Hi! Welcome on the site of Le Notti di Nibiru, an Italian tabletop RPG by Luca De Marini and Daniele Fusetto.
Introducing Nights of Nibiru
The Interstellar Empire, build by humans with the help of other alien species, begins to fall for unknown reasons. Several Fleets of explorers are sent to remote places in the galaxy to find something that could prevent the Empire to fall. One of the Fleet, The Virgo, arrives near a weird purple planet and lose contact with the entire galaxy. Nobody seems alive. Half the Fleet decides to go home and find the truth about the Empire; the other half remain orbiting around the planet. After years in orbit, the people of the Fleet decide to land on the planet who they call Nibiru. The planet has a strange year cycle: after 12 lunar months of darkness called Nights (brighten only by two moons), there are only 3 lunar months of light called Alusea. A supernatural wind, called The Tide, blows on all the surface of the planet, changing objects and places by touching them, making impossible to explore and map some part of the surface. The life of humans and aliens of the Fleet is always in danger also because enormous creatures, called Xefriot, walk the planet, destroying everything they encounter.
After a century on the planet, the Descendants of the Virgo has mutated. Two groups have been formed: the Dormant and the Tonalists. Dormants developed a weakness to the Tide and the Nights, during which they enter a supernatural sleep: their souls leak from their dormant body and walk by it, answering questions or giving quests. The Tonalist developed a symbiosis with the Tide: they can use the atmosphere of the planet to create a supernatural effect similar to magic and, thanks to new organs, they can alter they form into the one of a totemic animal. They were influenced by one of the few autochthonous allies of the Descendant, the Tonals, huge druidic sentient animals. Other allies are the Dolems, golem-like creatures of different sizes that have the shape of buildings and architectonics.
The atmosphere of the planet is toxic for anthropomorphic creatures, so the Descendants have lived many years inside a big metropolis called Edsi. But with the power of morphosis, Tonalists can explore the world a little and defend the Edsi by Xefriot and other enemies – like ßæmoths, Tsoalnia, and Sages of the Lochs.
Inspirations
Nights of Nibiru was born thanks to the artworks of Roman Roland Kuteynikov and the ideas of writer Daniele Fusetto. The game was also inspired by videogames, novels, and animes that mix dreams, surreality and fairy atmospheres. Some titles that influenced us:
- The Mist, ICO, Shadow of the Colossus, the Final Fantasy series;
- short stories from the Dream Phase of Howard P. Lovecraft (Beyond the wall of sleep, Polaris and Hypnos among many);
- The Incal by Magnus and Jodorowsky;
- ESP an Italian comic by Michelangelo La Neve;
- Made in Abyss.
The System, Dark Destiny 2
Nights of Nibiru lies inside a common universe with other Acchiappasogni products and it’s based on Dark Destiny 2 (DD2 from now), the follow-up of an Italian game and system by Luca De Marini.
At the core, DD2 is based on a single roll of a couple of eight-sided dice sum up with two numbers, an Attribute and a Skill. There are thresholds of failure and success, each of whom allows the Storyteller to move the plot forward.
This simple core mechanism is combined with a series of cues that prevent players from remaining at the mercy of the blank page. Indeed, the entire system is organized to allow even those who have played little or only heard of role-playing games to play without major problems.
In addition to this, great simplicity and dynamism are reserved for combat, with a system of Symbols and powers that also wink at veteran players.
The other rules complete a system of two layers of discoveries, one physical (the exploration of Nibiru) and one “spiritual” (the exploration of the powers of the characters).
In this sense, DD2 system proved immediately perfect for the setting we were writing due to its flexibility and wide customization of Characters.
In conclusion, the system engine lightens the task of the Narrator, who can concentrate more on recreating the atmospheres of the setting and endowing it with enemies and allies of the characters in a quick and evocative way.