Savage Worlds: Deadlands: Hell on Earth Reloaded

209 Pages·2012·42.46 MB·English

by  Pinnacle Entertainment

Hell on Earth Reloaded Written by: Shane Lacy Hensley, Teller, and Clint Black
Original Hell on Earth Written by: Shane Lacy Hensley, John Hopler, Teller,
John M. Goff, and many others
Layout & Graphic Design: Aaron Acevedo, Simon Lucas, and Joel Kinstle
Art by: Aaron Acevedo, Chris Bivins, Mike Burns, Jim Crabtree, James Denton, Bartłomiej Fedyczak, Bien
Flores, Alberto Foche, Tom Fowler, Liz Green, Darnell Johnson, Johan Lindroos, Chris Malidore , Mauro
Mussi, Paolo Parente, Angel Rams, Jose Maria Reyes, Alida Saxon, Carly Sorge, Tomasz Tworek, and
Cheyenne Wright
Character Sheet by: Cheyenne Wright
Cover By: Carmen Cianelli
Proofing by: Piotr Korys, Marguerite Kenner, Clint and Jodi Black, Matthew Cutter, and Scott Woodard
Playtesting and Advice: Clint & Jodi Black, Simon Lucas, Piotr Korys, Evil Mike, Chaos Steve,
Jay & Amy Kyle
Shane’s Dedication: To Teller, for his infinite patience and enthusiasm.
One day, my friend, you will be the Warlord of the Wastelands.
Teller’s Dedication: To Shane, Michelle, Charlie, John, ‘Shroom, and all
the great folks who made the original Wasteland game come alive.
© 2012 Pinnacle Entertainment Group. Deadlands, Hell on Earth, the Weird West, the Wasted West,
the Way Out West, Savage Worlds and all related original characters, marks and logos are
trademarks of Pinnacle Entertainment Group. All rights reserved.
Produced under license by Studio 2 Publishing, Inc. The Studio 2 logo is a trademark of
Studio 2 Publishing, Inc. © 2012. All rights reserved. Printed in China.
Contents
Player’s Guide • 1 MarsHal’s Handbook • 93
Coup                     93
introduCtion                 1
Radios                    93
The Great Spirit War         1
Weird Weather             94
Judgment Day               6
Mutations                 95
The Wasted West            7
Veteran o’ the Wasted West  96
Who’s Who?               12
The Harrowed              98
The Harvest               19
Fear Levels               100
Gazetteer                  24
Scrounging               102
Makin’ Heroes                 31
tHe Wasted West            105
Making Characters         33
East of the Mississippi     105
New Hindrances            34
Great Basin               106
New Edges                36
The Great Maze            114
equiPMent                    41
The Great Northwest      123
Gear Notes                42 High Plains                131
Weapons                  52 The Sioux Nations         140
Gear List                  55 Lower Mississippi and Delta 142
Vehicles                   56 The Wild Southwest       146
Pimp My Ride!             60 The Coyote Wasteland     153
settinG rules               65 Monsters & Misfits          157
Counting Coup             65 Humans                  192
Death                     65 Personalities              195
Ghost Storms              65
referenCes • 202
Scavenging                66
Index                    202
no Man’s land • 69
Character Sheet           204
Doomsayers               69
Harrowed                  72
Junkers                   77
Sykers                    80
Templars                  86
Toxic Shamans             90
Hell on Earth was inspired by two things—the movie Road Warrior® and the computer
game Wasteland®. But it was also inspired by the backstory in Deadlands I had a long
elaborate story concocted about the Reckoners—how they were out to soak the world in
fear and the heroes were out to stop them
And then it occurred to me how much fun it would be to play in the Weird West some
200 years later if the Reckoners were successful We’d call it the “Wasted West,” and
it would be a post-apocalyptic Western The outcast mutants would take the place of
American Indians in our tragic narrative, bikes would replace horses, and junk-collecting
madmen would be our new mad scientists
I would also be remiss not to admit that, at the time, before Deadlands had actually
come out to the public, I had been told by retailers and distributors that our little horror
Western wouldn’t sell So I thought, “That’s okay I’ll put it out anyway and then blow
it up!” It sounded cool and a little edgy, and as the idea grew, I started thinking about
how we’d hide the identity of the Reckoners and the coming of Hell on Earth in the first
Deadlands rulebook (The names of the Reckoners appeared in certain headers)
Of course, Deadlands was a great success and that left me with a little bit of a dilemma
We had struck gold—and now we were going to blow it up? So we decided Hell on Earth
was the most likely future of the Weird West—not the only one That’s important because
it makes the adventures in Deadlands a little pointless if the heroes are ultimately doomed
to failure
In the “official” timeline, the heroes were successful—the first time But then the
Reckoners cheated (at great cost) and sent their killer, Old Stone, we call him, back
through the Hunting Grounds to the Weird West to kill certain do-gooders before they
could do too much good
Not to be hand-wavey, but I wouldn’t get too wrapped up in all that Instead, dive
into Hell on Earth and see how hucksters have gradually become sykers, or the blessed
have become Templars Check out how many servitors the Four Horsemen have running
around the Wasted West these days—it’s a lot more than four and they’re really hard to
take down Read deep enough and you’ll find all kinds of lore that reaches back into the
dusty past of the Weird West and tells you what happened to folks like Mina Devlin and
Black River, or the nefarious Doctor Hellstromme
You players can ignore all that if you want There’s a customized road-hog out there
with your name on it, or maybe a cache of ammo for your favorite shotgun and a six-pack
of pre-war Bubbly Fizz Cola—”Good for what ails ya!” Scavenge around the wastes long
enough and you might even find a relic from days long past, or a working suit of power
armor, or even secret enclaves of other wasters trying to reclaim the world…or finish off
what’s left of it
This isn’t just a wasteland It isn’t just post-apocalypse This is Hell on Earth.
—Shane Hensley
April 2012
Note: Changes have been made from the original Hell on Earth to better reflect events
that happened since we first released it in 1998 It’s a little more serious this time out, and
there are some rule changes between this game and Deadlands Reloaded to reflect the
state of the Wasted West, or because of our playtesters’ comments If you’re familiar with
Deadlands, you’ll want to pay particular attention to the rules for Fear Levels, Guts, Grit,
Fate Chips, and certain Harrowed powers
iv
Player’s Guide
introduCtion
The year is 2097, but the future is not The most powerful of the shamans—the
our own Old Ones—learned that a great deal of
the supernatural evil in the world was
For over 200 years, a Cold War was waged
channelled through bad spirits the Indians
between the United and Confederate States
called “manitous,” what Westerners call
of America The American Civil War ended
demons
in a stalemate in the late 1800s, leaving the
South a free and independent nation A These beings served as conduits for
magical energy to and from the world
long, tense peace was punctuated by brief
to the mystical “Hunting Grounds” This
spasms of violence and briefer moments of
power could then be used to augment the
cooperation for a greater good
manitous’ chosen allies—monsters and
The long Cold War came to an end on black-hearted humans—or create all-new
September 23, 2081, at 6:17 pm Eastern horrors from humanity’s worst fears and
Standard Time Judgment Day arrived on nightmares
the wings of irradiated ghost rock bombs,
The Old Ones reasoned that if the
leaving about six billion dead Of the billion
manitous could be kept out of the physical
or so who survived, most fell victim to
world, the earth’s monsters would gradually
starvation, disease, random violence, and
die out For this, the shamans turned to
worse in the chaotic days following the end
their ancient allies, the strange and distant
of the world
nature spirits
What happened next? That’s a long story,
Besides many strange savage rituals,
but before we get started, let’s go back to
there was one additional cost: the Old
the beginning Ones would have to remain in the Hunting
Grounds and bar the doorways that kept
tHe Great sPirit War
the manitous trapped Forever
The ensuing battles came to be called
the Great Spirit War and tore the Hunting
Monsters are real They always have
Grounds asunder In the end, the shamans
been Walking dead, werewolves, vampires, and their allies were victorious Afterward,
and even dragons have stalked the Earth the surviving nature spirits returned to their
since it was created But around what strange ways while the Old Ones turned
Europeans call the Dark Ages—and a whole to guarding the pathways to Earth Thanks
undiscovered continent away—a group to their sacrifice and eternal vigil, the
of American Indian shamans from many influence of the manitous in the physical
different tribes came together world was greatly diminished
1
ground, the same
place the Old Ones
had crossed into the
Hunting Grounds
centuries before
Once on the other
side, Raven and his
band hunted down
and murdered the
Old Ones With the
ancient shamans
dead, the gates
were opened and
manitous were once
again free to enter
the physical world
the reckoners
During his travels,
Raven discovered
that the manitous
served greater forces
of destruction that
later came to be
called the Reckoners
enter raven by some, or the Four
Horsemen of the Apocalypse by others
The next few hundred years were pretty
With the blood of the Old Ones on
good for mankind Demons did occasionally
his soul, Raven became the first of
slip through and monsters still roamed, but
the Reckoners’ “servitors,” willing and
their numbers and powers were shrinking
intelligent humans paving the way for
rather than growing
the Four Horsemen on Earth In exchange,
Unfortunately, the white man’s arrival Raven (and future servitors) received great
in the Americas set in motion a tragedy power and near-immortality
that would end with a literal Hell on Earth
The Four Horsemen had been waiting
A young Susquehannah shaman named
for their chance to rise for millennia The
Raven watched his whole village get
actions of the Great Old Ones panicked
wiped out by the pale-skinned invaders in
them and they knew they’d come close
1763, and he carried a grudge to Hell and
to being trapped in the Hunting Grounds
back—literally
forever
Though the nature spirits had grown
So they became proactive Each created a
even more distant since their bargain
chosen servitor—War claimed Raven’s soul—
with the Old Ones, Raven still managed to
to champion their cause They also tasked
become a powerful shaman He discovered
the manitous with creating monsters and
the secret of long life, found out the story
mayhem wherever they found the tender
of the Great Spirit War, and hatched a plan
beginnings of fear and misery
to undo the Old Ones’ work and visit evil
upon the white man Negative energy eventually “terror-forms”
an area into a “Deadland” When enough
Raven gathered up others who had
Deadlands are created, they form a literal
suffered like him—the Last Sons—and
Hell on Earth that can sustain the Reckoners
entered the Hunting Grounds through a
and allow them to walk upon it in the flesh
hidden portal in an ancient Micmac burial
2
Ghost rock tHe nature of fear
The Reckoners’ “investment” in servitors
The Reckoners know they can’t
and manitous returned rewards quickly, but
just throw a monster into a town
that wasn’t enough They knew the best
and transform it into a Deadland
way to drive bloodshed and fear was to give
If everyone believes in monsters,
mankind something to fight over
they rally and begin to fight back
Around 1868, Raven performed a ritual The most effective horrors are the
that shattered California into a labyrinth ones no one admits believing in, but
of mesas and channels stretching from secretly dream about in their worst
Mexicali to Oregon Within the walls of nightmares
the “Great Maze” were veins of a brand
That’s not to say a good massacre
new mineral This new fundament burned
doesn’t create a Deadland near
a thousand times hotter than coal and
overnight That definitely happens,
screamed like the damned when set alight
especially during wars But it has to
It was quickly dubbed “ghost rock”
be done carefully or the Reckoners
Soon after, ghost rock was discovered all know they or their minions will be
over the world—though the majority of the exposed and that will set them back
largest strikes were in America Within a greatly
year, ghost rock became the most valuable
It’s also worth noting that
mineral in the world and people started
servants of the Reckoners (except
fighting and killing one another just to get
the servitors) don’t know they were
a hold of it
given life or power by ancient evil
Ghost rock is an incredible power beings A werewolf just knows it
source and soon gave rise to all manner wants meat and a murderous spirit
of inventions—from steamships to vapor just knows it wants to cause chaos
cannons Most of these inventions were and pain They all forward the Four
geared to destroy, but those who raised that Horsemen’s agenda to terror-form
issue were ignored in the face of “progress” the world into a literal Hell on Earth,
however
Hell on earth—almost
The destructive nature of ghost rock
and the rising tide of fear in the world’s
backwater regions continued through the
next century Men like Hitler and Stalin
accelerated the pace, along with world-
wide economic depressions and tragedies, Despite some close calls of the Cold
such as the Rape of Nanking, that spawned War, bloody brushfire wars, and the rise
countless horrors and formed Deadlands of atomic and ghost rock-powered bombs,
all around the world the world actually stayed intact Countries
rebuilt, economies rose, and electronics
By the time of World War II, it seemed
replaced machines
the world was finally on the verge of Hell
on Earth, but the hard-fought victory of a Whole new World
the Allies gave the world hope Despite the
terrors living in the ruins and the monsters
In 2044, Hellstromme Industries
prowling the edges of civilization, humanity
announced a project that would change the
won out It was helped greatly by secret
world And another world on top of that The
societies of soldiers, agents, and civilians
geniuses at HI built something called “the
who fought back against these horrors
Tunnel,” which could propel a ship at faster-
Most even kept their stories to themselves
than-light speeds to other star systems
so as not to generate more fear
Within a few years, they even found a way
3
the eye of the storm
to a new system they dubbed “Faraway,”
complete with an inhabited planet called
Banshee—for its howling winds Just as they had in World War II, heroes
rose Some fought on the battlefield, some
Banshee was home to a race of purple-
strove for peace, and others quietly fought
skinned creatures called “anouks,” who
the secret horrors rising in the violence of
seemed a lot like early American Indians to
war
the first colonists who landed there They
traded with some, warred with others, and Just before Christmas of 2080, President
then made the discovery that would change Mary Tremane of the United States,
everything Banshee had ghost rock President Jonas Sothby of the Confederacy,
and their allies agreed to a cease-fire On
That became especially important in
New Year’s Eve, the two presidents issued a
2078 when a geologist named Gerhard
joint press release declaring their intent to
Hauptman published the Hauptman Survey
negotiate a more permanent peace
He concluded the earth’s supply of ghost
rock would be exhausted in about 20 years Shortly after taking off from Denver
on New Year’s Day, Tremane’s aircraft
Wealthier nations stocked colony ships
disappeared over the Rockies Theories
full of miners—and soldiers—and paid
abound as to what happened to the
Hellstromme Industries exorbitant fees to
presidential plane, ranging from a freak
hurl them through the Tunnel to Faraway
electrical storm to assassination by air-to-
War broke out literally hours after the first
air missile Sothby immediately issued his
colonists arrived and the United Nations
sincere regrets, but Tremane’s successor,
sent their first armed troops (and later
Andrew Bates, wasn’t hearing it
starships) through to keep the peace
He believed the Southern Alliance had
Of course the less-developed countries
shot Air Force One out of the sky and
couldn’t afford colonies on Banshee, so
said as much on national television Peace
they fought over what was left back on
talks disintegrated and Bates threatened to
earth
nuke a Confederate city every week until
the War to end the World the Confederacy ceded Southern California
as “payment” for Tremane’s assassination
Eventually these wars spread to the larger It was the first time any nation had
countries and their entangled alliances seriously threatened using the awesome
Both the USA and CSA had treaties all over power of a ghost rock bomb
the world, and North America was hands
the beginning of the end
down the continent with the richest ghost
rock deposits
Most folks knew “A-Bomb Andy’s” threats
When the American nations called on
were the beginning of the end and they
their allies, they came running and North
were right Fighting broke out all over the
America soon became the focal point for
world within hours
World War III
Germany invaded Mexico, the heart of
The Northern Alliance consisted of the
the Latin American Alliance, and also
People’s Republic of China, Deseret, France,
mixed it up with French troops guarding
the Latin American Alliance, South Africa,
their embassy in Mexico City In retaliation,
and the United States itself
French forces in Europe marched across
The Southern Alliance included the the Rhine to invade Germany, then turned
Confederate States, the Warsaw Pact (still around to repulse a British invasion across
a political bloc despite the dissolution of the English Channel
the Soviet Union nearly a century before),
Fiercely cruel battles broke out in Asia,
Great Britain, Canada, Japan, Germany, and
Africa, and South America Russia and
Russia By the end of 2080, America—along
Japan invaded China South Africa charged
with the rest of the world—was awash in
north, carving through the smaller nations
blood
4
before butting heads with Egypt The In North America, the Canadians anted
tremendous oil fields of the Middle East up with nukes of their own, directed against
were set aflame as Iran and Iraq renewed Union border defenses in Washington and
their age-old enmity New England Within a couple days, the
Canadians took Boston and proceeded
Still, no one had dropped a ghost rock
south to rendezvous with a Confederate
bomb A-Bomb Andy had started folks
division for an attack on Washington, DC
talking about it, but no one had actually
yet had the nerve to do it Then Pakistan Suddenly, A-Bomb Andy was up against
launched a single tac-nuke against India the wall Worse, he turned out to have a
and the nuclear genie was out of the bottle case of the deep-down crazies Some think
he had a psychotic break thanks to the
the big bang
stress he’d been under since the death of
Mary Tremane, but others now wonder if a
The Pakistani nuke was the shot heard more nefarious force had pushed him along
round the world The unspoken rule had to destroy the world
been broken and ghost rock bombs were
Whatever the case, he lived up to his
now fair game A few weeks later, Great
name and turned to his last resort: scorched
Britain tossed a nuke at France’s coastal
earth Scorched planet Earth
defenses to pave the way for a new
amphibious invasion, planned to coincide
with a German counterattack against
France Russia came to France’s aid and all
of Europe erupted in flame
5