Our Latest Publications

Cat Links MoN - Keeper, New York

Chapter Inspiration – NYC

Posted on Keeper Doc

Turning to New York, we have a nearly endless selection to dig into, but we’ll focus on some inspirational imagery. When imagining Prohibition-era East Coast life, we can’t help but draw from the HBO series Boardwalk Empire simply for the incredible costume and set-work alone. While primarily set in Atlantic City, the show includes a good deal of underbelly New York action. The gritty New York gangster film released in 1939, The Roaring Twenties, begins in the trenches of the Great War and offers some classic genre imagery in black and white, as well as incisive social commentary. For fans of such films, this is an absolute classic and features the last paired casting of Bogart and Cagney.

Read on…Chapter Inspiration – NYC

Cat Links MoN - Keeper, Peru

Puno – Peru Prologue’s Sidetrack

Posted on Keeper Doc

  The expedition to the ancient ruins in the Highlands will take the team through Puno where they will disembark from their motorized transport and begin their long trek into the mountains. The campaign book provides suggestions for interactions in Puno, which center around Jackson introducing them to Nayra, a wise-local woman. She can provide the Investigators with directions to the ancient ruins, as well as further reveal the nature of the kharisiri and their master, the Father of Maggots. Depending on the circumstances, your players may not need or choose to meet with her. In essence, Keepers may simply want to consider exploration of Puno a sidetrack to the chapter’s main event. By acknowledging

Read on…Puno – Peru Prologue’s Sidetrack

Cat Links Keeper Tips, MoN - Keeper

Feedback – An Easy Campaign Diagnostic

Posted on Keeper Doc

Perhaps you just ran your first session with a new group of excited Investigators or you’re wrapping up an epic chapter. Or maybe things felt a little stale and subdued at the table during the last game. Whether things appear superlative or sub-par, gathering player feedback allows us Keepers to continue actively improving our campaign and developing our skills. To obtain useful, candid feedback, you will want to rely on some simple, open-ended questions for your players. After our first Peru session that included an extending roleplaying introduction to Larkin, de Mendoza, and Jackson at Bar Cordano, as well as some high-tension sneaking around the Hotel España while distracting the proprietor and discovering Larkin in

Read on…Feedback – An Easy Campaign Diagnostic

Cat Links MoN - Keeper, Peru

Mythos Monsters – Kharisiri

Posted on Keeper Doc

The Peru Chapter offers a novel Mythos threat in the kharisiri, who serve as the “cultists” of the Nyarlathotep avatar, the Father of Maggots. Originally a small band of 16th-century Spanish explorers seeking plunder, these men attempted to loot the Andean pyramid imprisoning the Father,  broke the golden seal, exposed themselves to its infectious, burrowing larva, and transformed into the hungry, half-dead servants of Nyarlathotep. Before the arrival of Augustus Larkin, these fat-sucking Spanish vampires functioned more as mindless predatory servitors stalking the Andean highlands and providing their master with a steady stream of nutritious regurgitated adipose tissue; however, with the advent of a more intelligent Nyarlathotep agent, the kharisiri begin to expand their numbers

Read on…Mythos Monsters – Kharisiri

Cat Links Keeper Tips

Random Events – Going Off-Script in Masks of Nyarlathotep

Posted on Keeper Doc

Since the dawn of role-playing games, random event and encounter tables have been available as tools for gamemasters to fill time and space during play. This campaign requires ongoing, dedicated preparation, so it can be nice to toss out a simple encounter and improvise. Empty travel time can suddenly become an opportunity to interactively illustrate the world your players inhabit. A lull in the action at the table can spontaneously be disrupted. Or a missed clue can be revealed in a chance encounter. The campaign book provides two random event tables, including a wonderfully detailed d10 table in Egypt for complications encountered en route to Nyarlathotep’s Chamber (p.352). A second random encounter table can be

Read on…Random Events – Going Off-Script in Masks of Nyarlathotep

Cat Links MoN - Keeper

Preparing for Death & Insanity

Posted on Keeper Doc

  As we have mentioned before and you well know, MoN’s fame and legacy rely in no small part on its reputation as an unforgiving PC meatgrinder. However, the latest edition mitigates this in several ways by altering some particularly deadly bits and introducing Pulp Considerations. Even still, MoN remains a dangerous campaign with a high probability of gruesome Investigator deaths and crippling insanity. While we here at Prospero House do enjoy some gory blood-soaked tales, we also prefer for them either to be thoughtfully constructed or very clearly grindhouse fare before we sit down with them.  In a similar vein, you will want to prepare your players, particularly ones new to RPGs and/or CoC,

Read on…Preparing for Death & Insanity

Cat Links MoN - Keeper

Nyarlathotep – A Foe of 1,000 Possibilities

Posted on Keeper Doc

  The pantheon of Mythos deities includes a wide range of horrors threatening the weak hold we humans attempt to maintain on the already flimsy fabric of reality. For example, take Azathoth, the Daemon Sultan, a sprawling, ineffable cosmic monstrosity spiraling in the outer void. Sure he’s old, beyond scale, and probably a malign black hole that will eventually consume the universe, but he’s also pretty dumb and, like we said, way way out there pretending to be Sagittarius A* for some reason. Then we’ve got the great Cthulhu, who instantly melts brains worldwide when he wakes up from his long sleep to make a trip to the bathroom, but he spends most of his

Read on…Nyarlathotep – A Foe of 1,000 Possibilities

Cat Links Keeper Tips, MoN - Keeper

Session Zero for MoN

Posted on Keeper Doc

The experience of Keeping and playing MoN requires a significant commitment from everyone involved. A baseline non-play session before commencing the campaign provides an opportunity for you and your players to discuss the campaign while aligning your goals and expectations for the collaboration. You may approach your Session Zero with a specific campaign conception in mind (Classic or Pulp, for example) or you may be exploring your player’s interests and deciding together. Even if you have an idea of what sort of campaign you want to Keep, a Session Zero should be approached as dialogue aiming to form an optimal consensus to ensure everyone has fun. By agreeing to a shared vision of the campaign,

Read on…Session Zero for MoN

Cat Links MoN - Keeper, New York

Ju-Ju Rising – Backup Cult Hideouts

Posted on Keeper Doc

  A well-paced New York chapter typically concludes with a climactic confrontation involving the Cult of the Bloody Tongue. The campaign book presents the Ju-Ju House as the likely site of this potentially explosive conclusion; however, a hasty team of Investigators may move quickly to shutter (or burn down) the cult’s headquarters well before the end of the New York chapter. Having some alternative sites for a secondary base of operations and dramatic showdown with the cult and its leader, Mukunga M’Dari, will allow you to keep the tension running throughout the chapter.  First, we’ll touch briefly on a popular secondary location for the chapter climax, which often occurs at Erica Caryle’s house during a

Read on…Ju-Ju Rising – Backup Cult Hideouts