$24.99Esoteric Ebb A cleric investigates a very odd murder
Solve a magical crime before election day, rolling dice and arguing with your own stats along the way.
Is Esoteric Ebb worth it?
Esoteric Ebb is worth it if…
- you want a story-first RPG where reading, arguing and choosing carry the whole experience
- you like tabletop sessions and the comedy of dice deciding your fate
- you enjoy witty, absurd writing with real substance underneath the jokes
- you don't mind a lot of text: there is no voice acting, and the writing is the game
- you want choices that come back to bite you across a branching, replayable campaign
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A mystery nobody wants solved
Five days before Norvik's first-ever election, a tea shop explodes in the heart of the city. You are The Cleric, an expert in esoteric events and, in practice, a glorified government goon. They send you to deal with the mess. You wake up in a morgue with half the river in your boots, ten thousand rotting apples, several corpses and one zombie for company, with no official backup.
The dice decide, and failure gets interesting
Norvik runs on true tabletop rules. Clerics here are taught that violence is a last resort, so when a turn-based encounter does break out, a single roll of the dice can decide life or death. The fun part is that failing is rarely a dead end: in proper TTRPG fashion, a botched roll often sends the story somewhere stranger than success would have. Hit a natural 20 at the right moment and it feels earned.
Your stats talk back
Each of your ability scores is its own voice in your head, and they love to interrupt important conversations with conflicting opinions. One wants you to debate the devil, another wants you to control his mind for fun and profit. You pick a side, and the quest resolves in a wonderfully ridiculous way either way.
A city worth getting lost in
Norvik is the kind of place you explore for its own sake: streets, towers and dark tunnels in a post-Arcanepunk fantasy world where ideologies have outshouted dead gods. The hand-drawn, colorful art gives every corner a storybook quality, and the game is built to linger in it. Quests branch openly, from low-stakes errands to city-shaking schemes, and the Questing Tree turns your log into a living mind map where each branch can take root and change how The Cleric plays through game-changing feats.
Can you play it more than once?
Do you need to know Dungeons & Dragons or CRPGs to enjoy it?
No. The tabletop inspiration shapes the rules, dice rolls and tone, but everything is explained as you play, and the humor lands even if you have never rolled a d20. Familiarity with classic CRPGs adds a few nods, nothing more. What actually matters is an appetite for reading: dialogue and narration carry the game, and there is no voice acting anywhere.
How long is a playthrough?
The story runs across five in-game days until the election, and it is a long, text-heavy campaign rather than a short session game. Players commonly report spending dozens of hours in a single run, thanks to the branching quests, exploration of Norvik's streets and tunnels, and the sheer amount of dialogue. Expect a substantial commitment for one full playthrough, with more available on repeat runs.
Is there combat, or is it all talking?
Both. Talking is the main event, and The Cleric's order teaches violence as a last resort, but turn-based encounters do happen. When they do, dice rolls determine the outcome, and your stats, spells and equipment matter. You also have bizarre non-violent solutions to most problems, from mind control to speaking with the dead, so how much you fight is largely up to how you play.
