In the world of Bhurloka, the cosmic force of dharma ensures that good deeds earn good karma and wicked deeds earn bad karma, so that everyone ultimately gets what they deserve - if not in this lifetime, then in the next. But now a dark force has risen in the east; Tamapara, the Dark Yogi. Enraged by the cruel, but just, punishment inflicted on his lover Sujata, he intends to destroy dharma itself, breaking the connection between actions and rewards. If he succeeds, he will bring about the Geli Yuga, the last age of the universe which will end with its ultimate destruction.
But all is not lost. Across the land, dharma has empowered worthy mortals, granting them great enlightenment and the power to remember their past incarnations. These Chosen of Dharma must find a way to defeat the Dark Yogi before his assault on the cosmic order brings about the birth of the last of the Eighteen Wicked Kings.
Against the Dark Yogi is a roleplaying game published by Tab Creations, using their in-house Saga Machine rule system. It takes place in a world based on Hindu Mythology where the players take on the roles of epic heroes who can meddle in the affairs of devas, asuras, yogis and rajas.
This game contains examples of the following tropes:
- Always Chaotic Evil: The Rakshasas are cannibalistic ogres who love to desecrate what is holy and just generally make a nuisance of themselves. They stand out as being just jerks through and through in a setting where even the shadier races have their own form of honour.
- Black Magic: The path of adharma, which lets you use bad karma like good karma (thereby not just escaping but inverting cosmic justice) and indulging in many tropes of stereotypical villainy.
- Carnivore Confusion: Implied to be handled by the setting's Deliberate Values Dissonance. It is within the dharma of a (sentient, talking) tiger to try to eat a human. It is also within the dharma of the human to try to avoid getting eaten. Neither one is a bad person for acting their part. The fact that reincarnation is known to be real makes it easier to be philosophical about such things.
- Charles Atlas Superpower: While some paths are explicitly magical, others are mundane but have a few decidedly weird powers associated with them. For instance, the path of the archer includes, along with a number of Boring, but Practical techniques for fighting with a bow, the ability to make it start raining by shooting an arrow into the clouds. No explanation is given; it seems that archers in Bhurloka are sometimes just that awesome.
- Deliberate Values Dissonance: Bhurloka has objective rules of right and wrong that are sometimes in line with modern Western ethics ("do not steal") and sometimes not ("do not disobey your elders").
- Enlightened Antagonist: Tamapara, the Dark Yogi. He understands the spiritual order of the universe better than anyone, which is why he's so dangerous.
- Eternal Recurrence: How the Dark Yogi ultimately justifies his actions - the Geli Yuga, while it will end in the destruction of the universe, ultimately will not be the end of everything; it will simply result in Omdra taking a break before recreating it as the Satya Yuga again. Of course, the problem is that quickening the cycle will still cause untoward suffering and preventing improvement while it still can be done, so no one outside of his followers accepts it.
- Even the Guys Want Him: Performers can learn a trait that lets them attempt to seduce anyone, regardless of sexual preference. Or species, for that matter.
- Fantastic Caste System: Bhurlokan society is divided into the Brahmin (priests), the Kshattriya (warriors), the Vaishya (merchants and farmers), the Shudra (servants and slaves) and the Dalit (foreigners and other disagreeable types).
- Fantastic Racism: Nagas and garudas hate-hate-hate each other, to the point where even the sight of a regular bird or snake (respectively) distracts them from whatever they're doing.
- Greater-Scope Villain: Geli, the Demon Raja whose birth Tamapara is trying to bring about. Once born, he is destined to conquer the world and rule it for a thousand years after which it will finally end until the next spin of the Eternal Recurrence, so if he ever shows up the game is effectively over.
- Heroes Prefer Swords: Averted; Bhurloka reveres the bow above other weapons. Swords are what common ruffians use.
- The High King: A maharaja is a powerful ruler who rules over several cities, each of which has its own raja.
- Home of the Gods: The devas rule the world from Mount Niru in the Wolaya Mountains.
- Improbable Weapon User: If you possess an astra, you can make it infuse any material weapon for the purposes of a single attack, making it absolutely devestating. This is explicitly the case even if the "material weapon" is something ridiculous, like a single blade of grass.
- Karma Houdini: The path of adharma lets you literally escape the karmic rewards of your actions. The Dark Yogi and his followers make good use of it.
- Karma Meter: A literal one. Players can assemble good and bad karma through their actions, and burn it off by having strokes of good and bad luck, respectively.
- Life Energy: Prana, the energy that runs through living things. It's divided between different chakras, each of which lets you perform one sort of action. Distributing your inflow of prana between your chakras is an important part of the game's tactical combat system.
- Master of Illusion: Rakshasas and other unsavory creatures tend to be good at creating false images.
- Mischief-Making Monkey: Vanaras are a curious and mischievous race of monkeys with magical powers.
- Misery Builds Character: Ascetics turn this into a source of power. Suffering burns off bad karma, so if you make sure to suffer enough you eventually reach a state of spiritual purity that unlocks magical abilities.
- Noble Demon: The asuras are divine beings who inhabit the underworld and are the enemies of the devas (the "good" gods). They aren't so much evil per se as sneaky and ambitious, though.
- Non-Lethal K.O.: A Chosen of Dharma can be injured, knocked out, imprisoned or even end up in Naraka and need his mates to spring him, but he can't be killed, no matter how implausible or indeed how physically impossible his survival is. Only weapons and creatures with the Fatal property can cause a player character to die, and no weapon or creature has that property by default; it only comes into play when the Game Master decides that a situation is sufficiently climactic that it makes sense for a hero to die in it.
- "Not So Different" Remark: The path of adharma includes a trait that lets a villain confuse and distract a hero by pointing out their similarities.
- Old Master: If your character didn't die in the climactic battle of your age and you want to continue playing them, you can have them go off into the wilderness and meditate for a few decades, rejoining your reborn companions as this when the game resumes. This has the same mechanical effects as rebirth, including raising your Enlightenment, though you also have to take a trait representing your relative physical frailty.
- Omnicidal Maniac: Tamapara's plan is to bring about the Geli Yuga and ultimately the end of the current universe, since the woman he loves is doomed to suffer until the universe comes to an end and rebirth.
- One-Man Army: Every player character. And just about everyone who's anyone in Bhurloka, for that matter.
- Our Vampires Are Different: Vetalas are unquiet spirits who can possess corpses and pass for the living. The touch of a Vetala still counts as "touching a dead body," which is a sin that inflicts bad karma on you. They can be destroyed by finding out their true identity and holding a funeral rite for them.
- Past-Life Memories: Chosen of Dharma can remember their past lives and even use some of the skills they knew in them.
- Physical Gods: The devas are quite corporeal and live in the same physical world as humans, albeit in a hard-to-reach location.
- Precursor Heroes: In a longer campaign, you will play multiple reincarnations of the same people, coming together in one generation after another to fight the good fight. Meaning, you'll be the Precursor Heroes to yourselves.
- Purgatory and Limbo: Naraka is a place in the underworld where all but the most virtuous people go after they die. There, they suffer torments until they've burned off their bad karma and are ready to be reincarnated. Inverted with Svarga, which is a heavenly realm on Mount Niru where the truly good burn off their good karma through blissful living until they are ready to be reincarnated.
- Reincarnation: A fact of life in Bhurloka. In fact, the main way to raise your Enlightenment stat is to die and come back in another life.
- Sizeshifter: Part of the possible abilities of an ascetic. There is one siddhi each for growing, shrinking, becoming heavier (which makes your punches land harder), and becoming lighter (which lets you fall from great height without harm).
- Talking Animal: All animals can talk (though they haven't necessarily learned any human language) and have their own kingdoms and rajas.
- Talking Is a Free Action: The path of adharma includes one power that lets you hold an entire speech in a single combat round, handy for a baddie who wants to get a villainous monologue off before the heroes start shooting arrows at him.
- Tragic Villain: Tamapara and Sujata were initially guilty of nothing worse than falling in love and running away together, but her forsaking of her marriage vows and royal duties still condemned her to eternal suffering. While Tamapara's response of trying to kill everyone in the entire world puts him far beyond the pale, it's hard not to feel a little sorry for the old bastard.
- Unequal Rites: There are two main approaches to magic. The first is the path of the yogi, which is the one most resembling regular wizardry, learning spells (siddhi) from books (sutras). The other is the path of the ascetic, which is the attainment of mystical power through physical hardship and self-control. It is perfectly possible for player characters to learn both kinds, though it's beyond the abilities of most people.
- Weird Currency: The base unit of Bhurlokan trade is the chicken. Ten chickens are worth one gold coin, and ten gold coins are worth one cow. For practical reasons, a lot of people just use the barter system instead.
