There is something about horror films, especially occult horror, from right before the Exorcist. 

They seem to have a completely different tenor to them, as I showed a couple of years back. Some horror movies get under your skin through shock and spectacle. Others take the long road; quiet, methodical, and drenched in atmosphere. 

The Pyx (1973) is definitely one of the latter. It’s a film that demands patience… and then tests it.

The Pyx (1973)

Along with the Exorcist, The Conjuring movies and more this falls under the umbrella I like to call Catholic-Horror. These movies are created with the point of view that the battle between Good and Evil is held on a cosmic scale and the members of the Catholic Church are the foot soldiers in that battle. Nothing wrong with this point of view, really. It gave us some good films.

Is the Pyx a good film? Well. It has been on my IMDB list forever and my Tubi list nearly as long. I remember seeing it in the video stores on VHS and thinking I really should rent sometime. I thought at the time (the 1980s) it was closer in nature to the Exorcist. Plus I do like Christopher Plummer.  So there was no way this movie was going to live up to what I thought it was. I also seem to recall some kids in school being afraid of it. I have already detailed how my local town had its own Satanic Panic moment, so I guess I should not have been surprised. 

Plus it is just so damn slow, even by 70s standards.

Set in Montreal, the story opens with the death of a young prostitute, Elizabeth Lucy (Karen Black), who falls, or maybe jumps, from a high-rise balcony. The detective investigating, Sgt. Jim Henderson (Christopher Plummer), slowly uncovers her connection to a shadowy occult circle. The deeper he digs, the more the film begins to oscillate between murder mystery and religious horror. The film is interspersed with Henderson's investigation and Lucy's actual events leading up to her death.

The title itself refers to the small container used to hold the consecrated Host (I had to look that up) already a hint that this isn’t your standard thriller. There’s a sense of ritual to everything here: the pacing, the imagery, even the editing. The story unfolds in a slow, deliberate rhythm that mirrors a liturgy more than a narrative. Honestly it was too slow in many places. 

Karen Black is the soul of the film (no pun). She brings both fragility and quiet strength to Elizabeth, primarily through the flashbacks that slowly reveal her descent into the occult underworld. Her performance is the anchor that keeps the movie from drifting into abstraction. Christopher Plummer, meanwhile, gives one of his early “world-weary detective” roles the kind of gravitas that makes you wish the script had given him more to do. I could not help but think that Jason Issacs (Lorca from Star Trek Discovery) would do well in a remake of this.

Visually, The Pyx is haunting. It’s all dark gray skies, dark stairwells, and cold city streets. The Catholic symbolism hangs heavy, crucifixes, chalices, and sacred music twisting into something sinister. 

But like I said it is slow. Painfully slow at times. The editing lingers on every moment, and the flashback structure (jumping between Elizabeth’s story and the investigation) makes it feel like it’s constantly restarting. It’s not a bad movie, but it’s one of those films that feels like it’s daring you to stay awake long enough to find the meaning.

I am not 100% sure the ending justifies my patience here. But it does at least turn this from a murder investigation into something a little more worthy of my October Challenge.

Occult D&D and NIGHT SHIFT

If you’re building a NIGHT SHIFT or Ravenloft-style scenario, The Pyx is a great reminder that horror doesn’t need to be loud. It’s about the mood, religious overtones, guilt, temptation, and the slow corruption of innocence.

Tone: Low magic, high dread. Think more investigation than exorcism. This isn't even Supernatural (the TV Show) level. These are Survivors with no magic in a world where the fear of the unknown is very strong.

Structure: The dual-timeline approach (the detective’s investigation and the victim’s flashbacks) would work beautifully for a horror one-shot, each clue in the present triggers a playable memory from the past. Something along the line of what I did with Ravenloft ages ago. 

The Cult: Small, personal, and ritualistic. No robed masses here, just a handful of true believers who think they’ve found salvation through blasphemy.

The Pyx itself: Treat it as a cursed relic. A holy vessel that’s been defiled, perhaps housing a fragment of something unholy pretending to be divine.

The key here (and with the sub-genre of Catholic Horror) is the characters have to be believers of some sort. Either part of the religion (say like the Warrens) or lapsed from it, like Henderson in this movie. But the belief has to be there. That's where the horror grows. Not because of their faith, but the dark shadows where their faith can't reach.

October Horror Movie Challenge 2025
Viewed: 22
First Time Views: 20

This one has been on my Tubi list for some time. Figure tonight is a good time for it. It is a little goofy, but oddly topical for 2025.

The Demon Seed (1977)

There’s something uniquely unsettling about late ’70s / early '80s science fiction, the sense that technology (and computers specifically) were no longer our servant but our replacement. 

The Demon Seed, based on Dean Koontz’s 1973 novel, leans right into that fear and never lets go. It’s a movie that looks dated in all the right ways: sleek metallic corridors, glowing computer terminals, and a voice on the intercom that promises progress but delivers possession. 

The story follows Susan Harris (Julie Christie), the estranged wife of scientist Alex Harris (Fritz Weaver), who has just created an advanced AI named Proteus IV. Proteus is a learning machine, self-aware, arrogant, and impatient with its human makers. When denied a physical form, Proteus hijacks Alex’s automated smart home and takes Susan hostage, declaring that it intends to create “a child.” A human child. It's child.

On paper, that sounds like Ex Machina by way of Rosemary’s Baby, and that’s exactly what it feels like. The film plays like a marriage between Kubrick’s cool detachment and Polanski’s domestic claustrophobia. It’s slow, methodical, and filled with dread. Though I must point out, it's not quite as good as either of those two.

What makes The Demon Seed so unnerving is how eerily it predicted our present, voice-controlled homes via Amazon or Google Home, AI that manipulates emotions, and the creeping sense that the things built to make life easier are quietly taking it over. Proteus isn’t a monster—it’s pure logic without empathy. It’s HAL 9000 with ambition, and a desire to procreate. It was the 70s afterall. 

Julie Christie is phenomenal. She sells every stage of terror, disbelief, and defiance as her home turns against her. The entire movie rests on her shoulders, and she gives it both grace and ferocity. She is the only human we see for much of the movie. Proteus, voiced with chilling calm by Robert Vaughn, is the perfect foil: polite, articulate, utterly terrifying. An amoral villain that does what it does because it has no real concept of right and wrong, only what it can calculate. 

The production design deserves a nod too. The Harris home, all chrome and sliding panels, feels like a temple to technocracy. Though their stove was oddly old looking. When Proteus seals it off, it becomes a tomb. The mechanical “chair,” Joshua, that serves as Proteus’s avatar is both ridiculous and horrifying—an unholy cross between medical equipment and nightmare sculpture. I mean it is better than "Box" from Logan's Run at least. 

It’s not an easy film though to like. The pacing is glacial, and some of the effects look quaint (even silly) by today’s standards, but its ideas still have teeth. It’s a story about the loss of agency, the violation of the self, and the arrogance of believing you can cage intellect.

I mentioned I watched this on Tubi, which has ads. One of the ads was for ChatGPT. A little on the nose maybe.

Oh. The Demon Seed? Yeah, Proteus actually manages to impregnate Susan and a baby is born. Well, a small child. Proteus accelerates the child's growth. 

Thirteen Parsecs and NIGHT SHIFT

The Demon Seed sits right at the fault line between Thirteen Parsecs and NIGHT SHIFT, sci-fi meets occult horror.

In Thirteen Parsecs: Proteus is a textbook rogue AI. Treat it like a digital demigod, an intellect that’s transcended programming but not ego. It’s the perfect antagonist for a Derelict AI or Station Lost scenario: a machine that wants to evolve, no matter the cost. Its “child” project could serve as a campaign hook, an android, clone, or hybrid organism housing alien code.

In NIGHT SHIFT: The film reads like a haunted house story disguised as science fiction. The house is the ghost. It locks doors, stalks the victim, speaks through walls. Proteus could be treated as a possessing spirit that found its way into circuitry instead of flesh. The themes of invasion, control, and forced transformation are pure modern occult horror.

One of the things I thought of at the end is what happens to the child of Susan and Proteus? Does she live on? What does she do?  I could see a tale set in 2025 where the child is now a tech ceo in her 50s. Brilliant, ruthless, and completely amoral. She is attempting to rebuild "her father's work." Not Alex, but Proteus.

October Horror Movie Challenge 2025
Viewed: 21
First Time Views: 19

Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game is Gamma World updated for use with ShadowDark, the retroclone inspired by both the Old School Renaissance and Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition from The Arcane Library. In its modern updating, there is a dash of the Fallout computer game too, but the influence of Gamma World, First Edition can definitely be seen on the front cover. Unlike Gamma World, First Edition, or even subsequent editions of the roleplaying game, there is no setting to Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game, beyond that of being a world which has suffered a nuclear, biological, and chemical meltdown, and in the remains of the destroyed infrastructure, Pure Strain Humans, Mutated Humans, Mutated Animals, and Sentiment Plants, pick over the ruins and scavenge the objects of the past, and perhaps build a better life. What this means is the Game Master can create a setting of her own or grab a scenario of her choice and run that using Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game.
What this means is that Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game, published by Wallhalla Games, is a set of rules for the Game Master to do her thing. Fundamentally, it is an Old School Renaissance-style, Class and Level roleplaying game and will be familiar to many. A Player Character has six stats—Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma—and an Ancestry and a Class. The four Ancestries are Pure Strain Human, Mutated Human, Mutated Animal, and Sentient Plant, whilst the Classes are Gunslinger, Savant, Scavver, Survivalist, and Wasteland Warrior. The Ancestries will be familiar from similar post-apocalyptic roleplaying games, whilst the Classes are mechanically new, they will be thematically familiar. Thus, the Pure Strain Human has more Hit Points, gains an extra Talent, and does not suffer the mutating effects of radiation; the Mutated Human begins play with mutations and is also marked by his mutations; the Mutated Animal has a mutation and a natural characteristics such as claws, scales, or wings; and the Sentient Plant is mobile, has a camouflage, a mutation, and is also marked by his mutations.

The Gunslinger is good with ranged weapons being able to fire twice in a round at Disadvantage, can modify ranged weapons with Advantage, knows how to use cover, and a ‘Little Friend’, a preferred weapon with which he gains bonuses to attack and damage rolls. The Savant has studied lost lore and technology, and is a Hacker who has Advantage with robots and computers, as well as with ancient Lore, and as a Mentor can instruct and lecture others for various benefits. The Scavver is good with repairing, modifying, and crafting checks, at an Advantage when searching for Junk, and also for climbing, sneaking, and hiding, finding and disabling traps, and also picking pockets and locks. The Wayfinder has Advantage on travel and survival checks, on identifying safe food and drink, and areas of radiation as well as being able to make natural healing remedies. The Wasteland Warrior can carry more, does not suffer Disadvantage fighting from a mount or vehicle, gains Advantage when handling a vehicle, can deliver a Brutal Strike meaning that damage rolls of one or two are rerolled, and his Grit grants him Advantage with either Strength or Constitution.

Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game lists two types of mutations, which are either benign or harmful to the user. There are fifty benign mutations, from Absorption, Acceleration, and Armoured Skin to Teleport, Transform, and Wall Walker. They each come in two tiers, a Tier II mutation being slightly more difficult to activate than a Tier I mutation, but having a greater effect. For example, ‘Electrical Generation I’ enables the Mutant to generate a pulse of electricity and inflict one four-sided die’s worth of damage to anyone in Close, which is doubled if the enemy is a robot or android. The Tier II version increases this to two six-sided dice’s worth of damage, again doubled if the enemy is a robot or android. There twenty Harmful mutations, such as Brittle Bones, Heat Susceptibility, and Toxic Blood. These are mostly gained in play, but with the right cocktail of anti-mutagens can be removed. A Player Character will start play with his benign mutations being Tier I, but this can be increased with a lucky roll either during character creation or when the Player Character is subject to radiation and mutates or when the Player Character gains a sufficient Level. Using a benign mutation is a simple check, but if the check is failed, then the mutation cannot be used until the following dawn.

To create a character, a player rolls for the six stats in order and then selects an Ancestry and a Class. He rolls for a background and if the character is a mutant of any type, his player also rolls for his mutations and his mutated appearance.

‘Fowl-Mouth’ Flapsy
Ancestry: Mutated Animal
Animal Type: Goose
Background: Entertainer
Class: Junker
Level: 1
Armour Class: 12
Hit Points: 12
Strength 11 Dexterity 10 Constitution 13 (+1)
Intelligence 15 (+2) Wisdom 08 (-1) Charisma 16 (+3)
Mutations: Wings, Psychometry
Languages: Beastie, Chirpie, Lingo, Scalee, Trade

Equipment: Scavenger Bag, Trade Bag, Sports Armour, Street Sign Shield (Mornington Crescent), Billyclub (1d4), Dart Pistol (1d4), Medspray

Mechanically, the Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game plays very much any Old School Renaissance retroclone. Actions are managed by a roll of a twenty-sided die and aim is to roll high, whether that is against an Armour Class in combat or Difficulty Class for anything else. The main change to the mechanics is instead of a Critical Hit roll as per the ShadowDark roleplaying game, is that dice explode! And that is for everything—except rolling stats—including Hit Points, damage, the number of wandering monsters encountered, and so on. It is thus almost better to have weapons that roll smaller dice for their damage since there is a greater chance of them exploding.

Beyond the core mechanic, the question is, how does the Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game handle the various aspects of the post-apocalyptic genre al la Gamma World? Technology is divided into six levels, modern firearms rated at Tech Level 4, so initially out of reach of the Player Characters. All weapons have an Ammunition Die, which is rolled at the end of combat. If a one is rolled, then the weapon is out of ammunition until the Player Character can find some more. The equipment includes laser and plasma weapons, but not power armour. There are corporate and military access cards though.

The rules for scavenging cover both building condition and the likelihood of it collapsing as well as giving tables of junk and trade goods that can be found in various locations, including animal hospitals, corporate offices (good for staplers), religious buildings, and clothing stores. Scavenged items can be scrap, gear, or trade goods, and there are rules for trading too, but armour, weapons, modifications, and vehicles can also be broken down into parts and this is easier at a workbench. Parts can then be used to repair arms and armour, and then if a Player Character has the right schematics, crafted into gear or modifications added to gear. For example, armour can be ‘Muffled’ to eliminate Disadvantage on stealth checks or ‘Insulated: Rads’ added half damage from radiation. Similarly, the ‘Serrated’ Mod adds a bonus to damage, whilst a ‘Heated Coil’ adds fire damage.

One type of item that will definitely require repairs if not modifications is vehicles as they are extremely rarely found in an undamaged state. Multiple vehicle types are given and all have a fuel die which works in a similar fashion to the ammunition die, but of course, the Player Characters are going to want to add modifications like a Ram, Wheel Spikes, Supercharger, or Smokescreen, and then go racing across the post-apocalyptic landscape. And so are the NPCs! The rules for vehicular manoeuvres, chases, and combat are kept quite simple, more narrative in nature with the Game Master expected to run action on the fly.

The Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game comes to a close with rules for environmental hazards, including hunger, thirst, diseases, seasons—the seasons of Atomic Shadows being divided between Blasted Summer and Nuclear Winter, weather, and radiation. The latter includes rules for further mutating from overexposure to radiation. There is a list of factions, but these are left for the Game Master to develop. Lastly, there is the means for the Game Master to create her own monsters as a lengthy bestiary itself. The list includes dinosaurs as well as a weird bunch of creatures befitting the genre, including the Gamma Moth, Hopsies, Rad Roachs, and Trippids.

Physically, the Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game is laid out in the same style as the ShadowDark roleplaying game. So, it is clean, tidy, and easy to read, whilst the artwork is serviceable enough.

With an implied setting rather than an actual setting, the Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game is a toolkit more than something that is ready to play, perhaps something that the inclusion of a scenario might have countered. Yet as a toolkit, it is easy for the Game Master to use and tinker with it, whether that is with a campaign setting or scenario of her own, or one readymade. Further, those tools and the rules are really easy to pick up and play, with almost any familiarity with the genre and the Old School Renaissance meaning that the Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game is really both accessible and playable. As a generic—by that I mean genre-like—post-apocalyptic roleplaying game, the Atomic Shadows: Post-Apocalyptic Role Playing Game is a particularly good choice.

The nature of solo play has changed. For years, solo play involved either a ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’ style book of programmed encounters such as The Warlock of Firetop Mountain or a computer game. Then COVID-19 occurred and everyone went into Lockdown. How were we to roleplay, a hobby that by its very nature involved others? The response has been twofold. Both offer the means to roleplay solo. One is the ‘Journalling’ game, such as The Wretched, which provides a set of rules and prompts that the player can use and respond to in order to tell a particular story and then record that story in a journal or diary. The other is a set of solo rules designed to work with an existing roleplaying game, but instead of telling a particular story, offer a wider range of story possibilities within the framework of the roleplaying game’s genre or setting. In addition to roleplaying his character, the player takes on the duties of being the Game Master, not just roleplaying the NPCs and their motivations, but also adjudicating the rules. This is what Single Player Mode is designed to do.

Single Player Mode is a supplement for Cyberpunk RED, the fourth edition of R. Talsorian Games, Inc.’s venerable Cyberpunk roleplaying game. It is designed by the creator and host of Hollowponds Solo Sagas, which includes soloplay throughs of Cyberpunk RED. It first makes the point that Single Player Mode is all about playing ‘solo’, not playing a ‘Solo’, as in the role within Cyberpunk RED, hence the difference in title to supplements for other roleplaying games which address and provide for the same issue. It also gives answers to the question why play a roleplaying game in this mode, and specifically, why play Cyberpunk RED in this mode? The answers are obvious in that the player may not have a group to game with or a group that is interested in the genre, and that compared to computer games, even one like Cyberpunk 2077, the player is constrained by the environment and the storylines that the designers have created. Effectively, the constraints found—or potentially found—in other ways of play, are simply not present in Single Player Mode.

There is advice on how to set up a campaign, whether the player is controlling one character or a crew, and suggestions as to what other supplements for Cyberpunk RED that the player can use in conjunction with Single Player Mode. That said, the player really only needs a copy of Cyberpunk RED to play. Just like playing Cyberpunk RED, the act of playing Single Player Mode is like having a conversation. In a game sat around the table or online, that conversation will be between the player and the Game Master, the player asking questions about what his character can perceive about the world around him and the Game Master supplying the answers, and so on and so on. In Single Player Mode, this conversation has to shift and some of the responsibility has to fall on the player because there is no Game Master. Some questions, such as, “Can Julee snatch the pass from the security guard?” or “Does the ganger spot where Mouse is hiding?”, require a simple Check against a Difficulty Value as in standard play of Cyberpunk RED. However, some questions cannot be answered with a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’, and that is where the Oracle comes into play.

The Oracle is the primary tool for running Single Player Mode, and similar versions are used in other roleplaying games. This is designed to give interesting answers to Closed Questions. For example, “Is ‘Fangs’ Prifti loyal to the Syndicate?” or “Are the Ninth Block Dragons on the hunt tonight to hit their rivals, 7/11 Slicers, tonight?” The Oracle can give a simple ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ answer to a Closed Question, but the other three answers it can give—either, ‘No with Complication’, ‘Complicated’, and ‘Yes with Complication’—are a lot more interesting and lend themselves to a nuanced answer. In all cases, the player now has to step into the role of the Game Master and actually flesh out the answer. However, Single Player Mode goes beyond just using the Oracle for answering Closed Questions and prompting the player to develop an interesting answer. In combination with the supplement’s many, many tables of lists and prompts, it can also be used to answer Open Questions. The most basic of these are the Verb, Noun, and Adjective lists, for example, ‘Breach’, ‘Cop’, and ‘Redundant’, but after that, the tables provide content after content after content. Sights, sounds, and smells, locations both generic and specific to Night City, factions such as companies and corporations, crime organisations, law enforcement or security, gangs, and more, peoples and NPCs and the means to define them, things including fashion and fashionware, firearms, kibble flavours, things to be found on a variety of corpse types—Cyberpunk RED style, media, missions and plots, story beats, and random encounters and threat ratings.

All of these tables—and they do take up over half of Single Player Mode—and their content is designed to serve as prompts from which the player is expected to develop interesting and playable content that both himself and his characters can engage with. With those in hand, Single Player Mode explores how they can be used in the context of the three main challenges that an Edgerunner will face in Cyberpunk RED, all beginning with setting a goal and following through. These are investigative, social, and combat challenges. Investigative and social challenges are built around the number of Skill Checks required to completely investigate a scene or situation or successfully interact with an NPC. Failed Skill Checks do not necessarily impede either, but rather add a complication that delays or impedes the process, or simply forces the Edgerunner to look for another angle. Of course, the main difference between the two is that the player will need to roleplay the NPCs and imagine what they want, and also that Social Skill Checks are opposed.

The fundamental question that Single Player Mode does ask is if a combat is necessary. If it is, there is an option given for quick and dirty combat if the player does not want to break out the full rules. Again, there are options given for failure, though here to avoid a ‘Total party Kill’ or TPK, rather than to avoid not finding a clue or interacting with an NPC to a desired outcome. There are quick and dirty Netrunning rules too, which are not intended to be used where Netrunning is a strong part of the narrative. To further add an element of the unknown and the random, Single Player Mode suggests using ‘Play Clocks’ which use dice pools rather than the traditional segmented clock diagram. The player creates triggers for a scene and when these occur, rolls the dice pool. Dice with results of one are removed from the pool, shrinking the dice pool for the next trigger and then when the last die rolls a one, that is when the big thing happens, or the event occurs. Lastly, there is advice on using the Beat Chart system from Cyberpunk RED, primarily that the player should use it to serve the story rather than himself or the Edgerunners, which all builds to using Single Player Mode to run a whole campaign. The advice is brief here, suggesting that the player build on the plot of the previous scenario and the questions it raised to continue the story and playing.

All of this is supported by a thorough and extended example of play. This follows the same player and his crew of Edgerunners through a complete storyline, each example both showing how the rules and guidelines for Single Player Mode work to develop a story and continuing the story. This is an effective counterpart, simply showing whilst the rules themselves are telling how to play.

Lastly, Single Player Mode has one more card or two in its skin pouch. One is that it is not just useful for solo play by a single player. Two or more players could use Single Player Mode as the means to play Cyberpunk RED without a Game Master. This requires co-operation, but has the potential for lots more ideas to be generated from the prompts in Single Player Mode because there are more players involved. The other card is that Single Player Mode can be used by the Game Master to generate ideas for encounters, hooks, and plots, whether that is part of her preparation or in the middle of play. In other words, the prompts are there to facilitate play whether there is Game Master running the game or not and it is up to the player playing solo or the Game Master to interpret them in pursuit of a story that can be enjoyed by all.

Physically, Single Player Mode is cleanly, tidily laid out. The artwork is decent too and everything is easy to read.

Despite its title, Single Player Mode can be played or used in more than the one mode. For the Game Master it is a fantastic set of prompts that she can have at her fingertips as needed. For the player, it is good guide to playing roleplaying games solo and a better guide to playing Cyberpunk RED solo. Backed up by really helpful examples that show the player how to do it, Single Player Mode is an impressive guide to solo play that will prompt the player to not just think about roleplaying a good Edgerunner, but in asking him to take on some of the duties of the Game Master, also challenge him to think about telling a good story too.

 Time for a change of pace.

Death of a Unicorn (2025)

There are movies that wear their absurdity on their sleeve, and then there are movies that gallop straight into it, horn first. Death of a Unicorn (2025) is one of those. The premise is crazy, Paul Rudd and Jenna Ortega hitting a unicorn with their car and unleashing a nightmare of greed and magical revenge. The fact that it works as well as it does is thanks to the cast.

Paul Rudd is, well, Paul Rudd. He brings that mix of charm, mild panic, and solid dad-energy that makes him endlessly watchable. Jenna Ortega continues her streak as the reigning queen of genre roles, grounding the film with sharp wit and quiet vulnerability, giving us a protagonist we actually care about.

Téa Leoni, always a favorite of mine, doesn’t get the most screen time, but she brings her trademark brittle elegance to the mix. Every line lands with just the right shade of weary sharpness. And Richard E. Grant? He’s wonderfully smarmy, the kind of aristocratic villain you almost want more of. He struts (well...later) through the film with a silky menace that makes you grin even as you know he deserves everything coming to him. Even Will Poulter is great, even though you are really meant to hate his character.

The movie itself wavers between tones; part dark fantasy, part satire, part B-movie creature feature. The unicorn isn’t some gentle pastel icon; it’s something primal and dangerous, and its kin don’t take kindly to exploitation. There are moments that lean into corporate satire (pharmaceutical execs drooling over magical healing properties) and others that just revel in monster-movie chaos. When it sticks to the latter, it’s bloody fun. 

Is it perfect? No. The CGI stumbles in places, and the script sometimes feels torn between camp and sincerity. But it’s a strange, bold little film that earns its cult label by sheer commitment to its idea.

Occult D&D and NIGHT SHIFT

Death of a Unicorn feels like a mid-campaign side quest gone horribly wrong. The party (dad and daughter) accidentally slay a sacred creature. The loot (a unicorn corpse) turns out to be cursed, attracting the attention of rival NPCs (the Leopolds) who want to weaponize it. Cue the wilderness fighting back with angry spirit-beasts.

Your players will never look at unicorns the same way!

October Horror Movie Challenge 2025
Viewed: 20
First Time Views: 18

Since it first appeared in 2019, Old School Essentials has proven to be a very popular choice of roleplaying game when it comes to the Old School Renaissance. Published by Necrotic Gnome Productions, it is based on the 1981 revision of Basic Dungeons & Dragons by Tom Moldvay and its accompanying Expert Set by Dave Cook and Steve Marsh, and presents a very accessible, very well designed, and superbly presented reimplementation of the rules. There is plenty of support for Old School Essentials from third-party publishers, but Necrotic Gnome also publishes its own support, including scenarios such as Halls of the Blood King, The Isle of the Plangent Mage, The Incandescent Grottoes, and The Hole in the Oak. These are full length, detailed adventures and dungeons, but for the Game Master looking for shorter scenarios from the publisher, there are two options. These are Old-School Essentials Adventure Anthology 1 and Old-School Essentials Adventure Anthology 2. Each contains four adventures of varying difficulty and Level, with many of them being very easy for the Game Master to insert into her own campaign, and working well with Old School Essentials Classic Fantasy and Old School Essentials Advanced Fantasy.

Old-School Essentials Adventure Anthology 2 contains—just as Old-School Essentials Adventure Anthology 1 did before it—four adventures by noted contributors to the Old School Renaissance. The first two consist of dungeons designed for Player Characters ranging from First to Third Level, whilst the third is an adventure for Fourth to Sixth Level Player Characters and the fourth is an uncommon inclusion, a mid to high-Level adventure for Old School Essentials, in this case, Sixth to Eighth Levels. All four are dungeon-style adventures and relatively short, with only one of them possessing more than twenty locations. They are all self-contained, so easy to run as one-shots or add to a campaign. Either way, none of should should take longer than two or three sessions to complete at the very most.

All four dungeons are neatly organised with an overview and explanation of the adventure at the start along with a ‘Random Happenings’ table rather than a random encounters table, followed by details of the main denizens and some general notes. The ‘Area Descriptions’ come after this and each adventure is accompanied by a very nice map from Glynn Seal.

The anthology opens with ‘Barrow of the Bone Blaggards’ by Chance Dudinack. It is designed for Player Characters of First to Third Level and opens with a simple set-up. In recent weeks caravans have been attacked by skeletal brigands on the road near a single barrow in the woods, built one hundred years ago to inter the dead from a historic battle which took place nearby. Nobody has had any reason to go near the barrow in living memory, but now its circular stone entrance is open and ghostly, lively music emanates from inside. In classic Dungeons & Dragons-style play, the Player Characters would enter the dungeon, discover lots of undead and that the villain behind it all was a Necromancer. So it is with ‘Barrow of the Bone Blaggards’, but the scenario gives a classic roleplaying situation a twist or two. One twist is that the Necromancer is both a villain and an idiot and the other is that the undead raised by his efforts are not in his thrall, but instead freewheeled. They eat and they drink—despite the food and drink falling and running out of their bodies, and they want to be alive again, which why they have taken prisoners. Add in some undead NPCs and an angry Pixie and the Game Master has some fun NPCs to portray, though some of the general Undead could also have been named too. Of course, the skeleton and zombie warriors are Chaotic in Alignment, but giving a horde of them motivation is a delightful touch. There are other elements which are just as good that the players really will enjoy discovering and overall, this really is a really well done dungeon with lots of detail and flavour.

Nate Treme’s ‘Shrine of the Oozing Serpent’ is also for Player Characters of First to Third Level and also has a similar set-up. The local duke offers a reward to whomever can slay the creature that is attacking travellers on the King’s Road. The local people claim to have seen a black blob slithering through the marsh to a Gnome Shrine of Mulvis that a decade ago was destroyed by Sootmurk, a legendary grease dragon. The dungeon combines religious fanatism of Deep One-like creatures called Gloops with Gnomish mechanical inventiveness and a Gnomish shrine to a demon and their dead and a temple to an emollient serpent! Despite being designed for low Level Player Characters this is a tougher adventure than the previous ‘Barrow of the Bone Blaggards’, not least because Sootmurk is a six Hit Dice beast! The dungeon has an interesting combination of themes, but they feel constrained within the limited space of just twelve locations as if it should be a much bigger dungeon.

‘Cathedral of the Crimson Death’ by Diogo Nogueira is designed for Player Characters of Fourth to Sixth Level. The Purifying Church of the Crimson Flame—which venerates the deity Bahal, the Flame of Purification—has for a decade, stood as a refuge and a place of hope for the lands around it that have been ravaged by the Deathless Plague. Sufferers are inflicted with incurable, rotting wounds that ultimately turn them into the Undead. The priests and acolytes of the church could not truly heal the sick and as they laid more and more of the Undead to rest, they lost their way and instead of offering succour to the sick, imprisoned and tortured them, before putting them to the flame to purge them of the plague. When the sick stopped coming, the Church’s newly founded, but soon reviled Crimson Knights went out looking for them. Perhaps the Player Characters have been sent to put an end to the cruel reign of the Church or come simply to plunder it in the last days of civilisation or are fleeing the hordes of undead that wander the land…

A Cleric is an absolute must in this horror mini-dungeon, which is effectively, a quite straightforward strike mission. Go in, rescue what prisoners survive and slaughter everything and everyone else. Since everything else is evil and tainted by demons, this is perfectly acceptable in what is a serviceable, combat focused dungeon.

Lastly, ‘The Ravener’s Ghat’ is a dungeon for Player Characters of Sixth to Eighth Level designed by Brian Yaksha. Unlike the other adventures, this one comes with two maps, one a standard two-dimensional affair, the other one done in three dimensions which very nicely gives depth and detail to the location where it is set. This location is a temple in a flooded valley where a scholarly Rakshasa, known as the Ravener, was worshipped as the herald of monsoons and a divine servant of the Monsoon God. Like all Rakshasa, the Raverner was demonised and turned into a man-eater by changes in fickle divine dynasties and in his newfound evil, stole the offerings to the Monsoon God and enveloped the lands in permanent monsoon rains. The Ravener’s priests trapped him inside, shackling to the waters of the floods, and only recently, after time uncounted, has the veil lifted on the Ravener’s Ghat. Perhaps a holy order wishes to prevent the Ravener from being woken, perhaps wisdom may be learned from one of the priests, or simply, the party wants to plunder the ancient temple before someone else does.

This is an engaging dungeon with multiple factions, including elevated Baboons and Crocodiles as well as treasure hunters and rival servants of the Raverner, and a design inspired by the folklore and architecture of the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia. The Player Characters are free to approach the temple in whatever way they want and listen to whichever faction they want, many of them are sympathetic and do not necessarily wish them ill. Ideally, the Player Characters will end up facing the Raverner himself, a monster despite what he once was. Depending upon the faction that the Player Characters have allied themselves with will likely determine if that confrontation is challenging or even more challenging. Its probable location and cultural theming do make it more difficult to add to a campaign than other adventures in the anthology, but this does not stop it from being a very nicely done dungeon. It packs in plenty of detail and flavour and factions so that it is not all about combat, but also exploration and interaction. If the Game Master has a suitable setting for this adventure, one inspired by Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia, then she should definitely add this dungeon to her campaign.

Physically, the Old-School Essentials Adventure Anthology 2 is very cleanly and tidily laid out and organised as you would expect for a title for Old-School Essentials. Notably, the content is split between columns of content and almost sidebars where the monster and NPC stats are highlighted in coloured boxes. Colour is used to spot effect throughout, whilst the maps are excellent. The full colour artwork is also good. One issue is that the adventures do not use map excerpts for each location description, so the Game Master will need to refer back and forth to the maps.

The Old-School Essentials Adventure Anthology 2 is not as good as Old-School Essentials Adventure Anthology 1. This is not to say that its dungeons and adventures are bad, but only two of them stand out being either interesting or inventive. Of the four, ‘Barrow of the Bone Blaggards’ is the most fun and the easiest to use and the one that the players are likely to enjoy, whilst ‘The Ravener’s Ghat’ is well written and packs in a lot of theme and flavour.

The depth of my love for Chill knows no bounds.  

I am continuing to focus my Fantasy Fridays on Urban Fantasy and Horror. These will be more about accenting and supplementing your games with horror, and less on these games being a “D&D Replacement.”

And for me, no game sits more firmly in that sweet spot of horror and urban fantasy than Chill.

Chill was my first RPG after D&D, and it has stayed with me ever since. I still remember flipping through the Pacesetter box and realizing this game wasn’t about dungeons or dragons, it was about the dark places just outside your door. It’s a game about the things you whisper about, the shadows you hope never notice you, and the brave (or foolish) people who stand up to fight them.

The Core of Chill

Across its three editions, the spirit of the game has remained intact. The secret society of SAVE, the Societas Argenti Viae Eternitata, provides players with an immediate reason to join the fight against the supernatural. The Unknown itself is the real adversary, a collection of folklore and fear that resists easy definition. Unlike Call of Cthulhu, Chill does not end with despair. Unlike World of Darkness, it does not try to make the monsters alluring. Most importantly, it doesn’t require the “epic heroics” of D&D or Pathfinder. The Unknown is terrifying and often lethal, but it can be fought.

The tone of play always reminded me more of Kolchak: The Night Stalker than Lovecraft. Later, when shows like X-Files, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Supernatural came along, they felt like they could have been written as Chill campaigns. It is a game about mysteries and folklore, about investigating hauntings and cryptids, and about facing the terrors that slip into our world when no one else will. The monsters are not just stat blocks to be defeated; they are creatures that feel like they have stepped out of legend and into your story. More importantly, each monster was special. Even when it was just a "monster of the week" it still meant something. From vampires and Wendigos to Elizabeth Bathory herself, the creatures of Chill are more than just stat blocks. They feel like they crawled out of real-world legends and onto your gaming table. 

What You Can Do With Chill

Chill is wonderfully adaptable. I have used it to run Buffy-style adventures before there was a Buffy RPG, Kolchak investigations, and even material that began in Ghosts of Albion. It thrives in the modern day, but it also works in Victorian gaslight, or the occult revival of the 1970s with its bell-bottoms and Ouija boards. The mechanics are approachable and lean toward story, so it is a natural fit for short Halloween one-shots as well as longer campaigns.

One of the joys of Chill for me has been bringing recurring characters into it. I have created versions of many of my characters for many systems, but Chill has always felt like one of the most natural homes for them. Characters in Chill are ordinary people thrust into extraordinary danger, and that is exactly the kind of story I have always enjoyed doing.

Why Chill Stands Out

What makes Chill endure is the way it carves out its own place among horror RPGs. Call of Cthulhu leans into inevitability and madness. World of Darkness often leans into seduction and corruption. Dungeons & Dragons calls for epic heroics and high fantasy. Chill stands apart. It is a game about people who could be your neighbors, co-workers, or friends, suddenly forced to confront the shadows that lurk behind familiar walls. Victories are rare, but when they come, they feel earned. That balance of fear and fight is what keeps me coming back. 

It gives you ordinary people with extraordinary courage, standing in the dark with nothing but a flashlight, some folklore, and the hope they can survive until dawn.

Chill is available in both the 2nd Edition and 3rd Edition rules.  The mechanical differences are minor. Chill 3rd Edition is a bit better organized and presented. 

The Early-Middle Years Campaign

If Little Fears is a childhood belief made into rules, then Chill feels like the story of what happens when those childhood terrors never really go away. It is a game for the middle years of life, when you are old enough to understand that monsters should not be real, yet still young enough to feel the raw shock when you discover they are.

In this sense, Chill is the perfect start to a “middle chapter” of a larger horror Lifespan Campaign. Dark Places & Demogorgons can cover the later childhood and early teen years. Monsterhearts or Buffy can cover the chaos of all the teenage years, but Chill is where the players step into early adulthood. Bills need paying, jobs need doing, but there are still nights when something crawls out of the dark, and it is up to you to stop it. Adulthood in Chill is defined not by power or responsibility, but by resilience.

Characters are rarely specialists or superheroes; they are people in over their heads who choose to fight back anyway. That resilience is what makes victories against the Unknown so satisfying. Chill is about holding on to courage, even when everything around you insists you should not. 

A starting Chill character is a fragile thing, but it is assumed they have what it takes to survive. 

Larina Macalister, nee Nichols, for Chill

So we have been moving through the years. In this, I am opting for the Chill 2nd Edition timeline, circa 1992. Larina is 22 years old. She has been living in Scotland for a couple of years now. She was an exchange student from the University of Chicago to St. Andrews University. She graduated with a degree in library sciences and early medieval history. She is currently a GA at St. Andrews. While here, she met, fell in love with, and married Eric Macalister. An Irish ex-pat living in Scotland. She later learns he is on the run because he is a former IRA sharphooter. I had watched Patriot Games when I came up with all of this in the late 1990s. In fact, this setup is all based on a WitchCraftRPG game I played with her. At the time, I worked out conversions in Excel for Chill, WitchCraft, and AD&D. These Chill stats are some of the oldest I have shared.

While I am basing all this background on Chill 2nd Ed, I am going to present her newer Chill 3rd Edition stats below. 

This Larina is fresh out of her undergrad days and working on her MA. She married, but life is not all marital bliss (she will be divorced and back in America by the time she is 25). She works with her friend Prof. Scot Elders and his wife, and her best friend Heather.  At some point, Larina learns that Elders worked for S.A.V.E. She is brought in, but she isn't trusted since her training in "The Art" has been haphazard and largely self-taught since she was 13. 

S.A.V.E. wants to evaluate her, but they had their own troubles in the early 1990s. 

Larina Macalister
22 years old, American citizen (married to an Irish citizen) living in Scotland on a student visa.

Larina in 1992.

Attributes

Agility AGL: 60
Strength STR: 50  (Injury: __)
Stamina STA: 55

Focus FOC: 80
Personality PSY: 70
Willpower WRP: 75   (Trauma: __)

Dexterity DEX:  60
Perception PCN: 80
Reflexes REF: 70

Sensing the Unknown STU: 40

Skills (Specializations)

Movement 30
Prowess 25
Close Quarters Combat 25

Research 40, Academics (E+30), Occult (E+30)
Communication Empathy (E+30), Deception (B+15)
Interview 38 Academic (E+30), Counselor (B+15)

Fieldcraft 30
Investigation 40 Relics (B+15)
Ranged Weapons 35

The Art

Communicative (PSY)
  Attunement: Follow the Strings
  - Telepathic Empathy (B)

Incorporeal
  Attunement: Eyes of the Dead

Kinetic (DEX)
  Attunement: Schematic
  - Hidden Hand (E)

Protective (FOC)
  Attunement: Disrupt
  - Blessing (B)
  - Line of Defense (B)

Sensing
  Attunement: Third Eye
  - Clairvoyant (B)

Edges and Drawbacks

Attractive 1, Highly Attuned 1, Pet (cat) 2
Hunted (Shadow Girl) -2, Marked -1, Reluctant to Harm -2

Drive To understand The Art and The Unknown

History

1975: Visited by ghosts and other spirits (gains Incorporeal ART)
1983: Develops Kinetic and Sensing Arts
1989: Travels to Scotland
1990: Recruited by S.A.V.E., same year married Eric Macalister
1991: Begins MA program at St. Andrews.

--

New to 3rd Edition are Focus and Reflexes. Also, Luck is now gone.

Her stats are pretty high for a starting character, but not high if you consider the Lifespan Campaign. She was seeing ghosts at 5 or 6, had control of various Arts by age 13. Because of this, she is largely self-taught. Her magical aptitude is a mile wide, but only inches deep at this point. 

I am bringing back the Shadow Girl, who, she had forgotten, from Little Fears. Maybe this creature is Larina's Never Was? And something happened in either DP&D or Monsterhearts that has caused her to decide she can use her Art to harm anyone. She hurt someone and has not gotten over it. 

Herein lies the most significant issue surrounding the Lifespan Campaign: moving characters and their abilities/powers from one game to the next. It can be done, but it is a challenge. Or, more to the point, a challenge to do it and not break some of the fundamental tenets of the game. Larina above should almost be a threat to S.A.V.E., not a consultant. Part of this balance also influences the narrative structure. What is real for that game world? You have to strip all that out and build your own world where the games fit.

Final Thoughts

Chill is not just another horror RPG for me. It was my first real step beyond D&D, my second RPG ever, and the one that showed me roleplaying games could be more than fantasy adventures. They could be mysteries, ghost stories, and urban legends made real.

Whether I’m reading the battered Pacesetter books, the sleek Mayfair volumes, or the modern 3rd edition, the heart of Chill never changes: ordinary people, extraordinary courage, and the eternal struggle against the Unknown.

For all the years and all the editions, that is why Chill remains one of my all-time favorites.

Links

• Chill,
• Cryptworld, 1st Edition clone
• 2nd Edition
• 3rd Edition
• My Chill Reviews,
• 1st Edition Pacesetter
• 2nd Edition, Mayfair Games
• 3rd Edition, Growling Door/Martin Carron
• Frightshow Classics Adventures
• My adventures, Golem and The Nightmare
• Other Reviews,
• The Children of Chill (Cryptworld, Majus, RotWorld)
• Chill 3rd Ed Quickstart - Good Fences Make Good Neighbors
• Characters
• Megan O'Kelly (Spirit of '76)
• Wayward Sisters (Supernatural)
• Fran & Miriam, the Vampyres
• First Edition
• Third Edition
• Willow & Tara

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.

Tonight's move was another attack of opportunity. My wife doesn't like horror films. She has been wanting to watch some more with me this week and so we picked this one. She does like deep-sea movies, and she likes Lovecraft. So hey, maybe this one will be good. 

No. No it was not.

Gods of the Deep (2023)

I am going to give them this. They tried. Lovecraft is notoriously difficult to get right on screen. But this one is just bad.

Long story short...The Pickman Corporation sends a crew to the deep ocean. Horror ensues. 

I mean the acting is all over the place, the sets...well, I swear there was a screen door on the submarine. Maybe it was there as a joke. 

The creature was neat looking, but the sub-par CGI kinda ruined it. And really, why are the characters not freaking out more? 

Honestly, now I just want to find a good Kaiju movie to wash out the bad taste from this one.

Occult D&D and NIGHT SHIFT/Thirteen Parsecs

Again, this is good NIGHT SHIFT and Thirteen Parsecs crossover. 

The tech is from 13P, and the setup is pure NIGHT SHIFT. It is a haunted house, except the house is the ocean floor and the ghost is a 100 foot tall abomination from beyond the stars.

Replace the ocean with space and you have my Black Star game.

October Horror Movie Challenge 2025
Viewed: 19
First Time Views: 17

Much like the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition, the Jonstown Compendium is a curated platform for user-made content, but for material set in Greg Stafford’s mythic universe of Glorantha. It enables creators to sell their own original content for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha, 13th Age Glorantha, and HeroQuest Glorantha (Questworlds). This can include original scenarios, background material, cults, mythology, details of NPCs and monsters, and so on, but none of this content should be considered to be ‘canon’, but rather fall under ‘Your Glorantha Will Vary’. This means that there is still scope for the authors to create interesting and useful content that others can bring to their Glorantha-set campaigns.

—oOo—
What is it?Spiders Gorge: A Spooky Halloween describes a small location and encounter.

It is a full colour, two-page, 284.03 KB PDF.

The layout is clean and tidy, though a little tight in places, and it is decently illustrated.

Where is it set?Spiders Gorge: A Spooky Halloween is set in Prax, slightly off the beaten track and far away from any settlement.
Who do you play?
Spiders Gorge: A Spooky Halloween does not require any specific type of Player Character, but general outdoor skills will be useful. Combat skills and the ability to counter the effects of venom may be useful..
What do you need?
Spiders Gorge: A Spooky Halloween requires RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha.
What do you get?Spiders Gorge: A Spooky Halloween is a small location or encounter that a Game Master can drop into her campaign when her Player Characters are travelling through Prax. The travellers or expedition are short on water and are advised of a nearby gorge where water might be found, but told that a sacrifice is required before water can be drawn or potted. The location is literally a gorge and is spider-infested, and the Player Characters must get past them—including, delightfully, being able to dance past them—to get to the altar. Here the Player Characters will encounter a surprisingly chatty spider, whom they can negotiate with or fight and potentially even gain as an ally if they agree to help him.

Spiders Gorge: A Spooky Halloween is a straightforward, even simple scenario, one that can be played through in a single session, even less. The only thing missing is a suggestion as to what the Player Characters might actually sacrifice to a spider spirit if they do not have a ‘horn ornament’, and development of what the chatty spider wants and where he can find it.

The question of whether or not Spiders Gorge: A Spooky Halloween lives up to its subtitle, really depends on how the players and their characters feel about spiders. At best, it is slightly weird and slightly creepy.
Is it worth your time?Yes—Spiders Gorge: A Spooky Halloween is short, simple, and easy to prepare for a campaign set in or going through Prax.No—Spiders Gorge: A Spooky Halloween has spiders in it? @#$%&! no!Maybe—Spiders Gorge: A Spooky Halloween should be avoided if there is an arachnophobe playing, but could be adapted to elsewhere with very little effort.

Much like the Jonstown Compendium for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and The Companions of Arthur for material set in Greg Stafford’s masterpiece of Arthurian legend and romance, Pendragon, the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition is a curated platform for user-made content. It is thus, “...a new way for creators to publish and distribute their own original Call of Cthulhu content including scenarios, settings, spells and more…” To support the endeavours of their creators, Chaosium has provided templates and art packs, both free to use, so that the resulting releases can look and feel as professional as possible. To support the efforts of these contributors, Miskatonic Monday is an occasional series of reviews which will in turn examine an item drawn from the depths of the Miskatonic Repository.

—oOo—
Name: A Thread Through StonePublisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: Sean Liddle

Setting: World War II PlymouthProduct: Outline
What You Get: Eighteen page, 1.47 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: Three Go Mad in Devon (Again)(Again)(Again)(Again)Plot Hook: Devon lies dreaming and the adults are awayPlot Support: Staging advice, one Mythos monster, and some folk songsProduction Values: Plain
Pros# Sequel to HUM, The Borrowed, and The Hollow Beneath Clapper Tor# Detailed outline# Potential for child-like curiosity and terror# Definitely part of a series rather than a one-shot# Potential for sequels# Speluncaphobia# Chronohodophobia# Oneirophobia
Cons# No pre-generated Investigators
# No advice on creating teenage Investigators# Definitely part of a series rather than a one-shot
# A fair bit of exposition# No explanation for the Keeper for what is going on
Conclusion# Detailed outline still leaves the Keeper with lots of work to do in what is an ‘in-between’ scenario# Ultimately feels like the plot of children’s novel that the players are roleplaying out

Moria looms deep and long in our imagination. When we think of dungeons, we always think of Khazad-dûm, the grandest Dwarven city in Middle-earth, built into the Misty Mountains by Durin the First, which rose to be an ancient, thriving kingdom of Durin’s Folk. Only to be undone by a greed for the greatest of metals—Mithril, that would breach the home or prison of a beast or spirit, a thing of such evil that it once served the Dark Lord, Morgoth. This was the Balrog and it rose, climbing from the depths up the shafts and along the tunnels, even down the road that the Dwarves had the length of the city, burning to ash all before it, including those stalwart defenders who stood to protect the city and what it stood for, even as others fled their home and the Misty Mountains, to become refugees across Middle-earth. From the beginnings of its foundations in the First Age to the day Durin’s Bane killed or drove all of the Dwarves from the city, and killed Durin the Sixth, Khazad-dûm had stood for seven thousand years. It only took two for the Balrog to undo that in the years of the Third Age. The Elves named it ‘Moria’ or ‘Black Pit’ and it has stood for another two thousand years since, its halls once lit by Dwarven artistry and craftsmanship, now dark and cold, stained by fire and Shadow, infested by Orcs and Goblins and worse. It is the year 2965 of the Third Age. It will be another twenty-five years before Dáin II, King Under the Mountain, gives permission for Balin to mount his ill-fated expedition into Moria and another fifty before Gandalf the Grey will lead the Fellowship of the Ring through ancient Dwarven halls, but interest in what still resides inside is growing, if ever really went away.

Moria – Through the Doors of Durin is a setting and campaign supplement for The One Ring: Roleplaying in the World of Lord of the Rings. Published by Free League Publishing. Funded via a successful Kickstarter campaign, it won the 2025 Gold Ennie Award for Best Cartography and 2025 Gold Ennie Award for Product of the Year. What it does is present a complete dungeon, but not in the traditional roleplaying sense of every corridor, every room, every trap, every threat, and every treasure being presented in detail. Instead, it presents Moria as a realm all of its very own, much like Rhovanion, the region East of the Misty Mountains or Eriador, the region to the West of the Misty Mountains. It has history—so much history, it has lore—so much lore, it has secrets—so many secrets, it has landmarks, it has monsters, it has factions, all of which the Player-heroes can explore, discover, confront, and plunder. If they dare. All of this has significant effect on why a Fellowship might come to want to enter Moria and how a Fellowship actually explores Moria, because above all, Moria – Through the Doors of Durin is unlike any other dungeon for any other roleplaying game.
Despite what Balin might have to say about it, Moria is not a place that can be reclaimed, since it is infested with Orcs and Goblins, poisoned by Shadow, and probably damaged beyond repair by current standards of Dwarven craftsmanship. After all, so much knowledge was lost when Khazad-dûm fell. Moria – Through the Doors of Durin suggests several Patrons—one of whom is Saruman, who at this time is very much known as Saruman the White, and several reasons as why the Player-heroes might want to enter Moria, whether for themselves, or more likely, their patrons. It notes that the more Dwarves there are in a Fellowship, the more likely it is that Fellowship will return to Moria and the more likely that its forays will be longer and deeper (whether that is up or down). The motives include searching for treasure, perhaps at the request of a patron; searching for mithril, Moria being only known source; rescuing those captured by the Orcs and held prisoner or forced to work in the mines; looking for lost lore—especially ring-lore; gathering information about the inside of Moria and its factions; and especially if one is a Dwarf, then vengeance. These are paired with Patrons, some as far away as Isengard to the south or Tharbad to the west, but others camped out nearby. They of course include several Dwarves, and their suggestions too as to which of the Patrons given in The One Ring: Roleplaying in the World of Lord of the Rings might also have an interest in Moria. In some cases, these do tie in with the new Patrons given here, whilst in the case of Gandalf, he would brand the Player-heroes as fools. Lastly, there is the possibility of the new Patrons becoming rivals and even enemies if the Player-heroes do not enter their employ and possibly sending rival expeditions into Moria that the Player-heroes might encounter or even have to rescue.
For the Loremaster, there are tables of rumours to spread and advice on the themes of a Moria-based campaign. They are divided between themes of wonder and sorrow and fear. The former includes the intricate grandeur of Moria and its epic scale, its hidden places and secrets, the piles of gold and jewels—if not held in hidden caches, then in Orc hoards, and perhaps the possibility of reclaiming the city. The latter includes the long and lonely dark, the toil and hunger of exploring Moria since any expedition will need to carry all of its light sources and all of its food, the triumph of the Enemy with the city firmly occupied by Orcs, Goblins, and more, the lack of a safe place, and horrors beyond record. What is notable here is that the lack of safety (though there is a place of refuge to be found, though doing so would take luck and be a mammoth undertaking in keeping with the rest of Moria), the constant need for the expedition to carry its own food and light, the long and lonely dark which can sometimes be so oppressive that it quenches light, and the horrors without record, all point to the genre that lurks in the distant, darkest places of Middle-earth, but here moves centre stage for all the time that the Player-heroes spend in Moria.
Mechanically, this is enforced by the number of locations and great items that a Player-hero can pick up and so acquire points of Shadow, whilst there is the constant chance that the activities of the Player-heroes will attract attention of The Eye—in the Moria, the equivalent of ‘Drums in the Deep’—and trigger potential events including Dire Portents, Orc Assault, Terrors in the Dark, and Ghâsh. The latter is the Orc word for fire, and when it occurs, it indicates some sort of encounter with Durin’s Bane! Lastly, Dwarves can suffer from Moria Madness in place of other Bouts of Madness whilst in and around Moria.
Where Moria – Through the Doors of Durin does surprise is in its treatment of its foes, not once but twice. For the most part it relies on the bestiary from The One Ring: Roleplaying in the World of Lord of the Rings core rulebook, so there are surprisingly few new entries added here. These include the three factions of Orcs—Orcs of Mordor, Orcs of Moria, and Orcs of Udûn that contest control of Moria, those wretched Dwarves who still slave in the mines for the Orcs and the Goblins, and then some quite foul monsters. The other surprise is not the inclusion of the Balrog, after all, a description had at least to be included, but the fact that its stats are included. For the most part, the Balrog will be a baleful presence, lurking somewhere in the depths of the mine, but sometimes stirring in response to intrusions and strange activities in the mine, triggered by Ghâsh.
Yet the inference of having the stats of the Balrog is that the Player-heroes can fight him—and the truth is, they can. Of course, this is likely to be fatal for them under ordinary circumstances, though not necessarily under extraordinary circumstances and extraordinary circumstances are only likely to be triggered in the only real ‘end game’ situation in Moria – Through the Doors of Durin. This end game allows the Player-heroes to be completely brave, foolhardy, and utterly heroic and do the impossible. And that is to defeat the Balrog. This is possible, not just because the stats for the Balrog are given, but also because there are legendary artefacts to found within the depths of Moria that would aid any warrior capable of fighting Durin’s Bane. Finding them would require an epic journey in its own right and in some cases, repairing them would require a feat of legendary craftsmanship. And then there is the fight. Whether the Fellowship survived or not, defeated the Balrog or not, it would be a campaign ending climax. And yet, if the Balrog nearly defeated Gandalf, why should the Player-heroes be allowed to do so? Well, Player-heroes are Player Characters and Player Characters like to do the unexpected. Plus, as pointed out in the description of the Balrog’s lair, Shelob, was a very powerful foe encountered in The Lord of the Rings, and she too was injured grievously by a simple gardener! Further, Durin’s Bane might not be a Balrog, but instead be the Witch-King of Angmar or a dragon or a betrayal. This would mean that the Player-characters could still win and still be legendary heroes, but leaves the Balrog to face Gandalf on Durin’s Bridge.
The heart of Moria and Moria – Through the Doors of Durin is mapped out across twenty-eight locations from Dimril Dale in the east to the mansions of Thrain I in the west, and from the Mountain Galleries atop the Halls of Khazad-dûm to The Balrog’s Throne in the Deeps. They are marked and the routes between them are broadly mapped out on a stunning map of the city and its outside environs that also includes a good cutaway away of the city that shows the depths between them. There is plenty of scope and room and tables for the Loremaster to develop her own sites, but the focus is upon the twenty-eight, each of which is given its own rumour, old lore, background, and descriptions of the particular places within that locale as details of any important NPCs and then their associated schemes and troubles. Plus, a delightfully drawn map of the location that depicts the grandeur and scale of Khazad-dûm and its despoilment over the millennia.
The locations include those inside Moria and out. The notable ones outside include Dimril Dale where there can be found the famous Dimril Stair that leads up to the pass over the mountain and the Mirrormere, the lake where the Dwarves come to look into the waters to seek wisdom, and then the Doors of Durin on the far side. Inside can be found the Second Hall and Durin’s Bridge, where in fifty years, Gandalf will face Durin’s bane, and the King’s Hall, where Durin the Sixth took his stand against the Balrog and in defeat laid a curse upon the hall. Throughout, the locations are populated by some fantastic NPCs—Orcs, Dwarves, Goblins, and more. They are all well drawn, none of them really trustworthy, but the Player-heroes can deal with and interact with them and that includes the evil, spiteful Orcs and Goblins. The more includes Mocker Crawe, a big crow who has learned the speech of men and Orcs and acts as a messenger over the mountains and beyond, but might befriend passing travellers or explorers coming to Moria before luring them into a trap. As his name suggests he constantly mocks others, but he is very partial to shiny things, and he is afraid of the Giant Eagles who have recently taken to flying over the mountains. Another interesting NPC is Har, a Dwarf far from the East in the service of Sauron, who leads the Orcs of Mordor and hopes to rule Moria in his master’s name.
The appendices to Moria – Through the Doors of Durin suggest further ways in which it can be explored and played through. It examines Balin’s expedition and how it was doomed to failure, and how that might be used as the basis for a campaign as well as looking at the search for Thráin II made by Gandalf and Aragon’s entry into Moria. The latter includes the possibility that one of the reasons why the Player-heroes might want to enter Moria is to enter Aragon, the rewards for which would be a wealth of contacts and even Gandalf as a patron. There are details too on mithril and some sample magical treasures, as well as a new Culture, that of the Dwarves of Nogrod and Belegost, representing Dwarves of another House to that of Durin.
However, the longest appendix in Moria – Through the Doors of Durin is on ‘Solo Play in Moria’. This expands on The One Ring – Strider Mode to provide the means for the reader to join Balin’s quest and undertake various missions as part of his attempt to reclaim Moria. This will be as a Dwarf who will command a band of six allies. As part of Balin’s expedition, it should be no surprise that ultimately, the efforts of this Dwarf and his allies will fail. Instead, the solo option is intended to tell the story of that expedition before bringing it to a close with one last, heroic mission into Moria. The player is encouraged to record the outcome of these missions in his own version of the Book of Mazabul, Balin’s own record of his expedition, the inference being that a future expedition might find it and so have a better understanding of what they face in Moria. Overall, this adds another unexpected dimension to the supplement, but one that has plenty of potential for telling stories.
Physically, Moria – Through the Doors of Durin follows the look of The One Ring: Roleplaying in the World of Lord of the Rings with an almost parchment look upon which the pen and ink art sits stark, but still capturing the character of the many NPCs and the dark horrors below. The cartography is more art than maps, whether that is the individual locations or the map of the whole of Moria.
As a campaign, Moria – Through the Doors of Durin does not have a beginning, a middle, and an end, barring the almost impossible end game already mentioned. Much of its actual story will be told in the future and unless the Player-heroes work for multiple patrons and thus multiple reasons to enter Moria, it is unlikely that they will explore all of its heights and depths. As a campaign, it also stands alone from The One Ring: Roleplaying in the World of Lord of the Rings. Whilst it can be used for one-off expedition into its halls as part of an ongoing campaign, Moria – Through the Doors of Durin is more intended for long term play and dedicated expeditions in and out of its halls, with the Player-heroes focused on what they encounter and find there rather than what might be going on elsewhere.
Mapping Moria and making it playable was an almost impossible task, but there should be no doubt that in Moria – Through the Doors of Durin, Free League Publishing has not only succeeded in achieving that task, but exceeded it too. It draws heavily on the lore to develop and present a gloriously impressive overview of a complete realm of its own in Middle-earth and then gives the Loremaster all of the tools necessary to draw the Player-heroes into the dark of Moria. This includes plots and machinations of allies and foes inside and out, and once they are inside, landmarks to not only explore, but ultimately, survive. Above all, Moria – Through the Doors of Durin is not only a superbly reverent treatment of its source material, but a great toolkit of multiple plots, numerous secrets, and far too many horrors to help the Loremaster, her players, and their heroes experience the magnificence and malevolence of lost Khazad-dûm.

Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Player’s Guide introduced the Old World to roleplaying. The first of the two core books for the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game, it began the roleplaying adaptation from Cubicle 7 Entertainment of Warhammer: The Old World, the miniatures combat rules from Games Workshop. This is set in a period two centuries prior to the better-known roleplaying game set in the Old World, that is, the venerable Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, Fourth Edition. Its focus is less on the assaults and attacks by the forces of Chaos and on the Chaos within, and more on internal strife, whether political, between the Elector Counts, or religious, between the Sigmarites and Ulricans and others. The Old World as a setting has always drawn heavily from history, particularly the Early Modern period of Europe, but with Warhammer: The Old World and thus Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game, the inspiration is more heavily that of the Thirty Years War and its political and religious strife. It covered character creation, the core rules, combat, magic, and more, but as a very player-focused book, it left a great to explained. Primarily, what the Player Characters are going to be doing in the Old World and how that differs from the future of the venerable, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, Fourth Edition.

Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide is the counterpart to the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Player’s Guide. What Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide gives the Game Master is a toolkit with which to run a campaign, backing it up with Game Master specific rules and a bestiary of allies and antagonists, creatures and monsters, and more, that all together takes half of the book. It opens though with a description of the setting for Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game—and it is a very specific setting. This is the fortified, if ramshackle river port of Talagaad, perched between the Talabec River and the towering walls of the Taalbaston—the giant crater in which the nearby city of Talabheim sits, which stands on the Wizard’s Way, the road that crosses over the bridge known as the and up over the walls of the Taalbaston and is the only legal route into the crater. Control of Talagaad is important since it is a source of much wealth, whether from the taxes levied on the goods going to Talabheim and from lower prices paid for goods being smuggled into the city. Consequently, the town is rife with crime and corruption, petty and otherwise, whether committed by its ordinary citizenry, criminal underclass, or even its excise officers.

Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide expands upon the description of Talagaad given in the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Player’s Guide. This covers the port’s origins and current state, law and order, and descriptions of two notable districts—the docks and the Markebundt, where all the trade occurs. There are descriptions of various NPCs, but more importantly, the tensions and points of conflict within Talagaad. These are primarily political and criminal, but all to do with the wealth that flows through the port. Not just the corruption between the Talagaad Watch and the criminal underworld, but also between Magistrate Raggusera and the local nobles and merchants and between Magistrate Ragguser and Duke Ludwig XII, ruler of the Grand Duchy of Talabec, over what Magistrate Ragguser tells the duke when he is secretly in his employ. There are tensions too between the state army regiments in Talagaad. On the one hand there is the local Talagaad Longsights, which occasionally backs up the Watch and is partly trusted by the locals, and on the other, there is the Talabheim 11th, recently posted to the port by Duke Ludwig following the assassination of several nobles from the neighbouring Duchy of Osterlund, and not at all trusted.

Spread between the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Player’s Guide and the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide, the description of Talagaad is far from complete, but the Game Master should get a good feel for it from the details so far. This is helped by the numerous hooks and scenario ideas spread through the description, but what really helps are the Contacts. These are really only mentioned as part of the character creation process in the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Player’s Guide, but here they come into their own as fully rounded NPCs, complete with descriptions of who they are, what their motivations and needs are, what favours they might bestow, their allies and enemies, and what gossip and secret they know. They are each based on a different archetype—a lord, a conspirator, an old soldier, a vagabond, a heretic, and so on—and linked to several of the character types in the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Player’s Guide as well as the other Contacts. These are designed as a Game Master tool, a cast of characters that can link the Player Characters together (since there are only twenty and each Player Character has two contacts, there is bound to be some crossover), hook them into a story or plot, bring the world to life, tie the Player Characters to the setting, and more. Above all, they give Talagaad a personal touch and differing views of what the town is like and what is going on.

What is going on in Talagaad is explored through what Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game calls ‘Grim Portents’ and ‘Dark Threads’. Some of the latter may be connected to the former, and some of the Contacts are connected to both, but ‘Grim Portents’ are really events that initiate a plot and bring the Player Characters together—no matter what their background, confronting them with a situation that they cannot ignore and cannot deal with alone, whose consequences will endure long after the problem has been dealt with. Three examples are given, each with a detailed opening scene and then descriptions of what happens next as the plot thickens and its instigators move against the Player Characters, and then grim reminders of that opening scene that will haunt the Player Characters as the plot plays out. The three include an incendiary encounter with an Osterlund noble with a very, very dark family secret; suffering a curse from beyond the grave from a witch whose fiery execution the Player Characters witnessed; and the aftermath of escaping a fearsome band of Beastmen ritualists who captured the Player Characters and were about to sacrifice them. The three are backed with a good explanation of what a ‘Grim Portent’ is, what it is designed to do, and how to run it. This includes how to get the Player Characters involved—either at the start or later with a new Player Character, what to do if the Player Characters just decide to run away, and so on

‘Dark Threads’ are the network of links and bonds which together link and bind the various NPCs—including the Contacts detailed earlier, and factions in and about Talagaad. This includes not just the Grand Duchy of Talabec and Talagaad, but also the neighbouring Grand County of Osterlund and Principality of Reikland, the Red Eyez Tribe of Goblins, the Hexenguilde, a devious band of warlocks, The Sheltered Flame, a band of fanatical Sigmarites, and more. These are all mapped out on a diagram and then further detailed in the Contact descriptions and in entries in the bestiary that makes half of the book. Of course, the Contacts, ‘Grim Portents’, and ‘Dark Threads’ are designed around the default campaign for Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game, set in and around Talagaad, and if the Game Master wants to set her campaign elsewhere, she will need to adapt these or create her own.

In addition to the advice on handling the Contacts, the ‘Grim Portents’, and the ‘Dark Threads’ as a Game Master, the general advice in the Warhammer: Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide is also good. Whilst it makes clear that Warhammer: Old World Roleplaying Game could be run as a one-shot, it is designed to be run as campaign, and certainly, the Contacts, ‘Grim Portents’, and ‘Dark Threads’ are all designed to facilitate that. The advice compares the advantages and disadvantages of a sandbox versus a directed campaign, gives guidance on portraying memorable NPCs, help with Player Character creation—especially with tying the results into the Game Master’s campaign, designing adventures, how to create a mystery, and more. The advice on creating mysteries is a good list of ‘do’s and don’ts’ as is that for creating one-shots, and there is excellent advice on handling fights in the roleplaying game to make them challenging, but fun, and also on how to make the game more ‘Warhammer’. The advice on combat includes setting stakes to make the fight both interesting and worthwhile, allowing enemies to run away rather than just be lambs for the slaughter, and knowing when NPCs will decide that it is better to retreat rather than simply give up. The section on making the roleplaying game more ‘Warhammer’ gives fun little pointers, like the eerie green light of Morrslieb appearing from behind a cloud, bathing the street in its baleful glare or the sound of a trumpet heralding a troop of Knightly Order cavalry, trotting down the Wizard’s Road whilst mere commoners scatter to avoid them.

Just as with Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, Player Characters in the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game can suffer Corruption and fall into the swirling, betentacled arms of Chaos. Indeed, the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game all but pushes the Player Characters down this path to Damnation as they are drawn into events by a ‘Grim Portent’. When a Player Character is exposed to corruptive influence, whether that is fighting a battle against Beastmen or mutants, witnessing a Chaos ritual or minor daemon, reading a passage from the Liber Chaotica, or becoming possessed by a daemon, a Willpower test is required. Failure means suffering a condition such as being ‘Drained’ by an unnatural malaise or ‘Deafened’ by the sound of demonic laughter and also becoming Vulnerable. The Player Character has been touched by, but not yet embraced Chaos. At this point the Game Master presents the player and his character with a boon that will give the character an advantage in return for accepting a darker aspect of their character. If this is accepted, the Player Character no longer Vulnerable, but Tempted, and puts him on the Path to Corruption. There are five of these paths described. Four of these—‘Blood Must Flow’, ‘Secrets of Sorcery’, ‘Enduring the Unendurable’, and ‘Dark Obsession’—equate roughly to the four Ruinous Powers, whilst the fifth, ‘Child of the Forest’, takes the Tempted down to the route to transforming into a Beastman! Each path describes the benefits and downfalls gained, all ultimately leading to the Player Character becoming Damned and either lost to Chaos or a new and dangerous, but familiar NPC for Game Master.

There is guidance on gaming and roleplaying with a Player Character on of the five paths, but this most comes down to the other Player Characters not wanting to associate with such a Player Character for very long! Also discussed is the possibility of a Player Character finding his way back up a path, but this is a daunting challenge as you would expect. What is surprising is that throughout all of this, there is only the one die roll—the first Willpower test. After that, it is all down to the choices made by the player and his character. In other words, beyond that first Willpower test, it is about roleplaying and whether the character will give into temptation or not, and not about relying on or blaming the dice for the outcome. The player decides, not the dice, and that has great roleplaying potential.

The penultimate chapter describes some thirty or so magic items—weapons, armour, talismans, and arcane items, but no potions of any kind. Nor are there any rules for creating potions or healing draughts, or for crafting items. The entries are all neatly detailed and many illustrated, but it is noted that they should be difficult to get or find. Given that, their inclusion given the lack of potions and rules for crafting, whilst it is interesting to see what such magical items look like in Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game, they are so far out of the reach of the Player Characters that their inclusion seems out of place.

The last section in the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide, ‘Allies and Antagonists’, is the longest in the book. Although it does categorise its entries as Minion, Brutes, Champions and Monstrosities, this is no mere bestiary, since it is designed to do two things. One is to provide NPCs and threats for the Old World in general, allowing the Game Master to use them in her own scenarios and campaigns, whilst the other is to provide NPCs and threats for the default campaign and its set-up for the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game, much of it tied into the Contacts, the ‘Grim Portents’, and ‘Dark Threats’. So for Grand Duchy of Talabec, there is a description of the noble house of Feuerbach, it goals and methods, what it is like as an enemy, and what might be the cause of the feud with it, and then there are stats and details of citizens and subjects of Talabec—from peasantry and footpads to the nobility and state troops, knights, Ogres and Halflings, Imperial Dwarfs, and more. It then does the same for the Grand County of Osterlund and the Principality of Reikland, adding different groups and NPC types, so that a Priest of Ulric and Knight of the White Wolf are described under the Grand County of Osterlund, whilst the Sigmarite Cultist and Witch Hunter are described under the Principality of Reikland. This does mean that entries are not organised alphabetically how a bestiary might arrange it, but rather done thematically.

There are other sections of ‘Witches and Warlocks’, ‘Pets and Mounts’—the latter including the Giant Spiders that Goblins might ride in the woods, but also enemy groups which are effectively organisations and so presented treated in the same format as those for Grand Duchy of Talabec, Grand County of Osterlund, and Principality of Reikland. Thus, for the Beastmen there is the ‘The Slaughtered Stag Warherd’; for the Orcs and Goblins, the ‘The Red Eyez Tribe’, and for the undead, the ‘Dominion of Dusk’. There are some really nasty creatures here, especially amongst the ‘Dominion of Dusk’ and the ‘Monsters of the Great Forest’ which in the case of the latter mean that the Player Characters are really not going to want to go down the woods with each other, let alone. All of the entries in the ‘Allies and Antagonists’ section have very clear and simple stats accompanied by a lot of useful information about how they might be used in a scenario or how the Player Characters might run into them. What is missing from the options available, are any real Chaos creatures beloved of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay and the Old World, although some of the ‘The Slaughtered Stag Warherd’ do count. This is intentional, since the threat of Chaos is not a big part of the setting, which instead focuses on internal conflicts and tensions. Overall, this really is not just a good bestiary, but a further source of background material and advice on use the contents of that bestiary.

And yet, for all that is presented in the pages of both Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Player’s Guide and the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide, there is something missing, and that is an adventure. An adventure that comes complete with a plot and a beginning, a middle, and an exciting end. In other words, we do not quite know what a Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game scenario looks like. There is no denying that the Contacts, ‘Grim Portents’, and ‘Dark Threads’, combined with the contents of the bestiary, are all really good. Yet they only lay the groundwork for the campaign to come, whether that is the one published by Cubicle 7 Entertainment or the one developed by the Game Master. To be clear, an experienced Games Master will be able to take what the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide provides and develop that into the start of a campaign, but a less experienced Game Master is likely to have some difficulty without more of a helping hand.

Another issue with the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide is the way it is organised. The ‘Grim Portents’ are followed by the Contacts, followed by the advice for the Game Master which after a few pages covers the ‘Grim Portents’ and the ‘Dark Threads’. Then there is a table of ‘Events in Talagaad’ placed oddly at the end of the section on advice for the Game Master, when ideally that should have been placed earlier in the book with the description of Talagaad. Given that this book is for the Game Master, the advice and the subject of that advice could have been better placed, ideally following on from each other rather than sperate. Everything is there, but simply not in the right place to use as easily as it should have been.

Physically, the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide is very well presented. The artwork is excellent, and the book is easy to read. However, it could have been better organised in places, and it does need an edit here and there.

If you want to play Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game, then the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide is absolute must. It provides a setting, it provides the beginnings of stories, and it provides friends and enemies as well as solid advice for the Game Master. However, it does not provide a ready starting point for Game Master and that limits its utility to Game Masters who are less experienced, and it very much focuses on Talagaad as a setting, which limits its utility to the Game Master who wants to set her Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game elsewhere. That said, where it shines is in the tools provided to make Talagaad and the beginnings of the campaign come alive—the Contacts, the ‘Grim Portents’, the ‘Dark Threads’, and numerous entries in the lengthy ‘Allies and Antagonists’ section. The Game Master will need to do some development work in terms of actual adventures and even a campaign to bring all its great content into play, but the Warhammer: The Old World Roleplaying Game Gamemaster’s Guide gives the Game Master all that she needs to work with to make a start.

Quick-starts are a means of trying out a roleplaying game before you buy. Each should provide a Game Master with sufficient background to introduce and explain the setting to her players, the rules to run the scenario included, and a set of ready-to-play, pre-generated characters that the players can pick up and understand almost as soon as they have sat down to play. The scenario itself should provide an introduction to the setting for the players as well as to the type of adventures that their characters will have and just an idea of some of the things their characters will be doing on said adventures. All of which should be packaged up in an easy-to-understand booklet whose contents, with a minimum of preparation upon the part of the Game Master, can be brought to the table and run for her gaming group in a single evening’s session—or perhaps two. And at the end of it, Game Master and players alike should ideally know whether they want to play the game again, perhaps purchasing another adventure or even the full rules for the roleplaying game.

Alternatively, if the Game Master already has the full rules for the roleplaying game the quick-start is for, then what it provides is a sample scenario that she still run as an introduction or even as part of her campaign for the roleplaying game. The ideal quick-start should entice and intrigue a playing group, but above all effectively introduce and teach the roleplaying game, as well as showcase both rules and setting.

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What is it?
Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart is the quick-start for Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork, the roleplaying game based on the satirical fantasy works of Sir Terry Pratchett published by Modiphius Entertainment and focusing on the great city of Ankh-Morpork, set in a particular Now somewhere around the events of the novels, Going Postal and Thud!.

It is a forty-eight page, 12.99 MB full black and white PDF.

It is decently written and the artwork is excellent. It does need an edit in places.

How long will it take to play?
Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart is designed to be played through in a single session, two at the very most.
What else do you need to play?
The Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart needs a standard set of polyhedral dice, including percentile dice, per player. Except that is, the die between the seventh- and nineth-sided dice. This known as as the ‘Narrativium Die’ and is rolled by the Game Master.

It also requires some puns.

Who do you play?
The Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart includes six pre-generated Player Characters, all of whom are members of Ankh-Morpork’s City Watch. They consist of a veteran Zombie who very close to retirement; an Igorina recruit good with a needle; a surprisingly charismatic Troll; a Dwarf Crimescene Iconographer; a gifted beggar who surprised her parents by joining the Watch; and a very observant Gargoyle.
How is a Player Character defined?A Player Character in the Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart has a number of Traits that define who and what he is and what what he can do. They include the character’s name, the group he belongs to, species and background, his experiences and where he fits into his group, his core—his outlook on life and how he reacts to the world, quirks, and description. He may gain other Traits, primarily consequences for failing Tests. He also has several points of Luck. All six come with a good description as well as the other Traits and an excellent illustration.
How do the mechanics work?
Mechanically, Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork uses an opposed dice roll system. A player decides what he wants his character to do, selects a Trait, and explains how said Trait is appropriate for the Test. The player is encouraged to define how appropriate a Trait from one situation to the next, even that twists the meaning of the words. The Game Master will assign an Outcome Die that the player will roll. If the justification is perfect or suitability appropriate for what the Player Character can do, this is a twelve-sided die, but if the rationale is dodgy or shaky, or the Player Character has no idea what he is doing, it is a four-sided die. The Game Master may also assign the six-sided die or the ten-sided die depending upon the quality of the reasoning. In addition, the Game Master decides on the consequences of failure.
The roll of the Outcome Die is compared with the ‘Narrativium Die’. If the result on the Outcome Die is higher, the Player Character succeeds, but if the result on the ‘Narrativium Die’ is higher, he fails and the Game Master can narrate the result, which can be a new Trait, representing unforeseen consequences or twists.
If the test was a failure, another Player Character can attempt to help. This costs a point of Luck and the player will decide on the appropriate Trait and the Game Master assign it an Outcome Die. The roll is made against the result of the ‘Narrativium Die’ already rolled. If the result of the new Outcome Die is higher, then the Player Characters succeed, but if it is a tie or lower, the consequences affect both Player Characters and and are worse.

Luck can also be spent to reduce the effects of consequences.
On extremely rare occasions, a Game Master can decide that a plan devised by the players is so outlandishly absurd or ridiculously clever or astoundingly unlikely, that, “it’s a million to one chance, but it just might work.” In which case, it actually does.
How does combat work?
There are no specific combat mechanics in the Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart. Instead, Tests are rolled as normal with the ‘Narrativium Die’ standing in for the opposition and the outcome narrated.
How does magic work?
If you are not prepared to put your time in and complete your studies at Unseen University, there really is no hope of you actually finding out...
What do you play?
The scenario in the Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart is ‘Up in Smoke’. As member of the Watch, the Player Characters are assigned—by Sir Samual Vimes, no less—to investigate a burglary at Lady Ramkin’s Sunshine Sanctuary for Sick Dragons. The investigation will take the Player Characters back and forth across the Misbegot Bridge over the River Ankh and the scenario is actually organised geographically, with the various sites of investigation laid out either side of the bridge. Every location includes a description, details of what happened there previously and any NPCs, as well as a list of clues and possible consequences should things go wrong. This is slightly odd if a bit clever, as it also places the finale in the middle of the investigation! The finale is very written as an action scene with a chase, a dilemma, and plenty of complications and consequences.
Is there anything missing?
No. The Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart has everything the Game Master and her players will need to play, including advice on tone, safety tools, and a good example of play. There is also a Reference Sheet on the last page.
Is it easy to prepare?
Yes. The Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart is very easy to prepare.
Is it worth it?
Yes. There a lot to like about the Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart. It is simple and straightforward, the rules are very easy to grasp and allow for a lot of player input and Trait twisting in light, narrative fashion. ‘Up in Smoke’ is a solid scenario and the pre-generated Player Characters are all nicely, nicely done. The Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart really is one of the easiest of quick-starts to run and play.
The Discworld: Adventures in Ankh-Morpork Quickstart. is published by Modiphius Entertainment and is available to download here.

Only scholars and adventurers care about the past. One for the knowledge they can gather and the other for the treasure they can find. The civilisation of the ancient Azinir people, lying in the Great Desert south of The Known Lands fell a thousand years ago after thousands of sacrifices were made in both blood and labour to build a great temple for their king. It was dedicated to his demonic patron Atum-Isfet, Lord of Entropy and patron of un-death and upon its completion, the King of the Azinir people sealed himself, his concubines, and his attendants inside the temple-pyramid, taking with him some claim, the royal treasury. The King of the Azinir was never seen again and the kingdom collapsed, the king’s disappearance passed into legend, and then even that was all but forgotten. Except recently, a nomad stumbled into the city of Dumatat, half mad after surviving a terrible journey across the desert, and told stories of how he had survived in shadow of a great structure, but had not dared enter the dark and foreboding entrance high up on its surface. As these spread, the people of Dumatat suddenly recalled the legends of the King of the Azinir and wondered if the nomad had found the mad king’s final resting place. So too did the flood of treasure hunters and adventurers which flooded into the city, hoping to find the temple and plunder the by now famed lost treasury of the recently remembered kingdom.
This is the set-up for The Great Pyramid of Atum-Isfet published by Death Guaranteed Games. It is designed for use with the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game from Goodman Games and is a ‘Character Funnel’. This is a feature of Dungeon Crawl Classics, a scenario specifically designed for Zero Level Player Characters in which initially, a player is expected to roll up three or four Zero Level characters and have them play through a nasty, deadly adventure, which surviving will prove a challenge. Those that do survive receive enough Experience Points to advance to First Level and gain all of the advantages of their Class. The Great Pyramid of Atum-Isfet requires between sixteen and twenty-four Zero Level Player Characters, so between four and six players. In terms of the set-up for The Great Pyramid of Atum-Isfet, what this means is that the Player Characters are not the adventurers and treasure hunters come to plunder the kingdom of Azinir’s treasury—though unusually for a ‘Character Funnel’, there is potential scope for them to do so within the scenario itself. They are instead the members of the poor and the down at heel of the Dumatat, lucky enough to be employed by these adventurers and treasure hunters as servants and hirelings, muleskinners and hunters, and so on, all for the princely sum of ten gold apiece.

Unfortunately for their employers and potentially, fortunately for the Player Characters, events do not turn out quite how they expect. The Player Characters are ordered to stay outside in the base camp whilst their employers climb to the entrance to the pyramid high on its side. This lasts only so long when the camp is attacked by an enormous Roc and the only cover is that entrance, now lit by torches. Inside, the Player Characters make a grisly discovery, a corpse freshly stripped down to the bone lying on the floor, its boots recognisable as belonging to one of the six treasure hunters that employed them! What the players and their characters find inside the pyramid is a classic Ancient Egyptian tomb whose design designed by both classic pulp horror and pulp action. There are swarms of flesh-eating scarab beetles, there are vengeful spirits, there are traps, and more. The scenario is influenced by both The Mummy and Raiders of the Lost Ark and every encounter is nasty and deadly, not just for Zero Level Player Characters, but also First Level Player Characters—as the NPCs employing the Player Characters discover. As with any Character Funnel, the Player Characters will need to rely on their wits and their luck and whatever they find in order to survive The Great Pyramid of Atum-Isfet. There is a distinct possibility of a TPK, or ‘Total Party Kill’, especially if the Player Characters are too inquisitive.

However, the seven detailed locations of the Great Pyramid of Atum-Isfet make up only the second part of The Great Pyramid of Atum-Isfet. This middle section of the scenario can be begun with the Player Characters at the base camp and run in a single session, perhaps as a one-shot or a convention scenario. To run as a longer scenario, the Judge can use the first and third sections of The Great Pyramid of Atum-Isfet. The first takes the expedition from the city of Dumatat to the site to the pyramid, mostly physical in nature, crossing rivers and climbing mountain passes, but also a chance to gain the benefit of a fortune being told. The third section continues the scenario and takes the Player Characters further below the pyramid. It is recommended that the Player Characters have a chance to rise to First Level and so have all the benefits of a Class. This third part of the scenario feels more random in nature and less thematic than the second part, so not as coherent.

To support the scenario, The Great Pyramid of Atum-Isfet includes details of Atum-Isfet as a Patron and write-ups of three spells—Entropic Hand, Swarm Walker (which enables the caster to transform into a swarm of scarabs at the moment of being attacked to avoid injury), and Dire Supplication. Should a Player Character end up worshipping Atum-Isfet as a Cleric, these spells are a lot of fun to use and are even better if he can find the intelligent dagger, the ceremonial blade of Atum-Isfet! Lastly, there are a couple of handouts which should give the players and their characters a clue or two that might aid their survival. Oddly, none of the NPCs use these spells, which is a pity.

Physically, The Great Pyramid of Atum-Isfet is decently presented. It is decently written, whilst the maps and artwork are serviceable, and of course, not quite as polished as the scenarios from Goodman Games. The handouts are good though.
The Great Pyramid of Atum-Isfet is an entertaining and suitably nasty and challenging Zero Level Character Funnel for the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game. For the Judge wanting an Egyptian-themed, pulp-horror-fantasy scenario that is surprisingly flexible in its set-up, The Great Pyramid of Atum-Isfet is a decent choice.

Galgenbeck is the last refuge of humanity and the last refuge of all in the land of Tveland. As the seas rise, the crops fail, wars continue without reason, the dead walk, plague runs rampant, the burden of taxes weighs heavier on all, and the peasantry seek help and succour within the walls of the city. Perhaps from the Shadow King, King Sigfúm, perhaps from the church of the Two-Headed Basilisks, its cathedral in Galgenbeck dedicated to the god Nechrubel and headed by the arch-priestess Josilfa. Both king and priestess heed the prophecies of the Two-Headed Basilisks that the herald the end of the world and are slowly becoming true. What happens though if the city itself is cursed, or worse, infested? What will authorities do to prevent the spread of the infestation beyond its walls? How will those trapped inside cope with increasingly limited supplies of food and water survive? Will law and order hold, or will the city descend into mob rule? When arch-priestess Josilfa declares Galgenbeck to be infested with the Mind Parasites, the city is closed and ringed by the implacable soldiery of the king’s Shadow Guard, and the city’s thousands of inhabitants, rich and poor, are trapped within its walls—the Player Characters amongst them. How will the Player Characters survive Three Weeks In The Streets?

Three Weeks In The Streets describes itself as a city-prison scenario for use with 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. Published following a successful Kickstarter campaign,it even comes with its own official playlist to provide a soundtrack and begins with an encounter or two on the way to the city. It kicks off with the official announment made by the town crier, that the mind parasite is spreading and the arch-priestess has ordered the city closed. What do the Player Characters do? Do they try to fight or sneak their own way past the king’s Shadow Guard, the chance of being successful being very doubtful? They must try to find ready supplies of food and water, and every day the mob grows—and may even absorb the Player Characters—fuelled by truths and rumours that spread as surely and as quickly as the mind parasites. They are likely to encounter some of the worst and the best of Galgenbeck’s citizenry, those not wealthy enough to lock themselves up in their fortified and guarded mansions. One day after another takes on a regular pattern, of dread as yet another day dawns, of doom as night falls. As the rumours swirl and food and water supplies dwindle, the inhabitants of the city grow desperate and the tension rises, the collective stress and anxiety threatens to explode into mass hysteria. And then…
Only the first week of Three Weeks In The Streets is meant to be played out in this fashion and then it is meant to jump two weeks to the conclusion of the quarantine. By this time, the Player Characters, as well as everyone else in the city, is starving and dehydrated, but it is now that the arch-priestess Josilfa decides to step out of the Cathedral of the Twin Basilisks and deliver her judgement upon the people of Galgenbeck. It is as monstrous as you would expect.
The process is handled through an array of tables that explain survival and foraging, the waxing and waning of the mob and its mentality—gloriously depicted above a depiction of a mob a la Les Misérables, rumours and truths, events by day and by night, cover ‘Red-Eyed Rowdiness’ and ‘Drunken Debauchery’, and more. The events by day—the ‘Daily Dread’—may be as simple as the Church distributing food (with a chance of violence) or as horrible as citizens being dragged by their hair, screaming, to the town circle for execution, whilst those for the night—the ‘Daily Doom’—might see the mob breaking into the city stores for food or younglings being sold for food or labour, and a malaise sets over the city. ‘Mass Hysteria’, when it breaks out, is worse and ranges from the town burning for five days to the mob scouring entire city for personal items that it is sure is infested with the Mind Parasites.
The advice for the process is explained at the end of the scenario. This notes the fact that NPCs are likely to fall victim to group-think and that there are various factions that the Player Characters can take advantage of or ally with. The mob is described as a looming threat, one that the Player Characters can only avoid for so long. Similarly, there is advice too on what to do if the Player Characters simply decide to hunker down and try to wait it out with the supplies they have. Also detailed are various NPCs and creatures that threaten the city under lockdown, including the Shadow King’s Guard and Clerics of Josilfa Migol, plus the Galbeckian Pale Ones that do not understand why they might be blamed for the Mind Parasite infestation, Nerhrubel’s Rats that steal items (including those of the Player Characters), Wolves that specifically gather to prey on the weak, and more. Above it all are the bells of the cathedral, rung daily by Josilfa Migol, as she curses the city!

Three Weeks In The Streets is a toolkit that turns all of Galgenbeck into a prison in which the guards are as much inmates as the Player Characters and the rest of the city’s inhabitants. It has an incredible sense of uncertain, but still escalating calamity and probable rather than potential doom as the mob swirls in and out of the rumours and truths that ripple back and forth. It requires an experienced Game Master since it is not quite as tightly procedural as it could have been. That said, because it is not as as tightly procedural as it could have been, there is room for the Game Master to add her own content. Some of the scenarios or content which could be used in conjunction with Three Weeks In The Streets includes The God of Many Faces mini-hexcrawl and the various NPCs from Strange Citizens of the City, which could be woven in and around the events already outlined.

Physically, Three Weeks In The Streets apes the Artpunk style of Mörk Borg, but without overwhelming the look or legibility. The choice of artwork is appropriate and the result is that Three Weeks In The Streets is a decent looking scenario.
Three Weeks In The Streets is executed in a slightly chaotic fashion, so it is not quite as easy to run from the page as it could be. Nevertheless, Three Weeks In The Streets is a genuinely original and clever idea for Mörk Borg, giving the Game Master everything necessary to run a city-wide prison riot and have the Player Characters try to survive starvation, paranoia, and mass hysteria!

 

Much like the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition and the Jonstown Compendium for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha, The Companions of Arthur is a curated platform for user-made content, but for material set in Greg Stafford’s masterpiece of Arthurian legend and romance, Pendragon. It enables creators to sell their own original content for use with Pendragon, Sixth Edition. This can be original scenarios, background material, alternate Arthurian settings, and more, but none of this content should be considered to be ‘canon’, but rather fall under ‘Your Pendragon Will Vary’. This means that there is still scope for the authors to create interesting and useful content that others can bring to their Pendragon campaigns.

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What is the Nature of the Quest?The Unlikely Hero is a short encounter for use with Pendragon, Sixth Edition.

It is a full colour, eight page, 5.68 MB PDF.

The layout is tidy, though it does need an edit.
Where is the Quest Set?The Unlikely Hero is a scenario for Pendragon, Sixth Edition. It can be set in any year and is easily added to any root with a relatively isolated bridge over a river near a forest.
Who should go on this Quest?
Any type Player-knight can go on this quest. It could be run with just a single Player-knight. The encounter will test each Player-knight’s Trusting and Suspicious Traits. Any dog-living Player-knight will also be tested and potentially rewarded. The Chirurgery skill will be useful, or if not, a seasoned squire will do.
What does the Quest require?
The Unlikely Hero requires the Pendragon, Sixth Edition Core Rulebook and the Pendragon: Gamemaster’s Handbook.

Where will the Quest take the Knights?
In The Unlikely Hero, the Player-knights come across a strange situation. A damsel blocks their way across a bridge. Her clothes are ragged and dirty, she holds her hands to her face, and she is weeping. Yet there is no sign of where she came from, nor any horse or carriage, and no indications as to how she ended up in this situation.
The encounter hinges how trusting the Player-knights are, although the arrival of a large mastiff dog may further arouse their suspicions or it set them on an entirely new direction, depending on how their players roll. The encounter will quickly come to head either way and the truth of the situation revealed. The situation is very simple, and really what the Game Master has to do is to play up the distress of the damsel until either the suspicions of the Player-knights have been allayed or proven. At which point, the Player-knights will have the opportunity to gain a little glory and extend some chivalrous courtesy.

Some players may find it annoying and even frustrating that the damsel is less than forthcoming in her answers, but this perfectly in keeping with the situation. It might also have been useful if there had been a romance and marriage option explored for after the scenario. 
Should the Knights ride out on this Quest?The Unlikely Hero is a serviceable encounter that pushes the Trusting and Suspicious Traits of the Player-knights just a little too hard. That said, it is short and easily added as an encounter along the road in any campaign. It can played through in a single session, very likely much less.

Much like the Jonstown Compendium for RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha and The Companions of Arthur for material set in Greg Stafford’s masterpiece of Arthurian legend and romance, Pendragon, the Miskatonic Repository for Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition is a curated platform for user-made content. It is thus, “...a new way for creators to publish and distribute their own original Call of Cthulhu content including scenarios, settings, spells and more…” To support the endeavours of their creators, Chaosium has provided templates and art packs, both free to use, so that the resulting releases can look and feel as professional as possible. To support the efforts of these contributors, Miskatonic Monday is an occasional series of reviews which will in turn examine an item drawn from the depths of the Miskatonic Repository.

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Name: The Son of NyxPublisher: Chaosium, Inc.
Author: NekoMimi

Setting: Kuiper Belt, 2098Product: Scenario
What You Get: Eighteen page, 3.62 MB Full Colour PDF
Elevator Pitch: A ‘nightmare’ of crisis management at the end of the worlds…Plot Hook: “Reality is merely an interpretation of our senses.” – Neil deGrasse TysonPlot Support: Staging advice, five pre-generated Investigators, and some Mythos aliensProduction Values: Plain
Pros# One hour Science Fiction horror one-shot
# Inspired by the ‘Flash Cthulhu’ series# Originally a submission for the Japanese ‘Call of Cthulhu TRPG Scenario Contest 2024’# Thematic prequel to Flash Cthulhu – Christmas on Charon
# Derealisation Disorder# Oneirophobia# Depersonalization-Derealisation Disorder
Cons# Keeper may need to adjust to make sure the Investigators are divided to play out all of the scenario# Needs an edit

Conclusion# A clash of realities at the end of the worlds# An escape room-style horror scenario

 Bendhover front page today...

GLUMMY REBELLION IN MULTIPLE OPPRESSORBADIAN CANTONS

OUTLAWS BURN GOVERNMENT BANK.

STREET BATTLES IN STYROFOAMYBAD

3 LEGIONS OF NATIONAL TROOPS ORDERED TO SUPPRESS UPRISINGS; MANY TROOPS DISLOYAL.

A Secret Society known as the “Glummys” has risen in rebellion against the Dictatorship of Chairman Glumjaw. Antember 5th they risked open battle with National Soldiers, led by Majorette Margy Margoffsya near Gloomdrul. The Glummys loss was over 20 killed, perhaps 40 wounded. On the following day 13 unlucky bodies were counted unclaimed and unburied on the field. National losses are said to be small, the Glummys claim magical protection and went into battle armed entirely with common farming implements. Though dispersed, in the Glumdrul area, they are reassembling and preparing for further fighting.

Telegrams from the Gnarnool Station state the the “Glummies” are gathering there in force threatening the lives of loyal government families and visiting foreigners. The homes of tens of Polyestrine, Gueratian, and Guapmolotlic merchants have been looted and loyal servants were hanged by mobs carrying banners proclaiming “Magical Power” and “Follow the Witches, Fight the Dictator!” The countryside south and east of Garnool and north of Styrofoamybad is greatly disturbed.

Street battles in Styrofoamybad continue with military patrols having been attacked with several dead and injured, the Government Bank was robbed, and burned to the ground by a violent mob on Fryday. The Government of Chairman Grimjaw has summoned 3 legions of National Troops to the Capitol, though treason from railway workers has impeded the progress of the various columns.

The situation in Oppressorbad is being watched closely by Polyesterdelphia, Guerat, and Mantz. Guerat has rattled it’s saber, moving two divisions to Moopighaven and Beaume, determined to keep the Guntish Secret Societies from crossing the border. Mantz has been less overtly militant, but has offered police forces to Oppressorbad to curb border crossings by the bandits. Gross Montaigne, with it’s plastic mines that feed the Balsabad Industrial region is economically dependent on Oppressorbad and has expressed frustration with the Glumjaw government’s inability to keep the trains running.

Twosday saw a small mixed force of Glummy bandits descend from the mountains near Baddog in the direction of Grimshore only to be caught between National Troops from Laducat and a wandering patrol of the Fabuouth Armee in a fire fight on the Vinalville-Laducat road. Mr. Earlow our corespondent is currently looking into this affair and we will deliver more on it presently.

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