Convict Conscript Combat

It should be no surprise that the future is a corporate future despite our aspirations. So, governments and agencies might do all the scouting and exploration, but the corporations have the money to invest and they expect a return on that investment. In the Corealis System, the conglomerate known as the Corporate Echelon is attempting to squeeze as much profit from the system and that includes protecting their facilities, let alone the colonies. There are reports of bug infestations and scab pirates attacking ships and outposts. In response the Corporate Echelon has instructed its Military Foundation to find a cheap solution to the problem. The result is the Rehabilitation Incentive Program (R.I.P.), a programme of enforced conscription from the Corporate Echelon’s private prisons. Convicts are given basic training and sent off on relentless tours of duty. They will eradicate bug infestations, assault pirate bases and spaceships, conduct salvage missions, run supply missions, and more, but no matter the type and nature of the mission, the Convicts, known as ‘Dirtbags’, are expendable. However, if a Dirtbag survives long enough, there is the promise of freedom and reintegration.

This is the set-up for Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG, published by The Dungeon’s Key following a successful Kickstarter campaign. Inspired by films such as Starship Troopers, Tank Girl, and Aliens, plus The Dirty Dozen and an unhealthy dose of the Borderlands video game franchise, it is a satire on corporate greed and capitalism and deals with a lot of mature themes. The dystopian satire starts with the look of the rulebook, which is heavily graffitied in a running commentary upon service in the Rehabilitation Incentive Program, the Convict Conscripts sticking two fingers up in punk attitude at the corporate commanders and masters.

To create a Convict Conscript, a player divides five points across three abilities—Bones, Cunning, and Nerves, rolls for his Convict Conscript’s Pardonable Offence and the Fallout, and then selects a role assignment, loadout, and trait. The Convict Conscript’s upbringing, personality trait, and appearance can all be rolled for. Each Convict Conscript also receives a fifty-credit signing bonus. The roles are Ape (Infantryman), Pill (Combat Medic), Tech (Combat Engineer), Hen (Reconnaissance), and Muscle Head (Support Gunner). Each provides three options in terms of Loadouts and Traits. Both the Pardonable Offence and the Fallout provide an extra bonus. In addition to his loadout, a Convict Conscript wears a Prisoner Identification Collar, which of course, is fitted with a small amount of explosives which can be detonated remotely, as a deterrent against escape attempts.

Name: Louise Kincy (MD)
Bones 1 Cunning 2 Nerves 2
Pardonable Offence: Medical Malpractice (75 years)
Fallout: High-Strung (No breathers in combat)
Role Assignment: Pill
Traits: Field Surgeon
Upbringing: Water Carrier in the circuit city sweatshops
Personality Trait: Petty
Appearance: Old World Prosthetic Hand
Loadout: 350-SI Service Pistol (three magazines), Surgery Kit, Juice Box Energisers (two), Tourniquet (one)

Mechanically, Dirtbags! uses a dice pool system. In fact, it uses three dice pools. These are Action, Ammunition, and Reserve. The Action pool is based on the Convict Conscript’s abilities. It is the number of dice that a player can assign to any one action. Using six-sided dice, any result of a four, five, or six is a success, although this range will increase or decrease depending upon if the Convict Conscript has Advantage, Disadvantage, or Severe Disadvantage. Any failed results go into the Convict Conscript’s Reserve where they cannot be used. Various traits will restore dice from the Reserve to the Action pool, but the primary means is to ‘Take a Breather’. Out of combat, this takes fifteen minutes, but in combat, it takes a whole turn in which the Convict Conscript can nothing else. A critical success, a roll of two sixes on an action will also restore a single die from the Reserve to the Action pool.

The number of actions that a Convict Conscript can undertake in a round is determined by his Ability values. For example, a Convict Conscript with a Bones of two has two physical actions in a round. So, his player might describe his actions in cleaning out a bug nest as first throwing a grenade at the hole out of which a bug swarm has erupted and then charging to its lip. Whilst a Convict Conscript with Cunning of two operating a drone might send it to hover over the hole and then scan for movement. In either case, the Convict Conscript’s player needs to roll a success for each action. Notably, none of the actions involve shooting or attacking. This is a free action. Nor does a player roll to hit. Instead, he rolls the Ammunition pool for his Convict Conscript’s weapon. The Convict Conscript can fire as many times as he wants. The only limits are the ammunition capacity of the weapon and its firing mode. Firing at targets beyond a weapon’s range reduces the number of Ammunition dice the player rolls. Every success is a hit, but if two ones are rolled, it means that the weapon has jammed. All dice rolled from Ammunition pool go into the Reserve pool and can only be refreshed when the Convict Conscript takes a turn to reload.

When hit, a Convict Conscript can defend using his Action pool or his Ammunition pool and every success negates a hit. Armour negates hits and can be destroyed. Damage is inflicted per location and if a hit location suffers two more points of damage, it is bleeding and will suffer more damage loss. Limbs can be ruined and amputated; if the torso is reduced to zero Hit Points, the Convict Conscript cannot ‘Take a Breather’, but can talk and still take free actions like shooting; and if a Convict Conscript’s Hit Points in his head are reduced to zero, he is dead. In addition to possible access to a Pill or Combat Medic, every Convict Conscript carries at least one ‘Muscular Intravenous Liquid Koka’ (M.I.L.K.) Energiser in his Prisoner Identification Collar. This can be automatically injected to negate hits of damage, ignore Ability limits, gain advantage on the Convict Conscript’s next roll, reroll any number of dice with disadvantage, and spend a success to gain an extra action. However, consume too many Energisers and a Convict Conscript can suffer an emotional outburst, such as hyperventilating, suffering a nervous breakdown, fleeing, and so on. Similarly, witnessing another Convict Conscript’s death, suffering an amputated limb, and other dire situation may also result in an emotional outburst. An emotional outburst is resisted with a Nerves roll.

Mechanically, Dirtbags! is simple and it does give a player plenty of freedom in terms of how and what his Convict Conscript does. Primarily this is because it removes the need to declare an attack as action and have it happen automatically if the player declares it. All the player has to do is roll for the effect. It means that the player can focus on his Convict Conscript moving and taking other actions. The limits are his Ability values and the size of his Action pool and the flow of the play is going to be from action to rest and back again from running and gunning and hiding and ducking to needing to ‘Take a Breather’ and back again. The Action pool and the Ammunition pool are both resources that need relatively careful handling.

Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG is played out as a series of tours of duty, each of which consists of several operations, the number randomly determined reflecting the difficulty of a campaign. Effectively, length of play determines the campaign difficulty. A completed operation reduces a Convict Conscript’s sentence by five years and for every twenty years his sentence is reduced, he can improve an ability, take a Retinal Curriculum Projector course which grants a trait, or take a trait from his role. Between tours of duty, a Convict Conscript can take Shore Leave, which may be a relaxing time or it may leave the Convict Conscript without an internal organ, which reduces his torso’s Hit Points. The Convict Conscripts also have access to a wide range of military surplus that they can purchase and in return they can sell their military surplus and salvage. A sample mission, ‘Occam’s Razor’, a training mission that goes to hell with a bug invasion!

Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG does not feel quite complete. There is background to the setting, but no advice for the Game Marshal and it could have done with a random mission generator at the very least. There is content sufficient to inspire the Game Marshal, but such a table would have been useful. It also does not address what happens if a Convict Conscript manages to reduce his sentence to zero, which is possible, but difficult after ten to fifteen operations. Whomever has amended the training manual that is Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG calls it a return to slavery. The Corporate Echelon states that the Rehabilitation Incentive Program has an eighty percent success rate. One option here might be to look at Gangs of Titan City, a roleplaying game of criminal gangs and life in a spire city, as to what happens next, but otherwise, the Game Marshal is left to decide what happens next.

Physically, Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG is a scrawling mess of a book and intentionally so. It is all punk attitude verses corporate bullshit and sometimes that does get in the way of what is relatively simple, straightforward roleplaying game. The example of play is actually the easiest and quickest means of learning the roleplaying game’s rules. The artwork is decent though.

Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG has the potential to be manically chaotic fun, throwing it as it does a disparate, desperate group of poorly trained conscripts into one dangerous mission after another, whilst the Game Marshal throws every military movie cliché into the mix. It would be interesting to see what happens if the Convict Conscripts are actually rehabilitated, but that will have to wait for a supplement or another roleplaying game. In the meantime, the Dirtbags have one last chance to prove they are not scum in a light, but surprisingly detailed military Science Fiction shooter.

Solitaire: Bloody and Alone in Appalachia

Maybe it went wrong when you drove off the highway and into that small town? Needed some gas or a place to stay for the night or simply a rest room. Took a wrong turn on the trail and found yourself outside a house in the woods? For whatever reason, you have found yourself in the small town of Bludworth Hollow in the Appalachian Hills of Eastern Kentucky. And them Appalachians take against strangers and to them there is no one stranger than city folk. And you are definitely city folk. The store owner took one look at you and with a curl of his lip, he knew you were not from around here. And then that was when everything went black… When you woke up, there was a bruise on the back of your head, you were in a barn, your wallet gone, and you had no idea where you were. There was a radio nearby that you might be able to call for help and if all else fails, you have been left with a video recorder on which you might have time to record what happens to you. Or maybe that is what they want, to record your last hours. To record your terror as the situation closes around you. As you scramble to switch the recorder on and point at it your face, your hands trembling, you think you hear movement. Is someone coming? Are they coming to help? Are they coming to hound you…?

This is the set-up for Bloody and Alone in Appalachia, published by Beyond Cataclysm Games following a successful Kickstarter campaign and based on SURVIVE THIS!! Bloody Appalachia, the Old School Renaissance roleplaying game published by Bloat Games. Where SURVIVE THIS!! Bloody Appalachia is a typical roleplaying game, Bloody and Alone in Appalachia is a solo journalling game, and is thus best played when all but the last Player Character has been hunted down and butchered! Further, instead of using rules derived from Dungeons & Dragons, for its mechanics Bloody and Alone in Appalachia uses the rules and format of The Wretched, the Science Fiction journalling game published by Loot the Room. Thus, the game requires two ordinary decks of playing cards without the Jokers, a six-sided die, a Jenga or similar tower block game, and a set of tokens. In addition, the player will require a means of recording the results of the game. It is suggested that audio or video logs work best, but a traditional journal will also work too. The roleplaying game is inspired by films such as The Blair Witch Project, Cabin in the Woods, Deliverance, and just about any backwoods horror film you care to name. Lastly, one major difference between Bloody and Alone in Appalachia and The Wretched is the number of antagonists that it offers. Typically, a solo journalling game like The Wretched presents a difficult situation and one threat. In Bloody and Alone in Appalachia there are not one threat, but thirteen! The Butcher. Bigfoot. Children of the Corn. Dirty Hoof. Fairies. Iris Lynch. Jack the Scarecrow. Piggy Lee. Reggie ‘The Mad Miner’. The Sheriff. Las Bandisas. The Ruby Mind Cooperative. The Wild Wrestler. The player will only face one of these at a time, and what that means is the player can return to play Bloody and Alone in Appalachia over and over in an attempt to escape and defeat a different foe each time. This gives it a replayability factor that is rare amongst solo journalling games.

Set-up is simple. The Jenga tower is set up with a random number of blocks pulled to represent the battering the player has already suffered and the stress he is currently suffering. Every time the player is instructed to pull a block, it represents another wound suffered, and if the Jenga tower collapses, it means that the player has died, whether from this one last wound or stress as his heart gives out. Each deck of playing cards is shuffled. One becomes the Event deck, the other the wound deck. Each day of the player’s travails is divided into two phases. Phase One is ‘The Tasks’, whilst Phase Two is ‘The Log’. There are four steps in Phase One and two in Phase Two. In ‘The Tasks’, the player draws a random number of cards from the Event Deck and works through them one by one, consulting ‘The Tourist Guide’ for each one. ‘The Tourist Guide’ is broken into four card types corresponding to the four suits in an ordinary deck of playing cards.

Hearts represents an encounter of a ‘Personal’ nature. For example, the nine of hearts entry reads, “A rusty hook bounces off the chain-link fence as someone—or something—tries to entangle you. You vault the fence in a single burst of adrenaline, but the razor blades at the top cause you to stumble. Pull from the tower.” Diamonds are the ‘Physical’ world about the player, representing places in and around Bludworth Hollow. For example, the seven of Diamonds entry reads, “The Bokenheel Bridge tricked you—it’s desperately dangerous and can’t leave the town here. How did you learn that miserable lesson? Pull from the tower.” The clubs are ‘People’, individuals that the player can meet in and about Bludworth Hollow.  For example, the eight of club reads, “When Mayor Hooper asked you to follow him, you hoped it would be the first favour in a chain that would lead you to freedom. What you saw at the Town Hall instead taught you that hope comes to Bludworth Hollow to die. What did you see?” Lastly, spades represent the monster stalking the player in and around Bludworth Hollow. Each one of the thirteen monsters has its own set of entries. This enhances the replay value of Bloody and Alone in Appalachia simply in terms of variety, but with thirteen entries per monster, the player could actually replay Bloody and Alone in Appalachia with the same monster and it still be different. Further, each monster not only has thirteen entries, it also has some background, but also two locations which can visited if the right diamonds card are drawn.

In Phase Two, or ‘The Log’, the player takes the time to consider what has happened to him that day. What he learned about the town and its inhabitants? Did he encounter the monster? How is he feeling? He then records his diary for the day.

The Wound deck simply gives fifty-two options for injuries the player might suffer. They are simply described, leaving it up to the player describe them as graphically as wants. The player is further supported with advice and a decent example of play—a nice addition for a solo journalling game—plus tables for NPC motivations and things to be found in and about the town. There is also a map of Bludworth Hollow which the player can use or create his own during play.

Like all of journalling games based on The Wretched, the subject matters of Bloody and Alone in Appalachia are dark and distressing. The player is going to be chased and cut, stalked and stabbed, pursued and punched, and more. In other words, the horror is not going to let up. However, it does lean into the clichés of rural, back woods, redneck horror, but ultimately, it is up to the player to decide how he handles these elements of his playthrough.

Physically, Bloody and Alone in Appalachia is cleanly and tidily presented. There is no art bar that on the front and back cover. There is more artwork than is typical for a solo journalling game based on The Wretched, primarily illustrating the thirteen monsters in Bloody and Alone in Appalachia.

Bloody and Alone in Appalachia is easy to play, but challenging to win. And win not once, but thirteen times! It all depends upon the draw of the cards, but every card is potentially interesting prompting the player to be creative in telling his own story. This is in line with The Wretched format, but Bloody and Alone in Appalachia goes bigger and bloodier than most solo journalling games. With thirteen monsters, Bloody and Alone in Appalachia dishes up more hillbilly horror than you ever imagine you wanted and will bring the player back to the back woods again and again to see if he can survive another monster.

Friday Fantasy: Dungeon Crawl Classics #81: The One Who Watches From Below

We are all fascinated with what is to come, what will happen in our futures, such that many consult horoscopes and seek out fortune tellers and pray to the gods for answers. Such means are rarely reliable, but what if there was a source of true prophecy? A place where answers of true meaning and accuracy can be gained for those willing to seek out its location and pay the price? There have always been rumours and stories of such places, but it one case they are actually true. The Cave of Secrets does exist and if the seeker of his future can find it and pay coins, gems, or magic items as tribute, he can ask the questions that he wants answers to. There are other rumours about Cave of Secrets though… So many men and women have sought answers that a great hoard of treasure has been amassed down the ages. Enough to buy whole kingdoms! Razor-edged swords and powerful wands! Precious gems and jewels that rain through your fingers! Which means that the Cave of Secrets has attracted an entirely different class of person  interested in what it contains! Mercenaries! Robbers! Raiders! Treasure hunters! Adventurers! Now the adventurers have followed the map with an ‘X’ marked ‘Cave of Secrets’ and stand before the cave entrance with its wooden sign which reads, ‘ENTER’.

This is the set-up for Dungeon Crawl Classics #81: The One Who Watches From Below, a scenario published by Goodman Games for use with the Dungeon Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game. Designed for a group of six to eight Player Characters of First Level, the scenario is notable for three things. The first is that it is the winner of the Mystery Map Adventure Design Competition that was included in the pages of the Free RPG Day 2012 adventure module and the second is that as the competition winner, the scenario is actually good. The third is the nature of the curse that dominates the scenario and for the length of the scenario at least, will change how the players roleplay. The curse is triggered by the Player Characters’ greed when they touch the wrong items. Anyone who suffers the curse collapses to the floor, comatose, as his eyes tear themselves from their sockets and flesh grows back over the sockets, and then…! Then, the victim’s eyes move across his body and slide onto the floor and across the walls. The player is no longer roleplaying his character’s body, but just his eyes and he can send them hither and thither. However, the eyes can be attacked and there are some things, like the Eye Slime, which actively hunt these cursed eyes. Further, the only way in which the Player Character can communicate is by blinking or other eye moment and by tracing letters in the air or writing them down, which takes time. To facilitate this, the scenario includes a handout which the Judge can copy and cut out so these is a gap which the Player Character’s eyes can be seen. On the plus side, the Player Character can dominate unintelligent creatures, but this is not easy and the Player Character still cannot communicate using his voice, only the growls and howls of the creature dominated. Ways to remove the curse are suggested, but they are challenging, and ultimately, so is having to roleplay without being able to speak. This does not mean that it will not be entertaining though!

The theme of eyes runs all the way through Dungeon Crawl Classics #81: The One Who Watches From Below. Sets of eyes slide across the walls, blinking and spying on the Player Characters, they bounce down from looming stalks to batter and bruise them, and in one case, they even attempt to blink a message to them! The Player Character Eyes can slide through pipes and cracks and the scenario facilitates this, though the party will need to penetrate beyond the Cave of Secrets that make up the first part of the dungeon. Beyond lies the Temple, clearly a working area, although oddly devoid of its inhabitants. This does not mean that it is free of any dangers. For example, the Player Characters will be able to scour the library for the means to result the eyes to victims of the Cure, but it triggers an attack upon them by every single book in the library! They will likely also discover references here to ‘Shigazilnizthrub’ and ‘The One Who Watches From Below’. There is a room containing ‘Guard Pillars’, eyestalks of a gargantuan subterranean beast that pierce up through the floor and once aware of intruders, bounce up and down on them and rolling over them. The Temple level is the most detailed of the scenario’s four levels and there is a lot here for the Player Characters to discover and examine.

Underneath the Temple are the Brood Pit and the Undertemple. The former injects an arcano-technological element into the scenario as the location of the birthing pools of the abominable Halfling Hybrids that work and protect the complex. The latter is the location for the scenario’s finale and what a finale it is! For players who feel that they have not had enough combat up until now, will certainly get in the final scene. It takes place in ‘The Vault of Eyes’, a massive cavern marked by an abyssal central pit surrounded by mounds and mounds of treasure! There are even wheelbarrows nearby that the Player Characters could use to ferry treasure out of the cavern. Fortuitously, this is one of the treasure vaults of Shigazilnizthrub. Fortuitously, Shigazilnizthrub objects to thieves. So, before the Player Characters have time to go over treasure there is, a titanic black rubbery mass of tendrils, fins, and eyestalks shoots up from the depths of the cavern and surveys all before it. At the same time, the eyes on the walls of the cavern all open and look at the Player Characters. It is a sweet moment of cosmic horror… and choice. Do the Player Characters stay and fight? Do the Player Characters make a run for it? Do the Player Characters make a run for it and attempt to take as much treasure as possible? Make no mistake, this a very challenging, deadly encounter that could end in a total party kill. Or they could defeat Primordial Titan and make off with everything, and become legends. It is possible. More likely, the scenario will end somewhere in between as the Primordial Titan thrashes its tentacles up and down, and the Player Characters make a run for it with what treasure they can carry, chased all the way through the dungeon to the cavern exit by eyes sliding along the walls. It is a memorably great finale.

To support the Judge, Dungeon Crawl Classics #81: The One Who Watches From Below includes notes on how to run the final scene, in particular how to use the Primordial Titan’s ‘powerful suggestion’ which has been changed from ‘domination’ to make for a more interesting and less player agency-denying encounter. There are playtest notes too and a bonus encounter that that did not appear in the original printing of the scenario. There are also another three handouts, images of various locations. It is a pity that there are not more of them as they really help the players visualise the dungeon.

For the long term, Dungeon Crawl Classics #81: The One Who Watches From Below details Shigazilnizthrub as a Patron. This includes his Patron Taint, three Patron spells—Remote Seeing, The Crawling Eye, and Book of the Dead, and his Spellburn. This is an entertaining addition to Dungeon Crawl Classics canon and would work well with Player Character and NPC wizards.

If there is an issue with Dungeon Crawl Classics #81: The One Who Watches From Below it is that the treasure rewards do feel very light. At least in terms of what the Player Characters can carry in terms of coin and gems and thus carry out of ‘The Vault of Eyes’. The scenario is supposed to be giving the Player Characters life-altering amounts of treasure, but the scenario does not allow for that and effectively, the encumbrance rules feel as they limit what can be carried.

Physically, Dungeon Crawl Classics #81: The One Who Watches From Below is as well presented as you would expect for a scenario for the Dungeon Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game. The writing, the artwork, the cover in particular, and the cartography are all excellent.

Dungeon Crawl Classics #81: The One Who Watches From Below is a great dungeon crawl infused with a sense of cosmic horror, given lots of detail and entertaining encounters, and topped off with brilliantly weird gimmick of a curse. The combination will not only present a challenge to any player, but also really make for a fun playing experience.

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Dungeon Crawl Classics #80.5: Glipkerio’s Gambit was the previous scenario •

The next scenario is Dungeon Crawl Classics #82: Bride of the Black Manse.

Friday Fear: Vengeance of Bathory

Has the greatest serial killer in history fled America for her homeland in present day Slovakia? Has she taken refuge in her ancestral home of Castle Čachtice, despite it having been destroyed in 1799 and her having died there in her sleep in 1614? Who is this monstrous murderer, this woman with the worst reputation in history? None other than Countess Elizabeth Báthory of Ecsed! Following the revelations about her viciously cruel and bloody campaign of torture amongst the fashion community and on the streets of Los Angeles, her whereabouts are unknown. But those in the know, those that know of her true nature and abilities, have reasons to suspect that they have not truly defeated and that she will return again. Perhaps though, can she be really destroyed and the threat she presents to the world stopped once and for all in her home? This is the set-up for Vengeance of Bathory, a modern day, vampire-hunting setting scenario set in central Europe. It is a sequel to The Blood Countess, the entertaining scenario about the efforts to uncover Báthory’s swathe of stalking and slaughter in Los Angeles that took in part some of its inspiration from the seventies television series, Kolchak: The Night Stalker. Published by Funny Shaped Dice Productions, Vengeance of Bathory is a short, one or two-session horror scenario, the seventh 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.

Vengeance of Bathory does work better as a sequel to The Blood Countess, but it is not the only set-up suggested in the scenario. Alternative suggestions include looking for a tourist, Lucinda Miles, who has gone whilst visiting Čachtice, the village below Castle Čachtice; working for an organisation that want to investigate Countess Elizabeth Báthory; and a vision is experienced of one her victims point towards the village. Of these options, only the first is developed in the scenario, leaving the others to be developed by the Fright Master. The scenario begins with the arrival of the Player Characters in the sleepy village and their first night at the Penzión Čachtice, the only guest house not to be fully fixated on the Báthory legend. The Player Characters have time to interact with a few locals at the guesthouse’s bar and the following day visit the Draškovičov kaštieľ – Múzeum Čachtice and Church of Methodius and gain some extra background about Báthory and the surrounding area.

However, there is an issue with the scenario in getting the Player Characters from this set-up and into the meat of the plot. There are hooks and pointers as to where the Player Characters might go in the village, but they are underwritten and not easy to bring into play by the Fright Master. It does not help that the village itself is not detailed in a way can be easily used and the only locations detailed are the Penzión Čachtice, Draškovičov kaštieľ – Múzeum Čachtice, Church of Methodius, and Castle Čachtice. The village also has a tourist industry dedicated to dedicated to Báthory and relatively little is made of that. As it turns out, the village is full of threats and dangers to the Player Characters, including cultists and the presence of Countess Elizabeth Báthory herself. The cultists’ presence could have been made more in and about the village, having them watch the Player Characters and making them a little paranoid. Some of the cult members include the staff of Penzión Čachtice and unless they are really pushed and confronted by the Player Characters, their involvement and the horrific nature of their activities may not be discovered. Which is an issue when discovering their involvement and their activities is one way in which the plot can move the Player Characters onto the main thrust of the plot.

Eventually, the Player Characters will find their way into the tunnels that run under Čachtice all the way to Castle Čachtice, and this is when the pace of the scenario picks up. As they make their way through the tunnels, the Player Characters will come across horror after horror. Torture chambers, ghoul nests, dark temples, sacrifice storage spaces, and moreVengeance of Bathoryand worse! The complex of tunnels and rooms are stalked and haunted by cultists, ghouls, and phantasms, and none of it is mapped. The Fright Master is expected to roll for locations found, encounter details, and events. The events are all attacks by the various threats, but all varying in terms of the odds that the Player Characters have of defeating them, effectively how many there are versus the Player Characters. The ‘Details’ table includes some entries that are easier to use than others. Hostile, injured, corpse, and squabbling encounters are likely easier to use than say the curious and friendly encounters. Here is another aspect Vengeance of Bathory that the Fright Master might to develop so that she has something interesting to place in the path of the Player Characters in what is otherwise a random dungeon!

Apart from a possible vision, the Player Characters will not have met Countess Elizabeth Báthory so far in the scenario. This changes in the finale, which takes place in the Tomb of Báthory. She will command a haunting of phantasms to flit back and forth battering at their psyches, whilst she flits in and out, punching and kicking, and shrieking in cruel laughter at their plight. She will especially take delight in taunting any Player Characters who had a part in defeating her in Los Angeles. It is a challenging fight and there is a chance that the Player Characters will be defeated, captured, and tortured… However, they can also defeat her and do so for good. The Player Characters may want to arm themselves in preparation and ideally, the Fright Master should help them do that, perhaps back at Penzión Čachtice. Another option is to involve the local police and an NPC is provided for that, and being a European police officer, he does have access to firearms.

The scenario includes eight pre-generated Player Characters. Two of them are locals, one the curator of the museum, the other the priest at the village church. If they are not used as Player Characters, then they can be used as NPCs instead. Only four of them have combat skills and only one has a psychic ability, but all come with backgrounds, weaknesses, and a thumbnail portrait. Four of them are also continuing their hunt of Countess Elizabeth Báthory after their encounter with her in The Blood Countess.

Physically, the cover to Vengeance of Bathory manages to be both distracting and horrific! The internal artwork is good and it does include a decent image of the village, though the Fright Master will need to work out what some of the buildings are. Otherwise, the production values are decent.

Unfortunately, Vengeance of Bathory is simply not as good as The Blood Countess. It does not flow as easily as it should and the Fright Master will need to develop elements of it to strengthen its plotting and so ease the Player Characters towards the finale with Countess Báthory. With the necessary development done, Vengeance of Bathory has the potential to deliver an session or two of bloody horror in the Grand Guignol style.

Miskatonic Monday #443: Resonance Cascade

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: Resonance Cascade

Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Florian Krates

Setting: An underground facility, 9:00 AM, May 16th, 2005

Product: Scenario

What You Get: Twenty page, 1.07 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: Call of Cthulhu meets Half Life.

Plot Hook: Warning. This is not a test. Warning. This is not a test. Warning. This is not a test. Warning. This is not a test. Warning. This is not a test... Warning. The test starts now.
Plot Support: Staging advice, no pre-generated Player Character employees, five NPCs, and five Mythos entities and monsters.

Production Values: Decent

Pros

# Half Life survival horror where death or escape are the only options

# Third-person dungeoneering in a doomed laboratory

# Helminthophobia

# Cleithrophobia

# Atelophobia

Cons

# No maps

# Locations, but no sense of the overall facility

# What if a Player Character employee dies? Can he respawn?

# Really, really needs pre-generated Player Character employees

# Half Life survival horror where death or escape are the only options

Conclusion

# A linear narrative plus no map makes progress challenging to describe

# Multiple Gordon Freemans without pre-generated Player Character employees

Miskatonic Monday #442: The Drowned Thorn

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 Drowned Thorn

Publisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Stuart McNair

Setting: Lancashire Coast, 1926

Product: Scenario

What You Get: Ninety-Four page, 107.00 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: The secrets of the sands, fear of the foreshore.

Plot Hook: A missing rifleman on the shifting shore.
Plot Support: Staging advice, six pre-generated Investigators, 

sixteen NPCs, six handouts, three maps,  and three Mythos entities and monsters.

Production Values: Good

Pros

# Littoral horror where the intertidal edge keeps shifting

# Brilliantly nebulous

# Well worked through conclusion that presents the players and Investigators with concrete options

# Useful set of extra locations

# Decent handouts

# Thalassophobia

# Ammosophobia

# Epistemophobia

Cons

# Annoyingly repetitious in its use of NPC descriptors

# Needs an edit

# Brilliantly nebulous

Conclusion

# Challengingly off-kilter and nebulous environmental scenario whose sparseness may be difficult to impart

# The investigators will have to supply the emotion and thus the contrast

Mauve Madness II

From the detective stories of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle to the ghost stories of M.R. James, from the adventure tales of H. Rider Haggard to the speculative fiction of H.G. Wells, and the social commentary and mystery of Charles Dickens to the fantasies of Lewis Carroll, from the so-called perversities of Oscar Wilde to the murders of Jack the Ripper, from the fog-shrouded streets of London to the dusty frontier of the Punjab, from the refined and mannered lives of the aristocracy with their downstairs servants to the squalor of the slums and rookeries, there is much that we know about the Victorian Age in the latter half of the nineteenth century. This is the period of La Belle Époque, the Golden Age between the Franco-Prussian War in 1871 and the outbreak of the Great War in 1914 when the great European powers dominated the world like never before, their rivalries and tensions affecting millions of people around the world, but barely at home, a situation that would drastically change in the twentieth century when the great alliances that had previously helped to keep the peace calamitously clashed and changed the world like never before. This is a world that will be familiar to many, though both history and fiction, and has been ripe for gaming since “The first ‘Truly British’ role playing game”, that is, Victorian Adventure published in 1983. It is a roleplaying game that William A. Barton certainly saw and reviewed and perhaps was influenced by when he wrote Cthulhu by Gaslight: Horror Roleplaying in 1890s England, published by Chaosium, Inc. in 1986. This boxed set shifted the horror of H.P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos from the Jazz Age and the USA of the 1920s as presented in Call of Cthulhu in 1981 (and ever since) to the streets of London and the far reaches of the British Empire in the Mauve Decade. It has remained a popular setting for Call of Cthulhu over the years, the setting receiving two further editions in 1988 and 2012, but it returns with a fourth edition with the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Investigators’ Guide and Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide.

Together, both volumes return the Mythos to the Mauve Decade of the 1890s as a standalone book. What this means is that neither of the Keeper Rulebook or the Investigator Handbook for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition is required to run and play Cthulhu by Gaslight. In addition, the setting and rules are compatible with Pulp Cthulhu: Two-fisted Action and Adventure Against the Mythos for a more adventurous style of play and with Down Darker Trails: Terrors of the Mythos in the Old West, should a Keeper and her players want to escape the stuffy confines of London and the East Coast of the USA and venture onto the American frontier. Of the two, the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Investigators’ Guide – Mysteries & Frights in the Victorian Age presents a grand overview of the Victorian era and setting, its society and attitudes, its science and pseudoscience, and of course, the means to create Investigators appropriate to the era, whether that is in Victorian London or the wider British Empire, or further afield on the east coast of the United States of America and even in Lovecraft country. What the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Investigators’ Guide does not do, is explore the horror of the period. That is what the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide is for.

If the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Investigators’ Guide is all about preparing for the horrors of the Victorian Age, then the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide is all about those horrors. As it acknowledges, the period was rife with real-world horror, including cruelty, crime, poverty, and disease, let alone social attitudes, even before thinking about the place of the Mythos and its influence in the period. It is thus no surprise that the supplement begins with the mundane, even ordinary horror, that the Investigators are likely to encounter again and again. The deprivations of the workhouse, the last recourse of the destitute where the poor were divided by age and gender, effectively splitting families up, and then essentially then forcing them to work as a punishment for being poor. This is described in detail as are Victorian asylums and also crime and punishment before it explores some of the most notorious crimes of the era. This includes a pleasingly sober treatment of the Jack the Ripper murders and the ‘Murder Castle’ of H.H. Holmes at the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893, which is suggested as alternative excursion, and some nicely detailed real-world crime figures, including the ‘Napoleon of Crime’ and the Forty Elephants, an all-female gang of shop-lifters and extortionists, both of which are begging to be added to a Cthulhu by Gaslight scenario or campaign.

Of the villainous organisations, the ‘Hatfield Club’ is a dining club for university students is an obvious nod to the Bullingdon Club, but with its cruelty and heartlessness turned up a notch, and the ‘Morley Gang’, ex-Resurrection Men turned caterers to England’s Ghoul population! The next Mythos connection is more controversial, linking scientist Francis Galton and his belief in eugenics to contact with Martians via a Mi-Go artefact. More benign is the ‘Servants of Empire’, an organisation consisting of civil servants in the Colonial Office and India Office, which secretly directs investigations into the Mythos and the occult, and would serve well as a patron or Investigator organisation, though its designs are ultimately imperial. More neutral perhaps is the inclusion of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, expanding on the details in the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Investigators’ Guide, presented as an organisation that the Investigators can join and progress through its Orders alongside their normal careers and investigations into the Mythos. It can be used as a social organisation as much an occult one, but it is up to the Keeper to decide how much its members know about the Mythos and how much actual magic they know. In conjunction with Pulp Cthulhu, it could become a Mythos fighting organisation, but lean in the other direction, the members of the Golden Dawn become mystical dabblers at best, unaware of the dangers they are dealing with. Mechanically, members of the Golden Dawn are supported with rules for astral travel and combat, skills like Hermetic Ritual, Astral Projection, and Divination, as well as astral monsters. The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn has been detailed for Call of Cthulhu before in the 1996 supplement from Pagan Publishing, The Golden Dawn. Of course, that supplement has long been out of print and complemented with the content from the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Investigators’ Guide, it is pleasure to have it detailed once again, giving the Keeper the scope to use it and its members however she wants. Equally, there is scope here for Chaosium, Inc. to support this inclusion with further content.

Numerous Victorian notables are described in the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide, some of whom are given Mythos connections, such as Major General Chares George Gordon having encountered cults and monsters, but not yet connected them to a ‘Mythos’, and Madame Helena Blavatsky’s links to the ‘Mahatmas’ or ‘Masters of Ancient Wisdom’, whomever or whatever they are—it is left up to the Keeper to decide. Some of these have stats, but not all, and in addition, there are some fictional characters included. Amongst them are Ayesha or ‘She’ of H. Rider Haggard’s eponymous novel, Captain Nemo from Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea, and Doctor Moreau from H.G. Wells’ The Island of Doctor Moreau. What they do not include is Sherlock Holmes and that really does not feel like an omission since the rationality of the character would be at odds with the Mythos.

The general advice for the Keeper gives some guidance on dealing with problematic content, but mostly focuses on advice for the new Keeper that looks at different campaign types and themes. The most notable of the latter are Victorian Science Fiction and Folk Horror, as well as advice on using particular aspects of the period, whether that is the workhouse, Victorian family values, the Empire, the Dreamlands, and even the Martians. The inclusion of the Martians obviously ties into H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds and their appearance in earlier editions of Cthulhu by Gaslight, as well as the discussion of Francis Galton and the stats for the Martians given in this supplement.

In terms of the Mythos and horror, the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide details numerous Mythos tomes, many familiar to the Call of Cthulhu Keeper, many not. It also describes the activities of many cults across the country. Some like the cults of Shub-Niggurath or the Cult of the King in Yellow are dedicated to particular entities and so their treatment is comparatively broad, but some of the most entertaining are those that particular to the period. For example, The Factory Girls’ Sunday Club is made up of young girls who work in factories and having discovered and studied a Mythos tome, their leader is bent on revenge on all those who have done her wrong, whilst the Mothers’ Institute is a middle class charitable organisation in favour of women’s suffrage, whose members actually worship Shub-Niggurath free of the influence of men!

However, the bestiary is of limited use. Its focus is on Victorian horror. So, the Beast People of The Island of Doctor Moreau and the Martians of The War of the Worlds alongside personality monsters like Carmilla, the eponymous vampire from Sheridan Le Fanu’s novel, Count Dracula from Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and Helen Vaughn from Arthur Machen’s The Great God Pan. This shifts the focus of Cthulhu by Gaslight away from the traditional Mythos of Call of Cthulhu and towards a Gothic, even a ‘Universal’, style of horror, and even a Pulp style of horror. Although it shows the flexibility and differences of the setting, it still means that the Keeper will need access to the Call of Cthulhu Keeper Rulebook if she wants details of the Mythos monsters and entities contained therein, perhaps in developing the cults mentioned earlier in this supplement.

The Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide includes two scenarios. The first is ‘The Forby Masterwork’, previously published as ‘The Masterwork of Nicholas Formby’ in 1993’s Sacraments of Evil. It is also a Gothic horror scenario rather than a Mythos scenario. It takes place over the course of a weekend in August 1890, at the Forby home in West London. In keeping with the genre, it involves family illness, a family curse, a dastardly villain, a monster stalking the grounds, and secret upon secrets. It also includes two options in terms of set-up. In option one, the Investigators are asked for help by an old school friend, Harold Forby, who is suffering from an old childhood sickness, in finding a family treasure that might restore the family fortune. In option two, the Investigators are not of Middle or Upper Class standing, but of Lower Class—and worse—of criminal standing! Perhaps associates of the Forty Elephants crime gang mentioned earlier in the book, these Investigators are hired by the Forby family as new servants and go in search of the treasure for their own ends. Advice is given on running both groups, but the criminal Investigator option is likely to be the most entertaining and likely the most demanding to play and run. The scenario mostly confined to the family mansion, its grounds, and nearby locations, is a busy affair, heavy on investigation and interaction and there are a fair few number of NPCs to keep track of. The scenario is pervaded by a wane, sickly feel as the Investigators tiptoe around the house and household dealing with the family and servants, including a very annoying nine-year-old boy. The only real problem is that the name of one of the NPCs which is bit too on the nose, but otherwise this is a well done, creepy affair.

The second scenario is ‘Oranges & Lemons’. It shifts the action to Shoreditch in East London, involves middle and lower class Investigators, and starts with a bang! The Investigators are at a coffee shop when a man stands up, cries out for help, staggers over to them, vomits copiously over them, and then drops down dead on the floor where his corpse rapidly desiccates. The players and their Investigators may need a bit of a push to investigate the death, but when they do, they quickly learn that the man’s death was not only odd one in the district of late. Learning more will send the Investigators back and forth across the district as they discover one victim after another, and quickly, the strange rash of deaths is linked to a local apothecary and then to a well. What will also drive the Investigators to act is the possibility that one or more of them will begin to feel ill and even act out of character, which begs the question, have they been infected by the same thing as those who died? The scenario makes good use of London’s history and the Victorian obsession with waters, having been influenced by the Broad Street Pump and cholera outbreak of 1854. This is the more straightforward of the two scenarios in the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide and is easier to run. The Keeper advice on how handle possible Investigator infection will keep the players on edge whilst the finale really does reveal that there was something nasty in the water!

Unfortunately, the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide could have been better organised. There are places in the book where the flow of the content is split by the intrusion of unrelated material, such as floorplans between the discussion of the workhouse and crime and punishment and the situational rules placed in the middle of the advice for the Keeper. Another issue is that even together, the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Investigators’ Guide and the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide do not feel complete. Certainly, the Keeper can run both scenarios in the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide and create and run scenarios using the Victorian horrors it details, but beyond that, the Keeper is going to want to consult the Call of Cthulhu Keeper Rulebook for a deeper treatment of the Mythos at least.

Physically, the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide is a good-looking book. It needs a slight edit, but the book is well written and very readable, and the artwork and the cartography are both decent.

The Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide does a good job of complementing the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Investigators’ Guide with an informative and genuinely interesting guide to horrors mundane and horrors Victorian rather than Mythos. It is better in its treatment and examination of Gothic horror, Victorian Science Fiction, and folk horror than it is Mythos horror, though it does at least lay the groundwork for the latter in its pleasingly extensive coverage of Mythos-related cults in the period. Their details and that of the Golden Dawn do lend themselves to some great campaign possibilities and scenario ideas should the Keeper—or publisher—want to develop them. However, as presented and in terms of Lovecraftian investigative horror, the Cthulhu by Gaslight: Keepers’ Guide does slightly underwhelm, leaving it reliant on the more experienced Keeper to bring out the best in the book.