Major mythos tomes are, as any Keeper knows, rare, difficult to find, and hard to read. They tend to be in foreign, dead, or alien languages, and even the library copies extant are kept away from public view and under lock, key, and quite possibly some serious wards. Finding one is usually an adventure, and the threat to the character's sanity that comes with the cosmic revelations within means that the player characters should be wary and respect of the book and its power. The inherent difficulty of obtaining these prizes is part of their allure and mystique; keeping the books rare adds to their value and impact when the investigators do come across a copy in some cultist's library, or are finally (after having shown many proofs) been granted access to the copy of the Necronomicon at Harvard or Miskatonic.
Rarity is also a problem, because the overuse of these tomes dampens their appeal. Experienced players may well be checking off their lists like pokemon, hoping to collect all the major tomes before the campaign is over. Campaigns set in the 1980s or later worry about the underground electronic dissemination of books, which has exploded in recent years. When everybody can download the Book of Eibon or Google Translate Cultes de Goules, some of the fire goes out of the game.
A possible solution to "tome-fatigue" can be found in August Derleth: reference works. These are standard, scholarly papers, articles, documents, and books which are based on the more famous tomes, but which contain only a fraction of the actual lore - and that as glimpsed through the biases of the author and the context of their paper. Some examples from Mythos stories include:
• An Investigation into Myth-Patterns of Latter-Day Primitives with Especial Reference to the R'lyeh Text by Prof. Laban Shrewsbury (August Derleth)
• Cthulhu in the Necronomicon by Prof. Laban Shrewsbury (August Derleth)
• Polynesian Mythology, with a Note on the Cthulhu Legend Cycle by Harold Hadley Copeland (Lin Carter)
• The Prehistoric Pacific in Light of the ‘Ponape Scripture’ by Harold Hadley Copeland (Lin Carter)
• Study of the R'leyh Text by Phillips (Randall D. Larson)
The idea here it to give players partial glimpses of what are available from the greater tomes, while preserving their awe and mystery. These books grant only a fraction of the Cthulhu Mythos percentile ratings (and cost on a fraction of the Sanity points), and generally contain few spells - but those spells they do contain would be immediately relevant to the content of the specialized reference work.
Without access to the actual Necronomicon, characters could build up libraries of these reference works in an effort to replace it - a flawed exercise, just as fans today might collect excerpts and quotations from The Necronomicon in hopes of one day having a complete text (anyone fond of this, Dan Harms actually made a go at it in the back of The Encyclopedia Cthulhiana). Picking up major Mythos works piecemeal whets the investigator's appetites for the real thing, without unbalancing a campaign. In a modern setting, these reference works can be more readily available, so that the actual source materials remain obscure. No one in 1989 can download The Necronomicon, but with a little digging and the right contacts you might be able to find Cthulhu in the Necronomicon.
Keeper's Option: Making Reference Works
The following is an optional procedure for making a reference work based on a Cthulhu Mythos tome. This reference book may be introduced into your own campaign, or inserted into a published adventure in place of the major source book.
Step 1. Pick A Major Source
Choose a major mythos tome, such as the Necronomicon or Book of Eibon. Ideally, this should be a book with +10% or more Cthulhu Mythos percentile rating
Example
Keeper Jackson needs a new mythos tome for Masks of Nyarlathotep, because he doesn't want the player characters getting their hands on the complete Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan, but they still need some of the information and spells within. With that in mind, he picks the Seven Cryptical Books as the major source tome.
Step 2. Pick A Focus and Name
Select a focus for the reference volume. It may be a specific Mythos deity or race, or a particular real-world geographic area, ethnic group, or subject such as art, literature, etc. Feel free to be as general or specific as you choose. The name of the volume should contain both the focus and the title of the source mythos tome.
The most important aspect of the Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan in Jackson's adventures are its details about the Order of the Bloated Woman, so Jackson decides that's his focus. With that in mind, Jackson decides the title of the reference work will be: The Bloated Woman in the Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan: An Historical Analysis.
Step 3. Calculate Statistics
Divide the Cthulhu Mythos percentile of the source book by 3, rounding down. Then, select up to 1/3 of the spells in the source book to be present in the reference work. For each 2 spells the tome contains, increase the Cthulhu Mythos percentile by 1.
The sanity loss and average reading time for the tome should be determined by the following table:
After consulting the table,Code:San Loss CM+% Weeks 0/1 0 1d3 1/1d3 1-3 6 1d3/1d6 4-6 10 + 1d3 1d6/1d10 7-9 12 + 1d6 1d6/2d10 10-12 24 + 1d10 1d10/2d10 13-16 48 + 2d10
These are beginning statistics and may need to be tweeked by the Keeper. As a rule, the reference work can never have a Sanity Loss, Cthulhu Mythos percentile Bonus, or average duration of study equal to or greater than the source text.
The Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan have Cthulhu Mythos +8 percentiles. Jackson divides this by three (8/3 = 2.66...) and rounds down (2). Looking over the spells, he decides the book will only contain the spells Contact Deity/Nyarlathotep and Door to Kadath, which raises the Cthulhu Mythos percentiles of the book to +3. Consulting the table he notes the book will have a sanity loss of 1/1d3 and require six weeks of reading to study and comprehend. Jackson's stats currently look like this:
The Bloated Woman in the Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan: An Historical Analysis
Sanity loss 1/1d3; Cthulhu Mythos rating +3 percentiles; average 6 weeks to study and comprehend. Spells: Contact Deity/Nyarlathotep, Door to Kadath
Step 4. Develop Backstory
Time to fill in the gaps! Start with a brief description of the book's contents, then add an author, language, and date of publication. This is the fun step, so be creative! Remember that the author's perspective is important to the work; you might use a respected Mythos scholar from a short story, one of your NPCs, or something more clever and bizarre.
Jackson brainstorms the details behind the reference work's contents and history. After an hour and a trip to wikipedia, he's satisfied with the results.
The Bloated Woman in the Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan: An Historical Analysis - in English translated by Lafcadio Hearn (1903)
This book was a translation of a scholarly Japanese text that Hearn discovered during his exploration of Japanese folklore. Considered too macabre even compared to some of his earlier publications, it only received a small print run at the University of Tokyo shortly before his death. It deals with the folklore of the Bloated Woman cult, as given in the forbidden scrolls of Hsan.
Sanity loss 1/1d3; Cthulhu Mythos rating +3 percentiles; average 6 weeks to study and comprehend. Spells: Contact Deity/Nyarlathotep, Door to Kadath
To represent an article, paper, or except based on one or more of these books, simply repeat the procedure. These tertiary texts rarely include spells, and those that do often contain flaws which limit their use or place extra requirements upon the wizard.
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