It’s Jonathan here again with another Rules Ramble! Each week, I’ll introduce a topic that will be important in an upcoming game, explain some new mechanic or system for DR:TX, or discuss a particular rule from the DR Corebook. In each ramble, I’ll focus on explaining that topic in more detail than the book alone can provide and help provide one place to reference all the various errata or rulings that might be relevant. Sometimes I’ll even drop a few Story Teasers or provide a summary of the last game in a Game Recap.
This week, we are starting with our four-week countdown to our first combined virtual AND in-person NATIONAL EVENT of 3.0, covering some details on what you get for attending this event, new Blueprints that will be released, and our Content List for this event, as you get ready to experience …
THE NECROPHAGE
What is it?
THE NECROPHAGE is the First Virtual + Live Dystopia Rising Crossover Event — a joint production of DR: Texas and DR: Connecticut. We will be running TWO linked games, one online with our friends at DR:CT - STORMWALL, that starts the story of Grandfather Nichols and the creation of the Necrophage virus, and then we will finish that story in person, at Camp Kachina, for our first LIVE National Event of 3.0 - PYROCLASM. The events that occur in the virtual game will directly effect the resolution of our live event!
This is an exciting opportunity to invite folks to a game as BIG as Texas, and show our friends across the network some good old San Saba hospitality. We get to tell a BIGGER story, use BIGGER bad guys, and help you experience a BIGGER event!
Let’s talk a little about what to expect…
The Story:
Something wicked this way comes...
Grandfather Nichols and the evil forces of Killhouse Prison’s extended network of murderers, candymen, maniacs and machinators, have come home to roost in the Lonestar at last. From the necrotic swamps of the Wailing Shores, the mad Nemesis doctor brings with him The Necrophage, a powerful mutagenic disease that turns anyone who breathes it into pliant supersoldiers and eventually, living bombs. Nichols seeks to destroy the system that betrayed him twice, by immolating the San Saba Territories with the very brains of the people who committed each layer of badly broken faith.
Nichols sieges Killhouse Prison; lair to the most foul and murderous personalities in the Lonestar Wastes, recruiting an army from within. The Necrophage spreads out before him like a black carpet, but in his way is the township of New Bravado, where the Oxline pulls into station. When Nichols steps off the train, with his newly Necrophage-infused soldiers in tow, it will be with the intention to complete the genocide of the San Saba people, a feat denied to him one year ago. With the successful test of his mutagen on Bravado, Nichols will be able to market The Necrophage to tyrants and warmongers across the Greater Wastes as a tool to create armies from enemies.
As the Necrophage creeps across the Blastlands, rendering common strains into vicious and merciless killers, it must be to be the will of the Survivors that rise up to meet the ardent monsters who stride across the San Saba unshackled. Left unchecked, The Necrophage will first infect everyone in the San Saba and then beyond. In an act of ironic Indulgence, the Survivors must team up with the new Warden of Killhouse Prison one last time to cleanse the waste of criminal filth once contained within, and thereafter choose the ultimate fate of the unlawful in the San Saba.
A cell, or a coffin.
wHERE cAN I BUY TICKETS?
Pre-Registration: What do I get?
Once you’ve bought your ticket (or if you are still on the fence), let’s talk about what you get.
If you can, we hope you can get your tickets early and help our team with some advanced ideas of how many players to prepare for, what kinds of NPC shifts we can expect to have for big fights, and help craft our plans for cabins and tenting. Pre-registration helps us with all of these things and more, but it even offers some nice advantages for you as well..
Save time on site!
While you can still purchase a ticket for PYROCLASM on site, it’s a National Event so there could be a bit more traffic to get checked in when there are many more players on site. The BEST advantage to getting a ticket early is that we will have your Character Sheet pre-printed and ready to go so you can save time in line. Spend that time claiming a bunk, setting up your tent, plot out your item builds for the weekend, grabbing dinner with your friends from all over the country, or just use it to take your time getting into that neat upgrade to your costume.
Opt in to the story
In the pre-registration questionnaire, you will have your FIRST opportunity to OPT IN to the Necrophage plot kit in person. You can choose to try out a terrible fate for your character, and get opted in for a deadly and harrowing experience. I’ll cover a bit more about this below in our Content List. This is a guaranteed way to get a jump start into the action at the National Event, but it is still OPTIONAL — there will be other ways to OPT OUT of the disease plot at the event as well! Do you have what it takes to survive THE NECROPHAGE?
mechanics and items:
I know, I know. Let’s get to the good stuff, why you are really attending a National Event:
EXTRA XP — National Events allow you to purchase up to TEN (10) more Experience Points for each of your characters. This is a huge leap forward, allowing you to buy that next Skill a few months early, or even pay the points for a new Infection or a PFA Action Request.
SELF TEACH — You gain the ability to Self Teach ANY Skill (Non PFA) that you are able to learn, on each of your characters that are checked in. If you have an Advanced Membership, you can Self Teach a Skill for each of your three characters! This is a trick that normally costs 50-300 CAPS to get a teacher, so this is a great value. Have you been struggling to find a player that has that particular Skill you want? Look no further!
ONE MYSTERIOUS ORE — Your Primary Character will earn ONE (1) Mysterious Ore, a brand new DR:TX Local Plot Item printed on a neat illustrated item card. These new items will be crucial during our National Event, and are a new collectible item that will surely be a prize for folks that like to collect currency and other unique items in game. There will be other ways to earn these in game, but this is one guaranteed way to get your hands on this new item.
ONE FESTERING CRYSTAL — Your Primary Character will earn ONE (1) Festering Crystal, a National Event Resource available at National and Premiere Events in limited quantities. This item can be used to activate certain powerful Murder Incorporated blueprint items, as well as being used in several new injectable brews called Byproducts.
NARRATIVE CROSSOVER — If you have purchased a ticket to the Virtual DR:CT event the previous week, there will be a direct narrative crossover between the characters, places, and plots of these two events. While it won’t be necessary to attend both games to enjoy the plots of PYROCLASM, there will certainly be more context to certain events happening in game if you attend both events.
An example of what Mysterious Ore looks like!
Festering Crystals
New Blueprints!
Oh yeah. My favorite part.
We have at least FIVE new Blueprints coming your way, featuring some of the San Saba favorites you might have seen as Local Plot Cards in previous seasons. We’ve got a fan favorite item that was MUCH requested by folks all over, as well as some unique items with a bit of Texas flair. These will be new NATIONAL BLUEPRINTS available throughout the network after our event, but attending in person to our PYROCLASM event will be the FIRST opportunity to get one of these new items. We will be previewing these items over the coming weeks, so stay tuned!
If you are like me, you gotta catch ‘em all! Don’t miss out on a chance to keep your collection of blue paper up to date!
Content LIST
Based on feedback from our last game, we’d like to make sure we are providing some advanced notice about themes and elements in the upcoming National Event to allow you to to decide whether or not a DR:TX event will be something you enjoy. In our tradition of radical trust, we want to also trust in each player that attends our game to know their own limits and be able to choose to avoid topics and situations that make them uncomfortable.
We’ve had up a Content List on our website for a while now, but I’d like to bring your attention to some of the common elements of a DR event, while also focusing on two major things to expect in this upcoming game, PYROCLASM.
This concept is in the DR Corebook, on page 13:
A content list is Dystopia Rising’s use of a technique known as innehållsförteckning, or “ingredients list”, which was first created by Nordic game designer Karin Edman. A content list is a series of focuses that are expected to be regularly occurring at a local branch. It is not the same as a content warning in that a content list provides a wide array of information about the nature of an event’s intended design and not just items that the writers of an event may see as “warning worthy”. Since it is impossible to know what might be triggering for all potential participants, we have decided it is better to provide a listing of content (or ingredients) that participants can use to make educated decisions regarding their participation at an event.
Past the Content List, there are two major elements of the next game that need to be specifically mentioned, and I’d like to talk about them in turn.
Content List: infectious Disease & Weaponizing Diseases
The story of the zombie apocalypse is at it’s heart a story of disease. Zombie stories involve pandemics, viruses, and the deadly consequences of what that disease turns survivors into. You could argue that “fear of disease” is the key trope to any story that involves zombies and the undead. During our PYROCLASM event, we will be using a new dangerous Disease into the world of Dystopia Rising.
Given the state of the global pandemic and the impact Covid-19 has had on us all, we understand that this topic isn't for everyone. Each of our lives have been impacted by this crisis and each person is dealing with this trauma in different ways. Our goal is not to minimize the impact of this disease nor it’s effect on our community, and given that we have staff members who have lost a family member to Covid-19, we empathize with anyone that has suffered loss during this pandemic.
Last season, DR:TX explored this concept in depth during our game BLOOD FEAST. During this event, we released a terrible disease known as Gutscourge, and introduced the villainous Grandfather Nichols for the first time in a live game. I included a similar warning about this topic back then and it’s worth repeating for this event.
During our upcoming National Event, we will be using a brand new in-character disease known as NECROPHAGE. This disease has the strong potential to be character deadly, especially in it’s later stages as it can remove Infection itself from your character. I’ll be going over these specific mechanics in a later blog post in detail called The Anatomy of a Disease Plot Kit, but since it’s a possibility I’d like to make sure everyone knows how to avoid this up front.
Necrophage can be character deadly and your character can permanently die from this disease.
There will also be SCs and NPCs that will be actively attempting to spread and weaponize this disease in game. These villains will be trying to purposefully infect your character with this disease as part of their dastardly plan, so there will be some potential danger of your character contracting this disease during the course of the event. There will also be some chance of contracting the disease through environmental exposure like Zone of Mechanics or particular unique props.
Contracting Necrophage may NOT be for you, so this disease is unique in the fact that you can OPT OUT at any time. You may not want to risk Infection, or maybe your story of your character isn’t finished yet.
With our Natural Immunity rules, you can simply declare yourself IMMUNE to this disease at the start of the game, and you will be mechanically safe from the effects of the disease for the entire game, even if Grandfather Nichols himself tries to infect you. This won’t necessarily protect you from a Killing Blow from a bad guy or raider, or a being devoured and Cannibalized by a pack of zombies, but I can promise that you contracting a disease won’t be the reason your character dies.
It IS still a survival horror game, after all.
Natural Immunity (OPT OUT MECHANIC):
If you would like to OPT-OUT of this National Disease Plotkit, you may write NATURAL IMMUNITY on your character(s) sheet before Game-on and if exposed to a situation where you would contract it at any level, you may call “No effect, Natural Immunity”. This immunity cannot be applied to any character, other than your own, through any in-game mechanic.
This Natural Immunity status will be used during Research Challenges in order to develop a Treatment Plan and permanent cure for this disease.
I’ve wrote a lot of information about this disease and some of our philosophies on approaching this topic on our National Event Website several weeks ago, and you can find a link to explore more here:
Content List: Loss of Control & Compulsion
One of the curious side effects of the Necrophage disease is one that Grandfather Nichols has worked to weaponize with his allies in the Wailing Shores. During this event, victims of the Necrophage virus will be extremely vulnerable to a local DR:TX mechanic called COMPULSION.
This mechanic will be in play on limited NPC threats portrayed by STs and Gamerunners, but it offers a powerful way to cause a Loss of Control to your character. Many horror stories involve this concept, where you are powerless to stop a monster that is itself a metaphor for the relentless advance of time, death, or war.
Here’s the mechanics to expect:
Compulsion
Effect. When an NPC calls “Psionic: Compulsion, All <KEYWORD>, [Insert Command]”, the affected target must follow the next single command until the task is completed or nullified (such as being compelled to defend someone who then dies). The target must complete the command to the best of their ability. When the target enters Bleed Out, the effect immediately ends. Characters under the effects of Compulsion remember the actions they take, but are not in control of them. This ability is normally resisted by Mental Endurance, but some effects may prevent this resistance.
You can already do similar things to this Skill on zombies and raiders with Telepathy, but this Threat Skill allows them to use a similar ability on YOU. That last line is important, though, because one effect that prevents this resistance is being inflicted with an advanced stage of NECROPHAGE.
Characters with Stage 2 or beyond of Necrophage will NOT be able to spend Mind points to resist these Compulsions. This means that if your character is infected with this disease, it could put you into situations where your character is no longer in control of their actions. This is a unique form of mind control that might allow the bad guys to COMPEL you to help them. The bad guys might order you to defend them, hurt your friends, abandon your crew, or do other terrible things that your character might not normally do.
If you were playing in 2.0, you may remember similar abilities that monsters could use to turn you into a Body Puppet, and it can be a great challenge and intense scene when one of your friends suddenly turns on you and it’s not just the monster that’s after you in that combat.
However, you have TWO ways to avoid this mechanic in game.
First, you can decide that your character has a particular quirk that makes you completely immune to the Necrophage virus. If your character is Naturally Immune (see above) to the Necrophage, then you will be able to resist these effects as per a normal psionic attack. You might need to save some Mind points for a use of Mental Endurance, but you can avoid some of the terrible commands like “kill and eat your friends”, for instance. There will even be other items in game that can help you resist this ability if you don’t have the Mental Endurance Skill too.
Secondly, you can choose to use the OK Check-In System to opt out of a scene entirely by using the “thumbs down” gesture and exiting the area.
SIMPLY PUT: The COMPULSION mechanic DOES NOT override the OK Check-In system.
Our ultimate goal with THE NECROPHAGE is to tell a story about villains spreading a dangerous disease on purpose, recruiting others by force and compulsion to help their cause, and causing significant damage to the San Saba and your characters unless YOU can stop them from their evil machinations. We want you to consider a world where DEATH is finally the end, where you need to come to grips with not coming back when you die, and the consequences that erupt when the very cycle of Infection you’ve come to understand is under threat.
It’s a high risk, high reward type story, and we hope you are as excited as we are.
If you have already purchased a ticket for this event and would like a refund based on this information, please email info@dystopiarisingtx.com.
where can I find out more about the event?
We’ve had a lot of resources up already for the Necrophage events, and our friends at DR:CT have been hard at work with an ARG event through Discord, cool new videos, and a lot of interactive content already. Over the next few weeks, we will provide even more details about this event, but for now we have a few resources to use:
Upcoming Blogs:
Over the next few weeks, I will be focusing on topics related to our upcoming National Event. Here’s a sneak peek of what to expect:
Pyroclasm: National Event Expectations - National Events have a LOT more players involved, and that means some different logistics than a normal game, for things like the Post Office, sleeping arrangements, LIT inventory, NPC shifts, and such. I’ll try to cover some realistic expectations about what to expect at a National Event, so you can be ready to hit the ground running.
Pyroclasm: Anatomy of a Disease Plot Kit - The story of Pyroclasm involves a new and dangerous disease known as The Necrophage. I’ll discuss some expectations for this disease, how you can avoid it, how you can opt in, and some ideas of what to expect if medical research and science is your idea of a good time.
Pyroclasm: What’s Different in DR:TX? - We have a lot of travelers coming out to our first live game in a while. Let’s talk about some culture expectations of our game, some major differences between our game and what you might see at your local events, and some resources to help you understand the differences.
Pyroclasm: Rules You Should Know - The week before game I will release a series of specific rules that might come up during the PYROCLASM event. We will talk about some common rules that might be important, new Zones of Mechanics, new Plot Items, and new Threat Skills you should save some Mind points to Avoid!
It’s an exciting time for DR:TX, so make sure you get your tickets to THE NECROPHAGE: PYROCLASM today! See you soon travelers to the San Saba and Vados alike!
