"The ground remembers what the factions want to forget. Every dig site is a political act. You are not exploring. You are choosing who inherits what was buried."
-- Operator Observation, Callsign DUSTLINE, Field Report 2060
00The BriefingIntroduction
The Dramatic Engine
A stolen coordinate fragment has triggered a five-faction race to claim the Architect network -- a sealed planetary installation buried beneath Metropoli Perdida. The factions think they are racing for an energy source. They are wrong. The installation is a containment vessel, and the Lumicite deposit at its core is not a power supply. It is an antenna.
You are one team among many, racing through collapsing infrastructure and faction crossfire while a rival team pursues the same prize on a parallel track. What you find at the bottom will not match your briefing.
The Situation
Three weeks ago, a UC intelligence officer named Yusuf Osei stole a nine-character coordinate fragment from a joint UC-EO research facility near Granitsa. The fragment is part of a larger encryption key that unlocks the Architect network -- a planetary web of sealed installations containing Lumicite technology, pre-Upheaval data, and coordinates to other sites.
Osei is dying. Progressive neurological decline. Eight months, maybe less. He is running his final operation: ensure the archive reaches everyone, not just one faction. He recruited two field operatives -- Will Durant (historian) and Ariel Durant (field explorer, diver) -- and seeded fragmentary intel to every major faction simultaneously.
The result: chaos. Every faction is moving. The Brotherhood is fracturing. The Syndicate is selling access. The installations themselves are waking up.
The operatives arrive into this.
Campaign OverviewFormat: 3-5 sessions, 3-6 players. Structure: Five location nodes, four coordinate fragments, one convergence point. Core tension: Assemble fragments to access the Architect archive before rival teams, collapsing infrastructure, and faction crossfire close the window. The Durants run a parallel track. The archive broadcast is fixed -- it happens regardless of operator action. What you control is who you are when the dust settles.
This adventure is not a linear mystery or a simple heist. It is a chaotic race where the players are one team among many, operating in a world that does not revolve around them.
Nobody calls it the war. That would require admitting who is fighting. Use "operation," "contract," or "the work."
Operator Tactics core rules. This module. Maps for five location nodes (provided or improvised). A willingness to let the sandbox breathe. If any operators are gene-forged, have the Stock Instinct table and Template Drift table at hand -- they will activate.
GM-Only: The Deeper Truth
The factions believe Lumicite is an energy source. It is not. Lumicite is an antenna -- a crystalline-metallic substrate that receives a signal from something deeper. The Architect installations were not built to store knowledge. They were built as containment vessels for the strongest substrate resonance nodes, engineered to hold the signal at a frequency that would not trigger uncontrolled access in unshielded humans. The composition locks were designed to keep something in, not just to keep factions out. Do not reveal this during the adventure. Let it surface as wrongness -- acoustic anomalies, compass failures, gene-forged operators hearing things baseline operators cannot. The revelation belongs to the campaign threads that follow UNEARTH, not to the adventure itself.
01Entry PointsFour Paths In
Four ways into the scenario. Each gives different intel, resources, and complications. Choose one or let players pick. Each entry point shapes faction relationships and available resources throughout the campaign.
A: NAF Direct Hire
Patron: General Sarah Chen, NAF Joint Chiefs
Budget: $50K. NAF military liaison (Colonel Marcus Webb -- competent, rigid). Pre-positioned safe houses. Access to NAF gene-forged wolf and eagle stock operatives as support assets. Encrypted comms with NAF command.
Intel: Confirmed fragment in circulation. Archive on equatorial band. Lumicite energy solution critical to NAF tech advancement.
Complication: NAF does not know Osei leaked the intel. Operatives are told they are chasing a Brotherhood theft. NAF gene-forged support assets run pack doctrine -- wolf stock coordinates instinctively but resists splitting from the group, limiting tactical flexibility.
Hook:"Retrieve the fragment before the Brotherhood weaponizes archive data. NAF will handle the archive itself. Your job is the race."
Budget: $40K. Extensive terrain contacts in Samudra Sattva and Gorodskie Ekho. Three SCA gene-forged operatives (jaguar/caiman stock) available as escorts. Black-market Lumicite detection equipment. SCA patience doctrine applies.
Intel: Fragment sighted moving through three terrain zones. Archive contains environmental mapping and water-source data worth billions.
Complication: SCA patience strategy means operatives are expected to move smart, not fast. If they accelerate, they outrun backup. Volkova does not renegotiate -- she withdraws.
Hook:"The terrain is changing. Archive data shows why. Get us there, get us that data, and the SCA guarantees water rights for a decade."
C: Independent Broker (Syndicate)
Patron: Kael Rix, freelance data broker
Budget: $30K (operatives keep percentage of sales). Fake credentials for all five factions. Direct comms with Baroness Volstok. One gene-forged contact: a defector-stock boar operative (former EO Tempest Riders) who knows the Metropoli Perdida upper strata. Maximum flexibility.
Intel: Multiple fragments exist. Osei is a wild card. Real money is selling archive access to the highest faction bidder after breach.
Complication: The patron will sell operatives out if another buyer pays more. If the squad transfers their contract to Volstok, Rix sells their operational details to the highest bidder within 24 hours.
Hook:"The archive is a commodity. Five factions want it. You are going to make sure none of them get it cheap. We split 60-40."
Intel: Archive contains pre-Upheaval AI architecture. Fragments are encryption keys. The real prize is understanding how the Architects built a civilization-scale network.
Complication: PRC AI support triggers faction detection algorithms. ORACLE has its own agenda -- producing outputs its programmers did not request and prioritizing archive data that relates to AI architecture over mission-critical intel. PRC tiger stock operates with kill authority and does not check in before engaging.
Hook:"The Architects built something that lasted millennia. We need to know how."
02The RaceFragments & Clocks
Theater Map
The Fragment Puzzle
The nine-character coordinate fragment is part of a larger encryption key. The full key requires assembling data from four locations. The Durants have Fragment A. Three more are scattered across the node network.
Fragment
Location
Function
A
Durants have it
Base coordinates to Metropoli Perdida
B
New Prague archive
Historical validation -- proves the site is real
C
Gorodskie Ekho submerged server
Depth and approach vector
D
Samudra Sattva Lumicite node
Energy signature unlock sequence
Archive Gate Access2 fragments (minimum): Breach time 30-45 minutes. Security runs validation loops. One environmental hazard every 10 minutes during breach. 3 fragments: Breach time 10-15 minutes. One hazard during breach. Meaningful reaction time. 4 fragments (full key): Immediate access. No hazards. The Lumicite cascade pauses for 30 minutes. Fragment A + any one other: Treated as 3-fragment access.
The Rival Team
The Durants move on a parallel track. They are always one step ahead or behind. Players encounter evidence of them constantly -- recent equipment, cached data, NPC witnesses, faction intercepts. Players can race them directly, shadow them, sabotage them, partner opportunistically, or bypass them entirely.
GM Tip: The Durants
The Durants are not a plot device you control. They are a rival team on a parallel track. Track their progress session by session. Drop evidence of their work -- recent camps, NPC references, equipment caches -- but never narrate their actions directly unless players are present for them.
Gorodskie Ekho or Samudra Sattva. Fragment pursuit.
Dive gear left behind. Vehicle tracks. Faction intercepts.
4
Converge on Metropoli Perdida. Will prepares broadcast.
Fresh camps in upper strata. Civilian witnesses.
5
Archive access. Broadcast. Lumicite chamber.
The broadcast itself. Direct encounter.
Interference Rules: If players sabotage Durant equipment or detain one of them, delay the track by half a session. If players partner with the Durants, accelerate by half a session and share fragment access.
Ticking Clocks
Four campaign-level countdowns run simultaneously. Track them at the start of each session. Never announce the number -- let the world announce the consequences. When a clock hits 0, something breaks permanently.
Architect Awakening
Starts at 10. Tick down 2 per session. Tick down 1 extra if operators trigger a Lumicite surge, blow a sealed door, or use heavy equipment near an installation. At 4: EM interference kills electronics within 500m of any node. At 2: structural collapses at every location, blackouts cascade. At 0: feedback loop -- the network locks. Archive access requires 4 fragments or fails.
Durant Progress
Starts at 8. Tick down 2 per session (they are fast). Tick down 1 extra if operators stall or skip a location. Tick UP 1 if operators sabotage Durant equipment or detain a team member. At 2: Durants reach Metropoli Perdida. At 0: Will broadcasts. Endgame triggers whether operators are ready or not.
Faction Support
Starts at 6. Tick down 1 per session. Tick down 1 extra if operators fail an objective or burn a patron relationship. At 3: patron demands results -- reduced resupply, no extraction guarantee. At 1: patron cuts contact. Operators work with what they have. At 0: patron sends a competing team.
Brotherhood Schism
Starts at 6. Tick down 1 per session. Tick down 1 extra if operators give intel to either wing. Tick UP 1 if operators broker a temporary truce. At 3: active sabotage between wings -- access to Seam becomes contested. At 1: defections. At 0: Military Wing attempts to collapse the Seam. Scholar Wing sends everything to stop them.
Running Clocks at the Table
Write all four clocks on an index card. Update at the start of each session and after major events. When two clocks drop below 3 simultaneously, the campaign enters crisis mode -- every session should end with a hard choice.
GM-Only: Gene-Forged Clock
There is a fifth clock that does not appear in the players' briefing. Gene-forged operators approaching the Metropoli Perdida Lumicite source will begin experiencing substrate effects: low-frequency hum audible before baseline operators hear anything, compass and targeting drift, involuntary stock instinct surfacing. This escalates with proximity and depth. By Strata Five, gene-forged PCs should be rolling Stock Instinct checks triggered by the environment, not by combat stress. Do not explain why. Let the players connect the dots.
03GranitsaArctic Research Zone
NODE 01GranitsaArctic // EO Dominant
A research facility half-sunk into cracking permafrost, walls spreading like broken teeth. Zero sound -- no organic matter, air scrubbed clean by cold. Geometric shapes push through the ice where buried installations are being born into the air. The tundra looks wrong before you can explain why.
Read AloudThe research complex is half-swallowed by the ice. Walls tilt three degrees to the west -- enough that pencils roll off tables. The air is so cold it scrubs your sinuses clean. No birds. No insects. No sound except the permafrost cracking beneath your boots. Something geometric is pushing through the ice fifty meters north. It is warm to the touch. It should not be.
FunctionUC-EO joint research facility where the fragment was stolen three weeks ago.
ScarcityHeat. Stable ground. Communication bandwidth.
FactionsEO (dominant, facility security). NAF (covert, listening post 400km north). SCA (3 jaguar-stock scouts, guides for hire at $8K). Void Walkers (unconfirmed, sensor logs show movement).
Under-System
Permafrost is accelerating its collapse. The facility sits on bedrock that is increasingly unstable. Geothermal vents are opening new passages beneath the research complex. Power generation is failing. When the system strains: crevasses open without warning, buried Architect structures push through the surface like bones, equipment fails in electromagnetic dead zones.
Haecceity Texture
Installations tilt as the permafrost changes. Three degrees is enough that pencils roll to the west wall. The ice over research stations opens like a mouth and closes. Brotherhood operatives came in during a Dominion patrol rotation window -- the ice decides who moves. Pre-Upheaval data cores surface with composite casings no one manufactures anymore. Cold enough that weapons condense frost through insulated gloves.
Guaranteed Discovery: The Four-Fragment Map
This discovery is not contingent on a roll. Every team that spends meaningful time at Granitsa finds it -- a UC research document mapping four Lumicite signature locations, each corresponding to a coordinate fragment. It is how the module surfaces the full strategic picture before Session 2. Do not hide it.
Encounters -- Day (d6)
1EO patrol drone overhead. It has not flagged you yet. Cover or credentials -- choose now.
2SCA scouts hauling water-mapping gear. They have seen something underground and are not talking about it. Their jaguar-stock point operative smells you before she sees you.
3Permafrost crack opens 20 meters ahead. Equipment on the far side. Getting it means crossing unstable ground. A geometric shape is visible in the exposed wall of ice.
4Abandoned EO supply cache. Fuel cells, rations, encrypted comms unit. The comms unit is still transmitting to a frequency nobody assigned.
5Research contractor running. Says the lower level is “wrong.” Will not elaborate. Gene-forged operators notice she is covering her ears.
6Geothermal vent erupts nearby. No damage, but the steam reveals a geometric shape in the ice wall. Warm to the touch. Not geological.
Encounters -- Night (d6)
1Electromagnetic pulse from below. All electronics dead for 1d6 minutes. In the dark, something moves. Gene-forged operators hear a low hum that continues after the pulse ends.
2Strange light from the geothermal passages. Blue-white. Pulsing. Not natural. The frequency is too consistent.
3EO security team, six operators, running a sweep. They are nervous and trigger-happy. One of them is gene-forged boar stock and keeps scanning the walls like he hears something.
4Cryo-Varanus -- giant cold-adapted monitor lizards -- circling the facility perimeter. Attracted to heat signatures. Gene-forged operators with reptilian stock feel a pull of recognition.
5Void Walker sensor ghost. Equipment shows a contact that is not there. Or was not there a moment ago. The contact was standing exactly where the geometric shape surfaced.
6The facility backup power engages automatically. Lights come on in a section that should be offline. The section contains pre-Upheaval equipment that no one remembers powering down.
Rumors (d6)
1A researcher disappeared three days ago. EO listed her as AWOL. Her last recorded position was the lowest accessible level. Her gene-forged escort came back alone and has not spoken since.
2The geothermal passages connect to something deeper than bedrock. A mapping team turned back when their instruments registered a temperature inversion that made no geological sense.
3EO is pulling out within the week. The official reason is budget. The unofficial reason is the ground-penetrating radar returns changed shape between scans.
4Osei was here ten days before the theft. Spoke to three people. All three left Granitsa within 48 hours.
5SCA scouts found a second Architect structure beneath the first. Sealed. The material is the same composite as the data cores -- pre-Upheaval manufacturing that nobody replicates.
6A Void Walker was photographed at 200 meters. The image shows a figure standing on ice that, according to survey data, should not hold weight. The ice held.
Contacts
Sergei Koval, facility maintenance chief (human). Can get: access codes to lower levels, power grid schedules, equipment repair. Wants: passage to the coast -- his contract ended and EO is not honoring extraction. If the operators help him leave, he gives them the lower-level access codes and a hand-drawn map of the geothermal passages.
Dr. Lina Vasquez, UC climatologist (human, stayed behind). Can get: geological survey data, Architect structural analysis, permafrost collapse patterns. Wants: her research published. Fears: that the Architect structures beneath the facility are not dormant.
Mara, SCA jaguar-stock scout leader (no surname given). Can get: guide service through geothermal passages, terrain knowledge, fauna behavior patterns. Wants: $8K or a specific favor -- extract an SCA operative trapped in an EO holding facility in New Prague. Fears: the deep passages. She has been down twice. Both times, her stock instinct told her to run. She did.
Site Clocks
Permafrost Stability
Starts at 6. Tick down 1 per 4 hours on-site. Tick down 1 extra for heavy equipment use or geothermal vent eruption. At 3: crevasses open without warning -- traversal checks required. At 0: lower level collapses. Equipment in lower sections lost.
EO Detection
Starts at 4. Tick down 1 per failed stealth action or visible equipment deployment. At 2: drone flyovers increase, patrol frequency doubles. At 0: EO security team (6 operators) deploys to your position. 15-minute ETA.
Salvage (d6)
1
Fuel cells (4 units). Standard military grade. Worth $2K or two days of vehicle operation.
2
Encrypted EO comms unit. Still transmitting to an unassigned frequency. Worth $5K to the right buyer -- or priceless if you crack the encryption.
3
Pre-Upheaval data core in composite casing. Unreadable without a specialist terminal. Contains geological surveys that predate every current faction's maps.
4
Cold-weather medical kit. Frostbite treatment, stimulants, two doses of broad-spectrum antibiotics. Worth more than cash at any location south of here.
5
Lumicite detection meter (prototype). Range: 200m. Reads intensity and frequency. EO stamp on the casing. If they find out you have it, the Detection clock drops to 0.
6
Osei's field journal (partial). Handwritten. Maps three Architect signatures the four-fragment map does not show. One of them is beneath Metropoli Perdida's Strata Five.
If the Squad Goes Down
EO security recovers the operators within 6 hours. Detention at the facility, not a black site. Interrogation is professional -- EO wants to know who sent them and why. All equipment confiscated. Release after 48 hours with a formal warning and a tracking tag embedded in one piece of returned gear. The squad loses two days on the campaign clock. The Durants gain a full session of lead. The four-fragment map, if found, is copied by EO intelligence before return.
GM Tip
Granitsa works best when the permafrost itself is the enemy. Let the ground shift. Let equipment fail. The cold is not atmosphere -- it is a clock. Every hour operators spend here costs them something. Gene-forged operators should notice things baseline operators miss: the geometric shape in the ice feels warm through gloves; the low hum from below resonates in bone, not in air.
04New PragueArchive City
NODE 02New PragueUKE Territory // Contested
Old-world stone and amber light through tall windows. Hundreds of shelves holding the physical record of a world that collapsed and left its paperwork behind. Coal smoke mixes with electric vehicle ozone in narrow cobblestone streets that carry conversations further than they should. No flood damage. That absence of destruction reads, to anyone who has been elsewhere, as a kind of impossible luxury.
Read AloudCobblestone streets and amber light through windows that were old before the Upheaval. The archive district smells like coal smoke and paper. Conversations carry in these narrow lanes -- you hear arguments two blocks away. Everything here survived. The buildings, the shelves, the bureaucracy. Somewhere in those stacks is the data that proves what you are looking for is real. So is everyone else looking for it.
FunctionLargest surviving pre-Upheaval archive complex. Fragment B is here.
ControllerEO claims authority. The Brotherhood runs the archives. The undercity runs itself.
DrawArchive data. Fragment B. Black-market intel. Forged documents. PRC cyber access.
Under-System
The power grid serves three masters -- EO military, Brotherhood archives, civilian infrastructure -- and cannot satisfy all three. Rolling blackouts hit on rotation. When archives lose power, data extraction becomes impossible. When military loses power, checkpoints go dark and the undercity surges.
Encounters -- Day (d6)
1EO checkpoint. Papers check. The officer is bored and bribable ($500) or sharp and suspicious (50/50).
2Brotherhood archivist in a hurry, carrying a sealed data core. She drops something. Picking it up means she owes a favor. The core is warm.
3Power grid failure. Your district goes dark for 1d4 hours. Archive access impossible. Undercity access wide open.
4Academic conference in the main archive hall. Every faction has someone here. Perfect cover for intel gathering. Perfect exposure risk. A PRC macaque-stock operative is running electronic surveillance from the back row.
5Forger approaches. Brotherhood research credentials for $3K. They are good. He is also selling your description to someone else.
6Nadia Volkova at a cafe near the archive. She is reading. She looks up when you enter. She was expecting someone else.
Encounters -- Night (d6)
1Undercity market at peak activity. Everything available for a price. Three people are watching you specifically. One is gene-forged -- fennec-stock ears tracking from forty meters.
2PRC cyber-probe triggers your equipment. Comms compromised for 1d6 hours unless you dump the hardware.
3EO night raid on an undercity block. Arrests, gunfire, confusion. Good cover for a move. Bad timing if you are in the target block.
4Brotherhood night-shift archivist offers archive access codes ($5K). Legitimate, but the codes expire at dawn. She mentions that someone else already asked tonight.
5Kasim's bar. Drinks, information, and the feeling that everything you say is being recorded. Because it is.
6Void Walker graffiti on a wall that was not there yesterday. A coordinate sequence. Partial. It matches nothing in your files -- but it uses the same nine-character format as the Architect fragments.
Contacts
Monsignor Pavel Iorga, Brotherhood Scholar Wing archivist (human). Can get: archive access, historical context, Fragment B location within the stacks. Wants: proof that whoever takes the archive data will not weaponize it. Fears: the Military Wing arriving with authorization he cannot refuse.
Nadia Volkova, SCA operative / Osei's agent (human). Can get: archive contacts, black-market data access, SCA support channels. Her pressurized lab in Gorodskie Ekho contains a restored pre-Upheaval reference terminal. Wants: to complete Osei's distribution plan. Fears: being exposed to SCA before the broadcast happens.
Kasim, Syndicate information broker (human). Can get: intel sales, black-market equipment, contact brokering across all factions. Fixes cable systems while walking -- maintenance as political act. Wants: money and continued chaos. Fears: a faction lockdown that shuts his operation.
Site Clocks
EO Raid Cycle
Starts at 6. Tick down 1 per day in the city. Tick down 1 extra if operators attract attention or access restricted archive sections. At 3: EO increases checkpoint intensity -- papers checked twice daily. At 0: city-wide lockdown. Undercity sealed. Archive access requires force or a very good bribe ($15K+).
Power Grid
Starts at 4. Tick down 1 per rolling blackout (GM triggers one per day, or on encounter roll of 3). At 2: archive loses power for 1d4 hours -- data extraction impossible during outage. At 0: grid failure. City goes dark. Military, archives, and civilians all compete for generator fuel.
Salvage (d6)
1
Forged Brotherhood credentials. Pass casual inspection. Will not survive a database check. Good for one archive entry before someone notices.
2
PRC signal interceptor (palm-sized). Captures local encrypted transmissions for 30 minutes before burning out. One use. What it captures may be worth everything.
3
Undercity safe house key + location. Two nights of unmonitored rest. The previous occupant left a map of EO patrol routes taped inside a cabinet.
4
Pre-Upheaval reference terminal (portable, battery-damaged). Can read data cores from any era. Needs a new power cell -- Kasim has one. Price: a favor.
5
Brotherhood internal memo on encrypted paper. Details Military Wing asset movements toward Metropoli Perdida. Date: three days from now. Monsignor Iorga would pay to see this.
6
EO officer's personal sidearm with biometric lock. Worth $8K black market. The officer will notice it is missing within 24 hours. If traced to operators, EO Raid Cycle clock drops to 0.
If the Squad Goes Down
EO detains the operators. Colonel Volkov conducts the interrogation personally -- cold, efficient, looking for faction affiliations. Equipment confiscated, credentials flagged. Released after 72 hours into undercity custody (Kasim arranges it for $5K, deducted from future earnings). All archive access revoked. Operators must find alternative routes to Fragment B: undercity data brokers ($10K), Nadia's back channel, or a nighttime break-in during a blackout. The Durants gain a full session lead.
GM Tip
New Prague is an information environment. Every faction has eyes here. Let players feel watched. Make privacy expensive. The undercity should feel like relief and risk simultaneously. Gene-forged operators stand out in New Prague's old-world streets -- use that visibility as pressure.
The drowned financial district is the foundation. What were once penthouses are now ground floors. Cable systems strung between towers carry supplies, people, communication lines. Sound bounces between towers and falls into the water below -- direction is impossible to read. A voice from three buildings away sounds like it is coming from beside you.
Read AloudThe tops of skyscrapers are the ground floor now. Cable lines sway between towers, carrying supply pods and people in harnesses. Below the walkways: blue-green water stretching down into darkness where the streets used to be. Sound is wrong here -- a voice from three towers away sounds like it is at your shoulder. Someone is shouting directions from somewhere. You cannot tell where. Nobody can.
FunctionFlooded vertical city containing submerged pre-Upheaval server clusters. Fragment C is in a sealed vault on Level 8.
ControllerSCA manages the surface. Below the flood line, nobody controls anything.
DrawFragment C. Submerged archives. Salvage rights. Black-market equipment.
Under-System
The flood line rises annually. The city's cable systems -- carrying supplies, people, communication lines -- are the infrastructure. Who controls the cables controls movement. When the system strains: flood line surges, black-market operations relocate to upper levels, SCA restricts diving.
Haecceity Texture
Kasim fixes cable fittings while walking -- maintenance as political act. Who controls the cables controls movement. Blue-green murk below the waterline, shafts of light cutting through water that was once air. Shop signs in a language nobody reads on the surface anymore. Vehicles settled on their suspensions forty feet down. The acoustic property that makes direction hard to read is a security feature the residents exploit.
Encounters -- Day (d6)
1Cable system groans overhead. A supply pod swings wide, nearly striking a walkway. The maintenance crew is arguing about whether to shut the line down.
2SCA dive team surfaces with a sealed container. Will not say what is inside. Their caiman-stock diver has not blinked since surfacing.
3Two Nordics operatives in the market, buying diving equipment with cash. Friendly if approached. Too friendly. Keira Soren is watching from the next level up.
4A boat engine dies in the transit channel. The pilot is a kid, maybe sixteen. The current is pulling the boat toward a submerged power junction.
5Castellan approaches. She has intel on where the Durants are diving today. Price: $5K or a favor she will name later.
6Water level rose overnight. A habitable floor is now ankle-deep. Residents moving upward. Below the new waterline: opportunities.
Encounters -- Night (d6)
1Flood Zone market. Equipment, information, contraband. A gene-forged deserter (EO boar-stock) is selling his unit's patrol schedules. He is sweating. Not from heat.
2Bioluminescent bloom in the submerged levels. Beautiful. The organisms are aggressive near diving equipment -- attracted to electromagnetic signatures. Gene-forged operators with aquatic stock feel the bloom as a vibration before they see the light.
3Aqua-Felis hunting pack at flood line. Three semi-aquatic big cats, silent in water, fast on the walkways. Territorial. Gene-forged feline stock experiences a recognition response -- the cats do too.
4A salvage pirate crew has found something in the deep levels. They are celebrating. Loudly. Whatever they found, it is glowing with a blue-white frequency that does not match any known bioluminescence.
5Electromagnetic pulse from submerged Architect systems. All electronics within 500 meters fail for 1d6 minutes. Below the water, something activates. Gene-forged operators hear a sustained low tone that baseline operators cannot detect.
6A body floats to the surface. Recent. Diving suit. The suit's data recorder is still functional. It logged a coordinate before the diver died -- and a frequency reading that matches no known Lumicite signature.
Contacts
Castellan, Syndicate operator (human, former SCA). Can get: diving permits, salvage rights, safe passage, intel on faction movements. Wants: profit -- saving for a boat that can cross open ocean. Fears: being identified by her former SCA unit.
Tomas Keel, independent salvage diver (human). Can get: deep-dive guide services, knowledge of submerged vault locations, improvised equipment repair. Wants: a partner for a dive he cannot do alone -- there is a vault he found that requires two people to open. Fears: whatever he heard through the vault door.
Keira Soren, Nordics scout leader (gene-forged macaque stock). Can get: professional expertise, diving logistics, shared intelligence. Wants: everything you know about every other faction's progress. Fears: that ORACLE is tracking her team's movements. Her stock gives her prehensile precision in confined spaces -- she climbs infrastructure that baseline operators cannot navigate.
Site Clocks
Flood Level
Starts at 6. Tick down 1 per day. Tick down 1 extra after heavy rain or structural collapse. At 3: habitable floors shrink -- residents crowd upper levels, equipment must be moved. At 0: Level 8 vault access requires deep diving gear. Surface operations limited to rooftops and cable systems only.
Dive Gear Integrity
Starts at 4. Tick down 1 per dive below flood line. Tick down 1 extra if operators encounter EM interference or bioluminescent bloom. At 2: air supply unreliable -- dive time halved. At 0: gear fails. Operators surface immediately or drown. Replacement gear costs $8K from Castellan.
Salvage (d6)
1
Sealed server rack (submerged, intact). Contains financial records from three pre-Upheaval corporations. Useless as intelligence. Worth $12K to the right collector. Heavy. Requires two people to carry.
2
SCA dive manifest (stolen). Lists every permitted dive in the last 30 days, including depth, duration, and what was recovered. Three entries are redacted. Those three match the frequency readings from the Architect installation.
3
Bioluminescent sample (contained). Reacts to electromagnetic fields. Points toward Lumicite-active material within 50 meters like a living compass. Shelf life: 72 hours.
4
Emergency rebreather (one use). Extends a single dive by 30 minutes. Found in an abandoned Nordics cache. Still functional. Keira Soren will want it back.
5
Salvage pirate frequency scanner. Monitors all boat traffic and dive communications within 2km. Three days of battery life. Castellan's private channel is on it.
6
Sealed container from Level 8 antechamber. Pre-Upheaval composite. The lock mechanism is warm. Inside: a data wafer in a format no current reader accepts -- except the reference terminal from New Prague, if operators found it.
If the Squad Goes Down
Below flood line: operators wash up on a lower walkway, equipment scattered. Castellan's salvage crews find them first and strip anything valuable. Recovery costs $5K paid to Castellan, or a dive favor she names later. Above flood line: SCA security detains operators for 24 hours, confiscates diving equipment, revokes permits. Fragment C requires an unsanctioned night dive with improvised gear (Tomas Keel can help, but he will want his vault dive in exchange). The Durants gain half a session lead.
GM Tip
Sound behaves wrong in Gorodskie Ekho. Describe it. Voices three buildings away sound arm's length. Boat engines create constant low frequency. Underwater, silence is total except for your own breathing -- until it isn't. Use audio confusion to create tension.
06Samudra SattvaExpanding Desert
NODE 04Samudra SattvaPCU-Adjacent // Ungoverned
Pre-collapse infrastructure surfaces from dunes at unexpected angles. A traffic sign at forty-five degrees. A multi-story building with its top three floors intact, the rest below the surface. Nothing organic in the deep desert. At night: cold that arrives without warning and the faint mineral quality of sand releasing stored heat.
Read AloudA traffic sign juts from the sand at forty-five degrees. Behind it, the top three floors of an office building -- the rest is buried. The horizon shimmers. Nothing lives in the deep desert: no birds, no insects, no plants. The sand smells mineral and warm, like it is releasing heat it stored before anyone alive was born. Somewhere beneath your feet, something is humming at a frequency you feel in your teeth.
FunctionExpanding desert containing sealed Architect vaults with Lumicite technology. Fragment D is encoded in the primary power system.
ControllerPCU claims divine and strategic authority. On the ground, the sand decides.
DrawFragment D. Lumicite samples. Architect vault access. Environmental data.
RiskDust storms (15-minute warning). Sinkholes. EM anomalies. Extreme temperature swings. PCU military response. Thermo-Canis.
ScarcityWater. Shade. Communication range. Vehicle fuel.
Under-System
The desert is expanding at 15-20km per year. Architect installations beneath the sand are actively pumping Lumicite-charged particles into the subsurface, altering soil chemistry and accelerating desertification. The installations are not dormant. They are operating exactly as designed -- the desert is a side effect of a system never intended to run unattended this long.
Haecceity Texture
The horizon is never reliable -- sand creates its own topography and changes it. Surfaced structures are load-bearing for their own specific purposes. A water treatment facility holds weight differently than an office building. Sandstorms form with short notice -- the locals read the horizon for a brownish tinge. Nothing organic in the deep desert. The installations beneath the sand pump Lumicite-charged particles into the subsurface, altering soil chemistry.
Encounters -- Day (d6)
1PCU checkpoint. Papers and vehicle inspection. The officer quotes scripture while searching your gear. Looking for Lumicite detection equipment specifically.
2Sinkhole opens 50 meters ahead. Sand pours into a cavity below. Something geometric is visible at the bottom. Warm air rises from the opening.
3SCA guide caravan passing through. They will sell water and route data. One of their jaguar-stock scouts recognizes gene-forged operators from another faction by scent before visual ID.
4Pre-Upheaval structure surfacing at a 45-degree angle. Traffic sign, concrete, rebar. Untouched for decades. The materials are warm to the touch -- warmer than solar heating accounts for.
5Dust storm forming on the horizon. Brownish tinge. One hour warning if you are paying attention. Gene-forged operators with enhanced sensory architecture feel the pressure change 20 minutes before baseline.
6Brotherhood scouts at a distance, using ground-penetrating radar. They have not seen you yet. They have found something -- and they are arguing about whether to report it or keep it.
Encounters -- Night (d6)
1Thermo-Canis pack. Four heat-adapted wolves with reflective fur. Tracking your vehicle's heat signature. They do not attack groups. Yet. Gene-forged canine stock feels a territorial pull.
2Temperature drops 30 degrees in an hour. Equipment stress. Metal contracts. Something in the sand cracks -- and beneath the crack, a faint blue-white glow pulses once and goes dark.
3Lumicite signature visible beneath the sand -- faint blue-white glow in a line stretching east. Pulsing at a rhythm too regular to be geological. Gene-forged operators hear a low tone -- not sound, exactly. Resonance.
4PCU night patrol. More aggressive after dark. They shoot first if you are near a vault entrance. Their commander is gene-forged falcon stock -- she spots movement from distances that should be impossible.
5The desert is silent. Completely silent. No wind, no fauna, no sand movement. The silence lasts ten minutes and is deeply wrong. Gene-forged operators feel it as pressure. Something is listening.
6A pre-Upheaval vehicle hull surfaces from shifting sand. Inside: a data core in composite casing. Heavier than it looks. Partially readable. The data includes references to a "containment protocol" that matches no known Architect terminology.
Contacts
Commander Tariq al-Rashid, PCU military liaison (human). Can get: excavation permits, military escort, water access. Wants: proof that Architect installations are not weapons. His superiors believe they are divine heritage. He believes they are dangerous. Fears: being right.
Fen, independent desert guide (gene-forged fennec-fox stock, PCU origin). Can get: route knowledge, hidden entrance locations, sand navigation, weather prediction. Her ears track air pressure changes before instruments register them. Wants: news from the coast. Fears: the PCU discovering she is gene-forged. In PCU territory, gene-forging is doctrinal -- she left the program. They do not forgive that.
Brother Callum, Brotherhood Scholar Wing scout (human). Can get: Installation #7 location data, Architect research, Brotherhood internal intelligence. Wants: alliance against the Military Wing. He has been ordered to find and destroy Installation #7. He intends to find and preserve it. Fears: that the Military Wing sent someone to watch him.
Site Clocks
Water Supply
Starts at 6. Tick down 1 per day in the desert. Tick down 1 extra for sandstorm exposure or vehicle breakdown. At 3: rationing required -- physical checks at -1. At 1: critical -- operators take 1 wound per day. At 0: squad must abandon the site or die. Fen knows a hidden well, but the price is steep.
PCU Alert Level
Starts at 6. Tick down 1 per day near vault sites. Tick down 2 if operators are caught with Lumicite detection equipment or near a vault entrance after dark. At 3: PCU patrols doubled -- Commander al-Rashid demands an explanation. At 0: PCU military response. 12 operators, armored vehicle, shoot-on-sight authorization near vaults.
Salvage (d6)
1
Water purification tablets (30 doses). Worth $3K at any trading post. Worth your life in the deep desert. Each dose makes 2 liters drinkable.
2
Ground-penetrating radar unit (damaged). Functional for 1d6 hours of use. Shows subsurface structures within 50 meters. The Brotherhood scouts want this badly enough to trade intel.
3
Pre-Upheaval vehicle hull data core. Partially readable. Contains a route map with nine locations marked -- seven match known Architect sites. Two do not appear on any current database.
4
Lumicite fragment (thumb-sized, inert). Warm to touch. Not actively emitting. Worth $20K on the black market. PCU would kill for it. Literally. Gene-forged operators who hold it feel a low pulse.
5
Sandstorm survival shelter (inflatable, one-use). Protects a squad of four for 12 hours. The difference between life and death if caught in the open.
6
Brotherhood scout's encrypted journal. Details Installation #7 location, vault access observations, and a hand-drawn diagram of the Lumicite power system. Fragment D extraction procedure is sketched in the margins.
If the Squad Goes Down
In the deep desert: Fen's network finds the operators dehydrated and stripped of equipment by scavengers. Recovery takes 48 hours and costs all remaining water rations plus a debt to Fen (she will collect). Near a vault: PCU detains operators at a military camp. Commander al-Rashid interrogates personally -- he is looking for proof these are not tomb raiders. Equipment confiscated. Release in 72 hours if operators can produce legitimate credentials. Fragment D requires returning with a different approach: night operation, Syndicate route, or al-Rashid's cooperation (if operators convinced him the vaults are dangerous). Durants gain a full session lead.
GM Tip
The desert is scale and silence. Make players feel the distance between things. Water is currency here. Track it. Make them buy it, carry it, ration it. When the sand moves at night, do not tell them why. When gene-forged operators feel the resonance, describe it as physical -- bone vibration, pressure behind the eyes, the sense of being observed from below.
07Metropoli PerdidaLayered Ruins // Convergence
NODE 05Metropoli PerdidaUngoverned // All Factions by Session 5
Horizontal strata in vertical walls. Colors shift by era -- modern concrete gray, older concrete yellow-white, stone below, then older masonry in colors that indicate specific quarrying traditions. Seam passages between eras exist as negative spaces where collapsed structures of different periods left the same footprint of absence. The Lumicite source 2km below illuminates the deep installation level -- not enough to read by, enough to see by.
Read AloudSeven civilizations stacked on top of each other. The walls show it: modern gray concrete at the top, then yellow-white, then stone, then masonry in colors no one quarries anymore. You descend through centuries with every level. The air gets colder. The echoes change -- steel becomes stone becomes something older. Far below, a faint blue-white glow. Not enough to read by. Enough to see that the installation is still there. Still waiting.
FunctionThe convergence point. Seven civilizations layered in strata. Architect archive and Lumicite source sealed at Strata Seven.
ControllerNobody. The city resists ownership.
DrawThe archive. Lumicite. The answer to everything every faction wants.
RiskStructural collapse. EM cascades. Faction crossfire. Void Walker activity. Substrate effects on gene-forged operators. The city itself.
ScarcityStable ground. Working electronics. Light below Strata Three. Trust.
FactionsAll major factions by Session 5. Brotherhood (major presence, both wings). Void Walkers (confirmed, pursuing specific Architect technologies). Archaeologists and independents.
Under-System
Architect power systems are coming online after centuries of dormancy. Self-repairing, activated by the fragment theft. Electromagnetic cascades multiply. Structural collapses accelerate. The Lumicite source at Strata Seven creates a standing wave that intensifies with each pulse. Compasses malfunction within 500 meters. Gene-forged operators feel the wave before instruments detect it.
The Strata
Stratum
Era
Character
Hazards
1-2
Modern / post-Upheaval
Concrete gray. Steel echo. Civilian communities in upper levels trade passage knowledge and hoard light.
Structural instability. Faction patrols.
3
Mid-century construction
Yellow-white concrete. Last reliable light. The strata communities end here.
Electromagnetic dead zones. Navigation drift.
4
Pre-modern stone
Church-like echo. The Seam -- primary vertical chokepoint. Brotherhood-controlled.
Brotherhood gatekeeping. Military Wing sabotage. Collapse risk.
5-6
Medieval and older masonry
Regional quarrying traditions visible in stone color. Cold. Silent. Dark.
Compass failure. Stock Instinct triggers for gene-forged. Cognitive drift.
7
Architect installation
Pre-Upheaval composite. Warm. Faint blue-white illumination. The composition lock.
Full substrate effects. The standing wave. The Lumicite source.
The Seam at Strata Four
The primary vertical route from habitable upper strata to the archaeological lower levels. A gap between collapsed structures of different eras -- negative space where settlement patterns of two different periods left the same footprint of absence. The Brotherhood controls access. Scholar Wing and Military Wing operatives are both present. The Scholar Wing wants to trade access for research rights. The Military Wing is evaluating whether to collapse the passage.
Navigating the Seam: A historian (OPINT check) can read the seam passages by identifying construction eras. Gene-forged operators with geological sensitivity or enhanced structural analysis navigate more effectively (+1 to traversal checks). A field operative without either skill relies on rat-runs -- Giga-Rattus paths through the rubble that mark the most reliable routes. Where the rats run, the floor holds.
Upper Strata Communities
Civilian communities occupy Strata One through Three. They trade passage knowledge, strata maps, and structural stability assessments. They hoard climbing gear and light sources. Their most valued luxury: a floor that has not shifted in a year. Among them: Resonants -- people who feel something near the Lumicite source. Not organized. Not a belief system. They converge on the upper levels and perform personal rituals. The factions call it a nuisance. The Brotherhood considers it significant.
Haecceity Texture
Echo behavior changes by layer. Modern construction echoes like steel and glass. Older layers echo like stone churches. Seam passages have confused acoustics -- you cannot tell how far away sound originated. The installation door at Strata Seven is a composite material composition lock that reads the hands that touch it at the molecular level. No post-Upheaval technology replicates this. Giga-Rattus runs through the rubble mark the most reliable paths -- where the rats run, the floor holds.
Encounters -- Day (d6)
1Structural collapse blocks the primary descent route. Dust fills the air for 20 minutes. A new seam passage is visible in the rubble. Gene-forged operators with enhanced senses smell old air -- a sealed space has just opened for the first time in centuries.
2Archaeological team fleeing upward. They triggered something below Strata Four. They will not go back. Their abandoned equipment includes a Lumicite detection meter still reading a signature from below.
3Brotherhood operatives establishing a perimeter around the Seam. Scholar Wing insignia. Not hostile -- yet. Their leader wants to negotiate. A Military Wing operative is watching from one stratum up.
4Electromagnetic pulse. All equipment fails for 1d6 minutes. When it comes back, your navigation data has changed. Something below shifted the magnetic field. Gene-forged operators feel a physical snap -- like a tuning fork struck in their bones.
5Void Walker observed at distance. Standing on a collapsed structure, completely still, observing something below. It does not acknowledge you. It is gene-forged -- raven stock. No faction markings.
6Two faction scout teams encounter each other. Tension. Weapons drawn. Neither has fired yet. Your arrival changes the calculus. One team has a gene-forged tiger-stock operative whose kill authority makes her the most dangerous person at the intersection.
Encounters -- Night (d6)
1Lumicite glow intensifies from below. Blue-white and pulsing. Shadows move in patterns that do not match surface movement. Gene-forged operators hear the pulse as language -- not words, but structure.
2Osei's voice on an open frequency. Brief. Coordinates. A warning. Then silence. The transmission was directed at the Durants but your equipment caught it. His voice sounds different -- slower, more precise, as if each word costs him something.
3Void Walker entity moving through seam passages ahead of you. Following a route you have not mapped. The route leads deeper. It paused where you paused. It knew you were there.
4Gene-forged operative from another faction, alone, wounded. Her team was attacked below Strata Five. Not by a faction. By something automated -- Architect defense systems activating. She is tiger-stock PRC and her cybernetic integration ports are glowing faintly at the joints.
5The archive complex lights up. Interior illumination visible through cracks in Strata Six. Someone has activated the access sequence. You are not the only ones here. The light pulses at the same frequency gene-forged operators have been hearing since Strata Three.
6Storm above. Lightning strikes the Architect structure in the plaza. The structure absorbs the energy without damage. The ground beneath you vibrates at a frequency you recognize -- the same resonance from every other location node, concentrated.
Substrate Effects -- Gene-Forged Operators Below Strata Three (d6)
Roll once per session for each gene-forged operator who descends past Strata Three. These effects are cumulative within the adventure. They are not damage. They are the installation noticing.
1Low-Frequency Awareness. The operator hears a sustained tone that baseline operators cannot detect. It is not unpleasant. It contains structure. +1 on navigation checks in the deep strata -- but must pass a GUTS check to stop listening voluntarily.
2Thermal Sensitivity. The operator can feel Lumicite-active material through walls, floors, and sealed containers by heat differential. Useful for finding sealed passages. The sensitivity does not turn off. Even above ground, the operator feels “warm spots” for 1d6 days after leaving the site.
3Stock Instinct Amplification. The operator's stock instinct triggers at lower thresholds while in the deep strata. Roll on the Stock Instinct table at -1 modifier whenever the standing wave pulses (roughly once per hour of in-game time below Strata Four).
4Resonance Echo. The operator begins perceiving acoustic information from other strata, other times. Useful for detecting movement on adjacent levels. Disorienting in conversation. Other gene-forged operators in range hear the same echoes.
5Compass Alignment. The operator's sense of direction becomes more accurate than instruments in the deep strata -- internal compass aligns with the Lumicite source rather than magnetic north. Navigation +1 but the operator always knows exactly where the source is. Exactly.
6Template Surface Event. A brief, involuntary expression of the operator's non-human biology. Dermal change, sensory mode shift, vocal alteration. Lasts 1d6 minutes. Cosmetic only. But the other gene-forged operators notice. And the standing wave intensity increases for the duration.
Contacts
Dek Orans, independent archaeologist (gene-forged monitor lizard stock, Void Walker adjacent). Can get: strata navigation, seam passage maps, Architect technology identification. His stock gives him thermal sensitivity in stone environments -- he reads the ruins by temperature. Wants: to understand the Void Walkers. Fears: that the installations are not dormant and that his proximity to them is changing him. He is right to fear this.
Sera Voss, Brotherhood Scholar Wing archivist (human). Can get: archive complex access protocols, Brotherhood internal intel, Kess's position and agenda. Wants: the archive preserved. She will work with anyone who credibly commits to preservation. Fears: that the Military Wing will reach the Seam controls before she can negotiate safe passage.
Ghost, Osei network contact (callsign, human). Can get: Osei's current location, Durant team status, broadcast distribution network frequencies. Wants: to complete Osei's mission. Fears: that Osei's neurological decline has compromised the operation. He has noticed Osei making references to things that have not happened yet.
Reva, upper strata Resonant (human). Can get: passage through civilian territories, structural stability assessments, strata maps no faction possesses. She has lived in Metropoli Perdida for twelve years and knows the ruins by feel. Wants: to understand what she hears from below -- she is not gene-forged, but she perceives the standing wave as a persistent awareness that something is present. Fears: that the factions will seal the site.
Site Clocks
Structural Integrity
Starts at 8. Tick down 1 per session at Metropoli Perdida. Tick down 1 extra for explosives use, Architect system activation, or EM cascade. At 4: primary descent routes blocked -- operators must use seam passages. At 2: Strata 5+ collapse risk on every traversal check. At 0: full structural failure below Strata 3. Anyone deeper is trapped until excavation (1d6 days).
Architect Activation
Starts at 6. Tick down 1 per archive interaction or fragment use near the installation. Tick down 2 if operators breach a sealed section. At 3: automated defense systems in Strata 6-7 go active -- Architect constructs patrol. At 1: the composition lock begins cycling -- access window narrowing. At 0: installation enters lockdown. Sealed for another century.
Faction Convergence
Starts at 4. Tick down 1 per session. Tick down 1 extra when operators reveal their position or a faction discovers the archive location. At 2: two additional faction teams enter the site. At 0: full convergence -- every faction present. The Seam becomes a chokepoint under fire. Brotherhood schism reaches breaking point.
Salvage (d6)
1
Strata map (hand-drawn, civilian). Shows three seam passages no faction has mapped. One leads to Strata 5 bypassing the Brotherhood checkpoint. Annotated: "rats use this one -- floor holds."
2
Architect composite tool (unknown purpose). Warm to touch. Glows faint blue near sealed doors. Gene-forged operators who hold it feel the standing wave intensify. May function as a key. May function as a beacon.
3
Brotherhood supply cache (Scholar Wing). Climbing gear, rations for four days, two light sources rated for deep strata. A note: "If you find this, the Military Wing does not know about it. Keep it that way."
4
Void Walker equipment fragment. Material is not post-Upheaval manufacture. Not pre-Upheaval either. Gene-forged operators experience a recognition response they cannot explain. Worth studying. Worth fearing.
5
Electromagnetic shielding kit (jury-rigged). Protects electronics for 4 hours against EM cascades. Found in a Nordics cache near Strata 3. Their team left in a hurry.
6
Archive access wafer (partial). Pre-loaded with one of the four authentication sequences. Reduces fragment requirement by one for archive breach. The composition lock responds to it with a sound like breathing.
If the Squad Goes Down
Upper strata (1-3): Reva's civilian network recovers operators within hours. Equipment scattered, some lost. Operators owe the civilian community a debt -- passage knowledge is not free. Lower strata (4-7): operators are trapped. Structural collapse seals the route behind them. Recovery requires a rescue -- another faction team, the Durants, or Ghost's network. The rescue takes 1d4 days and costs the operators their anonymity. Everyone who helps them knows where they were going. If a gene-forged operator goes down in the deep strata, substrate effects continue during unconsciousness. They wake up different. Roll on the Substrate Effects table twice.
GM Tip
Metropoli Perdida is vertical, not horizontal. Describe descent. Describe strata -- color shifts by era, temperature drops, acoustics change from modern steel-echo to older stone-church resonance. The deeper they go, the older the world gets. Gene-forged operators should feel the depth as physical change: the standing wave, the thermal sensitivity, the stock instinct surfacing. Do not explain it. Let it accumulate.
GM-Only: The Composition Lock
The lock at Strata Seven reads at the molecular level. No post-Upheaval technology replicates the reading mechanism. The Architect operational procedures consistently require a human element -- not machines. The lock makes the "ready" judgment on its own. If a gene-forged operator touches the lock, they may trigger a response that a baseline operator would not. This is not a puzzle with a solution. It is a situation with consequences. The lock was designed to recognize something. Whether any current operator qualifies is a question the adventure does not answer -- the campaign threads do.
08The Faction WebEight Factions
Primary Conflict Axis: Control vs. Distribution
Centralizers (NAF, EO, PCU) want to monopolize the archive. Decentralizers (SCA, PRC, Syndicate, Void Walkers) want it fragmented or public.
Faction Lumicite Approaches
Faction
Approach
Blind Spot
NAF
Tech-first. AI decryption. Overwhelming data processing.
Cannot model what they do not understand. ORACLE is producing outputs not requested.
EO
Brute extraction. Treating installations like mines.
Will damage what they are trying to claim. The installations are not robust against drilling.
SCA
Biological integration. Organic interfaces. Gene-forged test subjects.
Publishing nothing. Other factions cannot verify their progress.
PCU
Doctrinal confirmation. Believe they already understand.
May be catastrophically wrong about the nature of the installations.
PRC
AI modeling (Project Amaterasu). Cybernetic integration.
Amaterasu feeds are producing outputs that alarm the programmers.
Brotherhood
Scholar preserves. Military denies.
Two wings are actively sabotaging each other by Session 3.
Syndicate
Brokering access. Selling coordinates.
Knows where three unopened installations are and is not selling the locations.
Void Walkers
Unknown. They appear near installation sites with prior knowledge.
Nobody has confirmed their operational structure or objectives.
Faction Movement by Session
Session
NAF
EO
Brotherhood
Syndicate
1
Deploying to Granitsa. Webb coordinating.
Facility security at Granitsa. Patrols increasing.
Scholar Wing at New Prague. Military Wing mobilizing.
Selling fragment intel. Route control.
2
Moving toward New Prague. Deep mole activation.
Volkov tightening New Prague security.
Schism tensions rising. Military operatives arrive.
Kasim brokering in two cities.
3
Nordics intelligence trading. Support sporadic.
EO column forming for Metropoli Perdida push.
Open conflict. Wings sabotaging each other.
Volstok raising prices. Three clients.
4
Resources depleting. Webb demanding results.
Armored column en route. Seismic detectable.
Defections. Both wings heading for Perdida.
Positioning as post-broadcast broker.
5
All remaining assets converge.
Column arrives. Heavy. Not subtle.
Divided arrival. Seam control contested.
Selling access from the margins.
Gene-Forged Solidarity Network
Gene-forged operators from opposing factions share an informal cross-faction network. Drift-aware medics shared across enemy programs. Information about template drift management crosses faction contracts. Species solidarity in certain circumstances supersedes faction loyalty. At Metropoli Perdida, a gene-forged EO operator and a gene-forged NAF operator near the Lumicite source, both hearing the standing wave, may have more in common with each other than with their own briefings. This network is canon and unacknowledged by the programs. Use it as a wildcard when faction tensions peak.
Intelligence Sales -- Faction Timeline Consequences
When players sell fragment location intel to a faction, that faction accelerates toward that location. Apply once per intel sale -- multiple sales stack. By Session 4, check: has the players' intel trading inadvertently concentrated three factions in the same corridor? If yes, that corridor becomes a standoff.
09The NPC RosterCast
These are not your assets. They are not your enemies. They are a parallel operation running the same race. Treat them like weather -- track their position, predict their movement, and do not get caught in their path.
-- Briefing Addendum, UNEARTH Dossier
The Durant Team
Will Durant
Historian // Parallel Operative
Can Get
Intel on Architect patterns and fragment locations. Historical analysis of any pre-Upheaval site. Archive access through academic credentials. Can read seam passages by construction era -- the only person in the scenario who navigates Metropoli Perdida by knowledge rather than instinct.
Wants
To broadcast the archive to all factions simultaneously. The monopoly race ends with everyone having the data. This is fixed -- it happens regardless.
Fears
That one faction will weaponize what was meant to be shared. That Osei's sacrifice was for nothing.
Current Pressure
The broadcast network Osei built requires physical presence at the archive. Will must reach Metropoli Perdida alive. He is not a combatant.
Ariel Durant
Field Explorer // Diver // Gene-Forged (Unconfirmed Stock)
Can Get
Navigation expertise. Deep-dive capability. Field support in any terrain. Current routes through Samudra Sattva that no one else possesses. Three active dive profiles simultaneously.
Wants
To protect Will and complete the mission. The Lumicite chamber descent at Strata Seven is her endgame.
Fears
Template drift in gene-forged allies. The Makali Extraction repeating -- seventeen operatives, Syndicate operation, her efficiency the cause. Her own stock instinct surfacing at depth.
Current Pressure
Equipment degradation across multiple terrain types. Near the Lumicite source, her unconfirmed gene-forged status begins to manifest -- enhanced spatial awareness, thermal sensitivity, the standing wave registering as physical sensation. She has not told Will.
Yusuf Osei
UC Intelligence // Dying Spymaster
Can Get
Critical intelligence about archive security and faction movements. He sees the whole board. Indirect contact via intelligence network until Session 3-4 face-to-face.
Wants
The archive to reach everyone. Not one faction. Everyone. This is his final operation.
Fears
That his neurological decline will compromise his judgment before the operation completes. That he misjudged the chaos he created.
Current Pressure
Progressive neurological decline. Eight months, maybe less. His handlers do not know he leaked the intel. He is making references to things that have not happened yet. His proximity to Lumicite-active material over a career of intelligence work may have contributed to his condition -- but no one has made this connection. Yet.
Dr. Amara Kess
Brotherhood Scholar Wing Leader
Can Get
Archive preservation. Scholarly cooperation. Brotherhood internal politics. Her pre-Upheaval research mapped the conventional routes through Metropoli Perdida.
Wants
The archive preserved intact. She will negotiate with anyone who credibly commits to preservation over exploitation.
Fears
The Military Wing gaining access to destruct protocols. Her own institution captured the mission and turned preservation into monopoly.
Current Pressure
Two Military Wing operatives arrived yesterday with authorization she cannot refuse. Her archival gloves are the tell -- not tactical, archival. At the composition lock, those gloves may matter more than anyone expects.
Colonel Marcus Webb
NAF Military Liaison
Can Get
NAF resources, military assets, pre-positioned safe houses, encrypted comms. Competent and rigid.
Wants
Mission alignment. The fragment retrieved. NAF strategic advantage from archive data.
Fears
That the operatives he hired are playing their own game. That NAF command will blame him for Osei's manipulation.
Current Pressure
NAF does not know Osei leaked the intel. When the broadcast fires in Session 4, Webb is furious and controlled about it, which is worse than furious and loud.
Keira Soren
Nordics Scout Leader // Gene-Forged Macaque Stock
Can Get
Professional expertise, diving logistics, shared intelligence. Prehensile precision in confined spaces -- climbs infrastructure baseline operators cannot navigate.
Wants
Everything you know about every other faction's progress. The Nordics intelligence-trading trap: she gives useful information and expects the same, but what she gives is always slightly less than what she takes.
Fears
That ORACLE is tracking her team. In the deep strata, her Stock Instinct is Flight Calculation -- she finds the fastest exit. Where exits narrow, this instinct becomes a liability.
Current Pressure
Running six operatives across two locations. Her macaque stock gives her exceptional multitasking ability but her stress response works against the mission underground.
Baroness Volstok
Syndicate Leader // Remote
Can Get
Economic engine of the black market. Route control through Samudra Sattva. Never face-to-face -- operates through intermediaries.
Wants
To sell access to whoever gets to the archive. Not trying to win the race -- trying to make the race expensive while positioning as broker.
Fears
A clean resolution that eliminates the chaos she profits from. If one faction takes the archive cleanly, her leverage evaporates.
Current Pressure
Running three clients simultaneously and considers all of them marks. Knows where three unopened installations are. Not selling the locations.
Reva
Upper Strata Resonant // Metropoli Perdida
Can Get
Passage through civilian territories. Structural stability assessments. Strata maps no faction possesses. She has lived in Metropoli Perdida for twelve years and knows the ruins by feel.
Wants
To understand what she hears from below. She is not gene-forged, but she perceives the standing wave as a persistent awareness that something is present.
Fears
That the factions will seal the site. She considers the presence benign. She may be wrong.
Current Pressure
The civilian communities are being squeezed between faction arrivals. She is the informal leader of the Resonants, who are not organized enough to negotiate collectively. The factions are noticing her.
10Session FlowFive Sessions
GM Principle
Every session should end with a choice that shapes the next session. If players do not have a decision to make at session's end, you have not given them enough pressure.
Operatives receive briefing from hiring faction. Arrival at Granitsa -- UC facility ransacked, fragment stolen three weeks ago. Evidence of the Durants. EO presence visible. Operatives find Osei's four-fragment map (guaranteed discovery). Architect network awakening begins: subtle power fluctuations, strange sounds. Gene-forged operators notice things baseline operators miss -- the geometric shapes in the ice feel warm, the low hum from below carries structure. Choose: pursue directly, follow research trail, or pivot to different location.
02
The Archive and the Fragment
Session 2 // 3-4 Hours // New Prague
Access the Brotherhood archive. Fragment B is here. Encounter Nadia Volkova, EO security, PRC cyber operations. Evidence of Durants' progress -- Will spent 14 hours in the restricted archive. Environmental instability increases. Gene-forged operators stand out in New Prague's old-world streets -- visibility is pressure. Operatives acquire Fragment B or choose a different path. Choose next location.
03
The Deep Locations
Session 3 // 3-4 Hours // Gorodskie Ekho OR Samudra Sattva
Fragment C (diving, Level 8 sealed vault) or Fragment D (desert excavation, Lumicite power system). Faction competition intensifies. Brotherhood schism reaches crisis. Gene-forged operators begin noticing consistent substrate effects across locations: the warm spots, the low tone, the sense of being observed. The effects are connected. Choose: pursue third location or push directly toward Metropoli Perdida.
Multiple factions present. Environmental instability severe. Navigate the Seam at Strata Four -- Brotherhood-controlled chokepoint. Encounter upper strata communities: passage traders, Resonants. The Osei Transmission fires -- mission misframe collapses completely. Gene-forged operators descending past Strata Three roll on the Substrate Effects table. Critical choices: alliance or opposition with Durants, faction cooperation or isolation, how deep to go.
Archive access sequence. Will's broadcast happens -- this is fixed, the campaign's fulcrum. Optional Lumicite chamber descent (2km underground, partially flooded, partially crystallized). The composition lock at Strata Seven. Gene-forged operators at depth experience full substrate effects -- stock instinct triggers, resonance echo, the sense that the installation is aware of them. Final environmental crisis. Extraction from collapsing strata. Endgame: how operatives' actions shaped the outcome.
Condensed 3-Session VariantSession 1: Combine Granitsa briefing + New Prague archive (Fragment B). Session 2: One deep location (Fragment C or D) + rapid transit to Metropoli Perdida. Session 3: Full convergence, the Seam, archive access, broadcast, extraction.
11Climax Variablesd6 Complications
Roll when the archive access sequence begins. Will's broadcast is predetermined and happens regardless. The d6 determines what accompanies it -- the secondary crisis that complicates the primary event.
1Will's Broadcast. Archive data floods all faction communications simultaneously. The monopoly race is over. The interpretation race begins. Gene-forged operators near the broadcast equipment experience a resonance spike -- the broadcast activates something in the substrate that was waiting for a signal.
2Kess's Defection. Scholar Wing wins the Brotherhood schism. Military Wing marginalized. Brotherhood becomes a preservation force. Kess offers operators full access in exchange for securing the Seam against Military Wing demolition.
3Military Wing Ascendant. Sabotage corrupts significant archive data. Partial destruction. Players must work with Scholar Wing to recover what is possible. The composition lock is damaged but not breached -- whatever was being contained remains contained. For now.
4Void Walker Intervention. 2-3 entities activate Architect defense systems. Collecting pre-Upheaval technology with precision that suggests prior knowledge. Not hostile but intensely focused. Gene-forged operators who have rolled Substrate Effects feel a pull toward the Void Walkers -- species solidarity or something else.
5Lumicite Cascade. The source begins controlled energy release. Expanding EM hazard zone. Metropoli Perdida becoming uninhabitable above Strata Five. Timed escape sequence. Gene-forged operators feel the cascade as physical acceleration -- stock instinct thresholds drop, senses sharpen, the body responding to the signal with everything it has.
6Faction Standoff. NAF, EO, and PCU military forces converge simultaneously at the Seam. Tense armed zone. Archive access becomes political negotiation or covert infiltration through seam passages that only historians and gene-forged operators with strata sensitivity can navigate.
Victory Conditions
Type
Description
Faction Victory
Their faction gains strategic advantage from archive data or Lumicite access.
Personal Victory
Operatives survive, acquire resources, complete their mission.
Narrative Victory
Operatives influence how archive data is distributed, preserved, or weaponized.
Pyrrhic Victory
Operatives get what they wanted at high cost.
Defeat with Escape
Failed objectives but survived with partial data, new alliances, or personal growth.
12GM GuidanceRunning the Game
Running the Sandbox
The Durants are not a plot device you control. They are a rival team on a parallel track. Track their progress session by session. Drop evidence of their work -- recent camps, NPC references, equipment caches -- but never narrate their actions directly unless players are present.
Every faction is doing something specific this week. Not doctrine -- action. Check the faction movement timeline at the start of each session. Adjust based on what players did last session. The world responds to player action.
The ticking clocks drive urgency. Make them visible. Power failures. Structural sounds. NPCs mentioning that things are getting worse. Do not announce the clock -- let the world announce it.
Running Gene-Forged Operators
Gene-forged operators are mechanically identical to baseline operators. The gene-forged layer is narrative, visual, and campaign-level -- it changes how the operator looks, feels, and behaves between the dice rolls. In UNEARTH, proximity to Lumicite-active material makes the gene-forged layer operationally significant for the first time.
Stock Instinct
Every gene-forged operator has a Stock Instinct -- the baseline behavioral template of their animal source, surfacing under stress. In UNEARTH, the Lumicite source creates environmental stress that triggers Stock Instinct independent of combat. Wolf stock fixates on the nearest threat. Jaguar stock goes silent and still. Boar stock charges. Macaque stock calculates exits. These are not penalties. They are character moments.
Template Drift
Between missions, gene-forged operators who took Mortal Wounds roll on the Template Drift table. In UNEARTH, the Lumicite source accelerates this. Consider allowing a Template Drift roll between Sessions 4 and 5 for any gene-forged operator who descended past Strata Four, regardless of wounds. The body is changing.
The Cross-Faction Network
Gene-forged operators from opposing factions share drift management information across faction lines. In the deep strata, gene-forged PCs may encounter gene-forged NPCs from enemy factions willing to cooperate because they are experiencing the same substrate effects. Species solidarity supersedes contract. This is a wildcard the GM can deploy when faction tensions peak.
Pressure Menu (d8)
Drop any of these into any location when pacing stalls or operators get comfortable. Roll or pick. Each one costs the operators something -- time, gear, position, or trust.
1EM Dead Zone. All electronics fail for 1d6 minutes. Navigation drift. Comms blackout. Operators in vehicles lose GPS. Gene-forged operators feel it as a pressure drop behind the eyes.
2Faction Checkpoint. Wrong-faction patrol blocks the route. Papers check. Bribe ($2K-$5K), cover story (OPINT check), or detour (costs 1d4 hours and ticks a site clock).
3Equipment Cascade Failure. One critical piece of equipment fails -- comms, weapon optic, vehicle, diving gear, or climbing rig. Repair requires 1 hour and parts, or $3K replacement from black market.
4Informant Burns. An NPC contact goes dark. They were compromised, arrested, or bought out. The operators lose one contact at this location. Remaining contacts raise their prices by 50%.
5Substrate Spike. Gene-forged operators experience an involuntary Stock Instinct event. Wolf stock fixates on the nearest threat. Jaguar stock goes silent and still. Boar stock charges. Macaque stock calculates exits. Lasts 1d6 minutes. Baseline operators see it happen.
6Durant Evidence. Fresh evidence the Durants were here: recent camp, NPC who spoke with Will, equipment cache still warm. Tick the Durant Progress clock down 1 extra. The operators are behind.
7Environmental Hazard. Location-specific: permafrost crack (Granitsa), blackout (New Prague), flood surge (Gorodskie Ekho), sandstorm (Samudra Sattva), structural collapse (Metropoli Perdida). Tick the relevant site clock down 1.
8Void Walker Sighting. A figure at distance. Gene-forged. No faction markings. Observing. It does not engage. It does not flee. It was standing exactly where operators were about to go. Gene-forged operators feel recognized.
The Broadcast
Will Durant broadcasts the archive to all factions. This is fixed. It is his agency, not the players' permission.
If players are ahead of the Durants: Will arrives as they access the archive. They see him initiate. They can try to stop him, join him, or ignore him.
If players are concurrent: They meet Will and Ariel in the archive complex. Recognition. Will broadcasts while players are present.
If players arrive after: The broadcast already happened. The monopoly race is over. Players pivot to Lumicite access or faction positioning.
Broadcast Patron Fallout
Entry Point
Patron Reaction
What Operators Can Salvage
A (NAF)
Webb is furious and controlled. Files as "partial results under adverse conditions."
Lumicite access data. Faction positioning intel. Relationship with Webb if they warned him.
B (SCA)
Volkova is pragmatic. Reduces final payment 30%.
Water-source data from archive. SCA terrain contacts remain available.
C (Syndicate)
Rix pivots to selling interpretation services. Not angry -- new market.
Percentage of Rix's interpretation brokerage. Volstok contact intact.
D (PRC)
Liu Chen considers the operation successful. ORACLE resolved its erratic behavior.
Full PRC payment. ORACLE data. The AI has stopped producing unsolicited outputs. Or it is hiding them.
13Campaign ThreadsWhat Survives
UNEARTH does not end cleanly. The broadcast happened. The archive is public. What follows depends on what the operators did, who they aligned with, and what they carried out of Metropoli Perdida.
Archive Interpretation Race
The Data Is Public. Understanding It Is Not.
Every faction now has the archive data. None of them understand it yet. The interpretation race -- who can make sense of Architect technology first -- is the next campaign's engine. Operatives with direct archive experience are the most valuable consultants alive.
Brotherhood Aftermath
Scholar Wing vs. Military Wing Resolution
The schism played out at Metropoli Perdida. If the Scholar Wing won, the Brotherhood becomes a preservation network. If the Military Wing won, destruct protocols are in play at other Architect sites. Kess's final decision shapes the institution for a generation.
Lumicite Source Access
The Antenna Question
The Lumicite source 2km below Metropoli Perdida is still there. If operatives descended, they know what it looks like. If they did not, the source remains unmapped. The factions think they are fighting over energy. They are fighting over an antenna.
Void Walker Escalation
Something Is Listening
The Void Walkers moved with purpose during the convergence. They were collecting specific Architect technology. What they took and where they went is the question no faction is asking yet. Every gene-forged operative in range reported the same thing: something is listening.
The Gene-Forged Question
They Came Back Different
Every gene-forged operative who descended past Strata Three came back different. Substrate effects that were supposed to fade have not faded. Stock instinct thresholds remain lowered. Template drift is accelerating. The programs are not tracking this because the programs do not know it is happening. The informal gene-forged network knows. They are not telling the programs.
The Durant Question
They Remember How You Treated Them
Will and Ariel are still alive (unless operators killed them, in which case Ghost completed the broadcast anyway). They have direct archive knowledge. They are the most informed researchers on the Architect network. Every faction wants to hire them. They will remember how your operators treated them during the race.
Patron Relationships
Each entry point's patron reacted to the broadcast differently. Webb (NAF) is furious and files the operation as "partial results under adverse conditions." Volkova (SCA) is pragmatic and reduces final payment 30%. Rix (Syndicate) pivots to selling interpretation services. Liu Chen (PRC) considers the operation successful -- ORACLE resolved its erratic behavior with the AI architecture data.
The Resonant Network
Reva and the Resonants in Metropoli Perdida's upper strata are an unacknowledged variable. They are not gene-forged but they perceive the standing wave. The Brotherhood considers them significant. The factions consider them irrelevant. They may be the first humans to establish sustained contact with whatever the installation contains. Nobody is watching them closely enough.
GM-Only: What the Campaign Threads Are Really About
The installations were containment vessels. The composition locks were designed to keep something in. The Resonance Network is waking up on shortening intervals. The gene-forged operators are incidental receivers of a signal addressed to something else, and it is slowly rewriting them. Osei's neurological decline may be related to a career of proximity to Lumicite-active material. The Void Walkers may have preserved reference archives no faction knows about. These threads are the bones of the next campaign. Let them grow in the space between sessions. Let the players connect the dots at their own pace. The mystery belongs to them.
14Quick ReferenceSummary Tables
Fragment Summary
Fragment
Location
Challenge
Function at Gate
A
Durants (in hand)
Negotiate, steal, or partner
Base coordinate confirmation
B
New Prague archive
Brotherhood gatekeeping, EO security
Historical authentication
C
Gorodskie Ekho, Level 8
Deep dive, EM interference
Approach vector key
D
Samudra Sattva vault
PCU permits, desert navigation
Energy unlock sequence
Faction Alignment
Faction
Stance
Primary Interest
Lumicite Approach
NAF
Centralizer
Lumicite tech advancement
AI decryption (ORACLE)
EO
Centralizer
Lumicite source control
Brute extraction
PCU
Centralizer
Divine authority over sites
Doctrinal confirmation
SCA
Decentralizer
Environmental/water-source data
Biological integration
PRC
Decentralizer
AI architecture understanding
AI modeling (Amaterasu)
Syndicate
Transactional
Selling access to highest bidder
Brokering coordinates
Brotherhood
Split
Scholar: preserve. Military: destruct.
Scholar/Military conflict
Void Walkers
Unknown
Prior knowledge of installations
Unknown methodology
Session Structure
Session
Location
Key Event
Fragment
1
Granitsa + New Prague intro
The theft trail, four-fragment map
--
2
New Prague
Archive access, Nadia Volkova
B
3
Gorodskie Ekho OR Samudra Sattva
Deep location, faction crisis
C or D
4
Metropoli Perdida
Convergence, Osei transmission, the Seam
--
5
Metropoli Perdida
Archive, broadcast, extraction
Gate access
Clock Summary
Clock
Start
Tick Trigger
Crisis At
Zero Consequence
Architect Awakening
10
-2/session, -1 extra for surges
4 (EM kills electronics)
Network locks. 4 fragments required.
Durant Progress
8
-2/session, -1 if operators stall
2 (Durants at MP)
Will broadcasts. Endgame forced.
Faction Support
6
-1/session, -1 for failures
3 (reduced resupply)
Patron sends competing team.
Brotherhood Schism
6
-1/session, -1 for intel leaks
3 (active sabotage)
Military Wing collapses the Seam.
Gene-Forged (GM-Only)
8
-1 per location with Lumicite
4 (substrate effects table)
Full substrate transformation.
Threat Profiles
Use when encounter tables produce a threat. Each profile gives you what you need to run the encounter cold: danger level, behavior, and the thing that makes them different.
EO Patrol (6 operators)
DANGER: MODERATE // MORALE: PROFESSIONAL // GEAR: STANDARD MILITARY
Behavior: Checkpoint mentality. Check papers, search equipment, report irregularities up the chain. Will not fire first unless operators are near a restricted site after dark. Weakness: bureaucratic -- a credible cover story or $500 bribe buys passage. Escalation: if they radio for backup, a second team arrives in 15 minutes.
EO Security Team (elite, 4 operators)
DANGER: HIGH // MORALE: DISCIPLINED // GEAR: HEAVY WEAPONS, BODY ARMOR, COMMS
Behavior: Tactical. Move in pairs. Suppress and flank. Will call for extraction rather than fight to destruction. Weakness: communications-dependent -- EM dead zone strips their coordination. Escalation: if one goes down, the rest switch to lethal force and call rapid response (ETA 10 minutes).
Behavior: Giant cold-adapted monitor lizards. Circle heat signatures. Do not attack groups larger than two unless cornered. Weakness: bright light and sudden noise cause retreat. Special: gene-forged operators with reptilian stock feel a recognition response. The animals hesitate -- one round of free action before they decide.
Aqua-Felis (Gorodskie Ekho)
DANGER: HIGH // MORALE: PREDATORY // 3-4 ANIMALS // SILENT IN WATER
Behavior: Semi-aquatic big cats. Ambush from waterline. Silent underwater approach, fast on walkways. Hunt in coordinated packs. Weakness: fire. They avoid it completely. Special: gene-forged feline stock triggers a mutual recognition response -- the pack pauses. GUTS check to exploit the hesitation.
Behavior: Heat-adapted wolves that track vehicle thermal signatures. Do not attack groups. Shadow from distance. Attack stragglers, wounded, or isolated operators at night. Weakness: cold -- they avoid refrigerated containers and cold-weather gear. Special: gene-forged canine stock feels territorial pull. The pack reads this as a challenge.
Behavior: Scholar Wing prefers negotiation -- will trade access for research commitments. Military Wing is aggressive -- will deny access by force and destroy what they cannot control. Weakness: the schism. One wing will cooperate against the other if operators play the division correctly. Escalation: Military Wing deploys demolition charges. Scholar Wing calls in external allies.
Behavior: Observes. Does not engage unless cornered. Moves through spaces operators cannot follow. Appears at locations before operators arrive. Weakness: none identified. Special: gene-forged operators feel recognized. Void Walkers respond to gene-forged operators differently than baseline -- possible communication attempts. Do not stat. This is a narrative encounter, not a combat encounter.
Architect Defense System (Metropoli Perdida, Strata 6-7)
Behavior: Automated. Activates when the Architect Activation clock hits 3. Patrols Strata 6-7 on fixed routes. Targets non-authorized personnel -- identification criteria unknown. Weakness: the composition lock controls them. An operator who touches the lock may gain temporary authorization -- or trigger a full lockdown. Special: gene-forged operators are not targeted for 1d6 rounds after activation. The system is... deciding.
NPC Quick Generator
Four rolls. Instant NPC. Use when you need a contact, bystander, or complication mid-session.