BlackStar: Horror in Space. Children of Earth, Cardassians, and Aliens

Plain and simple Garak

In many RPGs, the enemies are easy to figure out.  In *most* horror RPGs the bad guys are the supernatural creatures.  If you are playing Buffy for example then you are going to be hunting vampires.  Now it is also fun to "flip the script" so in the various World of Darkness Vampire games you are the vampire.  You are still the monster, but you have some more control over that evil.  In "Ordinary World" in NIGHT SHIFT you can play a supernatural creature, but you are not the bad person, you are "just a person" trying to get by in a world full of mortgages, jobs, oh and neighbors that might want to kill you.

In many fantasy games there are plenty of other monsters that want to kill you. We might be getting away from orcs (thank goodness) and goblins (have not used them as "bad guys" in over a decade or two) but there are still plenty of evil dragons, beholders, and of course demons and devils. 

Sci-Fi games tend to fall into the same sort of tropes.  Only this time it is whatever aliens are the focus.

I want to talk about three different sorts of aliens, all considered to be enemy species, but handled in different ways.

First are the Cardassians.  Introduced in Star Trek: The Next Generation and really got the focus in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.  The Cardassians are humanoid (this is important later) and come from the world of Cardassia.  They had occupied the nearby Bajor in a very clear analog to fascist Germany occupying France.  The Cardassians are never painted as irredeemably evil. Yes, many of them are in fact evil, but there are some that are not.  They are also depicted as highly intelligent, organized, and utterly brutal.  For most of the seven seasons on DS9, they were the bad guys.  Each step forward (oh look they love their kids) is reversed (oh, but they slaughter Bajoran orphans).  They are richly detailed and complicated, but always a foe to stand up to.  They are not an existential threat though to anyone but the Bajorans.  They are not even "supernatural" threats until the very, very end when Gul Dukat (a Cardassian and our main bag guy since Season 1) is possessed by the Kosst Amojan, the literal Bajoran devil. 

The other alien race is known only as the 456, for the frequency they contact Earth on in Torchwood: Children of Earth.   The Nazi connections with the Cardassians are intended, and not designed to be subtle.  These aliens are also not subtle; they steal human children and graft them into their own bodies because the chemicals the children create feels good to them.  They are back because they want more kids.  These creatures are never seen clearly, we never learn their name, their language, or even where they are from. Only that they want our children and they have the means to get them.  They are properly scary.  But. Do they make for a good "big bad?"  I don't think so.  They have one trick; stealing children.  While that is good enough for a fairy tale witch, the witch usually gets tossed into the oven at the end.  The 456 get sent back to their planet/ship or are destroyed much in the same manner when Capt. Jack Harkness feeds their communication signal back on them and killing his own grandson in the process.

The last is the Xenomorph from the Aliens franchise.  Alien is a true horror film in space, right down to a monster stalking everyone to a "final girl" in Ellen Ripley.  Aliens is sci-fi adventure.  I have lost track of how many Traveller games I saw in the 80s that were more or less a riff on the Aliens movie.  Again these guys are properly scary.  One on a ship is a true horror. Hundreds on a planet can take out a bunch of Marines.   The trouble with the Xenomorph is there is little to no mystery about them anymore.  In the original movies they were mindless, insectlike killing machines.  In future movies they...well I am still not 100% sure what Alien Covenant was about or Prometheus, though I did enjoy them.  The "Shared universe" of Alien, Blade Runner, and Predator though does give me a lot to game with. 

Use In BlackStar

The issue for me is not just "do these aliens make for a good scary monster?" They do.  The real question is "will they work for me and my particular game?"

I mean this is no different than any other game or setting.  Let's take an odd example.  Orcs in Ravenloft.  I originally did not want to do orcs, a classic D&D/Fantasy monster, in my Ravenloft games.  When it came up that I needed an orc-like monster I went with something more akin to a Grimlock or even a Neanderthal-Troglodyte (in the classical sense of the word) creature.  I made it work AND it also made me want to redo the troglodyte from D&D to make them more "devolved" human. Like the old Homo Sapiens Troglodytes. Maybe even a cross between H.S. and the Pan Troglodytes. 

But what about BlackStar which happens in a Star Trek universe. Well oddly enough that rules out the Cardassians. We know what they were doing at the time in Universe, they were at war with the Federation.  So I will have that going on, but in the far background.  They are on the far side of the Alpha Quadrant. My action is closer to home and might even take tiny little excursions into the Beta Quadrant.

The Xenomorphs would be fun for an "Episode" (what I am calling a single adventure) but not a "Season" (a campaign).  Same with the 456.

Originally I WAS thinking the 456 would be my focus as the bogeyman alien in the background.  But having a couple of conversations with my oldest he was like "why not just use the Mi-Go?"

He has a point.

There are a lot of great reasons to use them not just for the Lovecraftian origin.  They would have had an outpost on Yuggoth/Pluto that I absolutely LOVE.  It fits in with my ideas when watching the Thing and the various horror movies on Mars. 

I mean if I am going to do "Cthulhu meets Star Trek" then I kinda need to have appearances by the Mi-Go, Elder Things, Shoggoths, and Yithians.  They were described as "Alien" but I think I want to use them in the "Alien" sense of both Lovecraft AND of Trek.   The Mi-Go could take the place of the Borg in terms of a lifeform that can't be reasoned with and have their own, completely separate, morality. 

Given that my preferred version of Trek for this is Modiphius' Star Trek Adventures this makes things pretty easy for me.  I can now use ideas and stats from the new Achtung! Cthulhu 2d20 system. 

But system and stats are only the start of the conversation, not the end.  I have to make sure these guys are scary.  Mi-Go landing on the hull of The Protector while not wearing EV suits and cutting through (like the Borg did) is scary.  Leaving behind dead crew with their brains surgically removed (not unlike "Spock's Brain", but less...bad) is a little more horrifying.   Finding crew members whose livers have been altered to create a sort of super-acid that eats through their bodies but keeps on working is more horrifying still. The Mi-Go don't communicate. Their chitterings are unable to be translated.  Since they are reported as not being able to be filmed or photographed they are largely invisible to sensors; having natural stealth abilities. 

I could introduce them much in the same way we saw in "At The Mountains of Madness" only this time they are discovered on Pluto/Yuggoth.  This leads to discoveries of bases on Earth, millions of years old, in the Andes, Appalachians, and Himalayas mountain ranges. How to get the crew out into deeper space to encounter them is the bridge I have not built yet.  

Frankly, I am overwhelmed with the potential. 

ETA:  I have found some more data that puts the Mi-Go origin, or at least another base of operations, at 61 Cygni, about 11.4 light-years away.  64 hours at classical Warp 9, but only 19 hours at The Protector's Warp 13.  In Star Trek, this is also the home of the Tellarites.  So obviously the Mi-Go visited them as well.

I will take a completely different approach in my Star Trek: Mercy game.

The Aliens

• https://aliens.fandom.com/wiki/Cardassian
• https://aliens.fandom.com/wiki/The_456
• https://aliens.fandom.com/wiki/Xenomorph
• https://aliens.fandom.com/wiki/Mi-Go

NIGHT SHIFT: Game Design, GM's Screens and Amazon

Quick one today.  My NIGHT SHIFT Co-designer and the main author, Jason Vey, has been posting about some of the game design choices we made in NIGHT SHIFT and why we wanted to stick with an old-school feel instead of creating a new system.

You can read his thought over on his blog for Elf Lair Games.

• What Does Night Shift: VSW Bring to the Old School Table?
• Why Re-Use Old Mechanics? Why Not Create a New System?

For my part, I agree with Jason.  I have played around with dozens of systems for my two Night Worlds; "Generation HEX" and "Ordinary World." 

Long time readers here will recall a time when Generation HEX was part of my magic-school project which had a lot of homes and even spent some time as a "D&D" world.  The great thing with these rules I can STILL do that.

Ordinary World began as a Cinematic Unisystem idea, morphed over to Mutants & Masterminds, and even spent some time as a BESM 3.0 idea.  I enjoyed all these forms of the setting, but none gave me what I wanted.  So one night during a huge snowstorm where I was stuck in traffic for over 2 and a half hours I came up with a new system for OW.  I thought it was great. I half-jokingly referred to as the Power of Three System since it only had three attributes.  But as I worked on it it became obvious to me at least all I was doing was creating the bastard child of BESM/Tri-Stat and Unisystem.

The points Jason makes in his posts are salient here.  Going back to a well-known system at least for me has solved a number of problems. 

New GMs Screen & Amazon

Jason just released the new GM screen on DriveThruRPG.  Grab these for your Portrait style screens.

Also, you can now get hardcover versions of NIGHT SHIFT from Amazon.

You can still get your hardcover and the special edition, numbered, hardcover from the Elf Lair Games store.

Can't wait to share more with you!

NIGHT SHIFT Links

• Elf Lair Games Store
• DriveThruRPG Links
• Night Shift: Veterans of the Supernatural Wars, Core Rules
• Quick Start Kit
• Errata and Frequently Asked Questions
• GM Screen Inserts

October Horror Movie Challenge: The Horrible Sexy Vampire (1970, 1971)

Well.  One of the words in the title is a lie, but one is spot on.

Also known as "El Vampiro De La Autopista" this is a movie that never really knows what it wants to do.  Both titles tell us this is a Vampire film, but it is often treated (right up to the end in fact) as a mundane murder mystery.   They make a big deal of the murders happening every 28 years, but the ending does nothing to explain that.

Not to spoil it, but the movie is kind of dull, the police detective pins the murders on an escaped mental patient.  One we don't even hear about till the very end.  This is despite the fact that the murders have an obvious supernatural element to them.  How obvious?  Well, the killer is invisible.

Now under other circumstances, this might be interesting, but here it is just cheesy.

Sadly some interesting ideas lost in this Spanish "Hammer-envy" movie.


Watched: 2
New: 2

Night Shift Content

Well.  The best thing to do with this one really is to have a serial killer in your games. Everyone thinks it is a vampire, but it really just a human psychopath.  This works well in Ordinary World if all the characters are supernatural and they are worried that one of their own is going to get them exposed.

NIGHT SHIFT: Talking 'bout my Generation

We are getting into the final days here for NIGHT SHIFT so I thought I'd share some more details on two of my "Night Worlds" for the book.  Some details will certainly look familiar to readers here.

Ordinary World
This is one I have talked a bit about here.  The idea behind Ordinary World is a simple one.  You are some sort of supernatural creature.  A witch, a vampire, maybe an exiled fae.  You are just trying to get by in a world full of other supernaturals, humans, and hunters.
Every character will get the Supernatural levels for free (different than the core rules)  BUT you have to work blending in amidst all sorts of hazards thrown at you.
There is a government group known as the Bureau, that wants to grab any supernatural they can to either dissect or use as a weapon and they already have few working for them now.
There are is an underground slavery market of Supernaturals run by "demons" that also want to grab you.   There is a group of Witch Hunters known as the "Dorothies" that really, really want to burn you alive.
And there are the humans that do what humans do in large groups.

And you just want to get to your job and pay the bills!

Lots of urban intrigues and working against a huge enemy that has all the advantages.  It will make you wish for the days of just dealing with angry mobs with pitchforks.

I am planning on introducing some new supernatural types including Cat People.

Generation HEX
Another one I have talked about here.  This one has two focuses, foci, there is more going here.
First, magic is back and everyone knows it.  But it is only the newest generation that can do it.
So there is that kind of world to deal with.
The second aspect of GenHEX is the magical school aspect for the first generation of new witches in 300 years.

You get some of the struggles of Us vs. Them as we do in OW, but this is Magic vs. Non-Magical, as well as Generational.

Characters will all be younger, high school age, with some members of their magic-using Generation as just a little older, maybe in their very early 20s.

Rule additions here will be more kinds of magic and rules for running a Generation HEX school in any of the other Night Worlds or even other Old School games.

We have so much more planned for you all.  So give us a little support on the Kickstarter if you can!

Edited to add: Now available, Night Shift: Veterans of the Supernatural Wars. You can get the PDF from DriveThruRPG and both the standard and special edition hardcovers from Elf Lair Games.

Ordinary World

Ordinary World

Ordinary World was the working title of a new game I was working on.  It was going to be modern supernatural and use this new system I was developing that I had code named "The Power of Three" system.
The basic premise of Ordinary World was the players would be playing supernatural types just trying to get along in a world that didn't believe they existed and considered them monsters.  In a way sorta like "Being Human" the RPG, but also elements of all the things I like in modern supernatural fiction.

I wanted to have the experience of writing a new game from the ground up and I wanted to do something in a realm I am really familiar with.  Trouble is every time I would bring this game up to friends they would remind me I already did all of that with Ghosts of Albion.

So sometime this past Summer I shelved Ordinary World.

No sooner had I done that than I had this great idea for an Old-School game that I was calling Monster Mash.  The rules would have been Labyrinth Lord compatible and instead of heroes you would have played the monsters.  In particular the old Universal Pictures Monsters, so vampires, golems, werewolves and ghosts.  I would have made it compatible with The Witch since one of my big influences for this was the video to the Rob Zombie song, American Witch.  I thought it might have been a fun beer and pretzels sort of game.
In truth I probably came up with it while listening to Hellbilly Deluxe one too many times.  I even had an adventure partially written "Dr. Satan Needs Blood!".

Last week I was still thinking about these two when I had an idea of bringing them together.  When it also dawned on me that I had other WiPs, some from the earliest days of this blog.

Generation Hex was this really cool, awesome idea I had  for Unisystem/True 20/Mutants & Masterminds or whatever system I happen to really enjoy at the time.  Simply put it was a game to play kids in a magical school.  Since that time this sort of thing has been better done by Witch Girls Adventures.

I also have material laying around for Licensed properties that never saw the light of day and I am now the owner of again (the RPG material, not the properties).  One was d20 and the other True20.

So.  What's a guy to do?

Well the natural thing is to bring them all together under one system to do the one thing they all kinda of were doing anyway.

A few caveats though.
I want to use an old-school system.  I think it would be a great addition to all the material we have out there now and NOT redo something everyone else has already done.

I want to be able to play any character I want.  If I come up with an idea or see something in a book then I need to have a system that can do that.

While it is an Old-School game, I don't want to forget about the advances made in other games. There are a lot of great games out there and they are great for a reason.  This my chance to distill that into a new game.

So. Look for more information coming from me on this.   I think this is one I will design live on the blog.  Posting ideas, sending up files for playtests.  Things like that.

First thing I need to figure out.  What system should I use?