So, in December I was thinking about converting the Mysterium material to good old Call of Cthulhu to reach more gamers. But, in the end I didn’t, partly because I’m not sure the Mysterium campaign frames would fit the expectations of most CoC players, and partly since I did not enjoy the thought of trying to adapt things to that system. Even if I don’t reach many players this way, the point of the game was to find something that fit how I wanted to play.
Expanded some of the scenarios (especially Lost and Found, and Angel Tears)
Changed the system for mental stress so that it is more in line with the specific themes of Mysterium
The revised edition is now live at DrivethroughRPG and all you blessed souls who have previously bought the game should have gotten a message with the updated pdf (if not, reach out!).
However, from now on, I’ll let this book rest. Any new material for Mysterium will be published in a series of modules with the tentative title Borderland Encounters.
For this last post for the Character Creation Challenge, you will have to forgive me for being a bit self-indulgent and doing a PC for my own game Mysterium Weird Fiction Roleplaying. Specifically, I’ll be doing a character for the campaign frame The New Gods which is about the meeting between humanity and a kind of god-like aliens, the asymmetrical power relations between the two species, what humans do to gain access to the services of the alien entities and how this changes them. These alien organisms, the Zothyrians, have transmigrated to a higher-dimensional state of being, but still need to anchor their existence to the primary matrix of matter and energy and find a sort of nourishment in the attention of conscious entities, which is why they reach out to and make contact with humans. These blessed or cursed few who are chosen by the Zothyrians are the main protagonists and antagonists of the campaign.
The first step in making a Mysterium PC is to come up with a concept. If I was going to play a campaign, this would be done collaboratively in the group, but for the sake of this challenge, I’ll just roll on the random table for occupations. I roll 23 (!), which gives me “Taxi driver”. Hmm, ok, let’s say the campaign is set in Berlin. My cab driver PC will be Emre Özdemir, a young German-Turkish man working for a popular app-taxi company. I’ll let the die roll be the age of this guy as well. Then I choose four personality traits, that not only describe my PC but give advantage on die rolls in situations where they are applicable (each can be used once per session). Emre has strong principles and is friendly, but he’s got a habit of seeking excitement through gambling and owes a few thousand euros to a local gangster. Next, we have stats. My attributes (body, speed, mind, psyche) start at 10, and I get 220 points to distribute. For skills, I get to distribute as many points among one set of skills as I’ve got in their governing attribute. And then I get another 200 points to divide among the skills as I like. Each attribute has also three basic skills that start at 15% for free (except Initiative which begins at half the Speed value). For stress meters, I’ll use a new rules version where the four I had originally cribbed from Unknown Armies are exchanged for two inspired by Delta Green. As a new and fresh PC, Emre starts with no failed or hardened notches in either meter and no mental issues. He’ll have two bonds, important relationships that help him through tough times. I choose his mother, Defne, and Hannes, his secret boyfriend (Emre has not yet come out to his family). They both start with the same value as Psyche.
Then we get to the campaign-specific stuff. How was Emre first contacted by the Zothyrians, who is this entity he communes with, and what does it want? To begin with, I roll for the title of the entity and get “Hand” and “Eye” (perhaps implying action and perception?), lets call this being “The Mystery of the Hand and the Eye”. It will use a symbol reminiscent of the well-known “Hand of Fatima”. Then I roll twice for the entity’s objectives, and get “Experience carnal pleasure. Extreme, inventive, and transgressive” and “Accumulate knowledge. Research a particular subject or discover someone’s deepest-held secrets”. Fittingly, one could be related to the hand, and the other to the eye. The entity has dominion over the spheres of Space-Time (distance and proximity, change and causality) and Matter-Energy (mass and substance, force and potential).
Name: Emre Özdemir
Background and description: 23 year old man, german-turkish, grew up in Berlin, works as an app-taxi driver. Tall, short black hair, neatly trimmed mustache, glasses.
Personality traits: The strong must protect the weak, Thrillseeker, Friendly, In debt to Jürgen Koch (gambling).
Body 60, Athletics 45, Stealth 45, Struggle 35
Speed 60, Dodge 45, Drive 55, Initiative 50
Mind 60, Conceal 35, Education 45, Turkish 55, German 55, English 30, Notice 45
Bonds: 1 Dephne (mother) 80, 2 Hannes (boyfriend) 80
Mental issues: None (yet).
Contact and initiatory experience:
While in bed with a bad fever, he is awakened by a high-pitched buzzing sound and sees how the ceiling of his apartment is removed to reveal a strange multi-dimensional space filled with what is not quite complex industrial machinery, but neither really a busy insect hive.
Up becomes down, and Emre falls into the kaleidoscopic domain of the Zothyrians. The insectoid machine-beings gather around him, examining him with great curiosity, but with a weirdly sensual, almost erotic tension. With a sharp incision, they split him open and placed a crystal shard, crackling with electrical charge, into his chest. All of a sudden Emre is capable of understanding the cybernetic hivemind that introduces itself as “The Mystery of the Hand and the Eye”. He is shown the many chambers and activities of the bio-mechanical realm and learns the secret of how to initiate communication with the entity (the Rituals skill). The being can grant Emre miraculous power over Space and Time and Matter and Energy. In exchange, it wants two things: to experience carnal pleasure (extreme, inventive, and transgressive), and to accumulate knowledge (research a particular subject or discover someone’s deepest-held secrets).
When Emre comes to, and the fever abides, he tries to forget the whole thing as a strange dream, but within him, he can feel a shard of alien energy calling out to its trans-cosmic home.
This story game about trust, treason, and secrets is set in Berlin in 1950. The Second World War finished five years ago, and the Cold War has just begun as the Allied forces are split into East and West. But the capital of the former Third Reich is still rife with secrets left behind by the Nazi regime. Just like in real history, the victors are scrambling to lay their hands on research made by German scientists. Unlike real history, in this game, these secrets include occult and weird super-science gadgets, weapons, and horrors. Ostensibly, the Allied Forces are collaborating in keeping peace in Berlin, and the joint Reserve Police Agency is responsible for handling weird and occult stuff left behind in ruined labs and underground bunkers. PCs are members of the RPA’s multinational teams, all sworn to cooperate, and all answering to their respective national governments. It‘s like a cross between the cold war thriller The Third Man and the Hellboy and BPRD comics.
Creating PCs for Cold City is supposed to be done in collaboration with the group, but for the sake of the Character Creation Challenge, I will do the steps I can do without input from GM or other players. First off, I choose nationality (USSR), occupation (military medic), and invent some details regarding my PC’s background and how they ended up in the RPA. Then I spend 5 points on the three attributes (each starts at 1). Next step is to invent five traits (talents, gifts, quirks), three positive and two negative. Then, I create hidden agendas, one national and one personal.
And then, we run into the steps requiring other players. A central part of Cold City is the PCs’ relations with each other in their RPA team, what they think of each other, and how much they trust one another. Trust is measured with a numerical value for each of the other PCs in the team, from 0 to 5. Team members can get bonuses to die rolls, so everyone profits from the high trust as long as the team works together, but when someone betrays another team member the traitor receives a bonus based on how much they were trusted. Therefore, let’s say there is another PC, one Major Digby Bassett-Wright.
Name: Dmitry Petrovich
Nationality: USSR
Occupation: Soviet Red Army Medic
Background: Grew up in a kolkhoz in western Russian Socialist Soviet Republic. Wanted to study to become a doctor. As the war began he was drafted into the Red Army, given a basic education as a medic, and sent away to the front.
Draw: Petrovich was the sole survivor of an incident during the last weeks of the war in Europe when soviet troops entering Berlin were attacked by a strange luminescent inhuman entity. Because of this experience, he was considered qualified for this mission.
Attributes: Action 2, Influence 2, Reason 4
Traits: Cool and steady under stress (+), Perceptive (+), Accurate marksman (+), Brusque manners (-), Perhaps too curious about all things scientific (-)
Hidden agendas, National: Secure any research data concerning enhancing the performance of the human organism.
Hidden agendas, Personal: Find out what happened to his friend Alexei Mikhailov who went missing during that encounter with the inhuman entity.
Languages: Russian, German
Trust & Opinions: Major Digby Bassett-Wright, British imperialist, stiff-backed and with an air of superiority. My trust: 2, Their trust: 1.
Aenglum is my friend Jim’s osr-game. Years ago, I had the pleasure of playing in his megadungeon campaign Under (depending on context this can be one of two Swedish words, one meaning “below” and another meaning “wonder”). I still remember the palpable sense of evil and sinister secrets surrounding the dungeon, that place wanted to hurt you! Good times.
To create a PC in Aenglum, you choose a race and class. In addition to specific abilities these give you fixed values for the characteristics. I choose Southling for race (humans from the most civilized region). This gives me Str 3, Dex 3, Con 3, Wil 4, Int 2, Cha 3, and a couple of abilities. For class, I choose the Dollmaster, a creepy kind of spellcaster who creates animated dolls. I get Str 2, Dex 2, Con 2, Wil 3, Int 5, Cha 3, and a whole lot of different abilities. Then I roll 2d4: Str 5, Dex 3, Con 7, Wil 5, Int 3, Cha 8. To get my total characteristics scores I add together the race, class, and dice values.
Didrik is a journeyman Dollmaster of Ramanta. He was taught the secrets of how to summon the Ramanta spirit into the rag doll by his father, just like he was taught by his father before him, in a tradition stretching generations and centuries back in time. He knows how to create the doll with the right materials, entice and lure the spirit with the right words and gestures, and control its dance. Didrik wanders the lands of Aenglum practicing his art wherever he goes, sometimes to the amazement and wonder of the locals and other times to their horror and revulsion, it matters not, the dance of the doll is its own purpose. Lately, he has been following a faint but persistent rumor about a Theater of the Night, which has led him far out into the north-western wastelands, to a cursed and forgotten place called Under.
Name: Didrik
Race: Southling
Class: Dollmaster
Characteristics: Str 10, Dex 8, Con 12, Wil 12, Int 10, Cha 14
Movement: 6
Combat morale: 4
Life value: 4 (max 10)
Melee Attack Value: 0
Ranged Attack Value: 0
Class-based weapon damage: Light d4, Medium d4, Heavy d4, Ranged d4.
Valor: Aeidmars Child – The Southlings are the true children of the sun and the breath of the lion god is what makes up the spirit of this people. Regain 1d6 morale.
Abilities: Summerborn +2 on saves vs heat/fire; Sign: The Red Anger- +2 AV on all attacks vs undead and demonic creatures. +2 on all saves vs magic; Toy familiar (Ramanta).
This post-apocalyptic game exploded upon the rpg scene in 2010 and almost entirely swept away the indie / story games of the previous decade in a deluge of powered-by-the-apocalypse-games and has had lots of influence on mainstream game design.
To create a character, I choose one of the “playbooks” provided in the rules. This gives me an archetype and lets me choose some details to make it my own. No one who knows me would be surprised that I chose the Brainer, the strange weirdo afflicted with psychic powers. I choose one string of stats, two moves particular to brainers, and a packet of gear.
Few AW PCs are entirely nice, but I think Burroughs here might be something of an unrepentant creep. Will they manage to salvage a scrap of humanity, or will they turn out to be a monster who only values the autonomy of others as a prize to conquer? We’ll have to play to find out!
Name: Burroughs
Playbook: Brainer
Look: Thin and frail to the point of skeletal, white as porcelain, entirely devoid of hair, wrapped in tattered robes. Has a strangely childlike voice.
I start by choosing my Calling, which determines Aptitudes, Combat values, Calling abilities, Character advancement, and Combat gear allowance. I choose to play a Heretic, a summoner of The Sealed Names, spirits both bright and dark. Next step is Species which determines Species Abilities, Size, and Quirks. I choose to be a Tenebrate, a kind of humanoid warped by a sunless existence. The character’s homeland and history determine bonus language, purviews (background skills), and starting gear. I choose to have been a Blight Raider in the Wistful Dark. Next step is Traits that modify my aptitudes, I choose to raise Grit and Aura by one each, and lower Might and Deft. Quirks are unique mental or physical features that give the character an advantage and a disadvantage. I choose the physiological quirk Dark demeanor, playing to type concerning my calling and species.
Calling abilities: Fitful sleep (Nightmares, can ask GM for clues), Dreadful (Edge on rolls to intimidate, Aura check to learn what target fears), Squire Marlow (Servant-spirit, Grit check to summon for one task)
Purviews: Swift and ruthless action, Getting out of tricky situations, Taking what isn’t yours
Combat gear allowance: Armor light, Melee weapons standard and lash, Missile weapons thrown
Species abilities: Night born (1 Dark allegiance), Shadow sight
Size: Medium
Languages: Dark tongue
Quirks: Dark demeanor (Advantage: At first glance wicked creatures believe me to be a potential ally, Disadvantage: Distrusted by those favoring law and order)
The original science fiction game from 1976 (some would say science fantasy). The set-up, with a generation ship adrift in space, the descendants of its crew afflicted with strange mutations and no longer aware of the nature of their home, is familiar from sf-books such as Orphans of the Sky by Heinlein and Non-Stop by Aldiss. The game would go on to spawn the better-known and hugely influential Gamma World, but a lot was already there in this little booklet.
Step one is to choose whether the PC is a human, mutant human, or mutant creature. Humans get an ability called Leadership potential, while mutants get mutations, both physical and mental. I chose to play a mutant human. Step two is abilities, which are 3d6. I get pretty good stats, except for strength. Step three, derived attributes: I don’t get any damage bonus. I roll as many d6 as my constitution value to determine hp, and get 43. Step four, mutations! I roll 1d4 twice, once for my number of physical mutations, and once for mental. I get to choose 1 physical mutation and 1 mental, I was hoping for more but the dice have spoken. I select Electrical generation and Teleportation. Then the GM is supposed to select one defect (negative mutation), either physical or mental. I roll and the die indicates one mental defect. I choose Epilepsy. And that’s it, since as per the rules “mutations start in the forested area of the ship, with no material goods”.
Milia was shunned by her tribe as a child after teleporting randomly around the village and accidentally electrocuting one of the elders. Since then she’s survived on her own as a semi-ferrall hermit in the woods.
The classic science fiction rpg, inspired by such SF stories as the Dumarest series by EC Tubbs and Space Viking by H Beam Piper. I’m using the original rules from 1977.
Step one is to generate characteristics by rolling 2d6 for each. Dexterity and Endurance are ok, but whoever this is does not have much else going for them. Step two is the fun part, the minigame of trying to enlist in (and survive!) the six services (Navy, Marines, Army, Scouts, Merchants, or Other) to acquire skills and experience.
Term 1: Thanks to their above-average Dex and End, the PC manages to enlist in the Army. By sheer luck, they not only survive the first four-year term but get a commission, and even manage to be promoted – now they’re a Captain! But, after this explosive start, they do not get reenlisted and their career with the army ends here. I get four rolls on the acquired skills tables and receive +1 Dex, Blade Cbt Sword, Mechanical, +1 Edu. When mustering out of service I get two rolls and choose to roll once on each table, which gives me a Middle Passage travel allowance and 2000 in cash. Captain Mikhaal Voronov is ready to chase his fortune among the stars!
Odd Soot is a game of weird science fiction set in an alternate 1920s where humans have ventured into space, encountered strange creatures, and become afflicted with an alien plague.
This is a brp-game (Mythras to be precise), so it’s got lots of characteristics, attributes, and skills. I can choose to either roll dice or distribute 80 points for my characteristics. Since I have a specific concept in mind (priest of Wittenberg) I choose the point-buy method. Then I calculate my attributes that are derived from the characteristics. Next, I distribute several pools of skill points on skills chosen from lists for my cultural background and career. Finally, the PC gets some personality and implied history by choosing passions and circles.
Athanasius Kremer studied theology at Wittenberg and became very interested in the science of magic. His goal for the moment is to gather enough experience as a priest, perhaps among the colonies, to be eligible to study the subject at his alma mater.
Athanasius has a twin brother, Theophrastus, who became the black sheep of the family when he dropped out of his theological studies and became an adherent of solipsism. They have not seen each other in years but Athanasius fears that his brother will return to perpetuate some nefarious deed.
In this OSR game, the player characters are weirdos and criminals who explore the occult underground (in both senses of the word, as a social milieu and as a subterranean environment) and try to build a criminal empire of their own.
I roll 3d6 for my attributes and choose a class that suits my stats. It’s quite clear that this one will be a fighter of some kind, and I choose the Mercenary class. I lucked out when rolling for Flesh and Grit, getting an 8 on d8 for both, and with the CON bonus they both start at 10. Then I note my saves and skills, altered by attribute modifiers. Finally, I choose my starting equipment. Benny is ready to explore the underground!
Benny Warda is a 32-year-old mercenary from Germany. He served with German UN troops in the Middle East but got thrown out for drug abuse and disorderly conduct. Benny is tall and buff and has a blond mullet and mustache. He is enthusiastic, has a loud laugh, and talks somewhat like Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Caverns Measureless to Man 