Lineage: Epoch Edition | Review + Journal
"Let us sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the death of kings..."
I’m no expert at them, but I love resource management and grand strategy games. The first game I ever played in that genre was Pharaoh. The player starts out as a low-ranking official, eventually rising higher in rank as more missions are completed. The game ends with the player hailed as the Pharaoh, tasked to build the Great Pyramids that take quite a bit of real-life hours to complete. I live for this journey of history and (fictional) kingdom expansion. The game allows you to build a dynasty. It feels larger than life, but human at the same time.
That aspect is what drew me to Lineage. It’s one of the few solo journaling games that I spent hours getting lost in, pressing play on one of the Downton Abbey or Game of Thrones playlists on Spotify for full immersion. I like how playing as a royal historian detaches me from the royal family I’m tasked to record— it is my duty to note down the facts. People in power sometimes do terrible things because they simply can. I’m not going to hide this knowledge from the world.
…Unless I add more roleplay elements as a royal historian. Maybe something happens, and a “another” historian retcons everything I wrote, telling a totally different tale. An idea to try for next time.
Now, let me tell you the history of Princess Cornelia, “The Bear”.
Part I: A Blessing
The King and Queen were desperate for an heir. For three years, they pleaded to the heavens for a healthy, lively child that would rule wisely over the Kingdom of Itraviel someday. The Swans of the kingdom were soft-hearted and innovative— a gentle but firm rulership would allow Itraviel to expand and gain more resources to accommodate its growing population.
One night, the Queen had a dream. A scarlet dove instructed her to visit the palace gardens at the next Waxing Moon, holding a golden bull horn retrieved from the palace vault. Puzzled but with nothing to lose, the Queen counted down the nights til the moon was a bright crescent in the sky. Golden bull horn in hand, she slips quietly into the gardens.
There, under the willow tree, was the answer to the monarch’s prayers. The babe was sleeping peacefully, the skin on her fragile arms fading into the fur and paws of a bear cub. The infant’s snout twitched at the avian scent of her mother.
The Queen held her tight to her chest. A blessing from above. She was christened Princess Cornelia.
There is something about randomness in TTRPGs that make a game so enjoyable. I need a game that uses d100 and a Problem Table like in Wuthering Heights. The thrill of getting Old, Catholic, Hemophiliac (or all three!) adds a lot of spice and wackyness to the session.
Randomness has more weight to it in Lineage, though. 2d6 will determine the Rise of your Kingdom, the events that transpire during its Golden Age, and the Kingdom’s eventual Fall. The events can be cruel (“A bandit army has laid waste to several outlying settlements. A military response may be expensive. How important are these villagers, anyway?”), petty, (“A charismatic, young knight directly challenges the monarch’s authority and leads a small army in rebellion. Many peasants support the interloper. How do we crush this insurrection?”) or hair-raising (“Our spymaster has vanished. Military leaders fear they have turned traitor and fled. What must be done to protect our secrets?”). Each event is always fresh because if I roll for an event playing as the current monarch, I know the heir will not react to the situation the same way if I get the same roll. This makes the game endlessly entertaining.
I envisioned the characters in my previous journals as the typical Crusader Kings, medieval, European monarchs. But I was happy to realize that Lineage is versatile! My royal family doesn’t need to be situated in a fictional European kingdom. I can have my story take place in a fairy tale land where swans are monarchs and moonlight can gift bear infants to aspiring parents. Lineage provides just enough structure so that I can freely imagine how the royal bloodline falls into decline.
Part II: An Alliance
When Cornelia was 14, the noble reptilian kingdom of Slulyra asserted their claim on the borders and rivers of Itraviel. Haughty and determined, Itraviel’s King called on his bannermen and declared war on the cold-blooded creatures.
The Kingdom of Zelon, a reluctant, draconian ally whose lands bordered the territories of both Itraviel and Slulyra, sought a stronger alliance with the Swans. The Zelonian King arranged for his son, Prince Innocent, to wed the Bear Princess. Itraviel was pleased with this match, especially because of the stories claim that Innocent brought great luck to whoever he came across.
Their marriage was fulfilled out of duty, but Cornelia and Innocent quickly bonded as friends. The war would go on for 7 years, the youth of the Prince and Princess taken away by royal obligations.
Part III: A Tragedy
Itraviel and its allies emerged victorious, but Princess Cornelia’s father suffered a knee injury in battle. Deciding to further cement the Itraviel-Zelon bloodline, the couple bore and raised six children (all of them more bear than dragon, to Innocent’s amusement), the eldest christened Prince Sabinian.
Decades after the war with Slulyra, a cadet branch of the reptilian nobles reasserted their claim. Bitter and obssesed with expansion, it is said that a spy paid the castle a visit before dawn and set fire to Cornelia’s and Innocent’s room. Not as nimble as she was before, Cornelia was burned and trapped under the debris.
Innocent, heartbroken, died a week later.
Their eldest, Prince Sabinian, is crowned King of Itraviel.
Despite this being a short journaling session, I had a great time. I’ll definitely come back and write Sabinian’s story. Who knows what chaos will ensue when you have five siblings vying for the throne? The political intrigue! The family drama!
Overall, Lineage is a great journaling game and an awesome worldbuilding tool if you want to use it as such. You may come to hate, love, or even grieve the royal genealogy you just recorded. But when all that’s left are names on paper, you can only hope that people learn from their past in order to build a better future.