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the ravens of despair
tHe raVeNs Of desPair / HistOry
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credits
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cONteNts
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WritiNG
Steve Darlington
LiNe deVeLOPers
iLLustratiON
Jon Hodgson
Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan
tHe raVeNs Of desPair
HistOry
Nature & aPPearaNce
Getting Resolve Back
GOaLs
cOVer
Paul Bourne
GraPHic desiGN & LayOut
Paul Bourne
Ravens of Despair
The Ravens on Earth
Allies
Enemies
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editiNG
Andrew Kenrick and Matthew Pook
creatiVe directOr
Dominic McDowall
OrGaNisatiON
Habitat
adVeNture ideas
art directOr
Jon Hodgson
Published by Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd
(UK reg. no. 6036414). Find out more about
us and our games at www.cubicle7.co.uk
© Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd. 2013
Summer Holiday
Hard Time
Mourning Day
The Crest of Corazon
War and Grief
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BBC, DOCTOR WHO (word marks, logos and devices), TARDIS, DALEKS, CYBERMAN and K-9 (word marks and devices) are
trade marks of the British Broadcasting Corporation and are used under licence.
BBC logo © BBC 1996. Doctor Who logo © BBC 2012. Dalek image © BBC/Terry Nation 1963. Cyberman image © BBC/Kit
Pedler/Gerry Davis 1966. K-9 image © BBC/Bob Baker/Dave Martin 1977.
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the ravens of despair
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tHe raVeNs Of desPair
There are some individuals in this universe who follow fear and trouble. They are drawn to it like a magnet,
ending up time and time again in places rife with threats and danger, full of enemies at work or monsters at
large. They arrive in the nick of time, when all seems darkest.
Then there are others, in this wide, nigh-infinite universe, who seem to follow sorrow. They are drawn to
heartbeak and defeat. They lurk in the shadows of the darkest of days and the worst of nights. They arrive,
and bring the darkness with them. So hungry are they for sadness that they are called the Ravens of Despair.
They are ancient and they are everywhere but they remain relatively unknown because, like
so many things in this universe, they are very good at staying hidden. So they have
become nothing more than legend, a dark fairytale, and only those beings as old
or as well-travelled as Time Lords have an inkling that they are real. Even fewer
know just how dangerous they can be.
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HistOry
The Ravens are old. Legends of them stretch back to when even the Time
Lords were young. But they in turn were created by an even more ancient
species, the Alturons.
The Alturons originated in another dimension, one composed entirely of
psychic energy. They themselves were also composed of nothing more
than thought, and that being their nature, sought to master and control
all such things, removing all chaotic and uncontrolled thoughts from
their dimension.
They encountered our universe when it was relatively young,
and found it entirely unsatisfying – or aesthetically unpleasing,
translations vary. Even back in the first days, our reality was
full of war and strife, chaos and confusion, pain and suffering.
Quickly, the Alturons determined that the cause of all these
problems were negative emotions – hate, fear, pain and sorrow.
Correcting the universe, then, was simply a matter of removing
all the fear, anger and sadness from the inhabitants.
They couldn’t do this by themselves. Lacking any physical form,
they found it difficult to interact with the organic creatures of our
universe. To overcome this, they made servant species, creatures built
to carry out their will. These creatures took different forms to better
match their purpose, each designed to devour a particular emotion for their
own sustenance. They were intended to spread across the universe, feeding
like locusts, until all the negative emotions were purged.
There was, however, a fatal flaw in their design, due to the Alturon’s imperfect
understanding of our universe. Just as a leech will cause more blood to flow
than it can ever fit in its stomach, these “pathophages” caused their victims
to experience the emotion being drained from them, at terrible extremes. So
although they drew strength and sustenance from the emotions they drained,
they completely failed to reduce their prevalence. Instead, they increased
them.
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the ravens of despair
HistOry / Nature & aPPearaNce
The Alturons did not notice, however. They had
already returned to their universe, assured in the
knowledge that ours would soon be perfected by their
handiwork. They have not been seen since. Some
ponder if perhaps the pathophages made it into the
Alturons’ dimension and devoured their masters.
Others believe the Alturons may still be alive, and if
they should return, could be made to stop their mad
creations. Thankfully, most of the hungry creatures
soon destroyed themselves.
The pathophages that devoured fear and hate were
drawn to places of great war and destruction, and
soon made those places even worse. Enormous
galactic wars broke out in their presence. In the
destruction, almost all of the pathophages were
destroyed or, left with nothing but corpses to feed
upon, and starved to death.
There was one species that did not die off so quickly.
The creatures that drained sorrow endured because
sorrow endures. Many humanoids find sadness
comfortable: too familiar to fear, too safe to
escape. Sadness can hide deep in the psyche for
decades, slowly draining the joy and will from
its victims, yet sustaining them just enough
to go on. The Ravens do much the same,
patiently feeding in the shadows for years
upon years. They have spread across the
universe, hiding in the unbound misery they find in
so many, slowly destroying their host and everything
around them.
Just like the other pathophages they can overfeed
and destroy their food source, but they have learnt to
compensate for that, and even gain strength in their
numbers. Some have formed large colonies, creating
enormous ships to help them travel across the stars.
These great grey “Rookeries” can house thousands
of Ravens, perhaps even millions, producing enough
sorrow to sink entire worlds into despair and provide
the parasites with food for centuries. Eventually even
the largest civilisation will run dry or destroy itself to
end its misery, and the creatures will move on once
more.
As they moved across the universe, legends of the
Ravens and their great ships spread, and their
appearance has become a harbinger of destruction
and loss. This ensures that the Ravens have
something ready to feed on wherever they travelled.
So they have only grown in number over the aeons,
and more and more planets and species have
provided them with sustenance.
They have no name for themselves, claim no territory
and sing no songs of victory, so they are not known
as one of the great enemies of the universe. They
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the ravens of despair
have no terrible empire or ever-expanding borders,
so they cannot easily be contained or destroyed. They
are indeed like locusts: they roam at random, feed at
will, and leave nothing but emptiness in their wake.
It’s possible that the Mind Parasite the Third
Doctor encountered in Strangmoor Prison was
one of the last of the creatures the Alturons
built to remove hate. How the Master found
such a creature, and convinced it to work with
him, remains a mystery (see
The Mind of Evil
in
The Third Doctor Sourcebook).
Those brave or foolish enough to look closer, into the
blackness under the mask will discover the truth of
the Ravens. Although they have a solid presence, and
their arms are easily strong enough to knock down
a large opponent or hold a strong prisoner, there is
nothing physical inside their shell. Instead, they are
filled with a swirling matrix of dark neural energy.
This is the same kind of energy used to create Psychic
Paper and similar gadgets. Just as Psychic Paper
reads the target’s mind, selects the appropriate
information and projects what they expect to see,
the neural energy within each Raven seeks out the
saddest feelings, worries and memories in its target
and pulls them to the forefront. In the process, the
Raven gains energy, feeding on its target’s sadness.
The victim is not aware of any attack, they only feel
suddenly overcome with sad thoughts and memories,
and the terrible emotions associated with them.
Of course, if the target was already suffering
grief or torment, the effect of a Raven will go
unnoticed.
A single attack does no little permanent
damage, but few minds are strong
enough to withstand a prolonged
barrage. As the sorrow endures, the
target soon becomes unable to
imagine anything beyond their
despair. They become withdrawn
and inactive, numb to sensation and
seeking no comfort or distraction.
Some escape into fantasy reverie
or full madness. Many die,
whether by taking violent action
against themselves, or losing
any sense of self-preservation
in a dangerous world, or simply
by losing all interest even in the
basic needs of daily life, such as
food, sleep and exercise. Others
manage to cling on but may as well
be dead, existing without any sense of
life, hope or meaning. If the Raven’s
feeding is ended, this damage can be
healed, but only over much time.
In other cases – after several weeks
of feeding, for the average mind —
the sad memories are repressed
or even destroyed along with the
emotions behind them. On the
surface, this can be a good thing:
the target forgets his sorrows and
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Nature & aPPearaNce
The nickname of “ravens” is poetic rather than
descriptive. Although they do have long beak-like
faces, they are humanoid in size and shape. They also
share with ravens pitch-black colouring, although
the Ravens of Despair have more folds than feathers.
From behind, they could be mistaken for a man in a
heavy dark robe and strange hat. On a dark night in
medieval Europe, their beaks might even cause them
to be mistaken for a plague doctor, in his leather
uniform and long-nosed pomander mask.
Nothing beneath their “cloak” or “mask” is visible.
They have arm-like appendages, but these end in just
more rustles of skin and feather, no hands nor talons
extending beyond. Most of the time, they keep their
wings close to their body, almost invisible, only using
them to grapple prey and hold them still for feeding.
They move at a steady walking pace, but without a
gait or footfalls. They make no noise. They can speak
if needed, but the voice sounds more like a distant
echo rising up from some deep channel far below.
Most of the time they find they need to do nothing but
stand and wait. They are so still and unresponsive it
is unnerving and unnatural, and few can spend long
in their presence without being shaken by it.
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