JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure Heroic Roleplaying: Stardust Crusaders Adventure Book By Lonesome Blues DM and Blue Man !1 JJBAHRP - Draft 0.0.7b - CHOO CHOO MOTHERFUCKER Edition JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure Heroic Roleplaying: Stardust Crusaders is a fan creation based on the 1987- “JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure” manga series written, illustrated, and created by Hirohiko Araki. All images and names of characters, locations, and Adventures, unless expressly stated are TM and (c) Hirohiko Araki, Shonen Jump, Shueisha, and Subs. Used without permission. All references to people, places, and things including titles, lyrics, and other media are the property of their respective copyright holders. Used without permission. This game material references the Cortex Plus® game system, available from Margaret Weis Productions at www.margaretweis.com. Cortex® and Cortex Plus® and all associated logos and trademarks are solely owned by Margaret Weis Productions, Ltd. and are used with permission. Margaret Weis Productions, Ltd. makes no representation or warranty as to the quality, viability, or suitability of the purpose of this product. Stands contributed by Deepo, elementsguy, Ozzy Crowley, and Anon. Stand Creation Rules are a highly modified form of those found in JOJO’S BIZARRE TABLETOP. All rights reserved. Special thanks to Zealot Vedas and all of /SSS/ and /WWW/. Stay fabulous, my friends. Text by Lonesome Blues DM (aka TK Nyarlathotep) and Blue Man (aka J Frost). !2 ADVENTURE: STARDUST CRUSADERS Preparing for the Adventure…Pg. XX Terminology…Pg. XX Structure of the Adventure...Pg. XX To Jo or Not to Jo?…Pg. XX Incorporating Music…Pg. XX The Stardust Crusaders Sourcebook…Pg. XX STAND PROUD: A Guide to Stands, Stand Users, and Standing Tall…Pg. XX Stand Power Sets…Pg. XX Roundabout: The Joestar Family Line, the Speedwagon Foundation, and the Ripple…Pg. XX Around the World: A Traveler’s Guide to the World’s Exotic Locales…Pg. XX Seize the Night: Creatures of Darkness…Pg. XX Falling Off the Edge of the World: Dio and His Bloody Ambition…Pg. XX Going Off the Rails: Shuffling Your Stardust Crusade…Pg. XX Adventure Milestones…Pg. XX ACT ONE: The Man With the Star…Pg. XX Scene Structure…Pg. XX Hooks…Pg. XX Doom Pool…Pg. XX Action: A Man Possessed…Pg. XX Transition: Jailhouse Blues…Pg. XX Action: Get Out of Jail Free…Pg. XX Action: The Terrible Invader…Pg. XX Action: DIO’s Curse…Pg. XX Transition: The Evil Spirit’s Identity…Pg. XX Transition: The Thing on the Plane Action: Insect Attack! Transition: Seek An Alternative Route ACT TWO: The Stand Warriors…Pg. XX Transition: A Stay In a Nice Hotel…Pg. XX Action: The Devil…Pg. XX Action: Yellow Temperance…Pg. XX Action: Emperor and the Hanged Man…Pg. XX Transition: Research DIO’s Assassins…Pg. XX Action: Local Flavor…Pg. XX Transition: Enya’s Hospitality…Pg. XX Action: Justice…Pg. XX Action: "Geb" N’Dour…Pg. XX Action: “Khnum” Oingo and “Tohth” Boingo…Pg. XX Action: Anubis…Pg. XX Action: “Bastet” Mariah…Pg. XX Transition: Relax At An Inn…Pg. XX Action: D’Arby the Gambler…Pg. XX ACT THREE: DIO’s World…Pg. XX !3 Transition: Beautiful Cairo…Pg. X Action: Deadly Duo!…Pg. XX Transition: Find DIO’s Manor…Pg. XX Action: Pet Shop at the Gates of Hell…Pg XX Transition: The Mysteries of DIO’s Manor…Pg. XX Action: The Mist of Emptiness, Vanilla Ice…Pg. XX Transition: Learn the Secret of DIO’s Stand…Pg. XX Action: End of THE WORLD…Pg. XX Action: Save a Hero’s Life…Pg. XX Transition: The Long Journey Ends…Pg. XX Action: Destroy DIO’s Body…Pg. XX HERO Rap Sheets Boingo…Pg. XX Hol Horse…Pg. XX Iggy…Pg. XX Jean Pierre Polnareff…Pg. XX Joseph Joestar…Pg. XX Jotaro Kujo…Pg. XX Muhammad Avdol…Pg. XX N'Dour…Pg. XX Noriaki Kakyoin…Pg. XX" !4 STARDUST CRUSADERS Stand proud, warriors! This is a full-blown Adventure for the Cortex Plus Heroic Roleplaying system based on Part 3 of Hirohiko Araki’s JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, titled Stardust Crusaders, with additional material referencing Pts. 2 (Battle Tendency), 5 (Aureo Vento/“Golden Wind”), and 6 (Stone Ocean). Future supplements will be based on Parts 1 and (Phantom Blood and Battle Tendency), the Apocrypha of Pt. 3 (The Genesis of the Universe, The 7th Stand User, and more) and Part 6 (Stone Ocean) and will feature further material from their respective sources. In this Adventure, you’ll be playing as someone with phenomenal powers, be it the of the Ripple or Spin, mighty martial arts infused with the power of the sun or the golden rectangle, a Stand, a ghostlike entity that hovers behind you and can affect your opponent or the environment with a variety of bizarre effects, or even another power entirely (there’s vampires!)! When the course of your life is radically altered by the machinations of a vampiric madman named Dio Brando, you and a group of other likewise-affected warriors must race against Dio’s assassins to the city of Cairo, Egypt to put an end to DIO’s bloody ambition once and for all. Will you and your fellow Stardust Crusaders put an end to DIO, or will he fuse once and for all with the stolen body of his ancient arch-rival and bring an age of darkness to the world like none ever seen before? Stardust Crusaders works best as an Adventure for 4 to 6 players (but more or less are welcome and even encouraged! Do what you want, Heaven’s Door hasn’t written “I will only run with 4 to 6 players.” in the margins of this Adventure), and can take an absurdly long amount of time to play or could be over in seconds if someone removes time with King Crimson or just advances the end of the universe in seconds with Made In Heaven. You could even be doomed to just replay the Adventure over and over again with Killer Queen. Point is, don’t play RPGs with bad guys. You might get inspired by the Rap Sheets, scenes, and other elements to continue past the three Acts, and that’s cool too! Your story doesn’t end just because the book did. Heck, you might not even use all the scenes in this book, or you might add some after using them all, or whatever! The future Phantom Blood + Battle Tendency and Stone Ocean supplements will add even more fun stuff for you to use, so your campaign can run as long as Anubis’ life (which is a few thousand years, give or take). Everything in this Adventure is meant for the Emcee’s eyes only, but they might throw you a bone and let you see some stuff before, during, or after in the Sourcebook section. Ask and ye shall (probably) receive. Also in order to play this, you WILL NEED EITHER a copy of Marvel Heroic Roleplaying Basic Game or the Premium versions of either Annihilation or Civil War, or the Cortex Plus Hacker’s Guide which contains the rules for Fantasy Heroic Roleplaying a differently focused game with all the rules you’ll need. There may or may not be a forthcoming version of the Heroic Roleplaying rules, but that’s between you and Margaret Weis and is beyond the scope of this game." !5 PREPARING FOR THE ADVENTURE Like most adventures, Stardust Crusaders requires some prepwork before you inflict it on your helpless players. Here’s what you’ll need: ̣Read over the whole Adventure and become familiar with the three Acts and the way the scenes flow in each Act. Familiarize yourself with the sourcebook so you won’t be caught flat-footed if your players do something tricky (which they should, it’s JoJo’s after all). Print copies of the Sourcebook if you think your players will dig it! ̣When your group meets up for the first session, each player should choose a hero from the Rap Sheets provided, make their own with help from the STAND PROUD chapter, or even convert a hero from another Cortex Heroic game line entirely and re-fluff them as a Stand User or with some other incredible power! ̣Be sure you have enough dice (d4, d6, d8, d12, and d12), Style Point tokens (D’arby the Elder prefers poker chips!), and some kind of action order token for each player (maybe a Major Arcana tarot card). You can also include miniatures, maps, and anything like that. You may also benefit from taking note of each hero’s Affiliations and what Milestones they’ve chosen. Keep this list near you during the game. ̣If your group has never played a game of Cortex Heroic Roleplaying, you should introduce your players to the basic rules and go over their Rap Sheets with them, or help them construct or convert their Rap Sheet. The rules of this are virtually unchanged from Marvel Heroic Roleplaying, so if you think it would help, hand out copies of a Cheat Sheet as well. I recommend both the Hero’s and Watcher’s Cheat Sheets from Nerd NYC, which can be found rather easily via Google or your search engine of choice. Obviously the terminology will be changed (see below), so make sure your players are privy to that too. TERMINOLOGY To better fit the mood and feel of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, I’ve modified some of the terminology a little. Anything that’s unchanged means what it means per Heroic Roleplaying, but otherwise the differences are listed as follows: * Adventure: Replaces Event. The overall journey your player characters go on, and the campaign you’re playing in.