NAMES

Introducing

THE SYMBIOTE
When the apocalypse came, it did not come as they expected it. Oh, they expected their world to
break down — feared it would, denied it would, planned for it, planned against it, whatever. But they
looked at their future and they could only see their own monsters. They couldn’t see, couldn’t even
guess, the creatures that would come that were not them.

STATS MOVES
do something
under fire
HX
help or interfere; session end SYMBIOTE MOVES
The health of the host (i): at the beginning of the session, roll+weird. On a hit, give +1 to
everyone else making a beginning-of-session move. On a 10+, for each of them who also hits their
COOL move with a 10+, you mark experience. On a miss, give -2 to everyone else making a beginning-of-
session move.
go aggro;
sucker someone; The health of the host (ii): at the beginning of the session, roll+weird. On a 10+, choose 4. On
do battle a 7–9, choose 3. You may choose an option more than once, but you must choose the first option at
least once:
HARD • Name an NPC, and explain how good luck has improved, eased, or enriched their life.
• Name another player’s character. They get 1-barter to spend on their lifestyle. Tell them which one of you
seduce or
manipulate SYMBIOTE SPECIAL
When you and another character have sex, choose 1:
is their benefactor.
• Name another player’s character. They get 1-barter to spend on their lifestyle. None of your colony is their
apparent benefactor. By all evidence, the barter comes from their own efforts and/or good fortune.
• Your psyche fixes upon theirs. Next time they improve, On a miss, instead choose 2. You must choose the first option at least once:
HOT mark experience.
• Ask them any 3 questions you want. They must answer
• Name another player’s character, and explain how their luck has turned suddenly incredibly shitty.
• Name an NPC, and explain how their luck has turned suddenly incredibly shitty.
read a sitch; honestly. You can defer your choice to the MC, if you prefer.
read a person • They may use you for augury. You roll and they make all
the decisions.
OTHER MOVES
SHARP IMPROVEMENT > >>improve
open your brain experience
— get +1weird (max +3)
— get the other symbiote move
— add an option to your colony
WEIRD — add an option to your colony
— add an option to your colony
HARM — add a person to your colony
1-harm: cosmetic damage, — add a person to your colony
concussion, pain, fear.
2-harm: wounds, unconsciousness,
— get followers (you detail) and fortunes
— get a move from another playbook
BARTER
bad pain, broken bones, shock, At the beginning of the session, spend 1- or 2-barter for your lifestyle. The options you chose for
— get a move from another playbook
often fatal. your colony determine how much you have to spend for each of you.
3-harm: Terrible wounds, shock, — get +1 to any stat (max stat+3)
— retire your character to safety If you need jingle during a session, tell the MC you’d like to work a gig. Your gigs:
sometimes immediately fatal,
• Brute labor for a wealthy NPC or population. • Any of the gigs from your colony segments.
otherwise death soon. — create a second character to play
• Others, as you negotiate them.
4-harm: Mangled and ruined, — change your character to a new playbook
always fatal, usually instantly — choose 3 basic moves and advance them. As a one-time expenditure, and very subject to availability, 1-barter might count for: a night in
fatal. — advance the other 3 basic moves. high luxury & company; any weapon, gear or fashion not valuable or hi-tech; a session’s hire of a violent

SYMBIOTE
5-harm and more: fatal and bodily individual as bodyguard; a few sessions’ hire of simple labor; the material costs for crash resuscitation by
destructive. a medic; a few sessions’ tribute to a warlord; a few sessions’ maintenance and repairs for a hi-performance
When your last self dies, mark
enough experience to improve and
continue play.
THE vehicle well-used; bribes, fees and gifts sufficient to get you into almost anyone’s presence.
For better stuff, you should expect to make particular arrangements. You can’t just wander around
the commons of some hardhold with oddments ajangle and expect to find hi-tech or luxe eternal.
 YOUR COLONY CREATING THE SYMBIOTE
By default, your colony consists of 3 people. You are each integrated into the surrounding population, As the symbiote, you are a psyche in some way native to the world’s psychic maelstrom.
not by default distinctive or remarkable. Your individual homes, means, and livelihoods are typical You live there; it is the medium of your life the way that the earth and air are the medium
for this place, providing a 1-barter lifestyle at the beginning of every session. If you choose to fight of others’. However, you are also embodied in this world, in the form of several otherwise
together in a coordinated fashion, you count as a small gang, by default with 2-harm 0-armor. apparent human beings. You all seem to live and act and move independently, but it’s an
Then, choose 2: illusion. You’re one creature, you, sharing experiences and thoughts and separated only
Martyr: when you take a blow for another player’s character, mark experience. When anyone of bodily.
your colony dies, mark experience. To create the symbiote, choose moves, colony, and Hx.
Thriving: add a person to your colony.
Sustaining: When anyone of your colony dies, erase their information from your colony and
create a new person to replace them. Use the same colony segment or an unused one.
MOVES HX
Tendrils: when 3 or more of your colony convene and act together, you can expand your reach You get all the basic moves. Choose 1 Everyone introduces their characters by
through the world’s psychic maelstrom. +Augury. symbiote move. name, look and outlook. On your turn,
Shared eyes: when you read a situation, roll+weird instead of roll+sharp. introduce all of the people in your colony.
You can use all of the battle moves, and
you’ll find that your colony is better suited List the other characters’ names.
CREATING YOUR PEOPLE: to some than to others. If your colony tends
Go around again for Hx. On your turn,
To create one of your colony, choose one of the available colony segments, and choose name, looks hard, look up seize by force; if it tends cool,
ask each of the others which of your
(selecting all that apply), and circumstances. look up the subterfuge moves; if it tends
colony they know.
sharp, look up keeping an eye out.
During initial character creation, don’t choose the blank segments. When you add someone new • If they know none or only 1 of you,
to your colony, you can choose to use a blank segment then, to create someone to fit the current write Hx=0.
circumstances of play. When you do use a blank segment, for your +2 and -1 stats, choose cool, hard, COLONY • If they know 2 of you, write Hx+1.
hot, or sharp, not weird. You always have weird+2. • If they know more than 2 of you, write
Print out supplemental: the colony and Hx+2.
bring it to the table with you.
A RIVAL COLONY Create your colony.
On the others’ turns, answer their
Once during play, whenever you choose, you can create a rival colony. Tell the MC which you questions as you like.
choose, and that they’re perversions of birth. She’ll know what you mean. When you act, you act as one of your colony, At the end, choose one of the characters
Choose 1: in that one’s body. For all practical purposes with the highest Hx on your sheet. Ask
The rival colony is like you. you, your MC, and your fellow players can that player which one of your colony
treat all of your colony as full and separate is most interesting, and highlight it.
The rival colony is some kind of psychic & physical contamination. If the contaminated is in
characters, with these exceptions: Instead of getting highlighted stats, you
play, ask that player what the contamination is like. Otherwise, create it yourself:
• You all share your moves. get one of yourselves highlighted.
Affected people become (circle 3–4): bloodcrazed, cannibalistic, insatiable, inhumanly fast & strong, • You all share Hx, experience, and
inhumanly patient, unsleeping & tireless, a hive mind, contagious, nearly unkillable, blood-washed, advancement. The MC does NOT highlight a second.
electricity-eating, memory-eating, terror-driven, death-intent. • You each take harm as NPCs would, as When everyone else changes highlighted
The rival colony are child-things. If the child-thing is in play, ask that player what child-things are listed, not on a PC’s harm countdown. You stats, you change highlighted selves.
like. Otherwise, create them yourself: are individually fragile. Again, ask the player whose character
They are (circle 3–4): ravenous, omnivorous, mercurial in form, impossible to contain or restrain, many,
• You can’t have sex with yourself. has the highest Hx on your sheet which
maelstrom-worshipping, silent & staring, ferocious, snarling & shrieking, quite possibly rabid. When you roll+a stat, the person you’re of you to highlight.
Their den includes (circle 2–3): parts of a plane, labyrinthine tunnels, ancient underground vaults, a acting as may give you +2 or -1, as listed.
Otherwise, roll +2 for weird and +0 for all
terrifying place of death, an alien place of luminous glass, other things of significance only to them.
other stats.
IMPROVEMENT
The rival colony are wolves of the maelstrom. If the child-thing is in play, ask that player what the Whenever you roll when you’re acting
wolves of the maelstrom are like. Otherwise, create them yourself: If the last person of your colony dies, mark
as the highlighted one of your colony,
They seem human, but under their disguise, like all of the maelstrom’s wolves, they look like enough experience to improve, and take
and whenever you reset your Hx with
(cirlce 1): people, birds, beasts, insects, angels, shadows, machines. your improvement right then.
someone, mark an experience circle.
Except (choose 2): When you mark the 5th, improve and
they don’t stand on the ground they have no faces they have awful voices RIVAL COLONY erase.
they make terrible grinding noises they have human faces they’re invisible
they are made of metal and plastic they have wolves’ faces they’re dripping gore Once during play, whenever you choose, you Each time you improve, choose one of the
they come and go impossibly they have no expression they only howl can create a rival colony, too. options. Check it off; you can’t choose it
they have empty holes for eyes again.
The Symbiote © 2018 by D.Vincent Baker & Meguey Baker
APOCALYPSE
APOCALYPSEWORL:E:E
WORLD THE
THEOCOLONY
LONYYY

NAME & LOOK CIRCUMSTANCES

highlight

NAME & LOOK CIRCUMSTANCES

highlight

THE

HARM
You take harm like NPCs, not like a PC:
COLONY
1-harm: cosmetic damage, concussion, pain, fear.
2-harm: wounds, unconsciousness, bad pain, broken bones, shock, often fatal.
3-harm: Terrible wounds, shock, sometimes immediately fatal, otherwise death soon.
4-harm: Mangled and ruined, always fatal, usually instantly fatal.
5-harm and more: fatal and bodily destructive.
When your last self dies, mark enough experience to improve and continue play.

The Colony A PLAYBOOK SUPPLEMENT

a Playbook Supplement for the Symbiote
©2018 by Meguey Baker & D.Vincent Baker for the symbiote
 NAME & LOOK CIRCUMSTANCES NAME & LOOK CIRCUMSTANCES
Past, Cass, Dutch, Echo, or Bow. Choose 3: Lee-On, Billy, Mox, or Bismark. Choose 3:
I’m in —’s crew/cult/gang.* I’m in —’s crew/cult/gang.*
Man or transgressing. I have a brother, Jinte, who’s also a fuckin badass.
Man, woman, or ambiguous. I have access to —’s infirmary, and I can work on
Hulking, shaven, crooked-built, I have a shotgun (3-harm close messy) and Slight, long-haired, smoky-eyed, people in it.*
dead-pale, slight, heavy-bearded, impressive body armor (2-armor). arresting, tattoed, disfigured, I’m —’s lover.*
one-eyed, handsome, smirking, vast, I get +1 to reading a situation. angular, energetic, fat, calm-eyed, I have a 9mm (2-harm close loud) and scrounged
mashed-faced, dapper, and/or tall. I have a gig doing violence for pay, worth 2-barter stocky, and/or sharp-featured. armor (1-armor).
for lifestyle at the beginning of every session. I keep hives of bees (vicious, swarming little bitches
highlight I have a fortified little double-room I call home. highlight who love only me).
+1armor in defense. When I kill someone, mark experience.
I have oddments worth 3-barter. My rooms are atmospheric, cool, and well-appointed.
I get +1 to read a person within them.
*Free if a PC, with that player’s approval.
I have oddments worth 3-barter.

HARD HOT HOT HARD *Free if a PC, with that player’s approval.

NAME & LOOK CIRCUMSTANCES NAME & LOOK CIRCUMSTANCES

Woodward, Murray, Gams, or Jastor. Choose 3: Dystart, Safire, Elba, Olive, or Jaim. Choose 3:
I’m in —’s crew/cult/gang.* I’m in —’s crew/cult/gang.*
Woman, transgressing, or concealed. I’ve got something big on —.* Man, woman, or transgressing. I have access to —’s living space.*
Scarred, broken-bodied, powerful, I have free passage through —’s holdings, no Compact, long-legged, mild-eyed, I have wicked knives (2-harm hand) and fashion
curvaceous, aristocratic, slender, questions asked.* nervous, utterly bald, severe-faced, worth 1-armor.
rope-veined, velvet-skinned, gray, I have a smg (2-harm close area loud) and fashion quick-eyed, beautiful, thick-bodied, I have a distinctive presence in the local
rangy, and/or blunt-faced. worth 1-armor (you detail). lithe, flush-faced, and/or towering. population; I command attention when I come into
I have a gig keeping and holding onto valuables for a room.
highlight highlight When I die, mark experience.
—, worth 2-barter for lifestyle at the beginning of
every session. My rooms are above the autoshop.
I’m one of the few who make my home in the upper I have a bike (you detail).
rooms. I have oddments worth 3-barter.
I have oddments worth 3-barter.
*Free if a PC, with that player’s approval.
COOL SHARP *Free if a PC, with that player’s approval. SHARP COOL

NAME & LOOK CIRCUMSTANCES

Choose 3:
NAME & LOOK CIRCUMSTANCES
Silk, Frans, Azaz, Rolfball, or Janis. November, Hyacinth, or Capella. Choose 3:
I’m in —’s crew/cult/gang.* I’m in —’s crew/cult/gang.*
Man, woman, or concealed. I have a hunting rifle with a good sight (3-harm far Woman or transgressing. I have access to —’s garage and all their vehicles.*
Old, pierced, willowy, golden-eyed, loud reload). Stocky, shave-headed, grinning, I’m —’s lover.*
barrel-chested, amputated, bearded, I have a spike-studded baseball bat (3-harm hand buxom, full-lipped, heavy-eyed, I have a machete (3-harm hand messy) and fashion
lush-mouthed, elaborately-coiffed, messy) and bulky body armor (2-armor). dimpled, salt and peppered, soft, worth 1-armor (you detail).
tiny, fat, and/or muscular. I have a tempestuous, devoted, tough, beautiful lissome, angry, wounded. I have a gig providing — with food, entertainment,
little family: Asso, Ki Yin, Quick, Limester, and me. and drugs, worth 2-barter for lifestyle at the
highlight I know basic first aid. I can’t heal harm, but I can highlight beginning of the session.
stabilize it. I get +1 to go aggro.
I make my house down in the maze. The other PCs can come to me for insight.
I have oddments worth 3-barter. My rooms are poor, cramped, and claustrophobic.
I have oddments worth 3-barter.
*Free if a PC, with that player’s approval.
HARD SHARP HOT COOL *Free if a PC, with that player’s approval.