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Recent entries August 9, 2022 Appendix Liminal Horror Adventure Writing Facilitator Tools

Designing Framework
Adventure Writing Primer: Liminal
dungeon23 prep for The Below Horror as an Adaptable System for
Modern Horror
Tales from the Void... What lurks
within the dark

Tales from the Void;

Introduction
Supplements & Hacks
Liminal Horror as a system works extremely well for bringing modern horror to the
Future Liminal Horror Projects ttrpg table.

The Archivist The core

core
corerules
rules
rules are built on the chassis of Carin (and by extension Into the Odd &
Knave). This foundation allows for easy to engage with rules that allow people to
Light generate characters quickly, and jump into play.

Appendix F Flashbacks Liminal Horror intentionally took something that worked well and made a few
adjustments (modernization of equipment and language, taking away scars and adding
It Follows the stress/fallout system based on the damage/scar system). This document showcases
what design aspects make LH works well for general ttrpg horror, and what aspects
Appendix V...Vehicle's Expanded adventure designers can tweak to help reinforce the specific themes/genres of horror
and the weird.
Adventure Writing Primer
This document acts as a draft for the overarching concepts and ideas. Over time (in
Faction The Bureau multiple forms) I will expand these, adding more examples and specific steps on how
core rules
to adjust variables to best meet your adventure’s needs. Use this as a primer.
Empty Rooms | Architecture and
Horror Panel

Liminal Horror Third Party

License
Liminality of characters
Item Tags for Liminal Horror
Liminal is often used to talk about types of places. As I have designed adventures, run
Time Procedures for Liminal
games, and talked with other designers, it has become clear that Liminal Horror is not
Horror in reference to a place, but the characters themselves.

Ghosts of Another Present Characters embark on a process of change as a direct result of the horrors they are
forced to grapple with. This transition from “normality” to the weird is the main
Funnel Rules function of Liminal Horror’s core design. Exposure to monsters, stress, fallout, and
being forced to make increasingly difficult choices results in characters that may or
Voidcrawl Procedure for Liminal may not survive, but will undoubtedly be changed through play.
Horror

Writing
For more information see a talk I participated in: Writing
Writing&& Designing
&Designing Non-Cthulhu
DesigningNon-Cthulhu
Non-Cthulhu
Welcome to the Goblin Archives Horror
Horror
Horror|||Virtual
Virtual
VirtualHorror
Horror
HorrorCon
Con
Con2022
2022
2022

Setting/Place

The spaces in which these stories are told are extremely important to many types of
horror. The cabin in the woods, the mall outside of time and space, a dark hospital.
These places function as another character that is just as important as the big bad.

Even seemingly mundane spaces are important forWritingmodern&horror

Designing
as they
Non-Cthulhu
are instantly
Horror | Virtual
relatable to the players.
Horror Con
Using
2022
the schemas of those at the table we are able to imagine
these spaces with vivid detail. It is then when you introduce the weird, strange, and
horrifying that the juxtaposition hits players (and their characters).

Empty
For more information watch Empty Rooms:
EmptyRooms: Architecture
Rooms:Architecture and
Architectureand Horror
andHorror Panel
HorrorPanel
Panel

Liminal Horror and Cops

A value that was not made explicit when writing the core text, but is fundamental to its
conception, is that Liminal Horror is written as to not be playing law enforcement
(cops, FBI, military). The themes inherent in playing as extensions of those types of
systems are problematic, exploitative, and uninteresting.

Reframing as people interested Empty

in theRooms:
paranatural,
Architecture
people in
andover
Horror
theirPanel
heads,
journalists, writers, etc is a more fruitful of an outlet.

Any piece of media that you love that is centered around being a cop can be reframed
in a ttrpg context as being an investigative journalist of some sort. Columbo as an
eccentric writer always looking for the truth to the mystery is more interesting, while
also not needing to benefit from a system designed to oppress. Now take your
journalist Columbo and throw him at a lich.

Take playing the store clerk that sees something that cannot be believed. The journey
that has them stumbling forward into horror beyond imagining, and seeing how that
character ends up is much more worthwhile story than a cop trying to jail the shadows.

So if your inclination is to frame the characters as cops, military, or something like

that, I ask that you take the time to think of what framing it differently could do for the
story. Law Enforcement, military, and government agencies have their place in LH, but
it is to act as a natural friction point and adversary. They pose themes worth exploring,
just not with players being on the side of oppression.

Reinforcing Specific Themes/Genres in Horror

As I’ve designed official modules for Liminal Horror, I’ve found that the versatility of
the core system allows for aspects to be prioritized or adapted to reinforce specific
genre desires.

VARIABLES INDEX

- Character Gen (backgrounds, starting equipment) - recommended start for all

adventure writing
- Party Composition (party questions/framing, entanglements)
- Stress (its use and ways to adjust)
- Fallout (creating your own to tie to your specific brand of weird) - second place to go
if writing an adventure
- Modular Rules (examples of some I’ve created as a means to support different genre
set pieces)

CHARACTER GEN

Tailoring your Character Generation is the first aspect I would recommend if you are
aiming for a specific genre/theme in your adventure module.

The most straightforward adaptation you can do is to create custom backgrounds

backgrounds
backgrounds,
getting
getting to
gettingto know
toknow your
knowyour character
yourcharacter questions
characterquestions starting
questions, and starting gear
startinggear
gear that specifically aligns with
your module. This can help give an extra level of immersion in the composition of the
party.

Below are three different, specific examples of approaches you can take. They have
varying degrees of restructuring from the core text.

- From Funnels
- From The Bureau
- From The Mall

FROM FUNNELS backgrounds

getting to know your character questions starting gear
For the Appendix introducing Funnel
Funnel
FunnelRules
Rules
Rules I simplified the character generation
procedure by cutting down the amount of questions, and having each background
include two items related to the background.

Journalist (Audio Recorder, Camera)

Store Clerk (Lighter, d6 Mini-baseball bat )

One option you could do is choose a specific set of thematic backgrounds with
accompanying starting equipment. 6 options should suffice for most tables and give
you a range. The more options you provide also help by informing the Facilitator and
players the types of characters that would be in this setting. What you include in a table
111222
is an act of lore/worldbuilding.Funnel Rules

FROM THE BUREAU

For The
The
TheBureau
Bureau
Bureau Josh Domanski and I tailored the character gen (renamed Personally
Identifiable Information (PPI) Policy - p. 5) to be a streamlined version of the process
in the core text. We included references to Liminal Horror’s questions as an option but
embedded a majority of the flavor in the Operational Experience (renamed
backgrounds).

Each Operational Experience (The Bureau p. 6-7) had a short description of the
12
background (2-3 sentences) that hinted at why they were in the Monolith. They also
alluded to potential complications and goals for the character. Each OE also included
2-3 items as starting equipment.

FINALLY FOUND YOU: You’ve spent years searching for answers. But this is it,
you finally know where to find them. Take: Leather Jacket (1 armor), old photograph
The Bureau
(The Bureau p. 6)

GHOST HUNTER: Ever since your show was canceled, you’ve been trying to go
legit. They haven’t returned your calls, but there’s no harm in showing up in person.
Take: Spirit box, thermal camera, EVP wrist recorder. (The Bureau p. 6)

COMPLIANCE OFFICER: Records show that the Bureau has missed the last 51
annual safety inspections. This oversight simply cannot stand. Take: Inspection
form,flashlight (d6), all-in-one measurement/testing tool. (The Bureau p. 7)

This option expands on the custom background/equipment combo by baking in more

implied world building and characterization with the short prompt. Creating
backgrounds that have a blurb and equipment can be a way for you to reinforce the
setup and give players a starting point that has some built-in stakes.

- You could take it a step further and add some more in depth characterizations to the
prompts to give a tailored setup.
- You could give (either to each of them or have a roll table) each character a hidden
goal/drive.

FROM THE MALL:

The
For The Mall
TheMall
Mall I rewrote the entire character generation for Liminal Horror from the
ground up. A web-based
web-based
web-basedversion
version
version can be found on the Liminal Horror website.

I started by having players add to the mall (setting) as a means of building shared
vision for the space. They then dove deeper into their characters, specifically
answering:

Why Are You At The Mall?

How Does Your Character Feel About The Mall?

The starting gear was rewritten to be mall themed, with little notes to reinforce the
setting (like what uniform they wear if they are an employee, etc).
The Mall
web-based version
Creating a custom procedure for creating a character can be a great way to modify
character gen to produce a specific style of starting character. It puts not only the
characters into the space of being a part of the setting but helps prime players. A
simple framework could be:

- Step 1: Adding to the setting (mall, town, organization)

- Step 2: Ability Scores & HP (standard core rules)
- Step 3: Investigator Details (use this section to ask guiding questions that establish the
characters’ connection to the setting)
- Step 4: Starting Gear (write a starting gear table that aligns to the tone and theme of the
scenario)
- Step 5: General Info (age, look, name, final touches)
following
- Step 6: Entanglements (see the following section
followingsection
section for details)

PARTY COMPOSITION

“An elite team composed of lone wolves, nerds, thieves, marginalized, heretics and
enemies of the academic bureaucracy.” - Shin Gojira 2016

Getting to the heart of what brings the party together is another variable that can be
adjusted to reinforce theme, tone, and setup. Sometimes it’s implied based on setup
(The Mall has people as customers or employees) or is it more open to interpretation
(The Bureau has a few questionsfollowing section
that can be influenced by people’s Operational
Experiences - but serendipity can easily be the culprit).

Party composition is often made up of:

- Party Questions
- Entanglements - Connections
- Entanglements - Bonds

PARTY QUESTIONS

One way to adjust the system for your module is to create a unifying setup that brings
the party together. Liminal
Liminal
LiminalHorror
Horror
HorrorParty
Party
PartyQuestions
Questions
Questions introduces some options that could
bring the group together. You could write in a specific unifying prompt for the
scenario.

For Bayocean one of the options I will be using as a frame for the pamphlets is having
the PCs together making a radio show/podcast on the area. This framing gives a
starting unification of the group and will allow for some context/equipment at the
impetus. While not necessary for the flow of the scenarios, providing an option for
Party composition can be worthwhile.

ENTANGLEMENTS - CONNECTIONS

Having players create at least one NPC

Partythat they have a connection to is a fantastic
Liminal Horror Questions
way to bring them deeper into the setting. In The Mall players create (or choose) an
NPC that their character has a connection with. This gives an immediate thread for the
Facilitator to tug on, building stakes and creating narrative buy in for the characters.
(Spoiler: I would often use one of the NPC connections as the first victims of the
monster in The Mall, establishing what’s at stake immediately after things break bad)

ENTANGLEMENTS - BONDS

While in the core text this is listed as optional, for The Mall I made it a built in step for
players. It begins to create a web of connection and gives a starting point for characters
in relation to each other. This is also great because of how play impacts and changes
these relationships (remember, the Liminal Horror is how characters change in the face
of these events, and often it is not for the best).

STRESS

Stress is a great resource for Facilitators. It allows them to put characters at risk, and
can help control pacing. Since it is a modular addition specifically for Liminal Horror,
altering/adjusting/removing stress is something that is completely possible.

Stress serves two functions:

1. To be a non-physical threat to players - directly in relation to the weird

2. It is the means in which Fallout is triggered, thereby permanently changing characters
through the weird.

Depending on the themes, tone, and need in your adventure, you can adjust how stress
gets used. It will be important to make the adjustment explicit for the Facilitator (and
support them in explaining it to players).

POSSIBLE ADJUSTMENTS

- In Place of Stress: One adjustment could be introducing a variable in the place of

mechanic
stress (or to go alongside it). In The Mall, there is a mechanic called
mechaniccalled Whisper
calledWhisper Cards
WhisperCards
Cards.
For this module the trigger for Whisper Cards would replace getting stress. This only
occurred for the player taking an action. So while other characters got stress in a
situation, the one taking the most risk got a Whisper Card instead. This mean while
stress was still in play (especially for attacking HP and establishing stakes) Whisper
Cards become the main conduit for the weird. (This decision was to reinforce the being
replaced theme of the module, and was a way to integrate a modular rule - see
below).

- Drop Connection To Fallout: Another adjustment could be to drop the connection to

Fallout. Having stress simply be a risk akin to physical damage. This removes the
characters being shifted by the weird, but maintains the resource tension by giving
another avenue to impact HP and decrease stats. In a straight slasher style module I
mechanic called Whisper Cards
could see omitting fallout (see the Fallout Considerations below).

- Shift to a Build Up System: One other option is to have Stress build up over time,
accruing until something happens (with the trigger being specific to a modular rule
created for your scenario - see below).

Note: Liminal Horror explicitly is designed to avoid playing into stigmatizing mental
health. If you create a new stress trigger that is not Fallout it needs to not step into
historical tropes of sanity systems and its ilk. If there’s a mechanical impact to rules, be
careful what you name it.

FALLOUT

Fallout is the rule that directly entwines Liminal Horror with the weird. When
designing Fallout, my intent was to use it as a means of entangling characters. It
functions as a narrative progression (and sometimes mechanical one) and makes
explicit how characters have changed as a result of the stress caused by the weird.

The generic
generic
genericFallouts
Fallouts
Fallouts written for Liminal Horror are fun and each provide a different
narrative hook that could have sessions built around them.

If you are writing your own Liminal Horror scenario, one of the first things I
recommend doing to reinforce your intended theme/tone/monster/etc is create a few
adventure specific Fallouts. This align the weird that happens to the players to the
horror being written in the adventure.

FOR THE MALL

I wrote Fallouts that relate to the Children of Ammon infecting the Carpenter Mall:

01: You the choir’s song, its melody is an ever-changing constant. ▶ Increase
hearFallouts
generic
your CTRL by 1d4.

07: Sounds begin to manifest visually. At first, they are just shapes and colors, but they
slowly start to become more distinct. Their form is unlike anything you’ve ever seen.

FOR THE BUREAU

We leaned in to Fallout as a major facet of the themes of corruption. The Shadow is

invading The Monolith, and as characters get closer to the goal they become infected
by shadow, getting stronger (hopefully strong enough to overcome the Director) but
potentially losing themselves in the process:

02: Halo of Black Flame: It forms over your head, faint at first, but the longer you
spend in this place, the more pronounced it becomes. Roll d4 and add it to your CTRL
(max 18).

07: Arm of Night: The flesh from your right arm sloughs off and is replaced by sharp
angles made of shadow (acts as a d8 weapon).

11: Maggot Warren: Maggots made of shadow burrow in your flesh. They grant a
limited ability to manipulate shadows. You can move 150lb objects up to 100ft. Every
time you use this the burrowing of the maggots causes d4 Stress to anyone that sees.

Fallout can be a thing that is shifted or omitted (see Stress, Possible Adjustments
above), but it is also one of the easiest ways to strengthen the connection between the
system, the weird, and your scenario. Character Gen and Fallouts are two things I
always adjust for my Liminal Horror adventures and are the first places I recommend
people look at when trying to write their own.

MODULAR RULES

One of the things that I have loved doing for Liminal Horror is creating modular
rules/procedures that can be used in both campaign play and short for adventure
writing.

What I have found is that since there is a strong central ruleset, you can adjust modular
rules to meet needs of play, adding and removing them over time based on the story
being told.

Whisper
For The Mall I used Whisper Cards
WhisperCards
Cards as a modular rule that specifically reinforced The
Thing/being replaced/not knowing who has been replaced. If I were to continue after
the events of the adventure, I may drop the Whisper Cards and stay with the core rules,
adding a different modular rule if the need arose.

This adaptability can be leveraged in your own writing. Creating rules/procedures that
specifically reinforce a tone/theme/event sequence can elevate play but doesn’t break
the table or narrative.

Some examples of other modular rules that I’ve put out (or are planning on putting
out):

- Item
Item Tags
ItemTags
Tags Whisper Cards
- Time
Time
TimeProcedures
Procedures
Procedures
- Funnel
Funnel Rules
FunnelRules
Rules (for running a level 0 meatgrinder)
- Voidcrawl
Voidcrawl
VoidcrawlProcedure
Procedure
Procedure (a turn based integration of overloaded encounter die for explore
dark and neglected spaces)

Some ones that are in the cue to come out:

- Whisper Cards (a generic way to use them as a corruption/replacement mechanic)

- Doppelganger rules
- Flashback mechanic
- Car Chase
- Confessional Booth (like on reality tv)
Item Tags
Time Procedures
These
Funnelcan be in addition to the core rules, or adapted to replace/work alongside stress
Rules
& fallout. IfProcedure
there is a complicated or genre specific thing that happens (especially in
Voidcrawl
relation to character change), creating a custom rule or procedure can be a great way to
really tailor the system to your adventure.

I use the term modular because it truly is. Liminal Horror is built in such a way to
facilitate telling interesting horror stories from a multitude of genres.

(Writing and Design © 2022 Goblin Archives)

1. Vi Huntsman did a great video on table entries and how they can act as way of
The
understanding the world: The Good,
TheGood, The
Good,The Bad
TheBad and
Badand the
andthe Aleatory
Aleatory---Roll
theAleatory Roll Tables
RollTables Part
Part111---
TablesPart
YouTube↩︎
YouTube
YouTube↩︎
YouTube ↩︎

2. John Battle does a great dive into how bits and pieces presented in a text (like table
The
entries) help build an understanding of the world - which then can lead to roleplay: The
The
Descent
Descent
Descentinto
into
intoRoleplaying
Roleplaying YouTube↩︎
Roleplaying---YouTube
YouTube↩︎
YouTube ↩︎

The Good, The Bad and the Aleatory - Roll Tables Part 1 -
Previous post Next post
YouTube↩︎
Faction The Bureau Appendix V...Vehicle's Expanded
The Bureau is a government organization tasked Vehicles have HP. When HP reaches 0 the
with controlling the paranatural. Contain and vehicle is totaled. Totaling a vehicle causes
The
control any paranatural threats. Dimensional damage to those in and around. Vehicle damage
Descent into Roleplaying - YouTube↩︎
bleeds, is relative to

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