2023 Shotgun Scenario Contest Reviews

In this post I review all submissions to the 2023 Shotgun Scenario Contest, except for my own. I have written a separate blog post about my scenarios, which you can find here.

These reviews are only based on reading the scenarios, I haven't run or played in any of them. Also, I don't have a grading system or anything, but there are basically three things that I take into account when deciding whether I like a scenario or not:

• Readability, or how easy is it for me to understand a scenario on the first read-through. Things like, is there an executive summary, is the language clear, is it easy to find things, etc.
• Usability, or can I take this scenario and run a full session without having to do much additional prep. Are there stat blocks for important NPCs and monsters, are there enough gameplay elements for the Agents to interact with, are new mechanics easy to use, etc.
• Does the scenario align with my personal preferences, do I like the themes and the tone of the scenario, etc. This is totally subjective of course. Even if I didn't like a scenario that does not mean it is necessarily bad. Just that it isn't for me.
  

With that said, here are the reviews. There were a lot of scenarios, so prepare for a long post.

A Flame Unto My Path
The “occult symbols at crime scene” hook is weak, but otherwise this seems like a solid scenario. I especially like that the Unnatural threat can be talked to and even reasoned with, which naturally leads to multiple different ways the scenario can be resolved. If I were to run this I might simplify the mechanics of Uriel. You have to keep track of the WP at all times, which is fine, but then you also have to make opposed POW checks between Uriel and the host every 30 in-game minutes? The host is very unlikely to succeed against a creature with 30 POW, so I would just not bother with this. Unless, of course, it’s an Agent that is possessed. This is a good scenario and I can definitely see myself running this.

The Twelve Disciples
The hook for this one is also occult symbols, this time carved into the chest of suicide victims. Maybe this is this year's theme? The plot of the scenario is that a cult leader gets his followers to commit suicide in order to summon the Dark Man, which is horrific, but not particularly original. A large part of the scenario text is a list of twelve(!) cultists. That’s too much for a shotgun scenario. The scenario author tells us that there is only one way to solve the scenario: kill the cult leader who is currently in a coma. The cult leader can be found by investigating the three cultists that have already committed or attempted suicide, so the other nine cultists might not even come into play. I think the scenario could be better by cutting down the number of NPCs and using the now available word count to make the investigation more complex.

Bad Blood
This scenario is great for an action-packed one-shot. Since the Agents start at only 1 or 2 HP there is a high chance that some of them will die. They are infected with an unnatural disease, which might help them heal, but which also might not be curable. For this reason I probably wouldn't run this scenario as part of an on-going campaign, it seems like too much of a meat grinder for that. But it could be a fun one-shot.

Pliers and their uses
The setup of this scenario is similar to the scenario Holding Cell: The Agents are sent to a black site and tasked to get information out of a prisoner who is affected by the Unnatural. This is a good premise, but in this case the execution is lacking. The scenario lists a lot of things the Agents could do, but as written none of them will work. The only way to solve this scenario is to have the entity escape, let it open the safe and then overwhelm it somehow. I would have wished that the scenario provided some additional ways to solve it. The creature itself and the black site are also not terribly interesting.

The Cremation of Agent SAM
A survival scenario in the Alaskan wilderness in which the Agents have to find a place to burn the body of a fallen comrade before it can rise as a wendigowak. The Agents have to succeed on four Navigate checks before they can find such a place. I wish there were more suggestions on things that could happen on a failed check. The scenario only suggests a bunch of combat encounters, which is a bit disappointing. I would have liked more suggestions for non-combat survival challenges. Also, what happens after the Agents successfully burn the body? How do they get home? Not a bad scenario, with an interesting hook, but it would require some additional prep before I run this.

The Four Story Fall
This scenario has an interesting structure, but some things are weird. If the Agents kill Mark for some reason (or if he is arrested for murder) he is just back in the next scene anyway? Why? And what is actually going on with Mark? Originally I assumed that he was just losing his mind, but then in the last scene it comes out that people were actually following Mark. No reason is given as to why this is happening. I like the creativity in this scenario, but it doesn’t make it easy enough to understand what is going on. The time limit for each scene might be a good idea to keep everything moving, though I’m not sure if 15 minutes would be enough for some of them.

A Real Bargain
In this scenario the Agents have to investigate a group of murderous garden gnomes, which is a really fun premise. The investigation is basic, but the NPCs are very well realized. A lot of word count is spent on describing these NPC with sometimes unnecessary detail. The same goes for the backstory of the garden gnomes. This effort would have been better spent on additional gameplay or on creating stat blocks for the gnomes. I also don’t recognize the “Wrack” spell. Maybe that is from Call of Cthulhu? Despite these criticisms this seems like a fun scenario.

Government-Issued Boyfriend
Another fun premise, an Agent has to go on a date with Stephen Alzis in order to find a weakness. This scenario is heavy on the roleplay so the Handler should be comfortable portraying Stephen Alzis for an extended amount of time. I think this one works maybe best in a one-on-one session. The scenario lists some stuff that other Agents could do during the date, but not much of it helps with the current operation.

For The Squatch, There Are No Heroes
Double-column format is fine for physical books, but I hate it in digital documents. Please don’t make me scroll up and down all the time to read your scenario. Besides that, the scenario is well written and very runnable. It’s not for me personally, because I have no interest in Bigfoot/Sasquatch. But for people who are into that this would be a great scenario.

Love Will Keep Us Together
This scenario starts in media res, the Agents are trapped in a house while one of their comrades transforms into a Worm-that-walks. It’s a cool setup. However, the scenario doesn’t answer some of the questions I had while reading. Who is the Weaver and how can it have a whole town under its control? Why is the magical brooch in this house? Where do the other DG agents, Raccoon and Rosehip, come from? Of course you can’t put every possible information into a shotgun scenario. But I think these are reasonable questions a player would ask, so the Handler has to do some additional work to have satisfying answers.

Homecoming
This scenario starts as a basic murder investigation (nothing wrong with that) but has the potential to end in a hostage situation, which is always fun. The hook is a bit weak. The Agents are sent to investigate a murder with possible cult connection, but nothing at the murder scene indicates that a cult is involved. The scenario is set at the Canadian-American border, which is cool. But I’m not sure why Delta Green would investigate a murder on the Canadian site instead of letting M-EPIC handle it. Especially, since it seems that M-EPIC is already aware of the event.

Subliminal
This is my own scenario.

Call of the Wild
This scenario has a cool hook: the Agents have to investigate why long extinct species of birds are appearing in the Everglades. The author seems to have done his research and there are plenty of clues for Agents with a Science (Ornithology) background. The weakest part of this scenario is the middle, where the Agents have to explore the Everglades to find the person responsible. It boils down to rolling various skill checks until enough successes have been accumulated. The Handler has to do a lot of work to fill this section with details. I am sure the author would have been able to do this as well, if it weren’t for the word count. Despite this flaw, I like the scenario for the bird lore.

Generational Trauma
There are some cool ideas in this scenario, like the Yithian that finds itself trapped in an artificial neural network and the imperfect copies wandering around. I can see myself running this or mining for ideas. The SAN losses are a bit weird, but whatever. And the formatting could be a bit better. E.g., I don’t know why the stat blocks were put into a separate document, seems unnecessary.

Lethe
A cool setup, the Agents have collectively become the victim of the personality exchange ritual and must now get their bodies back from wizard cultists. What is interesting is that the Agents can’t just kill the cultists, because then they would destroy their own bodies. I like it.

An Excitable Girl
Two ideas in this scenario stand out to me: Fenton’s replacing of her own head with that of someone else and the undead agent walking for years across the ocean floor. These ideas alone make me want to run this. I think the formatting of the scenario could be improved. Some sections could be more readable if bullet points would have been used.

Black Buzz
The investigation in this scenario is nothing special, but the antagonist is very cool: a man hollowed out by a bee hive. It reminds me a little of the Father of War from Iconoclast, but with bees instead of obsidian shards. Truly horrible, so good job. The German poems are also very good.

Dead Meat
This is a solid scenario with some cool body horror imagery, like the melted-together animals. I especially like the cow centipedes dragging the meat god around. Bonus points for the fact that tinfoil hats are actually useful against the threat. Maybe I missed it, but is there any special reason why the scenario has to take place in 2013? The stat blocks could be formatted in a more compact way.

Corporate Contracts
I like the setup of this scenario: a giant corporation fails because it was part of Majestic-12, which has suddenly ceased to exist. However, a lot of word count is spent describing the real world background of Nortel. As a consequence, there is not a lot of gameable content like NPCs, location descriptions with clues, etc. I don’t think this scenario can be run without a lot of Handler prep (or someone who is very good at improvisation).

46 second preview
The time fuckery in this scenario does not make much sense to me. If the second Henry is a version of the original Henry, but 46 seconds into the future, why are they so different? But time travel scenarios rarely make sense, so I won’t hold this against this scenario. The idea of these time travel twins as antagonists is still cool. One problem with the scenario is that it solves itself. Majestic comes, destroys the Henries, then they get killed by the Hounds. The Agents best course of action is to do nothing. Of course they don’t know that, but still. This scenario is one of the better formatted ones, thanks to the author for making it easy to read.

Los Reyes Magos
I don’t like the two-column layout for digital documents, but the rest of the formatting in this scenario is very pretty. This one is a SCP scenario rather than a Delta Green scenario. I’m not a huge SCP fan, but whatever. The scenario itself is rather simple and linear. The Handler has to do some prep or be good at improvising to run part 3, where the characters encounter creatures and locations based on their character’s fears. While it is always a good idea to adapt scenarios to the PCs I don’t like it when I have to do all the work. Some examples would have been appreciated.

‘Twas the Night at the Opera
A Christmas scenario, where the Agents have to find clues to solve a puzzle, which enables them to enact a ritual that stops the incursion. What is the incursion? Some mild reality warping at a christmas tree lot and apparently some people disappeared? The details are all quite vague and it’s missing some real horror elements. To be honest, the scenario reads to me like it has been generated by ChatGPT, at least some parts.

Writhe
I’m a fan of the Disciples of the Worm, so it’s nice to see a scenario featuring them. This scenario tries to accomplish a lot in the limited word count: we have at least six named NPCs and four different locations. The Shady Acres facility also has a bunch of sub-locations. Thankfully we are given a nice map. Still, I think it would have been better to cut down the scope and instead flesh out a select few of these elements. The stats seem to be for CoC instead of Delta Green RPG and could use a more compact format. But overall still a good scenario.

Eyes Wide Open
This scenario needs an editing pass, there are a lot of run-on sentences, missing commas, etc. I like the idea of the South American Atlach-Nacha cult. The investigation is standard and the scenario probably ends with a raid of the cult headquarters, so we have a pretty typical Delta Green scenario. Not bad, but also not terribly original.

True Friends
The scenario has a really fun premise, but on the first read-through I had a hard time understanding what was going on. I think some restructuring and different language could help here, e.g. by clearly stating that the case officer didn’t kill anyone, that Tabitha is alive, and that the corpse is “only” a manifestation. All this info should be in an executive summary at the beginning. Aside from these issues this seems like a fun scenario. I love the skills in the NPC stat blocks.

Ideasthesia
An ant colony is infected by the King in Yellow through a perfume, a cool and original idea. There are also some nice, creepy details, like the tiny insect theater or the ants forming the words of the play. The formatting and structure is also great. I would probably change the fact that the perfume component was discovered by pure chance, but other than that I really like this scenario.

Leslie Got Her Pain
Johnny Got His Gun as a Delta Green scenario, nice idea! I like the various effects on the people on the military base. Some things are unclear to me, like why is Leslie in the morgue if there is already a grave including a headstone? When did the accident happen? Has no one outside of the military base noticed the strange things that happen there? Overall, a cool idea for the scenario but before I would run this I would have to spend some time prepping answers for all these questions.

A Cold Price to Pay
A survival scenario in the snowy wilderness, so of course the threat is Wendigos. The scenario is competently made, has clear formatting and seems easy to run. I don't have any major complaints, so good job.

Phantom At The Opera
This is a very good scenario with a lot going on. We have a Dog of War who is up against an unwilling cult of Nyarlathotep, who are working on a creepy construction site. And despite all this stuff the scenario seems very runnable without major modifications. The structure and the formatting is top notch, I’m only a little annoyed at the vast amounts of whitespace between some sections. I like my shotgun scenarios more compact. But this is only a minor gripe for a great scenario.

I Wanna Go Home Dad
The scenario starts with the players taking the roles of police officers in a car chase, which is awesome. The subsequent Delta Green investigation into the magical tattoos seems straight-forward and ends with the Agents confronting a Feaster from the Stars. What’s more interesting to me is the Resolution section, i.e. what do the Agents do with this juvenile Spawn of Yog-Sothoth? Good stuff!

OPERATION BODY BAG
Interesting setup for a scenario, the Agents have to evade Majestic assassins by faking their own death or doing something similar to disappear. But I don’t understand why Majestic bothers trying to kill the Agents if they have already wiped their memories. There is not a  whole lot of detail on how the Agents could plausibly shake off Majestic. Instead, a lot of the scenario is a description of the Doom mechanic and the different levels. This mechanic is quite interesting. But again, I don’t know why Majestic would make it so complicated. So, while the scenario is well put together it stretches my suspension of disbelief a little too much, but that is just my personal taste.

Tsnuggles
The author calls this a micro-scenario, and with only one page of content this is a pretty fitting description. I like the idea of a one page scenario and this one is quite funny. However, it is also very specific and thus has a very limited use case.

Operation GOATWEED
A Shub cult is in the process of taking over a town, the Agents have to stop them. It is not explained where this cult is suddenly coming from, unless I missed it. Is it related to the mystical bell? I think the investigation would be more interesting if it would lead to the origins of this cult. This has also the advantage that it would reveal the bell in a more natural way, rather than having to rely on hearing the right rumors.

Lost Light
A standard investigation into a killer using hypergeometry. But the ritual that the killer uses is neat and I like that the Agents can “save” the antagonist. I enjoyed reading this scenario and would definitely run this.

Operation PRE-RELEASE
Funny coincidence, I also started writing a scenario that takes place at an abortion clinic for this year’s contest, but then shelved it. In this scenario the Agents are at the clinic because of an Unnatural pregnancy. The reasons for this pregnancy do not really matter, because the climax of the scenario is an attack on the clinic by a far-right lunatic. The investigation afterwards doesn’t reveal anything that falls into DG’s purview (except a tenuous connection to the Sowers). I guess the author wanted to portray the mundane horror of far-right terrorism, which is a valid choice. The writing and structure is also very good.
I’m not sure if I would run this as written, because I don’t like it when scenarios rely on these big coincidences where the Agents are at the right place at the right time. But if I were to run it, I would change the pregnant person and have it be a Bond of one of the Agents, to make it more personal. The pregnancy could somehow be the result of a previous mission.

Falcon Lake Incident
The players take on the roles of random people in the middle of a Grey/Mi-go incursion. A lot of stuff happens around these characters, especially when Majestic and the military arrive. But to me it’s not clear what the characters are actually supposed to do or what their goal is.

Minimum Viable Population
Most of this scenario takes place in a single house, which is described in great detail. We even get a cool map and some nice pictures! The formatting is really good, especially the fancy stat blocks. However, the gameplay is mostly exploring the house and then a combat encounter with the Yig avatar. So I feel there is not enough to do for the Agents. The Serpent Patriarch wielding multiple firearms, which are carried to him by snakes, is a fun idea, but a bit too pulpy for the games I like to run.

32 Candles
The setup is funny, an immortal street magician kills people at a specified time and date for his own amusement. Not necessarily something that I would put in my Delta Green game, but an amusing idea. The investigation into the dead Friendly is quite short and will quickly lead to the killer. Except for his immortality the magician doesn’t seem to have any special abilities, he will probably not pose a significant threat to cautious Agents. The formatting is very good, I suspect that this scenario is by the same author as the previous scenario.

FEAR & SCROTING IN WYOMING
This scenario puts the explanation of what’s happening in the conclusion section, for some reason. Please put it right in the beginning. I don’t want to have to read the whole scenario confused and wondering what is going on. And even the summary references things that are only explained later on (the Means, the Ways, Black Carnation, scroteyotees). So yeah, this scenario could use some restructuring.

Bigger on the Inside
The Agents check out a Green Box and find themselves trapped in the Night World. This scenario has a similar problem to Night Floors: the encounters are cool, but there is nothing that the Agents can do to move the story forward, until the Handler decides it is time. However, it is fun that the manifestations in this scenario are not only related to the King in Yellow, but also to the items that were stored in the Green Box.

IS0-L8
I had a hard time trying to understand what’s going on in this scenario. It starts with a description of different scene types and how they should be played, but gives no further context. Then some mechanics for handling the IS0-L8 system are provided, but it’s not explained what IS0-L8 even is. I get that the Agents are supposed to be thrown into a disorienting situation, but please don’t do the same to a potential Handler reading the scenario. Instead, make it easy for them and put a summary in the beginning that explains in clear terms what’s going on. There are some cool ideas in this scenario and it would be a shame if no one is going to run it, because they are too frustrated to keep on reading.

The Face on Witch Mountain
What a waste of time.

Houston, We’ve Had a Problem
Delta Green in space, nice! You have to suspend your disbelief a bit for this scenario, because the idea of DG establishing a Green Box on the moon is a bit far-fetched, I think. But it sounds fun, so if you want to have something like this in your game, then this scenario might be for you.

Reach for the Powder
The Agents have to track down a pair of criminal Deep Ones. The investigation in this scenario is mostly mundane, but very solid. I like the hook with gold coins. I find Deep Ones boring, so while the scenario is well written, it's not that interesting for me personally.

Apoptosis
Very cool concept and well executed. The attacks by random animals are a good hook, but it immediately got me thinking: if all biological life in the vicinity turns against someone who has learned the truth, then what about the person’s gut flora and other microbiological life that exists in the human body? What would happen if that stopped working or actively attacked its host? I think that could be a good addition to this scenario, via another victim that has been exposed to the truth and was able to isolate themselves. This is just an idea I had while reading the scenario, it is already very usable without adding anything on to it. Great job.

Wayward Tunnels
I think this scenario is connected to the conspiracy theories around the Denver Airport, which is a fun idea. But I think the hook is a bit weak and the deaths in the house could use a bit more mystery.

Morning-Star Over Arizona
The Agents have to take an artifact away from some archaeologists, when they bring the artifact to the surface weird stuff happens and aliens appear. A pretty standard Delta Green scenario, but I don't mean that in a bad way. The Outsiders seem to be pretty powerful, a 50% lethality attack may be a bit overkill. Given the setting, I would have liked to see some clues for Agents with a history or archaeology background.

Office Space
A bunch of office workers use an unnatural gate to shorten their commute. A silly, but funny concept. I like the setting of the drab office and the NPCs are all quite good. A bit too wacky for my taste.

Blood and Treasure
This starts like a scenario, but then turns into something resembling a short story. The writing is good, but lots of dense, descriptive prose  make it hard to extract the actual gameplay.

Keep it Brief
The second scenario this year where the Agents are caught up in a random shooting that has nothing to do with their mission. This time an Unnatural artifact is in the mix, but the scenario is still pretty mundane. The structure and formatting is generally pretty good and we even get some nice pictures and maps. I'm (again) a little annoyed by the large amount of white space due to overuse of page breaks. I don’t want to have to scroll 16 pages for a 1500 word scenario.

NOTHING TO DECLARE
I don’t have much to complain about in this scenario. It features an interesting creature to inject some liminal horror into your Delta Green game. I really liked the little mannerism descriptions for the NPCs.

Lifestyle Choices
Another scenario where I miss a summary at the beginning. The luxury resort setting is cool and I like the creepy imagery. But it seems like there is not much the Agents can do to affect anything, except whether they wake up in a puddle or if they are returned to the resort after meeting the stepmother. The scenario doesn’t list any options for how the incursion could be stopped. There are also no stat blocks, so I have to assume that there is nothing the Agents could do. I know that Delta Green is a horror game, where bad things happen, but it’s still a game where we want to do stuff.

The Klickitat County Fire
The players take the roles of firefighter and  are confronted by a ghoul amid a wildfire that was started by a DG agent. Seems like a fun one-shot or a nice way to bring some firefighter characters into Delta Green. I appreciate the pregenerated characters.

Men at Work
Not a lot of action in this scenario. Even the suggested complications are all kinda tame. I like the descriptions of the construction workers, though.

Recess
This scenario is probably from the same author as the previous one, it has a similar structure and formatting. I like this one better. It’s still a pretty mundane cover-up mission, but this time the Agents have to deal with elementary school children and the creepy visions they had. I think it would be cool if one of the visions showed the Agents. Maybe a premonition of something terrible happening to them or maybe it made the child afraid of speaking to the Agents.

Conditions of my Parole
It’s a mundane scenario. A serial killer police chief is active at the location of a former Delta Green operation, but nothing unnatural is going on. Not something that I would run, but it might be for someone who likes mundane operations and has run Puppet Shows and Shadow Plays for his players before.

Kaleidoscope
The hook for this scenario is very cool and the Kaleidoscope is an interesting enemy. But the mechanics of its attacks seem really complicated. The stat block stretches over three pages and then there is an additional random table on which you have to roll. I would probably simplify these mechanics before I run this.

Hellhole
Speaking of complicated stat blocks, this scenario is about a Lloigor! Thankfully, the author restricted the Lloigor to manifest its powers mainly in its lair. On the other hand, the author also added some scenario-specific abilities, so it might still be complicated to run this enemy. Aside from that, the scenario is pretty good.

Terminal Lucidity
My second submission to the contest.

Impossible Lamb Shanks
A joke scenario, but one that actually made me laugh. It should win the prize for best title.

Veritas Americae
Non-DG investigators look into a cult that worships Greys. I don’t have any complaints about this scenario, but it also didn’t really grab my attention. It’s solid and could be used as a scenario that explains how the PCs got recruited.

In Shadows
The Agents search for an artifact that was sold at a thrift store. The investigation seems pretty easy, so they should have no trouble finding the creepy house where it currently is. This is a solid scenario. The creature is very similar to the one that I created for Terminal Lucidity, they are both vitality-draining shadows.

Keep on Truckin’
A good M-EPIC scenario, using the 2022 “Freedom Convoy” as a backdrop. However, it seems that the convoy isn’t that central to the scenario. More could have been done with it. Or, alternatively, those references could be removed and the scenario could be played at any other time.

Operation CHOLLIMA BLACK
Delta Green goes to North Korea. I don’t really get it. The scenario states that the North Korean Leader hasn’t been seen since 1993. Is this scenario establishing some alternative history, where Kim Il-Sung is still believed to be alive? Then why give the real world history dates in the beginning? If the scenario assumes some kind of alternative history, then that should be stated clearly at the beginning.

The Ties that Bind Us
It’s another scenario where Delta Green has to investigate one of their own. But I really like it. The artifact and its effect on the family is intriguing and creepy. The scenario gives multiple avenues of investigations and suggestions on what happens next, which is always appreciated. At some points I would have liked more info, e.g. what kind of information can the other Agents of Byron’s cell provide. But I guess this was not possible due to the word limit. Good scenario!

Here Am I
What I found most interesting in this scenario is the idea of the cognitive dissonance that is caused by the transferal of knowledge from the burnt books to the book burners. This is a really cool idea. I would have liked some more examples on how this manifests in different members of the church.

Taken by Force
In this scenario they players investigate a rape/murder as US Army investigators in WW2 France. I like scenarios that take place in more unusual locations or time periods, so the setting for this one is nice. But I think the scenario doesn’t use this setting to its fullest, because it could be easily transferred to another time/location with minimal changes. It’s still a good investigative scenario.

Add Loathing
This scenario uses footnotes, which are not correctly counted by the Google Doc word count tool, so this scenario is over the 1500 word limit. But only barely. The starting situation is cool, the Agents wake up without memory and soon realize that the Haunter of the Dark is hunting them. The scenario is good, but the formatting is a bit inconsistent and I’m also not a huge fan of the overly casual writing style.

Jukebox
I like the idea of someone posting horror videos to the internet, which turn out to have been taken in a Green Box. But overall, this scenario is a bit too pulpy for my taste (e.g. with the feral hogs). For a scenario about a spooky Green Box there are not enough artifacts or encounters provided. We only get some descriptions of the videos, which are put into the appendix to circumvent the word count limit. I guess the video descriptions are optional and not required to run the scenario. But still, the appendix is meant for stat blocks, rituals, etc., so things with mechanics attached, not descriptive text.

Operation CALCIUM JIG
This is an interesting scenario hook, but not a full scenario. Even for a micro-scenario I would prefer a little bit more than just the starting situation.

LUCIDITY
Like one of my scenarios, this one features weird dreams and has lucidity in the title. But I think these are the only similarities. I like the pretty pictures, but I don’t like the white font on black background. That’s just a minor complaint, in general the formatting is quite good in this scenario. The scenario is a bit overloaded with Unnatural factions. We have Ulwkho, we have Isirix, and we have Tleche-Naka. On top of that we have an Elder Sign, a Deep One hybrid from the Exalted Circle, and mentions of the Elder Things, Ryleh and Mu. A bit much for me, less would have been more.