Christianity & Cosmology

The Straight Way Lost: Adventuring between Heaven and Hell in a Fantastical Renaissance Italy is a campaign for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, but do not let that put you off. This is as different a campaign for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition as you could imagine. It is a low fantasy campaign that is highly fantastical. It treads a fine line between the Possibility of magic and the Permeance of non-magic. It is historical. It will take the players and their characters to places rarely thought about and rarely visited in roleplaying. Its scope is grander than ever imagined, taking the Player Characters from High Renaissance Florence to the gates of Hell—and beyond. Down all nine circles of Hell and out of the bottom to climb the Mountain of Purgatory to reach Paradise, before returning to the mortal world and stopping a great evil. Inspired by Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso, the three parts of Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy, the campaign will literally take the Player Characters through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven, and thus across a Ptolemaic model of the universe. Dungeons & Dragons has visited Hell before. Most notably with 1980’s Inferno for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, First Edition, from Judges Guild, which detailed the first four circles of Hell as detail by Dante, and which has been more recently completed in Inferno: Journey through Malebolge by Spellbook Games. A Paladin in Hell, published in 1998, allowed the players to visit Hell once again, complete with actual devils rather than ‘baatezu’, whilst the Guide to Hell, followed a year later. Both were for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, Second Edition. Unlike those releases, The Straight Way Lost is not designed for traditional Dungeons & Dragons-style play.

The Straight Way Lost: Adventuring between Heaven and Hell in a Fantastical Renaissance Italy, published by Vortex Verlag following a Kickstarter campaign is both a sourcebook for fifteenth century Florence, a guide to the cosmology of Dante’s Divine Comedy, and a complete campaign for Player Characters of Third Level. Should they survive and complete the campaign, they will attain Eighth Level. However, there is relatively little scope for continued play beyond the campaign and anyway, the world portrayed in The Straight Way Lost is unlike Dungeons & Dragons. It is set in High Renaissance Italy where magic is known and studied in private, but deeply frowned upon by the church since it could lead to the study and practice of necromancy. Man is not the only intelligent species in this world, though the Elves, Half-Elves, Dwarves, Half-Dwarves, Tielfings, and Nephilim try not to bring too much attention themselves. There are no obviously non-Human species, but even the acceptable species ten to hide their non-Human traits. So, no Dragonborn, Halflings, or Half-Orcs. In terms of Dungeons & Dragons’ Classes, the Bard, Fighter, Ranger, Rogue, and Wizard are unproblematic, whereas the Barbarian, Druid, and Monk are unsuited to the setting. The Cleric and the Paladin require some consideration in terms of their faith, though it is likely to be Christian; the Sorcerer’s magical nature is likely to at odd with the rationality of the age; and the Warlock is provided with a list of alternative Patrons to select from, though there are no ‘Great Old Ones’ to choose from. These include Archfae, Infernal, and Titan Patrons.

Besides the new species, The Straight Way Lost also introduces two new Classes and a Sub-Class. Under the Polymath, the Philosopher, who understands and uses reason and logic to weave the powers of creation, whilst the Artist uses creativity and imagination. Mechanically, both expend Weave Points to fuel a mix of powers, some which they share in common. The Philosopher begins with the powers of ‘Language Master’, ‘Linguistic Recall’, ‘Peer Connections’, and ‘Caustic Remark’, whilst the Artist has ‘Likeness’, ‘The Artist’s Eye’, ‘The Artist’s Hand’, and ‘The Artist’s Favour’. The ‘Courtier’ is a Sub-Class for the Bard which focuses on social interaction rather than performance. In addition, The Straight Way Lost adds the new skills of Arts Liberales, Courtly Manners, Diplomacy, Fine Arts, and Law. What this offers is a range of character options that emphasises brains over brawn and manners over murder—and as the authors make clear, The Straight Way Lost is a campaign that emphasises roleplay versus rampage. Yes, some martial skills will be needed, but a Player Character entirely focused upon them will probably get less enjoyment out of the campaign.

Further, to encourage player and character involvement and roleplaying, The Straight Way Lost suggests possible character motivations, reasons for group cohesion, and motivational drives. The character motivations include Family Duty, Holy Duty, Heritage, Informant, and more, whilst the group cohesion suggestions include Family, Powerful Patron, Business, and so on. Both of these can be rolled or chosen, and if two or more Player Characters share one, the Game Master is encouraged to tie their backgrounds together. The motivational drives, such as Truth Seeker, Danger Seeker, God is Truth, and Fear Itself, are designed to encourage the player to get his character involved in the campaign’s plot and its ongoing storyline, and when roleplayed, will reward the player with Inspiration.

The Straight Way Lost notably eschews the standard Alignment system of Dungeons & Dragons. Instead, each Player Character will have a Dark Secret from a flaw or a committed sin; a Good Deed, committed because of a virtue; and a Happy Memory. All three will be tested and examined in the campaign, especially the Dark Secret and its associated sin in Hell. One of the advantages that the Player Characters will have in relation to the other souls in Hell is that they are mortal, should not be in Hell, and cannot be automatically confined to the Circle of Hell pertaining to their Dark Secret. The Straight Way Lost also adds a new mechanic in the form of Dismay, representing the effects of the trauma that the Player Characters can suffer as a result of traversing through Hell. Wisdom checks are made against a Difficulty Class which varies between eight and a shocking incident and fourteen and extreme terror. A Player Character’s Dismay can range in value between one and ten, and as it rises he will become increasingly apathetic and may fall into a ‘State of Dread’, a ‘State of Madness’, or ultimately, suffer a ‘Breakdown’. Both player and Game Master are encouraged to work together to portray the effects of Dismay in a manner that everyone is comfortable with.

The Straight Way Lost does include a sourcebook for the city of Florence in the year 1492. This is not an extensive look at the city, but rather a good overview and that is sufficient to run the campaign. The campaign proper begins in March, 1492, with the Player Characters invited to attend a feast hosted by the Capponi family, allies of the Medici family, to celebrate the achievements of a noted philosopher. They will have the opportunity to interact with their fellow guests and even attend an audience with Lorenzo de’ Medici, already in clearly poor health. Unfortunately, the event is thrown into disarray with the discovery of a dead woman, clearly murdered, lying in an arcane circle in the cellar. As the news of the murder spreads through Florence, it threatens to discredit Lorenzo de’ Medici and his family for simply being there, so he hands the investigation into the death to his fiercest critic, Girolamo Savonarola, a prior of the Dominican convent of San Marco. This includes Father Savonarola who will interview the Player Characters and ask them to help. This is not to investigate the murder directly—though the campaign does allow for that if the players decide that their characters want to—but rather to consult with Ofelia, a holy hermit who lives three days outside of the city and ask if she can pray to determine who has let his evil into the city of Florence…

Ofelia will direct the Player Characters on the campaign’s great quest. They will be accompanied by a guide who can advise them and help them, if necessary, but the Game Master will need to be careful in her portrayal so that it does not appear that she is not leading them by the nose. The path through the campaign is obvious, that is, down and eventually up. First descending down through the funnel formed on the other side of the world, at each Circle confronting its keeper, encountering the souls whose sins have cast them into Hell and exploring the consequences of their sins, confronting any Player Character whose Dark Secret corresponds to the Circle, and then finding a way to progress to the next lower Circle. The encounters also include famous persons from history, some of whom are pertinent to the campaign and the city of Florence, but all of whom have, according to Dante’s Divine Comedy, have been cast into Hell. The confrontation with the personal Dark Secret will automatically increase that character’s Dismay, but it throws the spotlight on the character and player, giving the latter an opportunity to examine and roleplay his character’s darker side and its consequences. It requires careful handling by both player and Game Master, whilst altogether, the group might want to spread the choice of Dark Secrets their characters’ possess. This would avoid the possibility of replication and spread such scenes out over the course of the Player Characters’ descent, rather than having them all at once. How the Player Characters get past the keeper of each Circle varies, combat invariably not being the best option. The path down is intentionally gruelling and by the time the Player Characters have descended to the lowest Circle of Hell, their Dismay levels will be quite high and they will be drawn and traumatised by what they have seen and experienced.

Fortunately, whilst the climb up the Mountain of Purgatory is more challenging, it is the path to redemption. Where the Player Characters were condemned for their Dark Secret and its associated sin on their descent into Hell, here they have them purged as they climb to the Earthly Paradise and by the time they have ascended to the top, they will hopefully be cleansed. Their time there will come as a relief after the literal hell and the Player Characters will also be able to get the answers they are looking for as well as a means to heal Lorenzo de’ Medici. With this in hand, they can return to the mortal realm, a path that will take them through Paradice, an awe-inspiring view of the Ptolemaic cosmos. Ultimately, they will descend to Earth and make their way back to Florence where they have a chance to heal Lorenzo de’ Medici, but not before a confrontation with the villain behind it all. Success is not guaranteed and failure will mean that Lorenzo de’ Medici dies and history plays out as it did in our own timeline.

Beyond the expected stats and descriptions for all of the NPCs and monsters in the campaign, The Straight Way Lost includes notes on what could happen next and potentially allow play beyond the end of the campaign. These are only suggestions though and, in each case, the Game Master will need to develop herself. An appendix suggests music for the campaign, provides a list of Italian Renaissance names, and a bibliography. There is an index for the NPCs in the campaign and a general index as well as a de’ Medici family tree.

Physically, The Straight Way Lost is an incredibly fantastic looking book. Notably, its pages are colour-coded. A light, earthy brown for Florence and its surrounds, deep black for Hell, a smoky blue-grey for Purgatory, and rich gold for Paradise, the effect enhancing the tone and feel of each of the associated acts in the campaign. In addition, the illustrations by Jana Heidersdorf, Mark Smylie, and Gwenevere Singly are excellent and should definitely be used by the Game Master to show to her players. On the downside, the book does need an edit in places and it is a little untidy in places. That said, the writing is clear and the advice for the Game Master never less than direct, even pointed at times.

The Straight Way Lost: Adventuring between Heaven and Hell in a Fantastical Renaissance Italy is a campaign for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, but not really a campaign for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. At least not in the traditional or the mechanical sense. Mechanically, its stats, Races, Classes, and monsters are written for use with Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. Yet beyond that, the mechanical complexities within the campaign are so light that it does not feel like Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. Adapting it to a system that the Game Master and her players prefer would take some effort, but not necessarily as much effort as a more traditional campaign would demand.

In the traditional sense of a Dungeons & Dragons campaign, The Straight Way Lost is unlike any campaign for the roleplaying game—or indeed any roleplaying game. Its themes of sin and redemption are mature subject matters and given its nature, it should be no surprise that there are scenes of terror and torture. Yet there are also scenes of hope and succour. Structurally, The Straight Way Lost is a journey and does want to tell a story, so it is linear, with no real options other than forward. Thus, the player agency comes in the individual scenes and small decisions that the characters are faced with. It is not a long campaign by any means, but requires no little commitment because of its themes and nature, as well as the roleplaying required in exploring the sins and Dark Secrets of the Player Characters.

The Straight Way Lost: Adventuring between Heaven and Hell in a Fantastical Renaissance Italy is not so much a fantasy campaign as a campaign of classical fantasy. It takes the players and their characters to places unseen and of wonder and of awe, and it challenges their roleplaying too. The Straight Way Lost: Adventuring between Heaven and Hell in a Fantastical Renaissance Italy is proof that sometimes the system matters not—not when you have a campaign as unique and literately inspired as this.

1976: Monsters! Monsters!

1974 is an important year for the gaming hobby. It is the year that Dungeons & Dragons was introduced, the original RPG from which all other RPGs would ultimately be derived and the original RPG from which so many computer games would draw for their inspiration. It is fitting that the current owner of the game, Wizards of the Coast, released the new version, Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, in the year of the game’s fortieth anniversary, and the new edition of that, Dungeons & Dragons, 2024, in the year of the game’s fiftieth anniversary. To celebrate this, Reviews from R’lyeh will be running a series of reviews from the hobby’s anniversary years, thus there will be reviews from 1974, from 1984, from 1994, and from 2004—the thirtieth, twentieth, and tenth anniversaries of the titles. These will be retrospectives, in each case an opportunity to re-appraise interesting titles and true classics decades on from the year of their original release.

—oOo—

By the end of 1976, Ken St. Andre had published three roleplaying games, two of which can be argued were genuinely ground-breaking. The first was Tunnels & Trolls, designed as a lighter, easier, and faster alternative to Dungeons & Dragons and published in 1975. It would be followed in 1976 by Starfaring, the first Science Fiction roleplaying game, which like Tunnels & Trolls, was published by Flying Buffalo Inc. Then, there was Monsters! Monsters!, also published in 1976, which inverted the by now traditional style of fantasy. That is, of great heroes descending into dungeons and defeating monsters and solving puzzles and returning with the treasure looted from below. Monsters! Monsters! was a roleplaying game for “When YOU want to be monster!” because instead of the players roleplaying heroes, they roleplayed the monsters. As Dragons, Goblins, Black Hobbits, Gorgons, Mummies, Snollygosters, Slime-Mutants, Night-Gaunts, Giant Slugs, Unicorns, Shoggoths, and Human Scum, the Player Characters—or rather Player Monsters—could swarm up out of their dungeon homes or other hidey holes and go on the rampage and take their revenge on the Humans, Dwarves, Elves, Fairies, and Hobbits living in whatever village, town, city, castle, palace, or plantation that the Game Master has created. Monsters! Monsters! was, as St. Andre’s co-author, Jim ‘Bear’ Peters, intimates in the book, a call for the equal rites of your dungeon-dwelling monster.

Monsters! Monsters! is both a standalone roleplaying game and a supplement for Tunnels & Trolls, expanding upon the details of enemies faced by heroes in the latter, but does not require Tunnels & Trolls to be played. Where Tunnels & Trolls is likely to be useful is the expanded spell section since those given in Monsters! Monsters! only go up to Level Four. Notably, Monsters! Monsters! was not published by Flying Buffalo Inc. Rather, it was published by Metagaming Concepts, best known for publishing Steve Jackson’s first designs, particularly Ogre, G.E.V., and The Fantasy Trip. It was subsequently published by Flying Buffalo Inc. and more recently in expanded editions by Trollhalla Press Unlimited. As the editorial explains, the roleplaying game’s origins lay in a catchphrase that grew out a cry of fear and then a battle cry in game. Its ethos was simple.

“So it was only natural that eventually the monsters should come out of their tunnels and dungeons to strike back at the smug world of the Men, Elves, Dwarves, Hobbits, etc., who had been so greedily despoiling their homes and treasures. This turning of the tables, to play monsters as protagonists, has proven to be even more hilarious than the original games. A monster lives by a completely different code of ethics, affording a splendid opportunity to get rid of the impure and perverted impulses which affect most of us – impulses it’s hard to express while playing a hero. Monsters get experience points for wanton cruelty and destruction above and beyond the call of duty.”

In other words, if this was Dungeons & Dragons, then Monsters! Monsters! lets the players roleplay evil (or Chaotic or Chaotic Evil) characters. Unlike Tunnels & Trolls, the aim in Monsters! Monsters! is not to accumulate treasure take from monsters underground—though recovering it from those annoying dungeon interlopers is bound to be very nice—but to “…[P]ile up “experience points”. Then, “The more experience points a character gains, the more powerful it becomes, and the more interesting are its adventures. Also, the higher levels your character reaches, the more you (the real person out there, reading this) will be respected by your fellow players. As long as you keep your characters alive and gaining experience, you are winning. When you overextend yourself and a character dies, that is your loss.” So, Monsters! Monsters! is in effect, the anti-roleplaying game. Evil Player Characters, revenge and rampage as core game play, and as a roleplaying game, there are actual winners.

Morally, it is another matter. Monsters going on a rampage and enacting revenge is not moral. Admittedly, there is not a list of ‘evil’ acts that the Player Monsters will be rewarded with Experience Points for enacting, though a Player Monster will gain Experience Points for engorging itself (it does not say engorging itself on what though…), taking valuable captives—especially if particularly handsome or beautiful, and for general acts of destructiveness. So, the Player Monsters are not heroes. Nor is Monsters! Monsters! in any way introspective as later roleplaying games exploring the roleplaying of monsters would examine. Tonally though, Monsters! Monsters! is tongue in cheek, retaining the humour of Tunnels & Trolls, but with a darker edge. Further, as “…[A] splendid opportunity to get rid of the impure and perverted impulses which affect most of us – impulses it’s hard to express while playing a hero.”, it is cathartic, a chance for some manic mayhem, even a palate cleanser. Though likely no more than that, given its limited scope for extended play. A campaign of Monsters! Monsters! is likely to get only so far before a group tire of it or in game, a bigger force of heroes turns up to smash the evil threat represented by the Player Monsters.

Monsters! Monsters! includes everything necessary to play. Rules for Player Monster creation, combat and magic, Experience Points, and more. There is even a complete location—Woodsedge Inn and its surrounding cottages and wilderness—that is ripe for the Player Monsters to attack. Most of the inhabitants are Zero Level ‘Monster Fodder’, but there are a handful of Third and Fourth Level inhabitants who pose much more of a threat and a challenge to the Player Monsters. If any of them can rally the ordinary locals living near by the Woodsedge Inn, the Player Monsters could have a tougher challenge on their claws…

As with a Player Character in Tunnels & Trolls, the details of a Player Monster in Monsters! Monsters! can be recorded on three-by-five-inch cards. A Player Monster has six Prime Attributes. These are Strength, Intelligence, Luck, Constitution, Dexterity, and Charisma. Unlike a Player Character in Tunnels & Trolls, a Player Monster does not need to note the amount gold it has and pretty much starts with equipment needed—depending upon the monster type, some monsters do lack arms and hands. So, he may have some arms and armour and some languages too if his Intelligence is high enough. What he does not have is a Class. Thus, he cannot be a Warrior, Magic-User, or Rogue. Instead, he has a Monster type. Monsters! Monsters! lists some fifty-two monster types, which a player can either pick from or draw a card from an ordinary deck of playing cards to determine which type.

The list of Monster types includes the usual ones you would expect from both fantasy fiction and roleplaying fantasy. So, Goblins, Orcs, Trolls, Minotaur, and Dark Elves all the way up to Dragons and Balrogs! However, Monsters! Monsters! draws from a weirder and more diverse range of sources. These include the ‘Demon’ from L. Sprague de Camp’s The Fallible Fiend; the ‘Shadowjack’ from Roger Zelazny’s Jack of Shadows; the Shoggoth from At the Mountains of Madness and the Night-Gaunt from The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, both by H.P. Lovecraft; the ‘Snark’ from Lewis Carroll’s ‘The Hunting of the Snark’ (misspelt as ‘shark’ in its description, so no, a player cannot roleplay a shark in Monsters! Monsters!); and the ‘Tsathoggua’ from Clark Ashton Smith’s ‘The Tale of Satampra Zeiros’. Another oddity, not taken from fiction is the ‘Snollygoster’, meaning a shrewd, unprincipled person, especially a politician, but here a hybrid between a large cross-eyed dog and a half-truncated crocodile. The last entry aside, Monsters! Monsters! would have broken copyright laws in 1976 when it was published and would still do so today!

Creating a Player Monster is an easy process. A player picks a Monster Type or draws a playing card to determine what it is. The Monster Type will primarily determine the attribute modifiers that need to be applied after the player has rolled three six-sided dice for each. The modifiers can lead to a wide range of attribute values depending upon the Monster Type. This includes caps on maximum attribute values and in the case of Charisma, replacing them entirely because the Monster Type is so fearsome!

Name: Glurk

Type: Slime-Mutant

Strength 28 Intelligence 05 Luck 03

Constitution 60 Dexterity 13 Charisma °

Combat Adds: +8

Speed: Slow

Monsters! Monsters! is a played as a series of turns, of which there are two types. The first type is general in nature and last about five minutes, during which time a Player Monster can move, loot, or pillage an area or room, or simply wait, whilst the Game Master will check for wandering monsters. The other is the combat turn, which lasts an entire minute.

Mechanically, Monsters! Monsters! is essentially Tunnels & Trolls. Thus, there are two main rules. One is the Saving Throw, rolled to avoid a trap, to dodge a missile weapon attack, to withstand a poisonous brew, and so on, and it is always rolled using a character’s Luck. The target number is dependent on the ‘Danger Level’ rather than the Level of the dungeon as Tunnels & Trolls. This is twenty at Danger Level #1, twenty-five at Danger Level #2, and so on. The Player Monster’s Luck is subtracted from the Danger Level and this is the target number that the player has to roll equal to or exceed to overcome. The roll is on two six-sided dice and doubles allow the player to roll and add again.

Combat in Monsters! Monsters! is like that of Tunnels & Trolls. Both sides, the Player Monster and the heroes or mobs it is facing, are rolling handfuls of six-sided dice. In Tunnels & Trolls, the number of dice rolled for a Player Character is determined the weapons he wields plus an ‘Add’ value if he has high Strength, Luck, and Dexterity. Then for Monsters, it is their Monster Rating. Monsters! Monsters! treats each Player Monster as a Player Character and apart from mobs, also treats the NPC enemies as Player Characters. This makes it more complex in a than Tunnels & Trolls. A Player Monster who lacks hands and so cannot use weapons, instead will roll a number of dice derived from its Strength attribute. The lower result is subtracted from the higher result and that is the number of hit points of damage the losing side suffers. This is deducted from the Constitution of the NPC or Player Monster. If worn or carried, armour and shields will protect against incoming hit points, but armour will be damaged in the process. The rules take into account unarmed combat, the bigger weapons wielded by bigger creatures, movement, speed, and so on. Combat is decently explained and it helps that there is a detailed example of it in action.

Player Monsters can learn magic, but cannot make magic staves. Only ‘good’ Magic-Users can make magic staves, so if a Player Monster wants to gain the benefit of the lowered cost of casting magic using a magic staff, it will have steal one or kill a Magic-User and take his. Spells have a cost in the caster’s actual Strength Primary Ability to cast, which then has to regenerate. A Player Monster pays the cost of the spell if it wants to learn it, so there are limits on what spells it knows. This though, is not clearly explained. The spells included only go up to Fourth Level, and a copy of Tunnels & Trolls is needed for spells beyond that. Some Player Monsters will automatically know various spells, such as Demons putting Bats Wings on any other creature; Dragons are immune to spells cast by anyone less intelligence than themselves; and various Monsters have innate spells such as Wise Disguise for the Ogre and Vampires get Oh boy obey, Going Batty, and Ha, Ha, Ya Mist Me.

Physically, Monsters! Monsters! is presented well enough. It is readable and the artwork is excellent. The Maps are reasonable.

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Monsters! Monsters! was not widely reviewed at the time of its original or later publication. Jon Freeman in The Playboy Winner’s Guide to Board Games (Playboy Paperpacks, 1979) said, “Monsters! Monsters! (Metagaming) is Tunnels & Trolls in reverse: Players take the part of various monsters and evil creatures and get points for rape, pillage, and slaughter. It’s an irresistible idea that could be adapted readily to any FRP system.”

Ronald Pehr reviewed the roleplaying game was in The Space Gamer Number 34 (December, 1980) in ‘Capsule Reviews’. He said, “Necessarily and deliberately, there is a lot left to the referee’s imagination. More so than any other FRP game, if he doesn’t take charge the proceedings give way to meaningless slaughter. It is a constant challenge to provide a challenge to the monsters.” He was highly critical of the combat system, describing it as boring as it was fairly easy to determine who would win before any fight and suggested substituting a different system. He concluded by saying, “MONSTERS! MONSTERS! is a good game for beginners, or anyone who wants to be a troll, but experienced gamers who enjoy complex campaign games offering more than bloodlust won’t find what they want here.”

—oOo—

Monsters! Monsters! is innovative. It does make you think about fantasy roleplaying from the enemy’s perspective by casting you in a different role. However, it does not make you think too deeply—as similar and later roleplaying games would—since the roleplaying game is about the monsters’ revenge and everything to do with it. That and the lack morality does have the potential to shift the play of the game into a much darker place in terms of story and Player Monster actions. That shift may not necessarily happen, since Monsters! Monsters! does not possess scope for long term play, more likely a one shot, possibly a mini-campaign at best. Where that shift does happen, the place will vary from group to group and today, would definitely require a discussion as to where the place is and what acts that the Player Monsters might carry out are acceptable. This does not mean that the ideas in Monsters! Monsters! are invalid, but that they have been explored with more sensitivity in more recent roleplaying game designs. Nevertheless, Monsters! Monsters! got there first and upended our ideas about fantasy roleplaying.

The Other OSR: Unconfirmed Contact Reports

It is curious to note that since its original publication in 2018, the Mothership Sci-Fi Horror RPG from Tuesday Knight Games has been reliant upon the single rulebook, the Mothership Sci-Fi Horror RPG – Player’s Survival Guide. First as a ‘Zero Edition’ and then as an actual ‘First Edition’. Curious, because despite the horror roleplaying rules detailing no alien threats and giving no advice for the Warden—as the Game Master is known in Mothership—the has proved to be success, with numerous authors writing and publishing scenarios of their own as well as titles from the publisher. What the Mothership Sci-Fi Horror RPG offered was a stripped down, fast playing Science Fiction system that supported a number of sub-genres. Most obviously Blue Collar Science Fiction with horror and Military Science Science Fiction, the most obvious inspirations being the films Alien and Aliens, as well as Outland, Dark Star, Silent Running, and Event Horizon. Yet the authors of third-party content for the roleplaying game have also offered sandboxes such as Desert Moon of Karth and Cosmic Horror like What We Give To Alien Gods, showing how the simplicity of Mothership could be adjusted to handle other types of Science Fiction. This combination of flexibility and simplicity has made it attractive to the Old School Renaissance segment of the hobby, despite Mothership not actually sharing roots with the family of Old School Renaissance roleplaying games derived from the different editions of Dungeons & Dragons. It is thus, at best, Old School Renaissance adjacent.

With the publication of the Mothership Core Box and the Mothership Deluxe Box following a successful Kickstarter campaign in 2024, the Mothership Sci-Fi Horror RPG has a complete set of rules for what is its first edition. The includes rules the construction and option of spaceships with Shipbreaker’s Toolkit, monstrous threats with Unconfirmed Contact Reports, and a guide for refereeing the roleplaying game in the form of the Warden’s Operations Manual.

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Unconfirmed Contact Reports is the monster book for the Mothership Sci-Fi Horror RPG. It contains descriptions of fifty strange entities and horrendous abominations with which to scare the Player Characters, stalk them, and bleed them, infect them, feed on them, or worse… It is designed to do several things. Obviously, it is intended to provide a range of threats that will strike fear into the Player Characters, but the authors also want to spur the Warden’s imagination. The entries—where appropriate—have the minimum of stats, so mechanically they are all easy to use. The collection begins with ‘The 4youreyez Algorithm’ which infects electronics and completely wipes, but seems to affect androids in some way, and continues with ‘Angels’, those who have communed with the great eye-like portals that have opened up in space, and ‘The Body Politic’, an invasive colonial organism which forms parliamentary voting body in all of the host’s cells rather than a single collective. ‘Cabin 102-B’ is a locked cabin that appears aboard one spaceship after another, ‘The Engineer’ is an itinerant ship’s engineer who high on stimulants sabotages the spaceships he is hired to work whilst the crew are asleep, and ‘Good’ is an alien ‘subtle, psychotropic “oversight and ethics committee.” that makes people good and so corporations and governments fear it.

There are a lot of entries Unconfirmed Contact Reports and some of are less interesting than others. For example, ‘Granny’ describes a hole in the ground from which an old woman’s voice emanates, begging to be fed. Whatever is thrown in is not enough, and on the colonies where this hole appears, the colonists begin feeding her everything they can—supplies, pets, children, and ultimately themselves. It is enough and soon Granny will leave the hole to hunt. Similarly, ‘The Sea of Silence’ is a viscous and vicious protoplasmic organism that absorbs any body of water it can and immerses its victims, scouring away any sense of self and awareness. In too many cases, the entries consist of nothing more than this description and some colour fiction accompanying the illustration. To which the response amounts to no more than, “Yes, and…?” There is no obvious way in which to bring these monsters, memes, mutterings, mutations, and more into play and so make them threats that arouse more than a similar, “Yes, and…?”. The book states that it aims to spark the Warden’s imagination and that, “Importantly, much about these entities, from their history to their reasoning, and even how they may be defeated (if they can be at all) has been left absent.” The Warden is the encouraged to these descriptions in Unconfirmed Contact Reports as a starting point for creating a scenario.

What this means that the entries in Unconfirmed Contact Reports are as just much prompts as they are descriptions of monsters. In fairness, there is advice on running scenarios and using monsters in the Mothership Sci-Fi Horror RPG. It is in the excellent Warden’s Operations Manual and it is called the ‘TOMBS Cycle’, which stands for ‘Transgression, Omens, Manifestation, Banishment, Slumber’ Cycle. This is neat little summary of how a horror scenario typically plays. So, in ‘Transgression’, the horror disturbs the horror and awakens; in ‘Omens’, signs of its activities appear; it begins to move openly in ‘Manifestation’; ‘Banishment’ can only be attempted once a means of destroying or stopping the horror has been found; and finally, under ‘Slumber’, it can be banished or subdued, at least temporarily, until someone else triggers the ‘TOMBS Cycle’ once again.

The ‘TOMBS Cycle’ is brilliantly succinct and not only a great way to outline a scenario, but to categorise a horror. Imagine if the ‘TOMBS Cycle’ had been applied to each and every one of the entries in Unconfirmed Contact Reports? Imagine how quick and easy it would have made each and every one of the entries in Unconfirmed Contact Reports to use? Imagine how quick and easy it would have made making a change to each and every one of the entries in Unconfirmed Contact Reports rather than think up any way to use them in a scenario from scratch? Imagine how not how much better Unconfirmed Contact Reports would have been if the ‘TOMBS Cycle’ had been applied, but simply just how useful?

It begs the simple question. Why was the ‘TOMBS Cycle’ not applied to Unconfirmed Contact Reports?

Physically, Unconfirmed Contact Reports is okay. The writing is okay. The artwork varies widely in quality and that is okay too.

If you have the Mothership Deluxe Box then you already own Unconfirmed Contact Reports. If you own neither, and perhaps want a good bestiary or book of threats to run with the Mothership Sci-Fi Horror RPG, the sad news is that Unconfirmed Contact Reports is a poor choice. It lowers the quality of the Mothership Deluxe Box because it more a work of fiction than a game book and more a book of prompts than something that the Warden can readily use in her game. Unconfirmed Contact Reports could have been very, very good, but as it is, it is just not good enough. One for the completionist rather than either essential or actually useful.

Friday Fantasy: Friends in Need

Friends in Need is a scenario for Shadow of the Weird Wizard, the roleplaying game set on the world of Erth in the Borderlands between the remnants of once great empires and the realm of the Weird Wizard greatly changed by his magics. The unexplained disappearance of the Weird Wizard allowed all manner of creatures and strangeness to flood into the empires and kingdoms causing strife and civil war, as refugees fled into the borderlands and adventurers ventured into the Weird Wizard’s lands into explore its strangeness, hopefully stop any dangerous threats, and perhaps return with treasures both magical and mundane. Player Characters progress from Level One to Level Ten, their progress divided between three Paths—Novice, Expert, and Master, gaining greater ability, skill, and specialisation. A Novice Path begins at Level One, an Expert path at Level Three, and a Master Path at Level Seven. Adventures for Shadow of the Weird Wizard are tailored to these three Paths. Friends in Need is designed for Novice Heroes and can be run as a beginning scenario for Shadow of the Weird Wizard. It confronts the players and their Heroes with one of the big changes in Shadow of the Weird Wizard in comparison with traditional fantasy roleplaying games.

Friends in Need takes a classic set-up—or a cliché, depending upon your point of view—from high fantasy roleplaying and gives it just of enough of a twist to make that set-up interesting. That set-up is the meeting of the heroes of in a tavern, or the stopping off on a journey in a tavern and spending the night, and either being hired to go on an adventure or following up on some rumours and so going on an adventure. The tavern in the adventure is more than that, a walled compound called the Traveller’s Rest, which was once a stop on a coaching route through the Borderlands. The current owners have worked hard to retore it to a going concern and it also has a forge and a general store as well as somewhere to eat, drink, and stay, overall, offering a major source of employment in the area. Here the Player Characters have a chance to stop and rest on their journey and interact with the staff and patrons, perhaps while away the evening playing cards and dice, and along the way picking up a rumour or two. Amongst the latter is the fact that several people from the area and some travellers have gone missing, a lion in the nearby Green Hills have been preying on goat herds, and there is word that a new disease is spreading through the borderlands. Then, of course, the Player Characters are offered a proper job.

A scholar resident at the Traveller’s Rest recruits the Player Characters to escort him on an expedition in the Green Hills where he has discovered an old tomb. He believes that there is treasure to be found in the tomb, but also clues as to what happened to the peoples once indigenous to this part of the borderlands. However, the twist comes the following morning, when the Player Characters discover that the scholar has already left without them, and worse, has done so in the company of another band of adventurers which was the bar the previous evening. Essentially, what has happened is that this other band of adventurers has undercut the Player Characters!

This is an entertaining twist, but as much as the Player Characters’ newly-encountered adventuring rivals undercut them, the twist has the potential to undercut the scenario. Whether this happens depends on what the players and their characters decide to do next. They could simply do nothing or leave, and events will play out without the Player Characters’ involvement in which case they do not what discover what is actually going on and the region surrounding the Traveller’s Rest suffers the consequences. Effectively, this negates second half of the scenario. Alternatively, the Player Characters can follow the path of the scholar and his hired guards, and this is the plot thread that the scenario presents, but the Player Characters could also explore one of the other rumours that were floating about the tavern the previous evening. The events of these sidequests can be brought back connect to the main plot, but the Sage will need to develop these a little more to flesh them out.

Eventually, and ideally, the Player Characters will reach the tomb site which the scholar wanted them to guard whilst he excavated. Here the Player Characters discover another twist to the classic set-up—or a cliché, depending upon your point of view—from high fantasy roleplaying and what is actually in the tomb. The latter plays out in more traditional fashion.

Friends in Need is a slightly more complex scenario than, One Bad Apple, the previous one for Player Characters on the Novice Path. It will need more input from the Sage to keep the players and their characters on the main plot and thus into the second half of the scenario. That said, this is not too difficult, but it is in addition to the preparation required to ready stats for both the NPCs and the monsters for the scenario.

Physically, Friends in Need is cleanly and tidily laid out. It is well written, but there are no maps. The Sage may want to provide them, but they are not necessary to run or play the adventure.

Friends in Need is strong on interaction and roleplaying with the Player Characters given time to interact with the other patrons at the Traveller’s Rest, learn about the area, and perhaps gamble away some of their monies. The various NPCs are nicely detailed and there is even an example dice game which the players could play too. The scenario is short, but Friends in Need will probably take two sessions to play through if its plot is followed as written. If it is, the players and their characters will find that Friends in Need delivers a couple of nice little twists to its clichéd set-up as a good mix of interaction, combat, and exploration.

Cannibals in the Cold

Achtung! Cthulhu is the roleplaying game of fast-paced pulp action and Mythos magic published by Modiphius Entertainment. It is pitches the Allied Agents of the Britain’s Section M, the United States’ Majestic, and the brave Resistance into a Secret War against those Nazi Agents and organisations which would command and entreat with the occult and forces beyond the understanding of mankind. They are willing to risk their lives and their sanity against malicious Nazi villains and the unfathomable gods and monsters of the Mythos themselves, each striving for supremacy in mankind’s darkest yet finest hour! Yet even the darkest of drives to take advantage of the Mythos is riven by differing ideologies and approaches pandering to Hitler’s whims. The Black Sun consists of Nazi warrior-sorcerers supreme who use foul magic and summoned creatures from nameless dimensions to dominate the battlefields of men, whilst Nachtwölfe, the Night Wolves, utilise technology, biological enhancements, and wunderwaffen (wonder weapons) to win the war for Germany. Ultimately, both utilise and fall under the malign influence of the Mythos, the forces of which have their own unknowable designs…

Achtung! Cthulhu 2d20: Operation Snowstorm is a scenario that takes Achtung! Cthulhu 2d20 back to North America, but not the Mid-West USA of Achtung! Cthulhu Mission: Seventh-Inning Slaughter!. Instead, the action is in British Columbia, Canada, and involves agents of Majestic rather than Section M. The scenario is intended to be set late in the war after the USA has become involved, but does not specify a year. It is designed for mid-level play by a group of experienced Agents and the author notes that the scenario is intentionally deadly, so advises that players might not want to play it using their primary Agents. However, the scenario does not include any guidance as to what character types might be useful or appropriate, nor does it include any pre-generated Agents ready to play. This is a major oversight, since the location of the scenario in western Canada means that it is actually not that easy to get existing Agents there, let alone the fact that it is suggested that they not be used at all. This makes it difficult to add to an ongoing campaign. As ever, a good mix of skills and abilities will be required to overcome the threats in the scenario, but given the physical and environmental nature of the scenario, every Agent should have some combat skills and some survival skills too. Mechanical or technical skills as well as scientific knowledge will also be useful. This is effectively a one-shot scenario, one that will probably take two to three sessions to play through given its focus on combat. Decent sized floor plans of the outpost are provided. They could be used to play out the likely multiple combats that will take place during the scenario using miniatures if the Game Master and players want to.

The Agents’ mission is to travel to Majestic Research Outpost Epsilon-3, which lies a few miles outside of the town of Dunley in British Columbia. Recently, communication has been lost with the outpost, which the Agents’ bosses suspects is due to the severe blizzard which has settled on the area. The Agents are to re-establish contact and assess the current status of the research being conducted there. If there are no problems, then they only have to report back to headquarters. If there are issues, they are ordered to extract the research and return it to headquarters. Of course, this is a scenario for Achtung! Cthulhu, so there are going to be problems.

Those problems begin as soon as the Agents leave Dunley. Having outfitted themselves with weapons and cold weather gear, they must trek their way through the snow and up the side of the mountain where Majestic Research Outpost Epsilon-3 is sited. This is a bit of slog in and out of game. Multiple tests of the Survival (Orienteering) and Athletics (Physical Training) are required to get through the checkpoints representing the journey, which is expected to take just under three hours. Plus, after every hour, a Resilience test is required to avoid both fatigue and further coming under the ‘Influence’, the latter a complication due to the supernatural nature of the blizzard. Mishaps can cause delays, but Momentum can be spent to reduce the time it takes between each checkpoint and potentially reduce the overall time the journey takes and the number of Resilience tests the players have to make for their Agents. After a combat encounter, the players have the choice of a longer, safer way, which will mean further Resilience tests are required, a quicker, but potentially deadly route involving a climb up a cliff…

The aim of the ‘Influence’ is to inflict a growing hunger upon the Agents. This cannot be satisfied by any obvious means and will continue to inflict fatigue losses throughout the scenario. Worse, if an Agent is overcome by ‘Insatiable Hunger’, he will immediately attack the nearest living person—NPC or player Agent—and attempt to chow down on them! In other words, the Agent has been turned into a cannibal, and guess what has happened to the men and women assigned to Majestic Research Outpost Epsilon-3?

After an encounter the ‘Influenced’, the Agents can get into Majestic Research Outpost Epsilon-3. Inside, it is quickly clear that whatever research is being conducted has been disrupted. There are bloody bodies and signs of a desperate fight everywhere, but eventually the Agents will find a lone survivor, a French scientist working for Majestic. It should be obvious that both the scientist and whatever research survives needs to be evacuated. However, as the Agents are chased back down the mountain, help appears in the form of a team of indigenous people’s Pathfinder Demon Hunters, who have been hunting the Wendigo that now stalk the area. Once the fight is over, the Pathfinder Demon Hunters have a demand of the scientist and the Agents. It turns out the research being conducted was on artefacts taken from a nearby dig site that the staff at Majestic Research Outpost Epsilon-3 had recently excavated. The Pathfinder Demon Hunters warn the Agents that unless the artefacts are returned, the Prescence locked within the mountain will be unleashed and the blizzard will spread unchecked across the whole of North America. So, the Agents have a choice to make…

The scenario will end with either the Agents working with the Pathfinder Demon Hunters and saving the world or fighting the Pathfinder Demon Hunters and getting away with the research and so not saving the world. The latter is probably campaign ending as the blizzard keeps spreading and spreading, but the scenario does suggest the possibility of the greatest conflict in world history being turned on its head as all sides involved in the war suddenly must work together to defeat a new enemy which threatens everyone. This is of course left unexplored, but as a new campaign direction, it has interesting potential.

Achtung! Cthulhu 2d20: Operation Snowstorm is a combat-focused scenario, one that is both straightforward and unless the players are new to the genre of Lovecraftian investigative horror, obvious in its choice of threat. There are points where there are opportunities to roleplay, but only a few and the choice presented to the Agents towards the end of the scenario is not an overly difficult one. One way in which greater roleplaying opportunities could have been added and perhaps the choice made more difficult is if the scenario had included a set of pre-generated Agents, complete with backgrounds tied to the situation in the scenario and to each other. This could have added tension and scope for roleplaying. Again, this is a missed opportunity, especially for what is effectively, a one-shot scenario.

Physically, Achtung! Cthulhu 2d20: Operation Snowstorm is well presented. It is decently written and the floorplans of Majestic Research Outpost Epsilon-3 are more than workable. There is no area map and the scenario is not illustrated.

Achtung! Cthulhu 2d20: Operation Snowstorm is unsophisticated in its plotting and obvious in its choice of threat, as well as being combat-focused and physical in nature. This does not mean that it is terrible scenario, but rather as decently done as it is, it could have been all the better with some good pre-generated Agents tied into the scenario’s plot and each other.

Snæland Sagas #02: The Darkest Day

Much like the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition, the Jonstown Compendium for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha, and The Companions of Arthur for Pendragon, Sagas of the North is a curated platform for user-made content, but for material set in Iceland the other lands that the Vikings travelled to. It enables creators to sell their own original content for use with Age of Vikings. This can be original scenarios, background material, alternate Icelandic settings, and more, but none of this content should be considered to be ‘canon’, but rather fall under ‘Your Vikings Will Vary’. This means that there is still scope for the authors to create interesting and useful content that others can bring to their Age of Vikings campaigns.

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What is the Nature of the Saga?

The Darkest Day is a scenario for use with Age of Vikings.

It is a full colour, seventeen page, 858.72 KB PDF.

The layout is tidy, but it does need an edit in places.

Where is the Saga set?

The Darkest Day takes place in and around the Vatnsendi farm owned by Ásmundur, near Lake Vesturhóp in northern Iceland. It takes place over the Yule period.

Who should be the subject of this Saga?

Any type of Player Character can take part in this sage. At least one Player Character with good Mythic skills, such as Second Sight and being able to cast the Runes, is recommended, but a diverse range of skills is better than focused ones.

It is written to be played by beginning Player Characters. The only limit on the scenario is the time of year at which it is set, but that can easily be changed.

What does the Saga require?

The Darkest Day only requires the Age of Vikings core rulebook.

Where will the Vikings go in this Saga?

The Darkest Day is a story of grief, greed, and revenge which takes place over Yule at the end of Ýlir. The Player Characters are invited to spend the festivities with their friend, the farmer Ásmundur Ívarsson. As they journey there through the harsh winter, they make a terrible discovery. Someone has placed a local family under a curse! The person responsible is nearby and easily found, one of the Hidden People, hiding in a cave with her children. She not only confirms that she laid the curse and did so because a local farmer killed her husband, but promises to lift the curse if the murderer is brought to justice. If not, she promises that worse is come…

The scenario hinges on identifying the murderer and whether the Player Characters will pursue the course of justice or protect the accused farmer, who of course, is the one they are due to stay with. Ásmundur is rigid in his pride, whilst his wife, Ragna, who is the local midwife, is stricken by grief, for her touch strikes blind any newborn she delivers. Caught between the customs of hospitality and the nature of the curse, the Player Characters can conduct a little investigation before ultimately confronting Ásmundur over his actions.

How the situation is resolved is entirely down to the Player Characters. The presents and explores several options, including persuasion, confrontation, and revenge. Of course, there is one true path that will lead to justice, but if the Player Characters follow it, they will be suitably rewarded.

What will the Skalds sing of this Saga?

The Darkest Day is a short, one session scenario that can easily be run as a demonstration or convention scenario, just as it can be used as part of a campaign. Its length and its directness—the fact that the players and their Vikings know who the villain is from the start—make it is easy to prepare and add to a campaign. The Darkest Day is a solid, serviceable scenario strong on justice, roleplaying, and magic, with a little (or great depending on the choices that the Player Characters make) opportunity for combat.

Miskatonic Monday #428: Colours of the Deep

Much like the Jonstown Compendium for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and The Companions of Arthur for material set in Greg Stafford’s masterpiece of Arthurian legend and romance, Pendragon, the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition is a curated platform for user-made content. It is thus, “...a new way for creators to publish and distribute their own original Call of Cthulhu content including scenarios, settings, spells and more…” To support the endeavours of their creators, Chaosium has provided templates and art packs, both free to use, so that the resulting releases can look and feel as professional as possible. To support the efforts of these contributors, Miskatonic Monday is an occasional series of reviews which will in turn examine an item drawn from the depths of the Miskatonic Repository.

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Name: Colours of the Deep

Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Nader Rabie

Setting: Massachusetts, USA, 1925

Product: One shot
What You Get: Thirty-seven-page, 2.19 BB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: The Colour Out of Space… “Under the sea … Under the sea”

Plot Hook: A tourist trip by advanced submarine ends with a clang and pales into horror...

Plot Support: Staging advice, six pre-generated Investigators, nine handouts, one schematic and one deck plan, and two Mythos monsters.

Production Values: Excellent

Pros

# Exhilaratingly creepy underwater threat

# Doubly trapped—underwater and in a mine!

# Strange bedfellows make for maddening allies

# Easy to prepare

# Easy to adjust to other modern times and coastal cities

# Nicely selected illustrations

# Submechanophobia

# Thalassophobia

# Monochromophobia

Cons

# Needs an edit (surprisingly)

# No maps, but the schematic works

# Feels a little too modern for its period

Conclusion

# A one-shot which takes the Investigators somewhere different

# Creepy, claustrophobic encounters with the Mythos that are definitely fish out of water!

# Reviews from R’lyeh Recommends