Jenny Valentine [Risus]

 

Jenny has worked close with her father, one of the founding members of the Black Chamber, the pre-eminent crypto-occult studies agency of the US government tasked with defending the country (and the world) from the mysterious other-world invaders. Due to her experience with her father, Jenny has experience in dealing with the occult, paranormal, and other-worldly entities. She uses her civilian cover as a press reporter to get into areas typically difficult to gain entrance to, plus let's face it, she is simply gorgeous and men melt in her hands.

I give you Jenny's Risus character card, those of you with Risus experience may notice the dice convention here instead of the usual straight number. This is because I have adopted Norbert's fantastic Risus hack (laid out here[link]). As I have decided this is simply brilliant and immediately 'ups' the use and power of Risus, I have decided to move to using this exclusively here on the blog.

Doctor Demento [Risus]

Dirk Douglas, heroic savoir of the city has had run-ins with various criminal elements, but his most formidable foe to date was the terrifying lord of the underworld: Doctor Demento!

Dirk Douglas [Risus]

Dirk Douglas, a hard-boiled occult detective. Once a gentleman criminal, he changed his path in life after he witnessed a black magic occult ceremony (he was told it was a burlesque performance) that involved the sacrifice of the innocent. Since that fateful night, he has been on a course to right the wrongs and bring justice to those who would use dark arts and burgeoning scientific discoveries to bring the people under their evil heels!

Risus for.....Writing?

My bud Norbert posted this fantastic table on his blog:

(reposted from Norbert's blog here)

Now, this is a standard inspiration table, nothing too amazing (though quite nice and did exactly what it was supposed to do...INSPIRE), but this along with Norbert's recent posts about Risus, popped an idea in my head. 

// -------- Wait, let me backtrack a little.

I love to read, I have spent my life reading and always wanted to be a writer. Life happened and now that I am old I sort of regret never following through on that dream. I specifically wanted to write pulp men's adventure tales. I just love the fairly straight forward and short stories and find them wonderful to read. Men were men, damsels need rescuing, evil scientists want to take over the world!
His posts inspired a nutty idea. He made it for gaming...but what if we took that and used it for writing? So I quickly wrote up a random table to pulp novel themes such as Gaslight Detective, 1930's crime, sword and sorcery, etc. I ended up rolling Victorian Gaslight (think the Alienist novel or Sherlock Holmes) and created a character in Risus, I give you Doctor Horace Norbert Walker:

Dr. Horace Norbert Walker
Meddlesome Surgeon of great reputation [4]
Amateur Detective [3]
Genteel Scholar of History [2]
Reluctant heir to a Noble Fortune [1]

Then I rolled on Norbert's table and got the result: Hidden, Messages, Maps which seems oddly perfect. I pulled up my favorite online writing site https://writer.bighugelabs.com/ and started writing. I quickly wrote up about 2k words, but something else happened. I got to really thinking about writing and how easy it would be to describe everything in terms of Risus cliches as a means of providing quick and easily-remembered details of places, people, and situations. 

Where does the story take place? 

1880s Chicago
Gloomy, cold, and wet [4]
Crime Ridden streets [3]

Need an antagonistic foil for the doctor?

Lt. Samuel Cogburn 
Smarmy police detective [5]
Sticky handed venal hack [4]
High-level political connection [3]

What about the doc's sidekcick?
Witherford 'Withers" Malone
Cheerful scientific genius [4]
Always ready with the right tool at the right time [3]

I can quickly and easily create memorable place and people. It almost feels like a shorthand system to describe everything. Anyway, this discovery sounded quite interesting when I stumbled upon Risus for Writing last night while sitting at work. Let's see what will come of it!

Bugbear - Risus

A recent post by my pals over at Pits Perilous (link) got me thinking about a Risus version of the OD&D monster, the bugbear. I am a visual person so naturally I wanted to have a bugbear image in this latest style I am playing around with, so I headed over to MidJourney to play around. What follows is my journey (no pun intended) to get a solid image to use. At the end I will have a Risus bugbear!

Nice, a little weird (though given Gary's description of merely a "great hairy goblin-giants" it somewhat does the trick)

I love the face here, somewhat pumpkinish and very monstrous, but the rest is too civilized for my tastes.

Too weird...and wth is with that grip on the sword??

Oh now here we go. Giant and hairy monstrous thing, with a "large, round flat oval" head

Let's give it one more go, see if we can get something a little nicer.

There we go, I like that one. Gives me a "Where the wild things are" vibe. A wild and feral beast, with the smidgeon of intelligence like a Neanderthal. Plus, as a bonus, he is carrying a pumpkin.
Perhaps bugbears have an uncontrollable love of pumpkins? I would imagine they can speak in a deep, guttural voice, able to formulate very simple sentences such as "Me hungry. Eat you." kind of thing.

Here we go, a Risus monster card.

Cwene of Bamburgh - Risus

Cwene is a young woman on the run. Originally from York, she slayed a man when he trapped her in an alleyway one late night. Barely escaping with her life, she stowed away on a boat heading north, ending up in Bamburgh. One cold winter night, Finan rescued Cwene and provided food and shelter. As days turned to weeks, she learned of God's grace and discovered a new purpose in life. Now, she travels with Finan as he spreads the word and does the churches work around Northumbria. She is a capable young women, with some skill as an herbalist but she has also proved to be skilled in the use of a spear and fending off bandits on the road.