in Through The Hedgerow all PCs are servitors of the Light, so how does this come about?

Perhaps your Buggeber is a condemned prisoner of the Light, fully deserving to be punished for their crimes, but offered a reprieve if they serve the Briar Company of Sky and Furrow. You're still a nasty piece of work, but fear keeps you in line (unless you think no one is looking!).

Or perhaps you're on the run from the Dark, having betrayed your ghastly masters or let them down in some nefarious task. The Light offers you protection, in return for service, but your monstrous nature is still unredeemed.

Then again, perhaps you seek redemption and a way to atone for your sins. Or perhaps you have become enamoured with humanity, or one particular human, or a place or a family, that you want to protect from the Dark. Or maybe you are just a supernatural mercenary and the Light commands your service for the time being.

Dark Buggebers wear their victim's skulls and animate them with their horrid tongues, but Buggebers serving the Light aren't allowed to do this: they wear hollowed-out turnips instead. The Glamour surrounding them can help them pass as (scary-looking) humans for short periods, but children and lunatics see straight through that.

A Buggeber at home in the Age of Swords (9th Century). The turnip-head is a clue that you won't be eaten straight away.

The thing that distinguishes your Buggeber is its Appetites. Buggebers can eat anything, but they hunger for particular types of things: dead things, exotic things, beautiful things, things that belong to particular people. Feeding your Appetites during an adventure is a big deal, because you earn Free Respites that way (which Fay characters don't usually get). It will, however, send you off on side-quests to consume a corpse, a parrot, a family portrait, the Old Brigadier's wooden leg...

When an adventure starts, Buggebers will be living their best monster life: stalking small children, being hunted by pitchfork-wielding villagers, raiding graveyards, battling other monsters, masquerading as humans in an attempt to be 'good.'

You'll enjoy a Buggeber PC if you like playing the anti-hero or the touching (or comedic) attempts by a monster to learn humanity.

Flayboglins

Another Fay Gentry, Flayboglins are animated scarecrows. That's the least of what they are, because Flayboglins are ancient (but now diminished) chthonic gods, now confined to a clumsy effigy and standing watch over a stretch of countryside.

This Flayboglin from the Age of Plagues (17th Century) is unleashing its powers.

These forgotten gods are motivated by a Fury - and you decide what you are furious about. Maybe it's the pollution of the countryside, or humanity's wickedness, or cruelty to animals, or the neglect of ancient traditions. Fury builds in a Flayboglin and is then released in a whirlwind that topples walls and blows open doors.

At the start of an adventure, a Flayboglin might be minding its own business, keeping the rooks off a far-flung field, until the Briar Company requests aid. Other Flayboglins drape themselves in Glamour and move among mortals, preserving those things they care about. The landlord of a local pub, the scoutmaster who trains a troop of Morris Dancers, the gamekeeper who chases down poachers, or the old woman who cares for stray cats and dogs: they could any one of them be a Flayboglin.

Flayboglin PCs are for players who enjoy taking on a mystical role, of a being that can pass for human, but has no humanity: only an passion for protecting a vanishing world.

Heathen Clerks

This is the first Mortal Gentry: Clerks are ordinary humans who serve the Heathen Saints of the Hedgerow. The Saints are dimly personified beings: Elder Mandrake, King Wren, Lady Hagthorne, and Wuthering Stormcrow. This service binds them to the mysteries of the countryside and the battle against the Dark in small and great ways.

A Clerk from the Age of Steel (19th Century), with his friends.

Clerks have access to a wide range of spells. They also gain powers from their Saint, as well as the ability to 'abjure' certain agents of the Dark. For example, Clerks of King Wren talk to birds, abjure the undead (like a D&D cleric!), and their spells can be violent or protective, but they are compelled by Elder Mandrake never to be the instigator of conflict.

Between adventures, Clerks have a role in the local community: a school teacher, the local squire, a farrier or ostler in a small village, a tramp who sleeps in the hay ricks. They carry out their Saint's work in minor ways until the Light summons them.

A Heathen Clerk is a familiar PC archetype: the rustic cleric or druid, serving a higher cause, but cut off from society by a lonely calling. Of course, your Heathen Clerk might be a family man, a housewife, or a local politician, in which case keeping their magical identity hidden will be a source of drama in itself.

Hodkins

Another Mortal Gentry, a Hodkin is a champion of the Light, albeit a tragic one. Each has been exalted as an immortal warrior in the war against the Dark, but the Light has robbed them of family and home. The power of Glamour means their loved ones no longer remember them and it is their doom to fight on, unrecognised, and hope only one day to die, unlamented.

I love Peter Johnston's image of a world-weary Hodkin from the Age of Thunder, plucked from the Battle of Britain and doomed never to go home.

Hodkins carry a magical treasure to aid them in their battle with the Dark. They are immortal until the Light finds no further use for them, and the Doom can be postponed over and over. Each suffers a very personal Sorrow, and roleplaying this burden and loss can earn you an extra Free Respite, in which to recover from your battles.

Patience Hardy, a Hodkin from the Age of Plagues, is one of my favourite NPCS. 

When not adventuring, a Hodkin might return to their loved ones - or descendants - to watch over them from a distance, or else dedicate themselves to defending little patches of history that mean something to them: an old farmhouse, an unmarked grave, a meadow where two lovers once parted.

Playing a Hodkin can be very straightforward: you're a time-travelling immortal warrior. The creativity comes in designing your magical treasure and in expressing your unique Sorrow.

Motleys

Motleys originated as 'Holy Fools' - mortals whose madness gave them powers for the Light or the Dark. Credit to editor Phil Smith's team at Osprey for helping me develop this idea, This Mortal Gentry still consists of oddballs and eccentrics, but they are more like entertainers than simple lunatics. Each has been taught a cosmic Secret by the Light, a Secret that has transformed their perceptions as well as granting them powers.

This capering Motley from the Age of Steel carries a 'marotte' - a jester's stick, with an inflated bladder on the end

Your Motley is characterised by her Secret and the Day of the Week associated with it. As Monday's Child, you are a Harlequin who can lie and change appearance. As Wednesday's Child, you are a Lazar, your secret is Death, and you can kill with impunity - as well as talk with ghosts. AS Saturday's Child, you are a Jester who performs supernatural pranks.

Motleys are committed to Holy Poverty and never start an adventure with any equipment. Between adventures, they live a hand to mouth existence, begging or performing, or perhaps assassinating enemies of the Light if they are Lazars!

Play a Motley PC if you want to be the comic relief - or else delve more deeply into their Secret and the tragedy of being cut off from society by your own inexpressible strangeness. Each Motley Day functions like its own separate character class (there! I said it!) so there's a lot of variety with this Gentry.

Ouzels

Back to the Fay Gentries: this time the sorcerous Ouzels. These are humanoid Fays with the heads of birds who were expelled from Fayrie because of their determination to aid mortals against the Dark - or at any rate, that's the story they​ tell.

An aristocratic Ouzel of Siege Peregrine living in the Age of Plagues.

Ouzels cast spells pretty easily, but they are more than just magic-users. They can transform into birds, of course! There are eight noble houses ('sieges') that arrived from Fayrie, each aligned with a different bird.

Siege Cathartine are buzzards who revel in slaughter, while Siege Milhuyt are thrushes who delight in beauty and song. Dreoilin wrens are strategists and plotters, while Strigine owls are philosophers and knowledge-seekers. Each house has its own magical focus and powers.

Ouzels are political creatures: the sieges manoeuvre against each other, and Ouzels often involve themselves in mortal divisions too, taking sides in the conflicts of the Age they inhabit. In the Age of Plagues, they might be Cavaliers opposing Roundheads, or rebels rescuing accused witches from the Witch-Harrow. They are often in conflict with other Fays too, which unites the fractious houses as one.

Playing an Ouzel PC gives you plenty of spell power and shapeshifting, but it also involves you in politics and negotiations, often with the Proud Fay who live in the Mortal Ages and want nothing to do with the Light or the Dark.

Tomnoddins

The last of the Fay Gentries is probably the weirdest. Tomnoddins are humanoid spiders with lots of hairy arms terminating in hands, and human-like eyes.

Mister Dankworth Darkly is a Tomnoddin NPC from the Age of Steel. Here he is taking tea, which is a surprisingly significant part of the game.

Despite their gruesome appearance, Tomnoddins are fascinated by humanity; so much so, they obsess over one aspect of humanity, which becomes their 'weaving.' Some Tomnoddins are fascinated by money and live as merchants, others by love and they pursue romance at all cost. The problem is, Tomnoddins have an erratic grasp of humanity, so their weavings are always faulty. The Tomnoddin merchant tries to sell horrific or absurd things, like severed fingers or bottled tears, while the lover pursues their beloved with disturbing gifts and distressing poetry.

Tomnoddins have spider-like powers too, of course: they can use multiple limbs, scuttle along walls, and squeeze through tiny gaps.

Being a Tomnoddin means committing to a role in human society, but never getting it quite right. Adventures often start for a Tomnoddin with a crisis in their weaving, when they are confronted by terrified or outraged humans.

Tomnoddin PCs can play similarly to Buggebers if you want the character arc of someone monstrous who is learning to be human.

Waifs

Through The Hedgerow draws inspiration from children's fantasy literature and TV, so of course you must be able to play a child character, caught up in a fantasy adventure. Waifs aren't magical and don't have powers, but they are protected by their Innocence, which means they can't be seriously harmed or killed if the player doesn't want that to happen.

Waifs in the Age of Thunder might be children evacuated from the big cities to the countryside that is as surprising to them as they are to its rustic inhabitants.

Waifs don't have to worry about a Doom Die and aren't bound by the Light's Bans, like the Law of Flint and Flame, so they can use technology and even harm mortals in a way that other Briar Knights cannot.

Eventually, a Waif's Innocence declines and is lost. When that happens, the Glamour might erase all their memories of adventures with magical companions: they have outgrown such things. Some, however, will join a Gentry, becoming a Heathen Clerk, Hodkin, Motley, or Warlocke, with a Doom weighing them down.

Playing a Waif PC is liberating: you don't have to worry about being killed or wounded. Nor do you have great powers to work out how to use. Instead, you concentrate on taking part in the story, using trickery, empathy, and honesty to win through. You also offer your companions 2 Free Respites, which will make you welcome in any Briar Company.

Warlockes

Warlockes are a Mortal Gentry of sorcerers who get their spells from an intelligent entity known as their Grimoire. The Grimoire could be a literal spell book, but often it's an animal or piece of technology that imparts magic to the Warlocke, who alone hears it speak.

This Warlocke from the Age of Swords has a Grimoire in the form of a talking pig. If you remember Hen Wen, the oracular pig from Lloyd Alexander's Chronicles of Prydain, you'll know what this is like.

Warlocke's are pretty effective magic-users, maybe not with the same mystical punch that Ouzels enjoy, but very potent if they take time to cast spells as rituals rather than on-the-fly hexes. Their Grimoires store spells for them, to cast as needed. But the main fun to be had with your Grimoire is the Oath it offers you.

Your Grimoire has its own strange agenda and it offers you an Oath to fulfil at the start of every adventure. In Through The Hedgerow you enjoy certain advantages while under an Oath and you get helpful rewards for completing it. While your Grimoire is weak, it imposes fairly trifling duties on you (e.g. protect a child from bullies), but as it grows in power, the things it wants you to do become more grandiose (e.g. breaking an innocent man out of prison).

Most of the fun in playing a Warlocke PC is in your bickering relationship with your Grimoire. The main advantage is the Oath, which gives you a lot of control over the way your Doom Die grows. Warlockes won't meet their Doom in a hurry, giving you time to mature the Warlocke and his Grimoire into an awesome spell-casting team.

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You can watch players bringing some of these characters to life in our play-through videos.

Dankworth Darkley the Tomnoddin, Wally Walsh the Motley, Wombard the Warlocke, and Tumbleguts the Buggeber.