Mystic Punks RPG’s half weird magic and half grungy counter culture vibes get an official book

Whether you already lived through the ‘70s and ‘80s or simply heard about it from old people on TikTok, Mystic Punks takes players back to an angrier and dirtier time with a new official core rulebook all about roleplaying magical punks in a world on the brink of apocalypse - and I don’t necessarily mean Reaganomics.

Creator Anthony Meloro has been picking away at Mystic Punks’ design since it first ran as a solo RPG back in 2016, its aesthetic blend of B-movie horrors, magical monsters and itinerant mall teen fashion fully formed. Distributor Exalted Funeral and co-creator Jay Domingo have teamed with Meloro to flesh out the rules into a fully formed tabletop game that is currently crowdfunding on Kickstarter.

The world is under threat from vengeful ghosts, shambling eldritch gods and a gelatinous force of acid monsters from below the city’s sewers, and all that stands between it and a dozen encroaching threats are a motley crew of disaffected burnouts, goths, punks and rebels armed with magical abilities and potent relic weapons. Mystic Punk’s new book fleshes out and revises the rules underpinning the old solo version with campaign builders, more monsters and guidance on weaving a bit of intrigue and mystery into the setting.

Character creation constitutes little more than a handful of six-sided dice rolls and choosing a name - everything else is determined during play and around the table. Players work with five core stats, Vigilance, Agility, Intellect, Social and Cunning, and haul both a signature weapon and some spell pre-loaded in their fingertips. Weapons have true names known to their wielder (even if they’re cheap replicas from a mall kiosk), and everyone carries around a grimoire stuffed with occult wisdom and spellcraft. Astral markers act as guides and rest stops as the group pushes through an increasingly weird real world as the Psycho Realms bleed into our dimension.

Clocking in at more than 250 pages, Mystic Punks RPG boasts a hefty serving of artwork that sells the intentionally off-putting vibes of the game. The team brought on plenty of comics and tabletop illustrators, including Benjamin Marra, Tia Roxae, Pol-Eduoard and David Hoskins. An included bestiary contains 45 monsters from space, underground, or that weird industrial park a few blocks down. In old-school gaming fashion, both the core book and the Tome of the Dark Guide (their version of GM) are filled to bursting with random tables for loot, magic, weed strains, scenarios, trouble and anything else.

The Kickstarter campaign for Mystic Punks RPG runs through April 19th to fund both digital and physical editions of the book, which was edited by Lindsay Woodcock and bears cover art by Ben Marra. An adventure collection called Weird Wanderings Vol. 1 is also on offer and contains design work by Levi Combs, Steve Albertson and John McGuire. Books are expected to ship out to backers in the first quarter of 2025.