SIGNALIS (feat. LSTR Unit Class for Mothership)

 ACHTUNG------ACHTUNG

Signalis is a survival horror game in the style of classic Resident Evil and Silent Hill where you play as 90s anime cyborg lady descending into a mining facility gone to hell on a faraway planet and it's the sort of game where, if you like Mothership - or survival horror at all - and have 20 bucks to spare, go buy it immediately. It's on literally everything. Play it, then come back to this post when you're done. Steam's telling me it took 9.7 hours to beat on normal difficulty.

That's it, that's the pitch. This is a recommendation without reservation. The only negative thing I can say about this game is the restrictive inventory, but the devs have said they're looking for a solution and even without a change it is a survivable frustration greatly outweighed by everything else.

The post will wait. Play it.

(Steam page. Trailer. As requested by Claytonian down below)

If you are really impatient or only care about the Mothership component but still care about spoilers, ctrl+F "equipment". This is your only warning.

***

Right then, done? What a fucking ride. I have thoughts.

In a lot of modern Lovecraftiana, the King in Yellow / Carcosa is used as a sort of infectious idea that carries with it a sort of ontological breakdown. The Delta Green Handler's Guide uses the phrase "slurry of thought and quantum possibility" and while I have my problems with DG (and people over-explaining their spooky shit in general), I must admit that this is a fucking strong concept.

Signalis is the only game I've seen where the constant, unsubtle references to other works are part of the thematic core. Fragments and memories, ideas and symbols, suspended in a slurry of thought and quantum possibility. It could have just stopped with picking up a copy of The King in Yellow, plenty of lesser games would have. But the title sequence that follows, whirling together East German numbers stations, obscure Lovecraft quotes (no one's read "The Festival", come on), flashes of Die Toteninsel, Chopin's Raindrop Prelude - perfect encapsulation of what you're getting yourself into.

And it just keeps going. So much from Resident Evil. "Some parts of this game may be considered violent or cruel." Silent Hill's blinding red save screens and much more besides. The carpet from the Shining. The Major tearing off her arm. Gestalts and Replicants from Nier. The fucking 'THIS IS NOT A PLACE OF HONOR' warning.

It just keeps on going.

And if that's not fucking enough, it's not just the references and details of it all - Elster's mind is decaying from being copied over and over again. All the Replikas' minds are. Memories from different people are blurring together, cycles of actions are repeating, dreams leaking out and mingling.

A slurry of thought and quantum possibility.

Something might live beneath the ice.

There are visions of a coastline and of still, black water.

***

I recently ran a game of Mothership, where the players found a pair of misshapen, naked humanoids standing ankle-deep in a stream. They didn't do anything besides stand there and point out towards the western horizon. One of the players, a longtime friend, said "Dan this is such a fucking you thing" as soon as I was done describing it, and she was absolutely correct. My favorite horror is that of the indelible, inexplicable image. Can't stand jumpscares and gore, tension can often be too much, but imagery, pump that directly into my veins. The uncanny, the anomalous, the unsettling, the unheimlich, the inexplicable, the fundamentally wrong. If doesn't have to do anything but exist, if the image is good enough.

***

You'll notice, in the medical files, that most of the people have some sort of permanent lung damage or long-term infection.

***

I do have some story analysis, of course, cobbled together into a rough timeline.

1) A soldier from the Vinetan (Earth) war is used as the basis for the LSTR line of Replika units. (This event is likely some years in the past)

2) Ariane Yeong is born on Leng (Pluto), moves to Rotfront (Ganymede or Europa), lives with her mother in a radio station for a time, attends Mandelbrot Polytechnic, works part-time in a photo store owned by the Itou family. After graduation, she applies to join the Penrose Program - the documentation states that if she is rejected, she will be assigned to the S-23 Sierpinski mining station on Leng.

3) A Penrose vessel is launched from Jovian orbit via mass driver with Ariane Yeong and LSTR-512 on board, aimed at the Oort Cloud with the intention of finding icy bodies that can be Klimaformed using bioresponant technology.

4) Roughly 14 years pass as the Penrose 512 mission heads towards the outer system. The mission is revealed to be a death sentence, and is subsequently stretched out long past its intended end by Ariane and LSTR-512. The ship begins to fall apart, Ariane's health fails, and is kept in cryo to prevent her from dying.

5) Penrose 512 crashes on an icy body and god damn it I cannot figure out where. My initial thought was that it crashed on Leng, but that's looking less and less likely the more I think about it. The sticking point is this line in the REPLIKA OVERVIEW: LSTR document.

New LSTR units have been produced based on a decommissioned unit from the Penrose Program.

And this is the sort of note that plants a link between LSTR-512 and Elster in our brains. But then how did the Nation recover LSTR-512? I have settled on two major options, which will have major ramifications down the line.

• Option A - Penrose 512 crashed on Leng. Potentially caused by either LSTR-512 or Ariane, or both, redirecting the ship to the nearest safe location. it would even be possibly to turn the ship around with Ariane's help - we know that bioresonance is used in artificial gravity it would be possible to generate a slingshot orbit around an artificial gravity well. The Nation physically recovers LSTR-512.
• Option B - Penrose 512 crashed on an unknown planet. Let's call it Carcosa. The Nation recovers LSTR-512's consciousness through Ariane's bioresonant projection. More on this later.
  

6) There is Something under the ice of Leng / Carcosa, and it, being what I presume is an enormous bioresonant flesh monstrosity, is stirred awake by the presence of the dying Ariane. With bioresonant fuckery in play, they might not even be in the same place. Even more confusing, there might be MULTIPLE flesh monstrosities, if the Moon bit of the tarot card puzzle is to be taken literally, as it describes an entity living in a subglacial ocean as one would expect to find on Europa or Ganymede...

Actually, multiple entities, or multiple nodes of the same entity, makes everything so, so much cleaner.

Regardless if Option A or Option B was picked last step, the Entity serves as a bioresonant amplifier for Ariane.

7) The opening of the game happens. LSTR-512 steps out onto Leng / Carcosa, finds the Gate and the Pit, and already starts tumbling into the Nowhere hellscape that has been formed by the dying Ariane projecting her thoughts and memories through the Entity.

DIVERGENCE POINT: It is entirely possible that the entirety of the game takes place within the Entity+Ariane's mindscape. I don't find this likely enough to subscribe to, but if Ariane was, say, born and spent early childhood inside Seirpinski station, it might bleed through into the Nowhere. But, as I prefer the train of thought where Seirpinski is real, I am mentioning this only for thoroughness.

8) Ariane dies in the real world, but continues to exist (constructed out of her own memories) via the Entity's projection. LSTR-512 reaches the end of her operational lifespan (possibly while plunging through Nowhere). (Ordering of deaths is important, and uncertain)

9) LSTR-512 is recovered, either physically or through Alina's Entity-amplified projection, and used as the base template for all future LSTRs.

10) TIME PASSES

11) Alina Seo arrives at Sierpinski.

12) Excavations at Sierpinski disturb the Entity (or an Entity), and it notices that Falke (a powerful bioresonant) is present. Entity starts projecting Nowhere as a defense mechanism against Falke. (Unconsciously, like an immune system response)

13) The entity's normal response carries the imprint of Ariane's dying mind on it. This shapes how Nowhere manifests (as the Entity itself is not conscious)

14) Shit becomes fucked at Sierpinski. Falke won't die, and so the Entity just keeps the projection up. Cycles begin. Nowhere starts bleeding over into the facility. Everything gets very Wibbly. Falke starts taking on memories and traits of LSTR-512. Alina Seo starts taking on traits of Ariana Yeong. Isa Itou is formed from Ariane's memories of Erika and Isolde Itou.

15) An LSTR unit (we'll call her Elster) - already suffering from mental degradation and carrying forward the memories of LSTR-512 - arrives at Sierpinski base, treating Alina Seo as a surrogate Ariana Yeong (as the old memories are corroded and repressed and are leaking through strangely, plus Entity influence and dream-bleed). It is possible that the Entity's influence has drawn her to Leng.

16) The events of the game keep playing out, over and over again. Elster dies again and again, trapped in the Entity's bioresonant immune system. (Also possible: multiple LSTR units have arrived at Seirpinski)

17) The cycle where we get an end happens. The end reflects, perhaps not entirely accurately, what happened to Ariane and LSTR-512, as an expression of Elster trying to reach some sort of catharsis between her memories, and the remaining imprint of Ariane on the Entity's bioresonant field. With Falke dead, and imprint-Ariane dealt with, this might (in at least one ending, perhaps) end the Nowhere incursion into Seirpinski base.

Memory Ending - Imprint-Ariane is so degraded by time and the Entity that she does not remember Elster. Elster dies.

Promise Ending - Imprint-Ariane remembers Elster. Elster fulfills the promise and kills Imprint-Ariane. Elster dies.

Leave Ending - Elster is unable to fulfill the promise, returns to the surface of Leng, and dies. Throwing a wrench in the works, we see a crashed spaceship...but it's not a Penrose one. Possibly the one LSTR arrived in. 

Artifact Ending - Elster takes some potted lilies to a location in Nowhere, and dies. Five other Elsters have already arrived and died. There is a cube. Possibly frees Ariane from the Entity? Not a fuckin' clue.

***

If you thought I was going to get through this post without making MoSh-compatible material, you got another thing coming.

LSTR UNIT REPLIKA (ALTERNATE ANDROID)

LANDVERMESSUNGS / SCHIFF-TECHNIKER REPLIKA
Land Survey / Ship Technician Replika 'Magpie'
Generation 5 Kosmo-Pioneer Specialist
Biomechanical with carbon fiber-reinforced polyethylene shell and titanium skeleton
178 cm

A versatile combat engineer unit.

STATS: +15 COM +1 WOUND
SAVES: +60 FEAR +10 BOD
SKILLS: Industrial Equipment, Mechanical Repair, Computers, Firearms
TRAUMA RESPONSE:

• Allies make FEAR saves at [-]
• You may turn a failed roll into a success by spending SAN at a 1:1 ratio
• You gain INSTABILITY (see below)

STARTING EQUIPMENT: Revolver (3d10), shoulder-mounted flashlight, shortwave radio module, cyberbrain (computer link, file storage, text log), cybernetic diagnostic scanner module, eidetic record module (6 slots, 1 minute each), AP 5 armored carapace (+2 AP if wearing armored vest overtop).

STARTING TRINKET: Damaged photograph of [FIELD INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK]

INSTABILITY: Operates similarly to THE BENDS in Gradient Descent. You begin play with 5 INSTABILITY, and gain it as follows:

• 1d5 points for failing a SAN roll  
• 1d5 points for encountering any triggering stimuli regarding [THE WAR], including: film footage, visual or auditory propaganda, photographs, music, interactions with veterans, and open conversation.
• 1d5 points for encountering a bioresonant enemy

You may decrease INSTABILITY by 1d5 by spending a full day in a stabilization chamber (standard issue on all ships with a LSTR unit on crew)

INSTABILITY rolls can be triggered by:

• Encountering a bioresonant enemy
• Critically failing a SAN save
• Waking from a period of unconsciousness
• Losing a Wound

INSTABILITY TABLE

• 00-09 - [SCREEN INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK] - Gain 1 Stress when seeing triggering stimuli (see above)
• 10-14 - MEMORY BLEED - Experiences not your own overpower your awareness. Gain 1d10 INSTABILITY.
• 15-20 - SAFE ROOM - This place is safe. You will refuse to leave it for 24 hours.
• 21-24 - WAKE UP - You are dreaming, you are dreaming inside a dream. Gain 1 INSTABILITY every round you do not pass a SAN save for 1d10 rounds.
• 25-29 - DREAMS OF THE BLACK SHORE - Your waking hours are filled with visions of cold, grey sand and still black water. Gain 1d10 INSTABILITY.
• 30-34 - WE HAVE DONE THIS BEFORE - Rooms with encounters now have a 50% chance of containing your own corpse. Others do not seem to notice.
• 35-39 - ACHTUNG, ACHTUNG - Codes over the radio. Voices from beyond. Keep your radio tuned and listen carefully...
• 40-44 - DETERMINATOR - You endure brutal injury without flinching, without slowing down. Allies gain 1 Stress / round from watching you in combat.
• 45-49 - FATAL ERROR - Bluescreen. Reboot. Restart. Reload. Lose 1d5 SAN.
• 50-99 - REMEMBER OUR PROMISE - You know what you must do. You know where to find her.

***

There is a perfectly smooth pit in the ground. Metal slats, unconnected, spiral down to the bottom. There is a crawlspace at the bottom - just enough to drag yourself through on your belly. You cannot turn around, you cannot move to the side, you can only go forward. there is a room at the end. There is a desk, with a computer console and an old radio. There is a cot with thin sheets, and a safe bound in chains. Three padlocks. Faded propaganda posters of the Nation on the walls. A red door. The crawlspace is missing. There was a hole here - it's gone now. On the desk there is an ancient book, black cover with a gold figure. Crown and sword. You pick up the book, and the katakana title is THE KING IN YELLOW. The radio crackles to life. Three notes ascending. Three notes ascending. A woman's voice. Achtung...achtung...

4 More Mothership Backgrounds, Plus Inventories

 A sequel to this post.

Rogue Paracoita

Cyborgs built for the pleasure of others. Common among the entourages of the corporate, political and religious elite. Common aboard ships whose owners are unwilling to pay the fees for a union sex-worker. The arrangements are entirely legal, you see, right down in the fine print. In ones and twos they escape - by guile, violence, outside aid or circumstance - seeking their freedom on the Rim or in more just corners of the cosmos.

1. Forged visa / ID papers
2. Cyberbrain spoofer
3. Receipt (Facial reconstruction surgery)
4. Multitool w/ bottle opener
5. Loyola-5 'hand cannon'
6. Takoyaki skewer
7. Self-maintenance kit
8. Anti-rejection medication
9. Jacket (Military surplus; winter camo)
10. Yokai of the High Frontier trading cards
11. Chemical hand-warmers
12. Faraday messenger bag
13. Glow larvae (Hair decoration)

Great House Footman

Soldiering is the same wherever you go. Moments of terror interrupting long stretches of nothing. Pomp and circumstance and standing at attention. The uniform changes, the marching songs change, but the soldiers stay the same. The Great Houses, for all their airs of nobility, can't escape this.

1. Dress beret (Hidden pocket)
2. Friend-or-Foe ID implant
3. Boarding cutlass
4. Long coat (Blue, stab-resistant)
5. Torso scarring (Laser burn)
6. Disinfectant foam spray
7. Butterfly hairpin
8. Energy-drink shots (Mango)
9. One-time cipher pad
10. Tattoo gun
11. Emergency tightbeam transmitter
12. Distillery flask (illicit)
13. Baliset

Android Proxy

The aliens were native to the shorelines of hydrocarbon seas on a frigid methane world. They were old, cold, and terribly, impossibly patient; possessing of such a brutal R-selection strategy that the gentlest among them would still be counted a sociopath among humans. Still, they were close enough. Formal relations went ahead carefully. A limited exchange program was authorized. Somewhere in the ship, in a pressurized chamber so cold that oxygen is as stone, the alien tele-operates an android body.

1. Science officer badge
2. Hand-tooled brass buttons
3. Packet of unanswered correspondence
4. Lapis lazuli lip stud (x2)
5. Novelty jester hat (Gift)
6. Interactive cultural exchange presentation
7. Tablet computer
8. Book: The Annotated Brothers Karamazov
9. Monitor and translation module
10. Mahjong set
11. Silk smartsuit
12. Kigarumi crochet (In-progress)
13. Wall art, hand-painted (Xenographical)

Longshoresren

The shipyard unions are ancient organizations, heavy with the weight of history, tradition, and superstition (nearly so much so as their spacer cousins). The sprawling clans of laborers are one of the pillars gears of interstellar civilization; without the longshoresren, there would be no one to load and unload the ships, no one to repair them, no one to manage and direct traffic as it comes in and out of port. They are a lynchpin, and have weaponized it in the past. Their strikes can cripple the economies of entire planets and bring corpocrats to their knees, as they find that the futures they were trading will never arrive in time to make good. Walk with your head held high - for the spirit of the working ren shall not die so long as you persist.

1. Union member token (Bristrova Clan)
2. Universal systems diagnostic tool
3. Spool of optical cable
4. Sleeve tattoo (Irk Batig)
5. Religious amulet (Small gods)
6. Tool box (Heavily stickered)
7. Magboots
8. Subdermal heat protection (Hands & forearms)
9. Polarized welder's mask
10. Plasma torch (Cutter/welder)
11. Coveralls
12. Thermos of soup (Vegetable)
13. Pet gremlin (Smart lemur)

5e Build: Hitting Things With Excessive Force By Means of My Fist

I'm doing this now so that I will never have to do it again, and maybe so that I can play in a real-life game I don't also run. Modifications that I have made, and other notes, will be in italics.

AYO, MONK OF THE GUTTER

Custom Lineage (Cambion, but huge)

• +2 CON
• Feat: Magic Initiate
• True Strike - [+] on first attack made against targeted enemy. (Cantrip)
• Blade Ward - 1/2 damage taken (piercing, bludgeoning, slashing), 1 turn duration (Cantrip)
• Burning Hands - 3d6 fire damage, DEX save for half. 15' cone (1st, once per long rest)
• Skill Proficiency: Athletics
• Language: Abyssal
  

 

Background: Party Animal (Rakdos Cultist)

• Skill Proficiency: Acrobatics, Performance
• Tool Proficiency: Instrument (Vocals)
• Language: Giant
• Fearsome Reputation (The description here is "you can get away with minor crimes because people are terrified of you")
  

• Alignment: Red/black (chaotic neutral)
• Theme song: Damn It
• Motivation: To eat, drink, and fight to death, and then spend eternity fighting demons in hell. Maybe topple a couple archdukes. Plan is open to change.
  
• Morality: Violence against those who cannot defend themselves is despicable. Violence against those who commit violence against those who cannot defend themselves is rad.
  
• Bonds: Mentor (Another cambion from back in the Shades), the Sex Workers' Union (you are a valued customer), sibling (by the same demon), an exorcist for the church.
  
• Flaw: There are some major lingering insecurities underneath all that bluster and muscle.
  

Equipment

• Street clothing
• Pipe and tobacco tin
• Fists d8 / 10 bludgeoning, versatile (Instead of going two handed, d10 damage is a stance, which comes with a -2 AC)
• Kanabo 
  
• Straw hat (doubles as begging bowl)
  

 

Class: The Mountain

Dissatisfied with the way multiclassing prerequisites get in the way of actually playing what you want, I have instead made an executive decision that you may piece together whatever classes desired, but so long as features are gained at their appropriate level, and that you cannot gain more features in a level than one of your parent classes would allow. For things like Rages and Ki Points, I have ruled that you can only increase the features of one class per level up, if there is an increase available. In practice this means the gain is slightly slower, but not as hobbled as a normal multiclass character.

• HD: d12
• Armor Proficiencies: None
• Weapon Proficiencies: Simple, improvised, unarmed (I am allowing unarmed combat to act as equivalent to any standard weapon)
• Saves: STR, CON
• Tools: None
• Skill Proficiencies: Intimidation, Survival
  

Standard Stat Array at level 1 (including lineage bonus)

• STR 16 (+3)
• DEX 13 (+1)
• CON 16 (+3)
• INT 8 (-1)
• WIS 10 (+0)
• CHA 12 (+1)

Level 1 (2 Rages, +2 Rage damage)

• Rage - [+] STR checks and saves. Bonus damage
• Unarmored Defense - Unarmored AC = 10 + DEX mod + CON mod
  

Level 2 (2 Rages, 2 Ki Points +2 Rage damage, d4 Flurry damage)

• Ki. Save bonus is 8 + Proficiency + STR bonus (Hit harder, not wiser)
• Flurry of Blows - 1 KP - After attack, make two additional unarmed attacks (d4 damage)
• Patient Defense - 1 KP - Dodge as a bonus action.
• Step of the Wind - 1 KP - Dash or Disengage as bonus action. Jump distance doubled.
  

Level 3 (2 Rages 3 KP +2 Rage damage, d4 Flurry damage)

• Open Hand Technique - When you hit an enemy with Flurry of Blows, choose one of the following:
• DEX save or knocked prone
• STR save or pushed 15 feet away
• Can't take reactions until end of your next turn.
  

Level 4 (3 Rages 3 KP +2 Rage damage, d4 Flurry damage)

• Ability score increase

Level 5 (3 Rages 4 KP +2 Rage damage, d4 Flurry damage)

• Extra Attack
• Fast movement - Speed increases to 40' when not wearing heavy armor (Which you can't wear anyway)
  

Level 6 (3 Rages 5 KP +2 Rage damage, d4 Flurry damage)

• "Wholeness of Body" - As action, gain 3x lvl HP. Once per long rest. (Local woman too drunk to die)

Level 7 (3 Rages 6 KP +2 Rage damage, d6 Flurry damage)

• "Evasion" - Passing a CON save vs an AOE attack nullifies all damage, instead of 1/2 (Air quotes because this is tanking a direct hit. Save switched to CON to keep in line with concept)

Level 8 (3 Rages 6 KP +3 Rage damage, d6 Flurry damage)

• Ability score increase

Level 9 (3 Rages 7 KP +3 Rage damage, d6 Flurry damage)

• Brutal Critical - Roll an additional weapon damage die on a critical hit.

Level 10 (4 Rages 8 KP +3 Rage damage, d6 Flurry damage)

• "Purity of Body" - You are immune to disease and poison. (The alcohol hasn't killed you yet, a bit of venom won't start)

 

This out to be sufficient, I think. I suspect from a purist's standpoint there are balance issues but I'm already playing a character who has exactly 0 qualms about kidney punches and breaking kneecaps.

7 New Backgrounds for Mothership, Plus Inventories

Anthony Weatherson

I still don't like having to come up with skill packages and stat bonuses for MoSh classes, so I didn't include them. I'll update my classless chargen when I have my hands on 1e.

Codepriest

Intermediary between the world of flesh and metal with the innumerable ainima that live in the digital ether. Mendicants beholden to no corporate authority or protocol, only the great Open Source that upholds all things.

1. Insulated schema robes, black with gold circuitry. (1 Armor)
2. Personal deck and tablet (hand-built, open-source programs in accordance with the Stack)
3. Fresh pack of incense sticks
4. Arc-crosier (produces a modulated EMP)
5. Lacquered alms-bowl + bamboo flute
6. Ainima quick-reference identification chart
7. Choral sheet music (Turingsmass hymns)
8. Box lunch (bento)
9. Tengai basket (includes vocoder and internal HUD)
10. "Hard exit" portable drive (one-time computer-kill)
11. "Sign of peace" handshake protocol module
12. Book: Yokai of the High Frontier
13. Energy drink 6-pack (Pineapple-durian flavor)

Nun with a Gun

The flesh is bound only through the presence of a soul in unity with the great design of the cosmos. Should the binding slip, the soul prove unfit, then the flesh shall deteriorate, return to its primordial inchoate mass and gnash with slavering maws at the roots of the universe. Where your sisters do their part praying in the cloister or ministering to the vulnerable, you have a large gun and shoot flesh monsters with it. 

1. Powered armor + everyday habit
2. Missal, annotated with study notes.
3. Anointing oil, vial
4. Flamethrower (sanctioned and licensed)
5. Light machine gun (Seraph XII model)
6. Pyx containing nodule of [DEFILED FLESH] (Can detect presence of the Demiurge)
7. Ecstatic Communion Module
8. Cord rosary (handmade, a gift from mentor-sister)
9. Liquid food packet (spicy gumbo)
10. Comfortable, weatherproof cloak (Icon of the 14 Watchers)
11. Mark of the atum (forehead)
12. Handheld video game console (second hand)
13. Letter of introduction, signed by the Mother Superior (forged)

Translator-Avatar

Productive interaction with a truly alien mind is impossible without assistance. The Overminds knew this, and reached out to humanity using proxies made in our image, and humanity followed suit by making their own. Through this narrow corridor of interspecies telephone, the wants and desires of the powers that be can be can be shared. Violence, averted.

1. Fancy suit (formal occasions only)
2. Stress toy (squishy space shuttle)
3. Corp-issued tablet (contains WIP drafts of white paper and fantasy novel)
4. Granted neural link compatible with local Overmind.
5. Custom morph (Proxy)
6. Dietary supplements
7. Care package from home.
8. Decorative woven shawl (gift from Overmind-side proxies)
9. Board game: Eld Lords of Zetakrom Prime
10. Catalog for the colony commissary.
11. Pet plant (alien, carnivorous, affectionate)
12. NDA (enforceable through violence)
13. Contact info for a "good friend"

Rimworlder

The boom-bust cycle of Rim colonization has given rise to a class of mercenary survivalist: wandering guns-for-hire that make their living on the margins between syndicates, corporations, and the struggling independent polities. Tendency towards esoteric religion.

1. Duster jacket, colorful headscarf, shady hat, protective goggles
2. Tattoos marking family affiliation
3. Unidentifiable grilled meat, onna stick
4. Grip-gloves (black)
5. Long rifle (bolt action, wooden stock with kill notches)
6. Heavy revolver (military surplus with aftermarket mods)
7. Desalination canteen
8. Portable solar charger
9. Good-favor token (Panan Shō syndicate)
10. Booklet found at the train station (We Need Pax Klanq)
11. Packet of contraband, wrapped in butcher paper (banned literature and an ampule of angeldown)
12. Compact mechanist's toolkit
13. DIY mini-spiderbot

Corporate Inquisitor

Account books audited. Contractor performance reviewed. Contracts notarized. Quality maintained. Hierarchy upheld. Irregularities dealt with. Subversive elements eliminated. Obstacles liquidated. The Board's in their Heaven, all is right with the worlds.

1. Menacing robes and hat (black and red)
2. Pistol (collapsible, auto-disposal module)
3. Scary reflective Alucard-ass glasses
4. Signet ring (Full authorization under both Office of New Religious Movements and Alliance Trade Investigations Bureau)
5. Cyberbrain-cracker (single-use)
6. Encrypted tablet with direct line to regional headquarters
7. Local copy of debt and thoughtcrime registry
8. Blackmail material against multiple disruptive NRM leaders
9. Sphinx Salt injector (clear and protect against mental influence, greatly increase observational awareness)
10. Android command codes, memorized (for standard CTA operating systems)
11. Eidetic recording suite (half hour of sight and sound playback)
12. Takeout container of red curry and rice
13. Sliver of alien nanotech in diamondoid case, recovered on-site

Carvergirl

There's a feral child in the maintenance crawlspace. Stowed away when you stopped for maintenance on some shithole rim world. Calls herself a "biggabad killa", keeps threatening to "shanka guts" and "droppa kill choppa deelucks on tha". Steals food from the mess, makes a horrible racket like a cornered cat when anyone tries to get her out of the vents. Really just a scared, traumatized kid.

1. Patchy jumpsuit (orange)
2. Barcode tattoo (forehead and back of right hand)
3. Knife (shard of scrap metal)
4. Knife (bone)
5. Plush unicorn, limp-necked and dirty
6. Hide satchel
7. Unidentifiable jerky (3 small servings)
8. Plastic water bottle on a string
9. Assorted flowers, feathers, small bones, bits of string, pebbles
10. 1/2 pack of matches, handful of cigarettes
11. Rag bandana, red paisley.
12. Molotov cocktail.

Alien Footsoldier

One of the anonymous underclass that carries the alien war machine on their shoulders. Handed a gun and armor valued more than their life and thrown at the enemy without preparation or training. Stripped of all rights, culture, dignity and hope - and yet they endure. The song-paths are still sung. The glacial bureaucracy has its eyes focused elsewhere. Who is to miss the lowest of the low when they don't return from the battlefield? They were never expected to anyway.

1. Armor harness + breathing apparatus
2. Plasma sidearm (75% charge)
3. Two plasma grenades (likely duds)
4. Dextro-amino pemmican cakes
5. Picture-book: The Great Benefits of Adherence to Our Unswerving Caste System and the Unity It Provides Us
6. Restraint collar (broken, forcibly removed)
7. Grease-pencil sketch of creche mates
8. Biochem adaptation injections
9. Oral history (Southern Great Green Lake Region)
10. Humanitarian aid blanket
11. Resident alien documentation
12. Six-stone-game set, makeshift

Cult of Lu (for Esoteric Enterprises)

 

Dandibuja

Mystic Cult: Lu

HE-ZU-AM

Three cuneiform symbols have been lovingly inked on a piece of cardstock, flanked by sprigs of lilac. On the altar below there is a somewhat-lumpy pottery bowl, glazed a deep brown and filled with a cardboard campfire of orange, red, and gold. Simple clay animals - dogs and horses and one lopsided elephant - orbit around a little ball-upon-cone figure of a person.

Domains - Humanity, family, parenthood, trickery, cleverness, women, mothers, protection (of children, of homes, of the downtrodden), sex, marriage, fertility & sexual health, passion (in general) overcoming obstacles, hospitality, daemonomachy, righteous fury, righteous thieves, fools,  mercy, justice, wisdom (eventually).

Symbols - Hamsa, handprint or hand stencil, the sign of the horns (pictured), the fire-maker's mudra (pictured), the crown of fire (pictured), pictorial depictions (varies by culture and depicted aspect)

Taboos - Abuse (in all forms, but specifically that of children, elders, spouses), incest, kinslaying, cruelty towards animals, inaction in the face of evil, adherence to law above common humanity, withholding mercy, undermining justice, deliberate failure to uphold the compact with the Folk, consorting with demons.

Epithets

• The Clever - She was clever first and always, let no gentle manner fool you. She is sharp.
  
• Mother of Multitudes - All peoples are kin, for all peoples come from her.
  
• Broad-Shouldered One - She has endured, unbreaking.
  
• Thief of Fire - Seeking, always seeking, stumbling forward, ever onward.
  
• Demon-Waker - They would have slept forever in the hearts of the Ancestors, till the Crown lit the kindling and the fire cast all we hate of ourselves as shadows of the soul.
• Mother of Grief - Her first child was born still, and drew no breath. 
  
• The Terror Striding Forth - Invoked only in the greatest desperation, when the barriers have failed and demons pour forth across the doorstep, when need is not for wisdom but for wrath.
  

Spell List

A mystic of Lu will start with two spells at random from this list.

1. Mending - as per Esoteric Enterprises
2. Cure Wounds - as per Esoteric Enterprises
3. Comprehend Languages - as per Esoteric Enterprises
4. Turn Away Malicious Ones - as per Turn Away Undead, but may also be applied to demons and malicious Folk.
   

And will gain the following cult spells as they level up.

1. Create Fire - as per Esoteric Enterprises
   
2. Call DOG - Summons an enormous spectral hound (stats as Black Dog). They are the best and goodest boy. No Flesh points - will dissipate after loss of all HP. Lasts 10 min / caster level.
   
3. War Form - +1 athletics, +2 to perception, +2 to attack rolls, 1d6 unarmed damage.
   
4. Breath of Fire - 15' cone, 1d6 dmg / caster lvl, save vs hazards for half.
   
5. True Sight - as per Esoteric Enterprises
   
6. Legend Lore - as per Esoteric Enterprises
7. Earthquake - as per Esoteric Enterprises
   
8. Crown of Fire - Can be cast only once. Can be cast only in circumstances where you are faced with your greatest enemy. As War Form, with all bonuses tripled. You take no penalties from Horrible Wounds and may resist 1 lethal blow. If you take lethal damage, make a Save vs Hazards when the effect of this spell ends - if passed, you survive, though you now will take all penalties for accrued Horrible Wounds and are now Bleeding Out. This spell lasts until the target is incapacitated or killed, or the caster suffers a second lethal wound.
   

Followers of Lu may speak with the Folk and certain animals (elephants, corvids and parrots, dolphins and whales, great apes, dogs) with ease.

The Cult in the World

The cult of Lu is mostly found on the surface, with only a few mostly or permanently residing in the Underworld. Followers have a strong tendency toward allying with human and ecological rights movements, often militantly. Cultists will usually be able to provide their allies some measure of sanctuary (of varying levels of security) and some means of safe(r) passage between safehouses.

The cult of Lu is on best terms with those of Coyote, Judas Thaddeus, Santa Muerte, and Ursus. It is enemies with those of Abraxus, Mammon, Sol Invictus, and The Void. Both apply to the cult of Lilith. 

Class: Sword Devil

Lochiel

I found our sword-demon a short distance from camp, sitting atop a low stone wall from which he could watch the entire valley. The ruins below were by then cloaked in shadow, save the remaining belltower.

"What do you make of it?" I asked him.

"I've seen two war-wights in the last hour, or the same war-wight twice. They're getting antsy."

That itself wasn't surprising news: Linus and Berenike had estimated the same when they did their scouting run during the safety of daylight.

"Do you think it will be a problem?"

"Not if I get to 'em first." His head swiveled like an owl's, bright teeth gleaming. "If it's just the one, or two on their own, no trouble for you lot. But, could be that there are more of them down there, or a graveraiser leading them. Then it'll be plenty of trouble." Swivel back to watching the valley, gold eyes aglow in the dying sunlight. "For you, of course. If they get to you first. I don't think they will."

He left the "because I will have already killed them" unspoken, treating it as a given. Such was the way of a sword-devil. I gave him my assent and left him to his business - he had told me enough.

As I walked the path back to camp, I caught traces of singing from behind me, accompanied by the steady punctuating rasp of a whetstone.

"Awé dékapitoré, tu joyeu dé bastardé Mor."

Class: Sword-Devil

Third of the nine ranks of devils, and the most common to be seen outside of a diabloarium. Their domain is violence by means of sharp edges, and their home is the Flensing Tower.

Sword-devils are driven above all by their desire to master the blade-arts, compete against their kin, and usurp their father-mother Azazel, megaduke of bladed instruments. This makes them remarkably straightforward among devils, as they have long understood that humans are good at inventing opportunities for violence without any effort on the devil's part. For this reason they are commonly found in the company of soldiers, cutters, and venators.

Their skin is typically grey or blue, and their eyes white or gold. They tend towards glee in their work, and either sleepy indolence or jittery impatience when there is no violence to be found. They do not hate. They will fight anything, but adore fighting particularly skilled or novel opponents. Better yet, other sword-devils.

**

Bound By Rules - During character creation, the players should decide which one of them is the bearer of the contract. This character can be the original summoner, or might simply be the person who the contract was passed to. Contract scrolls might be found as treasure out in the world (an excellent way to introduce a replacement character mid-session).

Live By The Sword - Sword-devils cannot die. Not properly, at least. Should they lose all their HP, they will dissipate into a roiling cloud of oily smoke. They may be resurrected from any corpse human-sized or larger (erupting from it in a most impressively gory display) through a magic user casting their contract scroll, using either spell dice or a spell slot of level = the sword-devil's hit die.

No Shield Shall Stop Me - Your attacks against non-supernatural entities ignore AC bonuses granted by armor. Armor will reduce damage by 1 (light), 2 (medium) or 4 (heavy) instead.

Blade-Arts

The blade-arts work like magic dice - you get a d6 for each level up to 4. You may roll any number of these during your attacks, choosing effects from the below list in any combination. Dice devoted to one effect cannot be used for another. Dice that come up 4+ are removed from the pool until after a long rest.

Backfoot Style - A sword-devil's base AC is 10. They will gain +2 for each unburnt blade-die they currently have at their disposal.

• Gain +[DICE] to hit
• Deal +[Sum] damage
• Teleport within [SUM] x 5 feet (line of sight) to make an attack as bonus action
  
• Gain a specific damage type (auto burn die)
• Gain an additional attack (auto burn die)
  

Class: Sword that Cuts Heaven

I'll stop basing things on Auntie Maya when I am DEAD

Class: Sword That Cuts Heaven

I have no idea if this class even works. Who even knows. What's a class. I'm just going to ignore HP and Saves this is absurd enough entirely on its own. High level fighter, can't increase HP by leveling up or something. Whatever. Fuck levels.

Once a Generation

Only one player per campaign can be a Sword that Cuts Heaven. If the character dies, another one cannot be taken (though if a player leaves, the character may of course be adopted by another player).

Vow of A Quiet Life

You have sworn yourself to a life of peace (and usually isolation). You may draw your weapon to kill only under very specific circumstances. Note that this is not what must be fulfilled in order to enter combat, only what must be fulfilled to kill someone. Make it limited and specific. Ex:

• You have named enemies of great power.
• There is an individual you are sworn to protect above all others. 

In both cases you still need to try an alternative first before delivering killing blows, whether by words or nonlethal combat.

A Crude Tool to Create Ghosts 

You deal damage in HD. This is not a mistype. Your damage die remains the same for whatever weapon you choose, it just jumps right over hit points. Morale rolls will be made.

Farewell to Arms

Successful attack rolls made against antagonists who have not triggered your Vow do no damage, but will instead disarm them of their weapons. This can also be used to strike projectiles out of the air.

There is Another

The Sword That Cuts Heaven has no shortage of enemies, but this one stands above the rest. They are your equal, and wish to see you dead.

The tracker begins at 1-in-100. It will increase by 1 for every time the StCH is seen in combat, (whether or not anyone is killed), by 5 if they kill an enemy in combat, and by 1 each in-game day after the initial combat.

1d100 is rolled each game day. If it is is ever under the tracker, the Enemy knows of your location and will be upon you in 1d10 in-game days (or next session, whichever is more relevant / fun)

The Enemy is another Sword That Cuts Heaven, with the same mechanics.

 

Class: The Wudu-Wasa (5th Public Conversion Project)

(Diregrizzlybear suggested OSRfying 5e subclasses over on their blog. Lacking drive for any other posts, this is precisely what the chirugeon ordered.)

BigMSaxon

Class: Wudu-Wasa

 

HD: d10 

Saves: as Cleric

Starting Equipment: Staff, sturdy clothing (as gambeson), medicine bag, oral tradition

You are one of the forest folk, specifically one of those tasked with maintaining your people's relationships with the outside world. You wander between deep country villages both as doctor and shaman - setting bones, stitching wounds and delivering babies, but also dealing with troublesome spirits, tending to the shrines, and making sure that the great and delicate order of things is upheld. 

Class Abilities

 

The Big Picture: You have a deep knowledge of the environmental cycles and systems of your homeland, and can identify any living things within it. 

Medicine Bag: You have at any given time (and know where to look for more), herbs for alertness, for sleep, for pain reduction, for disinfecting wounds, and for birth control. See Fungi of the Far Realms for other things you can add to your bag while tramping through the woods.

You may also use the contents of your bag to perform Cure Light Wounds, but will need to dedicate time to replenish your supplies after each usage.

Broad of Shoulder - You have item slots equal to twice your Constitution.

 

Wood-Arts - You have an innate sensitivity to dedicated ground, the presence of spirits, enchantments, and the aftereffects of worked magic cast since the last sunrise or nightfall.

 

To Go Unseen - You make make yourself  not invisible but easily overlooked in when in a forested area, tall grass, and with some effort a city or crowd. This ability does not make you invisible or prevent detection, but it will make typical passersby look past and ignore you. The effect will be broken with speech or sudden movements (attacking, running).

 

Green Speech - You can be understood by animals and plants, though they cannot make themselves understood to you. 

Spirit-Work - You can perform the summonings (calling forth) exorcisms (driving out), propitiations (appeasing), and channellings (inviting in) of spirits, according to the table below (stolen from Donn Stroud's The Lesser Key to the Celestial Legion)

When attempting to perform any of these works, roll 1d20 + your current level. (No rolls are needed for a propitiation if you have the correct offering - you only need to roll if you are trying something else.)

 

Any given spirit has (as per Arnold K) a sensory premonition, a manifestation, and a unique propitiation.

• Ghost - The lingering spirit of a dead being.
  
• Minor / Typical (DC 13), Major (DC 15)
  
• Nature Spirit - Spirit of and bound to a place, ranging from geographic features to individual trees, stones, streams.
  
•  Minor (DC 13) Typical (DC 15), Major (DC 17)
  
• Demon - A chaotic unbound spirit.
• Minor (DC 15), Typical (17) Major (18)
  
• Herald - A spirit directed by the authority of a divinity
• All (18)
  

Using 1 unit of holy water or incense will give +1/+2/+3 to the roll, depending on quality. Knowing the spirit's true name grants an additional +3

Troika Background: Radical Anarchist Catgirl

 

DinerforWolves

Many apologies to everyone, especially David Prokopetz, whose game I am shamelessly ripping off. 

Lexi beat me to my own post, but I am okay with that. I was playing Outer Wilds at the time. Plus, I like this better as a Troika background.

Unlike most other Troika backgrounds, this one is put together in pieces, and you assign point values to the skills as you go (I am presuming a default of 9-10 skill points)

Background: Radical Anarchist Catgirl

You are a catgirl. You are also a radical anarchist. The world's gone right to shit. You have taken things into your own hands. L'Internationale is on your lips. The way is lit, the path is clear. It's ride or die time.

Why do you have cat ears? Precisely what anarchist band do you belong to? Who gives a shit, there's work to be done.

(Important to note that catgirls may be of any gender, of course: catlad and catenby are perfectly valid descriptors for those who choose them)

Starting Possessions 

• Go bag (burner phone, painkillers, caffeine pills, disinfectant, water purification tablets, flashlight, emergency flare, pepper spray, cash, baggie of recreational drugs of your choosing, revolutionary pamphlets, handcuffs, etc)
  
• Weapon of your choice
• Fistful of Sharp (ie your claws, as a knife)
  
• Idiom-appropriate casual outfit
• Tactical vest / tactical gambeson (as modest armor)
  

d66 Personal Idioms

This is your deal, your gimmick, your essential distilled character archetype.

11) Team Mom

• Gain Diplomacy, Wrangling, or Danger Sense
• You have a bag of snacks and something someone else forgot to pack. 
  

12) Chonk

• Gain Adorable.
• You have a disarming, easily-underestimated demeanor.
  

13) Stronk

• Gain BIG AND STRONG.  
• You have immense quantities of protein shake.
  

14) Magical Girl   

• Gain a Spell of your choice. 
• You have a transformation sequence and an animal sidekick.   

15) Goth

• Gain Secret Dark Knowledge. 
• You have a notebook of dark poetry and occult tattoos. 
  

16) Bookworm 

• Gain Overabundance of Trivia. 
• You have a large book. In fact, you have entirely too many large books.

21) History Buff

• Gain Period-Appropriate Knowledge
• You have several period-appropriate artifacts and a bitter rivalry with another historian.
  

22) Punk

• Gain Fight the Power.
  
• You have spray paint and a camera-fooling haircut-makeup combo.
  

23) Heavy Metal Queen

• Gain Real OG
  
• You have a killer sound system and permanent hearing damage.
  

24) Delinquent

• Gain Ruffian Persona. 
• You have cigarettes and a pompadour.
  

25) Maximum Tsun

• Gain Intimidating as Shit.
• You have a supportive letter from your friends at anger management counseling.
  

26) Ice Queen

• Gain Withering Gaze. 
• You have a university education and  designer sunglasses.
  

31) Space Cadet

• Gain Loopy Loon Logic
  
• You have an astronaut helmet, and a big book about space.
  

32) Bright-Eyed Newbie

• Gain Air of Innocence
• You have a birthday card from someone back home.
  

33) Scarred Veteran

• Gain War Stories
  
• You have many scars and the fragments of many languages.
  

34) Runaway Nun

• Gain Mission from God.
  
• You have a stolen saintly relic and a book of liberation theology.
  

35) The Chipper One

• Gain Talk About Anything, Forever
• You have boundless enthusiasm and endless hyperfocus.
  

36) Lazybones

• Gain High-Inertia Semiliquid
• You have sweatpants
  

41) Alcoholic

• Gain Alcoholic Savant 
• You have a bottle of strong booze.
  

42) Witch

• Gain a Spell of your choice. 
• You have a pointy hat, sturdy boots, and a shamble
  

43) Tech-head

• Gain Grey Hat Hacker
  
• You have a high end computer and a porn hoard.
  

44) Pirate

• Gain High Seas Nautical Chicanery
• You have an astoundingly impressive hat and a actual goddamn ship cannon.
  

45) Arsonist

• Gain Pyromania.
• You have a box of matches and a can of oil.
  

46) Driver

• Gain Drive Like a Lunatic. 
• You have a car. It is not, currently, on fire. 

51) Beggar Knight

• Gain HYPERVIOLENCE
  
• You have a broken sword and a begging bowl.
  

52) Battle Cook

• Gain Meal out of Anything.  
• You have a ominous cleaver and a heavy apron. 

53) Artist

• Gain Dsicerning Eye.  
• You have a work in progress and a completed work. One is good and no one else likes it, one is bad and everyone else likes it.
  

54) Prima Donna

• Gain Eyes on Me. 
• You have an immaculate voice and a lawyer. 

55) Ninja? Sure, I guess

• Gain Master of Stealth
• You have a bright orange jumpsuit and a special move name for everything.
  

56) NEET

• Gain Terminally Online
• You have an army's worth of ramen and a body pillow of yourself.
  

61) Pop Idol

• Gain Song and Dance Routine
• You have at least one crazed fan and a bodyguard named Big Leroy.
  

62) Actual Cat

• Gain Perfectly Ordinary Domestic Cat
• You have a feathery toy and an unceasing hatred for all life beyond yourself.
  

63) Cyborg

• Gain Cyberbrain.
• You have a robot arm and a baggie of anti-rejection meds.
  

64) Blaseball Star Player

• Gain Eldritch (Splorts) Knowledge
  
• You have a blaseball bat and a miniature black hole.
  

65) Manic Pixie Dream Terrorist

• Gain Homemade Explosives
  
• You have a penchant for sudden, dramatic entrances in the lives of strangers.
  

66) Abomination in the Eyes of God 

• Gain Anathema
  
• You have a deconsecrating aura and the terror of angels, demons, priests, and cultists. There is no visible outward reason why.

Combat Expertise: Pick one of the following skills.

• Tactician - Making sure everyone goes where they need to.
  
• CQC Specialist - Right up in their face.
  
• Reconnaissance - Scouting behind enemy lines
  
• Wetwork - Covertly getting your hands dirty.
  
• Cyber-Ops - Fucking around with computers.
  
• Sniper - hitting small things from far away.
  
• Heavy Weapons - More dakka.
  
• Tank - Hits hard, takes hard hits, draws aggro
  
• Field Medic - Bite the bullet this is going to get unpleasant
  
• Frontline - This catgirl kills fascists.
  
• Beserker - RIP AND TEAR YOUR GUTS
  

Weapon Skills: Pick one. Refluff according to taste, as all you really need to care about is the damage range and handedness.

Basic Skills

Pick any number of the following to fill out the rest of your character.

• Swiftpawe - Quick reflexes, falling gracefully
  
• Eyes and Ears - Extended senses.
  
• Suss Out the Fash - A finely-tuned field of Detect Authoritarian Intent
  
• Mother of Improvisation - Cobbling together solutions from items on hand.
  
• Crowdwork - Getting people marching in the right direction
• Political Theory - Someone needs it, probably.
  
• Anime Bullshit - All-purpose style over substance.

You are now ready.

Class: Gun-Saint of An-Hehm

 

Yarryozzo

By Beholster eye, Dragun tooth
Gungeon wind do whisper one truth

SULFUR 10, CHARCOAL 15, SALTPETER 75.

These are the words of the first Gun-Saint, passed down through the ages from blackened lip to deafened ear. Know this well, for it is the tripartite formula of God.

The chambers and firing ranges of their monastarmories are ever home to those men and women who have become priests of the parish of black powder.

Their sanctuary is the foxhole, their flock is the platoon, their sermon travels at 853.4 meters per second.

Flesh & Grit: d6 Flesh, d8 Grit
Saves & XP: As Mystic

Improved Accuracy – Gun-Saints have an attack bonus equal to their level.

Combat Maneuvers - Gun-Saints can Aim, Fight Recklessly, Fight Defensively, Go For The Kill, and Provide Covering Fire without penalty.

Guns Akimbo – A Gun-Saint can wield two one-handed weapons with no penalty to hit. This does not grant an additional attack per turn.

Starting Items: Firearm of choice. 1 standard ammunition. 1 special ammunition. 1 standard grenade, Reinforced Schema Habit (light armor)

Tinnitus and Other Hearing Damage: You're almost, but not quite, entirely deaf by this point.

The Leaden Sacraments

Gun-Saints undergoing their muninitiations gain access to a new sacrament with each level.

• Sacrament 1: Nimblefingers – You may reload a weapon or change its ammo type without spending a turn by switching to a different weapon. 
• Sacrament 2: Quick Draw - With a successful DEX check, you can make your attack first during combat, regardless of initiative or surprise.
• Sacrament 3: The Coat of Arms – Store up to character level firearms and reloads in your clothing without encumbrance.
• Sacrament 4: Clicka Clack Bang Bang -You may make two attacks per turn.
  
• Sacrament 5: The Magic Bullet – Will instantly kill the individual whose full name is inscribed upon it, should it hit. Takes up 1 equipment slot and can only be removed if fired. A new bullet cannot be engraved until your next level up.
• Sacrament 6: The Golden Gun - A +4 pistol. It cannot use special ammo, but if it hits it will always damage Flesh directly.

Weapons & Ammo

Several of these were stolen from Swords and Scrolls

Base Weapons

• Pistol - d8 damage. Can be used in melee combat.
• Rifle - d10 damage. Can be used as a melee weapon with -2 to hit.
• Shotgun - d12 damage. Can attack 2 adjacent enemies, splitting damage between them.
• Sniper - d12 damage. -4 to hit when not used with Aim.
• Grenade - d12 damage, no to-hit roll (save for half damage), area of effect, one use.

Ammo Tags

• Standard - Default, no special properties. Always available to purchase.
  
• Blessed - Double damage to demons etc.
• Cold Iron - Double damage to fairies etc.
• Anathema - Double damage to angels etc.
• Exotic Matter - Double damage to ghosts etc, no damage to material foes.
  
• Flechette - Can attack 2 adjacent enemies, splitting damage between them. If applied to a shotgun, both targets take full damage.
  
• Needler - Ignores armor, decrease damage die by 1 stage.
  
• Incendiary - Target must Save vs Hazards or be set alight. +1d4 bonus damage.
  
• Foam - Expands and hardens. Save vs hazards or immobilized.
  
• Hypervelocity - +2 damage, enemies gain no AC bonus from cover.
• Beam - +2 to hit, rendered ineffective by smoke or fog.
• Plasma - Damage is split between Flesh/Grit and AC reduction.
  

Sons and Daughters of RHEA

Julie Dillon

Ah! Bright goddess solar-crowned
Look upon us with thy favor
And keep us in the safety of thy arms
As the dark night lasts longer than memory may endure
And the dawn is yet to come

The Tangle is not static: nothing involving hyperspace can ever be. The tides of unform wear down its walls, fill in its tunnels, erode its paths. The fortress of humanity must constantly be renewed and remade, lest it fall apart completely - this is the eternal task of RHEA, and the only means by which humanity can survive in the cosmos. But even so: There are worlds that have slipped out of the Tangle's protective boundary, and there are those that have never known its safety; worlds prey to the Gods of the Black and their servants, protected only by escaping the notice of those alien minds and cut off entirely from the Fortress and the protection of RHEA.

To the average inhabitant of the Labyrinth, none of this is apparent. To them it is a black glacier of time and space, vaster than empires and more slow. If they are aware of what lurks outside the Fortress at all, their response is fear. Perhaps momentary pity, if word of the lost colonies slips through. There's no chance of any Company or government doing anything if they were aware, which most are not.

But...

Hope is never lost to the mad.

(Many, many thanks to sigmacastell / swampgirl for letting me use their space gods.)

Ἠλύσιον Κουρῆτες

The Elysian Kouretes are the three militant cults of RHEA: those who live on and aboard her great warships and serve as the primary human line of attack and defense against planetary incursions of the Gods of the Black. All three branches of the Kouretes possess technology and occult knowledge well beyond the norms of human space. All are trained in the secret arts of DEICIDE.

The Kouretes exist outside any company or government and have severed all of their connections to such. They are treated with equal parts fear and reverence by the civilian populace.

Insignia: Triangular patch. Golden sunburst overlaid by a navy hamsa. The names of the three warships are written on the three middle fingers in white. Left and right fingers bear the unit and callsign.

I made (read: cobbled together) this one

DEMETER

Thesmophoros

The workhorse and the foundation. The Kouretes of DEMETER are pulled from volunteers from within the Labyrinth - she is the only ship to do this. Her technology is also the most in-line with the standards of human space, at least from an operational standpoint. DEMETER likewise spearheads the recovery efforts of lost worlds, re-introducing habitable environments.

Insignia: Circular green patch. Sheaf of grain within a white pentagram.
Methodology: Hit once, hit with overwhelming force. Do not let them rise back up.

PERSEPHONE

Queen of the Lower World

Most devout of the three. The Kouretes of PERSEPHONE have taken the path of occult augmentation, opening up their cyberbrains to perceive the things once hidden to mankind - in this way they can see, even in a limited way, what the Gods see and know what they know. Minds shaped by awareness of hyper-space-time have little in common with the masses of humanity, leaving these Kouretes adrift and untethered even from their comrades-in-arms.

Insignia: Circular blue patch. Mechanical Eye of Providence with red iris.
Methodology: Utilizing Inner Space and the Hidden World to fight the Gods on their own territory and with their own rules. Further advancing their knowledge of the hyper-space-time arts.

ELPIS

The Final Hope

Where the tools of man might fail, alien arts might yet secure victory. The Kouretes of ELPIS venture further out into the Black than the other two branches, plucking their weaponry from worlds beyond the Labyrinth. They have made alien their own bodies, and what they cannot make of themselves they will tame, domesticate, edit, absorb into their armories of life.

They are seeking a grail; an alien people that has resisted the Gods of the Black. They have found no trace of one.

Insignia: Circular white patch. Clay jar in ochre.
Methodology: Adaptative combat through biotech and genetic engineering. Recovery, study, and utilization of alien life and, when found, technology.

Playing as the Kouretes

As Kouretes you have two primary goals

• Locate, identify. assess the threat
• Stop the threat. 

Everything else is secondary. You are absolutely overpowered.

Skills et cetera

• Kouretes roll 20+4d10 for Combat, Fear, and Sanity
• Gain +5 to combat when near an allied marine or Kourete.
• Stress responses are as according to classless chargen
• General skills: Military Training (+10%), 0-G (+10%), CQC (+15%), Firearms (+15%), Occultism (+15%)
• DEMETER skills: Gunnery (+15%), Tactics (+15%) 
• PERSEPHONE skills: Inner Space (+15%), Hidden World (+15%)
• Inner Space - Perceiving and understanding hyper-space-time.
• Hidden World - Interacting with hyper-space-time
• ELPIS skills: Xenology (+20%)

Cyberware & Special Equipment

• General - Panic Button
• DEMETER - Spinal Rig, Scapegoat System, OGRE, ASTARTE Powered Exoskeleton (+20% armor, (+) to Strength, capable of orbital insertion)
• PERSEPHONE - Blackbox, Remote Uplink, Machine Code, Cyberbrain
• ELPIS - Zookeeper (Tacnet distributed among all linked organisms), Second Skin (As +15% armor environment suit), three partner organisms (examples below).
• Gasbag Floater - Silently floats, really good vision, launch poisonous darts 50%
• Enhanced Alien Hound - Thermal vision, slicksocket, can carry four additional items, 2d10 bite 45%, hyper-alkaline blood 3d10.
• Cuttlefish Mantle - Instantly change color, texture, temperature.

Oh great goddess of man

Reactor at critical

Be with us in our hour of need

Railguns charged

For yours is the Tangle and the RKV and the antimatter

Ready to fire

Forever and ever

Ignition

AMEN

Class: Theotokos

Ninebreaker

This is a gimmick class, a mash-up of Monsieur's Witch and Lexi's Cleric. It is above anything else an excuse to use this image, which I am quite fond of.

Class: Theotokos

Somehow or another, you ended up carrying a god's child. It might be your profession, your fate, your choice, or your bad luck, but it's where you ended up.

Uses HD as wizards, in games where this matters. No armor or weaponry skills at all.

Miraculous Magic

A theotokos gains access to the miracles of their deific partner and may only cast them when in service to one of that deity's commands, as per the cleric class linked above. They do get access to increasing spell dice as per the witch (lvl+1 d4, lvl d6, or lvl-1d8), through one of the two options applies.

1) The die size increases with level. As GLOG spell dice cap at four, this is a convenient way of marking off trimesters, with the birth of the god-child occurring at level 4.

• Level 1: 2d4
• Level 2: 2d6
• Level 3: 2d8
• Level 4: 3d8

2) Your spell die size is determined by the manner of the whole deal. The child may already be born with this option, at the player's discretion.

• d4 - Your child is particularly blessed by your deity, but otherwise mundane.
• d6 - Your child was conceived in the typical fashion with a human partner, but contains the spark of divinity within them.
• d8 - Your child was conceived purely by the god's power. A physical act may or may not have occurred. The child is a full demigod.

Followers

A theotokos may have up to their level in followers. At any given time, only one of them may have class levels.

The follower gained at first level will likely be a spouse, partner, close friend, attendant, or protector.

Gods 

A small selection of potential god-parents includes:

1. Auson, god of undeath and the wilds - Death is a thing born in cities. In the wilderness beyond those shimmering white-gold walls, the world lives and lives and lives forever and ever amen carcinogen.
2. Oublor, god of storm and elemental ooze -They are the watery greenish eye in the center of the viscous hurricane that never ends, that tamps down the waves with slime and makes sludgy wastes of the land.
3. Edu Tatanu, god of authority and nobility - Fuck this guy. Narcissistic autocratic sister-fucking wig-wearing war-starting eugenics-loving boot-licking orphan-kicking puppy-eating peasant-impaling Malthusian prick. Eat shit and die, Edu.
4. Ai-Thoth, god of knowledge and love - Rarely emerges from their hidden library, but is a tender and temperate lover in those brief moments.
5. Mammonatum, god of creation, forge, and greed - The creator of the world demands repayment from all life that came forth from their work. Interest is charged.
6. Riksennic, god of blood and vengeance - When violence is committed, violence meets it. Despite this, they are a mild god and detest the cycles they represent and perpetuate.
7. SALTY JOHN, god of elemental surprise and the crab - Wait, who's that? It can't be...it is! Holy shit! It's SALTY JOHN! Hell yeah! Salty John!
8. Mnysillias, god of the harvest and the spider - When the leaves turn orange, leave an offering in the attic. Fine silks will be granted to the devout.
9. Redmane, god of blood, battle and the lion - A roar tears across the battlefront, the god stirs in the hearts of men and is brought forth beneath the banners.
10. Sev Likon, god of trickery and undeath - Forever dancing out of the reaper's hand.

7d8 Road-Weary Wanderers

This post originally went up on Patreon in July.

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d8 Mendicants

1. Fox-masked relic-seller, muddy shovel over one shoulder.
2. Desiccated monk, fasting to death, accompanied by the woman pregnant with their reincarnation.
3. Flagellant pilgrim of the centipede god.
4. Holy fool in motley, hunting another whose gone bad.
5. Wandering carnifex-priest. Executioner-for-hire low on work.
6. Woodsy mystic, catching crayfish in the creek.
7. Radium Priest of the Exclusion Zone. Scarred from viewing the Elephant’s Foot.
8. An ordinary farmer, host to billions of mitochondrial Star-Gods.

d8 Rogues

1. Travelling ukiyo-e painter and pornography salesperson.
2. Second-story man and their beloved, greying pug.
3. Repairer of reputations, book of receipts under their arm.
4. Organlegger, off to make a repossession. Enjoys giving forewarning.
5. The fall-guy. An expert in taking the blame, might have a complex about it.
6. Drop-bear trainer, recently mauled and looking for a career change.
7. Fake wizard. Does birthday parties, weddings, and the occasional funeral.
8. Assassin of the Mosquito School. Immaculate black suit beaded with fresh red drops.

d8 Fighters

1. Escaped professional gladiator and chamber-choir singer.
2. Bearhide-wearing hillfolk warrior. University educated, came back home.
3. Subterrene guerilla from down below. Clearly a deserter.
4. Minuteman of the Biting Wind Company
5. Lancer of the Serpent Riders, bearing the shed-skin banner of Nidhogg
6. Iron-Masked shock trooper, fresh from the penal colonies.
7. A dragonfly knight, servant of those lady loves Justice and Violence.
8. To prove their bravery, their armor has a glaring, brightly-painting weak point.

d8 Magic-Users

1. Keeper of carnivorous books, absolutely loves their work.
2. Does birthday parties, competes with the fake wizard on table 2.
3. Wannabe demonologist, in it mostly to get groupies.
4. Personal arcane investment accountant. Dreams have been dead for 25 years.
5. Nudist. Not nearly as unfit for it as one would expect.
6. Mosaic rune-reader. Divination doesn’t pay well, so does romance novels as a side hustle.
7. Hierophant of the Sturgeons. Undergoing crisis of faith.
8. Trepanned Astrologer, currently on their third brain.

d8 Elves

1. Garbed as an orchid mantis.
2. Cinderlike skin, burning coal eyes.
3. Lives inside a toad, looking for a housemate.
4. Sheds skin like leaves. Unbreakable melancholy of the pleasant kind.
5. Looks like an ordinary human, held upright on strings.
6. Hammerhead. Vestments of defrocked priest.
7. A little tree in a clay pot, carried around by a mindless servant.
8. A shadow in a bank of cloud.

d8 Dwarves

1. Humpbacked maggotman.
2. Lives in a giant oyster shell surrounded by pearl-children.
3. Carved out of jade.
4. A very small orangutan. Constantly tinkering.
5. A boulder with a bearded face engraved upon it. Gives sage advice.
6. A hairy blob, oozing along the ground. Always hungry.
7. Has smaller dwarves nested inside it, is looking for its bigger shell.
8. Molten slag, vaguely man-shaped.

d8 Halflings

1. Feral children that never grew up.
2. Badger-folk bringing turnips to market.
3. Carried around via stork.
4. An ancient domestic droid.
5. Horde of squirrels pretending to be a person.
6. Roly-poly armored patroller. Comes with banner and fun songs about nature.
7. Long, beautiful quilted scarf. Weapons sewn in hidden pockets.
8. Riding a pet pygmy elephant.

The Ship-Children

Nadia Wendt

The Ship-Children

Homo sapiens cambiatum tecnavis

The tecnavi were the creation of direst necessity. A small population of humans stranded on their ships in a solar system they did not plan on arriving in, with no way out and no way to build the infrastructure necessary for a proper colony to wait out the decades a tightbeam request for aid would take. The early years of warp travel are filled with stories such as this: an extra 0, a misplaced bracket, an engineer who kept clicking "remind me later". In this version the tragedy is averted, but just barely.

The ships of the proto-tecnavis could sustain the population for a time, but not forever. More importantly, among the fleet there were several talented geneticists and enough android logic-cores to rewire into a proper shipmind.

Generations pass. The original crews die. The tecnavi replace them. Help finally comes, and by that point there is no going back.

The tecnavi are small, sexless beings, designed to take up as little space and consume as few resources as possible on board a vessel. Their brains are augmented with cybernetics to make up for the lack of volume, rendering many of their underlying thought processes as transactional and their speech as both incredibly swift and incredibly dense. They wear their environment suits at all times when traveling outside their specific ships - their home microbiomes are so specifically tailored that exposure to foreign bacteria will likely result in swift and terrible illness and highly likely death. So as to better identify themselves to outsiders, they take great pride in the decoration and coloration of these suits: a group of tecnavi arriving on station will be a bombardment of sound and color.

While the tecnavi exist within the same cultural sphere as the spacer clans, hidebehinders, apulmon, and cacogens, they stand apart in one primary way: their naviparens. Shipmothers.

Exowombs are nothing new. Shipminds are established tech. Combining the two is hardly controversial. But generations of wetware upgrades to the ships and hardware upgrades to the children, linking logic cores to brains from fetus to death, have hybridized the two until there is very little difference between. The ship gives birth, the tecnavi grow and live and die, their brain imprints return to the ship and their genes go back into the bank to be hybridized again. When the tecnavi arrive on station in their bombastic hazard suits it is the shipmother that calls for clearance and gets visas stamped.

A tecnavi on their own is either an extreme social outlier, the result of incredible tragedy, or terribly miswired. Otherwise, their shipmother has asked something of them.

Starting Skills: 0-G +20%, Shipwise +15%, Consult the Shipmother +10%, Machine Language +10%

(Note: I only included the starting skills with the intention of plugging this more elegantly into the classless chargen I am working on.)

This post was requested by Zelda (a player in my Mothership game), who wanted me to make quarians to go along with the asari thelychroma I already had. I wasn't planning on using art of quarians for the post, but then I found that piece which is basically exactly what I wanted in all of its wonderful rat-monkey-hazmat glory.