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Protagonists
John Henry Booth
A former New Arkham Ranger on a quest for revenge.
- Bad Powers, Good People: John develops quite a few abilities, including the power to become a monster, over the course of his journey.
- Berserk Button: John has this reaction to slavers and considers that anyone keeping a slave or dealing with them worthy for killing. This also applies to those who hurt children as someone who does so is almost certain to get slaughtered by any human remaining. Cruelly subverted with Alan Ward who murders a whole bunch of them out of a twisted sense of mercy.
- Body Horror: John is slowly becoming a monster and all his attempts to arrest the process fail miserably. In the end, he embraces his nonhuman status and becomes a mixture of himself and a long-dead alien.
- Deal with the Devil: John made one of these but he's not sure what he actually promised Nyarlathotep or what the latter could possibly want. It's actually the ancient Katro'vaal, R’thugh’cruan, who made the deal and John is his reincarnation.
- The Exile: He is sentenced to the Wastelands after his squad dies under mysterious circumstances.
- Famous Ancestor: A bit of a Dramatic Irony one, Booth is revealed in The Tree of Azathoth to be a relative of John Wilkes Booth (despite being Black). However, he's a relative of him through his brother, Edwin Booth, who famously rescued Lincoln's son from death so he is not a Villainous Legacy.
- The Gunslinger: John Henry Booth is both the Trick Shot and the Vaporizer. He's implied to also be the Quick Draw but that is somewhat useless when dealing with monsters and eldritch horrors. It helps that his pistols tend to be magical, though, and he once shot to pieces a shoggoth.
- Half-Human Hybrid: John is actually the child of a Kastro'vaal or Eyes of Yog-Sothoth.
- Humanoid Abomination: He is revealed to be one of these in The Tower of Zhaal.
- Pals with Jesus: A peculiar example given Lovecraft's Cosmic Horror Story universe but actually something with precedent in HPL's works. John has a weird relationship with Nyarlathotep, the Crawling Chaos and Other God. Nyarlathotep seems to find him slightly more interesting than other mortals and has placed his "mark" on him.
- Reincarnation: John is the reborn R’thugh’cruan from the Retgone Kastro'vaal race.
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: “Under an alien sky where gods of eldritch matter rule, the only truth is revenge.” - is the tagline. The first book is all about John seeking revenge against Alan Ward for killing his squad.
- Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: John despite being a cold hardened soldier from a Wasteland military dictatorship is prone to long and ridiculous uses of speech.
- Sole Survivor: He is the sole survivor of Gamma Squadron when Alan Ward slaughters them.
- The Stoic: John attempts to keep his emotions in check in the face of the existentialist nightmare of the Post-Rising world. Notably, the narration reveals this is just an act and he's frequently terrified.
- Talks Like a Simile: Due to the indescribable nature of much of what John is surrounded by, he often makes comparisons and metaphors to comprehend it all.
- True Companions: Gamma Squadron, though with elements of Vitriolic Best Buds.
Mercury Takahashi
A former torturer for New Arkham who flees with John.
- The Atoner: Mercury wishes to become this but doesn't quite realize how difficult it's going to be in the Wasteland.
- Black Magician Girl: Learns sorcery from the books recovered from the Black Cathedral.
- Fantastic Racism: Comes with the setting but is a Downplayed Trope as she gets to know more monstrous beings.
- Good Girls Avoid Abortion: Mercury averts this. Though has questions as she did it out of fear her child with John would be a monster.
- Hero with Bad Publicity: Everyone from New Arkham considers her a monster for what she did under duress.
- Hooker With A Heartof Gold: Mercury becomes one after the second book, managing a brothel as a madame while also being the town dentist.
- Maligned Mixed Marriage: Mercury and John develop this for both a combination of racism and hatred of monsters.
- Naïve Newcomer: Despite being a interrogator for New Arkham, her knowledge of the Wasteland is almost nonexistent. At least at first.
- Took a Level in Badass: Mercury has gone from a helpless Naïve Everygirl Torture Technician (It Makes Sense in Context) to a badass Black Magician Girl.
- Torture Technician: This was her job at New Arkham despite being a trained doctor. Mercury was forced into being one of these when she was barely above a teenager.
Jessica O'Reilly
An Arkham Ranger and member of John's squad that he considers his closest friend.
- Action Girl: She's an Arkham Ranger and John's near-equal in ass-kicking ability.
- The Atoner: Jessica feels this way after her failed attempt to save John from becoming a monster.
- Crusading Widow: Jessica lost her husband and two sons to the Color when it attacked. John doesn't know how she manages to keep on afterward.
- The Lad-ette: Is a drinking, smoking, cursing Action Girl that intimidates most others in her squad.
- Mercy Kill: Attempts to do this to John when he's transforming into a monster. John doesn't appreciate it, or the method she chooses to strike.
- The Not-Love Interest: John is a lot more emotionally intimate with Jessica than he is with his wife or even Mercury after their Relationship Upgrade. It is destroyed by her attempt to kill him.
- Romancing the Widow: Most of Gamma Squad seems interested in this possibility but she shows no interest. At least until The Tower of Zhaal.
- Sex Signals Death: Jessica tried to invoke this on John, knowing his crush on her.
Antagonists
Alan Ward
A powerful New Arkham wizard banished to the Wastelands.
- Adaptational Heroism: Joseph Curwen was pure evil and never showed any redeeming qualities in The Case of Charles Dexter Ward while Alan Ward is a Well-Intentioned Extremist.
- Antihero: According to
Word of God, Alan Ward's actions all follow a pattern to help humanity survive. They're just horrific to conventional morality. They might not be wrong, though. - Big Bad: The primary antagonist of Cthulhu Armageddon and architect of a lot of the problems in the setting.
- Black Magic: His power comes from human sacrifice, worship of the Old Ones, and human experimentation.
- Body Horror: Alan Ward has been slowly morphing into something else that covered his chest with mouths as well as alien tongues.
- Canon Character All Along: As his name, Ward, indicates, he's actually Joseph Curwen in disguise. Again.
- Evil Overlord: Alan Ward rules a small kingdom from the Black Cathedral and raids nearby settlements.
- Evil Sorcerer: Alan Ward is one of the most powerful sorcerers alive, at least among humans.
- The Exile: Alan Ward was exiled from New Arkham for his various atrocities and unnatural practices.
- Luke, I Am Your Father: Alan Ward is the man who arranged for the ritual that conceived John.
- Mad Scientist: It comes with being a Lovecraft character, he's as much scientist as sorcerer.
- Offscreen Moment of Awesome: Alan Ward has the skeleton of the Deep One God, Dagon, in his home base.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Alan Ward's atrocities and experiments are all motivated by his twisted desire to preserve the human race at all costs.
- Would Hurt a Child: Alan kills all of the children he kidnapped so he can send their spirits to live in the Dreamlands.
Other Gods
Nyarlathotep
The Crawling Chaos. The Black Soldier. The God with 1000 Faces. He is the messenger of the Outer Gods.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Nyarlathotep very much enjoys giving people what they want, knowing it's what they least are capable of dealing with.
- Blasphemous Boast: Nyarlathotep actually claims that all gods worshiped everywhere are just worshiping one of his avatars and when someone is worshiping something nonexistent, he's likely to create a new one.
- Character Filibuster: Nyarlathotep will often go into these, talking about the true nature of the universe and how it is all about elevating those mortals capable of transcending it into Greater Old Ones. Mostly because he decided to do it that way.
- Deal with the Devil: He loves making these with a Be Careful What You Wish For caveat. His deal with R’thugh’cruan to save his species is one example as he proceeds to have the man reincarnated as a human.
- Eldritch Abomination: One of the "true" gods, he is a terrifying inscrutable monster that is close enough to humanity to understand it.
- A Form You Are Comfortable With: Nyarlathotep chooses to appear as the various races he consults but Subverted that he often appears as aliens just to mess with the species he deals with.
- Humanoid Abomination: He is capable of assuming humanoid forms as he desires with the Black Soldier being one with John.
- It Amused Me: Nyarlathotep says this is his primary motivation and John compares it to a child pulling the wings off flies.
- Jackass Genie: Nyarlathotep often answers prayers and wishes from his followers in hopes of seeing them destroyed by exactly what they asked for.
- Jerkass Gods: John states that the other gods have an excuse of being alien and inscrutable. Nyarlathotep is just an asshole.
- The Man Behind the Man: Nyarlathotep claims that he is actually responsible for the creation of the Great Old Ones and each of them is actually the result of him ascending a member of their race to godhood. This is a reference to The Silver Key.
- Motive Rant: Suggests that his ultimate purpose is to provide beings across the universe with someone to blame for their problems.
- The Omnipotent: Nyarlathotep is effectively all-powerful and can do anything he desires from rewriting the universe at will to altering time. He is limited only by either his avatar, his own boredom at cheating, and the power of the other Outer Gods (one of whom is mindless).
- Pals with Jesus: Nyarlathotep has taken an unhealthy interest in John and decided to play with him in ways that are sometimes helpful but usually not.
- Physical God: He can appear as such at will but is omnipresent as well.
- Reality Warper: Nyarlathotep is capable of altering or recreating matter at will.
- Red Baron: All of his names are actually ones given to him by mortals, including Nyarlathotep.
- The Trickster: Nyarlathotep actually feels like his pranks should have some meaning to them and be capable of teaching lessons, though what 'wisdom' he imparts is questionable.
- Unreliable Narrator: Nyarlathotep freely admits his avatars are affected by the perceptions of his mortal associates so anything they say is usually what they want to hear.
- Troll: A lot of his existence is defined just by screwing with individuals across space and reality.
Great Old Ones
Cthulhu
The most famous of the Great Old Ones. He has awakened and destroyed the majority of humanity, wandering around the galaxy at will.
- Adaptational Heroism: A very Downplayed Trope version. Cthulhu destroyed the Earth, yes, but wasn't necessarily even aware of humanity when destroying it. He certainly didn't pay any attention to the Religion of Evil Cargo Cult types who worshiped him. He also helps destroy the Unimaginable Horror for a second time.
- Badass Family: Cthulhu is accompanied by multiple other members of his race in The Tower of Zhaal. All of them help kick the Unspeakable Horror's ass.
- Blue-and-Orange Morality: John believes it is completely alien and inscrutable so that ascribing it any morality is completely pointless. It is like a hurricane or earthquake.
- Complete Immortality: Nyarlathotep says that Cthulhu and all other Great Old Ones are impossible to kill, period.
- Cthulhumanoid: The original squamus horror in all of his squid-dragon glory.
- Draconic Abomination: Is repeatedly compared to a dragon as well as a squid.
- The Dreaded: The statues of Cthulhu are treated as greatly ominous and he terrifies even the jaded half-insane survivors of Earth.
- Evil Is Bigger: Cthulhu is over a mile tall in his manifestation on Earth.
- Evil Versus Evil: His conflict with the Unspeakable Horror can be framed as this.
- Extra Eyes: He has six eyes in circles of three, just like the original.
- Godzilla Threshold: Mercury and John end up summoning Cthulhu to deal with the Unspeakable Horror.
- Monster Progenitor: Nyarlathotep says that Cthulhu is the first being he elevated to Great Old One status.
- Physical God: Great Old Ones are a specific class of being elevated to godhood by Nyarlathotep.
- Reality Warper: Is capable of changing reality around himself at will, just by thinking it.
- Religion of Evil: Cthulhu's worshipers are considered insane murderous slavers even by the morally ambiguous survivors of the Wasteland.
- Sealed Evil in a Can: Averted. Cthulhu has already arisen and destroyed the majority of Earth by his very presence.
The Unimaginable Horror
The Great Old One that has yet to be freed from its prison. It is an enormous energy cloud that has been merged with Earth's oceans and later the Tower of Zhaal.
- Archenemy: The Unimaginable Horror has long been an enemy of Cthulhu. While initially imprisoned by Cthulhu in the Earth's oceans, The Unimaginable Horror proceeded to block out Cthulhu's psychic powers as well as keep it imprisoned until the stars were right.
- Complete Immortality: The Unimaginable Horror cannot be killed like all Great Old Ones.
- Elemental Embodiment: The Unimaginable Horror exists as energy in every single drop of water on Earth..
- Evil Versus Evil: The Unimaginable Horror is the longstanding enemy of Cthulhu.
- Godzilla Threshold: The Unimaginable Horror being freed warrants the protagonists summoning Cthulhu.
- Monster Progenitor: The Unimaginable Horror is a gigantic version of The Colour Out of Space. Apparently, they're an entire race of energy vampires that it is the father of.
- Physical God: The Unimaginable Horror is a Great Old One and thus qualifies as one of these.
- Power Nullifier: Its presence in the Earth's oceans is why Cthulhu's dreams haven't had a far greater effect on the world.
- Reality Warper: The Unimaginable Horror transforms large portions of the Great Barrier Desert into ocean in its brief freedom from the Tower of Zhaal.
- Sealed Evil in a Can:
- Cthulhu initially imprisoned the Unimaginable Horror in Earth's oceans.
- The Yith, specifically one of their ranks named Zhaal, imprisoned it in the Tower of Zhaal.
- Tome of Eldritch Lore: The Unimaginable Horror is also the name of a book that contains its history as well as secrets.
