Custom Fallout

Custom Fallout should make the Investigators a little stronger and also a little weirder. The character becomes more powerful, but it comes with a cost. Loose guidelines for different mechanical bonuses and their downsides are discussed below.

• Attributes: Add d4 to STR, DEX, or CTRL up to a maximum of 18. This typically comes with a narrative change, either in a physical sense or to the character’s demeanor. Increased STR means you become physically more robust. Increased DEX means you become quicker or have a sharper eye. Increased CTRL means you’re better in touch with the strange and weird.
• Armor & Stability: Add +1 up to a maximum of 3. Additional Armor generally comes with a physical change as the Investigator becomes more durable or harder to hit. Stability generally means an acclimation to the horrors has occurred, either through a growing sense of resolve or being directly connected to the horrors in some manner.
• Abilities: These should be thematically similar to the abilities of the horrors. The effects are typically either profound and dangerous or incredibly specific. When in doubt, borrow from a Resonant Artifact or Ritual. Simple abilities can be performed without issue, but the more powerful the ability the higher the cost, either causing Stress for the user or for those that witness it. Using the ability then creates a feedback loop where it may end up causing further Fallout.

It’s also important to note that there is no hard requirement for Fallout to be beneficial in some manner. They can be purely detrimental if that better fits with the theme and tone of the scenario.

GENERAL FALLOUT

1. Caustic Blood. Your blood turns to an acid-like substance. While it does not hurt you, it will harm others. If it makes contact with another being it causes d6 damage.
2. Hunted: You have become entwined with an entity that creeps ever towards you. It never stops, stalking you endlessly until you are dead. It can look like anyone. Only those connected to it (through Fallout, Rituals, cult influence, contract, pact, etc) can see it coming. Ever prepared, increase your HP by d4.
3. Re-Animated: Death will not be able to find you. Whenever you “die” (STR reaches 0) your body will become a Reanimated Dead (see Reanimated Dead in the Deluxe Edition Catalog of the Strange).
4. Exsanguinate: Consuming the blood or flesh from a living host will instantly replenish your HP, even in a risky situation.
5. Behold the Night: Your eyes shift to a dark shade of purple. You are able to perceive unimpeded, even in darkness.
6. Calcification: The bones upon your knuckles and hands harden in sharp spurs. While using them causes your skin to tear, your bare fists deal d6+d6 damage.
7. Chaos Rituals: A connection to the weird has been formed, but it is wild and outside of your control. Once per day you can perform a random Ritual without paying the cost.
8. Resonance: Your attunement to the strange makes you more able to locate and understand the nature of Resonant Artifacts. This boon is especially attractive to those who seek to harness Resonant Artifact for their own means.
9. Plagued by Visions: It comes for you every night, without fail. You do not know if they are from the beginning, or the end. All you know is that they won’t stop, and that they must mean something. After a week of nightmares, tell your Facilitator two distinct images that linger at the edge of your remembering. You gain +1 Stability.
10. Shadow Step: You can step through shadows. Every time you do you leave a bit of yourself behind. On use, your CTRL decreases by d4 (this does not trigger a Save or Fallout).
11. Heavy is the Head: An ethereal crown hangs above your head. It is not visible to all, only a special few. Tales have been told of your coming. Increase your CTRL by d6 (max 18).
12. The Hunt: It becomes harder to ignore the primal impulses that burn deep inside you. Your attacks are Enhanced. You become the primary target of otherworldly Horrors, and their attacks against you are also Enhanced.

Fallouts from The Bureau

Representing the corruption of Shadow.

1. Shadow Stained Blood: Inky blemishes appear in your blood, spider-webbing across your body. + 1 Armor.
2. 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).
3. Creeping Black Mold: It stains your fingertips, slowly spreading further and further. Roll d4 and add it to your STR (max 18).
4. Feet of Tar: Your feet drip with a viscous shadow. You cannot wear shoes and every step you take leaves a dark print. Roll d4 and add it to your DEX (max 18).
5. Detached Shadow: Your shadow becomes detached from your body. It remains near your person, for now. Roll d4 and add it to your HP.
6. Entropic Forces: Chaos flows through you like a conduit. Once per session you can reroll any Save or Damage dice.
7. 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).
8. Eyes Wide Shut: Your eyes burn with a fierce red light. You can see in complete darkness. Something is coming.
9. Alms from the Abyss: You hear constant whispers from the shadows, and they are getting louder. +1 Stability.
10. Maggot Warren: Maggots made of shadow burrow in your flesh. They grant a limited ability to manipulate shadows. You can move 150 pound objects up to 100 feet. Every time you use this the burrowing of the maggots causes d4 Stress to anyone who sees.

Fallouts from The Bloom

Fallout representing the spreading fungal infection.

1. Sporocarp: Your nails yellow and your skin begins to crack and harden in places, mottling in color. +1 Armor.
2. Bioluminescence: There’s a chemical reaction going on inside of you. In darkness, the skin of your hands produces a weak light.
3. Mycelia Hair: Your hair begins to fall out, quickly replaced by wispy white strands. You are much more sensitive to environmental changes (temperature, wind direction, pressure, etc.). Roll d4 and add it to your CTRL (max 18).
4. Coagulation: You don’t bleed. Mycelic fibers stitch together your wounds. Heal d2 STR per day, up to max.
5. Psilocybin: Your vision waivers. Hallucinations manifest. Ghosts wander at the periphery. +1 Stability.
6. Impulse: You can feel them communicating. A tingle on the skin, a spike of anxiety. Every dawn there are more voices.
7. Twisted Strands: Strands of mycelia twist under your skin, bulging like varicose veins. Digging into muscle, they act as extra ligaments. Roll d4 and add it to your STR (max 18).
8. Deadened Nerves: Something inside is allowing you to push past your physical limits, but everything comes at a cost. You are no longer affected by Fatigue or Deprivation.

Legacy Fallout

Some moments change an investigator forever. Players roll or choose from the the Fallout table when the Investigator suffers Critical Stress. Unless marked, the Fallout can only be chosen once per table. Each Fallout takes up an Inventory Slot. It cannot be removed.

1. Have you been replaced? You’ve seen what they can do, their magics and their deceptions. What would stop them from taking you? Maybe you aren’t who you think you are? How would you even know? During your next moment of quiet reflection, roll 1d6. If the total is higher than your max HP, take the new result.
2. Memories of an Unknown Traveler: These memories are not your own. They are of a different time, a different place, from a perspective so unlike your own. The realities they walk through are so alien and different, their feelings so foreign. If only you could understand what they experienced. During your next rest, roll 1d6. If the total is higher than your max HP, take the new result.
3. Paranoia: Is it paranoia if the worries are completely reasonable? You’ve seen what happens in the dark, you know what goes bump in the night. After a week, roll 1d6. If the total is higher than your max HP, take the new result.
4. Plagued by Nightmares: It comes for you every night, without fail. You do not know if they are from the beginning, or the end. All you know is that they won’t stop, and that they must mean something. After a week of nightmares, tell your Facilitator two distinct images that linger at the edge of your remembering.
5. Mirror World: Everything seemed okay at first, but now you are sure of it, the world inside the mirror is different. The side glances, the shifting of places, it is undeniable.When you first start to notice, roll 2d6. If the total is higher than your max HP, take the new result.
6. Odd: You adopt an odd behavior that makes others uncomfortable. If you resist indulging in your “Oddity” for 24 hours, take the Deprived tag. If others see you engage in this creepy behavior, they must make a CTRL Save or suffer 1d4 Stress. After the first instance, roll 3d6. If the total is higher than your current CTRL, take the new result.
7. Hunger: You develop an unnatural hunger for the unusual. If you do not satiate your appetite for 24 hours, take the Deprived tag. When you eat, restore HP and give 1d4 stress to any that can see. After the first instance, roll 3d6. If the total is higher than your current STR, take the new result.
8. Scarred: Every wound you inflict leaves its ragged mark upon your body. After the first instance, make a CTRL Save. If you pass, increase your max STR by 1d4.
9. Liminal Communion: It wasn’t noticeable at first, but something is trying to communicate, though without a mouth from which to scream. Its words manifest throughout physical space. Increase your max CTRL by 1d4.
10. Magical Corruption (this can be taken multiple times per Investigator): Flesh is weak. A part of your body becomes visibly changed through your proximity to the weird. The Facilitator and Investigator should decide on how that change manifests, if it has any mechanical impacts.
11. Threshold: There is a pale door with a black handle. It is unremarkable other than the fact that this door can seemingly appear anywhere. Sometimes the door is in places it should not be. Sometimes it stands alone, attached to nothing at all. The one thing you are sure of is that it is the same door each time, one you have not yet been able to open.
12. Neural Superposition: You see images of unknown places superposed onto this one, sometimes making it difficult to tell what is real. In another time you may have been called an oracle. When you roll DEX Saves, roll 2d20 and take the lowest result. Once per day you see something significant (ask your Facilitator what it is).
13. Shadow Step: You can step through shadows. Every time you do you leave a bit of yourself behind. On use, your CTRL decreases by d4 (this does not trigger a Save or Fallout).
14. Marked by Fear The core of your being has been twisted and changed. When you act in a way that manifests your marked fear and have to make a Save, roll 2d20 and take the lowest result. When you resist an opportunity to indulge the fear, suffer 1d4 Stress. Create a fundamental fear with your Facilitator.
15. Heavy is the head: An ethereal crown hangs above your head. It is not visible to all, only a special few. Tales have been told of your coming. Make a CTRL save. If you pass, increase your max CTRL by 1d6.
16. Full to Bursting: You have a feeling of fullness and contentment. Next time you would fail a Critical Damage STR Save, you succeed instead. Immediately and violently begin to vomit vermin (player’s choice). Any being that can see they must make a CTRL Save or suffer 1d6 stress. Roll 3d6. If the total is higher than your max CTRL, take the new result.
17. Progeny: Something is growing inside of you. Hope has long since abandoned it, and it has no more room for dreams. Roll 2d6. Take the new result as your max HP
18. Fate’s Web (this can only be taken once per Investigator but multiple times per table): At least a puppet can see the strings that bind it, if only you were so lucky.
19. The Hunt: Patronage is a dangerous thing. It becomes harder to ignore the primal impulses that burn deep inside you. Your attacks are Enhanced. You become the primary target of otherworldly entities, and attacks made against you are Enhanced.
20. Doomed (this can be taken multiple times per character and multiple times at the table): You have been branded for sacrifice, anointed for doom. If your next Critical Save against damage is a failure, you die horribly. If it is a success, you roll 3d6 + the number of times you’ve taken Doomed. If the total is higher than your max HP, take the new result.