Vermissian-Black-Ops-1-con5ih.pdf

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VERMISSIAN
BLACK OPS
G R AN T HOWI TT & C HRI STOPH ER TAYLO R
I LLUSTR AT ED BY FELIX MIALL
•
Vermissian Black Ops
Written by Grant Howitt and Christopher Taylor
Illustrated by Felix Miall
Edited by Helen Gould and Mary Hamilton
Layout and design by Minerva McJanda
Produced by Mary Hamilton
Copyright © 2020 by Grant Howitt and Christopher Taylor.
Published by Rowan, Rook and Decard Ltd.
First Edition (2020)
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced,distributed, or transmitted in any form or by
any means, including photocopying, recording, or other
electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior
written permission of the publisher, except in the case of
brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain
other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
For permission requests, write to the publisher at the
address below.
Rowan, Rook and Decard
15 Tufnell Court, Old Ford Road
E3 5JJ, United Kingdom
www.rowanrookanddecard.com
Content warnings:
Heart is a horror game, and as such,
there are some unpleasant things in the text. These
include but are not limited to: violence, drug use,
addiction, ghosts, unwanted bodily transformation, and
monsters that used to be people. We can assure you that
there is no rape or sexual assault in this game.
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INTRODUCTION
ALTERNATIVE RULES
ADVANCEMENT
DOMAINS
HAUNTS AND HEALING
FALLOUT AND RESISTANCES
COMBINING THIS GAME WITH SPIRE
1 THE VERMISSIAN, BY LINE 10
2
2
2
2
3
4
Candle Line
Fathom Line
Spiral Line
Loft Line
pulse Line
12
15
17
19
22
GROUPS AND FACTIONS
GAMEPLAY
SESSION STRUCTURE
Operations
ENTERING THE CITY ABOVE
THRONE DIVISION EQUIPMENT
5
5
5
7
8
THE PALADINS
THE MINISTRY OF OUR HIDDEN MISTRESS
THE SPIRAL COUNCIL
THE VERMISSIAN COLLECTIVE
GUTTERKIN
23
23
24
26
27
28
3
Introduction
1
The Ministry of Our Hidden Mistress (hereafter
just “the Ministry”) is a paramilitary cult devoted
to the dark elf goddess of secrets, grace and shad‐
ows. Their ultimate aim is to overthrow and
replace the high elf government of Spire via an
extended campaign of sabotage, blackmail and
assassination - but at present, they’re making do
with destabilising aelfir rule in any way they can.
The bulk of the Ministry is divided into cells
who have no contact with each other. These cells
are secreted within the city of Spire and tasked
with subverting the rule of the aelfir. But you don’t
work as part of a cell - you’re too weird, too danger‐
ous and too valuable to be placed in civilised soci‐
ety. Plucked from the depths of the undercity, you
have been formed into a team of special operatives
and assigned to crucial missions.
Using illegal magic and a barely-understand‐
able cursed mass transit network - the Vermis‐
sian - to navigate the city, you emerge from the
shadows and strike at the most valuable targets.
You are a member of the Throne Division: the
Vermissian Black Ops.
WHAT THIS BOOK IS
Vermissian Black Ops
uses the
Heart
rules to tell
stories of action and horror in the city of Spire. It
focuses on the Vermissian - the failed train net‐
work that runs through Spire like diseased tissue,
spreading arcane fallout throughout the city -
which is used to access dangerous or hard-to-
reach locations which are valuable to the Ministry.
The tone and content are quite different from
the standard
Heart
experience. This isn’t an
introspective descent into a shared personal hell
to satisfy your hubristic obsession. This is des‐
perate bullets-and-blood combat against an
occupying force, using a cursed subway network
to attack from unexpected directions. We use
the
Heart
rules to tell these stories because
they’re focused on combat and travelling
through hostile environments.
We’ve done our best to make this a
Heart
sourcebook that you don’t need to read
Spire
to
understand, whilst avoiding repeating ourselves
or reprinting material. However, given where the
game takes place, reading
Spire
will probably help
you gain a broader understanding of the factions
and locations at play.
This book functions as an expansion for
Heart
because it details the upper-city portions of the
Vermissian. Though they’re less cursed and mad
than the parts beneath the city, they’re still non-
euclidian nightmare mazes of twisted steel and
phantom trains where delvers can find adventure,
secrets or whatever they’re searching for. You don’t
have to work for the Ministry to explore them.
It also functions as an expansion for
Spire
because it details the different lines of the Ver‐
missian, which is in that game too.
Alternative Rules
In this section, we’ll focus on some tweaks to the
core
Heart
rules that allow you to run mission-led
games that deal with stealth, combat and para‐
military cults in a cursed transit network.
ADVANCEMENT
Characters on Vermissian Black Ops missions
don’t advance by hitting beats from their Calling
like regular
Heart
characters. They should still
have one (there’s a reason they went into the
undercity) but they will gain advancements by
completing missions instead.
Each
minor objective
the characters achieve
earns them, appropriately, a
minor advance;
major objectives
grant
major advances.
You can
learn more about mission structure on p. 8.
There’s no means of earning
zenith abilities
within this system, mainly because it doesn’t fit
with the overall tone of the game. Also, since
characters all advance at the same time, this
would result in every single delver going super‐
nova at once - which might detract from the
essential gravitas of the experience.
DOMAINS
In the standard
Heart
game, the Vermissian is
(mostly) covered by the
TECHNOLOGY
domain.
However, given that roughly half the events in a
Black Ops
game take place in the Vermissian,
access to the
TECHNOLOGY
domain might
provide an unfair advantage.
So, in
Black Ops
games, the Vermissian comes
under every possible domain to offer variety and
limit how often you’re rolling that extra dice.
CURSED
locations are places where the ener‐
gies of the Heart are especially strong. These are
more common in the lower areas of the Vermis‐
sian, but even the Loft line isn’t completely free of
the Heart’s presence.
DESOLATE
locations are barren, empty and
unforgiving. Huge lift shafts are one example, as
are the exposed areas of track on the upper Spire.
HAVEN
locations are rare in the Vermissian,
given the nature of the place (and that it’s so close
to an actual habitable city) but some people
choose - or are forced - to live here.
OCCULT
locations feature magic circles
(abandoned or active), the theoretical libraries of
the Vermissian Sages (i.e. the libraries them‐
selves are theoretical, and all the texts in them
cover theoretical topics) and no end of shadowy
cults devoted to unearthing hidden knowledge.
RELIGION
locations include shrines to the
Midden Mistresses of the Vermissian, houses of
worship for banned religions and one particu‐
larly elaborate solar temple which collected the
sun’s energy to be funnelled into trains.
TECHNOLOGY
locations cover machinery -
such as lifts, winches, drawbridges, signal-boxes
and turntables - as well as the more practical
efforts of the Vermissian Collective.
WARREN
locations are plentiful in the Vermis‐
sian; it’s made of tunnels, after all. Some have col‐
lapsed or shrunk over time, and countless
maintenance vents and passageways make it hard to
predict where or when an ambush might be sprung.
WILD
locations are a useful contrast to the
iron and galvanics of the rest of the Vermissian -
having the occasional tree or deer in there can
really spice things up.
HAUNTS AND HEALING
The Ministry provides safehouses, materials,
doctors and spiritual guidance to operators
between missions. This means that you don’t
need to worry about using haunts to remove
stress and fallout from your character.
Instead, at the end of every mission when you
return to your safehouse, you can:
• Clear all stress marked against
resistances;
• Remove any
Minor
fallout;
• Reduce all
Major
fallout to
Minor.
your
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