Through Monday, February 23 we present the Forbidden Psalm Bundle featuring eight death-metal miniatures games from OptimisticNL inspired by, and compatible with, the artpunk FRPG Mörk Borg from Swedish design teams Ockult Örtmästare Games and the Stockholm Kartell, published by Free League Publishing. The rules-light old-school Mörk Borg RPG tells of miserable heretics enduring a bleak, dying world. Forbidden Psalm designer Will Rahman plants you in that world at 28mm skirmish scale, in a warband of disposable warriors who unleash horrible magic and probably suffer for it.
The flagship game in a long and successful series, Forbidden Psalm offers a do-it-yourself, pick-up-and-play miniatures experience that combines the skirmish excitement of games like Mordheim and MAC Attack with the grimdark vibe of Darkest Dungeon. With warbands of just five figures, plus a few monsters and hostiles, you can play quick six-turn scenarios on tight 2×2 battlefields using any miniatures you have on hand, head-to-head, cooperatively, or even solo. Play any scenario on its own, or run a complete narrative campaign. Lob in elements from any Mörk Borg RPG title, and use the magic, relics, and monsters from the wargame to enhance your roleplaying dungeons. Or, with the seven other standalone compatible games in this offer, send your plane-tossed mercenary warbands across dimensions, from fantasy into cyberpunk and survival horror. They won’t have a happy life, but they’ll stay active. And for hardened survivors, a wealth of plunder and experience awaits.
You start Forbidden Psalm by creating a warband of five models, each with four stats, a random flaw, and a random feat. Spend 50 gold on equipment and weapons, or recruit a spellcaster that substitutes for one of your models. Each wizard has random clean and unclean spells. Next, choose a scenario with objectives, basic features, and foes. Forbidden Psalms gets to the gore quickly with alternating activations and deadly melee combats where both sides roll simultaneously to strike. Each model has 5-11 Health Points; going to zero downs a model, requiring a Death Save. A system of Omens, one-shot bonuses (like rerolls and max damage), helps a luck-starved model. Add heft to the action with rules for mercenaries, pets, calamities, relics, and more. The included bestiary plows across cultures and games, a patchwork of fearsome horrors.
The raw and bloody meat of Forbidden Psalm is its 24-scenario campaign, wherein Vriprix the Mad Wizard hires your hapless warband to do his bidding. After each mission you roll Death Tests for the downed, and give injuries to those who make it through. Then you count your cash and convert found loot into gold, using that to upgrade. The warband gains collective experience, which you spend to improve a stat, remove injuries, gain feats, and more. The brutal system means a constant struggle between upkeep and advancement. The campaign scenarios present the story of a crumbling world, lunatic mages, and unready adventurers. Given that games have a set six-turn limit, you can easily run several battles in a session. The Forbidden Psalm plot evolves over 24 grimly humorous scenarios to a gore-splattered epic ending.
- The Last War, a John Blanche-colored history of unending war on haunted battlefields, is a grindhouse mix of Trench Crusade and Never Going Home; special troopers include snipers and loup-garou, and new rules add mutations and tanks.
- Kill Sample Process, compatible with CY_BORG, adds Hackers, Drone Operators, and Cyber Vampires. CyberMods replace feats, Programmes can hack targets and their equipment, and Narcotics give dangerous temporary boosts.
- Hope is for the Dead has you controlling a Haven of 25 Survivors in an infected, zombie-bloated world. Its campaign is simple: Survive two years. Every scenario tracks Noise Level. Noise attracts zombies; when the 20th zombie appears, all your survivors flee, and the slowest one dies.
- Endless Horrors From Between the Stars recasts your warband as a dark cult trying to summon a particular Endless Horror, whose purpose and desire shape how you play your cult. Through sacrifices, you try to gain enough Infamy to survive when your dread lord arrives.
- The monster-hunting play of Dread Nights feels like a mashup of Mordheim, the Savage Worlds setting Rippers, and the campy Van Helsing movie. Your Hunters guard the city from monsters both classic and reimagined. Dread Night’s campaign is a tour of Hammer Horrors leading to a final awful confrontation.
- Mörk Boll, “the world’s bloodiest and most beautiful game,” is a sports game in the vein of Blood Bowl. You create a team of BOLLERS and play out league seasons managing a roster of the fresh-faced, the injured, and the damned. Rules for mascots, referees, and pitches make this feel convincingly like sport – if not fair sport.
- Cloth Goblins, an unusual collaboration with Statuesque Miniatures, brings their unique goblin figures into the world of Forbidden Psalm. You play a lost clan of gobbos fighting to establish a fort and face bad things that lurk in the dark.
This all-new Forbidden Psalm Bundle gives you all these games, plus the rules expansions Collection of Death and Forbidden Seas, for less than you’d pay to remove a Gammy Foot, Vacant Mind, or Putrid Smell. Pay just US$9.95 to get all four standalone miniatures game rulebooks in our Starter Collection (retail value $60) as DRM-free .PDF ebooks, including the complete Forbidden Psalm End Times Edition core rulebook, along with the CY_BORG spinoff Kill Sample Process; The Last War, a game of WWI-style trench warfare; and a game of zombie survival horror, Hope is for the Dead.
And if you pay more than the threshold (average) price, which is set at $19.95 to start, you’ll level up and also get our entire Bonus Collection with six more games and expansions worth an additional $69, including a game of evil cultists, Endless Horrors From Between the Stars; Dread Nights, about demon-hunting Nightfolk; the brutal ball game Mörk Boll; Cloth Goblins, where adorable cloth constructs of the habernagerie try to survive dark and twisted nights in the dead woods; and two expansions compatible with all these games – Collection of Death and Forbidden Seas.
[Note: An earlier edition of the Forbidden Psalm core rulebook appeared in our January 2022 Mörk Borg Compatible offer. This offer presents the new End Times Edition.]
Get this Forbidden Psalm offer before it fails its Death Save Monday, February 23.
https://bundleofholding.com/presents/Forbidden
These titles are independent productions by Will Rahman and are not affiliated with Ockult Örtmästare Games or Stockholm Kartell. They are published under the Mörk Borg Third Party License. Mörk Borg copyright Ockult Örtmästare Games and Stockholm Kartell.
