Hi, I'm new to these board, so I hope I'm going about this the right way. *nervous smile*

I'm a religion/religious mythology major and when I told my roleplaying group about my classes, they wanted me to make a roleplaying game based on some of the modern myths I've learned. We've played it and they think I should trry to sell it, so I thought I'd put it up here to see how well it gets received. *nervous smiles*

(Remember, I'm a religion major, not an author.) :)

July 30, 1945

"The trains... the Russian Front will cave if you keep using the trains to transport the Jews, Adolph. We've received word from cammanders... they need supplies in Russia."

"We will not alter the plan!" Hitler declared, pulling an insignificant peice of paper from a towering stack of more insignifican papers. "Russia is not my major concern! My interest lies in the Collectors! Where is their report!"

"The collectors? Do you truly think their success would turn the tide of the war?"

"Look at this LIST!" Hitler yelled, exuming an ancient scrap of paper from his pocket. It had been on Hitlers person for seven years. It smelled of blood. "See these artifacts! The grail of Christ! The vial of his blood! The wood from his cross! But still... the staves of Pharoahs magicians! The staff of Moses! Even the life powder from Africa!" His eyes glossed over with insane dreams of power. "We could create armies. Immortal armies. Perfect armies. Armies who don't need FOOD! WATER! AMMUNITIONS! TANKS! ARMIES WHO DON'T COST MONEY!"

"But the list has nearly twenty items on it. The collectors have only found thirteen and they..."

"They waste their time with worthless JUNK!" Adolph screamed, knocking over the woer of papers. "The sword of Aurthur!? The rings of Mongol!? They waste my time and my money travelling to Japan to search for DRAGONS!?"

"You ordered them to search for rare and-"

"I ordered them to acquire the items on this list! The Russians are mere MONTHS from completing their psychic troops! The Brits have destroyed my super-guns! Without the items... without this ARMY... the war is OVER!"

September 2, 1945

"BERLIN SURRENDERS! THE WAR IS OVER!" -American Headline

"You said the allies would never reach Chzecoslavakia..." a stout man said driving his packed Volkswagen through a desolate town. "The war is over... these items are worthless to us."

"We follow the plan," the woman replied. She removed her sunglasses to reveal her glowing, blood red eyes. "We retreat and reconveine in South America."

"Jesus, Helen... your eyes," the man said stunned. "They're worse. Maybe you should take off that ring."

"I took it off DAYS ago!" she screamed. "It's another one of these cursed items! It's... one of them... and I can't sleep!"

"Collection be damned!" the man said, slamming on the brakes. He got out of the car and began throwing the Collection onto the ground. "The collection and Hitler be damned!"

The Collection lay on the side of that road along with the twenty items on Adolphs list. The pile was scavanged. As the years passed, each peice of the collection was spread to the four winds.

September 16, 2003

Thriteen men in dark robes encircled the Grand Piano once owned by the great Nazi composer Wagner. It was said that one of the strings inside was the string of an Angels Harp.

The fourteenth peice of Hitlers Collection. The list was torn. The remaining six peices were not present.

The New Nazi Regme finished their incantation, hoping to accomplish Hitlers dream of a perfect army. Without all the items present, they brought about unforseen evils upon the world. Evils which were foretold thousands of years earlier.

"And behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it had a bow. A crown was given to him, and he came forth conquering, and to conquer." Revelations 6:2

PRESENT DAY

Inadvertantly, the End of the World was brought upon Earth. War turned nations against nations. Famine swept across the land. Pestilence infected everyone and Death was there to claim the weak.

But man was not ready. They weren't going to go peacefully.

True, the Great Abyss was open and deamons were pouring out, but the War had just begun. The deamons spread from Berlin, but suffered a defeat in Vatican City. The newly elected Pope John Paul III was not afraid and he led the first crusade in hundreds of years against the Deamons.

The Deamons fled back to Germany, and then attempted to attack into Russia. What Russia lacked in firepower, they made up in manpower. They bought themselves time... enough time for Bishop Tolvich to arrive weilding Excalibur. He moved as a mortal, but slayed uncountable deamons as they fled in fear from the splinter of wood hanging over his neck.

Then there were those without the Mark of the Beast... those who were either too poor or to afraid to have the six sided computer chip installed in their hand. this select 144,000 men and women were "saved." 12,000 men and women who descended from the 12 tribes of Judah.

The Heavenly Hosts granted them supernatural powers to endure the Great War. But these men and women were not going to endure. They were going to win.

Priests blessed bullets. Bishops blessed rockets. Massive armies were built. Italy and the Pope led the crusaders. The United States led their troops. Britain deployed uncountable aircraft. Russia amassed uncountable men.

Just when it seemed the Deamons would be driven back into the Abyss, the Nazis emerged in South America. They had used the Vial of Christs Blood to "clone" their new savior. The Anti-Christ. With him came unforseen powers from the depths of Hell. Central America was now defended only by the guerrilas already present there. They stood between the Anti-Christ and the United States.

Then the BEAST arrived. A great Red Dragon burst free from its concrete tomb in Chzecoslovakia. It was not contained in Germany. It was free and it began to amass troops of its own in Australia.

Roleplaying

Essentially, each player assumes a character in this dark game to help save mankind from oblivion. My friends have played the following types of characters:

A "saved" Amercan trooper loaded for bear with heavens powers.
An Itallian preist who uses prayers as magic to heal allies and attack deamons.
A sleazy merc from Central America intent on getting rich.
A Japanese trooper/fighter pilot.
The daughter of a collector weilding the Staff of Moses.
A traitor from the Anti-Christ army with demonic powers.
The Mercs guardian angel.
A traitor Deamon intent on winning favor with God and going to heaven.

Our group worked really well together! The characters bond quickly when opposed by such evil (nazi-deamons are pretty damn evil) and there are a bunch of different magic types:

"Saved"
Faith
Collection Items
Anti-Christ Powers
Angelic
Deamonic

Along with standard technology that can be blessed by a Cleric.

The catastrophies that cover the world are all from Revelations (1/3 of the stars gone, 1/3 of the water gone) but this is long enough and those details are pretty easy to figure out... IF you've read Revelations.

If not, that's kinda required reading to play this game. However, if you haven't read it, that could be incorporated into a non-religious character out to learn what's going on from the ground up.

There are plenty of Collection Items the GM can create for their players. They can be acquired any number of ways (inherited, auction, garage sale, trasure hunting, etc.)

It took a lot of talking, but thats about it! *whew* *smile*

I should also mention that the SECRETLY successful Russian Psychics have revealed their presence t othe world to help turn the tide of the war. No one ever played one, so I forgot.

But you can be a Russian psychic, or a psychic from anywhere if the Russians taught you.

Its an interesting idea, although I'd ditch the funky spelling of demon myself. So is the intent here "RPG during Revelations"? There was a game that kinda tackled this a while ago, forget the name... Only one concern: what do you do apart from smiting evil?

Incidentally, the modern stuff here appears to be the Nazi occultism: anything else?

I suppose it would be up to your character on what you wanted to do besides fight.

I can suggest a few things my group did.

They were strong enough to handle some of the lesser deamons, but nothing that would get them close to Germany. They spent a lot of time trying to hunt down some of the Collection, hoping to find a way to close the Abyss.

They also wanted the Pope to bless their equipment because he is Top Dog and the best at Faith powers.

They also got sent on an espionage mission into the Anti-Christs territory in Brazil, but that turned into a blazing gun fight. Wouldn't necessarily have to though. :)

Of course, this war is huge and there are barely enough commanding officers to lead all the troops. A lot of men are equipped, transported and then cut loose with vauge orders. And they can't supply troops over seas very well, so getting re-supplied might involve doing some merc work for whoever comes along.

Or do favors for governments in exchange for better supplies or troops of your own.

I've GMed this about ten times now and its really easy to get a good story-line going on. Especially if there are traitors from both sides and trust comes as often as Meals Ready to Eat. ;)

contracycle wrote: Its an interesting idea, although I'd ditch the funky spelling of demon myself. So is the intent here "RPG during Revelations"? There was a game that kinda tackled this a while ago, forget the name... Only one concern: what do you do apart from smiting evil?

Incidentally, the modern stuff here appears to be the Nazi occultism: anything else?

Incidentally, the modern stuff here appears to be the Nazi occultism: anything else?

Well, maybe ill just write GURPS Revelations for Steve Jackson. Hee hee

$$$$

Naw, free is better. ;)

Welcome to The Forge, Gwen!

THANKS! :)

Gwen wrote: Then the BEAST arrived. A great Red Dragon burst free from its concrete tomb in Chzecoslovakia. It was not contained in Germany. It was free and it began to amass troops of its own in Australia.

Australia in the Pacific. :)

Gwen wrote: Australia in the Pacific. :)

That's not a bad idea for an adventure! :) Sending troops deep into the Lions Den to eliminate a potentially unstoppable threat. Me likee!

What game system are you using for this setting? GURPS or something else?

Me and my friends have just been developing house rules, although I'd like to get something more concrete. I'm not sure if the system should be siple or complex, but I do know I would like it to involve either 1d12 or 2d6, because 12 is a big number for revelations.

Oh, and wasn't Gog and Magog based up in Siberia somewhere. I think I remember seeing some maps with that.

Anyway, looks like you have a great premise there Gwen. Gets me wanting to play it straight away. And welcome to the Forge too :)

I need some help! :) I'm not really too sure what to call this game. Something like Wolrd War 3 seems VERY cliched and REVELATIONS is too simple. Ive pretty much summed up the story, but what name would really make it sound cool?

My other problem is what I should call the "magic" in this game. It isnt really magic, per se, because most of it is either blessings from Heaven or influence from hell. Maybe blesses and curses, but thats kinda cliched as well.

talysman wrote:

contracycle wrote: Its an interesting idea, although I'd ditch the funky spelling of demon myself. So is the intent here "RPG during Revelations"? There was a game that kinda tackled this a while ago, forget the name... Only one concern: what do you do apart from smiting evil?

Incidentally, the modern stuff here appears to be the Nazi occultism: anything else?

the game you're thinking of is The End, I believe. I think they just came out with a d20 version of their game. there were also some notes on doing Revelations in GURPS Y2K.

Too bad "The End of Days" is taken. What about "No Flesh Shall Be Spared"? But that's a bit too long of course. "The Number of The Beast" could work too but... Too long again.

Other obvious names would be "Harmageddon", "The Seventh Seal", "Abaddon" and stuff like that. Also used. However, I think that "Revelations" really works. For me personally.

My other problem is what I should call the "magic" in this game. It isnt really magic, per se, because most of it is either blessings from Heaven or influence from hell. Maybe blesses and curses, but thats kinda cliched as well.

Wow, those are all really great ideas, guys! I think sign of God and Mark of the Beat will work GREAT!

As for the aliens angle, do you think it's too much going on at once? I was afraid to make the aliens a definite part of the wolrd in case it seemed too conveient that all this stuff was happeneing at once. But, i guess when it rains, ir pours!

I was also thinking of making the game relativly letal, but with ressurection. However, if the character was EVIL, they'd have to crawl out of the Abyss, which might make for interesting gaming.

GOOD characters might get some downtime in Heaven before re-entering the fray.

And don't forget the Russian Phychics! They really did those testings in World War 2, ya know! And there is lots of opprotunities to create new Collection Items; anything from ancient mythology that the Nazis migh have been searching for. (Dinosaur eggs, alien debris or Egyptian magic scrolls)

Andrew Martin wrote:

Gwen wrote: Australia in the Pacific. :)

Then you really have to have Ayer's Rock as a Dragon's egg. :)

Hi Gwen,

It's great to see something like this show up at the Forge. In fact, I think I'll take a second to say that Indie Design has been exceptionally good in the last few weeks. Thanks, everyone.

Anyway, Gwen, a few people have wrestled with the concept of a Revelations/biblically-inspired setting for Clinton R. Nixon's game, Paladin. Although none of them are too, too close to what you've provided, I think the discussions about their settings would be interesting to you.

[Paladin] Inquisitor help
Paladin, angels and demons

What I'm thinking is that in some ways, raising issues like this during a game is somehow ... lessened if the only task at hand is to beat on the bad guys. In my view, for whatever goals of play (and boy are there plenty), using such a setting or situation as a basis for a game design cries out for acknowledging the bitterness, or moral ambiguity, inherent in most myths.

Greek, Persian, Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Native American, Biblical, Norse, etc ... in my readings, the people who "live close to the gods," so to speak, often pay a high price for it, even the devout ones. I'm not sure if that's something you're interested in including in your design, but if it is, it would be a big improvement over many existing Revelations-ish games, in my view.

Best,
Ron

The problem there is the conflicting "truths" of those different religions. If I use the Chinese creation theory of Pan Gu, then that leaves the humans fighting the man who grows ten feet every day for 10,000 years. That would certainly be creepy, but now there's is a MASSIVE conflict between the Chinese Myth and the Christian Myth.

It would also be very great to throw in some Lovecraft monsters (Cthulu, Azathoth) but now there are more conflicting myths. This would be cool, but that gives me a HUGE headache trying to make it to where all these myths fit together.

It would be like trying to force peices together from three different puzzles. They might go together a little bit, but people will easily be able to recognize the peices don't match up.

So I've stuck mainly to the Heaven/Hell Revelations myth.

Signs of God, Marks of the Devil and the Symbols of Man

Signs of God
"Saved" humans (the 144,000 people protected by the seven seals of Heaven) receive special endurances, physical boosts and resistances.

The Angels receive Heavenly powers and are mainly protected from physical attacks, but are vunerable to powers from those with Signs, Marks, or Symbols.

The Clerics have a special bond with God that allows them to call upon holy powers from above.

Marks of the Devil
Legions of the Anti-Christ are granted demonic powers from their leader, ranging from corruptive energies, demonic strength or speed, and grotesque forms.

The Demons are significantly more powerful than mortals. They are much stronger then the Legions of the Anti-Christ, but they are much more vunerable to the holy damages from the Signs of God.

Cultists are those who worship the BEAST and are given evil powers from below to fight the war of Good vrs. Evil.

Symbols of Man
The Gengineered humans have had gene therapy to bring their human body to new levels of power, equalling the Saved and the Legions.

The Psychics have mastered the use of their brain power to manipulate their surroundings. Some are so powerful they can actually defeat Angels or Deamons.

Collectors are ordinay men and women who have managed to stumble across one of the great mythological items of power from human history. They uses these items and their power to aide in their involvement in the war.


Each one of the nine types has 12 special abilities that they can learn and use as the game is played.

The magic number in this game is 12 (I think I already stated that, but I just wanted to be sure.) There are only 9 types of Signs, Marks, and Symbols and this leaves 3 unaccounted for to reach 12.

This remaining 3 could be taken up by the Alien ideas, which I haven't created rules for just yet. This group of three might look something like this:

The Alien Omens
The Possesed (Humans who have become hosts for alien embryos which gives them certain hybrid abilities.)
The Aliens (Strong beings on the same level as Deamons, Angels and Psychics.)
The Hybrids (Results of Human/Alien genetic altercations which result in hybrid creatures.)


This makes 12, but does this Alien element seem cliched or weak? I would like to know if it makes a strong or weak addition before I devote too much time to developing it.

It's weak, in my opinion; you could add a fourth to each of your three categories if you're so set on having 12 archetypes. Here's something: disposessed archetypes (they fall under a particular category not because they draw power from it, but because they are antagonistic to it, and do not draw from the other two.)

The Infidels are charged with disbelief that prevents the power of God from touching them.

The Repentant are hardened against the legions of the Beast, and stand unusually steadfastly against them.

The Ascetics have rejected the world of Man, and gained spiritual powers through their understanding of themselves; they have uncanny percaptions and control over their own bodies.

I suppose you could bind these into a fourth category too, but as I see it you kind of have a matrix of archetypes, the Cartesian product of {God, Devil, Man}, and {Follower, Leader, Representative}. The Man segment is hard to horn into those roles, but the divine/provane archetypes are obviously mirrors of each other.

I entertained the idea of non-believers before, but I thought that it might proove to be a little unbalancing.

The idea of someone with the maximum Disbelief would be able to stand toe to toe with St. Michael the Archangel and not take any wounds. This thought of that seems like it might cause some problems.

Of course i thought of the idea that the presence of an Archangel alone might force someone to believe. However, if that occured, the character would forever be unable to Disbelieve anymore, because they saw the glory of an Archangel. Then the character is way out of their league in this relatively powerful world.

Besides, I think it would be rather hard to not believe when deamons are pouring out of the great Abyss and being held at bay by Crusaders and Angels.

Perhaps not disbelief then, that's too passive, but a kind of metaphysical stubbornness. I don't see why concerns of imbalance should limit your artistic vision; if you see your world as having resisters, let them be.

So the issue becomes not disbelieving, but holding onto one's nonstandard ideals while the embodiments of other ideals wage war across the land.

Greetings Gwen,

Looking good.

Gwen wrote: Signs of God, Marks of the Devil and the Symbols of Man

Greetings Gwen,

Gwen wrote: Besides, I think it would be rather hard to not believe when deamons are pouring out of the great Abyss and being held at bay by Crusaders and Angels.

I'd love to read anything on the subject as long as there's an element of it grounded in the bible or WW2 myths.

I was watching the History Channel the other day and decided to add the parts of the show into the game.

Apparently, following WW2, the Russians began building all sorts of oddball technology during the Cold War. One of these was a massive boat the size of a football field, but shaped like a plane. These boats could reach speed of 300 mph, at which point they began to skim over the top of the Ocean. It could carry a large amount of troops and artillery... some were equipped to fire off missiles.

While none of the boats were ever employed and Russia went broke shortly after the prototype, it would add in a weird 50's Cold War element to the game if the boats were discovered.

Of course, discovered by who might be up to the GM, I will simply make the rules surrounding the Aero-boat.

Other decomissioned vehicles that could be discovered might be the Tunnel-Tanks the Russians attempted to build. They were essentially normal tanks equipped with a massive drill on the front (like a cartoon or a bad movie) but were intended to drill down into the Earth and tunnel underground as a suprise attack.

The proto-type, however, tunneled straight down and got stuck about 75 yards down.

They also had plans to build city-tanks like something out of a Mecha-Anime. These tanks were HUGE, which is why they never even constructed a prototype. They were the size of a seven story building and several city blocks. It had a surreal amount of forward gun embankments and missile launchers.

For the game, the GM might say these city-tanks exist and could be found... or already in use.

Gwen wrote: I'd love to read anything on the subject as long as there's an element of it grounded in the bible or WW2 myths.

I was watching the History Channel the other day and decided to add the parts of the show into the game.

Apparently, following WW2, the Russians began building all sorts of oddball technology during the Cold War. One of these was a massive boat the size of a football field, but shaped like a plane. These boats could reach speed of 300 mph, at which point they began to skim over the top of the Ocean. It could carry a large amount of troops and artillery... some were equipped to fire off missiles.

While none of the boats were ever employed and Russia went broke shortly after the prototype, it would add in a weird 50's Cold War element to the game if the boats were discovered.

Of course, discovered by who might be up to the GM, I will simply make the rules surrounding the Aero-boat.

Other decomissioned vehicles that could be discovered might be the Tunnel-Tanks the Russians attempted to build. They were essentially normal tanks equipped with a massive drill on the front (like a cartoon or a bad movie) but were intended to drill down into the Earth and tunnel underground as a suprise attack.

The proto-type, however, tunneled straight down and got stuck about 75 yards down.

They also had plans to build city-tanks like something out of a Mecha-Anime. These tanks were HUGE, which is why they never even constructed a prototype. They were the size of a seven story building and several city blocks. It had a surreal amount of forward gun embankments and missile launchers.

For the game, the GM might say these city-tanks exist and could be found... or already in use.

Karl Heinz (GZG email list) wrote:
Some mad scientists have had ideas to build such stuff in 1:1 scale. There
are:
the WWII German 1000 ton "Rat" tank project
http://www.panzerschreck.de/panzer/pzkpfw/p1000.html
the 1500 ton "Monster" gun
http://www.panzerschreck.de/panzer/pzkpfw/p1500.html

And in the early 1930's the "Midgard Serpent", a tunneling tank.
http://www.geocities.com/madsin72/midgard.html
Some data:
Length 524 meters (a 6 mm scale model would be over 5 feet long)
composed of 77 coupled sections, each 6 m long, 6.8m wide, 3.5 m high
the head to be fitted with 4 drills
total 19.800 horsepower
able to wade up to 100 m
speed 30 km/h over land, 10 km/h under the earth

It was rejected as technically and tactically absurd

Sorry, all weblinks in German

Thanks! :)

Couple more ideas which just popped in...

First is a name... you might try "Like a Lion..." in reference to the idea that Jesus came as a Lamb before and now he is coming to Kick butt and take names... it gives that second coming kind of feel...

As for Disbelievers well its hard to imagine anyone not believing in some higher power when said higher power is dancing on your face. However, I will remind you many people still believe we have not been to the Moon. Also for one man's Michael is another Man's Loki or Hisii. Despite their bone chilling goodness some people may belive the Angelic forces are Flesh loving corrupters or something. Just one thought anyway.

As for High Tech... For old School there was a German Carrier built but it never saw much action and did not meet a good end... perhaps it survived and it carries squadrons of Demonic or Angelic fighters... which are like the Trade Fed Droid Fighters which can fly AND then land and fight as well... also a nuclear submarine which instead of launching nukes, launches missiles full of little demons to drop on unsuspecting towns...

also there is a game, small self published, called Gaianar. Its very OVER THE TOP Post Apocolypse playing but it has intense Christian themes. Might be worth a look. www.gaianar.com

SMH
ADGBoss

Greetings Gwen,

Asketh and thee shall recieveth...

Gwen wrote: I'd love to read anything on the subject as long as there's an element of it grounded in the bible or WW2 myths.