Monster Mash Jam

Concept: "Random tables to spice up your PCs." 

Content: Two tables for customizing living dead creatures: d6 heinous powers and d6 ways to become undead.

Writing: Flavor is hilariously macabre, and mechanics are explained clearly but also in line with macabre flavor.

Art/Design: Black/yellow color scheme accents the image of a deranged living dead creature surrounded by table entries.

Usability: Content is easy to read but tables are “exploded” across the page.

Concept: “They said they would make you beautiful. They lied. You were a model. A false beacon of hope and aspiration. In the shadowy boardrooms they made you a deal to stay young forever. It was only in the glint of the scalpel that you figured out too late you were sold, slush for a tax write off. An experiment in how badly you can fuck someone up. Now you are madness and steel.”

Content: A class for the highly motivated survivor spirit of vengeance and wrath.

Writing: Intense descriptions of class abilities and unfinished business can inspire tons of compelling roleplay opportunities.

Art/Design: A black and white illustration of a triumphant cybergorgon stands between columns of text describing class features and mechanics, with light green background accents throughout.

Usability: Class details are laid out in easily recognizable and navigable blocks with consistent presentation of headers, list item numbers, and so on.

Concept: “There are creatures from worlds beyond our own, and all of them fucking hate you.”

Content: A nightmarish behemoth you’ll want a BFG just for the chance to frag it.

Writing: Deadly stats combined with a mesmerizing world-building overview of the creature’s origins.

Art/Design: A brightly colored two-page spread with an image of the monster and its stats next to its origin description.

Usability: Assorted content blocks are easily distinguishable, although the longer descriptive text block may become difficult for some to read over the background pattern near the bottom of the page.

Concept: “An eight page bestiary featuring a multi-stage creature based on those from [the first three] TREMORS movies, as well as bits of lore, and a few new bonus weapons.  This was made as part of the second Slasher Jam: Monster Mash for the ttRPGs Mork Borg, CY_Borg, and Death in Space.”

Content: A set of five creatures (really, one creature with several distinct life stages) that are sure to terrify even hardened punks.

Writing: Brief statistics and stage-specific characteristics are complemented with lore tables and an informative breakdown of the creature’s life cycle. Bonus table of weapons that might be used against the terrors.

Art/Design: Two-page spreads of red-tinged wasteland backgrounds with hand-drawn illustrations of terrors at each stage and distinct blocks of content arranged consistently throughout the supplement. 

Usability: Consistent visual grammar for creature details provides a helpful means of recognizing and using desired information, and color combinations for text are high-contrast. However, some text is searchable and selectable, but not all.

Concept: “Lhamo Rigosa, the biggest horror vidstar in CY is dead. But their co-star has been receiving incomprehensible voice notes from them. And was that stream coming from inside a coffin? The transmissions are coming from the set of their new film but hasn’t that been abandoned?”

Content: A scenario based on Bauhaus’ “Bela Lugosi’s Dead” that gives PCs a chance to engage in a horror/slasher adventure.

Writing: Vividly detailed descriptions of scenario setup, locations, items to discover, and NPC motives/perspectives are all tinted with a macabre flair. 

Art/Design: High-contrast text on dark background across three spreads, with a bright orange grid map of an abandoned movie set.

Usability: Consistent color and font choices provide easy identification of and navigation through scenario content.

Concept: “Stupid. Tough. Dripping black ink that sizzles the ground. They track by scent and taste. Their spikes crackle with demonic energy. Get close and you are leaving the mortal coil sans a head. C.A.U’s animal experiments have a bone to pick. It’s yours.”

Content: A snarling demon-creature that will not only bite the hand that feeds but it’ll chow down on the entire arm.

Writing: Hilariously dark description of the creature alongside brief and menacing stats/mechanics.

Art/Design: Two-page spread emphasizing a hellbeast and the creature’s name, with supporting text on the bottom of the left page.

Usability: High-contrast text condensed in one area minimizes browsing the entire spread for details, but the text is not embedded (so not searchable/copyable or accessible as a result).

Concept: “Somewhere in G0: A naniteinfested monstrosity is trying to help those tossed to the turrets within the cement walls of G0. Within the confines of the abandoned CY Central Mall, a monument of capitalism now a battle ground between 4 factions, The Heir of Kergoz, Virid Vipers, an other worldly being know as Vecbod, and a relentless horde of mushroom brained zombies. It doesn’t matter if you’re here out of desperation or curiosity, having a safe house in G0 is worth hearing”

Content: A mall crawl for survival in the shadows of an ominous otherworldly threat.

Writing: Imaginative and disturbing ideas abound, giving GMs and players alike plenty of unexpected encounters, creatures/NPCs, and opportunities to run wild with. 

Art/Design: Two-page spreads packed with visually loud and abrasive aesthetic choices that reflect the chaos of the scenario itself.

Usability: Progression through the document reveals locations and monsters as players would encounter them. A wide variety of layouts, color schemes, font choices, and text size can make some content easier to locate and read than others.

Concept: “Monster movies go all the way back to the Universal Monsters and are a staple of the horror movie industry. The genre also lends itself well to the play style and tone of MÖRK and CY BORG. Pick your favorite monster movie and write up anything for it. Items, classes, monsters, dungeons, it is all fair game!”

Content: A collection of monster-themed jobs, classes, creatures, and more for Cy_Borg.

Concept: “A 120-meter-tall monster emerges from the waters around Cy. Its behavior baffles scientists and officials; it isn’t hunting or nesting, it just moves.”

Content: A scenario for surviving the onslaught of an unstoppable roving apocalypse.

Writing: Focused, direct descriptions of a wide range of relevant factors (from available subplots to environmental obstacles to military actions) provide GMs with an immersive adventure/experience for their players.

Art/Design: Current ashcan edition has a simple, barebones layout subject to change when more art assets are finalized. 

Usability: Different kinds of content are immediately distinguishable, high-contrast fore/ground colors assist accessibility, and navigation through the document is incredibly easy.

Concept: “A gaping maw beneath an all seeing eye. How badly do want to die? In the first waves of the demonic incursion into C.A.U’s generators, corpses mounted around energy pylons with staggering speed. Infernal power fused together the pulsating remains which took flight to join the demonic hordes.”

Content: A creature searching for its Doomguy soulmate–to murder them, of course.

Writing: Vividly ominous descriptions and features situate the creature as at home in the CY world. 

Art/Design: Layout centers on an image of the opthalmosphere itself, with creature details surrounding it.

Usability: Text has clear distinctions for different types of content and mostly contrasts starkly with background except for one block of text for a special ability that might be difficult for some to read.

Concept: “Towering skeletons of cobbled together bones, each the fused together remains of shattered dreams. When the Undead and Corrupted die, their parts are swept together and taken to the infernal furnaces. Molten remains poured into vats of malice. What emerges is a foe with a mastery over explosive technology and explosive language. Adapting C.A.U tech that got the living into this mess in the first place, it flits around in flights of frenzy.”

Content: Undead creature + rocket-powered explosions = exciting fun for everyone.

Writing: Hilariously morbid descriptions and NPC features provide a ton of personality to the monster.

Art/Design: Blistering red background intensifies white text and the central image of a reused creature firing its shoulder-mounted rockets. 

Usability: Small white text on red might pose trouble for some, but it’s easy to recognize different kinds of content and how each contributes to an understanding of the creature and its mechanics.

Concept: “On an expedition into the subways of G0, beneath an ancient foundry, the punks are infected with the IRON VIRUS a nanovirus that turns flesh to metal, hair to wire and nails to scalpels. The subway screens flicker to life. The metal tyrant Wodan announces the countdown of sacrifices to priming the Iron Egg. If not stopped, it will destroy everything in a Nearby District. STOP THEM”

Content: A body horror-centric race against the clock to stop a virus-wielding tyrant.

Writing: A disgustingly fascinating adventure, complete with a set of viral nano-infections to make one’s skin crawl (perhaps literally).

Art/Design: Two-page spreads of the scenario setup (and impressively vivid depiction of the virus in action), GM notes, infection list, adventure locations and creatures, and a map.

Usability: Easy to navigate and text (primarily white on black) is readable–the opposite end of the “unsettling” spectrum of document’s content.

Concept: “There's a sickness in the streets of CY. Rain drips like a broken IV. Dying adverts flicker in sallow shades. They say the world is ending. Has ended. Will end. They say the howls at night are Cy-Ragers. NanoPhreaks. Nothing to worry about. Nothing abnormal. The water is poison, but it always has been. The air is poison, but how bad can it be? It churns through your lungs all day and hasn't killed you yet. There's nanites in the trash, nanites growing like mold on the walls, nanites in the blood and bones of regular citizens, but all of this is familiar misery. Last night you stared blearily at your face in the bathroom mirror, watching it change. Watching it become something new. As you did, your cybernetics clicked like beetle legs, like teeth shuffling in the mouth of a cannibal. They squirmed and contorted to match your new flesh. You vomited your whole stomach lining into the sink, then washed it out with a swig of cheap ethanol. But the disinfectant didn't purify you. It just made you worse. Tonight, the glitching moon hangs low over the skyline and your body is wrong. Wrong for the city. Wrong for the life that clings to it. Wrong for the alien gods that have touched its streets. You hate them all, and that hate pours out of you in a howl.”

Content: A set of rules to incorporate werewolves into CY.

Writing: Matter-of-fact explanations and descriptions of a variety of factors pertinent to affected characters (transformation rules, clothing options that survive transformation, a “Festering Wolfborg” class, etc.) as well as several lycanthropic foes and their stats.

Art/Design: A mix of black-and-white splash images with brightly colored sections of content, each with its own bold color scheme. 

Usability: Single-page, single-column layouts make for quick perusal and identification of desired content, assisted by a hyperlinked table of contents.