Penumbra City - A World of Harrow Game

There’s a black fog that hangs over the city, and it’s not as metaphorical as you might hope. It’s coal dust. Somewhere up through that smoke, there’s a glorious silver city hovering in the sunshine—but don’t concern yourself much with the floating quarter, because only the rich and holy will ever see it. Groundside, orphans dig through rubble and trash to scavenge the parts to fix their motorcycles, street poets sell fungus and brawl over territory, and bureaucrats ride black horses to midnight salons where they plot the death of the god king. The graveyard’s been squatted by immigrants now for longer than you’ve been alive, and there’s a gang of nihilist ex-marines who seem intent on blowing up half of everything. Welcome to Penumbra City. There’s plenty to do, if you don’t mind the dust. Or the smoke. Or the crime. Or the monsters.

Penumbra City is a rules-medium, campaign-world-rich tabletop roleplaying game designed for 3-6 players. Penumbra City is a class-based game with simplified core mechanics but a broad range of character class abilities. Healing is hard to come by, so the decision to fight must never be taken lightly. While one player takes the role of the Game Master, players roll all dice. Most rolls are made with d20s. Penumbra City uses a reputation economy–it is a world where money has lost its luster, and it is a character’s reputation with the various gangs, factions, and coalitions that determine their access to resources.

The book contains a complete game system as well as a lore-rich world with its own complete cosmology. The city contains eleven unique districts. There are nine playable classes (or twelve, if we reach our stretch goals) and twenty or so factions. The only other things you need to play Penumbra City are dice, pen and paper, a game master, a party, and to answer the call to adventure. And to not get eaten by a murderous swamp crane.