OSR Mini Campaign Commentary - 'His Flesh Becomes My My Key' By Venger Satanis - An Invisible College And Wretched Darkness Crossover mini campaign

"Then the last days were upon me, and the ugly trifles of existence began to drive me to madness like the small drops of water that torturers let fall ceaselessly upon one spot of their victims body, I loved the irradiate refuge of sleep. In my dreams I found a little of the beauty I had vainly sought in life, and wandered through old gardens and enchanted woods."
Ex Oblivione  (1921) 
by H. P. Lovecraft

 I keep seeing Venger and the Red Room advertising The Outer Presence & the Wretchedverse rpg material together. Ages ago I ran Venger's His Flesh Becomes My Key with Wretchploitation but after a quick rereading of the adventure I was mistaken. The better of the Wretchedverse games would definitely be Wretched Darkness and the Invisible College rpg for this game adventure. The PC's here would have to be anti heroes with connections to the cops, the mafia, or organized crime or both. These PC's might also have to have some supernatural angle. His Flesh Becomes My Key is going to be centered around thier campaign city setting. And having run this adventure during Covid, the use of a pandemic running riot in the background might be interesting. The PC's are called into the manhunt of a serial killer by an old partner Richard Black. And this is a serial killer  who is racking up the body count;"I'm not sure what this latest serial killer wants. That's what I'm struggling with now, why I called you. His pattern seems random… and yet, there's something here, possibly something I can use to catch him. This latest victim makes three - a young woman, a college student. She was returning home from a lecture at Miskatonic University. The bastard cut into her - mutilated her body with symbols. I'm still researching them. Have you ever read the work of Thomas Alhazred Lovejoy? Here's a better idea - let's go over the case in person. Have your group meet me for coffee later tonight. I could really use a second opinion, any insight that'll help us track this son of a bitch down." Richard Black doesn't show and things spiral into obilvion from there.This promotion for the Wretched Darkness rpg really plugs into weirdness and vile aspect of "His Flesh Becomes My Key.' 

For the Invisible College of magus the events of 'His Flesh Becomes My Key' are spiraling outta of control. The cult of Typhon is going to be behind some of the events of this adventure but there's far more going on here. Reality itself could be unravelling and the players are going to need every trick in thier arsenal to reel it back in if its not too late. 

"The other gods! The other gods! The gods of the outer hells that guard the feeble gods of earth! . . . Look away . . . Go back . . . Do not see! Do not see! The vengeance of the infinite abysses . . . That cursed, that damnable pit ."
The Other Gods
by H. P. Lovecraft

'His Flesh Becomes My Key' isn't simply investigation but it's got some real teeth to actually change a campaign across the board. And the player's PC's could be right in the middle of it. How? The player's PC's are deep into an almost but not quite John Carpenter apocalpyse film trilogy style situation. So there are going to be some very adult and hard choices along the way in this adventure. 

And this is what makes 'His Flesh Become My Key' solid for this style of campaign. The choices have real impact within the confines of the 'cosmicism' of the adventure. There has to be heroics or anti heroics against the framework within the adventure. This 'philosphy' isn't what we as DM's and players think it is, the wiki entry goes; "The philosophy of cosmicism states that "there is no recognizable divine presence, such as a god, in the universe, and that humans are particularly insignificant in the larger scheme of intergalactic existence."

And this blatantly goes deeply against the grain of the magickal underpinnings of the 'Invisible College' rpg and even to certain extent 'Wretched Darkness'. 

And in fact the key adventure events could lead into Wretched New Flesh Post Cards From Avalidad's Novanexus adventure. 

"His Flesh Becomes My Key" Adventure By Venger Satanis Run With The Wretched Darkness Rpg By The Red Room Session Report

 "This is an eldritch pulp / investigative horror scenario for The Outer Presence roleplaying game, suitable for experienced characters.  It works just as well for the 1970s as it does for 2017.  Converting the adventure to your system of choice should be a snap."

"Within the scenario, investigators are hunting a serial killer.  Their friend was leading the case, but now he's disappeared.  It's a spiral staircase of sordid mystery until the final revelation at the end!"

So today was one of those days where little time & weather weirdness means that little time meant that it was time to write an adventure for the on going Wretched Darkness campaign . So instead I backtracked into a favorite Venger Satanis rpg adveture for 'The Outer Presence' called "His Flesh Becomes My Key". 

So why  "His Flesh Becomes My Key"?! There are a few reasons for this first of all 'His Flesh Becomes My Key' is an investigative horror adventure, the second is the savage nature of the 'Wretched Darkness' rpg, and the third is how 'His Flesh Becomes My Key' is put together. These themes are stated straight out of the gate with the adventure intro:"This is an eldritch pulp / investigative horror scenario especially suited for The Outer Presence roleplaying game. A serial killer case opens up before the investigators and leads to something beyond the usual detective story"'

His Flesh Becomes My Key centers around a good cop ", Richard Black and his tracking down a serial killer. Our crew in tonight's Wretched Darkness rpg centers around the Updike Society. A group of friends whose adventures have 'changed them' in many subtle ways. This Wretched Darkness game centered around 'New York City' where else would one find a place of Wretched scum & villainy. And it all begins with a strange snow globe that none of the players have ever seen before. There were seven members of the Updike society and seven representives inside the snow globe. 

And then the phone rang! 
Richard wants to meet with the society to discuss his latest case at the usual diner & never showed up. 

Now a few words about Wretched Darkness as an rpg. 

Wretched Darkness is far more savage in my opinion then many of the other Wretchedverse games. We've got a Loup Garou & Succubus among the party.  A careful search of the dinner patrons for traces of  Black revealed nothing. And the focus back at Black's police department isn't any better. Thier focused on finding the "blood magic killer." The party went to see Black's ex wife Sarah Black in lower Manhatten. Sarah was of interest to the party because she's a Wiccan witch with some subtle power. Sarah wasn't in the original "His Flesh Becomes My Key" but is an NPC I stuck in to have a connection for the upcoming 'Welcome To Saint Cloud ' arch. Sarah Black is from St.Cloud but hadn't seen Richard in months. Thier marriage crumbled because of his work & his obsession with his current case. She gave the PC's copies of the 'blood magic killer' case files. Then the PC's got a phone call from Cecil Slandy Black's  police partner. 

The meeting did not go well as Cecil sees the party as a group of investigative busy bodies. Cecil Slandy did give the players information on Black;"According to Cecil Slandy, Black was a sensationalist, exploiting victims in order to forge his reputation as the man who could catch the Devil himself. Slandy even believes that Black was writing a book chronicling some of his more thrilling cases."

And then the PC's phone rang it was Black and his voice was followed by a gurgling scream & a stream of esoteric nonsense then the phone hung up! 
This is where we ended for this week. 

Commentary & Review of 'His Flesh Becomes My Key' By Kort'thalis Publishing For Your Old School Horror Campaigns

One of the harder tricks to pull off is telling a modern  & engaging Neo noir/horror adventure with OSR overtones. Well, 'His Flesh Becomes My Key' is one part John Carpenter/Stephen King / mixed in with a simmering helping of Cliver Barkerish weirdness strained through the lens of Venger Satanis.

Alright this is the usual Outer Presence rpg included in the adventure package bit we've seen before & I'm going to go out on a limb here & throw that right into the waste basket.
" This is an eldritch pulp / investigative horror scenario especially suited for The Outer Presence roleplaying game. A serial killer case opens up before the investigators and leads to something beyond the usual detective story."
So after reading through this adventure which puts the PC's front & center of a murder investigation/slash horror story I'm going to say that this would make a killer horror story adventure for the 

Silent Legions From  Sine Nomine Publishing. 

Why? Because quite frankly this adventure has a bit of it all; 

1. Viable underworld/sleaze encounters, a trail of madness & dead bodies everywhere. 
2. Sex & weird reality warping world sex magick occult themes pepper throughout the adveture. 
3. Darkness & dangerous cultists waiting. 
4. Independent Venger Mythos action, if you know the Venger's other adventures then you know the drill here. He's big on working his own brand of horror that fits the same DYI horror ideal that Silent Legions adheres to. 
5. There are not enough Silent Legion adventures & this one actually fits the bill very well. He's sort of toned down the T&A to actually tell a coherent adventure & it shows.
   "The Outer Presence RPG is about curtailing obscenity and darkness.  Horror = fear + revulsion.  Does that mean spectators, rather than participants, are just as subject to "mature content"?  Should reading or listening to the description of unwholesome things also be restricted to "adults only"?"
6. Because he's toned down the sex Venger has upped the weirdness which makes this far more accessible as a dungeon master. 

So the PC's are on the trail of Richard Black a horror novelist & run smack into the back burner of a whole lot of unraveling pulp horror business. Sure there's plenty of bloods, guts, gore & more here. But this is a thinking man's adventure that can be played over several nights sessions. Sure it includes everything you need to get started and play through but I want more. I want solid pacing, plot/setting, and a set of rules that's going to give me extended modern OSR neo horror play. That's where Silent Legions comes in and frankly there aren't enough adventure modules to support at system but 
'His Flesh Becomes My Key' fills the slimy gap quite nicely. This really isn't Lamentations of the Flame Presence turf although there is this sort of thing,  ‘When his gaze meets that of  the investigators, the chartreuse-hued dweller of the cavern begins to melt into a pool of liquid flesh.’
Instead this is one part X Files twisted around an unraveling 'In The Mouth of Madness' with a good helping of Cthulhu & Venger's tendrils of horror. So yes its a good solid fit for a Silent Legions game.



 

What I like about this adventure is that its about holding back the darkness but it doesn't play cute with the subject matter. This adventure handles things in a quick & with a deft hand. Its the sort of thing to spring on a group that needs to be eased into the deep end of a horror game without the numbness that one sometimes finds with Call of Cthulhu. This is an investigation adventure that is quick, down, dirty and apocalyptic. 

Are there any complains? Well a few.  There needed to be more of this adventure & I don't mean padding. I mean there needs to be more encounters & more of a fleshed out world for the Outer Presence or perhaps not. The fact is that sometimes less is more and more horror and material might have bogged down  'His Flesh Becomes My Key' as an adventure. I really need to run this adventure to get the real gist of it as a DM. So with that said I'm still weighing in on that part of the adventure. 

The content itself is a step up and off for Venger as a writer/designer. Quite frankly I want to see more of this sort of adventure  from him. Now that I know that he's capable of doing this sort of Neo OSR adventure then I want to see this sort of a standard from him. 

Who should buy  'His Flesh Becomes My Key'? Those who are looking for a different take on the investigative horror adventure. Who shouldn't buy  'His Flesh Becomes My Key'? Stodgy horror dungeon masters  who would rather research obscure historical facts, timelines, and historical events rather then run an action packed Eighties horror inspired adventure. Grab this one if you want a quick jumpstart for an easy to run horror campaign.