The Other OSR: THREE from the LOCKER

THREE from the LOCKER is a ‘Pamphlet Bundle’ for Pirate Borg, the self-described, “Worst Pirate RPG Ever Made™!”, published by Limithron. It is published by SkeletonKey Games, which previously released the excellent fanzine, Tales from the Locker #1, and consists of a mini-adventure, Sweet Tusk, and two mini-supplements, Blood in the Water and Raise the Black, that are also available separately. In turn, they give the Game Master a location-based scenario that combines H.G. Wells’ The Island of Doctor Moreau with George Orwell’s Animal Farm in the Dark Caribbean; six possible situations when the ship that the Player Characters are aboard is rendered into a derelict, whether from a ship-to-ship engagement, a terrible storm, a run in with sea monsters, or other threat, and about to sink; and what might happen when a pirate captain orders his crew to ‘raise the black’ and hoist the jolly roger! All pamphlets are available on their own as well as a bundle (or pack if physical). They do share the same trade dress, so definitely feel as if they should be bought together!

Sweet Tusk promises ‘Pigs Plot, Rum Flow, Adventure Awaits’ in detailing a costal rum plantation and rum distillery that was once home to a necromancer and his cult, but is now home to a passel of pigs, some sentient, some feral, many bipedal, most of them anthropomorphised. The Player Characters could simply wash ashore at the plantation a la Wells’ The Island of Doctor Moreau, but the adventure’s own hooks include looking for a new source of rum, being sent to exterminate ‘feral’ pigs to prevent them from spreading across the Dark Caribbean, or being hired to retrieve an item from the plantation for its previous owners. To get the best out of the location, the Game Master should ideally combine the latter with one of the first two as that will drive the Player Characters to interact with most of the inhabitants of the plantations, its plot threads, and explore its depths.

The plantation is dominated by two factions. One is lead by Lord Wembly Trembleton and wants to restore the rum distillery and sugar mill with the aim of becoming self-sufficient, whilst Scrofa, the plantation’s spiritual leader, her sorcery twisted by the necromantic studies she found that belonged to the previous owner, is becoming increasingly and brutally isolationist. The Player Characters will need to deal with them and explore the plantations—including the tunnels that have been dug under the plantation (and make it feel like a Vietcong tunnel network)—to achieve their given objectives. Alternatively, the Player Characters might ignore them altogether and clear out the whole of plantation and take it over and run it themselves as a going concern.

Sweet Tusk has a hot, sweaty feel, sticky with perspiration and sugar and piggy peculiarity. The latter is probably the only reason why the Game Master might not want to run Sweet Tusk, talking pigs not necessarily going to suit every campaign. As written though, it adds an off-kilter element that the Game Master can throw at her players and their characters and have fun portraying a passel of pigs in the process.

Blood in the Water gives the Game Master ‘Six Sinking Ship Scenarios’. The Game Master can use this when the Player Characters’ ship, or the ship that they are on, either selecting one of the options or rolling for it. Each one has events happening on deck and three zones surrounding the vessel, out to thirty feet and beyond. The six options include the ‘Feeding Frenzy’ of a shark attack on the ship going down; ‘Tentacles from the Deep’ that flail at the ship and its crew and passenger; a ‘Powder Magazine Explosion’ that sends fire and shrapnel across the deck and beyond; the ship and floating wreckage being thrown about by ‘Angry Seas’; ghosts that come looking for new crewmembers in ‘Revenant Recruitment’; and potentially the crew and passengers being saved with a kiss by ‘Meddling Mermaids’! Since the action in each divided into four zones—three plus the deck—where different things will happen, there is a degree of procedure to running any one of these post-disaster ship encounters. Not a lengthy procedure, but quite a simple one, and they all do add a bit of flavour to a sinking ship situation beyond the Player Characters abandoning ship and racing for the boats. Added to this is a sea shanty, Sharks in the Water, that a ship’s crew can sing to give its members bonuses to tests in the first few rounds of the sinking ship. The Game Master might want to have her players and their characters learn this in response to having been in a sinking ship the first time and so learn from their experience. Blood in the Water is quite specific in the situation it needs to trigger its use and that trigger is not going to happen that often, but definitely useful to have on the shelf though.

The third pamphlet is Raise the Black. This expands upon the various effects of the jolly roger in play. First, when ‘Raising the Black’, that is, hoisting the jolly roger and its effects upon the crew of the vessel being targeted by the pirate ship. In play, the ship’s captain of the pirate ship tests his Presence and result, which depends upon the size of the targeted vessel in comparison to the pirate vessel, may leave the crew plucky still and laughing off the threat or feeling doomed and wanting no part of the battle. There are plenty of options in between and effectively determines the morale of targeted vessels. ‘Witchjacks’ are special flags, ensorcelled versions of the jolly roger, that grant special powers that can be used once per day. For example, the Banner of the Black Whale grants an extra die of damage in ramming attacks and extra damage the further it has travelled, whilst the Pennant of the Mermaid grants an extra Crew Action. A pirate captain is unlikely to want to fly a flag other than his own, so there are rules included that enable to cut up a Witchjack and sew the resulting parts and its magic into the pirate captain’s own flag. This does not always work, but it destroys the original flag. Minor, but optional rules beyond this are included to help speed up naval combat and ‘D20 Pirate Flags’ give options for both a Player Character or an NPC crew if the Game Master needs to a pirate flag quickly. Given that a third of the pamphlet is taken up illustrations of jolly roger flags, Raise the Black is the least useful of the three pamphlets in THREE from the LOCKER and add the least to the play of Pirate Borg.

Physically, the three pamphlets of THREE from the LOCKER are all decently presented. They are clearly and simply laid out and all easy to read and use. Sweet Tusk is the busiest, so is harder to read, but only slightly so, and nothing that is going to impede the Game Master running the scenario from the page. The artwork is light, but the cartography is decent.

THREE from the LOCKER is solid support for Pirate Borg, the scenario Sweet Tusk being the highlight of the three, entertaining and enjoyable, a Player Character-driven plantation-crawl that is easy to add to a Game Master’s campaign. The other two pamphlets are shorter and not quite as entertaining as Sweet Tusk and Raise the Black not quite as useful, but in the right circumstances, still good to have in the ship’s locker.

The Other OSR: Down Among the Dead

Down Among the Dead describes itself as ‘A Terrible Expansion’ for Pirate Borg, the ‘Worst Pirate RPG Ever Made’. In the case of the latter claim, Pirate Borg is actually highly accessible, especially in the form of the Pirate Borg Starter Set, an Old School Renaissance-style roleplaying game is set in the Dark Caribbean, a sea of tropical islands marked with European towns and fortresses and ruins of civilisations long gone, of shipwrecks with rich cargoes and even richer treasures, and of the Scourge. The Scourge made the dead walk once again, ghosts return to haunt the living, and monsters lurk ready to smash the foothold that the Europeans have established in the region. The governors and the viceroys, representatives of kings and queens, have forced to adapt and rule with no contact from home following the Scourge and even take advantage of the situation, especially since the discovery of the abilities and addictive nature of ASH, the ash of the burned and ground undead. Some seek to make money from the trade in ASH and some seek to control it, whilst others seek to repress it. This is another cause of the conflict in the Dark Caribbean. Pirate Borg casts the players as members of a crew who will sail the ASH-tinged waters the Dark Caribbean, raiding and smuggling, carousing and drinking, adventuring, and exploring. In the case of the former, Down Among the Dead is the first official supplement for the roleplaying game, providing four adventures, three new Classes, skills, motivations, even house rules, and a lot more.

Down Among the Dead is published by Limithron via Free League Publishing following a successful Kickstarter campaign. It contains three new Classes, new skills, adds motivations for Player Characters, four sets of tables for generating different aspects of the setting and game, and three lengthy adventures, all of which can be added to an ongoing campaign. The first new Class is ‘The Antiquarian’, which is essentially Indiana Jones (or other swashbuckling archaeologist of your choice) for the Age of Sail, complete with a phobia, a holy grail—perhaps discovering lost temples or ruins and ancient treasures or the origins and dark secrets behind the creation of ASH, and an ’Expertise’ such as ‘Theology/Arcana’, ‘Athletics’, or ‘Occultism’. The ‘Deep One’ brings a Lovecraftian touch to Pirate Borg, its origins such as ‘Hybrid’, ‘Bathyal’, and ‘Abyssal’—the type and depth of water it comes from—determining starting stats, and its options include either ‘Shaman’ or ‘Warrior’. The former learns Pelagic Sorcery Spells, whilst the latter is armed with a cultural weapon like a coral and seashell long knife or a piece of driftwood with stingray spikes and learns combat techniques. Lastly, the ‘Unlocked Soul’ is resurrected spirit who has returned to the surface after dying and being cast into Davy Jones’ Locker. This Class is living on borrowed time as there is a increasing chance that Charon will reclaim his soul, but in the meantime, he can regenerate wounds and regrow limbs, ask questions of the dead, become like transparent water, and more, though his skeleton might itch from within because it is made of coral or his head might be able to spin right round and he cannot see a particular colour.

All three Classes are good, bringing fun archetypes into Pirate Borg. All three can be played as written, but the ‘Unlocked Soul’ is best used for an NPC or for Player Characters who have also escaped Davy Jones’ Locker—perhaps after playing through ‘Lost to the Locker’ later in the book—and wanting to multi-class upon returning to the surface.

One possible negative aspect of Pirate Borg is the limited number of Class features that a Player Character can have. A Player Character gains one per Level, so typically by Fifth or Sixth Levels, there are no more abilities to choose from. ‘d66 Skills for the Seasoned Sea Rover’ remedies that with a list of alternative skills that a player can select from instead of taking a Class feature, and not once, but twice for each skill. For example, with ‘Gunsmith’, a Player Character can repair black powder weapons, lower their chances of misfires, and improve their accuracy and damage inflicted, and if taken a second time, improve their accuracy and damage inflicted again. With ‘ASH Apothecary’, a Player Character can cook ASH down to a potent crystallised form that when consumed has a greater effect, but also sells for triple the price, and if taken again, these effects are doubled! From ‘Deadshot’, ‘Barrelman’s Eyes’, and ‘Font of Chaos’ to ‘Salvage Diver’, ‘Agile Amputee’, and ‘Siren’s Tongue’, this is an entertaining selection and there are a lot here that a player will want to choose from rather than one of his character’s Class Feature. There is the option to roll randomly, but the Game Master could also use these skills as rewards during play or simply allow Player Characters to have both these skills and their Class Features to make them more capable and heroic.

The ‘Motivations During the Apocalypse’ can be used for both the Player Characters or NPCs, whilst ‘House Rules’ gives options for the Game Master in terms of design notes, examples, and tips. These range from rerolling initiative each day and adding Armour Class to the game when one Player Character fights another (instead of rolling to defend) to having damage dice explode and playing Pirate Borg in either Nightmare or Heroic modes! Many of these address issues that a Game Master might have with the roleplaying game and some of them push Pirate Borg away from the Mörk Borg model and closer to a Dungeons & Dragons-style roleplaying game. All though are options that enable a group to play the roleplaying game in the style it prefers. The other general support for Pirate Borg includes four sets of tables for generating elements of the Dark Caribbean setting, including a ‘Jolly Roger Flag Generator’, ‘Dark Caribbean Island Generator’, ‘Coral Reef Generator’, and ‘Coin Generator’. ‘Dark Caribbean Island Generator’ and ‘Coral Reef Generator’ both come with examples, but all four are useful adding further details to the Game Master’s Dark Caribbean campaign.

The first of the four scenarios in Down Among the Dead is ‘Anchor Drop Falls’. It is a short, two-page location detailing a set of caves behind a five hundred foot high waterfall where pirates and/or conquistadors are said to have buried their treasure, Deep Ones have made a home, and then been driven out by a hungry, giant crab. It is a plain and simple affair, with the location descriptions placed around the map, that is very easy to run from the page and just as easy to slot into a campaign. ‘Anchor Drop Falls’ can be played in a single session, whereas the other three scenarios are much longer and much more detailed.

‘Lost to the Locker’ is a seabed, sandcrawl in which the Player Characters awaken to find themselves dead in a purgatory of small islands and shipwrecks, and will very likely do so again should they die again. The aim is for the Player Characters to escape back to the realms of the living, requiring a vessel and an exit, as well as several coins called ‘Obols’. Finding all of these forms the focus of the scenario. Once they freed themselves from the floating rocks they have been chained to, the Player Characters will be ferried by Charon to the liminal space of ‘The Locker’. Overseen by Lady Oblivion—ethereal, watery Egyptian priestess or Reef Ghoul?—this region consists of just eight locations, including the pirate-town-like Port Oblivion with its wrecks and boulders home to Lost Souls like the Player Characters; the Pellucid Palace of volcanic glass where Lady Oblivion holds court; and the Inverted Galleon, capsized and chained to the seabed. Every location details vessels that might be repaired or stolen, how Obols might be gained, as well as numerous NPCs, random encounters, and more. There is a lot of detail to this concentrated sandbox and a lot of elements that the Game Master can bring into play. It is fantastically liminal place with plenty for the players and their characters to do and plenty of random elements that Game Master can use to enhance the undersea unreality. ‘Lost to the Locker’ can be used as written, following a ‘Total Party Kill’, but it could also be used as a non-standard campaign starter.

The second scenario veers towards the fantasy horror of Robert E. Howard, rather than the Lovecraftian horror of ‘The Deep One’ Class, with its use of Serpent Men as the villains of the piece. ‘Venom in the Veins’ details an ancient shrine to the Slithering One, rumoured to be the last known location of a missing conquistador, to hold ancient knowledge, to be target of French spies and revolutionaries, to be source of a deadly venom, and so on. Overseen by a once-human shaman corrupted by necromancy and his undead serpentfolk guardians, this is snake-infested, trap ridden, but nicely detailed dungeon that requires some set-up to get the Player Characters to explore its depths. There is plenty of treasure to be found and no little forbidden knowledge, but lingering over that has its own consequences. Particular attention is paid to the traps and puzzles, which makes running it easier. ‘Venom in the Veins’ would be a perfect adventure for the Antiquarian Class given at the start of the supplement.

‘Into The Maelstrom’, the third scenario in the supplement requires more experienced Player Characters and takes a classic Gothic set-up and gives it a piratical, nautical twist. Instead of a haunted house, the setting is a haunted galleon, The Maelstrom, a galleon with blood-red sails of flesh that is home to  Albrecht the Tideborn, a Deep One vampire, and his vampiric crew. The Player Characters are hired to sneak aboard and rescue an important VIP that Albrecht the Tideborn is holding prisoner and also to slaughter as many of the vampires as they can. However, that is not the only reason the Player Characters to want to board The Maelstrom. They will each have their reasons. All of this is set up ahead of time, using a deck of ordinary playing cards and the rules for ‘Three-Eyed Parrot’, a game provided prior to the scenario. This includes the identity and location of the VIP being held prisoner, the identity of the Player Characters’ Patron, the location of a powerful ritual, the location of an artefact, and so on. The cards are then divided into their suits and then used as decks to determine random prisoners, mundane items, treasure, and encounters. The scenario is played against the clock and there is a strong chance that prisoners will be sacrificed before the Player Characters rescue them—the scenario even suggests that the Game Master tear up the card for a particular NPC if the Player Characters fail to save him!

The main feature of the scenario is The Maelstrom, but also detailed are ‘The Dead islands’, the former Virgin Islands in the Lesser Antilles, infested by ASH addicts, cannibalistic pirates, and the undead, its coats marked by numerous derelict ships and wrecks waiting to be picked over. Several locations are detailed on the island, including Charlotte’s Cove, the main settlement now overrun with vampires, the swamp encroached Ruins of Whitby Abbey, Sanctum of the Feathered Tree—home to an orangutan sorcerer, and other locations. This gives the setting longevity beyond the scenario itself, and there are notes too, if the Game Master wants to run it as a one-shot, short campaign, or a long campaign, and even includes tournament mode and scoring! As such, ‘Into The Maelstrom’ is a tool kit that the Game Master needs to adjust fit her players and for full effect is best run over multiple sessions. This brings all of the brine and rot of the sea to the Gothic and the doomed romance and horror of the Gothic to the Dark Caribbean. When their characters  have enough experience to play it through, ‘Into The Maelstrom’ should be a grand, memorable scenario for the players.

Physically, Down Among the Dead is very well laid out, and the artwork and cartography are excellent. Everything is very easy to use.

Down Among the Dead has everything a Pirate Borg Game Master would want. Three good scenarios, two of which have really memorable locations, content that the Game Master will still come back to, and options that the Game Master and her players can pick and chose from to make Pirate Borg theirs.

[Fanzine Focus XLII] Tales from the Locker #1

On the tail of Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed how another Dungeon Master and her group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons,RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord and Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, as has Swords & Wizardry. A more recent Old School Renaissance-style roleplaying game that fanzines are being based upon and inspired by is Mörk Borg, the Swedish pre-apocalypse Old School Renaissance retroclone designed by Ockult Örtmästare Games and Stockholm Kartell and published by Free League Publishing. However, there are far fewer fanzines for its swashbuckling cousin, Pirate Borg, published by Limithron and set in the zombie-infested, isolated Dark Caribbean.

Tales from the Locker #1 is published by SkeletonKey Games. Published in May, 2026, this describes itself as a “PIRATE BORG compatible anthology … a place where cursed maps, dangerous ideas, and half-buried legends are pulled from the depths and dropped straight into your campaign.” What it actually provides is three adventure locations, three new Classes, some new equipment, and an awful lot of prompts, all of which are undeniably useful and interesting, and which could be added to a Game Master’s Pirate Borg campaign. What strikes you first about this inaugural issue is the price. It does seem high for what is just a forty-page fanzine. The second thing that strikes you is that it is in full vibrant colour that veers from the cartoonish to the carnage and back again. This is a good looking affair that actually looks like a supplement for Pirate Borg and is actually better professionally produced than most fanzines. The quality is enough to warrant the price even if that does mean that Tales from the Locker #1 looks too good to be an actual fanzine.

At the heart of the issue is a quartet of adventure locations. This leads off with ‘Temple of the Spider God’ by Lars White. This describes a ziggurat deep in the jungle standing at the base of a dormant volcano, infested with deadly Jaguar spiders, the spawn of the Spider God, and Shepherds of the Spider God, cultists who maintain the webs that festoon the temple inside and out. It is bright and colourful, the ziggurat depicted side on as a cutaway. This a solidly done, if simple location, that is easy to drop into a jungle somewhere in the Game Master’s campaign. However, it is yet another ziggurat location and the Game Master will need to come with a reason why the Player Pirates might want to go there. This is because there are no hooks with which to get them involved.

The second location is Alexander Jatscha-Zelt’s ‘The Cartographer’s Den’. This details Nathaniel Pellwick and his home, a wealthy shop and town house in Port Royal as it was before it was struck by an earthquake. Pellwick has a reputation across the Dark Caribbean as a master cartographer, who buys, draws, and sells maps and charts of its islands and seas. His own maps are remarkably detailed and often depict secrets and routes unknown. This has earned him the patronage and protection of the good and the bad of the port. The Player Pirates can come to Pellwick as customers and develop into a recurring contact and resource who will in turn buy from them. The location details both Nathaniel Pellwick, who he is, what he wants, and what he is currently doing, his services, what he buys, and his house from the master bedroom and other rooms on the first floor to the cellars under the house. This could be simply enough, but the description includes a plot too. Pelliwick has let slip that he has come into possession of a unique chart, but despite enquiries of several interested parties, has so far refused to sell. Some of those parties are willing to go further and hire agents to steal the map. Alternatively, Pellwick suspects a burglary and hires extra protection. As to the chart itself, the details are left up to the Game Master to decide, but suggestions include ‘The Isle of 1000 Corpses’ which follows in the issue, as well as locations in Ravaged by Storms by Golem Productions, Down Among the Dead by Limithron, and These Bloody Sales by ThisEffinGM.

‘The Cartographer’s Den’ is the issue’s highlight. It gives a setting and options in terms of how the Game Master uses it. Its only limitation is when it is set, that is before the earthquake in Port Royal, but other than that, this is flexible and easy to use.

The third adventure location is ‘The Isle of 1000 Corpses’ by Philip Reed. This is the foulest and vilest of the trio—and intentionally so. Subtitled ‘A Shocking Tale of Dark Caribbean Carnage’, it describes an island of floating corpses and body parts, undead and flailing such that it swims randomly across the region. Complete with random rumours (oddly all true) and encounters, everything on the island is made of undead, rotting flesh and rattling bones. This includes a spire of corpses that form a lighthouse, a sea turtle sanctuary that has accidently been turned into a sanctuary of zombie sea turtles(!), and a rotting whale corpse home to sailor called Jonah. Also included is a trio of ‘meaty jetsam’, the corpse raft, corpse barge, and corpse cay, sea-going corpse vessels to add to the naval combat aspect of the roleplaying game. It is inventively grim and grungy and brings an element of the Grand Guignol to Pirate Borg. However, there are no hooks to get the Player Pirates to the island and the Game Master will need to develop them herself.

This is less of an issue for the fourth and final adventure location in  . Julius ‘kin’ Karajos’ ‘Ash Fall’ opens with an Ash meteor crashing to the earth on a nearby island, which with the revelations as the nature of ASH—created from burnt zombies—has led to an ASH rush as pirates, cultists, and Spanish miners seek to capitalise on the bounty. By the time the Player Pirates turn up, the mining site has turned into a hellhole. The soldiers accompanying the Spanish miners have turned it into an armed camp, miners continue to descend into the crater where they scrape Ash from the weird stone meteor, all are in danger of catching the ASH disease which eventually turns sufferers into undead (which can then be burnt down into ASH), and the jungle seems to seethe and regularly and violently encroaches on the camp. The scenario has a weirder feel to it than most others for Pirate Borg, being infused with Cosmic Horror a la H.P. Lovecraft’s ‘The Colour Out of Space’.

The four adventure locations are followed by a trio of new Classes. The ‘Ironclad’ by Thomas Zitkevitz details a warrior swathed in armour salvaged from a lost conquistador and gain benefits from it such as carrying ‘Heavy Metal’ weapons that are double the size and inflict extra damage and ‘Deflect Shots’ with armour so shiny it can reflect bullets back at their firers! Christopher Samson’s ‘Occult Sailor Master’ whose navigational ability is supernatural indicated by the symbols on his body. These can be activated for spell-like effects, for both normal and maritime play. For example, Shoals warns of hidden danger, secrets, and hidden doors, whilst at sea, guides the ship through dangerous waters, negating potential travel penalties, whilst Jolly Roger can paralyse a foe with fear whilst in naval combat, makes it easier to have enemy crews surrender or mutiny! Lastly, the ‘Tusked Raider’ by Ed Bourelle is a feral hog twisted into an anthropomorphic creature renowned for its toughness. It can be a ‘Greased Pig’ less easy to be hit in the first round in combat, an ‘Indiscriminate Eater’ that heals more if it overeats, and ‘Pig Headed’ with a bonus to resist being controlled, influenced, or coerced where it was once cowed and preyed upon. All three Classes are simple and easy to add to a campaign and give a player lots more options, playing around with the horror and the Pulp tones of the setting.

Penultimately, Tyler J. Stratton’s ‘Quartermaster’s Corner’ presents Two-Tone Heller, a ready-to-play NPC that can be added to the crew of the Player Pirates’ ship. As his name suggests, his manner can flip depending upon the circumstances from jovial leader to harsh disciplinarian. The write-up suggests Gibs from Pirates of the Caribbean or Sergeant Hartman from Full Metal Jacket. It is followed by the tables, ‘D12 Problems Among The Crew’ and ‘D20 Crew Punishments’, which would support stories that involve Two-Tone Heller, but also be useful in a Pirate Borg campaign in general.

Tales from the Locker #1 starts and ends with tables. The Old School Renaissance has its ‘I loot the body’ or ‘dx Things to find on a corpse’ tables, and Pirate Borg has its equivalent, which is ‘d10 Messages in a Bottle /on a Corpse’. Written by Ed Bourelle, this has entries such as “I be marooned on a spit of sand no bigger than a whale’s back, with a pistol, two damp biscuits, and a singing skeleton. If mercy yet sails these waters, look for the carrion gulls that circle above me. I’ll share secrets better than gold.” and ones that link to the adventure locations given earlier in the fanzine, like, “Pellwick marked a reef that no man had seen, not even the oldest salt among us. We laughed until our hull split upon it at dawn, just where his ink had dried. He even charted the graves on the beach before we dug ’em. If ye meet the man, ask him what else he’s been drawin’.” These serve as good prompts, as does the ‘Plot Twists’ at the front of the issue, also by Ed Bourelle. These provide two set-ups and then three explanations for each, in a manner similar to the Patrons format of Traveller. For example, ‘In Port’ opens with the Player Pirates in a port when one of the ships anchored in the harbour lets lose an unexpected broadside on the harbour front or another vessel, potentially even the one aboard which the Player Pirates serve. The options for hook include Deep Ones shanghaiing the ship and testing the guns, vengeful ghosts settling a grudge with the ship’s guns, and the ship’s crew mutinying. These are solid ideas which the Game Master can easily develop with the addition of some stats and so on.

Physically, Tales from the Locker #1 is excellent. The artwork is good, the fanzine is well-written, and the cartography decent. This is a good-looking affair, but that gives it a slickness that some might argue that a fanzine should not have.

Tales from the Locker #1 is an impressive first issue. The only problem with it is the lack of hooks for several of the adventure locations, but other than that, the content is all easy to use or add to a campaign. The star of the issue is ‘The Cartographer’s Den’, but no Pirate Borg Game Master will be disappointed by the content in Tales from the Locker #1.

The Other OSR: The Cavern of Cursed Tears

The Cavern of Cursed Tears is a low preparation, pick-up-and-play scenario f it is an Old School Renaissance-style roleplaying game is set in the Dark Caribbean, a sea of tropical islands marked with European towns and fortresses and ruins of civilisations long gone, of shipwrecks with rich cargoes and even richer treasures, and of the Scourge. The Scourge made the dead walk once again, ghosts return to haunt the living, and monsters lurk ready to the foothold that the Europeans have established in the region. The governors and the viceroys, representatives of kings and queens, have forced to adapt and rule with no contact from home following the Scourge and even take advantage of the situation, especially since the discovery of the abilities and addictive nature of ASH, the ash of the burned and ground undead. Some seek to make money from the trade in ASH and some seek to control it, whilst others seek to repress it. This is another cause of the conflict in the Dark Caribbean. Pirate Borg casts the players as members of a crew who will sail the ASH-tinged waters the Dark Caribbean, raiding and smuggling, carousing and drinking, adventuring and exploring. Pirate Borg is based upon Mörk Borg, the Swedish pre-apocalypse Old School Renaissance style roleplaying game designed by Ockult Örtmästare Games and Stockholm Kartell and also published by Free League Publishing.

The Cavern of Cursed Tears is said to be the last resting pace of the treasures of not one, but two pirate captains who happened to be in love with each other. The Cavern of Cursed Tears is rumoured to be of interest to both the British Royal Society and the Inquisition. The Cavern of Cursed Tears is said by many pirates to be cursed, but that will not stop Sir Barrington from looking for a crew to sail him to the island where it is located and then lead an expedition into its depths. These are just some of the rumours that can be discovered about the Cavern of Cursed Tears and certainly, the Game Master could create more. The rumours are the reason to get the Player Characters and their expedition to the mouth of the sinkhole that drops away into the dark. Below there are caverns filled with bones, caverns filled with bats, a cenote and a water maze, and much more that the Player Characters need to traverse before they get anywhere near its secrets.

The Cavern of Cursed Tears is straightforward and linear, there are good reasons for this, both in game and out of game. In game, this is a limited network of caves, but split over two levels. The lower level is mostly underwater and there is a great sense of verticality throughout. The Player Characters will need to do a lot of climbing and jumping to clamber from one cavern to the next, whilst below, any Player Character who can swim well and/or hold his breath will be at an advantage. In addition, the Antiquarian and Deep One Classes from the Down Among the Dead supplement for Pirate Borg are also appropriate, whilst any Player Character with a musical ability will be very useful. Out of game, The Cavern of Cursed Tears is straightforward and linear because it is presented in a trifold format with the whole of the cave network presented on the inside three pages, running from left to right as a side view cutaway, rather than as a more traditional top down map. This allows the descriptions of the upper parts of the cave network to be placed above the side-on view of the caves, with the descriptions of lower parts placed under the side-on view. This is a fantastic layout and as the Player Characters progress through the caves, the attention and eye of the Game Master is pulled across the inner of the trifold, and into the depths of both the cave network and its secrets.

There are elements of the supernatural in the upper two, sandwiched layers of the Cavern of Cursed Tears, notably Chonchonchon, Lord of the Grotto, a necrotic crocodile, but they come to the fore at the end of the cave network, below the upper sections. Here there is a lake and classic Mesoamerican step-pyramid with its own secrets to discover and treasures to plunder. There are some fantastic moments here, such as a shaft lined with dozens of skull-shaped stones, each with a glyph on their foreheads. The glyphs can be played as a tune and when that happens, five thousand glowing skulls appear, and chanting, form stairs leading down… This has a fantastic sense of pulp action a la the Indiana Jones films–and it is not the only one in the scenario. Plus, of course, there is something nasty protecting protecting the secrets of the Cavern of Cursed Tears. The stats for the cast and bestiary of the scenario are given on the back of the trifold and here and there, there are extra notes for the Game Master.

Physically, The Cavern of Cursed Tears is very nicely presented. It is clear and very easy to read and the trifold format is used highly effectively. The map, or rather the sideview of the caves, is well done, as is the step-pyramid below.

The Cavern of Cursed Tears will probably take a session or two to explore. It has a strong emphasis physical exploration with hints of the supernatural that manifest more fully at the end of the scenario. Self-contained, it could be run as a convention or demonstration scenario, but the Game Master might want to cut out the middle section of the cave network to ensure that her Player Characters reach the end. Otherwise, The Cavern of Cursed Tears is very easy to add to a Pirate Borg campaign. It has secrets, it has treasures, and both of those will attract all sorts. The Cavern of Cursed Tears is an entertaining mini-dungeon done the Pirate Borg way.

The Other OSR: Creatures of the Dying World

Mörk Borg is not short of monsters. Since its publication in 2020, the Swedish pre-apocalypse Old School Renaissance style roleplaying game designed by Ockult Örtmästare Games and Stockholm Kartell and published by Free League Publishing, has been supported by numerous third-party supplements and scenarios, which includes numerous new threats. The world of Mörk Borg is a dangerous, even lethal one with relatively little chance of survival for the Player Characters, so new monsters are always going to be useful. Primarily to confront the characters with foes that their players have never seen before, so in game such as Mörk Borg, a bestiary is invariably going to be useful. Creatures of the Dying World: A Bestiary by Jonny Bloozit #1 gives the Game Master some twenty-one monsters, parasites, magical constructs, lurkers, and other threats, all of which are presented in full, succulent colour. This is because they are written and drawn by the author and in some ways, Creatures of the Dying World: A Bestiary by Jonny Bloozit #1 is as much an artbook as much as it is a roleplaying supplement. There is a looming, lurking quality to the art style, often spattered with the muculent and malodorous mess of the midden. All of the entries get a full-page entry with the minimal stats of Mörk Borg monsters leaving plenty of room for the illustrations and the descriptive text. The latter varies in length from one entry to the next and places an emphasis on the folklore to the creatures described. Even this varies from one entry to the next. However, Creatures of the Dying World: A Bestiary by Jonny Bloozit #1 is no A Folklore Bestiary, The Merry Mushmen’s gold standard by which any Old School Renaissance or Old School Renaissance-adjacent bestiary must be measured. In fact, the folkloric elements are underwritten in place and the Game Master will need to extract them from the text rather than use them as written.

There are some common themes running through Creatures of the Dying World: A Bestiary by Jonny Bloozit #1. There are creatures from swamps and marshes and associated with filth and decay, such as the Bogmen which seek to suffocate, envelop, and digest its victim, but is immune to weapon damage, whilst the ‘Giant Leechworm’ is exactly what you think it is. The ‘Miasma’ is an evil spirit attracted to filth and decay and spreads diseases like the sniffles and the plague, whilst the ‘Plague Fly’ settles on carrion, fresh battlefields, and rubbish dumps in swarms, causing fever-like symptoms in those it bites and laying eggs in open wounds. Worm-like creatures are common too, such as the Cavern Worm that is like a deep sea tube worm that hides in crystalline tubes only to snap out and bite at its victims, The weirdest of the worms are the ‘Howling Worm’, a magical plant-human hybrid which howls and shrieks loudly when anyone comes near, so they are used as alarms much to the annoyance of anyone else living nearby. 

Not all of the entries in Creatures of the Dying World: A Bestiary by Jonny Bloozit #1 are simple foes that the Game Master can throw at his players and their characters. There is a version of the ‘Crystal Skull’ that is a combination of magical artefact and personality, containing the bound soul of a priest or herbalist who is not very happy about being so bound. Consequently, he is ill-mannered, angry, and contemptuous of the Player Characters, but might be persuaded to help. What is in no doubt is the Game Master will have fun portraying the unfortunate soul! The entry for ‘Dagon’ is really more illustration than description and adds little that is of use. The ‘Plague Doctor’ is an adaptation of the seventeenth century figure that sought to treat the bubonic plague, both as NPC and Player Character. It is suggested that the towns and cities setting of the Dying World are home to many Plague Doctors, who attempt cures through bloodletting, which can be dangerous if failed, and similarly use magical cures to shorten illnesses, though such an attempt will lengthen the illness if the attempt fails. In comparison to other Classes for Mörk Borg, this is underwritten, but there is perhaps scope for development.

Creatures of the Dying World: A Bestiary by Jonny Bloozit #1 is a slight affair at just twenty-one entries and sparse descriptions for too many of them. Similarly, the emphasis upon folklore in the entries veers towards the meagre rather than the substantial, and in places, that lack gives less for the Game Master to work with and work into her campaign setting. And whilst there is no denying the effectiveness of the artwork in Creatures of the Dying World: A Bestiary by Jonny Bloozit #1, it cannot wholly make up for the underwritten nature of some of the bestiary’s entries. Creatures of the Dying World: A Bestiary by Jonny Bloozit #1 does not wholly suffer from a case of style over substance, but the Game Master is likely to want to develop some of that substance herself to make fuller use of the bestiary.

Your Pirate Borg Starter

The Pirate Borg Starter Set is the introduction to the self-described, “Worst Pirate RPG Ever Made™!” that is Pirate Borg. This Old School Renaissance-style roleplaying game is set in the Dark Caribbean, a sea of tropical islands marked with European towns and fortresses and ruins of civilisations long gone, of shipwrecks with rich cargoes and even richer treasures, and of the Scourge. The Scourge made the dead walk once again, ghosts return to haunt the living, and monsters lurk ready to smash the foothold that the Europeans have established in the region. The governors and the viceroys, representatives of kings and queens, have forced to adapt and rule with no contact from home following the Scourge and even take advantage of the situation, especially since the discovery of the abilities and addictive nature of ASH, the ash of the burned and ground undead. Some seek to make money from the trade in ASH and some seek to control it, whilst others seek to repress it. This is another cause of the conflict in the Dark Caribbean. Pirate Borg casts the players as members of a crew who will sail the ASH-tinged waters the Dark Caribbean, raiding and smuggling, carousing and drinking, adventuring and exploring, and the Pirate Borg Starter Set comes with everything necessary for a group of two to seven players to enjoy a mini-campaign set within the Dark Caribbean.

The Pirate Borg Starter Set is a packed box. It contains a sixty-page ‘Player’s Guidebook’, the sixty-page ‘Trapped in the Tropics: A Pirate Borg Adventure’, six Player Character Creation Worksheets, a pad of twenty-five character sheets, ten poster maps, and a set of twelve dice. It also includes a set of twenty-two reference cards for general play and the scenario, tokens for use with the maps, and two Dry/Erase pens for use with the Player Character Creation Worksheets. The inclusion of the latter points to an absence of pre-generated Player Characters that would normally be expected to be found in a roleplaying game starter set. Instead, players have to create their characters to play through the ‘Trapped in the Tropics: A Pirate Borg Adventure’. This points to the fragility of characters in Pirate Borg because players may have to replace them as the Dark Caribbean is a sea whose waters are deadly. It also provides a player with the full Pirate Borg experience, and of course, the Player Character Creation Worksheets make that process easier and faster.

The ‘Player’s Guidebook’ is very much a cut down version of the full Pirate Borg rulebook, even down to having the same page numbers. This is intentional because it makes reference to the Pirate Borg rulebook easier. Inside the front page there is a replication of the Player Character Creation Worksheet, but beyond that there is an explanation of how to create characters, the rules, the roleplaying game’s six base Classes, plus the two optional Classes. A Player Character is is defined by his Abilities, Class, gear, and Devil’s Luck. The five Abilities are Strength, Agility, Presence, Toughness, and Spirit, each rated between ‘-3’ and ‘+3’. There are six Classes and two optional Classes. Each provides adjustments to Abilities, basic Hit Points, and starting Devil’s Luck. The Brute is a raging melee fighter who gets a trusted weapon like a ‘Brass Anchor’ or ‘Rotten Cargo Net’ and when he gets better, he might gain a ‘Boomstick’ or ‘Grog Breath’, the latter enabling him to belch in the face of an enemy and stun him! The Rapscallion is a sneaky, cutthroat scallywag, which as a Class requires an ordinary deck of playing cards to play. The Rapscallion starts with a single speciality such as ‘Burglar’ or ‘Sneaky Bastard’, and gain more or even double up on already possessed specialities. He can also drink Grog to heal himself. The Buccaneer is a sharpshooter and treasure hunter, and is also a skilled tracker. The Swashbuckler is a brash fighter, who might also be an ‘Ostentatious Fencer’ or ‘Inspiring Leader’, and when he gets better, he could be the ‘Shakespeare of Insults’ or a ‘Calculating Cutthroat’, the former adding damage to attacks with his wounding taunts, the latter letting the player achieve critical hits on a natural roll of nineteen as well as twenty. The Zealot has prayers like Heal, Curse, and Holy Protection, which are learned randomly and can be cast several times a day without the need to make a roll or a test. The Sorcerer draws power from supernatural spirits and ghosts to cast spells like Spiritual Possession, Clairvoyance, and Raise the Dead, not whilst near cold iron or holding metal.

The Haunted Soul is either a ghost, conduit for restless spirits, has an eldritch mind, is a zombie, suffers from vampirism, or is a skeleton. Each provides a benefit and a penalty. For example, restless spirits constantly communicate with the conduit to grant a random Arcane Ritual which can be cast without a Spirit test, but must be cast before dawn the next day or conduit suffers damage. The Tall Tale can be one of the Merfolk, an aquatic mutant like a crab or The Great Old One, or a sentient animal such as a ‘Foul Fowl’ or a ‘Clever Monkey’. Although both the Haunted Soul and the Tall Tale are given as optional Classes, they are not really Classes, but closer to a Race or a Species as in other Old School Renaissance roleplaying games. This is because not only do they not get any better with experience, but the player also then rolls for an additional ability out of the standard six. Their inclusion, though, is unbalancing, granting a Player Character extra abilities that other Player Characters without either the Haunted Soul or Tall Tale options simply does not have the equivalent of. Further, the six core Classes not balanced either, especially when it comes to their progression. Several of the Classes like the Rapscallion or Buccaneer have multiple specialities or features that can be taken twice, whereas the Brute and the Swashbuckler do not. Of course, there is no need for the Classes to be equally balanced, but some rough equivalency would not have gone amiss.

To create a character, a player rolls for his Abilities, Class, gear, and Devil’s Luck. Gear includes weapon, clothing, and a hat. Optional tables provide for backgrounds, distinctive flaws, physical trademarks, idiosyncrasies, unfortunate incidents and conditions, and thing of importance. Of these which a group might want to avoid is rolling for Class since it avoids too many of the same Class serving in a ship’s crew.

Mechanically Pirate Borg is based upon Mörk Borg—hence the name—the Swedish pre-apocalypse Old School Renaissance style roleplaying game designed by Ockult Örtmästare Games and Stockholm Kartell and also published by Free League Publishing. A player rolls a twenty-sided die, modifies the result by one of his character’s abilities, and attempts to beat a Difficulty Rating of twelve. The Difficulty Rating may go up or down depending on the situation, but whatever the situation, the player always rolls, even in combat or as both Mörk Borg and Pirate Borg terms it, violence. So, a player will roll for his character to hit in melee using his Strength and his Agility to avoid being hit. Armour is represented by a die value, from -d2 for light armour to -d6 for heavy armour, representing the amount of damage it stops. Medium and heavy armour each add a modifier to any Agility action by the character, including defending himself. This is pleasingly simple and offers a character some tactical choice—just when is it better to avoid taking the blows or avoid taking the damage? Armour can also be damaged, due to a Fumble when defending, reducing its protective effectiveness, and a critical hit in combat inflicts double damage or allows another attack. A Player Characters whose Hit Points are reduced to below zero is dead, but at zero, is broken and can recover.

Every Player Character also has the Devil’s Luck. Each Class receives a different amount of this, but all can spent to inflict maximum damage on a single attack, reroll any die, lower the Difficulty rating of a Test, neutralise a Critical or a Fumble, and to lower damage suffered by a random amount.

A Player Character may also have access to Arcane Rituals, such as Dark Delusions, which creates illusions in the minds that can see the caster; Phantasmal Fauna, which summons a ghostly hound or shark until sunset; and Thalassomancy, which fill the lungs of targets with sea water, causing them to suffocate. There are some truly nasty Arcane Rituals in this list. For example, The Black Spot which literally marks the target for death or Release the Kraken, which summons one of these great creatures in the nearby sea. If a Player Character fails to cast an Arcane Ritual, then a roll may be made on Pirate Borg’s Mystical Mishaps table. Other forms of magic in Pirate Borg include a quick and dirty pair of tables for handling alchemy and a list of Ancient Relics, such as the Conch Shell of the Abyss, which enables the wielder to ask a corpse one question or Mermaid Scales that when eaten grant the ability to breath underwater for a few hours.

Pirate Borg being a pirate roleplaying game, the one thing that it definitely needs is rules for ships and nautical combat. A vessel is defined by its Hit Points, Hull, Speed, Skill, Broadsides, Small Arms, Ram, Crew, and Cargo. Hit Points includes its condition and the health and morale of the crew; Hull, its armour; Skill the skill and training of the crew; Broadsides, the damage inflicted by a vessel’s main cannons; Small Arms the damage done by swivel guns and muskets; Ram, damage done in a ram action; and Crew, the minimum and maximum number of crew the ship can carry. Combat is conducted in thirty second rounds, and in that time, the captain moves the ship, the Player Characters take an action, and the Crew can take actions such as ‘Fire Broadsides’, ‘Full Sail’, ‘Boarding Party’, and more. Speciality Crew includes Legendary Captains, Strict Bosun, Deck Sorcerer or Priest, and so on. The rules cover crew skill, morale, cargo, repairs, and optionally—surprisingly, weather! An earlier section gives a list of sea shanties that the crew can perform each day, which might be to raise the crew’s morale or put out all the fires on a ship! Stats for the various ships are given on the Reference Cards included in the box.

What the ‘Player’s Guidebook’ does lack—and understandably so—is a bestiary and such things as tables for generating random encounters. What it does include is summaries of the rules, including those for naval combat, for ease of play.  Overall, the ‘Player’s Guidebook’ is attractive and functional, providing only the absolutely necessary details that a player is going to need.

For the Game Master there is ‘Trapped in the Tropics: A Pirate Borg Adventure’, which promises British Redcoats, rival pirates, booby traps, hordes of zombies, and cursed relics. It is specifically designed to teach the Game Master and her players the rules and how the game is played. So, there is more advice here for the Game Master than might be found in another scenario, but as a scenario in a starter set, it makes sense. It tells the Game Master how to prepare for the first session, gives her notes for tone, stye, and inspiration, of which there is lots (and pleasingly, is not afraid to suggest looking at other piratical games, especially wargaming rules), and suggests a way in which the adventure can be run as a one-shot. There is advice on running different aspects of the rules and a handy list of the tenets for both the Game Master and the player. The scenario is designed to be played using the included maps and tokens.

The scenario begins en media res and essentially in the same fashion as Pirates of the Caribbean! The Player Characters and their vessel have been hired by the Spanish Inquisition to locate a shipwreck on Eel Island. As the Player Characters emerge from the jungle, they find themselves on the beach, betrayed by a crewmember, attacked by Red Coast. Then zombies! It is an exciting start and the cues from Pirates of the Caribbean continue with the exploration of the island and the discovery of the target ship—hanging almost upside down deep into the jungle. Then on to a neighbouring island which is close by. One interesting aspect of the scenario is that in introducing both Pirate Borg and its setting of the Dark Caribbean, it also introduces the concept of ASH, how it is made, and how it is consumed. It is a fairly grim process and the scenario does suggest alternatives if the gaming group is unhappy with the concept. On Scrub Island the Player Characters can acquire a ship, and armed with a major clue they should have been able to acquire, set sail properly! This gives them a bit more freedom of action and opens up the play style a bit, first enabling the players and their character to experience some naval combat and explore Gibbet Town, a British port on a neighbouring island. The scenario will culminate in a disaster and a delve deep under an island in search of treasure leading to a confrontation with its guardians.

The scenario is well designed and written, taking the Game Master and her players hand-in-hand through the different aspects of Pirate Borg’s play. There is good advice throughout on the different aspects of the rules and the scenario, plus useful discussion of what to do next once the Player Characters have completed the adventure. The scenario is also entertaining and fun, both for the Game Master and her players, the former being giving a pair of intriguing NPCs to portray.

The ten poster maps show a mixture of maps and artwork. There are maps of the various islands and Gibbet Town, deck plans, and an illustration of the hanging ship in the jungle. There is also a plain sea map for use with the naval combat rules and one of the whole Dark Caribbean and even a double-sided treasure map that the Game Master is expected to tear in half! The tokens include ships for naval combat, NPCs and monsters, and one for each of the Classes in Pirate Borg. There are even tokens for the chicken, crocodile, and parrot companions (and there are other animals on the other side) that the Player Characters could have! There are even tokens to represent the approximate time of day. All together, the tokens are simply useful and their inclusion is well thought out.

Physically, the Pirate Borg Starter Set is fantastic. Both the ‘Player’s Guidebook’ and the ‘Trapped in the Tropics: A Pirate Borg Adventure’ books are sturdy and colourful, and the maps, along with the tokens, are going to look great on the table. Both books are both very well written, the scenario in particular being full of little extra details such as suggestions how to portray the major NPCs by referencing various films. Lastly, both inside of the lid and the inside of the base box have tables on them to help the Game Master run the game. There is even the detail of the embossed lid that gives  the Pirate Borg Starter Set a pleasingly tactile feel.

Like any good starter set, the Pirate Borg Starter Set can be used as more than an introduction to the setting of Pirate Borg. An experienced group can still play ‘Trapped in the Tropics: A Pirate Borg Adventure’ and beyond the adventure, the other content in the Pirate Borg Starter Set can be used as part of an ongoing campaign. The ‘Player’s Guidebook’ as a rule reference guide, several of the maps can be reused as can the Reference Cards, and the Player Character Creation Worksheets can be used over and over. Plus there are the dice…

The Pirate Borg Starter Set is an impressive box, offering a combination of simple, but highly thematic rules and an engaging, entertaining scenario, all supported by some useful play aids that will extend its usefulness beyond the completion of the scenario. Which all together is a great introduction to Pirate Borg. If other publishers within the Old School Renaissance were thinking of producing a starter set, the Pirate Borg Starter Set has just set the standard by which they will all be judged.

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 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?

The Other OSR: Candle

The Player Characters know that they are in trouble when they appear somewhere different than to where they were. The Player Characters know that they are in trouble when they appear somewhere to the stench of incense, blood, and burnt hair, and the sounds of screams echoing around the high-vaulted ceiling of the room lit by blood red candles. The Player Characters know that they are in trouble when they appear in a summoning circle, one marked with lines filled with salt and powdered silver, and two of the five cultists in the room dead on the floor, their throats cut. The Player Characters know that they are in trouble when they appear somewhere and towering over them is a devil, skin like blackened iron, his horns craping the ceiling, and steam rising from every one of his pores. He is looking down on them and he is furious. As well as knowing that they are in trouble, the Player Characters have no idea where they are, how they got there, and even if there is a way out of where they are, let alone the reason why the devil is angry at them. And they definitely have no idea that the situation they are in is entirely their own fault.

This is the set-up for Candle: A Reverse Dungeon Crawl. Published by Loot the Room, this is a scenario for 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. Although the scenario can be run at almost any time, it actually requires a bit more set-up, ideally in several adventures run before Candle. This is because of the ‘candle’ of the tile, which is what puts them in their new and terrifying situation. The candle, or Taper, consists of two feet of thin, twisted wax with a goat’s hair wick. When lit it provides light equivalent to a candle visible to the person holding and anyone touching the wielder. Although it burns with the strong smell you would expect from burning hair, the wax never melts and the candle burns indefinitely, and its light is only visible to the wielder and those touching him. The intent is that Player Characters get used to benefiting from it, being able to move in the dark without being seen—although the smell will be a giveaway. At which point, the Game Master runs the scenario and the Player Characters suffer the unforeseen consequences of the Taper’s use and origins.

The devil’s name is Gomduloch. Not only does he hate being summoned, he thinks the Player Characters are somehow connected to his being summoned, and now he hates them. Having butchered some cultists—and definitely willing to butcher more—he is coming for the Player Characters. So not only do the Player Characters have to find their way out of a dungeon filled with cultists, dead bodies, roaming imps and devils, and all the perversity and horrors you would expect of a cultists’ lair, but they have to do that whilst being chased by a very angry devil.

The scenario begins in what would be the last room in any other dungeon, the room where the summoning would be about to take place were this any other dungeon. Then it proceeds to present its rooms backwards, from thirty-three counting down to one, and the exit. Divided over two Levels, one above ground, the other below, the dungeon is relatively linear, but instead of the Player Characters going in and discovering its secrets as they get to towards the end of the dungeon, here they begin by discovering those secrets on the way out. There are plenty of secrets to be found and discoveries to be made. The secrets will help the Player Characters, often to withstand, at least temporarily, the influence and reach of Gomduloch, whilst the discoveries tend towards the gruesome. What else would you expect though, it is a scenario for Mörk Borg after all. The challenge, ultimately, is to discover a way to banish Gomduloch and get away. In the case of Candle, survival is its own reward, so the players and their characters should expect very little reward beyond that.

Physically, Candle: A Reverse Dungeon Crawl is well presented. Each location is given a one-page description and the map for the relevant Level is also included on the two-page spread. Bar the Taper itself, there is no artwork in the book. The only issue with the presentation is in the choice of fount for the sidebars, which is too fine and too light to be read with any ease.

Reverse dungeons are not new. In most cases, they set up the Player Characters as prisoners and expect them to escape their confinement, making them about breaking out, not breaking in, but others flip the dungeon by making the Player Characters the monsters not the heroes. Reverse Dungeon, published by Wizards of the Coast in 2000 is an example of the latter, whilst Escape from Astigar’s Lair, published by Judges Guild in 1980, is an example of the former. Of course, Candle: A Reverse Dungeon Crawl is definitely an example of the former, but given the nature of the Player Characters in Mörk Borg, it could also be argued as being an example of the latter. That said, as much as the Player Characters are monstrous in Mörk Borg, they face worse monsters in Candle.

The problem with Candle: A Reverse Dungeon Crawl is the Taper. The Game Master has to set the scenario by luring the Player Characters not only into finding it, but also using it and coming to love. Without that, the scenario is far less effective. There is no advice for the Game Master to ease or overcome that problem. Nevertheless, once set-up, Candle: A Reverse Dungeon Crawl opens with a bang and keeps the horror going with the desperate Player Characters going to be so glad to have escaped their imprisonment in the cultists’ lair, let alone the anger of Gomduloch!

The Other OSR: The Thing from the Swamp

On the edge of civilisation lies Lake Onda, pregnant with rain, its waters ready to break. Already, they gulp at its banks, choking the earth and saturating the trees and the plants and subsuming them into a mire that spreads and spreads. The inhabitants of the surrounding villagers eke out what life they can, drowning from the moment they were born on the hot, moist air, never knowing the comfort of a respite from the rot and the stench. The lucky few escapes to a life of poverty elsewhere, free of their sodden origins. The unlucky few falls prey to a coalescence of mouldering vegetation and undergrowth into a brain sparked into life by the violent storms that wrack the skies above the lake, its only feeling being one of hunger. The villagers only know it to be something foul and want it ended. King Fathmu’s royal biologist wants a cutting from the creature for his gardens. Some have had visions of a nascent godling born in the swamps and know they would be well rewarded were they to nurture and protect it to its intended status. There is said to be a temple in the swamp with an entrance to the underworld where great riches lie ready for the taking. The right flowers of the swamp can be harvested for useful remedies.

This is the set-up for The Thing from the Swamp. Published by Loot the Room, this is a scenario for 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. The scenario focuses not on the swamp, but on the remains of a building that has slumped into the swamp and what lies underneath its cracked roof. This is a complex of rooms dedicated to researching and testing the creature that lives in the fetid caves beyond, that with the building’s collapse have succumbed to the stagnant waters of the swamp, the walls pierced with tough roots and dripping slime and mould, the air thick with spores ready to infest the lungs.

The remnants of the research and experimentation can be found throughout the complex, but they are not the only things to be found in the waterlogged ruins. There are riches to be recovered—but this is a scenario for Mörk Borg, so not very much, and the fabled flowers to be harvested, but there are also signs of Frankenstein-like experiments too and encounters with various parties with an interest in the creature, perhaps to capture it, perhaps to kill it, and there is also a worshipper of the creature, bidden to tend unto godhood. Most of these will be encountered at random. Perhaps the strangest thing that the Player Characters will find is ‘The Walker’, a mobile mecha suit powered by a human heart, which could be used to attack the creature, but is almost as dangerous to operator as it is to anyone it attacks.

As atmospheric as The Thing from the Swamp is, it is poorly set up. Like other scenarios for the Old School Renaissance, it is designed for emergent play, but it suffers from emergent comprehension too. In other words, the elements of the story that can come into play as the Player Characters explore the complex, also emerge as the Game Master reads the scenario. This is poor design that hinders the Game Master’s preparation efforts. The Game Master should have been given this information upfront as a necessity. However, the technological elements of the scenario, including the obvious signs of pseudo-scientific research being conducted in the complex and ‘The Walker’, make the scenario far more flexible than one would think. Of course, it is easy to plonk almost anywhere remote on the island of Tveland, the default setting for Mörk Borg, but with adjustments, The Thing from the Swamp could work just as well with CY_BORG or Pirate Borg.

Physically, The Thing from the Swamp is well presented. There are some nice touches away from the scenario such as its content warnings being presented as The British Board of Film Classification film classifications from the 1970s. Away from this, the layout is clean and tidy with the map presented on each two-spread marked with the locations being described. It is light on artwork, but the descriptions make up for that. It does need an edit though.

The Thing from the Swamp is an atmospherically soggy dungeon whose secrets will emerge as the Player Characters explore, though they should have been signposted earlier for the Game Master. It otherwise is a classic self-contained dungeon for Mörk Borg, easy to add to a campaign or run on its own.

The Other OSR: Vast Grimm – Space Raiders

It has been over six hundred years since the First Prophecy of Fatuma came to pass. The SIX, the Disciples of Fatuma, who following the prophecies put down in the Book of Fatuma, made a pilgrimage to the Primordial Mausoleum of THEY and deployed the Power of Tributes to decrypt the Mystical Lock sealing the Mausoleum. It was then that the They drew in the stale air of the Mausoleum, becoming one with the THEY and breathing out the parasites. The Six scattered, bringing the word and the infection of THEY to every corner of the ’verse. Then the Gnawing began. The parasites of THEY gnawed their way out of the infected. They spread. They gnawed their way out of planets. They spread. The infected split open. The planets split apart. Now mankind clings to life, looking out for any signs of THEY or hiding it inside them in the hope that it never erupts and spreads… The Earth is gone. Shattered into large pieces. There are places and planets where the remnants of Mankind survive, squabbling over resources and power, fearing the parasitical infectious word of THEY, but not without hope. There are whispers of a means to escape the end of this universe by entering another, one entirely free of THEY. It is called the Gate of Infinite Stars. Yet time is running out. The First Prophecy of Fatuma came to pass and so has every other Prophecy of Fatuma since. Except the last Seven Torments. Will the last Seven Torments come to pass and allow the Würms and the Grimm to consume the ’verse and with it, the last of Mankind? Or will the lucky few find their way to the Gate of Infinite Stars and at last be free of the Würms and the Grimm in a better, brighter future? That is, of course, if everyone fleeing through the Gate of Infinite Stars is free of the gnawing…

This is the set-up for Vast Grimm. Published by Infinite Black, it is a pre-apocalypse Science Fiction roleplaying game compatible in tone and structure with 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. In the near unspeakable horrors of the future that is Vast Grimm, the survivors do what they can to survive, banding together as Legions that can work together to explore what remains of the galaxy, scavenge what they can, deal with emerging threats to survivors, and all as long as they can until they and the survivors can flee this universe. Not all choose to join a Legion. Instead, they band together to raid other survivors, to plunder and pillage what remains of civilisation, to salvage what they can, and survive in whatever way they can—and that way is not always humane or even necessarily human. They are not Legion. They are Space Raiders!

Vast Grimm: Space Raiders introduces a new way to play Vast Grimm—Factions! To go with the Factions, it adds new Classes and then it adds a galactic hexcrawl, as well as presenting a history of Space Raiders. The Space Raiders of old mostly picked through the wreckage of failed colonies and stations, with only a few groups being more sinister and vicious. That changed with the Prophecies of Fatuma coming to pass and the infection of THEY beginning to spread. The nastier, more rapacious groups have grabbed their own territories and only in recent times have their ships been seen beyond their borders. It cannot be too long before they are fighting. There is a map in Vast Grimm: Space Raiders onto which the Game Master place the factions. The new Classes are the Brutal Savage, the Merciless Mercenary, the Plunderluster, and the Salty Dog, whilst the Factions are the Claws of Doom, Cybersharks, Killer Clowns, Greyskrulls, Jolly Dodgers, Reapers, and Revenants.

The Brutal Savage is almost soulless, but very ferocious scoundrel. Strong and tough, he may have been a survivor who would have starved had he not eaten the flesh of his dead comrades or was thrown into an airlock by her mother before she and the colony he grew up on became one of The Grimm. ‘Skillz’ might be having ‘Gangrenous Goo’ for an arm that feeds on his arm, but can also rots away at anything that it touches, or he might have a stare so worthy of the Abyss that it saps morale. What morals the Merciless Mercenary had have long since been replaced by greed, having either been maltreated by Shit King Saule once too often and grown tired of being his muscle or dreams nightly of a display tank of decapitated heads that with enough credstiks will be his. Strong and menacing, his ‘Skillz’ might be good with building bombs or as a natural troublemaker, whether it is his attitude or the smirk on his cut up face, he attracts attention at the start of every fight, giving his allies an advantage. The Plunderluster does everything with a swagger. Graceful and charismatic, he either grew up in a troupe of traveling performers, stealing as they performed, or is actually a service bot, reprogrammed to talk like a pirate! His ‘Skillz’ might be that everything he does is done with flair, increasing his Critical roll range, or that his Grimm Compass has been hacked to spin wildly when The Grimm are near! The Salty Dog grew up a raider, perhaps after having been found by raiders abandoned in an escape pod and not eaten or even thirteen years ago, was teleported from an ancient festival where he was dressed and acting like a pirate into this hell of a future and has yet to work out if he is actually hallucinating. His ‘Skillz’ include being able to talk to ships and thus has a bonus to repair or modify them or is a skilled pillager and has a bonus on scavenging.

These are just some of the options for each Class, but all four play around with a combination of the classic pirate figure and the space pirate or raider a la the film Serenity. So, some are of a more brutal and nastier nature than others, the Brutal Savage and the Merciless Mercenary versus the Plunderluster and the Salty Dog. Vast Grimm is a bleak, often savage setting, and all four Classes fit its ‘Grim Dark’ post-apocalyptic future. Of course, it is up to the Game Master to decide whether they fit the game she is currently running, but all are going to require mature players.

All seven Factions are given a quick description, some Netwürk Chatter about them that can be speculative, partially proven, or cross-reference, and some further details that can include sample NPCs and crew descriptions as well as equipment. The Claws of Doom is an all-MAnchiNE raider Faction whose members replace a single arm with a strong claw and are led by DOOM-1, whose has replaced his other with a pincer, the crevices of his cyberware filled with dried blood. The Cybersharks crew ships which attack other ships with tentacles and replace their jaws with metal mandibles. The Killer Clowns want to make the ’Verse more colourful and wear clown masks and carry brightly coloured balloon animals filled with toxins on balloon belts, lead-filled rubber chickens, or squirting flowers that shoot acid! They even know the Collapsible Clown Car Tribute that miniaturises a starship and kills everyone aboard. This is intentionally, absurdly silly and are even available as a Space Raider subclass which replaces the ‘Skillz’ of another Class.

The Greyskrulls are former reapers, sympathetic to The Grimm, but with only a couple of known Crew detailed, are under described and developed, as are the Jolly Dodgers, a faction of smugglers lead by a captain known as Princess pain for her capacity to withstand torture at the hands of Shit King Saule. In comparison to the other Factions, there is not a lot of flavour to them and the Game Master will need to develop the Netwürk Chatter a little harder to attract the attention of his Legionnaires. The Reapers are the oldest Space Raider Faction and are infected by The Grimm, whilst the Revenants are led by Captain Sully Bloodbeard, who was vented by his crew over three centuries ago and returned as a Void Revenant, occupying one body after another, his remains hidden deep within the Graveyard where the best wreckage can be found!

The Revenants are the target in the hexcrawl adventure included in Vast Grimm: Space Raiders. The Player Characters’ Legion is hired (or bullied) by a Space Raider Faction to search the Graveyard for the remains of Captain Sully Bloodbeard or Shit King Saule levies a bounty on Captain Sully Bloodbeard’s ship, the Revenant’s Revenge. Collect either, or even both, and the Legion gets plenty of credstiks, a possible ally, and an even greater reputation. Deckplans are given for the Revenant’s Revenge as are a set of tables for generating the ships—including their type, condition, and what might be found aboard—within the Graveyard and the location of Captain Sully Bloodbeard’s remains. This can be run as a procedural adventure on the go or prepared by the Game Master, perhaps with access to Vast Grimm: Space Cruisers to provide expanded detail about the ships found in the Graveyard, and ultimately brings the Player Characters up against a major faction in the major Vast Grimm universe that will likely end in an epic battle aboard the Revenant’s Revenge.

Lastly, Vast Grimm: Space Raiders details some extra Tributes besides Collapsible Clown Car and some Space Raider Mods such as Black Flag and Plank Walker. A set of tables also provides plenty of Space Raider booty for the Player Characters to loot.

Physically, Vast Grimm: Space Raiders adheres to the Artpunk aesthetic of both Vast Grimm and Mörk Borg, with its use of vibrant, often neon colours and heavy typefaces. It looks amazing, a swirling riot of colour that wants to reach out and infect everything, but where the core rules were not always the easiest to read, the simplicity of the content in this supplement make it easier to read and use.

Vast Grimm: Space Raiders sends the Vast Grimm universe off in another direction, piratical at the very least, but likely even grimmer than Vast Grimm. This is a sourcebook of Space Raider adversaries, but also a sourcebook for roleplaying Vast Grimm as even more self-interested space bastards than usual. The latter probably lends itself to a shorter, one-shot scenario or campaign than the former, but either way, Vast Grimm: Space Raiders makes the Vast Grimm universe an even grimmer—and with the addition of the Killer Clowns (from outer space)—sillier future.

—oOo—

The Kickstarter campaign for Vast Grimm – Escaping Stasis, a starter set and expanded rules can be found here.