True Detective: Night Country and Valhalla, AK

I am a fan of the HBO series True Detective. I had a bit to say about the first season here and here, so I am a fan. The new season, Season 4, is out now, and so far, it is excellent, too.  I am not going to get into any spoilers here, but Jodie Foster is fantastic in this. Maybe some of the best acting of her career, and I have been a fan of hers forever. And Kali Reis is amazing so far.

This season, subtitled "Night Country," is a fantastic idea. It takes place in the fictional town of Ennis, Alaska just north of the Arctic Circle. It is a detective drama, but there appear to be elements of the supernatural in it as well. Plus, it ties directly back to the first season of True Detective.

It also sounds a lot like what I wanted to do with my Valhalla, AK. 

Now, let's be honest here. The idea is a good one. Plus, I know there is really no way Issa López (showrunner, writer, and director) has read anything I have ever written here. It is just a great idea. Mine might have been a little closer to "Northern Exposure," though my Valhalla would be somewhere south of Ennis and a bit north of Cicely. 

While it is a great idea and one I have some fun with, I am not sure I could get away with building anything for it now for publication. Sure, I have the benefit of having my Valhalla predate Night Country and the first season of True Detective, but I am not sure I could really do it justice.

So, I am thinking of going back to my original idea and doing it as something for free here online. Something people can use in their NIGHT SHIFT games. Hell, if I throw in more alien abductions, then I can add in bits of Thirteen Parsecs, or other games from Elf Lair Games.  

Something I have been working on for Thirteen Parsecs is the fact that the barriers between the multi-verses are very thin here. People wander and get lost and end up in a different universe. One of those Earths is a planet called Gaia where history is like our own, but due to disease and runaway climate change, the population is only a 10th of Earth's, and the global temperatures have risen an average of 7-10 degrees Celius. Valhalla, AK, on Gaia, is much warmer and wetter than it is here. I mentioned some of this in the Night Companion book for NIGHT SHIFT.

I hope to develop more ideas and ways to use this weird little town in NIGHT SHIFT. 

Starting Adventure Seeds

The Last of 97s

In this seed there is a local gold mine. The mine has been shut down since the turn of the last century. Then, one night, a stranger comes to town with handfuls of gold he claims he has taken from the mine. His paperwork is all in order and legal for his purchase of the mine. He begins paying the locals in this gold. Soon he, his miners, and anyone he gave gold too end up dead by mysterious and brutal ways.

The Culprit: The ghosts of the dead miners from the failed rescue of the 1897 Mine Collapse do not want their gold taken away. Getting to bodies is difficult. The only way to quiet the dead miners is to return all the gold taken out.

Prophecy in the Petroglyphs

A cave with petroglyphs from the last Ice Age seems to be depicting scenes in the nearby town. Are these a warning from the past about the future or is history repeating itself?

The Culprit: Unknown as of yet. But it's likely something I can add to another adventure.

The Fur Trapper's Curse

An old abandoned fur trapper's hut is discovered along with the frozen remains of two Russian Fur trappers from the late 1700s. They walked over the frozen sea during one of the coldest winters of the last 400 years. They froze, and their faces were frozen in terror. But what else is there? A nearby cave, now uncovered due to warming temperatures, has the answer. 

The Culprit: A giant frozen bear that is a throwback to prehistoric times. It is bigger than any grizzly or polar bear recorded. Maybe it is an Amphicyon. 

The Wrath of the Wendigo

This one is obvious.

The Culprit: The wendigo!

The Strange Auroras

The Aurora Borealis are a common sight this far north. But not these. These auroras have strange colors and patterns; if you listen closely enough, you can hear them whisper to you. It is a strange language that worms into your mind, and you can't get it out of your head, no matter how hard you try.

The Culprit: Unknown as of yet!

Utopia

A reclusive tech billionaire builds a self-sufficient town in the Alaskan wilderness, promising a new age of peace and progress. But beneath the sleek surface lurks a sinister secret, fueled by technology and dark bargains.

The Culprit: You think it is the billionaire, and yeah, he is to blame, but it has more to do with the creature he has made a pact with.

These are just a few of the ideas I have. There are more where this came from.

#AtoZChallenge2022: Y is for Yeti

The A to Z of Conspiracy Theories: Y is for Yeti

Not just yetis, but bigfoot too!  Now Yetis and Bigfoots fall under the heading of cryptids and not so much conspiracy theories.  The conspiracy part comes in later.

Let's be honest here. I love writing about Bigfoot.  Maybe it was growing up in the 1970s when there was a surge in the popularity of Bigfoot sightings.  But in any case, I have talked about them a lot here.  

• Monstrous Monday: Bionic Bigfoot
• October Horror Movie Challenge: Night of the Demon
• Monstrous Mondays: Illinois Hominids
• Monstrous Monday: Sasquatch (BECMI Special)
• October Horror Movie Challenge: Sasquatch, the Legend of Bigfoot
• #AtoZChallenge2021: Y is for Yeti, Almas

My introduction to RPGs was via monsters of myth and legend in the AD&D Monster Manual and while the Sasquatch was not originally there, the Yeti was.  

With all these posts (and these are just the ones on the subject) you would think I have had said everything I can and...that is accurate. But I have not talked about the conspiracies surrounding these cryptids.

Conspiracy #1: The various governments are hiding the evidence of Bigfoot/Yetis for ... reasons.  
I have seen this one in various books and websites and the one thing they all have in common is that there are no good reasons given for why the government would want to go through the efforts to hide it.  The reason given is usually "to protect the population."  But how this is supposed to happen is never very clear.

Conspiracy #2: All the bigfoot sightings are faked by a small group of fakers. This I am likely to believe except that I doubt they are organized in any way.

For NIGHT SHIFT

I do use Sasquatches, Bigfoots, and Yetis in my games.  They might even outnumber regular animals in my games! Well not really. But close.

The NIGHT SHIFT RPG is available from the Elf Lair Games website (hardcover) and from DriveThruRPG (PDF).

New NIGHT SHIFT Content from Elf Lair Games

My *other* publisher, Elf Lair Games, has been putting out some great free content for all of February in support of the new Night Companion and I would be remiss if I didn't share or point some of it out to you all.

Click on the links below for more information.

The Order of the Dragon

This is a holy order of knights set to defend Christianity from Muslim incursions.  Vlad Dracul was a member, but when he became a vampire the order shifted focus to destruction of all vampires and hunting of the supernatural. 

The Divine Order of the Sisters of Orleans  

A sister organization to the Order of the Dragon created by and in the name of Jeanne d’Arc.  They have also survived to the modern day to fight supernatural threats.

Folk Horror

Jason gives some advice on adding Folk Horror to your NIGHT SHIFT games.  This part was left out of the core rules. 

The Mandragora Book Store

Our old friend from the Eden days Derek Stoelting has been part of NIGHT SHIFT from the start.  He is up with more information on the location mentioned in the Quick Start Kit. 

Supers

A couple of good posts on Supers including how to create street-level supers in NIGHT SHIFT using the Inventor class.  Followed up by adding supers to a fantasy style RPG, with NIGHT SHIFT as the translator.

This naturally branched out to and from the next two topics.

Cyberpunk and how NIGHT SHIFT, or more accurately O.G.R.E.S. is a great Rosetta Stone for all sorts of old-school play. 

Finally we get some discussion on the Fighter class.

I also have more NIGHT SHIFT goodness for you all coming up including some more weirdness from Valhalla, AK and a new feature I am working on called From the Editor to support my Weirdly World News NIGHT WORLD from the Night Companion, and GenHEX from the NIGHT SHIFT Core Rules.

So keep an eye out here and on the Elf Lair Games blog for more material for Jason, Derek and myself.

October Horror Movie Challenge: The Fourth Kind (2009)

Going to start my week of Sci-Fi horror with one my wife picked.

The Fourth Kind (2009)

This one seemed like it had a lot going for it. First, we get the notion that this is all based on a true story and actual events.  There is some "found footage" of the "actual people involved" and then we also get Milla Jovovich, who I adore, and Elias Koteas who is always great. 

The movie has some genuine scares involved too.  Even the found footage is good.  The footage of course are also just actors and none of this ever happened.  BUT it does turn out that this area of Alaska does actually have a history of missing persons.

While I went into this one with the idea of mining it for ideas for a BlackStar game (I always wanted to an Alien Abduction plot where humans and aliens are on more equal footing) instead I was given ideas for my NIGHT SHIFT Valhalla, Alaska game.   Valhalla though runs closer to "Resident Alien" than this one's mix of "Close Encounters," "Fire in the Sky," and "Blair Witch."  

The ending left us feeling a little empty. No resolution, but some good jump scares and weird special effects.  

Still, Milla Jovovich is still great. This was one of director's Olatunde Osunsanmi first movies.  He would go on to direct and produce episodes of New Trek and the series "Falling Skies."   So sci-fi is certainly in his wheel-house.

Maybe I should do an Alien Abduction night.

October 2021
Viewed: 21
First Time Views: 9.5

October Horror Movie Challenge: Sasquatch, the Legend of Bigfoot (1976)

I talked about this movie back in June. So I added it to my Amazon watchlist.  And then I forgot about it.  I decided to pull it up for today.

This one can only be described as Previously Watched.  I think I might have watched it a few dozen times back when my family got Showtime back when it was new to our town.  Not a bad choice though for my first re-watch of the season.

The movie is a pseudo-documentary about the "North American Wildlife Research" group taking a group into British Columbia. It had the same feel of a lot of pseudo-documentaries on various "alternative science" that were popular in the late 70s. 

Watching it then, when I was about 10 or so, it seemed like the real deal.  Watching it now? Yeah, I am a little embarrassed I was taken in.

The movie is not great, or even good, but it was a good distraction.  And for a G-rated movie it has some scares in it.  I still remember that howl of the Bigfoots.

The ending is still surprisingly scary.

Watched: 10
New: 9

Night Shift Content

It is not a stretch of the imagination at all to consider this movie the "Event Zero" of what became my Valhalla, AK game.  Of course, the sasquatch in Valhalla is a bit different than this one.  

In a normal NIGHT SHIFT game, the Sasquatch would be more of a threat, like this movie.  In my Valhalla, AK game...well the sasquatch was more of a nuisance.  

Every night the townspeople of Valhalla would be awoken by the sounds of moose braying in the night followed by the unholy sound of something else. I would play the sasquatch sounds at this point.  The old locals of course know this is a sasquatch.  So the PCs investigate, expecting to find dead moose. They don't find any at all.  Quite the opposite really, they find all these female moose just hanging about this one strange clearing.  Turns out that there is a young male sasquatch, a teen really, and has been having sex with the female moose (mooses, moosen, miice?) after the sun goes down.  The townsfolk have been hearing his amorous escapades.  The adventure resolves when they can lure the sasquatch back to his own people.

A bit silly? Yes.  A bit ribald? Sure. But that is exactly the sort of thing I want to happen in Valhalla, AK.

Monstrous Mondays: The Wendigo for NIGHT SHIFT, BX RPG and AS&SH

Modern Wendigo by skeletoninadress

The Wendigo has always been a favorite monster of mine.  

The Algonquin (and Illiniwek) people had great mythology and SO underutilized in games or novels.  One creature that I always was fascinated with was the Wendigo. The Wendigo has been seen a lot in horror fiction, especially with the rise in popularity of werewolves and zombies.  But they are still very interesting.  The most famous one of course is The Wendigo by Algernon Blackwood, followed by August Derleth's Ithaqua.

This is a creature that possesses humans under conditions of extreme cold and hunger and gets them to become cannibals.  Also, people that engaged in cannibalism were also at greater risk of possession.

The Wendigo is a spirit most times, unable to physically manifest in the world or interact with it.  That is until someone in a cold part of the world begins to despair and go hungry.  There are plenty of places in the world that are cold and these have hungry people, the Wendigo though chooses someone though that has or will resort to cannibalism to stay alive. Once this is done the Wendigo has access to the victim's heart. 

With their heart frozen the victim becomes the physical Wendigo.  They appear lean and gaunt, but taller; as if stretched out.  Their hands become claws with vile blue talons.  Their entire appearance becomes more feral.  They appear to be something akin to a ghoul or even a starving were-wolf mid-transformation.  They are constantly hungry, eating all the flesh they can, though they never eat their fill.  Eventually, the wendigo strains the host body too much and they die completely in a number of weeks.  Though there are rumors of giant wendigo, whose heads reach the clouds that are thousands of years old.

I included the Wendigo and the more powerful Wendigo Matron in my The Winter Witch for Swords & Wizardry.  Here it is for other games. 

Wendigo

NIGHT SHIFT

No. Appearing: 1-2

AC: 3

Move: 45ft.

Hit Dice: 8

Special: 3 attacks (2 claws, bite) + Breath weapon, Enhanced Senses, Immunity to Cold, Immunity to Normal Weapons, Requires Blessed weapon to hit.

XP VALUE: 1,280

This creature shares a number of characteristics with were-creatures and undead. Ancient people believed that only a tribal shaman could bless a weapon that would kill both the host body and the wendigo spirit. 

The wendigo is completely immune to all cold-based attacks.  It attacks with its claws and bite and can emit a blast of freezing cold air up 3 times per day for 1d6+5 hp of damage (save for half).

Ordinary World: Wendigos are known to exist in the Ordinary World, but few even among the supernatural community have encountered them.  They are generally feared to be unpredictable and very, very dangerous.

Valhalla, AK:  Everyone in Valhalla "knows" that there are "wendigos" north of the town.  The locals though will point out that the creature everyone thinks is a wendigo is actually the wechuge ("way-chu-gay"). Someone can become a wechuge by breaking a tribal taboo or becoming too prideful. 

Some of the indigenous locals still remember tales from their grandparents and great-grandparents of the horrible winters of long ago where you could hear the howls of the wechuge/wendigo. 

Wendigo

BX RPG

Armor Class: 2     

No. Appearing: 0 / 1d3

Hit Dice: 8

Save As: F8

Movement: 150/50 

Attacks: 3 claw/claw/bite 

Damage: 1d6/1d6/1d8

Special Attacks: Breath weapon (cold) 1d8+5

Special Defense: Immune to cold-based attacks, immune to normal weapons, requires a blessed weapon to hit

Intelligence: 4 (devious cunning)

Morale: 11

Treasure Type: None

Alignment: Chaos

THACO: 12

Experience: 1,750

This creature shares a number of characteristics with were-creatures and undead. Ancient people believed that only a tribal shaman/cleric could bless a weapon that would kill both the host body and the wendigo spirit. A cleric can turn one as a Special Undead. Once a person is infected with a wendigo they can not be cured.

The wendigo is completely immune to all cold-based attacks.  It attacks with its claws and bite and can emit a blast of freezing cold air up 3 times per day for 1d6+5 hp of damage (save for half).

Wendigo

Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea

No. Encountered: 0 (1d4)

Alignment: Chaotic Evil

Size: L

Movement: 50 

Dexterity: 12

Armour Class: 2

Hit Dice: 8

Attack Rate: 3/1 (claw / claw / bite) + breath weapon (cold) x3

Damage: 1d6 / 1d6 / 1d8 + 1d8+5

Special: Immune to cold-based attacks, immune to normal weapons, requires a blessed weapon to hit

Saving Throw: 12

Morale: 11

Experience Points: 1,000

Treasure Class: None

The wendigo are believed to have been first created by Ythaqqa.

They can be turned as undead type 13.

Working the NIGHT SHIFT!

Early mail-call this week and I can't be more pleased.

Night Shift: Veterans of the Supernatural Wars RPG

Hard copies my Jason Vey's and my new game are appearing in the wild and I am so happy.  Here are my leather and standard copies.

The insides also look fantastic.  Better than I had hoped for really.

And of course, it has my favorite of my Night Worlds, Generation HEX.

You can get PDFs from DriveThruRPG and Print copies (not PODs!) directly from Elf Lair Games.

Can't wait to share more with you all including an Other Side exclusive Night Spot. 

Come back for adventures in Valhalla, Alaska.  A Night Spot that can be used in the Ordinary World setting or added to any game.

Been looking forward to this for some time now!

Going to Valhalla, Alaska

Back when I was in high school I had these two friends that put together this "fake" band ala Spinal Tap.  The name of the band was "Harvey Goes to Valala" which was an obvious play on "Frankie Goes Hollywood" and my high school and college nickname "Harvey" (long story).  I say "fake" because it was supposed to be in fun, but my two friends really got into it to the point of "releasing" an album called "Pocket Full of Braincells" (also a full year before Spin Doctors came out with A Pocket Full of Kryptonite, no no there was nothing too that, something in the water in the late 80s/early 90s I am sure).

I liked the town, Valala, and always thought it was this out of the way place up north where the people were weird but had limited outside influences to keep themselves sane.

Valala, Alaska took various shapes and forms in my mind since the late 80s.  It wasn't till the late 90s/early 00s that I considered using the WitchCraft game.  I thought about it again when I was running a WitchCraft game online a few years back, "Vacation in Vancouver" which was a fun, but really dark and adult game (deaths in a prostitution ring that catered to supernatural clients).
The Valala game was going to be something along the lines of a weird Northern Exposure.  A town full of odd folk and supernaturals.  There was going to be humor, but dark.

Over the weekend I was doing laundry and found the "concert" shirt for the Harvey Goes to Valala World tour.  All the towns were places where we all had run off to go to college.  But it got me thinking about this game again.

I still think WitchCraft is a great choice for it, but again with dark humor and really strange people; both mundane and supernatural. Everything in most modern supernatural games are so serious.  This would be.  Sure things would still be dangerous. But the characters would all be locals and quirky ones at that.

With WitchCraft I could use all the supernatural types.  I have always wanted a Werebear character in one of of these games.  I also had this idea for an old and lazy vampire.  Basically the opposite of every other vampire you have ever seen. He's old, ugly, poor and lazy. He survives by trapping animals.
I'd also have to include some crazy ass, conspiracy theory- believing, "prepper" guy.  Someone living in a hole in the ground with his guns and cans of beans.

It was pointed out to me that this is a similar idea to Buffy.  But mine would be less Joss Whedon and more David Lynch.

I would need to get some basic adventure ideas together.  The trick is to take a normal supernatural adventure and do something bizarre with it.   The first one I came up with was about a Sasquatch.  In the normal adventure the Sasquatch is causing problems or killing the local livestock.  In a "Buffy" version the Sasquatch is a demon.  In the "Valala" version the Sasquatch is having sex with the females of the local moose population.  The cries of the moose are keeping people up at night.  The moose hanging around the outskirts of the city because they are enjoying are causing even more problems.  So the issue is not "wow Bigfoot is reall!" it's "Bigfoot is real. And he is a nasty perv keeping everyone up at night."

If I come up with some more ideas I'll share them.  Thought with what I have been thinking of lately you might not want me too!

I'll have to look to see what I have of this.  I seem to recall making a map of the town at one point.  It was on the water.

Though I think I am going to rename the town to be Valhalla, AK.  Kinda like calling a town "Hell" or "Purgatory".