A Review of the Role Playing Game Supplement Border Town

Border Town by Michael Bertolini is a role playing game supplement published by Chaosium Inc. through the Miskatonic Repository Community Content Programme for use with Call of Cthulhu, the horror role playing game based on the works of H.P. Lovecraft.

Border Town is available as a ten page Pay What You Want PDF from DriveThruRPG.

The first page explains that there is a town that is devouring the minds of its people, and that this is a framework for an adventure, and that players shouldn’t read further.

Important! explains that this is not a straightforward scenario and that it requires a lot of customisation. The five pre-generated characters included can be used as PCs or as NPCs, and that if others are used for PCs, they need a backstory so that appropriate encounters can be created.

What’s Going On? explains that investigators wake up in Rick’s Diner in Purlieu, Idaho, or another appropriate location. The investigators will have no memory of who they are or why they got there, but they need to escape. Some details are given as to the town and what the investigators encounter, but the Keeper will need to fill in many details.

The final six pages have five pre-generated characters and stats for Yog-Sothoth.

Border Town in Review

The PDF lacks bookmarks and is short enough that these are not needed. Navigation is okay. The text maintains a two-column format and appeared to be free of errors. The only illustrations are tweaked photos for the characters. Presentation is okay.

As is stated, this isn’t truly a scenario; it’s the bare bones of a framework that can be developed into one, and Keepers will likely need to do quite a bit of work to turn this into a true adventure. For one thing, it might be an idea to take a look at the various Sanity losses given in the text; they look like they could quickly erode investigators’ Sanity, perhaps too much, and may need to be reined in. Border Town is what it sets out to be – a bare bones scenario framework – and it can be found by clicking here.