There have been nine player characters in this game so far, namely:
Click on the character names to return to the top of the page.
In all the character descriptions below, for powers 'F' means Frequent, 'V' means Versatile and 'M' means major; a 'x 4' or similar after one of the letters means that the power has that feature that many times (e.g. the 'M x 4' means the power is four times Major).
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In human form Akula is 5'9" tall with black hair, blue eyes and a muscular build, but very pale faintly bluish skin. He stands tall and confidently, and speaks in a deep voice. In terms of dress he wears a plain shirt and tie, or a suit, in keeping with his job as a researcher.
In water form he is identical in height and build to his human form except made out of completely transparent water (with a slight blue tint) and covered in slight ripples so that someone seeing him cannot tell who he is or even if he is clothed. His watery skin slightly reflects the world around him. When underwater in this form he is almost invisible, blending with the water around him.
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| Powers and Skills | |
| Water Form and Powers (F, V, M x 2) This gives the following abilities:
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4 |
| Radiation-Based Paralysis Beam (F, M) A beam of Cherenkov-blue radiation which harmlessly paralyses living things it hits, surrounding them with the blue glow for as long as it lasts. Targets of Earth 3 are paralysed for an hour or so with each extra point of Earth reducing the time; targets of Earth 2 or less are paralysed for even longer. Targets can be un-paralysed by Akula if he wishes, or brought out of it by medical means. |
2 |
| Immunity to Hard Radiation | 0 |
| Total Points = 5 + 4 + 7 + 8 + 4 + 2 + 0 = 30 |
| Experience Point Expenditure | |
| Radioactive Heating Akula has learnt how to harness the hard radiation inside himself to heat his body. This, among other things, stops his water form freezing solid in the middle of the Moscow winter. He can also use this ability to create a radioactive glow to see by in darkness. |
1 |
| +1 V on his Water Powers Akula has learnt how to make his water powers more versatile, for example by developing the ability to make his water form more liquid so as to allow attacks to simply 'splosh' right through him. He has also learnt how to use his 'water cannon' water jet as a means of transport, jetting his entire self from place to place. By this means he can jet himself a hundred metres or so horizontally and thirty metres vertically, as well as achieve sustained speeds of perhaps 60kph. |
1 |
A nuclear power plant engineer in a military submarine which suffered a reactor fire. He was trapped in the wreckage for days, and only escaped as Akula when his water-based super-powers activated. He now works as a researcher in the Moscow State University nuclear power plant centre. He lives in a top floor apartment close to the university, in the Sparrow Hills area of Moscow.
When he was younger, he was the Soviet naval wrestling champion for three years running.
He has a contact in the Russian Navy named Alexander (Sasha) Petrovitch whose life Akula saved in the reactor accident, as a result of which Vladimir "died". He is now based in Archangel, the captain of a nuclear submarine.
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The baby-eating crone of Russian legend, somehow awoken into 1996, with her nasty tendencies somehow gone. A hideous hag, dressed in ragged medieval-style clothing, dirty and smelly.
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| Powers and Skills | |
| Manic Cackling Strikes fear into opponents; the higher their Earth score, though, the less effect it has. |
1 |
| Chicken-Legged Hut (F, M) Which can:
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2 |
| Mortar (F, V, M x 2) Which can:
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4 |
| Pestle This is very tough and can be used as a blunt weapon. |
0 |
| Alchemical Brewing (F, V, M x 2) By using her mortar and pestle together Baba Yaga can brew gasses (sleep gas, poison, icy cold, fear-inducing mists, etc.) and potions (healing, love, sleeping, simple alcohol etc.)of various kinds. This takes ingredients and time commensurate with the usefulness of the thing she is trying to create at the time. |
4 |
| The hut, pestle and mortar are all effectively unique items which can only be used by Baba Yaga. They can be destroyed, but if so they can be re-created by her using her alchemical skills. | |
| Total Points = 3 + 4 + 4 + 8 + 1 + 2 + 4 + 0 + 4 = 30 |
After apparently centuries asleep, Baba Yaga woke up in her chicken leg hut in what has become the Losniy Ostrov park in the north-east of Moscow. She seems to have lost her malevolent and murderous tendencies while asleep, and is now benevolent, but a bit mad...
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He looks to be in his forties, 5'6" tall, with a muscular build, firm brow, strong jaw, piercing ice-blue eyes and black hair shot with silver. In his General Winter identity he has pale, bluish frosty skin (which he can switch off when in his normal identity). As a costume he wears a Russian Army general's uniform in white, with a frosty sheen, and a half mask under the cap.
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| Powers and Skills | |
| Summonning Winter (F, V x 2, M x 6) This gives the following abilities:
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9 |
| Total Points = 5 + 5 + 5 + 6 + 9 = 30 |
| Experience Point Expenditure | |
| +1 M on his Summoning Winter Power This gives a total of 7 x Major on his power, and makes all his abilities that much more effective. |
1 |
General Winter was born 934 years ago in a small village near what became Moscow. As a small boy, at mid-winter during a particularly bad winter, he wandered too far into the woods looking for a lost goat. Lost and freezing he thought he would die when he came upon an ancient cairn hidden in the deepest primeval woods. A combination of his presence, and the correct alignment of the stars at midwinter, released an ancient spirit of the winter, trapped in the cairn since the last ice age by the magic of ancient wizards. The spirit merged with the boy, saving his life and giving him its powers over cold and the winter.
Over time he learnt to use his powers, starting with his home village, using them (influenced by the spirit which was now part of him) to steer humanity onto what he sees (at the time) as the correct path. In the centuries since then some of the most powerful winters in Russia have been due to him, acting to steer the people onto his view of the correct path.
Drifting into the military life early on, he has been a series of generals in the Russian military, coming back as his own son many times, or simply assuming new identities. He has fought in most of Russia's wars, including against Napoleon and in the first and second world wars. Over time he has accumulated a great deal of personal wealth, scattered in many accounts.
He thought communism was a good idea at the time. But with Stalin coming to power, he was declared an enemy of the state and forced underground, though remaining in a military career. He has only resurfaced as General Winter in recent years, with the fall of communism.
He is currently a reserve general in the Russian army. He has a military contact, Alex Romanov.
He has a butler/chauffeur named Adrik, who drives him to and from the action in a limousine, and a cat.
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Description :A small female beagle-type dog, who appears to be in the prime of life, rather than the more than forty years old which she really is. |
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| Unageing | 0 |
| Resistant to Radiation Also quite resistant to cold. |
1 |
| Photographic Memory | 0 |
| Small Size (F) | 1 |
| Psionic Powers (F, V x 2, M x 4) These give the following abilities:
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7 |
| +1 with Use Psionics (use at Air 6) | 1/2 |
| -2 to Presence (use at Air 2) | -1/2 |
| -4 to Strength (use at Fire 2) | -1 |
| Familiarity with Air and Space Vehicles | 1 |
| Government/Communist Party Contact | 0 |
| Total Points = 6 + 4 + 6 + 6 + 0 + 1 + 1 + 7 + 1/2 - 1/2 - 1 + 1 = 31 |
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Laika was the first Earth creature on the Moon. A stray Moscow beagle, she was picked up for training by the Russian space programme who were looking for docile test subjects. In 1957 she was blasted into space and orbited the Earth twice before her Moon landing. Unlike many later explorers she did not actually get to walk on the Moon. Space travel was still in its infancy and the scientists were keenest on determining the physiological effects of the Moon and the ability to take off from Earth's only natural satellite. During the trip her vital signs were continuously monitored and a psychic, Doctor Ursula Agafia, augmented with bio-mechanical transmitters, kept close watch upon her mental state. Somehow, the combination of interstellar radiation and psychic intrusion had a significant effect on Laika. During the course of the mission Dr Agafia reported increasing awareness by Laika of her surroundings and the objects around her. During her thirteen hours on the Moon this increased to such an extent that Laika began to sense the doctor and begin a basic conversation across the ether. These events excited the commissariat considerably and immediate preparations were put in place to cover up the discoveries and pave the way for a manned mission. Dreams of intellectually enhanced humans and the effects upon psychic abilities were discussed. Laika had been considered expendable but it was now decided to try and ensure she came back alive. The re-entry of her capsule was certainly spectacular. Warships and super-beings were on hand to ensure that Laika returned home safely. However it was reported that she died that day. The next problem that had to be faced was that of Laika herself. It soon became apparent that her mental advancement had not been confined to her intellect as she used new found abilities to dominate those around her. She retained a close link with Doctor Agafia and Laika only trusted her. Negotiation with the ubercanine led to her being formally recognised as a citizen of the Soviet Union and to her gaining a place on the space programme. Laika never returned to the Moon but made several other space journeys before being retired from service. She was almost unnoticed when she aided at the Chernobyl disaster, shifting concrete and rubble in the chaos there. She now resides with Professor Agafia at Moscow State University but retains her dreams. |
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Utterly variable.
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| Shapeshifting (F x 2, V x 2, M x 5) This gives the following abilities:
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9 |
| Photographic Memory | 0 |
| Total Points = 7 + 5 + 4 + 5 + 9 + 0 = 30 |
| Experience Point Expenditure | |
| +1 V on his Shapeshifting Power This gives a total of 3 x Versatile on his power. The main thing this allows Mirov to do which he could not do before is split himself into multiple entities, all linked by his mind, which can act independently. He currently seems to be able to split himself into eleven such entities. |
1 |
An ex-Soviet cosmonaut who, about eighteen months ago, was seriously injured by radiation in a solar flare while posted to the Mir space station. He saw his own body stripped down to the bone in a hideous spray of radiation. Although he did not expect to wake up at all, he came round to find his body fully intact, but crippled. He was shipped back to Earth and because of his being crippled, retired from the space force on a state pension. However, over the next two months or so he developed his highly versatile shapeshifting powers, which he now uses to fight crime for the good of the state (as he sees it); he has not volunteered his gaining powers to the state - as far as they know he is still a crippled ex-cosmonaut.
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A tall, muscular generally big-built woman with a roundish face, dark hair and eyes, and generally Slavic looks. As a plain-clothes detective she wears cheap blouses, jackets and skirts. As Molinya she wears a red jump-suit with a yellow lightning bolt insignia across the front.
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| Lightning Powers (F, V x 2, M x 4) This gives the following abilities:
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7 |
| Total Points = 5 + 6 + 9 + 3 + 7 = 30 |
| Experience Point Expenditure | |
| +1 M on her Lightning Powers This gives a total of 5 x Major on her power, and makes all her abilities that much more effective. She also seems able to drain electrical power from sources close to her, such as a city power grid. |
1 |
Orlenda became a police officer in the Moscow Police Department during the days of communism, and was a loyal servant of the state. With the fall of communism she continued as a police officer, fighting against the rising crime and corruption in the city. About three years ago she was tracking down a number of Mafioski hard cases, when she was captured by them instead. After assorted beatings and other abuse (which has given her a severe bias against the Mafia which persists to this day), they thought it would be amusing to kill her by putting her in an electric chair. Unfortunately for them, the killing charge of electricity instead activated Orlenda's electrical powers, and they all died in the brief and bloody battle which followed.
It took some months for Orlenda to become used to her new powers, but eventually she took to the streets as a superhero, using the nom de geurre of Molinya. Initially she just worked against the Russian Mafia but as time went on it became obvious there were other threats which the normal police were unequipped to handle, but which she could. And so the scope of her activities widened to more general superheroic activities...
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Description :A heavy-boned woman in her forties of average height and a muscular build. She has dark eyes and dark hair with no signs of grey. In her normal identity she wears overalls to work and blouse, skirt and head-scarf otherwise; as Mother Bear she wears a costume of her own design coloured with natural dyes - browns, greys, olive greens and the like (this is what she is wearing in the picture). In bear form she is a very large bear which is much stronger and faster than any normal bear. Depicted by Nigel Gale. |
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| Bear Form She can polymorph into a large brown (Russian) bear, and back, while in contact with the earth; when off the ground (inside buildings and the like) she is fixed in whatever form she is currently in. In bear form her speech is impaired and growling, but still understandable. |
1 |
| Acute Bear-like Senses (F, V) | 2 |
| Accelerated Healing Only when in contact with the Earth. |
1* |
| Toughened Claws in Bear Form | 1 |
| Summon Spirit-Bear This can be done once per Lunar month, and is very tiring. It can only be done when in contact with the Earth, by bellowing. The misty form of the spirit bear rises up out of the ground when this is done. |
1* |
| Summon Pre-Dawn Mist This can only be done when in contact with the Earth, and takes about half an hour. |
1* |
| Comrades When necessary, she can call upon her family and fifty or so fellow factory workers to assist her. |
0 |
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Total Points = (4+4*) + (4+0*) + (4+3*) + (3+1*) + 1* + 2 + 1* + 1 + 1* + 1* + 0 = 30
* Cost reduced by limitations. |
| Experience Point Expenditure | |
| Swim Through The Earth Mother Bear has learnt, when in bear form, how to sink into the ground and 'swim' through it at a walking pace, leaving no tunnel behind her. She can only do this through natural ground; she cannot move through artificial materials. She can sense things around her while 'swimming', and also things on the surface. |
2 |
Ludmilla is a line supervisor in the 'Tula' tractor factory in Moscow. She is married to Vladimir Leonidovitch Chestikov, and is the mother of eight children. The family lives in a first-floor apartment in a block on Nakhimoski Prospekt in southern Moscow.
About six years ago, Ludmilla was accidentally locked in St Basil's cathedral after hours. While looking for a way out she fell through an age-weakened stone floor into an ancient pre-Christian chamber in the earth. Her abrupt arrival woke an ancient nature spirit of some kind which in return for helping her escape took up joint residence in her body (not a possession, more of an upgrade). As she adjusted to her new state Ludmilla took on some of the attitudes of the spirit, and gained both her bear-related powers and her mission to restore Russia to health.
Her powers were relatively weak until a year or so ago, when for no readily apparent reason they increased to their current levels.
Her children are:
The two children born since she gained her powers (Grigori and Anya) are both showing ... signs that they have been affected by whatever powers Mother Bear has. They are both very big and strong for their ages - Grigori looks in his early teens, and Anya appears to be roughly six...
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Average height and build, quite pretty in a care-worn, waif-like way; mid-length straight blonde hair; grey eyes. She normally dresses in military surplus cast-offs, which are usually more than a little dirty from her life on the streets.
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| Fire Powers (F, V x 2, M x 4) This gives the following abilities:
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7 |
| IR Vision | 0 |
| +2 with Fire Powers (use at Fire 9) | 1 |
| Total Points = 7 + 4 + 7 + 4 + 7 + 0 + 1 = 30 |
| Experience Point Expenditure | |
| Healing Box (F, M) The box heals all of a person's physical wounds when it is placed in physical contact with them, over the course of ten seconds or so, using needles which it sticks into the injured person. Napalm has not paid any points for this item as it is loot, taken from the Vilma, tongue-less bodyguard in campaign segment 1. Note that normally Instant Regeneration costs two points; the cost of the Box is reduced both because it is quite slow (but not slow enough to be merely Rapid Healing), via a Focus, and it requires conscious effort to be used rather than being on constantly all the time. |
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| +2 M on Fire Powers This gives a total of 6 x Major on her powers. This allows her to fly at 350mph and makes all her other abilities that much more effective. And dangerous. |
2 |
Born in 1970, you were drafted into the Red Army in 1988, at the age of 18 (as your national service), and sent to Afghanistan as a mechanic. Although mostly you were away from the front lines, late in the war the base you were on was attacked by Mujaheddin, and you were caught in the middle of it. You were caught in the middle of a firestorm, but woke up somehow miraculously unharmed, physically at least.
Suffering post-traumatic stress disorder, you became a 'discipline problem', but were kept in the Army because the war was still going on. When the USSR withdrew from Afghanistan, and the USSR dissolved, like so many others you were kicked out onto the streets.
It didn't take very long to realise that civilian life wasn't really for you any more; you seem unable to take stability, or to hold down a steady job, and so you came to live on the streets, supported only by the charity of the Afghanistan Veterans Foundation. Because of what's happened to you, you hate to be oppressed or stomped on by authority, and dislike when others are too. As time passed, you noticed your fire powers slowly growing, and they burst into full life during an attempted mugging.
Now you use your powers to protect the poor and homeless of Moscow, from all those who would oppress and exploit them, be it the Russian Mafia, corrupt officials, or whatever. You have made one major enemy in the Russian Mafia, after you stopped them taking control of the Afghanistan Veterans Foundation, and they now hunt you...
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Nut is a slim and beautiful woman with middle-eastern features and night-blue star-sprinkled skin, wearing what is essentially a skimpy golden bikini. The ancient Egyptians also depicted her as a cow with star-sprinkled skin, but so far has shown no signs of assuming this form in Moscow. Likewise, apparently Nut should swallow the sun at every sunset and give birth to it again every morning; she has shown no signs of this yet, either...
Although she cannot fly as such, because of her position as a sky-deity, when she walks she does not touch the ground, walking about an inch off it. This means that she does not leave tracks, but this ability will not protect her from falls and the like.
As an Egyptian deity she has iron bones (though Andrey does not!).
Andrey, on the other hand, is a respectable, intelligent-looking middle-aged man with a peppering of grey hair.
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| Goddess of the Night Powers These divide into three groups, which she has under more and more limited circumstances:
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8 |
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Total Points = (3+3*) + 5 + (3+2*) + (5+1*) + 8 = 30 * Cost reduced by limitations. |
(All of information on Nut is Paraphrased from GURPS Egypt.)
A long time ago the deities Nut, Ra, Atum and Amun were created by Ptah, the god of art, wisdom and inspiration. Ra and Atum created various new deities. With the help of his children and grandchildren, Ptah created the universe as it is. Nut was married to Ra, the divine Pharaoh, who invented most of the useful crafts and the concept of society.
But Nut and the earth-god Geb developed a secret love which was disapproved of by Ra when he found out about it. His prohibition did not keep Nut and Geb apart. Nut was soon pregnant by Geb with five children. In revenge for this infidelity Ra cursed Nut, preventing her from giving birth in any month of the year.
Thoth, the god of knowledge, sympathised with Nut and helped her by playing a high-stakes game of senet with the moon-god Khensu. Thoth won a 70th part of Khensu's light, which made the moon from then on wax and wane as Khensu had to stretch his remaining light over the whole lunar disc.
Thoth used his light to add five extra days onto the year which weren't part of any month, giving Nut the time to bear her children. This she did, over the five consecutive days, giving birth to Osiris (god of growing things and husband of Isis - eventually), Heru-Ur (a god of the sky), Isis (goddess of ideas, inventor of mummification and marriage) and Nephthys (guardian of wealth and the dead, scourge of tomb robbers). Set, the last child, was not born but ripped himself out of Nut's womb to become the god of war, snakes and the open desert.
After Nut's children were born, Ra ordered Shu, the dutiful god of the atmosphere, to place himself between Nut and Geb to keep them apart. This he did, keeping Nut and Geb eternally apart.
Nut has no memories between those of her life as a goddess, and waking in the modern world.
Thousands of years later, Andrey Vladimirovitch Sichul was born in the Soviet Union. He grew up and became an Egyptologist, ending up as a curator in the Egyptology section of the Hermitage in St Petersburg (or Leningrad as it was known at the time).
With the fall of communism and the growth of the Russian mafia Andrey, almost without realising it, became involved in a smuggling and money laundering operation involving the smuggling, buying and selling of antiquities.
Then he somehow offending the mafioski he was involved with, and some thugs were sent to the Hermitage to administer a punishment beating to him. Andrey hid inside a sarcophagus of Nut (on a holy day, under the star of Sirius, with the right holy symbols; which he was not stealing ... oh no ... and so forth) and was taken over by Nut when he gripped the holy sceptre and ankh that were inside it. Emerging, she promptly beat the rather rude mafioski into unconsciousness and went out to investigate the outside world...
The sceptre and ankh are now 'his' in the sense that they were 'lost' by the Hermitage (in St Petersburg) as part of the money laundering/smuggling operation that he was forced into aiding.
After resigning his position at the Hermitage he moved to Moscow and now operates as a small time dealer in antiquities. He is still used by certain mafioskis who wish to use him as a legitimate front for fencing their loot. He is therefore involved in illegal activities, but uses his involvement in these to scan the thoughts of the criminals he meets. This provides him with information on the 'big fish' of the criminal organisations he deals with, and whom 'Nut' can then target. Because of this he has contacts.
On to the pages of Non-Player Characters from Campaign Segment 1 or Campaign Segment 2.
Or the page of Generic NPCs.