Friday Fantasy: Dark Visions

Dark Visions does not waste a lot of time before getting down to brass tacks. Three lines make up the back cover blurb and there is no introduction before it leaps into describing the first of the three Character Classes found in its pages. So, it feels as if it could do with a bit more context and a bit more in the way of guidance for the Game Master as to what it is, what its contents are, and how it might be used. To explain, it is a supplement for ShadowDark, the retroclone inspired by both the Old School Renaissance and Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition from The Arcane Library. Published by RPG Ramblings Publishing, following a successful Kickstarter campaign, it is dedicated to cults and cultists, who and what they worship. In addition to its three Player or Occult Classes and their spells—twenty-five of which are new, it details sixteen cults, twenty-five dark creatures, and more. The more consists of two scenarios, the first two parts of a three-part mini-campaign which culminates in The Tower of Six.

Dark Visions opens with the Cultist Class. The Cultist is an outcast from society because of the taboos broken, dark deeds done, and secretive rituals performed in the name of his patron or deity. With ‘Ashes to Ashes’, he can burn Hit Points to increase damage inflicted and can cast a particular set of spells. The Inquisitor Class hunts for signs of heresy and heretics, and has Advantage when hunting the enemies of his god. He can use the Priest Class’ scrolls and wands and bring down the Judgement of ‘Mark of Hellfire’ or the ‘Mark of Radiance’ on a target. With ‘Mark of Hellfire’, the target is illuminated and if Chaos-aligned, at a Disadvantage for the next round, whilst ‘Mark of Radiance’ gives the target damage resistance and illuminates if they share the same alignment. The Covenant Knight is a Lawful-aligned knight dedicated to the ideals of the Covenant Council, which pass the ‘Final Word’ upon an enemy, inflicting maximum damage several times a day and ‘Resolute in Adversity’, is at Advantage to resist the abilities of devils and demons. At Third Level and above, the Covenant Knight can cast Priests’ spells.

The new Classes are an interesting mix, with the Covenant Knight feeling like a variant of the Paladin-type Class. The other two are potentially more interesting given that much of their flavour will come from the player’s choice of patron in terms of a god, demon, devil, or other entity. Nor are they exclusive, since the Cultist need not be Chaos-aligned and instead linked to the Celestial, the Draconic, Primordial, or Sylvan. With some thought, the three Classes could be found working together, as well as with other Classes for ShadowDark. In addition, there is a table of for ‘Cultists Backgrounds’ and a list of Cultist gear.

The Cultist also has its own table for ‘Cultist Mishaps’ as well as list of its own spells. Some of the spells do come from the ShadowDark core rulebook, whilst a few are taken from the official fanzine, Cursed Scroll 1: Diaberlie!, which does limit the Class’ usefulness. The new spells are grim in nature, such as Inflict Pain, a Tier 3 spell which enables a Cultist to inflict damage on his target by drawing his own blood, essentially exchanging his Hit Points for dice of damage, whilst the Tir 1 spell Misery, floods the mind of the target with guilt from dreadful deeds and ill-fortune, forcing them to roll at Disadvantage. There is also flavour too that the Cultist—whether a Player Character or the Game Master as an NPC—can bring into the casting and application of the spells.

Dark Visions gives simple descriptions of various gods along with their Domains and those of various demi-gods not so detailed. Further, these pale into insignificance in comparison to the attention paid to the sixteen cults described in the supplement. These are archetypes, such as Ash cults, Blood cults, Doom cults, Moon cults, Plague cults, and more, that the Game Master can flesh out and develop. Each comes with a description, a special ability or sacred item, and then tables of rumours, encounters, and plot generator, as well as stats for associated NPCs and monsters. For example, the Gallows cult is Lawful and dedicated to levying capital punishment, its leaders wielding axes and regarding themselves as judge, jury, and executioner. Its holy item is the Axe of the Executioner, a +2 great axe that cannot be wielded by the Chaotically-aligned, has a better chance of rolling critical strikes and when its wielder does, inflicts maximum base damage. Yet at the end of a combat in which it did not inflict a killing blow, the wielder can suffer a loss of Intelligence. The rumours include stories of gallows suddenly appearing in the town squares of every nearby town, the encounters a band of cultists that has broken into a butcher’s shop where it is preparing a chopping block, and the stats are for standard cultists and cultists leaders. Combined with the ‘Plot Generator’ table and there is a decent amount of detail, flavour, and gameable content in all the cult descriptions. It is notable that not all of the cults are necessarily Chaotic (or evil) in nature and that expands the flexibility of the content.

Rounding out Dark Visions is a pair of scenarios that both involve cultists and together form the first two parts of a trilogy of scenarios that culminates with The Tower of Six. The campaign sees the Player Characters discover the activities of a band of cultists and then track it in order to find out what it is that the cultists are planning and try to put a stop to it. The given cult is the Cult of Nightmares, but the campaign suggests alternatives. The first scenario is ‘In Cultist’s Wake’, which is designed for First Level Player Characters and can be played in one or two sessions. They are employed by a farmer to investigate a water-logged crypt that has just opened up. What the Player Characters is a mini-dungeon where the cultists appear to be cleaning up after their activities in the crypt and looting what they can. What is interesting is that the crypt is for a Lawful lord and what that means is that the dungeon has become dangerous because of the cultists’ meddling rather than being a place of evil. It is pleasingly atmospheric, the Player Characters having to slosh through the lower level to find out what is going on.

‘In Cultist’s Wake’ ends with a map taken from the cultists and in the Player Characters’ hands. It is marked with locations that the cultists are also interested in and one of these is detailed in ‘As Above, So Below’. It is designed to be played in two to three sessions by Player Characters of Second and Third Level, either as direct sequel or another adventure or two afterwards. It details a partially collapsed dome structure that was once used by druids and mages to study the power of ley lines. Again, the cultists are clearing up after investigating the site, so are busy and going about their duties, which gives the Player Characters the opportunity to sneak in and strike. Things are complicated by the interest of a rival cult, which has sent thieves to steal what the Cult of Nightmares has found so far. It gives the adventure an energetic dynamic that plays out at dusk as the Player Characters discover what the cultists are doing, what they have been looking for, and what happened at the complex to cause its collapse.

Physically, Dark Visions is cleanly and tidily presented. It is a good read and although lightly illustrated, the artwork is good. Both dungeons are very clearly presented so that they are easy to run from the page. The maps do have slightly fuzzy feel.

Of course, cultists can be any Class or even none, but Dark Visions gives the cultist focus and role and causes and masters to be fervent over, as well as rewards for their service and devotion. Which can be as Player Characters or NPCs, and the fact that there are multiple cults described means that the Game Master can return to Dark Visions again and again for inspiration and opponents—or even use to set up a campaign in which the Player Characters are cultists fighting other cultists. Certainly, the two scenarios in that supplement can be used in fashion as well as with normal Player Characters. Dark Visions will not suit all campaigns given its nature, but for those it does suit and those with more mature themes and players, it is an excellent supplement, bringing a grimmer, darker tone to a ShadowDark campaign.

Synth Sedition

With its near future setting of a San Franciso ravaged by climate change and protected from the sea by seawalls, the bulk of its population having moved off-world  in ‘The Scramble for Stars’ to start again on the megacorporate-sponsored colonies, and the use of Synths or biological androids as a pliable workforce in their stead, Carbon 2185: A Cyberpunk RPG feels very much inspired by Blade Runner and Blade Runner 2049. Published two years after the latter film by British publisher, Dragon Turtle Games, Ltd., Carbon 2185: A Cyberpunk RPG is also noticeable for the fact that its mechanics are derived from those used for Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. Despite the lack of a Human workforce to replace them, not everyone is happy with the use of Synths as what they see as slave labour, and some have taken this further with the Synth Liberation Front, which supports escaped Synths and protects them against the government’s ‘retirement agents’ as well as striking at manufacturers such as Villeneuve Robotics. This theme is explored in Interlinked | A Carbon 2185 Mission Book, a scenario for Cyberpunks—as Player Characters are known in Carbon 2185—of First and Second Level. It is designed to be easy to run and is suitable for both new players and new Game Masters and it would not be difficult to run it after the events of ‘Chow’s Request: A Carbon 2185 Adventure for 1st Level Cyberpunks’, the scenario in the core rulebook.

Interlinked | A Carbon 2185 Mission Book pulls the Cyberpunks deep into the underground conflict between the Synth Liberation Front, the government’s ‘retirement agents’, the corporations manufacturing and employing Synths, and the manufacturer’s own reclamation agents. Set in San Franciso, it is a five to six act affair, plus a prequel, that the Game Master can run in two or three sessions. It opens with ‘Road Block’, the short prequel which sets the Cyberpunks up against the villains of the piece, Villeneuve Robotics. It provides the players and their Cyberpunks with a solid selection of motives as why they would take a job against Villeneuve Robotics above and beyond the generous amount of money that the fixer is offering. It consists of the simple smash and grab of some corporate access codes from a tech support team on its way to a Villeneuve Robotics facility followed by the Cyberpunks having to break into the facility and download a data core. Everything seems set up for easy access to the facility as someone seems to have set it on fire, meaning that security and everything else is in an array! It is a simple affair, with lots of options and suggestions as to how the Cyberpunks might go about the mission.

The scenario proper, ‘Interlinked’ follows quickly on. The Cyberpunks’ employer, the Fixer  Rico ‘Replay’ Montoya gives them another job. They are to break into a Frisco’s Finest Production Facility where several popular lines of food are manufactured, upload some data, and get out, preferably without a loss of life. Unfortunately, there is no fire to distract corporate security, so the Cyberpunks need to find a way to get in on their own. What is common to both facilities is the use of Synths as a workforce and deployment of armed security, the latter actually bored with their duties at Frisco’s Finest. Again, various options are suggested as how they might get in and get out, the latter more detailed as the Cyberpunks have to succeed at four types of task to escape without alerting security.

In both ‘Road Block’ and the start of ‘Interlinked’, the Cyberpunks get to see the Synths put to work and plenty of evidence that they are treated as second or even third-class citizens—even if they can be classified as citizens. In the next part, the Cyberpunks are contacted by Kaito Tanaka, a local electronics restoration store owner, who asks them to find Thomas ‘Willy’ Williams, a Villeneuve Robotics employee who is unhappy with the treatment of Synths and wants to leave Villeneuve Robotics. Of course, Villeneuve Robotics is unhappy with this, and by the time the Cyberpunks catch up with Williams, Villeneuve Robotics security teams and mercenary squads in their employ, are close behind. The resulting encounter should ideally result in a chase and Interlinked | A Carbon 2185 Mission Book gives a quick and dirty means of running this (and again, if the Game Master needs to run another chase).

Depending upon the outcome of the previous encounters, the Cyberpunks may need to rescue Thomas ‘Willy’ Williams or even one of their own, if Villeneuve Robotics captures either. The scenario supports this possibility with details of the Villeneuve Robotics Reclamation Centre, which can also be used as a target for the Synth Liberation Front to employ the Cyberpunks to assault in an attempt to free the Synths there. In whatever way it is used, it effectively means that the Cyberpunks can see the creation of Synths in the first part of the scenario and the destruction of Synths in this part. This is another corporate facility, but one that the scenario makes clear is not much different to an abattoir, even if it’s a high tech abattoir. In the earlier part of the scenario, the players and their Cyberpunks will have seen signs of the poor, and even ill, treatment of Synths, but here they will be confronted with direct evidence that Synths are treated as tools, ones that are discarded and destroyed. Make no mistake, Interlinked | A Carbon 2185 Mission Book wants the players and their Cyberpunks to feel sympathy with the Synths and be on their side.

Penultimately, the Cyberpunks have one final job to do for Thomas ‘Willy’ Williams and a Synth that he wants to get out of San Francisco. This is to escort them onto the B.A.R.T.—or ‘Bay Area Rapid Transit’—and thus get them out of the city. The challenge here is not that Villeneuve Robotics has sent security teams after them, but that B.A.R.T. is neutral ground in the city and weapons are not allowed. B.A.R.T. enforces this arduously. So, when it comes to any confrontation, the Cyberpunks will have to rely on their fists and feet, on their ingenuity, and any cyberweapons that they have installed. This sets up the classic good guys versus the bad guys railway station confrontation scene seen in so many films. The nod to film scenes, and the Film Noir genre, continues with the aftermath of the scenario as it quickly becomes apparent that the Synth Liberation Front is not as morally pure as the Cyberpunks might have first thought and likely have been led to believe up that point. The end of the scenario is more open and player-led than the earlier more directed chapters.

Physically, Interlinked | A Carbon 2185 Mission Book could be tidier and better presented in places. It is lightly illustrated with decent enough artwork. The floor plans are also decent enough, in the main depicting corporate or factory locations, so there is an anodyne regularity to them. It would have helped had the maps been given a key to their locations for easy reference.

Carbon 2185: A Cyberpunk RPG is an interesting setting and Interlinked | A Carbon 2185 Mission Book provides reasonable, if unspectacular support for it. With its multiple factory style targets, it does feel monotone in its depiction of the Carbon 2185 future and the Game Master may want to run other shot scenarios in between the chapters to add a little variety. Of course, Interlinked | A Carbon 2185 Mission Book can be used as source material for any Cyberpunk roleplaying game that the Game Master is running, but as is, it works well enough.

Miskatonic Monday #408: The Swarms of Tanffridd

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.

—oOo—

Name: The Swarms of Tanffridd

Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Hari Blackmore

Setting: Wales, 1920s

Product: Scenario
What You Get: Twenty-page page, 1.31 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: “You catch a lot more flies with honey than vinegar, as they say, though I warrant you get even more flies with corpses. Flies aren’t too picky, when you come to it.”

― Thomm Quackenbush, A Collector of Spirits

Plot Hook: Flies alight on the corpse of dying village

Plot Support: Staging advice, six NPCs, one map, six NPCs, and two Mythos monsters.

Production Values: Plain

Pros

# Isolated, bucolic instigated by the lord of the flies

# Straightforward plotting

# Pteronarcophobia

# Entomophobia

# Cymrophobia

Cons

# Only has a map of the village, not the mine or surrounding areas

# Definitely not one for entomophobe

# Feels as if the Investigators are being held back from the final scene

Conclusion

# Insect invasion scenario in which the Investigators are also invaders
# The final scene could come sooner if the scenario let it

Miskatonic Monday #407: Gelateria

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.

—oOo—

Name: Gelateria

Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Hayley P

Setting: Rome, 1954

Product: Ninety-minute one-shot
What You Get: Seventeen page, 14.35 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: “The box was a universe, a poem, frozen on the boundaries of human experience.” – William Gibson

Plot Hook: Frozen in time at the gelato shop

Plot Support: Staging advice, four pre-generated Investigators, three handouts, one floor plan, three NPCs, and one Mythos monster.

Production Values: Plain

Pros

# Ninety-minute one-shot for the new Keeper

# Pleasingly parochial setting

# Easy to prepare with most options and outcomes covered
# Aliens could be replaced by the Mi-Go

# Athazagoraphobia

# Pagotophobia

# Frigophobia

Cons

# Needs a slight edit

# Not a Mythos scenario

Conclusion

# Claustrophobic Italian ice horror meets a ‘Man in Black’
# Easy to run scenario, but advice for the new Keeper could have been stronger

Coriolis Campaign III

The Third Horizon is a place of mystery and mysticism. The location of the thirty-six star systems that comprise the third wave of colonisation from Earth via a series of portals built and abandoned long ago by an alien species now known as the Portal Builders, it stands isolated once again following an interstellar war between the First Horizon and the Second Horizon that closed the Portals. The identity of the Portal Builders remains a mystery, as does the identity of the recently arrived faceless aliens known as the Emissaries who rose from the gas giant Xene. Compounding that is the fact that one of the Emissaries claims to be an Icon and ordinary men and women have been seen to use abilities said to be the province of the Icons themselves. Are they heretics, evolving, or the result of Emissary meddling? Then what secrets are hidden in the dark between the stars and the portals? This is the situation in the Middle East-influenced Science Fiction roleplaying game, Coriolis: The Third Horizon, originally published in Swedish by Free League Publishing, but since published in English. It is also the situation at the start of Mercy of the Icons, a campaign trilogy for Coriolis: The Third Horizon, that will explore them in detail and reveal some of the secrets to the setting.

By the end of the Mercy of the Icons – Part 1: Emissary Lost, the first part of the campaign, the Player Characters discovered starting revelations in the wake of the disappearance of the Emissary. These were the identity of the organisation behind the death and disappearances of mystics from aboard the Coriolis station, the so called ‘The Mysticides’, and more information about who the Emissaries are and that they in danger after receiving a vision of the Second Horizon. It seems that despite the Third Horizon having been long isolated from both the First Horizon and the Second Horizon, the former is attempting to make long lost contact and manipulate events in its favour, whilst the latter is trying to prevent it. The action having shifted from Coriolis station to tracking across the world of Kua below, the first part of the campaign ends with the Player Characters wanting to get off planet knowing that some of the most important figures in the Third Horizon are in danger.

By the end of Mercy of the Icons – Part 2: The Last Cyclade, the second part of the campaign, the Player Characters will have made a startling and almost alien discovery as to the nature of threat which has been operating in the dark between the stars and the portals, in a thoroughly unnerving dive on a submerged starship and returned to Coriolis Station to be feted as heroes. This brings them to the attention of numerous factions and notables, all ready to extend offers of employment as useful and capable agents in the turbulence following ‘The Mysticides’ and the reactions against the mystics. No matter which faction the Player Characters sided with, they find themselves investigating the activities of the Nazareem’s Sacrifice cult, originally a Firstcome faction, but long since reviled for its nihilistic and brutal practices, including alleged human sacrifice, performing dark rituals, and making unholy pacts with evil spirits and djinn. In the process the Player Characters make further horrifying discoveries about the origins of the Third Horizon. Meanwhile, the other factions continued to plan and plot and those plots and plans come to fruition against the backdrop of a hastily called election to the Council of Factions aboard Coriolis Station. As the results of the election are called, rioting breaks out, martial law is declared, and the Emissaries move in the open, attacking Coriolis Station, causing its shattered pieces to fall to the planet Kua below.

To continue playing the campaign, it is recommended that at least one Player Character be combat capable. In addition, a Player Character with the Data Djinn skill is definitely going to be useful and whilst a Mystic character is not mandatory, the presence of one will add an extra dimension to the campaign. The Player Characters do not necessarily need to have their own starship, but should have access to one. That said, they may able to recover their own spaceship, which they lost access to in Mercy of the Icons – Part 1: Emissary Lost, and carry one from there. One way in which the Player Characters can acquire a ship from the start of the campaign is in playing The Last Voyage of the Ghazali, a prequel scenario to the Mercy of the Icons – Part 1: Emissary Lost. It is worth running Last Voyage of the Ghazali before Mercy of the Icons – Part 1: Emissary Lost, but it should be noted that the connection between The Last Voyage of the Ghazali and Mercy of the Icons – Part 1: Emissary Lost is never really explored from the perspective of the Player Characters. However, it becomes much more important in Mercy of the Icons – Part 2: The Last Cyclade and then Mercy of the Icons – Part 3: Wake of the Icons. As with Mercy of the Icons – Part 1: Emissary Lost and Mercy of the Icons – Part 2: The Last Cyclade before it, the Atlas Compendium is likely to be useful in running the ongoing campaign.

The third and final part of the campaign, Mercy of the Icons – Part 3: Wake of the Icons, is like the first two parts, divided in three acts. The first act begins not long after where Mercy of the Icons – Part 2: The Last Cyclade left off. As the Player Characters begin to recover from the shock of the destruction of Coriolis Station, they experience a number of visions—waking and otherwise—that draw them back to Kua, the planet above which Coriolis Station long hung in orbit before falling to the planet. There is only a little time for them to pursue their own interests and perhaps for the Game Master to run other adventures, before they have to answer the call in ‘A Song For Kua’. The Player Characters find the world much changed, both the old order with its indentured servitude and the spire from which it ruled, shattered and waters that were once held back now flooding what is left. Chased by weirdly jerking, but precise attackers who are accompanied by the sound of shrill piercing and a chorus of whispers, the Player Characters work their way out into the jungle surrounding the spire and then underground. There they make yet another startling discovery: miraculously, one of the icons has survived, the Machine Icon. She called out to the Player Characters and has an amazing offer to make. This is for them to join with her. The Player Characters do not have to do so, but doing so not only grants them access to some amazing mystical gifts, it gives them protection against the threat posed by the Second Horizon’s control of the Mystics in the Third Horizon.

After ‘A Song For Kua’, the Game Master has one last period when it is possible to run content that is not part of the campaign before the action ramps up in the penultimate chapter, ‘The Tenth Icon’. Against a backdrop of mystics mutinying and stealing warships and taking them to Xene, the gas giant where the Emissaries first appeared, the Player Characters are contacted by a patron informing them that their presence has been requested. The Sadaal system has been closed to outside traffic, but is known to control a large flotilla of warships that would be very useful in the fight against the threats that the Third Horizon faces. Previous negotiations with the Sadaalian leadership have failed, but now it is prepared to accept a new delegation on the proviso that the Player Characters are part of it. ‘The Tenth Icon’ is as straightforward as ‘A Song For Kua’, but the stakes are much higher. What begins as a potentially hopeful situation is undone when Sadaalian security turns on the delegation and arrests its members, including attempting to arrest the Player Characters. On Sadaal below, the Player Characters learn the true nature of the system’s leader, Aremerat the Eternal, and what a monster he truly is as they race to ascend Crying Ziggurat atop which the members of the imprisoned delegation are to be executed. The scenario climaxes atop the building, facing both security and Aremerat the Eternal, all in front of the city’s faithful below. This is a challenging encounter and it helps if the Player Characters joined to the Machine Icon in the previous chapter.

What ‘A Song For Kua’ and ‘The Tenth Icon’ are doing is really setting up ‘The Horizon Wars’, the final part of both Mercy of the Icons – Part 3: Wake of the Icons and the Mercy of the Icons campaign itself. They are both linear in nature and deviating away from their storylines weakens the Player Characters in the long run and makes a lot of extra work for the Game master. The campaign more or less notes this when discussing briefly, the possibility of the Player Characters siding with the forces arrayed against the Third Horizon. It is also those forces that the players and their characters are being warned about in ‘The Tenth Icon’. These include the Second Horizon’s manipulations by their Emissaries of Mystics of the Third Horizon to make them run to Xene that are undermining the Third Horizon’s capacity to defend itself and the more insidious efforts of the First Horizon, led by the Eternal Emperor. Of the two, the First Horizon is a bigger threat than the Second Horizon, but ultimately both want to conquer the Third Horizon. Armed with this knowledge, the Player Characters are set-up for the finale of the campaign.

Where ‘A Song For Kua’ and ‘The Tenth Icon’ were both linear and location focused, ‘The Horizon Wars’ takes an entirely different structure and opens the campaign to the whole of the Third Horizon—and just a little beyond. ‘The Horizon Wars’ consists of series of metagame ‘War Turns’, each divided into two phases. The first consists of a standard mission, whilst the second is a conflict action. In the metagame action, the players direct the naval forces of the Third Horizon against those of First Horizon and Second Horizon, ordering the movement of fleets and rolling for the outcome of battles, assigning damage and assigning reinforcements as necessary—and it really will be necessary! A map is provided of the Third Horizon and where the starting positions are for the various fleets on all sides plus stats and details for them. This can be run as theatre of the mind, but there is scope to turn it into a strategic wargame with pieces moved from system to system. To that end, the Game Master will want to prepare some pieces to represent fleets as well as a good map that the players can access. It helps that a lengthy example of 

At the start of ‘The Horizon Wars’, the Third Horizon finds itself on the backfoot with limited resources and capabilities, for example, constantly in danger of being overrun because of the possible influence that the Second Horizon has over the Mystics serving in the Third Horizon Fleets. Where ‘A Song For Kua’ and ‘The Tenth Icon’ were both linear and location focused, ‘The Horizon Wars’ takes an entirely different structure and opens the campaign to the whole of the Third Horizon—and just a little beyond. ‘The Horizon Wars’ consists of series of metagame ‘War Turns’, each divided into two phases. The first consists of a standard mission, whilst the second is a conflict action. In the metagame action, the players direct the naval forces of the Third Horizon against those of First Horizon and Second Horizon, ordering the movement of fleets and rolling for the outcome of battles, assigning damage and assigning reinforcements as necessary—and it really will be necessary! A map is provided of the Third Horizon and where the starting positions are for the various fleets on all sides plus stats and details for them. This can be run as theatre of the mind, but there is scope to turn it into a strategic wargame with pieces moved from system to system. To that end, the Game Master will want to prepare some pieces to represent fleets as well as a good map that the players can access.

At the start of ‘The Horizon Wars’, the Third Horizon finds itself on the backfoot with limited resources and capabilities, for example, constantly in danger of being overrun because of the possible influence that the Second Horizon has over the Mystics serving in the Third Horizon Fleets. The missions in ‘The Horizon Wars’ directly influence the outcome of the subsequent conflict phases in the metagame, but there are also several mini-missions that the Game Master can develop that can help influence the outcome of the main missions. Although it is stated that they are optional, their inclusion helps move the campaign along and it means that the players and their characters are always focusing on the metagame aspect of ‘The Horizon Wars’. The main missions in this chapter are shorter than in the previous chapters allowing for a wider and more interesting variety of tasks. ‘The Fifth System’ sends the Player Characters off in search of new allies that will test their negotiating and diplomatic skills as they find their way through a secret portal and into a hidden star system, whilst in ‘The Ghosts of Xene’, the Player Characters have to sneak and/or fight their way into getting an audience with the Emissaries to negotiate a way to end their directly interfering with Third Horizon’s militaries. The First Horizon finally makes its move in ‘The Legacy of the Founders’ as it triggers a Third Horizon-wide trap and launches strikes against key systems, and the Player Characters have to stop its forces gaining access to another fleet. In each multiple options are discussed in terms of possible outcomes and their consequences. Lastly, the Player Characters are given the means to strike hard at the forces of the First Horizon, so hard that it will change the Third Horizon forever. Again, there are multiple outcomes discussed, all in no little detail and all of which will change the Third Horizon to some extent, good or bad.

Lastly, Mercy of the Icons – Part 3: Wake of the Icons includes details of numerous spaceships that can be used in the latter part of the campaign, and beyond. More useful for the former than the latter and sadly the ships are not illustrated.

Physically, Mercy of the Icons – Part 3: Wake of the Icons is well presented. The artwork is excellent and the campaign is decently written, although it does need a slight edit in places.

 

Mercy of the Icons – Part 3: Wake of the Icons brings the Mercy of the Icons campaign to an epic conclusion. As much as it is an end to the Mercy of the Icons campaign, it may well be an end to the Game Master’s Coriolis: The Third Horizon campaign too, although there are notes on how a campaign might continue. The first two chapters of Mercy of the Icons – Part 3: Wake of the Icons are tight affairs, funnelling the story onto a grand stage in the third and final part where both players and characters have a big role to play. Players in the conflict phases, characters in the mission phases. This does add complexity to the campaign, one of mechanical complexity in addition to the campaign’s complexity in terms of setting and background. Especially political background. There is a lot for the Game Master to grasp in terms of that background and be able to impart that background to her players. As with the campaign as a whole, Mercy of the Icons – Part 3: Wake of the Icons warrants a high degree of commitment by both player and Game Master and in an exciting finale, it repays that commitment.

The Other OSR: Punk is Dead

Punk is Dead: A Post-Apocalyptic SongwritingTTRPG kicks the punk of Mörk Borg into England’s dreaming. It is a roleplaying game that is both like and unlike Mörk Borg, the Swedish pre-apocalypse Old School Renaissance style roleplaying game designed by Ockult Örtmästare Games and Stockholm Kartell and published by Free League Publishing. Its tone is very much ‘punk’ and punk rock and it is very much like Mörk Borg set on an island lost from the dying world, However, it is a post-apocalyptic world rather than the pre-apocalyptic world of Mörk Borg, and its setting is modern rather than fantasy, but still ‘grim dark’. How exactly this world came about is unknown, but everyone knows that it was the fault of foolish old men, who in the space of seven days expended every nuclear weapon and shrouded the world in grey. Only the Ununited Kingdom remains, a lonely island onto whose shores climbs every nightmare and myth, come in search of power, a feast, or just a seat at the last dying of the world. It has been divided into five realms. In the southeast, The Murk exists Underground, dominated by the organisation known as the ‘LCV’, or Literal Corporate Vampires, and their shareholders, who reside in the Earthscrapers that fork out from the old tunnels of the Underground. Their world is a hell of torture and decadence, dug ever deeper by captives destined to become food. In the southwest, The Whimsy is ruled by an Undead Queen pulled from the grave to enact retribution upon those who killed her husband a thousand years before and unite the kingdom. She covers her realm in a thick mist which hides the monsters she commands and makes travel difficult. In the west, Adain Ddraig is protected from The Whimsy and the rest of the Ununited Kingdom by two gurt wyrms that demand tribute in cattle. To the north, The Grim is scarred by the cracks of former rivers and canals, divided between and vied over by the Petrolhdz and the EquestriPunks, who only come together for a good rave or to trade at the realm’s only building still standing, the Manchester Free Trade Hall. Further north, The Fern Jungle is a labyrinth of towering ferns and forests, where ‘Quantum Fuckery’ has merged nature and humanity as one, the Stag Folk silent and swift, and protective of their Hidden King. In between is The Woe, the workhouse of the Ununited Kingdom, run by middle management for the Literal Corporate Vampires. To the east, somewhere in the poisoned sea comes a signal from a Pirate Radio station, broadcasting news and music, and worse, Emergency Broadcasts that herald the end of the UuK. Few hear them for the Literal Corporate Vampires outlaws the possession of radios. Even as the end draws near, there is hope. Hope that runs like a river. Not of water, but MUSIC! Music that Punks will play to bring hope to the Ununited Kingdom and kick fascist, vampiric arse along the way.

Punk is Dead: A Post-Apocalyptic Songwriting TTRPG is published published by Critical Kit Ltd, best known for Be Like A Crow – A Solo RPG and Aces Over the Adriatic: A Solo RPG. A Punk in Punk is Dead is defined by six attributes—Nngh (strength for pushing and punching), Deft, Stage Presence (intimidation and charisma), Tough, Yeet (throwing stuff), and Streetwise. These range in value between ‘-3’ and ‘+3’. He has a weapon, such as a steak tenderise, an eight-ball in a sock, or a chainsaw. He will also have a Role, a Class that is his role in the band. These consist of Vocals, Guitar, Drums, and Keys, plus there are three bonus Hip Hop roles, which are Em Cee, Dee Jay, and Breaker. (If there is an eighties version of Punk is Dead, there definitely needs to a ‘Bez’ Role.) Each provides some ability modifiers, how money he has, and a way in ‘Quantum Fuckery’ has affected him. For example, Vocals might have the ‘War Song’ that unleashes a scream twice a day that grants a bonus to the other Band Members’ next actions or ‘Crowd Surfer’, which with running start or leap enables the Band Member to attack everyone in the ‘crowd’, whilst for the Keys there is Sight Reading’ to read the intentions of someone else and ‘Discordant Demo’ that creates an off-key melody which causes temporary brain fuzz and increases the Difficulty Rating of all tests for several minutes.

Name: Nuclear Trashcan Ned

Role: Drums

Nngh +2 Deft 0 Stage Presence 0 Tough +3 Yeet 0 Streetwise -1

Hit Points: 11

‘Quantum Fuckery’: 808 (inflict double damage on anyone attacking a fellow bandmember)

Weapon: The Truncheon Thing (d6)

Threads: Kevlar Jacket, Kneepads, DMs, leather gloves

Equipment: Fuck all

£23, bottle of water, two days’ worth of food

Clash symbol

To have his Punk or Band Member undertake an action, a player rolls a twenty-sided die and adds the appropriate ability score to roll equal to or higher than a Difficulty Rating. The Difficulty Rating ranges from ‘Piece of piss’ and six to ‘No fucking chance’ and eighteen, with ‘You’ve got this’ or twelve being the average Difficulty Rating. A Band Member has a number of Creativity Points that his player can spend to modify rolls, whilst the Band Creativity Points are useable all by everyone as long as they all agree.

Combat uses the same mechanic. Initiative is random, the band members or the enemies going first. Tests are made against Nngh for melee attacks and Yeet for ranged attacks. An attack can be dodged with the Deft test. The rules allow for ‘fuck-ups’ if a roll of one is made. If a Band Member’s Hit Points are reduced to zero, he is broken and may result in him being knocked unconscious, losing or breaking a limb, losing an eye, heavy bleeding, and death. If reduced to negative Hit Points, he is definitely dead.

The songwriting aspect of Punk is Dead is treated with a similar brevity, even though it is part of the title. There are no mechanics to support the process, but rather the players are expected to rely upon their creativity, take a vote on proposed lyrics, and if accepted are rewarded with Creativity Points. There is a quick and dirty guide, which is very in-keeping with the Punk ethos. The other way of earning Creativity Points is performing great gigs. There are tables for a gig’s outcome and for life on tour, preferably in a Ford Transit Van.

For the Band Manager as the Game Master is known there is a plethora of enemies, fascist and otherwise. They start with the Literal Corporate Vampire with sharpest of suits and include the First Wave of undead raised by the Undead Queen in The Whimsey after the apocalypse, Flame Hounds, the Gurt Wyrm, Stag Folk, Splitter made from seaweed, rope, and micro-plastics, Root Blights, Woebots, The Undead Queen of Avalon, and more.

Lastly there is a scenario, ‘London Falling’. The band gets to play at The ePoxy Club in Covent Garden Ruins as a support act. It is a fun little stealth and strike mission which kicks off when the main act gets kidnapped by the local Literal Corporate Vampire. It can be played through in a single session or so, including Band Member creation.

Punk is Dead: A Post-Apocalyptic Songwriting TTRPG is missing advice for the Band Manager in terms of setting up and running a game. Given that, this is not a roleplaying game that really should be picked by the prospective Game Master as her first roleplaying game unless she is definitely a fan of Punk. It is better suited to a more experienced Game Master who will have no issue with the rules or how to play or run Punk is Dead. In the main, the Band Manager and her players will be drawing upon all manner of media depicting band life and going on tour, not just that of Punk, and for the majority of players, they will have some idea of what that is like from having consumed some of that media. Similarly, there is no advice on creating a scenario or campaign, otherwise known as going on tour, and again, the Band Member will likely want to draw inspiration for those media sources and then inject some of the horror of Punk is Dead.

Physically, Punk is Dead: A Post-Apocalyptic Songwriting TTRPG is presented in the rough Punk style that you would expect and as seen on punk rock album covers, flyers for punk concerts ,and punk fanzines, with lots of paste-ups, torn out content, and collages. It fits the genre of the roleplaying game and it work well with the more horrifying style of Mörk Borg.

Punk is Dead: A Post-Apocalyptic Songwriting TTRPG is an entertainingly different treatment of the post-apocalyptic in roleplaying, likely to be a bruising, sweary headbutt of a game. Its presentation of the post-apocalypse of the Ununited Kingdom leans towards breadth rather than depth, and perhaps it could be explored further a full Punk is Dead tour across the Ununited Kingdom?

Secrets & Solitude

Dawnworld is an unregarded, almost forgotten world lying on the border of the Third Imperium in District 268 of the Spinward Marches. Over the centuries, its Eden-like nature has made it an attractive world for potential colonisation, but all of the numerous attempts to settle it have failed because of the sterility of any male born on the planet. However, the world is not uninhabited. It is home to some fifty or so monks at the Monastery of the New Sun, devout members of a monastic all male sect that is part of the Church of the Stellar Divinity. Its adherents believe that all stars are gods, conscious beings of transcendental power, whilst the monks also believe that the Dawnworld system once had only the single, but the ancient Saint Phranz was so beloved by the sun Sagree who longed for a companion that the Saint achieved apotheosis in this system and became the New Sun. There is a legend too that Saint Phranz entrusted the monastery with a great treasure, but since the monks live humble lives of worship, work, and austerity, there can be no truth to the legend. However, such a legend is cause enough to attract the attention of the worst that Charted Space has to offer. The modest and unassuming monks of Monastery of the New Sun are about to suffer the most wretched day of their lives as space pirates descend on Dawnworld and demand that the monks hand over the treasure—and they are not going to take no for an answer!

This is the set-up for In the Name of the Dawn, a scenario for Mongoose Publishing’s Traveller and published by March Harrier Publishing via Mongoose Publishing. It is from the same author who wrote The Zhodani Candidate and Eve of Rebellion, and though very much less political than either of those, it brings his experience of freeforms and LARP—Live Action Roleplaying—to the Third Imperium with its combination of Player Characters with strong motivations. It is designed to be played in a single session with four players and includes four pre-generated Player Characters. It thus suitable to be run as a convention scenario or as one-shot. They include a monk with a bloody past, a monk who is being blackmailed, an Aslan monk with a tragic past and a fascination for Shakespeare, and a monk who thinks that Dawnworld has an interesting past. This barely scratches the full details of each of the Player Characters’ secrets, all of which will be revealed in the course of the scenario, some of which may prove useful in the course of the scenario, and many of which will leave the Player Characters with dilemma—more or otherwise—at the end of the scenario. All four Player Characters have detailed character sheets, including an extra page of Shakespeare quotes for the Aslan!

In the Name of the Dawn is divided into three acts. In the first act, the scenario opens with the Player Characters going about their daily lives when they realise that a ship is in orbit and a shuttle is about to land. That this is not the regular supply shuttle come several months early is confirmed when its doors open and out rush a seeming horde of Vargr all shouting and shoot guns in the air. The monks, including the Player Characters, are rounded up and questioned about the treasure that is held at the monastery. In the second act, the Player Characters have an opportunity to escape and begin to search for clues as to what is really going on at the monastery because it becomes clear that the abbot was hiding something. In the last act, the Player Characters will make an amazing discovery and need to work exactly what they want to do with it and who they tell, if anyone. This discovery is the big secret behind In the Name of the Dawn, and given the stellar theming of the scenario, the dedicated Traveller fan probably has a good chance of guessing what it might be.

Bar its opening scenes, In the Name of the Dawn does not have set scenes and is entirely character driven. The scenario is entirely driven by the decisions of the players and their monks, the pirates mostly acting in surprised reaction to their actions. What is interesting about the scenario is that the players and their characters are faced with a moral dilemma from start to finish, followed by a very big one. The main moral quandary they face concerns how much violence they use in either escaping from or dealing with the pirates. Their choices will be limited since the Monastery of the New Sun is a house of peace, but as the scenario progresses, the monks will lay their hands on some weapons. However, too much violence and certainly killing, will likely lead to a crisis of faith. As will the last moral quandary and the revelation as to the big secret at the monastery

The Game Master is supported with solid advice, a full description and maps of the Monastery of the New Sun, and write-ups of the NPCs. There is also plenty of Library Data which provides even more background detail to the scenario.

Physically, In the Name of the Dawn is tidily, if plainly organised. If the scenario is missing anything, it is a map of the secret (though the Game Master could create something using Starship Geomorphs 2.0), and given the nature of that secret, a map of the Dawnworld might have been useful too.

Imagine being a monk in a ninth century monastery on the coast of Ireland and discovering that the only means of defending yourself and the monastery beyond faith is actually a battery of nuclear missiles? That revelation lies at the heart of the In the Name of the Dawn. This is a terrific scenario that presents the players and their characters with challenge and a dilemma, forces them to rely on ingenuity rather than gear, and reveals to them secrets upon secrets, including one that the Traveller fan will relish.