Chaosium Digest Volume 19, Number 8 Date: Sunday, May 25, 1997 Number: 1 of 2 Contents: CF: The Great Menagerie (Shannon Appel) MYTHOS Zombie Variants (Bryan J Stewart) CALL OF CTHULHU Editor's Notes: This week, two volumes worth of articles: a pair of Card Files for Mythos, a short adventure for Pendragon, and some monsters for Call of Cthulhu. Shannon NEW RELEASES: * Call of Cthulhu - _Minions_ (Chaosium, 64 pg, $10.95), by Paul McConnell, is a set of 15 short encounters. Each one should be runnable in a few hours. Cultists, dark young, deep ones, serpent people, and more abound in these pages. _Minions_ started shipping last Tuesday, and will start to appear in stores at the end of this week. * Glorantha - _Tales of the Reaching Moon, Issue 16_ (Reaching Moon Megacorp, 64 pg.) is the Lunar Special. It contains cults for the Red Emperor and Danfive Xaron, part of the Seleric Verses, a Holiday Glorantha describing the Oronin Valley, Rodin Greanbeak's treatise on plants of the red moon, and more. Tales #16 is currently available from the RMMC or Wizard's Attic. RECENT BOOKS OF NOTE: * Pendragon - _The Eagle and the Sword_ (Harper Prism, TPB, 340 pg, $14.00), by A. A. Attanasio, is the sequel to _The Dragon and the Unicorn_. It's about Pendragon's Son, Arthor. Like the original book, it seems to be a very different take on the legend. Published in Britain as _Arthor_. _The Singing Sword_ (TOR Forge, HC, $23.95), by Jack Whyte, is the sequel to _The Skystone_. It actually came out late last year, but I didn't see it until this week. The first book in the series was a terrific story about the dying days of Roman Britain. This book continues the story, as a small stronghold tries to survive Britain's darkest age. -------------------- From: appel@erzo.org (Shannon Appel) Subject: CF: The Great Menagerie System: Mythos ** THE CARD FILES: THE GREAT MENAGERIE ** THE CARD -------- Name: The Great Menagerie Set: The Dreamlands Type: Adventure Subtype: Corrupt Value: +6 San: +2 Text: It is your goal to gather together a fantastic menagerie of the most splendid creatures in the world. With the help of your friend (and _ADVENTURER or EXPLORER_), journey to _THREE different OUTSIDE LOCATIONS_, and discover _FOUR MONSTERS of different subtypes_. Once your creatures have been gathered, you will need to find a nice _CITY LOCATION_ to house your menagerie in. THE SOURCE ---------- None in particular. CLARIFICATIONS -------------- The card listing for this adventure is: Adventurer or Explorer; three different Outside Locations; four Monsters of different subtypes; and city Location. QUESTIONS --------- Q: Can a single Location be used for both an outside Location and a city Location? A: As is noted in the Mythos rules "One card can not meet two requirements on the same Mythos card... Multiple copies of the same card may each be used to satisfy different requirements on the same Adventure card." This means, you must have at least four Locations in your Story Deck to play this Adventure. If you have two copies of an Outside City Location in your Story Deck, one may used to fulfill the Outside requirement, and another to fulfill the City requirement. This is, in fact, an excellent strategy. Q: Can I use Monsters in play as Allies to play this Adventure? A: No. Whenever a card moves from one part of the in-play area to another, it tends to totally change its card type. A Monster in play as an Ally is solely of the Ally type, and not of the Monster type. The card will revert to being a Monster when it goes into your Story Deck. STRATEGIES ---------- The best strategy for using an Adventure is to optimize a deck for it. Here are a few suggestions for optimizing for the Great Menagerie. * On Where to Set this Adventure - There are five requirements which may restrict region and dimension choice: adventurer or explorer; three outside locations; one city location. The Ally requirement is the tightest, and is met by the following cards: Etienne-Laurent de Marigny (WW, LC, any City), Laban Shrewsbury (WW, LC, Arkham), T. E. Lawrence (WW, ME, any Country), Iranon the Musician (DL, Any Site), and The Hunter (DL, Any Country). The Following subregions have at least three Outside Locations and a City Location: Arkham (WW, LC), Innsmouth (WW, LC), Kingsport (WW, LC), Providence (WW, LC), and Celephais (DL, East). Looking at Allies and Locations, Arkham is clearly the winner, but the Adventure can be played without real problems in: Lovecraft Country, the Middle East, and all of the Dreamlands. Don't be afraid to add in nearby Outside Country Locations if required. You should be rewarded with slightly better cards. If you're in Lovecraft Country, take advantage of the outside Waterbury State Hospital in Vermont. If you're in the West of the Dreamlands, the Temple of Bokrug is Outside. * On the Many Subtypes of Monsters - It is helpful to remember that there are actually seven subtypes of Monsters. There's the Lesser and Greater Independents and Servitors which you probably think of straight off. That's four of the subtypes. There's also Living Dead, although they haven't been seen since Limited. And, finally we have #6 and #7: Great Old Ones and Outer Gods. The more subtypes you put in your deck, the likelier it'll be that you draw at least four different subtypes. You might want to consider one of the other Adventures that requires a GOO (Seeking Everlasting Life II or The Hero's Journey) as a good match for this Adventure. * On Joining Monsters - One of the problems with multiple subtypes is that you usually can't play them together, even if you have them all in your hand. Joining Monsters can get around this. There are a few Monsters which Join across subtypes. Deep One + Shoggoth + Father Dagon + Mother Hydra is a pretty good combination, since you'll have two Lesser Servitors and two Greater Servitors which can all be played at once. Buopoth and Giant Albino Penguins are also excellent choices. They are both Lesser Independents that Join with all Monsters. Another possibility is using Cthulhu. As a Great Old One, he will count as one of your four subtypes. He will also allow all the rest of your Monsters to Join. * On Summoning Monsters - Summoning Monsters has several advantages. First, it allows Monsters to go straight to the Story Deck, instead of waiting in the Threat for an entire turn. Second, it allows Monsters to be brought into play without the use of gates. There are also disadvantages. It's costly in Sanity, and you can only bring one Monster into play at a time, but still you should consider having some Summoning devices in your deck, just in case. As of Dreamlands, there is a S/C spell for every subtype but GOOs and Outer Gods. Also, if you play in the Dreamlands, you can take advantage of a few different Lairs, which allow the Summoning of Monsters for no extra Sanity. * On the Power of Thaol - If you have the Circles of Thaol out with the Star Stone of Mnar, you can Summon both a Lesser Independent and a Greater Independent. You flip the spell, and then get to Summon and attack with two different Monsters. This is another tricky way to play Monsters from two subtypes at once. Consider putting this potent pair in your deck. * On Optimizing your Locations - This Adventure calls for three Outside Locations and one City Location. You should try and include as many combined Outside/City Locations as possible, so you can choose to use them for either requirement, as necessary. * On Optimizing your Allies - As with any Adventure, it is better to have two different Allies who meet a specific Ally requirement (in this case Adventurer or Explorer) then it is two have two copies of the same Ally. If you had two copies, the second one in your hand is a wasted card, while if you had two different Allies, you could play them both. Once you're actually playing, one of the most important things you can do is prepare for an adventure before-hand. That is, set yourself up for it while working on prior adventures. If you follow all the preparation suggestions below, you can play this new Adventure a minimum of four cards after your previous Adventure, and the three cards in between are relatively easy: two Outside Locations and one City Locations. (Actually, there's likely one more turn required, when you convert Allies into Monsters, as noted below, but you may be able to use a "free turn" during combat to do that.) * On General Preparations - In this case, you can try and get your adventurer or explorer out, and try to hold on to outside Locations and rarer Monster subtypes. * On Preparing Monsters - This takes more work, but can be done. What you want to do is get a Monster of each subtype into play as an Ally. The Kitab Al-Azif is the easiest way to do this. There are a few other methods, such as getting Mi-go into play as Allies using N'gah-Kthun, but they aren't as convenient. Once your Monsters are in play as Allies, make sure you have a way to easily convert them back into Monsters (they're Allies, not Monsters at this point). Call Power of Nyambe is probably the best method, since it's relatively subtle until you use it. You could also stock up on Enchanted Weapons, and use your Monsters to attack when you're ready to play your Adventure, but not only does this tend to freak out your opponents and make you a target, but it's also slower. * On Preparing Locations - You need three Outside Locations for your deck. Why not be sitting at one when you play your previous Adventure? And finally, here's a deck possibility: * On the Underworld Deck - It turns out that the Underworld in the Dreamlands is a pretty good place to play The Great Menagerie. There are lairs for three different subtypes of Monsters. Though there are only four different Outside Locations, one of them is a City as well. The Tower of Koth and the Great Abyss should be ignored; the other five Underworld Locations are all good to use. A few copies of The Hunter will fill the Adventurer requirement. Since he can be buried to give you a benefit, having the extra copies won't hurt you. Use the Kitab Al-Azif and the Brilliant Egyptian Archaeologist to make the Adventure easier to play. Several GOOs are easily playable since the Underworld is Underground and has Outside Country Gates: Ghatanathoa, Hastur, Abhoth, Nodens, Nyarlathotep, and Tulzscha. Don't forget to use Limited Edition Dholes, which are 5/-1 if you are Underground. Staging an entire deck in the Underworld is possible, though difficult. Four-Armed is Forewarned, as well as some of the other tiny (5 or 6 point) adventures are playable. You'll need to go spell heavy, and use Call Power of Nyambe, Soul Singing, and Steal Life to gain Sanity since there are no Underworld Sanitariums. If you're going spell heavy, consider Nyarlathotep, playable at Outside Gates. He'll count as a subtype, and make the playing of other spells free. He won't help with the above three spells, since you can't gain Sanity, but if you have lots of other spells he'll be cool... If you do this, you'll need to add the Tower of Koth, since it's the only Tome Location in the Underworld. Another possibility is to make the Underworld your primary home, but have occasional trips to Waking World Sanitariums. This works well because the Dimension-travelling items (ie, the Silver Key) stay in play, so you can step back and forth. You could do the same trick with Dreamlands Sanitariums and Travel Events, but it honestly isn't as easy. COUNTER STRATEGIES ------------------ The first step in countering an Adventure is recognizing it is being played. Here's how to watch for The Great Menagerie. If someone shows two or three of the following signs, they're probably playing this Adventure. Here's the signs, in order, from least important to most. * The Adventurer or Explorer - As of the Dreamlands, there are only five Allies who match this criteria, all listed above. Having one of these Allies out is a danger sign. * The Outside Locations - Outside Locations usually make up 1/3 or less of most Cities. If someone is playing almost all Outside Locations, this is a another danger sign. * The Four Monster Subtypes - This is the giveaway. If an opponent has lots of Monsters, unrelated by theme, and they span lots of subtypes, they're probably playing this Adventure. Especially watch for Buopoth and Giant Albino Penguins, since they're not terribly common cards. Once you've recognized an Adventure, you need to defeat it. This is typically done by discarding required cards or burying cards required to play other cards. Here's possible ways to do that, in order from least annoying to most. * Hide an Ally - A minor annoyance at best. You can slow down your opponent by putting his Ally into the Threat with Body Warping of Gorgoroth or Innsmouth Look. Usually, this will make it so he can't play his Adventure until at least the next Round. You can make this nastier by then casting Blasphemous Obeisance. You might end up knocking the Ally back to your opponent's hand. This can be a big problem if the Ally was brought out by Surprise Meeting, or in a different subregion. * Get Rid of Summon/Control Spells - This will just slow your opponent down. Ways to do this include: Wilbur Whately, the Insects of Shaggai, and Song of Hastur. * Destroy a Location - The Outside Locations are the most vulnerable in this Adventure because so many different ones are required. Discard those via Cthulhu Rising (possibly paired with Hurricane), Green Mist of Doom (definitely paired with a Night card), and Wave of Oblivion. * Destroy an Ally - You can Discard an Adventurer or Explorer via one of several cards: Command of the Bloody Tongue (paired with something to bury the Ally), Limited Edition Nightgaunts, and the Awful Doom of Cerrit. This will work particularly well if your opponent is playing in the Middle East, where there is just one of the required Allies. * Destroy a Monster Subtype - If an opponent has Monsters out as Allies, use one of the Discard Ally tricks to try and selectively weed out one of your opponent's subtypes. Blasphemous Obeisance is another good card, since it returns a Monster to your opponent's hand. -------------------- From: bryan.stewart@juno.com (Bryan J Stewart) Subject: Zombie Variants System: Call of Cthulhu Zombies are a good part of Call of Cthulhu for beginners. In a group of players that is used to hack and slash, a couple of zombies are the cure. JU-JU (VOODOO) ZOMBIE These are Voodoo zombies that are poisoned and die, or seem to, and wake up a few days later. They truly become zombies when a voodoo priest calls for them and performs a ritual. Real life sources say that the voodoo zombie is a person that was poisoned. As far as we know, one of the main ingredients is poison from a fish that puts a person into a very deep coma. Doctors think the victim is dead, so they hold a funeral, and people flip out when they see the person walking around a week later. They is the same person, but he can not remember anything about the past week. In movies, the same thing happens, but then a priest calls to the victim, usually through some personal item of theirs, kills the person, and then performs a rite. This usually involves draining the blood, and always includes sewing the mouth shut. Afterward, the victim is a true zombie. LIVING ZOMBIE: a voodoo zombie that has only been poisoned. They seem to be normal people that a while back lost about a week of memories. Stats: as a normal human, except for POW, which is drained down to half. The other half is put by a priest into a personal item. Weaknesses: these Living Zombies don't like salt. Too much will make them convulse. A salt packet poured into their drink would make them seem to have a seizure. They also have an unexplained phobia for salt. If a salt shaker were knocked over on a table, and salt splashed toward a Living Zombie, it would jump. Game Play: a friend may be turned into a zombie. The cure would be to get back the personal item and kill the voodoo priest. THE CALLING: The range of this calling is the priest's POW in miles. When a voodoo priest calls a human with his personal item, the human can make a resistance roll Pow Vs Pow of the priest. If the priest succeeds, the human is totally controlled. He can be commanded to walk and fight anything in his way (only bashing with his hands). The victim gets glass-eyed, mumbles under his breath, and goes to the priest as he is commanded to do so. They can be stopped, locked up, tied up or whatever else, though they will try to get free. The zombies are unaware of their surroundings, and have almost no care for their own safety. If the human succeeds, he feels a little strange, and if he rolls POWx5, the victim sort of knows where the priest is. LIVING DEAD ZOMBIE: A sickly-looking human, gaunt and skeletal, with its mouth sown shut. Stats: the same as in the rule book execpt for STR, which is 3d6, and instead of Bite they Punch with hands if they don't have weapons. Damage is 1d6+db. In large numbers they are very deadly, usually ripping apart they enemies Weaknesses: These zombies have a particular weakness for salt. They can't cross a line of salt, and ingestion of a cup of salt will kill them. Game Play: these zombies are to best used in Louisiana/New Orleans or other voodoo countries, and only with voodoo priests. GOOD MOVIES: _The Serpent and the Rainbow_ and _Voodoo_. MESSENGER ZOMBIE This zombie is very strange, and it is not yet known how they are made. The zombie is usually left as a warning. It is typically a person the players knew or have meet. Alternatively, it may be used to start an adventure. DESCRIPTION: this is a dead person that is alive and can talk somewhat. They have been tortured to insanity, and killed, but are still alive. They usually have a message to say like "bruno says stay off the east side". Afterward, they will ask for help. The only help is death. The body is still alive, but can do nothing but lay there and maybe twitch. STATS: SAN lost is 2/1d8+1. The description should be very gross, and the body is always mangled and tortured... GAME PLAY: This is good for Voodoo Drug Cartels, mobs and others of power, or a very evil person. -------------------- The Chaosium Digest is an unofficial electronic 'zine about Chaosium's Games. In no way should it be considered representative of the views or beliefs of Chaosium Inc. To submit an article, subscribe or unsubscribe, mail to: appel@erzo.org. The old digests are archived on ftp.csua.berkeley.edu in the directory /pub/chaosium, and may be retrieved via FTP.