By John Houlihan
It is said it is the journey rather than the destination which is more important and Achtung! Cthulhu: Unexplored is a brand new 150 page book which aims to fill in the blank spaces on the map agents often simply “redline” through before their next epic encounter.
Everyone remembers the classic roving red line from the Indiana Jones movies, which signifies fast travel between major set pieces, but surely, we wondered, here was a prime opportunity to fill in some details about what actually happens to agents in between their main adventures?
Inspired by the epic desert traversals of the SAS during the North Africa campaign, a prototype was first deployed in The Serpent and the Sands book, where, in a classic desert survival sequence, the agents are left stranded in the middle of the Great Waste.
Rather than create a linear sequence of encounters, we thought it might be more fun to give GMs and agents a more procedurally generated experience so that no two journeys were ever the same. Jason Brick who did the writing on that chapter and eventually Unexplored itself, not only came up with some great ideas for different desert environments and encounters, but also added rules for traversal and using supplies like food, water and fuel to map the journey.
The finished chapter was impressive and that led onto thinking that maybe there could be a whole book based on journeys into unexplored territory and so Achtung! Cthulhu: Unexplored was conceived (although it was originally codenamed Achtung! Cthulhu: Here Be Dragons! after cartographers’ habit of filling in the blanks on early explorers’ maps).
So what awaits you inside Achtung! Cthulhu: Unexplored? Well, there’s a rules chapter which includes instructions and guides for wilderness traversal, supplies, weather and survival and six challenging biomes including Mountains, Plains, Jungles, Desert, Caves and Caverns environments. Each of the biomes also has unique events, challenges, and encounters and includes hazards, terrain, easter eggs, new creatures and even special effects unique to that location.
Each of the six different biomes also has up to four maps featuring themed locations which provide an epic conclusion to the journey or an intriguing encounter along the way. For example, the Caves and Caverns biome has four different scenarios: Active Listening which features a concealed Nachtwölfe listening post, Shoggoth Squeeze which stars an ancient cave-dwelling horror, The Endless Stair which invites you to meet the inhabitants of a Blauer Kristall cavern, and finally Caught For Eternity which features an encounter with a trapped Elder Thing. All come with further adventure seeds and ideas so you can re-use them for alternate adventures.
Achtung! Cthulhu: Unexplored is a slight detour for the series which seems appropriate given the subject matter but we hope it will prove useful for both players and GMs. You can use it to plan a journey in advance or improvise endless forms of wilderness adventure on the fly, or indeed just use it as a source of inspiration to create adventures of your own.
We’ll be happy to tell you more in an AMA with writer Jason Brick and Achtung! Cthulhu creative lead John Houlihan. So come join us on Tuesday 20th February at 4pm GMT (11am EST) on the Modiphius Discord channel, where we’ll field questions, provide answers and maybe even demonstrate a sample journey to show you how Unexplored works.
Hope to see you there! In the meantime, you can get a copy of Achtung! Cthulhu: Unexplored at the following: