It is absolutely necessary, for the peace and safety of mankind, that some of earth’s dark, dead corners and unplumbed depths be left alone; lest sleeping abnormalities wake to resurgent life, and blasphemously surviving nightmares squirm and splash out of their black lairs to newer and wider conquests.
–H.P. Lovecraft, At the Mountains of Madness
You feel it just below the surface. Something gnawing at the edge of sanity, a feeling that the steady march of machines and concrete that have come to be recognized as progress in the modern world is transient. Your visions show you a desolate future, where all that remains is dust, ash, and those who have long slumbered.
Violent earthquakes contort cities to unrecognizable ruin, unrelenting typhoons eradicate coastlines, and deep below the Earth something ancient stirs. Shudde M’ell, The Cataclysm from Below, approaches with destruction and ruin as his heralds.
Cities in Ruin sees four new investigators face the brink of madness to battle Ancient Ones, and introduces a slew of new monster and encounter cards to the world of Eldritch Horror. And what's more, new Ancient One Shudde M’ell’s presence brings a destructive twist to the game in the form of the Disaster deck.
A World in Turmoil
Shudde M’ell’s violent dreams are throwing cities around the world into a state of bedlam, and players will have to deal directly with the consequences via the new Disaster deck. If they’re lucky, an investigator may escape with some scars, if they're not, they may see a city devastated and left in ruin.
Devastation can happen in a number of different ways, and investigators must work together to prevent such catastrophes. However, they can't save everyone. When a city space becomes devastated, it has a devastation token placed over it, representing its new, and bleak, place in the world. Encounters there now take a post-apocalyptic turn that sees cityscapes turn into wastelands, and citizens looking to saviors to deliver them from eradication.
Investigators will find survivors jumping to their doom under the trance of a servant of Shudde M’ell, a milltary too petrified to fight the horrific creatures that prowl a now ruined city, or a cult preying on those who remain. Regardless of the heroics the investigators pull off, the city is still eradicated and all that remains are ashes to be protected from whatever horrors lurk in the shadows.
The Cataclysm from Below
The ancient city of G’harne was founded by the Elder Things and, in eons past, served to guard Shudde M’ell’s prison. Now it sits abandoned, its ancient warding-stones destroyed or stolen by souls too blinded by greed to understand their importance. Shudde M’ell now stirs, and the world trembles before him.
Ruin is unavoidable in a game featuring Shudde M’ell, as it even begins with Rome being wiped off the map. Your adventure is sure to include more Disasters as the doom track inches forward, terrible tragedies to the rest of the world, horrifying omens to you. Investigators will have to solve three mysteries while dealing with the Ancient One’s catastrophic outbursts if they have any hope of survival. Should they fail to stop the awakening, Shudde M’ell will roar to life, and there may not be a world left to save.
Brave Souls
With the world falling apart around them, a select few have taken it upon themselves to face the cataclysmic storm. Cities of Ruin sees four new investigators: Bob Jenkins, Rita Young, Roland Banks, and “Ashcan” Pete stand against Shudde M’ell and his waves of destruction.
Since the onset of his prophetic dreams, “Ashcan” Pete has taken on the role of the wanderer. Traveling the rails with his trusty companion, Duke, Pete has noticed the disturbing trend creeping up on the edges of society. Fires, floods, earthquakes; calamities are striking cities across the globe, and the cold-hands of desperation grip their survivors.
Except the people of Oulu.
When Pete set foot here, he found a town that didn’t give in to fear or madness, he found a people that had rebuilt after their great fire, he found a purpose. Pete reckons if he can figure out the source of all this carnage, he can help those who need it most.
Pete begins the game with Duke, a unique asset, in play. The trusty companion gives Pete a second chance at success when resolving a test with a free reroll. Additionally, the bond between Duke and Pete allows the drifter to recover one additional sanity when he performs a rest action.
What Pete lacks in influence he more than makes up for in utility, as he is able to perform an additional action while traveling along a train path, as long as the rails aren’t frozen in place by the bizarre weather patterns affecting the planet. Finally, Pete converts trash to treasure when he performs an acquire assets action; he can gain one item or trinket asset with a value less than his observation skill from the discard pile, and he'll need every item he can scrap together in the fight ahead.
The World Trembles
The sky will bleed, the earth will shake, and a few brave souls will face the Cataclysm from Below. Can you survive the devastation to come?
