The Contemporary Quixotist

It’s Christmas Eve, and I’m prepping my clan for an evening trip to visit family up north, but I have time for one quick check on the Random Christmas Encounter Table before I go.

This time, it’s the Rōgun Holiday Special, a free holiday special supplement for the new Retrostar RPG by Spectrum Games. Retrostar is the RPG of classic 70s science fiction television shows. Now I’m going to be honest here – I haven’t had the time to check it out yet (the Pay What You Want starter edition is here), but if history means anything, I’m certain it will capture the genre with the same spirit that their other games (Macabre Tales, Slasher Flick, Cartoon Action Hour, etc) have in the past.

So if the idea of roleplaying some classic Buck-Rogers-styled adventures piques your interest, be sure to check out Retrostar, and pick up this free holiday supplement to get started.

Swords and Stitchery has another creepy Christmas treat for our science fantasy OSR games – Zebulara, the Twisted Christmas Demiplane:

Zebulara is an Outskirt demi plane realm that has been created from the debris and remains of mankind’s dreams and memories of Christmas’s past lost to the collective unconsciousness of humanity’s memory from the Nineteen Hundreds through the present seen through the eyes of a Holiday Christmas special from classic television. At least in the beginning of a visit. This demi plane actively hunts and sucks in adventurers as well as heroes from across time and space. A strange candy can colored vortex is often the first and only warning of  Zebulara’s dimensional trap springing upon PC’s. The dimensional vortex opens near the PC’s and Dex checks are needed just to avoid the debris and what not that will try to knock characters out. They will awaken upon Zebulara.

Learn more, and check out the Zebulara encounter table, at Swords and Stitchery.

The Krampus is the first installment of Rogues, Rivals, & Renegades, a series of villain supplements for the Mutants & Masterminds 3E RPG. A devoted fan of the Christmas holiday, Oliver Christmas became mentally unhinged after a series of tragic events, and turned to a life of the vigilante. Now he vows to punish those who do not truly understand the real meaning of the holiday, using his Yule whip and other Christmas-themed weapons that he has engineered himself.

This supplement includes the backstory and M&M stats for The Krampus, some great character art, and a printable mini.

You can find a copy at DriveThruRPG.

The most excellent OSR RPG blog Swords & Stitchery has a creepy Lovecraftian creature for us – the Red Variuri, or False Santa, a greedy murderous lich that is sometimes summoned by evil cults to guard treasure or oversee evil rituals.  Doesn’t that just fill your heart with holiday cheer?

You can find the Red Variuri at Swords & Stitchery.

The next goody under the angry treant stuck in the little pot in our living room is Holiday Heroes & Horrors, a holiday and arctic themed supplement for the Pathfinder RPG from the wonderfully named Octopus Apocalypse.

Packed in the 18 pages are details of a new arctic region called “White Hell,” rules for snow blindness, a new item, item quality, and item material, two new magic items, three new spells, two new races, and a bunch of new monsters to top it all off.

As with many holiday themed products, the material and illustrations are a bit whimsical, but if you’re looking to bring some lighter fun to your Pathfinder games, then this would be three bucks well spent.

You can find a copy at DriveThruRPG.

The Christmas classic Santa Claus Conquers the Martians turns 50 years old this year. To celebrate, Berin Kinsman – who previously brought the Martians to Pathfinder – has created Santa Claus Conquers the Martians: The Roleplaying Game!

In an alternate dimension (my favorite kind!), the movie spun off a popular television show, and using the FATE system as an engine, SCCtM lets you play in that playground:

This roleplaying game is based on the expanded universe of that television series! Powered by the Fate Accelerated Edition rules, you can play a human, an elf, a Martian, a robot, or even Santa Claus himself! Battle the forces of Voldar’s rebellion! Oppose the secret agents of NYET, who think Santa has the key to winning the Space Race! Spread joy and good cheer to all of the good girls and boys, on Earth and Mars!

Find out more and pick up a copy at DriveThruRPG!

It’s that most wonderful time of the year yet again, the time when we dump the dice out of our stockings and roll the Holiday Dodecahedron to see how many days of Christmas we’ll have this year!

As with every year, it wouldn’t be a true 1d12 Days of Christmas without Krampus, our favorite germanic holiday demon. For our first random day of Christmas, the Ultanya blog gives us a freebie OSR magic artifact – the Bag of Krampus!