Mixed Bag

 

****Quick Update****

Bad News: I haven't been actively blogging since mid-January because I lost my job and for the past two months my computer has solely existed to submit job applications. That hasn't changed, I'm still looking. You can ease my financial stresses by buying the Monster of the week Tome of Mysteries out in May. You can read about it here and buy it wherever RPG products are sold.

Good News: The Monster of the Week Tome of Mysteries is being published! It's out in May!
I've already mentioned two-three times in this blog post but it's still kinda unreal to me. It's pretty cool. I'll also start blogging again with regularity, Google+'s absence will be felt.
I'll probably post something about that.

tl;dr: I'm not dead, just sidelined. But I contributed to a book coming out in May. You can learn more about it here.

Redwood Mystery Machine

My long running podcast ended earlier this year and we've decided to keep playing Monster of the Week. We're in the same setting but jumping from the Deep South in the Great Depression to Northern California in the late 90's. Most of the preparation for Tumbleson was done via a D6,6 table providing the sorts of rumor and gossip that permeate small towns wherever the grass grows. I put this together for Shasta, California.

D6,6
1,1 - Strangers - The Park houses a large population of drifters and vagrants, so be careful when you're camping. Don't leave anything out or it'll walk off. And pack table salt. A line at the door to your tent should suffice.
1,2 - Medical trials - The local Church is heavily involved with the local medical practices, funding many of them directly. Especially the Urgent Care and free clinics. However, if you ever need a little money, you can always go to the Hospital and participate in some medical trials. They take a bunch of neurology readings and stuff. I heard Dr. Alder at the college is also offering money for some other ... stuff.
1,3 - Sleepwalking - Speaking of Dr. Alder, has your sister been sleeping alright? My nephew was in his class and stayed late for extra credit. Ever since then he walks and talks in his sleep, talking to things that aren't there. Could he still be in Il Regno Delle Fate? Should've out grown it by now.
1,4 - Missing children - There's been a rash of child kidnappings. Unfortunately the sheriff can't be bothered with it. Just a bunch of poor kids out in the trailer parks, far from the touristy spots. If some out-of-towner was snatched he'd give a shit.
1,5 - Suspicious circumstances - Three bodies washed up in a creek deep in the park. They were all young Klamath women, which explains why it wasn't really reported. Coroner said they died from drowning. 

dappermouth

1,6 - Enchanted motel - When you're driving late at night on those two lane roads, wending through the trees, you might see a neon sign for a motel you don't remember. It's safe to sleep there if you need to. Just heed the sign and don't eat anything. Even the mints on the front desk.
2,2 - The old junk shop - You know the junk shop with the "?" sign? That's the "Mysterium" it's where everyone's old crap ends up. Ran by Zach Ketchum. A lot of weird shit ends up there too. Unlike Gold Diggers Pawn, Zach puts it all up on the shelf for sale. Usually has a yarn to got with it.
 2,3 - Ritual murder - Valeria Magnani was hard to get along with. But she didn't deserve to die like she did. It must've taken a long time, having her face split up like a flower and her eyes cut out. I heard she was close to one of the MCs. Maybe a gang killing?
2,4 - Slaughtered family - You remember last summer when the Tillinghasts went missing? Turns out they were killed about a half mile into the woods from that rest stop. Never did catch the killer.

2,5 - Wisemen - The Town was founded by Italians who've "gone native." That's why everything waxes Americana too thick. The past 30 years have been marked by East Coast wiseguys "Going West" into retirement. Those idle hands end up doing a lot of "community work" for the local Church, dedicated to St. Clare of Assisi.
2,6 - Pill mill - If you're hurting, just see Dr. Ricci. He'll get you the medicine you need. Since Valeria's murder, he's the only person I'd trust. He won't take money, instead he'll want favors. Last time my brother needed some painkillers, we took a package out to the prison for Kim Yancy.

3,3 - Crossroads - You know the local record shop? Yeah, "Holy Mountain". Warburton's kid runs it, and he's really turned around musically. Gossip's he went down to the crossroads and bartered with a Fell Power, sealing the deal with a fluid exchange. But that's just superstitious nonsense.
3,4 - The Gentry - If you came for the golf, you're in for disappointment. The local country club keeps odd hours, a stable full of horses, and the grounds are unkempt. Nothing weird about that at all.
3,5 - Motorcycle clubs - Something about the woods draws the rootless. Jim Jones, the hippies, etc. The Town used to have a bunch of small motorcycle "cliques", calling them clubs would oversell them. Recently two large outlaw clubs moved in - the Shaggy Men and the Mountain Devils. Venomous rivals, if you've got a bike they'll patch you in for whatever rumble is sure to happen.
3,6 - The covered bridge - I hope the old bridge get's taken down soon. the road feeding it has  been blocked for a decade. Fool kids playing out there are liable to get hurt. 
4,4 - Bigfoot hunters - Everyone's heard those stories of folks going missing in state parks. The Park and the Mountain are a bit different. A couple of yahoos have moved in to the Trailer Park, hunting "Bigfoot". They've got tunnel vision- eyes only for Sasquatch. I hope they don't stumble across the Market.
4,5 - Silly games - You ever wonder how ideas spread among kids? You know; insults, jokes, nursery rhymes, and other odds 'n ends. Especially playground games. The kids around Town have been playing the same game of pretend for the past decade. Even kids who just moved in get into it. The call it "The Matter" and there's prescribed role and motivations. Whoever plays the monster is called "Talpa" and wants to pluck out the maiden's eyes.
4,6 - Star crossed lovers - The Rosettis and the Lastregas have bad blood since their fathers' time back East. I heard they buried the hatchet last year but, with Ray L making eyes at Jerry R, I don't think the patriarchs will leave it alone.

5,5 - Dreamlands - Did you know that Spanish cartographers drew California as a massive island? I think the Mountain remembers that as truth. Spend too many nights up there and you'll dream of an Old World Eden. It's a strange place. Clings to you even after you leave. The old families call it "Il Regno Delle Fate". 
5,6 - Mystery cult - It's an open secret around here that "the Church" isn't some extension of larger Catholicism. It's a syncretic mix of folk beliefs and New Age hippie stuff. They hold their doors open, but only members who meet various esoteric requirements are initiated into the greater mysteries. I know couples who were struggling to have kids were blessed with kids not long after joining. 
6,6 - Roll twice. 

Sounds like - Dragonaut by Sleep off the Album: Holy Mountain

On Top of Mt. Shasta: The Goblin Market

The Goblin Market - Getting lost's an easy thing in the Park, finding is often the hard part. Plenty of treasure hunters and mystics have wandered off the beaten path surrounding the mountain. Never to be seen again. Most become ensnared in the Goblin Market's wheeling and dealing. Squirreled away in the rough country, you can find vagrant tent cities intermingled with market stalls and vendors hawking a range of goods. Some human, some not. All are welcome to barter in the Goblin Markets. Just remember that money doesn't spend here. They're interested in baubles and ephemera, refusal gets the Gobbomeister Flim-Flam involved.
And nobody wants that.

Goal: They want more people to come to the park. Some to trade, some to lose.
Move: Constituents of the Goblin Market may take Sticky Bandit as an advancement.
Sticky Bandit - When you turn out your pockets looking for something, roll +Sharp. On a 10+ then you have what you need. On 7-9, you have something that's not quite close enough. On a miss, you had it but someone stole it from you.
Leader: Flim-Flam - At the intersection of snake oil and used cars salesmen, you'll find Flim-Flam. His loud suits and greasy hair camouflage his Otherworldliness, something he'd rather not discuss. The greedy goblin has grown fat and happy with the Underdim Compact and maintains it as best he can. If the Mole King wants a girl with green eyes, then that's what Ualichu gets.

Like this but WAY more flea market.

On Top of Mt. Shasta: The Wireless Church

The Wireless Church- Settled by Italian immigrants in 1905, the city of Mt. Shasta was fertile ground for fringe beliefs and folk traditions. Later this century the New Age Movement declared Mt. Shasta a sacred mountain, a lodestone of spiritual energy, or a refuge of lost Atlantean civilization. The Wireless Church is a culmination of all these beliefs and more. Claiming lineage from the benandanti and guidance from Saint Clare of Assisi, patron saint of television. They espouse the belief that the soul is an eternal part of the electromagnetic spectrum. That when you die, you're dispersed into the ionosphere and have a unique frequency. With proper diet and prayer, you can tune into the Saints and maybe even the voice of God. For a faith movement so heavily predicated on communication through the ages, they are heavily invested in human cloning, President Clinton's ban on 3/4/1997 has thrown leadership into a tailspin.

Move: Members of the Wireless Church may take the move Divine Protection as an advancement.

Divine Protection - The Saints grant you 1-armor, impenetrable. If you wear armor  use that instead.
Goal: They seek the lost Refuge the Saints say is in the park, so they can shelter against the turning of the millennium.

On Top of Mt. Shasta: The Groundskeepers

Groundskeepers - You won't find park rangers friendlier than those working at Mt. Shasta State Park. Under the keen supervision of Chief Ranger Carson Ranger, the park's volunteer and professional staff have become the envy of the National Park Service. The saccharine shell of smiling faces and ever helpfulness hide a secret. Several of the park rangers formed a druid cult around the"Stareek." Following its guidance they plant juniper saplings around the park and on neighboring properties. In exchange they have purpose and command over the park's wildlife. Park Lieutenant Rodney Womack is the self-appointed leader. A sprig of juniper in his hatband.
Goal: They want to expand the boundaries of the park. By any means.
Move: A Groundskeeper Initiate can take the move Wild Tongue as an advancement.
Wild Tongue - You can speak and understand the speech of animals. You may also issue simple one word commands and they obey the best they can.
Leader: Park Lieutenant Rodney Womack - A once athletic guy, now gone to seed. Park Policeman Womack crawled inside the bottle after his divorce. Since communing with the Stareek, his life has found new purpose. No one will take it away from him.

On Top of Mt Shasta: Shaggymen MC

Shaggymen M.C. - Founded in 1972, the Shaggymen drew mostly from the reclusive Sasquatch community in Northern California. Originally a way to hide in plain sight, the idea caught on and other Bigfoot communities across North America started their own chapters. The world has shrunk over the last 25 years and Shaggymen M.C. feels the crunch as the open road becomes the big empty. Peanut, the Shasta Chapter's sky pilot, experienced a spiritual revelation that Mt. Shasta is the paradise for all Bigfoot and it's their Manifest Destiny to seize the park.
Goal: They want to take over the park for all Bigfoot kind.
Move: If you're a sasquatch then you may take One Man Gang as an advancement.
One Man Gang - You count as a small gang when you Kick Some Ass
Leader: Rubble - An enormous Sasquatch standing a bit over 8 feet. His intense gaze draws the eye away from his piebald appearance. Swathes of his fur were burned away in a fight with a rival Bigfoot M.C. - The Mountain Devils.

Troublesome Times In Tumbleson County - Teaser Trailer

Calm Before the Storm

I haven't blogging as much over the last two months or so, because other projects have taken my focus.  Since my birthday in April I've been running my Southern Gothic MotWeek campaign, Tumbleson County, within earshot of a microphone.  Most of my free time has been consumed with co-production (editing, voice over, etc.) and we're hoping to have it ready for weekly release come Thanksgiving.  For more information, you can check out our network page here.

Not yet a link

Tumbleson County Glossary Part 2

 All the different monsters I've made list various keywords as Powers.  Here's the context and mechanics for Tumbleson County's haints and monsters. 


Tumbleson County is a God-fearing patch of Earth on the eastern bank of the Mississippi River, too bad God forgot all about them.  The hunters are townsfolk, young and old, fighting to keep their town together.  Ghosts of a damnable past, and a bloodier future, rise up beneath the boughs and rotten plantation roofs sending it all tumbling down. 
Necromancer- Derived from the Etruscan tradition of communing with the dead, necromancy was once a sacred art.  True masters can do more than interrogate bones, they can command and control the mortal remains. Since the coming of Christianity the Black Art has become taboo.  Once a necromancer puts out the call, the dead rise for the next 2d6 moves.

Norn- To the layman the future is an open field of possibilities, to the fortune teller it’s a get rich scheme, to the oracle a nebulous cloud of events but, to the norn, the future is as straight forward as a railroad track.  If the hunters have earned a norn's ire then Doom is shortly at hand.  When a norn is the source of Keeper moves, then hunters have to spend an additional point of Luck to gain any benefits.

Oracle- Participating in an ecstatic tradition of seeing the future, oracular visions are a hurley-burley of conflicting images and actions.  Disorganized and conflicting from the onset, an experienced oracle massages the barrage into a rough sequence.  

Otherside- The Otherworld, Hell, the Umbra, or the Upside Down; whatever you call it the Otherside is a rough place where everything is backwards and more literal.  Left is right and right is wrong. Home to carnivorous entities such as Eidolons, 

Invert the stats rolled for moves, ex: roll +weird instead of +charm and vice versa.

Ourside- To describe Ourside as the physical world is short-selling the wondrous reality surrounding human minnows.  So much of the human mind's daily processes revolve around locking the doors of perception and staying mercifully disorganized. When you look to closely at the world, the world look back.  Attracting unwelcome attention is a soft move in Tumbleson County.

Shapeshifter-  Supernatural entities rarely hold fidelity to form, their flesh changes on a whim.  This makes corporal destruction a daunting task, especially out in the woods.  Sometimes the only way to be sure is setting a forest fire. But that comes with its own complications.

Silver Tongue- Some, like the Biblical Aaron, can sell ice to Eskimos and charm the Sun from the sky.  These golden calves are dangerous to themselves and others.  Like the Boy Who Cried Wolf they wear their veracity thin.  Any creature with this quality is a font of unvarnished truth and sincerity, until provided contradictory information hunters do not doubt them.

Sin-Eater- What's become an Appalachian tradition has its roots in the English hinter country.  Through the consumption of a ritual meal, a single person takes on the sins of a household.  In Tumbleson County, only the most trusted are allowed to perform the practice as it peels back the mask of gentility and reveals the family's myriad sins.  Sin-Eaters are a trove of discrete evils and possible blackmail.

Skin Thief- The dead don't need their covering and evil men desire to mask their sins.  With a prepared ungent, human skin, and the light of the full moon; a man may become a monster.  While wrapped in the stolen form, their conscience is suppressed and their ill thoughts spill forth.  Grotesque tableaus and violent crimes spring in the wake of skin thievery, graverobbing is just the first sign.

Spirits- Tormented echoes, whether once a dream or a living thing.  A torturous death produces a more powerful haint.  There isn’t any set form, the only thing they share is permeability.  Spirits gain power by kludging together but they then lose focus and threaten their long term existence as unfinished business becomes a poison of mass distraction. The monster moves through solid objects without hindrance and can drag hunters with them as a soft move, leaving them partly in as a hard move (5-harm)

Tumbleson County Glossary Part 1

 All the different monsters I've made list various keywords as Powers.  Here's the context and mechanics for Tumbleson County's haints and monsters.

Tumbleson County is a God-fearing patch of Earth on the eastern bank of the Mississippi River, too bad God forgot all about them.  The hunters are townsfolk, young and old, fighting to keep their town together.  Ghosts of a damnable past, and a bloodier future, rise up beneath the boughs and rotten ceiling beams sending it all tumbling down.

Eidolon- The Greek word for apparitions, describes immaterial entities of the Otherside too great to exist on Ourside without flesh to anchor them.  Unembodied, the best they can do is leer from mirrors and other reflective surfaces. The monster always deals at least 2 points of harm, regardless of spending Luck.

Emanation- Supernaturally potent beings composing Ourside, often clothed in religious symbolism and described as gods or angels.  They command a particular portfolio of earthly properties but overlapping identities.  They will bend an ear to human supplication, but are otherwise uninterested in our mayfly existence. Confronting an Emanation causes it to passively assault your bits that fall under its sway (mark unstable, cannot be reduced.) Ie, Mother Mud causes your fertility to literally rot out of your body.

Embodied- When and Eidolon is anchored to a prepared vessel.  Could be the work of others or a supplicant.  Once embodied, our perceptions invert around the Eidolon’s true nature.  For example, Kindness is anything but sensitive to our feelings. Embodied Eidolons unleash a death curse as they're slain.

Face of Innocence- The mask of civility and normalcy remains in place because people are desperate for pacifying routine.  Some monsters prey on this weakness, blending in with the masses and obscuring their true nature to hunters.  The monster in indistinguishable from bystanders, unless a hunter exposes themselves to the true horror of reality.

Great and Terrible- Some monsters clothe themselves in atavistic fear, provoking fight or flight response in onlookers.  Hunters take -1 forward until a 10+ Acting Under Pressure breaks the fear.

Immortal-  Some things are just too ornery to take the Reaper's hand, clinging to life with terrible tenacity.  This monster takes -1 harm even if the attack is armor peircing.

Juggernaut/Leviathan:  Some foes are so great that the usual tools for killing aren't up to the task.  Can only be harmed by weapons and effects with the messy tag.

Magus- Well read and learned in the dark wisdom, magi are incredibly dangerous foes to hunt. Able to bend the forces of magic and the weird to their will, the best prepared hunters are underequipped. The Keeper applies Use Magic Backlashes with soft and hard moves.

Mesmerism- Popularly known as hypnotism, meserism is concious communication with the subconcious mind.  Implanting suggestions, manipulating memory, seeding new habits or abolishing old ones; these are only the surface.  Hunters start missing time, God only knows what evil they've wrought in those lost minutes.

 

The River Remembers

 

 Old Man River
The River flows through both Sides, bearing wisdom, greedy for Sky, and jealous of its past. It remembers strangling the Land for forty days and forty nights. When its grasp was broken, it took everything it could carry to the bottom.  The River longs to hold and cherish everything again, never letting go.  Its agents work to complete the River's collection one piece at a time.

The Hellion- a cursed river boat casino, "do what thou wilt" is the only rule until you're caught cheating the House.  The ship is staffed by the Union soldiers forced into the River, fleeing the Harmans' night of vicious revelry.  Passage is negotiated at the crossroads by the Burnt Up Church Place, a night on the Hellion is ephemeral and costly.
Monstrous Motivation Queen
Powers
Spirit, Juggernaut
Harm-  Bloated Boys in Blue 2-harm, messy, loud, ranged Armor- Warped wood armor-2 Health: 12 Health  
Unique Moves

The House Always Wins- When a hunter rolls 10+ the Keeper still makes a soft move. 

Stoke the Fires - When a hunter rolls +Weird, increase the harm caused by the bloated boys in blue by 1 or heal the Hellion 1 Health. 

Salome LaBeija- an agent of chaos and a seer, she uses Kindness' left eye as a crystal ball. She now dwells on the Hellion, since she was drowned in the River, offering self-fulfilling prophecies and cold reading.  Salome's upper vertebrae were harvested for gris-gris, coveted all over the region for their myriad properties.

Monstrous Motivation Trickster
Powers
Face of Innocence, Oracle, Un-Dead
Harm-  Chaos bolt 3-harm, magic, Armor- Unfeeling flesh armor-2 Health: 9 Health  
Unique Moves

Entropic Barrage - When Salome causes harm, she damages another hunter for each degree. 1 additional hunter on a full success, 2 on a partial sucess, and three on a failure.
Lightning Dance- When a storm rages overhead, Salome can appear anywhere behind a lightning strike congealing from the aftermath. 4-harm entrance. 
False Visions - Salome can actively obscure premonitions of the future, hunters take -1 forward when following her poisoned futures.

Baphomet- This great Watcher is trapped in the River's collection since the Good Granny buried its Reliquary in the riverbed.  Bound to the Hellion, s/he runs the Blackjack table and bargains for the souls of mortal folk.  The combination of opposites, its paradoxical nature allows it to slip the Keeper's leash in small ways.
Monstrous Motivation Tempter
Powers
Watcher, The Paradox, Sacred Hermaphrodite
Harm-  Gore 3-harm, messy Armor- Otherworldly flesh armor-2 Health: 13 Health  
Unique Moves
One Man's God, Another Man's Devil- When a hunter makes an offering, roll +Weird - on a 13- hold 3, 10+ - hold 2, 7-9- hold 1. Hunters may spend the hold to cause Use Magic effects in addition to Keeper moves. 
Know Thyself- When Baphomet locks eyes with a hunter, that hunter must confide their weakest moment. Afterimages haunt the hunter, -1 forward in scenes reminiscent of that moment. 

The Apple Fell Close

Original Sin
While the 3 Kings are united in purpose but divided in method, Original Sin is the inverse. They have overlapping goals and share methods, they will be enemies in the end. 

Erica Harman and the Horror That Follows -  If the service hadn't been interrupted, Erica  could have been the Witch of Endor to the Rex Mundi. Now she wants the circle to go unbroken and run through her. One mind, one body, one spirit. 

Monstrous Motivation Collector
Powers
Face of Innocence, Oracle, Grotesque, Spirit
Harm-  The Press of Bodies 3-harm, messy Armor- Pulped mass armor-2 Health: 13 Health

Unique Moves
Tangle of Limbs- When Erica deals harm to a hunter, they take -1 forward as they're caught up in the jungle of her anatomy.  This is cumulative, anyone who takes more than a -3 forward is pulled into the mass and must be rescued.

Heaving Flesh - Hunters roll +sharp when fighting Erica instead of any other stat.  She recovers 1 Health
when she doesn't take any harm as a move's result.

Soiled - Seeing Erica stirs up a wealth of unwholesome feelings, hunters discover they have some issues to work out.  Roll +cool to suppress. 

Barren, the Mother Mud - A spiritual cast-off, Barren forgot her intangible past and found a new purpose in fundamental muck. If she gets her way, the rain will fall ceaselessly and tje mud will brim with new life in her image. 
Monstrous Motivation Breeder
Powers
Emanation, Leviathan
Harm-  Spectral Tadpoles 3-harm, magic, messy The Tongue 2-harm, sticky Armor- Greater than you armor-3 Health: 14 Health
Unique Moves
Human Mud - Anyone dealt damage by a Spectral Tadpole hosts a rapidly gestating Frog Demon minion. Next missed +tough roll births the minion. 

Reel Them In - When a hunter is hit by The Tongue they get pulled into Barren's gullet. 

Formed From Dust - Mother Mud sloughs off doppelgangers of people she's eaten.  They're stuffed full of Frog Demons and don't always survive birth trauma. 

Bayard Tagert- An unrepentant gambler, Bayard ignored his sister's advice and went out to Burnt Up Church Place. At the crossroads he lost his soul to Mother Mud with a roll of the dice. For fear of what he had wrought, Bayard attempted to enlist the Queen. Barren would have none of that and consumed him. Sloughing off a doppelgange of old B.T. and binding his spirit to the Hellion. Now he wants a new chance at life, maybe behind Cam Dolittle's face. 

Monstrous Motivation Tempter
Powers
Silver Tongue, Spirit, Skin Thief
Harm-  Revolver 2-harm, loud Armor- Spectral flesh armor-1 Health: 8 Health
Unique Moves

Helter Skelter - Bayard throws everything not nailed down in a flurry. Roll +tough, everyone marks unstable and suffer 2-harm 

Ghost In the Shell - Outside of Lacuna, Bayard can't physically embody and is forced to interact through machinery. 

We Three Kings

Eidolons. The Greek word for apparition, applied to entities of the Other Side too great to crossover bodiless.  Each Eidolon represents an element of Our Side: wrath, gluttony, greed, etc. Filtered through the Looking Glass, perception distorts their meaning.  Their nature remains static but people interpret the inverse. Thus Deceit is seen as Truth.

The Kings were once lordlings of the Other Side but global events shifted the order of things. The Great War fed souls and pain to Hope, a rising power that usurped their eminent position.  Nostalgic for nights before gods-on-sticks and sterile worship they seek a return to blood, love, and pain. With physical vessels prepared for their spirits, they set their plans in motion. 

Patience, the Cold King -
The long-toothed lord of ambush is known among the folk of Tumbleson County as Charlie. Sprouting from the Ferguson's cthonic seed, the flesh is clay to his will.  He has waited a long time for the Eschaton, he will not wait anymore.

Monstrous Motivation Devourer
Powers
Eidolon, Shapeshifter
Harm Massive Craw 5-harm, messy, magic Armor- A higher order than you armor-5 Health: 20 Health
Unique Moves
Just A Log - May be present in any scene as a piece of the landscape.  When Patience makes his move, inflict 5-harm and hunters take -1 forward as their lizard brains freak out.

Swallow Whole - anyone dealt harm from Patience's Massive Craw could be swallowed whole. Soft move, sliding towards oblivion and separated from the party. Hard move,  lost completely. 

Appeasement - Patience is appeased when families drown their youngest child. He bestows prophecy upon those performing the gruesome rite.
 

Abstinence, the White Teeth -
A large composite skeleton wrapped in gauzy flesh, Abstinence lairs beneath Hollow Hill, the Harman family estate. Each death on the Harman family adding to her mass. Plagued with nagging emptiness, she longs to be full.

Monstrous Motivation Beast
Powers
Eidolon, Necromancer,
Harm- Gnawing and tearing 4-harm, magic, armor piercing Armor- A higher order than you armor-5 Health: 16 Health
Unique Moves
Leftovers- Abstinence vomits Leftovers when threatened, minions made from misshapen beasts and people pulped together. Hunters need to roll +cool to keep their lunch down

Thirsty- Abstinence recovers Health equal to harm dealt. 

Appeasement- Abstinence' favor is earned through debased consumption. Raw offal, feces, cannibalism, the more extreme the greater your favor. The Eidolon grants the ability to wear the flesh of the dead. 

Kindness, the Blackeye Huntress -

A quiet menace, invisible against the night sky, Kindness misses the nights she could inflict cruelties on the human mice. The Rambler, Otis Lee, desecrated the Governor's son's corpse, a blood caked owlet congealed in the remains. She ate his heart and curled up in the cavity. Since the Rambler's arrest she now nests in the jailhouse.

Monstrous Motivation Torturer
Powers
Eidolon, Mesmerism
Harm-  Long Claws of Night 3-harm, magic, armor piercing, mark unstable Armor- A higher order than you armor-5 Health: 16 Health
Unique Moves
Dark Wisdom - Apply 2 backlashes when a hunter attempts to Use Magic. Apply 1 when they roll +weird.

Falling Up- When a hunter suffers harm from Kindness' talons they are drawn hurling upward.  Roll +weird to navigate the surging weightlessness. Plummet to Earth on a miss. 

Appeasement - Missing its right eye stirs Kindness' envy. Offerings of human eyes, especially from the heads of of willing supplicants, draws Kindness' attention. The favored move with the silence and presence of shadows. 

Everyone Trusts Granny

 The Kindly Grandmothers
Beldames, termagants, maenads, and witches are a few of the names you'll hear describing the wild women who dwell far away from Tumbleson's townships.  Sought for favors by the desperate, the cost of business is more  terrible than the nuisance.  With their long memories and longer legacies, these women have a deep influence over County affairs following the Spinner's inscrutable directions.

Good Granny - preys upon her granddaughters and wants to free her grandsons from Abstinence. She uses the Great White Teeth's investments against it.

Monstrous Motivation Parasite- to infest, control, and devour
Powers
Magus, Shape Thief, Sineater

Harm- Hideous strength 3-harm messt Armor- charms braided into her skin armor-1 Health: 12 Health
Unique Moves
Worm in the Apple - Anyone who owes Good Granny a favor bears her worm in their ears, it shares their senses and takes over their bodies when they are willed to do so.
Counterspell - When a hunter rolls +Weird against the monster, reduce the success level by one.
Iron Nails - Good Granny Bulloch can hex any place or person that has one of her iron nails stuck in it.  They look like normal nail with hair wrapped around it. 

The Spinner- under England's gray skies they called her the Cutwife. In the New World she puts her Scissors to the Great Work.

Monstrous Motivation Parasite- to infest, control, and devour
Powers
Norn, Great and Terrible, Immortal
Harm-  The Scissors 2-harm, magic 

Armor- Death trembles to take her armor-2 Health: 10 Health
Unique Moves
Seen It All Before - When a hunter rolls against the Spinner, reduce the success level by one.

Welcome To My Parlor - Anyone who enters her Sanctum is unable to leave without permission. 

The Clean Cut - The greatest power held by witches is centered around fertility. The Clean Cut severs fecundity and fortune, requiring only the victim's bodily scraps. 

Wisteria Coryell - an herbalist first and will worker second, she is deeply involved in the life of her grandson Simon.

Monstrous Motivation Parasite- to infest, control, and devour
Powers
Face of Innocence, Herbalist, Medium
Harm-  Daddy's Peacemaker 2-harm, loud Armor- Innocence only preserves so much armor-0 Health: 11 Health
Unique Moves

A Kiss of Nightshade - If a hunter has consumed something prepared by Wisteria, they are considered poisoned when she wills it.

Malignance - When a hunter rolls +Weird against the monster, take -1 forward on future rolls. 
Daddy's Little Girl - A hunter rolling a miss on +Weird becomes possessed by the ghost of Wisteria's father. Turning on the other hunters, targeting the weakest one first. 

Bumps In the Night

This is a high point perspective of the competing supernatural factions in my Southern Gothic setting.  I will define the terminology and cosmology in entries focusing for intensely on each group.

 The Three Kings

These 3 Eidolons predate Man's arrival beneath the brackish canopy and grew addicted to his worship and flesh. Like junkies hungering for a fix the Three have differing methods to capture Man's fascination. But they share an end goal: aid the Rex Mundi in his Ascent and bask in the adulation of the Eschaton.  To do that they will need an Embodiment, so they can walk on our Side and intercede.
Movers & Shakers
Patience, the Cold King - born to one of its cultists and a Ferguson, its Embodiment is still a child but maturing rapidly.
Abstinence, the White Teeth - entered into a pact with Goodberry Harman, a bit of itself Embodies within every Harman boy.
Kindness, the Blackeye Huntress - the Rambler, Otis Lee, incubates its Embodiment where his heart should be.

Old Man River

The River flows through both Sides, bearing wisdom, greedy for Sky, and jealous of its past. It remembers strangling the Land for forty days and forty nights. When its grasp was broken, it took everything it could carry to the bottom.  The River longs to hold and cherish everything again, never letting go.

Movers & Shakers
The Hellion- a cursed river boat casino, "do what thou wilt" is the only rule until you're caught cheating the House.

Salome LaBeija- an agent of chaos and seer, uses Kindness' left eye as a crystal ball. Dwells on the Hellion since she was drowned in the River.

Baphomet- This great Eidolon is trapped in the River's confines since the Good Granny buried its Reliquary in the riverbed.

The Kindly Grandmothers

Beldames, termagants, maenads, and witches are a few of the names you'll hear describing the wild women who dwell far away from Tumbleson's townships.  Sought for favors by the desperate, the cost of business is more immediately terrible than the nuisance.  With their long memories and longer legacies, these women have a deep influence over County affairs following the Spinner's inscrutable directions.
Movers & Shakers
Good Granny - preys upon her granddaughters and wants to free her grandsons from Abstinence.
The Spinner- under England's gray skies they called her the Cutwife. In the New World she puts her scissors to the Great Work.
Wisteria Coryell - an herbalist first and will worker second, she is deeply involved in the life of her grandson Simon.

Original Sin

Burned alive on a Protestant altar, the death of Erica Harman and a generation of young people gouged a hole to the Other Side. Since then the Burnt Up Church Place is the center of superstition and avoided at all cost. Numinous power gathers and empowers otherwise minor spirits and Eidolons
Movers & Shakers
Erica Harman and the Horror That Follows - a nubile, young lady to the hips heralds the extruded tangle of human limbs and body parts behind it. She wants all of humanity to join her in unity.
Barren, the Mother Mud - the fecundity of the swamp given volition. Jealous of Man's independence, Mother knows best and wants him home.
Bayard Tagert- reneged on a debt he owed to Mother Mud, his soul is now trapped on the Hellion. Her agent in the court of foes.

Gently Used Grimoires and Tomes

“Then, idly scratching his nose, he walks to the bookcase in the living room and stoops before a set of drab brown Victorian volumes gathering dust on the second shelf from the bottom.

How amusing, he thinks, as he withdraws one of them-amusing that a key to dark and ancient rites should survive in such innocuous-looking form.

A young fool like Freirs would probably refuse to believe it. Like the rest of his doomed kind, he'd probably expect such lore to be found only in ancient leather-bound tomes with gothic lettering and portentously sinister titles. He'd search for it in mysterious old trunks and private vaults, in the "restricted" sections of libraries, in intricately carved wood chests with secret compartments.

But there are no real secrets, the Old One knows. Secrets are ultimately too hard to conceal. The keys to the rites that will transform the world are neither hidden nor rare nor expensive. They are available to anyone. You can find them on the paperback racks or in any second-hand bookshop.”  - T.E.D. Klein, The Ceremonies

Mystics, warlocks, and their ilk share one fascination - a desire to be remembered after they have left the world, to stave off their memory's demise. In the past they would take an apprentice, but in the modern age it is much easier to self-publish than ever before.  In spinner racks and recycle bins, the starry wisdom of the ages is available to the truth seeker at bargain prices.  Be wary, the knowledge within will fundamentally change who you are and how you grapple with the world. 

When you read a magic tome, roll +Sharp: on a 10+ you choose 2 Benefits and 1 Backlash, 7-9 you choose 1 Benefit and the Keeper chooses 1 Backlash and 6- receive no wisdom from this tome, for good or ill.

Benefits
Take +1 forward when applying the book's subject to a task. (ex: when you read a book on demon summoning you have more knowledge to draw on when summoning demons.)
Recover 1 point of Luck

Ask 1 question of the Keeper, expect authorial distortion. 

Backlashes
You are drawn to a person or place.
Attract unwanted attention.
Driven to distraction,  -1 forward to off topic rolls. 

A magic tome can only be gleaned once per group of hunters. 

Pelles Holocaustorum (Latin for 'Skinning')
Originally written in Mesopotamia, the Pelles Holocaustorum has belonged to several occultists and mystics through the centuries.  The modern translation was written by the infamous Russian mystic, Rasputin.  The book outlines an escalating series of self-inflicted initiations allowing the initiate to peel back the skin of reality and access its pulsating organs and twisted musculature.
Add the following Benefit and Backlash to the read a magic tome move.
Benefit: You may ask the Keeper 2 questions which they must answer to the best of their ability.
Backlash:  Take 2-harm as your limbs involuntarily begin your initiation.

Great Albert

Relatively common in the Southern United States, this book represents the pinnacle of Albus Magnus' quest for enlightenment.  Finding himself too base to undergo the Grand Transfiguration, the alchemist instead had parts of himself cut off and mixed with ink so he could literally pour himself into the Work.  Since then his essence has been difffused and all copies of the memoir bear matching traits: they weigh as much as a grown man, readers hear the author's voice in their heads, and once you've picked it up, you're stuck with it.  Unless you give the book a funeral.
Add the following Benefit and Backlash to the read a magic tome move
Benefit: You can use magic to create a philosopher's stone.
Backlash: Part of your body petrifies, probably a hand.

Spiritist's Telegraph

Recovered from a sinking library boat in the Ten Thousand Islands, the Spiritist's Telegraph provides a step-by-step guide to attuning yourself to astral frequencies and those who haven't moved on.  Further chapters detail how to invite the broadcasting entities within and similar mysteries.  Overall leaning on the metaphor of spine as antennae for the Otherside.
Add the following Benefit and Backlash to the read a magic tome move
Benefit: You may interrogate distant ghosts when you investigate a mystery.
Backlash: You're lost in the ghost's narrative and rush off to fulfill part of it.

The Verse of Kings
Brought to France by the Swan Knight and entrusted to the Merovingian dynasty, the Verse of Kings empathically selects its readers in pursuit of its own agenda.  The book details the responsibilities of would-be rulers and provides prophecies to those it feels are "worthy."  The book isn't actively malevolent, just understand that anything it shows you serves a greater purpose.
Add the following Benefit and Backlash to the read a magic tome move
Benefit: When you manipulate someone take +1 forward to further manipulate them.
Backlash: Become obsessed with a scrap of prophecy, sacrificing anything to attain the dream.

This month's RPG Blog Carnival theme is the Ways of the Wise, click the image below if you're interested in other fine entries from other fine blogs.