Gnomemurdered 1e: The Setting Book

[RPGPundit]

(note: the following material is now no longer considered up-to-date, and is completely superseded by the Gnomemurdered 2e RPG):

Gnomemurdered: The Setting Book

Yes, yet another extra manual for the increasingly bloated most rules-lite RPG in the world.  But as before, there won't be any new mechanics here.

Instead, many of the possibly BILLIONS of people who have now (possibly) played and enjoyed Gnomemurdered are asking "What is the default setting for Gnomemurdered"?

The answer is, of course, there is no "default setting". Gnomemurdered is a UNIVERSAL RPG system, made for ANY setting whatsoever.

The only thing you have to determine (besides the setting itself) is the question of where the Gnomes fit into the setting you're playing in.
In a couple of settings (mainly fantasy) this will be obvious.  Though in these settings, you must determine first of all whether the Gnomes are known to exist, whether they are reviled for the filth they are, or whether they have managed to fool the local population into thinking they are either extinct or benign.

But what about non-fantasy settings? It is important to justify the Gnomes, though your PCs (depending on their level of "gnome lore") may or may not have any idea why the Gnomes are there, or even that they existed.

Some sample settings and how the murderous Gnomes fit into them:

Historical
The historical setting is not a difficult one to include Gnomes, seeing as how it has now been scientifically proven that Gnomes do exist, and have been interfering with humankind since the dawn of time.  The so-called "hobbit" skeletons recently found are in fact nothing more than gnomes, and most short people have at least some gnomish blood in them, which can possibly manifest itself into pure evil, even unto the seventh generation (its in the Bible, folks!).
Plus, through  most of the periods of human history, this was a commonly-known fact.  Almost every culture has believed in, and most sane cultures have feared, the Gnome.

Modern
In a modern setting, Gnomes might often disguise themselves as midgets.  They might be hiding out in a circus, or as santa's elves in shopping malls. It may of course come as a shock to people in a modern game when Gnomes show up and start murdering people, and it would be in character for Modern-setting PCs to initially refuse to believe that the Gnomes are anything other than criminal midgets.

Horror
In a modern (or near-modern) horror campaign, the role of Gnomes is obvious: they seek to destroy mankind, and possibly bring on the end-times. If there is some other Horror being confronted besides the Gnomes themselves (and really, there needn't be, save that as mentioned in the previous sourcebook, Gnomes are a nearly-invincible enemy, so it might be good to have something less dangerous, like a Demon or Cthulhu for the PCs to have a chance of defeating), it will be clear that once the Gnomes do show up they will be actively working with the Horror that is central to the storyline.

Superheros
In a Supers setting, the Gnomes can easily be explained within the old comics stereotype of the "Mole people"; subhumans that live underground. That's not the only option, of course, they could also be a supernatural enemy (if one or more of the PCs is a "magic" superhero this could be especially apt as a choice) who are now entering out world or have been here for some time.
In a Supers game, the Gnomes may be a particularly terrifying enemy, especially unnerving in a "four colour" kind of game. In these games, the regular Supervillains are not automatically murderous, they will tend to prefer to capture the Heroes and create elaborate easy-to-escape deathtraps or reveal all their plans. It will be a shocking, nearly Alan Moore-esque twist of genre to have the Gnomes suddenly show up and just start killing supers without any of these usual "pleasantries". An interesting twist might be if the Super-villains themselves are just as horrified by the Gnomes and the menace they represent as the heros are, maybe even joining forces to try to stop them.  After all, if Lex Luthor or Doctor Doom want to conquer the world, it won't do them much good for the Gnomes to have laid waste to it.

Sci-fi
In this setting, the gnomes can be an ancient cosmic evil, something inexplainable to modern science.  They could also be just a particularly deadly race of aliens, but this to me is the inferior choice, seeing as how there's no way a mere alien could effectively express both the danger and the repulsiveness of the Gnome. Do you get me, people? They're worse than motherfucking Daleks!!

Anyways, if you have any other Genres you'd like me to explore with the Gnomemurdered Game, please let me know.

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