A mental inventory for occult horror campaigns: an HPless system
What follows is a proof of concept for a mental inventory-cum-HPless system for use in occult horror campaigns with an operation—>downtime—>operation structure (i.e., Delta Green and the like, though you’d have an easy enough time translating it for use in elfgames). It hasn’t been playtested, and I’m sure that faults in the numbers will become readily apparent the moment you bring this to the table.
A character’s psyche, pictured above, is composed of slots into which thoughts of various sizes can be inserted. There are two general categories of thoughts, negative and positive, as well as various sub-categories of negative and positive thoughts. Interactability stems from your limited ability to move and rotate different kinds of thoughts within the psyche—think Dredge or Tetris or any other such games with spacial inventories.
Negative thoughts
Negative thoughts (highlighted in red) are suffered by characters in the course of an operation and can range in size and shape depending on the severity of their trauma. Some examples include hunger, thirst, exhaustion, pain from various wounds, financial insecurity, knowing someone you love is sick, addiction, student loans. Different negative thoughts are of different severities (e.g., the pain of a twisted ankle would only be a one-slot negative thought, while the pain of a gunshot wound would be composed of 1d4 slots, determined when the thought is initially suffered).
When you suffer a negative thought, you place it wherever you would like in the psyche. If the negative thought is composed of multiple slots, then you can place them in any arrangement you’d like, so long as all slots composing the thought are contiguous. (E.g., the four-slot pain of a gunshot wound could take the form of a 2x2 square or a 1x4 line.) The specific inception, size, and cures for negative thoughts vary, but once placed in the psyche all negative thoughts can only be moved or rotated over downtime (see “between operations” below).
There are many kinds of special negative thoughts. Stress (highlighted in pink) is the most common, and accompanies all standard negative thoughts. When a character suffers a negative thought, all unoccupied slots contiguous to the negative thought are filled with stress. Stress is the most common negative thought, but it is also the easiest to remove, either over downtime or during an operation through feeding a character’s addiction. Addiction is another kind of special negative thought, whose size you can increase by one (contiguous) slot by feeding your habit during an operation in order to clear 1d6 slots of stress. That Which Man Was Not Meant To Know is the final category of special negative thought, and has its own rules that are covered below.
If ever a character suffers a negative thought that cannot fit in their psyche, they inconsolably follow their default algorithm unto death (see “violence” below). Surrender control of the character to the referee.
Positive thoughts
Positive thoughts (highlighted in green) are your defenses against negative thoughts. Positive thoughts are almost always one-slot thoughts and can be moved and rotated at any time except when suffering a negative thought. (E.g., you cannot have three contiguous open slots, suffer a four-slot negative thought, and then move positive thoughts to make room for it.) But positive thoughts can, at any time, be overwritten with negative thoughts. (E.g., if you have only three contiguous open slots and suffer a four-slot negative thought, but those three contiguous open slots are adjacent to a positive thought, you can overwrite the positive thought and avoid overflowing your psyche.)
Positive thoughts are useful because they are movable defenses against accruing stress. You can move positive thoughts to create ‘corrals’ in which negative thoughts can be quarantined, preventing stress. Then you can move the positive thoughts to more generally-advantageous positions, perhaps creating another corral. Lots of options here.
Examples of standard positive thoughts include being well-rested, well-fed, having a steady job, or faith in a higher power. A good rule of thumb is considering the components of Maslow’s pyramid.
Bonds are a special kind of positive thought that are highlighted in blue, rather than green. Bonds represent the character’s connection to other people in their life—to normalcy—and start as regular four-slot squares. Bonds can be fostered over downtime, growing in size if the character’s psyche has room (see “between operations” below); this growth is always in regular fashion with each side increasing in size by one slot (e.g., a four-slot, 2x2 bond always grows into nine-slot, 3x3 bond).
Bonds are useful because they can be used as ‘armor’ to negate incoming negative thoughts by shrinking them one step in size—representing a change in behavior once a character returns back to normal life after a harrowing operation. The maximum number of slots negated equals the amount of slots shrunk (e.g., a sixteen-slot, 4x4 bond shrinking to become a nine-slot, 3x3 bond can negate seven slots of incoming negative thoughts, while a four-slot, 2x2 bond shrinking to become a one-slot bond can only negate three slots). It’s thus worthwhile to consider investing in enlarging bonds, rather than relying on many, smaller bonds that are easier to maneuver within the psyche.
N.B.: Keep in mind that this system functions in addition to any skill system you might already have; you aren’t tracking the amount your character knows about, e.g., surgery or HUMINT with this system. A character’s psyche represents that which is actively weighing on their ability to function (or bolstering their ability to function!), not that which they’ve spent time on memorizing/practicing in the past. The skills with which you perform your job as a surgeon are not a positive thought, but the financial security of having that good job is. But, for example, if your character is subject to an amnesia ray and loses their knowledge of human anatomy, that sudden lack of skill could translate into a negative thought: ‘insecurity,’ or ‘lost proficiency,’ as well as a likely imminent firing (corrupting the ‘steady job’ positive thought).
That Which Man Was Not Meant To Know
That Which Man Was Not Meant To Know (TMWMK, highlighted in black) is a special kind of negative thought that cannot be moved or rotated over downtime, though they can be removed as normal. Do not suffer stress when placing TMWMK. Additionally, though each instance of TMWMK must be placed contiguously (like other negative thoughts), TMWMK does not function in separate units once placed: all TMWMK is the same, interchangeable.
TMWMK is key to the expansion of the psyche. If ever a character’s psyche contains a nine-slot, 3x3 square of TMWMK, their psyche expands by one slot in all contiguous directions. These additional slots in the psyche are initially filled by TMWMK. Once a character’s psyche has been expanded once, it can be expanded again in similar fashion if it contains a sixteen-slot, 4x4 square of TMWMK (the expanded slots once again filled with TMWMK).
Expanding the psyche can be useful to create more slots with which to fill with positive thoughts, though it is a dangerous gamble, as the many slots of TMWMK must be cleared before the expanded psyche can be properly utilized. An expanded psyche is also useful to a character invested in mastering occult rituals (see “rituals” below), as some rituals are too large to comprehend without an expanded psyche.
Rituals
Characters may discover occult rituals during the course of play, whether in the form of experiencing these rituals firsthand, reading instructions in ancient tomes, or through exposure to maddening creatures who whisper truths in your ear. In the psyche, rituals take the form of specifically-shaped negative thoughts. Each is governed by unique rules, but, as a baseline, rituals count as TMWMK in all respects other than their modularity. Some examples and the space they take up in the psyche:
An invitation to the grue
In a place that has not known light for a year and a day, bore a hole in your skull: an entranceway. Your psyche must be an appealing place for the thing that comes to investigate: ensure there is an empty slot surrounded by TMWMK on all contiguous sides. A grue will arrive without fail. While still in darkness, close the hole and seal it inside.
While the grue remains in your psyche, you can move around in complete darkness as if you could see. You can also make small objects and creatures disappear forever in the darkness, consumed by the cousins of the thing trapped in your skull.
The song of starry-eyed lovers
A yellow-bound book describes a way to make someone do exactly what you want. The ritual requires inviting a quiet song to live in your mind. The song lives there until you sing it, uttering lyrics in some tongue alien to any linguist, though you have your suspicions. Once you sing it, the meaning of the song is lost to you, and all that remains in the slots once filled by the song is TMWMK.
When you sing the song of starry-eyed lovers to someone who, in that moment, wholly trusts you, they will obey any command given by you without question until the day that they die.
Solomon’s key
Knowledge of the cipher to unlock the true meaning hidden in the original Latin text of the Key of Solomon. It's a heavy burden to bear. Using the original text as a point of comparison, reveals the methods by which to summon any number of creatures from outside our world and bind them to one’s service. The efficacy of the summoning and binding depends on the preservation of the reference text.
Violence
Characters who are adapted to violence (a four-slot, 2x2 negative thought) are able to define their own actions during violence. Otherwise, a character follows their default algorithm in response to violence, chosen at character creation: fight, flight, or freeze.
- Fight. Respond to violence with violence in kind, no matter how insurmountable the threat may seem.
- Flight. Flee from violence at top speed until exhausted or safety is reached.
- Freeze. Shut down and look for somewhere, anywhere, to curl up and hide.
Between operations
Between operations, characters can take one of the following downtime actions:
- Cultivate bond. Go on a road trip just the two of you, or collaborate for ten hours a day on an extensive work project. Either place a new, one-slot bond or expand an existing bond by one size. There is a [side length]-in-6 chance of turning a bond codependent each time it is expanded beyond a four-slot, 2x2 bond. A codependent bond is successfully expanded, but it becomes a negative thought instead of a positive one.
- Research ritual. Self explanatory, probably—downtime allows for extensive investigation of that evil tome you smuggled home from your last operation.
- Destress. Spend time in therapy, out in nature, or with loved ones. Relish in the normalcy of it all and remove all slots of stress. Then, roll 2d6: on a result of 7–9, remove one additional slot’s worth of negative thoughts; on a 10+, remove 1d4 slots. A character can only take this downtime action if their basic needs are met—if they’ve been fired, are homeless, or are in the hospital for a lasting injury, they are not in a position to destress.
- Thought rotation. Perform 1d4 negative thought movements or rotations. Try to process it all.
Starting play
Characters start play with psyches filled with the following thoughts, placed as you wish:
- Two four-slot, 2x2 bonds (blue)
- Three one-slot positive thoughts: well-rested, well-fed, steady job (green)
- One one-slot negative thought, with specifics up to you: perhaps an old wound aches, a life of regrets unpursued, overwhelming student loans, a burgeoning addiction (red) Then, either define their default algorithm in response to violence or adapt them to violence. For other traits, follow your character creation procedure of choice.
Play example 1
Figure 1 shows the psyche of John Smith, a veteran agent who has been very successful in his recent operations. Between operations, he’s spent time cultivating a third bond and expanding his preexisting bond with his wife. In the excitement of seeing how clean his psyche is, John forgets to create a corral of positive thoughts, so when during his next operation he stumbles during an intense pursuit and twists his ankle, he has to suffer one slot of pain and the contiguous slots of stress (fig. 2).
The operation concludes without much more excitement, so John moves his positive thoughts to create space to expand his bond with his wife once more (fig. 3). He then spends his next period of downtime cultivating his bond with his wife, but rolls a 3 on his now-4-in-6 chance of turning that bond codependent. Figure 4 shows the results of that failed roll—in an instant John’s psyche is looking a lot more fragile.
Thankfully, John’s next operation goes smoothly, and he can destress over his next period of downtime with no issue. He rolls an 8 on 2d6, so he clears all slots of stress and can remove one slot’s worth of negative thoughts. He chooses to clear his psyche of the lingering pain of his twisted ankle (fig. 5). Unfortunately, the following operation quickly goes bad. John gets into a firefight and suffers three bullet wounds: three instances of 1d4 slots of pain. The first instance is a two-slot negative thought, which John negates by reducing his relationship with his sister. The second instance is another two-slot negative thought, which John negates by reducing his relationship with his parents. The third is a one-slot negative thought, so John negates that by cutting off his sister. John didn’t suffer any lasting negative thoughts, but the only bond that remains is the one-slot bond with his parents (fig. 6).
John tries to salvage his relationship with his parents after the operation concludes, expanding it from a one-slot bond to a four-slot, 2x2 bond (fig. 7). This immediately pays off in John’s next operation when he stumbles across four twisted, man-like ghouls from under the earth feeding on the corpse of a jogger dragged into an open sewer mouth. He suffers 1d4 slots of That Which Man Was Not Meant To Know and rolls a 4; John chooses to cut off his parents entirely to negate it (fig. 8).
But John is not out of danger yet—the ghouls then leap at him, angry that he has interrupted their midnight feast. He has no more bonds to sacrifice, so he must simply suffer through the pain their bites cause. The first ghoul rips the flesh of his arm with too-large teeth: 1d4 slots of pain rolls four slots, which John slots into the spot his parents once occupied to avoid undue stress (fig. 9). He then moves his positive thoughts into corrals of various sizes in preparation of the other ghouls’ attacks (fig. 10).
The second ghoul bites for three slots of pain, which John places—there is room enough for one slot of stress, this time (fig. 11). He moves his positive thoughts again before the third ghoul attacks, gambling that it will only inflict one or two slots of pain. This would give him enough open slots to withstand the pain of the fourth ghoul’s bite no matter what (fig. 12).
Unfortunately, John fails the 50/50, and the third ghoul rolls four slots of pain. John is forced to place those slots in the four-slot opening, as even if he overwrote his positive thought from being well-fed, there are no contiguous slots that don’t overflow (fig. 13). The fourth ghoul then bites him savagely enough that he suffers four slots of pain once again, leaving him in the same predicament, but with no recourse. John is forced to place those four slots of pain contiguously, overflowing his psyche (fig. 14). He hands his character sheet to the referee, who rules that John follows his default algorithm to fight, attacking the ghouls until they overpower him. They feast on two corpses that night.
Play example 2
Figure 15 shows the psyche of Valerie Hawthorne, a linguist undergoing her first operation. During this operation, an extended stakeout has transformed her ‘well-rested’ positive thought into the negative thought, ‘exhausted.’ The stakeout wasn’t for naught, however, as Valerie sees strange, pulsating lights in the sky that then shoot off in a uniform direction—these were not mere stars. She suffers 1d4 slots of That Which Man Was Not Meant To Know, rolling a 3, which she decides to place (fig. 16). Keep in mind that TWMWK does not accrue stress in contiguous slots.
Valerie discovers an occult tome during the course of the operation, which she hides from her fellow agents. After the operation concludes, Valerie’s ‘exhausted’ thought is transformed back into a positive thought (fig. 17). She spends her downtime researching the tome she stole. She learns about the song of starry-eyed lovers and how to invite a grue into her mind, but suffers 1d4 slots of TWMWK from the weight of the knowledge. Valerie rolls a 4, creating an inviting home for a grue in the process (fig. 18). She cannot comprehend the song of starry-eyed lovers at this time, lacking the space for it in her psyche, so that ritual goes on the back burner for now.
Valerie’s next operation goes smoothly, and between operations she performs the ritual to invite a grue into her psyche and trap it (fig. 19). Things are going well; Valerie is relishing in the power she now controls. However, she then receives a call learning her mom has just been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, a negative thought that comes with contiguous stress (fig. 20).
Valerie’s next operation opens with a firefight versus a hostile organization; she is shot twice, for two instances of 1d4 slots of pain. Both gunshots are strays, only scraping her: two instances of one-slot pain. Valerie decides to place both thoughts, not wanting to distance her boyfriend or parents (fig. 21). To destress during the operation, she then smokes a pack of Marlboro Reds. She clears 1d6 slots of stress, rolling a 3, and increases the size of her addiction by one contiguous slot (fig. 22).
The operation comes to a head in a confrontation with the unnatural creature performing the serial killings Valerie and her team have been tasked to resolve. Its inhumanity prompts 1d4 slots of TMWMK, which Valerie happily suffers. She rolls a 3 and places the slots (fig. 23). With these additions, Valerie’s psyche now contains a 3x3 square of That Which Man Was Not Meant To Know, as the grue counts as TWMWK. Her psyche immediately expands contiguously on all sides (fig. 24).
Her team is forced to run from the creature and they fail to stop its rampage, but Valerie does not suffer any harm in the process. Between operations Valerie destresses, rolling an 11 on 2d6: If she had any stress, she would clear it all, and she likewise clears 1d4 slots of negative thoughts, rolling a 4. Valerie clears one slot of her nicotine addiction, two slots of TWMWK, and the negative thought stemming from her mom’s sickness (fig. 25). This doesn’t mean her mom isn’t sick anymore; rather, it means that Valerie has had the time to process and accept the turmoil. Another smooth operation means another period of downtime. Valerie, ambitious, has cleared enough room in her psyche to comprehend the song of starry-eyed lovers with a little rearranging. She pores over the tome, allowing its strange melody to make itself at home in the folds of her mind (fig. 26). Note that because the song counts as TWMWK in her psyche, if the slot currently containing the positive thought ‘well-fed’ were also replaced by TWMWK, then Valerie would have a 4x4 square of TWMWK—her psyche would expand once more.
For G L A U G U S T 2 0 2 5, an "HPless system."