Free Role Playing Game Supplement Review: The Miskatonic Five

The Miskatonic Five by Matthew Sincic and Alex Artang is a free 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.

The supplement is available as an 18-page PDF for free from DriveThruRPG. One page is the front cover, one the front matter and one the Table of Contents.

The Introduction starts by explaining that the scenario is set in Miskatonic University in May 1970 and that the title should be changed to reflect the number of investigators.

Background explains that a professor, who is also a priest of the Cult of Hastur, plans to travel to Carcosa and has recruited several students to his beliefs. Using the skull of a byakhee, he intends to create space-mead, summon a byakhee and travel to Carcosa. There is also a reference to the Kent State Massacre, which is a real event that happened on May 4th 1970, and is presumably the reason for the unusual timeframe selected for the adventure.

The Investigators explains they are seniors at the university and the skills they should have, if the pre-generated investigators aren’t used.

Dramatis Personae lists the NPCs.

Chapter One: The Class has the professor asking for people to help with an experiment that can gain them extra credits. The news of the Kent State Massacre follows after the class and the university becomes restive.

Chapter Two: The Break-In explains that the exam the investigators were going to do is cancelled. They will then overhear the cultists making their way into the building and can confront them; they may be asked to join.

Chapter Three: The Summoning is the attempt to summon the byakhee, which they may try to prevent, fail to prevent or get involved in.

Epilogue wraps things up. Cultists may disappear, there may be a number of bodies and the investigators may become notorious, with their portrayal dependent on their actions and the NPCs, as well as possibilities for further adventures.

NPC’s and Creatures has the various stats and Pre-Generated Investigators has five (naturally) characters.

The Miskatonic Five in Review

The PDF lacks bookmarks and is long enough that these would have been useful. The Table of Contents covers the major sections. Navigation could be better. The text maintains a two-column format and a few minor errors were noticed; notably, one NPC varied in name between “Chip” and “Chop”. There are a number of photo-based illustrations. Presentation is decent.

Though there are suggestions for further adventures, the unusual time period due to the tie-in with an actual event means that a Keeper will have to create them themself, as there is a dearth of scenarios set in the 1970s. As such, this is perhaps better run as a one-shot than as part of a campaign. There seems to be a lot of potential for things to go quite badly wrong for the investigators, even if they survive – one of the NPCs is a bit kill-happy – given they could end up with quite a few bodies with little, believable, explanation for them, and with some disappearances too. The Miskatonic Five is a decent little adventure and it can be found by clicking here.