At Sea

The wind howls and the rain pounds against the hull of the small boat you’ve boarded to Cinnabar Island. The surf is rough and wild enough that you can barely keep your footing. The only break in the endless sound of rain and wind is the frequent crash of thunder while lightning follows close after.
The sky was clear when you left Pallet Town, yet through the course of the day a full storm has taken hold. Your captain, a young woman named Daisy, has been at the helm for the past hour with her teeth clenched from the effort of keeping the ship afloat.

Question

Where are you on the boat? What are you doing, and how are you dressed?

After giving the players a chance to introduce themselves to the table at large, the storm picks up and the Shipwreck commences.

You spot Cinnabar island at the same time as you hear a shout cut through the rain.
“Oh, shiiiiit!” Daisy shouts from the helm of the boat. You all feel rather than see her yank the wheel to the left, barely dodging a breeching Gyarados. It cries violently before lightning strikes it from the sky, causing it to dive back under the massive waves. The damage is done however, as the ship starts to twist past the point of no return.
“Hold on real tight, it’s going to be rocky landinggggg!” Daisy desperately tries to keep the boat upright as the waves seem to coordinate, lifting the boat higher and high above sea level as it comes sailing, borderline flying towards the rocky shore of Cinnabar island.

Ask the players how the they try and land safely. If they just ride with the boat, they’ll either need a Dexterity+Athleticx4 check in order to roll with the crash landing without damage, or roll Vitality to reduce the damage they take from the crash by the number of successes they get. The crash itself will do 3 damage with Vitality successes or a failed Dexterity roll.

Sanity Roll

The damage to the trainers will trigger a roll from the Sanity Table.

Reward any ingenuity using their pokemon to help with the crash by either reducing the dc on the Dexterity check above or applying a different, more relevant roll. Unless they roll really well, keep the damage to at least 1. It’s a dangerous crash and shouldn’t be entirely avoided.

Daisy, due to steering the boat, is unable to avoid anything and takes the full brunt of the crash.

The Coast

The rain doesn’t stop through out the scene. The coastline is characterized by large rocks on the beach itself while behind the coast is a hill sloping up to the Cinnabar Mansion ruin. A radio dish is visible on the mansion roof.

The rain batters you while your ears ring from the force of your crash against the short. You look around to see the boat threaded between two massive rock outcroppings, shredding the sides of it. Amazingly, that was the least dangerous place for Daisy to hit the shore. Daisy herself is hanging over the side of the helm, suspended over the front deck of the boat, suspended by the straps for her seat. Blood drips from her forehead and you can see bruising billowing out from where the seatbelt holds her aloft.

Daisy is barely conscious and basically coherent. She’ll need help freeing herself from the boat and getting safely down. The boat is in a precarious position and rocks when people get onto it. It could slide out of it’s position if anyone is too rough while on it, sliding down into the sea. A Dexterity+Athleticsx2 is required to climb up onto the boat in the first place. Any decent method can be used to extract Daisy from the belts.

Daisy regains consciousness when she’s extracted from the belts. She has a broken leg and a head wound. She’ll insist they need to go to the cockpit and check the radio, and find that it broke in the crash.

Daisy: You guys… you guys see over there…? The mansion has a radio dish, they might have a way to call for help. I’ll see if I can get this radio working in the meantime, I’m dead weight with my leg.

Daisy will insist she’s fine alone and that the ship is her home. She’ll also point out that the more of them in the mansion, they less they’ll have to worry about from wild pokemon in there.

If the party insists on splitting up (what are they, genre savvy?), Daisy will continue to insist she’s fine. Before the mansion team ends up in the mansion, have the boat start to slide into the water. Daisy will end up falling in with the boat, encouraging the remaining people to leave her.

Cinnabar Mansion

Cinnabar Mansion

The front door isn’t locked and leads to the foyer. When they do enter, the following block occurs.

As the last of you make your way inside the manor, the door slams closed behind you. At first, you think it’s simply the wind. But as you look, you hear a loud crackling in your ears and the door seems to shudder and shake. You blink and the knobs are missing from the door.

Let the players react, but then whenever they make to interact with the door, continue that the door is gone. The wall is solid and no sign of a door exists.

Sanity Roll

Ideally, the players will investigate the Study, Radio Room, and Library in that order. This doesn’t need to be enforced though.

Cinnabar Mansion#Study

Study

You notice as you walk through the halls that asides from the muffled sounds of the rain outside, you don’t hear anything in the mansion. It’s well known that wild pokemon have moved into the mansion since it was destroyed yet you don’t see or hear a single sign of them.

Investigating the study will lead the players to some documents stored in a desk drawer. Oddly, they don’t show the signs of age everything else does in the mansion. The documents appear to be excerpts from a journal.

Journal

Diary: July 5

Guyana, South America

A new POKéMON was discovered deep in the jungle

Diary: July 10

We christened the newly discovered POKéMON, Mew

Diary: Feb. 6

MEW gave birth.

We named the newborn MEWTWO.

Diary; Sept. 1

MEWTWO is far too powerful.

We have failed to curb its vicious tendencies…

Nothing else is of interest in the study.

Cinnabar Mansion#Radio Room

Radio Room

There is a loud thud on the roof, directly above you. Whatever hit the ceiling landed hard, like a Pidgeot coming in to roost. You quickly check and there are no holes in the ceiling here, so whatever made the sound can’t get you here.

Climbing up requires creativity or a Strength+Athleticsx2 roll. The machinery connected to the radio dish is all old, dusty, and doesn’t power on. On top of the table is a memo under a coaster.

James, it looks like the radio dish is old tech and they moved the comms down to the basement lab. Head down there when you finish looting the library. Butch.

Once a player has picked up the memo, the encounter can begin.

The radio equipment starts to crackle to life, despite not showing any signs of working before. A single red light flickers slowly, beckoning in a way. The speakers suddenly BLARE with a crackling, overwhelming sound and you instinctively cover your ears and wince. Just as quickly as the radio activated, it shuts off… In time for you to hear the same thud sound from the roof.
However now there is a hole in the ceiling, and through crawls the skeleton of an Aerodactyl. Bit of flesh still stick to it’s arms, dangling like fleshy streamers. It opens it’s mouth in a wordless cry and drops towards you!

Sanity Roll

Both for Aerodactyl and it’s damage.

Any players on the second floor ledges must make a Dexterity+Evasionx3 to avoid a point of damage from the Aerodactyl as it dives.

Versus Skeleton Aerodactyl

Missingno Aerodactyl

  • The Aerodactyl crawls more than it flies, and will frequently go up on walls and ceilings to dive bomb the players.

Cinnabar Mansion#Library

Library

Presumably the party will enter the library. Ask them for Dexterity+Alertx2.

As you investigate the library, you start to hear a… strange sound. It reminds you of wood thumping against wood, yet sounds strangely hollow. It’s getting closer to you too.

If someone succeeded on their roll, give them a chance to react, then continue.

You turn towards a bend in the shelves as the thumping sound encroaches. Something compels you to stand and stare as a dirty ivory foot steps around the corner in a jerky motion. Your mind whirs trying to guess what the foot might be attached to yet none of you think what it’s actually attached to could be the truth.
From around the bend comes a skeleton of a Kabutops. It turns it’s head at you, quirking it in a curious fashion that almost seems cute despite the horrifying visage it otherwise has. It opens its jaw and no noise comes out. Then that loud crackling sound from the foyer rings in your ears again and the Kabutops closes the distance between you and it in the blink of an eye, it’s bone blades raised high to swing down on you and it’s mouth open in a soundless screech!

Sanity Roll

For Kabutops itself, but also for an damage the Kabutops may do to the trainers.

The lead player must roll Dexterity+Evasionx3 to avoid 2 points of damage from the attack.

Versus Kabutops

Missingno Kabutops x3

  • There are three Kabutops in the library. The others will appear in each subsequent round, trying to surprise the players.
  • There is no room in the Library for more than one pokemon to fight a Kabutops on either side of the group.
  • With a Dexterityx4 roll from a leading player, the party can escape into the Foyer to get more space. With less than that, one of the hidden Kabutops appears and attacks in the same vein as the first before join initiative.

If the players decide to go back into the library or generally head deeper in after encountering the Kabutops, they will find a large painting over a fire place. The painting is of the foyer of the mansion in it’s prime. The statues lining the entrance are numbered in red paint. Left to right going down, they read 3,4,5,2,1,6. This is the order of the buttons to press to get to the basement.

Mansion Basement

The basement is accessed either by finding the code in the library, investigating and trying out the buttons, or can be revealed by MissingNo itself. If Missingno reveals the basement, it will trigger a Sanity Roll as reality glitches to show the stairs as if they had been there from the start.

Cinnabar Mansion#Lab

Lab

A single document stands out to each of you as you look at the mess. It’s hard to describe why, it’s an ordinary document made with a typewriter, like most of the documents here. But never the less it catches your eye.

The players do not have to pick up the document, and if they don’t nothing happens in the Lab itself. Curiosity killed the cat, as it were

Journal

Diary; Jun 5:
We extracted Mewtwo’s DNA to attempt to reproduce it

Diary; July 16:
Experiments with Mewtwo’s DNA have been unsuccessful.
We’ve decided to try and take Mew’s DNA and merge it with Mewtwo’s

Diary; Aug 12:
Experiment failed

Diary; Aug 13:
We succeeded. But what we created…
What we created could not be called a Pokemon

May Arceus help us all…

A sizzling, crackling sound tears through your ears. The lights all burst as if they were exploding Voltorb and while your ears are overwhelmed with the head splitting sound your eyes are deprived of all sight. Then, one by one, bunsen burners scattered about the room turn on like automatic candles. They turn on in a circle, starting in front of you then circling behind you till the circle is closed. Each light seems to cause the sound to mute, slower and slower.

Sanity Roll

The burner lit room is suddenly washed with light. Words appear on the wall opposite the door to the room, made up of what looks like television static that moves and hisses like the real thing. The words read “Arceus Doesn’t Rule Here”

Sanity Roll

Touching the letters triggers a third sanity roll for the trainer doing so. A Pokemon that touches it vanishes in a glitch. A trainer takes an automatic Will point loss.

Cinnabar Mansion#Statis Chamber

Statis Chamber

The room does nothing until the players attempt to leave. When they turn around, they see the same room again in a glitched effect. This time however, add the following to the description.

In the empty, broken tube you saw before you now see something… wrong. It’s inherently wrong, down to your fundamental core. It’s a block of floating static, you aren’t sure if it’s even three dimensional because the longer you look at it the more the feeling of WRONG bubbled up in your heart. Whatever you are looking not is meant for this world, this thing is is active defiance of the laws of nature around it.
It moves out of the test tube, passing through the leftover glass. The glass vanishes in a staticy flair as it does. The thing approaches… you.

Sanity Roll

Versus MissingNo

MissingNo

  • The recommended variant is the Unkillable one.
  • Standard MissingNo
    • Every time MissingNo takes damage, it either summons a Missingno Kabutops, a Missingno Aerodactyl, or changes the battlefield to a different room in the mansion. (Roll a Die, flip a coin)
    • MissingNo must be defeated to escape
  • Unkillable & Cthulhu MissingNo
    • Every time MissingNo takes damage, it either summons a Missingno Kabutops, a Missingno Aerodactyl, or changes the battlefield to a different room in the mansion. (Roll a Die, flip a coin)
    • When the Foyer appears, tell the PCs the door outside has returned. They can escape out the door following the usual escape rules. (After getting the Foyer, don’t cycle the rooms anymore.)
  • A Big Damn Heroes variant can be the arrival of Mewtwo when the battle starts. Mewtwo ignores MissingNo’s defenses and can damage even the Unkillable variant. As it feels appropriate, have Mewtwo fight alongside the party until it teleports them out.
DMansion Rooms
1Foyer
2Study
3Radio Room
4Library
5Lab
6Statis Room

Wrap up

  • After having killed MissingNo, the players glitch a final time before finding themselves in an empty plot of land with the rain having dried up. There is no evidence of the mansion or the basement. Any Pokemon that glitched out reappear, but there’s a strange tint to their eyes…
  • After having escaped MissingNo, all Pokemon and players that fainted are gone for good. They party watches the door dematerialize on the mansion in a glitch before knowing they barely escaped with their lives.
  • If Mewtwo showed up, he can explain that the scientists who created him created MissingNo and it’s too powerful to be killed. He tries to keep it from taking more victims, but there’s only so much he can do against it’s power.
  • If the players all faint, they do not wake up again. A fantastic closing line could be Player blacks out… then close your call, laptop, or book.