Three years ago, I had an idea for a Liminal crew assigned to Historic England, and responsible for dealing with Hidden World situations associated with scheduled ancient monuments and other historical buildings.
I wrote this up for the blog (here), and it sat in the back of my mind for a while.
Then, about a year ago, the temptation of mixing historical sites (which I love visiting) with modern horror/fantasy rpg grew too much, and inspired by Neil Gow’s Case Files Patreon, I decided to expand the article into an unofficial supplement for Liminal.
Expanding the department
So I needed to develop the Department for Irregular Services (DfIS). Here’s the full team, NPCs and PCs:
- Bernard McTavish, who leads the DfIS. (NPC)
- Hester Babbage, the wheelchair-bound archivist. (NPC)
- Cecil Philip Mayhew, a dead academic archaeologist “living” in a ghost realm.
- Dr Cassandra Blackwood, occult history specialist (PC)
- Titus Stone, expert in paranormal engineering and protective wards. (PC)
- Grey Calderwell, the DfIS’s fae expert (PC)
- Erik Grimsson, cryptozoology specialist. (PC)
- DI Yasmin Burton, P-Division’s liaison officer (PC)
In my head, the youngest characters are in their fifties – the oldest are past retirement. (McTavish is 71.) Of course, players can play them at whatever age they want, but I like to think of the DfIS as a bunch of old folk.
Tools of the Trade
I decided that the DfIS probably has a store of occult artefacts – including a hand of glory, blessed weapons and other mysterious devices of limited use. My favourites are probably the Nails of Wem:
Nails of Wem: 17 bronze Roman nails were discovered with the famous Wem Hoard collection of coins and silver. To anyone with The Sight, the nails were clearly occult – and the DfIS took possession of them. When hammered into a doorway, a single nail will prevent the passing of any fae. The DfIS have only 11 nails left.
One of the things I’ve tried to do is suggest that the world is wider and stranger than just the things that directly affect play. So I’ve dropped in hints and suggestions that can be expanded upon if a GM wishes. (For example, what happened to the other six nails?)
The investigations
I created three investigations – one of which was an update of an investigation I’d published previously.
The Hairy Hands involved the famous Dartmoor legend – they’re back! I wrote this after visiting Dartmoor and realising that we had been driving along the famous “hairy hands” road.
Hardknott Roman Fort Ghost Realm consists of a ghost realm new to the DfIS. This is the investigation I had already published, so it just needed updating to suit the department.
The Wherewell Cockatrice is a longer investigation that ends with the PCs face-to-face with a cockatrice, which I decided was a fae creature.
I ran my online group through these adventures, and we took about ten sessions to work our way through them all, which was about right. I’m not sure I’d use any as a convention one-shot, so that's maybe something I should work on.
The ghost realms
I figure the DfIS has records of dozens of ghost realms, and I thought it would be good to describe some.
So I conclude with a description of four ghost realms: Machrie Moor stone circles, Rushton Triangular Lodge, South Stack Lighthouse, and Bilton Viaduct. (I’ve visited all of these, which probably gives you a sense of what I do on my holidays…)
One thing that I found I needed to pay attention to was making sure that the ghost realms aren’t too easy to get into. I like to assume that the world of Liminal is pretty much like our own, and since people aren’t being regularly swallowed by ghost realms (if it happened often it would be news and we would know about it), I made the ghost realms tricky to access (requiring specific times or activities to be performed).
AI input
Given the current furore surrounding AI art, I decided not to use AI for character portraits. Instead, I found suitable public domain and Creative Commons-licensed artwork.
However, I did use ChatGPT for brainstorming, so I acknowledged that.
Approval from Mr Liminal
Once I had everything formatted, I sent the pdf to Paul Mitchener to ask for permission to publish it, which he kindly granted me.
Purchasing The Department for Irregular Services
You can purchase The Department for Irregular Services from itch.io or DriveThruRPG.