Risus Sky Baron

Overview

At the end of the Great War a discreet antiquities brokerage bought Count Zeppelin's airship works and at the dawn of 1920 unveiled a revolutionary airship design and a new synthetic lift gas half again as effective as Hydrogen.

As Europe lay in ruins, and Hugo Eckener, Zeppelin's heir apparent, struggled with high end sky liners, the reclusive genius behind the Robur class sky freighter moved from strength to strength with preternatural ease, establishing skyports near major cities and seaports, and sky stations in the more remote, rough and tumble corners of the world to pursue both untold riches in mineral resources and his one known obsession: Religious and Occult objects.

As his empire spans the globe, his wealth and influence know no bounds, the man known only as the Sky Baron expresses no political agenda, his empire crosses every border and every skyport a sovereign embassy. He has hired many demobilized battle hardened German soldiers as a private security force. Still, he needs 'inquiry and recovery' agents for special work.

The Sky Baron's indefatigable apolitical stance fosters the unrest that ripples across the globe following the chaos after the Great War. Colonial states struggle for freedom while the European nations make mad grabs for new lands, both happened to German East and South West Africa and German colonies in the Pacific The Great Game between Britain and Russia is still in play in the Near East.

People

Pulp player characters are covered at length in Two Fisted Mini Six.

PCs will be in the employ of a enigmatic millionaire who collects rare and valuable knickknacks from around the world and has many enemies who would love to take over his cartage empire. PC’s will have to fight through a bandit ambush as often as run for dear life through the Vienna sewers after a black-marketeer double crosses them.

Character archetypes:

Adventurer, jungle or urban
Adventuress, mostly urban
Pilot
Occult Investigator
Company Spiritualist
Gadgeteer
Scientist

Job titles are preceded by Two Fisted, Square Jawed, Trigger Happy, and/or Morally Dubious.

Villains are politically incorrect, and specific to a region.

Red Scare:

Bolsheviks and The Cheka
White Russian
Cossacks
Comintern, the Soviet Union’s world wide communist spy ring

Yellow Peril:

Chinese Warlords
Triad Crime Bosses
Chinese Communists
Imperial Japan

The Dreaded Hun:

The Thule Society (semi-secret occult proto-nazis)
The Ahnenerbe (those wacky nazi archeologists)

Assorted Foes:

Sky Pirates - Miyazaki's Porco Rosso - without the pig curse.
Capitalist Dogs the competition and various governments.
Cults and Secret Societies
Thuggees
Yezidis, a sect of alleged devil worshipers in the Middle East
Warlords
Military Strongmen
Mussolini's drive toward Rome
Stalin as last man standing
Bandits
Black-marketeers

Places

1) The Great Grey North

The hostile and resource rich Siberian Tundra. The Communist own the land but lack the infrastructure to exploit the mineral wealth locked in the permafrost.

2) The Wild and Wooly East.

Rebuilt Tokyo and Imperial Japan
Shanghai "Paris of the East"
Singapore "Sin-apore"
Hong Kong
Bombay
and other colonial trading centers.

3) Jurassic South America

The impassible Andean Mountains and the impenetrable jungle basin create a continent sized lost world.

4) Tarzan’s Africa

Sub Saharan Africa, traditionally. Clock-a-block wild beasts, pitiless Great White Hunters, savage natives, hidden valleys, forgotten cities, and lost races.

5) The Weird West

The spirit of the Old West is not going quietly, strange doin’s out on the range, and many a sacred burial ground disturbed.

6) The Turbulent Middle East

Indifferent Colonial powers, foreign business interests, and the callous despots particular to the region make the land from Morocco to India the white hot mess that it has been from biblical times

7) Traumatized Europe

After a series of treaties, Western Europe joins the euphoria of the Roaring Twenties while most of Eastern Europe takes either side of the Communist Revolution.

Gear

As a rule I only keep track of game changing gear.

Assumed Gear: what a character could carry on his/her person. matches, flashlight, twine, water food…..

Tools of the Trade: gear specific to the character’s job, guns, knives, climbing rope, charms...

Bonus Gear: Upgraded Tools of the Trade, Fetishes and Totems, scoped rifles, hand cannons, ninja climbing gear…..
(see the Basic Gear and Basic Weapons lists in Two Fisted Risus.)

Artifacts

Raider-verse Artifacts

Relics: are the powerful artifacts that power communication between the planes of existence. These are powerful and perhaps have their own, or a previous owner’s, agenda.

Charms: specifically amulets and talismans, focus animus or spiritual power to a specific function. see Talismans by Steffan O’Sullivan

For example: The Eye of Maya - a talisman that creates illusions of light and dark and can ‘alter’ landscapes, conceal doors, hide hallways. The Gift of the Fox adds bonuses to agility rolls. And so forth.

Mundane characters can use one charm at a time. Spiritually active characters can use an amulet and talisman at the same time.

Totems/Fetishes: are the same for the purposes of this setting. These channel and amplify animus or shamanistic power. Powers of this plane of existence. These will enhance a medium’s innate psychic powers.

Instrumentation: anything that enhances a medium’s psychic power. Tarot cards, scrying crystals and so forth.

Gadgets

Not evident in the Raider-verse. If the GM wishes, he can include gadgets as outlined in Two Fisted Risus under:

Specialized Gear

Specialized Weapons

Gizmos
(see the Expanded Gear and Expanded Weapons lists in Two Fisted Risus)

Supplements

Forthcoming titles from Hidalgo Press, Ltd.

Conklin's Atlas of the World's Occult Sites

Tombs and Tomes: a primer to Conklin's 13 volume A Global Field Guide to Theosophy.

The Complete Theosophist's Handbook by Sir Basil Conklin-Hart, CMG