Dateline Lovecraft EXTRA!: Bottoms Up! (OC)
"We Put the Tonic in Miskatonic! Try Our New Njamura Pod Soda! It's The Taste From Beyond!"
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EXTRA! "Bottoms Up!" is a short investigative scenario of Cthulhu Mythos horror¸ set in H.P. Lovecraft's fictional towns of Arkham and Bolton. It is not a fully self-contained scenario¸ but rather an add-on to the newspaper-based resource¸ Dateline: Lovecraft¸ Issue #1. To make full use of this PDF you will need to own a copy of that product.
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A war is brewing in the normally-pedestrian world of soda (aka tonic) manufacturing in the Miskatonic Valley. Bolton Brewing -- once the local staple of every grocery shelf and diner in Arkham -- is losing out to big names from out of state: Moxie¸ Bub-L-Pep¸ and the like. In order to survive they need to innovate... they have plans to introduce a range of new and bizarre-sounding flavors. But do people really want to drink Djingula Bean soda or Xiun Flower Elixir? And what is a Djingula Bean anyway?
Meanwhile¸ other strange events are taking place near the industrial town of Bolton. Two separate reports of peculiar "suicides" have reached the pages of the Arkham Advertiser. In each¸ a dead body was pulled from the bottom of the Miskatonic River -- inside a brand-new automobile¸ hands lashed to the steering wheel. Are these really suicides? Is there something weird that is driving people to strangely-similar methods? Or is someone using the Miskatonic as a dumping ground for people who need to be "disappeared"?
The investigators receive a mysterious summons from an out-of-state employer who seeks answers on both fronts. As well as an answer to an even more pressing question that might link the two: would someone really go so far as to murder for the secrets to new soda recipes? After all¸ it's just soda... isn't it?
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Dateline Lovecraft EXTRA!s are small supplemental PDFs which provide resources to help Game Moderators use the Dateline: Lovecraft period newspaper product as a centerpiece to their roleplaying games of investigative horror. Each includes a selection of game-related elements which can either be used collectively as a scenario relating to the core newspaper prop¸ or can be used in isolation to provide pieces that enhance a scenario of your own invention.
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To make best use of this material¸ you will need to own a copy of the Dateline: Lovecraft¸ Issue #1 product¸ also published by Cthulhu Reborn. All profits from the sale of Dateline: Lovecraft are reinvested to fund the writing¸ illustration¸ editing¸ and layout of further free supplements like this PDF.