dce

Hi @Napkin Pope, I am the designer who created the original versions of Chaosium's interactive character sheets for Call of Cthulhu 7th Ed. I'm not sure whether these are archived somewhere on Chaosium's website (you'd need to ask them) ... but I do know that they are still available for download from my blog -- this page collects links to all the fillable CoC7e PDF sheets for different eras, as well as character sheets I have made for other Lovecraftian RPGs. I hope these give you access to the files you're seeking. Cheers, Dean.

In case it's helpful to anyone in the interim until Chaosium re-draws the published version of the Inner Sydney map, here's a version of my rough sketch that corrects the (future) bridge location as per @aldaron's notes above. D.

You are absolutely correct @Aldaron -- my sketch map is also incorrect, but in a different way to the published one. Dean (from Adelaide)

For the record, the "Australian Team" who wrote the manuscript didn't actually draw any of the final maps that appear in the Terror Australis book. Those were done by other artists based on reference sketches. Below is the reference sketch I drew for the Sydney map, which (correctly) shows the future location of the Harbour Bridge. The Farm Cove/Parm Cove confusion might have come from the font that's used in this sketch, however -- the sketch does actually say Farm Cove (I double checked by zooming in the original drawing) but at lower resolution it's kind of hard to tell. Dean (from Adelaide)

What he said. The interview is in two halves: Part 1 Part 2 Dean

Yes, and yes. Pulp Cthulhu Char Sheet, non-fillable, no paper texture: https://cthulhureborn.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/pulp-cthulhu-sheet-non-fillable-no-paper.pdf Hope this does the job for you @paladin2769 Dean (from Adelaide)

@alter is quite correct. The best way to think about Delta Green is that it exists as THREE related settings/editions: The original DG, released in the 1990s-2000s by Pagan Publishing was a conspiracy-oriented modern-day setting for CoC 5&6 Arc Dream later published a standalone DG game which uses a d100 engine which is BRP-related but definitely not CoC. That is a very actively supported product line through to today. Pelgrane Press cut a deal with Arc Dream to publish "The Fall of Delta Green" (so far as a one-off book). This is a 1960s setting which uses the GUMSHOE system which also powers Trail of Cthulhu and other Pelgrane Games. Dean

Also, a late thought -- you should probably also add Chaosium's "Atomic Age Cthulhu" (mostly a book of 1950s scenario but with a tiny amount of rules material for running games in the era). D.

For Call of Cthulhu, you should probably add the French Revolution material by Chaosium (Reign of Terror and its forthcoming sequel). Chaosium have also put out Cthulhu Through The Ages which has basic notes for playing in other eras as well: Mythic Iceland Cthulhu Icarus (near future space exploration) Cthulhu End Times aka "The Reaping (Post Apocalypse) Two older Chaosium titles Strange Aeons and Strange Aeons II contain scenarios in unusual time periods, mostly historical (but in one case pre-historical). Also, while World War Cthulhu from Cubicle 7 did have ambitions to cover WW1 and WW3, the line folded before they got to either of those. So, really just WW2 and Cold War. Trail of Cthulhu doesn't exclusively deal with the 1930s; there are some excellent WW1 scenarios and sourcebook (probably the best that have been published so far for any Lovecraft RPG) and the surrealist take on the Dreamlands in Dreamhounds of Paris. A few of the excellent PDFs in the Pelgrane subscription series Ken Writes About Stuff also offer good advice on running games in intriguing settings -- the one that most readily comes to mind is Elizabethan England. Cthulhu Dark isn't really a "setting" as much as a rule system -- although the core book did have a few unusual settings sketched out: 1850s London, Arkham 1692, and Jaiwo 2017. There is also Punktown from Miskatonic River Press / Chronicle City. Arguably the Laundry line from Cubicle 7 might be considered part of this list also (although it's really it's own game, with a different tone to most investigative Lovecraft games) If you wanted to go even further afield, Lovecraftesque has tiny sketches of a lot of different unusual settings for Lovecraft gaming (of a narrative style). BTW I don't think it's accurate to call Delta Green a "minor" setting -- in the last few years their output has probably been more than Chaosium's CoC line. D.

A few small ones: Front cover -- most authors names are in small caps, but Sandy Petersen is in ALL CAPS p29: The section titled "Northern Tropical Tablelands" covers both the tropical north of Australia (North Queensland, NT, and top of WA) but it also covers the south-west (coastal) parts of WA down to Perth, which are not at all tropical. Suggest either renaming the section or splitting it into a tropical and non-tropical part p72: right column, last bullet -- "QUANTAS" should be "QANTAS" p110: left column, last para of "Suburbs and Inner City Housing" -- text refers to the "Booth family from Gunditjamara" which makes it seem like Gunditjamara is a place; it's the name of the Aboriginal group whose lands that the Booths came from. It would be more accurate to say "Booth family from Gunditjamara country" or something similar. p174: right column, para directly under "Australian Cults" header -- refers to six organisations which follow, but there are only five. p191: right column, para directly under "Dark Spirit Powers" header -- refers to the "Provenance" of a spirit, but should be "Domain" as per the paragraph to the left p192: right column, para directly under "Defining Dark Spirits" header -- same as above Also, the maps of Adelaide (p118) and Brisbane (p124) do not mark any of the locations mentioned in the text. The Adelaide map also seems to label a few modern-day suburb names rather than 1920s ones; it also shows the city's main cemetery (centre left of the map, immediately west of West Terrace) as a lake. For a period-source, see: http://mapco.net/adelstreets/suburbs.htm Dean (from Adelaide)

Although not directly related to Call of Cthulhu, you might be interested in this news update that I posted a few days back on the Cthulhu Reborn blog. We are actively working at present to create a book of d100-based Lovecraftian post-Apocalypse RPG scenarios -- though it probably won't see release until at least late 2018. Dean (from Cthulhu Reborn)

Hi Elder Thing, As the guy who designed the DDT sheet ... I don't believe that Chaosium have released such a PDF, but it's easy for me to cobble it together given the parts at my disposal. The links below should get you to non-fillable PDFs for both the Pulp and CoC versions of the sheet. Because some people have also asked for versions without the paper texture in the background, I've also included versions which omit it. Non-Fillable CoC 7e Sheets for DDT with paper texture: https://cthulhureborn.files.wordpress.com/2017/12/ddt-non-fillable-coc-paper.pdf without paper texture: https://cthulhureborn.files.wordpress.com/2017/12/ddt-non-fillable-coc-no-paper.pdf Non-Fillable Pulp Cthulhu Sheets for DDT with paper texture: https://cthulhureborn.files.wordpress.com/2017/12/ddt-non-fillable-pulp-paper.pdf without paper texture: https://cthulhureborn.files.wordpress.com/2017/12/ddt-non-fillable-pulp-no-paper.pdf Dean (from Adelaide)

Hi Jason, Dean here -- as is usually the case with Call of Cthulhu scenarios there are several possible ways that a Keeper might handle the player's reaction to the events described in "In A Different Light". What I would personally do is probably only about as valuable as what your own intuition says you should do. Having said here's what I think might be some options I would (as a Keeper running this scenario) consider. (sorry but I don't know how to format paragraphs to hide spoilers on this forum, so it's here in normal text -- look away if you you're a player!) The climax of the scenario as written involves the hidden creature in the cave being exposed to the moonlight -- and in your situation it seems like, despite the fact that your players have Duncan (or his proxy in your version) captive, they are likely to use his explosives to basically do the same job that he had planned himself. I wouldn't deter them from that path ... since it means that the big reveal can happen pretty much as written. I would suggest that perhaps the hidden creature might be exposed but initially invisible to most of the players, but that a massive cloud of the phosphorescent powder get thrown up into the air to waft over them. Hopefully a few of the investigators (or any NPCs the players have brought along) can become "awakened" by that, thereby providing targets for the extradimensional creatures to target as they aim to collect the final pineal glands necessary to bring the sleeper back to life. The twist for your group is that they have Duncan (or his proxy) in their custody the whole time -- this offers an interesting opportunity to mess with the characters and try to push the players towards a dramatic resolution (e.g., the above). By the time that they encounter Duncan he is not only hell-bent on applying maximum force to destroy what seems to be a perfectly ordinary cave (which is weird) ... but also dangerously paranoid. As a captive he will automatically assume that the investigators are somehow agents of the thing, somehow working to free it from its bonds. He will doubtlessly rant and rave while the investigators are preparing, telling them that whatever evil they have planned will likely doom the whole of humanity to a horrible fate (or something similar). If the investigators try to question him as to what the heck is going on, I would make his replies cryptic ... and also manipulative. While he is their captive, there is nothing to stop Duncan from trying to trick the investigators into doing the exact task that he was planning to do. So, perhaps he might hold out under questioning before finally telling them what he thinks they want to hear -- dressed up in a form that suggests that they blow up the hill to achieve whatever goal they seem to be pursuing. The other intriguing potential that you might like to explore is the fact that Duncan's perception is fully awakened which means that as soon as the sleeping monstrosity is exposed to the outside world he will gasp in terror, even if few if any of the investigators can see anything. This can be played for drama. Similarly, if the investigators are put off by the insane professor's insistence that they destroy the cave and instead decide to explore it first, he can be an NPC witness to the horrible scene inside the cave. Regarding what might happen if the creature is exposed but not defeated in combat (or allowed to escape) ... I think the best way of handling this situation is by highlighting the fact that there are still insidious things happening in Arkham that are basically feeding energy to the creature. Sure, it's not going to be an instant "end of the world" scenario, but if the players get convinced that their failure to comprehensively expunge the horror has left a lingering but persistent series of disappearances in the poorer streets of Arkham they should understand that nobody is really safe until the creature is destroyed. Whether Duncan (or his proxy) helps or hinders this effort is up to you -- and also how the events at the cave unfolded. Does the professor still think they are evil cultists? Does he blab to the local authorities? Does he decide that their actions have shown the investigators to be good guys after all? You could let the players initially think that they have "won" and even move on to a different scenario ... but then drop in subtle clues that people around Southside are still going missing in similar ways ... and then plan your own sequel scenario where the investigators need to track down the marauding creature as it lurks in some other nearby dark hollow or cave slowly building strength from the nourishment its servants bring nightly. You could either tip them off to the hiding place of the thing by some unnatural phenomenon (maybe all the local farmers' cows are mysteriously producing glowing milk?) or you could make them hunt down stray clues to narrow down a set of potential locations. One thing that you should definitely consider is penalising the investigators a small amount of Sanity for each disappearance that happens after they have understood the situation (since they should recognise themselves as partly responsible). I hope that gives you ideas to exploit. Dean

Not really an answer to your question, but maybe of prop/handout use anyway ... There are some nice colour versions of the illustrations that appear in the Dreamlands Express scenario over on one of my portfolio pages. The artwork was all created in Photoshop using out-of-copyright colour pictures from old books -- the train interiors that appear in the backdrop of some of the character portraits probably came from some old book about the historical Orient Express. Dean (from Adelaide)

Most of the items you mention were AFAIK only ever produced in quantities sufficient to meet the needs of the Kickstarter, so I'd be skeptical about them ever being released as after sale items (even if that was the original attention). The one exception to this is the Medallion of Ithaqua, which is available for purchase direct from the company Chaosium sub-contracted to make it: Mark Morrison's rather awesome Campaign Coins. Dean (from Adelaide)

Hey Elder, All the things you ask about do certainly exist (and would be in Chaosium's coffers somewhere). Here's a ZIP file with the most recent versions of the 1920s sheets: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5nHQJNrXlp4emI3dThFMnlDb1k/view?usp=sharing I hope that these are useful to you Dean (from Adelaide

Hi Elder, it's probably too hard to make a version which has the paper texture but not the ornaments at the side (since they're all part of one background texture image). But if you'd like a version with no background texture at all, I can certainly do that: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5nHQJNrXlp4THVzRFRLZHhfV0k/view?usp=sharing Dean (from Adelaide)

Hey Elder Thing, Well, it's easy enough to give you what you want -- but I also think that there's some confusion here as well (see below). First, the links to some non-fillable PDFs which are *just* the base images for the Pulp and Modern sheets. BTW the former are probably what *should* have been included at the back of the Pulp Cthulhu book PDF. Non-Fillable Pulp Sheet: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5nHQJNrXlp4S3ZvRW80UnRRbm8/view?usp=sharing Non-Fillable Modern Sheer: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5nHQJNrXlp4NjV6ejBIT3dJTWs/view?usp=sharing As for the confusion: well, you mention a couple of times you don't like having to rub out the values for Sanity, Luck, etc and replace them (instead preferring to circle the current value). But only the *simplified* version of the autocalc sheets include boxes for writing in the current Sanity, Luck, etc -- the non-simplified autocalc sheets (just labelled "autocalc" in the filenames) actually include a traditional meter for Sanity Points, Luck Points etc -- the idea is that you can interactively just click on the current value and the sheet will automatically circle it for you and erase any circles already drawn on the same meter. If you go back and look at the ZIP files linked above, you'll see that they include both the simplified and non-simplified PDFs. So, if you opened up the non-simplified version and printed it out you would have *almost* exactly what you want: the only problem would be the silhouette head and shoulders included as a placeholder. You could easily remove that by clicking on it and telling Adobe Reader to load a blank JPG into the portrait box, e.g., https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/48/Blank.JPG Anyway, if you grab the PDFs linked at the top of this post you should have pretty much what you're after (I hope :)). Dean

Hey Elder, As the guy who designed all the sheets you are speaking about ... I can safely say that fillable versions of all the different sheet versions you mention certainly exist and are with Chaosium. Which of them have been released via their website (and are currently downloadable), I can't really say. I'm sure that, in the fullness of time, Chaosium will get everything up on their site ... but in the meantime if you want to get fillable PDF versions of the Pulp and Modern character sheets, you can use the links below. Each will give you a ZIP file containing both the full autocalc and simplifiied autocalc versions of the colour sheet. It's important to extract the PDFs from the ZIP file somewhere on your hard disk and then open them with Adobe Reader -- opening the full autocalc sheet in a cut-down PDF reader (such as browser plugins that show you PDFs inside your web browser or email reader window) can cause errors; opening the same files with the full version of Adobe Reader works fine. Fillable "Pulp" sheets: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5nHQJNrXlp4Q0k4RUxlWmJ5dE0/view?usp=sharing Fillable "Modern" sheets: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5nHQJNrXlp4NU10RzF4SnVIQ1k/view?usp=sharing Of course, once official links from Chaosium become available you should use those in preference to my "home made" links. And you are correct in pointing out the small error in the way that the character sheets are shown in the Pulp Cthulhu PDF -- in an ideal world the book layout should have used the high-res image-only version of the sheet which doesn't have the silhouette etc. It seems as though the layout incorporates the fillable PDF instead -- which has all the interactive fields (including the placeholder for the character portrait). It's a small error, but like you said it makes it less useful for anyone who wants to print the sheet and sketch their own portrait. I hope these PDFs will give you what you need for now. Thanks, Dean (from Adelaide)

Hey Jason, As the guy who many years ago wrote "In A Different Light" I'd be quite interested in hearing anyone's experiences too. [In case folks don't have the free PDFs -- you can get the 34 page scenario from this link; there's an additional 8 pages of handouts in another PDF here]. To answer your question, though, the times I've run this scenario I've only used the Mythos creatures that are statted for the scenario itself. However, I guess if you wanted to increase the number of inter-dimensional horrors that would be easy enough to do. The basic plotline for the adventure is based on the premise that recent advances in technology had the effect of opening human perception to adjacent dimensions (or whatever), which allows things from those weird places to seep back into Arkham. I guess that if you decided that the strange side dimension was also home to Dimensional Shamblers, or other similar things that would make sense. Or maybe all this messing around with dimensions attracts the attention of something from further afield (Hounds from Tindalos? Daoloth?). Also -- if you own the Chaosium book "The Stars Are Right!" I guess you could use the Fractal creatures that are described in one of its scenarios. They seem kinda similar (assuming you can describe fractals in 1920s terminology I suppose). Anyway, I hope that you and your group enjoy "In A Different Light" when you run it! Thanks, Dean (from Adelaide)

Chances are that if you have ever run Call of Cthulhu games set in the modern-day era, you will have bought a copy of Chaosium's excellent scenario anthology "The Stars Are Right!" First published in 1992, then again in a second edition in 2004, the book is Chaosium's only collection of contemporary scenarios published to date. It's writing team boasts some of the best names from 1990s era Call of Cthulhu (including Richard Watts, Kevin Ross, John Scott Tynes, and Gary Sumpter -- just to name a few). While the scenarios in "The Stars Are Right!" are generally well-written and tackle a bunch of modern-day horror themes, there's no denying that the fact that most of the scenarios are now 25 years old does lead to a few anachronisms. Most of these relate to the ways that technology -- in particular information and communication technology -- has changed over the past few decades. Fortunately, game scenarios being somewhat fluid things, the majority of the anachronisms can be easily fixed with a combination of small plot tweaks and conversions of old information sources from older to newer formats (e.g., printed newspaper clipping to online news article). To make this process of "modernising" the scenarios from "The Stars Are Right!" easier, Cthulhu Reborn have created a free PDF "upgrade pack" (which also updates the scenario's stats up to 7th Edition). This is available right now for download direct from our site. The upgrade pack contains Keeper resources which fall into three categories: New versions of each of the scenario handouts, converted to more "modern" forms and rendered in full prop-quality detail. For some scenarios we've also created new handouts (things that are alluded to in the scenario, but never explicitly provided as handouts) Some brief notes on ideas for tweaking plot elements in the scenarios to make them feel more "contemporary" -- mostly these are slight, but one of the scenarios (Steve Hatherley's intriguing "Fractal Gods") has some deeply embedded anachronistic elements that warrant some more significant rewriting [sorry Steve] Updated statistic blocks and skill roll descriptions, which bring the scenarios up to 7th Edition compatibility The montage below shows just a few of the 48 handouts that are included in the pack: We hope that fans of modern-day Call of Cthulhu will consider using these revised handouts and resources to revitalise the scenarios in "The Stars Are Right!" and terrorise their players anew. And if you *don't* currently own a copy of "The Stars Are Right!" the good news is that Chaosium still has print copies (and PDFs) of the 2nd Edition for sale on their website. [Legal Note: The Stars Are Right! Upgrade Pack is released under a Creative Commons license, and complies with the terms of Chaosium's policies on "fan material" which must always remain free of charge. The pack is not a standalone product, and will not be helpful unless you already own one of the two editions of the Chaosium book. Call of Cthulhu is a trademark of Chaosium Inc.] Thanks, Dean (from Adelaide)

Those who have been following the (rapidly-expanding) Convicts & Cthulhu product line that Cthulhu Reborn has been publishing, might be interested to hear that we've just released the sixth supplement in the "Ticket of Leave" series. Ticket of Leave #6: Night of the Convict Dead is available right now over on RPGNow. This supplement differs slightly in format from some of the previous "Ticket of Leave" titles in that it devotes most of its 15 pages to a somewhat-ready-to-run scenario (the eponymous "Night of the Convict Dead"). This is supported by some historical source material which can be extrapolated by Keepers for other purposes. It also featurs some awesome new artwork from Reuben Dodd (see above). The subject matter of this supplement is simple: it's about death in the early penal colonies of Australia. Because of a combination of rampant disease, poor hygiene, horrific and barbaric punishments, and the occasional hanging, Death is a pretty frequent visitor to the colonies. This creates some practical problems, mostly relating to the sanitary disposal of so many corpses. Remarkably, the early colonies seem to have approached this in an entirely haphazard way -- while there were allocated burying grounds, the arrangement of graves within those spaces was pretty random, and no official records were kept of who was buried where. Because gravedigging was a job given to convicts -- who hardly had an incentive to do a good job -- many graves were dug much shallower than is ideal. This created noxious odours whenever the weather got hot, and attracted pigs and goats from neighbouring farmlands, who sometimes dug at graves. All of this adds up to a setting where there is an ample supply of corpses, and not too much care taken in keeping track of them ... and in the worlds of the Cthulhu Mythos, that can only spell trouble. After all, how much easier would the "researches" of young Herbert West have been if he had a ready and limitless supply of source materials sitting right at his doorstep? The scenario component of this "Ticket of Leave" explores a detailed investigation where an unlucky bunch of investigators are given the task of getting to the bottom of a sudden rash of dead bodies discovered in several places around the colony. In each case, two corpses were discovered in close proximity -- one a recent victim of violence, but the other ... well those all look to have been dead for a considerable time. Do your plucky investigators dare to plumb the depths of this macabre mystery -- and, more importantly, can they act fast enough to stop -- The Night of the Convict Dead?! As a side-note, this release also marks a special occasion for "Convicts & Cthulhu" -- it's one year ago today that the core C&C book was first released. As we described over on this blog post, since that time that book and its supplements have sold around 3,600 PDFs and softcover books -- which is an amazing achievement for a tiny publisher like Cthulhu Reborn. We are heartily indebted to the many, many people who've grabbed our book, whether as free downloads or accompanied by an ever-helpful donation. We hope that Convicts & Cthulhu has brought some quirky fun to your gaming table! Ticket of Leave #6: Night of the Convict Dead is downloadable right now via RPGNow -- as with other larger titles we have made this a "Pay-What-You-Want" title. Of course we are more than happy if folks (particular readers of this forum) want to grab it free of charge -- but equally, if you'd like to chip in a small donation to help keeping the C&C line going, everything that you're able to contribute is very, very much appreciated. We hope you enjoy the "Night of the Convict Dead" ... and trust that you will put on a suitably creepy-sounding voice when you declare "They're Coming To Get You, Convicts!" Dean (from Adelaide)

While it's true that there is a post-apocalytic "End Time" kind of setting described in Cthulhu Through the Ages, it feels more like a new attempt at creating such a beast than a continuation of the material created by Michael LaBossiere for the monograph. Actually the new stuff kinda makes me think of a roleplaying tie-in to Sandy Petersen's "Cthulhu Wars" boardgame, which might be closer to what Chaosium has in mind ... To answer the OP's question, though -- I think it's safe to assume that there's no current development of the La Bossiere "End Time" setting (which was really only published in book form at all because Pagan dropped the project sometime in the late 1990s IIRC). It would be cool to have more post-Mythos-apocalypse game material out there ... but the only stuff that's even come close in recent years are the Cthulhu Apocalpyse scenario/setting books Pelgrane published for Trail of Cthulhu. And they take a different tack again. Dean (from Adelaide)

Those who have been following Cthulhu Reborn's ongoing series of mini-supplements to the Convicts & Cthulhu setting, may be interested to learn that we've just released the fifth installment in the "Ticket of Leave" series -- ToL#5: The Damned & The Degenerate. This PDF completely overhauls and massively expands the character generation guideliness from the original C&C book. ToL#5 is avalable right now via RPGNow as a Pay-What-You-Want PDF. This supplement weighs in at 24 pages (and as such really doesn't qualify as a "mini-supplement" anymore). Unlike previous "Ticket of Leave" titles which have focussed on expanding the setting by introducing narrative elements like scenario seeds, this supplement revisits the character options/templates for the colonial Australian convict setting and adds almost 30 new occupation types. Ever wanted to play an indigenous "bush constable" who works with prison guards to track down escaped convicts? What about a convict who was a professional gambler before being caught? Or one of the colony's fearless explorers charged with the task of filling the huge blanks on the maps? Alternatively, maybe you'd care to play a French spy who has been paid to infiltrate the colony to find out the strength of the British military presence in Australia? All of these character types -- and lots, lots more -- are now at your fingertips. To complement the character creation templates, we've also peppered the PDF with examples of real-world ordinary characters who held those professions: these fully-statted write-ups are based on real historical figures (since the real lives of people in the colonies is far more rich and colourful than any fiction we could dream up). Also included are some notes on unusual character options -- like early bushrangers (escapees that decided to try to survive off the alien land), or free wives that accompanied their convict husbands[*] ... All up, this PDF replaces the few scant pages devoted to character creation in the main Convicts & Cthulhu with a comprehensive set of interesting and colourful options for player investigators or Keeper NPCs. You can grab it right now from RPGNow -- because this is much longer than we really intended for the "smaller" Ticket of Leave releases we've made this another "Pay-What-You-Want" title. However, in the interests of keeping the whole C&C line as accessible as possible, we are more than happy if folks (particularly BRP-Central-ers) want to grab it for free -- consider anything you contribute to be a small (and very welcome) donation to help Cthulhu Reborn keep these coming ... We hope you enjoy filling your Convicts & Cthulhu games with all manner of ... the damned and the degenerate Dean [*] This is a weird historical detail that I never knew about -- some convict men transported to Australia were accompanied by their (non-convicted) wives, who effectively came out as free settlers. Because convicts were often assigned to settlers as a kind of free labour force this led to a number of unusual cases of men being assigned to their own wives as workers.

It is highly unlikely that anybody could trademark the term "Miskatonic University" in its totality. For starters that's not how Trademarks work. It might be the case that someone has made a "Miskatonic University" branded thing -- say a brand of beer. If they successfully managed to trademark their logo/name then all that would mean is nobody else can make a beer or similar beverage with that branding. You could still make any other kind of thing with the same name -- unless that was obviously referencing the original logo in some way (like making clothing using the exact logo of the beer, using the exact fonts etc). As a reference, check out the long legal battle that eventually decided that Apple computers had no rights to force Apple Studios (of Beatles fame) to give up their name. So -- the only time this could ever cause a problem for Chaosium is if somehow someone had trademarked a line of books with the name, and given the fact that the original stories that mention MU are all now in the public domain (in the US at least) that would be pretty hard to do. Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer ... but I have talked with lots of lawyers about Intellectual Property stuff over the years, and this is how I understand things to work. Dean (from Adelaide)