Friday Fear: Medieval Mysteries

It is rare that scenarios are set during the period of the Spanish Inquisition, despite it lasting over three-hundred-and-fifty years. ‘Fires of Hatred Defile the Sky’ from Red Eye of Azathoth, a singular foray into the Cthulhu Mythos for Kobold Press, and Chaosium, Inc.’s ‘Garden of Earthly Delights’ from Strange Aeons, both published for Call of Cthulhu, are exceptions. Medieval Mysteries takes gamers back to early period of the Spanish Inquisition with two scenarios designed to be played in two hours each. The first is ‘The Shroud of Pestilence’ in which the Player Characters investigate what looks to be an outbreak of the Black Death in a nearby village, but which turns out to be something else, whilst in ‘Heresy’, they attempt to save a group of conversos—Jews who converted to Christianity—from what is effectively, two monsters! This is all packaged with a framing device which lends itself to an ongoing campaign. Published by Yeti Spaghetti and Friends, Medieval Mysteries is a duology of short play time, one-night horror scenarios, the first entry in the series of historical horror adventures in the publisher’s ‘Frightshow Classics’ line. Ostensibly written for use with Chill or Cryptworld: Chilling Adventures into the Unexplained, the percentile mechanics of the scenario mean that it could easily be adapted to run with Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition and similar roleplaying games.

Medieval Mysteries is set in Spain in about 1490. Whilst the Kingdoms of Castile and Aragon, as well as much of Spain, are united through marriage of Queen Isabella I (of Castile) and King Ferdinand II (of Aragon), but they remain separate entities. What unites the Iberian peninsula is religion and the growing power of the Inquisition under the command of Inquisitor General Tomas de Torquemada which not only enforces Catholic orthodoxy, but also investigates possible acts of heresy, apostasy, blasphemy, witchcraft, and customs considered to be deviant—often in the most violent of ways. As a default, the Player Characters are all associated with the Santa Maria de Soria monastery, some hundred miles or so north-east of Madrid. The monastery offers a place of relative safety, but hides its own benign secrets. It is led by an abbot whose gift of foresight enables him to see paranormal abilities in others and dangers elsewhere, directing such individuals to seek out, investigate, and defeat supernatural and monstrous threats. Such efforts have to be conducted with great care, since any paranormal ability would be regarded by the Inquisition as mysticism and thus heresy.

In addition to a brief description of the monastery, Medieval Mysteries describes two new skills and two new paranormal abilities. The two new skills are Blacksmithing and Religious Mysticism, which will be of a specific faith, like Taoist Mysticism or Judaic Mysticism. The paranormal abilities are Exorcism and True Sight, both of which are likely to find their way into other scenarios. The pre-generated Player Characters consist of a mix of monks, nuns, and peasants, some with paranormal abilities, some without, but all with some background, a description, and a phobia. Perhaps the only thing missing here is advice on creating Player Characters suitable for the period and setting, since the set-up lends itself to a campaign in the style of The X-Files, but set in medieval Spain.

In ‘Adventure 1: The Shroud of Pestilence’, the Player Characters are directed to the village of Herrero which he initially believed to be suffering from an outbreak of the plague, but after receiving a vision, believes that there is an evil dark shadow looming over both it and its inhabitants. He wants them to investigate the possibility of the infernal. The Player Characters will initially encounter a plague doctor attempting to treat the terrible symptoms. The Player Characters get to examine the bodies that have not yet been buried and examine them for the terrible signs of the plague and interview the very concerned remaining villagers. Although many suspect that the devil himself is responsible, but very quickly, the Player Characters should discover signs indicating that something else is responsible, more monstrous than devilish. The Sense Monsters paranormal skill will be useful confronting this creature.

Despite its brevity, ‘Adventure 1: The Shroud of Pestilence’ packs in a decent amount of investigation and interaction before the Player Characters ascend into the hills and the second half of the scenario, which involves a confrontation with the culprit. This is a combat scene in a cave, a nasty encounter that has a chance, more or less, of instantly killing a Player Character, and that is even before the battle commences. Only one of the Player Characters is equipped with an effective weapon, so he should absolutely be selected. Ultimately, the players and their characters should try and get the creature out of its comfort zone, otherwise, a ‘Total Party Kill’ is a possibility. Which is fine for a one-shot, but not if the players want to continue playing their characters in the next scenario.

In ‘Adventure 2: Heresy’, the abbot sends the Player Characters to the city of Sigüenza where he has learned the Inquisition is about to begin an investigation into rumours of heresy and witchcraft among the conversos, those Jews who converted to Christianity. The abbot wants the Player Characters to investigate such rumours before the Inquisition begins its own heavy-handed inquiries. Talking to people in the converso quarter of the city will reveal that there is a young woman who talks to herself. Use of paranormal may confirm more and if confronted, she will tell the Player Characters that there is heresy being committed in the city, but not amongst the conversos. Rather it is occurring in the St. Jerome Monastery attached to the College of San Antonio de Portaceli, the city’s famed university.

‘Adventure 2: Heresy’ follows the same format as ‘Adventure 1: The Shroud of Pestilence’, but the combat encounter is not quite as deadly and does not mark the end of the scenario. Ideally, it should end with a trial of the culprit after the Player Characters have captured him, with them giving testimony against him. This is not the only way that the scenario can end, another possibility being trials of the conversos. Either way, the Game Master will need to run this to best effect, perhaps playing up the drama and theatre of any such trial more than the scenario does, which really only provides broad details. Overall, ‘Adventure 2: Heresy’ is a more sophisticated and more interesting affair than ‘Adventure 1: The Shroud of Pestilence’. The only thing that the Game Master might want to do is create some Inquisition NPCs as none are provided.

Physically, Medieval Mysteries is a decent looking affair behind a somewhere murky cover. The artwork inside is reasonable and the scenarios are generally well written. The cartography is plain and serviceable.

Both scenarios in Medieval Mysteries end in a little sign-off as if presented by the host of a late-night horror anthology series, so making them slightly different to traditional horror roleplaying scenarios. There is an ominous threat of lurking power and paranoia that pervades both scenarios, though definitely more so in the second scenario than the first. The short, two-hour running time for both scenarios does also means that ‘Adventure 2: Heresy’ is underwritten given no stats for the Inquisitors and the lack of staging for the trial. Nevertheless, it is the better and more interesting of the two scenarios in the book. Overall, the brevity of both scenarios in Medieval Mysteries means that they are easy to prepare and run, with scope to develop them a little further and scope to explore the setting in future releases.